Week in Headlines

Sphere: Related Content War and Peace
Afghanistan War Resister to "Put the War on Trial"

"What I did there, I know I contributed to death and human suffering.” Those are the words of Victor Agosto, a soldier stationed Fort Hood, in Killeen, Texas. Agosto was answering a question in an interview with TruthOut.org about the thirteen months he spent in Iraq, and now Agosoto is refusing to deploy to Afghanistan. “It's a matter of what I'm willing to live with. I'm not willing to participate in this occupation, knowing it is completely wrong."

Politics
The Coming End of the Culture Wars

The “culture wars” have taken over the political landscape in the last thirty years, however, the political landscape may be changing. According to a report by the Center for American Progress, ongoing demographic shifts have seriously eroded the mass base for culture wars politics and will continue to erode this base in the future. The report notes that effects of the Millennials, the generation born between 1978 and 2000, will have on the future of politics.

Texas Politics
'Experts' Stir Controversy Over Social Studies Textbooks

In the coming months, the Texas State Board of Education six expert reviewers appointed by the board will be focusing on the social studies curriculum standards for 4.7 million Texas public school children. The Houston Chronicle is reporting that recommendations are already causing controversy, such as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Stephen F. Austin not being included in text books for elementary schools students and to emphasize the role of the Bible and the Christian faith in the settling of the original colonies. This is coming on the heels of a controversial SBOE debate over evolution, and Texas Governor Rick Perry’s nomination of the Chair of the SBOE not being confirmed by the Texas State Senate.

Media
Open for Business

Would you pay for news online? Some small news outlets that service large areas or media organizations that focus on specific and narrow audiences are charging for news. However, could larger news organizations successfully make a profit from charging for news and information online? The Columbia Journalism Review reports that online subscriptions will not save newspapers, and that no one revenue stream will (not online or print advertising, or alerts on handheld devices, or new electronic). However, all of them together might.

Education
Ex-Athlete Says High Schools Teach How to Win Instead of How to Live

An ex-athlete who played high school football in Texas, testified before the State Board of Education that high school athletes only learn how to play and how to win but learn little else about health. The Houston Chronicle reports that Alex Payne requested that the SBOE require schools to teach athletes about the long term effects of injures, and that high school sports focus more on prevention and not solely on competition.

Economy
Bernanke’s Bad Teachers

An article from Dollars and Sense about how Fed chair Ben Bernanke got “hooked” on Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz while he was in graduate school, and following their teachings on the Great Depression, he’s been starving the real economy to avoid interfering in free markets. Conducting an economic policy as cruel as it has been ineffective whose blame goes beyond Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz, and lies squarely on the economics profession.

Environment
From the Sewage Plant: The Promise of Biofuel

A Yale Environment 360 report on how researchers throughout the world are working to produce biofuel from algae. But a few are trying a decidedly novel approach: Using an abundant and freely available source — human waste — to make the fuel of the future while also treating sewage.

Reproductive Rights
Playing the Abortion Card

The conservative opposition to universal health care is using abortion as a wedge issue to prevent health care reform. An article in the American Prospect points to organizations such as the Family Research Council and the National Right to Life Committee who are promoting the idea that a vote for universal health care is a vote for abortion. Those groups point to the “family planning” language in the legislation as evidence that abortion will be federally funded, when in reality "family planning" language refers exclusively to contraceptive services.

GLBT Issues
Episcopal Church Moves to End Ban on Gay Bishops

This week the Episcopal Church voted to allow openly gay bishops, which ended the moratorium on ordaining gay bishops that was passed just three years ago. The decision that was passed overwhelmingly by church delegates would allow dioceses to consider gay candidates to the episcopacy, but does not mandate that all dioceses do so. The vote comes at a time when the Church has faced internal strife over the issue of homosexuals, and has cause splits in the denomination both in the United States in other countries throughout the world.

Race and Racism
Closet Racism in the Age of Obama

How does empathy equal racism? If the white male experience is the only authentically American experience, and therefore the only one that could possibly be unbiased. This is the picture that Republicans tried to paint during the confirmation hearings of Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s Senate confirmation hearings. Marie Cocco at TruthDig.com writes that “Senators who argue in the Sotomayor hearings that race—let alone “empathy”—should never be a factor in legal rulings would do well to look beyond the dais.”