- Not sure what it says about your college or university if you have to instate a policy banning banned the wearing of women's clothes, makeup, high heels and purses – by dudes. Such is the situation at Morehouse College, an all-male college in Atlanta, Georgia. The new rules are part of a new crackdown on what the institution calls inappropriate attire. Why an all-male school would need a far-reaching dress code called its "Appropriate Attire Policy" and which includes a no dress-wearing rule, I do not know. Some of the other aspects of the new policy are a bit more logical, if not misguided, lame and in the spirit of ripping some of the quintessential parts of the college experience from the Morehouse student body. Those aspects would include a ban on wearing hats in buildings, pajamas in public, do-rags, sagging pants, sunglasses in class and walking barefoot on campus. The no dresses worn by guys, that I get. Sunglasses in class are just lame, as are sunglasses in any indoor setting. Whoever you are, you’re not cool enough to wear shades indoors and get away with it. But no pajamas in public? What the hell? College is all about being able to roll out of bed ten minutes before your first class, realize how late you’re running and shuffle off to class in your pajama pants and favorite old t-shirt. And no walking barefoot on campus? Why not? You’re in freaking Atlanta, one of the best-climate big cities in the country. If guys want to walk around barefoot on the grass while enjoying a beautiful ATL afternoon, let them. But I suppose when you’re a private college with a miniscule 2,700-member student body, you can make these types of rules and get away with it. Also, this situation follows the norm of a few troublemakers ruining the fun for everyone. Dr. William Bynum, vice president for Student Services at Morehouse, explained that the new policy is aimed at a small part of the student body. "We are talking about five students who are living a gay lifestyle that is leading them to dress a way we do not expect in Morehouse men," he said. Before you decry this as an offensive attack on homosexuals, homosexual community, listen to what I’m about to say. Bynum explained that before the school released the policy, he met with Morehouse Safe Space, the campus' gay organization. "We talked about it and then they took a vote," he said. "Of the 27 people in the room, only three were against it." Around campus, the new policy has already drawn sharp criticism from many students. Senior Devon Watson said he disagrees with parts of the new policy, especially those that tell students what they should wear in free time outside of the classroom. "I feel that there will be a lot of resentment and backlash," Watson said. "It infringes on the student's freedom of expression. I matriculated successfully for three-and-half years dressing so how is this a problem?" First off, props for successfully executing the word matriculation in a sentence. Safe to say that 99 percent of college students, be it at a historically black school like Morehouse, a public university with students of all races, an all-male or all-female school or a liberal arts college, could not accomplish that. But I wholeheartedly agree with Watson that the policy goes too far and infringes on the free will of students to dress the way they want outside of class. As it relates to class, dress code violators will not be allowed to go to class unless they change. Those who repeatedly violate the dress code could be suspended from the college. One wonders what notable Morehouse alumni like Martin Luther King Jr., actor Samuel Jackson and Spike Lee would think of the new policy. As for me, I’m down with the ban on dressing like a chick, but beyond that this new policy sounds like a load of crap……………
- Hip-hip….goodbye. Washington Redskins coach Jim Zorn, who famously shouted, “Hip-hip, hooray!” during a postgame victory speech last season, may soon be uttering the line I just used. Already under fire entering this season, Zorn’s Redskins have gone 2-4 against what could arguably be the easiest schedule in the NFL so far this season. The team’s two wins have come against two of the league’s three remaining winless teams, Tampa Bay and St. Louis. Those wins were by a combined total of five points, hardly an inspiring margin. The ‘Skins have also lost to 1-5 Detroit and Sunday, they lost to a Kansas City team that entered the game 0-5. The 14-6 loss was a true clunker in which neither team scored a touchdown. The offensively stunted game also featured Zorn yanking starting quarterback Jason Campbell at halftime and replaced him with Todd Collins, who hadn't played since the end of the 2007 season. Collins was equally ineffective, but this game could be the death knell for Campbell’s career in Washington. He was 9-of-16 passing for 89 yards and an interception, leading his team to no first-half points. Toward the end of the game, Zorn stood alone on the sideline Sunday, his headset off, his arms folded across his chest as the few fans who hadn’t headed for the exits lustily booed his lackluster team. He then entered the room for his postgame news conference and kicked things off with a loud, lengthy sigh into the microphone. “I've got to be better. And it really irritates me. Truly irritates me," Zorn said. "And I'm just not going to rest until I get that taken care of." Actually coach, you are going to rest before you resolve that problem, even if it’s not of your own volition. See, owner and noted pompous ass Daniel Snyder will soon be relieving you of your duties and giving you lots of free time, like it or not. Heck, I’m surprised the impetuous D. Snyder didn’t storm the field as soon as the game ended, cut in front of Kansas City coach Todd Haley as he tried to shake Zorn’s hand in the traditional coaches’ handshake after the game and fire Zorn on the spot. The fact that Zorn even made it back to his office after the game is astonishing to me, because no way does a meddlesome, blowhard owner like Snyder stomach that sort of loss by a team he is paying a ridiculously bloated salary to and just let it slide. With an extra day before their next game due to it being a Monday night contest Oct. 26 against the Philadelphia Eagles, Snyder has all the time he needs to ax Zorn and bring in his next terrible coach. Zorn’s players may be trying to show their support for him through their words, but their actions on the field haven’t exactly validated their coach’s methods and they know it. "Winning would help," linebacker London Fletcher said. "We haven't performed up to our abilities to help coach Zorn out." No L., you haven’t. Despite being the first team in NFL history to face six consecutive winless opponents, you are in last place in the NFC East and sinking fast. As bad as this past week was, losing to Kansas City is going to make the coming week even worse. "It's going to be a very hard week. Last week, I thought that was as hard as it can get," Zorn said. "It just got harder." Again, that depends on your definition of harder. See, in a few days you’re not going to have to worry about how to lead the Redskins to a win at all, so in that sense your life could be about to get much easier, Jimmy. Someone else is about to inherit your headache and be on the receiving end of Snyder’s vitriol when the talented-yet-losing ‘Skins drop a game to a team they have no business losing to. Looks like former Redskins great John Riggins was right on the mark in his recent YouTube rant about the terrible state his former team is in. Perhaps Riggo would be interested in coaching the Redskins for the rest of the season? Lord knows he couldn’t do any worse than Jim Zorn………………
- Tonight was Sylar reclamation night on Heroes, with Samuel Sullivan and his merry band of superpowered carnival misfits looking to turn everyone’s favorite jack-of-all-powers bad guy back into his old self. After appearing out of thin air in the middle of the forest last week to allow Sylar to enter their carnival crew, the Sullivan Bros. gang went to work on their newest family member. After giving Sylar a warm bed and change of clothes, Samuel hopes his memory will return. And the memories do return, but they’re not Sylar’s. They are Nathan Petrelli’s memories, on account of Matt Parkman using his mind control powers to force Nathan’s memories into Sylar last season and turn Sylar’s body into Nathan’s in the process. Being shot and killed a couple episodes ago brought out Sylar again, but he can’t shake Nathan’s memories. Frustrated, Samuel calls in the big guns with another member of his family named Damian. Damian takes Sylar into the house of mirrors and without speaking a word, places his hands on Sylar’s head and transports him into some weird zone of consciousness that allows all of Sylar’s memories of the people he has killed in his life to come flooding back. He’s horrified at the sight and runs from the room, throwing up in a trash can as he realizes what a monster he is. Samuel finds him and tells him that now he knows who he is and that he needs to be honest with himself. To that end, Samuel has sent out his right-hand man, Edgar, to deliver free tickets to the carnival to Capt. Lubbock, the police detective who arrested Sylar last episode. Capt. Lubbock and his family have come to the carnival and Samuel “suggests” that Sylar use this chance to resolve his legal troubles and take care of Lubbock. Sylar returns to the house of mirrors to confront Lubbock, but instead of going for the kill, he urges Lubbock to leave. Instead, the detective draws his pistol and Sylar’s powers to a) stop bullets and b) emit electrical impulses from his hands pop up. He electrocutes Lubbock but not enough to kill him. When Sylar won’t finish the job, Edgar whirls in with his super speed and ability to wield knives with that speed and offs Lubbock. He wonders to Samuel afterward what good Sylar is to them if he won’t unleash his powers and use them to kill. Samuel explains that they will rebuild a new, better Sylar and when they do, he’ll belong to them. Lydia, the Tattooed Lady, then leads Sylar off for a little alone time as the party rages on. Later that day, Sylar is baptized into the family by Samuel and welcomed as its newest member. New faces are also the order of the day for Noah Bennet, who finds himself confronted with an interesting challenge courtesy of Peter Petrelli. Peter is at the hospital with Hiro Nakamura, who teleported from Tokyo to Peter’s apartment in New York last week and summarily collapsed. At the hospital, Peter learns the truth about Hiro’s brain tumor and the short amount of time he has to live. Peter and Hiro trade theories about whether fate brought them together and what for, but Peter decides to alter fate by taking Hiro’s power to teleport and using it to find someone with the power to heal in order to cure his friend. On the way out of the room, Peter runs into Emma, the deaf woman who has just discovered her own power to see sounds as colors. Peter tells her about his mission and suggests that in the interim, she talk to Hiro about her worries over her new power. Peter teleports to Noah’s apartment, where the man formerly known as H.R.G. is being visited by his daughter Claire. When Peter shares his dilemma, Claire wonders if her power to heal from any wound could help Hiro through a blood transfusion. H.R.G. says no because Hiro’s tumor is living tissue and her blood would only make the tumor grow faster. However, when working for the Company he came across a boy named Jeremy who was a healer and could help Hiro. With H.R.G. in tow, Peter teleports to Cainan, Georgia. They approach Jeremy’s house and walk inside, where they find Jeremy’s parents mysteriously dead. Plus, everything in and around the house – plants and pets – are also dead and the place reeks of death. Noah explains that he once knew a girl who had the power to heal but it turned on her and she then had the power to sap the life from people. As the two examine the dead bodies, shots ring out from upstairs and Jeremy opens fire on them with a shotgun. Noah returns fire and tells Peter about a fire escape on the back of the house he can use to get upstairs safely. Noah then tries to talk Jeremy down from his proverbial ledge, explaining that he knows about his power and all of the pain it has caused him. A distraught Jeremy laments that everything he touches dies, including his parents – although it was an accident. Still on edge, Jeremy continues to point his shotgun at Noah until Peter teleports between them and tries to wrest the gun from Jeremy. The gun goes off and Peter stops time mid-blast, seeing the explosion from the gun’s barrel right in front of him. Looking down, he realizes that he didn’t stop time in time and has been shot. He collapses to the ground and Noah realizes he won’t survive long enough to make it to the hospital. His only hope is for Jeremy to harness his power to heal and save Peter’s life, with Noah’s encouragement. Jeremy mans up, focuses and gets the job done, bringing Peter back to life. After his revival. Peter is able to copy Jeremy’s power and Noah arranges for a private jet to fly him back to New York so he can heal Hiro. Noah then rigs the scene at Jeremy’s house to make it appear that his parents died accidentally of a carbon monoxide leak and vows to stay around until he’s sure that Jeremy is okay. Meanwhile, back in New York, Hiro and Emma are forging a bond. At first Emma only wants to know how to “turn my powers off,” but Hiro is determined to show her they are a gift to be used for good. To that end, he arranges an impromptu magic show for his fellow patients and leaves an invitation taped to Emma’s computer monitor. She shows up to see “Hiro the Magnificent” and gets pulled into the final trick of his act. He promises to make her disappear and hides her behind a blanket before stopping time. With time stopped, Emma steps out from behind the blanket and sees the sounds/colors emanating from the patients’ applause. She actually touches the waves of light and remarks about how beautiful it all is. Happy to have won her over, Hiro has Emma hide in the back of the room and unfreezes time to finish his trick. Everyone is amazed that he has actually made Emma disappear and she pops out from behind a screen in the back of the room. That’s all well and good, but Hiro’s strict nurse wants him back in bed ASAP. While in bed, Hiro begins telling Emma about his friend Charlie, the waitress from Odessa, Texas that he fell in love with and had to watch die because of her own brain disorder. That makes Hiro realize that on his bucket list of wrongs in his life to right before he dies, saving Charlie escaped him. He writes it down now and vows to get the job done, but Emma makes him promise not to go anywhere until Peter returns to heal him. She then wanders down the hall and begins playing the piano, drawing a crowd as she does. Emma sees the colors as she plays and Hiro is drawn by the sound of her music, joining the onlookers. Once she finishes playing, Emma orders Hiro back to bed and as he turns to go, he vanishes into thin air, teleporting back in time three years to the sidewalk outside the Burnt Toast diner in Odessa, where he looks inside and sees Charlie. Peter walks into the hospital prepared to heal Hiro but is told by Emma that he’s gone. Looking at the handwritten note Hiro left behind, “Save Charlie,” Peter realizes what has happened but has no idea what to do next. So that’s the episode, not a particularly good one. No Ando, no Mohinder Suresh, no Matt Parkman, almost no Claire Bennet, no Angela Petrelli, no Tracy Strauss…..in other words, the same problem that has plagued Heroes the past two-plus seasons, multiplied to the nth degree. Until next week, when the same problem will undoubtedly pop up again……………
- If nothing else, I’ll say this or the president of Maldives and his Cabinet: They know how to stage a good pub-grabbing event. As part of their quest to convince the United Nations to focus on the threat climate change poses to the archipelago nation located off the southwestern coast of India, President Mohamed Nasheed and his cabinet held an underwater meeting Saturday to sign signed a declaration calling for global cuts in carbon emissions that will be presented before a U.N. climate summit in December. The meeting took place around a table about 16 feet underwater, with all participants clad in wetsuits and scuba gear and using hand signals to communicate. "We are trying to send our message to let the world know what is happening and what will happen to the Maldives if climate change isn't checked," Nasheed said. According to Nasheed’s website, the president was asked at the meeting what would happen if the plan outlined in the ratified agreement fails. His response was simple, direct and frightening: If it fails, "we are all going to die." Following the meeting, the ministers signed their wet suits, which are being auctioned to raise money for coral reef protection in the Maldives. What makes Nasheed’s words so scary is that for he and his people, there is very little hyperbole in what he says. Based on the current pace of climate change and the rising sea levels that result from that change, Maldives could very well go under water if nothing is done. For the geographically clueless among you, the Maldives is an archipelago of almost 1,200 coral islands, much of which lie just 4.9 feet above sea level. Based on the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change’s projections a rise in sea levels of at least 7.1 inches by the end of the century, you can see that within a decade, much of Maldives could literally be consumed by the ocean. The country's capital, Male, is protected by sea walls, but creating a similar barrier around the rest of the country will be cost-prohibitive. You may recall that shortly after he was elected in November, Nasheed raised the possibility of finding a new homeland for the country's 396,000 residents and I suggested that it was a great opportunity for someone out there to adopt a nation. Since then, Nasheed’s government has spoken with several countries about the possibility of such a relocation and found them to be "receptive." Logical options would seem to be lands owned by Sri Lanka and India because the countries have similar cultures, cuisine and climate. Australia is also a possibility because it owns a huge quantity of unoccupied land, but then again, that land is unoccupied for a reason, likely because it’s not a superb place to live. Then again, anything is preferable to living underwater, which is what may Maldivians could be facing very soon…………
- With all of the recent stories of impending environmental doom I’ve been forced to bring you of late, I thought a story from the opposite end of the spectrum would be a nice change-up. In that spirit, I bring you the tale of Envion CEO Michael Han, a green entrepreneur who says he has found a cost-effective method for turning plastic trash into oil. Han recently welcomed viewers to his new demonstration plant in Maryland, where he explained his process: Waste plastic is shredded, melted and then processed in a way that separates the petroleum from the rest of the ingredients. The shredded plastic trash is sent to one end of the machinery, dumped in a hopper and sent up a conveyor belt into a "reactor." At the other end of the machinery, a collection of pipes, tanks and valves reside to complete the rest of the process. Inside the pipes is an apple juice-colored liquid with a fuel-esque smell, a liquid Han claims is ready to be processed for any number of uses: fueling cars, diesel generators or even jets. That’s the positive end of this story, but there is also an issue raised by the process that must be addressed. Because there are some ingredients in plastic that can’t be refined into petroleum, the chemicals that were added when the plastic was produced must be separated out and collected in a sediment tank. The question of what to do with those extra ingredients is one that doesn’t yet have a solid answer. According to Greenpeace researcher Kert Davies, several biohazards could be posed by Han’s waste products from producing oil. “What happens to the additives and the metals and the other things?" Davies asked. When told that Envion plans to either find asphalt makers who can use the sludge as an ingredient for paving or dry up the waste by microwaving and sending the dust to a landfill, he was skeptical. "Then you end up with a different problem," Davies said. "Is that going to a hazardous waste landfill?" Han counters that the dust is in fact not hazardous and that the process used to create it releases no gas into the air. "You don't smell anything burning," he said. "We don't incinerate. We simply melt." Now Envion is must sell the technology to sanitation departments, with the chief selling point being its potential to cut down on their trash volume by consuming up to 10,000 tons of plastic per year while producing some revenue as well. Han believes that his plant could produce up to 60,000 barrels of oil a year and be more than profitable in spite of the $4 million cost to build it. His chief selling point is that his engineered oil could sell for as little as $10 a barrel at a time when oil is selling for more than $70 a barrel. So there you have it folks, finally a positive environmental story for once instead of the regular gloom-and-doom…………
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