I happened to come across a protest in lower Manhattan today. Members of the LaRouche PAC were dressed as various versions of political figures, including one as Mouse-olini, to rally against the way Barack Obama has been running the country. They even had a picture of the president wearing a Hitler mustache.

-Liza

On Sunday, the ING New York City Marathon ran its way through all five boroughs. Here are some pictures from near mile 15, which was in Long Island City, Queens.

-Liza

Margaret and Angus Hendry cheer on their daughter, Kat during the marathon (photo: Margaret Teich)

Kat Raynour celebrates with her family on the sidelines in Long Island City (photo: Margaret Teich)

The Hendry/Raynour family talks about their daughter Kat and the hard work she put in training for marathon day

[audio:http://blogs.journalism.cuny.edu/interactive2010/files/2009/11/Marathon_Kat-Raynour_1-2.mp3]

When Kat Raynour, just one of the 40,000 runners yesterday participating in New York City Marathon stopped to hug her mother, father, brother, sister, nephew and son at mile 14 in Long Island City, Queens yesterday, she was almost as excited as they were.  The Brooklyn family watched the 26.2 mile run at three separate points in order to cheer on Kat, a legal secretary and her husband as they ran in their first marathons.

Angus Hendry, Kat’s father, said his daughter had been training for a year. During that time, she also raised thousands of dollars for the Lupus Foundation of America, in honor of her mother, Margaret Hendry, who suffers from Lupus.

Lupus is an autoimmune condition, in which the body’s defense system against pathogens attacks the body’s own tissue. GlaxoSmithKline announced a new drug today that scientists are claling a breakthrough for Lupus.

Since the inception of the official charity program of the ING marathon in 2006, more than 13,600 runners have raised over $49.2 million dollars.

“The for-profits are concentrating 100 percent of their effort on teaching students what they want to be taught, when they want to be taught,” says Richard Vedder, director of the Center for College Affordability and Productivity. Programs are designed around fields that need workers, like information technology, nursing and criminal justice. They operate year-round, at night and on weekends. They promise more career guidance than do cash-strapped community colleges.

But the cost of attending a for-profit school is proving to be prohibitive in some cases, especially when compared to community colleges:

For-profit colleges are not cheap, compared with public institutions. One reason is they don’t get government support or collect alumni donations. Tuition at Monroe, which is family owned, costs $11,744 for two semesters, versus $3,150 for a City University of New York community college and about $5,000 in a SUNY baccalaureate program.

According to the College Board, of four-year graduates who take out loans to attend for-profit colleges, 60 percent have amassed at least $30,000 in debt. To attend publics, only 20 percent of borrowers owe that much. And more graduates of for-profit schools default on their loans: 11 percent within the first two years, compared with 5 percent of nonprofit graduates. “With community colleges, you probably aren’t taking on huge amounts of student debt, so your life isn’t ruined even if you fail out,” says Stephen Burd, editor of the New America Foundation’s Higher Ed Watch blog. “But people who drop out of for-profit schools can end up in a nightmare situation with a huge amount of debt.”

So the question becomes: is it a good bet to pay more upfront in the hopes that you’ll land a job quickly and can start to pack back your student loans, or does it make more sense to pursue the cheaper option? Many community colleges are creating programs with targeted training in fields such as health care, so they’re adapting in an effort to win over more students by offering something the for-profits have done and it will be interesting to see which sort of institutions will be able to sustain their growth.

Here is the email she sent back to me:

“When you list an item up for sale, you sign an agreement that whatever the highest bid is how much its sold for. To avoid selling your item at a lower price then wanted you have a higher start bid and or a resevre price. You shouldn’t have set up an auction if you didn’t know the rules. I am a faithful christian woman and feel cheated. Maybe we can work something out so I wont have to report you to ebay.

Let me know, thanks!

” I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”
~ Philippians 4:13~
God Bless”

While I understand her anger, the thing that surprised me was the declaration that she is “a faithful christian woman,” followed by “maybe we can work something out so I wont have to report you to eBay.”

To me, her statement cheapens religious feeling by bringing it into a business transaction. I just don’t see how being a faithful christian woman has anything to do with getting a good deal on eBay. This makes me think of other absolute nonsense that people do in name of religion:

Muslim Woman Tries to Kill Husband; Claims He Fed Her Pork, Liquor

What do you think? Do you see the connection or am I totally out there?

(We made up after a series of emails, she agreed not to report me to eBay, and I plan to re-list my laptop.)

For the first time this semester, I decided to go to school on a Sunday. My Internet went out on the weekend. I had to file a story. I felt incomplete without this connection to the outside world.

But some part of my brain forgot that the 40th annual New York City Marathon was going on (I probably had a fracture in my memory because the story I had to file was about the marathon). Streets were blocked. Crosswalks, blocked. Spectators were kept in place by railings, to stay where they cheered from – the sidewalk.

Photo Credit: Peggy Truong

On Sunday, more than 26 miles of New York City sidewalks were filled with marathon cheers – people, posters, cowbells, cameras and cell phones. “C’mon Jane! You can do it! You’re so close to the water station! C’mon Henry! Go Barb!” yelled the deejay from the Z100 tent. After walking one block west of my apartment, I arrived at the marathon’s 17-mile mark – 1st Avenue and 76th Street.

Photo Credit: Peggy Truong

Oranges and bananas were handed out. Runners picked up bottles of water. Moments later, I found myself being one of the cheering machines. I gave high fives to random runners. I shouted, “Go!” to whatever name was on the bib of the next person on the other side of the railing. I screamed “Go Canada!” when I saw a couple of Canadian flags on a couple of runners.

The energy was bone chilling. The noise was incredible. The people were spectacular. This engagement on the sidewalk lasted for about an hour. My nose froze. My cheeks started to hurt from all the smiling at those whizzing by. I clapped so much that my palms turned into a dark shade of pink.

I never made it to school. Midtown is too far away when you’ve spent a good couple of hours trapped in marathon cheer. I decided to trek across to the Upper West Side to a café with free Internet. During my brisk walk in Central Park, I came across more marathon action. The last of the pack was crossing the finish line. Those who finished earlier were just walking out of the park to the designated reunion area. People were greeted with hugs, flowers and fresh clothes. Another spectacular sight.

Photo Credit: Peggy Truong

History was made today. An American won the race for the first time since 1982. (GO MEB!) Meb Keflezighi crossed the finish line in just over two hours. Marathon favorite Paula Radcliffe, from the UK, failed to make the top three in the women’s category. And I, journalism school student, traded in a couple of academic hours for an afternoon of inspiration.

Nov. 1, 2009 — NYC Marathon from Peggy Truong on Vimeo.

Customers trooped in and out of the store on West Tremont Avenue all afternoon. Silverman had to skip lunch to keep up with his customers’ demands. His brothers and partners, Al and David, as well as the nine other employees, buzzed about like bees making honey.

“We are always very busy here as you can see. Once we open in the morning, we hardly have time for any other engagement than attending to customers,” he said as he wrote out an invoice for a customer.

While most American businesses ail, retrenching staff and recording losses, Silverman’s business, Harrow, Lumber & Hardware Inc. has grown stronger and more profitable in the last year. Its owners won’t discuss its current profit level. But Silverman admits the company is still in good health, despite the recession. In fact, the company is about to hire extra help in response to the growing patronage it says it has enjoyed in recent months.

“We have been lucky, much more than many of our competitors. We know that the economic climate is bad but we have no reason to complain. We are doing well,” Silverman said, beaming with smiles.

Harrow, Lumber & Hardware is among the few businesses in the district that have remained immune from the effects of the recession, triggered by the collapse of the Lehman Brothers in September 2008. An online survey of 3, 974 small businesses conducted by Decision Analyst in January 2009 suggested that many small corporate concerns in the U.S. were groaning under the weight of the global recession. To keep afloat, many businesses across the country have opted to delay equipment purchases, cut supplies, reduce travel expenses and staff entertainment, freeze hiring and limiting overtime.

In its ability to defy the recession, Silverman’s firm is in the league of another Bronx-based company, Buena Vista Glass and Windows, Corp., which deals in the supply, installation and repair of glass doors and windows. Its manager, Abby Gonzalez, said when the recession began and it became apparent that demands would dwindle, the company decided to peg prices for its services “at a very low level.”

“That decision is a blessing to us. We may not have grown as we liked but our profit has not gone down. We are still where we were before the recession. We are OK,” Gonzalez explained.

Things might get even better soon. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke suggested on September 15 in a speech that the recession was over “from a technical perspective.”

But for many other small businesses in Bronx district 5, the recession is yet to ease off. Roc Charles, who runs This Is IT, a barbershop on Tremont Avenue, said the patronage of his shop and his profit have dropped by about 50 percent.

“It is very tough for us. Those who used to barb their hairs every week have reduced it to every two or three weeks. So, for us, it seems the recession is only just beginning,” Charles lamented. “Paying the rent for this shop is even becoming a serious problem for us.”

Meanwhile storeowner Silverman chalks up his escape from the downturn to simple foresight, and recommends that other small businessmen should follow his example.

“We look ahead and try not to be in too much debt at anytime. And whenever patronage is slow, we also try to buy less merchandise,” said Silverman. “Those measures have paid off for us and they can work for others.”

Important as it is, the Supreme Court of the United States is an odd institution. For starters, it’s an undemocratic, even unrepublican body, despite the fact that it’s the third branch of our government. Its members are appointed by a president elected by the public and approved by senators likewise have voters to whom they must answer, but the judges themselves are not elected and have often never been elected to any office before taking their seats as final arbiters as to the scope and meaning of our 233 year-old Constitution. The American people have, at best, a twice-removed input in this bestowing of power. Next, the length of time that power is wielded is limited only by the judge’s desire to continue to do so or the beating of their heart. Supreme Court justices are appointed for life, and while it’s rare that a justice will sit on the bench as long as Robert Byrd has sat at his desk in the Senate, nearly all of them remain long after the president that appointed them has begun to build his library. Finally, crucially, the person that becomes a Supreme Court justice is, of course, a person, prone to change depending on the environment in which they operate.

The President of the United States is answerable to the people of the United States, and his actions are geared toward that audience. There are crises and policy decisions that he must direct, but even in that direction, attention must be paid to the audience, lest fine solutions find little to no support (see Carter, Jimmy). United States Senators answer to their constituencies at home, the national leadership of the political parties and one another. Juggling the concerns of a party platform with the interests of the folks who sent you to office while maintaining cordial relations with the colleagues that will aid or hinder your success is quite an act, and very few members of the Senate manage all three with anything resembling grace. A justice of the United States Supreme Court answers only to the eight other justices, and prevailing in a fight simply requires the justice to convince four others of the righteousness of their opinion. Compared to guaging the opinion of 300 million people, the job is a cinch, yet the power of a justice is equal to, if not greater, than that of the chief executive.

The United States became a world power in the 1920s, as its industrial and financial strength reached across the oceans and began to influence the economies of other nations. Of the presidents since then, only three have made policy or passed legislation that touches Americans on a day-to-day basis: Roosevelt, with Social Security; Eisenhower, with Interstate highways; and Johnson, with the welfare programs of the Great Society and the Voting Rights Act. Were I a less churlish Democrat, I might include Reagan for his tax policies, but I am not, and so therefore I won’t. A partial list of Supreme Court decisions in the same time frame that impact Americans’ lives on a daily basis would include: Brown v. Board of Education, which desegregated public schools; Miranda v. Arizona, which required people detained by police to be notified of their rights; Roe v. Wade, the implications of which I assume everyone is familiar; Bowers v. Hardwick, which upheld laws that criminalized sodomy; and Lawrence v. Texas, which overruled Bowers.

Put much more succinctly, the justices a President appoints shape the legacy of the nation far more than any other decision he might undertake in office (unforeseen crises and world wars excepted).

Which returns us to the fact that they’re people point. Much of the left’s favorite bits of jurisprudence was authored by justices appointed by Republicans, and many Democratic appointees have proven either too idealistic or timid to leave a deep impression on the law. Earl Warren, Chief Justice during Brown and Miranda, was appointed by Eisenhower. John Paul Stevens, the Ted Kennedy of the current court, is a Ford appointee. Harry Blackmun, author of Roe, was nominated by Richard Nixon. Sandra Day O’Connor (Reagan) and David Souter (H.W. Bush) saved Roe in the early 90s. Were the presidents who picked them for the court allowed to decide those cases, the rulings would almost certainly have been different. Democrat-appointed justices have either found themselves standing alone on principle (Thurgood Marshall and, often, Ruth Bader Ginsburg) or authoring minor opinions on minor matters (Stephen Breyer) because their lifetime appointments distract them from the meaning of Justice White’s maxim – that the Supreme Court, though markedly different from the other two branches of government, still requires consensus before action. You have to get to five. Right now, that basically means you have to convince Anthony Kennedy that your view of an issue before the Court is correct. But that will not always be so.

Barack Obama has appointed one justice, Sonia Sotomayor, since his election. What model of jurisprudence she follows will become clear as the years pass. However, President Obama, particularly if he is re-elected, could have the opportunity to re-shape the Court in a way that few presidents ever have. John Paul Stevens is in his early 90s. Ruth Bader Ginsburg is being treated for cancer and, even before that, publicly declared that she was preparing to retire. Both of these seats are likely to open up before 2012. After 2012, the real opportunity (if you’re a lefty legal lush like me) arises. Justice Kennedy will be nearing 80, Justice Scalia will be in his late 70s and Justice Thomas, if current trends hold, will be approximately 400 lbs. The odds that these three remain on the court through 2016 are scant. There is the chance, of course, that any or all of Obama’s picks will make surprise turns rightward and the current conservative alignment of the court will not change. That’s the risk run by not having democratic oversight of the judiciary. But there’s the tantalizing prospect that, for the first time since LBJ, all three branches of government will be essentially progressive and that societal change and positive upheaval will have a predictable and lasting legacy.