by Rhona Mahony. Anant Raut came to Stanford University last week, on May 29, to describe the men locked up in the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo, Cuba. He is a lawyer, now working for the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, who has represented five of the prisoners. He has been to Guantanamo and met his clients in person. Continue reading →

by Rhona Mahony.  Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declared yesterday that an official state drought is parching California. We must cut back our usage of water by 20 percent. This afternoon, thinking carefully about how scarce water is in our state, and how many millions of dollars we spend to filter, chlorinate, pump, store, and argue about who gets which acre-feet of it, my question is, shall we continue to poop in it? Continue reading →

By Rhona Mahony. Marcus Yallow lives in San Francisco in 2010. He is a 17 year-old high school student who likes to program, tinker, and play an elaborate game, part puzzle and part race, whose clues are hidden on the Internet and about the city.
One afternoon when he and his friends are skipping school to play the game, the Bay Bridge explodes and collapses. The Department of Homeland Security arrests Marcus and his friends as suspects in the bombing. After all, they are not where they should be. Their pockets are full of electronic gadgets, some encrypted. Marcus politely asks to call his parents to arrange a lawyer. Instead, a sack goes over his head, the drawstring is pulled tight, and he is loaded onto a boat and, hours later, off of it. Nameless government agents question him roughly for days. When he is set free, back on the sidewalk in San Francisco, his city has changed. All communication is recorded: land lines, cell phones, email, the Internet. All movement is monitored: by closed-circuit televisions, automobiles’ electronic toll booth passes, traffic check points, and frequent ID checks of pedestrians. One of Marcus’s friends was injured when they were arrested and wasn’t released with them. Where is he? Is he still alive? Marcus vows to use his technological creativity to rally the young people of San Francisco. They must thwart the lockdown. They must make adults understand how destructive and how ineffectual it really is. Continue reading →

by Rhona Mahony. Half the Sky (HTS) gives one-on-one attention to Chinese orphans, runs preschools for them, and finds foster homes. Jenny Bowen and other parents of adopted children from China formed the group to enrich the lives of children in Chinese orphanages. Their U.S. office is in Berkeley, California. HTS workers are in Chengdu and Sichuan today with tents, food, and care for displaced children. Charity Navigator gives HTS good marks. You may donate to HTS on-line. Its Web site reports today:

Dear Friends, First, an update on the airlift to remote Aba prefecture. No less than 40 uniformed soldiers arrived at the Chengdu CWI yesterday to load two big trucks with emergency goods for the 1,000 stranded children of Aba. We’re waiting now for confirmation of the air drop. more.

Thanks to Ami Laws, mother of two adopted daughters from China, for the tip about this group.

by Rhona Mahony.  Martin Fackler reported for the New York Times last week (May 7, 2008) that big, aggressive crows, in unprecedented tens of thousands, are shutting down playgrounds, power grids, and even bullet trains across Japan. Since 2001, Tokyo environmental planners have trapped 93,000 crows–lured with fresh meat–then killed them with poison gas. Why the surge in the number of crows? Ornithologists and government officials say that people now throw away much more food than in the past. More wealth, more edible garbage, more food for wild animals, more wild animals. Many Japanese housekeepers now store their curb-side garbage in yellow plastic bags, hoping that crows dislike the color yellow.

Hai! Garbaru canu! Put those plastic bags into rigid, beak-proof containers. Next, instead of putting food scraps into the town landfill, compost them. San Francisco does it; so does all of Nova Scotia. When the Japanese quit catering sidewalk feasts, the crows will go.