What is the proper course of action for past transgressions?

Wellesley professor unearths a horror: Syphilis experiments in Guatemala

I don't have a lot of time to write this up very formally, but I thought this was a noteworthy article that was forwarded to everybody in SPH by another student.

My question is what is a government to do 70 years after the fact? Obama has apologized for this to the Guatemalan government, but if I remember correctly (I read this a few days ago), there was also a question of possible reparations of some sort. Personally, I don't really see what good it would do. The impression I got was that there were unlikely to be any descendants of these people. In that case, the suffering inflicted can not be undone or assuaged. The horror some may experience now is unlikely to be any higher than you or I might experience reading about this. And with a Guatemalan government complicit in the act at the time, how are the United States any more guilty than they?

What are your thoughts?

Book Review: Polio: An American Story

Title
Polio: An American Story
(Winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in History)

Author
David M. Oshinsky
George Littlefield Professor of American History, Department of History, University of Texas

Publication Date
2005

Publication Information
Oxford University Press; 288 pages

Political Trackers: Potentially benefitting society, but more likely not.

Here's a recent article on political trackers from the Star Tribune:

http://www.startribune.com/politics/state/101038219.html?elr=KArksLckD8EQDUoaEyqyP4O:DW3ckUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUycaEacyU

I haven't really heard of these people before, but it doesn't really surprise me given the ease of recording and disseminating video now.

One of the goals of tracking as listed in the article is ensuring politicians keep the same message instead of telling different groups what they want to hear, which seems to be a good thing. However, if it's more a witch hunt for the "gotcha" moment as is also mentioned, I wouldn't view it as favorably. Since people are rarely as noble as they like to make out, I tend to think it's more of the latter than the former.

Either way, I'm a bit skeptical of this tactic. It seems regardless of the intent, if this is employed successfully, the end result will be encouraging political parties to get candidates that can maintain a strict public persona without any hiccups or flaws, which is likely to mean that they're good at being fraudulent. The less politicians are able to be human and err (in normal ways, I'm not referring to corruption or anything like that), the worse off we are.

Thoughts?

MR OBAMA, TEAR DOWN THAT MOSQUE!

Before I say anything, I just want to make it clear that it is somewhat amazing to me that this even makes national news as it should have stayed in the confines of the Lower Manhattan Zoning Office, thank FoxNews in all likelihood for that.

Is college worth the costs?

Original Post by Papa TaggartRR (e-mail correspondence)
Posted here via TaggartRR
Feel free to join the conversation.

Interesting. I have thought this for a while. If parents took the same $80-90k that the spent on college and invested it in the child's name and the child learned some trade, would they be better off at 50 years old?

Is it worth it to go to college?
For people considering college, perhaps the greatest lesson of the Great Recession is not that you shouldn't go to college but that you should make sure the investment will pay off.

Source:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38561562/from/toolbar

Book Review: The J Curve

Title
The J Curve
A New Way to Understand Why Nations Rise and Fall

Author
Ian Bremmer
Adjunct Professor, School for International and Public Affairs, Columbia University
President, Eurasia Group

Publication Date
2006

Publication Information
Simon & Schuster Paperbacks; 291 pages

Reason for Reading
The author, Ian Bremmer was on The Daily Show on May 13th pitching his newest book, “The End of the Free Market.” In the interview, he seemed to be knowledgeable, thoughtful, and articulate so I thought his book would be worth checking out. While searching, I discovered a previous book of his in the bargain section of Amazon, so I thought I’d try that one first.

Book Review: On the Social Contract

Title
On the Social Contract (Du Contrat Social)

Author
Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Publication Date
1762

Publication Information
Dover (Dover Thrift Edition); 97 pages

Reason for Reading
In keeping with my goal of learning more of the American Revolution and the era in which it took place while simultaneously focusing on political theory to better understand the political system installed at that time, I picked this book by Rousseau discussing social contract theory. Given the time of publication, I would hazard a guess that many of the founding fathers of America (at least those involved in drawing up the new Constitution) would have read this. Whether or not it had any direct influence on either the Articles of Confederation or the Constitution I’m not certain. The little I’ve looked up online seems to indicate its effects on America’s founding were negligible, but it may have been more influential in the French Revolution. Regardless of this, the text remains noteworthy in the field.