Slavery And Eugenics In North Carolina

   There is an interesting movement among some North Carolina legislators to introduce a few bills which would attempt to fix  some of the social injustices of the past. The ideas are good to an extent. The eugenics victims should have their cash outlay but I'm not to sure about the new rules that the companies working for the state have to follow.

   Below are the House Bills

                                

    House Bill 298

    This bill  would require companies doing business  with the state to examine their corporate records for evidence they benefited from slavery. 

   House Bill 296

    This bill  would compensate the victims who were pretty much forced into sterilization programs between 1929 and 1974. It is estimated that some 7,600 people were sterilized in the state of North Carolina during those years.  The compensation could be up to $50,000.

Greensboro News & Record

As drafted, the slavery bill would allow a state agency to break its contract with a contractor if that company fails to complete a state-mandated affidavit. That record would attest as to whether the company or its predecessors profited from the practice of slavery in the United States.

The eugenics bill deals with a more recent part of the state's history.
    Earlier this decade, Gov. Mike Easley apologized for the practice on behalf of the state. Under what is now viewed as a completely misguided theory, eugenics proponents sought to strengthen society and cure social ills by preventing those considered "unfit" from having children.
"It was racially targeted, and to a certain degree, class targeted," Jones said.
The bill would set aside nearly $173 million to pay claims made before June 30, 2010.

 

Technorati tags: Slavery, Eugenics, North Carolina, Legislature

Russia Makes A Comeback

  Everyone thought that the Russia of old was dead on gone after Boris Yeltson, the economic collapse and other ailments that buried Russia very deep into a hole.

   But such is not the case as Martin Sieff (UPI ) points out in an interesting story on the rise of Russia with the help of it's energy holdings and a few of it allies, which include Iran, India and China among others.

Yet under President Vladimir Putin, Russia over the past seven years has recovered from its chaotic decade of powerlessness, economic collapse and humiliation under President Boris Yeltsin. It has become a formidable energy superpower whose annual revenues from its exports of oil and gas are greater than those of Saudi Arabia. And in terms of having allies who have serious military power in their own regions, it is arguably much less isolated than the United States.    Original Article

   It is ironic that while Bush has helped most of the rest of the world hate the United States, Russia is being welcomed by more countries as friends.The United States is in for a rude awakening, I'm afraid.

 

Technorati tags: Vladimir Putin, Boris Yeltsin, Saudi Arabia, Gen. Nikolai Solovtsov, United States, NATO