The Ubiquitous Grammar Cop

Heresy, or You've Got Science in my Astrology!

2011-01-14T02:43:00.003-06:00

Even though I have a Master’s degree in English, I am a science geek. My interest in the sciences prompted me to take two chemistry classes in high school (AP Chemistry as a senior) and two anatomy classes at the University of Illinois. My first love where science is concerned lay in astronomy. In fact, the only thing for sure on my “bucket list” is to see the southern night sky. That said, I have been reading with some amusement the apoplectic reactions to the news release made by the Minnesota Planetarium Society (MNPS for the sake of brevity) that there are actually thirteen signs in the Zodiac rather than the traditional twelve. To make matters more confusing and annoying, they say the dates associated with those signs have changed as well. This prompted people to post comments to the linked news stories and to social networking sites, crying defiantly, “I don’t care what they say! I’m a Taurus!” or, “What the hell is Ophiuchus? I’m not gonna be a sign I can’t pronounce!”

In my opinion, there is really no need to adopt these new dates or the “new” astrological sign Ophiuchus. There is a simple explanation why the dates have changed from what is familiar to most of us. The MNPS is correct that the Sun does enter these constellations in this order, starting from the northern spring equinox (either 20 or 21 March): Pisces, Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpius, Ophiuchus, Sagittarius, Capricornus, and Aquarius. This order is accurate for 21st century astronomy, but the order differs from ancient times when the Babylonians, Greeks, and other ancient cultures created astrology (astronomy’s mystic bedfellow).

Since the Earth’s axis has a 23˚ tilt and is constantly pulled by the Sun and Moon, the axis wobbles like a top, tracing out a circle that takes 26,000 years to complete one cycle. Because of procession, there was a different pole star in the days of ancient Egypt and Babylon 4500 years ago. Consequently, the order of the Zodiac was different as well; the spring equinox started when the Sun moved into Aries (the order remains the same). That is why we have the Zodiac order many people are familiar with: Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces. The ancients presumably omitted Ophiuchus for any number of reasons; the most likely explanation is there are approximately twelve lunar cycles in a year so having twelve Zodiac signs fit best. Since the Sun enters Scorpius first, they decided it best to omit Ophiuchus.

If the MNPS decided to make this observation, known to many astronomers (including me), public, I suggest they propose the following changes: change the names of the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn to the Tropics of Taurus and Sagittarius. It would be accurate and it works so well in their argument.

The Finger-Popping Pimp Hand of Adam Smith

2010-08-06T05:59:00.001-05:00

Music is powerful. It helps us learn things (think of the Alphabet Song or anything from Schoolhouse Rock). It recalls memories of events past, both specific and vague. For me, I see myself walking past WIMPE (the former nickname for Campus Recreation Center - East at the University of Illinois) on my way back to Allen Hall whenever I listen to Hearing Aid by They Might Be Giants. Music can lift our spirits or drive us deeper into despair. Because music has such an impact, I argue advertisers use music, popular music especially, to subconsciously feed our society's runaway consumerism.

Once upon a time, advertisers used to commission songwriters to produce songs specific for the product they wanted to sell. The jingles for Alka-Seltzer® and Tootsie Rolls® come immediately to mind for me, but there were thousands of jingles for the thousands of products advertised on television and radio. In the last fifteen years, most advertisers stopped writing jingles, choosing instead to cull form the vast music library of popular music to find songs that made the best fit for the message they wished to convey. For example, I am a big fan of The Smiths. One of my favorite songs by them, How Soon Is Now?, recalled portions of my sophomore year of Illinois. Now when I hear the song, I think of those times but they are interrupted with images of a cherry red Nissan® Altima performing a slow motion skid on wet pavement ever since Nissan® used How Soon Is Now? in a TV advert in the late 1990s.

Over the last decade or so, increasingly popular songs appear in television advertisements. Banana Republic® used Nina Simone's Feelin' Good to sell their clothing in the late 1990s. The Gap® superimposed AC/DC's Back in Black over Audrey Hepburn's spontaneous dance routine in "Funny Face" to shill their Skinny Black Pant. Heineken® used Green Onions by Booker T & the MGs in a commercial showing how three men: The Rookie, The Pro, and the Master, hid their precious stash of beer with varying degrees of success ("The Master" hid his bottles of beer inside of a cooked turkey). These songs, since they are older, would appeal to an older demographic. Advertisers though are getting cleverer in their use of popular music in their television advertising.

More recently, newer artists have their music featured in television commercials. For example, Natasha Bedingfield's song Unwritten is featured in a Pantene® shampoo commercial in 2007, Paolo Nutini plays his song New Shoes in an advert selling Puma® athletic shoes. I suspect using current artist's songs in television commercials plays into many retail establishments’ use of popular music over their PA systems rather than instrumental muzak from years past. If advertisers use popular music to sell products, you will be more likely to associate those products when you hear the songs from their commercials played over the store's or mall's PA system.

I can't fault advertisers and the corporations who hire them using this technique to sell their products. However, I do miss the days when I could hear a song on the PA system without thinking about shampoo or shoes I never intend on buying.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2010-07-09T00:39:00.003-05:00

Oops.

... By Any Other Name

2010-07-01T01:37:00.005-05:00

Disclaimer: This is simply an observation. To those with children, no offense is implied.

I used to work as an inventory specialist for a furniture store chain. While my cubicle sat in a raised mezzanine overlooking the large distribution center, I occasionally ventured out to the stores to manage the scheduled inventory of an individual store's stock (floor samples and so forth). On one of these trips, I met a person who worked for one of those independent inventory contractors with a very peculiar last name. While I cannot remember his first name, his last name is one I will never forget. It was Cmunt (pronounced "smunt"). Given his small stature, I gathered he had his share of ass-kicking and name-calling while growing up with a name like Cmunt. His well-weathered, lined face adorned with a walrus mustache and bushy goatee complemented his cheerful demeanor though. When speaking with him, he spoke of his last name with a weary, good-natured humor. It was obvious he clearly enjoyed having his last name since it's obviously a talking point similar to a childhood scar or a bad haircut that hasn't grown out. The funniest thing he said about his last name was, "When my son was born, I wanted to name him Harry, but my wife said no."

I think of Mr. Cmunt and his story because many people I know who have and will have children most likely struggled (or will struggle) with names for their kids. I can only speak of this in the abstract since the only things I have named are inanimate objects like my computer's hard drive and my car (HAL 9000 and Firah, respectively). They cannot feel embarrassment or pride if their name is odd or cool, depending on your point of view, unlike children whose parents gave them names that are culturally significant, rich with meaning, or uniquely silly.

Glossing over the fashion of certain Baby Boomers who gave their children hippie names (Moon-Unit and Dweezil Zappa come immediately to mind), there are many children of my generation whose names can be lumped into certain categories. For example, I am sure most people in my age group knows or went to school with at least a half dozen girls named Jennifer or Kristen (the latter with different spellings). That phenomenon is most common among middle class white suburbia, along with boys in that demographic named Michael or Kevin. In more urban settings, boys and girls were occasionally given monikers with hints of bastardized Latin (Tranquilla), pidgin French, or had something that rhymes with "Shawn" following a D or an L separated by an apostrophe (if it was a girls name, it was feminized by adding an "a" at the end).

In an effort to create new trends in children's names, some people in my generation (who now have children of their own), have taken to giving their daughters first names that are or were more commonly known as WASPy surnames: Tyler, Taylor, Madison. Perhaps it's a nod to our 19th century American presidents (which makes me wonder if there is a klatch of girls in Ontario with names like Macdonald and Diefenbaker). Names like Haley and Kaley and their variants have replaced Jennifer and Krystin while for boys the trend seems to be inspired by the Bible (more Lukes and Ezras rather than Ezekiels and Hezekiahs).

Thankfully, there are those who choose to give their kids names that have cultural meaning. Americans who are culturally Irish give their kids names like Medb or Tadgh (pronounced Maeve and Teague), a mother originally from Barcelona naming her son Xavi (cha-vee), or parents who name their son that actually means something in Swahili. It's unfortunate that there are others who saddle their kids with odd names like Apple (Gwyneth Paltrow's daughter), ESPN, or anything connected to a geographical location (you know who they, or you, are).

Uncut or Edited for Content?

2010-04-07T21:10:00.000-05:00

Good friends of mine are expecting their first child this summer. As part of all the preparation they are doing, they are reading as much information as they can. Mom-to-be came across an article that may be of broader interest so she posted a link and suggested feedback by doing so.

I found Swaminathan's anti-circumcision argument compelling but weak in two certain points. He argues that in recent years many people are questioning the reasons why men should be circumcised and how those numbers are increasing. He also points out why the medical rationale for circumcision (which makes it popular in the United States) is flawed. While I cannot dispute that circumcision is not medically necessary I will argue that it's done mainly for hygienic reasons. This is Swaminathan's first flaw; while arguing against the need for circumcision he cites examples indicating why parents of newborn boys should. He quotes a New Jersey mother warning parents to be "extra vigilant about keeping the cheese outta there." He also states adult film star Rocco Siffredi (AKA the Italian Stallion) at the age of thirty-one had himself circumcised for hygienic reasons. Doing so, Swaminathan bolsters the Occam's Razor why circumcision is hygienically necessary.

What I found most disturbing are the assertions from the people Swaminathan cites in his argument, suggesting that circumcision is akin to mutilation. I inferred this to mean that people like Andrew Sullivan, Christopher Hitchens, the unnamed Atlanta woman, and several others equate circumcision to the abysmal practice of female circumcision. I frankly don't see how the removal of a boy's foreskin compares to the removal of a girl's clitoris. That is mutilation.

The most ridiculous comment comes from Intact America's (an anti-circumcision group) Georganne Chapin. When some parenting experts suggest circumcision for their newborn son because dad is circumcised, she scoffs, "If your husband was missing an eye, would you poke his [son's] eye out?" Swaminathan did not need to add a ludicrous straw-man comment to bolster his claim.

Swaminathan's weak argument against circumcision does have its merits. If you choose not to circumcise your son, the parents and the son will have to be vigilant to keep him(self) clean. Otherwise, there can be painful consequences. If you do choose to circumcise your newborn son, the hygiene is easier and when he grows up, he will not know what he missed.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2010-03-17T11:16:00.002-05:00

I heard this question during a commercial for the CBS reality show The Amazing Race:

"How do you make champagne? Do you take wine and add club soda?"

He posed those questions to a champagne manufacturer (in France).

Just Because You Can Does Not Mean You Should.

2010-03-09T22:19:00.002-06:00

I wrote a piece about eighteen months ago about a ridiculous request made by PETA.

Apparently a chef in New York City decided to push that envelope.

Debunking Teabagger Revisionist History for Fun and ... Fun.

2010-03-03T23:53:00.004-06:00

I read the following blurb in Wednesday's edition (03 March, 2010; pg. 3) of the Chicago Tribune in the section titled "60-Second Riff":

Socialism Fails to Deliver Once Again
by Rex W. Huppke

My fellow patriots:

It was announced Tuesday that the United States Postal Service wants to scale back mail delivery to five days a week. With that, we can now definitely say that President Barack Hussein Obama's radical socialist agenda is failing.

Government-run mail delivery has long been a stain on the capitalist fabric of our society. Only last year the Postal Service - i.e., the propaganda distribution arm of big government - issued a stamp honoring civil rights pioneer Mary White Ovington, noting in a news release that she "grew interested in socialism." What further evidence that this federal entity is a simmering bed of anti-Americanism?

News that the post office is unable to fulfill its obligations - bringing us Eddie Bauer catalogs and reminders of upcoming teeth-cleaning appointments six days a week - should be celebrated far and wide. If government can't do something as simple as distribute 667 million pieces of mail each day, how could it handle the nation's health care needs?

What are we to expect? Doctors who are unavailable on Saturdays and Sundays?

Americans concerned about freedom from tyranny and the sanctity of the Constitution must continue to root for the downfall of the Postal Service. Our march to victory will be down a road paved with unmailed coupon booklets.

Thank you and God bless.

P.S. Please remember from here on out to send your tea bags via FedEx.

The first thing that sprang to mind in Huppke's ridiculous argument is how he believes that the Postal Service is some government monolith that became socialized under President Obama's leadership. Considering that the Postal Service predates an independent United States by a year (with uber-socialist Benjamin Franklin as its first Postmaster General), this assertion is laughable.

Secondly, the Postal Service is a government owned corporation and it's run as such. Because it is government run, it can operate without turning a profit. If it does run deficits to the point where it can't operate, then the government would provide a subsidy to keep it running. The last time the Postal Service received a subsidy to remain solvent was nearly thirty years ago. Since then, the Postal Service has operated solely with postal rates as its income.

However, Huppke is correct about the glut of catalogs that clog snail mailboxes all over the country. This is the magic of capitalism at work (direct mail campaigns, complete with coupons and so forth) is an effective driver of consumerism. But many people choose to correspond by electronic means and choose to pay and receive bills electronically, thereby removing a sure income stream from the Postal Service. As more people choose to do their business online, the Postal Service does what most corporations do when they have dams in their revenue streams; they cut back on services (like Saturday delivery).

The only explanation I have for Huppke's comparison between the Postal Service and the impending health care reform (HCR) is that he believes (as most teabaggers) that everything the government touches has the Midas touch (in the true sense of King Midas' tragic tale). I would argue that there are some things that the government should have a hand in: the distribution of some services and the regulation of others and of industry. I say this because capitalism's primary concern is making a profit. There's nothing wrong with making a profit, but bad things can happen if that is a person's or corporation's sole motivating factor in engaging in capitalistic behavior.

As for Mr. Huppke, if he prefers to spend $8.95 to send his tea bags to his representatives in Congress rather than give the Postal Service $0.44 to do the same thing, he is more than free to do so.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2010-03-03T20:30:00.002-06:00

I saw this on a advert at a BP Amoco station (touting their snack pizza's lower price):

"We cut the price, not the cheese!"

Three things came to mind:

1) I hope they didn't.
2) That's unintentionally amusing ad copy.
3) If it was intentional, it's even more funny.

Addendum

2010-02-24T00:27:00.003-06:00

At the end of my last post, Olympic-Sized Inequity, I commented on the outlier on the graph of gender inequity in sport, Grand Slam tennis tournaments. I would like to make the connection between that statement and MSNBC commentator Rachel Maddow, where I heard about the outrageous circumstances about Women's Olympic ski jumping.

When Maddow hosted a news show on the now defunct Air America Radio network, she mentioned about three years ago how Wimbledon (The Championships officially) finally joined modern times and paid the Women's Singles champion the same amount of money as the Men's Singles champion. This put Wimbledon on par with the French Open, U.S. Open, and Australian Open.

At first blush I thought, "Cool," when I listened to her reporting on this story on my iPod. Then I thought about it. In these four tournaments (the winners in any case), women tennis players play less for the same amount of money. Women play at most three sets while the men play can play up to five sets. Based on that, women tennis players in Grand Slam events are paid more for their work than their male counterparts.

Does this make up for the gross disparity between men and women in athletics? I'd be a fool to say it does. However, I can appreciate small doses of poetic justice. Those doses make me hunger for more.

Olympic-Sized Inequity

2010-02-22T00:04:00.005-06:00

I am a fan of the Olympic Games, both Winter and Summer. During the Winter Games presently playing out in Vancouver, I watched a little skiing, some hockey, but my biggest draw has been curling. However, I did hear on The Rachel Maddow Show a little over a week ago an interesting fact about ski jumping.

Apparently, all of the participating sports in the Winter Olympics have both men and ladies competitions except ski jumping, despite overwhelming support from the International Ski Federation.

Their endorsement could not sway the IOC, even though Lindsey Van set the distance record at Whistler, BC, the same venue where the Olympic ski jumping takes place. The reasons the IOC gave for not allowing womens' ski jumping in the 2010 Games are numerous and asinine, but it sheds more light on the inequities in sport.

On the other hand, there is always pro tennis where dollar for dollar the women champions make more than the men (in the Grand Slam tournaments anyway).

If This Is Real, Then the End Is Nigh

2010-02-20T00:13:00.002-06:00

This would make an absolutely awesome gag gift. If you sent this as a gag or for real, I'd give good odds the recipient would never speak to you again.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2010-02-19T10:24:00.002-06:00

The Flintstones are only partially based on fact. At least that's what some people in Texas believes.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2010-01-22T15:55:00.002-06:00

All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2010-01-20T01:12:00.003-06:00

For some time now, there has been a constant refrain from some of my fellow Americans (strangers and acquaintances alike) who want to "Take our country back". I would like to ask a question to those who agree with that sentiment; from whom are we taking our country back?

If you choose to answer keep these things in mind: be polite, be thoughtful, and be able to support your responses.

A Possible Solution to Discriminatory Currency

2009-12-10T20:31:00.002-06:00

I was at a drive through ATM this evening. Waiting for the transaction to finish processing, I read this sign posted under the screen (next to a jack for standard headphones or earbuds):

AUDITORY ASSISTANCE AVAILABLE FOR THE VISUALLY IMPAIRED

The first thing that went through my mind when I read that was, "Why would a blind person use a drive through ATM?" Next, I thought about how U.S. currency discriminates against the blind and visually impaired.

I remember reading several articles over the last few years about the new anti-counterfeiting measures they added to the redesigned currency: color changing ink, watermarks, microprinting, and the little magnetic strips that have the bill's denomination written on it. In these articles I remembered how some people still have issues with the currency because every bill in circulation is exactly the same size. Other countries, I believe, have different sized bills so you can tell them apart without looking at them. Euros come in several colors and have raised printing so visually impaired people can discern the differences between the notes.

While the new U.S. Currency designs are different from what they were in the past (purple-tinged fins and orange-tinted sawbucks), they are still basically green and nearly impossible to tell apart by touch.

Since ATMs all over have Braille on their buttons (even the drive through machines strangely), wouldn't it make sense to put the denomination on each bill in Braille as well? I doubt I am the first person to consider this, but I think this makes the most sense. It makes more sense than putting Braille on drive through ATMs.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-11-21T07:20:00.002-06:00

When you watch the first three minutes of this clip, ask these questions: "Do they explicitly state who suggests these new guidelines?" and "Whom does ABC News implicitly state that women follow these new guidelines?"

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-11-04T21:10:00.001-06:00

This is quite clever.

Kudos...

2009-10-25T02:41:00.000-05:00

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-10-19T22:36:00.002-05:00

The creators of the "Eagle-Man" auto insurance commercial need to take advertising lessons from these folks.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-10-12T23:10:00.002-05:00

There are stories like this that make me think:

1) This is part of the reason why people are afraid to fly.
2) This is a big chunk of the reason why I have issues with capitalism.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-10-09T22:20:00.002-05:00

While I walked around the University of Illinois campus today, I noticed that these (and all types similar) are the latest vogue with the female student body.

The Visible, Heavy Hand of Adam Smith

2009-10-09T18:40:00.002-05:00

I am presently sitting in the Illini Union at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. When I started attending this school almost twenty years ago, the Union and several other university-owned buildings had restaurants and diners in them. The Union had one in its basement, there was the Illini Orange, a fast-food diner in the Six Pack (a confluence of six residence halls in Champaign), and several university-owned commissaries in the residence halls. All of these places were owned by the university and its staff were state employees. If you lived in the dormitories, you could grab a meal at the Union and have it count as breakfast, lunch, or dinner if you had a meal plan through the university. If you craved a late night snack, you could purchase a bag of chips (or something similar) and have it charged to your student account if your pockets carried nothing but lint.

Today there is a different scene in the Illini Union and at the Orange (I cannot verify if the residence hall commissaries still exist since I cannot access the dormitories). The university-owned restaurant and diners are gone. A mall-style food court, complete with a Sbarro and other corporate owned restaurants have replaced them. The diner in the Orange now houses a McDonald's. While the Orange's McDonald's is bad (but not as bad as this), I can't help but feel dismay at the ever present encroachment of private enterprise in public institutions. I feel this way especially since there are many closed and empty storefronts in along Green Street (the main commercial strip at U of I).

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-10-02T23:19:00.002-05:00

Conservative schadenfreude is extremely disturbing.

Cigars, Bananas, and Short, Blunt Swords

2009-09-22T01:02:00.002-05:00

The three objects mentioned in the title refer to a line uttered by Dr. Niles Crane in an episode of Frasier. In that episode, the main plot involves Dr. Frasier Crane working to analyze a persistent dream he has (where he finds himself in bed with a male colleague). When Frasier relays the details of this dream to his brother (a fellow psychiatrist) Niles wryly asks, “Are there images of cigars, bananas, or short, blunt swords?” This deadpan joke about Freudian latency in my opinion describes the source of some people’s animosity and criticism of President Obama.

The vitriol goes back nearly two years when Senator Obama began his run for the presidency. People all over the country during the primary season and through the general campaign expressed their concern about the possibility of someone like Obama becoming President. Once he was elected, these feelings metastasized into the Birther movement for those people whose bigotry stands out overtly. For others who congregate in Tea Party protests all over the country, the “cigars, bananas, and short, blunt swords” analogy works best. In addition to their worries that the federal government is overextending itself with deficit spending and taxing the them (and their progeny) into oblivion, many people who attend these events express that they are:

Losing the country they know and love.

Losing their freedom(s).

Worried they will not get their country back.

When reporters who cover these events and rallies ask the attendees questions, looking for specifics about what freedoms they’ve lost or to clarify their sentiments, some of those asked simply cannot expound on their feelings, others come up with irrational explanations, or they simply repeat the vague uneasiness that consumes them. A question I would like to ask the people who feel like the America they’ve come to know and love is slipping away from them is, “What has changed in the last year to make you feel this way?” It cannot be because a Democrat is President; I don’t remember President Clinton's critics voicing this sort of fear and uncertainty about where our country was headed during his administration (at least not at the levels we presently hear and see).

Quite simply, it’s latent racism (although bigotry is semantically more accurate). Don’t take my word for it. President Jimmy Carter said it best last week. Coming from a southern white man who grew up and lived some of his life benefiting from the policies of Jim Crow, his words hold more weight.

Don't Secede; We'll Cut You Off Instead

2009-09-16T00:22:00.003-05:00

Media-created nicknames for people and the cultural phenomena they spawn existed for decades. There are those who remember the Beatniks from the 1950s and most people, regardless of age, are familiar with the Hippies from the late 1960s and the early 1970s. Now that mainstream media has a profit leech attached to its information-providing hide, these nicknames appear with greater frequency. Just in the last nine months, the American public has been introduced to:

Birthers – These are people who vehemently believe that President Barack Obama is not a natural-born citizen.

Truthers – This is a new nickname for conspiracy theorists that contend the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks were an inside job.

Deathers – These are people who erroneously think the expansion of government-funded health care beyond Medicare, Medicaid, and the Veterans Administration will inevitably prompt the government to abandon health care for the elderly.

Sadly, there are people in elected federal office who cynically foment the nonsense Deathers believe in. This segues into a fourth media buzzword specifically crafted for elected officials at the state level: Tenthers.

Tenthers, consisting mostly of governors, state representatives, and people who support their views, believe that the federal government has no business advising them on what the individual states should and shouldn’t do. The name stems from the rights enumerated in the Tenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. It would be fair to call people like Strom Thurmond, George Wallace and the rest of the segregationists Tenthers because they believed the federal government had no right to dictate how individual states should conduct business or enforce the laws in their respective states.

Some of the more prominent Tenthers today include Texas governor Rick Perry (R) and Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty (R). When the stimulus bill passed last spring, Perry, Governor Mark Sanford (R-SC), former Governor Sarah Palin (R-AK), and Governor Bobby Jindal (R-LA) all wanted to refuse the stimulus funds coming to their states (they all relented and accepted the federal funds). With the Health Care bill approaching resolution by year’s end, Pawlenty has threatened he will not accept any monies for federally funded health care. If Pawlenty or any other Republican governor wishes to follow this path, they are Constitutionally bound by the Tenth Amendment to do so. If I were the federal government if this came to pass, I would adhere to their wishes fully and not provide any federal funding to their respective states (not for transportation, Medicare, Medicaid, education, and so on).

This tactic is similar to the media’s habit of creating buzzwords for cultural phenomena; it’s been around for a long time. In my lifetime the federal government employed this strategy at least twice: during the Nixon administration to get every state to comply with the 55 MPH national speed limit and during the Reagan administration to raise the federal drinking age to 21. Each time the federal government withheld transportation funds from states who were slow to comply with federal law.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-09-15T01:30:00.003-05:00

Kramer on Seinfeld once said of baths, "You're sitting in a tepid pool of your own filth!" Well according to research at the University of Colorado - Boulder, showers are no better.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-09-09T00:02:00.001-05:00

This is simply three shades of wrong.

Link courtesy of fark.com

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-09-05T20:17:00.001-05:00

Oh, snap.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-09-04T20:48:00.002-05:00

Why do some Americans feel that providing health care is something to profit from when it is illegal in nearly every industrial country? This question seems to be lost in the vast echo chamber provided by the media.

On a tangent, kudos to Sen. Al Franken for conducting a proper town hall discussion on health care.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-08-23T22:58:00.004-05:00

Is it reasonable to argue that choice (or the awareness you have choice) is a fundamental aspect of independent thought?

The More Things Change...

2009-08-20T20:18:00.002-05:00

Two Saturdays ago, I attended my high school reunion celebrating twenty years since graduation. I initially had reservations about going at first, but I wanted to see my how my high school classmates evolved (and I to them) over the last twenty years; vain curiosity trumped everything else.

A little background first: I did not enjoy high school very much. I did not have the clichéd experience some people believe high school to be (on either end of the spectrum). My days in high school were dollops of “good”, heaping tablespoons of “bad”, all on top of a wide base of “meh”. With that in mind, I decided to leave most of my high school experiences (and the people involved) in the past and moved on. This worked for nineteen years until technology and web-based social networking rendered my efforts moot.

As for the reunion itself, it had a much smaller number of people I had expected. Out of four hundred or so people in our graduating class, about sixty people showed up for the festivities throughout the course of the evening (not including spouses). This small group of people though created a nice sample to make Nate Silver (fivethirtyeight.com) proud. The sixty classmates assembled formed a nice microcosm of my high school social structure (as I remember it). Initially, all of the people intermingled with one another. That’s to be expected when you meet people you haven’t seen in two decades in some cases. However once the hall’s staff served dinner, the static high school dynamics came into sharp detail; all of the people who ran in the same circles back in the day did so again over a buffet of mostaccioli, fried chicken, Italian beef, mashed potatoes, and salad.

I did enjoy the conversation that progressed throughout the evening: talking about teachers from high school, speculation of missing classmates scheduled to arrive (but failed to do so), local and national politics, and the like. Now the event has passed without me collapsing into a puddle of insecurity, I can finally accept and appreciate how much I have grown in the last twenty years. It also showed me that even though change can come to individuals, that change becomes more difficult when those individuals gather (especially if there is a shared history among the collected individuals).

Harry Potter and the Film Adaptations

2009-08-20T19:11:00.003-05:00

There is a cliché that claims, “You shouldn’t see the movie until you’ve read the book.” The trouble is, that advice doesn’t really work in every situation. There are some film adaptations that come from best sellers that will draw the attention of those who (sadly) prefer to see the work rather than read it, or inspire those who don’t haven’t had time to read to pick up the written work and see how it differs from the film.

I admit I am a big fan of Harry Potter. The films initally attracted me to the novels and predictably, I enjoyed the novels more. My appreciation of the novels did not diminish my enjoyment of the film adaptations but with the release of the film Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (HBP/f) last month, I can understand the criticism of the film.

The criticism I hear most often are for the films not directed by Christopher Columbus, Philospoher’s/Sorcerer’s Stone (PS-SS/f) and Chamber of Secrets (CoS/f); many key elements in the books were glossed over or omitted completely. Alfonso Cuarón’s adaptation of Prisoner of Azkaban (PoA/f) and David Yates’ Order of the Phoenix (OotP/f) and HBP/f are the Harry Potter films that receive the most raised eyebrows from both camps: those who read the books and those who haven’t. For example, the scene in PoA/f that reveals which of Harry’s parents’ friends betrayed them felt incredibly rushed. This is a sentiment shared by mostly everyone I know, regardless if they’ve read the book or not. There are similar criticisms for OotP/f and especially for HBP/f.

In the case of HBP/f, the film focused not on the backstory of the main antagonist Lord Voldermort but had a more scattershot feel to it: a little about Voldermort’s past (but clearly not enough), a little about relationship between Harry and Dumbledore, and a lot about the romantic relationships between Harry and the rest of his classmates. Voldermort’s backstory and the master/protégé dynamic of Harry and Dumbledore are especially important in the final novel The Deathly Hallows (DH) and I am curious how they will treat the amount of omissions from the previous film(s) as the producers adapt the final novel into two films similar to Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill (the producers claim this will allow them to wrap things up nicely).

I do not want to bash the treatment of the Harry Potter novels in film form though. I simply argue the films, since four different directors have worked on them, created a universe parallel to the one J. K. Rowling created. Similar to Rowling’s clever gift of dropping small hints in previous works that become major plot developments in later novels, the directors have done the same thing in the films. They are not the same hints since films rarely recreate the vision of the original work, but they have the same effect. Harry’s last words to Dobby the House-Elf in CoS/f (“Never save my life again.”) and Neville Longbottom’s discovery of the Room of Requirement in OotP/f are excellent examples if the producers of the film version of DH decide to follow the novel as closely as possible. Given that, I will still see the two movies when they come out during the 2010 holiday season and during the summer of 2011.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-08-14T21:50:00.000-05:00

This is a shoo-in as a candidate for the 2009 Stella Awards.

Thank You for Pissing in the Well, Chuck.

2009-08-14T00:39:00.002-05:00

For the last couple of weeks or so the media has been highlighting the exciting events at local town hall meetings "debating" health care reform. Some of the anger is genuine, yet misplaced (these are the people who will never accept Barack Obama as President of the United States). Other people get their anger from spurious sources, egged on and paid for by the corporations who would prefer the system to remain as it is (it's part of the reason why their efforts have been dubbed Astroturf™ rather than grassroots). What has brought many people to an apoplectic frenzy recently are the comments made by former Alaskan governor (and media attention whore) Sarah Palin.

In an interview on Saturday, 08 August 2009 she stated that she did not want her parents or her youngest child (who has Down's Syndrome) to go before a "Death Panel" if the proposed government-funded health care plan deemed them too expensive to care for. This is disgustingly cynical for two reasons. First, this convolutedly misinterprets a provision in the bill that would reimburse people for end-of-life counseling (living wills, hospice care for terminally ill people, et cetera); it's something that some private insurance already provides its customers. Secondly, her assertion projects what many private insurers already do; there are countless examples of insurance companies cutting their customers loose because they become too sick or not insuring them because they have any preexisting condition.

It was bad enough when pundits, commentators, and telegenic private citizens said this on camera, allowing everyone within earshot to hear this disingenuous drivel. However, Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA) made it infinitely worse by confirming Palin's nakedly false assertion of the End-of-Life Counseling provision in the pending health care legislation. Making that statement at an Iowa town hall gathering about health care gave Grassley the cover to effectively weaken the bill.

Senator Grassley is running for reelection in November 2010. I hope he has to drink long and deep from the well between now and then (especially if his efforts are made fruitless).

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-08-12T20:41:00.002-05:00

Two weeks ago Bill Maher, comedian and host of HBO's Real Time, was asked a question during an interview on CNN. Wolf Blitzer asks Maher if Sarah Palin would be a serious contender for President in 2012. In response Maher says, "I would never put anything past this stupid country."

Consequently, Maher received a lot of flak for that comment. Based on the results of a Public Policy poll conducted in North Carolina this past week (thanks to MSNBC's Rachel Maddow for bringing it to my attention), perhaps the vitriolic criticism Maher received for his comments are not necessarily warranted.

(Take note of questions four and five and the associated cross-tabs further down the document.)

Unintended Irony?

2009-08-02T00:14:00.003-05:00

Out of all the reasons why conservatives (Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats alike) propose why we should not have publicly funded health insurance, this has to be the weirdest. This meme reminds me of the classic movie Soylent Green. The movie is based in a futuristic dystopia where food is in short supply but Soylent Green, the miracle wafer, comes to the rescue. Given the movie stars Charlton Heston, a cheerleader of conservatism in his later years, and how the plot progresses to its famous last line, "Soylent Green is people!", I can see why opponents to health care/insurance reform decided to inject this air embolus into the bloodstream. To me, it's not a big leap.

If the movie Soylent Green prompted these opponents to claim government funded health insurance will steer the elderly toward systematic euthanasia, there is a slight flaw. Soylent Green was not a product of the government. It was a product of the Soylent Corporation.

Thick with Irony

2009-07-28T00:27:00.003-05:00

This is an interesting article. While it clearly shows that many engineering degrees do pay well in comparison to careers (or lack thereof) that await those with Liberal Arts degrees, it's telling in what the article doesn't say.

The article suggests that math geeks suffer ridicule from their liberal arts studying classmates only to get the last laugh when they land jobs for British Petroleum, Lockheed, Microsoft, and Allstate. I have no argument with that since the article states that there are fewer college graduates that emerge with strong math skills. It's simple supply and demand. To the ridicule that math and engineering geeks endure, I can only speak to my limited experience at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. That school is rich with math savvy students who spend much of their time on the North Quad (where most of the newest buildings presently sit). I don't recall seeing many engineering students taking it on the chin (I did run in a circle of architects so I may not be the best source though).

What it doesn't say: even though the well-paid, top-of-the-class, math-fluent engineering students go on to careers that pay far more than their B.A. and M.A. holding counterparts they would not be in those coveted positions if it weren't for Liberal Arts-educated teachers. They taught these number crunchers how to comprehend textbooks so they could study organic chemistry, differential equations, and actuarial science.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-07-24T07:09:00.002-05:00

It's obvious that some people still lack personal responsibility. I wish they would not use that (lack of) power to try to save the world.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-07-23T10:42:00.002-05:00

Bad: During last night's Presidential press conference on health care, a reporter asks President Obama a non sequitur question about Dr. Henry Louis Gates' recent arrest.

Worse: President Obama answers the question, suggesting the Cambridge police "acted stupidly" in their treatment of Dr. Gates.

Fail: The Mass Media decides to make this exchange the top story to come out of last night's health care press conference.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-07-21T12:41:00.001-05:00

This is a small example why most of society cannot take conspiracy theorists seriously.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-07-19T21:35:00.000-05:00

Why do hospitals feel the need to advertise?

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-07-09T19:35:00.001-05:00

Why is this necessary?

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-07-08T17:50:00.000-05:00

The joy of empty calories from a bygone era, courtesy of TotalFark.com

A Good Compromise Will Screw Everyone

2009-06-19T13:53:00.003-05:00

Someone once said, “A good compromise leaves everyone angry.”

Most people who believe in the free market system argue that capitalism works best when companies compete with one another to keep prices down and to weed out the companies who charge more for inadequate products and services. I have no problem with this. If there are several organizations that do provide things the public needs for the lowest possible cost, good for them. This will force out companies that want to maximize their return with the minimal amount of investment.

If the government needs to get into the act in providing a service the private sector has a stranglehold on in order to A) make sure the services provided reaches the largest pool of consumers, and B) keeps the cost of those services down, they should do so. I’ve mentioned before how the government already does this in a way that most people take it for granted. The federal government through the United States Postal Service provides a courier service for letters and packages. They are able to do this even though the two largest privately owned courier services, United Parcel Service and Federal Express, remain profitable. UPS and FedEx do things the Post Office doesn’t and vice versa (UPS and FedEx ship freight while the USPS does not). However the services all three entities provide are kept in check by the prices set by the Post Office.

I mention this because in the debate about President Obama’s proposed health care plan, some people believe that a public option is something that would cause great detriment to privately owned health insurance companies. In his speech to the American Medical Association President Obama argued, “[A] public option will give people a broader range of choices and inject competition into the health care market so that [it] forces waste out of the system and keep[s] the insurance companies honest.” I argue this is a good thing. People still get to choose what sort of coverage best suits them and their families, private insurance companies will change their business plans to remain competitive, and no one is left to twist in the wind.

The trouble is there are some Democrats in the Senate who think that this is bad for private health insurance companies. Senators such as Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Max Baucus (D-MT) would prefer to either initiate a trigger for the public option (suggesting if health care costs continue to skyrocket, the public option will start in seven years) or not have the public option at all because Senate Republicans don’t want private, for-profit companies competing with the government who can provide basic services for much less money. These Democrats want to do this in the name of bipartisanship. To me, this is the surest way to make sure that actual reform doesn’t take place and keeps the majority of Americans mired in the same ineffectual muck we’re growing accustomed to.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-06-13T11:36:00.002-05:00

If your stubbornness to acquire a material thing prompts a call to the authorities, you're doing it wrong.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-06-11T12:20:00.001-05:00

I've heard that some people do this in their personal lives, but this is simply stupid.

We Can Remember It for you Retail (at a 40% Margin)

2009-06-06T01:11:00.002-05:00

Like most people who shopped online in the past, I receive an abundance of specialty catalogues in my mailbox. Most of the catalogues have something interesting in them so I give them a cursory once-over before I chuck them in the recycling bin. I received one recently with items in it so offensive and obscene I could not believe my eyes.

The catalogue comes from a company called Foods Across America. They market and sell specialty foods from places all over the United States in an Alton Brown fashion collected from famous eateries and regional favorites: Chicago-style hot dogs, Philadelphia cheesesteak, beignets from New Orleans, and so forth. This is a rather clever idea. If you’re from Cincinnati (but live in San Francisco) and you have a Jones for Chili Five-Way, Foods Across America is the place to go if you want to order Skyline® chili. The trouble is you will have to pay $7.50 a can for it, not including the shipping charges.

The prices they justify charging for these items are outrageous bordering on obscene. For example, if you want to make six authentic Philly cheesesteaks, complete with rolls from Amoroso’s®, be prepared to spend $74.95. If you want a six-pack of locally produced root beer or cola, that’s $35.00. Remember how good the key lime pie was when you went to Key West last winter? You can taste it again for the low, low price $69.95 for two nine-inch pies (six to eight servings each). All of the offerings in this catalogue feature the same ridiculous price schedule. I find it amazing how much someone can profit to help someone relive their halcyon days.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-05-31T22:31:00.002-05:00

Here are the opening lines to "Black Cow", sung to the tune of Led Zeppelin's "Black Dog":

Got vanilla ice cream
Got some root beer too.
Gonna mix it well
Gonna make it smooth...

(Jimmy Page guitar riff)

Promote the General Welfare for Fun and Profit

2009-05-30T01:47:00.003-05:00

President Ronald Reagan once said, “The government isn’t the solution to our problems; government is the problem.” He said that in the firm belief that privately owned enterprises, for-profit companies and non-profit organizations could provide goods and services better than the government could (presumably at any level). This ignores the fact that the primary goal of a privately owned business is to make profit. The secondary goal is to serve the public good. If a business provides a product or a service that the public values, they will satisfy its primary goal while fulfilling the secondary goal. Some organizations that serve the public good, the government (in principle) and non-profit organizations like charities for example, do the same thing as for-profit entities for much less cost since their primary goal is to serve the public good.

In our economy where private enterprise supplies all of the products (material goods) while public entities provides us with basic services that make things run as smoothly as possible, I find a balance between which group does what is essential. For example, I do not want the government to manufacture goods like they do (or did) in Communist countries. Along those lines, I do not want private entities to have sole control over services that government agencies can run more efficiently. I have no problem with companies like UPS and FedEx providing courier services since the U.S. Postal Service does the same thing. What bothers me is the government outsourcing their responsibilities to private, for-profit enterprises for reasons known only to those public leaders who craft these arrangements.

Recently in Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley and the City Council approved a deal that leased the control of the city’s parking meters to Chicago Parking Meters LLC, a subsidiary of Morgan Stanley. Chicago Parking Meters in turn outsourced the routine maintenance of the parking meters to LAZ Parking. The deal between Morgan Stanley and the City of Chicago infused about $1.2 billion into the city’s starved financial coffers.

While this influx of cash on the surface seems beneficial to Chicago’s bottom line, it benefits Morgan Stanley and its contractors even more. Since the first priority of a private company is profit, the $1.2 billion dollar 75-year lease seems to have certainly done so from the time the ink dried on the agreement in December 2008. If the revenue generated by parking meters in 2007 is a guide (and if that number remained static for the life of the lease agreement), the lease agreement created a $274.5 million profit for Morgan Stanley (operating as Chicago Parking Meters LLC). Since Morgan Stanley contracted the daily operation of maintenance to another for-profit company, Chicago Parking Meters LLC predictably raised parking rates so LAZ Parking could profit from providing its services. Consequently, all of the private entities involved with the parking meters will profit from the service it provides the City of Chicago.

The most troubling aspect of private entities managing services the government should provide is not the amount of money they glean from their work but their accountability to the public. If something goes wrong or if the services they provide don’t do what they should, public redress is potentially impossible. If the government doesn’t do the job it is supposed to do, there are inquiries, oversight hearings, and elections to remedy the solution. This is a difficult and tedious process, but it does work. If you apply the same methods to a private entity, the people raising issues about the quality of service can (in theory) face charges of harassment or trespassing if the public outcry does not hinder the company’s profitability.

The deal Chicago’s government made with Morgan Stanley, Chicago Parking Meters LLC, and LAZ Parking is not the only privately run service Chicago’s government outsourced. Several parking garages owned by the Chicago Park District are presently leased to Morgan Stanley. A company headquartered in Spain and Australia manages the Chicago Skyway, a section of Interstate 90 running southeast through and out of Chicago to Indiana. The Skyway and parking garage lease agreements did not raise the public outcry of grievances the most recent deal handing control of the city’s thousands of parking meters to three companies. The level of indignation from disgruntled motorists in the last few days revealed a silver lining in the gray cloud of privatized government services. The silver lining comes in the form of Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan. I am at least happy to see that while some feel it beneficial to abdicate their responsibility to the public, others make it their priority to serve the public good.

More Equal than Others

2009-05-21T00:07:00.004-05:00

With Iowa, Maine, and Connecticut joining the ranks of Massachusetts in recent weeks saying gay couples should enjoy all of the legal benefits afforded to heterosexual married couples, other state legislatures show they want to follow suit. There is one state in particular, New Hampshire, that triggered the memory of an argument I made in an essay about five years ago.

The governor of New Hampshire, John Lynch, recently vetoed a bill passed by the state's legislature calling for Marriage Equity for gay couples (civil unions are legal for gay couples in New Hampshire). He did so because he felt the bill, as passed by the New Hampshire legislature, did not do enough to protect the significance marriage has in religious institutions. According to Governor Lynch, "I have also heard, and I understand, the concerns of our citizens who have equally deep feelings and genuine religious beliefs about marriage. They fear that this legislation would interfere with the ability of religious groups to freely practice their faiths." He continued in his statement arguing, "[T]he role of marriage in many faiths extends beyond the actual marriage ceremony."

In a seemingly preemptive response to Governor Lynch's argument, I wrote this five years ago in an essay arguing against a proposed "Marriage Amendment" to the United States Constitution:

Most people would say if asked, that marriage is a religious sacrament. However, state governments must recognize all marriages regardless who performed the ceremony: priest, rabbi, cleric, minister, justice, or Elvis impersonator. Considering that state governments recognize unions between men and women, any state choosing to recognize same sex unions in the same vein should do so as well.

Lynch believes calling gay marriage what it is, rather than the euphemistic civil union, would cause discomfort among some in ecclesiastical circles. It does not obscure the fact that the secular state government needs to recognize the religious ceremony many people perform to show their commitment. People can feel free to have their spiritual advisor join them in holy matrimony if they choose to but they will not enjoy the legal benefits of "spouse" if the state did not approve.

If people who claim to be religious (you know who you are) did get married in their church/synagogue/temple but failed to get state issued marriage licenses, they would get a taste of what committed gay couples go through in most of the country.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-05-08T01:55:00.000-05:00

This is why I enjoy Fark.com.

You Can't Spell 'Pandemic' without PANIC.

2009-05-01T02:15:00.002-05:00

I am amazed at the reaction I've seen so far about the recent influenza outbreak. Schools closed their doors to prevent the potential spread of the virus, businesses are complying to the point of overcompensating with the guidelines submitted by the World Heath Organization (WHO) which issued a Level Five alert on 29 April 2009, and the public behaves as if it were listening to an Orson Welles radio program from October 1938.

While this event gives me cause for concern (just like any flu season), I fear that this flu frenzy, spurred on by hyperactive media outlets, will make people behave more irrationally that they presently do. So far I have seen plenty of precautions taken by my place of employment. I've also read reports of actions taken so far by organizations, public and private, to minimize the spread of this virus that leaves vigilance behind heading towards hysteria.

Because of this, I wonder what may happen if the fever pitch (pardon the pun) continues to rise. Will employers send a worker home because he or she is sneezing due to a high pollen count? Will they declare public water fountains off limits, fearing this strain of the flu will spread that way (forcing people to purchase even more bottled water)? Will this curb airline travel even more? (Although I would not object to keeping my shoes on when I go through security; that would prevent the flu and plantar warts.) How will it affect the new school year if the Level Five alert persists through the next few months or escalates?

The incredible access to information we have, in addition to better quality health care (for the most part), this should keep this "pandemic" at the level of a standard flu season that we are all familiar with. Perhaps people will keep a level head so this will pass like SARS in 2003.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-04-23T21:35:00.001-05:00

You can find plenty of strange stories on Fark.Com

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-04-12T22:37:00.002-05:00

"Made in China" is still not a good source for jokes.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-04-11T00:34:00.002-05:00

Funnily, Congressional Republicans channel Beavis and Butthead in their efforts to voice their opposition to President Obama's economic stimulus he signed into law last February.

Machines are Oiled with Apathy

2009-04-08T00:40:00.003-05:00

While some Chicago White Sox fans celebrated the home opener against the Kansas City Royals, there were other events occurring in the Chicago area and elsewhere all over the country that received much less attention: municipal elections.

I voted today partly because a former classmate ran for office in my town, but mostly because my town desperately needs a change from the selfishly inept leadership that presently runs it. What bothers me is in a town of about 15,000 where approximately 70% are of voting age (11,000 potential voters) only two thousand people cast ballots in this election. This is a far cry form the nearly 7,000 ballots cast fourteen months ago in the 2008 Illinois primary contest.

It is reasonable to speculate that the severe drop in voter turnout stems from election fatigue, especially if there is a hotly contested seat for federal office: president, senator, or (U.S. House) representative. I wonder whether or not this possibility factored into the decision to make municipal elections fall in odd-numbered years rather than during presidential and/or mid term Congressional election cycles. I believe those decisions were made so it would be easier for incumbents to maintain their power. Having all elections run concurrently would benefit the constituents in their individual communities (familiar with the saying, "All politics is local"?).

It would force the municipal candidates to become more active since people are already keen for the bigger, seemingly more important, up-ticket races for president, senator, or governor. It would reduce the likelihood that machines, prone to corruption and graft, could form since off-year elections are generally settled by the politically connected few rather than by the many. Thirdly, even though this would increase the amount of political advertising during federal election cycles this would be offset by an absence of those tiresome ads, complete with smears, distortions and creepy "Halloween-esque" piano music.

I would like to see some changes in how municipal elections operate in this country. It could make political machines grind to a halt for lack of lubrication.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-04-05T10:11:00.002-05:00

Samuel J. "Joe the Plumber" Wurzelbacher is Homer J. Simpson.

Random Question

2009-04-02T22:13:00.001-05:00

Would you go to a school that advertises on television with the disclaimer, "Credits unlikely to transfer"?

April Fool's Day and Humor

2009-04-02T17:02:00.005-05:00

I don't consider myself a practical joker, but I do enjoy a good prank when the situation warrants. For me, April 1st provides enough cover for me to do something grand for a couple of reasons. First, people whose sensibilities would be offended at other times would take offense at the prank. Secondly, it's a holiday I don't mind getting into the spirit of since it costs virtually nothing to celebrate.

In order to play a believable prank, especially on April Fool's Day, there has to be an element of plausibility in the prankster's ruse. I decided to use my recent excursion on Jeopardy! to supply the ethos for my prank. Since most everyone I know, directly and indirectly, congratulated me on my Jeopardy! experience, I needed a vehicle to produce the biggest impact possible. I decided to use the popular networking website Facebook to my advantage by making this pronouncement, "Shawn St.Clair received a call asking him to audition for "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" hosted by Meredith Viera", knowing that some of the people in my networking circle would respond positively. Needless to say I was not disappointed.

When I returned home, I found several people responded with well wishes and greetings of good luck. The last person to respond to my phony announcement asked, "And your response was...?", to which I replied, "April Fool."

When I revealed my prank, the feedback was, to say the least, mixed. Some applauded my efforts while others vented their good-natured spleens at me for tricking them. They have good senses of humor and will probably return the favor. My sense of humor is developed enough to take a jab here and there since I am more than willing to dish it out.

Case in point, I received this recently from a friend of mine acknowledging my efforts on Jeopardy!:
Front Back

I want to thank "Prinicpal" for the tee shirt; it gave me a laugh and a good amount of luck so far.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-04-02T00:52:00.002-05:00

If all of the Nigerian lawyers, bankers, and financiers looking to safely transfer funds to Americans just sent cashier's checks rather than emails to people, our economic crisis would be solved.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-03-22T21:51:00.001-05:00

A broken arm is not a worthy price to pay for a stainless steel stock pot on sale for $10.

Tomato, To-mah-to (or What's the best thing to throw at someone you revile?)

2009-03-20T06:17:00.004-05:00

When I read about American International Group CEO Edward Liddy's testimony before the House Finance committee earlier this week, I noticed something that got my hamster wheel turning (it was not the notion that Ed Liddy and G. Gordon Liddy are brothers or kindred spirits). Ed Liddy has been CEO of AIG for only six months. Prior to that, he headed Allstate. I am not sure where he worked prior to that or how long he as CEO of Allstate; I would guess that he did not work there very long if he was a CEO.

It seems that CEOs have become a band of high-priced journeymen (or day-laborers if you prefer) moving in random patterns across the corporate landscape. For example, Bob Nardelli went from General Electric to Home Depot to Chrysler in the span of six years (he collected well over $200 million in severance from Home Depot because he did not raise the stock value of Home Depot during his tenure).

Apparently, CEO tenure is something that has dwindled over time, especially in the last decade. They don't stay with a company very long once they attain the top position in the company, nor do they have much experience in the company they run. If they receive bonuses and golden parachutes for failure, there's no reason for them to stop doing what they do. Musical chairs can last forever as long as no one removes the chairs when the music stops.

If only the day-laborers at the local Home Depot had it this good (relatively speaking).

The Face of Terrorism

2009-03-13T22:59:00.002-05:00

On the 12 March 2009 edition of The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC, Rachel Maddow spoke at length about the recently late James G. Cummings. He died in December 2008 at the hands of his wife who, according to witnesses, suffered through years of physical and mental abuse from her now dead husband. What I found most striking about Rachel Maddow's story was not the "Burning Bed" vengeance of Mrs. Cummings but what authorities found in their home after she killed her husband: materials and ingredients for a dirty bomb.

A dirty bomb is similar to a conventional explosive device except it is laced with an amount of radioactive material (depleted uranium for example) so when it detonates, the radioactive material disperses over a small yet particular area, rendering it unsafe. It does not produce the mushroom cloud since the radioactive material itself does not explode. Dirty bombs, in certain circles, causes an understandable amount of concern. Many of these people are worried that foreign terrorists will find a way to construct a dirty bomb and detonate it somewhere in the United States. It is what the Bush Administration claimed Jose Padilla attempted to do, giving them justification to hold Padilla as an enemy combatant without due process and other Constitutional protections guaranteed to U.S. citizens (Padilla is native to Chicago). But I digress...

Given that this story had almost no coverage outside of Maine for nearly three months disturbs me. What distresses me more is ever since the terrorist attacks of 11 September, 2001 we think of brown men who may wear keffiyeh, speak Arabic, Farsi, or Urdu when we think of "terrorist". Shouldn't we be more vigilant and concentrate our efforts to spot potential terrorists wherever they may lurk? This certainly does not look like the image that comes to mind when we think about the word "terrorist", but he was. I have not seen any photographs of James G. Cummings but I would guess that Cummings did not look like someone with Arabian or Persian ancestry.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-03-07T22:59:00.002-06:00

Since it's time to spring forward, I remember reading (and hearing on National Public Radio) two years ago how the new schedule for Daylight Savings Time actually isn't about saving energy but more about sales. Specifically, since the new schedule means we "spring forward" on the second Sunday in March and "fall back" on the first Sunday in November, is it just to give trick-or-treaters an extra hour of daylight on Halloween? That certainly would not hurt candy sales at all.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-03-07T01:39:00.002-06:00

I wonder if the reason why we, the only industrialized nation in the world without universal, single-payer health care, don't have it because we have a heterogeneous population. Are some people actually afraid that a brown person gets a prescription to clear up a sinus infection or abscessed tooth?

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-03-05T09:36:00.002-06:00

Do the opponents of socialism understand at one time Republicans embraced socialist programs and projects? Today's GOP could take a leaf from Eisenhower's book.

Grade A(merica) Homogenized...

2009-03-04T21:42:00.003-06:00

Once upon a time in America's not too distant past, there used to be a regional flavor to the towns and cities that varied depending on where you traveled. While each town and city may look the same from afar, on closer inspection, they varied. Each town had its own series of banks, drug stores, restaurants, grocery stores, and so forth, most of them independently owned and operated. Because commerce existed in this way you could be reasonably certain that something you purchased in Columbia, South Carolina for example was something you possibly could not buy in Detroit, Michigan or in Denver, Colorado.

This does not apply to all things of course. For example, anyone in the United States in 1978 could walk into their local grocery and purchase a bag of Doritos. They could stop in their local drug store and pick up a bottle of Pepto-Bismol to soothe an upset stomach (after eating an entire bag of recently purchased Doritos). They could go into their local record store and buy the newest LP by Journey or Teddy Pendergrast. Before they went shopping or ran their respective errands on a Saturday afternoon, they would have stopped into their local bank (where they most likely received their stable, fixed-rate mortgage) to make a withdrawal from their checking or savings account. Even though they purchased nationally available brands supporting those corporations, they also supported their local merchants: independent grocers, pharmacists, bankers, mechanics, and other merchants.

Today, with a few exceptions, that is no longer possible. Independently owned grocery stores, record shops, pharmacists, bookstores, and so forth are going (or have gone) the way of the passenger pigeon. When you go grocery shopping, you do it at Albertson's, Safeway, or Wal-Mart Supercenter. You make home improvement purchases at Home Depot or Lowe's. You buy your home entertainment goodies at Best Buy. You get your over-the-counter and/or prescription drugs at Walgreen's or CVS. Even restaurants are not completely immune from the homogenizing effect of corporate consumerism. Plenty of cities across the United States have an Olive Garden, Chili's, T.G.I. Friday's, or Applebee's.

Thankfully restaurants and other places that serve food and beverages are reasonably safe from corporate homogenization. I'd hate to see Gray's Papaya, Billy Goat Tavern, Voodoo Doughnuts, or Ray's cloned hundreds of times so it seems like I never left Chicago when I travel around the country.

The Ignored, The Buried, and The Spineless

2009-02-25T08:30:00.003-06:00

With all the hoopla and buzz surrounding leading up to President Obama's "SOTU Light" last night, very few media outlets failed to mention Karl Rove skipped his third House issued subpoena to testify before the House Judiciary Committee.

The only major news that had anything to say, not to impugn other newspapers and blogs, was the Chicago Tribune with no mention of what Rove should have been doing instead.

Representative John Conyers (D-MI), do the duty the Constitution and House rules say you have the power to do. Arrest Karl Rove for contempt of Congress.

Definitions

2009-02-21T17:36:00.002-06:00

The word for today is Asinine.

Asinine (adj): Extremely stupid. The policy for a certain cellular company's prepaid minutes is asinine.

Apparently, AT&T's policy of "prepaid" cell phone minutes, for those who choose not to have a contract, means that they have a contract whether they want to or not. You can purchase minutes for a prepaid cell phone account in $50, $75, or $100 increments. However, they have expiration dates: thirty days, ninety days, and one year respectively. Any unused balance at the end of that time period is lost (not really lost, but pure profit for AT&T). That, to me, is contrary to the notion of "prepaid".

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-02-10T12:33:00.003-06:00

In the face of unseasonably warm weather here in Chicago (59F and sunny at noon CST) I have one observation to make:

If you are wearing shorts, a down jacket, and Ugg boots, it's probably still too cold for the shorts.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-02-10T02:38:00.002-06:00

It's refreshing to see the President of the United States take questions from unscreened people.

Logic Costs 6% Extra

2009-02-08T01:48:00.003-06:00

One of the websites I frequent on a daily basis is Fark.com, a news aggregation site where people submit links to news stories. While getting my morning fix last Sunday, I came across this little gem.

Ed Lasky asserts that Amazon's better than expected performance during the recent holiday season is a direct result of people's preference to stay at home to shop and to skirt oppressive sales taxes. Lasky openly wonders if high sales taxes (like in Cook County, Illinois - 10.25%) contributed to Amazon's success (comparatively speaking). I'd say it's possible, but highly unlikely.

For example, there are some states, since sales tax is a locally generated revenue stream, that do not impose a sales tax. Oregon is a good example. Lasky admits he would like to see which regions contributed the most to Amazon's sales. Since he does not know for certain, he cannot make the claim that high sales taxes in places like Chicago, New York City, and other large cities contributed to Amazon's holiday sales successes.

What I find most egregious about Lasky's article is his assertion the sales tax many consumers pay has a direct relationship to the collapsing American economy. While sales taxes have been a part of American consumerism for decades (during times of economic feast and famine), it is ludicrous to assert that high sales taxes contribute to the present mess that we find ourselves. Lasky's argument that consumers' "unwillingness" to pay high sales taxes drives businesses into bankruptcy and bloats the unemployment rolls reeks of intellectual dishonesty. There are so many elements that helped create the crisis we face now:

Deregulation of financial institutions have allowed the companies that make up that industry to run it that makes Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme pale in comparison.

The abolition of tariffs allowed companies that make things ship millions of jobs overseas. It's more profitable for a company to make widgets in China for twenty cents each, knowing the company will not pay an extra eighty cents in tariffs because it costs a dollar to make that widget here.

Outsourcing service jobs to India and the Philippines for the same reason why Americans no longer make things.

Sales taxes aren't destroying our economy.

Out of work people who cannot buy anything because they have no steady income and they've overextended their credit can't afford to pay sales taxes anyway.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-02-02T20:18:00.001-06:00

It looks like Tyler Durden is alive and well in Tuscon and works for Comcast.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-01-31T13:45:00.002-06:00

I give full credit to Thom Hartmann who at times asks this question:

Have you ever seen a pigeon chick (or eggs for that matter)?

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-01-30T10:57:00.002-06:00

I have a question regarding the buzz-worthy human interest story from the Los Angeles area: "Why would a woman with six young children need fertility treatments?"

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-01-29T23:54:00.002-06:00

Now that Rod Blagojevich is no longer the governor of Illinois (cheers and applause), I wonder how long it will take crews to replace his name over all of the Open Road Tolling booths that pepper the many miles of Illinois tollways?

On a related note, I am glad that the capital of Illinois will move back to Springfield, rather than Chicago's 33rd Ward (where Blagojevich and his father-in-law, Alderman Richard Mell, presently reside). I still cannot believe that taxpayer money went to the upkeep of the Governor's Mansion that sat empty for six years; Blagojevich never moved to Springfield because his wife did not want to leave Chicago.

Today in 'Random Trivia'...

2009-01-29T23:46:00.002-06:00

A friend of mine inspired this question. As a consequence, she is ineligible to answer today's trivia question.

Which three actors did Amy Heckerling direct in her classic 1982 ensemble film Fast Times at Ridgemont High go on to win Oscars? I will award bonus points (no cash value) if you can name the films that earned them their Oscars. Double-plus-good bonus points if you can name their characters in Fast Times at Ridgemont High.

In Vino Veritas?

2009-01-29T00:39:00.002-06:00

I've been reading and listening with interest the news reports regarding the passage of the $819 billion stimulus package passed in the U.S. House. The bill will be packed with vast amounts of individual programs, projects and the like. In short, many news organizations summed up the basic premise of the bill passed today: it will shore up existing, crumbling infrastructure, provide some tax relief to working class individuals and small businesses, refitting American schools, and so forth. President Obama , true to his inauguration address last week, extended an olive branch to Republicans in Congress to get this passed in a bipartisan manner. The passage of the House version of the bill came with no GOP votes for it.

In fairness to GOP House members, they did offer amendments to the bill that would've suited them and their constituencies (you know who I mean) that failed, also along party lines. Bipartisanship is a two-edged sword. This time, with President Obama ready to sign any bills that come his way, House and Senate Democrats have few incentives to cater (or kowtow in Senator Harry Reid's case) to Republican demands.

If I were President Obama, the House Republicans' actions today would make me think twice about agreeing to work with them in the future, especially about anything with the sense of urgency as an economic stimulus package. Thankfully, President Obama doesn't have my reservations or my level of cynicism.

I can only hope that Vice President Biden had an absinthe spoon at hand.

Today in 'Random Trivia'...

2009-01-23T09:16:00.003-06:00

The last President of the United States who publicly wore facial hair took the oath of office one hundred years ago (on 04 March 1909). He also was the only person to take the Presidential oath of office and administer it as Chief Justice. Who was he?

... and Now, a Word from Our Sponsor.

2009-01-20T19:18:00.005-06:00

I enjoy certain game shows. Some games challenge me intellectually and feed my love for trivia. Others simply allow me to comment (sometimes with helpings of schadenfreude) on how people react when placed in pressure situations, especially when they have the chance to win cash and/or prizes. Still others get on my nerves because of the pure silliness they ooze from everyone's unblinking eye. Here is my assessment of game shows, past and present. (N.B. The shows from the past aired in my lifetime, so no references to Monty Hall's Let's Make A Deal or Twenty-One.

Jeopardy!
This is a favorite of many people (including me) who never thought that nerds and geeks could be telegenic. I am privileged to have recently adorned the Jeopardy! stage and pressed the buzzer very recently. Speaking as someone who has appeared on the show, I can say that being an armchair contestant is much easier than being on the show. Placing wagers, even if you know all about sculpture materials, the capitals of South America, or the ingredients of cocktails, is far more difficult than I ever imagined.

The Price is Right
I enjoy this show simply for the pure entertainment value the contestants provide. Watching the everyday people run down the aisles in their discount, big-box store grandeur allows me to bring out my inner Nelson Muntz. Por ejemplo, recently in Contestant's Row, the four players bid on two iPods. Three of the four bids ranged between $400 and $700 (not unreasonable bids). The fourth bid $150. I thought (out loud), "Where in the hell is she shopping?" I would like to go on this show just for the sheer pleasure of doing so and to see if it really that hard to bid on poorly built catamarans (I assume it is).

Deal or No Deal
You will not catch me on this show. While most game shows require a modicum of skill in order to succeed, this one employs chance and more chance. The suspense added to the show with the mysterious, off-screen "banker" offering the contestant guaranteed gobs of cash is the hook that makes it so popular; I can only assume that's the case (no pun intended).

Press Your Luck
This was a favorite back in the day when high top fades and hair sprayed coiffure's were in vogue. This show had a decent mix of skill and luck because the contestants had to answer trivia questions in order to get more spins around the game board. Once the luck portion of the game replaced the skill portion, this is where the comedy and cutthroat, screw-your-neighbor-over appeal took over. The contestants, if they were lucky enough to gain a good chunk of prizes and money, could pass their remaining spins to other contestants in the hopes they would land on a Whammy (which erased all of their winnings). Unlike the earned spins they gained from answering questions, they HAD to use the spins passed to them by their opponents. This lead to contestants screaming things like, "Big bucks and no Whammies... STOP!"

Wheel of Fortune
Who would have thought that a Hangman-type game would be so lucrative? I usually don't watch Wheel of Fortune, but if I do, I generally have the same question: "Why do the contestants buy vowels (especially the obvious 'E') so early in the rounds?"

The Newlywed Game
For entertainment value, The Newlywed Game was pure gold. Each episode I watched left me wondering, "I wonder how that couple's ride home went."

For the record, I have to give props to MTV's Remote Control. Without it, we would not have Adam Sandler to kick around.

I've Always Wondered...

2009-01-17T09:34:00.003-06:00

Both Milwaukee, Wisconsin and South Bend, Indiana are the same distance from downtown Chicago (about 90 miles). Why do the Chicago media give University of Notre Dame (located in South Bend) athletic teams the same treatment as an area school, like De Paul, University of Illinois-Chicago, and Loyola?

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-01-15T11:30:00.002-06:00

Being an armchair quarterback is easy. When you finally get the opportunity to do what seems easy, you have a deeper appreciation how difficult it really is (whatever it is).

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2009-01-08T06:42:00.003-06:00

Remember the apocryphal story circulating the news and internet about Clinton staffers performing all sorts of pranks as they left the White House? While people still argue the veracity of that incident, I doubt it reaches the level of pettiness exhibited by President Bush towards President Elect Obama.

Samaritans in our Present Litigious Society

2009-01-01T23:00:00.003-06:00

A customer approached me today and asked what would be the best way to get help to change a flat tire. She said she had roadside assistance with her insurance company but had no way to contact them. She could not use her cell phone since she lent it to her daughter (this contradicted her later claim, come to think of it, that she could not get an answer from her family members at home in Chicago to lend help). I suggested she speak with the folks in Safety and Loss Prevention, but she claimed that they gave her "attitude", especially since she asked to use their phone. In the end, I did get the non-emergency number for the Bolingbrook Police Department and contacted them for her using our courtesy phone. Afterward, I bade her good luck.

Skepticism worked against my sense of empathy once she told her tale. When I shared this experience with my coworkers during lunch, one of them suggested that this woman attempted to prey on my empathy to change her tire for her. This of course prompted me to draw things to a seemingly illogical conclusion. If you're a Good Samaritan today, you can be a civil suit defendant tomorrow.

But is it really an illogical conclusion?

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-12-28T00:51:00.003-06:00

Improvisation is a part of any business strategy. It should not, however, be the only part of your business strategy.

Exceptions:
1) You stand in front of a red brick wall, blinded by the glare of a spotlight.
2) Clive Anderson and/or Drew Carey feeds you prompts.
3) You have to make a five course meal in one hour, all based on "a secret ingredient".

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-12-24T00:57:00.001-06:00

It's amazing what you remember (and what you forget) when you meet with people you have not seen in nearly two decades.

Liberals Can be Guilty of Misplaced Anger Too.

2008-12-21T14:30:00.002-06:00

I've been reading plenty of angry commentary about President-Elect Obama's choice to have Rick Warren provide the invocation at his inaugural. I've even heard angry muttering on liberal leaning talk radio (such as it is). Their ire comes from Warren's position on Roe v. Wade, on the LGBT community, and several other issues that social liberals and conservatives argue about constantly. While I disagree with Warren's positions on these issues, I have to ask those people who are upset about Warren's invocation of Obama's inauguration to calm down and keep it in perspective.

Firstly, this would be a graver issue if Warren were somehow associated with Obama's incoming administration in some capacity, as a spiritual adviser or something similar. Warren is only giving the opening prayer which will last no more than two minutes.

Secondly, many people feel Warren's invocation will provide him a large platform to speak about this, that, and the other. Historically speaking, many people feel that Obama's inauguration speech will be on par with FDR's in 1933 ("The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.") and JFK's in 1961 ("Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country."). Based on that, I would like to ask those who angrily disagree with Rick Warren giving the invocation at the inaugural this question: who gave the invocation for the 1933 and 1961 inaugurations of FDR and JFK respectively? Consequently, how did those opening prayers help shape their policies in their administrations?

The invocation simply asks God to watch over the proceedings and the new administration. Nothing more, nothing less. It is not a platform to further a political agenda, nor is it a place for someone to imbue dogma into the new president's policy. The sooner people realize that Obama, not Rick Warren, is the focus of the festivities on Inauguration Day, the happier they will be.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-12-17T22:59:00.001-06:00

I see a lot of therapy in this kid's future.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-12-13T22:13:00.001-06:00

An existential question purely based on etymology: How can an Arab be anti-Semitic?

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-12-11T07:08:00.001-06:00

Why do the most ill-prepared, ass-backward people seek your help when you are about to close for the day?

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-11-27T12:16:00.003-06:00

This is my definition of irony:

This morning I saw a car (a foreign SUV specifically) with this in its rear windshield: "Socialism sucks!". I passed it on Interstate 80, a highway paid for and maintained with everyone's tax dollars.

I thought to myself, "If he thinks socialism is so bad, why is he traveling on a public route?"

My Beef with Proselytes

2008-11-18T00:37:00.002-06:00

The pun comes from an experience I had recently in Los Angeles. I decided, based on a glowing report I saw on Sixty Minutes, to have dinner at a local In & Out Burger in Culver City (very tasty burgers by the way; I recommend the Double Double). While I waited for my food, since it was quite crowded, a woman with two children approached me and asked, "Excuse me, are you an evangelical?"

I replied, "No, I don't practice."

She then proceeded to explain why she approached me. She said that I resembled someone she met on a train trip, perhaps to a retreat of some sort, and thought that she would at least say hello. She continued to ask why I don't practice and if I've accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior. Without waiting for a response, she continued on a thread suggesting that if I have not, then when it's time for me to be judged, I will be judged based on the Ten Commandments.

She then proceeded to ask if I've:
Ever lied,
Lusted after anyone (even if it's a photograph),
Ever hated anyone,
Ever stolen anything (even something as small as a paper clip or pen).

(The answer is yes to all and I thought, "Hasn't most people?")

If I have done all of those things then I am going straight to hell. At this, I asked her, "Excuse me, but do you proselytize a lot?"

This caused her to pause then answer, "When the spirit moves me to."

I then explained to her her actions demonstrate a part of the reason why I no longer practice religion as some people believe I should practice it (I was raised as a Baptist). A major reason why I don't practice religion, any religion, is that religion is simply a set of rules in order for people to express their spirituality, something that is personal and unique to every individual.

I don't tell the woman this because she seemed sincerely convinced her way was the correct way, which is something I don't necessarily agree with; attempting to do so would waste valuable time and my order came up during her second offer to join her in a sixty second prayer, ensuring my salvation (in her mind).

I did leave feeling satisfied that I did not bear false witness by joining her in prayer, thereby satisfying her need. I have enough respect for other people's faith to not engage in such an insincere act.

How Un-American...

2008-11-11T18:09:00.002-06:00

Some people love to espouse the notion that spreading freedom is one of our American ideals, or that there are people in the world that "hate us for our freedom". What really irks me is that some of those people who most likely believe in that aspect of our culture (especially the latter sentiment voiced by George W. Bush) more than likely voted to make gay marriage illegal in several states including, most notably, California. What I don't understand is how people who actively believe that we should have freedom to do what we choose as long it does not hurt anyone else in the process deny a group of people the freedom to enjoy what everyone else can do (and abuses it on many occasions)?

Keith Olbermann of MSNBC expresses how I feel about this asinine rationale much more eloquently than I can.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-11-05T00:39:00.001-06:00

Remember, remember, the Fourth of November.
We received the change we have sought.
I will always remember the Fourth of November
And for the hope it hath wrought.

Yes we can.

Myth Versus Reality

2008-11-03T09:52:00.002-06:00

The ~~Mainstream~~ Corporate Media has devoted several news stories to allegations of potential voter fraud specifically implicating ACORN, a grass roots community organization that encourages people to register to vote (among other things). More recently, there have been news stories about the long, long lines in some places (Florida, Ohio, and Indiana) for early voting. I'll get to that later.

The media successfully conflated fraudulent voter registration as voter fraud while making cursory mentions of voter suppression. Here are some of the myths and realities surrounding voter fraud and voter suppression.

MYTH: ACORN, with the help of the Obama campaign, has registered thousands (if not millions) of fraudulent voters.

REALITY: ACORN only submits the registrations they get from their volunteers to the fifty Secretaries of State. Each Secretary of State office in all fifty states registers voters, not ACORN. Furthermore, ACORN actually flags potentially fraudulent voter registration forms when they submit them, alerting the agencies to investigate them before adding them to the voter rolls.

MYTH: Voter fraud is rampant, especially in areas where there are large Democratic political machines such as Chicago and Philadelphia.

REALITY: Evidence of voter fraud in present day elections is scant at best. In Crawford v. Marion County (Indiana) Election Board (2008), Justice David Souter argues in his dissent upholding Indiana's Voter ID law, "[E]ven in the State's interest in deterring a voter from showing up at the polls and claiming to be someone he is not must, in turn, be discounted for the fact that the State has not come up with a single case of in-person voter impersonation fraud in all of Indiana's history." (emphasis mine)

REALITY: While there is little to no evidence that voter fraud exists, there is ample evidence that voter suppression exists and has existed in the past. There are Constitutional Amendments prohibiting voter suppression. Also, election boards all over the country have limited the amount of voting machines in precincts where there is heavy voter turnout and the strong possibility that those places will vote heavily in favor of one candidate over another. This occurred in Ohio in 2004, where precincts in Cleveland and Columbus had only two functional voting machines in heavily populated precincts (resulting in eight to ten hour waiting times) while sparsely populated precincts in Ohio had as many as twenty viable machines available (Google 'Rolling Stone Ohio 2004' for more information). This more recently occurred in Indiana, Ohio, Georgia, and Florida where early voting polling places saw lines of voters waiting as much as six hours to vote early. Rachel Maddow this Sunday on MSNBC makes a salient argument about how this and what we may see on Tuesday acts as a violation of the Twenty-Fourth Amendment.

I hope you have voted already (if you have early voting where you live). If not, please do so on Tuesday.

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-10-20T21:28:00.003-05:00

This posting to a Fark.com forum made me laugh and gives me an opportunity to parse it.

"I sincerely doubt Liberals hate working people. More likely they think of them like the chickens who lay their morning eggs and the pigs who gave them their bacon."

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-10-18T22:38:00.002-05:00

I have to paraphrase Al Franken, presently running for U.S. Senate in Minnesota from his book Lies and the Lying Liars who Tell Them. He said in so many words that liberals love America the way adults love their loved ones. They see both good and bad traits and want their loved ones to enhance their good traits while overcoming their bad ones. Conservatives love America the way a four-year old loves her Mommy. She thinks that everything Mommy does is good and anyone who speaks against Mommy is bad.

We Can Certainly Party with the Haiti-ans

2008-10-17T00:10:00.008-05:00

A friend of mine suggested I parse the grammatical missteps in the final debate between Senators Obama and McCain. Honestly, it would be sort of unfair to compare the oratory style of McCain against Obama. Since I live in Chicago I have witnessed the plodding oratory skills of Mayor Richard Daley during his unscripted press conferences (and he was a prosecutor in the Illinois State's Attorney's office). Also, I've had healthy servings of schadenfreude over the last few weeks. In my opinion, political debates in today's television and YouTube era does not possess the rhetorical gravitas of past debates (Kennedy/Nixon in 1960 comes to mind). Instead they have several key elements that people see and react to: sound bites and visuals.

Some of the sound bites offered by McCain and Obama I deem worthy of these internet forum inspired tags: LOL, WIN, FAIL, or FACEPALM. Here are some examples taken directly from the debate transcript provided by the Los Angeles Times.

MCCAIN: No. I would like to mention that a couple days ago Senator Obama was out in Ohio and he had an encounter with a guy who's a plumber, his name is Joe Wurzelbacher.
FAIL -- This tag actually goes to the person who transcribed this particular quote. McCain mispronounced his name as "Wurzelburger". After that, McCain referred to Joe Wurzelbacher as "Joe the Plumber". (On a side note, this would have been a perfect impromptu drinking game rule while watching the debate. McCain said "Joe the Plumber" twenty-one times during the debate.)

MCCAIN: The whole premise behind Senator Obama's plans are class warfare, let's spread the wealth around. I want small businesses -- and by the way, the small businesses that we're talking about would receive an increase in their taxes right now.
FACEPALM -- Mentioning class warfare is a political third rail. Also, considering many Americans see politicians turning our country into an oligarchy (thanks to Congress' transparent pandering to special interests and lobbyists), they have no qualms about seeing someone wanting to stem the flow. Remember, Robin Hood was an economic populist.

OBAMA (on tax policy): If I can answer the question. Number one, I want to cut taxes for 95 percent of Americans. Now, it is true that my friend and supporter, Warren Buffett, for example, could afford to pay a little more in taxes in order...
MCCAIN: We're talking about Joe the Plumber.
OBAMA: ... in order to give -- in order to give additional tax cuts to Joe the plumber before he was at the point where he could make $250,000. Then Exxon Mobil, which made $12 billion, record profits, over the last several quarters, they can afford to pay a little more so that ordinary families who are hurting out there -- they're trying to figure out how they're going to afford food, how they're going to save for their kids' college education, they need a break. So, look, nobody likes taxes. I would prefer that none of us had to pay taxes, including myself. But ultimately, we've got to pay for the core investments that make this economy strong and somebody's got to do it.
MCCAIN: Nobody likes taxes. Let's not raise anybody's taxes. OK?
OBAMA: Well, I don't mind paying a little more.
WIN -- This heated exchange demonstrated with visuals that are key in present day debates. Here McCain (by persistently rolling his eyes) showed himself to be impatient and attempted to throw Obama off of the point he made with interruptions.

MCCAIN: Yes. Senator Obama, I am not President Bush. If you wanted to run against President Bush, you should have run four years ago.
WIN -- I have to give this one to McCain. This was an excellent line.

MCCAIN (speaking about Gov. Sarah Palin): She's a reformer through and through. And it's time we had that bresh of freth air (sic) -- breath of fresh air coming into our nation's capital and sweep out the old-boy network and the cronyism that's been so much a part of it that I've fought against for all these years.
LOL -- A Freudian slip if I ever heard one, especially after all of the glowing, hot-and-bothered right wing commentary about Sarah Palin's winking performance in the Vice Presidential debate. This slip of the tongue (no pun intended) seems to tell me that McCain prefers the "T" in T&A since it sounded to me he almost said "breast.

MCCAIN (on health care costs): Now, my old buddy, Joe, Joe the Plumber, is out there. Now, Joe, Senator Obama's plan, if you're a small business and you are able -- and your -- the guy that sells to you will not have his capital gains tax increase, which Senator Obama wants, if you're out there, my friend, and you've got employees, and you've got kids, if you don't get -- adopt the health care plan that Senator Obama mandates, he's going to fine you. Now, Senator Obama, I'd like -- still like to know what that fine is going to be, and I don't think that Joe right now wants to pay a fine when he is seeing such difficult times in America's economy. Senator Obama wants to set up health care bureaucracies, take over the health care of America through -- as he said, his object is a single payer system.
If you like that, you'll love Canada and England. So the point is...
SCHIEFFER (to OBAMA): So that's your objective?
OBAMA: It is not and I didn't describe it...
MCCAIN: No, you stated it.
OBAMA: I just...
MCCAIN: Excuse me.
OBAMA: I just described what my plan is. And I'm happy to talk to you, Joe, too, if you're out there. Here's your fine -- zero (making a hand gesture indicating "0"). You won't pay a fine, because...
MCCAIN: Zero?
OBAMA: Zero, because as I said in our last debate and I'll repeat, John, I exempt small businesses from the requirement for large businesses that can afford to provide health care to their employees, but are not doing it. I exempt small businesses from having to pay into a kitty. But large businesses that can afford it, we've got a choice. Either they provide health insurance to their employees or somebody has to. Right now, what happens is those employees get dumped into either the Medicaid system, which taxpayers pick up, or they're going to the emergency room for uncompensated care, which everybody picks up in their premiums.

WIN -- Obama, under persistent interruption from McCain and clarification from Bob Schieffer, explains and demonstrates his health care plan.

MCCAIN (on the topic of SCOTUS justices): Senator Obama voted against Justice Breyer and Justice Roberts on the grounds that they didn't meet his ideological standards.
FAIL -- The Senate confirmed Justice Stephen Breyer in 1995, ten years before Obama served in the U.S. Senate.

MCCAIN: We need to encourage programs such as Teach for America and Troops to Teachers where people, after having served in the military, can go right to teaching and not have to take these examinations which -- or have the certification that some are required in some states.
LOL -- This gets the "Wait, what?" treatment from me. While I can understand that military training can provide potential teachers with necessary leadership abilities, it cannot be the sole criterion for new teachers. They need to know the subject matter as well. The program McCain offers is something that can work in conjunction with the new G.I. Bill passed this year (which McCain initially opposed).

After watching this debate, it became clear to me that McCain reminded me of Cher (Alicia Silverstone) in Clueless in her debate class. More specifically, it reminded me of Mr. Hall's (Wallace Shawn) critique of her arguments, "Unresearched, rambling, and unconvincing."

Hamster Wheel of the Day

2008-10-15T00:24:00.002-05:00

Why do people persistently confuse socialism and communism? They are not the same thing even though they have similar elements. Potatoes and carrots are both vegetables that grow underground; no one confuses them.