PM to apologize for Chinese head tax
Jun. 13, 2006. 05:46 PM
CANADIAN PRESS
OTTAWA — Prime Minister Stephen Harper will apologize next week for a racist head tax from the last century that still scars the Chinese community.
But there’s no word on whether he’ll offer compensation during his June 22 statement in the House of Commons.
“Cash payments, community projects, some kind of memorial — that’s the sort of thing that’s being considered,” said a government source who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“There is no clear consensus within the (Chinese) community.”
Fewer than 20 people who paid the immigration tax are still believed to be living.
About 81,000 Chinese immigrants paid fees ranging from $50 to $500 to enter Canada between 1885 and 1923.
About $23 million in head taxes were collected, placing a burden on immigrants that often meant they could not afford to bring their loved ones to join them.
“Just an apology is not good enough,” said New Democrat MP Olivia Chow, who is Chinese.
“That is not justice, that is not reconciliation. There has to be compensation.
“Some of the descendants were directly affected because they’re sons and daughters who never knew their fathers. They have mothers who committed suicide because of loneliness, because of despair . . . (after) 30 years of being separated from their husband.”
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&pubid=968163964505&cid=1150192918451&col=968705899037&call_page=TS_News&call_pageid=968332188492&call_pag
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Fatah militants torch parliament, cabinet offices
RAMALLAH: Palestinian factional rivalry erupted into unprecedented violence Monday as followers of president Mahmud Abbas set fire to the parliament and West Bank cabinet offices while supporters of the Hamas government tried to storm a security compound in Gaza.
Militants loyal to Abbas’s Fatah faction set fire to the ground floor of the parliament building in Ramallah where the flames quickly leapt through the rest of the complex.
Gunmen from the same Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades also torched the cabinet building in Ramallah after hundreds of security officers, staffed largely by Fatah followers, forced their way into the premises and opened fire.
Black smoke spewed into the night sky out of the fourth floor of the five-storey cabinet building as fire engines rushed to the scene but were prevented by militants from trying to extinguish the flames. Protesting against deadly violence between Fatah faithful and loyalists of the ruling Hamas movement, which today controls government after beating Abbas’s party at a January election, Fatah gunmen and security officers smashed windows, destroyed computers and tore up files. In a bid to contain the situation, Abbas issued an edict placing the Palestinian security forces on a maximum state of alert. afp
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5C06%5C13%5Cstory_13-6-2006_pg1_3
Cats helping spread of bird flu?
LONDON, England (UPI) -- A British scientist says cats might play a key role in the spread of the avian flu virus.
Professor Jeffrey Waage of Imperial College London -- a member of Britain`s Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs -- has issued a review of the science underpinning the government`s avian flu contingency plans, the London Telegraph reported Tuesday.
'The ability of mammals to contract and transmit the avian influenza virus has important human health implications,' wrote Waage. 'We know about cats as a potential host for avian influenza because of the extensive infection of cats in Asia in outbreaks there.'
Waage calls for more research into exposure to the virus by feral cats, farm cats and household pets and the associated risk of transmission to poultry.
Professor Andrew Easton of the University of Warwick told The Telegraph culling cats is not an option and a vaccine is not yet available, so it`s important to prevent the animals from coming into conta
http://science.monstersandcritics.com/news/article_1172377.php/Study_Cats_might_spread_avian_flu_virus
ACLU Tells Judge Not Even President Above Law
DETROIT---"Under our Constitution, no one is above the law, not even the president," said Ann Beeson, associate legal director of the national ACLU, argued in Federal court Monday, saying that the Bush administration's warrantless spying program is unconstitutional and should be stopped.
The Government argued to have the case dismissed saying that the National Security Agency program that monitors international communications involving people in the U.S. is vital to national security and permitted by the Constitution.
The judge deferred any decision in the legal challenge, the first time a court has heard arguments on the legality of the NSA program.
Besson said "The government's arguments that the president, alone, can decide to spy on Americans without a warrant are fundamentally un-American and contradict the vision of the founders of our democracy."
However, the government argued that ACLU's defense of the constitution and checks on presidential power were "extreme." In response, Beeson said, "If our view of the separation of powers is extreme, than the Constitution is extreme."
Representing a host of prominent journalists, scholars, attorneys and national nonprofit organizations who say that the NSA program is disrupting their ability to communicate effectively with sources and clients, the ACLU charged that the program violates Americans' rights to free speech and privacy under the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution. By circumventing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the ACLU argued that the program violates separation of powers principles and encroaches on Congress' power to regulate the president's authority to spy on Americans. FISA, which was passed by Congress in 1978, requires the executive branch to obtain a warrant before engaging in electronic surveillance of Americans.
"The government repeated its Orwellian argument that national security prevents any judge from reviewing the legality of the NSA program," said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU. "The spying program has no oversight or checks and balances and seemingly no limits. This means that the government can not only monitor any Americans' phone calls or e-mails, but can even search their homes and businesses without a warrant."
The ACLU filed the lawsuit in January against the NSA in the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Michigan. Following Monday's arguments on the legality of the program, Judge Anna Diggs Taylor has scheduled a second hearing on July 10 on the government's request to dismiss the case on state secrets grounds.
"The government is trying to shut this case down, without any legal review, because it simply knows that this program is illegal," said Kary L. Moss, executive director of the ACLU of Michigan. "To avoid any oversight, the government is trying to hide behind the once-rare state secrets privilege. Fortunately, everything we need to argue this case is already available in the public domain."
http://www.northcountrygazette.org/articles/061206AboveLaw.html
Clinton, Kerry use liberal forum to criticize Iraq war policy
WASHINGTON Senator John Kerry makes another call to end the war in Iraq.
The Massachusetts Democrat compared the fighting in Iraq to the Vietnam War, in which he served. He says the Iraq war "weakens the nation each and every day it goes on."
The Navy veteran is offering an amendment to withdraw troops from Iraq by the end of this year.
Kerry and New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke today at the gathering called "Take Back America." Both are possible presidential contenders in 2008.
Kerry called thge war "immoral" and said he was wrong to vote for the Iraqi war resolution.
Clinton's restrained rhetoric on Iraq has earned her both boos and cheers from a liberal crowd in Washington.
http://www.eyewitnessnewstv.com/Global/story.asp?S=5026774&nav=F2DO
Colo. court spikes ballot measure dealing with illegals
Associated Press
Jun. 12, 2006 03:11 PM
DENVER - A lightning-rod proposal asking voters to deny most state services to illegal immigrants is likely dead for this year under a Colorado Supreme Court ruling handed down Monday.
In a 4-2 ruling with one justice abstaining, the court said the proposed constitutional amendment cannot appear on the November ballot because it violates a requirement in the constitution that initiatives deal with only one subject.
Supporters cannot start over with a revised proposal because a key deadline has passed, but they said they will ask the court to reconsider. advertisement
Defend Colorado Now, the group behind the measure, had already gathered more than 30,000 of the required 68,000 voters' signatures required to qualify for the ballot and was on track to have about 100,000 by the August deadline, said former state Senate President John Andrews, a member of the group's steering committee.
Signature-gathering will continue, he said.
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0612wst-court-immig12-ON.html
Verizon Rolls Out Kid-Tracking Device
Monday, June 12, 2006
NEW YORK — Verizon Wireless, the No. 2 U.S. cellphone service provider, plans Monday to launch a wireless service that lets parents check their children's whereabouts and alerts them when they venture out of bounds.
Parents can use the service to set up geographic limits and recieve text alerts if their children, who also carry phones, go too far from home. The service also lets parents check where their offspring are via a map on their cellphone or computer.
The Chaperone-branded service from Verizon Wireless, a venture of Verizon Communications (VZ) and Vodafone Group Plc , follows in the footsteps of a similar service that Sprint Nextel Corp. (S) introduced in April. Entertainment conglomerate Walt Disney Co. (DIS) is also set to offer a similar service when it starts selling cellphones this summer.
Such services are aimed at bringing in revenue from a location technology that U.S. wireless service providers are required by law to put into cellphones so that safety workers can pinpoint the location of 911 emergency service callers.
Mobile packages designed for families have become key to growth at U.S. operators, which currently sign up as many as 60 percent of their new subscribers via family discount plans, according to technology research firm Yankee Group.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,199107,00.html
RIAA: Illegal downloads peaking
6/13/2006 2:09:56 PM, by Anders Bylund
Current and former leaders of the RIAA seem to disagree on the efficiency of the organization's antipiracy efforts. In a recent interview, Mitch Bainwol—the current CEO of the RIAA—said that illegal music downloading may have already peaked and is destined for a downhill ride:
"The problem has not been eliminated," he says. "But we believe digital downloads have emerged into a growing, thriving business, and file-trading is flat."
There is little doubt about the growing, thriving legal downloading business, as evidenced by Apple's iTMS and others putting a serious dent in the overall music market. USA Today mentions a 77 percent increase in digital sales, though my own analysis of the numbers points to a 149 percent boost from 2004 to 2005. We do agree on about a 7 percent digital marketshare, though in my case, the figures don't account for subscription services like Napster or newcomers like URGE.
But filetrading analyst company BigChampagne reports a 15 percent increase in media-swapping users year-over-year, up to "nearly 10 million people" on the sharing networks at any given time. It's unclear whether that's a US-only figure or a global one, but it's a respectable chunk of the broadband population either way.
Taken together in a generous interpretation, you could say that illegal downloading may be reaching market saturation where the people who want to swap files illegaly are already doing it and the rest of us simply have no interest in that activity. Less charitably, I could point out that 15 percent annual growth means doubling the number of users in five years, and Mr. Bainwol did avoid the inconvenient issue of the number of files actually traded. If I say that the current lawsuit strategy hasn't been particularly successful, I'd have support from former RIAA CEO Hilary Rosen:
[F]or the record, I do share a concern that the lawsuits have outlived most of their usefulness and that the record companies need to work harder to implement a strategy that legitimizes more p2p sites and expands the download and subscription pool by working harder with the tech community to get devices and music services to work better together. That is how their business will expand most quickly. The iPod is still too small a part of the overall potential of the market and its propietary DRM just bugs me. Speaking of DRM, it is time to rethink that strategy as well.
Ms. Rosen touches on several issues we find troubling here at the Orbiting HQ, notably DRM restrictions and the value of legal downloading as a tool against piracy. Of course, it would have been nice if she had woken up to this worldview a little earlier in her service with the RIAA, but better late than never as it never hurts to have (former) insider support on important issues like these. Now, perhaps she can go have a little fireside chat with her old friends the music label heads...
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060613-7047.html
Jun. 13, 2006. 05:46 PM
CANADIAN PRESS
OTTAWA — Prime Minister Stephen Harper will apologize next week for a racist head tax from the last century that still scars the Chinese community.
But there’s no word on whether he’ll offer compensation during his June 22 statement in the House of Commons.
“Cash payments, community projects, some kind of memorial — that’s the sort of thing that’s being considered,” said a government source who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“There is no clear consensus within the (Chinese) community.”
Fewer than 20 people who paid the immigration tax are still believed to be living.
About 81,000 Chinese immigrants paid fees ranging from $50 to $500 to enter Canada between 1885 and 1923.
About $23 million in head taxes were collected, placing a burden on immigrants that often meant they could not afford to bring their loved ones to join them.
“Just an apology is not good enough,” said New Democrat MP Olivia Chow, who is Chinese.
“That is not justice, that is not reconciliation. There has to be compensation.
“Some of the descendants were directly affected because they’re sons and daughters who never knew their fathers. They have mothers who committed suicide because of loneliness, because of despair . . . (after) 30 years of being separated from their husband.”
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&pubid=968163964505&cid=1150192918451&col=968705899037&call_page=TS_News&call_pageid=968332188492&call_pag
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Fatah militants torch parliament, cabinet offices
RAMALLAH: Palestinian factional rivalry erupted into unprecedented violence Monday as followers of president Mahmud Abbas set fire to the parliament and West Bank cabinet offices while supporters of the Hamas government tried to storm a security compound in Gaza.
Militants loyal to Abbas’s Fatah faction set fire to the ground floor of the parliament building in Ramallah where the flames quickly leapt through the rest of the complex.
Gunmen from the same Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades also torched the cabinet building in Ramallah after hundreds of security officers, staffed largely by Fatah followers, forced their way into the premises and opened fire.
Black smoke spewed into the night sky out of the fourth floor of the five-storey cabinet building as fire engines rushed to the scene but were prevented by militants from trying to extinguish the flames. Protesting against deadly violence between Fatah faithful and loyalists of the ruling Hamas movement, which today controls government after beating Abbas’s party at a January election, Fatah gunmen and security officers smashed windows, destroyed computers and tore up files. In a bid to contain the situation, Abbas issued an edict placing the Palestinian security forces on a maximum state of alert. afp
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006%5C06%5C13%5Cstory_13-6-2006_pg1_3
Cats helping spread of bird flu?
LONDON, England (UPI) -- A British scientist says cats might play a key role in the spread of the avian flu virus.
Professor Jeffrey Waage of Imperial College London -- a member of Britain`s Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs -- has issued a review of the science underpinning the government`s avian flu contingency plans, the London Telegraph reported Tuesday.
'The ability of mammals to contract and transmit the avian influenza virus has important human health implications,' wrote Waage. 'We know about cats as a potential host for avian influenza because of the extensive infection of cats in Asia in outbreaks there.'
Waage calls for more research into exposure to the virus by feral cats, farm cats and household pets and the associated risk of transmission to poultry.
Professor Andrew Easton of the University of Warwick told The Telegraph culling cats is not an option and a vaccine is not yet available, so it`s important to prevent the animals from coming into conta
http://science.monstersandcritics.com/news/article_1172377.php/Study_Cats_might_spread_avian_flu_virus
ACLU Tells Judge Not Even President Above Law
DETROIT---"Under our Constitution, no one is above the law, not even the president," said Ann Beeson, associate legal director of the national ACLU, argued in Federal court Monday, saying that the Bush administration's warrantless spying program is unconstitutional and should be stopped.
The Government argued to have the case dismissed saying that the National Security Agency program that monitors international communications involving people in the U.S. is vital to national security and permitted by the Constitution.
The judge deferred any decision in the legal challenge, the first time a court has heard arguments on the legality of the NSA program.
Besson said "The government's arguments that the president, alone, can decide to spy on Americans without a warrant are fundamentally un-American and contradict the vision of the founders of our democracy."
However, the government argued that ACLU's defense of the constitution and checks on presidential power were "extreme." In response, Beeson said, "If our view of the separation of powers is extreme, than the Constitution is extreme."
Representing a host of prominent journalists, scholars, attorneys and national nonprofit organizations who say that the NSA program is disrupting their ability to communicate effectively with sources and clients, the ACLU charged that the program violates Americans' rights to free speech and privacy under the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution. By circumventing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the ACLU argued that the program violates separation of powers principles and encroaches on Congress' power to regulate the president's authority to spy on Americans. FISA, which was passed by Congress in 1978, requires the executive branch to obtain a warrant before engaging in electronic surveillance of Americans.
"The government repeated its Orwellian argument that national security prevents any judge from reviewing the legality of the NSA program," said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU. "The spying program has no oversight or checks and balances and seemingly no limits. This means that the government can not only monitor any Americans' phone calls or e-mails, but can even search their homes and businesses without a warrant."
The ACLU filed the lawsuit in January against the NSA in the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Michigan. Following Monday's arguments on the legality of the program, Judge Anna Diggs Taylor has scheduled a second hearing on July 10 on the government's request to dismiss the case on state secrets grounds.
"The government is trying to shut this case down, without any legal review, because it simply knows that this program is illegal," said Kary L. Moss, executive director of the ACLU of Michigan. "To avoid any oversight, the government is trying to hide behind the once-rare state secrets privilege. Fortunately, everything we need to argue this case is already available in the public domain."
http://www.northcountrygazette.org/articles/061206AboveLaw.html
Clinton, Kerry use liberal forum to criticize Iraq war policy
WASHINGTON Senator John Kerry makes another call to end the war in Iraq.
The Massachusetts Democrat compared the fighting in Iraq to the Vietnam War, in which he served. He says the Iraq war "weakens the nation each and every day it goes on."
The Navy veteran is offering an amendment to withdraw troops from Iraq by the end of this year.
Kerry and New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke today at the gathering called "Take Back America." Both are possible presidential contenders in 2008.
Kerry called thge war "immoral" and said he was wrong to vote for the Iraqi war resolution.
Clinton's restrained rhetoric on Iraq has earned her both boos and cheers from a liberal crowd in Washington.
http://www.eyewitnessnewstv.com/Global/story.asp?S=5026774&nav=F2DO
Colo. court spikes ballot measure dealing with illegals
Associated Press
Jun. 12, 2006 03:11 PM
DENVER - A lightning-rod proposal asking voters to deny most state services to illegal immigrants is likely dead for this year under a Colorado Supreme Court ruling handed down Monday.
In a 4-2 ruling with one justice abstaining, the court said the proposed constitutional amendment cannot appear on the November ballot because it violates a requirement in the constitution that initiatives deal with only one subject.
Supporters cannot start over with a revised proposal because a key deadline has passed, but they said they will ask the court to reconsider. advertisement
Defend Colorado Now, the group behind the measure, had already gathered more than 30,000 of the required 68,000 voters' signatures required to qualify for the ballot and was on track to have about 100,000 by the August deadline, said former state Senate President John Andrews, a member of the group's steering committee.
Signature-gathering will continue, he said.
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0612wst-court-immig12-ON.html
Verizon Rolls Out Kid-Tracking Device
Monday, June 12, 2006
NEW YORK — Verizon Wireless, the No. 2 U.S. cellphone service provider, plans Monday to launch a wireless service that lets parents check their children's whereabouts and alerts them when they venture out of bounds.
Parents can use the service to set up geographic limits and recieve text alerts if their children, who also carry phones, go too far from home. The service also lets parents check where their offspring are via a map on their cellphone or computer.
The Chaperone-branded service from Verizon Wireless, a venture of Verizon Communications (VZ) and Vodafone Group Plc , follows in the footsteps of a similar service that Sprint Nextel Corp. (S) introduced in April. Entertainment conglomerate Walt Disney Co. (DIS) is also set to offer a similar service when it starts selling cellphones this summer.
Such services are aimed at bringing in revenue from a location technology that U.S. wireless service providers are required by law to put into cellphones so that safety workers can pinpoint the location of 911 emergency service callers.
Mobile packages designed for families have become key to growth at U.S. operators, which currently sign up as many as 60 percent of their new subscribers via family discount plans, according to technology research firm Yankee Group.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,199107,00.html
RIAA: Illegal downloads peaking
6/13/2006 2:09:56 PM, by Anders Bylund
Current and former leaders of the RIAA seem to disagree on the efficiency of the organization's antipiracy efforts. In a recent interview, Mitch Bainwol—the current CEO of the RIAA—said that illegal music downloading may have already peaked and is destined for a downhill ride:
"The problem has not been eliminated," he says. "But we believe digital downloads have emerged into a growing, thriving business, and file-trading is flat."
There is little doubt about the growing, thriving legal downloading business, as evidenced by Apple's iTMS and others putting a serious dent in the overall music market. USA Today mentions a 77 percent increase in digital sales, though my own analysis of the numbers points to a 149 percent boost from 2004 to 2005. We do agree on about a 7 percent digital marketshare, though in my case, the figures don't account for subscription services like Napster or newcomers like URGE.
But filetrading analyst company BigChampagne reports a 15 percent increase in media-swapping users year-over-year, up to "nearly 10 million people" on the sharing networks at any given time. It's unclear whether that's a US-only figure or a global one, but it's a respectable chunk of the broadband population either way.
Taken together in a generous interpretation, you could say that illegal downloading may be reaching market saturation where the people who want to swap files illegaly are already doing it and the rest of us simply have no interest in that activity. Less charitably, I could point out that 15 percent annual growth means doubling the number of users in five years, and Mr. Bainwol did avoid the inconvenient issue of the number of files actually traded. If I say that the current lawsuit strategy hasn't been particularly successful, I'd have support from former RIAA CEO Hilary Rosen:
[F]or the record, I do share a concern that the lawsuits have outlived most of their usefulness and that the record companies need to work harder to implement a strategy that legitimizes more p2p sites and expands the download and subscription pool by working harder with the tech community to get devices and music services to work better together. That is how their business will expand most quickly. The iPod is still too small a part of the overall potential of the market and its propietary DRM just bugs me. Speaking of DRM, it is time to rethink that strategy as well.
Ms. Rosen touches on several issues we find troubling here at the Orbiting HQ, notably DRM restrictions and the value of legal downloading as a tool against piracy. Of course, it would have been nice if she had woken up to this worldview a little earlier in her service with the RIAA, but better late than never as it never hurts to have (former) insider support on important issues like these. Now, perhaps she can go have a little fireside chat with her old friends the music label heads...
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060613-7047.html
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