Col. Flagg

Well any SE worth his weight would check something like this before they post it. If not, they should be removed. You simply do not post stuff until you've verified its authenticity when you run a business.

I see "reports" of all sorts of stuff. Until they are validated they are only one-sided reports that can be either true or lies. Given the state of journalism these days, one cannot put much trust in these reports. Many times the truth lies somewhere in between. I've gone to Sea Base (non US areas) and been interrogated about my visit, length of stay, etc. I've gone on mission trips where we've been held for hours while the government validates our valid visas. I've been held up by my own customs guys on occasion. I've been denied entry in to countries at the border. I've been on trains that were denied entry in to countries and returned back to the station of origin. I been outright discriminated against in Mexico for being American. Spat on, denied entry, held for questions, subjected to search. What I am going to do? Complain? Everyone knows that Americans are not liked there. But I don't go to the media to complain. The response would be, "Yeah, we know. What did you expect?"

I love how the FAQ and the "recommended" language of the announcement says to sign up to Scouting Wire to get the latest information, but when you go to that site there's nothing. Nada. Zilch.

Yeah I saw that. But with not solid evidence one way or the other, now this, I thought was interesting. I was thinking the same thing. Usually April Fools jokes are a day before or day of. Announcing THIS early would mean prior planning; something BSA is not noted for. Adding an FAQ with all the links seemed overkill for a joke, but who knows.

Did anyone else receive this? I checked Scoutwire and didn't see any mention of this yet. Wondering if this is just local or national.

I am not tracking here. The Beneficiary, SM and district/council approve the project. The Beneficiary, SM sign off on the final project as meeting requirements. How does a district/council approved project -- that has been accepted as meeting not only the project plan, but Requirement #5 as well -- get second guessed and possibly denied by a district/council EBOR? That's not right. The district/council already reviewed and signed off on the proposal. If the plan was executed to the Beneficiary's satisfaction, and the SM signs off, the requirement is COMPLETE! The BOR does not have standing to over ride the completion of the requirement. That would be like an SM not allowing a completed blue card. This is a slippery slope.

Providing the original post... The words were mine. I was not quoting the OP. I was applying the word indignant to the sentiment that the temperance movement seems to be applying to the situation, and I drew out other issues which are more pervasive and less monitored of which adults should be more concerned. The OP knew the line was fine. My point was that yes, the line is fine, but the existence of booze should be no worse than a TV being on with prime time programming, someone smoking near by or Simply put, having booze in plain view of Scouts (with adults around to monitor and help discuss if there are questions) is LESS of an issue than bullying, YPT, internet or chat room usage, use of SnapChat, or other things that Scouts are confronted with daily where this is little to no adult monitoring or intervention. If we are going to get upset about booze bottles we should be upset about a few other things done around Scouts. IMHO it is a non-issue.

Last time I checked, Somalia, Yemen, Sudan, Iraq, Iran and Syria were about as rogue as you can get in the Middle East. According to the latest reports that have been released from the western governments combating terrorism, planning cells in these countries have been responsible for most of the attacks and foiled attacks in the past two years. The training camps are in these countries, the leaders are in these countries, the apparatus for arming and aiding is in these countries. But by all means, let's not worry about that at all. What's a six month wait while we institute better vetting procedures measured against stopping even the potential for one Paris-style attack? We owe our citizens the protection which is their right. Helping those nationals from other countries is secondary to that duty.

I wonder how many of these indignant parents lock up their liquor, us e parental locks on TV or monitor their kids phones or online activity. In my experience their concern is misplaced. Where I live there used to be dry counties all over. It is a very conservative area, and yet many VFW posts sponsor BSA units where this very thing is allowed (private clubs). There's little to no discussion on the topic. It is simply a non-issue.

Yup. That's what I said above. The skin got hacked as well as the js.

I'd be interested to see which "skins" or themes people are using when they see this. I have yet to see it on either iPad, iPhone, Galaxy, Chrome or IE. I am using the theme IP.Board if that helps.

Looks like a hack of some sort. I am not seeing it when I log in here but you'd have to check a few places to see if this is 1) a server-based hack or 2) a trojan that a few of you have picked up. The company info is here. It does not say what the company does but their old FB page says they are a "forum software skinning and web hosting company." My Guess: The forum software uses one of their skins. There must be a code in the skin that either got hacked or is purposely pulling UID and PW information. Try another skin or theme and see if your problem persists. Above all do not put your information in to that pop up.

Please show me, it being so obvious, where the discrimination lies. Barring people from six countries is hardly racist or discriminatory.

Really? The six countries in the ban have huge problems with terrorism. It has nothing to do with religion. If you cannot see that I cannot help you. Go take a group of kids to any of those countries. Have fun.

Not necessarily. Data is data. How it is processed, ported and presented does not have to rely on open source platforms. You could have a proprietary system which ports this data for the councils. The problem lies in getting all councils on one platform for the data. In this day and age of cloud computing, this should not be a big deal.

Let's host it in Pakistan or Nigeria or Qatar or Saudi Arabia or India then. I wonder how tolerant those cultures are of gays or women or minorities. For all of our faults, we (the US) is still the most welcoming and generous nation on the face of the Earth. We should not lose sight of this fact when we discuss exercising our right to keep our country safe. Imagine the publicity if we DIDN'T scrutinize folks coming in and we had a Paris or Berlin-style attack at Jamboree. How indignant would people be then that we weren't more vigilant?

This is where good IT management and a solid, realistic technology road map is key. We are not talking a sophisticated application here. We are talking pulling data out of a database, writing a few batch routines and porting these reports via a reporting and email mgmt software. This not not rocket science, this is high school Comp Sci 101. Its a matter of prioritization. I have had contact with council and national in this area, as well as with their IT guys. You are right, they are capable. It's the lack of organization, direction and prioritization inherent in their leadership which keeps good ideas from seeing the light of day. They are more interested in things that have little impact, than others which would have greater.

Is your council using it?

If units know how to manage themselves then district becomes irrelevant. If district wants to black ball me from the training committee, great. Nothing keeps me from offering my training to Pack and Troop leaders to help their units. So all you need to do is "end run" the district. They'll be gone in a short period anyway.

In theory, all MBCs have to register and keep current YPT. Assuming the database works, you should be able to run a sort on MBCs with their YPT. There's no reason the software couldn't do the following if properly developed: Supply a monthly list of MBCs in the council with current YPT to the district Key 3 and advancement chair. Email MBCs with expiring YPT to remind them to update. Remove MBCs with expired YPT from the system. Allow for an "opt out" or removal feature if an MBC does not want to be a counselor anymore (this removes their membership status). New MBCs are automatically added to this resource pool. This is a very, very basic type of customer management system. If the current BSA software does not allow such functionality then their CIO and systems division should be fired. This could be done quite easily and would provide a huge benefit to their members. I'd rather they focus on this than more adult award ceremonies to hand out more knots and WB scarves.

Look at their February numbers.

Look at the numbers, not the verbiage. The numbers are going up, not down. Yes, that's a picture in time but for now the numbers are up. Time will tell if the verbiage of a reduction comes true.

Can you highlight for me the part where anyone is being targeted due to race, religion or ethnicity? https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/03/06/executive-order-protecting-nation-foreign-terrorist-entry-united-states

Since the discussion had turned to the Candian Girls and the British teacher, the first part of your comment ("Well, of course the recent governmental activity is going to adversely affect travel.") appeared directed at that current issue and not to the future probability. And no, the whole point of the policy is NOT to reduce travel to the US. The point is to eliminated criminal aliens, terror threats and other nasty things that can happen when you let your guard down. Canada does that today too. The result may be a slight drop in travel. I will take better vetting procedures for increased safety any day. We do that in Scouting now. We do background checks to keep the Scouts safe. One guy got turned back. He's Muslim so everyone starts crying foul because one guy got turned back. Below is a list of all the various things the Customs and Border Patrol has to deal with in January. How many Muslims do you think were in this data? How many were turned back? It is not a perfect system by any means. Heck, the system even went dark last month in a few major ports of entry. But when you deal with this much incoming and out-going stuff you have to have a system. Some times it works. Some times it doesn't. But just because one guy gets turned back does not mean it was because of race, religion, nationality or anything else. It could be a good old mistake. Month: 1/2017 Trucks: 900,901 Loaded Truck Containers: 655,175 Empty Truck Containers: 236,176 Trains: 3,288 Loaded Rail Containers: 168,914 Empty Rail Containers: 86,767 Train Passengers: 16,048 Buses: 20,763 Bus Passengers: 261,237 Personal Vehicles: 8,539,345 Personal Vehicle Passengers: 16,313,043 Pedestrians: 3,757,048 https://transborder.bts.gov/programs/international/transborder/TBDR_BC/TBDR_BC_Index.html

But if you look at what @@backpack posted, it hasn't really. Can we agree we should post statistics or cite sources if we are going to make statements like this? We usually ask people to cite BSA sources when giving advice or feedback on a substantive issue. One would think we would do the same for issues like this. The information is there for people to cite rather than making statements one way or the other.