For so many reasons, Acadia National Park is special to Heidi and me. If you haven’t been, you’re missing out on one of the treasures of the National Park system and, really, of the east coast. The beauty of the park is remarkable (just look at the photo on the right!). Acadia’s real strength, though, is how accessible and easy it is to explore. The park is crisscrossed with miles of easy to ride carriage roads and easily reachable trails. It’s an easy, if long drive up to the park from New York or anywhere in New England, and has a great little town right outside the park in Bar Harbor. Whether you go for a drive on the Park Loop Road, or a hike or bike ride on the trails or carriage roads, you’ll be rewarded with spectacular views of water, islands, and the rugged coast of Maine.

On our most recent trip, I made time to take a long bike ride through the eastern half of the park. The carriage roads, built by John D. Rockefeller, Jr. as a labor of love, run through some of the most beautiful sections of the park. There are different loop combinations possible, allowing you to choose the duration and difficulty of your ride, run, or walk with ease. Some of the roads hug the lakes and ponds through the park, while others follow ridge lines or climb mountains in the park, leading to spectacular views out over all of Mount Desert Island. There are some challenging climbs, but since the roads are graded for horse-drawn carriages, there aren’t many of them. On the other hand, because of Acadia’s mountains and glacial past, there are really no flats anywhere. As one of my guide books said, the good thing is that nearly every climb is rewarded with a good view and a nice downhill after.

The route I chose covered about 33 miles, around 30 inside the park on the carriage roads (there’s a map below). While riding, I saw a number of families and groups riding around. I even saw a number of older couples (60+) making their way around the carriage roads. The western part of my loop (miles 6-13 in the map below), and the climb to the top of Day Mountain were among the quietest portions. I passed only a handful of riders and joggers. The portions closer to Jordan Pond & Eagle Lake were the busiest. If you know the park at all, that probably wasn’t surprising. I highly recommend getting away from the busy portions if you have the time. Just bring some food & a decent amount of water and give yourself enough time to take breaks and enjoy the views.

The one thing I wish I had was a guidebook for Acadia. I carried a bike map and a small guide for the roads, but concerned about weight, I left everything else except the water and my cell phone behind. After I tweeted about my ride, though, a developer based in Maine sent me a tweet about an iPhone & Android app he’d built for Acadia National Park. He offered to let me take a look for free and to offer feedback. After taking a look, I really wish I had it on the ride. The app is Chimani Acadia National Park, developed by Chimani, LLC. The app is beautifully designed and well thought out. It contains trail maps, cycling routes, sunset/sunrise info, ranger events and even an audio tour for the Park Loop Road. The app also has a schedule and route map for the free Island Explorer busses. Best of all, everything works without a network connection. Acadia may be many things, but cell phone friendly it isn’t, so this is a requirement for a park app.

My guide book was a little better in a few ways, though. First, the app’s maps don’t really have a turn-by-turn set of instructions for any of the routes or trails. They just indicate the starting position of a route or some portion, and list out points of interest. It would be great if they included turns at the sign posts. Every intersection on the carriage roads is numbered and is usually a three way intersection, so your choices always basically boil down to right or left. For each route, then, “directions” are a list of left & right turns. For example, the box to the right shows my cheat sheet for the ride (Note: I amended this while on the ride, so it doesn’t match the route above). It would be great if the app either listed the turns or allowed the user to create a cheat sheet like this.

That being said, it’s a great complement to a good bike map. The routes all include points of interest with some background info. For example, the carriage roads include many beautiful stone bridges throughout the parks. If I would have used this for my ride, I would’ve tweaked my route to include the Cliffside Bridge, which sounds spectacular.

Overall, the app looks solid and worth having if you’re going through the park. My only advice is not to rely on the app as your primary map when you’re hiking or biking. For one thing, the maps aren’t detailed enough. Most importantly, though, batteries don’t die on paper maps. Many of the maps you can pick up at the Visitor Center are also waterproof. For what it’s worth, I usually keep my phone inside a ziplock back when I ride in case it rains along with a little cash and one credit card.

My paper map was an awesome one that’s available at the Visitor Center. It’s the “Complete Hiking Trail & Carriage Road Map” by the Friends of Acadia. It’s $3.50 and well worth it.

This ride was also the first time I’ve been on any sort of mountain bike in years. I rented a nice Cannondale F4 from Bar Harbor Bicycle Shop. This was my first time renting there, but I’d be happy to do it again. You really can’t go wrong at any of the shops along Cottage St. in Bar Harbor, but they had a full bike shop attached, which was great for last minute gear I needed.

The F4 is a nice ride. While it felt super slow compared to my road bike, it was really pretty damn fun to zoom around the park without worrying as much about the gravel or rocks. I recommend staying away from road bikes on the carriage roads. I wanted the wider tires of a comfort bike or mountain bike on the gravel. I also really appreciated the hill friendly gearing on the mountain bike. I’ve been on the roads using a comfort bike and was fine, so just use your judgement. Bikes aren’t allowed on the hiking trails, so there’s no real easy opportunities to truly go trail riding, as far as I know. It was the first time I really wish I had a cross bike.

Heidi and I also went on a whale watch. This was my first time doing one. I didn’t really expect much from the trip, thinking we might be lucky if we saw even one whale. Boy, was I wrong. We saw at least 4 finback whales playing and diving. No breaches (leaps out of the water), but we saw a fin slap and a number of terminal dives where we saw the tail before it disappeared below the surface. We did a sunset whale watch, so we were treated to some beautiful views on the way home. If you’ve never been on one, highly recommended. Just remember to dress warmly. We were freezing out on the water, and when the boat really gets moving, you feel like you’re in a wind tunnel experiment about wind chill. We were both freezing, but didn’t want to take a chance we’d miss a whale sighting. Definitely, bring fall/winter layers (sweatshirt or fleece plus windbreaker or warmer jacket, etc.). It’s a great way to spend time with nature when you don’t want to be out in the park or can’t hike (say, if you’re with a pregnant wife, for example ) I’m really glad we went on this.

Beyond all the nature and hiking and biking, Bar Harbor and the other towns on the island have great, great restaurants. A lot of places are very vegetarian friendly, and there’s a variety of cuisines to suit whatever you might want. There are great restaurants all over, including Thai, Mexican, Greek, Italian, and lots of seafood. A lot of the restaurants use locally sourced ingredients, too. Good stuff. Some of the places we like include Guinness & Porcelli’s, Lompoc Cafe, McKay’s Public House, and a number of the pizza joints on Cottage and everything on Rodick St. There are also some great restaurants in Southwest Harbor and in some of the other towns on the island, so be sure to get out and explore!

Finally, getting a place to stay up there can be a bit expensive during the high season. The best thing we’ve found is to rent a house for a week and try to go up with another couple or family. We’ve done this a few times now and it’s really the most cost effective way to go. You can eat in, since you have a kitchen, and make lunches for your hikes/rides/whatever. The other thing we’ve done is camped. The park has a number of campgrounds nearby and many are reasonably priced and have showers and other amenities. We’ve stayed at Smuggler’s Den Campground. They had a shower and a pool and a shop on the campgrounds for things you may have forgotten. On our most recent trip, we went a little more upscale, since it was our anniversary, and stayed at a phenomenal B&B called the Atlantean Inn. The owners were awesome, balancing the being helpful but giving us space thing perfectly. Our room was great, and the breakfasts were amazing. They cook vegetarian breakfasts, but I’d be surprised if most non-vegetarians would notice or care, the food was that good. I really loved staying there. Too bad they don’t allow kids, otherwise we’d probably plan another trip in a few years.

Acadia National Park and Mount Desert Island are really great places to visit. Hopefully this has given you a taste of some of things you can do there and why I really love the place. Even with everything I’ve mentioned, there’s so much more (the only fjord on the east coast!, the first place in the U.S. to see a sunrise!).

I have a lot of good photographs up on Flickr from our recent trip, and would also suggest checking out Faith’s beautiful photo set from her recent trip. This is a gorgeous park and a rugged and beautiful part of the world. Whether you’ve been there before or not, I hope you get a chance to visit soon.

Music with cellos always win, even when the cellos aren’t really full cellos. The instrumentation on this song is actually pretty phenomenal. The entire album is pretty good, too.

Mr. Ryan’s plan calls for steep cuts in both spending and taxes. He’d have you believe that the combined effect would be much lower budget deficits, and, according to that Washington Post report, he speaks about deficits “in apocalyptic terms.” And The Post also tells us that his plan would, indeed, sharply reduce the flow of red ink: “The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that Rep. Paul Ryan’s plan would cut the budget deficit in half by 2020.”

But the budget office has done no such thing. At Mr. Ryan’s request, it produced an estimate of the budget effects of his proposed spending cuts — period. It didn’t address the revenue losses from his tax cuts.

The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has, however, stepped into the breach. Its numbers indicate that the Ryan plan would reduce revenue by almost $4 trillion over the next decade. If you add these revenue losses to the numbers The Post cites, you get a much larger deficit in 2020, roughly $1.3 trillion.

Emphasis added.

Honest debates. That’s all I’m asking for.

(ok, a tiny comment)

I posted the photo at left earlier today with a probably-not-funny joke referring to the lawsuit filed (and won!) by a mountain biker who hit a bright yellow gate at the MDC reservoir in West Hartford. The reservoir has miles of paved bike paths and unpaved trails that are used by cyclists, hikers, runners, and walkers.

As I rode around Acadia National Park today, I was struck by the sheer number of similarly positioned, closed gates. The Farmington Valley Greenway, which I’ve also ridden several times, has similar gates on the northern portions. Neither place has any particular warning that the gates are closed.

Plus, the gates at the Reservoir are painted bright yellow. They’ve been there for years, closed 95% of the time as far as I can tell. I don’t understand what other warning a rider would need. Certainly, looking at the gates at Acadia or the FVG, neither are as brightly painted or as obvious as the ones at the MDC.

So, I keep coming back to a simple question that I haven’t seen an answer for: how did the six-person jury conclude that the MDC was at fault, especially to the tune of $2.9mil?

So, sincere question: has anyone talked to the jury members or anyone else involved in the case aside from the plaintiff’s attorney? Have I missed any press covering that?

A lot of the reporting has covered some of the technicalities of the case, specifically whether the MDC should even have liability in cases like this. That seems to be two steps too far. I still don’t understand how the jury reached the initial conclusion. Does anyone know?

The gist of the post is that banks and lenders are justified denying mortgages to expecting couples, ostensibly defending some lending practices outlined in a Times article on how lending standards are affecting new parents.

From the Times piece Indiviglio links to:

Both Fannie and Freddie have always required that borrowers have enough income to pay for the loan on closing day — and the lender must document that the income is likely to continue for at least three years.

But here is how some lenders are interpreting the guidelines for, say, a new mother receiving short-term disability insurance for a couple of months (new mothers may receive disability payments while on maternity leave, though the amount and length depend on state law and company policies).

Since the disability payments will not continue for three years, these lenders will not count it as qualifying income, brokers said, and will require the new mother to reapply for the mortgage once she returns to work. (The same logic may apply to an injured employee receiving worker’s compensation.)

That’s the money section and, in and of itself, isn’t very outrage worthy or really all that controversial. If temporary leaves and short term disability affect initial approvals and final income verification at closing, requiring additional documentation in all cases where one is on temporary leave or short term disability isn’t discriminatory. All the examples involve new moms on maternity leave either at closing or at the time of the initial approval.

Somehow, Indiviglio takes this and boils it down to, “who knows what those wacky pregnant women will do??” and “What if the child has a birth defect?!” He then draws a link to the mortgage crisis, suggesting that accounting for every “What if” improves underwriting standards. His contrarian conceit is that a little discrimination might’ve prevented the housing crisis. The problem is that there’s no justification for that in either article, either with actuarial or demographic data.

More damning is the confusion between being pregnant vs. being on maternity leave. This nuance seems too advanced for Mr. Indiviglio, so as you might imagine, he doesn’t do any better describing policies used by the lenders or explaining how the banks are approaching risk. It’s a terrible piece.

(A note: the anecdote where a lender rescinded a mortgage approval b/c of an out-of-office message saying the borrower was on maternity leave seems like unreasonable behavior from the lender. Requiring additional documentation should’ve been the next response, not a rejection.)

Happy 4th of July

Originally uploaded by sujal.

Long day winding down for Heidi and I. As we’re getting closer to adding to our own family, we’re reminded often about how great our parents and our siblings are. This weekend, they came to help paint our future-baby’s room, working with the windows open and no AC in the room. I’m thankful for their help this year as we get ready.

I really love this first picture in the set. Looking out the window, I saw this gorgeous sunset. I grabbed my camera and took a quick couple of shots with the window & screen still in place, which led to the cool pixelated effect you see in this shot.

I then took out the window and screen, shooting the next few without obstruction. somehow, they just didn’t turn out as cool as this one. Something to be said for spontaneous and inspired turning out better than deliberate, I guess.

Hope you’re all having a fun, safe, and happy 4th of July!

If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll know that I got to see OK Go perform at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference last night. It was a cool surprise, since we were expecting some local or semi-famous band at the bash. They put on a great show, really getting their crowd, which, you’ll have to admit, was a bit unusual (iPhone geeeeeeeks, EVERYWHERE!).

I’m posting this in part because I’ve got more than a few “Who’s OK Go?” questions. You’ll probably recognize them as the treadmill video band. The video above is just as cool, and it’s a song from their new album. Good stuff.

More video and photos from the concert will be posted later on my Flickr account.

I ended up looking around for a bit and found these 5/8″ rubber coated clamps at Lowes which seemed like they’d be perfect. Bought two packs of two, got home, and they went on like a charm. Just keep in mind that you’ll need to buy screws and matching nuts, preferably nylon lock nuts. I used #8-32 x 3/4″ stainless screws & #8-32 locking nuts. I probably could’ve gone with 1/2″ screws without any problem. If you prefer to do your shopping via the Internet, I’ve added everything to a Listmania list at Amazon.

Hope that helps someone get a really simple, sturdy set of baskets on their bike.

(You’ll see some twist ties on the rack in the photo above. I read a number of reviews suggesting that plastic cable ties would keep the rack from rattling and making a lot of noise. I haven’t had a chance to try this out,since I’ve only done short test rides so far, but I’ll update this post later when I have more real experience with the setup.)

For me, hands down, it’s my combination of hummus, salsa, low fat cheese, and Morningstar Farms Veggie Sausage Links. As I was getting ready to post this, I remembered that I had blogged about this a few years ago. The comments were predictably amusing.

iPad vs. iPhone or iPod

The biggest surprise so far is that in many situations, given a choice between my iPad and my iPhone or iPod, I still choose the smaller devices more often. The remaining items may point at why, but habit and better size for twitch gaming are two obvious ones to me. It’s also a LOT easier to type on the smaller device, more than I expected.

Favorite apps so far:

By far, I use the iPad the most for watching video and reading. Netflix, ABC Player, and ScoreCenter XL (not just plugging my own work, I really love the highlights) are at the top of my most used apps. The Marvel app rocks, and I’ve been playing Scrabble on it, too. Occasionally, I’ll mess around with Looptastic HD, too.

Things I thought I’d like, but don’t

I don’t read Twitter, check email, or chat on this much. Keyboard is easier on a phone, and I really miss Tweetie. Twitterrific is nice, but it just feels awkward at that size (lots of eye scanning for 140 characters). I had some dreams of this thing being a great media companion device (i.e. something you’d use as a second screen while watching TV), but so far that hasn’t panned out.

Portability

I don’t carry the device around as much as I thought. I might once I have the standard case. Feels too, I don’t know, showy to walk around with it. Beyond that, my iPhone or iPod Touch are just fine for 99% of the things I want to do. I think we need more apps to show up before the iPad will supplant the iPhone in my hand.

Accessories

Do NOT buy the bluetooth keyboard for this. Get the integrated dock/keyboard. The reason for this is that when a keyboard is attached/paired, the on screen keyboard is disabled. Convenient, except when you decide to undock the iPad for a lean back experience, decide to type or tweet and the on screen keyboard remains disabled… because the keyboard is still in range. Doh!

Just some observations so far. More in another week or two as I incorporate it into my day a bit more and also find more apps.

I’ve been reading up on opinions about Apple’s recent changes to the iPhone developer agreement. If I summarized the debate that’s ensued, you would think that this fight goes to the heart of Freedom with a capital F on our computing platforms. Innovation hangs in the balance, and a future generation of Steve Jobs, Wozniaks, Gateses, and Brins will never get a chance to create the next great technology revolution because of this. I’m sensitive to these concerns. I contribute to groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation because maintaining the rights of tinkerers is important. Maintaining their access to the market is even more important. The thing is, this debate between Apple and Adobe is about none of these things. It’s simply about these two companies & their profits.

I’m sympathetic to Adobe’s argument here: there’s a computing platform for which they have built an innovative cross compiler. This cross compiler serves a valuable function to application developers who want to bring an application to several platforms at the same time. On top of that, Apple is certainly playing hard ball here, and that’s less than endearing. At my day job (reminder, I’m speaking for myself here), I face this problem head on every day. We have products that exist on the web, on the iPhone, on Blackberrys, Android apps, and other platforms. We face the porting question all the time. Something like Adobe’s CS5 could be a big help solving this problem.

However, my experience has also shown me that Apple has a valid point as well. When Steve Jobs says, “… intermediate layers between the platform and the developer ultimately produces sub-standard apps and hinders the progress of the platform,” he’s right. I spent this evening thinking hard about every cross platform toolkit, sdk, or runtime I’ve ever used. None of them ever match what is possible on the native platform directly. None. Some technologies get very close: SDL and OpenGL come to mind. Several runtimes (e.g. Java, Perl, Python) get very close in non-GUI applications. None, though, fully take advantage of the native platform. Jobs’s statement is, quite frankly, true. If you take Apple’s concerns about having the best experiences on their platform at face value, their position makes a lot of sense. Heck, at my day job, we haven’t (so far) chosen any of the compatibility layers on the market because they keep us from building the best experiences for each platform.

The thing is, taking either company’s statements at face value is silly. Apple, of course, wants to get developers and companies to make investments in their platform that create some level of lock-in. This is, at it’s base, very good business sense. Whatever else is going on here, it’s hard to ignore that.

At the same time, there’s really no doubt in my mind that Adobe wants to do the exact same thing with their own platform. They’re not angels or innocent bystanders. To use the tortured analogy TechCruch wrote about, they’re not even Coco. They’re a titan, fighting to maintain their own lock in. It’s not about freedom. It’s about money. It’s about bottom lines, not Freedom with a capital F. So, it’s hard for me to get too worked up about this, especially on behalf of Adobe.

I’ve also read the complaints by folks that are long time Flash developers hoping to bring their skills to a new, popular platform. I sympathize, but their concerns are about their own livelihoods. That’s not really about Freedom with a capital F.

There are also the complaints from people like David Heinemeier Hansson (creator of Ruby on Rails). They come from a variety of perspectives, but ultimately I think they’re concerned over the possibility of something they might someday be interested in getting shut out. Again, I’m sympathetic, but I’ve also seen numerous products damaged by designing around a list of cool sounding future features instead of focusing on getting things done. Making sure I can build the next great app on, say, MonoTouch doesn’t actually matter to getting great apps out to the world. The principle isn’t Freedom w/ a capital F. It’s about the chance that the next great thing may come from the intersection of the iPad hardware and something non-C/C++/Objective-C. That has to be a slim risk.

As long as people are able to tinker with their own products, innovation isn’t really dead. Take this story from an O’Reilly blogger. That’s how the tinkerers are born, not because Apple (or Microsoft or IBM) sanctions their efforts.

Ed Felten captures how I feel pretty well:

To me, the iPad is Disneyland.

I like Disneyland. It’s clean, safe, and efficient. There are lots of entertaining things to do. Kids can drive cars; adults can wear goofy hats with impunity. There’s a parade every afternoon, and an underground medical center in case you get sick.

…

What makes Disneyland different is that it is an island of central planning, embedded in a free society. This means that Disneyland can seek its suppliers, employees, and customers in a free economy, even while it centrally plans its internal operations. This can work well, as long as Disneyland doesn’t get too big — as long as it doesn’t try to absorb the free society around it.

The same is true of Apple and the iPad. The whole iPad ecosystem, from the hardware to Apple’s software to the third-party app software, is only possible because of the robust free-market structures that create and organize knowledge, and mobilize workers, in the technology industry. If Apple somehow managed to absorb the tech industry into its centrally planned model, the result would be akin to Disneyland absorbing all of America. That would be enough to frighten even the most rabid fanboy, but fortunately it’s not at all likely. The iPad, like Disneyland, will continue to be an island of central planning in a sea of decentralized innovation.

So, iPad users, enjoy your trip to Disneyland. I understand why you’re going there, and I might go there one day myself. But don’t forget: there’s a big exciting world outside, and you don’t want to miss it.

He’s right, though he does miss one possible way where central planning can become the norm. The Freedom with a capital F that everyone keeps talking about can be lost when the force of law prevents you from tinkering, experimenting, and tweaking the products you own. That’s the real battle, and that’s where the risk really is.

So, rather than focus on Apple vs. Adobe or section 3.3.1, I’m going to focus on a few other things: donating to and supporting the efforts of groups like the EFF and talking to legislators and candidates about these issues whenever I get a chance. The battle is happening in Congress and legislatures around the world.

Besides, if the next innovation requires something the iPhone OS ecosystem doesn’t have, then the iPhone OS will lose out. Apple’s obviously willing to take that risk. That’s fine with me.

Hey, the song doesn’t suck this way!

The effects of this are subtle but profound. Already, we’re seeing pressure on companies like RIM to update their browsers to “catch up” w/ where the iPhoneOS, Palm OS, and Android OS are taking the web. This is setting a new baseline for developers and will shift internal development priorities. Already, for example, we’re seeing more & more AJAX & JavaScript features on mobile web sites. We’re seeing a lot more CSS3 transitions & effects in products like ESPN’s mobile NFL GameCast. We’re also seeing more HTML5 features coming out as well.

There’s going to be a big leap in the quality of mobile web applications and experiences over the next few years. Just think about what you expect from your desktop browsers today vs. what you expected in 2004. So much good stuff coming.

You should watch this or listen to the video above. It’s of President Obama speaking to and then taking questions from the House GOP Caucus. While there are the talking point moments, overall this was one of the more fascinating interactions I’ve seen in American politics. It’s also the first time that Obama has, personally, directly engaged himself in changing the tone of politics in an activist manner, if you will, rather than simply leading by example. You can get a sense of what I’m talking about, if you don’t have time to listen to the whole thing, by listening to the last 12 minutes or so (from around 73:00). Some really decent, substantive conversation between Obama and the GOP House Caucus.

More like this, please.

I hope Obama follows through on having regular meetings with both leadership teams (w/ part televised?), and perhaps can make Q&A like this a regular part of the conversation. I would love our own version of prime minister’s questions.

One of the random extras I bought when I got the camera was the Canon EOS Rebel T1i/500D Guide by David Busch. I’m basically going through the book cover-to-cover, it’s been that interesting and helpful. While he covers the basics like explaining the various features of the camera, I’ve found that his explanations of a lot of basic photography technique has been a good refresher for me. While I didn’t necessarily need the reminder of what an f-stop is or whatever, getting everything in context with sample photographs helped me gain some insights and make connections I don’t think I understood before.

The book does dive into some depth and provides a lot of good background about the body itself. For example, the T1i has a cropped sensor (otherwise known as APS-C sensor), something I only understood at the very basic level (i.e. the sensor is “smaller” than a full 35mm frame). The guide explains the differences, but then takes the next step and explains the design choice by Canon (and other manufacturers), along with how it might impact your lens choices, your photography, etc. It’s good stuff.

There’s also a good chapter that explains Canon’s lens naming system, along with explanations of why different features are better or worse than others. So now, when I see a lens named “EF 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6L IS USM,” I know it’s one of their full-frame professional (luxury) zoom lenses that’s image stabilized and has an ultrasonic motor to drive the autofocus. The book also explains what each of those things mean, why you might or might not want/need each feature, etc.

Overall, I really recommend this book if you have a T1i. Lots of good little tips and hints in the guide that you’ll be happy to read even if you’ve got some experience with the camera already.

What the Democrats — and a lot of this is on the White House — have done is get so deep into the inside game of legislative maneuvering, this and that ‘gang’ of senators and a lot of other nonsense that they’ve let themselves out of sync with the public mood and the people’s needs.

I have a few small things to add to this: I’ve found a lot of the angst about this bill from both left and right inexplicable in the basic sense. I get the general outline of the concerns. From the right, folks think this is a massive entitlement that may or may not get at the issues they feel are important (e.g. malpractice reform, more concrete cost controls, etc.). From the left, folks are clamoring that they voted for Change and Obama has failed them.

These things may or may not be true, but I’d argue that these complaints are a symptom of what Josh Marshall highlights above.

Obama is and was always a cautious centrist. I don’t have time now to link to all the pieces matching up his actions this first year with his campaign promises, but if you have doubts ask and I’ll find the pieces. He ran a nuanced tack about gay rights and DADT. He ran a nuanced tack about Guantanamo. He laid out his version of health care reform, maintaining private insurance and doing the least to disrupt the system. Both bills, quite frankly, follow the basic layout of his campaign proposals (exchanges, pooling risk, taxing the top bracket to pay for it).

The issue I have is that there’s a disconnect from the communicative candidate, who used his presence and skill to get in front of people to convince them to trust him, and the quiet President who only seems to come out with a “major” speech when something is going wrong.

I’m not suggesting he’s hiding, no.

He’s simply not leading. What I voted for was a competent executive who, as I wrote then, seemed to be running a very good campaign with a very good ground effort and delegation. Someone who could stand up and communicate with people. Well, it’s been a while since he’s been out doing that, and he’s turned over the message and the communication to folks like Reid and Pelosi who, for their other strengths, are horrible communicators.

So, this is where we find ourselves today.

I’ve tried over the last few weeks to talk to more people I disagree with, especially on this issue. I’ve been able to have productive conversations, generally. I certainly understand and respect those folks who think government shouldn’t help people at all (the no entitlements crowd), but that’s not me. I am pretty sure that it’s also not most of this country.

In the end, I don’t think people would be so upset about the bills if they actually understood what’s in it. Or if someone would point out how getting the exchanges in place would make it easier to start businesses. Or that this bill, like the stimulus is about getting America back on stronger economic footing, not disconnected from the effort to create jobs but part of it.

Not everyone would love the bill, I’m sure, but I’m sure more people would be willing to trust the President about this. I wish the he would stand up and try to make that case so we could find out.

Looks like a performance at NYU (where she was a student for a few years). She really can sing (though she has a few misses playing the piano). There’s talent there, covered these days in a blond wig/hairdo and heavy makeup. Do your best to ignore the goofy MC, if you can.

I found the interviews with Troy Roush interesting for their candor about Monsanto. He is identified as the Vice President, American Corn Growers Association. I became curious because the name sounded like an industry lobbying org, but his comments really were quite critical in some significant ways. Turns out that the National Corn Growers Association is the big corn backed organization, and American Corn Growers is a smaller group dissatisfied with the state of corn policy in the U.S.. Roush is a 1st VP in the Indiana chapter.

Anyway, all of that is background for why I ended up on Monsanto’s page dedicated to criticizing Troy Roush, which states, with no apparent irony, the following to close out the page:

It is interesting to point out, that while Mr. Roush is a harsh and frequent critic of Monsanto and GM crops, he remains a customer of Monsanto having purchased a considerable amount of corn and soybean seed from us during 2008.

Roush’s main topic in Food, Inc. was to point out Monsanto’s hard ball tactics forcing farmers to remain Monsanto customers even if they’ve ever just had GMO corn pollen blow onto their farms. He was accused by Monsanto of violating their patents, and subsequently settled after spending hundreds of thousands to defend himself. So, if he’s still growing corn, of course he’s a Monsanto customer. More background here and here.

The short version of the background here is that I’ve been a long time Reason owner, and I have Record as well. I’m pretty poor with both, and I’ve finally set aside a little bit of time to figure out how to use everything. I’ve decided to start by just figuring out mashups and remixes (creating original songs seems way too hard right now) while trying to learn the guitar. For Christmas, I got a copy of the book Audio Mashup Construction Kit by DJ Earworm. It’s a good book, and I’m really learning quite a bit just from the music theory chapter. The only issue is that the book uses Sony ACID as the tool it describes in detail. ACID is a Windows-only product, so I’m SOL. So, that’s how I ended up messing with Live & Record this weekend.

Here’s a clip (about 30 seconds or so) of the mashup tutorial from the first chapter, built by me using Record.

Nothing complicated, obviously. Just a beatmatched, slightly sliced mix of Dizzee Rascal’s Stand Up Tall (Instrumental) with the a cappella track of Tag Team’s Whoomp There It Is. This probably took about 2-3 hours or so to learn what to do, how to do it, and then tweak until the beats lined up.

Like I said, this deserves a longer post, because I’ve learned a few things worth sharing for novices like me. For example, mixing/matching tempos is very different in the two products. So far, Live seems a bit more natural to me, but I was able to get better results out of Record (probably because I’m more familiar with Propellerhead’s products. More eventually, once I’ve done something a bit more original.

Synesthesia came up in sort of a wacky conversation on Twitter. I linked to a clip from Heroes showing their take on Synesthesia. This clip, however, is a neat little 8 minute doc on Synesthesia.

Military occupation generates resistance because it is humiliating, disruptive, arbitrary and sometimes terrifying to its objects, even when the occupying power is acting from more-or-less benevolent motives. If you’ve ever been caught in a speed trap by a rude or abusive policeman (I have), or selected out for special attention crossing a border (ditto), you have a mild sense of what this is like. You are at the mercy of the person in charge, who is inevitably well-armed and can do pretty much whatever he (or she) wants. Any sign of protest will only make things go badly — and in some situations will get you arrested, beaten, or worse — so you choke down your anger and just put up with it. Now imagine that this is occurring after you’ve waited for hours at some internal checkpoint, that none of the occupiers speak your language, and that it is like this every single day. And occasionally the occupying power kills innocent people by mistake, engages in other forms of indiscriminate force, and does so with scant regard for local customs and sensibilities.

Some good stuff in there.

There’s nothing scandalous about Palin showing some skin, or wearing Spandex. But this cover image is deliberately styled to make the then-governor of Alaska look like a Vargas pinup girl. Unlike the other images in the series, this one references her status as a governor. As she poses like a swimsuit model, she’s clutching one icon of political power–the Blackberry–and leaning on another. The theme isn’t Sarah Palin, athlete. The theme is Sarah Palin, Sexy Governor. (As in: one of those dime store Halloween costumes: sexy cop, sexy ladybug, sexy sanitation worker…)

Predictably, Palin complained that Newsweek’s use of the image was sexist. Yes, the image was plucked from its original context. The whole point was that the picture was appalling it its original context. Newsweek is holding this picture up to the world and asking: Who does this?

My only problem with this explanation is that neither of the stories that made up the cover package actually addressed this point. The choice of the photograph for the cover would’ve made sense if Beyerstein’s piece was the cover story. But it wasn’t, leaving the new picture plucked out of its original context and really kind of dropped into no real context. It’s just there to catch the eye which, I guess, is what covers are meant to do.

Granted, the other pics inside apparently didn’t help Newsweek’s case any.

I’d rather see more people pay attention to what she’s actually saying about policy. Read stuff like that and it’s scary that she could’ve been VP. (make sure you read the first comment to understand how idiotic her statement was)

Amazon’s MP3 Store’s Best of 2009 list is a really neat, diverse mix of albums from 2009. Pleasantly surprised. I bought a bunch of albums last night from the list. Among them was the latest Midival Punditz album, Hello, Hello. I checked YouTube for this track, which was on the 2009 Best Song list and found this really need live performance with the Punditz & Karsh Kale. I also have Karsh Kale’s Broken English album. Some great tracks on there.

There are also several other videos on YouTube from their set at the Paleo festival, where this video was shot. You’ll see them in the related videos section if you click through to YouTube.

I know, two songs from the same album back-to-back, but I like the album. It’s different than most of the stuff I listen to, for sure. It is, however, really good. This is a cheesy song (Lerche describes it as show tune-y in the video), but it’s fun and light. I like it.

A recent post over at Julie’s place about the budget situation in Hartford got me thinking again about problems with how we discuss politics.

My observation was that a number of people were debating policies in abstract terms. For example, one commenter suggested Hartford consider offering tax incentives for businesses to relocate into Hartford or use TIFs to boost development. The incentives idea was criticized because the taxes would eventually go up on the businesses once the incentives expire.

On the surface, this pair of points could make sense, but it really is missing too much detail to be even remotely useful. It’s akin to having a debate about tools. “Hammers are bad” is a pretty absurd thing to say, yet we do this with policy ideas all the time. We discuss the tool, in abstract, without considering specific policies that fill in important details. TIFs, tax incentives, marginal tax rates, etc. are all policy tools. They’re not policies themselves, so we should recognize that in our conversations with each other.

For example, in the case of a tax incentive for a business to relocate, a lot depends on how big the tax incentive is, how long it lasts, and what kind of businesses get the tax break. For example, if a business is easy to move, then the tax incentive is riskier, and less likely to achieve the desired outcome. On the other hand, if a tax incentive is structured to help offset relocation costs, perhaps it makes more sense for the business to move.

This also connects to a larger trap that we often fall into, one reinforced by the political parties and their attempts to sloganize their policy preferences. Folks across the political spectrum have preferences among policy tools but believe the tools are actually policy. For example, Republicans look to tax policy as their only tool for fixing many (most? all?) problems. Yet this is only one policy tool in a vast array of tools available. Maslow’s Maxim applies to policy issues, too. Not every problem is a nail, and we have more than just the hammer to help. Democrats would be wise to remember that as well.

We should all be asking candidates and fellow bloggers or commenters to be at least a little more precise about policies their advocating so we can all save time.

I love the strings in this song. It reminds me of a lot of Bollywood songs when I was a kid.

I first heard Sondre Lerche on the Dan in Real Life soundtrack. It was a great soundtrack. This is off his new album, also titled Heartbeat Radio. Haven’t listened to the whole album yet.

1. Prosecutorial or judicial misconduct of some kind
2. 50 years was an unfair sentence
3. it was so long ago, why now?
4. The victim wants the charges dropped

I’ve read the arguments for each of these and remain completely unconvinced. I keep coming back to the same basic point: he broke the law, was convicted, then decided he was better than everyone else (and our appeals process) and ran. I know it’s not a particularly new idea, and maybe he was hoping to be Marc Rich, but that’s basically it.

The rest of this stuff is BS, pure and simple. The two pieces I’ve found that basically sum up my feelings on this case are this piece at Salon by Kate Harding and this piece at Cogitamus by litbrit.

It really just comes down to this for me: He broke the law, plead guilty, and then didn’t like what the judge might do so he ran, committing another crime. It doesn’t matter how nice he is, or how flawed he believes the judges behavior was, we have a system to deal with these things. It’s imperfect, we all recognize that, but it’s the system we have. Polanski may have had a point about the judge going back on his deal, but he could’ve appealed (though, if you ask me, 45 days time served is a bullshit sentence for raping a 13-year-old girl, barely counting as a slap on the wrist). As a famous director, he could’ve fought this.

I’m also really upset that the victim’s wishes keep getting brought up as some sort of validation of Polanski’s plight. The only reason she agreed to this crappy plea deal was to avoid living through the pain of testifying again. In her 2003 editorial, she again makes the point that it’s the pain of going through it again that is motivating her to advocate for his freedom:

… honestly, the publicity surrounding it was so traumatic that what he did to me seemed to pale in comparison. … I have to imagine he would rather not be a fugitive and be able to travel freely. Personally, I would like to see that happen.

…

I know there is a price to pay for running. But who wouldn’t think about running when facing a 50-year sentence from a judge who was clearly more interested in his own reputation than a fair judgment or even the well-being of the victim?

If he could resolve his problems, I’d be happy. I hope that would mean I’d never have to talk about this again. Sometimes I feel like we both got a life sentence.

I’m sympathetic to her plea, and feel like I can rationally understand why she would feel that way. The thing is, it’s not her call. It’s also not the judge’s fault that she has to go through this again. Ultimately, this is all Polanski’s fault. He committed the original crime that put her in this position. He ran instead of accepting whatever justice the judge was going to offer. In running, he prolonged the publicity, increased the sensational nature of the case, and ensured that the story would never die. Her desire to have this go away is understandable, but ultimately it’s not motivated by anything that mitigates what Polanski did. There’s no justice in that, and justice is what our system is supposed to be about.

The Salon piece I linked above says it well, so I’ll just end with this:

I happen to believe we should honor her desire not to be the subject of a media circus, which is why I haven’t named her here, even though she chose to make her identity public long ago. But as for dropping the charges, Fecke said it quite well: “I understand the victim’s feelings on this. And I sympathize, I do. But for good or ill, the justice system doesn’t work on behalf of victims; it works on behalf of justice.”

It works on behalf of the people, in fact — the people whose laws in every state make it clear that both child rape and fleeing prosecution are serious crimes. The point is not to keep 76-year-old Polanski off the streets or help his victim feel safe. The point is that drugging and raping a child, then leaving the country before you can be sentenced for it, is behavior our society should not — and at least in theory, does not — tolerate, no matter how famous, wealthy or well-connected you are, no matter how old you were when you finally got caught, no matter what your victim says about it now, no matter how mature she looked at 13, no matter how pushy her mother was, and no matter how many really swell movies you’ve made.

That’s my read, and that’s why he should face a judge and do the time. If that makes me Puritanical, then get me a hat with a buckle, because it’s the right thing to do in this case.

PS. I’m really shocked at some of the names that have come out defending him – supposed signatories to the Free Polanski petitions include Wes Anderson and Natalie Portman. Plus there was that weird “rape-rape” comment from Whoopi Goldberg. I wish I could talk to one of these people and ask, “What are you thinking?”

This person linked to a Politico article about Sen. Ensign receiving a handwritten note confirming that not having health insurance could lead to fines of up to $25K and/or up to 1 year in prison. They then made this comment:

Don’t want to buy the proposed mandatory health insurance? The penalty for non-compliance in the bill now is up to a YEAR in jail and $25,000 fine. And it’s in writing from the committee staff.

I read this and thought, there’s no way that’s the first penalty for not having health insurance. And, it isn’t. Here’s my comment back to him on FB:

I think you’re engaging in hyperbole for effect, but here’s some perspective on this that may make this seem more reasonable than you’re implying.

First, the requirement is that everyone will have health insurance, not that we buy a particular plan. Not sure if you meant to imply there was a particular plan, but wanted to clarify that. You and I, for example, will not see any change. The law includes a means test to make sure those who cannot afford insurance will never face the original fine. Certainly, we can debate the means test levels/limits, and I would welcome that.

Which is another point of clarification: the penalty you cited is for failing to pay the fine for not having insurance. The fine for not having insurance is UP TO $1900 (in a judge’s discretion, I assume). The 1 year + UP TO $25K is for failing to pay that fine.

Second, because this is a requirement to have insurance, not a requirement to purchase any particular plan, it’s very similar to how auto insurance works in many states. In CT, for example, failure to carry the proper car insurance can result in fines up to $1000. Failure to pay the fine is a Class A Misdemeanor with additional penalties + up to 1 year in jail.

Even failing to pay a parking/traffic ticket in CT is a Class A Misdemeanor.

Both of those are state penalties for very similar style regulation.

Again, not saying that this is perfect or ideal, but it’s not so bizarre or extreme. Certainly, the requirement for people to have auto insurance hasn’t lead to what [a commenter] above is implying. I’m not aware of a government run auto insurance program in CT, for example.

It occured to me after writing this that the car insurance analogy is actually the one that makes a ton of sense both in highlighting the banal nature of the proposed reform plans but also the risks that such plans might entail. After all, we have had mandatory insurance requirements in CT for at least 20 years (as have many states). Food for thought.

Citations for the penalties above, in case the lawyers want to correct anything I wrote (please do!):

Insurance violations

• Sec. 14-12c: Verification of security coverages. Surrender or confiscation of plates, when. Penalties for failure to insure or maintain insurance and for presentation of false or fraudulent identification card.
• Sec. 41-164r: Failure to pay or plead [looks to be general penalty for not paying a court ordered fine or fee]

Traffic ticket violations

• Sec. 53a-173: Failure to appear in the second degree: Class A misdemeanor [ my read of my research this AM: if you don't pay your ticket, it gets sent to court, which turns into this]
• State of CT Table on Fines & Penalties

A while ago, I was looking at (and tweeted about) some dude’s travel gear list and noticed a nice pair of binoculars in the pack, a pair of Pentax Papilio 8.5×21 binoculars. I saved it to my Amazon Wish List and this year Heidi bought them for me for my birthday. We’ve taken them on a short hike near our house and I’ve been messing with them here and there. I want to point out a couple of nice things about the set that might make them useful for some of you.

The cool thing about these binoculars is that they can focus at things about 2 feet away. While this may seem sort of silly for the traditional use for binoculars, the cool thing is that you can actually focus on things like bugs, butterflies, and flowers. They almost work like a magnifying glass but from a distance. If, like me, you’re curious about the little critters but are mildly afraid of getting too close, this is a great thing. I suspect kids would have a great time with these out in the woods just looking at all the little things in the woods.

The Papilios are decent at range. They’re not particularly powerful. At 8.5x you’ll find some cameras with more powerful zoom. Binoculars are nice, though, because you can look at things with a larger field of view and in better viewing conditions than a little screen on the back of a camera. I could see using them for casual bird watching or checking out animals from a distance. We’re not serious birders, but our primary use will be on hikes and longer rides.

I was also pleased by how light they were. On our walk, I hardly noticed I was carrying them. If you want a pair of binoculars, this is a good pair to take a look at. I really like them so far.