According to eyewitness reports, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan of the U.S. Army opened fire at Fort Hood on Nov. 5, 2009 and yelled “Allahu Akbar” — “God is the Greatest.” To those present at the scene, at that moment of horrendous bloodshed when 13 people were killed, it must have appeared like total social breakdown. Today, it is still hard to fathom the horrific events. In writing my last column about terrorism, I chose not to discuss the deplorable attack. It had happened recently and the implications were not clear. Yet almost immediately, speculation began that this was an act…

For decades, the United States government has worked to imprison or kill radical ideologues who actively seek to murder innocent civilians. Recently, this activity has been renamed the “war on terror” as part of an elaborate public relations campaign by the Bush administration. Setting aside this superfluous designation, however, it is clear that the war on terror has never been anything but an extended exercise in law enforcement. Don’t say that to a conservative though, as they are very sensitive about people belittling our enemies. And it makes sense: they have a lot riding on finding a new arch nemesis…

“The Congress will not pass this,” Republican Rep. John Boehner of Ohio said more than six weeks ago, agreeing that the Democratic health care reform bill was dead. Kneejerk disbelief is what one might have expected from the leader of the Republicans — the leader of a party whose lack of ideas derives directly from its lack of imagination. If health care legislation does pass this year, it will be an unprecedented feat by Democratic politicians. In the face of economic crisis and multiple wars, moneyed opposition and misinforming media, policy disputes and dire predictions, Democrats have pressed on for…

While watching live news feed updates on Facebook the other day, I was suddenly reminded of the time I read “The Grapes of Wrath.” Veiled concern weighed on one post after another. One friend had a bad job interview; two more discussed moves out West and down South in search of work; another was irritated at living with his parents post-college. These posts are typical lately. It’s no secret that young people face a bleak job market. By one measure, about one out of every five want a job but cannot get one — not surprising since seven million jobs…

Conservatives are gloating over the prospect of soundly defeating a Nobel Laureate in the battle of poll-driven politics. They keep a tally of all his defeats, celebrating each check on their hit list. Soon, they insist, they will add health care and climate change legislation to that list, and by then they will have won. But they are wrong. Fundamental political changes often remain indistinct until events unfold to reveal them. Politicians continue to talk, broadcasters stay focused on past issues and segments of the public cling to old views, as if nothing has happened. Until eventually, after months of…

Will an extra-long rainstorm end human life as we know it? What about a few horsemen and some angels with trumpets? Maybe the Earth’s polarity will reverse in 2012, as predicted by ancient peoples without telescopes. We avoided violent chaos in 2000, as a computer bug threatened to turn modern times into a technological deathtrap (Watch out! Those traffic lights think it’s 1900!), but we were not able to avoid mass hysteria. Indeed, human history can be viewed as an absurd chronicle of conspiracy-theory freak-outs, and we are more than living up to the precedent of paranoia set by our…

There is a great uprooting of the accumulated wisdom of the last several centuries because new forms of communication are well underway. It has been written about, mostly on the Internet, for years, but up to this point the speculation of so-called futurists has appeared like the mutterings of a mad man: all prophecy, but no proof. It was easy to dismiss dire warnings of drastic change. This is not the case anymore. Within years, social networks like Facebook will provide more cohesive systems for personal inclusion in a collective effort than soon-to-be archaic notions like nationhood and religion. Already,…

As Saddam Hussein stood before a mocking crowd at Camp Justice, upon the same gallows where his orders of execution had been carried out for decades, and as the crowd chanted the name of one of his enemies (“Muqtada, Muqtada!”) in the moments before his death, he asked, “Do you consider this bravery?” A poignant question, though the lack of self-awareness displayed by the former murderous dictator is astounding (Saddam gained power by conspiratorially executing all of his rivals and was found by American troops cowering at the bottom of a hole). The bloodthirsty jeers of those witnessing Saddam Hussein’s…

“God damn America.” These three words, without context or explanation, might have emerged from any number of sources: a laid-off worker, an irreverent comedian, a black pastor, a person who has lost family or friends in conflict. In their exclamation, these speakers grasp to articulate complex grievances with the United States, but settle on the simplicity of righteous indignation. Does this short verbal assault on the United States, usually expressed in service of a larger point, represent a slight against the ideals of the soldiers and social workers, business people and bureaucrats, community organizers and others who collectively define America?…

In January, the spectacle of presidential politics will reach a new level as Barack Obama, the orator-in-chief, the supreme family man, the star basketball player, the reflective lawyer, someone who represents the United States as no one else has, is sworn into office. Huddled around flat-screen TVs and Internet streams, Americans will watch Obama’s inaugural address with millions or even billions of people around the world. He will have an unprecedented opportunity to gather support for his plans. Nearly 60 Democratic senators will be sworn in with Obama, and moderates in the GOP will likely support him based on the…

We’ve been dogged by it for two years now. The question had reached such epic proportions that it seemed to defy any answer and obscure perspective past the date in question, Nov. 4. Well, now it’s answered, and a question remains unanswered: What now? I can’t be the only person who had an acute experience of surreality on Tuesday night, toasting a victory that was a long time coming but that seemed too good to be true, so amazing that crowds gathered in Times Square and on Pennsylvania Avenue in spontaneous patriotic uprisings that accompany elections around the world but…

I’ve been saving all of my best material about the election for a column that was supposed to be written right before Nov. 4, but my math skills have left me in a bad spot. You see, in “your time,” as you read this, it is the future, three to five days after I write this column. It’s too late for anything I say to reverberate enough to make any difference, so my only choice is to perform a pre-postmortem of this “defining” election — a risky choice, since we haven’t yet been defined, but I tend to be pretty…

The city of Binghamton and I have been working through a philosophical disagreement over the last few months. It goes like this: I don’t think that I should have to gather trash off the streets of Downtown Binghamton as punishment for carrying an open beer around the corner from my house. The city judge disagrees, and he has the state behind him. So be it — there are worse things than an early morning walk, and trash picking is surprisingly relaxing. Equipped with a picker, which at this point feels like a third arm, I’ve spent eight hours so far…

With Nov. 4 around the corner and an electorate more unified behind Barack Obama than we’ve seen for any presidential candidate since at least 1996, the Republican ticket has determined that it must cynically redivide the country in a relentless campaign of character assassination. It began this weekend, with Sarah Palin on Saturday accusing Obama of “palling around” with domestic terrorists, in an absurd charge that proves that John McCain’s campaign isn’t worried about being subtle as it exploits the barely subterranean racial resentment that can be found in many parts of the country. Palin was more explicit later: “This…

It is a long and drowsy ride down Interstate 88 when it’s noon on a Sunday and hot on a deteriorating Greyhound bus. The sun is too bright for sleep and the interior too gloomy for productivity, so the only thing to do is to watch the green rolling hills and rivers, the small towns cut in half by cars that speed by but never stop, the mines and smokestacks and high schools, dormant on Sunday or maybe forever. Laid before the rumbling bus, this panorama invites reflection on the simplest things, like what we take for granted. The gradual…

On a May evening in Florida this year, Rachel Hoffman, 23, drove with $13,000 in her pocket down a backwoods road. After two hasty location changes, the drug deal — a police sting with Rachel as the informant — would take place under the concealing canopy of the forest in the middle of nowhere. Little did Rachel know that the police had lost track of her miles earlier. She was going it alone, buying 1,500 ecstasy pills, cocaine and a handgun from two large-volume drug dealers, and she had little choice. After being caught with .25 pounds of marijuana and…

Yielding to the inevitable power of industrial machinery, the loose earth gives way and is siphoned gently to the surface, discarded onto a slowly rising heap of waste. The drill drives deeper and deeper until it hits a wall of solid rock where it lingers a moment before shattering the shale into dust. Millions of gallons of water are sluiced from local streams and rivers, and are redirected to the fresh perforation in the earth’s surface and incorporated into a mix with toxic chemicals and sand. The concoction is then fired 9000 feet into the ground with the power of…

Students living under R-1, R-2 or R-3 zoning on Binghamton’s West Side should not expect any imminent changes to the zoning regulations that render many of them law-breakers, according to a Binghamton City councilwoman. Currently, R-1 zoning, which spans across much of the West Side, makes any housing configuration that includes more than three unrelated people illegal. Single dwelling houses in the R-2 and R-3 zones are held to the same standard. The law was used in February to order the eviction of six students living on Lincoln Avenue. Despite negotiations between members of the Landlords Association of Broome County…

Starting next year, students in residence halls should be prepared to open their dorm room door for Binghamton University staff at any time — or else they may be charged for violating a rewritten “failure to cooperate” policy. BU Council made several changes Friday to the Rules of Student Conduct manual that will affect students starting next year. The new 2008-09 edition creates a penalty for students who do not open their doors for University officials. Members of the council received copies of changes proposed by the department of Student Affairs about a week in advance of the meeting. They…

University Police Lt. Mady Bay stood across from a portrait of a smiling Nelson Mandela last Tuesday and, choked up, asked students, faculty and staff at Binghamton University to lead lives of compassion. “Helping people. Standing up for yourself. Standing up for your friends. We need to work together because we are a community,” she said to a quick round of applause — the last words of a short ceremony in the Mandela Room honoring the lives of those killed in college shootings. The memorial was the day before the one year anniversary of the Virginia Tech massacre, where a…

With a little more than a month until renovations start on the Old University Union, Binghamton University administrators are still searching for a solution to the inevitable cut in programming space. The Old Union is slated to be offline for a full year, leaving student groups and event planners scrambling for locations to hold their events. The renovations will hit areas that hosted a total of more than 500 events last year. Binghamton University Union Events Relocation Committee, an ad hoc task force, has generated a report that lists solutions to mediate the space cramp. A body that includes mostly…

A soldier overseas uses advanced electronics to detect chemical weapons before they can do anybody harm; a hiker recharges his GPS with a portable high-powered solar panel; Pipe Dream is displayed on flexible electronic paper. Binghamton University took a step towards bringing these imaginable but unrealized technologies to life last week when it officially inaugurated the Center for Advanced Microelectronic Manufacturing (CAMM). The center, located on a 10,000-square-foot property in Endicott owned by Endicott Interconnect Technologies (EIT), includes unique and sophisticated electronics manufacturing equipment. It is expected to take a leading role in researching and testing new manufacturing methods that…

Also passed by the Student Assembly on Monday was a resolution calling on Binghamton University to determine whether its nondiscrimination policies are incompatible with the Food and Drug Administration’s policy that excludes men who have had sexual intercourse with another man from donating blood. The resolution notes that AIDS is not confined to the homosexual community and that the policy of excluding gay men from giving blood to prevent its spread is not supported by evidence. It also states that the Red Cross itself supports allowing men to give blood one year after sexual intercourse with another man. The FDA…

Spring break was not enough to cool the simmering campus controversy over whether police at Binghamton University should be armed with Tasers. For the first time, the Student Association involved itself in the dispute by voting unanimously Monday in support of a resolution requesting an “open forum” held between students, administration and Binghamton’s New York State University Police. The resolution calls on SA President David Bass to “work on organizing an open forum in conjunction with University administration.” It also states that “the Student Association formally opposes the unilateral decision to arm UPD with Tasers.” “I think the sentiment is…

About 10 student activists opposing the use of Tasers by campus police were intercepted Friday by Binghamton University administrators in the lobby of the Couper Administration Building. The students were delivering a stack of letters to the offices of President Lois DeFleur, Vice President for Administration James Van Voorst and Vice President for student affairs Brian Rose. The letters called on the University police department to “remove all Tasers from their arsenal.” The activists included members of the Experimental Media Organization and BU’s chapter of Amnesty International. The event was a result of a series of meetings this semester in…

Were legalized abortion, gay marriage and other liberal ideologies steps down the road to Sept. 11? On Friday, April 18, Binghamton University students will have the opportunity to hear one answer to this question from prolific conservative intellectual Dinesh D’Souza. D’Souza, who has been invited to speak in the Mandela Room by the College Republicans, has courted controversy for more than two decades with a series of opinions that some might call provocative, and others incendiary. His views generally align with the prevailing opinions of the conservative movement, although at times he has clashed with his colleagues in the right-wing…

More than 50 people gathered in Lecture Hall 1 Sunday night to hear a provocative speech by economist and commentator Julianne Malveaux. Her visit, part of a series of events sponsored by the Black Student Union to celebrate Black History Month, explored issues of multiculturalism, politics and economics. “To say you’re tired of diversity is like saying you’re tired of the sunrise,” Malveaux said. “The sun will rise and the sun will fall. Similarly, with diversity, we have a series of trends that have already been put in place, so whether you like it or not, the fact is that…

The clash of colors that characterize human vision, as explored by famed abstract artist Josef Albers, is the subject of a new exhibit at the Binghamton University Art Museum. Curator Lynn Gamwell will be giving two lectures during the exhibit’s month-long stay to elucidate the ties between Albers’ artwork and modern science. Though to some his work may initially seem simple, Albers’ overlapping boxes of colors and shades became the foundation of color theory, which is still regularly taught in art classes. “This is the science of color, it’s about physiology,” Gamwell, who holds a Ph. D in art history…