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*Way too Politi to handle the facts, Politi_fact_...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 09:55:05 PST

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Way too Politi to handle the facts, Politi_fact_

Politifact, you're fired

Video on msnbc.com: Rachel Maddow reviews yet another instance of Politifact not living up to its name; this time by declaring two factual statements made by President Obama only "mostly true."

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*"Back in 1994, while plotting his takeover...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 09:51:08 PST

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*"Back in 1994, while plotting his takeover of the House, Gingrich circulated a memo on how to use words as a weapon. It was called "Language: A Key Mechanism of Control." Republicans were advised to use certain words in describing opponents — sick, pathetic, lie, decay, failure, destroy. That was the year, of course, when Gingrich showed there was no floor to his descent into a dignity-free zone, equating Democratic Party values with the drowning of two young children by their mother, Susan Smith, in South Carolina.

Today, if you listen carefully to any Gingrich takedown, you'll usually hear words from the control memo.
He even used them, as former Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams wrote in National Review Online this week, in going after President Reagan, calling him "pathetically incompetent," as Abrams reported. And he compared Reagan's meeting with the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to "the most dangerous summit for the West since Adolf Hitler met with Neville Chamberlain in 1938 in Munich.""*

Deconstructing a Demagogue

Over four decades, Newt Gingrich has perfected the politics of personal destruction.

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Banks Taketh, but Don’t Giveth - NYTimes.com

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 09:49:36 PST

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/28/opinion/banks-taketh-but-dont-giveth.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=thab1

Nearly everyone I know has had a bank make errors in the bank's favor, but I don't know anyone whose bank made an error in their favor without somehow punishing them for the bank's mistake. What happened to the Ephrons is starting to look more like willful fraud than a mistake.

Say, for instance, they record a deposit as larger than it actually is. They are guaranteed to withdraw the amount just after you've paid a major bill while ignoring the deposit you just made that would have covered the cost.

Then, they assess their fees.

In the nineties, I had a bank that told me they'd never charge a fee for a bill paid electronically. In fact, they charged me $10.00 every time the monthly bill was paid. Unfortunately, I wound up in the emergency room a week after the account was opened, followed by a two week stay This was followed by a flare up of a chronic condition. I wasn't worried, I had enough in the account to cover six months, or so I thought.

Then I got the notice that my internet access account would be closed for non-payment. The phone company gave me 10 days notice. My electronic payments were going out days late. So, late fees were charged on top of the regular bills. Instead of no fees that ten dollars was assessed on each bill and charged again when the companies sent the bills, now overdue, a second time for payment. Oh, and they would finally pay the original bill but not the late charges which added up in just three months to more than I had left in the bank.

At that point the bank added a $60 fee and froze my account. It took a month to get the bank to reverse the charges for the 'no fee' service. I paid the phone company by money order. (Remember they gave a ten day notice,)

The bank still wanted me to pay $60 to unfreeze my account. I told them what the temperature range in hell would be on the day that ever happened.

I also told them I'd sue not just the bank, but the bank manager if their mistake was placed on my credit report by that bank.

The net result is I still have good credit, and a new and better bank.

The Ephron's bank makes mine look like child's play.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/28/opinion/banks-taketh-but-dont-giveth.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=thab1

Will Somebody Please Get the Story?

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 04:38:15 PST

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Foreclosures, as numbers are either up, down or unchanged. Bankruptcies too, are changed for better, worse, for reorganization or not at all. More people are employed or fewer, and it all gets reported as if it was a race and the only thing important was what horse was in which position.

The numbers, as reported in the papers and on TV are just the crudest description of what's going on and, as reported, are mostly useless for figuring out what the problem is and how to fix it. Unemployment may be down, but are hours and wages adequate? Are banks selling homes for a fraction of the mortgage rather than adjust payment, interest rate and length with families? Are new businesses the ones going bankrupt, or is it established community institutions?

People are foreclosed. People and their businesses go bankrupt. People are employed and unemployed. People and their stories are behind those numbers. People also have a big political decision to make that's driven by the reality behind the numbers.

Unfortunately, obvious horse crap from politicians is treated as if it were fact because they say so. More subtle distortions are ignored in favor of who is ahead in a poll and whatever outrageous, often racist position they're promoting today in the race to the bottom.

People want to know if anything is working and how long it will take. what jobs will come back and what's gone forever. They want to know why. They need honest evaluations of how. They need to know who is actually working on the problem and who is just running their mouth.

If all you present when covering the economy is whether this or that set of numbers is up or down, of course no one is calling you. Unlike political campaigns, no one is paid to feed the media when it should be out finding the facts. There is no ready told story, nor anyone to do work. Real life has no PR department. Just some really important stories that people really want to hear.

What Are They So Afraid Of?

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 01:09:06 PST

Anyone and everyone who differs from them, apparently in any degree. And that's just for starters.

What's worse is the lengths they'll go to justify their fears. Their willingness to craft non existent incidents, to weave tales from fantasy aren't the end. They're the beginning.

We need to tell them that the Bill of Rights is not a sign of America's weakness. Due process extended to our enemies is evidence of our strength. Special tribunals and secret prisons are evidence of fear and weakness.

Even if Congress is weak and fearful, we, the people, are not afraid. And we,the people, are not weak.

Terrorists have failed, repeatedly, to sabotage the workings of government. Elected representatives, have not only succeeded, but are proud of doing the terrorists' work.

The confirmation of judges and executive appointments has been virtually halted. Congress does almost none of the nations business, tries to extort benefits for those who have no need as preconditions for the little business it does do.

The facts aren't on their side but they've become expert in drowning facts at birth and are hard at work developing systems and networks to abort truths while still in the womb. They've learned that lies are easier to swallow when mixed with a little fear, a bit of greed, a lot of volume and unending repetition.

High-tech Surveillance in the Digital Age - NYTimes.com

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 00:10:59 PST

High-tech Surveillance in the Digital Age - NYTimes.com: "It’s always seemed to me that a “reasonable expectation of privacy” is little more than an expectation that at least five justices are prepared to recognize as reasonable with respect to their own privacy."
Which explains far too many high court decisions. The justices have become more and more isolated from the average citizens experiences, so more and more decisions make no sense,

The decision about GPS surveillance probably won't be one of those. The justices drive the roads, too.

'via Blog this'

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/16/reasonable-expectations/?ref=opinion&nl=opinion&emc=tya1

When I was 18 I bought a used Bolex 16mm ...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 01:21:13 PDT

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When I was 18 I bought a used Bolex 16mm camera (no sound) from Calumet Camera in Chicago, got permission to audit a documentary film course at Northwestern University and waited for the Democratic Convention to arrive. My uncle Owen was a delegate from the Mississippi Freedom Democratic party and there was going to be a floor fight over which delegates from Mississippi got seated.

I never imagined that professional film motion picture cameras would go out of production. Of course, I never imagined the police rioting either, or the national guard preventing people from the South and West sides getting anywhere near the convention.

I resented the hell out of that at the time, but they probably deserve all the credit for the fact that I got through that week with an unfractured skull.

After 123 Years, Motion Picture Film Cameras Go Out of Production

Film is beautiful. It's going to be around for years to come. Plenty of feature films and TV shows are still being shot on film, and used film cameras will remain a viable rental market for a long tim...

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I thought the motto was "Don't be evil." ...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 01:16:21 PDT

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I thought the motto was "Don't be evil." Apparently, individual journalists need not apply.

Adventures in self-publishing: Rejected from Google News!

Google, the search company that started as two guys at Stanford, openly discriminates against entrepreneurs. At least for its Google News product.Not only i

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*"A study of daily news coverage from more...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 01:14:08 PDT

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"A study of daily news coverage from more than 11,500 media outlets doesn't support claims that the media favors President Barack Obama. Reports reflecting negatively on Obama have outweighed positive ones 4 to 1; negative coverage of Obama dominated even during the week that Osama bin Laden was killed. Politico's Keach Hagey notes that "the top four most favorably covered candidates … were all tea party favorites" — Texas Gov. Rick Perry, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann and businessman Herman Cain."

The same moneyed interests that find Obama threatening, own the media and although it's hard to determine what's covered, they have a powerful say in the emphasis and interpretation of that coverage.

Liberal media is somewhere between illusion and delusion. The middle class doesn't own media outlets. The working class absolutely doesn't.

Pew: Obama gets less favorable media coverage than GOP candidates | Poynter.

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A painting isn't a TV that doesn't work. ...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 01:06:25 PDT

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A painting isn't a TV that doesn't work. A magazine isn't a broken iPad. Different media work differently. New tends to be good. New-ism, not so good. Think different. Think deeply. Above all, think it through.

Reality check: Viral iPad video has cute baby, faulty premise | Poynter.

Standing for journalism, strengthening democracy | Journalism training, media news & how to's

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If you're going in the wrong direction, turn...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 01:05:44 PDT

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If you're going in the wrong direction, turn around. That's one word in Latin, "Repent!" Before you can do that, you have to recognize, and admit, 1.) that you've made a mistake and 2.) that there's something that you, can do about it, need to do about it and 3.) even if there's blame to spread around, nothing's going to get better until you,personally do something about it.

Before Succeeding, You Have To Fully Confront Failure. But How? | Co. Design

Before Succeeding, You Have To Fully Confront Failure. But How? We're wired not to fix our own worst mistakes: Our brains often convince us that failure isn't our fault or simply an aberration...

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View by cuisine, location and month

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 01:04:50 PDT

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View by cuisine, location and month

Art of the Menu

A division of UnderConsideration, cataloguing the underrated creativity of menus from around the world.

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“In America, banks rob people because that...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 01:04:09 PDT

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"In America, banks rob people because that is where the money is!"

Jokes and Their Relation to Crisis

People say that a crisis is not a laughing matter. But what if crisis is precisely what humor is about?

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*Today's What the?@!, brought to you by Kohler...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 05:09:15 PDT

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Today's What the?@!, brought to you by Kohler

"Still, there is the problem of technological overkill. When you add a computer to something, you are also adding the kinds of problems computers have. One day I approached the Numi only to discover that its remote had frozen. After consulting the 43-page user manual, I realized that it had come to this: *I had to reboot the toilet.*"

Kohler's Numi Is Everything One Wants in a Toilet, and a Lot More

Kohler's Numi toilet comes with a heated seat, music, a lid that automatically raises and lowers, a remote control and more, all for $6,400.

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*If you too are the spouse of an internationally...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:30:09 PDT

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If you too are the spouse of an internationally known author, there is customer service at Google.

Hacked!

As email, documents, and almost every aspect of our professional and personal lives moves onto the "cloud"—remote servers we rely on to store, guard, and make available all of our data whenever and fr...

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*Mark this down in the "If all you have is...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:29:42 PDT

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Mark this down in the "If all you have is a set of hammers everything that doesn't look like a nail, looks like a railroad spike." Or else it's just plain invisible.

It doesn't seem to have occurred to them that there are classes of problems not amenable to algorithmic solutions. Then there are the problems that call for answers now, not when someone finds the spare time to code an Advisor.

What is Google's approach to customer service?

youtube.com - Google's approach to customer service, and why it uses algorithms instead of people. Cale McNulty, Canada Have a question? Ask it in our Webmaster Help Forum: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Webmasters...

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If you're not following +Danny Sullivan, ...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:28:40 PDT

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If you're not following +Danny Sullivan, you should start now. He understands search engines and search companies and makes them accessible. Without good search capability, the net isn't a firehose. It's a ten thousand year flood sweeping away everything in its path. This article is a good place to start understanding the issues that affect the way we'll use the net in the future, and if the services we need have a future.

The "Google Doesn't Get Platforms" Family Intervention Memo

Google now has its own version of the Yahoo "peanut butter" manifesto, where Google staff software engineer Steve Yegge wrote a "family intervention" memo about Google's failure to build accessible pl...

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**Today's What the?@!, brought to you by ...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:27:55 PDT

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*Yesterday's What the?@!, brought to you by Facebook*

Facebook: Releasing your personal data reveals our trade secrets | ZDNet

Facebook says it is not required to give you a copy of some of your personal data as it could adversely affect the company's trade secrets and i

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**Once again Israel weakens the Palestinian...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 11:40:37 PDT

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Once again Israel weakens the Palestinian Authority, strengthens Hamas

"General Alon, a former commando and intelligence officer who is scheduled to end his command after two years in his post, agreed to discuss issues that have arisen during his tenure. In a wide-ranging conversation, he brought up American aid and spoke with great concern about increasing violence by radical Israeli settlers, which he called "Jewish terrorism." "We should do much more to stop it," he said.

He called for more police officers and for getting them to shift some focus from their main mission of protecting settlers to stopping radicals. The army has sent some troops in for this.

General Alon said violence was a problem in both directions. He said Palestinian rock-throwing had increased since the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, went to the United Nations last month, leading to the deaths of a settler and his infant son whose car turned over after they were pelted. In recent months, the militant settlers have burned several mosques and destroyed acres of Palestinian olive and fig trees. Last week, dozens of settlers surrounded an Israeli Army vehicle and assaulted soldiers.

On General Alon's desk sits a two-screen computer. During the interview, one showed in real time the deployment of security forces around settlements where Palestinians were picking olives. The other showed a news site of the Israeli settler movement.
Every year, the olive harvest produces increased tension because some of the trees are next to —or inside of — Israeli settlements.

There is clearly a public-relations battle under way. Most of the world shares the Palestinian position that the settlements are illegal and illegitimate, so anti-settler agitation is seen as less offensive than anti-Palestinian activity. Even within Israel, some of the more radical settlements are seen as politically costly.

A spokesman for the United Nations human rights commissioner said on Tuesday that the Israeli Army was not doing enough to protect Palestinians.

"The accountability for settler violence against Palestinians is less than adequate, let's say, and certainly not comparable to the reverse cases," the spokesman, Rupert Colville, said at a news conference in Geneva.

Though the relationship between the Israeli Army and the Palestinian security forces has been complicated, over the past three years, calm has largely prevailed over the West Bank. Palestinian forces mostly control about 40 percent, Israelis the rest.
But even the 40 percent, where most Palestinians live, is subject to nightly raids. General Alon said that a few years ago, Israeli troops went into the West Bank more than a dozen times a night, but that is down by half now. Fewer, he said, would require a political decision. The Palestinian Authority says the raids harm — and sometimes kill — their citizens and humiliate their forces."

*When Israel withdrew from Gaza under Sharon's leadership, it refused to negotiate or even talk to the PLA while Hamas was making continuous attacks. They even successfully destroyed an Israeli tank.*

That made Hamas appear strong and the PLA appear impotent. The Israelis destroyed infrastructure built by the PLA such as the airport and left Gaza's populace dependent on Hamas for basic needs. Then they and we (the USA) insisted on elections and punished the Authority when Hamas won a large number of seats, making the Authority weaker, setting the stage for Hamas' takeover in Gaza.

Now, a thousand prisoners are traded for one soldier. This makes Hamas appear even stronger. It makes the suffering the Gazans suffered seem necessary, though the capture of this soldier prompted ferocious assaults with many civilians killed and maimed.

It says that the PLA are weak fools for even trying to negotiate with Israel. Israel gives nothing unless you use force and have soething or someone they want. Meanwhile, Israel contnues to fault the PLA for failing to control Gaza. The settlements keep expanding. The humiliation continues, mostly, because they can.

Israel's West Bank General Warns Against Radicals

Cutting off American aid because of the Palestinians' United Nations bid will lead to instability, Brig. Gen. Nitzan Alon says.

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"A storm has just hit town. Buildings are...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 03:44:18 PDT

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"A storm has just hit town. Buildings are wrecked and the mayor is missing. How many times and in how many ways has some variation on this story been told throughout history? And how will it be told?"

This is what Matt Thompson and Robin Sloan envision as the future of News.

Stream at eleven.

The Storm Collection

vimeo.com - A traveling exhibit from the Museum of Media History, produced circa 2021. You can inspect the artifacts up close: http://snarkmarket.com/storm

CC-licensed music from Zef-music: http://soundcloud.com/...

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"When a consumer pays with a debit card instead...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 03:39:54 PDT

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"When a consumer pays with a debit card instead of a check, the bank saves money. In the 1980s, Visa calculated the savings at 55 cents to $1.60 per check. The savings is much higher today. For decades, Bank of America, the founding owner and member of Visa (originally called BankAmericard) and all of the Visa and MasterCard banks, including Chase, hid the identity of their debit cards from stores by designing them to look and function like their signature authorized credit cards and by charging stores the same price for debit and credit transactions. Banks did this despite the fact that purchases made with a debit card didn't involve a loan from the bank, posed very little fraud risk and were extravagantly profitable to banks because they eliminated the costs of processing and clearing checks."

So, on top of the money saved by not processing paper checks, banks have been charging stores 44 cents per transaction allowing them to make profit on top of savings. The transactions cost about 4 cents each, the savings per transaction is, at least, dollars per transaction. Even though they're allowed to charge from 21 to 24 cents for a 4 cent transaction they're screaming and scheming ways to rob account holders to replace the money they've been robbing from retailers.

Fees like B of A's affect interstate commerce and therefore fall under federal regulation, if the regulators are courageous enough, and their budgets aren't cut to prevent them from doing their jobs.

Debit Card Fees Are Robbery

Banks that charge customers to use debit cards are trying to rationalize one of the largest illegal transfers of wealth from consumers to banks in American history.

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This is the Apple that is, as opposed to ...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 03:38:17 PDT

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This is the Apple that is, as opposed to the willful wishful thinking that's going on in the wake of Steve Jobs death. Funny, how 1984 wasn't like Orwell's 1984 but 2011 both public and private is.

Yet, we love Big Brother, and fear the BORG.

Steve Jobs, Enemy of Nostalgia

Today there is no tech company that looks more like the Big Brother from Apple's iconic 1984 commercial than Apple itself.

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Talk about an unwarranted sense of entitlement...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 03:37:21 PDT

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Talk about an unwarranted sense of entitlement. The very people who wrecked the economy and got bailed out think we should suffer in silence while they collect bonuses.

Confronting the Malefactors

Occupy Wall Street is starting to look like an important event that might even eventually be seen as a turning point.

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Honesty is such a lovely word and mostly ...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 12:11:49 PDT

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Honesty is such a lovely word and mostly what I need from Facebook.

Nik Cubrilovic Blog - Facebook Re-Enables Controversial Tracking Cookie

Facebook Re-Enables Controversial Tracking Cookie. 3rd October 2011 #. In May of this year the Wall Street Journal reported that Facebook like buttons and other website widgets were setting cookies on...

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I don't know, after more than a decade of...

noreply@blogger.com (Alfred C. Ingram) — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 12:09:00 PDT

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I don't know, after more than a decade of blogging the main thing is that most of us just get tired.

What Does Eight Years Of Blogging Get You?

Eight years ago on this day in 2003, I started Blogging. Here's some basic info about what has transpired in eight years here at the Six Pixels of Separation Blog: over 2700 Blog entries, over 20,000 ...

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