User:Jrtayloriv/Scratchpad

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 * Great quote from Tunney, ... find more info about the amendment in question
 * 

Systemic bias

 * Average wikipedian
 * Where does that person get their information? What type of socio-political environment were they raised in?
 * What types of information gets excluded? Things that deviate far from the norm amongst white male, English-speaking, educated, white-collar workers in developed countries.
 * What is are two of the heaviest influences in the way this demographic thinks? State education and corporate media.
 * What types of things tend to get left out or removed? Points of view not expressed in state education or corporate media.
 * How do we fix that? Push to make it clearer that we should be aiming for factual accuracy and full context, rather than trying to mimic the weights given to topics in the corporate press or school textbooks.

Commodity market

 * Definitions and classification
 * Etym.
 * Historical usage of term
 * Types of commodities


 * History
 * Pre-history / Stateless horticulturalist/hunter-gatherer societies
 * Ancient city-states
 * Feudalism
 * Mercantalism/Nation-states/Capitalism
 * Modern markets & globalization


 * Theories of commodity markets
 * Historical
 * Modern


 * Stats
 * Size of commodity markets.
 * Who are major producers, consumers, shippers of top 5 commodities? Which commodities are facing shortage?
 * Change in consumption over course of global industrialization

Outline

 * Lead
 * Weber
 * No consensus definition
 * Many different theories of how states function and how they should function. Anarchists believe that the state is inherently harmful and shouldn't exist at all.
 * For most of human history, people lived in stateless societies
 * Agriculture and sedentarism led to centralization, division of labor, and a more stable bureaucracy ...


 * Definition/Etymology
 * Etymology
 * Oxford definition
 * Most commonly accepted definition (Weber)
 * However, there is no consensus, and different groups use the word state to talk about very different things (what you define as "state" depends on your ideology)
 * Diff between state and government/nation


 * Theories of state
 * Weberian
 * Pluralist
 * Class-dominance
 * Marxist
 * State autonomy
 * Anarchist
 * Elite theory


 * Justifications for the state
 * Divine right
 * Social contract ...
 * Hobbesian
 * Distribution of public goods (welfare state)
 * Fascist
 * Weber, rational-legal authority
 * etc.


 * Historical devel of modern state
 * Stateless societies
 * agriculture -- also need to discuss domestication, and how affects social relations and interactions w/ world around
 * Development of civilization (city-states)
 * Formation of nation-states
 * Modern bureaucratic state


 * Alternatives to the state


 * See also

Lead
In the social sciences, a state is a compulsory political organization with a centralized government that maintains a monopoly of the legitimate use of force within a certain territory.

There is considerable debate within the scholarly community regarding the definition of the state, the nature of it's function and structure, and the necessity and/or desirability of its existence.

For most of human history, people lived in stateless societies characterized by a lack of centralized authority, and the absence of large inequalities in economic and political power. During the Neolithic period, with the advent of agriculture and heavily populated sedentary settlements, more centralized forms of political organization began to develop. By approximately 10,000 years ago, the first large-scale states had developed in Mesopotamia.
 * first empires
 * antiquity
 * feudalism
 * capitalism
 * modern state -- characterized by bureaucracy, large size, reliance on technocratic expertise, rationalization, etc.

Pol repr soviet

 * find general historical overviews in ebsco/sage/jstor and try to determine best way to summarize ...
 * what should structure look like? by category of repression? campaign? time period?
 * more photos of gulags, etc. should be included ...
 * should talk about repression of anarchists
 * repression in eastern europe
 * should tie in resistance against repression

Outline

 * Lead
 * Definition
 * Many forms
 * Common characteristics of modern government (bureaucracy, class, military, police, regulatory agencies, education, etc)
 * historical development of different forms of government


 * Etymology and definitions (possibly not needed)
 * group of people in charge of state
 * but can also refer to the means of state organization
 * or to the act of governing -- i.e. of one group controlling people


 * Common features characteristics of modern government
 * Bureaucracy
 * Regulation of economic/social activity
 * Rational-legal
 * Who's in charge?
 * Economic influence
 * Surveillance
 * War
 * International relations


 * Forms of government
 * How do we structure this? (Liberal, socialist, monarchy/feudal, authoritarian)
 * mention that can be overlap (i.e. China is an authoritarian republic, and Britain is a constitutional monarchy.
 * don't try to cover every variation. Hit the major themes and go more for depth than breadth


 * Historical development
 * Focus on development of government techniques and structures, not on the development of the state

Ste ter
"Ironically, the US government cannot effectively deal with global terrorism because it practices a double standard: It condones the terrorism of friendly states such as that of Ethiopia and Israel while simultaneously complaining about other forms of terrorism." ... this should go in General allegations section, and rest of article should provide basis for section regarding state terr activities in Africa.


 * need to create section on Israel/palestine as well
 * create iraq section

mass media

 * consumerism in media
 * freedom of speech meaningless unless you have access to press ... "There's freedom of the press here, as long as you own one."
 * role in government propaganda ... tie in how earliest government propagandists were people from the corporate PR industry (Bernays, et al.)
 * intellectual effects (homogenization, lack of dialogue/critical thought, framing, etc.)
 * Should be sections for state media, corporate media, and democratic media.
 * mass culture, mass media entertainment, entertainment industry, etc.

Jefferson
Americans during Jefferson's time were raised on "tales of indian perfidy" regarding "savages" scalping and tomahawking helpless women (who they would likely sexually violate).

Jefferson's view of Native Americans
Jefferson felt that the Indian nations were remnants of an earlier, more savage, stage in human history, and that they should either assimilate themselves into the American nation or disappear.

From Notes on the State of Virginia, 1781:


 * Before we condemn the Indians of this continent as wanting genius, we must consider that letters have not yet been introduced among them. Were we to compare them in their present state with the Europeans North of the Alps, when the Roman arms and arts first crossed those mountains, the comparison would be unequal, because, at that time, those parts of Europe were swarming with numbers; because numbers produce emulation, and multiply the chances of improvement, and one improvement begets another. Yet I may safely ask, How many good poets, how many able mathematicians, how many great inventors in arts or sciences, had Europe North of the Alps then produced? And it was sixteen centuries after this before a Newton could be formed.

Deforestation

 * |++inpublisher:academic+|++inpublisher:springer+|++inpublisher:elsevier&num=50 -- use for deforestation stats

benz

 * Primary focus now should be time between Arevalo & coup ... try to determine how was elected, platform, questions about killing of arevalo ...
 * discuss UFC holdings and other multi-nat interests

-- ubico

Human exper

 * create intros to each section .. try to organize into more narrative structure rather than collection of facts ... add more ethical/political analysis from ethics texts ...


 * what were you using this for? :


 * -- experiments on conscientious objectors


 * add ted kennedy saying that most victims were poor disenfranchised black etc


 * In 1967, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency injected an unknown chemical substance into the drinking water supply of the headquarters of the Food and Drug Administration in order to test their ability to poison drinking water with chemical agents. ... false?


 * Removed sharav shit -- some is inaccurate ... find reliable sources and correct
 * From 1958 to 1962, in an Atomic Energy Commission study known as "Project Chariot", radioactive materials were spread over Inupiat land in Point Hope, Alaska.
 * In 1944, as part of the Manhattan Project, U.S. soldiers at Oak Ridge were injected with 4.7 micrograms of plutonium. ]
 * From 1961 to 1962 alone, over 33 U.S. pharmaceutical corporations used prisoners at Holmesburg Prison as test subjects for 153 experimental drugs.
 * In 1943, researchers at University of Cincinnati Hospital locked sixteen mentally disabled patients in refrigerated cabinets at 30 degrees Fahrenheit for over 120 hours to "study the effect of frigid temperature on mental disorders" . .... look into A. Mills (see http://books.google.com/books?q=%22university+of+cincinnati%22+mills+temperature+mentally&btnG=Search+Books&lr=])
 * Also see, which mentions Machle at U. Cincinatti ...
 * improve law section
 * 
 * 

Eugenics

 * In Eugenics, you need to dive more in depth about the false dichotomy between "positive" and "negative" eugenics (see work of Stern and this)

History

 * Early proponents
 * Increasing popularity
 * Business support - should tie in businesses that sprung up selling "genetic services" ... tie in how Henry ford was a supporter of racist/eugenics progs
 * Policy initiatives
 * Nazi Germany - section tying in Nazi experiments and eugenics progs and how were motivated by U.S. ... See Black, 2003, p. 2 for discussion of U.S. eugenic euthanasia program designs ("lethal chambers", etc.)
 * Discredited
 * Eugenics in the modern U.S. - how modern dialogue surrounding genetic engineering is essentially the same philosophy couched in new terminology

Ethical concerns

 * Early theories...
 * Nuremberg trials
 * Current theories

In popular culture

 * See "Taking Better Baby Contests Seriously" (or something to that effect), regarding the humourous tone surrounding the better baby contests (bumbling sci-fi buffoons, to use McCoy's phrase RE: mkultra)


 * Find youth-targetted propaganda regarding eugenics


 * se this as an example of what a pop-culture section should be - i.e. rather than just a list of movies, try to discuss the dominant cultural myth surrounding Eugenics -- i.e. most closely tied in with Nazi horrors, and U.S. origins ignored; how is portrayed as different with modern genetic engineering


 * Brave New World, Gattaca, Black Stork (probably could use the adverts for Black Stork as illustration for the section -- also add the tagline "kill defectives..etc")


 * "Are you fit to marry?" film

Anti-para laws

 * see Áviles, "Paramilitarism and Low-Intensity Democracy", p.393


 * Work with emerald baron and thug Victor Carranza

... ...

WP:NEWSORG
Why are they considered generally reliable? What does this mean? Shouldn't reliability depend on the context, the author of the piece, what information they are backing, etc.? Many "mainstream" news organizations such as Fox News or the Washington Post regularly put out stories that are factually inaccurate or deliberately misleading. Should there not be some form of disclaimer such as:
 * "Mainstream news sources are generally considered to be reliable, but there are exceptions and notability of a source should never be used as justification to prevent discussion about reliability of a source within a specific context.

... this wording seems "clunky" and would probably need a lot of tweaking, but I feel that something should be included to this effect, so that people start treating this as a guideline, rather than a rule. Too often I see people treating this like a rule, as opposed to a guideline, believing that anything in a major news organization always warrants inclusion, even if it is demonstrably false, misleading, fringe, etc. I know that this is a misreading of the rules on their part, but I think that we should be more explicit to reduce the amount of time wasted arguing about it. Perhaps this isn't the best place to include this "disclaimer", but I do feel that there is a very strong tendency to automatically

-- Jrtayloriv (talk) 05:57, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

FARC

 * FARC History
 * this is the full article that will be hatnoted from the main FARC article with
 * Should this be called History of the FARC-EP or History of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia? I think the latter, with redirect to latter from former ...

...Backed by heavy military aid from the United States, which believed that Colombia was going to be an important front in their fight against Cuban communism, the Colombian government attacked many of these communities in the early 1960s, attempting to reassimilate the territories under the control of the national government. In response to these attacks, these peasants formed FARC as a military defense group to protect their communities.

... both sources have more good info you should pull into other areas, incl. the main CGSB article

History section for main FARC article
In the aftermath of La Violencia -- a civil war fought between the forces of the Colombian oligarchy's Liberal and Conservative parties, which killed over 200,000 people -- many rural peasants fled to the countryside in southern Colombia, and established what were known as "peace communities", to escape the violence. The Colombian government began attacking many of these communities in the early 1960s, attempting to re-assimilate the territories under the control of the national government. FARC was formed in 1964 by Manuel Marulanda Vélez and other members of the Colombian Communist Party, after a military attack on the community of Marquetalia. 16,000 Colombian troops, backed by the U.S., attacked the 1,000 villagers, only 48 of whom were armed. Marulanda and 47 others fought against government forces at Marquetalia, and then escaped into the mountains along with the other fighters. These 48 men formed the core of FARC, which quickly grew in size to hundreds of fighters.

During the 1970s, due to the Colombian government's imposition of a free-market development model, many peasants were marginalized and dispossessed, and experienced severe repression at the hands of Colombian government forces. This led many campesinos to join or support FARC, which promised equal distribution of wealth, and equal opportunity for all Colombian citizens.FARC's strength quickly grew from 500 to 3000 fighters.

During the 1980s, FARC began kidnapping wealthy landowners, soldiers, police, lawyers, and other people who they considered to be supporting the Colombian oligarchy, or U.S. imperial interests.

In 1982, FARC-EP held its Seventh Guerrilla Conference, which called for a major shift in FARC's strategy. FARC had historically been doing most of its fighting in rural areas, and was limited to small-scale confrontations with Colombian military forces. By 1982, increased income from the "coca boom" allowed them to expand into an irregular army, which would then stage large scale attacks on Colombian troops. They also began sending fighters to Vietnam and the Soviet Union for advanced military training. They also planned to move closer to middle-sized cities, as opposed to only remote rural areas, and closer to areas rich in natural resources, in order to create a strong economic infrastructure. It was also at this conference that FARC added the initials "EP", for "Ejército del Pueblo" or "People's Army", to the organization's name.

In 1984, FARC attempted to call a truce, lay down their weapons, and form a legal, democratic political party known as the Unión Patriótica(Patriotic Union, or UP). However by 1989, over thousands of UP members and activists had been assassinated, as well as 3 presidential candidates, which led to FARC's rearmament in 1989.

In 1987 the FARC-EP and several other Colombian guerrilla organizations -- including the ELN, M-19, EPT, MAQL, and others formed the Coordinadora Guerrillera Simón Bolívar (Simon Bolivar Guerrilla Coordinating Group, CGSB).

Neo-liberal economic policies led to enormous growth in poverty and wealth inequality in Colombia, which caused more peasants to join FARC

In 1999, the Colombian government was beginning to receive heavily increased military aid from the United States as part of Plan Colombia, which was ostensibly to fight against narco-trafficking, but was mostly spent on counter-insurgency in FARC-controlled territory. It was in this context that President Astrana attempted to hold "peace talks" with FARC-EP.

In 2001, U.S. Department of State labels FARC as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), which enables them to use U.S. troops in actions against FARC, censor their websites, and makes it illegal to provide them with financial aid, amongst other things. They don't label AUC, which is responsible for 3/4 of civilian killings (and kills mostly peasants, as opposed to wealthy "civilians") as a terrorist organization.


 * Plan Colombia


 * Uribe

''Uribe has supported measures that have reduced overtime wages, raised the age of retirement by a third, and cut the salaries of public sector workers by 33 percent. After neoliberal restructuring the disproportion in wealth yet further increased. In 1990, the ratio of income between the poorest and richest 10 percent was 40:1. By 2000 the ratio reached 80:1.''


 * Parapolitics scandal

Ideology
Cover FARC-EP socio-political ideology ... PCC roots ... etc.

"'Latin America is a region of great economic disparity. The FARC supports the basic human rights that everyone needs to lead a dignified life, including access to nutrition, education, potable water, electricity, dignified living conditions, recreation and rest. Some 54 percent of Colombians, or 24 million people, live below the poverty line on just one to two dollars a day ... A variety of fertile lands and climates would permit the harvesting of crops in Colombia 12 months of the year, providing enough for all Colombians as well as a surplus for export. Colombia is also rich in mineral resources, including gold, nickel, coal, salt and oil. Colombia’s biodiversity, in flora and fauna, the fish in its rivers, and a wealth in human resources make Colombia a very rich country able to provide for all of its inhabitants ... Nevertheless, a small group of people, the petty governing class, has monopolized these resources, taken the best lands, controlled the economy, and kept the rest of Colombia in poverty. Leaders of both Liberal and Conservative parties have legalized these monopolies for the benefit of the rich, and by the same token, handed over Colombia’s resources to foreign capitalists for their own enrichment'"

Lead

 * CITE LEAD SECTION
 * add something in lead about how "Many of these studies have been funded by the U.S. government...for reasons x,y,z ...", etc.

Psychological experiments

 * Project OFTEN --
 * 1953-1970: U.S. Army experiments with LSD on soldiers at Fort Detrick, Md.
 * Frank Olson --
 * The CIA and Edgewood Arsenal Research Laboratories begin an extensive program for developing drugs that can influence human behavior. This program includes Project OFTEN -- which studies the toxicology, transmission and behavioral effects of drugs in animal and human subjects -- and Project CHICKWIT, which gathers European and Asian drug development information (Goliszek).
 * for use later

Ethical concerns

 * Arguments about biomedical ethics ...
 * Google Book search for "ethics human experimentation" mkultra

Other notes

 * Add Operation Ivy to the nuke section.
 * Operation Whitecoat? include or no?
 * Find page numbers for Golizek book, and create separate refs.


 * List of Drug Enforcement Administration operations


 * Geolocation Devices and RFID Tagging