Pretending All is Well - by: Ayisha Osori

"It is disheartening to hear from the lips of so many who work closely with government or around government, that ‘there is no hope. What is the scorecard for the soul of the country?"

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it”- Aristotle

It makes perfect sense that the President and his team would score themselves high in their review of the last 2 years. It is symptomatic of the type of people we have become in Nigeria. We are people who all complain about corruption, squalor, poor maintenance culture, general lack of integrity, disunity etc. yet none of us admit to being guilty of or contributing to these things. It is always ‘they’ or ‘some people’ but never us. We have learned to excuse the inexcusable and explain away the unexplainable; there has never been a thought or idea too low for us to attach ourselves to especially if money, ethnicity, religion and loyalty can be somehow be woven into it.

Try as one might, it is impossible as of the time this article was being written to find an electronic copy of the President’s mid term score card. It would have been ideal to read it as part of the material reviewed but it is also instructive that this article can be written without it. Considering that there was time enough to have the scorecard prepared, printed and bound, then there was time to have it uploaded unto several websites. Alternatively, the considerable talent managing the media and image of the Presidency could have circulated the scorecard amongst online and print media. Such a document, a campaign tool of sorts, should be freely accessible on the Internet for all Nigerians. Yet, neither the Presidency’s website nor any of the relevant ministries e.g., Information, have an electronic copy available for millions of Nigerians at home and abroad who don’t have access to the print report.

The scorecard was reportedly about things that can be measured: rates, funds, meters and megawatts but in a country where hiding information is the norm and obfuscation has become an art form, what is one supposed to believe if what you hear differs so much from your existence? It is all well to focus on some tangibles (and ignore others), but what about the soft things that cannot be easily measured? Are they any less important in rating the overall performance of a government? What is the scorecard for the soul of the country?

We cannot pretend all is well. There might be things, which for balance sake we admit seem shaped like progress such as inflation rates dropping to single digits but that is cold comfort when Ramadhan and the prospect of increased food prices looms. It is hard to keep hearing that our foreign direct investment is increasing and yes, maybe these are things which, by their nature, we can only appreciate in the future, but if people are still looking for jobs three, four years after graduating from school is it wrong to ask ‘what about now?’ What is it that we can see, feel and touch that is better today?

Materially, many seem to be worse of than they were two years ago. While the price of land, accommodation, goods and services steadily increases, salaries and benefits stay the same and access to funds, even in the non-profit sector is shrinking. Professional and amateur begging has increased and so has crime with a lot more stories of car jackings and home robberies. Kidnapping has taken the place of research and development and the yields are reportedly even more fantastic.

Spiritually, as the noise directed upward increases with the proliferation of churches and mosques on every street, Nigerians are getting meaner and meaner to each other. Acting godless in the name of religion and being spiteful and un-neighbourly every chance we get, the louder we chant and pray it seems the further we are away from the Almighty’s mercy. Men of God who have become rock stars and men in office who abuse power with supreme impunity, with the weak and oppressed finding absolutely no succor - not in the houses that men have allegedly built for God nor in the temples of governance maintained by our taxes and collective wealth.

Mentally, our best are exhausted and being bled of all hope. It is disheartening to hear from the lips of so many who work closely with government or around government, that ‘there is no hope’. Those who took roles in the public and development sectors in order to contribute to building a nation we can all be proud of, are quietly resigning, finding jobs in the private sector or abroad and leaving. This is how we have so many excelling all over the world where merit and integrity are valued and how the country continues to sink beneath the suffocating weight of mediocrity and unbridled greed. The young see clearly that the game is rigged and many are pushed to take the decision to join in.

Collectively, our union has never, not since the end of the Civil War, seemed so fragile and frayed. Calls for secession are as common as pure water sachets on a parade ground and nothing, not even transportation policy can be discussed without religion and ethnicity somehow finding a platform to participate.

What has this got to do with government? Everything. Fear, anger and scarcity is the best way to keep people divided and distracted while those who plunder can work in peace. Those who crave access to office at all costs routinely play on the insecurities of Nigerians slowly but surely creating a wedge that many think is now too wide to bridge. A government that is genuinely interested in long term sustainable development would act and sound a lot different from the governments we have today.

It is great to be positive and to see good in every situation but it is also necessary – like a person fighting an addiction – to admit to a problem in order to solve it. All is not well and a mechanical scorecard with no words to salve the many wounds on our collective soul is simply not good enough. No one needs a marking scheme to know that.
Leadership

John Boehner Was Allowed To Remain House Speaker Because God Spoke To Republicans, They Claim

The U.S. government was spared from going over the fiscal cliff earlier this year because God spoke to a group of Republicans and told them not to turn against House Speaker John Boehner -- at least, that's what they've told the Washington Post.

In a detailed piece about in-fighting among House Republicans, this gem stood out:

Barely 36 hours after the caustic New Year’s Day vote, Boehner faced a coup attempt from a clutch of renegade conservatives. The cabal quickly fell apart when several Republicans, after a night of prayer, said God told them to spare the speaker. Still, Boehner came within a few votes of failing to secure his speakership on the initial vote, an outcome that would have forced a second ballot for the first time in nearly a century.

The speaker apparently knew at the time that he would need divine intervention. Shortly after House Republicans rejected his "Plan B" fiscal cliff bill in December, Boehner expressed his dismay about ever reaching a deal with Obama that would satisfy his party's demands for spending cuts.

"How we get there, God only knows," he said.

HuffingtonPost

Soup Kitchen Meals Too Fattening, Not Nutritious, Says New Study

Homelessness, Soup Kitchen Meals Too Fattening, Soup Kitchens, St. Anthony's, UCSF Soup Kitchen Study, Food Deserts, San Francisco Homelessness, University Of California San Francisco, San Francisco News

Soup kitchens are often an essential resource for deeply impoverished individuals across the United States. But a new analysis shows that the free meals provided in many of these establishments are high in fat and low in other essential vitamins--an especially problematic situation for those who receive little other sustenance.

The analysis, released last month by researchers at the University of California San Francisco's Center for Vulnerable Populations at San Francisco General Hospital, examined the nutritional content meals handed out at sites across San Francisco and found that, by and large, the meals had an unhealthy amount of fat while providing low levels of fiber, calcium and vitamins A and E.

"We really want to be interested in providing not just any calories but the right kind of calories," said Dr. Courtney Lyles, a research specialist at USCF and lead author of the study. "The breakdown is really between donated food versus fresh fruit and vegetables. The meals tended to do well in areas like protein, but lacked in micro-nutrients, which primarily come from fresh fruits and vegetables."

The study looked at 22 meals--varied between breakfast, lunch and dinner--handed out at six different sites across San Francisco on non-consecutive days.

While there isn't a great deal of literature on the subject, Lyles noted that it wouldn't be surprising to find similar results in other cities because incorporating a significant proportion of fresh fruits and vegetables is a common challenge facing many soup kitchens around the country.

The health content of the meals provided by soup kitchens can often be an afterthought to simply making sure that everyone has enough to eat. However, since the population served by soup kitchens tends to lack access to health care, chronic diet-related diseases like diabetes and hypertension can often go untreated in a medical setting--leaving more of the burden of managing these conditions directly on food intake.

"This is something we struggle with all the time," said Karl Robillard, a spokesman at St. Anthony's, one of the largest homeless services organizations in San Francisco. "The need for fresh fruits and vegetables is paramount."

Robillard noted that one of the ways his organization works to get healthier meals is to coordinate directly with farmers for donations. "If a peach falls on the ground, it can no longer be sold to grocery stores, but that doesn't mean it's not edible," he explained, noting that his organization's cost averages out to about fifty cents per meal. "Those are the sorts of things we regularly get donated from both large- and small-scale farms in California."

Robillard recounted how, when pro golf's U.S. Open came to San Francisco a few years ago, the food vendor donated all of the event's leftovers to St. Anthony's, which allowed the organization to give out a whole host of healthy, tasty food items.

A report by the U.S. Conference of Mayors notes that, as a result of the recession, there's been a 24 percent increase nationally in the demand for emergency food services.

Many urban areas where homeless people tend to congregate, such as San Francisco's Tenderloin District, have been labeled "food deserts," because there are few places where residents can purchase fresh, healthy food.

In response, the city has pushed to allow a neighborhood farmers market to operate multiple days per week and, thanks to recent government efforts, many farmers markets have begun accepting food stamps.

HuffingtonPost

SKIN BLEACHING: Nigerian Women Have The World’s Highest Percentage – WHO

The World Health Organisation, WHO, has said 77 percent of women in Nigeria use skin-lightening products, the world’s highest percentage. The figure compares with 59 percent in Togo, and 27 percent in Senegal.


The WHO report said the reasons for this are varied but most people said they use skin-lighteners because they want “white skin”.

WHO also said skin bleaching comes with hazardous health consequences. The dangers associated with the use of toxic compounds for skin bleaching include, blood cancers such as leukemia and cancers of the liver and kidneys, as well as severe skin conditions. It said hardcore bleachers use illegal ointments containing toxins like mercury, a metal that blocks production of melanin, which gives the skin its colour, but can also be toxic.

The report said in many parts of Africa, lighter-skinned women are considered more beautiful and believed to be more successful and likely to find marriage. It also said it is not only women who are obsessed with bleaching their skins. Some men too are involved in the practice.

Mookie Blaylock Charged With Vehicular Homicide After Head-On Car Crash

Mookie Blaylock #10 of the Atlanta Hawks dribbles against the Sacramento Kings on March 31, 1994.

JONESBORO, Ga. -- Former NBA All-Star Daron "Mookie" Blaylock has been charged with vehicular homicide arising from a head-on crash in suburban Atlanta, authorities announced Monday.

Blaylock, 46, is also charged with driving on a suspended license and failure to maintain his lane in the Friday crash, Jonesboro Police Chief Franklin Allen said.

Blaylock was driving an SUV that crossed the center line of Tara Boulevard – about 20 miles south of downtown Atlanta – and struck a van, police said. A van passenger, 43-year-old Monica Murphy, died hours later. Her husband, who was also in the van, was treated and released at a hospital.

Blaylock was also wanted in Spalding County on charges of failure to appear in court, DUI and drug possession, Allen said.

Atlanta Medical Center spokeswoman Nicole Gustin said Blaylock was in fair condition Monday. He initially was on life support at the hospital, but his condition was upgraded.

Allen said police are working to determine the cause of the crash and that alcohol doesn't appear to be a factor. Authorities were working to gather documents on Blaylock's medical history Monday. Blaylock told investigators he blacked out just before the wreck but wasn't able to say much more, Allen said. It's unclear if he has an attorney.

Blaylock was a first-round draft pick by the New Jersey Nets out of Oklahoma in 1989.

He played as a guard for the Atlanta Hawks between 1992 and 1999 and played in the 1994 NBA All-Star game. He had his best season in 1996-97, averaging 17.4 points and 5.9 assists. Blaylock also played for the Golden State Warriors.

The Supreme Court Agreed To Hear A Case Today That Will Probably Nuke Separation Of Church And State

By Ian Millhiser 

Eight years ago, in an opinion warning of the “violent consequences of the assumption of religious authority by government,” retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor offered a challenge to her fellow conservative justices eager to weaken the wall of separation between church and state: “[t]hose who would renegotiate the boundaries between church and state must therefore answer a difficult question: Why would we trade a system that has served us so well for one that has served others so poorly?”

Today, there are five justices on the Supreme Court who would trade a system that has served us so well for one that has served others so poorly. And they just announced that they will hear a case that gives them the opportunity to make this swap a reality.

O’Connor was the Court’s leading supporter of the view that government cannot endorse a particularly religious belief or take action that might convey such a “message of endorsement to the reasonable observer,” and this view put her at odds with the four other members of the Rehnquist Court’s conservative bloc. When she left the Court, she was replaced by staunchly conservative Justice Samuel Alito, and most Court observers expected decades of precedent protecting against government endorsements of religion to fall in very short order.

Instead, the Roberts Court’s majority has thus far been content to chip away at the wall between church and state a piece at a time. In Hein v. Freedom From Religion Foundation, the Court immunized many Executive Branch actions from suits claiming they violate the Constitution’s ban on “law[s] respecting an establishment of religion.” And in Arizona Christian School v. Winn, they empowered government to subsidize religion so long as those subsidies are structured as tax benefits and not as direct spending. But the core question of whether the government can “demonstrate . . . allegiance to a particular sect or creed” likely still must be answered in the negative.

The case the Court agreed to hear today, Town of Greece v. Galloway, is likely to change that. The ostensible issue before the Court is whether a municipal legislature violated the Constitution’s ban on separation of church and state when it began its meetings with overtly Christian prayers roughly two-thirds of the time. Yet the case also explicitly tees up the question of whether a government “endorsement” of religion of the kind rejected by O’Connor is permitted under the Constitution. If you’re placing bets, the odds are overwhelming that five conservative justices will say that such an endorsement is permitted.

With O’Connor gone, the much more conservative Justice Anthony Kennedy becomes the swing vote on questions of church/state separation. Kennedy has held that “government may not coerce anyone to support or participate in religion or its exercise,” but it is not clear that he would forbid much else under the Constitution’s ban on government establishment of religion. By the end of the next Supreme Court term, however, it is very likely that his views will carry the day.

TP

Kansas, Oklahoma Hit By Tornadoes, Storm System Tears Across The Plains And Midwest

By TIM TALLEY 

MOORE, Okla. — A monstrous tornado at least a half-mile wide roared through the Oklahoma City suburbs Monday, flattening entire neighborhoods and destroying an elementary school with a direct blow as children and teachers huddled against winds up to 200 mph. At least 51 people were killed, and officials said the death toll was expected to rise.

The storm laid waste to scores of buildings in Moore, a community of 41,000 people about 10 miles south of the city. Block after block lay in ruins. Homes were crushed into piles of broken wood. Cars and trucks were left crumpled on the roadside.

The National Weather Service issued an initial finding that the tornado was an EF-4 on the enhanced Fujita scale, the second most-powerful type of twister.

More than 120 people were being treated at hospitals, including about 50 children. And search-and-rescue efforts were to continue throughout the night.

Tiffany Thronesberry said she heard from her mother, Barbara Jarrell, shortly after the tornado.

"I got a phone call from her screaming, `Help! Help! I can't breathe. My house is on top of me!'" Thronesberry said.

Thronesberry hurried to her mother's house, where first responders had already pulled her out. Her mother was hospitalized for treatment of cuts and bruises.

Rescuers launched a desperate rescue effort at the school, pulling children from heaps of debris and carrying them to a triage center.

Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin deployed 80 National Guard members to assist with rescue operations and activated extra highway patrol officers.

Fallin also spoke with President Barack Obama, who offered the nation's help and gave Fallin a direct line to his office.

Many land lines to stricken areas were down, and cellphone networks were congested. The storm was so massive that it will take time to establish communications between rescuers and state officials, the governor said.

In video of the storm, the dark funnel cloud could be seen marching slowly across the green landscape. As it churned through the community, the twister scattered shards of wood, awnings and glass all over the streets.

Chris Calvert saw the menacing tornado from about a mile away.

"I was close enough to hear it," he said. "It was just a low roar, and you could see the debris, like pieces of shingles and insulation and stuff like that, rotating around it."

Even though his subdivision is a mile from the tornado's path, it was still covered with debris. He found a picture of a small girl on Santa Claus' lap in his yard.

Volunteers and first responders raced to search the debris for survivors.

At Plaza Towers Elementary School, the storm tore off the roof, knocked down walls and turned the playground into a mass of twisted plastic and metal.

Children from the school were among the dead, but several students were pulled alive from the rubble. Rescue workers passed the survivors down a human chain to the triage center in the parking lot.

James Rushing, who lives across the street from the school, heard reports of the approaching twister and ran to the school, where his 5-year-old foster son, Aiden, attends classes. Rushing believed he would be safer there.

"About two minutes after I got there, the school started coming apart," he said.

The students were sent into the restroom.

A man with a megaphone stood near a Catholic church Monday evening and called out the names of surviving children. Parents waited nearby, hoping to hear their sons' and daughters' names.

Don Denton hadn't heard from his two sons since the tornado hit the town, but the man who has endured six back surgeries and walks with a severe limp said he walked about two miles as he searched for them.

As reports of the storm came in, Denton's 16-year-old texted him, telling him to call.

"I was trying to call him, and I couldn't get through," Denton said.

Eventually, Denton said, his sons spotted him in the crowd. They were fine, but upset to hear that their grandparents' home was destroyed.

As dusk began to fall, heavy equipment was rolled up to the school, and emergency workers wearing yellow crawled among the ruins, searching for survivors.

Because the ground was muddy, bulldozers and front-end loaders were getting stuck. Crews used jackhammers and sledgehammers to tear away concrete, and chunks were being thrown to the side as the workers dug.

Douglas Sherman drove two blocks from his home to help.

"Just having those kids trapped in that school, that really turns the table on a lot of things," he said.

A map provided by the National Weather Service showed that the storm began west of Newcastle and crossed the Canadian River into Oklahoma City's rural far southwestern side about 3 p.m. When it reached Moore, the twister cut a path through the center of town before lifting back into the sky at Lake Stanley Draper.

Oklahoma City Police Capt. Dexter Nelson said downed power lines and open gas lines posed a risk in the aftermath of the system.

Monday's powerful tornado loosely followed the path of a killer twister that slammed the region in May 1999.

The weather service estimated that Monday's tornado was at least a half-mile wide. The 1999 storm had winds clocked at 300 mph.

Kelsey Angle, a weather service meteorologist in Kansas City, Mo., said it's unusual for two such powerful tornadoes to track roughly the same path.

It was the fourth tornado to hit Moore since 1998. A twister also struck in 2003.

Monday's devastation in Oklahoma came almost exactly two years after an enormous twister ripped through the city of Joplin, Mo., killing 158 people and injuring hundreds more.

That May 22, 2011, tornado was the deadliest in the United States since modern tornado record keeping began in 1950, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Before Joplin, the deadliest modern tornado was June 1953 in Flint, Mich., when 116 people died.

___HuffingtonPost