LISNews: Librarian News

A scary thing lately is how...alien I feel I am compared to other librarians who would frequent NEXGENLIB-L. Such scares me. Am I that radically different? Am I living in that different of a world from other "young librarians".I wonder if the fact that I have my sermon to preach on August 15th working from James 5:7-20 might shed some light, eh?

Here are my thoughts in the matter:
THINGS YOU HAVE TO BELIEVE TO BE A REPUBLICAN TODAY: Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him and a bad guy when Bush needed a "we can't find Bin Laden" diversion. Different models of international relations were followed at different times. It is a failing. President Bush has pushed us away from being opportunistic to more hard-core on morals.Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country is communist, but trade with China and Vietnam is vital to a spirit of international harmony. China and Vietnam have nukes. Cuba does not. Cuba is well on its way to collapsing under its own weight. China and Vietnam are not pure Communist countries at all so the hope of international trade is that it will entice them away from communism. Cuba is being allowed to collapse on its own.A woman can't be trusted with decisions about her own body, but multi-national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation. Ooooookay, not quite sure where that came from. Judges have been more favorable towards utilizing "the corporate death penalty" for misbehaving corporations lately. Not quite sure what is being referred to there.Jesus loves you, and shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton. Hunh? Leviticus and Romans are fully clear on the first part and hundreds of years of commentaries are fully clear on the matter too. And Senator Clinton? I have no idea where that notion even comes from.The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches while slashing veterans' benefits and combat pay. Umm, that refers more to the voting pattern of Senator Kerry when he voted against funding the troops in Iraq yet spoke in support of their being there. Benefits are staying pretty competitive the last I heard. Pay reductions have not been on the plate as far as I have seenIf condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won't have sex. No. If students are occupied sufficiently, then that result exists as they will hopefully never have the time to think of such. Removing the temptation of forbidden fruit and the attendant curiosity also helps that goal. A pincer move is being attempted here but with limited success...Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy. Providing health care to all Americans is socialism. Iraq has been a socialist country for years. Osama condemned the Hussein regime as being socialist. Such is merely the imposition of status quo for them. On our end we could never afford such a system due to our tax structure and how much economic redistribution that would result in. We could easily bankrupt the middle class all too quickly since there are overall more people who have medical problems than there would be people to subsidize such care.HMOs and insurance companies have the best interests of the public at heart. They seek the most profit, not the best interests of the public. They are straining to almost collapse, though, so they may come around.Global warming and tobacco's link to cancer are junk science, but creationism should be taught in schools. Oooookay. A president lying about an extramarital affair is an impeachable offense. A president lying to enlist support for a war in which thousands die is solid defense policy. Anybody working for that particular president who did what that president did would have been summarily dismissed for what they did, stripped of pension, stripped of all benefits, and barred from ever working in the federal civil service again. What is good for the troops has to be good for the boss too, especially since he was the one who made such illegal for the troops when he revamped ethics regs upon entering office in 1993.Lord Butler upheld that Bush and Blair operated in good faith on what is now known to be flaky intelligence. What was operated with was not a lie but just really bad intelligence. It was acted upon in good faith and results happened. That is a problem in the information gathering system that the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks on the United States (a.k.a. the 9-11 Commission), the Butler Inquiry, and others have suggested needs rethinking and reworking.Government should limit itself to the powers named in the Constitution, which include banning gay marriages and censoring the Internet. Both are the regulation of interstate commerce. That is settled law. It has been for going on a century. Funny how Democratic presidents were the ones that started that idea. If the above is evil, then a major chunk of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal would also be quite bad too.The public has a right to know about Hillary's cattle trades, but George Bush's cocaine conviction is none of our business. OooookayBeing a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you're a conservative radio host. Then it's an illness, and you need our prayers for your recovery. That kinda does not consider that criminal charges are still pending against that particular radio host...and that the judge has not been favorable at all towards that radio host...so I do not see how he is getting off without punishment...his court case is just not on the front pages of newspapersYou support states' rights, which means Attorney General John Ashcroft can tell states what local voter initiatives they have the right to adopt. Voters Rights Act of 1965...pushed by the Democrat Lyndon Johnson...allows for such in certain states...it acts as a safeguard against the denial of voting rights to minorities...Janet Reno was much more active under said law during the Clinton years as it was...What Bill Clinton did in the 1960s is of vital national interest, but what Bush did in the '80s is irrelevant. What record do you run on? Clinton always made issue of what happened in the 60s. Bush never really talks about the 80s and his opponents really don't either. One turned their life around and found the Lord. The other kept on keeping on.Feel free to pass this on.If you don't send it to at least 10 other people, we're likely to be stuck with Bush for 4 more years. Something wrong with that? Clinton let the National Commission on Library and Information Science go into mothballs. At least Bush actually made appointments to bring it up to strength.Friends don't let friends vote Republican. Well that kinda convicts me and probably the vast majority of "Campbellites" who are part of the churches of Christ...

Liquid donuts? Such could be an interesting idea for perking up creaky catalogers who are fading out from consciousness.

Interning is hard stuff doing eight hours each day and then dealing with a web-based serials class at night. I did get to upload and see my first record that I originally created for an item in WorldCat today, though!

I really do not submit too many stories to LISNews. I have only ever submitted ten stories thus far. Compared to other folks, that really is not all that much.Being busy with finishing off my master's, I guess right now I am trying to be selective on what I submit in hopes that it gets widely read.

Considering that I very well could be considered a fundamentalist...From GetReligion: Fundies Don't Read! (Creeping Fundamentalism VIII)

This is an interesting hypothetical read: Dispatch from the future

Alrighty. Did I say I was "conservative"? If that means I agree with the policies of the Conservative Party of Canada led by Mr. Stephen Harper, then yes, I guess I am conservative. If being conservative means that I agree in principal part with the policies of the Conservative and Unionist Party in the United Kingdom, then I guess I am a conservative.That does not preclude in any event social responsibility. What is a librarian if the librarians care not one whit about social responsibility? The hackneyed answer "a cataloger" is totally incorrect as frankly a cataloger is one of the key people who helps maintain the social environment of a library by creating the ability to access stored information that has been indexed and organized according to whatever system the library is using.Enough ranting...I need some sleep...

The first week of my first summer session is done. Class went well. I met two conservative young ladies devoted to helping people and yet would probably not fit the SRRT mold.Life always gets interesting in the summer!

My courses that start off Monday morning:HISTORY OF BOOKS AND PRINTINGStudy of the evolution of the printed book through a survey of the origin of recorded communication; history of writing materials; study of manuscript production, typography, type design, illustration, bookbinding, book production, and copyright from the earliest times to the present.INTERNSHIP IN LIBRARIANSHIP (although I do not get to carry out the hours until the second summer session)Provides an advanced preprofessional experience in the atmosphere of a cooperating library or information center in which the student is able to apply and evaluate the theory and practice learned in the classroom. Students participate in seminar meetings, prepare an evaluative paper, and are observed and evaluated by both the site supervisor and the internship coordinator. Prerequisites: four core and four elective courses pertinent to the internship, permission of the student's advisor, the internship coordinator, and the department chair.DATABASE SEARCHINGGeneral introduction to interactive database searching, including database producers, search system vendors, management of search services, search strategy, Boolean searching, structure and indexing of computer stored files. The course includes historical and background information. Greatest emphasis is on becoming a proficient searcher.And in the last summer session when I am also carrying out my internship at a university in THE SOUTH...SERIALSOrganization and management of serial publications; includes the format, selection, bibliographic control (manual and mechanized), and preservation techniques; the selection of jobbers and the services they offer. Prerequisites: [redacted].

Librarianship does not seem all that diverse. One of my "Library School" professors even highlighted such in collection development class when we talked about responding to community needs. The majority of the class was white, female, and Roman Catholic. To say that any male WASP dominated there would have been a seriously problematic delusion (the ladies ruled and I had to live with it or suffer the consequences).There can exist a wide range of views held by librarians. I know of multiple learned colleagues from "Library School" who are lurking on LISNews and are not as vocal as I am right now. The views of folks in my program range from neo-cons (which was at least one of the catalogers-in-training to boot) to Green Party partisans and others to the left. Even though the body of students in the program was not as diverse racially as say The City of Cleveland might be, it still represented a quite wide range of views.We are all human beings. We are not all mindless automatons who all think alike. Seeing previews on StarTV & Movie Television (interesting television reception by-products resulting from tropospheric ducting of radio signals over that notorious seasonal snow machine, Lake Erie) of the adaptation of I, Robot, I can say librarians do not function like robots do at all. We all think freely and bring a variety of perspectives to the labor of love that is librarianship to serve populations that are not at all homogenous.And if the neo-con cataloger and the Green Party school media specialist could make amends and get along with each other while in "Library School", maybe there is hope for librarianship?

From The Ashtabula Star Beacon: Terry Hall of Miami Valley Church of Christ Talks to Lifestyles Editor Carl Feather About Preterism

This relates a bit to Left Behind and talks about a different theological stance.

Being in "Library School" presents interesting perspectives as to how left-wing most librarians are. What is scary is how left-wing college campuses are, I think. It was scary that one would find no open Republicans (an extremely tiny number trying to "hide out in the open", though) on the campus where my "Library School" is located and yet can find tons upon tons upon tons of Howard Dean/Wesley Clark supporters (most of whom are now quite unsure who to support: Nader or Kerry). The students on that campus were so far left that they would make SRRT look very much so right-wing in contrast!Reading what Blake had to say about LISNews being a "dysfunctional family" and what Rory had to say in today's Library Juice (yes, I do subscribe and read it top to bottom...it is just that my filters that support my 60-80+ today went goofy due to what seemed to be a transmission problem), I have considered such. Since I am taking a break before picking back up with classes, I have little else to do. I agree with both of them in part in the points they make. It seems that they both address something from totally different approaches.I will summarize it this way: LISNews reflects a little more of the outside world than did my rather homogenous group of colleagues in "Library School" have. That is difficult for anyone in any field to cope with.Welcome to the diversity that is His creation. Tories are not always "nasty people" and may be very caring and compassionate. Broad brushstrokes do not always work for defining and characterizing a group.

This item on The Shotgun is of note.

This is enough rain. ENOUGH! Medina and Lorain counties suffered major damage from yesterday's storm line. Today's storm line is new and causing more havoc.Not having a telephone for most of the day (due to an apparently spectacular lightning strike that took out the 911 center around 3 AM this morning did not help things at all, either!

Hansard is the colloquial name for the official reports of debates in the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Hansard from the House of Commons for Prime Minister's Question Time is always interesting. As I do not have access to BBC Parliament or C-SPAN, I merely get to read what happened the next day rather than watch it live.That Prime Minister's Question Time was disrupted and that Speaker Michael Martin had to suspend the sitting on Wednesday are not happy occurrences, though...

First he brought to the world of Ashtabula County his film Crazy Ray. Now a student studying filmmaking at Bard College, Director Ian Jones has a new film Commercialized.Starring John Hofmeister with Brian & J.C. Mudd, Commercialized can be seen at the Ashtabula Arts Center this Friday (May 21st) at 9:00 PM and admission costs US$3.

Today somebody decided to drive their car through telephone poles along Lake Avenue in Ashtabula City. Telephone poles along the intersections of West 19th Street through West 14th Street with Lake Avenue were driven through, resulting in power outages in the area. The local cellular telephone tower (which covers most of Ashtabula City and a signifcant part of Ashtabula Township) was also rendered inoperative apparently by the incident. The suspect, according to Rodger McCoy of 102ZOO News, turned himself in to the Ashtabula City Police Department suffering from hypothermia and injuries received.Gee, the incident today was slightly more destructive than the falling tree that caused the massive northeast blackout on 8-14 last year. I fully expect that I am going to inventory all emergency systems tomorrow to make sure that I have things back up to normal operating status to be able and ready for anything that arises. I normally have to maintain such readiness but have been lax about it recently.

Ugh. Sin is not fun at all. Being a librarian-in-training for some odd reason also includes the problem of rampaging hormones. What to do with those hormones is what the problem is.I am not a happy camper...

This is what happens when I am on the road dealing with I-80 being torn up in Pennsylvania for construction! I am gone for a few hours and I have a LISTSERV that I subscribe to exploding with messages and LISNews has a massively huge discussion. Being a conservative librarian-in-training, this is just a weird day!I read Mr. Litwin's piece in Library Juice this morning. Mr. Litwin had some interesting points to make. I will give some consideration to them, though.Comments are indeed forcefully made here in LISNews. I do not necessarily see a bias towards conservativism. I see a slight bias towards folks who have been tried in the field for several years as compared to folks who are just learning. There is nothing wrong with that, though. One merely need look at USENET groups such as rec.audio.pro, misc.fitness.weights, or rec.radio.amateur to see things be slightly crazy.LISNews serves a great information source. For picking up on current awareness topics in the field, the site sure is read quite a bit by learned colleagues of all political persuasions (which at my library school includes Green Party members, Democratic Party members, folks who think the Canadian Alliance was a good party and that the Conservative Party of Canada is even better, and Republican Party members). Some of us from my library school actually do make contributions although frankly we cannot be too active as we also have to worry about things like Advanced Cataloging and Classification and Introduction to Research in Library Science.There is no problem with LISNews being overrun by conservatives. Healthy dialogue is nice and is useful. If one cannot handle differing viewpoints, one either must lead a sheltered life or be in lots of torment. This is also why I oppose home-schooling of students to a certain extent as well.Of course, being a cataloger-in-training, I will note that there are serious differences between Mr. Litwin's publication, which is an electronic serial that brings into play at the bare minimum chapter 12 of Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules 2 Revised 2003 (there are other relevant chapters that I cannot remember off the top of my head and I do not want to go running to find my huge AACR2r 2003 binder quite just yet), as compared to LISNews, which is an electronic resource that does not neatly fit the definition (I think) of an integrating resource totally. Cataloging both things are quite different processes that must be undertaken.