American Girl, the company that produces toys and stories emphasizing a girls eye view of significant periods of American History is coming under attack for refusing to severe its ties with Girls Inc.

Girls Inc, formerly Girls Club of America is a non profit organization that encourages girls to buck gender rolls and develop leadership skills. From the Girls Inc Website

Grounded in research and tested in the field, Girls Inc. programs address the whole girl. They build her athletic skills and competitive spirit, nurture her ability and interest in science, math and technology, equip her with critical health and sexuality information, provide her leadership experience, teach her media literacy and money management skills, and foster her self-respect and self-determination

May all of you have a Happy Thanksgiving tommorow!

From the Open Voting Consortium

California Secretary of State Bruce McPherson is forming a panel to investigate using open source software in elections. He has invited OVC president Alan Dechert to be on the panel, and has asked for Dechert's input on who should be on the panel.

The article goes on to say that Senator McPherson was one of the few Republicans to vote for Open Source Voting software.

Open Source Voting Software would mean that programmers everywhere would be involved in designing, writing, and protecting the integrity of California's Voting System. It would also mean that how the software worked could be understood by every citizen!

From the Herald Sun

"A trio of Duke University sophomores say they drove to New Orleans late last week, posed as journalists to slip inside the hurricane-soaked city twice, and evacuated seven people who weren't receiving help from authorities.

The group, led by South Carolina native Sonny Byrd, say they also managed to drive all the way to the New Orleans Convention Center, where they encountered scenes early Saturday evening that they say were disgraceful."

Daniel Dennett, brilliant author of Consciousness Explained and Professor of Philosophy at Tufts, suggests on his website that Intelligent Design Theory is a Hoax and asks who is perpetrating the Hoax

"The proponents of intelligent design use an ingenious ploy that works something like this," writes Tufts philosopher Daniel C. Dennett, and author of Darwin's Dangerous Idea. "First you misuse or misdescribe some scientist's work. Then you get an angry rebuttal. Then, instead of dealing forthrightly with the charges leveled, you cite the rebuttal as evidence that there is a "controversy" to teach."

Yahoo News has an amazing story of a man who spent 8 1/2 in jail, not prison, because his case never went to trial. The article reviews the state of crisis that our Public Defender system is in all across the country.

A national phenomenon

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