Free Republic

The first thing that comes to mind when you meet Joe Wetmore, the owner and founder of Autumn Leaves Bookstore, is "Ithaca." With shoulder-length grey hair, dashing bluish-hazel eyes, a smile for everybody, black jeans and a t-shirt from WEOS, a Geneva radio station, he gives off the aura of everything this small city tries to achieve. It's a Saturday afternoon, and Wetmore is working in his bookstore, opening bills, joking with his employees, giving political advice to potential City Council candidates and answering questions from an overwhelmed Sun reporter. "I moved here 10 years ago," he says. "Ithaca seemed...

<p>ITHACA -- Council members from Ithaca and 26 other cities that have passed resolutions opposing a preemptive war with Iraq plan to deliver those resolutions to President Bush and also hope to meet with members of Congress today in Washington, D.C.</p>

Rachel Maines, author of The Technology of Orgasm, discussed the history of the vibrator and the double standard applied to male and female sexuality in Hollis E. Cornell auditorium yesterday. Her lecture was a part of Cornell's V-Day series, a week-long event aimed at curbing violence against women. Maines criticized what she characterizes as an "androcentric model of sexuality" that is dominant in America and, although to a lesser extent, all of Western society. This androcentric model holds that the act of sexual intercourse occurs only in the event of vaginal penetration. Maines said this concept was deeply problematic because...

<p>ITHACA -- Around 200 people gathered at the Pyramid Mall Saturday to protest a possible U.S. war with Iraq.</p> <p>This was the second time since December that a crowd, most dressed in black and many carrying antiwar signs and flyers, gathered at the shopping center on a busy Saturday morning.</p>

ITHACA, N.Y. -- New marriage-promotion welfare rules proposed by the Bush administration will violate poor women's privacy rights and will not work, says a position paper written by three academics associated with Cornell University. The rules are expected to be reintroduced in the House of Representatives next week as part of the welfare bill, and brought to a vote as early as Tuesday, Feb. 11. Martha Fineman is a professor of feminist jurisprudence at Cornell Law School. Anna Marie Smith is a professor of government at Cornell. Gwendolyn Mink, the daughter of the late congresswoman from Hawaii, Patsy Mink, holds...

<p>ITHACA -- Society's problems would be better solved with less emotion and partisan rhetoric and more application of scientific knowledge, Janet Reno told a packed Statler Auditorium on Thursday night.</p> <p>Reno, on the Cornell University campus for two weeks as a Frank H.T. Rhodes Class of '56 Professor, gave a speech titled "Truth and How We Seek It."</p>

After protesting a crow-shooting contest in Auburn, N.Y., animal rights activists Milo Polte '03, Brian Pease '00, Tim Slate '02 and Laura Carver were arrested on misdemeanor charges of trespassing and interfering with the legal taking of wildlife last Saturday. Released on $100 bail each, they are scheduled to appear in court on Feb. 22. The protesters played a recording of a crow "danger call" on a boom box as they drove around the property where the hunters were shooting. The recording of a crow supposedly warns other crows to leave the area. "They were absolutely in the process of...

While some might commend Maura Stephens for her willingness to join a peace mission to Iraq, it is inappropriate that Ithaca College ever considered funding her trip. The institution’s mission should be educating students, not furthering the political agendas of its staff members and administrators. Four different college offices initially agreed to contribute $500 each to help Stephens, editor of the Ithaca College Quarterly, make a trip to Iraq with a women’s peace delegation. It was only when an Ithacan Online story published Tuesday raised questions regarding the purpose and legality of the trip that the college began to question...

AUBURN - With a Bible in his left hand, Bill Atkinson quoted scripture Sunday to explain why he thought it was wrong to participate in this past weekend's controversial crow hunt. Wearing a black fedora and a long coat, Atkinson, 51, a member of the First Love Ministries in Auburn, said it doesn't take going any further than the Ten Commandments to show his disdain of the two-day event that downed 380 crows - "Thou shall not kill." "It's incredibly shameful that they are killing these birds. It's got to come to an end," he said. "Personally, I'm glad the...

ITHACA--Janet Reno '60 arrives on campus today to start her 11-day stint as a Frank H.T. Rhodes Class of '56 University Professor. During her stay on campus, Reno will deliver two lectures to the public. The first, titled "Truth and How We Seek It," is on Thursday at 7:30 p.m. in the Statler Auditorium. She will deliver the second on Feb. 12 at 4:15 p.m. in Myron Taylor Hall. Besides the public lectures, Reno will participate in policy analysis and management courses, both as a lecturer and a participant in discussions. Late next week, students in Human Development 258: The...

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Maura Stephens, editor of the Ithaca College Quarterly, has withdrawn her request for $2,000 in funding from the college to pay for her trip to Iraq. Four college offices had committed last week to give $500 each for her humanitarian and activist mission with the women’s peace delegation Code Pink: Women’s Pre-Emptive Strike for Peace. "I withdrew my request for support," Stephens said Tuesday afternoon. "I don’t want the college to be under any kind of cloud over this. I will be funding it myself." The Ithacan Online published a story earlier Tuesday that raised questions about...

<p>Forget any assumptions you have about organized protests. The images that come to mind may be a little outdated: Daisy-bearing flower children urging everyone to "make love, not war" and, more recently pipe bomb-wielding anarchists immortalized by demonstrations in Seattle and Quebec.</p>

As President Bush delivered his State of the Union Address last night, some local officials began preparations to demonstrate their discontent. Tomorrow, a Resolution to Defend the Civil Rights and Liberties of the People of Ithaca is anticipated to denounce the PATRIOT Act of 2001. This will be on the agenda of the Common Council meeting. "I was getting a lot of comments from constituents that Ithaca should draft a resolution like other cities were doing," said Dan Cogan (Dem.-5th Ward), the author of the resolution . Cogan said much of the text came from various resolutions found on the...

<p>TOWN OF OWEGO -- Eight local anti-war protesters dressed as weapons inspectors tried to enter Lockheed Martin Systems Integration facility Sunday, but didn't get far past the entrance.</p> <p>The group -- dressed in white hazardous materials uniforms with "citizens weapons inspector" printed in large black letters --were ticketed by Tioga County sheriff's deputies on trespassing charges. They are to appear in town court in mid-February.</p>

<p>Two weeks ago, Maura Stephens had no idea she'd soon be boarding a plane to Baghdad as part of a nationwide peace delegation.</p> <p>Stephens, senior editor of special projects in Ithaca College's Office of College Relations, is the only local woman out of the 15 U.S. women leaving Thursday for Iraq. Her husband, George Sapio, has also volunteered to join the delegation as its official photographer.</p>

<p>ITHACA -- "Drop Bush Not Bombs" reads one of the posters headed out of Ithaca for Saturday's antiwar protest in Washington D.C.</p> <p>At 1 a.m. the day of the march, people from the Ithaca area will load onto five buses, posters and all, for the eight-hour trip to the nation's capital. There, they will meet with what organizers hope will be tens of thousands of marchers protesting President George W. Bush's moves toward a possible war with Iraq.</p>

<p>I was sitting in Center Ithaca drinking a cup of coffee the other day when who should come along but my old pal Joe Woodchuck, archetypal yet thoroughly apocryphal Ithacan.</p> <p>He was accompanied by a shorter, somewhat younger, if equally scruffy version of himself. They made a beeline for my table.</p>

<p>Has there been enough yet said? Has the U.N. adequately said that there is "no smoking gun?" Is it clear that we are not yet in an impending crisis in which the U.S. government and its allies must attack Iraq? Has there yet been enough focus on the negative possibilities of war? Can there be a focus on creation of a safe world?</p>

<p>LANSING -- As demonstrators faced a judge Thursday for staging a die-in at a military recruiters' office, they made another attempt to voice their opinions about America's sanctions against Iraq.</p> <p>"I plead for the victims of war," said Leslie Schultz, when Town of Lansing Judge John Howell asked for her plea regarding the charges. "God forgive us for teaching of fear and hate."</p>

As years go, they don't get much worse than 2002. The year's main saving grace - that we haven't yet invaded Iraq - suggests that, believe it or not, 2003 could be even worse. A year that came on the heels of 9/11 was probably doomed from the start. Yet the ongoing War on Terrorism that most characterizes our times has cast a muddy shadow on public life that hints of the paranoia and knee-jerk nationalism of the 1950s. Although we have experienced no acts of domestic terrorism in the months since the Sept. 11 attacks, our country is becoming...

JAN 18th NATIONAL MARCH ON WASHINGTON to demand: NO WAR AGAINST IRAQ! ELIMINATE U.S. WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION! Rally at 11 am on the West Side of the Capitol March on the Washington DC Navy Yard What: Charter Buses leaving Ithaca at 12:30AM Saturday January 18th, 2003, to arrive in Washington DC at 8AM. Buses Leave DC at 6PM to arrive back in Ithaca by 1AM Sunday January 19th, 2003. Three, 47-passenger buses are reserved. Where: Green St. Bus Shelter, Tompkins County Public Library Tickets: $40 Round Trip, Available at Autumn Leaves Bookstore on the Commons, Ithaca Scholarships: Up to...

What: Movie Night: "LUNA: The Stafford Giant Tree Sit" When: January 8; 7 pm Where: "Old Jailhouse", 125 E Court St, Ithaca, NY This video chronicles the amazing story of Julia Butterfly Hill's heroic effort to protect a two thousand year old redwood tree. She lived on the tree for over two years, and faced harassment from Pacific Lumber throughout her tree-sit. But the world wide attention that she gained for the tree helped to preserve it forever. This is more than just a story of one woman's fierce campaign to save a forest. It is the story of the...

Lisa Guido, Peter DeMott and Grace Ritter of Ithaca and 13 others were arrested on December 28, 1:30 pm at the White House in Washington DC for participating in a nonviolent, peaceful die-in to protest the ongoing war against Iraq and the invasion of Iraq, now well underway. Some of the participants poured their own blood on themselves during the protest. DeMott and Ritter were charged with participating in a stationary demonstration in a restricted area and released with an order to appear in DC court on April 16; Guido is still being held. All three were part of the...

Meanwhile, at Cornell . . . While Saint Xavier busies itself with damage control over a history professor who cannot distinguish between protest and pedagogy, Cornell University’s health service is debating the important question of whether to sell vibrators in its dispensary. “Many students,” a college newspaper reports, “feel it would be helpful for Gannett [health center] to have vibrators available because Cornell is located in Ithaca, not a major city.” Somjen Frazer, Cornell ’03, explained the problem: “At this point, you either go online or go downtown to the sort of scary and not very woman-affirming place sex-shop.” Paraphrasing...

<p>ITHACA -- While some people dread the cold and snowy weather, Rauncie Pelletier loves everything about the crisp, white flakes covering Tompkins County. "There's just something about the snow and the lights, and I think about getting together with my family," she said. "It just feels really magical to me."</p>

<p>ITHACA -- Thirteen demonstrators were taken into custody Saturday after occupying the foyer of a military recruiting office for more than an hour.</p> <p>The group's supporters, about 60 people dressed in black, marched peacefully outside the office at the Cayuga Mall on Triphammer Road, protesting the United States' and Britain's stance toward Iraq.</p>

<p>When the state began redistricting congressional seats a year ago, Rep. Amo Houghton was worried that his Southern Tier district could disappear.</p> <p>So the wealthy and influential Corning Republican did whatever he could to preserve the constituency he has served for 16 years. Ultimately, he got most of what he wanted.</p>

<p>ITHACA -- Cornell University introduced Jeffrey S. Lehman as its 11th president Saturday afternoon, an alumnus who is the current dean of the law school at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.</p> <p>Lehman will succeed Hunter R. Rawlings III on July 1, 2003. Rawlings announced in March he would step down to return to teaching.</p>

Cornell University announced on Saturday that it has chosen Jeffrey Lehman as its new President. Lehman has been the Dean of the Law School at the University of Michigan. To get an idea of what Lehman is about, I ran a Google search on him. Virtually the only issue that he seems to be strongly associated with is defense of race-based affirmative action. It is Lehman's UM Law School that is the defendant in the famous lawsuit of Grutter v. Bollinger. The plaintiff is a white applicant who was denied admission despite having academic credentials that would have virtually guaranteed...

This is a warning. The story you are about to read is full of Republicans talking about their right-wing views and their impressions on what it likes to be a member of the GOP in a very liberal community. This is a one-sided piece about the role the GOP plays in Tompkins County and about how conservative idealism manages to survive - and some would say thrive - in our politically charged region. If you are not sure you can read a piece that is devoid of left-wing commentary, you may wish to peruse through the rest of this paper....

<p>ITHACA -- If pacifists and human rights workers could agree on a national spokeswoman, Amy Goodman might be it.</p> <p>If Goodman wasn't too busy being a reporter.</p> <p>An anti-establishment hero and host of the national public radio show "Democracy Now!", Goodman will appear at Ithaca College tonight. She spoke to the Journal on Wednesday about the theme for the evening, the role of "independent" media during war.</p>

Last month, a group of conservative students at Cornell University (including yours truly) squared off against radical leftists in a debate on the following question: "Does Cornell University promote racial segregation on campus through its housing policies?" The event was attended by several hundred students, most of whom were extreme left-wing racial minorities who were unable to maintain civility. They repeatedly interrupted speakers, whooped uncontrollably, and viciously attacked a black conservative on the panel. By debate’s end, the audience resembled the sort of trash one would expect to see at the Jerry Springer Show. Still, important arguments were brought to...

<p>"County Tax Bills to Reflect State Mandates" -- Ithaca Journal headline, Dec. 4, 2002.</p> <p>For months now, the Tompkins County Board of Representatives has been on a mission. The goal -- to evade responsibility for a county property tax increase more than five times the rate of inflation.</p>

Tenured Adolescents For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ “Chuck him out, the brute!” But it’s “Saviour of ’is country” when the guns begin to shoot; … —Rudyard Kipling, “Tommy” (1890) We have been reminded of Kipling’s poem “Tommy” a good deal lately. Its most famous line—in which Kipling speaks of “makin’ mock o’ uniforms that guard you while you sleep”—has a special relevance at a moment when anti-war animus is bubbling out of the universities and other protected redoubts of politically correct sentiment. Living in the aftermath of the 1960s and its culture of protest, most of us...

<p>Democrats need to stop blaming themselves for the Republican victories in the 2002 election and start understanding the religious right.</p> <p>Pat Robertson, founder of Christian Coalition wrote in his book "Millennium" in 1990, "with the apathy that exists today, a well organized minority can influence the selection of candidates to an astonishing degree." History has proven Robertson to be correct.</p>

Make Room for Daddy Government The vast majority of government regulations result in restrictions on individual liberty that flush valuable resources down the toilet. Consider the case of an 85-year-old landlord in Ithaca, New York. Let’s call her Mrs. T. to protect her from the long arm of the local government. Mrs. T., like many older widows, does not make use of a large portion of her home. Hence, she chooses to rent out space in her house to college students so as to supplement her income. Each year, she engages in private voluntary arrangements with students who choose to...

<p>"Bush is superman -- but we are his kryptonite!" exclaimed one speaker at the Nov. 15-17 protest against the Western Hemispheric Institute for Security Cooperation (known as the School of Assassins to critics).</p> <p>Between 10,000 and 15,000 people from all over the United States traveled to Fort Benning, Ga. to demand that the federal government shut down the institute and to bring to the attention of the national media this obvious contradiction in U.S. policy.</p>

<p>Regarding the British government's recent condemnation of Saddam Hussein for human rights abuses I pose the following question: From what moral perch does the British government have the audacity to assert that Saddam Hussein is any more an abuser of human rights than England or any other imperialistic autocracy?</p>

<p>President Bush's appointment of Henry Kissinger to lead the investigation of "failures of intelligence" surrounding the Sept. 11 attacks is the last straw for me. This is such an outrageous insult, not only to the families of victims but to the entire American public, that it is almost surreal.</p>

<p>ITHACA -- Picture this: A single Cornell University student consumes 140 pounds of reading material and 56,000 cases of paper are used and disposed at the campus each year.</p> <p>To help people visualize these facts, one artist is inviting people to go to Cornell Arboretum and take a walk to Newman Park and inside Slim Jim Woods. There visitors will find a symbolic representation of the consequences of viewing a forest as a natural resource.</p>

<p>Once again Ithaca demonstrated how hopelessly out of step it is with the rest of the nation by voting in liberal Democrats.</p> <p>As a national party they are in decline, intellectually void of any new ideas and apparently incapable of allowing any kind of independent thinking.</p>

Recently a friend of mine had the courage and tenacity to fully commit himself to the cause of peace in the face of Bush's indomitable war machine. In conjunction with the organization Voices In The Wilderness, Joe Quandt a resident of Albany, boarded a plane for Iraq last month to begin what he hopes will be a journey for peace despite our government's inexorable desire to make war. His decision was based on the overwhelming lack of media coverage emanating from the ground in Iraq and the appalling mendacity of the Bush Administration. Ultimately Joe hopes to provide his fellow...

If television were a state, it would be a red state. I watched Letterman three times last week, and he made a point each time of calling Sadaam Hussein "a stooge and a thug." On Sunday I watched the NFL on Fox (the one time I get to see the Redskins, so of course they get fustigated), and not only did the announcers thank our troops, but several of the commercials were reminders from the NFL to support our armed forces. On Sunday 60 Minutes ran a story portraying the mission of Hans Blix, the head U.N. weapons inspector in...

<p>In a few weeks or months the United States will probably begin bombing the Iraqi people. It should be a teachable moment for teachers to address peace. It won't happen.</p> <p>Only a few teachers will have debates on the impending war, and only a few will attempt to balance the overwhelming American cultural penchant for vengeance and violence.</p>

The new year will bring Ithaca residents a 13.59 percent increase to their tax rate and a significant reduction in city services. The outlook might not be rosy, but Ithaca mayor Alan Cohen still praised members of Common Council for making difficult decisions, one of which included the elimination of the prosecutor's office just moments before approving the final budget and tax rate. "Given the circumstances they were working under, they did a very good job," Cohen said Tuesday. But Alderwoman Diann Sams (D-2nd Ward...noted that many women were slated to lose positions due to this year's budget cuts, and...

<p>ITHACA -- The unknown consequences and the fear of a nuclear war were the topics of a lecture presented by Dr. Helen Caldicott on Sunday night at Ithaca College. "All Americans need to know that America had a radioactive war in 1991 with Iraq," Caldicott said to a mainly non-college age crowd. "There's been a virtual blackout in the American media about it."</p>

Eve Ensler's groundbreaking show, "The Vagina Monologues," comes for multiple performances at the newly renovated State Theater in Ithaca, Nov. 19 through 24. "The Vagina Monologues" is a series of sly, lyrical, incisive first-person vignettes, most hilarious, some heartbreaking, some harrowing, all illuminating the lives of women. Ensler interviewed 200 women about their bodies, particularly their vaginas, and the stories that came from these interviews were "nothing short of astounding," Ensler said. On Ensler's first national tour "The Vagina Monologues" turned from a play into a crusade. 'Vagina' vs. violence "So many women came up to talk to me about...

<p>Following media analysis of the elections, I suggest looking at fundamentalist, Pentecostal, and charismatic churches. I think you'll find their members voted en mass along a straight Republican ticket, providing as many as 25 million votes.</p> <p>Why do the churches active in the religious right vote exclusively Republican? Because the religious right controls the Republican Party.</p>

Racism: Back In Style? By Paul Eastlund, Published 11/11/2002 Last week, a panel discussion on ethnic-based program houses as racial segregation was held in the RPCC multi-purpose room. Fellow Review columnist Elliott Reed and I were invited to attend as panelists. As we approached the building before the debate, a group of black students crossed paths with us. A female in the group greeted Elliott and invited him to enter with their group; Elliott distanced himself from them. The other students walked on, but the female confronted Elliott about his behavior. Elliott explained, "I don';t even know those people." "You...

<p>From the latest budget hearing/ forum we hear that some of the 40 people in attendance may be unable to afford the 20 cents or so per day that the proposed tax rate increase will cost.</p> <p>I wonder if those same people stopped and thought about what, if anything, they purchase each day that costs as little as 20 cents. Cigarettes, beer, candy, soda, milk and cell phones on average cost more that 20 cents a day. However, for this 20 cents a day Tompkins County resident will continue to get roads repaired and plowed, bridges maintained, children and families protected from neglect and abuse and 911 services maintained.</p>