Random Canyon

What's next?

2010-05-15T10:17:00.000-04:00

This is funny.

Who said it?

2009-11-06T21:07:00.005-05:00

"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality.... We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit. We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press-in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of liberal excess during recent years."

Who said it?

A. Sarah Palin.
B. Glenn Beck.
C. Michelle Bachman.
D. Rush Limbaugh.
E. None of the above.

Answer:

E. None of the above. It is from a radio address that aired on July 22,1933. The speaker was Adolf Hitler.

Former CIGNA exec: Michael Moore was right

2009-07-11T09:24:00.003-04:00

Wendell Potter is former head of communications for CIGNA, one of Amrica's biggest health insurance companies. On tonight's Bill Moyers Journal (PBS), Potter says Michael Moore's health-insurance documentary Sicko "hit the nail on the head" and contains "a great truth" "that we shouldn't fear government involvement in our health care system, that there is an appropriate role for government, and that it's been proven in the countries that were in that movie."

Moyers reveals the secret industry plan which successfully blunted the film's message by "radicaliz[ing]" Moore and threatening Democrats with political retaliation if they embraced him or his film. Here's a clip:

It was a dark and stormy night...

2009-07-02T10:29:00.002-04:00

The 2009 winners in the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, the annual competition to write the worst opening line for a novel, have been announced.

I won't spoil the surprise and give you the winner, but here are some of my favorites from among the runners-up and dishonorable mentions:

It could have been no more than midnight's icy incipit when Clifford, stumbling in hitherto sanguine emprise through the tombstone teeth of the raven lit Kirk-yard like some well-performed but lichen-hushed human bullet-catch, heard the manifest bactrian vociferation which betrayed with desperate flourish the inexplicably wretched fact that his camel was out there, out on the ice - and she was in mortal peril. (Mr. S. J. Crawford, Redlynch, QLD, Australia)

On a lovely day during one of the finest Indian summers anyone could remember--a season the Germans call "old wives' summer," obviously never having had Native Americans to name things after, but plenty of old wives, and "Indian summer" in German would refer to the natives of India in any case, which would make even less sense than the current naming system--on such a day, however named, John Baxter fell in the creek and drowned. (Deanna Stewart, Heidelberg, Germany)

If she wasn't the poster girl for the word voluptuous, with her not exactly "bedroom," but definitely "walking-down-that-hallway" eyes, her hair a palomino mane rather than platinum blond, lips reminding me of Marilyn Monroe not Angelina Jolie, and that slow hip-swaying walk that sweet-talks a man's thoughts into dim, smoky rooms where R & B is played, she should've been. (Sandra Trentz, Yakima, WA)

Read the rest, and see the best - er, worst - here.

To the slaughter

2009-06-30T16:47:00.003-04:00

"They are hauled in crowded trailers as far as 1,000 miles from auctions and feedlots to abattoirs across the border. Many end up in unregulated slaughterhouses, where they are sometimes paralyzed with knife stabs in their backs, leaving them conscious as their throats are slit."

They are horses, and upwards of 72,000 were slaughtered in Canada and Mexico last year. Many of those came from the U. S. Washed-up racehorses, unwanted foals, horses and ponies whose owners can no longer afford to keep them - sold for a few hundred dollars or less, to be shipped across the border and slaughtered in "unspeakable" conditions.

Coleman concedes!

2009-06-30T16:05:00.002-04:00

Welcome, Senator-elect Al Franken.

Note to Harry Reid: you've got 60 votes now. Get off your butt.

I reckon not

2009-06-27T12:28:00.003-04:00

Texas governor Rick Perry recently told the San Antonio Chamber of Commerce that Texans will keep driving pickup trucks no matter how high the cost of gasoline goes, because "You can't put a bale of hay in the back of a Prius. It don't work."

Over at CleanMPG.com, Austin American-Statesman columnist John Kelso relates how he decided to test Perry's statement. Turns out you can't fit a bale of hay in the back of a Prius: you can fit five.

Unprecedented!

2009-06-18T20:45:00.003-04:00

A network is given "unprecedented" access to the White House. Is this a good or bad thing?

I guess the answer depends on which network it is.

Quote of the week

2009-06-16T21:41:00.002-04:00

Andy Ostroy, writing about the "Freedom Cruise" co-sponsored by Ollie North's Freedom Alliance and the National Rifle Association:

So who exactly is the Freedom Alliance? On its website, it states that its mission "is to advance the American heritage of freedom by honoring and encouraging military service, defending the sovereignty of the United States and promoting a strong national defense." As for the NRA, well, that's just an organization of he-man wannabes with small dicks who like to shoot shit up.

Who says liberals have no sense of humor?

Yet anther domestic terrorist attack

2009-06-13T10:54:00.002-04:00

The head of a so-called "minuteman" vigilante group is among three suspects arrested for the May 30 murder of a man and his eight-year-old daughter when the suspects allegedly invaded their home in Arizona.

Yet another case where right-wing activists are obviously engaging in terrorism by any definition of the word.

Yet another case where the terrorists are not charged as terrorists. It seems that distinction is reserved for those who protest at political conventions.

Yet another case where talking heads in the media (are you listening, Lou Dobbs? Sean Hannity? Rush Limbaugh? Genn Beck? Beuhler?) incite the wingnuts to commit violence and go scot-free.

I fear for my country's future.

And this is surprising because...?

2009-06-11T10:31:00.004-04:00

You mean he's not the Messiah? O Noes!

"The Obama administration is not going to represent an abrupt departure from Bush-era [secretive government] policy," Steven Aftergood, who runs the Federation of American Scientists' Project on Government Secrecy, told TPMmuckraker. "If we thought they were, we were mistaken."

He added that it's no longer realistic to think that Obama's administration will take a strong stand in favor of openness on national security issues. "We have to recalibrate our expectations."

Recalibrate our expectations? Only if we had unreasonable expectations to begin with. What we have to do is redouble our efforts. Reform does not come from the top - it bubbles up from below. FDR asked the people to make him do the right thing, and eventually he did it; in the same vein, we have to keep the pressure on Obama and make him be the president we hoped he could be.

I don't know what Aftergood's expectations were. My expectation, campaign rhetoric notwithstanding, was not that Obama would step in and fix everything. My hope was that with Obama in office, we had at least some chance to have our voices heard. But voices can't be heard if they're silent. We have to write Obama. We have to write our legislators. We must demand open government as policy and as law. Then we should write them again on health care reform, and then on corporate influence in government. We have to write them letters and call their offices and demand they do the right thing on every issue. Then we have to tell our friends what we've done and encourage them to speak up too.

I haven't been doing nearly enough along those lines, but I plan - no, I pledge - to start today.

You Bet Your Health!

2009-06-05T15:13:00.001-04:00

Here is a pretty good model of how for-profit health insurance works. Pretend it's a game show and see if you can win.

Smiles outlawed in Virginia

2009-05-28T14:51:00.002-04:00

The Commonwealth of Virginia's Department of Motor Vehicles has declared smiling verboten when sitting for your driver's license photo. I am not making this up.

As part of the DMV's effort to develop super-secure driver's licenses and foolproof identification cards, the agency has issued a smile ban, directing customers to adopt a "neutral expression" in their portraits, thereby extinguishing whatever happiness comes with finally hearing one's number called.

And Virginia is not alone, nor first, in forbidding smiles at the DMV. Indiana disallowed smiles - as well as hats, scarves, spectacles, and certain hair styles - last year when it joined about 20 other states that use facial recognition software "to detect fraud in drivers' licenses." It seems Big Brother's machines have trouble distinguishing your smiling face from someone else's, but do a better job if you're deadpan.

Ah, the land of liberty!

The founding fathers held that among the inalienable rights bestowed on us all is the "pursuit of happiness" - but in today's paranoid society, there's no recognition of an inalienable right to show happiness.

30 Reasons to be a vegetarian

2009-05-08T11:15:00.003-04:00

How many reasons do you need to stop eating animals?

I also recommend this video, if you can stomach it: Meet Your Meat focuses on the unspeakable animal cruelty that is integral to the factory farming industry. I made the decision to go vegan for purely selfish reasons, but I'm pretty sure if I'm ever tempted to go back to eating meat, all I'll have to do is watch this 12-minute documentary again and I'll lose all appetite for animal flesh.

Blackmail in the Senate

2009-05-07T14:55:00.002-04:00

How can this be construed as anything but blackmail?

Basically, the message from these Republican senators to the Attorney General is this: So you want to investigate torture in the Bush administration? Step lightly. We know a thing or two about your past.

These senators deserve to be brought up on ethics charges. If it isn't out-and-out blackmail, it is certainly an unmistakable threat.

That said, if there was "extraordinary rendition" by the CIA under the Clinton administration, and Eric Holder approved it, let's by all means get to the bottom of it. And whether it started yesterday or goes back to Warren Gamaliel Harding, the American people - and the nations of world - deserve to know the truth. If America is to be the beacon of justice and democracy we like to pretend it is, there is really no other choice.

It's time to appoint a special prosecutor, and let the chips fall where they may. The people should be demanding as much.

It's Nature's Way

2009-05-05T12:50:00.004-04:00

It's nature's way of telling you something's wrong
It's nature's way of telling you in a song
It's nature's way of receiving you
It's nature's way of retrieving you
It's nature's way of telling you something's wrong

["Nature's Way", from Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus by Spirit]

Kathy Freston writes that the swine flu and the economy might constitute a wake-up call for humanity, a message that we need to change our ways. "What can we do, as individuals," she asks, "to create a sea change, to halt the mutation of deadly viruses, to say no to out-of-control business practices, to stop creating environmental havoc, and to bring our health up to a better level?" Her solution:

A diet high in animal protein bloats us physically by clogging our bodies with saturated fat, growth hormones, and antibiotics; it has been proven conclusively to cause cancer, heart disease, and obesity.

And the meat industry poisons and depletes our clean air, potable water, and fertile topsoil almost more than any other sector of business. As just one example, the meat industry is responsible for about 18 percent of all global warming--that's almost half again as much as all cars, planes, and trucks combined.

And now it's become all too clear that factory farms are breeding grounds for viruses to mutate and become deadly.

Basically, our current food choices (the average American eats about 200 pounds of meat annually) are killing us on a host of different levels. Perhaps now more than ever, it's time to clear out old, tired, uninformed ways of eating and opt instead for food that nourishes us, is easy on the planet, and gives the animals some breathing room.

She also quotes Thomas Friedman: "What if the crisis of 2008 represents something much more fundamental than a deep recession? What if it's telling us that the whole growth model we created over the last 50 years is simply unsustainable economically and ecologically...?"

This echoes a theme from a post of mine back in November: global economic collapse might be the thing that saves humanity from itself by forcing us to live small. We can heed the message and live in voluntary simplicity, or we can wait for Mother Nature to smack us down.

On the road to the new me

2009-04-22T16:15:00.004-04:00

Two recent events have led me to make some pretty significant lifestyle changes.

One was the personal story of a friend and musical colleague, a retired geneticist who spent years studying cancer, who read a book called The China Study and immediately stopped consuming animal protein. He convinced another friend and musical colleague, an MD, to read the same book... and the latter went vegan too! Both of them report that they feel better, they're losing weight, and they're never hungry. Well, I'm about halfway through the book now, and I am avoiding animal protein - especially casein (goodbye, beloved cheese!) - as much as possible.

The other event, which came at about the same time, was that my doctor advised me my blood sugar is way too high. It's in the range she said we'll call Impaired Glucose Tolerance or hyperglycemia - "but between you and me," she added, "it's diabetes." So I'm giving up sweets, including sodas and other sweetened beverages; and I've joined a health club.The plan is to do circuit training three times a week, and swim twice a week.

So far I've been on my low-sugar, not-quite-vegan diet for a couple of weeks, and I started working out just 6 days ago. My (very rough) estimate is that I've lost about six or seven pounds so far. I feel great, and while I can't say I'm never hungry, that is primarily due to the paucity of 100% plant-based food options in downtown Richmond. I'm already getting hooked on this workout thing, and enjoying vegetarian foods when I can get them. And I can't wait until my next visit to the doctor, to see what changes I'm wreaking in my cholesterol, triglyceride and blood glucose levels.

I'll post more about all of this as I go, including progress reports. For now, I gotta go. It's time to hit the lap pool.

Audacity has a new name

2009-03-20T12:54:00.002-04:00

...and its name is AIG.

While the American International Group comes under fire from Congress over executive bonuses, it is quietly fighting the federal government for the return of $306 million in tax payments, some related to deals that were conducted through offshore tax havens.

A.I.G. sued the government last month in a bid to force it to return the payments, which stemmed in large part from its use of aggressive tax deals, some involving entities controlled by the company’s financial products unit in the Cayman Islands, Ireland, the Dutch Antilles and other offshore havens.

A.I.G. is effectively suing its majority owner, the government, which has an 80 percent stake and has poured nearly $200 billion into the insurer in a bid to avert its collapse and avoid troubling the global financial markets. The company is in effect asking for even more money, in the form of tax refunds. The suit also suggests that A.I.G. is spending taxpayer money to pursue its case, something it is legally entitled to do. Its initial claim was denied by the Internal Revenue Service last year.

This, of course, is the same company that infamously gave executives and others seven-figure bonuses after accepting the aforementioned billions of taxpayer dollars. Apparently the company's management does not subscribe to the adage "don't bite the hand that feeds you."

I have one question: why doesn't the new majority shareholder replace the current board of directors with someone more responsive to said shareholder's interests?

Uncaptioned LOLcat

2009-02-24T15:48:00.001-05:00

I hate cute cat pictures. But this one made me laugh anyway. (Tip of the hat to George Washington's Blog)

2009-02-13T11:57:00.002-05:00

I was listening to NPR's All Things Considered yesterday when a passing comment by movie critic Bob Mondello struck a nerve. What presumably was intended as a review of The International turned into a dismissal of movies that portray corporations behaving amorally in the pursuit of profits.

"In Michael Clayton," he for-exampled, "a lawyer played by Tom Wilkinson despairs, saying he's spent 12 percent of his life 'defending the reputation of a deadly weed killer.'

"Outside the multiplex, though, we tend to think of most of these corporate entities as necessary pillars of society. We need our weed killers, after all; though that doesn't mean we trust the chemical companies that make them."

We need weed killers? Well of course we do. Freedom from dandelions is one of the basic necessities of our modern life. We need weed killers like we need bottled water and disposable razors. Without them we might be reduced to drinking from the tap, sharpening and reusing our straight razors, and even pulling weeds with our own hands!

Therein lies the problem with our modern society. The toxic memes planted in our unsuspecting minds by the subliminal hucksters of Mad Ave (never was there a more appropriate moniker) have driven us to such a constant state of psychological neediness that we can no longer distinguish mere conveniences from real needs. We think it's more important to know which starlet is dating her former gardener than to understand what the chemicals we apply to our own gardens and lawns do to our health and that of our children.

Problem with the GOP's image is that it's dead on

2009-01-30T10:13:00.003-05:00

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell says the GOP is in danger of becoming a regional party if they don't market themselves better.

McConnell called on the GOP to push back against labels that have hurt the party in the past — anti-immigrant, anti-union and anti-environment — and to regain taxpayers’ trust that they support limited government spending.

“Too often we’ve let others define us,” McConnell said. “And the image they’ve painted isn’t very pretty.”

No, Mitch, your actions have defined you. And you need to change more than your sales pitch to become relevant again. You need to change your behavior. You're labeled anti-immigrant, anti-union and anti-environment because you are anti-immigrant, anti-union and anti-environment. To the extent that you have an image problem, it's because the image is accurate. The right wing has pulled the wool over the eyes of too many people for too long; but as famously said the great man on whose coattails your party still tries to ride, you can't fool all the people all the time.

The Fourth Estate awakens

2009-01-28T12:23:00.002-05:00

"Right on cue," writes Eric Boehlert, "the White House press awakens from its Bush slumber."

Having hammered Bill Clinton for eight years over everything from haircuts to blowjobs, the press handled George W. Bush with kid gloves from day one. Pundits at the time noted that it was about time the press gave the new guy a break.

Then, having slept through eight years of outrageous deceit and secrecy, not to mention open contempt of the press, on the part of the Republican regime, the press has suddenly reawakened and decided to play hardball with the Obama administration. ABC News' executive producer says he doesn't think there is a honeymoon, and the Daily Beast exults "Game on!"

Some of the issues that have the press in such an uproar include misspelled names of press staffers and phone lines that weren't properly connected on the first day, and - gasp! - the White House handing out official photos of the Presidential Oath of Office do-over rather than letting the AP photogs in to snap their own pix. This was deemed such a slight that the AP, Reuters, and Agence France-Presse refused to move the images, and CNN's Ed Henry complained to Wolf Blitzer that on the very same day Obama was talking about transparency, "we were not let in."

Politico noted how the Clinton administration had also run into trouble with the press over issues of access. Noticeably absent from the Politico article was any mention of how the Bush administration dramatically limited media access, regularly cordoned off information from the press, and warned reporters that edgy questions posed at the daily sessions were "noted in the building." That's all been tossed down the memory hole. It's only new Democratic presidents who are asked to play nice with the press and get badgered when they do not.

That's the damned liberal media for you.

Living history

2009-01-20T15:29:00.002-05:00

Two words. President Obama.

Make that three words. President Obama: YES!

Reason number 4,731 why I'm glad I have a Mac

2009-01-15T11:09:00.003-05:00

At the office, we've had a spate of user complaints about a particular application giving an error message that goes something like this:

"Sorry, we were unable to process your request at this time. If you are unable to continue working, please dismiss this warning and then select View, Refresh from your browser's menu."

Someone associated with the product in question produced the following list of "possible solutions":


- Disable Pop-Up blocker
- Clean up spyware (use application such as Spybot and/or AdAware)
- Add [webapp] server to Internet Explorer's Trusted Sites zone (this may be a good idea for any other intranet servers or via an Active Directory policy)
- Clear out Java Cache by running
C:\Program Files\Java\jre1.5.0_0X\bin\javacpl.exe
---Click “Delete Files” then click “OK”.
---*if there are different versions, do this for each version or uninstall older versions and leave only the newest copy.
- Clear out Windows temp folders.
--- C:\Temp
--- C:\Documents and Settings\USER PROFILE\Local Settings\Temp
--- C:\Documents and Settings\USER PROFILE\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files
--- C:\Winnt\Temp
--- *Clear out the Temp/Temp. Internet Files for each user listed in the Documents and Settings folder.
- Reset IE to default settings.
--- Right Click on the Internet Explorer icon on the desktop or go to Control Panel and open Internet Options.
--- Click on the Programs Tab. Then click the Reset Web Settings button. Uncheck “Also reset my home page” then click “OK”.
- Tools > Internet Options > Advanced > Disable "Use HTTP 1.1" (you may need to enable it because sometimes IE just doesn't like the setting. I have actually seen it start working by enabling this option.)
- Tools > Internet Options > Advanced > Disable "Do not save encrypted pages to disk"
- Download the MSXML 4.0 SP2. This link will get you to the download. I selected the msxml.msi.
- Clear Browser Cache
- Delete [product A] or [product B] class file
- If one is currently installed, upgrade to the latest Sun JVM
- Windows Update (also verify that a recent Windows Update has not broken this!)
- Reboot
- Defrag
- Run a tool such as Symantec/Norton WinDoctor

I was going to rant about it, but this list speaks for itself. I'm glad my Mac just works.

Louisville plays Austin Peay tomorrow

2008-12-12T20:11:00.004-05:00

The ninth-ranked Cardinals play the OVC champion Austin Peay Governors tomorrow. In case you're not familiar, Peay is pronounced like the letter. Or the vegetable. Or...

Now they're weakening the Endangered Species Act

2008-12-12T17:30:00.004-05:00

Yet another "midnight regulation" from the lame duck Bush administration removes "a provision that requires Fish and Wildlife Service scientists to make sure that endangered species won't be harmed by federally approved logging, mining and road-building projects," according to public-interest journalism site ProPublica.

"Now those reviews will be conducted by other federal agencies, like the Army Corps of Engineers or the Federal Highway Administration."

ProPublica also explains why it will be difficult for Obama to reverse the rule changes. They also have a page that tracks a great many more Bush League midnight regulations. It is truly amazing how many things these criminals are putting in place to gut environmental protections and civil rights. It's as if they were intent on destroying as much as they can on their way out - contaminating our drinking water, mining uranium on the brink of the Grand Canyon, loosening endangered species protections, stripping protections from wilderness areas, lowering air quality standards... allowing federally-funded institutions to deny abortion requests for religious reasons, expanding police surveillance authority, limiting employee access to medical and family leave time... the list goes on and on.

Fortunately, the site also shows which rule changes are still open for public comment and which are closed, finalized, or already in effect. If you can find a few minutes, take a look. Send in your comments on the ones that are still open, and write your representatives about the ones that are under OMB or Congressional review. Once these things go into effect, it can take years to reverse them.

UPDATE: I've also added ProPublica to the blogroll. For some reason, the blogroll is working intermittently on the main page; however, it still works consistently on individual post pages. So if you don't see the blog list, just click on the title of any post and they should appear.

County Fair: NYT's lame effort to hype the Blagobama meme

2008-12-12T11:34:00.006-05:00

The MediaMatters County Fair blog summarizes how the media seem to be trying to promote the idea that Rod Blagojevich's "pay for play" scandal has somehow tainted Barack Obama:

...in order for the Beltway press to gin up the Blago story this week, basic journalism guidelines had to be set aside and in some cases brazenly ignored. That's the only way this story worked because simply reporting the facts as presented by the prosecutors would have made it painfully clear that, in terms of Obama's involvement, there was none. In fact, Obama had thwarted Blago's money-making scheme.

But that wasn't the story the press wanted to tell. (i.e. Obama the reformer rebukes corrupt local pol.) So lots of reporters and pundits consciously, and often systematically, took it upon themselves to make the story more appealing.

Of course the sources used in all the stories implying Obama's career is tarnished because he happens to be from Illinois are... drum roll please... Republican leaders. But that fact is always buried several paragraphs deep in stories that breathlessly report that "questions are being raised by some" about what Blago's problems mean about the president-elect.

Your liberal press in action.

Breakthroughs in solar power

2008-12-11T21:16:00.003-05:00

From Science Daily, here is an impressive new development in photovoltaic power.

Anna Dyson, an architectural scientist from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, is leading the way to make solar energy a real alternative to pollution-emitting fossil fuels. Her system contains rows of thin lenses that track the sun's movement. Sunlight floods each lens and is focused onto a postage-stamp sized, high-tech solar cell. Dyson says, "Really, what we want to do is be capturing and transferring that energy for usable means."
Conventional solar systems are about 14 percent efficient. This system has a combined heat and power efficiency of nearly 80 percent. "What they're doing is very efficiently capturing and transferring that light into electricity and the solar heat into hot water," Dyson explains.

Watching the video, I get the impression these are best suited to large-scale use - office buildings, malls, and such. They have a lot of moving parts, and they can't be cheap to make.

But there's been another breakthrough more likely to show up in your home: researchers are reporting record efficiencies for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). And although an efficiency of 10% doesn't sound very exciting compared to the 80% Dyson is claiming, or even the 14% achieved by conventional cells, it's a record for DSSCs, which have lots of other advantages. They're cheap to make, can be fashioned into flexible sheeting, and are tough enough to take on the elements without being encased in glass. They also work better in low-light environments. Until recently, these cells topped out at about 7% efficiency; they also degraded quickly with exposure to heat and UV light. The new cells are more stable at high temperatures and retain high output after long hours in direct sunlight.

AutoBlogGreen added to the blogroll

2008-12-11T14:47:00.002-05:00

I've been reading AutoBlogGreen for months; I dunno why it hadn't occurred to me until now to add it to the Random Blogroll. The blog covers all things automotive that relate to the ecology - hybrids, PHEVs, biodiesel, hypermiling techniques, you name it. They cover all the major auto shows, and report on a lot of sponsored competitions (like the Automotive X-Prize); they feature many photo galleries of concept cars and new releases. And on Fridays they usually post something amusingly quirky. If you like cars and you care about the environment, enjoy!

Is the Right Wing really dead?

2008-12-10T21:15:00.003-05:00

There's been a lot of talk since the historic events of November 4 to the effect that the right wing has suffered a fatal blow, that the crazies have been repudiated and the Republican Party is going to be on the outside looking in until it finds its way back to the center.

The hoo-hah over Illinois Gov. Blagojevich and his "pay for play" scandal is revealing. The media - including a lot of mainstream outlets - are giving it a lot more coverage than they ever devote to Republicans in trouble, and painting it as problematic (or worse) for Illinois Democrats from Jesse Jackson, Jr., to Barack Obama. And they're using it as an excuse to revive all manner of guilt-by-association innuendo against the president-elect in particular. (Did you know, they ask with a wink and a nudge, that Blagojevich once held the very House seat later occupied by Obama's chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel? Surely some corruption cooties rubbed off.)

The mainstream media, one can hope, will tire of this silly game soon. Obama, after all, not only refused to play ball, but seems to have set in motion the events that brought Blagojevich down. But they've already planted the seed. Meanwhile, the Billos and Hannitys of the far right never let a little thing like reality get in the way of a good smear campaign. They'll harp on this forever.

Truth be told, the GOP lost the 2008 elections because the economy is in the shitter, and as the party in power, they got the blame. Prosperity and economic security are the change the voters want. There are hard times coming, and when people realize Obama can't wave a magic wand and undo the damage of the last 28 years, there will be a backlash. The right-wing hatemongers need seduce only so many minds back to the Dark Side in order to get back into a position of influence; and they will never stop trying. I'd like to think America has wised up to their cynical game, but I'm not convinced. Time will tell.

More doomsday forecasts

2008-12-09T12:38:00.002-05:00

This is scary. It seems like just about everyone who foresaw the current economic crisis now says it's just the tip of the iceberg.

"...the U.S. will enter a long period which could be worse than the Great Depression... might lead to martial law..."
"...severe stagnation and deflation... food riots..."
"...the U.S. will go bankrupt sooner or later..."
"...'capitalism I' is over, and things will get very bad before we get to a new form of 'capitalism II'..."
"...our entire modern society will crash and break down..."

How to prepare for the coming depression? A quick, unscientific survey of web sites seems to reveal three prevalent threads:

Stock up on dry beans and canned goods, and learn to garden and can your own veggies;
Buy gold and other precious metals, which will hold their value through collapse of the currency system; and
Be prepared to live off the land and to ward off aggressors - this means getting weapons and learning to use them for hunting and self-defense.

NOTE: This is not an endorsement of any of the above predictions or advice. But they sure do provide food for thought.

Dactyl fractal

2008-12-09T12:08:00.006-05:00

This is cool.

Bush's mad rush to destroy American waterways

2008-12-05T09:46:00.003-05:00

A flurry of activity by the lame-duck Bush administration provides fresh examples of the truth of my favorite Jim Hightower quote.

Yesterday, the EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers issued a new guidance document to clarify how many of the nation's waterways will not, for Clean Water Act purposes, be protected....
The day before, the Administration approved new rules that would legalize the practice of dumping mining waste from coal mining into streams....
Factory feedlots will also benefit from a last-minute Bush rule -- 15,000 of them would be issued a get-out-jail-free pass saying they don't have to comply with the Clean Water Act as long as they promise they won't pollute.

How much more can this imbecile wreck in the 46 days remaining to him?

Self-charging cell phones?

2008-12-02T11:47:00.003-05:00

I guess this would be the 21st century equivalent of the self-winding watch: a charging circuit that uses tiny piezoelectrics to power electronic devices such as cell phones and mp3 players by grabbing the energy from sound waves in the air.

"When materials are brought down to the nanoscale dimension, their properties for some performance characteristics dramatically change," said [Texas A&M ChemEng prof. Tahir] Cagin who is a past recipient of the prestigious Feynman Prize in Nanotechnology. "One such example is with piezoelectric materials. We have demonstrated that when you go to a particular length scale – between 20 and 23 nanometers – you actually improve the energy-harvesting capacity by 100 percent."

How much energy would be saved if we could unplug all the wall warts that we use to power our electronics? One estimate says they use more than 58 billion kilowatt-hours, wasting $3.5 billion annually in standby losses alone (because they typically draw 3-4 watts of power even when they're not being used) and consuming the output of 10 large power plants - and that's just in the United States.

Of course we can avoid the standby losses by unplugging the damn things when we aren't using them, or by using the more modern "switching mode" power supplies, which only draw current when they're actually being used; but it would be even better if our electronic devices could just convert ambient noise to the juice they need to power themselves.

Mmm, pass the N-acylphosphatidylethanolamines!

2008-11-27T11:55:00.003-05:00

Researchers have found a mechanism by which the brain responds to dietary fat. A certain type of lipids called N-acylphosphatidylethanolamines (NAPEs) are secreted by the smal intestine when you eat fatty foods; they go straight to the brain and concentrate in a center that regulates appetite. Rats dosed with NAPEs reduced their caloric intake without losing interest in food altogether. In other words, the chemicals appear to satisfy the brain's craving for fat.

What's more, chronic fat consumption seems to shut down the production of NAPEs by the intestine, not their effectiveness in the brain:

Animals fed a high-fat diet for 35 days lose the normal increases in circulating NAPE after a fatty meal. That suggest that derangements in NAPE secretion associated with chronic high-fat feeding may contribute to diet-induced obesity precipitated by overexposure to triglyceride-rich foods. However, those animals still responded to NAPE treatment.

So treatment with NAPEs may be useful in treating obesity by breaking the cycle of fat consumption.

I could use some of this stuff. Preferably with gravy.

Are we really this dumb?

2008-11-24T09:22:00.003-05:00

Q: What's worse than Americans averaging a score of 49% on a simple civics test?

A: Their elected officials averaging a score of 44%.

I managed a score of 84.85% (28 correct out of 33). See how you fare.

Obama appoints shaman to overhaul net regulation

2008-11-21T17:14:00.002-05:00

Short Sharp Science reports, in case you missed it in the blogroll, that President-elect Obama has named a wigwam-dwelling shaman to lead a team in charge of overhauling Internet regulation.

Oh, and he's a minotaur, too.

The man known as Kevin Werbach in the real world is also known in World of Warcraft as Supernovan Jenkins, a 70th-level Taurean Shaman. Werbach is obviously a gamer, a participant in virtual worlds. I prefer Second Life myself, as does Werbach's co-team lead Susan Crawford; they're both also proponents of net neutrality. I take this as a very good sign.

I just wonder how they feel about online poker.

A double-barreled addition to the Random Blogroll: DMI and DMIBlog

2008-11-21T16:19:00.003-05:00

"If you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice." - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Drum Major Institute bills itself as "a non-partisan, non-profit think tank providing ideas that fuel the progressive movement." Founded by Harry Wachtel, lawyer and advisor to MLK, and relaunched in 1999 by their sons, William Wachtel and Martin Luther King III, and Ambassador Andrew Young, the institute conducts research into social and economic issues, and advocates for progressive policies to benefit the middle class.

I'm just discovering this site, but it looks very promising and I've added feeds for both their main page, featuring daily (more or less) articles from a handful of contributors, and their blog, which has more frequent posts from a broader range of sources. Enjoy reading them.

Borowitz: Obama’s Use of Complete Sentences Stirs Controversy

2008-11-20T18:59:00.002-05:00

Here's the latest addition to the Random Blogroll. Andy Borowitz is a comedian and writer whose work appears in The New Yorker and The New York Times, and at his award-winning humor site, BorowitzReport.com.

In his latest post, he writes:

In the first two weeks since the election, President-elect Barack Obama has broken with a tradition established over the past eight years through his controversial use of complete sentences, political observers say.

Millions of Americans who watched Mr. Obama's appearance on CBS' "Sixty Minutes" on Sunday witnessed the president-elect's unorthodox verbal tick, which had Mr. Obama employing grammatically correct sentences virtually every time he opened his mouth.

But Mr. Obama's decision to use complete sentences in his public pronouncements carries with it certain risks, since after the last eight years many Americans may find his odd speaking style jarring.

Waxman takes over Energy Committee; change is coming!

2008-11-20T16:11:00.003-05:00

Henry Waxman has ousted John Dingell as chair or the House Energy Committee in a secret vote of the Democratic caucus.

Dingell, who represents Michigan and is married to a GM exec, has battled the more liberal Waxman on fuel efficiency standards. The move is seen as good news for environmentalists, and is a sign that the House understands the mandate for change that the 2008 elections represent. Waxman defeated Dingell by 15 votes (137-122) in the caucus vote. According to a report at politico.com, Representative-elect Gerry Connolly of Virginia said 18 of the 26 freshman legislators had committed to Waxman before the vote. However, unless at least 21 of the 26 actually voted for him, it means Waxman also got a majority of the returning members of the caucus - and thus would have won the chair even with an even split among the newcomers.

Progressives have been stewing over the number of familiar faces from the Clinton era among President-elect Obama's high-profile appointees, but author David Corn, speaking on today's Democracy Now! program, said that there are "a bunch of people who have been progressive public policy advocates, academics and other experts, who have spent their whole adult careers devoted to policy making, not necessarily to going between government and private sector and making a bunch of money."

It makes sense that as a relative newcomer to Washington, Obama would want some people with experience around him. I think it's encouraging that he has also brought some people who are passionate about the change we need. Yes, some of Obama's appointees have checkered pasts when it comes to AIPAC and PNAC and Gitmo; but he strikes me as a strong leader and a passionate advocate for change, and these people are going to know there's a new boss. They're going to have a chance to make a case to him for what they believe in, but ultimately he is the man who will make the decisions; and they, if they are faithful employees, will implement what he decides regardless of their personal views. I think we on the left should continue to pressure Obama for liberal and progressive changes, but I don't think we need to panic over his appointments. He said from the start that he planned to forge a team of rivals, and I think he deserves to be judged more by what he does than by whom he chooses to do it through.

Tim Robbins: an open letter to the NYC Board of Elections

2008-11-20T11:12:00.005-05:00

This is priceless. I assume Mr. Robbins won't mind my reproducing it in toto, since the implicit intent of writing an open letter is to have it read as widely as possible.

Mr. Gregory C. Soumas
Board of Elections in the City of New York
Executive Office
32 Broadway
New York, NY 10004-1609

November 17, 2008

Dear Mr. Soumas:

I would like to publicly apologize for being such a dim-witted dilettante on Election Day. I was under the naïve assumption that I could vote where I voted in the last two elections. Your thoughtful letter pointed out that if I had voted in the recent primary election in September I would have discovered that I was no longer registered in the polling place I have voted in since 2004. Considering your position at the Board of Elections and your deep respect for the democratic process I must assume that my local 14th St. poll worker, Betty J. Williamson's assertion that my name was on the active voter rolls for the primary in September of this year was erroneous and that she must be as confused and wrongheaded as I am. If Ms. Williamson saw my name in the book in September that would mean that you are lying. Certainly you wouldn't lie about a thing like that. That is unbecoming of a man of your bureaucratic stature. And why would anyone in the Board of Elections be eliminating legitimate voters from the rolls in late September and October of 2008? That's just crazy and un-democratic.

I should also apologize for the misguided actions of Justice Paul G. Feinman in issuing a court order on Election Day allowing me to vote on 14th St. He apparently thought that a printed out record from your own Board of Elections computer verifying my polling place as 14th St was justification for issuing the court order. If he had only thought to contact you, you could have helped him understand the logic and wisdom of eliminating my name from the book on 14th St. where I have always voted and leaving my name registered at a place I have never voted.

I must also thank you for sending your letter not to me but to all the major newspapers in the New York area and across the internet. I understand it was your way of clearing up this matter and for that I am grateful. I am particularly appreciative of your sending a copy of my voter registration card with my home address and driver's license number to all the newspapers and, by extension, to millions across the internet. What celebrity dilettante wouldn't want his private information made public? What kind of snob gets angry that his family's safety might be compromised? It comes with the territory, right? I was thinking of returning that favor by publishing your home address in this letter but then I thought that maybe one of the thousands of New Yorkers that were taken off the voter rolls in the last two months might not understand what a patriotic upstanding man you are and might show up at your doorstep with the misguided assumption that you are a petty vindictive corrupt scumbag.

Tim Robbins
New Yorker since 1961
Voter since 1976

P.S. If anyone reading this letter had a similar experience on Election Day it can and should be reported at 866ourvote.org.

cc:
Commissioners of Elections
Marcus Cederqvist, Executive Director
George Gonzalez, Deputy Executive Director
Pamela Perkins, Administrative Manager
Beth Fossella, Coordinator, Voter Registration
Steven H. Richman, General Counsel
Troy Johnson, Chief Clerk
Timothy Gay, Deputy Chief Clerk

[updated to correct the spelling of Mr. Robbins' name in the headline]

Collapse and survival

2008-11-19T22:56:00.003-05:00

Last week, futurist Gerald Celente - a man with a stellar reputation for getting his economic forecasts right - told Fox News that by 2012, the US will be wracked by tax revolts, unemployment, homelessness, and food riots; that at Christmas, we'll be more concerned with putting food on the table than buying gifts; in short, that the United States will become the world's first "undeveloped country" in an economic crisis that will far exceed anything that happened in the Great Depression. (Fox, in typical fashion, spins this as the upshot of an Obama presidency - just as Rush Limbaugh blames the current economic crisis on the man who won't become president for two months yet - but Celente blames it on "the takeover of Washington, D. C., in broad daylight by Wall Street.")

Others have predicted devastating economic (and other) consequences of global water shortage, peak oil, and the race to the bottom of the world labor market.

Oil wars. Water wars. Riots and revolts. Economic catastrophe.

As bleak as these predictions sound, a worldwide economic collapse may be the only thing that can save humanity from itself. The modern American economy is built on consumption at a level that is unsustainable in the long run, is contributing immensely to global warming, and left unchecked, could render the planet incapable of supporting life as we know it. And as China and India adopt the same economic model, the situation only threatens to get worse. A global economic collapse on the scale envisioned by Celente would force us back to simpler times, when business was conducted on a personal level, goods and services were produced and used locally, and simply getting by was a more realistic goal than the perpetual growth that modern capitalism requires. It may be the only thing that could bring about the drastic reductions in consumption and fossil fuel usage needed to forestall the impending climate crisis.

It's been argued that the Black Plague that swept the world in the 14th century, and the attendant death of somewhere between a quarter and half of the population, led to times of relative plenty and ultimately to the Renaissance. Could the fall of modern civilization, and another massive die-off, turn out to be the key to survival of the species?

Separated at birth?

2008-11-13T02:29:00.002-05:00

I'm just saying.

Unity poem

2008-11-12T15:18:00.002-05:00

A friend sent me this today (Thanks, Glenn!) and I just can't resist.

The election is over, the results are now known;
The will of the people has been clearly shown.
We should show by our thoughts and our words and our deeds
That unity's just what our country now needs.

Let's all get together - let bitterness pass:
I'll hug your elephant; you kiss my ass.

Added to Random Blogroll: Robert Reich's Blog

2008-11-08T15:54:00.003-05:00

Robert Reich, my favorite economist, is the nation's 22nd Secretary of Labor and a professor at the University of California at Berkeley. His latest book is "Supercapitalism." He used to host "Marketplace" on public radio. He describes his blog as his personal journal. I look forward to seeing his posts pop up in the blogroll.

My to-do list for President Obama

2008-11-07T21:33:00.002-05:00

This is the period every four or eight years when everyone weighs in with their ideas of what the incoming president should set as his priorities. It's a tough call. There are a whole lot of issues out there to be addressed. There's the increasing popular resentment of corporate greed, the downturn in the economy, the threat of global warming and other environmental concerns, Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel, the so-called "Global War On Terror," civil liberties, energy independence, free trade, fair trade, media reform, gay rights, tax reform, abortion, universal health care, and myriad other issues. But I'll take a whack at it. Here's my list of the top five things the new administration should do.

1. Declare a new policy of openness and accountability in government.
The abuses of the Bush-Cheney era have been conceived, planned, and largely executed behind an unprecedented veil of secrecy. From the clandestine meetings with oil company executives to define the administration's energy policy, to the secret and unwarranted snooping on citizens' email, phone conversations, and reading habits, to the secret prisons at Guantanamo and elsewhere, the government has been sneaking around behind our backs far too much for far too long. The Obama administration should make transparency and disclosure the default. Policy discussions, cabinet meetings, and inner workings of all government agencies should be open to public inspection, except when there is a certified national security reason for secrecy. And by certified, I mean there should be a governing body, to include representation from the judicial branch, from both major parties in Congress, and properly vetted members of the general public, which has the power to review and either approve or overturn any claim of a requirement for secrecy. FOIA requests should be granted as a matter of course, unless the requested information has been explicitly designated as classified.

2. Make survivability of life on the planet priority number one.
Of course the economy is important. So is health. And war is abominable. But if the economy is humming, and everyone has free access to all the health care imaginable, and the world is at peace, it's all for naught if the planet cannot sustain life. We can argue over whether global warming is man-made, and whether it threatens our survival, but let's at least agree that if anything does threaten the long-term survival of the species, that trumps all other considerations. Peace, freedom, and prosperity are secondary considerations next to survival. Explicitly saying so helps to set the stage for serious discussions about the environment.

3. Initiate a 10-year program to achieve 100% clean electricity, and work to eliminate dependence on foreign oil.
Obama has said he wants to create jobs that can't be outsourced, rebuilding America's energy infrastructure. An effort similar to that which followed JFK's pledge to go to the moon in 10 years could get us to an electric grid with a zero carbon footprint within 10 years; it would have a huge impact on carbon dioxide emissions, while helping the economy by creating those millions of jobs. At the same time, improvements in our transportation system - modernizing and promoting mass transit, development of more efficient cars, and other measures could reduce our dependence on petroleum to the point that we could satisfy our own needs without having to import a drop - this latter goal may not be met in ten years, but we can make signifcant progress in any event.

4. Begin building a bottom-up economy.
With the mortgage industry already on life support and the automobile industry begging for transfusions, the time has come to recognize that "too big to fail" is simply too big. The solution to this problem is not consolidation of the survivors into bigger and bigger entities, it is to rebuild our economy around the small businesses that have always been the backbone of the American economy. Rather than bailouts of megacorportations, the economic recovery should concentrate on revitalizing small businesses. A condition of bailing out any too-big-to-fail corporation should be its breakup into smaller units that can be allowed to succeed or fail on their own merits.

5. Take steps to restore America's moral leadership in the world.
This is a long-term project; we cannot reclaim our honor overnight. It starts at home with restoration of habeas corpus, due process for all defendants, and enforcement of the Posse Comitatus Act, and with moral treatment of the less fortunate among us (including universal health care and social programs such as Project Head Start). It continues with the closing of Guatnánamo and termination of the indefensible practice known as extraordinary rendition, and with holding both our military and the mercenaries we hire to supplement our military accountable for war crimes and for abuses committed in occupied countries. And it culminates with predicating our support of foreign governments as much on their legitimacy and their human rights records as on their willingness to do our bidding or their ability to turn a profit for well-connected American corporations.

There's much more to be done. Get the money out of politics. Break up the media monopolies. Reinstate the Fairness Doctrine. Bring back the separation of church and state. Guarantee a woman's right to choose. Allow adults who love each other to marry. Allow responsible adults to gamble online if they so choose, and use the intoxicants of their choice in the privacy of their own homes. Correct the mistaken notion that corporations, which do not suffer from human limitations, deserve the same rights and privileges as flesh and blood human beings. And on and on. But with transparency in government and a guarantee of free speech, many of these things will take care of themselves.

Enjoy reading? Please let me know!

2008-11-07T15:12:00.004-05:00

I've just added a Followers widget in the right-hand column. If you enjoy reading Random Canyon, and you have a Google account, please sign up! This will add Random Canyon to your Blogger dashboard along with any other blogs you're following, giving you quick access to the latest posts. It will let me know somebody's reading, and encourage me to keep writing. It's also a chance for you to spread the word about any other blogs you like to read, as other readers can view your profile to see what else you're following.

So THAT'S where I felt that before!

2008-11-05T16:33:00.002-05:00

I just read "Taking Our Country Back," an essay at Salon.com worth reading in its own right; it sums up rather well what the election of Barack Obama means to me. But its opening sentences evoked the sense of deja vu that I'd had last night as I watched Obama's acceptance speech. At the time, I couldn't put my finger on it. These words crystallized it in my mind:

Only rarely does one know that one is experiencing history while it happens. Barack Obama's victory is one of those occasions.

There have been two or three other occasions when I have had that feeling. A couple of them were tragic, and their dates are forever seared into my memory: November 22, 1963, and September 11, 2001. But the third - one whose exact date I can't even name - is the one those words recalled, and which in retrospect is the one that most closely resembled last night. It was the night Neil Armstrong first set foot on the moon.

Then, as now, I was aware that I was witnessing the unfolding of events that changed the world. Then, as now, the realm of the possible was profoundly and forever expanded by the completion of a difficult journey undertaken amid doubt that it could be completed. Then, a man had called on a nation to undertake such a journey; now, it seems, a nation has called forth a man.

I originally supported Barack Obama because of what he was not. He was not a neocon, he was not a religious fundamentalist, he was not a fearmonger. But over the course of a summer and an early autumn, I came to see in him the promise of a true statesman, a leader who has the potential to unite us again as Americans, to unite us again with our allies around the world, to awaken us again to what is possible, and hopefully, to inspire us again to rise to the challenges of our time and accomplish greater things that we have dared to aspire to. And last night, as on that night in 1969, I had the same thought: if we can do this, we can do whatever we need to do.

Yes, we can.

What Palin hath wrought

2008-11-05T14:50:00.002-05:00

Newsweek reports:

The Obama campaign was provided with reports from the Secret Service showing a sharp and disturbing increase in threats to Obama in September and early October, at the same time that many crowds at Palin rallies became more frenzied. Michelle Obama was shaken by the vituperative crowds and the hot rhetoric from the GOP candidates. "Why would they try to make people hate us?" Michelle asked a top campaign aide.

Because, Michelle, they're scum.

Yes We Did

2008-11-05T14:33:00.004-05:00

Enjoy

2008-11-05T11:47:00.002-05:00

Today the politics of divisiveness and fear has been repudiated, and we have in some small part fulfilled the dream of Martin Luther King, Jr., as this one man has been judged not by the color of his skin, but by the content of his character.

Last night in his acceptance speech, President-elect Obama thanked "the best campaign team ever assembled in the history of politics" - and I was proud to know I was part of that team.

Tomorrow I will be just as proud to poke and prod and try to pressure the president-to-be into doing the right things for the American people, the people of the world, and the very future of life on earth. The hard work is just beginning. For today, I'm just going to enjoy what we have accomplished.

Dixville Notch: the landslide is on

2008-11-04T14:56:00.002-05:00

In the wee small hours of this election day morning, Dixville Notch broke with tradition in a big way.

1972: Ford 13, Carter 11
1980: Reagan 17, Carter 3
1984: Reagan 29, Mondale 1
1988: GHW Bush 34, Dukakis 3
1992: GHW Bush 15, Clinton 2
1996: Dole 18, Clinton 8
2000: GW Bush 21, Gore 5
2004: GW Bush 19, Kerry 7

So in the past eight presidential elections, from 36 years ago to the present time, Dixville Notch has gone Republican - and usually by a landslide. So it's no surprise that their results today were lopsided too. Know what's a surprise?

Obama 15, McCain 6.

Nuff said.

VOTE

2008-11-04T11:51:00.000-05:00

Let's Be Careful Out There

2008-11-03T16:54:00.002-05:00

It's getting real ugly in some parts.

Sign wars

2008-11-03T15:28:00.004-05:00

Speaking of pettiness, one tactic that seems quite common from the McCain camp is stealing or defacing Obama signs.

At the Obama campaign office where I was waiting for my canvassing assignment Saturday afternoon, I saw this sign:

YOU STOLE MY OBAMA SIGN
SO I BOUGHT ANOTHER ONE
AND MADE ANOTHER CAMPAIGN DONATION

PLEASE STEAL MORE SIGNS

Then there's this approach:

Canvassing experience

2008-11-03T14:01:00.004-05:00

My wife sent me this link to an essay by a "pretty conservative" guy whose wife made him go canvassing for Obama ("I did... what most middle-aged married men do: what I was told") and who learned something in the process.

It's not about taxes. I'm pretty sure mine are going to go up no matter who is elected.

It's not about foreign policy. I think we'll figure out a way to get out of Iraq and Afghanistan no matter which party controls the White House, mostly because the people who live there don't want us there anymore....

I've learned that this election is about the heart of America. It's about the young people who are losing hope and the old people who have been forgotten. It's about those who have worked all their lives and never fully realized the promise of America, but see that promise for their grandchildren in Barack Obama. The poor see a chance, when they often have few. I saw hope in the eyes and faces in those doorways.

I went canvassing on Saturday myself, and I had a couple of memorable encounters. One was with a twenty-something Latino voter who recently got his citizenship and is thrilled to be taking part in the most important ritual of democracy. "I've been here six years," he beamed, "and this is my first time to vote." He went on for several minutes about how much Obama's message resonates with him; he would have gone on longer if I hadn't excused myself to continue my rounds.

Another experience was not as pleasant. Our marching orders were to speak to individuals on our lists who had been identified as potential Obama supporters, even if McCain paraphernalia were in evidence - after all, a given household may be split in its loyalties or leanings. So as I approached one house with a stern-looking middle-aged man raking leaves in the yard, I didn't let the McCain sign by the driveway deter me. I was looking for a 20-year-old, evidently this guy's son.

He seemed friendly enough, despite the Obama hat and button I was wearing. No, he said, his son wasn't home, but was there something I'd like to leave for him?

"Yes, if you don't mind, I have some literature for him from the Obama campaign that I'd like to -"

"I don't want it." His expression, his posture, his whole attitude changed at the mention of Obama's name.

"He doesn't want it?" I had to ask.

"He might. I don't. If you want him to have that," he said, looking at the packet in my hand as if he feared catching a disease from it, "you'll have to give it to him yourself." I think he may have had a slight pang of conscience, as he added in a somewhat less assertive tone, "he gets off work about 4."

I hope that if some McCain canvasser showed up at my door and asked me to give his literature to my daughter, I would take it and faithfully deliver it even though I disagree with just about everything I think the GOP stands for. Of course I can't say what I would do in ay hypothetical situation - I'll find out when and if such a scenario arises - but I think I'd do the right thing, especially if I had explicitly offered to take a message for her.

This seems somehow typical of the pettiness I see from way too many McCain supporters. At least he wasn't like the schoolteacher and Republican delegate in Michigan who refused Halloween candy to children whose parents support Obama:

Hey lady, it's pretty bad when even Fox is calling you on your outrageous behavior.

Sunday comics

2008-11-02T09:34:00.005-05:00

I love this collage from DailyKos' Photobucket album. I hope this trio wears the same expression Tuesday night.

Is it just me, or is McCain doing a Bob Dole impersonation?

Breakng news

2008-10-31T19:00:00.002-04:00

This just in: John McCain pals around with terrorists.

Indeed, when the Clinton administration considered forging a stronger relationship with the KLA as a means of bringing all parties to the bargaining table, GOP officials questioned whether such a policy would be a tacit support for a "group with terror, drug ties."

"Such an effusive embrace by top Clinton Administration officials of an organization that only a year ago one of its own top officials labeled as 'terrorist' is, to say the least, a startling development," read a paper put together by the Senate Republican Policy Committee.

And yet, John McCain, the current Republican standard-bearer, was one of the KLA's most outspoken supporters. Back in May 1999, when it seemed as if NATO air raids would prove ineffective in stopping the violence, and calls were being made to send in ground troops, McCain suggested that the U.S. simply fund the KLA instead.

Sorry, Mac. Sauce for the goose, and all that...

Misery loves company

2008-10-31T18:35:00.000-04:00

When I read this, I know I'm not alone.

While the economy sinks, oil giants soar

2008-10-31T16:23:00.003-04:00

Surely you're aware of the recession. The stock market is down, consumer spending is down, banks are failing, home sales are in the toilet... but there's one business that's doing quite well, thank you very much.

Exxon announced yesterday that it broke its own record for most profitable quarter. The company earned $14.8 billion, a 15% gain over the previous record set last quarter and a 58% gain over the same quarter a year ago.

Shell also announced record earnings yesterday. Their current cost of supply (CCS) net profit was $10.9 billion, a 71% year-over-year increase for the third quarter.

Meanwhile, the oil industry is in line for $32.9 billion "in tax breaks, subsidies and other handouts" over the next 5 years, according to a study published in July by the nonprofit Friends Of the Earth.

The blood is on their hands

2008-10-31T12:01:00.004-04:00

I'm concerned about the coming weeks and months. I worry that my country is headed for some serious internal strife.

A man who appears equipped to be a true uniter, a man who gives me more hope for the future than I have had in years, stands poised to win a solid majority of the popular vote and a veritable landslide in the Electoral College, yet I fear bitter violence between Americans. I fear riots in the streets, and worse.

There are two scenarios that trouble me. In the first, Barack Obama wins the landslide he deserves, and there is rejoicing in the streets. Confined perhaps at first to urban areas, there is raucous celebration into the night. But not everyone is happy. In particular, the right-wing militia groups and just plain everyday rednecks - the ones Sarah Palin has been busily whipping into a frenzy, those she has convinced that Obama is a racist, a terrorist, and a traitor, the ones who scream "kill him" at her rallies - are mightily pissed off. And they also take to the streets. Unlike the revelers, this bunch shows up armed and looking for a fight. The confrontations turn ugly, and mob-on-mob violence ensues. In normal times, this would not go very far, because cooler heads would prevail; only a small right-wing fringe would participate in the backlash. But the McCain-Palin campaign and their allies in the right-wing echo chamber have so demonized the left, and stirred up so much out-and-out hatred, there's all too good a chance this could escalate way out of control.

In the other scenario, John McCain - against all odds and in defiance of both advance polling and exit polls - pulls off the incredible upset. This time it's just too much to be swallowed even by the hitherto hypnotized public. People across the country take to the streets to protest the theft of yet another presidential election. Bolstered by evidence of electronic vote tampering, enraged by the voter-suppression tactics that prevented millions of Americans from voting at all, they march and chant and demonstrate - the vast majority of them peacefully - and the government response comes in the form of phalanxes of militarized police in full riot gear, rounding up the protesters and hauling them away for "rioting in furtherance of terrorism." This brings even more and angrier people into the streets in defiance of the government crackdown. Again, the well-armed and well-agitated right-wing loonies join the fray; and again, it escalates out of control.

This is the disaster that the right wing flirts with when they demonize the opposition. No matter the official results of the election, they have conditioned so may people on one side to hate those with whom they disagree that at least some of them are bound to bring that hatred to the surface in the form of violence against the evil liberals. Will it escalate to full-blown civil war? I hope not, but I don't rule it out. Will there be violence? Count on it.

It is very much to Barack Obama's credit that he spent thirty minutes on Wednesday night talking about the issues, about the problems Americans face and about what he plans to do about them, without ever once mentioning George W. Bush, John McCain, or Sarah Palin. It is vastly to his credit that he stops crowds at his rallies if they stoop to booing McCain or Palin, telling them "you don't have to boo, just vote." And it is to the eternal shame of the GOP and the McCain-Palin campaign, and their hate-mongering tools in the right-wing media, that their whole argument consists of telling people that liberals are anti-American, anti-freedom, pro-terrorism, and generally evil beings who want to destroy America. In so doing, they are fomenting hatred and inciting violence. And when that violence comes to pass, the blood will be on their hands.

Make History!

2008-10-31T10:34:00.002-04:00

Here's a good idea:

Of course you can be even more involved in making history by volunteering a day or two of your time between now and the closing of the polls on Tuesday.

McCain to appear on SNL

2008-10-31T10:27:00.003-04:00

John the Candidate is scheduled to appear on Saturday Night Live tomorrow night.

WIth any luck at all, his appearance will be memorable for the constant chants of "O-BA-MA" from the audience.

Can you say "bounce"?

2008-10-29T21:16:00.002-04:00

My prediction: Obama will gain at least 5 points in the polls over the next couple of days. that was quite possibly the most moving political message I have heard in my life - and at my age, I've heard plenty.

On Fox, the infomercial was followed in short order by a McCain ad that tried to make Obama look unattractive while the voice-over said he was unprepared. It served only to make McCain look pathetic. He cannot compare, let alone compete.

But let's not get complacent. Volunteer this weekend. This is history in the making, people; you will want to be able to tell your grandchildren you were part of it.

"No World Series delays when I'm president" - McCain

2008-10-29T16:11:00.003-04:00

What a joke.

"By the way, no one will delay the World Series game with an infomercial when I'm president," says John McCain. Apparently, he believes it's more important to see grown men making millions playing a child's game than to hear a candidate's plea for support of the changes he envisions for the direction of the country.

Presumably a President McCain would declare by executive order that TV networks are not allowed to sell blocks of time to advertisers that might conflict with coverage of a World Series game. (Well, actually, the TV networks can do what they want, but I guess the commissioner of baseball would be precluded from changing the start time of the game. He didn't say nobody could preempt coverage, only that nobody would delay the game. Either way, though, methinks the man doth slightly overstep the authority vested in the Chief Executive by the Constitution.)

But the funniest part of this comes up when you look at the facts. There are two of those I'd like to point out:

First, Obama's address - according to that pillar of the liberal media, the Fox Network - will not change the start time of the game. It will merely preempt pre-game talk - "you know, Joe Buck."

Second, McCain's acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention forced the NFL season opener to begin 90 minutes ahead of its planned prime-time start - providing a lead-in that was widely credited for helping McCain's acceptance speech get higher TV ratings (if lower approval ratings) than Obama's.

So it's OK to push sports around on TV if it gives the Republican candidate a bigger audience share than he could have gotten on his own, but it's not OK to preempt some pre-game commentary to let a Democrat speak his piece.

Hey, this isn't just a political blog. We also do humor here in the Canyon. Thanks for the laughs, John.

Obama leaves campaign to spend time with dying elderly opponent

2008-10-29T14:47:00.002-04:00

I've gotta add this site to my blogroll.

Presidential candidate Barack Obama surprised political observers yesterday by suddenly withdrawing from the campaign trail to spend some time with his elderly rival John McCain. McCain who is 97 years old and very frail is said to be fading fast and Obama wanted to see him one last time before he was gone forever. ‘Barack knows that he could never have got this far if it hadn’t have been for old man McCain. He owes everything to him.’

Obama reportedly sat at the bedside of the dying Republican nominee trying to make sense of the confused ramblings coming from the old man’s mouth, according to an assistant to the Illinois senator. ‘Grandpa McCain’s mind had gone unfortunately, he just kept claiming everyone was a terrorist and then he’d go off on some incomprehensible rant about dividing up a pie or making a bigger pie or something. He’s completely lost it.’

Who's he kidding?

2008-10-29T14:19:00.002-04:00

Thanks to DailyKos, here's John McCain's flip-flop on taxes. (Or is it simply flimflam?)

"Don't tell Matt Drudge or FOX News, but John McCain himself took the same basic approach to taxes as Barack Obama -- at least until the 2008 presidential campaign brought about some changes in his views."

In other words, he was for middle-class tax relief before we was against it.

McCain knows a middle-class tax cut is better than the Bush give-away to the wealthy that he voted against. Yet now he parrots the party line to keep the GOP's real base from revolting. This is a man who will say anything to get elected.

McCain stranded on campaign bus

2008-10-28T20:41:00.001-04:00

John McCain Accidentally Left On Campaign Bus Overnight

Is the bailout really about loosening credit?

2008-10-28T15:01:00.004-04:00

So the $700B bailout (which actually weighs in at over $800B, with its added pork) is suposed to get credit flowing again, right? I mean, that's what it's all about, isn't it?

Well, maybe. It appears that a good portion of that money will be used to line the pockets of investment bankers and to fuel acquisitions.

TIME reports:

Uncle Sam has a new name on Wall Street — Sugar Daddy. Bonuses for investment bankers and traders are projected to fall by 40% this year. But analysts, compensation consultants and recruiters say the drop would be much more severe, perhaps as much as 70%, had it not been for the government's efforts to prop up the financial firms.

Bonuses? The economy is in the shitter, and the taxpayers are funding bankers' bonuses? What's wrong with this picture?

The Wall St. Journal says:

The Treasury's bailout plan is fueling a long-simmering war between financial institutions, prompting fears among small banks that big banks getting rescue money will be encouraged to buy smaller rivals.

Big banks say the purchase of smaller, ailing institutions by larger ones promotes the recovery of the sector. But representatives of some 8,000 community banks -- the bulk of which remain financially sound -- worry that a taxpayer-subsidized consolidation could sweep up healthy institutions that are too small to fight back.

And Bloomberg quotes an industry insider:

Government funds may be used to finance acquisitions, prompting a potential “wave” of deals, Colin Devine, an analyst with Citigroup Inc. said yesterday in a research note.

Just what we need: another round of megabanks buying up local and regional institutions. We wouldn't want want local dollars supporting local economies, would we?

And the New York Times (among others) points out that all of this is actually intended by the administration:

In point of fact, the dirty little secret of the banking industry is that it has no intention of using the money to make new loans...

Treasury wants banks to acquire each other and is using its power to inject capital to force a new and wrenching round of bank consolidation. As Mark Landler reported in The New York Times earlier this week, “the government wants not only to stabilize the industry, but also to reshape it.”

I'm suspicious whenever this administration wants to "reshape" an industry, because inevitably it means one thing: the rich get rich. Redistribution of wealth is nothing new; they've been redistributing it for years - from working stiffs to fat cats.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer has something to say about this. In an editorial published today, they say the "bailout is already off the beam."

The federally forced sale of Cleveland's National City Bank to a Pittsburgh rival Friday requires urgent congressional hearings to force federal regulators to reveal why they've veered so far from the intent of the $700 billion bailout. Instead of vacuuming up troubled assets, the bailout is being funneled into bank acquisitions.

Such bank sales might make sense if the banks being bought out genuinely were failing. But using the taxpayers' dime to sink wounded banks that might otherwise survive is a far more questionable and inefficient way to rid the system of bad debt. It also runs directly counter to how the Treasury promised to use the money.

I have to agree. The backbone of the economy is on Main Street, where the goods and services are produced, and not on Wall Street where they are commoditized and made the objects of speculation. I agree with the Plain Dealer that Congress needs "to force federal regulators to reveal why they've veered so far from the intent of the $700 billion bailout."

In fact, I'll go the Cleveland paper one better. Congress needs to re-enact Glass-Steagall and take additional steps to introduce some adult supervision into the out-of-control greedfest of casino capitalism that is the banking industry. And Justice should start enforcing anti-trust regulations in the finance sector and elsewhere. It's time to recognize that, as Bernie Sanders puts it, "too big to fail" is too big to exist.

The Sinking Ship

2008-10-28T11:49:00.004-04:00

At Salon.com, Gary Kamiya sums up "The Republican Shipwreck" pretty well:

There's something surreal about how fast the GOP has gone from arrogant triumphalism to its death throes. Just yesterday, the GOP's mighty Titanic was cruising along, its opulent decks lined with fat-cat financiers and neoconservative warmongers, all smoking cigars, drinking champagne and extolling the deathless virtues of their fearless captain. The compliant media issued glowing dispatches. Karl Rove cackled with glee as he plotted out a permanent Republican majority.

Then the luxury liner hit an iceberg known as reality. The biggest damage was done by the Wall Street crisis, which happened just in time to tilt a close race toward Obama. But the economic meltdown was only one of the disasters for which the GOP is largely responsible. The war that was going to establish American hegemony forever turned out to be one of the worst foreign-policy blunders in our nation's history. The GOP's free-market idolatry led to the gravest financial crisis since the Depression. Its ideological insistence on cutting taxes for the richest Americans ran up a record deficit. Its embrace of torture and denial of due process assaulted the Constitution and eroded America's moral standing. Its doctrine of the "unitary executive" concentrated unprecedented power in the hands of the executive branch. Its anti-scientific denial of global warming endangered the entire planet.

Of course it's more than a little premature to exult in the demise of the Grand Oil Party - they've stolen elections before and they could do it again - indeed, they're trying* - but it does seem that a clear majority of Americans now realize what a house of cards "movement conservatism" was and is. If we're lucky, we may see the Republican Party move backs towards the political center and away from its dual (laissez-faire and religious) fundamentalist base. That would be a step forward for America and the world.

* (For information on how you can stop them from stealing this one, see STEAL BACK YOUR VOTE!)

UPDATE: GOP uses trumped-up ACORN allegations to distract from their efforts to disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of legitimate voters... and the "liberal media" gives them a pass, as usual

Here's Your Sign

2008-10-27T13:28:00.002-04:00

I finally understand what Bill Engvall has been talking about all this time. They really do hand out signs to certain people!

The Obama Flag - O Noes!

2008-10-26T13:38:00.005-04:00

Over at DailyKos they've pointed out a column by Mark Levin at the National Review that decries, among other things, the existence of "special Obama flags."

Here's the flag they're talking about. Obama was seen speaking in Toledo with this flag behind him, and a number of right-wing loonies went nuts over it.

Hey Mark, in case you haven't heard: that flag has flown in those parts since 1902 and the O has nothing to do with Obama. It actually stands for Ohio. Not too surprising since it's their state flag! Obama had as much to do with that O being on the flag as he had to do with a backwards B ("for Barack," said the McCain campaign) scratched onto the face of Ashley Todd.

In Defense of Bill Ayers - and of the '60s

2008-10-25T20:21:00.001-04:00

I found this article at The Smirking Chimp, defending Bill Ayers from the "terrorist" label Sarah Palin likes to throw at him (while refusing to hang the same label on bombers of abortion clinics and family planning centers), and revealing the attacks on Ayers for what they are: an attempt to recast '60s dissenters as unpatriotic when in fact they helped usher in the Civil Rights movement and get the US out of an ill-advised war that was destroying our country and damaging our standing in the world.

People over 50 remember that period very well, and many much younger people view it with envy and fascination. After all, today's youth listen to the Beatles, Stones, Doors, Jefferson Airplane and Grateful Dead, considering them their own. (We in the '60s rarely listened to the music of the '20s, '30s and '40s.) College students flock to courses on the '60s, viewing that decade as one of turmoil, excitement, and progressive change. The verdict's in: the war was wrong, segregation and all racism was wrong, sexism and homophobia were wrong—and the limited social progress as we've seen since the '60s is largely rooted in the tireless efforts of the activists of that decade. The '60s were good!

But McCain doesn't see it that way. Nor does Sarah Palin. She of course is 44 years old, but obviously atypical of her generation. There's no reason you can't be the popular governor of a state of 676,987 while expressing contempt for such '60s fixtures as "community organizers," sexual liberation and the questioning of wars of aggression. Palin, the lipstick-painted pit-bull, has chosen to attack Ayers as a "terrorist" decades after the demise of the Weather Underground, after he's become a Distinguished Professor of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and received a Citizen of the Year award (1997) from the city of Chicago for his work on education reform. Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley (son of the infamous Mayor Daley who ordered the police attack on antiwar protesters at the Democratic Convention in 1968), who regularly consults Ayers on school issues, says: "He's done a lot of good in this city and nationally." But for Palin, he's a terrorist, present-tense.

Like the attempts to smear Barack Obama as a Muslim or an ACORN supporter or a Socialist, the attempts to link him with Ayers presume there would be something wrong with that if it were true - and any attempt to deny the purported connection only reinforces the implied evil of the person or group they're trying to associate him with (as in "No, he's not an Arab, he's a decent family man...").

What to do? For the next ten days, we have to content ourselves with pointing out the absurdity of the allegations; but after that, we need to work to correct the implicit (an sometimes explicit) slander against ACORN, Arabs, Ayers, and Islam. We also need to expose the creeps behind this stuff for the hypocrites they are. Most of the people who fall for their bullshit really are decent family people, after all. Their only error has been to put their trust in scoundrels who have led them down the garden path.

We may get some help from moderate Republicans and real conservatives, as they attempt to rescue the party of Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt from the ruins wrought by "movement" Republicans - but don't count on it. As Shakespeare had it, "we have scotch'd the snake, not killed it." America won't be safe until Coulter, Hannity, BillO, Rush, and their hate-mongering ilk are rejected even by the right. The message to decent people everywhere must be "America is better than that. You are better than that."

Who is this idiot?

2008-10-24T11:46:00.003-04:00

This story would be hilarious if not for the fact that it ties up emergency lines that should be used only for... well, emergencies. A motorist calls 911 to complain about a traffic tie-up on the Wilson Bridge... hey, doesn't that voice sound eerily familiar?

[Update: the original post had an edited-for-TV condensation of the 911 calls involved. I have replaced it with a more complete version. Wouldn't want to quote the man out of context, after all...]

Quote of the week: McCain on negative ads

2008-10-23T16:54:00.002-04:00

"Sooner or later, people are going to figure out that if all you run is negative attack ads, you don't have much of a vision for the future, or you're not ready to articulate [it]."

John McCain

February, 2000

Fear and Loathing in the Right Wing

2008-10-19T16:25:00.003-04:00

Jay Bookman of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution makes a good point in his Oct. 18 blog entry: the GOP is indeed terrified of American voters.

The Republican Party thrives on fear. They want you afraid of Muslims and afraid of Arabs, afraid of immigrants and even Spanish-speaking Americans. They want you afraid of gays, afraid of the homeless, afraid of taxes, afraid of liberals, afraid of voter fraud. and afraid of Democrats. They especially want you afraid of Barack Obama.

But if there's one thing they're afraid of, it's American voters. Why else have they disenfranchised millions of legitimate voters? They know that if the people's will is expressed in 16 days, their reign of terror is over. Our national nightmare is, after all, their most cherished dream: permanent one-party rule.

So... what can I say? Piss off a Republican - vote!

A ridiculous man

2008-10-18T10:07:00.004-04:00

This sums things up rather well:

I sincerely believe that the biggest difference between Bush and McCain is that Bush has sociopathic tendencies. He either doesn’t know or doesn’t care about what cost his actions may bring to others. In the middle of the current financial crisis, he claimed that he was glad he was at the helm when it occurred; never once considering the fact that he and his minions were largely responsible for it. If Alfred E. Neuman found Jesus, he’d be re-christened “Bush.”

I believe McCain knows what he’s doing. Maybe, he even regrets it. That makes him the sadder of the two and, also, the more dangerous. He has built a career on lies and exaggerations and, now, he somewhat believes them. Like most spoiled kids, he has lived in a bubble. Today, he’s not only battling his own demons but the new and ugly presence of reality.

With his Cryptkeeper’s grin and his total lack of empathy for the “regular folks” he champions, McCain has resorted to the kind of campaign ethics Karl Rove made famous – only he’s screwed it up.

- Ed Naha

The GOP plan to "Block the Vote"

2008-10-17T20:42:00.002-04:00

If this effort succeeds in stealing the White House again, by disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of voters, there will be rioting in the streets.

In this light, you can see the ACORN flap for what it is: just one piece of a scheme to do anything and everything - ethics and constitutionality be damned - to keep Democrats from voting. Pathetic? Pathological.

McCain campaign incites terrorism

2008-10-17T17:23:00.004-04:00

The DoD defines terrorism as:

The calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to inculcate fear; intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological.

The US code reads:

the term “terrorism” means premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents;

Either definition easily applies to what is going on right now, provoked at least in part by the scurrilous lies being bandied about by the right concerning ACORN:

An ACORN community organizer received a death threat and the liberal activist group's Boston and Seattle offices were vandalized Thursday, reflecting mounting tensions over its role in registering 1.3 million mostly poor and minority Americans to vote next month.

Attorneys for the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now were notifying the FBI and the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division of the incidents, said Brian Kettenring, a Florida-based spokesman for the group.

Republicans, including presidential candidate John McCain, have verbally attacked the group repeatedly in recent days, alleging a widespread vote-fraud scheme, although they've provided little proof. It was disclosed Thursday that the FBI is examining whether thousands of fraudulent voter-registration applications submitted by some ACORN workers were part of a systematic effort or isolated incidents.

Kettenring said that a senior ACORN staffer in Cleveland, after appearing on television this week, got an e-mail that said she "is going to have her life ended."

A female staffer in Providence, R.I., got a threatening call from someone who said words to the effect of "We know you get off work at 9," then uttered racial epithets, he said.

When is the McCain campaign going to realize that the sick, irresponsible attacks they are making on Obama, ACORN, and their political opponents in general, are fomenting hatred and violence? There is a breakdown in the moral fiber of our country underway, and McCain and Palin have become the leading cheerleaders for it. It's time for Americans to say "enough is enough."

Quote of the week

2008-10-17T15:23:00.000-04:00

"I didn't decide to run for president to start a national crusade for the political reforms I believed in or to run a campaign as if it were some grand act of patriotism. In truth, I wanted to be president because it had become my ambition to be president."
- Sen. John McCain

Two Minutes Hate

2008-10-17T10:46:00.002-04:00

Was George Orwell a prophet, or is this really footage from a McCain-Palin rally?

2008-10-16T14:50:00.002-04:00

BushCo vs. the planet - same old same old

2008-09-05T09:32:00.005-04:00

One of my favorite quotes from one of my favorite Texans goes like this:

There are three things you never want to see:
Water coming out of your electrical sockets.
Flames shooting out of your sock drawer.
A press release coming out of the White House that begins: "The Bush administration today announced revised standards for..."
- Jim Hightower - Thieves In High Places

Jim is right, as usual. As proof, I offer this.

The stated purpose of the proposed rule "Amending the Formats of the Lists of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants" is to enhance the clarity of the lists of endangered and threatened species. However, the rule's title and its complicated legalese disguise the fact that it instead proposes regulatory changes would make significant changes in the way endangered species are listed and habitat is protected.
If in place at the time, this rule may have stopped the listing and protection of the bald eagle, Canada lynx, grizzly bear, brown pelican, the gray wolf and the jaguar. The proposed rule narrowly defines "the geographic area where the species is listed for purposes of the Act." This deceptively simple change could be interpreted to limit the area that endangered species will be protected only to their current range, which is usually drastically smaller than their historic range.

Of course it's hardly the first time Bush has quietly moved to undercut the law of the land by executive fiat. And between John McCain's silence on Bush's gutting of the ESA and his attempts to ridicule as wasteful a Montana Grizzly Bear study that is likely to save the government millions of dollars on the one hand, and Sarah Palin's attempts to block protection for Polar Bears on the other - not to mention their mutual obsession with promoting offshore drilling - there's ample evidence that under four more years of the Republican regime, things would be likely to continue going from bad to worse for the environment. Like McCain's ad says, Washington is broken and he knows it. He damned well ought to - he's participated in the breaking.

41 years later, King's words ring true

2008-01-21T14:06:00.000-05:00

"I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. When machines and computers, profit and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered."

A Time To Break Silence

Martin Luther King, Jr.

April, 1967

Quote of the month

2007-03-25T09:30:00.000-04:00

...or maybe of the year:

Now, when I heard George Bush was reading my emails, I probably had the same reaction you did: George Bush can read?! Yes, he can. And this administration has read your phone records, credit card statements, mail, Internet logs. I can't tell if they're fighting a war on terror or producing the next season of "Cheaters." I mail myself a copy of the Constitution every morning just on the hope they'll open it and see what it says.

- Bill Maher, "New Rules" (Real Time, 3/16/2007)

Damn Right We're Angry

2007-03-15T08:49:00.000-04:00

This sums it up rather nicely.

Yes, we’re angry at George W. Bush. We’re not angry at him because of who he sleeps with, and we’re not angry at him because we think he represents some socio-cultural movement we didn’t like 40 years ago, or because he hung out with a different crowd than we did in high school. We’re angry at him because of what he’s done.

It’s true, we don’t like the fact that the most powerful human being on the planet is such a ridiculous buffoon that he can’t put two coherent sentences together without beginning to giggle and shimmy his shoulders. But we’re not angry because we think he’s stupid, we’re angry because he treats us as though we’re stupid. We’re angry that he lied to us, and lied to us and lied to us again. We’re angry that when he lies to us it isn’t because he’s caught up in scandal or got caught doing something he shouldn’t have, it’s part of a carefully constructed plan to fool the public.

Yes, we’re angry about Iraq, and we may be for the rest of our lives. We get angry every day when we open our newspapers and see the photo of another young soldier who died for this, another one maimed for life, another one with a tormented and broken soul. We’re angry about the couple of trillion dollars this war will cost. We’re angry about the thousands of young men around the world have been driven into the arms of al Qaeda, who have decided to devote their lives to killing Americans because of this war. We’re angry about the thousands upon thousands of Iraqis who have died in the orgy of bloodshed we unleashed, and the living too, those whom we said we were coming to “liberate,” but who now find themselves in a suffocating, endless miasma of fear and misery and death.

We’re angry that when we talk about ending this monstrous war, the soulless hypocrites who are glad to send more and more men and women to be scarred and maimed and killed in Iraq have the gall to accuse us of not “supporting the troops.” We’re angry that people whose actions exhibit nothing but contempt for freedom and liberty and justice, who wouldn’t know real patriotism if it came up and smacked them across the face, pin a little flag on their lapel and say that we’re the ones who hate America.

- Paul Waldman, tompaine.com

You tell 'em, Paul. A little righteous indignation now and again is nothing to be ashamed of. It's time more of us stood up and said "We're mad as hell and we're not gonna take it anymore."

Military Medicine's New Spokesbandage

2007-03-13T09:46:00.000-04:00

Meet Ouchie, the Walter Reed Band-Aid!

Hagel puts impeachment on the table

2007-03-12T02:31:00.000-04:00

You know you're in trouble as president when a prominent member of your own party starts talking up the possibility of impeachment.

In an interview appearing in April editions of Esquire magazine -- set to hit stands next week -- Hagel suggests that President Bush could be subject to calls for impeachment as the Iraq war drags on.

"The president says, 'I don't care.' He's not accountable anymore," Hagel said in the article. "Before this is over, you might see calls for his impeachment. I don't know. It depends on how this goes."

If only the Democrats would listen to the mandate they got last November from the majority of Americans who favor impeachment, Hagel could be right.

iSpoof

2007-03-12T00:49:00.000-04:00

glumbert.com - The Apple iRack

Listmania: Genre Benders

2007-03-11T21:07:00.000-04:00

I've created a "Listmania" list at Amazon of music from my favorite genre - I guess I should say meta-genre. I call my list Genre Benders. It's composed of CDs that are covers of music from one genre (most of them classic rock) done in a different genre than the original (often reggae or bluegrass). I own or have listened to most of these CDs. There are two exceptions, the CDs from the "Pickin' On..." series; I've heard only the samples of those available on Amazon. I have ordered the CDs, so within a few days I'll have heard them in their entirety.

Of course, as an afterthought I checked the iTunes Music Store and found that I could have purchased the "Pickin' On" CDs (at least one of them) there, in which case I'd have the music on my iPod already. Still, this way I'll have the CDs to pass along to friends.

"Pickin' On Zeppelin" (a. k. a. volume I of Pickin' On Led Zeppelin) gets awful reviews at iTMS, but most of the low ratings are from people who went there looking for Led Zeppelin (whose recordings are not available via iTunes). The listener reviews on Amazon are much better (typically 4 or 5 stars). It's all a matter of expectations. I am a huge Zeppelin fan, and have little patience for bluegrass; yet I love what I've heard of this CD. Fortunately the recordings are instrumental (if they were full of twangy bluegrass vocals I wouldn't touch them with a ten-foot pole) and I find that the Zeppelin tunes seem to translate very well to bluegrass instrumentation.

Anyway, if you have an adventurous nature and an open mind, give some of these CDs a try. You don't have to buy them from Amazon; you can probably get them cheaper on eBay from someone more (a) narrow-minded, (b) discriminating, (c) sane, or (d) all of the above.

Of Lice and Men

2007-03-11T16:49:00.000-04:00

I've recently added the RSS feed from RichardDawkins.net to my Google Reader subscriptions, so you'll probably see more stuff from there in Random News, but I had to blog this one because it offered such great headline potential.

It seems analysis of louse DNA offers clues about when we lost our body hair and when we invented clothes.

One of the more embarrassing mysteries of human evolution is that people are host to no fewer than three kinds of louse while most species have just one.

Even bleaker for the human reputation, the pubic louse, which gets its dates and residence-swapping opportunities when its hosts are locked in intimate embrace, does not seem to be a true native of the human body. Its closest relative is the gorilla louse. (Don't even think about it.)

Louse specialists now seem at last to have solved the question of how people came by their superabundance of fellow travelers. And in doing so they have shed light on the two major turning points in the history of fashion: when people lost their body hair, and when they first made clothing.

I should point out, as the Dawkins site does, that this story was first published in the Paper of Record.

Self-Censorship at Sports Illustrated

2007-03-10T22:30:00.000-05:00

And now for something completely different... Sports Illustrated bans itself!

So, does this mean SI considers its swimsuit issue indecent? Does it also mean SI considers public and school librarians incompetent to judge what is appropriate material for their shelves?

Or does it merely mean that SI kowtows to the religious right and other prudes?

Come on, Time Warner. They're going to see more skin in your movies, and on your cable channels.

RIAA poised to kill Internet radio

2007-03-10T18:57:00.000-05:00

Do you listen to internet radio? I listen regularly to Aural Moon, "the net's progressive rock garden."

But I fear the time to listen to Internet radio may be short if the money-grubbing vermin at the RIAA get their way. They've successfully lobbied the Copyright Office to let them charge Internet radio stations exorbitant rates - much higher than those paid by broadcast and satellite radio stations, which have far larger audiences. In other words, you can play a song for millions of listeners for one price, or for hundreds or thousands of listeners for a higher price - and in many cases the more than ten-fold increase makes the royalties more than the stations' total revenues.

There's still time (only just) to change this and save Internet radio. The move has gotten some attention in Congress. It deserves more. Call or write your representative.

Dubya sings U2!

2007-03-10T18:37:00.000-05:00

Georgie Porgie shows us how hip he is. Go on with your bad self, Dub.

Cardinals come back, reach Big East semis

2007-03-09T01:31:00.000-05:00

The "instant rivalry" between Louisville and West Virginia, born less than two years ago, got a new chapter tonight.

The rivalry was born in the Elite Eight of the 2005 NCAA tournament, when Louisville - champions in their last season with Conference USA, and about to join West Virginia in the Big East - made an unlikely comeback from 21 points down in the first half and ten points behind with six minutes to play, to win it in overtime and deprive WVU of their first Final Four berth since 1959.

In the fall of the same year, the Mountaineers pulled off an equally unlikely comeback on the gridiron, overcoming a 24-7 third-quarter deficit to defeat the Cardinals 46-44 in triple overtime.

Last fall the Cards returned the favor, upsetting then #3 West Virginia en route to U of L's first Big East football championship and BCS bowl appearance.

Tonight it looked like it would be West Virginia's turn. Behind by 17 points in the second half, the 'Neers scored 18 straight points to take their first lead of the game, and it was nip and tuck from there through the end of the second half. West Virginia scored what appeared to be the winning basket with 4.3 seconds left, but Louisville freshman Edgar Sosa had other plans. He took the inbounds pass, dribbled the length of the court, split three defenders at the foul line, and hit a layup to send the game to overtime.

Five minutes later it was tied again, but the Cards took over in the second extra frame to win going away, 82-71.

This is a very special Louisville team. Picked 6th in the Big East before the start of the season, they appeared at one point to be in jeopardy of being quite a bit worse. Their injury-plagued 7-4 start included losses to Dayton and Massachusetts. They lost at home to a sub-par Kentucky team by as many points (12) as they beat tiny Bellarmine.

They hit bottom with back-to-back conference losses to Villanova and Georgetown in February. The latter, Louisvlle's 13th straight loss to a ranked opponent, dropped them to 16-8 overall and 6-4 in the Big East, casting considerable doubt on their post-season prospects and spoiling the night they christened the Freedom Hall floor "Denny Crum Court."

They haven't lost a game since.

They got back on the winning track with a blowout at home over South Florida, then won by 13 at #5 Pittsburgh. Next up was 12th-ranked Marquette, who had dispatched the Cards with relative ease at Freedom Hall in January. The Cardinals got up off the mat three times to take this one and break into the AP Top 25 for the first time this season, at #20. The Cards closed out the season with three more wins and entered the Big East tourney as the #2 seed, with their AP ranking improving to #12.

Tomorrow night, Pitt will be looking for revenge. If the Cardinals clear that hurdle, Georgetown or Notre Dame will be waiting in the finals. I don't like to jinx my team with brazen predictions, but there is something about this bunch I just can't resist. It says here Louisville will win the Big East tournament championship, and take a top-ten ranking to the big dance.

This is just too funny

2007-03-08T01:12:00.000-05:00

Jon Stewart and Al Franken between them couldn't have made this up...

Ever wonder why people who get their information about the world from Fox News are demonstrably more ignorant than people who get their news elsewhere?

Swiss invade Lichtenstein!

2007-03-04T17:48:00.000-05:00

Mother Jones Blog called this "without question, the best story of the day." Abandoning years of neutrality, the Swiss accidentally invaded the tiny principality of Lichtenstein when a (badly needed, I guess) training operation went off course and the troops marched about a mile over the unmarked border.

Various punch lines are among the reader comments at Wonkette.

Now that's what I call fine print

2007-03-04T12:00:00.000-05:00

I saw a banner ad on a college sports website today. It was animated, as far too many web ads are. It said:

Book the NCAA® Final Four® Package

And then it said:

Your Chance to Randomly Win VIP Seats to the 2008 NCAA® Men's Final Four®

Then:

The NCAA® Final Four® Package Starting From $89

Then came the fine print. There's a representative sample above; click on it for a look at the whole thing in actual size.

This is wrong on so many levels.

First, "final four" is a descriptive term for the semifinals of a single-elimination bracket tournament. How could the NCAA get away with registering it as a trademark? (They also claim trademarks on such phrases as "The Road to Atlanta" and "The Road to San Antonio.")

Second, why does an organization whose "purpose is to govern competition in a fair, safe, equitable and sportsmanlike manner, and to integrate intercollegiate athletics into higher education so that the educational experience of the student-athlete is paramount," need to register the abbreviation of its name as a commercial trademark?

And finally, how does anybody get away with the obfuscation of so much legally required information? It's bad enough when they put misleading commercials on TV that show paragraphs of fine-print disclosures for fractions of a second, so that you have to record and freeze them in order to read them. This stuff isn't legible at all, no matter how much time you have to look at it!

As near as I can make out, it says:

By entering this contest, you sign over to the sponsors the right to use your likeness and name for any purpose they choose, without compensation to you of any kind. No purchase is necessary to enter, because we're not allowed to require that, but we're figuring you won't bother reading this notice and will fork over $89 for about $50 worth of goods and services plus a minuscule chance of winning tickets to next year's national championship. Speaking of minuscule chances, the exact odds depend on the number of entries, but our reliable estimates say that you have about as much chance of winning the grand prize as you have of spitting off the top of the Empire State Building and hitting a Coke can on the sidewalk two blocks away; otherwise you won't get anything worth the annoying spam you'll receive for the next five years by virtue of having established a "relationship" with us by taking this bait, other than the dubious value of this overpriced "package."

Whatever it says, I'm sure they put that fine print there because they're legally required to, and not because they actually want you to read it. But if they're required to show it, shouldn't they be required to make it legible? There's no way this is in compliance with the spirit, if even the letter, of whatever laws or regulations require that they show it in the first place. But do you think the FTC, or whatever government agency supposedly enforces such regulations, will call them on it? Yeah. Me neither.

By the way, I tried clicking the "Package details" button in the ad. It led to a Radisson Hotels website that was "temporarily closed for maintenance." Go figure.

Cards spoil Boeheim's 1000th

2007-01-28T11:12:00.000-05:00

The basketball Cardinals got a quality win last night, coming back from 14 down with less than 10 minutes left to beat Syracuse by 5 in Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim's 1000th game. They outscored the Orange 25-6 in those closing minutes. The win boosts the Cards into a 3-way tie for second place in the Big East, where they were predicted to finish 6th.

Maybe Louisville hasn't completely turned into a football school after all.

Random Canyon

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