Digital Commons Network^™

From Odious Debt To Odious Finance: Avoiding The Externalities Of A Functional Odious Debt Doctrine, Christiana Ochoa

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Article looks at the generally agreed upon characteristics of the odious debt doctrine and considers the unintended consequences and externalities that would ensue if this doctrine were ever made regularly operative. The enlivened scholarly debate surrounding the odious debt doctrine assumes that debt is the sole finance vehicle for despotic governments. This is simply not the case.

Debt is not the sole finance vehicle; despots are able to raise funds through a wide variety of other methods. These include the pillaging of the nation's natural resources, property, and other valuable asset as well as the exploitation of the nation's …

Book Review. Einhorn, Robin L., American Taxation, American Slavery, Ajay K. Mehrotra

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Combining Climate, Crash, And Highway Data For Improved Ranking Of Speed And Winter-Weather Related Crash Locations In Oregon, Christopher M. Monsere, Peter G. Bosa, Robert L. Bertini

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

In recent years, the techniques for screening transportation networks to identify high crash locations have become more sophisticated. Many transportation agencies, however, lack sufficient data, either in timeliness, completeness, or accuracy to implement many of the recent advances. This paper presents the results of an empirical analysis of screening and ranking for specific crash type (speed and ice related crashes) on rural 1.6 km (1 mi) highway sections of Oregon highways. The analysis includes data generated with the extensive use of spatial techniques and incorporates climate data to enhance environmental considerations. The paper compares the results of five ranking methods—critical …

The Endless Judicial Selection Debate And Why It Matters For Judicial Independence, Charles G. Geyh

Articles by Maurer Faculty

In this overview, I begin by describing the five different systems of state judicial selection that have evolved out of a perennial struggle to strike an optimal balance between judicial independence and judicial accountability. I then explore recent developments that have intensified that struggle, before analyzing, with reference to available research, how different selection systems counter or accommodate such developments. My purpose here is not to write (another) position piece. Rather, my purpose is to step back and contextualize disputes over judicial selection with reference to the independence and accountability issues that animate them, and to isolate what we know …

Fingerprint Error Rates And Proficiency Tests: What They Are And Why They Matter, Jonathan J. Koehler

UC Law Journal

The reliability and probative value of a reported fingerprint match at trial is inextricably linked to the rate at which fingerprint examiners make errors. Therefore, it is important that jurors and other legal actors have valid information about the different types of errors, error rates, and scientific tests that can assist with error rate estimates. There is much confusion surrounding these issues and this paper addresses each using a question- and-answer style. Specifically, I describe the different types of errors (e.g., false positives, false negatives, and false alarms) and error rates, explain why they matter, and discuss how we might …

Tax Appeal: A Proposal To Make The United States Tax Court More Judicial, Leandra Lederman

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Accountability is a critically important protection for any justice system; its absence provides an opportunity for shortcuts that may undermine procedural fairness or even change case outcomes. Yet, the United States Tax Court, which is an Article I court, is not subject to Administrative Office of U.S. Courts or the U.S. Judicial Conference - institutions that serve and oversee the federal judiciary. In addition, because the Tax Court is not an administrative agency, it is not covered by the Administrative Procedure Act or the Freedom of Information Act. The principal source of oversight of Tax Court actions is appellate review. …

The Cleaver, The Violin, And The Scalpel: Duty And The Restatement (Third) Of Torts, Aaron D. Twerski

UC Law Journal

This Article takes issue with the approach taken by the proposed final draft of the Restatement (Third) of Torts that insists that noduty or limited duty rules should be formulated only when a court can promulgate clear, categorical, bright-line rules that are applicable to a general class of cases. In this Article I demonstrate that no-duty rules may often have to be formulated and tailored to the facts of a specific case. I respond to the critics who are concerned that no-duty rules that are fact specific allow courts to invade the province of juries whose task it is to …

Insult To Injury: A Disability-Sensitive Response To Smolensky's Call For Parental Tort Liability For Preimplantation Genetic Interventions, Alicia R. Ouellette

UC Law Journal

In her article, Creating Children with Disabilities: Parental Tort Liability for Preimplantation Genetic Interventions, Professor Kirsten Rabe Smolensky argues that children who were subject to preimplantation genetic manipulation should have the ability to sue their parents for damages when the parents "directly intervene in the child's DNA and consequently cause that child to suffer a disability which limits the child's right to an open future." This Essay addresses the implications for people with disabilities of that argument. Specifically, it argues that limiting damages to cases in which a child is born with a disability unnecessarily and inaccurately devalues life with …

Book Review. Governing Through Crime: How The War On Crime Transformed American Democracy And Created A Culture Of Fear By Jonathan Simon, Jeannine Bell

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Dynamic Workflow Management For Large Scale Scientific Applications, Emir Mahmut Bahsi

LSU Master's Theses

The increasing computational and data requirements of scientific applications have made the usage of large clustered systems as well as distributed resources inevitable. Although executing large applications in these environments brings increased performance, the automation of the process becomes more and more challenging. The use of complex workflow management systems has been a viable solution for this automation process. In this thesis, we study a broad range of workflow management tools and compare their capabilities especially in terms of dynamic and conditional structures they support, which are crucial for the automation of complex applications. We then apply some of these …

Komatiitic Flows Of The Pioneer Ultramafic Complex Of The 3.3ga Weltevreden Formation, Barberton Greenstone Belt, South Africa: Stratigraphy, Petrology, And Geochemistry, Marc Romain Cooper

LSU Master's Theses

The 3.29 Ga Pioneer Ultramafic Complex (WPC) is a 1 km thick east-northeast trending tilted (90° dip) section of layered ultramafic rock in the Weltevreden Formation in the west-northwest region of the Barberton Greenstone Belt (BGB). It was originally interpreted as an intrusive complex with slaty zones that have a linear horizontal fabric produced by shear. However, a recent study identifies these slaty zones as komatiitic tuffs and attributes their horizontal fabric to plane and cross bedding. The present study suggests the non-slaty zones are extrusive komatiitic flows with abundant pyroxene spinifex tops, normal volcanic textures and crystal sizes, and …

A Matter Of Questionable Death: An Analysis Of Physical Child Abuse, Carey M. Schwartz

LSU Master's Theses

The ability to identify child abuse through skeletal remains is a skill that has generally received little attention. Since the publication of influential articles dealing with battered-child syndrome and shaken baby syndrome, researchers have put more effort toward finding recognizable patterns of physical child abuse. Several studies have found specific fracture patterns associated with child abuse; the humerus, femur and tibia, skull, ulna and radius, and the ribs have all been identified as the most commonly fractured bone resulting from physical child abuse in previous studies. Furthermore, researchers have found that subdural and retinal hemorrhages are the most commonly seen …

Synthesizing Tsca And Reach: Practical Principles For Chemical Regulation Reform, John S. Applegate

Articles by Maurer Faculty

The European Union's newly enacted comprehensive regulation for industrial chemicals, known as REACH, draws heavily on three decades of experience in the United States under the Toxic Substances Control Act. Much of that experience has been negative, inasmuch as TSCA is widely regarded as a disappointment among US environmental laws, and so REACH deliberately reverses many of the legislative choices that Congress made in TSCA. REACH also takes advantage of important new regulatory concepts that were not available to the framers of TSCA thirty years ago. The passage of REACH has sparked renewed interest in reforming TSCA, and the reformers …

Message Framing And Interactivity In Direct-To-Consumer Internet Advertisements: Visual And Textual Cues On Web Sites For Prescription Medications, Brooke Alayne Harrington

LSU Master's Theses

Americans’ adoption of the Internet has spawned the increased usage of this medium for direct-to-consumer advertising by pharmaceutical manufacturers, despite the widespread controversy over the ethics of the practice, the educational value of direct-to-consumer advertising, and the ultimate cost of the practices to the public. While the U.S. Food and Drug Administration regulates the industry’s advertising within traditional media, the agency does not yet impose standards for direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription medications on the Internet. This content analysis of the visual and textual cues of 100 direct-to-consumer Web sites for prescription medications identifies the unexpected strong presence of gain frames …

Tax Fairness And The Tax Mix, David G. Duff

All Faculty Publications

Since a society’s tax system is one of its most basic and essential social institutions, the justice or fairness of this tax system is an important subject for social and political theory, as well as for practical politics. In order to assess the fairness of any particular tax or the tax system as a whole, however, it is essential to consider the purpose of the tax and the tax system in general. While the most obvious purpose of most taxes is to raise revenue to finance public expenditures, taxes are also employed to regulate social and economic behaviour and to …

Stressor- And Corticotropin Releasing Factor-Induced Reinstatement And Active Stress-Related Behavioral Responses Are Augmented Following Long-Access Cocaine Self-Administration By Rats, John R. Mantsch, David A. Baker, David M. Francis, Eric S. Katz, Michael A. Hoks, Joseph P. Serge

Biomedical Sciences Faculty Research and Publications

Rationale Stressful events during periods of drug abstinence likely contribute to relapse in cocaine-dependent individuals. Excessive cocaine use may increase susceptibility to stressor-induced relapse through alterations in brain corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF) responsiveness.

Objectives This study examined stressor- and CRF-induced cocaine seeking and other stress-related behaviors in rats with different histories of cocaine self-administration (SA).

Materials and methods Rats self-administered cocaine under short-access (ShA; 2 h daily) or long-access (LgA; 6 h daily) conditions for 14 days or were provided access to saline and were tested for reinstatement by a stressor (electric footshock), cocaine or an icv injection of CRF and …

Comparisons Of Bacterial Community Within The Abdomens Of Formosan Subterranean Termites, Fresh- And Alcohol-Stored, From Their Native (China) And Introduced (U.S.) Range, Huei-Yang Ho

LSU Master's Theses

The Formosan subterranean termite (FST), a pest species native to China and introduced to the U.S., is obligatorily dependent on its gut microbiota. Using high-throughput 16S rRNA gene sequencing, the effects of long-term alcohol storage and geographic location on the bacteria composition of the FST colonies were investigated. Initial studies found the use of amplified ribosomal DNA restriction analysis (ARDRA) to be unpractical due to its higher costs compared to the direct sequencing of 16S rRNA gene sequences. Using nine FST colonies consisting of fresh and alcohol-stored Lousiana FST colonies and alcohol-stored China FST colonies, 237 bacteria ribotypes were identified …

The Color Appearance Of Stimuli Detected Via Short-Wavelength-Sensitive Cones: Comparisons With Visual Adaptation And Visual Field Data For Peri- Or Post-Menopausal Women Under 70 Years Of Age, Alvin Eisner, Maureen D. Toomey

Community Health Faculty Publications and Presentations

Dynamics of foveal light adaptation for vision mediated via short-wavelength-sensitive (SWS) cones were compared for two groups of healthy amenorrheic (peri- or post-menopausal) women not using hormonal medication. Each subject was assigned to a group based on the color name – “lavender” (~2/3 of all subjects) or "white" (~1/3 of all subjects) – chosen in a forced-response paradigm to best describe a threshold-level 440-nm test presented on a larger 3.6 log td 580-nm background that had been viewed for ~5 minutes. During the first 20–30 seconds after this 3.6 log td background abruptly replaced a much dimmer background, the threshold …

Locke On Consciousness, Angela M. Coventry, Uriah Kriegel

Philosophy Faculty Publications and Presentations

Locke’s theory of consciousness is often appropriated as a forerunner of present-day Higher-Order Perception (HOP) theories, but not much is said about it beyond that. We offer an interpretation of Locke’s account of consciousness that portrays it as crucially different from current-day HOP theory, both in detail and in spirit. In this paper, it is argued that there are good historical and philosophical reasons to attribute to Locke the view not that conscious states are accompanied by higher-order perceptions, but rather that conscious states constitute perceptions of themselves.

Education And The Age Profile Of Literacy Into Adulthood, Elizabeth Cascio, Damon Clark, Nora Gordon

Dartmouth Scholarship

American teenagers perform considerably worse on international assessments of achievement than do teenagers in other high-income countries. This observation has been a source of great concern since the first international tests were administered in the 1960s. But does this skill gap persist into adulthood? We examine this question using the first international assessment of adult literacy, conducted in the 1990s. We find that, consistent with other assessments of the school-age population, U.S. teenagers perform relatively poorly, ranking behind teenagers in the twelve other rich countries surveyed. However, by their late twenties, Americans compare much more favorably to their counterparts abroad: …

The Warps Survey. Vii. The Warps‐Ii Cluster Catalog, Donald J. Horner, Eric S. Perlman, Harald Ebeling, Laurence Jones, Caleb A. Scharf, Gary Wegner, Matthew Malkan, Ben Maughan

Dartmouth Scholarship

We present the galaxy cluster catalog from the second, larger phase of the Wide Angle ROSAT Pointed Survey (WARPS), an X-ray selected survey for high-redshift galaxy clusters. WARPS is among the largest deep X-ray cluster surveys and is being used to study the properties and evolution of galaxy clusters. The WARPS-II sample contains 125 clusters serendipitously detected in a survey of 301 ROSAT PSPC pointed observations and covers a sky area of 56.7 deg². Of these 125 clusters, 53 have not been previously reported in the literature. We have nearly complete spectroscopic follow-up of the clusters, which range …

Scaling Up And Moving In: Connecting Social Practices Views To Policies And Programs In Adult Education, Stephen Reder

Applied Linguistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

The social practices framework has had a major impact on adult literacy and numeracy research over the past quarter century in the US, the UK and other countries. To date, the social practices view has had far less influence on the development of policies and programs in adult literacy and numeracy education. To help this happen, new kinds of assessment tools aligned with the social practices framework are needed to support appropriate changes in curriculum design, learner assessment and program evaluation.
In this article research is presented that illustrates how measures of adults’ engagement in literacy and numeracy practices can …

Bin Half Full: Construction Waste Recycling Solutions, Mary L. Grothaus, Melissa Johnston, Shaun Roland, Christina Skellenger, Amy Twilegar

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

According to the City of Portland’s Office of Sustainable Development (OSD), construction, remodeling, and demolition (CR&D) waste comprises 20 percent of the City’s waste stream. Additionally, per capita waste generation in this sector is increasing faster than in the residential or commercial sectors. However, the current amount of CR&D waste that is landfilled can be reduced: 90 percent of the waste from a typical project can be diverted from landfill disposal. Although OSD currently requires that 50 percent of CR&D waste from every project is recycled, the City estimates that contractors recycle slightly less than this. OSD’s Portland Recycles! Plan …

Providing Information Literacy Instruction To Graduate Students Through Literature Review Workshops, Hannah Gascho Rempel, Jeanne R. Davidson

Library Faculty and Staff Publications and Presentations

As future professionals, graduate students must be information literate; however, information literacy instruction of graduate students is often neglected. To address this need, we created literature review workshops to serve graduate students from a wide range of subject disciplines at a point of shared need. Not only did this strategy prove to be successful in reaching a large number of students from a wide range of subject disciplines, the data gathered from the students identified some of the gaps graduate students have in their knowledge about library services.

University Studies Annual Assessment 2007-2008, Portland State University. University Studies Program

University Studies Annual Assessment Reports

Annual in-depth examination and assessment of Portland State University's general education model, the University Studies Program. The tools and methods used to assess student learning are faculty driven and developed.

Focal Point, Volume 22 Number 01, Portland State University. Regional Research Institute

Research and Training Center - Focal Point

This issue of Focal Point explores how the increasing emphasis on using evidence–based practices and a "system of care" approach is driving changes in jobs and roles related to children's mental health. Articles in the issue describe how agencies and providers of services and supports have responded to these changes by creating new types of positions or by redefining existing roles. The articles also focus on training and other workforce development activities that are required to support these kinds of changes in the workforce.

First Results From Ideal 2-D Mhd Reconstruction: Magnetopause Reconnection Event Seen By Cluster, W. L. Teh, B. U. O. Sonnerup

Dartmouth Scholarship

We have applied a new reconstruction method (Sonnerup and Teh, 2008), based on the ideal single-fluid MHD equations in a steady-state, two-dimensional geometry, to a reconnection event observed by the Cluster-3 (C3) space- craft on 5 July 2001, 06:23 UT, at the dawn-side Northern- Hemisphere magnetopause. The event has been previously studied by use of Grad-Shafranov (GS) reconstruction, per- formed in the deHoffmann-Teller frame, and using the as- sumption that the flow effects were either negligible or the flow was aligned with the magnetic field. Our new method allows the reconstruction to be performed in the frame of reference moving …

Web 2.0, Synthetic Immersive Environments, And Mobile Resources For Language Education, Julie M. Sykes, Ana Oskoz, Steven L. Thorne

World Languages and Literatures Faculty Publications and Presentations

In light of the increasingly blurred line between mediated and nonmediated contexts for social, professional, and educational purposes, attention to the presence and use of innovative digital media is critical to the consideration of the future of computer-assisted language learning (CALL). This article reviews current trends in the use of mediated communication and offers a vision for near-future second and foreign language (L2) learning that utilizes emerging media as (a) meaningful contexts for L2 language development and (b) a means for adding real world relevance to in-class uses of internet-mediated communication tools. In this article, we first explore a sampling …

The Science Of Persuasion In Recent Discourse On T.R. Malthus: An Exercise In The Analysis Of Rhetoric In Economics, Laila Winner

Economics Undergraduate Honors Theses

Of all the dour portraits lining the august halls of Economics, it is that of Thomas Robert Malthus which seems perhaps to scowl the most grimly. Describing an approach or policy as Malthusian in everyday conversation conjures a host of disturbing images, bare fields and squalling babies chief among them. Such allusions provoke even stronger reactions within the discipline Malthus helped to found, ranging from Keynes's fervent championship to the sneering dismissal of Samuelson. Neither the more famous Smith nor Ricardo nor even Marx can claim to have gained in their lives what the comparatively less prolific Reverend did with …

Engaging Recreational Fishers In Management And Conservation: Global Case Studies, Elise F. Granek, Elizabeth M.P. Madin, M. A. Brown, Will F. Figueira, Darren S. Cameron, Zeb Hogan, Gerry Kristianson, Pierre De Villiers, Jack E. Williams, John R. Post, S. Zahn, R. Arlinghaus

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

Globally, the number of recreational fishers is sizeable and increasing in many countries. Associated with this trend is the potential for negative impacts on fish stocks through exploitation or management measures such as stocking and introduction of non-native fishes. Nevertheless, recreational fishers can be instrumental in successful fisheries conservation through active involvement in, or initiation of, conservation projects to reduce both direct and external stressors contributing to fishery declines. Understanding fishers’ concerns for sustained access to the resource and developing methods for their meaningful participation can have positive impacts on conservation efforts. We examined a suite of case studies that …