| No fix in sight for tracks of our fears
THIS week Geelong is playing host to more than 800 physically and intellectually disabled people from all over Australia. A number of them are in wheelchairs and arrived in Geelong by train. They had no real problems disembarking at Geelong station because their train came in on platform one. The problem will come if their departing train goes from platform two. Then, they'll have to be pushed across the tracks. It says a lot for Geelong's other facilities that the conference, organised by the Victorian Advocacy League for Individuals with Disability (VALID), has returned to Geelong for the second consecutive year as the annual conference is usually spread around the state. But that doesn't mean that VALID is happy with the facilities at Geelong railway station.
Internet feeds online addictions
Whatever may drive them, abusers seek out this temporary high, this pleasure that pulls them back for more and more still. Afterward, they may be riddled with guilt or shame. Yet if they go too long without a fix, they may become moody and uneasy. The "drug" of choice is the Internet – that wonder of technology that was supposed to make our lives easier, our world more accessible, and our relationships closer. And while it has succeeded in doing those things, it has also given rise to a wave of junkies and, possibly, a new category of clinical mental disorder. Internet addiction, or "compulsive computer use," is not a new concept. The phenomenon was first tagged 10 years ago as social observers and behavioral scientists increasingly heard anecdotes of people whose compulsive Internet habits – gambling, pornography, chatting and shopping – were dramatically interfering with their work and personal lives.
French Court To Rule On Whether Prophet's Cartoons Were Offensive
Publication of a number of caricatures of the Prophet of Islam, initially in a Danish paper, last year, created an unprecedented media-hype and violent protests amongst the worldwide Muslim community. These protests turned deadly in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya and Nigeria resulting in at least 100 deaths, which continued to rise by every passing day. Danish and other European embassies were been attacked, torched and even burned in countries like Syria, Iran, Indonesia and Lebanon. Churches were been burned in Pakistan and Nigeria. A Pakistani Cleric offered $1 million reward for killing each of the cartoonists. An Indian Muslim Minister offered $10 million bounty for the head of the cartoonists or their publishers, which got support from the Indian Islamic court and Islamic law board members.
Are you experienced?
A ccording to this story, Jenna Bush has the highest approval rating of any president in 30 years, in spite of Gulf War VI," a resident of a Bay Area nursing home reads aloud from the newspaper to his companions after naptime. The year is 2022, and you're on Chapter 1 of Tim Sandlin's tragicomic satire, "Jimi Hendrix Turns Eighty." If you're laughing, you'll love this book, which pokes stiletto-sharp fun at the boomer generation while taking seriously its idealistic hope that change is (still) possible. Everyman protagonist Guy Fontaine is neither hippie nor veteran, perfectly poised to observe the stoners and protesters now living with catheters and in wheelchairs, suffering the slings and arrows of age in Mission Pescadero, a pricey facility commanded by a fortysomething dictator who treats these elderly citizens -- many accomplished, most grandparents, some still smoking dope daily and tripping on weekends -- as unruly, ungrateful children.
Gang preyed on disabled to get licenses
Resident registers of mentally handicapped people have been illegally obtained to get new driver's licenses in the names of the disabled people in Kanagawa Prefecture, sources said Wednesday. According to the sources, the Kanagawa prefectural police have found at least 10 driver's licenses illegally issued in the names of mentally handicapped people. These licenses have been used to borrow money from consumer loan companies and take out contracts for cell phones, among other things, they said. The Kanagawa prefectural police have arrested two men they believe belong to a group organizing such crimes. It appears the group used a loophole in the current system that allows people to obtain driver's licenses using somebody else's resident register.
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