God, Politics, and Rock 'n' Roll

Best Neighborhoods For Halloween Candy

2009-10-30T12:01:00.003-05:00

Real estate site "Zillow.com" just came up with the most ingenious idea to promote its website...it is calculating the best neighborhoods in which to score Halloween candy in five major cities.

There is a common belief that wealthy neighborhoods are the Holy Grail for harvesting the most Halloween candy. However, to provide a more holistic approach to Halloween trick-or-treating, the Zillow Trick-or-Treat Housing Index was calculated using four equally weighted data variables: Zillow Home Value Index, population density, Walk Score, and local crime data. Based on those variables, this Index represents neighborhoods that will provide the most candy, with the least walking, and minimal safety risks.

More candy...less effort: this Internet thingie is so useful!

Beware...Beware...THE MAGIC MARKER BANDITS

2009-10-30T07:50:00.002-05:00

It's true...compared to many other states, Iowa doesn't have a high crime rate.

And also: when they strike, they tend not to be so bright.

Case in point: these dudes who ALLEGEDLY tried to rob the house of a guy who MAY have been fooling around with the girlfriend of one of these banditos. The general idea was simply to scare him--and that's pretty easy when you disguise yourself with permanent marker...

Roman Polanski should be thanking his lucky stars...

2009-10-26T14:24:00.002-05:00

that his victim's father didn't think of doing this.

What's the public option again?

2009-10-21T15:01:00.003-05:00

A nice explanation is here. Thanks, Matt Iglesias!

Or we can just call it Medicare.

George Lakoff is right. Branding matters.

Penny-pinching state governments should eliminate the death penalty

2009-10-20T16:32:00.003-05:00

Political hot-button issues seem to ebb and flow in the public consciousness. After a brutal crime in our state, you can safely predict that calls for the death penalty will increase. Here's a way for anti-death-penalty folks to combat those predictable reactions...by reminding lawmakers of the significant (REALLY significant) cost savings to be had in refusing to institute the death penalty--or even in repealing it if it already is on the books in their state.

The Christian Science Monitor has details.

Garth Brooks Un-Retires...Sorta

2009-10-15T11:08:00.003-05:00

Garth Brooks has announced his unretirement at age 47.

He has no immediate plans.

I've seen Brooks live--he is one of the best live performers, ever. If he's comfortable that his kids are raised, he should tour, tour, tour.

Identify Villain, Become Hero

2009-10-15T10:52:00.004-05:00

Since Tara and I are activists for opposite political parties, we often laugh at the similarities between how the parties operate.

When advocating for a cause, politicians on both the right and left try the same tactic: politicians identify a villain, then position themselves as the hero. It's an interesting tactic since the public continues to regard politicians as lowly creatures...but it is employed time-and-time-again.

So, as Democrats try to regain their footing in the health insurance debate, expect the demonization of health insurance companies to be ramped up.

And, of course, there is the obligatory fund-raising letter accusing the opposite party of trying to kill stuff--despite the fact that Democrats control everything at this moment and the GOP folks can't really stop anything.

Rush Limbaugh And The NFL

2009-10-15T10:37:00.002-05:00

Now that Rush Limbaugh has been dropped from a group attempting to buy the St. Louis Rams, expect a number of articles like this--which point out the hypocrisy of the league based on various statements made by its current owners and...oh...the fact that it allows some controversial folk to play the game.

Here's the interesting aspect for me: I watched the parade of columnists and commentators on television on Wednesday denounce Limbaugh for "divisive" and "incendiary" comments.

Of course, the reason that these columnists/commentators had achieved national prominence...thus their opinion being sought...was for making divisive and incendiary comments. It's how they draw readers/ratings/attention.

No More Jon And Kate? Right....

2009-10-15T10:26:00.003-05:00

Jon Gosselin says he has forbidden TLC from filming his children due to the possible harm it was doing to them...not because TLC was planning to do a show without him called Kate plus 8. Right...

Kate says she relies on the show for income. I think if a new deal is inked in which Jon reaps some benefit, he'll have a sudden "epiphany" that the kids are alright.

Dow 10K: The Turtle Was Right

2009-10-14T13:31:00.003-05:00

ABC's Dan Arnall offers some perspective on the Dow reaching 10,000 today: he points out that it first reached 10K a decade ago.

The inevitable question is where will it go next? Arnall says he'd be happy if it grows "slow and steady" over the next ten years.

Personally, I hope we’re celebrating Dow 15K a decade on thanks to 10 years of predictable 5% annual returns on the market. Slow and steady.

Heffalumps, Bogels, and Muffys!

2009-10-14T12:56:00.003-05:00

I'll admit it...I formerly mocked Panera as a restaurant for "girly men" and Tara endured much eye-rolling by me when she requested it as a dinner destination.

But I've finally 'fessed up to Tara that I've find lots to like on their menu and now enthusiastically head to Panera when she gets a craving for salad.

For those of you ready to follow my lead, be aware that you might need to learn the language of Panera before heading to the counter--for example, do you prefer a "muffy" or a "bogel?"

Health care models from around the world

2009-10-14T11:27:00.004-05:00

The Christian Science Monitor has profiles out today of five countries' approaches to comprehensive health care for their citizens. All are worth considering as we grapple with reforming the nightmarish system that's currently in place in our own country. Check out Singapore, Taiwan, Germany, Japan, and France.

Centrist Democrat? Vote Palin 2012

2009-10-12T06:21:00.003-05:00

Lifelong Democrat Amy Siskind knows how to stir up some conversation on "The Daily Beast": tell women they should give Sarah Palin a second look in 2012.

Palin, back in the headlines for rushing out a new book ahead of schedule this fall, is fresh, open-minded, a centrist and a party noncomformist. Hey, sisters in women's advocacy: Let's end the decades-long cold war with Republican women candidates. If we want progress to be made on issues of importance to women, our organizations need to master a skill at which men have always been adept: negotiation.

I've been surprised at the speed at which both the right and the left embraced Palin as a hero of the socially conservative movement. As Governor of Alaska, she didn't put an emphasis on social issues; her popularity (and why she is the bane of some activists on both sides) is that she represents the "populist" side of the current "populist vs. elitism" political debate.

"Evolution and monkeys and stuff"

2009-10-11T09:46:00.005-05:00

Daughter Lauren and I have the DVR set to record "Discovering Ardi" on the Discovery channel tonight. "Ardi" is the 4.4 million year old Ardipethicus Ramidus skeleton that was unearthed in Ethiopia in 1994. The announcement of this discovery last week bumped the famous australopithicus afarensis "Lucy" aside on the hominid evolutionary tree, as "Ardi" is over a million years older. Bipedal in open areas, Ardi was quadripedal in the trees. We can't wait to hear more about her tonight. As a teenager, I was captivated by articles and television programs about Lucy...and I admit to feeling a bit sad that she's no longer the most important archeological piece of the evolutionary puzzle.

Coincidentally, I happen to be re-reading Dava Sobel's wonderful "Galileo's Daughter," in which I am reminded of Galileo's struggle to argue for the heliocentric Copernican model of the solar system. Galileo (and Copernicus before him) believed, correctly, that the sun was the center of the solar system. The Catholic Church disagreed, in part based upon various passages in scripture that mentioned the movement of the sun. More importantly, however, religious leaders wanted to preserve the notion that the Earth was the center of the universe because that's what they believed God would have set up. Why would God create Earth as a tiny planet in a vast universe, revolving around one of billions of stars? While nobody seriously suggests that the Earth is the center of the universe today, many religious leaders (and their followers) continue to argue against evolution. Even our own teenaged son was recently shocked to hear that I "believe in evolution and monkeys and stuff."

Galileo had a response, one that should be re-read today by people who continue to teach their children that evolution is "just a theory." From Galileo's letter to the Grand Duchess Christina:

...I discovered in the heavens many things that had not been seen before our own age. The novelty of these things, as well as some consequences which followed from them in contradic tion to the physical notions commonly held among academic philosophers, stirred up against me no small number of professors-as if I had placed these things in the sky with my own hands in order to upset nature and overturn the Sciences ....

Showing a greater fondness for their own opinions than for truth, they sought to deny and disprove the new things which, if they had cared to look for themselves, their own senses would have demonstrated to them. To this end they hurled various charges and published numerous writings filled with vain arguments, and they made the grave mistake of sprinkling these with passages taken from places in the Bible which they had failed to understand properly…

Hence, in expounding the Bible, if one were always to confine oneself to the unadorned grammatical meaning, one might fall into error. Not only contradictions and propositions far from true might thus be made to appear in the Bible, but even grave heresies and follies.

I question whether there is not some equivocation in failing to specify the virtues which entitle sacred theology to the title of 'queen'. It might deserve that name by reason of including everything that is learned from all the other sciences and establishing everything by better methods and with profounder learning .... Or theology might be queen because of being occupied with a subject which excels in dignity all the subjects which compose the other sciences, and because her teachings are divulged in more sublime ways.

That the title and authority of queen belongs to theology in the first sense, I think will not be affirmed by theologians who have any skill in the other sciences. None of these, I think, will say that geometry; astronomy, music, and medicine are more excellently contained in the Bible than they are in the books of Archimedes, Ptolemy, Boethius, and Galen. Hence it seems likely that regal pre-eminence is given to theology in the second sense; that is, by reason of its subject and the miraculous communication, by divine revelation, of con clusions which could not be conceived by men in any other way, concerning chiefly the attainment of eternal blessedness.

Let us grant then that theology is conversant with the loftiest divine contemplation, and occupies the regal throne among the sciences by this dignity. But acquiring the highest authority in this way, if she does not descend to the lower and humbler speculations of the subordinate sciences and has no regard for them because they are not concerned with blessedness, then her professors should not arrogate to themselves the authority to decide on controversies in professions which they have neither studied nor practiced. Why, this would be as if an absolute despot, being neither a physician nor an architect, but knowing himself free to command, should undertake to administer medicines and erect buildings according to his whim-at grave peril of his poor patients' lives, and the speedy collapse of his edifices.

The photo above is a last one of my friend Lucy.

Respect Your Mayan Elders

2009-10-11T07:42:00.004-05:00

Please stop pestering your Mayan elders with questions about the world ending in 2012...so, is it?

Definitely not, the Mayan Indian elder insists. "I came back from England last year and, man, they had me fed up with this stuff."

The focus on the supposedly Mayan belief that the end of the world is nigh has been brought about by the upcoming release of the movie "2012." In it, another Hollywood director gets to play with his CGI equipment in order to wreak havoc on major historical sites around the world. Sorta like you and I used to do with action figures and Lego buildings, but with a $200 million budget and the expectation of enormous profit.

When Good People Become Bad Candidates

2009-10-11T07:28:00.003-05:00

Running for office is hard. You endure lots of hours on the road, lots of time away from the family, and lots of criticism.

I respect people who run for office regardless of political affiliation. They are, for the most part, good people with good intentions.

After all that hard campaigning, though, it's hard to face the prospect of losing. That's why good people often resort to bad campaign tactics. They are road weary and don't want all their efforts to go for naught. I've no doubt that there are candidates who, after getting some rest following a loss, regretted the personal choices that couldn't be withdrawn.

A scan of "RealClearPolitics" this morning reveals two desperation tactics; In Virginia, the trailing candidate is attacking his opponent as "anti-woman" due to a dissertation written 20 years ago; and in New Jersey, David Broder deplores the "fat boy" ploy.

Iowa voters rejected that ploy in 2004, when an opponent of Congressman Leonard Boswell okayed an ad depicting Boswell as an overweight baseball player striking out at the plate.

Obama...Nobel Peace Prize...Shock...Etc

2009-10-10T06:56:00.005-05:00

Tara and I are Internet addicts. I often don't blog on the "hottest topic of the day" because, after I've read so many posts on the topic--I don't have more to say.

So no post yesterday on President Obama's Nobel Prize win. I will say that Tara (a fervent Obama supporter) did call me early yesterday and beat everyone in the blogosphere in suggesting that the best strategy for the Prez was to decline it.

Dear Mr. President: Tara would take your call if you'd like to replace any of your current crop of advisers with one competent person.

I'll link to my favorite post: former Clinton speechwriter Mark Katz begins to draft acceptance remarks for future awards to our current President--including the Heisman and the Golden Obama.

Liveblogging Swine Flu.

2009-10-09T15:15:00.003-05:00

First off, I had it this week. Second, I am no longer contagious (at least according to my doctor). Third, everyone still appears to be terrified of me anyway.

So here's my after-the-fact swine flu "still alive-blog" report:

1. I felt sniffly and sneezy for a day or two last week. I thought I was getting a cold. By Friday, I felt feverish but not too terrible.

2. By Sunday afternoon, I felt awful. Fever was around 101 degrees. I was achy and alternating between sweating and chills. It felt like the flu, but not like a special, trendy kind of flu.

3. On Monday, I went to the doctor. I had to go in the back door of the clinic (there was a sign on the front door telling anyone with a fever to go around back). The nurse didn't touch me, but put me into an isolation room. Jeff and I joked that we expected the white-suited guys from "E.T." to appear. My doctor was sweet, as usual, and after asking me a bunch of questions, asked the one that made no sense: "Do your eyes hurt?" "OH MY GOD YES, MY EYES ARE KILLING ME." "You have H1N1."

4. I didn't get medicines. Neither did Jeff or our daughter. I went home and slept. I was told two important things: first, to stay home until I had been fever-free for 24 hours, and second, to watch out for respiratory complications. Apparently, this flu (more than the regular seasonal variety) tends to lead into secondary infections in the lungs--in other words, pneumonia.

5. The fever went away a day or so later, and I went back to work. Everyone at work was afraid of me. My pregnant colleague got Tamiflu. And my lungs started to feel raspy and crackly.

6. I went back to the doctor, who decided that I needed antibiotics to kick any lingering lung infection. I'm a couple of days into a course of antibiotics, and aside from a powerful cough, I feel like I am on the mend.

The bottom line? Not the worst I've ever felt, and as my doctor said, now I get the "I survived Swine Flu 2009" t-shirt. But still...wash your hands and don't cough on people!

Here's another account of swine flu (it sounds like a worse case than mine), by Lindsey Robinson at New York Magazine.

A Novel Idea: Reading The Bill

2009-10-07T11:05:00.000-05:00

Moderate Democrats are asking Senate leader Harry Reid to give the public 72 hours to actually read the health care bill before a vote is taken.

I've seen the polling measuring the support/opposition to so-called "Obamacare." But do we all know what's really in the final proposal? For that matter, does President Obama?

Yes, I know the 72 hours gives people time to ramp up the opposition after discovering items like the "mommy tax." I'd rather know in advance what's going to be happening to me. I don't want to find out when I attempt to see my doctor.

Or are some Congressman afraid that we'll find out that the staffers write and read all the bills for them?

Let It Snow...Let It Snow...

2009-10-07T10:56:00.002-05:00

An Idaho school district records the earliest snow day in its history...

A Colorado ski resort boasts its earliest opening day in its history...

Approval Of Congress: 21%

2009-10-07T09:18:00.000-05:00

Approval of Congress is down to 21% (Glenn Reynolds jokes "there are 21% WHO APPROVE?").

As a partisan activist, I don't pay attention to the Republican or Democratic numbers in these polls. Republicans heavily disapprove of a Democratic Congress; Democrats are angry about inaction on Democratic priorities.

It's the independents that draw my interest. They bring about change at the ballot box. The approval rating for Congress among indys is 16%, down from 23% from last month.

How to appeal to these voters? Glenn Greenwald at Salon.com says look to the tea party movement. Greenwald looks past the accusations of Obama-hatin' and racism to see a movement that defies conventional political definition.

...they're the by-product of a completely different dichotomy that is growing in importance: between system insiders and their admirers (those who believe our national political establishment and its elites are basically sound and good) and system outsiders (those whose anger is confined not to one of the two political parties but who instead believe that the political culture itself is fundamentally corrupted and destructive). There are people typically identified as members of either the conventional Right or Left who are, in fact, more accurately described as being in this latter group: those disenchanted with the political culture itself. Anger over the Wall Street bailout and corporate excesses was one example where that trans-partisan disenchantment was evident.

Greenwald says that Republicans are having trouble cashing in on this movement because many GOPers are just now being "born again" to the limited government movement. If the Republican party expands governmental reach while it is in power (just in different ways than Democrats), a frustrated amalgamation of right and left wingers form a completely separate "leave me and my money alone" coalition.

It's hard to see...given the partisan natures of our primary contests...how candidates are going to emerge from either party that will win the support of this constituency.

Pawlenty And Biden Are The Big Fall Speakers

2009-10-07T08:55:00.000-05:00

The Iowa political parties are among the biggest benefactors of the state's "first-in-the-nation" caucus status. The stars come out for the big fall fund-raisers.

The Democrats will host VP Joe Biden for their annual Jefferson-Jackson event on November 27. Worldwide readers will recall that this is the dinner in which Barack Obama stole Hillary Clinton's mojo and never gave it back.

In the meantime, presidential hopeful Tim Pawlenty will headline the Iowa GOP's fall event on November 7. I've seen him speak and he is eminently likable and delivers a populist message.

Good Films Ruined Then Saved!

2009-10-06T11:56:00.000-05:00

I must have had visions of apocalypse dancing in my head on Monday, as I watched "Blade Runner" and "I Am Legend" in high-def.

Studio changes to "Blade Runner" practically ruined the film. When first released, studio execs insisted on voice over narration (they were afraid that the film was too confusing for the common folk, i.e., everyone but them) and a happier ending. The studio also insisted on editing scenes out of the film meant to prompt audience debate over whether the lead character was a robot but unaware of it--again, the studio folks thought the viewer would be too confused by the inference.

Happily, Ridley Scott's intended version of the film is now what shows on television--and, as Roger Ebert says, it's a movie that's influenced every sci-fi film that's come after it.

A film's ending can completely make or break a movie. I believe the greatness of the movie "The Wrestler" was affirmed by how it ended; similarly, the "badness" of "I Am Legend" was confirmed by the generic Hollywood happy ending. I was already predisposed to not like "I Am Legend" because I love the original film, "The Omega Man", so much. I solidified my poor feelings for "Legend" when reading about the alternate ending that was jettisoned.

I believe I actually would have liked "I Am Legend" had they kept the more profound final scene. Watch it here.

Holiday Sales To Be Not SO Sucky

2009-10-06T09:27:00.000-05:00

October 1 also kicks off the holiday season for me. I love the constant anticipation of holiday fun: halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's. I'll break out the Christmas music during the week of Halloween (earlier if it snows!).

Merchants are looking forward to this holiday season...er...sorta. At least "the slump will be less grim..." and I guess that's making the best of it!

Christopher Hitchens On Monty Python

2009-10-06T09:24:00.000-05:00

It's been 40 years since the first Monty Python broadcast. Christopher Hitchens pays tribute. He points out that we can no longer imagine a world without Python references.

I discovered Python when PBS in St. Louis aired "Monty Python And The Holy Grail" late night--so that they could (mostly) show it uncensored. It wasn't long before everyone in my high school was referencing it. A particular gift wrought by the invention of the DVD: I own all their episodes and almost all their movies.

And now son Logan is a big fan, too. This stuff is timeless.

P.S. If you'll look to the right of the article, a couple of clicks will take you to pictorials featuring Shakira and Penelope Cruz. And then your day is complete.