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Morning Spice by Ginger
Better deal by McDonaldsSo McDonalds are here at last. Let’s hope, it is here to stay. If it is competitive in the real sense it would shake up some of eateries into giving the customer a better deal and will serve two useful purposes. Firstly it would give the public the option of yet another fast food joint that has quality and also take the complacency away from those in the business. Snacks on the counter were really something awful compared to the price one paid for them. Places reputed for their specialities had let their standards slip in recent times.
Now with McDonalds getting into the fray one feels many would raise the quality of their food. However McDonalds appear to have made the common mistake many business places do. The ad was impressive. Really McDonalds hardly needs any introduction here. It failed to give the prices of what it offered. In that respect Kentucky fried chicken got its response pretty fast initially as everyone knew what the price was and it had something for everyone’s purse. I don’t know how it is faring right now but I feel that McDonalds should let the public know what its range is and what their prices are.
Laura on talkshow
Physician heal thyself? It is some years since Laura Schlesinger started her talk show on which sends out the message that tough love is for sissies. She has a slightly sarcastic approach to her show and has little sympathy for those who ring her up and start snivelling.She is known to be a vehement anti shrink but last year she simply broke down and had her own "spiritual crisis". She was the woman who wrote about the ten stupid things a woman could do to mess up her life. She got a bad press report for having been nasty at a Jewish Press conference. She had refused to accept the offer of hotel suites and taxis because she did not like the ‘smell’. She tried to make up for it by giving her appearance fee to charity and get over her crisis.
Curse about modern medicine
The curse about modern medicine is that one drug may be good for a specific condition but it could create complications at some other point or other. Take as a case in point women who have tubal sterilization. They are in for a nasty shock when they hear the latest about tubal sterilization and the effect it could have.According to recent research if you conceive after that (the chances are extremely rare) you are 30% likely to have an ectopic delivery. An ectopic is when the egg is planted outside the womb. So if you have a pelvic pain only on one side or have any vaginal bleeding after that you better watch out.
Standardisation Debate Revisited - Clarification on Affirmative Action
Madduma Bandara’s article on the subject in The Island of 31 Aug. Mr. S. L. David’s response of 23 Sep. and Prof. Madduma Bandara’s reply of 10 and 12 Oct. make reference to affirmative action. I am not interested in getting into a debate as to which community, Sinhala or Tamil, is more racist, more responsible for initiating the on going conflict, or more prone to cheating at examinations. I only wish to comment on the references to affirmative action - a subject that I researched for some years at Harvard University and on which I have written a book, viz, " Discrimination with Reason? The Policy of Reservations in the United States, India and Malaysia", Oxford University Press, 1997.
Prof. Madduma Bandara says that, " In the United States, Standardisation is called something else: "the curve" What was called Standardisation in Sri Lanka was an attempt to equate the performance of different linguistic groups (in effect, ethnic quotas based on the ratio of student populations), which is a concept totally alien to American affirmative action and to the American Constitution . India uses quotas but the proportional representation principle applies only to "untouchables" (Scheduled Castes) and "tribals" (Scheduled Tribes) and not to any other category . The Indian Supreme Court has ruled that any comprehensive scheme of proportional representation would be unconstitutional.
Prof. Madduma Bandara declares that, "It is a fundamentally accepted scientific fact that no ethnic group is more intelligent than another. Therefore if any ethnic group out performs another ethnic group, all else equal, there is clearly some kind of systematic discrepancy at play". I share his opinion that no ethnic group is genetically more intelligent than another. (I also believe that no ethnic group is inherently more or less racist, or more or less prone to cheating than any other). It does not follow that if examinations are conducted without cheating, no ethnic group will out perform another. On the contrary, there is considerable evidence from studies in many countries that if recruitment is based on "objective" criteria such as test scores, there may be substantial and persistent disparities linked to ethnicity . In fact, Prof. Madduma Bandara concedes this point in relation to Asian Americans in the U.S.A. Their "over achievement" in America is surely not due to any cheating or other such "discrepancy". There are very many factors that determine the level of performance of which several (eg., the quality of schooling ) may be strongly correlated to ethnicity. Performance levels will therefore vary not only within each community but also between them.
Mr. David says that, "The U.S. Supreme Court has recently ruled that "positive discrimination" was unconstitutional and unjust". In the U.S.A., proportional representation has always been regarded as unconstitutional, but modest (much less than proportional) quotas for women and certain minority groups were permitted in the late sixties and seventies. The U.S. Supreme Court has since ruled against even such modest quotas but not against affirmative action which is prescribed in the Civil Rights Act. Affirmative action permits various disabilities and characteristics to be taken into account in deciding on admission or recruitment, eg., if a student is from a severely disadvantaged school (such as, in the Sri Lankan context, an ill-equipped, ill-staffed school in a remote village or estate ), this handicap could be taken into account, ie., such a student could be selected ahead of a student from an elite school (such as, in the Sri Lankan context, Royal ,Visakha, Trinity or Jaffna Hindu) who may have had a marginally higher test score. On the other hand, to discriminate solely on the basis of ethnicity (such as, in the Sri Lankan context, to discriminate between a Sinhalese medium and Tamil medium student of Royal College, as was done under "Standardisation") is not affirmative action but plain racism.
Prof. Madduma Bandara is confidant that examinations based on multiple-choice questions that permit "objective" assessment would lead to closing inter-ethnic disparities in performance. Multiple-choice question papers may be desirable for other reasons, but may not reduce ( and could possibly increase ) inter-ethnic disparities in performance. Studies in the U.S.A., India, and Malaysia have shown not only wide inter - ethnic disparities in university admissions, but also that disparities would widen further if admissions were based on "objective" test scores to the exclusion of " subjective" criteria now used in addition to test scores . If the purpose of making the recruitment examination more "objective" is to eliminate inter - ethnic disparities in performance, it could be predicted that this objective would not be achieved.
It must be noted that wide inter-ethnic disparities in performance may lead to political problems - as in 1971 when " Standardisation" was introduced in an ill advised response to a crisis - but linguistic quotas are not the answer. As we have painfully experienced, that " remedy "transferred us from the frying pan into the fire. The remedy that cures may need to be made up of a mix of ingredients including, perhaps, the devolution of the management of and admissions to all but two or three (Colombo, Peradeniya and Katubedde?) "national" universities to the provincial level. Any province could then, if it so chooses and using its own funds, increase intake into the university, under its charge, or avoid such increase and use the funds for development in other sectors .
Devanesan Nesiah
Colombo-4
Those days when I was a young banker at BoC City Office it was a mighty task to get a cheque drawn for Rs. 5000 or more to be paid over the counter as it had to be okayed by the ledger officer and the accountant. In the absence of the latter we had to refer it to the manager who was the highest authority. Then we never had such a glut of AGMs and DGMs. It was banking with the attendant risk — the true mettle of a banker who knew his customer at his worth.
One day I was at manager’s room to get a cheque signed. Then a woman walked in who appeared to be refined and intelligent. She gave the manager a book written by her for his comments. I understood they were batch mates at university.
The day following next I happened to be at the manager’s to see him flying into tantrums over a letter he had given his secretary to type. He had wanted her to say in the minimum of words "I was really fascinated by your novel" Instead she had typed "I was really fascinated by your navel". He was shouting "You.... are you trying to break decent families". It was an inadvertent mistake which would have had dire consequences if the letter had been posted. How alert they were? Sometimes they nearly knocked us down with paper weights for a slight mistake.
Now I want to digress.
Today in ‘Satan’s Box’ how many navels do we see in a day? The youth gyrate around the navel from morn to dawn by looking at the third grade Hindi and Tamil films. It appears their sole imagination is a web spun around the navel and the ‘V’ triangle of the belly dancing women of epileptic paroxysms who twirl like worms on salt. Sometimes these women are with drenched clothes glued to their bare skin exposing the contours to the envy of Mercator. It seems that India is the only country that is free of pneumonia!
This type of sexual onslaught will rid all of us of our inquisitiveness to remove the fig leaf! It will not be only the end of our families, it will be the end of humanity itself. This surcharge will impair your sexual libido which even Viagra will not be able to revive.
No wonder that men are declining on their sperm count!
A. C. I. Fernando.
Katubedda
Deterrent punishment for crimes
The wave of crime in the country is increasing alarmingly and your paper has correctly highlighted the necessity to check the spread of this curse. The police gives various reasons, like, lack of staff and being engaged in anti-terrorist activities for their inability to put an end to that. Whatever it is, the police is inefficient, lethargic and not trained to deal with modern methods of crime in which the underworld gangs are proficient in.
Political interference in police duties is another reason for the rise of crime. If the police officers stand firm without cringing this interference by politicians could be overcome.
This aspect has to be looked into by the new IGP and the DIG, Crimes. They should hold their grounds firmly and not buckle under any politician, however powerful he may be.
As the DIG Crimes has stated recently, capital punishment should be reintroduced and imposed on crimes like homicide, rape and drug trafficking. If a few of the drug barons are dealt capital punishment, some others will think twice before committing this crime.
G.S.Hemarate,
Ratnapura.
Recently after the murder of a young lady in Modera, a senior police officer stated that the police were understaffed by 10,000 personnel and as a result of which they were unable to cope with the present crime wave in the country. The police are more concerned with protecting VIPs than in protecting the public and the maintenance of civil order for which the police department has been set up. In the U.S.A. the President is protected by the Secret Service and not by the Police.
When parliament sits, the police line the streets from Dharmapala Mawatha to Kotte guarding every access road which falls on to the main road. If any crime is committed in Kotte when parliament sits, there are no police to be spared to investigate.
C .Ramachana
