Outsourcing
Among the protesters at New York City’s Gay Pride Parade on the Sunday after the Supreme Court’s historic gay-marriage decision was a group of men outfitted in Jewish prayer garments representing the Jewish Political Action Committee. They were carrying signs reading, for example, “Judaism prohibits homosexuality.” However, the men were very likely not Jewish but in fact Mexican laborers hired for the day. A representative of the committee told The New York Times that the men were “supplemental”—necessary because the committee’s rabbis would not permit their students (who normally staff such protests) to be exposed to the sights of same-sex exuberance typical for the parade.
Government in Action
WOOD TV of Grand Rapids, Michigan, seemingly uncovered an antiquity—if not a potential vulnerability—in the Grand Rapids public school system in June when it reported that the heating and cooling systems at 19 schools are controlled using a Commodore Amiga computer (released in the 1980s, about the same time as Windows 2.0), operating on an early Internet modem. It had been installed by a computer-savvy student and, according to the maintenance supervisor, still works fine. Fortunately, the supervisor said, the student still lives in the area and is available if problems arise.
New World Order
In 1993, the owner of the iconic 5Pointz building in New York City began allowing graffiti artists to use the walls for their masterpieces, but by 2013 had grown weary of the building’s look and had the walls whitewashed. In June 2015, nine of the artists filed a federal lawsuit demanding that the owner compensate them, substantially, for destroying their creations—and they stand a good chance of collecting (under the Visual Artists Rights Act) if they prove their particular works are of “recognized stature” and not merely art of an “ephemeral nature.” At its height before it was demolished in 2014, 5Pointz attracted more than 350 artists’ works from around the world.
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Animal World
■ A June entry in a Wired.com “Absurd Creature of the Week” series warned of the Beaded Lacewing that preys on termites by first immobilizing them with a “vapor-phase toxicant” released from its anus. The silent-but-deadly gas is reportedly powerful enough to disable six ordinary termites for up to three hours (plenty of time for a sumptuous meal of termite) and weaken several more that might get caught in the backdraft. Wired.com also learned of the related species Chrysoperla comanche, whose anal weaponry is secretion form, wielded by “master contortionists” who lift their abdomens in order to directly contact their victims’ head.
■ Suspicion Confirmed: In June 2015 research, scientists from United Kingdom’s University of Exeter and Queen Mary University of London warned that owners of “domestic” cats seem not, on average, to appreciate what vicious killers their pets are and urge, for instance, that they be kept indoors more often lest they decimate the neighborhood’s bird and small-mammal populations. Estimates of the yearly death toll generated by housecats are “millions” in the United Kingdom and “billions” in the United States.
Perspective
To cover various general expenses (such as helping the indigent), the average hospital mark-up for patient care in the United States is about 3.4 times the costs (according to a Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health report in June), but 50 of the nation’s 5,000 hospitals charge more than 10 times the cost, with the North Okaloosa Medical Center near Pensacola, Florida, billing at 12.6 times costs. According to the co-author, professor Gerard Anderson, the 50 “are marking up the prices because no one is telling them they can’t.” (Forty-nine of the 50 are for-profit hospitals and 20 are in Florida.)
Recurring Themes
Sy Allen, arrested in March in Colchester, England, on suspicion of possessing drugs with intent to sell, relied on a fairly common strategy: As officers burst into the room, he swallowed the “evidence.” As in the other cases, police decided to wait for nature to take its course in order to recover the suspected drugs. Unlike in the other cases, Allen managed to hold out with no bowel movement for 23 days—but not a 24th.
COPYRIGHT 2015 CHUCK SHEPHERD
