Why Be a Nation When You Are Your Own World?

I took this country quiz at Blue Pyramid. I don't know how they came up with this. I'm wondering how my answers became this, but I'm sure there's some people who would nod their heads and say, "Yep, that's him":

You're Afghanistan!

In the words of Bob Dylan, you "haven't known peace and quiet
in so long [you] don't remember what it's like!"  Sad but true.  Boss
after boss has led you around, using you for their nefarious purposes, and dumping you
when the time was right.  You've hurt and been hurt and now you're just sick and tired.
 When will people leave you alone and let you do your own thing?  But you
don't really even know what you want anymore.
Take the Country Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid

Link via Electric Venom

Yee Hah!!

Dad is coming home tomorrow. Blogging may be light through the weekend.

But What Will the Idiots Do With It?

I really don't care what happens to idiots when they do idiotic things. The danger of someone darting out into traffic while playing human Pacman causes me more concern for the damage to the car and potential mental trauma to the driver than for the idiot who did the darting. You roll the dice and you take your chances.

Anoter good on the surface idea is airborne taxi service. I'm all for new ideas for getting into town having commuted into Los Angeles. This one stinks. Problem #1: there is no graceful way to pull over should mechanical difficulties arise. I don't worry too much for the driver (pilot?) and passengers, they chose the risk. Commuting is bad enough, commuting with the risk of someone crashing into you from above is a little too much. Get hit from above, and it won't be a fender bender. Problem #2: Are security officials going to be keen on the idea of privately operated aircraft flying into the heart of the city? This service would be shut down with the slightest hiccup of the security level. Lastly, and not really part of risk assesment, $90 each way. I understand that fares would be route dependant and are comparable to ground taxi fares, but at that price, I can see why more people don't take ground taxis.

Jumping on the Ol' Bandwagon

One of the hallmarks of a successful company is that it lets few opportunities pass by. Given that they were the subject of the Final Jeopardy answer that broke Ken Jenning's win streak on Jeopardy at 74 and $2,520,700:

Most of this firm's 70,000 seasonal white-collar employees work only four months a year.

H&R Block has announced that they will provide Ken's tax and financial planning services free of charge. Not that he really needs to economize on that, but the publicity is definitely worth more than those fees. Let's see how good H&R Block really is if they can do something about this:

Jennings will probably owe about $1.04 million in federal and Utah taxes on the winnings, Byers said, citing preliminary calculations by H&R Block.

Methodology is Everything

I was somewhat excited when I heard on CNN about a study that purported to show differences in MRI brainscans between liars and truthtellers. Jim Lundgren at The Volokh Conspiracy dug a little deeper into the study and found some serious flaws. From the section quoted in his article:

Faro and colleagues tested 10 volunteers. Six of them were asked to shoot a toy gun and then lie and say they didn't do it. Three others who watched told the truth about what happened. One volunteer dropped out of the study.

Aside from the sample size, the issue Mr. Lundgren makes is that there are more than one variable in this arrangement. Those who are lying are also the ones who performed physical action, two areas where there is a difference from the other group. Therefore, it is impossible to say whether it was the lying or the memory of taking physical action that activates the additional brain regions.

A better set up for the experiment would be to have to groups, a group that is set before hand to lie to a particular question and one that will answer all questions honestly. While in the brain scan, each group will get the same list of questions. While answer all of the others truthfully, the first group will lie when given the key question. That way, comparisons can be made between responses in an unreliable individual's telling lies and truth, and between the unreliable person and the reliable one. In fact, you could have a third group instructed to lie all of the time. However it is done, the experiences of the subject will be functionally identical with respect to brain activity.

Update: Thanks to John of Boffoblog for bringing my attention to the more in depth look the study he took in a couple of posts. Looking at his posts, it is clear that it was the reporting on the subject that was shoddy rather than the study. One of the big issues I have is scientific illiteracy. Reporting like this tends to push the sensational, and the idea of a fool-proof lie detector is gold. It does not help the general issue of people uncertain about the real science. With reporting like this, it becomes all to easy for snake oil to sell and real medicines to be demonized.

WiFi as a Public Utitlity

As much as I like the idea of city-wide wireless internet, I have to stick by my guns and say that I don't like the idea of city or state governments doing the installations. Anytime you see numbers in a story like this, with respect to the project in Philadelphia:

The projected cost for installing antennas across the city's 135 square miles would be $10 million and another $1.5 million annually to maintain it, Neff said.

you will then know that if you double it, you will get a decent estimate of half the final cost.

Of course, this is a funny part:

Plus, the service could help make Philadelphia "hip" enough to stem the outward flow of college graduates, she [Barbara Grant, a spokeswoman for Philadelphia Mayor John F. Street] said.

First, getting widespread wireless coverage will be a temporary edge at best as other cities get networks online. Second, anyone who still uses "hip" has other problems in the cool department.

Update on Dad

He repeated the barium swallow test this morning, aka the quality assurance test for the surgeon. Great news, Dad's stomach is once again functioning as a sealed unit. I don't think that anyone has enjoyed a drink of water as much as he has.

Not What is Meant by "Hot" Toy

I recall the frenzy surrounding Cabbage Patch Dolls. The clashes over Furbies are still seared in the national consciousness. None of that may hold a candle to the possibility that someone used pepper spray in a case of toy rage.

If this is the case, forget the toys, its the parents how are really teaching kids the idea of dispute mitigation through violence. I would like to end this post on a witty bon mot, but I'm drawing a blank. Feel free to supply your own.

Time For Definitions

This story about putting warning labels on science books is almost too silly for words. Evidently those doing the labeling know very little about science, as well as seeming to be proud of the fact.

The problem is a fundamental misunderstanding of the relationship between facts and theories. Facts are incontrovertible. For that reason it takes a lot to get to that level. Nothing beyond single observations can truly be called fact, and even those might not be if the observation methodology is challenged, but that's another post. A theory, on the other hand, is an attempt to apply an organizing principle to facts. It is said that theories destroy facts. I prefer the analogy that theories consume facts.

For instance, if you have observed that a bus has stopped at a given spot at 10:00 am, 10:20 am, 10:40 am, and 11:00 am, you can say that a bus stops at the spot at 20 minute intervals. The specific observations of times are facts, while the statement of the twenty minute interval is a theory. You could test the theory by observing if a bus arrives at 11:20 am. All future facts within the scope of the theory must fit for the theory to remain valid. This is why it is often said that theories are of a higher order than facts, like "book" being of a higher order than "page". If the bus does not arrive until 11:30 am, then the theory must be ammended. (Assuming of course that the busses run on time, a tall stretch in virtually any town.) A theory can be simple (20 minute intervals) or complicated (20 minute intervals until 11:00 am, whereupon the busses run on 30 minute intervals).

So, strictly speaking, my assertion that the people that want stickers on science books are proud of their scientific illiteracy may be incorrect. That people want to put stickers on science books is a fact. That they are proud of their scientific illiteracy is a theory. I would welcome further facts to test my theory.

May I, Mr. Overlord, Sir?

I'd buy one of these Aluminum Foil Deflector Beanies, but my programming from the Orbital Mind-Control Lasers won't let me. If you will excuse me, I must now go and listen to Avril Levigne's new album as penance for even mentioning the Conspiracy.

Link via Instapundit.

Good Luck With That

We all know how long it took for video phones to become widespread features of people's homes. Oh, wait, they haven't yet. And the fact that I am currently bleary-eyed, fright-wigged, and, yes, pajama-wearing, kind of guarantees that it won't be happening around here.

So, in a way, I really have to admire the guys who are trying to market a hologram phone. Imagine, that telemarketer could determine just how big that zit on your forehead is while interrupting your dinner. Hope springs eternal, nonetheless:

It's also pricey. One cylinder costs 10 million yen ($97,100) although Tachi and Endo expect that to fall if the gadget is ever mass-produced.

Get it down to $150 and I might consider it. Considered, and No.

Sometimes its the Right One

I have been posting updates of my Dad's condition over the past couple of weeks. Latest news is a worry that the infection has drastically slowed the healing from the operation. That should only be a delay, however, and not a permanent setback.

Anyway, one of the pairs of eyeballs that came along this site belong to my uncle, my Dad's brother, with whom we've lost touch over the years. I figure, have to ask him, that he was Googling my Dad's name and up popped the blog. Kind of a scary way to find out that type of information about a loved one. Even with the names, my Uncle was able to put together enough clues (vis my tendancy toward injury) to make enough of a guess to drop his e-mail in the comments. Dropping that my injuries were orthopedic in nature closed the deal. He made contact with my Mom before I saw the comments and she told me how he found us.

One of the really cool things about blogging is that I can reach out to interested people all around the world. Today I had a visitor from Hungary, how cool is that? But some of those who come by are valuable for being closer to home, or at least should be.

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggeddy Jig

Just got home from a job interview in the San Fransciso Bay Area. Driving nearly a thousand miles in three days is just so much fun (/sarcasm). A couple shots of Jim Beam and I am just about ready for bed.

I also note that I picked up 55 visits while I was away. Including hits directly to some pretty old stuff. Thanks for the eyeballs, but is this telling me that I should be spending more time away from the keyboard? I'm writing this late wednesday, so if anyone reads this on thursday, ask yourself if your time isn't better spent looking at a turkey or football or something.

Bonus Geek Points to the first person to identify the reference in the title. Double if you are geeky enough to be reading this post on Thanksgiving. I sure won't.

Status Report and Itinerary

Great news, Dad went off the ventilator yesterday and is now breathing unassisted. Today, delayed diagnostics to check the surgeon's work from the operation that got all of this started.

I will be catching up on delayed matters as well. I'm headed up to the San Francisco Bay Area this morning for a meeting and will come back home on Wednesday. I won't be here on Thursday, like anyone else would be on Thanksgiving, and blogging shall resume on Friday.

Catch you all later.

Did Anyone Consider the Symbolism?

Donald Trump's casino group is yet again filing for bankruptcy. Among the casinos involved is the Trump Taj Mahal.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the real Taj Mahal a tomb?

The Marketing is Off to a Good Start

Oliver Willis has started a topic with the idea of creating a Brand Democrat. I couldn't help but nod my head to a few of these points. I particularly like the "What happens in your bedroom, stays in your bedroom," one.

Of course, this marketing campaign is potentially in danger of skewing off into territory that Democrats decry of corporate marketing, namely saying what sounds good rather than what the product delivers. The quotation ads are where it is the most obvious. From the JFK quote, as part of the hallmarks of a liberal:

Someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions...

Or the FDR qutoe about freedom of speech. There have been enough stories about hostility on college campuses and vandalism of Republican offices during the election, both to deafening silence from Democratic leadership, to show that the Democratic Party has fallen prey to ideosclerosis (hardening of the ideology) just as much as Republicans have.

Via Atrios

Nice Acceleration

From zero to 1,000 hits: approx 8 1/2 months.

1,000 - 2,000 hits: 8 weeks.

Thanks, Everyone.

Maybe I'm Missing Something...

But isn't the purpose of a limit to limit? What value is there to a spending limit when it can be raised when the powers that be feel like it? Please, there has to be some Republicans in Congress who, when they cast their vote, felt some qualm of conscience. I know, they are politicians, but hope springs eternal.

At some point, someone is going to have to realize that we can't afford all of this compassionate conservatism.

Check the Methodology

Via A Small Victory

There are two types of experiments that a scientist can perform. The first is to change one condition of the status quo and observe the results. A key element of this type of experiment is that one must know the status quo in order to know what is an outcome attribrutable to the change.

Therefore it often required to have experiments of the second type, like CHEERS, Children's Environmental Exposure Research Study, where as many details of the status quo are noted with as little change to the system as possible. In this case, the goal is to measure the chemicals that children absorb from their environment. The thrust of the experiment is made very clear on the website, the goal is to measure the effects of normal life, as shown by the following question and response:

Is there any risk to me and my family?

No. You and your child will not experience any risks from participating in this study.
o We will not ask any parent to apply pesticides in their home to be a part of this study.
o You are not required to change any of your regular household routines.

One last time, this is a passive experiment. Any changes in the environment of these children would nullify the value of any data gathered. There are no lab rats here.

BTW, this Gamer is in no way associated with Gamersnook.

Quantum Economics

This is an idea that has been kicking around in my head for a while, and I think it is time to let it out.

Idea #1: Oftentimes in physiscs there are particles that do not have strictly defined characteristics. In these instances, all of the possible configurations of the particles have to be taken into account. Essentially, the particle is in all of the possible states it could occupy until the time at which it collapses into a single state.

Idea #2: A post I wrote way back when discussed economic flow a la Adam Smith. It sought to explain how a free market creates wealth. What stuck with me was how value increased in one direction while money flowed in the other.

Combining the two, I get the idea that money is value in an indeterminant state. It can be converted into other forms of wealth that may be more useful to the buyer while that form is more difficult to exchange for other types of wealth. In fact, the easiest way to convert wealth is to use the medium of money. In post-apocalyptic fiction the point is often made that cash becomes little more than kindling since it has little value aside from the agreed upon. Or another example, when people win the lottery they talk about what they are going to buy with the money as opposed to enjoying the cashiness of it. Okay, personally, I'd take out $200,000 in hundreds and roll around in them for a while, but they would still eventually get spent. The only value money has is that it can be converted into any another form of value, but none actually in and of itself.

A Million Times Better

The phone call never came. In fact, when my sister called to check on my Dad, the nurse told her that he was awake enough to weakly nod or shrug his shoulders when asked questions. When Mom and I arrived, we saw for ourselves that his blood pressure had raised to a respectible level and, better yet, was stable rather than going through thirty point swings. His fever has all but disappeared. By the time we left, he was trying to communicate with a letter board, but it was obviously frustrating him.

I'd go and see him today, but I have a cold now, and that is the last thing they want walking around a Critical Care Unit. Compared to what my Dad has been through, this ought to be a snap.

Inversion

I wrote below about my Dad's surgery. It was a complete esophagectomy to remove a number of pre-cancerous growths that resulted from years of acid reflux. The initial surgery itself went very well. He was even up and walking around a very little bit.

When my Mom got to the hospital to see him yesterday, things had changed. During the night he had trouble breathing, and that morning they took him into surgery to drain the fluid off of his lungs. It happened so fast that there wasn't time to call the family. The pneumonia turned to sepsis and that infection sent his body into shock. The last thirty-six hours have been a fight to keep his blood pressure up and bring his fever down while a machine takes over the burden of breathing. In the meantime, Mom, sister, brother and I are just waiting. Getting Mom away from the hospital has been tough, she and I slept in the waiting room last night. I'll be sleeping with an ear open for the phone to ring while praying it won't.

I suppose that part of growing up is coming to grips with mortality, your own and that of loved ones. I can't count the number of times my Dad tended my wounds, and believe me, there were a lot of them. If less than all of them had happened away from home, we would have had Children's Services going over our lives with a microscope. A few of those times included stays in the hospital. All of those times Dad was in the chair next to the bed all night, reassuring me that everything would be all right. This time is my turn. I can't tell if he can hear me, but I say them anyway. My Mom is more scared than I've ever seen her. Thank God that we have each other because we have been taking turns comforting one another.

Those of you who pray, please remember my father, Winston L. "Larry" Wade. On behalf of the rest of the family, I thank you.

Sincerely,
Winston E. "Ted" Wade
aka Gamer

Fun With Teasers

I finally found the photo at Michelle Malkin's site.

I was watching the local news last night and they kept teasing the story attached to this photo. The teaser left me to my own devices to fill in the blanks. Those who know me know that my devices are some strange, unnatural things, so here are the first two responses:

1. Sneaking into a party in the cake is so passé.

2. A kid in desperate need of a suger rush needs no stinking bats.

Gee, Thanks, Dude

So we should be thanking Yasser Arafat for all the security hoops and the fact that we must not say the word "bomb" in an airport.

It is quite the struggle being a good christian and not taking (too much) glee in someone's death, but this really makes it tough.

Who Makes the Hard Calls?

Via Atrios

This story is particularly tragic. Thirteen year-old Lauren Rainey has a multitude of medical problems, including an airway defect that leaves her very vulnerable to suffocation. She is also dependant on Medicare benefits that have been cut off.

Obviously this isn't just. That despite the rules that were created to be even handed, it leaves the decision in the hands of someone who is, by those very rules, separated from the impact. This is what happens when decisions are made by those distant, whether by location or emotion, from the case. So who makes the hard calls? Certainly neither the HMO's nor Medicare (an HMO people don't have the ability to opt out of) will deliver just results so long as people are just account numbers.

Any ideas?

Some Things Just Take Precedence

I haven't gotten particularly personal on this blog, but today is the exception.

Last march my father started undergoing tests to examine the tissue that had grown into his esophagus after years of acid reflux. The tests showed patches of high-grade dysplasia. For the medically illiterate like myself, it is cancer without the kill-all-neighboring-cells attitude. Today he had surgery to have his esophagus removed.

According to the surgeon, the prognosis is excellent. Catching this in a very early stage made it so that all of the dysplasia could be removed, and there was no sign of any cancer outside of the esophagus. Everything looks like he'll make the full recovery in a couple of months that the doctor promised.

County By County Breakdown

Just finished looking at an electoral map put out by Princeton. A couple of thoughts.

1. When it comes to colors, this map could only be worse if it were red and green. (Christmas would be much happier for me if they would just change the color scheme) I can't keep track of one color to compare it with another. Is Los Angeles County as blue as the San Francisco Bay area?

2. Damn, some of those counties back east are tiny. Then again, some of the states back east are tiny. San Bernardino County could hold Vermont and most of New Hampshire.

Viva La Third Party

Michele Catalano once again takes on a commenter who claims that Bush's victory is a mandate for moral righteousness and that those who produced vulgarity shall feel their wrath. What gets me about that point of view is that the commenter, in using Bush's majority vote, is using Michele's vote in a way that she has been emphatic to disavow. There were a lot of one issue voters out there, yet the commenter failed to realize that there are a lot of "one issues" as well, and that everyone who voted for Bush was not choosing the same one issue.

I was tempted to vote for Bush. I believe that the war is of paramount importance, that Iraq, based on best intelligence of the time, merited "serious consequences", while believing that the Bush Administration has done less than necessary to achieve the best possible result-to-point thus far in that country. Meanwhile, I had zero confidence in Kerry's plan, whatever it was, to do what Bush had not. It was entirely too vague and was undercut by vocal unwillingness from our "allies" in Europe.

Regardless, if I had voted for Bush, it would not have been for any reason involving morals inside of our borders. I have written before about my preference for the government staying out of my moral decision making. The key reason that I did not cast a futile vote for Bush as a protest to Kerry is that I knew my vote in the popular number would be read as positive support for all of Bush's platform, which it most emphatically was not.

I voted for Badnarik. If my vote was going to be counted as an all or nothing Kool-Aid quaff, then I voted for having my vote misrepresented the least.

The Beauty of Democracy...

Is that there's always a next election. Not only is it the next chance for the party of the short end to make a comeback, but it keeps the incumbents honest. The Democratic Party is in a very low point right now, much like the Republicans were in Clinton's second term. The comparison that I like to make is to the midterm election in Clinton's first term. That was the year we had Newt Gingrich coming out with his "Contract for America" and riding voter unrest into a Republican majority in Congress. The big reason for that was a combination of the Clinton Administration trying to do too much too fast (Pushing for removing the ban on homosexuals in the military) and the Democrats in Congress fighting amongst themselves as to whose agenda had top priority.

If the federal government rushes too far to the right, expect a major backlash in 2006.

I'd Like to Thank the Engineers, and NOT the Gorvernment

The Mars Rovers are living well beyond their projected lifespans. In fact, there have been a few times where their power has increased. The biggest factor limiting the lifetime of the rovers is the ability of their solar panels to receive enough light through the inevitable dust and grime. The only explanation for the increases in power is that the panels are somehow getting cleaner at some points. Glenn Reynolds, the Instapundit, believes it is little green men with squegees. Possibly, but that would mean the rovers would have to have a stack of the local equivalent of dollar bills. So, JPL, what's the deal?

Politics in an Analog World

Two things are happening in the blogosphere currently. One is trying to figure out what happened and why. (Link via Instapundit) The other is the intra-party bickering of who is truly loyal.

The roots of both of these debates are the urge to shoe horn people into categories, and just what those categories mean. The first article is about people trying to define others and not doing a particularly good job about it. The other is about people trying to define themselves and their erstwhile allies. The criticisms in both pieces turn on the fallacy that the votes for either side are monolithic, that on a chart they could be represented by a plane with a straight line dividing the two sides. The election would then be seen as the two sides trying to push the line deeper into the other side's territory.

I don't agree with that model because it reduces all of the points on the plane as very simple, deterministic units. If we use as our plane a model such as the Nolan Chart then each point represents a distinct political position, and in a population as large as a presidential election, each point will be populated by at least one voter. If you were to color each point by which side the voter in that position ultimately chooses, then conventional wisdom would have it that one side of the chart would be red, for the sake of argument, and the other side would be blue, with a straight line separating the two.

I don't like that image because it implies that it would be fairly easy to decide which of the polarities one belongs to, nor does it allow for the small yet consistent presence of third parties.

There is a fractal image (scroll down to the bottom of the page, upper left picture) that is created using a pendulum suspended over three magnets arranged in an equilateral triangle. The color of each point is determined by which magnet captures the pendulum when the pendulum starts at that point. The magnets are located inside the largest regions of their color. Note how the plane is not cut into neat thirds but instead has intricately folded seams of colors, even where another color is closer.

I've been pondering this image as a metaphor for politics for quite a while. The problem has been that it is a three part system with each part aquiring a third of the total, even if it is impossible to determine before hand all of the points that would be part of those thirds. The political arena, however, is dominated by two groups, while not completely extinguishing third parties, that can alter their total share of the electorate. Fortunately, I found the site linked above and its alteration of the trial to include variation of the strengths of the magnets. Scroll down and look at the bottom left image. Now we have two of the three magnets dominating the field while the third almost, but not entirely, disappears. Too bad it was the blue one that ended up disappearing rather than the green. It would have been easier on the eyes and made the comparison to politics more dramatic.

Pulling the analogy together: each of the magnets represents a candidate and his platform. The large blobs around each magnet are those whose choice of grape or cherry Kool-Aid was already set. Those who had to agonize over their decision, like this fellow, reside in the outlying regions. The ability of altering the strength of the magnets then represents the impact of campaigning and world events. I have a theory that a straight line drawn from the starting point to the candidate/magnet and the length in anyone one color is relative to the time spent by the pendulum in that region/voter in a camp before moving on to the next region/camp, but I have yet to see any information on that. The variation of attractive force can perturb the distribution of points on the plane and cause an unequal division of the points/voters.

This explains how there can be atheistic Pro-choicers for Bush and individualistic anti-regulators for Kerry. Fortunately, we only had chaos in who voted for whom, not in what the result would be.

A Call to Sanity

The Backseat Philosopher has an excellent post-mortem and prescription to his fellow Democrats regarding this past election. I found myself nodding to most of his points. This one really rang a bell:

Many Democrats think that our patience and understanding are our weakness. "We don't know how to fight like the Republicans," we all told ourselves after Florida 2000. "We have to be more like them: tougher, meaner." "We have to energize our base more."

Actually, no. Our error is that we Democrats are far less understanding than we think we are. Our version of understanding the other side is to look at them from a psychological point of view while being completely unwilling to take their arguments seriously.

I have no emotional investment in George Bush. If anything, the guy turns me off a little bit for his unwillingness to concede imperfection. Only a little bit, however, not nearly enough to build up into an automatic grimace of distate if his name should come up. That is why I was not persuaded by any of the "arguments" put forward by John Kerry and his Democratic backers. The bulk of their arguments was that anything would be better than Bush, and I didn't agree with that, so what did they have to follow up? Nothing.

Everything that Bush did was held up as being wrong in anyway anyone might find it to be wrong, and very little else was said. This failed in two ways. First, it failed to establish that Kerry's way, whatever it would be, would be better. Second, the everything-and-the-kitchen-sink approach told me nothing about what Kerry valued. The everything is wrong approach creates the appearance that Kerry was everything Bush was not. It would have worked if there was only one option for being not-Bush, but there are near infinite variations of not-something. Kerry failed to define his values, and thus himself, as anything positive. He counted on enough voters filling in the blanks for him, or not caring what he was so long as it was not-Bush, to carry him into the White House. And it almost worked.

An aside to Bush and the Republican Party: you don't have much to hang your hat on in this election either. Bush is the incumbent, and yet he had practically nothing positive to say about his four years thus far. You have really hurt yourselves by only being conservative in ways that limit freedom and choice. Stop spending our money like sailors on shore leave. On second thought, I take that back, I'm familiar at least one sailor, and I wouldn't want to impugn his thrift. Anyway, the Republican President and the Republican Congress have done very little to inspire my faith. The only reason I didn't vote for the other guy was that he failed to show me that he would be better.

I voted Libertarian, for Badnarik. When the world is crazy, vote for the wacko closest to your opinion.

Best Wishes to Mrs. Edwards

CNN is reporting that John Edward's wife has been diagnosed with breast cancer. If anything should be bridge the partisan gap, it should be news like this.

Good News Already

Hoping and praying that the rumors of John Ashcroft potential resignation are true. I have heard a lot of talk about how Dick Cheney is the deal breaker when it comes to supporting the Bush Administration, but for me, Ashcroft has always been the lurking menace. Somehow I always had the feeling that he was too enamored with the power of federal law enforcement. At the very least I hold him responsible for misuses of the Patriot Act.

Be ready for a lot of "election conservative" bloggers to be showing their more libertarian colors with this story as well.

The Federalist Solution

I like federalism, the idea that one can experience different modes of living without having to go through the hassle of re-naturalizing. It gets tricky trying to explain the appeal to others, however. How do you explain the idea that a person, while living in America, can have one set of rights in one state, while being denied many of the same rights in others? Andrew Sullivan addresses the issue of a looming culture war given Bush's re-election based heavily on support from the staunchly religious. Proposals to ban same sex marriage have passed in every state that considered the issue. How do we handle the divide?

Andrew's answer is almost exactly my own, federalism. Let each state and the majority in those states decide how they shall live. With fifty different options, there is bound to be somewhere that will meet your needs. Immediate question: "What about those in the minority who will have their lives disrupted?" I have yet to come up with a diplomatic answer for that. The core of the answer is that each individual or family will have to decide if the right they are being denied to them in one state is worth the disruption of going to another state. The Declaration of Independence says that we have the right to pursue happiness. Nowhere does it say that the pursuit would keep you where you were. This idea cuts both ways, if California's permissiveness is too much for you, you can take your family to where the neighbors will be more to your liking. Head on down South, I'm sure that there will be a gay couple down there looking to sell.

America can handle divisions. As Andrew said:

Forcing California and Mississippi into one model is a recipe for disaster.

Amen, brother.

Time For a Breather

The election is over, finally. Kerry has conceded, and Bush has made his victory speech.

Everyone around me is pretty bummed right now. California is the classic democrat bubble. One of my friends is convinced that Kerry should be fighting for the Ohio provisional ballots, hoping against hope that the apocalypse of a second Bush term does not come to be.

I have never had much passion for either candidate. Where I put my passion was the debate. I fought for objectivity, that the world is as the world is, regardless of how I felt about it. Too often I have seen previously respected thinkers make their decisions and then perform mental gymnastics to contort new data to fit their position. What I wanted was that if two back flips and one and a half twists was appropriate for their analysis, then it was good for the other guy's. Logic is objective, or it had damned well better be. Both sides lost track of what things were in their rush to set what those things mean.

I, for one, am very glad that this election is over, and perhaps I was a little quick about announcing the death of the concession call. What will please me all the more will be the blogosphere reverting back to a more diverse form where everyone pursues their individual causes as opposed to the constraining dichotomy of Kerry v. Bush.

I know I'm already feeling a load taken off.

I'm Sure They Would Have Preferred Florida

Really, would you choose to be in Florida or Ohio for the whole month of November? I'm sure that's what a whole mess of lawyers (I'm pretty sure that's the proper group name for lawyers) are thinking right now. So the issue is going to be how many provisional ballots are to be counted. I hope that the reason for why a person was casting provisional was listed, because I would prefer to keep it limited to those who were off the rolls due to honest error. But since lawyers are involved, the definition of "honest" will certainly get misplaced. If it is because the person just showed up at the wrong polling place, well too bad, so sad. In California, the sample ballots sent out weeks before the election tell you where to go, even if they are of limited usefulness. I looked on it as a small test of perseverence.

It does seem, however, that one of my earlier predictions has borne out. Too bad.

This Seems a Little Too Familiar

Watching the first reports from after the close of the polls on the east, and I am recognizing a certain pattern. The sheer repetition of very little information reminds me of the news reports five minutes after an earthquake. There is no preparation for an earthquake coming, so no story is written yet. So far, all we have is how CNN is not going to make the same mistakes they made in 2000.

Wake me when it's over.

Polling Issues

God love the people who open up their homes, or at least their garages, to act as polling places. It must be a serious inconvenience, and I for one am grateful.

It does get a little problematic, however, when said garage is at the end of a culdesac in a housing tract. Even Map Quest didn't do a good job of providing directions. If anyone out there reading this is voting on Arrowhead Court, you need to look for Falcon St. (Ave. Ct. whatever) as that curves around to become Arrowhead. Your map may not include that bit of info.

Another Look at the Bin Ladin Tape

Has anyone else noticed that it seems like Osama was speaking from a studio? A podium, clean clothes (those whites really sparkled), a fabric backdrop. There was nothing rustic about that setting. The backdrop was clean, no wrinkles from having been folded up in a sack or backpack and carried for miles over rough terrain. Unlike previous videos, we don't see any stone, or clothes that look traveled in. My read is that he has new shelter somewhere civilized.

I would like to here some new ideas on how to hunt this guy down. It is a screaming travesty that we haven't found him yet, but just putting more boots on the ground in Tora Bora ain't gonna cut it. Let's here it, CIA, what have you got going? Isn't information, like someone's whereabouts, your line of work?

My Last Words on the Election, Hopefully

Virginia Postrel offers up her decision making on whom to vote for for president in "How Can You Vote for a Guy Like That?". She has a good point that kind of sums up why I am so bemused by the vitriol this election is creating. Virginia, like myself, never invested the emotion, positive or negative, into Bush that many other people have. Her closing paragraph:

Voting is an expressive activity, but it need not be emotional. Andrew Sullivan's invocation of "The deep emotional bond so many of us formed with the president back then" does not apply to me. Bush leaves me cold and always has. I never wanted to hang out with him, so I don't take our policy differences personally. I never idolized his leadership, so I don't feel he's failed me. He gets my vote in part because I don't identify with him. He's just a hired hand, and he's better than the alternative.

Over this past year, I have often jumped into a political fray on the side of Bush. Not that I am particularly enamored with the guy or his positions. Largely it is because of the lack of any philosophical consistency on the part of the opposition. The tactic seems to be to throw everything that anyone can find objectionable about Bush at him and hope it stains him in the eyes of at least a few people. The criticisms tell me nothing about what the opposition, namely Kerry and the DNC, finds truly objectionable.

As someone who knows that his candidate, Libertarian Michael Badnarik, is going to lose, I have been allowed a certain distance. And because I am not voting for Bush, I think that I make it clear that I am not pro-Bush in my defenses of him. I am, instead, anti-anti-Bush. My arguments are for searching for consistency in what a candidate and a voter wants this election. I want that to be a positive (My guy is good because...) rather than a negative (Anybody but...).

Neither side is evil.

Everything Has a Purpose

Everyone is familiar with pain. Or at least almost everyone. The article is about a young girl with a rare genetic disease that prevented the nerve cells that detect pain and temperature extremes from developing. I know pain having broken my arm a couple of times. There was nothing I wouldn't have done to stop the pain. Even the thought of trying to flex that arm caused a new stab. But that was the point. Any further movement would have set the healing process back to zero. So remember, pain is nature's way of saying, "Hey! Knock that off!"

That's Just Freaking Cruel

Doc in the Box links to a photo puzzle from Germany. For those who speak German, the instructions are to find three differences.

Happy Halloween.

The Local Take on the Osama Tape

My boss/best friend, who believes that Bush is 180 degrees wrong in how the country is going, lost a brother-in-law in the World Trade Center. His thoughts on the reappearance of Osama Bin Ladin is, "Why the fuck is this guy still alive?" The boss is very much against the war in Iraq and sees it as a tremedous distraction in the war on OBL.

My thought is that Iraq was necessary in that it attacked the spectre of WMD armed terrorists from the other angle. If OBL would have been a cunsumer of WMD, then it looked to all the world that Saddam would have been the supplier. OBL: the Will, Saddam: the Way. If you can look at the terrain of Tora Bora, one chain of mountains endlessly after another, one should be able to see that we could have sent in the entire Army, Marine Corp, Navy, and had the Air Force doing air recon, and we would still be looking for him while fighting every militia in the area.

Then again, and the boss and I are in complete agreement on this one, is that if you took down the back dropp behind Bin Ladin, you would have seen the swimming pool and back yard of the Pakistani Presidential Palace.

Halloween on Today

So the cast of the Today Show came out in their Halloween costumes this morning. Here's the video (Internet Explorer required). Check out Katie Couric (second after Anne Currie's Tina Turner). Obviously she was going for Donald Trump. Personally, I think she ended up a lot closer to Ted Koppel.

A Funny Thing, Language

George Carlin has always been one of my favorite comedians. Odd that it took a CNN article to figure out why. I am an engineer by training, but the misuse of words is a pet peeve of mine. Perhaps because as an engineer I need things to do their jobs, and arbitrarily assigning meanings to words breaks that. I think it bothers George too:

"Middle-aged" has become "pre-elderly," he writes, suggesting that perhaps "elderly" should become "pre-dead."

Euphemism is Geroge's main target. My biggest gripe is word inflation, using words to describe situations that don't quite make the cut. Things like describing Guantanamo Bay as an "atrocity". The way that "fascist" gets thrown around is particularly irksome.

One last thing: Wal-Mart, please grow a spine.

For Truth, Turn to Comedy

I make it a point not to listen to pundits on TV. Some of them slam Bush for saying what he says regardless of what really happens. Of course, they are the ones who invented the art. In troubled times, it is good to find that I am not a lone voice in the world. Sadly, however, my brother in arms in this matter is Triumph the Insult Comedy Dog. In a world where it takes Jon Stewart to speak the truth to Crossfire, I don't suppose that I could really ask for better.

Let Me Introduce You to Reality

Sometimes you read something and think, "Dear Lord, please let him be kidding." Now, I am a single guy, and I can tell you why this guy is a bachelor as well. It is just too hard to carry on a long distance relationship from different realities. Could it be that her liking you was not the reason she continued to beat you past unconsciousness? Who knows, maybe she'll answer the ad and want to recreate your first date.

link via Radley Balko

An Experiment in HTML

A Small Victory

This is NOT Covered by the 1st Amendment

You can put a candidate's sticker on your bumper, but you should not try to put a candidate on your bumper. This story just adds to my certainty that this election cycle is going to bring out hordes of lone wackos. It just warms the cockles of my heart that this scholar is relying on his knowledge of the Bill of Rights. (/sarcasm)

End of a Tradition

Another in my line of pessimistic projections for this coming election cycle:

The tradition of the concessionary telephone call on election night is as dead as dodos. Anything above state representative, especially for federal office, is going to have arguments and challenges loaded and waiting for court filing the next day. Any concession call will be avoided because, well, it might actually be taken as a concession.

Thoughts While Watching CNN

1. The commercials are more entertaining.
2. Yet another reason that I'll be glad that this election is over will be that "I approve this message" as a humorous tag line for non-political messages will go the way of "Where's the Beef?"
3. It is a strange statement about baby boomers when E-Trade uses a '60's protest song to advertise its stock brokerage. Just who are they protesting again?
4. I agree with William Bennett that everyone is pretty sick and F'ing tired with this election. (obliqe use of the "F" word is the author's - ed)

On a Lovecraftian Riff

Via The Agitator:

They say that some buildings are just bad. Either it was built on desecrated ground, or else a great tragedy occurred there. Or else it was built in the heedless lust of ego. One such building is The Ryugyong Hotel. If the name were not Korean, it would surely be counted among the inane babblings of Azathoth. Those who know of it, if they could be found, for its existence is denied, say thus:

The Ryugyong Hotel looms over Pyongyang like some kind of slumbering bat. Something deep inside my brain tells me that the 75° angle of the hotel's outer walls is exactly the wrong angle; it says sinister, it says creepy, it says get away.

Off course the angles are wrong. The profane geometries of those beyond time can not be comprehended by mortal minds. Once the final angle was installed nothing could stand in the way of the planes of existence being torn away and the descent of all minds into madness.

This was no hotel. It was the ultimate WMD, and Kim Jong Il is the gate keeper.

Alright, enough weirding myself out. Here's me signing off for the night with early wishes to you all for a Happy Halloween, and a brief political message:

Cthulu for President: Why Choose the LESSER of Two Evils?

This Week in Religion

Piggy backing off Scott Burgess at The Daily Ablution, I present a few thoughts at points of religion in the news:

The Payallup School District in Washington state has banned school Halloween parties out of an effort not to be offensive to Wiccans. I bet the Werewolf Defamation League and Parents and Friends of Vampires and the Undead had their hands in this as well.

The British Royal Navy has granted a satanist sailor permission to practice his beliefs on board ship. I guess this gives new meaning to the expression: Caught between the Devil and the deep blue sea.

Evidently Jesus was black and made his appearance on a top 100 list of black icons about a dozen spots ahead of Michael Jackson. I have heard this rumor before, but I don't believe it. There is no way on earth the Michael Jackson is black.

Hey, if you can't blaspheme among friends, where can you?

The Advantage of Religion

I have just come off of Jinderella's post on a genetic basis of God-belief. I haven't read the book that she is referring to, but her post has added a new dimension to something I've already given some thought to.

I approached the discussion of religion from the evolution of the concept (meme) "Religion". I started with the rough observation that the regions where day-to-day survival was the most difficult tended to produce the religions that were the most restrictive of individual freedom and the more focused on afterlife reward/punishment. The primary survival advantage that humans have is our cooperative social structure. As the demands placed upon the tribe by the environment increase, the need for tight functioning as a group increases. Often times this would require some individuals to gain less than they might feel they deserve. To take what they want would be detrimental to the group. This is where I envision the meme "Sin" developing. The individual could be placated with the idea that small sacrifice now would be more than offset with a greater reward later, even if the reward is delayed until after death. Too much "Sin" could change the reward into punishment. Essentially this is the old argument that it is better to for go the small pleasure of sin now in favor of the bliss of heaven than to take the small pleasure now and face the eternal torment of hell.

If this process has been active long enough to register on the genetic evolution scale, then I could easily see that additional reinforcement in the genes is possible. Instinct, I believe, is an artifact of the reality producing functions of the brain.

Financing is NOT Available

I have just picked my jaw up off of the floor after seeing this in the catalog: the child-size Mercedes 500 SL from FAO Schwartz.

A few thoughts that have crossed my mind so far about this:
1. I've never paid that much for a real car.
2. Anyone who could buy this for their kid had better be ready for the little darling begging for a real one when they turn 16.
3. Do you really need four-wheel disk brakes when the top speed is 15 mph?
4. I sure hope a lot of people are employed making those things.

A Note to Red Sox Fans

All that has happened is that your team has won a championship. That is hardly a reason to be tearing your town apart. Who do you think you are, Laker fans?

So please, try not to act like you've never been there before. Oh, never mind.

My Take on the Ashley Photo

Sometimes I seem to miss th obvious point that most people take from a photograph. For instance, I didn't get all that worked up over the Elian Gonzalez photo were he had been hidden in a closet and the SWAT officer was removing him. (I can't seem to find a link to the photo in question, if anyone has a link, please drop me a line) Much was made of the picture in that it supposedly revealed the jack boot of government action trampling on the dream of freedom. Aside from that whole business being a mess from the get-go, I just didn't see that interpretation. The officer had one hand off the weapon, and the barrel was not pointed in the same direction as the officer was looking. If anything, that was as non-threatening as that officer could be, given the body armor.

I am coming off the same type of situation with respect to the photo of President Bush and Ashley. The detail that really gets to me are President Bush's eyes and expression. His eyes are focused on the camera, and his expression reads to me that "this would make a great photo" was not entirely absent from his mind. All told, I don't think that that one photo is the political slam dunk for Bush that a lot of people feel it to be.

As a whole, I tend to be leery of photographs as opposed to video. I think it stems from the fact that I don't think that I photograph well at all. Hence why I don't have one posted here. A photo is just one split instant, image without the context of time. Too much can be read into the vacancy.

Umm, Guys?

I just saw a segment on CNN that has me scratching my head. It was on phantom ads, ads that are never aired on payed timed but see the light of day because news outlets like CNN and Fox deem them to be "news". In the course of the report, they showed a number of ads that fit that profile. The tone of the report was that the news outlets are being manipulated into giving the candidates free air time. The only thing that I can say it that the airtime is yours, oh noble reporters. Control your time.

The Reality of Ferrets

So a scientist decides to set up an experiment on how a brain processes visual information. Test subjects: ferrets. Dr. Michael Weliky studied the brains of ferrets as they were subjected to three different sets of stimuli: a dark room, white noise static, and repeated viewings of The Matrix. Personally, I can't think of a better movie for testing how reality is percieved. The experiments came up with some interesting conclusions:

1. Adult brains operate at 80% functionality as an idling state even when in a dark room, recieving no visual input. It is thought that this might be the state at which conceptions of reality are formed. It might also explain why infant brains, which do not run this background functionality, find peek-a-boo so endlessly fascinating.

2. That at least this one scientist has a sense of irony for selecting a brain twisting movie about the reality of reality to test perception of reality.

Via Virginia Postrel

Do Something

A reader at Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish explains why the military mindset results in overwhelming support for Bush over Kerry. It comes down to, as a friend tells me, It is better to do something than nothing. Or as the author puts it, "It is an old military maxim that blunders can be forgiven, but a lack of boldness cannot." He goes on to say:

One thing the Marine Corps taught me is that a 70% solution acted on immediately and violently is better than a perfect solution acted on later. My experience has proven this true time and again. The sad fact is however, that a 70% solution is a 30% mistake. And those mistakes can be hard to take. In WWII for example, 700 soldiers drowned in a training accident in preparation for D-Day (that is about how many combat deaths we've experienced so far in Iraq).

Bush is making mistakes, absolutely he is. And I think that he is making a greater one by not owning up to them. When it comes down to the final tally, I think that his actions are creating more good than harm in the long run. From what I have seen of Kerry's foreign policy, it is more of the same old "anything but taking a risk of messing up" that characterized much of the past thirty years.

Unforseen Consequences

I don't really have a dog left in the fight for the World Series. Both of the local teams, the Dodgers and the Angels, got themselves eliminated in the first round. It does seem that the American League Championship Series is taking its toll on Red Sox and Yankees fans back east. If your stock trades seem to be going in a little slow this week, you know why: Your trader has been up all night for the last four nights watching baseball. This could be huge, imagine what type of consequences not getting your trade executed in a timely matter might just do to the whole market?

Fortunately, I don't have any stock, so I don't wrack myself with guilt over it.

You Too Can Live Blog, Sort Of

Andrew Sullivan delivered a link to video of Jon Stewart's smackdown of Tucker Carlson on Crossfire. I mentioned this appearance earlier, but now it is your chance to behold the beauty.

Is Post-Modernism Over Yet?

A lengthy and cerebral article by Johann Hari regarding the death of Jaques Derrida and the legacy he left behind. I have tried to understand post-modernism, namely in the form of buying Postmodernism for Beginners. Even the author of the book makes the point that post-modernism hides behind it's vocabulary:

The first thing you have to do to translate it in to Postmodernese is to make the sentence stop making sense. You do this by substituting buzzwords or phrases for ordinary words that do make sense.

Either the author is being playfully ironic or I'm making a straw man of a straw man. My biggest gripe with the book, and hence of the post-modernism the author portrays, is that it cavalierly dismisses science on the basis of science failing to satisfy the criteria established by non-scientists as necessary to "justify" itself. The author is explaining the theorems of Jean-Francois Lyotard where he describes the basis of explanations of events as dependant on meta-narratives. According to Lyotard, the meta-narative "science" was dependant upon the concepts of the French Enlightenment, characterized in the book as "Let the practical discoveries of science allow men and women to get on with the proper business of seeking happiness!", and Hegel's idea of Unity of Knowledge, that by the completion of knowledge mankind shall achieve "total being".

While those might best describe the philosophy of science at the beginnings of the enterprise, I do not believe that science needs any justification other than nature itself. So long as nature exists, mankind will use science as the method to create the best possible description of it.

Even allowing for that, Lyotard claims to demonstrate that science has failed to satisfy its philosophical underpinnings. The use of science as a means to bring misery a la the railroad schedules and gas chambers of Nazi Germany disproves the happiness bringing argument, while the opacity of quantum theory denies us the Unity of Knowledge.

There is no denying that the Nazis used technological advances to bring great death. However, the Nazi philosophy that created the actions was based on theories, namely genetic superiority, that were deliberately shielded from scientific challenge. I equally hold that the net happiness existent in the world is greater thanks to vaccines, antibiotics, and efficient means of producing food.

Second, becuase scientific learning is challenging us with concepts that are far outside of our common conceptions, it does not follow that the enterprise is therefore useless. If science is going to show us the way from "ignorance to total being", then it must be expected that there must be some transformation on the part of human kind. The book's example of the paradox of an electron jumping from one atomic orbit to another without traversing the intervening space as a death knell to the concept of Unity of Knowledge. What it does in fact does is challenge the recipient of the knowledge to reassess the idea that a material body must cross all of the space between the end points of its journey. This is very difficult, but no one said that acheiving total being would be easy.

Final note, the founders of postmodernism seem entirely too fond of revolution. The whole effort seems to me as disdainful of incremental development. If the ashtray doesn't have enough room in it, trash the whole car.

Wish I Could Have Live Blogged It

Jon Stewart of The Daily Show was on Crossfire this afternoon. Oh, man, did he clean those guy's clocks or what? Tucker Carlson was particularly bad when he seemed to not get the point that The Daily Show is supposed to be comedy, with guys like Tucker Carlson being the butt of the joke. I found it particularly hillarious when Jon made the point, in response to Tucker's questions about the softballs Stewart pitched to Sen. Kerry shortly after the DNC. Stewart then pointed out that if they are looking to a show on Comedy Central for hard hitting news, then something is seriously wrong.

Stewart also skewered the whole idea of Crossfire being a called a debate show as opposed to, in Jon's words, "theater". Anyone who watches Crossfire knows that it truly is nothing more than political hacks, among whom Stewart explicity counted the hosts of Crossfire, talking over each other with their talking points. What didn't get said, and I thought that it was right on the tip of Stewart's tounge, is that if the news agencies didn't take themselves so seriously or allowed themselves to be spun so easily, then the Daily Show would not be as popular, or even necessary.

Inspiration Can Be a Funny Thing.

I picked up the latest issue of Scientific American and found the article The Hidden Genetic Program of Complex Organisms by John S. Mattick. If a system ever deserved the label "complex" molecular biology is it. Much of the article lost me in the myriad of positive and negative feedback loops. What really struck me however was the author's opening paragraph:

Assumptions can be dangerous, especially in science. They usually start as the most plausible or comfortable interpretation of the available facts. But when their truth cannot be immediately tested and their flaws are not obvious, assumptions often graduate to articles of faith, and new observations are forced to fit them. Eventually, if the volume of troublesome information becomes unsustainable, the orthodoxy must collapse.

I would expand the context of this statement from science out to politics. It seems to fit today's mood entirely too well.

Almost Live Blogging

Certainly livelier than the previous two. I guess neither one of the fellows wants to leave any blood unspilled.

By the way, don't feel bad about not getting this as I post it. I didn't know that I was going to do this until just now.

6:20 Who knew that domestic issues could make President Bush foam at the mouth?

Also, I am so sick and tired of hearing that Bush squandered the surplus. I knew those projections were BS as soon as I first read the word in a newspaper. The assumptions were that the business cycle had been broken.

6:23 If Senator Kerry does fight as hard for people as he fights for himself, then look out world.

6:30 I can't disagree with Kerry about imposing matters of faith on others. But what about those of us who do not have his faith in the government?

6:27 Keep twisting, George, you are not going to get anywhere on a marriage rights question. Kerry goes straight to Cheney's daughter, but lets see what he actually says. Damn, I looked down and missed the waffle.

6:26 I blinked, what was the question again?

6:30 I can't disagree with Kerry about not imposing matters of faith on other people. I wonder where those who don't have his faith in the government fit into it.

6:35 Moving medications to generic status quicker? Boy, that will play with the pharma corps.

6:38 Damn this is wearying. Steven Green has the idea to do this drunk. Fill it up.

6:40 Flashback to previous point: Did Senators Kerry and Edwards go back to Washington to vote against that corporate tax bill?

6:42 Good point by Bush that government funded health care will create an incentive for small businesses to drop their offered coverage.

6:46 Ah, yes, thank you, Senator Kerry, for pointing out that Social Security is fundamentally a Ponzi Scheme. And I still can't stop laughing whenever I hear a Democrat taking credit for balancing the budget. That only happened because congressional Republicans actually acted like Republicans during the Clinton Administration.

6:50 Does anyone recall how many people were employed by the Dot.Coms? The economy in 1999 was on perhaps the greatest bubble since the day before Black Monday. The numbers for employment were just as inflated.

6:53 Does either of these guys really have a philosophy with respect to any domestic issue?

6:55 The first point of Kerry's plan is that things suck now, even worse than before 9/11. And some people say that he doesn't really have a plan. Maybe those folks have a point.

6:57 Oh, goody, minimum wage. Just the thing that gets economist's blood pressure up. The President has skewed off into education. Not good for him.

7:04 Mr. Scheiffer, please cut down on the adjectives in your questions.
Also, why is it that percentage changes are not useful gauges? And for the "X kids have lost their after school programs," line, are all of X ones who had afterschool programs before?
And isn't this supposed to be a debate on domestic policies. Shame on Mr. Scheiffer for inserting this question into the debate.

7:08 Of course Sen. Kerry said exactly the opposite of the "Global Test" critique, he often says exactly the opposite after one thing or another. I have yet to hear how impressing the need for American action on the rest of the world is not a global test.

7:11 And drug dealers would balk at the need to smuggle in their AK-47's while smuggling in their drugs. Yeah right.

7:13 So its OK to give preferences to everyone except white guys. Check.

7:16 Either I am getting punchy or Bob Scheiffer asked that question about President Bush's faith as if a religious person is a strange specimen indeed.

7:18 Sen. Kerry, is tyranny a gift from the Almighty?

7:20 Some of the unity of the world has slipped away? Nice to see the CBS cocoon hasn't blunted Bob's perspective on the world.

7:23 Last question, thank god. And Bush has wiped the spittle off the corner of his mouth.

7:24 So President Bush can't keep a promise to his own wife.

7:29 Boy did Pres. Bush start slowly on his closing. Now that he is up to speed, he is doing OK. Perhaps he needs an overhaul on the lower gears.

First after impression: To my philosophical standing, this "debate" reinforced why I can't vote for either of them. Kerry is a modern liberal and Bush is not a true conservative. Bush came closer to what I wanted to see, and I think that Bush came out a hair ahead. At the bare minimum, Kerry has failed to cover the point spread against him given his higher standard his lead in the domestic issue polls has imposed on him.

Kerry Loses 3-4% in California

Rob Reiner has endorsed John Kerry. Anyone who smokes in California can thank Reiner for yet another 10 cents per pack or, in my case, upping the tobacco tax to 40% on my cigars. Thanks to this gentleman, California can not afford to have its people quit smoking.

I offer no proof that it will swing that many voters around here. I just that he makes people smoke without recourse to lighters or tobacco.

Vote With Your Thumb

Andrew Sullivan has his take on the Stolen Honor "documentary" that Sinclair is set to broadcast shortly before the election. It all strikes me as being tremendously dismissive of the population in general. Any programmer will tell you that people do not just turn on the TV and keep it on one station for the whole night. If you don't keep people's attention, they can change the channel with a twitch of the thumb. I think that the Sinclair stations are going to take a major hit in the ratings on that night. And much like Farenheit 9/11 it will only serve to harden the lines that the viewers have going into it. So maybe it will get an extra percentage point or two of the base out to the polls that wouldn't have. I'm just tired of the idea that the electorate are a bunch of empty skulled automatons waiting for their ideology downloads.

Things That Make You Say, "Huh?"

I try to find the rationale and reasons behind things, but this one just throws me.
CNN.com - Police aid Elvis,�chase 'Blues Brothers' look-a-like - Oct 12, 2004

Pre "Debate" Analysis

I caught bits and pieces of the last presidential debate. I was correct, listening to either of those guys speak is hard enough, going from one to the other in such rapid succession is like chewing on aluminum foil.

My decision to watch or not to watch has yet to be made. Either way, here is my pre-"debate" analysis: the point spread on domestic issues, to which this next debate is dedicated, favors Bush. Kerry's poll numbers on domestic issues are all to the positive. If the debate comes across as a draw, it will be translated as a Bush victory in that Kerry failed to put him away.

Fractal Rules

Dehydration is bad. It prevents the kidneys from working, impedes circulation, etc. If you had a map labeled "Dehydration", you would find almost all of it colored "Bad". Unless, of course, the dehydration is preventing something worse from happening, as seems to be the case with respect to the case of the girl trapped in her car for eight days.

Obviously, this is the exception. But I believe that what we call exceptions are the fractal boundaries between one set and another. In this case, the boundary between dehydration being bad and not bad. Where this particular case ended up on our map would be sensitively dependant on a whole host of details such as size and location of the clot, ambient temperature, possibly her blood alcohol level at the time of the crash, and other details that a person with a decent medical education could come up with.

The Most Consistent Read Yet

One of the big points of my philosophy is that there are relatively few causes for the way a person acts. It is the necessity for many decisions that create the illusion of complexity. Another aspect of this philosophy is that any given root principle will ultimately reveal itself because the effects of the principle can only be explained by that one principle and no other.

That is why I like this article by Jonah Goldberg at the National Review Online. It very succinctly puts the greatest amount of historical facts into a clean framework while showing the impossibility of many others.

There is no need for complex causes, simple causes create complicated enough effects as it is.

Real Nuisances

A big deal has come up from a New York Times Magazine interview with John Kerry in which he said something on the order of that the United States should come back to a state by the end of the war where terrorism is a nuisance on the order of prostitution or gambling or drugs. Even President Bush has stated in the past that the War on Terror shall not be "won" in the ways that wars have traditionally won. Both quotations are being spun out of their contexts in new ads.

I have slightly more concern over the real meaning of Kerry's remarks than Bush's in that it implies that Kerry believes that there is a tolerable level of terrorism. While I generally don't like slippery slope arguments, it is far easier to hold a line at an absolute than to maitain a shiftable standard such as "tolerable". Additionally, in the continuation of Bush's interview for the Today Show, he said that the War on Terror will have to be done so that supporting terrorism and terrorists will have intolerable costs for the supporters. An analogy of draining a swamp is useful, except that by trying to instill institutions of democracy and freedom in the Middle East, the current administration is also trying to create new high ground.

As a further thought, comparing terrrorism as an evil that can be controlled such as prostitution and gambling is particularly bone-headed to this voter. There are no real crimes (meaning damage to persons or property without the consent of both parties) being committed in prostitution, gambling, or drugs. The only violence that occurs are from the business ends which are dominated by those willing to break the law to advance their business. Since those niches are occupied by those willing to break the law to be in business in the first place, you can see how much respect they would have for other laws. It would be far better to remove the resources spent trying to bar the public from being exposed to those products and reallocate them to attacking those whose product is death of innocents.

Somehow I Doubt it was Worth It.

A plan to impress the significant other with staged heroics has gotten one high school teacher a misdemeanor citation and probably a lost job.

A couple of quick observations about this case:
1. They did not use enough duct tape.
2. There must have been some desire satified on the part of the teacher in hitting one of his students with a board. I have known situations where the feeling was mutual.

A Very Lazy Debate Roundup

Why do a round up when the Blogfather, aka Instapundit, aka Prof. Glenn Reynolds has done it for you? I'll just use his list to make a point of my own: how the hell can anyone say that one person or another has won a debate like this when it seems like no two people were watching the same "debate"?

Second point: Kerry has finally found a meme against Bush that is gaining some traction. The idea that Bush is out of touch with reality is much the same one that helped doom his father (please recall the supermarket scanner). It attacks directly Bush's perceived strength over Kerry by turning it into a weakness, Bush is too resolute while Kerry can reassess and change. I have not seen a decent counter-meme for this one yet.

Paging Dr. Beam

I am considering watching the "debate" tonight, but I am facing a massive ambivalence. I would like to be on the cutting edge of blogosheric discourse.

The problem is that I can't stand the sound of either Bush's or Kerry's voices. I don't think that Jim Beam makes enough product for me to willingly inflict that on myself. I might move onto vodka straight out of the freezer, but at that point its easier to just turn off the TV and call it a party.

Blogging With My Head in the Myst

Time to start scratching some pennies together, Myst IV: Revelation has just been released. The interactivity of the settings has been described as extremely high, and a new hint feature is present to help keep the frustration to enjoyable levels. Time to do some tracking.

The Design of Natural Selection

I came across this dicussion between Robert Wright, author of Non-Zero, and Daniel Dennett, chief proponent of the view that evolution is fundamentally purposeless, via Andrew Sullivan. I found it very edifying to read and watch (a portion of the filmed interview is available through the article) an exchange on this topic. Of late it has been gratifying to see any discussion of a contentious issue without one side trying to shout down the other. It would seem that the current political environment selects toward obnoxious boors at this point.

Back to my main point, I find it interesting of how the development of the entire biosphere is likened to the development of a complex organism from it's initial germ cell. One of the key points of Chaos Theory is the idea of similarity across scale. If one were to look at a mountain chain from a distance of twenty miles it would have a similarly rough outline to a single mountain peak which in turn would be similar to a single outcropping upon that one mountain. The images remain highly similar to one another despite the distance (space) at which one views the images. Their is a similar pattern if one were to look at a graph of stock prices over a year, month, week, or day. In this case, it is similarity across the scale of time.

What Wright proposes, and Dennett reluctantly agrees to, is that there are clear signs that there are clear parallels between the gestation of a complex organism and the development of the biosphere. That one is a lower level component of the other is a strong indicator that there is a similarity across scale in both space and time. It follows that if there is a design behind the gestation, then there might also be a design behind the development of the biosphere.

As it was used in the article, I use the word "design" to indicate that there is a strong direction in the expression of species and the biosphere as a whole, not that there is a divinity shaping His will upon the world. The analogy runs more on the line that species, in finding their niches within the environment, function within the biosphere much as specialized cells function within each organism. Humanity is evidently becoming the nervous system of the biosphere. I can imagine that some in the environmental movement would seize upon this analogy to push their agenda. For my point of view, I no more want to see humanity actively trying to manage the environment than I would want a homo erectus to perform an appendectomy on me. We just aren't at the level of awareness or understanding yet to accomplish something so bold.

Update: I meant to bring this up during the main body of the post, but Andrew Sullivan really overstated the matter in his original post. The way he phrased it made it seem that Daniel Dennett had recanted his atheism. Far from true, as the concession that Dennett had allowed was in no way was on the existence of God. The concession was that there might be an ultimate design to Natural Selection. The idea that intelligence is behind natural selection was never even considered.

Succinctly Put

Via Little Green Footballs

Bill Whittle has penned a very moving piece on how to separate the two political camps in the country today. He also makes very clear as to which side he comes in on. In my mind, his key point is:

And all of this rage and fury and spitting and tearing up of signs, all of these insults and spinmeisters and forgeries and all the rest, seem to come down to the fact that about half the country thinks you deter this sort of thing by being nice, while the other half thinks you deter this by being mean.

It’s really just that simple.

For my two cents worth: we can guess which method the enemy respects because its the one he is using.

Moratorium Broken

Alright, I watched the debate last night. I did it the hard way by not getting a fifth of Jim Beam and doing a shot each time the word "Halliburton" was spoken. Not that it made much difference, I was feeling pretty loopy trying to follow the logic of the answers. One thing that helped was writing down the questions so that I wouldn't lose track of the point despite the meandering of the answers. That technique also let me judge how hard the candidates were trying to steer their answers away from the thrust of the question onto their own talking points.

My judgment of the performances depends largely on how obviously each candidate did so. Cheney was set on expanding any question regarding Iraq into the larger War on Terror. While bringing up the context is allowable in my opinion, he used too much context in order to hide from problematic specifics.

Edwards's evasions were more glaring in my opinion. When asked if Chirac's and Schroeder's declarations that France and Germany will never send troops to Iraq, President Kerry or no, made Senator Kerry's coalition demands naive, Edwards failed to even mention those two countries in his answer.

Cheney scored all of the memorable lines of the evening, ranging from "This is the first time I've met you," to Kerry "does not display any the qualities of someone with convictions." That last was reinforced when Cheney truly flustered Edwards with Edwards's own history of establishing a tax-loophole corporation.

My call, Cheney's performance is going to leave a longer lasting impression than Edwards's, and the points he made are going to be sticking around as memes longer as well.

This One's a Keeper

Found another one for the storgate locker. This analysis and the article it references should be kept and examined frequently:
PressThink: Political Jihad and the American Blog: Chris Satullo Raises the Stakes

Embrace Gridlock

I'm all for small government. The government that governs best, yadda yadda. I have even flirted with the idea Andrew Sullivan puts forth about embracing gridlock. I have seriously considered voting for Senator Kerry for just this reason. Having a Democrat in the White House would force Republicans in Congress to start acting like Republicans again.

Too bad this decision is coming at a time when I want the government to be doing something, ie killing terrorists. At any other time, John "Debating Society of One" Kerry would be my ideal choice.

Beware the Power

Thanks to Michele at A Small Victory for helping the idea break through to daylight. In the wake of Danron (I still think that anythinggate is officially cliche) some bloggers are starting to show way more pride than is warranted. Michele, like myself, is concerned with the attitude of some bloggers on her side of the political aisle believing that they are just as capable as MSM at journalism and that they are somehow transcending blogging.

I still believe that the blogosphere will not replace Old Media because there is no way, currently, to aggregate the resources necessary to have full time data collectors, read reporters. Our position is better suited to replacing the Editorial boards. Give us the information, and the blogosphere/meme petri dish will figure out what it means.

What I am concerned about is that elements of the blogosphere will ultimately fall into the same trap that Old Media has: the power to create change with which it found itself invested causing its corruption. For the old media, this was Watergate. No doubt many in the media at the time (a few hold out McGovern supporters no doubt) thought that America was better off without Nixon, scandal or no. Suddenly, journalism became a way to create change, leading to new generation of activist journalists with the unfortunate results that we see today.

The blogosphere, being internet based, has had and still fights to remove the stigma of unaccountability. We are still tarred with a long history of e-mail and other web based rumors. The new connectivity has created strong feed-back loops that select for accuracy, and several bloggers have used that to good advantage in the Danron fiasco. To think that that means we are identical in effect to journalists is mistaken. Like Michele, I am not interested in dedicating myself to writing only about news. I'm especially not interested in wearing out shoe leather in chasing down leads.

The claim that bloggers are like unto journalists smacks of the same hubris that has corrupted the main stream media. So, as a member of the blogger peerage, I would like to say to those bloggers making that claim: Get off your high horse, you'll get a nosebleed.

(Shape of Days link via Instapundit)

X-Prize Accomplished

Pilot Brian Binnie and Scaled Composites have just captured the Ansari X-Prize with a trip of 368,00 feet and back in Mojave this morning. Obviously this trip was in the hardest direction, namely up, and add in that Brian Binney may now live down a rough landing from last year by having executed a near perfect landing.

Also, I have to say that I was very impressed with the tracking system used by CNN developed at a small school outside of Boston.

Clearly I didn't make it out to Mojave this morning. I decided to stay home and watch through the telephoto lenses provided by CNN. That and I think that $20 for parking this time around was a little steep.

Why Iraq is Different.

Libertarian purists and true conservatives would agree that an idea such as using Iraq as an examplar of freedom and democracy in the Middle East is too grand for a mortal government to achieve. Normally I would agree that any type of social or economic engineering is doomed to failure by nature of humanity's inherently limited understanding.

Here's the hedge: there is a type of system that can theoretically be delivered onto a populace with reasonable expectation that it will work due to the fact that it has worked in the past. That is the free market system. It is the imposing of restrictions that result in unforseen consequences and calls for new measures to fix the new problems, new measure that inevitably come with unforseen consequences of their own. By releasing strictures, the rules become simple enough that people can come to learn them and forcast far enough ahead to make reasonably accurate predictions of the future. Brian Micklethwait of Samizdata has a very good article, How Hockey Sticks Explain the Relative Attractions of Statism and Free Markets, that shows how the true costs and benefits of economic systems are typically disguised by transient changes in the opposite direction.

I have written before about how what results of a given politician's economic policies will not be realized typically until well after that politician's term in office has ended. I am coming to believe that the "blade" of the graph coincides nicely with American politic's four-year cycle. From where I sit, that's just another reason for government to get the hell out of economics.

When it comes to Iraq, the US acted in what it believed was its own best interests, both in removing Hussein and attempting to create the examplar. I do believe that things will get worse for the Iraqis in the short term, but the long term holds promise beyond the imaginings of Iraq if Saddam was still in power.

Sadly, I do think that things will get worse for Iraq before they get better. If the course is stayed, however, the people of Iraq will learn how to take care of themselves uder the free market, and their lives will ultimately be unimaginably better than if the Hussein regime had continued.

Political Inversion

This one is my analysis of Andrew Sullivan's analysis of a David Brooks column in the New York Times (registration required). Brooks separates the candidates according to their apparent foci: Kerry on process and Bush on ideal:

The atmosphere of Kerry's mind is rationalistic. He thinks about how to get things done. He talks like a manager or an engineer.

The atmosphere of Bush's mind is more creedal or ethical. He talks about moral challenges. He talks about the sort of personal and national character we need in order to triumph over our enemies. His mind is less coldly secular than Kerry's, but also more abstracted from day-to-day reality.

Andrew Sullivan largely agrees with the assesment and follows it up with the aforementioned political inversion:

But what strikes me in Brooks' defense of Bush is how it's traditionally a liberal defense of a liberal president. It's liberalism that has historically enunciated grand, abstract themes and conservatism that has always emphasized the difficulty of translating abstraction into reality, of finding the proper means to achieve certain ends, of the limits of our intellect when faced with the world of practical life.

So who was the brain surgeon who came up with this triangulation nonsense? I don't recall, but the way my head aches, I sure could use one.

Bravely Delving the Frontiers of Science!

In science, it is often important not to have too big of an impression of yourself. If you are too big, you might just miss out on some interesting discoveries. Hence, the The Ig Nobel Prizes handed out for the lighter side of scientific discovery. The prizes this year included awards in Engineering (The Comb Over), Public Health (Investigating the Five Second rule for dropped food), Medicine (the discovery of a positive correlation between country music air time and suicide among whites), and Invention (Karaoke).

Just the thought of Nobel Laureates belting out "Can't Take My Eyes off of You" should show that these guys do have senses of humor.

Know the Rules

James Lileks has penned his thoughts on the debates and the philosophy that John Kerry seems to live by. I agree, the vision is very striking, but there is a problem.

Here’s the thing. I’d really like to live in John Kerry’s world. It seems like such a rational, sensible place, where handshakes and signatures have the power to change the face of the planet. If only the terrorists lived there as well.

There are two types of thinking that one needs to use in the course of daily life: strategic and tactical. Strategic is what you want, tactical is how you get it. In the daily life of people in the industrialized world, we want to make our lives as pleasant as possible while still remaining civilized, because being civilized and moral is a pre-requisite for most people to be able to live with themselves.

This past weekend I was watching the new DVD release of the original Star Wars trilogy with some friends. (This is not as big of a digression as it seems, bear with me, please) The scene were Luke Skywalker leaves his training on Dagobah to rescue his friends came on. Yoda and the ghost of Obi Wan try to convince Luke that he must harden himself to the plight of his friends and continue the training. Luke, knowing full well it was a trap, went anyway. I, putting words into Luke's mouth, said, "There is no way I could live with myself, Jedi or not, if I let them die." My friend Drew said, "Wouldn't self-hatred lead as quickly to the Dark Side?"

My point being, we in the West value our honor as compassionate enough so that it tempers our actions, that we would count ourselves held by a handshake and a signature. That we would respect the feelings of others enough not to destroy something they value even if the enemy uses it for war (snipers in mosques, etc.).

The problem is that we are facing a foe that embraces cruelty as noble. They capture and behead unarmed workers, they bomb children, and they take war to those who do not fight them. Their goals, whatever they may be, are judged so lofty that they forgive any slight to any other value, be it compassion or mercy.

How far can a person who sins against those ideals be trusted to uphold the honor of a handshake or a signature? Let us ensure that we don't lose sight as they have.