UC Berkeley GOP student bake sale is mean-spirited [COLUMN]
San Francisco Chronicle
A Republican student group at U.C. Berkeley recently hosted a “race-based bake sale” on campus to protest pending California legislation which would factor in race and gender into college admissions. Chronicle columnist Chip Johnson weighs in:
Their point that government and justice should be color blind and that no individual – or group – should receive a leg-up in any public competition is a legitimate issue. But they didn’t go about making their point in an effective way.
If enrollment was based solely on scholastic merit – and did not include financial concerns – it would soon be white students clamoring for affirmative action alongside other “disadvantaged” groups. Consider this: Asian freshman students at UC Berkeley in 2010 made up 46 percent of the student body, while white freshman students constituted 32 percent. And those figures come after a 9 percent drop in enrollment among Asian students.
The ensuing controversy prompted by the bake sale has pretty much assured the group of special notice at Sproul Plaza, where student groups, political extremists and religious zealots set up shop to expound on their world views daily.
Epik High’s Tablo Signs Exclusive Contract with YG
soompi.com
Daniel Lee a.k.a. Tablo looks to be getting his life back together following a harrowing cyber-bulling experience.
Epik High’s rapper extraordinaire Tablo has grasped hands with YG’s Yang Hyun Suk.
YG Entertainment has announced on Sept. 27, “Tablo has signed an exclusive 4-year contract with YG Entertainment and will be dropping his first official solo album on Nov. 1.”
Through this event, Tablo will break out from his 2-year hiatus that occurred when an academic controversy sparked around him. This contract has been known to be a solo contract that doesn’t involve Epik High.
Police Seek New Leads in Unsolved Murder
Patch.com (Fairfax City, Va.)
One year ago this October, a prominent local businessman found murdered in his Fairfax Station home, dead of trauma to the upper body. Over the past year, detectives have searched for new leads, but to date the murder of Yong Suk Yun is still unsolved.
Yun owned the Dr. Wash Carwash on Route 50 in Chantilly, and another in Georgia. He was well-known in the Korean-American community was also a member of the Korean-American Association of Virginia.
North Koreans abroad said to face poison-needle attacks
Los Angeles Times
Three times in recent weeks, activists opposing the regime of North Korea’s Kim Jong Il have been targeted for assassination by well-trained agents wielding poisoned needles, fellow activists allege.
A 46-year-old South Korean pastor living in Dandong, a Chinese city near the North Korean border, was found unconscious in the street — his face and fingers badly discolored — and died.
The following afternoon in the Chinese city of Yanji, a South Korean involved with missionary work was standing at a traffic light when he felt a pinprick in his lower back. As he collapsed to the sidewalk, he heard a man muttering behind him in Chinese, “Sorry, sorry.” He survived the apparent attack.
Initially, the stories about North Korean assassins wielding poison needles sounded improbable, but the activists gained some support for their charges this month when South Korean intelligence announced that it had foiled an attack in Seoul in which the intended weapon was a poisoned needle. The target in that case was Park Sung-hak, an activist who had launched balloons into North Korea carrying anti-regime leaflets.
Stars come to support Brian Joo in “RENT”
allkpop
Actress Yunjin Kim of Lost fame and others came out to support Korean American singer Brian Joo, who is starring in the Korean version of Rent.
A mother’s lesson: Country living inspires the wife to learn mother’s traditional kimchee
Chicago Tribune
Chef Christine Lee makes a trip back to the mother land to discover the joys of country living.
Former top [South Korean] presidential aide arrested
Yonhap
State prosecutors arrested a former senior presidential secretary on Wednesday after a Seoul court approved an arrest warrant, dealing a blow to the Lee Myung-bak administration, which has been struggling to fight against corruption in its final years.
Kim Du-woo, who served as Lee’s senior secretary for public affairs, is accused of taking bribes from an indicted lobbyist for a Busan-based savings bank on the verge of bankruptcy.
Seoul’s 5 best barbecue joints
CNNGo
In Seoul, it can be a daunting task to choose from the staggering number of gogi-jip (literally, “meat houses”) that sit on almost every street.
Whether it’s a casual after-work dinner with colleagues, an unusual sogeting or after-clubbing munchies at 3 a.m., these five best barbecue places in Seoul are where sophisticated foodies go to grill some quality beef, Korean-style.
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Shanghai Subway Accident Injures Hundreds
New York Times
Hundreds of people were injured Tuesday when a subway train slammed into the rear of another train in a sprawling transit line that had opened just last year in Shanghai. The accident cast new scrutiny on the safety record of China’s rapidly modernizing mass transit rail systems.
