Three Wise Men

Score another House seat for Dems

2008-05-13T21:39:00.003-05:00

Yes, Democrats won another House special election in a solid Republican district. Congratulations to Rep.-elect Travis Childers of Mississippi's first district. Democrats now have a 236-199 advantage in the U.S. House, having started the cycle 233-202.

Childers defeated Republican Greg Davis in a special election to fill the final few months of a two-year term in Congress. The seat was vacated when Roger Wicker was appointed to the U.S. Senate after Trent Lott resigned. The NRCC spent over $1.3 million in this race. Turnout may end up exceeding 100,000 when all is said and done.

Just another good sign for Dems in the fall.

Don't worry, TWM is not dead

2008-05-10T18:08:00.002-05:00

Just lots of stuff going on. In the meanwhile, read some interesting news.

Washington Post's coverage of the global food crisis.

North Texas Elections

Brain Weapons

Circuit City sells out

Check back later for more real updates.

Democrats win yet another House seat

2008-05-04T01:55:00.003-05:00

While the presidential race looks 50/50 right now between McCain and Obama/Clinton, this continues to look like a blowout year for Democrats in Congress. Democrat Don Cazayoux won a special congressional election in Louisiana by taking a seat Republicans have held since 1974. Democrats now have a 235-199 advantage in the U.S. House, having started the cycle 233-202.

Capitol Hill Update V

2008-05-02T23:42:00.003-05:00

Both chambers of Congress and President Bush gave approval to legislation this week aimed at ensuring the problems in the credit markets don't prevent students from getting college loans by, for one, increasing the limit on how much borrowers can receive in federally subsidized student loans.

Congress also approved a bill, which Bush will sign, that bans employers and insurance companies from using genetic tests showing people are at risk of developing cancer, heart disease or other ailments to reject their job applications, promotions or health care coverage, or in setting premiums.

The Battle for History

2008-04-30T11:27:00.003-05:00

If you know anything about history (the subject, not specific facts of) you know that the study of history ("historiography") has long been defined by academics by the understanding of the works of two of the world's greatest historians, Herodotus' "The Histories" and Thucydides' "History of the Peloponnesian War." Anyone who has taken a college course on world history has probably heard the now long accepted tenet that both works represented two very different approaches to history, with Herodotus representing the "narrative" (and hence unreliable) style which seeks to survey history as widely as possible and where the author makes few judgments about what is or isn't reliable, authoritative or authentic. The work of Thucydides has come to represent the opposite approach, the neutral and "scientific" study of history where the historian seeks to understand all sides of a historical question and makes judgments about what is or is not reliable, leading the student or reader to natural conclusions regarding an historical event. Of course, as with any explanation or analogy that provides or easily leads to a "black and white" understanding, the truth is more nuanced. An effort has been underway for decades now to ressurect the reputation of Herodotus as a true historian, as well as to shine some light on the true nature of Thucydides' work. A new review by Peter Green in the New York Review of Books cast some light on both of these trends. The study of history has itself evolved over the last hundred or so years, and surprisingly, modern methods have come to mirror the approach of Herodotus:

That current trends in historiography echo, to a quite remarkable extent, the methods and assumptions of Herodotus is undeniable. The widespread use of social and ethnographic anthropology as an investigative tool is only the most obvious instance. Herodotus' observations about different customs and cultures—which in fact take up the greater part of the first half of the Histories, as he surveyed the various regions of the Persian empire—make him a groundbreaking anthropologist. Personal motivation (as opposed to abstract trends) and the influence of women in public affairs are very much back in the picture. The new understanding of oral transmission provides a satisfying answer to those who dismissed Herodotean anecdotes as mere crowd-pleasing digressions, and sheds fresh light on his careful evidential distinction between seeing (opsis) and hearsay (akoê). Many of the Persians, despite belonging to the Barbarian Other, come off with honor and dignity in his pages, even during the final narrative of Xerxes' invasion. Such insatiable and open-minded curiosity about the unfamiliar, including one's (undemonized) enemies, got him labeled philobarbaros by Plutarch, but today counts strongly in his favor.

In other words, an ethnographic approach to history that was dismissed as unreliable in college courses I took only ten years ago, has actually in recent decades become a valuable tool to modern historians (as it should, as in truth historians and anthropologists study the same thing, only at different times.)

Academics, for all the criticism about their lives in crystal towers above the frays of modern men and women, are actually extremely sensitive to political changes (as they are either in the leading forefront of such change, the elite of conventional political society, or the victims of political change.) Thucydides approach to history, with his focus on war as the dynamic for change and the central role of "great men" of history, was appealing to the imperalists and monarchists historians and philosophers of the 17th, 18th and 19th centures:

During the past half-century, however, Thucydides' almost superhuman reputation has come under severe critical scrutiny, while Herodotus' stock has correspondingly risen—a fact to which Robert Strassler's new Landmark volume of translation and commentary bears substantial witness. The change does little more than belatedly reflect a fundamental revolution in Western cultural values that has taken place during the last two hundred years. Greece, in particular the Athenian democratic ideal, only came to be privileged over Rome after the Greek, French, and American revolutions gave imperialism a decidedly shopworn look. Thucydides' main virtue for the seventeenth-century monarchist Thomas Hobbes had been that "he made me realize how silly is democracy." (This is hardly surprising. For true democracy Thucydides had no more time than did that aristocratic intellectual Plato; he welcomed the authoritarianism implicit in Pericles' de facto rule as first citizen, and his favorite acknowledged form of government was in fact a limited oligarchy.) The swing toward idealistic republicanism was further developed in the English-speaking world by the banker George Grote's unprecedentedly liberal History of Greece, published in twelve volumes between 1846 and 1856, which praised not only democracy but the Sophists as the true heralds of freedom.

This was the most radical change in Western assumptions about the ancient world since the Renaissance, and it prepared the ground for many other changes. Alexander the Great, for example, hitherto looked up to as the imperialist conqueror par excellence, now had to have his career of conquest explained and justified as a crusade designed to bring Hellenic culture to the benighted East (Victorian missionary work in Africa and Polynesia helped to support this view of him). The century-long struggle by feminists from the suffragette movement onward meant that eventually their automatic exclusion from the Thucydidean historiographical canon would be seriously questioned. Later still, first post-colonialism and then globalization meant a vast change—not always appreciated for what it was, or even, sometimes, noticed—in assumptions made about both other nations and one's own when studying the historical evolution of ancient society.

So, as our political climate changes, so too does the political thought of the academics changes. As the History Channel is a testement to, the preferred focus of the amateur (and presumably male) historian is on war and the power of individual men to sway the course of world events. But as academics have come to realize, great change in the world can be bred in the smallest of events involving (presumably) the least signficant of people, and war is frequently less a harbinger of change than a response to it. Herodotus, with his explorations of custom, his broad and all inclusive approach to history, and his unwillingness to provide conclusions for the reader (neutrality has long been lauded but seldom practiced by historians who, armed with the completeness of their knowledge and the confidence of their intellectual prowess, have usually been more than willing to arrive at conclusions for their students and readers) now suddenly is the inspiration for the approach of modern historians.

The Food Crisis

2008-04-30T11:15:00.002-05:00

The global food crisis is shaping up to be a huge problem. It threatens to substantially raise grocery bills in wealthy countries such as our own, but it also threatens to send millions of the world's poorest into malnutrition and starvation. And yet you won't hear much about it on the news networks, even though it has been perpetuated by American food and energy policies and will impact us quite directly. That's almost certainly because it's a complicated problem with no easy answers, and no easy targets for blame. But while our talking heads may wallow breezily in their ignorance, you and I have no such excuse. In that vein, I highly recommend this excellent series by the Washington Post on the food crisis; how it happened, what it means, and how it's effecting people the world over, from bagel producers on the East Coast to poor families in Mauritania. Read it and inform yourself as best you can, because it's a problem we're going to be dealing with for years to come and our only hope is to spur our normally pandering Congressmen and women to take what actions we can take to alleviate the problem.

Mavs Out

2008-04-30T08:31:00.010-05:00

The inevitable was made certain last night, as the New Orleans Hornets eliminated the Dallas Mavericks in five games, beating them 99-94. It's not as if this was an unexpected result of course. But nothing was sadder than watching this team trudge off the floor last night. Last season's loss to Golden State was more of a shock than anything else, but the loss last night presages fundamental changes in this team leaves one wondering exactly who will be in a uniform and on the bench next season. Mark Cuban, Donn Nelson and Avery Johnson have tinkered with this team the last several seasons, but without question this team has the indelible mark of Don Nelson all over it. That era is in all likelihood over.

There are many, many things wrong with this team and I don't have much to contribute to that discussion. But this morning on the way in to work I heard local sports man Craig Miller at the Ticket, opining that what's fundamentally wrong with this team is that they've never had a true defensive (or offensive for that matter) center, and they have a power forward in Dirk Nowitzki who can't be counted on to stop the other team's power forwards (or anyone else for that matter) and that such a situation has never resulted in an NBA championship for any team (and he listed off several examples of teams with strong defensive power forwards and centers who've won championships, going all the way back to the late 80's...which actually, would be every team that's won a championship going all the way back to the late 80's.) That makes a lot of sense, given that the Mavs have struggled in any incarnation beginning the Finals against the Heat, when they proved incapable of stopping Dwayne Wade from getting to the rim. Such defensive failings are a holdover from the Don Nelson era, but a lot of people (myself included) thought that was merely at attitude that had to be beaten out of the Mavs and that Avery Johnson was just the man to do the beating. And there can be no arguing that he did just that last season; nobody wins 67 games with poor defense. But I think time and age finally caught up to the Mavs, thus making it impossible to disguise their central defensive weakness, which is that other teams can score on the Mavs in the paint, but the Mavs can't score on anybody else in the paint. Of that material, repeated first round exits are made.

That conversation reminded me of a related thought I've had in the past. Dirk took a lot of the blame for the first-round exist last season, but I always thought that blame was misplaced. Yes he struggled somewhat to get the ball into the hands of his teammates when he was double and triple-teamed, but the only reason GS got away with that is because his teammates repeatedly failed to punish Golden State when they had the ball. Dirk was asked to get the Mavs past Golden State on his own, and he couldn't deliver. Which led to an off-season of talk about how Dirk had to learn to distribute the ball, which followed the prior off-season of Dirk learning how to post up, which followed an off-season of Dirk learning how to play better defense. So this post-season Dirk plays respectable defense (as best as a 7-foot power forward probably can) gets to the rim repeatedly, rebounds and distributes the ball effectively...and the Mavs still lose. I think this has led a few people to realize that Dirk is not the problem, and that repeatedly asking him to do things he can't do is not going to take this team to the finals again. Dirk is their superstar players, and this team should be designed around him. Why is he asked time and time again to alter his game, to fit into Avery Johnson's system, or to build a "complete" game? Dirk is what he is; an extremely talented big man who can get to the rim in the right scheme, or who can punish opponents with his outside shooting. He creates hellacious match-up problems for the other team when he's used appropriately (and his teammates can be bothered to score), he's a fantastic rebounder and he's a more than adequate passer of the ball, but he needs a little help on defense. This is what he is, and this team should reflect that or he should be traded to a team that can put him in a position to win. The prime of his career is being wasted on the Mavericks.

Hardly anyone thinks Dirk is going anywhere. But can Cuban put together a team built for his superstar, or is it another off-season of the best short-term fixes they can come up with?

UPDATE: I'm not the only one who feels this way. Here's Mike Fisher of DallasBasketball.com:

RE-WIRING: Avery’s attempts to make Dirk “more Duncan-like’’ (a phrase used derisively by Mavs staffers) and to “re-wire’’ Kidd (Kidd’s own words) speak to the coach’s mindset: Mold star athletes around the coach’s style and strengths, rather than molding the coach around the star athletes’ style and strengths.

What this team needs more than anything is a coach who can win with what he's got.

UPDATE II: And here's your condumdrum for the day. Would you rather have Dallas' problems, or Phoenix's?

UPDATE III: And Avery Johnson is gone. Incredible; in the span of less than two years, he goes from coach of the year and the coach of team heading to the finals, to ousted after another first round loss. How different would things be but for Game 3 against the Heat?

UPDATE IV: Players are certain to follow Avery out the door. Who should be the next ran out of town on a rail? I nominate birthday boy Josh Howard.

FLDS Way of Life a "Danger"

2008-04-28T10:02:00.003-05:00

Or so the State of Texas appears to be prepared to argue (via the Local Crank):

In the immediate sense, the raid may have happened because of a hoax. Telephone calls reporting abuse at the ranch have been linked to a woman in Colorado with an alleged history of false abuse complaints.

But both Texas and the polygamists had been courting a confrontation. Under "prophet" Warren Jeffs -- now in jail in Arizona -- the fundamentalist sect seemed to be ordering more underage marriages. And a West Texas representative sponsored a bill in 2005 that set new laws seemingly targeted at polygamists.

Here in Eldorado, the small town closest to the compound, residents still say they're glad the raid happened.

"It's not legal, and it's wrong, the way they were living," said Rosa Martinez, behind the counter at her Rosita's Casita restaurant.

But legal experts say the case could easily become a quagmire. They say Texas has an unusual burden: It has to prove not spankings or sexual abuse, but the dangers of an entire belief system.

"Can they say with a straight face that's in the best interest of these children, to be taken away from their parents?" asked Ken Driggs, a public defender in Georgia who has done extensive research on polygamy and the law. "Does government want to get in there and say, 'This is a good religion,' or 'This is not a good religion?' "

The answer to that question is obviously no, but of course that won't stop authorities in our great state. The question for me of course is whether the raid was prompted in part by religious prejudice, or whether authorities will settle for religion as the rationale for the raid when their other justifications fall apart. If they find little to no evidence of sexual, emotional or physical abuse, what else can they put on trial but the FLDS way of life? It's either that or back down, and we don't back down in our great state.

This is where conservatism in Texas runs runs into a condundrum. Religious conservatives would love nothing more than to shut the FLDS down and run them out of the state, but as the story gains national awareness it will become evident that FLDS members adhere to a lifestyle that, but for the polygamy, religious conservatives claim to value (Scott Henson explains in more detail.)And it will become evident even in most dimly-lit and prejudice wracked religious conservative brain that putting somebody on trial for their deeply-religious and Christian-like lifestyle is a little too much like putting fundamentalist Christians on trial for their parental decisions (like home-schooling.)

I don't agree with the FLDS way of life, but neither do I agree with the decision of fundamentalist Christians to teach their kids at home and indoctrinate with anti-science dogma disguised as religious freedom. But above all I think people should be allowed to live and raise their children as they see fit so long as they don't harm them physically or psychologically, no matter how unusual or strange their customs may seem to the rest of us. If Texas really wants to put the FLDS way of life on trial, then our whole state will lose.

Texas Blogger Round-Up 4/28

2008-04-28T08:22:00.001-05:00

North Texas Liberal analyzed the arguments from Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Flower Mound, and Newt Gingrich in favor of the flat tax. See our conclusions here.

The Commissioner of the General Land Office of Texas is a monumental ass. PDiddie of Brains and Eggs has the dirty details in "Discussted".

Gary at Easter Lemming Liberal News informed his readers about the local elections and other events taking place in a Local Early Voting Edition.

WCNews at Eye On Williamson has This Week's Transportation Wrap-Up.

WhosPlayin resumes his watch on GOP Congressman Michael Burgess, and joins North Texas Liberal in rejecting his "flat tax" proposal as a tax increase on the middle class.

Hal at Half Empty wonders why Texas' junior senator, John Cornyn, doesn't support our troops.

Over at McBlogger, Captain Kroc has a real problem with some of the concessions the City made to a certain developer looking to build condos on Lake Lady Bird.

The Texas Cloverleaf promotes a story about more shenanigans in the Texas Youth Commission, this time forcing a Denton County superintendent to quit before she is fired.

Last week, KUHT (PBS Channel 8) in Houston ran a special on immigration and public attitudes towards it called Houston Have Your Say, which included public officials, activists, ordinary citizens, and a couple of bloggers. Off the Kuff was one of those bloggers, and he wrote about his impressions here.

Vince at Capitol Annex notes that the Texas Association of Business is calling for education reform and wonders if anyone else sees the hypocrisy in that situation.

BossKitty at BlueBloggin looks at yet another VA screw up and continues to ignore the welfare of our troops in the VA Caught In Suicide Coverup.

Capitol Hill Update IV

2008-04-25T17:49:00.004-05:00

The Senate voted 95-0 to send the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act, which prohibits people from being fired based on their DNA, back to the House, which could approve it early next week. President Bush supports the legislation. The Senate also approved legislation that would increase veterans' benefits and establish pensions for Filipinos who served alongside Americans in World War II, 96-1. Bush has not said he would veto the bill. Senate Republicans killed a bill that would have removed limits on how long workers can wait before suing their employers for pay discrimination. Lastly, the Senate passed by a voice vote a bill to shield inspectors general from undue influence by the government agencies they are charged with investigating and makes reports and audits more accessible to the public, but it is watered down from the House version and faces a veto.

The House, meanwhile, passed bills to make the Coast Guard enforce security zones around eight liquefied natural gas terminals and any arriving tankers and to delay for a year the implementation of regulations affecting Medicaid programs (both opposed by the Bush administration).

Finally, Congressional negotiators reached a tentative deal today on the farm bill.

FLDS Compound Raid Fallout Worsens

2008-04-25T13:17:00.005-05:00

I hadn't kept up with the story of the raid of the FLDS compound in Eldorado, a small town near San Angelo in West Central Texas. But the more I read about it, the worse it looks for law enforcement officials who are presently separating children from the mothers and packing them off to various parts of the state, and who's high profile informant whose accusations led to the raid now turns out to be a mentally ill woman residing in Colorado. I'm not out to rush to defend this group because I have secret Mormon affiliations, but because it's utterly and absolutely wrong to take children away from their mothers and fathers based on the barest of evidence or prejudice about the lifestyles or religion of the parents.

For more information, I recommend fellow Texas blogger Scott Henson who's been following the story close.

Peace Agreement in Pakistan Imminent

2008-04-25T09:21:00.002-05:00

The government of Pakistan is apparently very near to agreeing to a peace deal with Taliban miltiants in Pakistan's western provinces:

A 15-point draft of the accord, which was shown to The New York Times, called for an end to militant activity and an exchange of prisoners in return for the gradual withdrawal of the Pakistani military from part of the tribal region of South Waziristan.

Even as the accord, a far-reaching draft that essentially forbids the tribes from engaging in nearly all illegal actions, was being negotiated by the government through tribal elders, the militant leader, Baitullah Mehsud, ordered his fighters to cease their activities in the tribal regions as well as the adjoining North-West Frontier Province, warning of strict punishment of any violators.

According to the draft document, the deal would be signed between the political administrator of South Waziristan and the tribal elders of the Mehsud tribes there.

It would require the Mehsud tribes to cease attacks and stop kidnapping military and government officials, to open all roads and to allow freedom of movement to the Frontier Corps, the local security force. They would also promise not to carry out terrorist acts in Pakistan, including the tribal regions, and not to assist others in attacks, or allow their territory to be used for antistate activity.

The draft requires the Mehsuds to respect state authority and resolve any problems through the local political administration, which would respect local customs and cooperate with tribal elders. It also requires the Mehsuds to assist the government in development plans for the region.

It also requires the Mehsud tribes to expel all foreign militants from their territory and deny them shelter in the future. The document says that the expulsion of foreign militants would begin within one month of the signing of the agreement, but a month’s extension could be granted for good reason.

There is no mention of ending cross-border attacks in Afghanistan.

That's a slight problem for us, as we rely heavily on Pakistan's security forces to interfere with the operations of Taliban militants in Pakistan, as well as their movement across the border in Afghanistan to support the insurgency there. As you can imagine, American officials are none to happy to hear about this. But one unanswered question is to what degree we will be permitted to continue missile attacks (and other covert operations which are probably being carried out) in Pakistan. Is the government of Pakistan giving us a wink and a nod? Or are they telling the militants they have nothing to worry about?

Movie Reviews

2008-04-24T15:07:00.003-05:00

We don't do movie reviews on our blog (though perhaps we'll start now!) but all three of us are avid movie-goers, and I for one am an avid movie-review reader. I've always regarded the time I spend sitting in a theater as precious and the experience of watching a bad movie as hateful, so I read movie reviews not only to learn about various movies that I probably won't go see, but most especially to read about movies I'm thinking about seeing so I can decide if they are worth my time and money. Of course, movie reviews (like all acts of criticism) are famously subjective and I find myself reading between the lines trying to figure out if something the critic hated is something I'll like (or vice versa.) In this vein, Scott Adams (via Andrew Sullivan) proposes a new system of movie reviews that will actually tell you something concrete about the movie you're thinking of seeing and whether it's worth your time or money. Here are some of his categories:

For example, I want to know if a movie has a happy ending, even at the risk of ruining the surprise. Is the arc of happiness something that starts high, dips for dramatic impact then ends on a high note? Or does it start high and just keep dropping until the movie ends and you want to swallow a bottle of sleeping pills? So I recommend an arc description, such as this example:

Arc: High – Low – High

Next, I need to know the mumbling quotient. How many times do you have to turn to the person next to you and ask “What did he say?”

Mumbling Quotient: 7

And how long is this movie? Can my bladder make it all the way or is this a two-pisser?

I have a hard time with any movie with a plot so complicated I can’t understand it. I have a right to know ahead of time whether I will be able to decipher the story I am paying to see.

Incomprensibility: 4

Given how loud movies are these days I don't generally worrying about mumbling (even with my hearing as bad as my wife says it is) but I certainly would like to know how much of my soda it is advisable to drink before the movie even begins. Also, I would add in a category for movie adaptations of books that would tell you how much the movie deviates from the storyline of the book, but that might be a personal quirk.

Would Hillary Lose the Black Vote?

2008-04-24T09:08:00.002-05:00

There are a lot of arguments against the super-delegates handing Hillary the nomination at the close of the primaries if she continues to trail in the delegate and popular vote totals (as she is likely to.) But according to Michael Dawson, another might be the loss of the black vote if insider shenanigans are seen to rob Obama of the nomination:

A "prominent Republican" interviewed for the story claimed that Obama's biggest weakness was that he was black and therefore had a significant percentage of the November electorate already predisposed against him. Such glaring numbers may persuade still uncommitted superdelegates that Obama is unelectable in November.

Should that happen, the Democratic Party will face the Herculean task of trying to mobilize its most loyal constituency – black voters -- in the face of deep and widespread black bitterness and active campaigns in the black community encouraging black voters to defect or abstain. You can already hear the angry comparisons. Just like in 2000, the protests will go, an election will have been "stolen." But this time from within the party! Malcolm X's quote about how the rules are changed when blacks start to succeed will also, I bet, be prominently displayed.

Many will argue that if a candidate with as much multi-racial appeal as Obama cannot be treated fairly, then there is truly no hope of any black in the U.S. (with perhaps the exception of a black Republican) to win the nation's top office in the foreseeable future. My own prediction, should we head down this road, is that the already worrying statistic of 79 percent of blacks who believe that racial equality for blacks will either not be achieved in their lifetime or at all in the U.S. will jump to an even larger percentage (see my website for how this percentage has changed over the past few years). Should this happen, Democrats would risk losing traditionally safe states with large black populations, leaving them with amuch more difficult, perhaps impossible, road to victory.

I have no doubt in my mind that if Obama fails to win the nomination thanks to the super-delegates, many voters of all colors will be furious. But black voters in particular would be likely to take it as a sucker punch to the gut. I don't know how many of them would stay home though. Black voters are in the same position as conservative evangelicals are in the Republican Party; complain though they may, they have nowhere else to go (though of course, conservative evangelicals have considerably more power within their party than blacks do within theirs.) But might they stay home in significant enough numbers to cost Obama electoral votes in close states? Perhaps. Would they be wrong to do so? Not in their minds, since they'd probably feel the Democratic Party no longer represents them. Who could convincingly argue that they'd be wrong?

PETA's Prize for Fake Meat

2008-04-24T08:53:00.003-05:00

PETA is now offering a $1 million to anyone who can produce "commercially viable" fake meat:

The organization said it would announce plans on Monday for a $1 million prize to the “first person to come up with a method to produce commercially viable quantities of in vitro meat at competitive prices by 2012.”

The NY Times article is mainly about the controversy within the organization over fake meat. That there even was a controversy is ridiculous, but apparently there are those within the organization who think that even vat grown meat treads too closely to the consumption of live animals. But the real issue appears to be the qualifications that PETA appended to the competition. What does the language above mean? Daniel Engber explains:

So what's wrong with the PETA prize? You need to sell your product in order to win. According to the contest guidelines (PDF), the million-dollar meat must be available in stores to qualify for the cash. Fake-chicken entrepreneurs have to demonstrate a "commercial sales minimum" at a "comparable market price"; in plain English, they need to move 2,000 pounds of the stuff at supermarkets and chain restaurants spread out across 10 states during a period of three months. And the Franken-meat can't cost more than regular chicken.

That means PETA won't be content with any intermediate (and not immediately profitable) breakthrough, like the development of lab-grown chicken that tastes as good as the natural stuff. Instead, the organization will hold the purse until a "commercially viable" product hits the market. In other words, you can't win the $1 million unless you're already in position to make a profit. At that point, a science prize doesn't provide much incentive for innovation. It's more like a small bonus.

To make matters worse, PETA's commercial requirements saddle researchers with demands that have nothing to do with science. Any company that wants to sell artificial chicken for public consumption will probably face a lengthy government-review process. Consider that it took five years for the Food and Drug Administration to approve the sale of cloned meat. Let's say you invented a perfect chicken substitute tomorrow—something so delicious and inexpensive that it could go into production right away. Even then, you still might not make the PETA deadlne for market sales.

So in other words, the blockheads at PETA have made it difficult, if not impossible, for anyone to actually win this prize. Researchers, seeing that for themselves, will have no motivation to try to win it. Here's a quote from the NY Times article:

Another scientist at Utrecht, Bernard Roelen, said via e-mail that he was “rather surprised” by news of the competition, but said that even with strong financing, it would be extremely difficult to produce commercially viable quantities of in vitro meat before 2012. Professor Roelen added, “For me as a researcher, the announcement does not mean so much.”

Many animal rights activists (including myself) have long been critical of PETA for their publicity stunts and an in-your-face approach that only discourages people from paying attention to the plight of animals. I thought this prize might be a step in a more practical direction, but instead it appears to be more about getting attention for PETA and less about actually doing anything to help the millions of animals we consume each year. Too bad.

And Now For Some Good News

2008-04-23T14:21:00.003-05:00

The Mavericks are provoking much rending of clothes and gnashing of teeth, but there are a couple of bright lights in Dallas these days. The Dallas Stars finished off the Mighty Ducks in six games and are onto battle the San Jose Sharks in the second round of the NHL playoffs. FC Dallas, who take on the New England Revolution tomorrow night, have won two and tied two in their first four games to retain the only unbeaten record in the MLS, and their two wins have come in two consecutive and solid performances. Also, the Cowboys have a draft coming up so that's always nice, right?

Of course, in the meantime the Texas Rangers are challenging their legendary reputation for mediocrity by tanking so early in the season that it's a surprise even to long-suffering Rangers fans (but if you think Rangers fans are mad, see the fans of Hicks newest toy Liverpool FC who hate Rangers owner Tom Hicks with such passion that local police have begged Hicks to stay away from Liverpool games because they can't guarantee his safety.) But 3 out of 5 non-horrible storylines ain't bad, right?

It's Over

2008-04-23T11:28:00.003-05:00

Look, I know it's only the second game of what could ostensibly be a seven game series, but barring an incredible playoff turn-around (the likes of which this team has not shown themselves capable of doing in two consecutive playoff performances) the contest between the Dallas Mavericks and the New Orleans Hornets is over. Lest you think I'm knee-jerking, I shall inform you that I am actually a fairly reasonable Mavs fan and that other similarly reasonable fans agree with me. Fans with more tender hearts or less patience are currently contemplating jumping off of a tall bridge over the Trinity River and taking Avery Johnson, Josh Howard, Jerry Stackhouse and assorted other players (Dirk or Kidd, depending on who they think is to blame for this mess) with them. If you add up the collective fan "wisdom" the only member of this organization qualified to return next year is Mavs Man.

I love this team but God help 'em, they somehow managed to get worse after the Kidd trade. It's beyond absurd to think that Harris and Diop were the only things holding this team together, but if there is an explanation for how this team has fallen so far in short a period of time the nobody knows what it is (least of all Avery Johnson or Mark Cuban.) This team is so bad they've somehow managed to make Jason Kidd, a future hall-of-famer, look only like one of the 15 best point guards in the league (and not near the top of that list.)

Of course, a lot of people want to pin this on Dirk or Avery. Of course, being as they are the superstar and the coach, they're the easiest pickings for the psychological and cliche-ridden explanations for this team's failings (see this blog's comments for what I'm talking about.) Also, those people don't know a damn thing about basketball and think that if a coach or a player fails it's entirely about the size of their balls. That's ridiculous of course. But something isn't working, and since the problem is so vast it's difficult to understand how anything but an incredible psychological meltdown is responsible for the recent turn of events. Of course, just as with Golden State, there are legitimate basketball explanations for why Dallas is struggling to deal with New Orleans, but even the experts who closely follow this game have questions for which there are simply no answers.

As I said there are fans who'd like to throw Dirk under the bus and then back it over him a few times, apparently for his inability to single-handedly win a championship ring while carrying a roster of under-performing veterans on his back. But even Kobe Bryant couldn't do that. One of Kobe's greatest performances, scoring 62 points in three quarters (against who else, the Mavericks) came in the midst of a disappointing and sub-par season. And Dirk has been nothing but a German God of Thunder since Kidd got here, raising his points and assist totals and coming back in two weeks from an injury that would've put most NBA ballers on the bench for six weeks. Dirk is not the problem.

So what's my recommendation? Nobody's asking, but it's the same as it was after the Golden State debacle. Blow the team up. Fire Avery, and get rid of as many players as possible who are not named Kidd, Dirk or Dampier. Avery appears to have been consistently out-coached, and despite all his harping appears to have lost his team. The team's other star players seem to no longer respond to their coach, and go inexplicably quiet when they're needed the most, and those are two pretty good reasons alone to get rid of them. Yes, I know Kidd is likely to be around for only another year and he's only getting older even if he does stick around, but is anybody interested in watching this team limp to another 50+ game season and another exit in the first round of the playoffs? I'm not. And it's not as if the Western Conferance is going to get any worse next season, or the Mavs would be in position to win the finals even if it did.

It is my sincerest hope that in another couple of months I'm eating these words as the Mavs are lifting the trophy over their heads and planning their parade. Also, I hope to win a million dollars, grow wings and learn to read minds. Frankly, the latter are far more likely than the former.

Al Qaeda 2.0

2008-04-23T09:16:00.002-05:00

Via Kevin Drum, this article by Daniel Kimmage about al Qaeda's slightly old-fashioned method of information distribution via the internet really is interesting, but we should remember that al Qaeda's success or failure will be premised on real world operations. A spectacular attack will do more to recruit followers than "user-generated content", and real-world setbacks cannot be made up for by any number of internet marketing techniques.

Capitol Hill Update III

2008-04-19T09:47:00.003-05:00

The House of Representatives passed the Jubilee Act, 285-132, which expands by some 25 countries the list of those poorest states eligible for debt relief, allowing them to divert scarce resources from loan repayment to health and education programs. The White House opposes the bill, but has not issues a veto threat. The House also overwhelmingly approved, 383-27, a bill calling for federal intervention to stabilize the student loan market amid turmoil brought on by the mortgage crisis. A bill similar to the House's is pending in the Senate, and the White House has voiced support for many of the provisions.

The Senate, meanwhile, voted 63-29 to direct the Justice Department to probe how a Florida road project made its way into a 2005 highway spending bill after the House and Senate voted on what lawmakers thought was the final version of the bill.

Apologies

2008-04-17T22:37:00.002-05:00

Apologies for the lack of blogging as of late. Our blog appears to have gone into a sort of hibernation, awakening only for a moment here and there to scratch oneself and belch out a short post. That mostly has to do with the fact that my personal and professional circumstances at the moment leave me little time to blog, and that my co-bloggers have about as much time to blog as they ever have. So we're sorry to our readers who find themselves without much to read these days, but hopefully circumstances will permit more comprehensive blogging at some point in the not-too-distant future.

Senate Outlook 2008

2008-04-13T21:40:00.003-05:00

Here's the latest skinny on the competitive races this year:

TOP TIER

Virginia - This is still the most clear pick-up opportunity for Democrats. Polls still show former Democratic governor Mark Warner beating Jim Gilmore, another former governor and presidential candidate (he dropped out awhile back), by large margins.

Warner could also help us win the state (which hasn't looked that red lately) for the presidential race. Bill Clinton was the last Democratic candidate to win the state. Should Warner win, we would have two Democratic senators from Virginia (the other is the ever-awesome Jim Webb, who won last year), a first since the 1970s. Sen. John Warner retiring was a godsend. The only downside is without Warner, there is no solid contender for the next governor's race right now, but I'd rather have another Senate seat.

New Mexico - Republican Reps. Heather Wilson and Steve Pearce have announced their candidacies (likely giving Democrats at least one pick-up in the House). On the Democratic side, Rep. Tom Udall is in and he beats both by double-digits in the polls that have been taken.

New Hampshire - Sen. John Snunu is a Republican in what has become a solid blue state since 2004 when Kerry won it after Gore hadn't. In 2006, Democrats took over the state legislature and Gov. John Lynch won with 70% of the vote. So, at the start, Snunu is in trouble. With popular former governor Jeanne Shaheen in the race, he's really in trouble. The last two Rasmussen polls show Shaheen leading Sununu 49% to 41%.

Colorado - We have a great candidate in Rep. Mark Udall (cousin of Tom Udall). Former Congressman Bob Schaffer is the Republican. Looks like a tight race, but Colorado has also been trending Democratic since 2004 when Ken Salazar won a Senate seat and we took over the legislature. In 2006, we took the governorship as well.

Minnesota - Polling also bears bad news for Sen. Norm Coleman, a Republican who won in this blue state solely because Paul Wellstone died in a plane crash a few weeks before the 2002 election (and he still only one by two points against former Vice President Walter Mondale). Al Franken, of "Saturday Night Live" and Air America Radio fame, is in a statistical tie with him.

Alaska - This one gets an upgrade. The latest Rasmussen Poll shows corrupt Republican Sen. Ted Stevens is also in a tie with Anchorage's mayor Mark Begich, the expected Dem candidate.

Oregon - Like Snunu, Sen. Gordon Smith is in the wrong party in the wrong state. This is one reason he has decided to support Democratic efforts to end the war in Iraq, unlike most of the rest of his colleagues right now. The current two Dem candidates running on our side are Jeff Merkley, the current Oregon House Speaker, and also grassroots activist Steve Novick. Smith is still running strong in polls, but he can definitely be beaten.

Maine - The last endangered blue state Republican on the list in Sen. Susan Collins who isn't quite as popular as the other senator from there, Olympia Snowe. Democratic House Rep Tom Allen is running and will definitely make this competitive. It could the be the Rhode Island (in which moderate Republican Sen. Chafee lost simply because he added to the GOP's numbers in the Senate caucus) of this year. Like Snunu, Smith, and Coleman, Collins will fall if Democrats sweep these races where the majority of Democrats and independents are sick of the Republican Party and the Iraq war, despite how well she is doing right now.

SLEEPER RACES

Kansas - Sen. Pat Roberts approval rating hovers around the 50% mark and the state has grown more Democratic-friendly in recent years, as evidenced by Governor Kathleen Sebelius' popularity and easy re-election last year, as well as Nancy Boyda re-capturing Kansas' 2nd Congressional district seat for the Dems. The previous Democrat to hold that seat was former Rep. Jim Slattery who is running against Roberts next year. Slattery was a popular congressman and represented KS-2 for 12 years until '94, when he ran for governor and lost in the Republican tide of that year. Democrat Greg Orman, a Kansas businessman, will challenge Roberts at least. Kansas hasn’t elected a Democratic senator in 75 years (read the great book "What's the Matter with Kansas?" by Thomas Frank), but historical precedents didn't stop Democrats in '06 so why should they in '08?

Kentucky - Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has lost a lot of popularity by leading an obstructionist Republican Party and is under 50% in recent approval polls. Democrats are already running hard hitting ads against him, in an effort to exact retribution for the ousting of former Democratic Minority Leader Tom Daschle in '04. Greg Fischer and Bruce Lunsford are running for the Democratic nomination, but McConnell still has the clear advantages against Dems without much name recognition.

Mississippi - Because Sen. Trent Lott retired, both seats are now up in 2008. Sen. Thad Cochran is running for re-election, and will win. Roger Wicker, formerly the representative of Mississippi's 1st congressional district, was appointed by Governor Haley Barbour on to fill the vacancy left by Lott. Former Democratic governor Ronnie Musgrove is running and will give him a run for his money. Recent wins by Democrats in the state legislature also show oppurtunity here.

North Carolina - Like McConnell, Elizabeth Dole's popularity has taken a hit. She's the favorite right now, but polls suggest vulnerability and she could lose if 2008 is another Democratic-landslide year. As for Dem challengers, state senator Kay Hagan joined the race and is seen as the most formidable candidate.

Texas - I dare put this here in the second tier despite the fact that Texas hasn't seen a Democrat hold a statewide office for a decade. Why? Because Senator John Cornyn is the most unpopular GOP incumbent running for re-election. State representative and Afghanistan war veteran Rick Noriega thankfully survived a runoff in the Democratic primary and will be the nominee. Cornyn's abysmal numbers and 2006 Democratic gains in the Texas legislature and in Dallas County suggest this race is going to be a lot more competitive than any statewide election we've had in awhile.

SAFE REPUBLICAN/DEMOCRATIC TOSS-UPS

Seats in Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Oklahoma, Nebraska, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Wyoming, are all third tier races for right now, but things could always change (which goes for any of these races, of course). State senator Andrew Rice seems to be a pretty damn good candidate out in Oklahoma, as is Larry LaRocco in Idaho.

Republicans had originally targeted three Democrats for potential pick-ups, but with Sens. Frank Lautenberg (Rep. Rob Andrews is challenging him in the primary, but Lautenberg will likely survive) and Tim Johnson deciding to run for re-election, Republicans have little chance in their respective states of New Jersey and South Dakota. However, Sen. Mary Landrieu in Lousiana is a vulnerable Dem, in part because of Hurricane Katrina, but also because Karl Rove got popular state treasurer John N. Kennedy to switch to the Republican Party and run against her. But even then, she's got a big lead in the latest Rasmussen poll.

But still, having to only defend one seat while being on the offense against 23 Republican seats make for pretty good odds that we'll not only definitely keep our majority, but we are likely to substantially expand it (at least based on how things look now). Things could certainly change and will one way or another, but I'm pretty happy with the way things are shaping up right now. I don't think it could favor Democrats more.

Quit Moving The Olympics Around

2008-04-12T08:26:00.003-05:00

Tony Perottet and Christina Larson (via Paul Glastris) think the real problem with the Olympics is that, by making the them a prize to be handed out to countries, we encourage politicization of the games and that we could stand to learn something from the ancient Greeks:

So how is it that the ancient Greeks managed to better insulate their Olympics from geo-politics? The answer is that they didn't move the venue every four years the way we do. Instead, with one exception, they always held the contests at the religious sanctuary of Olympia, in a politically irrelevant corner of the Peloponnese. Perrottet suggests that we follow the Greek's example and find a permanent home for the games in some safe little neutral country like Liechtenstein.

Of course, as the Greeks were nearly constantly at war with each other they had significantly more incentive to hold the games in a neutral location. Our problem is mainly that we don't see a tyrannical form of government as a disqualification for hosting the games, but we could avoid offending the tender sensibilities of the world's dictatorships by holding the games in the same place every four years.

FDA Regulation of Nicotine On The Horizon

2008-04-11T22:27:00.002-05:00

We here at TWM have in the past called for legislation that would grant the FDA authority to regulate nicotine as a drug, and it appears that Congress is finally close to granting such authority. Such a move is long overdue considering the cigarette manufacturer's well-documented lack of regard for human life. The Bush administration is opposed (you expected otherwise) but the best reason not to enact such legislation that Congressional Republicans can come up with is that the FDA already has enough on it's plate, a flimsy excuse even were it to happen to be true (and one that manufacturers like RJ Reynolds have been quick to include in none-too-convincing ads.) Of course, oversight will hardly begin to make up for the enormous cost in life and public money that decades of illegality produced, but it is a start to bringing an end to an era in which American companies could produce a product that, when it works as intended, kills people.