Florida: God, what a mess.

¶ 3 Posted at 10.33 AM ⇒ No Comments ( news | politics )

It is becoming more and more apparent to me that the the "winning" of the Cold War was not an unequivocal good. Now that the governments of the West no longer have the Warsaw Pact nations against which to contrast themselves, it's easier and easier for them to sell out the principles of freedom for which they long stood. The West no longer stands in opposition to the East and thus is no longer compelled to differentiate itself. The motivation is gone. Western governments no longer have to preserve our individual rights the way they had to back when they were presenting themselves as the moral superiors of the godless communists.

The victory of capitalism is also turning out to be a hollow one. The acceleration of the branding and marketing of everything is attempting to achieve the goal of turning us all into consuming automatons (when did we stop being citizens and become consumers?) who live to work and purchase. Ironically, that's not very different in practical terms from the fate we would have been assigned under a socialist system. The ineluctable path of capitalism is towards basically the same end as that of totalitarian communism; we live to work and consume. Here's an experiment for you: count how many times people are referred to as consumers rather than as citizens. When did that happen? Why are people labelled in such a materialistic fashion? When you use metonymy, identifying the whole by a some characteristic, you imply that is the important one. Using consumer as a label for you and me and everyone else is that our defining attribute is that we purchase goods and services. At least in communism there was the "worker," which has a certain nobility to it.

¶ 18 Posted at 12.00 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics | bummer )

And now for some political perspective.

¶ 34 Posted at 12.20 PM ⇒ No Comments ( linkage | politics )

I want George W. to be a one-term President. And I want Hilary Clinton to be elected President in 2008. And for no greater reason than the weirdness of it. Consider: the first impeachment in over a century, and only the second ever. Followed by the "election" of the son of a defeated President, who (hopefully) joins his father in the ranks of the one-term Presidents. Then something in 2004, which I haven't figured out yet, followed by the first woman President, the former First Lady. How weird would that be? Exciting times, I think. It would be something for the history books, that's for sure. The ancient Chinese curse: "May you live in interesting times."

¶ 38 Posted at 11.43 AM ⇒ No Comments ( deep thoughts | politics )

I have decided that President Clinton should resign on January 19th. That would give Gore a couple days as President, making George W. Bush the 44th, rather than the 43rd, President of the United States. This would accomplish several things. Most importantly, it would just be weird. Secondly, it would piss off Bush. Thirdly, Gore would get to be President, if only for a couple days. I've decided that Gore doesn't have a chance in 2004. I don't expect Clinton will have to do much Presidentially on the last two days of his term.

¶ 39 Posted at 10.56 AM ⇒ No Comments ( deep thoughts | politics )

The United States Postal Service will insure packages you send through them. That doesn't really make sense. We're paying them extra in order to cover them for their mistakes. That's a nice racket. I wonder if they've gone to the point of figuring out what the optimal level of package loss/destruction is in order to maximize their revenue and profit from insurance. I wouldn't be surprised.

I wonder how we'd go about deregulating the postal service. The problem becomes the "last mile," in many ways like the local phone service deregulation. Presumably there would be multiple mail delivery trucks coming to each residence/place of business. Or maybe it would be on a neighborhood basis. It's simple enough to demonopolize the backend, but the last mile makes it difficult. Something to think about, though.

¶ 44 Posted at 02.50 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Two bits about Clinton from Salon: bit one and bit two.

¶ 46 Posted at 01.46 PM ⇒ No Comments ( linkage | politics )

According to this article, law enforcement used face-matching technology to compare the faces of Super Bowl spectators with a database of known criminals/suspicious persons. They claim that this system is less intrusive than normal video surveillance. I disagree. The difference is that nobody looks at surveillance tapes unless something happens. In this case, they're investigating you before anything has happened. On the other hand, maybe it's more like the dogs that sniff luggage for drugs or bombs. Regardless, people should be made aware that they are being watched like that.

The Super Bowl half-time show was really lame. As I watched it, I had but one thought: this is so corporate. I mean, think about it. The selection of "musicians" chosen to perform totally smacked of "synergies." Not to mention two of them (Britney Spears and N' Sync) are two of the most "made" performers on the music scene today. Let me just point out that these are the most popular musical acts on MTV, which is owned by Viacom, parent company of CBS, the station that brought us the Super Bowl. Sting and Nelly are on Universal (or a subsidiary label), another of the Big Five music labels, while Aerosmith is on Columbia (Sony). I wonder who owns the NFL....

¶ 61 Posted at 12.42 PM ⇒ No Comments ( privacy | politics )

Former President Bill Clinton. Former. That just sounds weird. He's been an omnipresent figure in my adult life. I barely remember Bush (pére), and Reagan not at all. And on top of having to hear President George W. Bush for the next four years...

¶ 75 Posted at 11.45 AM ⇒ No Comments ( deep thoughts | politics )

Keep the estate tax:

Mr. Buffett said repealing the estate tax "would be a terrible mistake," the equivalent of "choosing the 2020 Olympic team by picking the eldest sons of the gold-medal winners in the 2000 Olympics."

Maybe they're not so greedy after all.

¶ 87 Posted at 10.40 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

His father's son: Bush bombs Baghdad. Our newest President joins the club. He's one of the boys now.

¶ 90 Posted at 03.32 PM ⇒ No Comments ( news | politics )

Clinton explains the Marc Rich pardon. My favorite part was the bit at the end, where the NY Times editors added:

William Jefferson Clinton was the 42nd president of the United States.

¶ 92 Posted at 11.57 AM ⇒ No Comments ( funny | politics )

I'm deeply bothered by the trend towards conservatism in recent years. The abuses of big government have convinced people that minimal government is the only way to go. Somehow the Democrats have managed to drop the ball on this as well, the same way that Al Gore somehow managed to avoid talking about the last 8 years of economic growth. They don't mention how the FDA does a pretty good job making sure we're safe. And if they don't do the best job, it's because they don't have enough power, not because they have too much. Ditto for the NTSB. And the FAA. These regulatory bodies have made our daily lives so much safer ovet the last 30 years, but nobody seems to remember that. And of course there's my big one, anti-trust action on the part of the government. From the oil trusts at the beginning of the 20th centuries to the breakup of AT&T in 1984, to the future (hopefully) breakup of Microsoft, the goverment has been working for our protection. Once again, if they did a less-than-perfect job, it was because they were less active than they should have been, not because they were draconian in their application of the laws. Capitalist idealists (it's not an oxymoron!) claim that the market will punish the abusive companies. The problem is, capitalism as a positive force only works when there is no oligopoly. When you have a situation like the music industry, with only five major players, bad things happen. The same thing almost happened with the American auto industry, but the government was goaded into watching them closely and the Japanese came in and kicked their butts. The worst is yet to come, however, because in many industries, barriers to entry are only increasing. It takes billions of dollars to develop and produce even a niche microprocessor. Similarly, nobody can compete against Microsoft's financial resources; the only recent challenge to their dominance in operating systems comes from one where money is irrelevant. And even if companies can compete resource-wise, restrictive intellectual property laws make it possible for one company to shut out all competitors to the detriment of consumers. When there is no choice, the market cannot operate.

All that aside, even when there is choice in the marketplace, the market wouldn't necessarily decide the right way. Consider free ISPs. Given the choice between a free ISP that tracks your actions online and a pay ISP that leaves you alone, most people would pick the former. If you explained to them the consequences and issues involved in that choice, they would agree in the abstract that they would be willing to pay a nominal fee in exchange for privacy, but they wouldn't necessarily act that way. People are very bad at translating abstract ideals into day to day action. Regulation is necessary to look ahead, to take the long view. Basic rights must be guaranteed by an extra-market power simply because it becomes too much of a bother for consumers to have to decide every time how much of their rights they are willing to give up in exchange for some material benefit. That's why it is impossible to give up some rights in court, because if you are tempted by leniency in exchange for a waiver of rights, you could be easily taken advantage of. It's better in many cases for the regulatory bodies to make one binding decision than for millions of people to make multiple decisions every day. Now, I'm not saying that regulation is the answer to everything. I strongly disagree with many parts of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, but then, that law is more of a restriction on individuals than organizations. The government has had its share of foolish behavior. But by and large, government regulations have helped us far more than they have hurt us, and could do even more if people would just realize how much of us has been done already.

¶ 99 Posted at 01.06 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

US Government merges with Mafia. Ok, so that's an exaggeration. And this does come from the Libertarian Party. But asset seizures are getting out of control. There's no need to prove you've done anything wrong for the government to take your property. The burden of proof is on you to show that your property was legally obtained and hasn't even peripherally been involved in a crime. It's almost getting to the point where, if a robber runs through your yard while making his escape, the police can seize your house. And they'll do it because they get to keep the moneys and the stuffs. Disgusting.

¶ 101 Posted at 10.34 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

From the floor of the Senate: The text of John McCain's Opening Statement on campaign finance reform.

¶ 111 Posted at 10.15 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

I have a theory. The last few episodes of "The West Wing" have dealt with the process of revealing secret of the President's multiple sclerosis. There's talk of lawyers, conspiracies, and coverups. They throwing around phrases like "perpetrated a fraud against the American public." It's all very sad, because we know that President Bartlett is a good man and had only the best intentions at heart, that his condition never caused any real danger, et cetera et cetera. It seemed like just another May sweeps climactic story arc. Then it hit me. Aaron Sorkin (the writer of the show) is using his fantasyland White House as a bully pulpit. This is his way of joining the ranks of Clinton apologists. There are many similarities. In this case, though, the integrity of the President is (ha ha) inimpeachable. So we take his side. We make excuses for him. We rationalize. And then the next time we think about Clinton, we're a little softer on the guy, because at some level, we've realized that the other side of things is a little harder and more complex than we thought.

What did you expect? It's called jaded.

¶ 125 Posted at 07.50 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics | theorizing | tv )

And the villagers rejoice: Vermont Senator Jim Jeffords to leave Republican party for Democratic party.

¶ 129 Posted at 12.32 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics | happy )

NY Times: Texas Retooling Criminal Justice in Wake of Furor on Death Penalty. What I want to know is who the hell are those 33% of Texans who think it's ok to execute someone who's mentally retarded? Or the 24% of Texans who think that the possibility of exoneration due to DNA evidence does not justify postponing (not cancelling, but just postponing!) executions. What is going on here? Kill everybody and let God sort it out?

¶ 131 Posted at 10.58 AM ⇒ No Comments ( stupid people | politics )

Take a survey (NPR): American attitudes towards poverty.

¶ 135 Posted at 04.44 PM ⇒ No Comments ( linkage | politics )

They agree with me. Therefore good: Spinsanity. Goofy name, though.

¶ 246 Posted at 03.34 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Merriam-Webster has as one of its definitions of corporation the following:

a body formed and authorized by law to act as a single person although constituted by one or more persons and legally endowed with various rights and duties including the capacity of succession

More from Cornell.

The rights of a corporation are the same as those of a person, but the set of corporate responsibilities is less. We need to start bringing those into closer alignment. Many things have been done by corporations that would cause a human to be imprisoned for life. For example, Monsanto and PCB pollution. As far as I am aware, however, there isn't really a corporate death penalty, but there definitely should be. Corporations are great for individuals avoiding responsibility, and many of these go on profiting for years from heinous acts. If there were a such thing as a corporate death penalty, wherein the courts could declare that Monsanto, Altria (nee Philip Morris), and Union Carbide simply cease to exist as legal entities. The company would be dissolved and the assets sold off. The net proceeds (after paying off debts and liabilities) could go to the shareholders, but my instinct is not, as it is the shareholders who are responsible for the behavior of a corporation. This would be a good motivator for them to pay attention to the way their investment is behaving, a type of responsibility sorely lacking today when the only consequence is lawsuits whose settlements barely amount to 10% of a year's profits.

¶ 248 Posted at 01.54 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

So I'm stuck on hold with Chase bank. When setting up access to my account with Quicken, I was told that Chase is currently authorized to share my account and other personal information with other corporations. There was a law passed recently that granted this right to financial institutions. They had to inform customers, but it was an opt-out rather than an opt-in. Clearly Congress got effectively lobbied by the financial industry here. So I made a second call to Chase customer service (because the person at the first number couldn't do this and couldn't transfer me) and wade through another phone menu to talk to a customer service rep. I explain what I want, then get put on hold because this rep has to talk to a "product specialist" who can do this. So she gets put on hold (she claims), so I get put on hold. I get put on hold three times at a few minutes a pop, listening to the same minute-long fragment of a piano song every time. Finally after about 20 minutes on the phone with multiple Chase reps, I get it done. Makes me not feel bad about going on the can while talking to her.

So clearly this is wrong. I wouldn't be surprised if Chase made this process difficult just to dissuade people from getting their information taken off limits. After all, I've done the same sort of thing in my job. The difference is, of course, my job is for a website that only demands an email address, country, and date of birth (for COPPA-compliance). I do not have a record of all of an individual's financial transactions. Nor do I have a social security number, mother's maiden name, or any other, more sensitive information. Clearly Congress was not acting in the best interests of Americans. While the Supreme Court has stated that privacy is a necessary adjunct to freedom of association, and there is the Fourth Amendment ("The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated"), neither is explicit in stating general privacy as a right in and of itself; rather, they support privacy in certain conditions as necessary to advance other primary rights. I think it is time, in this day and age where so much information on individuals is kept by entities outside their control, that American's have an explicit Constitutional right to privacy. The framers could not have seen this coming two centuries ago. Such an amendment would also prevent the so-called "tyranny of convenience," where an entity could effectively coerce an agreement to share personal information by making it sufficiently convenient to do so and sufficiently inconvenient not do, by providing a basis and impetus for Congress to climb out of the banking industry's pocket and make laws with teeth. Of course, that's just my opinion; I could be wrong.

¶ 255 Posted at 12.59 PM ⇒ No Comments ( privacy | politics )

Ok, so it's been about two weeks since I last got good and mad. No time like the present to make up for the past. Here you go: Fight terrorism by not buying drugs. I actually watched the Superbowl. Well, it was on in the background while I was cooking dinner. And I saw parts of the second half, which was surprisingly exciting. So anyway, the Partnership for a Drug-Free America (like I'm going to link to them) decides to put up these ads during the Big Game equating buying drugs with terrorism. Now, they will claim they're not doing so, that they're just highlighting a connection. Clearly this is not the case. Example (from "I Helped":

Person 1: We just wanted to have a good time Person 2: I helped kill a judge. . . . . Person (say) 11: I just wanted to get high. Person 12: I helped kidnap someone's family and kill his children.

Then the ad ends with "Drug money supports terror." Ok, so they're so way, way off here. Let's start:

1. They're equating all drugs. Let's look at the 6 top drugs that they want to address:
   1. Marijuana - Most of the pot smoked in the US is grown in Mexico, Canada, or inside these borders. I don't see many Canadian terrorists on the news.
   2. LSD - Street prices of LSD are cheap. Nobody makes big money off LSD. Nobody can fund a terror campaign on sales of acid.
   3. Ecstasy - The bogeyman of the moment. To hear the anti-drug forces tell it, everyone under 25 is doing this every weekend, selling it on playgrounds on weekdays, and suffering irreversible brain damage that will put them all in a coma in five years. But there's no evidence that terrorists have sold any to get money to kill people. Organized crime? Certainly. But not terrorism. So don't make that connection.
   4. Cocaine - Everyone knows it comes from Columbia. How about terrorists? Well, there are separatists guerillas. They haven't left Columbia. They're fighting a war against the Columbian government, which isn't exactly known for its englightened policies. They sure do sell a lot of cocaine, though. So they're partly right here, but completely wrong when they lump the Columbian guerillas with Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Most of the cocaine trade is in the hands of "entrepreneurs" interested only in their own self-aggrandizement.
   5. Speed - From what I read, this comes mainly from Western Europe, Mexico, and American bathtubs. I've seen nothing to indicate a connection here, not even from this site.
   6. Heroin - Ok, finally we come to a connection. Yup, there is evidence that Al Qaeda used heroin moneys. But on there other hand, last year there was a flood of articles like this one. As you may or may not recall, the Taliban banned the growing of opium poppies for religious reasons. Nobody thought it would work, but it turned out that that the Taliban made a big dent in the Afghan exports of opium and heroin. They did so well that the United States government gave the Taliban $43 million in aid to continue their efforts (source). Even more ironically, the Northern Alliance continued to grow opium poppies to finance their war against the Taliban. Once more we have failed to grasp the important of choosing our friends wisely. The mujahedin from whom the Northern Alliance came also supported their war against the Soviets with heroin profits. We gave them Stingers. And lots of other stuff. Oops. Kinda tricky there, isn't it?
   Judge for yourself. Also look at their information pages on each drug. This site that claims to be about the truth:

   Beliefs about MDMA are reminiscent of similar claims made about LSD in the 1950s and 1960s, which proved to be untrue. According to its proponents, MDMA can make people trust each other and can break down barriers between therapists and patients, lovers, and family members.

   You see that nice little trick? The two parts of the first sentence are unrelated, but make it sound like people are imagining the drug's effects. But look how even these propagandists qualify everything: "Beliefs" (which ones?). "Reminiscent" (to whom?). "Similar claims" (like what?). They construct a sentence around vague innuendo and unproven connections to try to convince you that anyone who tells you that Ecstasy does anything might do something even slightly enjoyable is a deluded fool who sure is going to look silly ten years from now when it's discovered (s)he wasn't feeling what (s)he thought (s)he was feeling. Oops. Most of the drug statements have similar biases. This site claims to be about the truth, but their agenda clearly precludes the whole truth. If drugs were as bad as they make them out to seem, then nobody would need persuading because nobody would do any drugs.

   The Ad Council is one of the groups that supports this campaign. You can see some of their supporters here. Notice in the list the purveyors of the two major legal drugs, alcohol and cigarettes, as well as big pharmaceutical companies. And notice in the list of of drugs any prescription drugs (even commonly abused ones like Xanax or Oxycontin) or alcohol.

2. Another major beef with this ad campaign is that by emphasizing the connection between (some) drug production and (some) terrorism, they gloss over many other connections. For example, the support of fundamentalist Islamic schools of the Wahabi sect by the Saudi government, a sect closely tied with the Taliban. So does that mean that every time you fill up at the gas station, you're supporting terrorism? Seems a much less tenuous connection than the vague mumbles of the anti-drug folks. Then there's Israel. What would you call a nation that assassinates opposition leaders, destroys innocent civilians houses, shoots protestors, and tortures prisoners? Sounds like state-sponsored terrorism to me. Well, not even sponsored, just state terrorism. How do you, the American citizen, support them? Simple. You pay your taxes. America has given billions of dollars a year for the last half century to Israel (source). There's yet another more direct connection between your money and terrorism than this silly drug propaganda.
3. The worst thing about this that their exaggerations cause a serious credibility problem, making it impossible to take anything they say seriously. Heroin's bad, kids. Very bad. You stay away. It wouldn't hurt to stay away from pot, too, but only if you want to be extra careful. Want to know what the lethal dose of marijuana is? So does everyone else. Nobody has ever smoked themselves to death. Plenty of people have drunk themselves to death. Makes you wonder.
4. And then there's the whole thing about equating things with terrorism to try to push a pre-existing agenda (as skewered here in September). Taking what is essentially a social and medical problem and equating it with terrorism magnifies one and diminishes the other, to the detriment of our battles with both. People need some perspective.
5. Finally, there's the complete lack of analysis as to why terrorists might be involved in the illegal drugs trade. Do they sell drugs because it's a way to strike at the weak and infidel West, a way to sap the strength of a corrupt and decadent society, thereby advancing their cause? Yeah right. To state the obvious: (some) terrorists sell (some) drugs because they can get lots of money for them. Same reason lots of other people sell drugs. Do drugs inherently have so much value? As all of us good students of economics know, there's no such thing as inherent value. You match supply with demand and out comes your fair market price. Demand for drugs is a more or less known quantity: there's lots of it. What about supply? There isn't as much as there would be in a truly free market. The government's crusade against narcotics has severely shrunk the supply. Tight supply meets high demand and results in high prices, therefore mucho profits. Let's look at the causal chain: drugs are illegal, but in high demand. Therefore anyone who sells drugs can get a lot of money. Terrorists want a lot of money to finance their activities, and so they sell drugs. Not a hard connection to grasp. If the drugs were legal, at least some of them, there wouldn't be nearly as much money in them. And terrorists wouldn't bother. Nor would other criminals. These people are going after easy money. If anyone can get in on the market, the forces of capitalism will find the optimal price point so that there's a minor profit and no more. The easy money will be gone, leaving criminals of all stripes scrambling to find another source of revenue. Instead, what we're doing is trying to choke off the supply (which doesn't work anyway), which will drive the price even higher, resulting in even more money for those still in the business. And chances are, it's not going to be your friendly neighborhood drug dealer who manages to keep going in that kind of environment, but the guys that you really don't want to mess with. Nor that you want to have millions of dollars. Once again, the drug war will have solved nothing.

¶ 270 Posted at 01.37 AM ⇒ No Comments ( stupid people | politics )

NY Times: Supreme Court to Intervene in Internet Copyright Dispute. Here's hoping the court does the right thing and strikes down the Sonny Bono Act of 1998, aka the "Protect Disney's Cash Cow" Act (Mickey Mouse), which retroactively extended copyrights by 20 years. Every day that goes by that I cannot create my own art featuring Mickey Mouse is a day that Disney, through the United States government, is stealing from me and restricting my rights. Granted, this isn't on the same level as, say, stealing my DVD player, or searching my house without a warrant, but it is a completely unjustifiable infringement on my First Amendment rights. In the Constitution, the power of Congress in this sphere is defined so:

To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;

Clearly the existence of intellectual property was not intended by the framers; ideas cannot be owned. The above (to me) pretty strongly implies that their feeling was that granting such exclusive rights to ideas was an evil necessary to encourage the generation of new ideas. If you asked them, they would say to make the "limited time" as short as possible. Intellectual property isn't one of those inalienable rights an inventor is entitled to, but rather a license granted by Congress as a reward for their innovation. In fact, the whole point is to have inventors and authors to create worthy works that are accessible to all, for the betterment of society at large. The exclusive license is merely in furtherance of that goal, an incentive to create and also a mechanism to enable creation, so ordinary citizens can devote time and resources to invention without falling into poverty. Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that there is an inherent right to ownership of ideas. To rephrase Proudhon: Intellectual property is theft.

Incidentally, there's a direct quote by Thomas Jefferson supporting this:

If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of everyone, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density at any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property.

If the Court goes the right way on this, I might start to forget about the coup of 2000.

¶ 287 Posted at 12.18 PM ⇒ No Comments ( news | copyright | politics )

Whereas Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law.... The Canadian charter of rights and freedoms.

¶ 294 Posted at 05.42 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Oil money supports terrorism (flash).

¶ 295 Posted at 02.35 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

In spite of myself, I find myself liking the Libertarian Party. Sometimes: LP News Online: March 2002: Libertarian Party runs provocative anti-War on Drugs newspaper ads.

¶ 302 Posted at 10.36 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics | terrorism )

More on terrorism: This is not a war.

¶ 309 Posted at 05.50 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics | terrorism )

The following is the text of a letter I intend to send to my House Representative and Senators concerning the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act, or the CBDTPA, introduced yesterday in the Senate by Senator Ernest "Fritz" Hollings, D-SC.

[edited several times because it was just too long]

---

I am a software developer in Austin, in the 10th Congressional district. I am writing to express my strong objections to SB 2048, the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act, or the CBDTPA. I am gravely concerned that this bill, if made law, would do great harm to the average American citizen. I believe the bill sacrifices the good of the American people for the good of a relatively small number of media corporations.

My most serious concern with this bill is the lack of protection it affords for the American citizen. While it contains language meant to protect individual consumers, I fear the protections as codified in this bill are neither strong enough nor explicit enough to guarantee my rights under the fair use doctrine, among other rights. Beyond simply stating that fair use should be protected, in order to make any sort of copyright control mechanism acceptable, Congress should pass a law affirming what the rights of consumers are. For example, as a result of Supreme Court ruling in 1986 in the Betamax case, the government cannot take away the right to "time shift" a recording of a television program. However, there is also nothing preventing the technology industry from taking that right away through technical means outside the scope of the law. Before any control mechanisms are implemented in technological devices, it is imperative that Congress guarantee the basic fair use rights of Americans.

By the provisions intended by supporters of the bill, all electronic devices would have mechanisms to verify that all content has been properly acquired. In effect, televisions, computers, compact disc players, and many other electronic devices will actively watching Americans as though they were criminals. These devices would implicitly assume that Americans are thieves and that theft can only be prevented by installing monitoring devices in every American home. This is contrary to American values. The device is not the crime, piracy is. In order to protect the interests of all parties, we must maintain the legality of electronic devices while prosecuting their misuse. Criminalize the deed, not the device. Appropriate laws already exist without compromising the rights of Americans. Furthermore, any digital rights management technology would require registration of individual users, an unprecedented invasion of privacy for entertainment.

We must also consider the impact to the nation's technology industry, widely recognized as one of the most important sectors of the United States economy. The entertainment industry grossed roughly on the order of $40 billion in 2001. By comparison, the combined software, electronics, computer hardware, and telecommunications industries are estimated to have grossed on the order of $500 billion last year, or over ten times the size of the entertainment industry. In spite of this tremendous disparity, we find the peculiar situation of the tail wagging the dog. This bill means considerable harm to the technology industry, as attested to the Senate by Leslie Vadasz, co-founder of Intel, one of the largest semiconductor manufacturers in the United States and the world. He testified as to the damage to the industry should the federal government mandate technological specifications to solve the problem of piracy. The American businessmen and women who have made this country's economy the strongest in the world will have to bear the cost of this technology, reducing the ability of American companies to compete both here and around the world.

Despite the claims of media conglomerates, it is not at all apparent that these measures are necessary. I have been using the Internet as a means for acquiring new music for several years, including using primitive precursors of the now infamous Napster. In that time, I have purchased nearly one hundred music albums as well as many DVDs. I would not have purchased many of the albums had they not been readily available through these illegal means. The reasons for my illegal acquisition of music were solely for evaluation of the music. In nearly every case, if, after sampling an album, I found it to my liking, I acquired it legitimately. While illegal, file sharing services satisfy a need in the market where the music industry has failed. Consumers do not want to steal music, but given the unrelenting blandness of standard music distribution methods, such as radio and television, we are forced to seek other avenues in order to satisfy our tastes. One attempt by the music industry to enter this market, known as Duet or PressPlay, has so far been a dismal failure due to a limited selection of music and draconian control mechanisms, not the cost. In addition, the laws currently in effect have been successfully used to prosecute pirates, including just recently when a counterfeit DVD operation in New York City was shut down.

One of the other arguments made in favor of this bill is that making rich media readily available for download is what is needed to create widespread customer demand for broadband technologies. However, with the existence of illegal content online, broadband nevertheless remains in the early stages of adoption. There is no reason to believe that legitimizing this process will accelerate its adoption. In addition, the federal government should not be influencing the market in this case; broadband Internet access is hardly of the same importance as electricity or a telephone. Any hurdles to broadband adoption are a result of telecommunications companies dragging their feet far more than a lack of demand.

Examining the history of the relationship between the entertainment and technology industries, we find in several instances the former expressed their concerns and fears over a technological advancement, be it the VCR or the audio cassette. In these cases, the fears of the entertainment industry were overblown. In fact, after embracing technologies they originally opposed, the movie studios and record labels managed to increase their revenues and profits, in spite of piracy. While no system is perfect, to some extent fraud is the cost of doing business. No mechanism that protects the rights of law-abiding citizens will be perfect in quashing fraud. The banking and credit card industries have managed to be profitable while still maintaining a fair degree of protection for the rights of consumers. The entertainment industry should be no different.

While I don't doubt that this type of measure would go a long way to stamp out piracy in the United States, it does so by intruding too greatly both on the consumer as well as business concerns. There is a solution to the piracy problem, but it cannot come out of treating Americans like common criminals or burdening the technology industry with further regulation. As such, I strongly urge you to oppose the CBDTPA and all similar measures that only benefit a privileged few to the disadvantage of both individuals and businesses. I would appreciate hearing your position on this issue. Thank you.

¶ 315 Posted at 03.14 AM ⇒ No Comments ( internet | copyright | politics )

Limited Time Offer: The Best Excuse Ever.

¶ 360 Posted at 11.56 AM ⇒ No Comments ( linkage | politics )

God Bless America Day. Another one of the worst ideas I've ever heard. I prefer the suggestion in the comments to this: "Holy Fucking Shit Day."

¶ 389 Posted at 12.03 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Deregulation has many proponents who have convincingly argued its merits based on failures of the federal and state governments to regulate some industries well. What we need is a list of case studies where governmental regulation has worked. The FDA, for example, does a generally good job. It would also be beneficial to have case studies where regulation has failed as a result of insufficient resources rather than inherent inefficiency, like the Department of Agriculture's meat inspections. Hopefully the debacle of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 as well as more recent corporate scandals have convinced the American public that strong regulation is necessary in some industries even if it will never convince the current administration.

¶ 420 Posted at 03.23 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

The most brilliant thing I have ever gotten out of a Slashdot comment:

The beauty ... of a war on an abstract concept is that the concept never surrenders and the war never ends...

¶ 448 Posted at 12.26 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics | terrorism )

All of you who didn't vote or voted for Republicans... way to go. I'm looking at you, Missouri. As if you weren't in trouble enough after giving us Ashcroft. This cannot be good. I'm going off to sulk.

¶ 452 Posted at 08.50 AM ⇒ No Comments ( news | politics )

This cannot be a good thing: U.S. Allows Candidates to Pay Themselves. Quote:

The Federal Election Commission (news - web sites) on Monday agreed to let candidates pay themselves salaries using campaign donations, aiming to encourage people who otherwise couldn't afford to give up their jobs to run. Commissioner Michael Toner, who sponsored the proposal, said it would help scale back some of the advantages of incumbency.

I myself cannot help but think that system could be abused, and badly. I mean, one of the counter-arguments against those who believe American democracy has been completely subverted by money is that nobody can give money to a candidate for office. The best they could do is give candidates' campaigns money, which the candidates could never keep and had very limited use. However, now there will be a direct linkage between contributions and a candidate's wallet, which makes me worried. The theory of allowing more middle- and lower-income citizens to participate in the process is laudable, but I am too skeptical that it will actually work out that way. I guess we will just have to see.

¶ 464 Posted at 05.07 PM ⇒ No Comments ( news | politics )

NY Times: Clinton Says Party Failed Midterm Test Over Security Issue.

Former President Bill Clinton said yesterday that the Democratic Party had lost the midterm elections because its candidates had failed to offer a convincing case that the party could manage national security during dangerous times.

Also:

The former president ... brushed aside the argument by some Democrats that the party needed to return to its liberal roots to regain power.

I don't like it. This is the president, after all, who was largely responsible for the shift to the right of the Democratic party. Surprise of surprises, now he is defending that strategy. I fear that, between Clinton's stature as the only Democratic president to be elected twice since FDR and in the absence of strong Democratic leadership, the Democratic party is likely to be swayed by this argument, and continue to be Pepsi to the GOP's Coke. I've read numerous surveys that indicate a majority of Americans think the Bush administration is corrupt, self-serving, and undemocratic, and yet they still handed them a substantial victory. This tells me there is something very wrong with the Democratic party, and after 10 years of the Clintonian New Democratic Party, I hardly think it is because they are too far left. Americans have had 10 years to get used to it, and I suspect they see no point in choosing a cheap knockoff (the Democrats) when they could have the real thing (the Republicans). It was obvious in 2000 when there was widespread voter apathy due to a lack of perceptible distinctions between the candidates, and it is even more obvious now as the Democratic party flounders without coherent leadership as the Republicans have organized a coherent and disciplined platform. Even if Clinton is correct and the only way to win votes is to effectively be Republicans, that doesn't mean that the Democratic party should shift its whole platform, it means that those more conservative Democrats should just go ahead and join the GOP. What's the point of having two separate but equal political parties?* Well, I guess the point is political leverage, but it is just not a good thing.

yeah, that was a misplaced reference, but so what?

¶ 466 Posted at 08.24 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

I read this interesting article in the latest Harper's called In Defense of Liberalism, written by George McGovern (yes, that George McGovern). He brought up an interesting point, namely, what have conservatives done for this country? To me, "liberal" means someone who considers new ideas and wants to "make things better," whatever that means. And a "conservative" is one who wants to maintain the status quo or regress to a previous state. Now, I'm equating "Republican" with "conservative" and "Democrat" with "liberal," an equation that has obvious problems but is mostly right. The Democrats won WWI, pulled us out of the Depression, won WWII, and pushed through civil rights. On the down side, Democrats got us into Korea and Vietnam, and Southern Democrats supported Jim Crow and segregation for decades. The Republicans gave us the Interstate Highway System, "One nation, under God", took us out of Vietnam, the War on Drugs, and racked up the biggest deficits in history. The Republicans would point to Lincoln, but there are a couple of problems there. One, Republicans haven't exactly been enthusiastic about civil rights. Two, for a party that advocates states' rights, you'd think they would have been on the side of the South. I myself am not entirely sure Lincoln did the right thing. Modern political theory supports self-determination, and one could argue the South should have been free to choose its own destiny. One could argue that Lincoln was guaranteeing the slaves' right to self-determination, but given that Lincoln explicitly stated the Civil war was about Union and not slavery, it's clear that the end of slavery was just a happy side effect. So, looking back, it's hard to see where this country has actually been improved by an overall conservative policy. Now, a lot of liberals get crazy ideas, so it's good to have a conservative, skeptical perspective to keep them grounded. However, to have as your primary goal to maintain the status quo and/or regress to a bleaker time just doesn't seem like a long-term strategy for success, to put it mildly. How can you move forward by looking backward? I just don't get it.

¶ 471 Posted at 12.49 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Al Gore to announce he will not run for President in 2004. I guess that's a good thing, but only just. My figuring on that is Gore vs. Bush is far too polarizing. While Gore standing only with other Democrats is clearly the strongest candidate, when pitted again Dubya, Gore takes a much bigger hit due to the rancor and confusion of the 2000 election. Perhaps he looked at the polls and the recent mid-term election results and decided that the Democratic candidate in 2004 was doomed, and did not want it to be him, especially considering the stigma that would be against him as a two-time loser in 2008. Better for him to sit this one out and let the memories of 2000 slowly fade away, and then face another Republican in 2008 starting with a clean slate. Now what he has to do is to find a way to maintain political relevance for 5 years. And to realize he doesn't have to laugh at everything Jon Stewart says on The Daily Show (which he was on last week).

¶ 472 Posted at 12.47 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

It occurs to me that, if we stripped the current Iraq situation of all the details, it would sound rather disturbing. Consider: A nation claims it is threatened by another nation that has a hostile government and wealth. In order to defend its security, the first is compelled to invade the second, invading with an army of the working class and under-priveleged. Along the way, innocents die, cities are destroyed, and the remnants of a nation are thrust into chaos. The merchant class of the conqueroring nation descends upon the vanquished and sets itself to plundering its riches. That is one of the basic templates of wars of conquest. Rome did it. The British Empire too. Tsarist Russia. The Aztecs. Shouldn't we be beyond this? If you look at the polls, you can see that nobody is buying the Bush story; they know it's about oil and revenge. But if you look at the polls, you can see that it doesn't matter. Somehow the Bush administration has managed to convince the nation that war with Iraq is inevitable and there is nothing they can do about it. I'm amazed and depressed at the same time. An imperial, colonialist America is such an oxymoron but it is happening. In fact, that would be the best possible outcome of a war with Iraq, that we occupy the country for many years and leverage American interest in oil to bring money to the region and build a profitable colony, I mean, a stable ally. Imagine the Marshall Plan, but without moral authority. Think carpet baggers. Or MacArthur in post-WWII Japan. The British East India Company. Bush may be the most autocratic and undemocratic President in recent memory, but that he would be so ready to impose his will on a sovereign nation is further than I thought he would ever go. September 11 was the best thing to ever happen for this administration.*

Not that I buy into the conspiracy theories; I accept that what happened is more or less accurate. But George Bush was floundering in mid-2001; now he has sky-high popular opinion, a Congressional majority built on that, a likely second term, and the fear of the American people letting him walk down a path that was never open before, where he can reward the wealthy, connected patrons who got him where he is, increase the size and power of federal government (ironically), and finish off the job dad left undone.

¶ 477 Posted at 01.47 AM ⇒ No Comments ( deep thoughts | politics )

Amir says "hi" with an editorial from the NY Times:

The most telling polling result from the 2000 election was from a Time magazine survey that asked people if they are in the top 1 percent of earners. Nineteen percent of Americans say they are in the richest 1 percent and a further 20 percent expect to be someday. So right away you have 39 percent of Americans who thought that when Mr. Gore savaged a plan that favored the top 1 percent, he was taking a direct shot at them.

¶ 480 Posted at 04.35 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

John Perry Barlow talks about Dick Cheney. This being the same Barlow who co-founded the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an organization devoted to protecting privacy and civil liberties in the electronic age.

¶ 497 Posted at 01.31 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Anyone wanting to look for signs of a significant shift in the way the US Government regards itself only has to look at the progression in covers of the CIA - The World Factbook. The 2002 cover looks a lot like the box for a Cold War-era Real-Time Strategy game.

¶ 511 Posted at 07.24 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

The United States is going to defy the United Nations and attack Iraq for defying the United Nations.

Attacking Iraq to save lives is like saving money by buying things you don't need because they are on sale.

¶ 513 Posted at 12.06 PM ⇒ No Comments ( deep thoughts | politics )

I have developed a single criterion for determining how to cast my vote in 2004. I will vote for the candidate who will undo every policy initiative of the Bush administration. Every law passed will be repealed. Every executive order will be revoked. Every new doctrine will be disavowed. Every sundered treaty will be reaccepted. I will vote for the candidate who will apologize to the world for four years of madness. This candidate need have no vision, no agenda, and no qualifications. All he needs is the willingness to roll back four years of regress, to put this country where it was before it was hijacked by thieves and murderers.

¶ 518 Posted at 09.13 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

I almost hate it when others speak my mind better than I can myself: The Lie Of The U.S. Military / Tough gritty American soldiers protect freedom of liberal S.F. columnist? Or the other way around?. Soldiers don't protect freedom. The best they can do is to protect property and people. Physical things. They do nothing to ensure the sanctity of more abstract notions such as liberty. There was a time when other powers wanted to invade this country and destroy our liberty. Even then, however, the military did not protect freedom. What they did do was make it possible for us to protect our own freedom. We ourselves, the citizens. On occasion, freedom may be protected by the police or a district attorney or a judge, but the greatest part of this protection comes from us living by the principles of our Constitution. And now the threat to freedom comes from within. American citizens will willingly give up their freedoms and those of their countrymen for the promise of security. Claiming that external forces will deny our liberty distracts us and makes it easier for internal forces to do the same. It doesn't matter if it is the Communists or John Ashcroft who denies my freedom to speak.

The notion of trading reduced freedom for security is treated as a necessary exchange, but I have seen no evidence to indicate that it is a zero sum system. The only credible argument I have seen for denying natural freedoms is laziness on the parts of those meant to protect us. They say it would be "too hard" to protect this country without maintaining classified dossiers on its citizens. They say that they need to be able to conduct wiretaps and searches without warrants are necessary tools to make them more "efficient." It is simple laziness, on the part of the government and on the part of your fellow citizens, who want a panacea for their fears (reinforced by the government's reckless and effectively useless handling of potential threats), but don't want to pay for more agents or more judges, or face the ever-so-slightly increased danger of a free society. And what then? As an engineer, I often attempt many solutions to a problem before finding the right one. As such, I am used to thinking about what happens when my chosen solution fails. Unfortunately nobody in our government seems to think that way. So when denying my freedoms fails to make us more secure, what happens? Do I get my freedoms back? Or do they demand even more from me, claiming this time it will be different? Somehow I expect the latter. Freedom and security are not mutually exclusive. Those who would deny you your freedoms are your enemies, and the enemies of this country, no matter what excuses they manufacture.

I have tried very hard to use phrases like "deny freedom" rather than "take away freedom" because freedom is an inalienable right. Others may make it impossible for us to exercise our freedom, but it exists independently of any actions they may take. To state that they can take it away gives them the power to do so. This has already happened in some areas, with many people erroneously believing that the government has the power to regulate your speech. This is partly based on a misapplication of this statement by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., in Schenck v. United States: "The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man falsely shouting fire in a theater and causing a panic." Freedom of speech does not apply here because you are on private property. The owner of the property has complete discretion over what is said, not the federal government. If the owner of the property gives me the permission to yell "fire," they cannot stop me. Suppose you have a dinner party. At some point, you shout "Fire!" and panic your guests. You may anger your friends, but it is your right. Thinking that the government can regulate that speech is a misunderstanding of the concept and makes the public conception of freedom subject to further erosion. Here is an interesting discussion going further into this issue. Of course, I am not a lawyer, but it sure sounds right.

...putting the "fury" in righteous fury since 2002...

¶ 519 Posted at 05.12 PM ⇒ No Comments ( linkage | politics | iraq )

After some discussion with mute, we both agreed that there is now no way for the United States to withdraw from Iraq. At this point, the least bad outcome is to win. That realization put me in a foul mood. Up to this point, I had held out hope that the situation was salvageable, that there was some way for it not to end badly. Now I have resigned myself there being no good options, only bad ones and worse ones. I realized that I've given up hope. That was the worst for me. I never give up. Anyone who's ever disagreed with me knows that. It's just not me. Now, though, I have given up, and it's terrible. I hate George Bush for making that happen. I hate him for taking my hope away.

¶ 520 Posted at 10.04 PM ⇒ No Comments ( me | politics | iraq )

Librarians have been vocal opponents of the PATRIOT Act ever since it was first proposed. One provision that affects their work directly gives law enforcement the power to investigate patrons' reading histories. For (hopefully) obvious reasons, this is a bad thing, and librarians strongly oppose it. Unfortunately, the same law prohibits them from informing their patrons if law enforcement has asked for information on them. Here are Five Technically Legal Signs for Your Library to warn people of the danger. Law enforcement claims it's nothing to worry about because the probability of someone being investigated is very low, but then, the probability of my car getting stolen is very low and I still have insurance. The probability of winning the lottery is very low, but Americans spend millions of dollars per day on tickets. When the risk or reward is great, it doesn't matter if the odds are low.

¶ 521 Posted at 11.43 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Michael Moore was at UT yesterday. He was supposed to give a speech at the LBJ School, but apparently there was enough demand that they moved it to Gregory Gym. I happened to notice a huge crowd of people as I went over for my swim. On my way out, I saw a stretch limo. I asked the driver, who was just standing there, and it turned out it was Moore's. There's a bit of irony for you.

I'm just sick of Michael Moore. His Oscar stunt was clearly a self-aggrandizing publicity move rather than an actual attempt to change opinions. I've read too many things like this and this to trust anything he says. I wanted to see "Bowling for Columbine" at some point, but now I don't want to because I'm afraid of my mind getting polluted by his half-truths and distortions. He's the left-wing's equivalent of Rush Limbaugh or Anne Coulter. Their inaccurate, self-serving, and sensationalistic output does a huge amount of damage by distorting facts and polarizing debates. It's hard for me to believe that any of them truly believes in the causes they espouse; they just use the causes to promote themselves. I would very happily launch those three into the sun, given the chance.

¶ 532 Posted at 03.50 PM ⇒ No Comments ( stupid people | politics )

An election correction.

¶ 541 Posted at 12.35 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Double standards, or why some Republicans suck:

• The Clintons make $100K on commodity futures (pork barrels, as I recall) and lose money on a real estate investment (Whitewater). Result: a big media furor and grand jury investigation into Whitewater over several years to the tune of tens of millions of taxpayer dollars, which found nothing. On the other hand, George W. Bush steered a sizable University of Texas endowment management contract to Tom Hicks in 1995. Coincidentally, Hicks purchased the Texas Rangers from Bush and his partners several years later, in 1998. Then there is the obvious Halliburton-Cheney connection with Iraq contracts, among others. Result: besides a fuss made in some opinion columns, nothing.
• Clinton orders bombings in the former Yugoslavia at about the same time as Congressional hearings into the Monica Lewinsky affair. He is lambasted in the media and rentals of "Wag the Dog" go through the roof. In 2003, Bush orders the invasion of Iraq after failing to capture Osama bin Laden, which also continues the redistribution of wealth from the common taxpayer to the owners of large industrial corporations such as Halliburton and Schlumberger.
• Clinton is universally ridiculed for his "I didn't inhale" statement, but Bush gets a bye on his evasion regarding use of more serious drugs. His statements have gotten so ludicrous as to be a tacit admission of the use of cocaine in the 1960s and/or 1970s. Then there is the covered-up DUI in the late 1970s. There's the attempted underage drinking of his daughters, which has been mostly ignored. Finally, there was the arrest of Noelle Bush, the president's niece, for attempting to purchase Xanax with a fake prescription. This got swept under the rug while Bush continued to push for increasing penalties against users of illegal drugs.
• Clinton was labeled a draft-dodger. Bush served in the Texas National Guard, a posting that was clearly arranged by his father's good connections. Not only did he avoid service in Vietnam, he also went effectively AWOL for over a year.
• Democrats are knocked as being soft on defense and the military. However, United States involvement in WWI, WWII, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War all happened primarily under Democratic governments. The last significant conflict fought by a Republican president was the Civil War under Lincoln. In the last century, we've instead had minor actions in Lebanon, Grenada, and Panama. Even Iraq (either time) fits into the latter category far more neatly than the former category, in that the first offensive lasted either a month or 3 days, depending on how you count, and the second lasted about a month also. I'll also point out that we won WWI and WWII, accomplished our goals (though did not outright defeat the enemy) in Korea, and only failed in Vietnam. In contrast, Lebanon is still basically owned by Syria, a terrorist state and the first Iraq war was mostly a failure (if it wasn't, why was there a second one?).

Somehow I don't think the bias in media is a liberal one. If most news reporting was indeed "fair and balanced," we would have gotten a lot more coverage of these bigger Bush transgressions than we did the more minor Clinton offenses.

¶ 551 Posted at 01.37 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

This is my take on the Democratic field:

• John Edwards - Too little experience. And being a trial lawyer is politically toxic.
• Richard Gephardt - Too lacking in personality. I just don't see him inspiring, well, anything.
• Bob Graham - Who? I guess nobody knew who Clinton was in 1991, but still...
• John Kerry - Funny-looking. Plus he has too much money; I just don't see him being in touch with ordinary people. And his Iraq position hasn't exactly been consistent.
• Dennis Kucinich - I like his politics. He's articulate and thoughtful, and seems to be consistent. Unfortunately, he looks like an AV club nerd.
• Carol Moseley-Braun - Who? There are a whole lot of reasons that have nothing to do with her, but they're enough.
• Al Sharpton - Uh huh...
• Joseph Lieberman - He's a fascist. If he wasn't Jewish, he'd be part of the Religious Right.
• Howard Dean - Needs to be consistent or he's doomed. Not particularly inspirational either, but apparently I'm in the minority on that.
• Wesley Clark - I'm a little turned off by the melodrama surrounding his entry into the race. On the other hand, he doesn't have the credibility taint that the Senators and Representatives do. We'll see what he looks like in the morning.

Right now, it looks like the best shot is a Clark/Dean ticket (or a Dean/Clark ticket, or as I like to call them, "Clean and Dark"). Apparently they know each other and get along, which should help. I doubt the competitors will recognize that Clark/Dean have the best chance of winning until they are forced to, though.

¶ 612 Posted at 10.23 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Approximately 3 million people have died over the last 5 years in the war in the Republic of Congo (aka Zaire). Western media have barely covered it. The NY Times is one of the few, with another article on the war, which may finally be at an end. I found a great link some time back that listed and ranked major events of world history by number of people killed. I believe this is it. By the estimates there, this war ranks in the top 10, possibly even the top 5. If you combine it with the massacre of about 1 million people in Rwanda in the 1990s, it is shocking. At least, it should shock you. Over 4 million people killed in Central Africa in the last 9 years. That is about 15% of the population of Iraq, and well beyond Saddam Hussein's wildest fantasies or capabilities, but somehow our President cannot summon up the same indignation. Doesn't he know they have natural resources too? I guess Halliburton doesn't sell diamonds.* Regardless, spend some time reading the list. There are things on there that I'd never heard of before, and I thought I knew a lot. American education is worthless when it comes to history. There's a whole world out there that we forget.

Yeah, cheap shots, but so what? It's not like any that isn't true.

¶ 616 Posted at 10.57 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

I've been watching Fox News lately. Not really intentionally, but because the YMCA seems to always have it on. Today one of their stories was advocating going easy on crooked CEOs because all the damage has been done already and the remaining corporate officers have all learned their lessons. I don't even get mad at Fox or Bill O'Reilly anymore; I just sort of shake my head. I've realized that's just the way they are. It's like the parable of the frog and the scorpion. I just remind myself that their job isn't what we assumed it was. They're not there to report the news. They're there to advance an agenda. Once I got over that hump, I just stopped getting mad at them.

¶ 623 Posted at 09.43 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics | tv )

Congress expands FBI powers. Now, I'm unhappy with that bill for the obvious reasons. However, another thing that bothers me is that the measure was slipped in at the last minute. I could write my Senator/Representative now, but it's a lot harder to get a law overturned than it is to prevent it from being passed. So I'm thinking we need some kind of transparency enforcement. It would be pretty simple. All bills have to be made public for a minimum of 1 month before they can be passed. If the bill gets changed, the counter is reset. So a three-month old bill that gets amended in a late-night session to slip in some irrelevant item will have to wait for one more month. Now, the obvious objection is emergency legislation. My answer is also simple. If Congress and the President have deemed a bill too important to wait 1 month (like the PATRIOT Act or the bill enabling the Do Not Call list), they may brand it "emergency legislation" and pass it as things go today. However, any bill passed as emergency legislation automatically sunsets after 6 months. That is more than enough time for Congress to pass it as ordinary, non-emergency legislation, while still ensuring that a permanent change isn't forced through. I can think of a handful of potential problems with this sort of approach, but I can't think of any that are intrinsic; at worst, they are problems with my particular formulation.

¶ 632 Posted at 04.11 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

Things you have to believe to be a Republican today. That is pure flamebait, except it's basically true. The only flaw is that it applies all of those statements to all Republicans (I hear they have a big tent these days), when obviously all Republicans are not the same. However, it is generally close to the current overall Republican platform. I found a companion "Things you have to believe to be a Democrat today," but it was rather limp; it seemed composed more to appear to balance the first list than to actually point out any of the deficiencies in the Democratic platform. I'm sure there's a better effort out there waiting to be discovered.

¶ 639 Posted at 11.39 AM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

As you must know by now, they have captured Saddam Hussein. Phew. I hope that eliminating him as a source of fear and inspiration will make progress much easier. Now they just have to track down Osama.

¶ 642 Posted at 10.17 AM ⇒ No Comments ( news | politics | iraq )

I have this crazy hunch that George Bush will drop Cheney as running mate this spring/summer and will add Condoleeza Rice to the ticket. That would be a killer political move. I don't see it having any downside for them, and it could have considerable upside. I mean, it's not like any conservatives are going to vote for a Democrat because the VP candidate is a woman or black. And it would appeal to a large number of swing voters and traditional Democratic constituencies. The more I think about it, the smarter it seems.

¶ 655 Posted at 03.40 PM ⇒ No Comments ( politics )

The US Government's annual debt interest payment amounts. It's surprisingly difficult to get a clear, single answer on what deficits have been over recent history, but based on the rough cross-section, it appears that deficits since the end of the Cold War have been approximately balanced by interest payments. To state that more clearly, recent budget deficits wouldn't have existed if we didn't have to pay interest on the already existing debt. Of course, that's all thrown into disarray with the recent tax cuts and spending increases, but it was true for a rather long time. By cutting taxes in the face of mounting deficits, Bush has effectively raised future taxes by a greater amount. Tax cuts to stimulate the economy are a permanent solution to a temporary problem.

As an aside, the data support the epithet of "tax and spend" Democrats. However,