Fascinating Facts and Trivia.

Fighting Panhandling with Pooches

The city of San Francisco is trying a novel approach to deal with two seemingly unrelated problems: unwanted dogs and a proliferation of panhandlers:

Now a government-backed program will try a two-for-one solution to make a dent in these seemingly disparate problems.

WOOF, Wonderful Opportunities for Occupants and Fidos, will pair residents in supportive housing who agree not to panhandle with adolescent puppies in need of socialization in order to be permanently adopted. The approach is believed to be unlike any other currently being tried and was the brainchild of Rebecca Katz, the city’s director of Animal Care and Control, and Bevan Dufty, the newly-appointed director of Housing Opportunities, Partnerships and Engagement.

“We think it will be absolutely magic to give these individuals and these dogs a second chance together,” says Dufty, Mayor Ed Lee’s point person on homelessness. “For the WOOFers it provides them a sense of purpose and dignity like no other.”

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Can You Live on Food Stamp Assistance?

Newark, New Jersey mayor Cory Booker is drawing attention to the difficulties faced by families who rely on food stamps (the SNAP program) for their nutritional needs, spending only $33.00 for a week of food:

Cory Booker has been known to run into burning buildings to save his constituents. But last Thursday, the Newark, N.J., mayor’s biggest challenge was whether or not he could get through a single meeting without taking a nibble of one Christmas cookie.
Booker, 43, and a rising star Democrat, has been living on just $33 of food over the last week as part of an effort to understand the plight of Americans who struggle to live on food stamps. The experiment ends Tuesday.
Booker has said he’s trying to raise public awareness about the struggles of average Americans amid threats of federal funding cuts to food stamp programs around the nation. But the mayor’s very public campaign comes as Booker mulls a challenge to New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in next year’s gubernatorial race.

Here in Montana, according to the Montana Partnership to End Child Hunger:

  • 14.5% of all people live with Low Food Security.
  • 20.9% all children live with Low or Very Low Food Security.
  • 125,226 people receive SNAP assistance.
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Media Spectacle in Connecticut

In light of our discussion about Neil Postman’s model of propaganda and the tragic events in Connecticut, this commentary from Roger Ebert seems appropriate:

Let me tell you a story. The day after Columbine, I was interviewed for the Tom Brokaw news program. The reporter had been assigned a theory and was seeking sound bites to support it. “Wouldn’t you say,” she asked, “that killings like this are influenced by violent movies?” No, I said, I wouldn’t say that. “But what about ‘Basketball Diaries’?” she asked. “Doesn’t that have a scene of a boy walking into a school with a machine gun?” The obscure 1995 Leonardo Di Caprio movie did indeed have a brief fantasy scene of that nature, I said, but the movie failed at the box office (it grossed only $2.5 million), and it’s unlikely the Columbine killers saw it.

The reporter looked disappointed, so I offered her my theory. “Events like this,” I said, “if they are influenced by anything, are influenced by news programs like your own. When an unbalanced kid walks into a school and starts shooting, it becomes a major media event. Cable news drops ordinary programming and goes around the clock with it. The story is assigned a logo and a theme song; these two kids were packaged as the Trench Coat Mafia. The message is clear to other disturbed kids around the country: If I shoot up my school, I can be famous. The TV will talk about nothing else but me. Experts will try to figure out what I was thinking. The kids and teachers at school will see they shouldn’t have messed with me. I’ll go out in a blaze of glory.”

In short, I said, events like Columbine are influenced far less by violent movies than by CNN, the NBC Nightly News and all the other news media, who glorify the killers in the guise of “explaining” them. I commended the policy at the Sun-Times, where our editor said the paper would no longer feature school killings on Page 1. The reporter thanked me and turned off the camera. Of course the interview was never used. They found plenty of talking heads to condemn violent movies, and everybody was happy.

 

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Florida’s Python Problem—and Hunt

I’m thoroughly convinced that whenever I encounter weird news online the story will take place in Florida, and the following is no exception. Given thepython1 encroachment of Burmese pythons in Florida, the state has responded as only Floridians could:

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) has announced that it will hold a month-long competition starting January 12, 2013, “to see who can harvest the longest and the most Burmese pythons” from designated public lands in southern Florida. The goal is to raise awareness about the threat this invasive species poses to the Everglades ecosystem, and to generate “additional information on the python population in south Florida and enhance our research and management efforts.” Python hunting permit holders, as well as members of the general public, are invited to compete for the cash prizes of $1500 for the most pythons killed and $1000 for the longest python killed.

Don’t worry, though. Participants will have to watch a 30 minute online preparation course before they head out into swamps full of pythons and native venomous snakes.

Oh, Florida.

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Should the U.S. Follow France’s Lead and End Homework?

According to Louis Menand, France is the place to go if you don’t enjoy doing your homework:121217_r22945illu_p233

Here is something you probably didn’t know about France: its President has the power to abolish homework. In a recent speech at the Sorbonne, François Hollande announced his intention to do this for all primary- and middle-school students.

Does that mean we should follow President François Hollande’s lead? Not so fast:

According to the leading authority in the field, Harris Cooper, of Duke University, homework correlates positively—although the effect is not large—with success in school. Professor Cooper says that this is more true in middle school and high school than in primary school, since younger children get distracted more easily. He also thinks that there is such a thing as homework overload—he recommends no more than ten minutes per grade a night. But his conclusion that homework matters is based on a synthesis of forty years’ worth of research.

So keep writing those essays!

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