Andanh.com

The mental health industry is the latest victim of our addiction to corner-cutting, now that computer programs threaten to replace traditional talk-therapy. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence in London gave the big thumbs up to two computer-based applications; one of them, FearFighter, teaches "patients"—can we call them that at this juncture?—to recognize the signs that trigger panic attacks and phobias and then cope with them. FearFighter is being flaunted as "perfect for the time-crunched."

Online therapy is another huge hit for pocket-liners but a sorry blow to the integrity of regulated care. Counseling exists in a gray area as is, rife with unlicensed therapists stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from Medicaid; once situated on the web—the entrepreneur's orgy—anyone dumb enough to believe could fall prey to manipulative individuals.

The most recent development in this opportunistic trend hails from the Golden State of idiots: California. Dr. John Kelsoe claims to have discovered the biological roots of bipolar disorder, a mood disturbance affecting 2.3 million Americans that can lead to suicide if left untreated. So he does what all good Americans would do: cashes in.

For $399, Kelsoe's La Jolla-based company, Psynomics, will send you a cup to spit in. Return your spit to their labs and they'll mail the results to your doctor—all to avoid self-analysis, God forbid. Then you can see how crazy you really are! Except Kelsoe himself says the presence of these gene variations does not at all mean the disease has or will manifest itself.

Bipolar disorder is notoriously difficult to peg. Until recently, diagnosis came only from the patient's descriptions of his/her behavior and their therapist's observations. Many psychiatrists identify Bipolar I and II in one hour and write prescriptions the same day.

Then Dr. Alexander Niculescu III, from Indiana University, discovered a blood test that could reveal bipolar disorder in human genetic code. Operative word here is "could"— Niculescu qualified his discovery with the tag "big step forward" and Psynomics' research only proves a patient is "two to three times more likely" to possess the disorder.

Niculescu signifies young children and early adolescents as the prime targets for his research—a noble cause. But if sneaking around the big bad doctor's office develops into the norm, mental disorders may devolve into a closeted monster—much like homosexuality used to be—better dealt with behind drawn curtains and out of the hands of licensed professionals receiving government oversight.

What we have here is a clear-cut case of opportunism at its most depraved, and soon, the slack-jawed lemmings will line up at the cliff's edge to avoid alliance with the stigma of mental disease. These mutations of goodwill serve to intensify the insecurity associated with unwellness, and while that may sound silly coming from the maw of our over-medicated generation, we have to realize we're dealing with a new generation of blood-sucking fiends. We cannot expect to ever understand or come to grips with the information spasming through our synapses if we don't grant ourselves the time or appropriate resources.

"I don't know. I mean, who isn't open to learning about the candidates? But, I mean, and I'm sure everybody is like that. But I really, I honestly have been too busy with books to really pay that much attention."

--Jenna Bush, talking politics with Larry King. She appeared on his show to promote her new book ... that she wrote. 4.24.08

"Give me a gun and I'll feel safe."

--A passenger on the Route 23 bus to 14-year-old pollster Desrianna Clary (Yeah, but how safe will the rest of us feel?). The survey revealed that 80 percent of Route 23 commuters felt unsafe. 4.24.08

Tibetan flags shook over the pit in Harvard Square, as a man wearing a "Free Tibet" beanie clutched a microphone. Then the chanting rang out, as it has each night since March 15th. It begins with one baritone voice, but is picked up and carried by the group of Tibetans and sympathizers who pray for the dead.

Protestor Kalsang Namgyal translated the prayers as requesting peace for all human beings, and praying for a good reincarnation. Tibetan Buddhist funeral rites last 49 days, or the duration of the transition between death and rebirth. "This is the 38th day," Namgyal said.

When peaceful protests in Lhasa and other cities in Tibet turned violent on March 14th, many Tibetans in the Cambridge area felt they needed to do something, explained Dhondup Phunkhang, a 35-year-old who helps young Tibetan immigrants retain the culture and identity of their homeland. "A lot of young Tibetans were extremely upset and frustrated," he said.

The nightly vigil in Harvard Square honors the many protesters—reports cannot verify how many—who were killed in Tibet during protests against the Chinese government in March. Since the Tibetan uprising, the international media has been largely banned from Tibet. The country has also been closed to domestic and foreign tourists since March 16. The protestors have four requests: They don't want the Olympic torch to go through Tibet and they're requesting the release of all innocent protesters. They also want the international media to be allowed back into Tibet and China to begin a dialogue with the Dalai Lama, which even President Bush has requested.

"We are not against China having the Olympics," Phunkhang said, "but the torch stands for justice, the spirit of mankind ... it would be ridiculous to have it pass through."

Phunkhang said his feelings were mixed when he heard about the recent Tibetan protests—the largest in two decades. "When we heard that monks were protesting in Lhasa, we were overjoyed—at the same time, we also had a lot of reservations," said Phunkhang. "We knew what would happen."

Two columns of white paper mounted on cardboard listed the fallen protesters' names, ages and places of death. The information was reported by the Tibetan Human Rights and Democracy website. A young girl with a red blessing string around her neck asked spectators to sign a petition.

"We have to take an active role, and spread unbiased information about what is going on," Phunkhang said, stressing that the protest was aimed against the Chinese government, not Chinese people. "This is about basic human rights."

He added that the Tibetan community in Greater Boston is clustered in Medford, Malden, Somerville and Cambridge. He estimated there are around 500 Tibetans in the state.

Tenzin Diki, a 24-year-old Tibetan studying English literature at Harvard, said that a powerful communal feeling had come out of the nightly gathering. "We are a community in diaspora, essentially," she said. "It's hard to know how to help family we left back in Tibet."

Fewer people will be bustling in the kitchen and making beds in restaurants and hotels across Cape Cod this year. Like other US tourist destinations, the Cape is suffering from a seasonal worker shortage, due to a lack of H-2B visas, which allow temporary seasonal workers to fill unskilled, entry-level positions.

Wendy Northcross, CEO of the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce, helps employers obtain H-2B visas and has seen their numbers drop in recent years. "Right after September 11th, Congress said. 'We're really going to enforce this cap for the [H-2B visa] program,'" she says. "And we went, 'There's a cap? Who knew?' So we educated ourselves really quickly."

In 2005, small business owners nationwide lobbied Congress for the Save our Small and Seasonal Businesses (SOS) Act, which divided the 66,000 available visas in two, 33,000 for each half of the fiscal year. The SOS Act had a built-in provision for returning H-2B visa workers: It allowed returning temporary workers to, well, return, not counted as part of the 33,000. But the returning worker provision ran out in October 2007 and was never renewed for 2008, leaving just 33,000 temporary visas for the whole country in the second half of FY 2008, including the tourist-heavy summer months.

On January 2nd, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services announced that the H-2B program had reached the 33,000 cap for the second half of 2008.

Northcross says that historically, the Cape, Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard have received about 5,000 to 7,000 visa permits, filling even more jobs, as some temps work more than one gig.

Greg Stone, owner of the Lighthouse Inn in West Dennis, has employed 18 to 20 Jamaican workers on H-2B visas for the past 10 years. This year, he's short-staffed. He'll be able to fill a few slots with Jamaican workers from winter resorts, since the H-2B program does leave room for extension from one season to the next. It won't be enough, though. Stone is already considering cutbacks, like opening his dining room for only breakfast, rather than dinner as well, on Memorial Day weekend.

"There aren't too many people who want a summer seasonal job," Stone says. "It's too long for high school and college students and school teachers." Underage staff can't legally work the long, late hours required by restaurants and hotels.

Young people can fill some of the void, though. The Massachusetts Department of Labor has been building a website (capejobs.com) and working with employers to standardize an online application in hopes of updating the job search process. Those hiring are also trolling areas of high unemployment for summer employees. A job fair in Westport this month allowed candidates from Fall River and New Bedford, two low-income, high-unemployment communities, to interview with employers at a location closer to home.

The problem with hiring those from far-off communities is transportation and housing. "Some of the companies themselves offer shuttles and in some cases housing," says workforce development undersecretary Jennifer James Price, "but they're doing a lot less in terms of supported housing for workers than they did 10 to 15 years ago."

In an attempt to fix this, the labor department worked with Cape Cod Destinations, a private transportation company, to provide the CAPEX bus, a daily ride from the Providence airport to the Cape, picking up employees in Fall River and New Bedford on the way.

Cape Cod also has a small program for retirees returning to the workforce. All these programs will work together to fill the shortage, though some are still hopeful for a program extension before the high season.

Price says a federal solution would be welcome, since response to Massachusetts Labor Department programs has been "decent, but not overwhelming. I've talked to some employers that see the writing on the wall," she says. "I'm not that hopeful that Congress will resolve the situation anytime soon."

Members of the Provincetown and Cape Cod chambers of commerce, along with business owners (including Greg Stone of the Lighthouse Inn), have lobbied in Washington several times for last-ditch H-2B legislation. Though they've made headway with those close to the Cape, they claim the main force holding back the extension is the Hispanic National Caucus.

In an effort to push broader national immigration policy reforms, the Caucus lobbied hard not to extend the SOS Act last year and won. But the Caucus keeps the details of its reform ideas under wraps, and a spokesman for the organization would only say that they want the guest worker program to be part of a broader reform package.

Some, like Northcross, have vague notions of providing employees with new benefits to entice them. "If we could somehow couple transportation with a job, or healthcare with a job ... people are looking to see what kind of subsidies they can offer, childcare or housing stipends."

Stone says it seems unfair to expect immigrants to work without some kind of benefit, since they're already working undesirable jobs. "It's certainly not about taking jobs from Americans," says Stone. "These are jobs that American people don't want. We really don't find any young people who want to make beds and clean toilets. You laugh, but it's a very important part of the business, and that's the response we get from young people: They laugh."

Some immigrant rights activists are taking up this cause. Gabriel Camacho, Northeast coordinator for Project Voice, an immigrant rights division of the American Friends Services Committee, thinks all immigrant workers should have the same labor rights as citizens, and that employers should dip into America's unemployment pool before turning to temporary workers. "Industry, whether it's agriculture or seasonal resorts, have a need for a cheap labor force," says Camacho. "That's why they lobby for guest worker programs."

The H-2B program, as Camacho sees it, is an extension of Operation Endgame, the bedrock and brainchild of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the largest investigative branch within the Department of Homeland Security. Formed in direct response to 9.11, ICE aims to remove all 12 million immigrants living and working without proper documentation in the US by 2012. "We must strive for 100 percent removal rate," the plan states.

"Integral to Operation Endgame is the guest worker program," says Camacho. "Part of this program is to be the enforcement mechanism of guest worker programs. They would be in charge of the channel that guest workers come in, and the way in which they get sent back."

Though Endgame doesn't mention H-2B visas specifically, its goals include "protecting America from customs and immigration violations not directly linked to terrorism" and mentions that "the INS estimated in 1998 that about two-fifths of the resident illegal alien population entered legally and then lost their legal status by overstaying their authorized visit and/or by illegally taking jobs."

ICE officials did not respond in time to repeated requests for comment.

The Office of Detention and Removal is the division of ICE responsible for the enforcement of national immigration laws, meaning that it's responsible for getting anyone deported who's not here legally. Activists worry that guest worker protection laws are not strong enough to fend off abuses.

"There's an essential imbalance of power in guest worker programs in the US" Camacho says. "A guest worker in the US is very tied to a particular employer, and the employer gets to decide whether they stay. Their visa is controlled by the employer. Therefore, if a guest worker tries to exert their rights they could be blacklisted or terminated."

Operation Endgame came to Massachusetts last March in New Bedford, when ICE agents arrested 361 undocumented workers at the Michael Bianco Inc. factory. Activists immediately decried the raid as a human rights disaster. Breast-feeding women say they were forced to bare and squeeze their breasts to prove they had newborns at home, and detainees were shipped to Texas with no family notification.

More raids could, of course, mean further worker shortages for the summer, as well as further human rights abuses. Some organizations, like Jamaica Plain Rapid Response Network (JP-RRN) are already planning for the next raid. JP-RRN is a group of about 75 volunteers who in March launched a raid hotline to commemorate the New Bedford raid. Dorotea Manuelia, a JP-RRN member, says that JP has several sites at risk for raids, but would not specify further.

In practice, the hotline will work as an emergency line for immigrants just arrested in a raid. Hotline volunteers can give advice or connect them with pro bono lawyers and family members.

JP-RRN also hands out small cards with the hotline number, along with immigrants' rights printed in both English and Spanish, to undocumented workers.

ICE raids and visa caps make it impossible to fill the Cape's labor demands, legally or illegally. But Northcross isn't worried about Cape businesses turning to illegal workers.

"We are pretty used to having enforcement agents around," says Northcross. "The irony is, these employers are going through these extreme measures. They're paying for transportation for people, doing so much paperwork, and they're doing all the right things. I hate to think that it's just going to encourage illegal behavior."

For all workers in the US, this Thursday, May 1, is a day of organization and protest. The Boston May Day Coalition, an immigrant rights organization, is planning a rally for 4pm on Boston Common.

For now, the H-2B extension bill lingers on the House floor, likely doomed, as Cape Cod employers scramble to fill positions.

"We don't want people to think they can't come to the Cape and enjoy their beaches and sunshine," says Stone. "We're still going to be serving margaritas and piña coladas out on the deck."

But the question remains, who will serve them?

Nestled among an assortment of leafy potted plants and manicured flower arrangements that apparently boosted his green cred, Gov. Deval Patrick spoke about "Clean Energy in the Commonwealth" to an enthusiastic crowd of hippies, students and yuppies at MIT's Kresge Auditorium on Earth Day.

"The age of clean energy is here," Patrick declared, before rattling off a laundry list of good environmental deeds accomplished by his administration and touting Massachusetts as a national leader in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The House and Senate have both passed a comprehensive energy reform bill backed by the governor that will increase the fixed sum companies spend on renewable energy upgrades and alters the way utilities charge customers to encourage efficiency.

"We estimate that the energy efficiency requirements of the pending energy bill ... will yield annual savings to consumers of $430 million in their monthly electricity bills," Patrick beamed, "resulting in 1,800 new jobs within a year of the bill's passage."

Patrick emphasized that increased investment in solar, wind and battery power, as well as advanced biofuels would boost the failing economy. "Clean energy technology spawns new jobs too, and not just in the lab. It's also jobs for manufacturing workers, installers, electricians, sheet metal fabricators and mechanics," he said. "Green collar jobs come in shades of both white and blue."

He mentioned the recent revamp of Deer Island's wastewater treatment plant to include a new solar energy system designed, manufactured and built by Massachusetts-based companies. He also brought up the much protested Cape Wind project, a proposed offshore wind farm that currently sits in permitting limbo.

"If we get this right," Patrick said, "the whole world will be our customer."

OMG LOL ... j/k. The Dig is back to normal. All you naysayers: we did not jump the shark. We killed the motherfucker and ate it for breakfast. PLUS 1

Passengers on the MBTA are subject to random bag searches as part of a drill to see how well transit officials would handle a security threat should the national security level be elevated to apricot on the cryptic rainbow scale (or in case someone puts a bomb on a train that will blow up if it goes slower than 50 mph!!!). How do you know if the MBTA police have passed the drill? Are a few passengers carrying around golden tickets, that the cops must strive to find? MINUS 1

Narwhals, the needle-nosed distant cousins of unicorns, could become equally extinct (that's right. We BELIEVE), according to a new study from the Journal of Ecological Applications. Sorry, polar bears, looks like you can't be the mascot for global warming anymore. MINUS 2

The Charles River is the cleanest it's been since the Federal Environmental Protection Agency started monitoring its quality in 1995. The river scored a B++ on the EPA's report card. We hate it when teachers do that! Just give us an A-, already. PLUS 1

The MBTA has to alter its signage so the orange line stop formerly known as New England Medical Center corresponds to its new alter ego, Tufts Medical Center. The T is asking Tufts to help foot the bill, but no word yet on how much it will cost. MINUS 1

Sam's Club and Costco are limiting how much rice customers can buy, due to record high prices and concerns about scarcity and inflation in the global market. DO NOT start hoarding rice, Americans. You don't even like rice that much. MINUS 2

The NYPD police officers facing trial for killing Sean Bell get acquitted. The decision prompts angry protesters to demand a federal civil rights case against the defendants. Well, at least it's an isolated incident, not a recurring problem, right? Oh, wait. Protesters are demanding a permanent attorney position to prosecute cases of police brutality, because, yeah, it is a recurring problem. MINUS 3

Sal DiMasi's personal accountant, former campaign treasurer and close friend Richard Vitale offered a group of professional ticket brokers help (at a price, of course) changing state regulations on the ticket resale industry. Vitale promised he "could do things lobbyists can't" to sway the house speaker (including a $250,000 third mortgage on DiMasi's North End condo). A bill on deregulation soared through the House. But, uh ... certainly that was inspired by Red Sox fever (no, not the stomach flu). MINUS 1

THIS WEEK'S TOTAL: MINUS 8

LAST WEEK'S TOTAL: DON'T GO THERE

ROFLcon and ponchos spark controversy

Dear Dig,

Your use of cutesy typographic misuse made reading your 4.23.08 issue a chore - especially since you stuck with this self-serving conceit from cover to cover. You guys sure know how to beat a dead horse. I suppose I should shell out the dough for the New York Times if I really demand good writing, but this crap suggests that you're not even trying anymore. Focus on your content, not how you style your content—otherwise you'll end up with something like Stuff @ Night.ERIC

VIA EMAIL

What's up with the misogynist poncho "ad" on page 49? "Bitches will be all up on your dick when you walk in a room sporting this ass raping poncho!" Wow. The potential hilarity was ruined by bad taste and poor judgment.

WENDY

VIA EMAIL

DO NOT WANT

kthxbai

-anon

PS Loving the cover work, the last five weeks have been out of the park.

Holy fuck, I wants me a poncho! I injured myself laughing. I'll never read the Dig again when I'm high. Also, it's hard to read when you're stoned. You motherfuckers! Awesome. Who's responsible?

SETH

VIA EMAIL

Dear Dig,Once a fine, fun paper, you've been dying over the past few months. Maybe you've been terminally ill all along and only recently showed symptoms. I mean, seriously: a lolcat-themed issue? Truncating Savage Love? De-illustrating Oh Cruel World and moving it to the back page? Interviewing a little kid at the aquarium for Exit Polls? I'm giving up. The one bright point in today's issue was an ad on page 49 for a fucking sweet poncho. There wasn't an email or phone number on the ad, just the pure majesty of the poncho. Can you tell me how to contact the guy who sent in that ad? I'd like to talk to him about starting our own damn newspaper.TILI

VIA EMAIL

In case you didn't notice last week a local freebie newspaper with a huge readership and good advertisement revenue folded.

So where is the eulogy or at least a snide ironic commentary or two? Also what's up with the Dig this week? Between that slip up and the barrage of stale internet memes I feel like I picked up a particularly shitty months old issue. I understand the cheeseburgers + roflcon = lolcats cover but to allow such a bad premise to bleed into most other sections is just sloppy.

JAVIER

VIA EMAIL

P.S. The Chezbrg3r gu1d3 d1d r0k.

P.S.S. OH SWEET LORD SPELLCHECK IS NOT PICKING UP THE LEETSPEAK AS AN ERROR...

Dear Dig,

God love ya. I love you. I look forward to reading you each week and have completely abandoned those other Boston free weeklies. But I was seriously annoyed with your choice to write several of your articles in misspelled internet speak last week (ROFLCon issue, 4.23.08). I'm finishing up a graduate degree, and I also ingest an obscene amount of pop culture, so I can appreciate your need to lambaste the ridiculousness of pop culture overlapping with academic analysis. But seriously, enough is enough. One or two articles is mildly amusing, twenty is mildly annoying. Don't get me wrong, I use "like" and "btw" on a fairly regular basis and would probably use "lol" in actual conversations if I wasn't concerned with seeming like a total ditz. But I was forced to start skipping some of your articles in frustration. And you don't want me doing that, do you? So just remember, a little bit goes a long way. That's what she said.

Sincerely,

GEOFFREY

BRIGHTON

Wow. Last week's issue was spectacular—spectacularly abhorrent and an utter chore to read. Forget griping about glossy covers and an increased ad over edit ratio.

It started with the cover. I noticed something amiss. The 3's, the 1 and the "nom nom nom" made me think, "Ok, fess up Weekly Dig staffers...who's a farker/farkette and who's into lolcats?" But then I noticed this was a theme for the issue and god was I mad. It wasn't just the roflcon-pertinent articles but almost every headline and sometimes whole unrelated articles. Don't ever, ever do that again or you will lose a reader not based on something petty like a glossy cover, but on integrity of print media.

Then again, it doesn't help this publication's cause when Isabelle Davis writes a review like she did for Blind Melon's new album. The one fact in her short spiel of opinion is in fact false. Hoon did lots of heroin, yes, but it was cocaine that did him in. As for the band keeping its name, I believe Glen Graham, Blind Melon drummer, put it best: "If you lost your arm," which is quite an important limb to musicians, mind you, "would you change your name?" That's some fine reviewing and fact-checking there, Izzy. It's all about integrity at this point in print media; it's quite obvious the Weekly Dig has a certain level of "snark" in its prose, but, for example, to criticize the Herald using this "internet speak" is below even the Herald's standards, which are not by any means noteworthy. Weekly Dig: get your shit together. Don't try to be "the internets." Just be the (legible) Weekly Dig.

BORIS

BACK BAY

Dig,

I look forward to reading your paper every week but what the hell was that crap you published in your last issue? I'm looking to your paper for something intellectual, cynical, funny, and for insight on where to get food or see a show this weekend. Writing standards have fallen so dramatically in the last few years with the onslaught on IM and texting, the last thing you should do is endorse this travesty.

Our society communicates through writing and there is no greater sign of intelligence than being able to effectively communicate. I have read enough 10th grade history papers and emails with ridiculous syntax that's a pain in the ass to translate, I don't need to do that when I pick up the paper.

In the first page of the issue it might have been cute, a little shout out to all the kiddies who text and IM all day long. After that it was just annoying and bothersome. If I want to read prose like that, I'll ask to see my 11-year-old cousin's AIM log. I felt I missed the Weekly Dig this week after trashing it when I realized that crap permeated the entire issue.

CHAD

CAMBRIDGE

Dear Dig,

At first I thought I was going to have a seizure trying to read through all the text messaging verbiage crap that you thought was clever to use. But then I came across one of the funniest things I have ever seen in my 31 years ... the ad for the Fucking Poncho! Sweet Baby Jesus is right! Seriously, who ever came up with this should be inducted into some hall of fame. For those people who missed this, I am so sorry because your life will never be complete. I have showed it to countless people, and watching their reaction as they read through it is fucking priceless. I am thinking about framing it and hanging it on the wall, but for now it is on my fridge for all to see, except that I live alone and nobody comes over, but I fucking crack up every time I see it. And in honor of your retarded text messaging issue, this ad has been chatted about via text many times so far. Happy?

And I started reading your magazine after you changed to glossy covers so I don't have an issue with it and am glad to see people are done bitching about it!

Keep it real!

ELIZABETH

BOSTON

GENRE | STARSUCK

VERDICT | YOU'RE SO PLAIN

RELEASE | 4.29.08

LABEL | HEAR MUSIC

HEARMUSIC.COM

You know how when a celebrity couple breaks up, America sides with one of them? Well, America chose James Taylor in the '80s and it is has been bummerville for Carly ever since. This Starbucks album isn't helping her cause.