Dumbfoundead: Dissed On the Red Carpet
November 19, 2011
Okay, we can all relax, rapper Dumbfoundead is still a card-carrying member of the 99%. Despite all his recent homegrown success~a new album, a million subscribers on YouTube, sold out shows on both coasts and overseas and major mainstream media coverage~”CNN”‘s Jonathan Park (aka LA Koreatown rap artist Dumbfoundead) found himself being informed on the red carpet by a “angry PR person” that he “wasn’t part of this” at the Nov. 2 L.A. premiere of “A Very Merry Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas.” DFD speculated that his FlipCam wasn’t official enough. The good news is DFD appeared to be well medicated when the incident went down. To be fair, I think John Cho (Harold) just didn’t recognize his dogg Ded. Afterall, Asian bruthas got to stick together, yeah?
Dr. Robert
September 29, 2011
Fukushima Evacuee Condemns Nuclear Power In NYC
September 23, 2011
NEW YORK (NHK)~A farmer from Fukushima Prefecture has urged people around the world to get rid of nuclear power plants, saying there is no such thing as safe nuclear power.
53-year Sachiko Sato from Kawamata Town spoke at a gathering in central New York on Thursday. The event, organized by a US anti-nuclear group, was attended by about 70 people.
Sato was forced to evacuate from Fukushima to neighboring Yamagata Prefecture with her family after the accident in March at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.
Sato called on people all over the world to work together to get rid of nuclear plants, for the sake of the children of the world.
Friday, September 23, 2011 09:30 +0900 (JST)
OH, WHAT A NIGHT! Typhoon Roke Tears Through Japan, FukuDaiichi Drenched and Shaken by 5.1 Aftershock
September 21, 2011
TOKYO [9:30 am, Thursday, Sept. 22 JST]~Typhoon Roke, packing 100 mph+ winds and torrential rains, swept the length of Japan from Shizuoka to Hokkaido. Seven are dead and evacuation orders were issued for more than a million people. From the Tokai region the Category 2 storm then headed northeast drenching Tokyo during the evening commute and disrupting public transportation. Roke then whirled its way toward the stricken Fukushima Daiichi reactors.
Workers at the now-infamous Tokyo Electric Power Company-operated nuclear facility had been scurrying to strengthen explosion-damaged reactor buildings, but TEPCO reported control buildings were leaking and that workers had to resort to using ropes to secure vital piping systems against Roke’s high winds. The measures seemed to be working, then at 10:30 pm JST Wednesday night a 5.1 earthquake struck in nearby Ibaraki.
Not to worry, Japan. The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) is reporting that “no irregular activities” were reported following Roke’s glancing blow and the ill-timed tremor did not further damage the beleaguered complex.
After a long night, the typhoon cleared the Japanese archipelago, evacuation orders were being lifted, radioactive cooling water had not overflowed from FukuDaiichi.
Here’s NHK World’s report, broadcast Wednesday evening JST as workers at Fukushima Daiichi waited for the full force of Typhoon Roke. Hiro Morita is at the anchor desk.
(This report was prepared using Katsuyuki Ueno’s Yokosonews Twitter stream. Yokosonews is headquartered in Yokkaichi, Japan, a region that has taken big hits from the last two typhoons. Ueno is a former L.A. resident.)
Fukushima Daiichi Reactor ‘Cold Shutdown’, Spent Fuel Stabilization Expected by End of 2011
September 20, 2011
VIENNA, NHK~Japan’s minister in charge of the nuclear disaster says reactors at the troubled Fukushima Daiichi plant will be cooled to below 100 degrees Celsius by the end of 2011.
Goshi Hosono spoke at the International Atomic Energy Agency’s annual ministerial meeting on Monday.
Hosono said that decontaminated water has been successfully used to cool down the troubled nuclear reactors, bringing the temperature close to 100 degrees Celsius. He also said spent nuclear fuel pools have been cooled in a stable manner.
Hosono also said the spent nuclear fuel has been steadily cooled and will fall below 100 degrees by the end of this year, instead of early next year as initially predicted.
When the reactors and spent fuel have been cooled below 100 degrees, radiation emissions can be kept very low.
The minister also said Japan will work with the IAEA to remove radioactive materials from areas near Fukushima Daiichi.
He explained the plan to separate the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency from the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry, saying it will be merged with the Cabinet Office’s Nuclear Safety Commission to create a nuclear safety agency under the Environment Ministry by next April.
Here’s NHK World anchor Catherine Kobayashi bringing news of Minister Hosono’s bold announcement on her Tuesday morning (8 am JST) newscast.
Tuesday, September 20, 2011 07:00 +0900 (JST)
Japan Marks Six Months Since Devastating Triple Disasters; Tohoku Reconstruction Slow, Workers Struggling to Bring Fukushima Reactors Under Control
September 11, 2011
Kaku: East Coast Quake Nuclear/Seismic Wake Up Call for US
August 23, 2011
Holy tectonic plate, Dr. Kaku!
TEPCO Update From Fukushima Daiichi
August 17, 2011
TEPCO, Japan’s infamous nuclear power utility has begun releasing apology-filled video reports showing their workers battling to contain the ongoing radiation disaster at its Fukushima Daiichi complex. This vid is kind of encouraging, but is it a true depiction of the situation or PR? Ganbatte!
Man on the Street Pwns BBC Presenter
August 9, 2011
BBC presenter Fiona Armstrong was classically pwned by London activist-journalist Darcus Howe Tuesday as she tried elicit reactions on the fourth day of violence in the streets of London. With leading questions, Armstrong attempts to steer the West Indian former Black Panther Party member into rote answers, but Howe redirects the live interview to the root cause of the unprecedented violence from bands of underclass youth which first spread from London suburbs to neighboring cities and onto TV screens around the world. Listen to Armstrong, who, failing to get Howe to condemn “the rioting,” switches to a tack of condescension and defamation. Watch as Howe schools Armstrong on social conditions in the UK, on years oppressive police abuse and sums it all up by stating “I don’t call it ‘rioting,’ I call it ‘an insurrection’ of the masses of the people. It is happening in Syria, it is happening in Clapham, it’s happening in Liverpool, it’s happening in Port-au-Spain, Trinidad, and that is the nature of the historical moment!” WATCH, but more importantly listen.
Report of ‘New’ High Levels of Radiation Add to Continued Bad News About Japan’s Nuclear Disaster
August 3, 2011
Japanese American nuclear physicist Dr. Michio Kaku appeared on CNN’s “In the Arena” news program Aug. 2 to discuss the disclosure this week that lethal levels of radiation have been detected outside reactors #1 and #2 at the earthquake and tsunami ravaged Fukushima Daiichi complex. Kaku’s CNN appearance Tuesday marked the first time in more than a month that he has taken to the airwaves to discuss developments at the Japanese reactors.
The recent admission by the Tokyo Electric Power Co., the utility that owns and operates the stricken reactors, came amid reports of radiation in water, soil, crops, beef and seafood across a more widespread area of Japan than previously reported, stretching in an arc up to and even beyond 200 miles away from the melted down reactor cores. (Note: Tokyo is a mere 140 miles from the Fukushima reactors.) The Japanese government announced Wednesday that it will soon begin testing rice across 14 prefectures from the northeast through central Japan to ensure the safety of the country’s staple dietary component.
Kaku says
- “They (TEPCO) haven’t even begun cleaning up the operation. It’s not stable yet. Maybe next year it might be stable.”
- Lethal radiation in the ventilator shafts is a leftover from the original accident. Workers have to stay away from the ventilation shafts; it’s no-man’s land. Robots at Fukushima Daiichi are not automatons that can perform repairs. “That is beyond our capability.”
- “Hitachi Corp. has estimated 30 years for cleanup~in other words, up to 50 years. Three Mile Island took 14 years to clean up. Chernobyl after 25 years is still not cleaned up. It’s still melting into the ground.”
- “The Japanese people don’t trust the utility’s (radiation) figures anymore. Either they were incompetent or they were lying.”
- Physicists in the U.S. using independent computer simulations of the Fukushima Daiichi accident suspected early-on that the Japanese utility was low-balling their estimates of radiation damage.
WATCH… via Somalian Pirate Media (video swiped using HTC Sensation)
Another Aftershock Rocks Northeastern Japan
July 30, 2011
Japanese awoke to this news update Sunday, July 31
In 1947, Nobel Prize winning novelist Pearl S. Buck published a children’s story set in a fishing village in coastal Japan. She called it The Big Wave.
In the book, Jiro, a fisherman’s son, tells his friend Kino that sometimes the ocean can be angry, and that sometimes the old ocean god rolls up in bed, heaves his head and shoulders and the waves run back and forth. Then he stands upright and roars and the earth shakes under the water.
Japan’s March 11 triple disasters have brought attention to The Big Wave, and the message it carries to children about life. Sales in Japanese bookstores have soared, with parents seeking out the little-known 64-year-old Buck story to read to their children.
Here’s NHK World’s Tomoko Kamata’s June 28 report on the book.
Watch the YouTube video that gave new life to 64-year-old book. Listen to NPR Weekend Edition’s Jacki Lyden read from The Big Wave in this prophetic piece from Jan. 1, 2005.
Fukushima Nuclear Workers in Race Against Time as Radioactive Water Levels Soar, Rainy Season Arrives
June 23, 2011
THE CRITICAL WATER DECONTAMINATION OPERATION at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactor facility was still not underway early Friday, June 24 in Japan as Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) nuclear technicians wrestled with a glitches in a MacGuyver-like system aimed at lowering dangerous radiation levels found in pools of cooling water under the three reactors that suffered core meltdowns following March 11′s 9.0 earthquake and 38-meter-high tsunami wave that inundated the six-reactor complex in northeastern Japan.
NHK World Newsline reported late Thursday “there is still no prospect of resuming a system to decontaminate radioactive water due to a series of problems and errors.”
The amount of contaminated water on site is estimated to be 110,ooo tons and is growing by about 400 tons a day, as fresh water is injected into reactors to cool them. The rainy season threatens to raise the water levels further, and TEPCO has said if the decontamination operation is unsuccessful water could begin leaking from the reactor buildings as early as July 5. Leakage of highly radioactive water could also prevent reactor technicians from continuing their work to stabilize the troubled Fukushima Daiichi #1, #2 and #3 reactors.
The US-French decontamination process was begun last week but was halted after problems arose and high levels of radiation was detected. Incorrect valve settings are the latest problems with the system, TEPCO said.
Japan Tsunami Alert Rescinded
June 22, 2011
Here’s raw footage of NHK World’s morning newscast on Thursday, June 23, 8 a.m. showing anchor Catherine Kobayashi informing Japanese viewers that the government had rescinded an emergency tsunami warning issued about an hour earlier following a 6:51 a.m. earthquake in coastal Iwate Prefecture, northern Japan. The Japan Meteorological Agency lifted its tsunami advisory at 7:45 s.m. In Tokyo, the morning commute was underway; business as usual. Whew…
TSUNAMI WARNING: The Japan Meteorological Agency has issued a tsunami warning following a 6.7 magnitude earthquake that hit the coast of Iwate prefecture northern Japan at 6:51 am Japan time Thursday, June 23. NHK TV was urging citizens in the affected area to hurry to higher ground. The quake struck at 2:51 pm PST. NHK World’s Hiro Morita, usually a sportscster, was on the anchor desk when the bulletin was issued 4 minutes ago.
Although U.S. mainstream media may have stopped covering the ongoing efforts of the Japanese people to recover their lives in the aftermath of the triple disasters that devastated Japan more than three months ago, innovative young relief volunteers and Internet journalists are finding ways to use mobile social media like Twitter and Facebook to connect those in the disaster zones with people in distant lands around the globe who want to help with cash, baby formula and other forms of real-time direct aid in an unprecedented grassroots effort.
NHK’s Minori Takao, host of the public broadcaster’s Japan 7 Days news magazine June 19 filed this story of how Japanese activists are using social media to help establish community ties in Fukushima. Tweets and FB wall posts have already resulted in an unthinkably successful charity event in the city of Iwaki that resulted in a same-day $12,000 cash donation to Iwaki’s city government.
UNCENSORED: 2011 Cal State Fullerton Undie Run
May 23, 2011
You know that Asian/Pacific Island American Heritage Month has reached its zenith when TimothyDeLaGhetto aka Traphik aka Tim Chantarangsu drops his CSUF Undie Run vlog. Who is TimothyDeLaGhetto? Duh. He’s the international king of Asian American TouTube clowning who brings much-needed levity to this month-long government-mandated orgy of whorish corporate-backed “festivals,” boring discourse and self-congratulation that “APAHM” is. A true social media wonder, TimothyDeLaGhetto has a bazillion followers of his Internet antics, all conceived from his luxurious crib in his parent’s house in Paramount, Calif. Here are some links to DeLaGhetto’s bad self: YouTube Channel / Tim Chantarangsu Wiki / http://TimothyDeLaGhetto.com
Bus Carrying Korean American Teens Home From Religious Retreat Crashes on Snowy Mountain Highway
February 21, 2011
At least one person died and several other people were seriously injured after a bus carrying 18 Korean-American teenagers slid over the side of Highway 189 near Twin Peaks on Monday, officials said.
Two people were airlifted from the scene with major injuries and 10 people had serious injuries, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection spokesman Bill Peters said.
The bus from Light of Love Mission Church, a Korean-American congregation, collided with a San Bernardino County Fire Department vehicle and a power pole just before noon on Monday.
Church officials said about 18 children — teenagers between 13 and 17 — and four adults were on the bus that was returning from a winter retreat. They had been at the retreat since Friday and were returning to Pasadena when the crash happened shortly before noon.
The man who died is believed to be the bus driver, Won Chae, 61, a member of the church and licensed bus driver, according to a deacon.
“What we know is the driver of the bus has passed away,” deacon John Cho said. “Our prayers are with his family, obviously.
Cho said Chae had been a member of the church for several years and often volunteered to drive for church activities.
(Read the Pasadena Star-News’ update here.)
Are high-achieving Asian American students “a cabal of brainiacs trying to steal all the academic glory from their non-Asian competitors” or are they simply industrious and energetic American teenagers trying to be like their equally achievement-oriented white classmates? Harvard senior Jenny Tsai looked at the myths, the facts and what Asian American students themselves think in her senior social science thesis: “Too Many Asian at this School: Racialized Perceptions and Identity Formations” that has attracted the attention of the mainstream media as well as inquisitive Asian Americans around the country.
Do some winter break extra credit. Read Washington Post education reporter Jay Mathews’ Class Struggle columnization of Tsai’s study and Asian American student stereotypes here or download and read Ms. Tsai’s thesis in its entirety here.
Michelle Rhee: The Exit Interview
October 13, 2010
MICHELLE A. RHEE, the controversial chancellor of Washington, D.C.’s school system resigned today in an action which came on the heels of D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty’s defeat in the Sept. 14 Democratic primary election. It was Fenty who had begged Rhee to take the job 3½ years ago, and it was Rhee’s educational reform program that some say was the main reason he lost to D.C. Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray.
In today’s resignation statement, the sometimes abrasive education reformer said her leaving was “heartbreaking,” Reporters wrote that her press conference was “short and to the point.” Later, Rhee, 40, gave an exit interview to NPR’s Melissa Block, host of All Things Considered, in which she said she would continue her efforts to reform flagging U.S. schools and would spend more time with her fiancé former all-star pro basketball guard and now Mayor of Sacramento Kevin Johnson triggering rumors that Rhee may entertain job offers from cities in northern and southern California as well as Colorado.
Michelle Rhee: The Exit Interview
- The Highs and Lows of D.C. Schools Chief Michelle Rhee, All Things Considered.
- Rhee: “Reform Can Move on Without a Hitch,” Newsweek
- Is Michelle Rhee’s Revolution Over? The New York Times
- A Nasty and Productive Tenure Ends, TBD.com
- Biography: Michelle A. Rhee, Wikipedia
