The New Vernacular

The New Vernacular has moved!

2005-10-03T10:27:00.000-05:00

My apologies for not posting much lately, but it's because I've been working on a new project. The New Vernacular has a new look and a new home at thenewvernacular.com (that's a whole lot of new).

I was beginning to get frustrated with the lack of design options on blogger and I've always wanted my own Web site, so I bought some space and decided to try a new blogging platform: WordPress. I'm really happy with the results so far, there's a lot more flexibility on WordPress.

This will likely be the last post I make on Blogger, so be sure to check out thenewvernacular.com for fresh content.

'X' marks the spot

2005-09-30T18:46:00.000-05:00

When I was younger I loved anything that had to do with sailing, pirates or buried treasure. I must have read Robinson Crusoe four times. And now, on the same island that inspired Daniel Defoe's masterpiece, a Chilean team has found real buried treasure.

From Guardian Unlimited:

A long quest for booty from the Spanish colonial era appears to be culminating in Chile with the announcement by a group of adventurers that they have found an estimated 600 barrels of gold coins and Incan jewels on the remote Pacific island.

"The biggest treasure in history has been located," said Fernando Uribe-Etxeverria, a lawyer for Wagner, the Chilean company leading the search. Mr Uribe-Etxeverria estimated the value of the buried treasure at US$10bn (£5.6bn).

And who atually found it? A robot.

This most recent announcement, however, deserves greater credence because of the equipment used by the treasure hunters: a mini robot that can scan 50 metres deep into the earth. The robot, dubbed "Arturito", was invented by Chileans and over the past year has grabbed headlines by breaking some of the country's biggest criminal mysteries.

Link: 600 barrels of loot found on Crusoe island

A bureaucratic comparison

2005-09-26T12:10:00.000-05:00

The criticism of both the United States' political leadership and its extensive bureaucracy over the past month reminds me of something we covered in my "Japan in the World" lecture last semester.

The American bureaucratic system is, for the most part, based not on merit and competency working in civil service, but more upon relationships with those who dole out the jobs. Although this has been painfully apparent during the current administration and the recent issues with FEMA director Michael Brown, it's visible during every presidency and at all levels of government. It's just how our system is set up.

Unfortunately, the system allows individuals to rise to positions they may not be qualified for. According to Wikipedia, Brown "was the Judges and Stewards Commissioner for the International Arabian Horse Association, (IAHA), from 1989-2001. After numerous lawsuits were filed against the organization over disciplinary actions, Brown was forced to resign."

In Japan, the system for choosing bureaucrats is much different.

From countrystudies.us:

The University of Tokyo Law Faculty is the single most important source of elite bureaucrats. After graduation from college and, increasingly, some graduate-level study, applicants take a series of extremely difficult higher civil service examinations: in 1988, for example, 28,833 took the tests, but only 1,814, or 6.3 percent, were successful. Of those who were successful, only 721 were actually hired. Like the scholar-officials of imperial China, successful candidates were hardy survivors of a grueling education and testing process that necessarily began in early childhood and demanded total concentration. The typical young bureaucrat, who is in most cases male, is an intelligent, hardworking, and dedicated individual.

By no means am I saying this system is any better than our own. In fact, I don't think it is. It has many of its own problems, including discrimination, corruption and narrow-mindedness. But although many department heads move often, most bureaucrats remain within as single agency for their entire careers, providing a certain amount of expertise in the field.

By looking at different governments and different cultures, we can see where we can improve ourselves.

It's following major events like a natural disaster that we need to consider changes to our system of government. It has been called the "grand experiment" for a reason. There's no reason to think that whatever we have now is the best we can achieve and it's always helpful to look around for new and unique ways of attacking the same problem.

It's obvious that there need to be some changes. We could probably start with requiring the director of FEMA to have some sort of background in disaster relief.

Barrows returns to work in new backup position

2005-09-26T12:08:00.000-05:00

It seems as though UW leaders (especially John Wiley) have a death wish. Following the release last week of the Steingass Report, a document investigating UW administrator Paul Barrows' conduct prior to his extended (paid) leave of absence and containing accusations of inappropriate conduct from five different women, Barrows returns today to his position as senior administrative program specialist at a salary of $72,881.

What's worse than the original allegations have been to cover-up from Bascom:

From the Badger Herald:
When Wiley demanded Barrows justify his use of sick leave, the embattled administrator produced an unsigned physician’s note, which did not validate the continuing application of paid sick time.

“[Y]ou and your administrative team should have been aware of the requirement that an employee must be ill in order to charge an absence of sick leave, and should have acted promptly either to obtain the appropriate documentation on Dr. Barrows’ situation or to require his return to work,” Reilly wrote to Wiley.

Not doing so “has hurt the university’s reputation,” Reilly continued.

At least the UW is still in the state legislature's good graces:

“I have lost all faith in both the president (Reilly) as well as the chancellor,” state Rep. Scott Suder, R-Abbotsford, said. “They should have fired Paul Barrows and severely reprimanded Chancellor Wiley, but neither of those actions have been taken.”

Badger Herald reports:

Barrows to return to work

UW releases report: Barrows will not be fired

Reilly reprimands chancellor in letter

Wisconsin State Journal editorial:

Uw Actions Don't Inspire Confidence

Madison vs. Milwaukee

2005-09-22T14:01:00.000-05:00

Having lived my entire life in Milwaukee and Madison, I've got a good idea where James Rowen is coming from when he compares the two cities at MadisonMagazine.com. Each has its own flavor, its own unique charm.

Rowen astutely observes that Madison is more successful in promoting itself than is Milwaukee (it also has an easier task being smaller and focused around the capitol and university):

The Historic Third Ward? Where's that, Madisonians say. Walker's Point? Most Madison residents haven't heard of it. Development along Brady Street or National Avenue or Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, or in Bay View or the Menomonee Valley, or along the ever-expanding RiverWalk north from downtown, towards Commerce Street and the Riverwest neighborhood, and south to the harbor? Sorry, doesn't ring a bell.

Part of this lack of knowledge is because Milwaukee doesn't toot its own horn very loudly. It is curiously adverse to self-promotion; Madison has a much better spin machine running full tilt about itself.

Whether it's Badger football, cutting-edge stem cell work at the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF), or some national magazine rating as a great place to live, Madison knows how to sell and celebrate itself. Milwaukeeans are more reserved about their hometown, and sometimes offer less praise about their city than do visitors. One friend visited from Kentucky a few years ago and was so taken with the downtown, the museums, the restaurant scene, and the varied and historic architecture that he tried, unsuccessfully, to trade his newspaper career there for a job here.

Since Rowen's article was written, Milwaukee civic leaders, including Mayor Tom Barrett have unveiled a plan to promote the city and its neighboring counties as "Milwaukee". The idea is to take a more branded approach to the region and create a more marketable identity for an area home to a $63 billion economy.

From the Journal Sentinel article titled The Goal: A strong regional economy: 7 counites launch joint effort to brand, sell 'Milwaukee':

The first step involves the creation of a brand or "regional identity" that all seven counties will accept. The "Milwaukee marque," as its planners call it provisionally, will become the centerpiece of the Web site and promotional efforts.

Even small steps amount to big breakthroughs. The seven counties have agreed to use "Milwaukee" as part of the regional brand. At least one regional economic cooperation effort failed five years ago because the collar counties refused to identify with their big urban neighbor. Mitchell, of the Waukesha County Economic Development Corp., said many visitors still cannot pronounce the name "Waukesha," but they all know Milwaukee.

Another big component of the plan will be the retention of businesses.

For that, the Milwaukee Development Corp., an arm of the MMAC, has begun a systematic outreach program to visit major employers in the region. One-on-one meetings with executives will give local governments an early warning when employers are in trouble or might plan to move or expand. That will allow local authorities an opportunity to intervene.

At the same time, the program will methodically collect information on companies and feed a database on regional economic trends that will become an analytical tool.

The biggest effort for now is to topple the "New Berlin Wall," as some call the boundary of suburban New Berlin that lies on the Waukesha-Milwaukee county line.

What Jon Stewart really wanted to say at the Emmy's

2005-09-22T13:49:00.000-05:00

If you like The Daily Show, you'll love this. If you're not a fan, don't watch the clip.

Jon Stewart's slightly censored Emmy speech about the handling of Hurrican Katrina

I like soccer too, but not this much

2005-09-22T13:43:00.000-05:00

This pretty much speaks for itself. I can't wait to be in Europe during the World Cup next summer.

From CNN.com:

Airliner fakes emergency so passengers can watch soccer game

LIMA, Peru (AP) -- A chartered jet carrying 289 Gambian soccer fans pretended it needed to make an emergency landing so they could watch their team compete in the FIFA Under 17 World Championships, officials said Wednesday.

The plane, claiming to be low on fuel, landed Tuesday near the stadium in Peru's northern coast city of Piura.

"It truly was a scam," said Betty Maldonado, a spokeswoman for Peru's aviation authority, CORPAC. "They tricked the control tower, saying they were low on fuel."

CBS's PublicEye

2005-09-19T12:45:00.000-05:00

A week ago, CBSnews.com launched "PublicEye", a blog that attempts to give transparency to the reporting process at CBS and provides a forum to discuss the role of the "4th Estate". Transparency is especially important to CBS after the "rathergate" scandal over forged documents questioning President Bush's National Guard service last year.

It's still too early to tell how PublicEye will develop. Because CBS doesn't have a 24-hour television news network, it important for the organization to build their Internet newsroom and create/sustain an audience without being about to direct TV viewers to their website. So far, it seems like the folks at CBS are doing a decent job, but they're still trying to figure out some of the more technical aspects of blogging, such as regulating comments. Jeff Jarvis over at Buzzmachine shares his take on the topic.

Some notable PublicEye posts from the last week:

Outside Voices: Jay Rosen's Open Letter To CBS

The Morning Meeting

What's up with the gas tax holiday?

2005-09-18T14:03:00.000-05:00

After reading the article "It Is Time for a Gas Tax Holiday" by WI State Senator Mary Lazich (R - New Berlin) on WisOpinion.com, I sent her an e-mail expressing my concern with the proposal:

Dear Senator Lazich,

I read your article on the gas tax holiday and felt the need to
respond. Although it is true that the gas tax holiday would save
motorists over $100 million, that would be $100 million less that the
state could spend on health care, education and property tax relief.
republicans have been complaining that we spend too much on education,
that property taxes are too high. Taking more money from the state is
probably not the way to go about solving these problems.

The individual savings from the gas tax holiday to individuals and
families will be negligible. Filling up a Ford Explorer with a 22.5
gal. gas tank 5 times during the 30 day period would only save the
owner $16.88.

That savings is not enough to balance a loss of over $100 million in state
funding at this time.

If you truly care about lowering gas prices, I urge you to support the
repeal of the minimum markup law so as to eliminate an artificial bump
in gas prices. The law does little to protect "mom and pop" gas
stations today (I don't remember the last time I saw an "independent"
gas station) and isn't necessary to cover the cost of credit card
transactions.

Thank you for your time.

Mike Westling

Here is the e-mail I got in response:

Hi Mike,

Thank you for your e-mail. Wisconsin is a high tax state. We lose
population and taxe revenues because people flee the state. If we
reduce taxes, maybe more people will stay here and the economies of
scale will benefit all Wisconsinites. The price of gas is hurting
people. If affects food and clothing purchases as well as health care
purchasing.

Senator Mary Lazich

In response to Sen. Lazich's response, I first need to say that I agreed that there was a problem with high gas prices... I simply don't believe that a tax holiday is the correct solution.

Secondly, it sounds as though Sen. Lazich's economic basis for the plan is pretty shakey. Just banking on the fact that "maybe" people will stay in the state if we reduce taxes is risky in my book. I dont know if many economists would support tax cuts simply based on the reasoning that "maybe people won't leave". I need some more evidence to convince me that this would make a positive impact.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I doubt that an extra $17 is going to be the difference between someone leaving the state or staying here. Now, taking an extra $100 million from the state budget... enough to fund an entire school district in, say, Florence... that might piss someone off enough to leave.

Gas prices are high around the country... this particular issue shouldn't be dragged into the Republican agenda of cutting taxes so that richer consituents can keep a few extra bucks in their pockets while those who can't afford private education suffer for lack of public funding.

Yes, Wisconsin is a high tax state. I'm not saying that we should never cut taxes... I'm just saying that it's probably not the best idea in this case. It's a PR friendly political publicity stunt that generates a lot of press (holiday just makes me feel warm and gooey inside), but it's poor public policy that won't do anything to relieve the underlying problem. Just because it sounds good and is popular doesn't make it a good idea. Not too many are going to say "no" to an extra holiday.

Even Jack Cafferty's making fun of Wolf Blitzer

2005-09-15T19:28:00.000-05:00

One of my new favorite pasttimes is making fun of "The Situation Room" on CNN. It seems like they've expanded it last pretty as long as Wolf Blitzer can stay awake and they're using the "feeds coming in from all over the world" in more and more of their normal reporting.

I'm not the only one that thinks it's all a little over the top:

From today's Situation Room:

WOLF BLITZER: That's fascinating, watching a friend or relative flying some place, you go there at flight explorer.com and you can see it almost realtime. Thank you. Useful information in "The Situation Room." Let's get more useful information, Jack cafferty. I almost said useless information, Jack, but i corrected myself.
JACK CAFFERTY: Has that been a Freudian slip? How many hours have you been on your feet? Too many? They should pay you by the hour. This show is a telethon without a disease. It goes on and on and on.

I don't always agree with Cafferty, but I like that he's a kind of check on the utmost seriousness and truth that Blitzer continually attempts to portray on the program. Being an observer for most of the show, it seems like Cafferty is the only one at CNN who will say what the viewers are thinking.

Thanks to Wonkette

When you've gotta go, you've gotta go

2005-09-15T18:31:00.000-05:00

...even if it's in the middle of a Security Council meeting at the 2005 World Summit and 60th General Assembly of the United Nations.

link and link

Original BoingBoing post

Open Letter by Tim Wise

2005-09-13T18:07:00.000-05:00

Tim Wise, a prominent anti-racist author and activist responds in an open letter "to the man sitting behind me at La Paz today, in Nashville, at lunchtime, with the Brooks Brothers shirt" about a conversation he overheard blaming those who did not leave New Orleans for their own fate. Understandably angry, Wise defends those who truly need no defending from criticism.

From the letter titled, "Blasphemy about New Orleans, a God with Whom I am Not Familiar":

I watched you wipe salsa from the corners of your mouth, as you nodded agreement to the statement of one of your friends, sitting to your right, her hair neatly coiffed, her makeup flawless, her jewelry sparkling. When you asked, rhetorically, why it was that people were so much more decent amid the tragedy of 9-11, as compared to the aftermath of Katrina, she had offered her response, but only after apologizing for what she admitted was going to sound harsh.

"Well," Buffy explained. "It's probably because in New Orleans, it seems to be mostly poor people, and you know, they just don't have the same regard."

She then added that police should shoot the looters, and should have done so from the beginning, so as to send a message to the rest that theft would not be tolerated. You, who had just thanked Jesus for your chips and guacamole, said you agreed. They should be shot. Praise the Lord.

Your God is one with whom I am not familiar.

I heard Wise speak last year in an event at the UW. He's a wonderful speaker who presents pointed positions on racism that many of us, no matter what your background, have either never considered before or avoided confronting. If you ever get a chance to listen to him, do it.

Tim Wise's Web site

Thanks to Xoff

Media frustration over hurricane response efforts (or lack thereof)

2005-09-13T17:32:00.000-05:00

Salon.com (free day pass required) has compiled viedo of reporters expressing their frustration over the government response to Hurricane Katrina.

In my mind, there are a couple different reasons for these dramatic reactions by individuals who are supposed to be objectively covering the story. There are a few things that differentiate the coverage Hurricane Katrina from other natural and unnatural disasters:

This disaster was inside the U.S., in a large city.
Unlike 9/11, the people directly affected (not from fear, but actual loss) are poor Americans who did not have much to begin with. Besides huge death tolls, people have lost their homes, their businesses, their jobs and their city.
Reporters have experienced the suffering of these people first-hand. It didn't happen over the course of a couple of days. There has been suffering and death for weeks. It didn't happened half-way across the world, like the Tsunami did. These people speak the same language and are connected by the same media. Many of these reporters have visited New Orleans before. The before-after comparison is extremely dramatic.
There is an obvious economic and racial contrast between those who were able to flee the are and those who chose to stay in New Orleans.

Brian Williams was in the Superdome with thousands of people seeking shelter from the storm. Other reporters saw firsthand not only the devastation that comes with a hurricane, but the impact that this particular storm had on a poor minority population.

It seemed to many reporters (and myself) that they cared more about the people being directly affected by the storm than those responsible for organizing the relief efforts. There was very little sincere frustration from public officials (besides the mayor of New Orleans). Why would the media know more than those in charge? It's a frustrating thought.

President Bush did say today that he took responsibility for the inadequate federal response to the situation, which is a step in the right direction. A step that is two weeks too late, but a step nonetheless. I don't blame Bush entirely for the piss-poor execution of relief efforts, but I do blame local, state and federal bureaucrats who didn't insist that more be done, immediately. There should have been a call at each rung of the chain command that screamed for more resources, assisted evacuation. In other words, drastic times call for drastic measures... not drastic defense of misinformation and inaction.

Thanks to Wonkette

Brian Williams talks about hurricane, relief effort problems on Daily Show

2005-09-10T18:49:00.000-05:00

Brian Williams, anchor of the NBC Nightly News, comes on the Daily Show after spending nearly two weeks in New Orleans covering Hurricane Katrina and its consequences. He talks to Jon Stewart about conditions in the Superdome during and immediately after the hurricane, an interview with FEMA Michael Brown, and martial law in New Orleans. Williams shares his experiences with military and police forces attempting to contain the media even during smaller events, like fires, in the area. This interview is one of the better analyses of the situation that I have heard or read yet.

Williams was the only nightly news anchor of the major networks to head down to New Orleans during the hurricane and broadcast from the area.

Williams' blog: The Daily Nightly

I just got a link from Rocketboom!

2005-09-09T14:49:00.000-05:00

Earlier today I suggested to Rocketboom that they read my post, higher gas prices are exactly what we need, and they ended up linking to it from today's show. It's the most exciting thing that's happened to The New Vernacular since I started it last year.

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, Rocketboom is a video blog, or "vlog", from New York that produces a short segment each weekday dealing with all sorts of news topics, from the highly important to the geeky and inane. Basically, all the stuff I care about.

Here are some articles that go into more detail about the Rocketboom phenomenon:

Rocketboom's powerful lift-off (Business Week)

'Rocketboom' may be future of TV news (ABC)

'Vlogger' cyber-culls the news (CBS)

Hummer or Hybrid? Let Rocketboom help you decide.

2005-09-09T10:56:00.000-05:00

Rocketboom for Friday, September 9, 2005

It's worth watching just for the punchline.

Katrina: Reports on treatment of refugees

2005-09-08T14:06:00.000-05:00

More information regarding refugees in Texas and Oklahoma. Both from today, September 8.

From BoingBoing:

Katrina: Astrodome lockdown report from blogger volunteer
A blogger who is volunteering at the Astrodome says:

They locked out the people out of the dome, evacuees and volunteers. we have not had volunteers able to come in all morning. people just screaming broke into the gate to get in and all the people and volunteers ran into the dome. hundreds, at least 200 or 300 people started pushing in. no one was on the other side of the locked gate, no traffic no guards, etc. my volunteer guy telling the story from the human rights campaign ran in too. finally one police officer tried to corral people and push them back out. and in ffact everyone was pushed out. except my guy who pretended he had been in all along. and the people who had been in were pushed out and locked out.
rumors: Bush is here or coming here any minute. and/or, FEMA is giving out debit cards and people got very rowdy and so fema locked everything down mega tight.
No reliant empolyees, no one , no officers, no one to ask, people screaming and panicking, locked out of what is now their home, their kids are in here, etc. no one in the dome knows what is happening

Katrina: Blog account from Oklahoma "FEMA Detainment Camp"

FEMA will not allow any of the kitchen facilities in any of the cabins to be used by the occupants due to fire hazards. FEMA will deliver meals to the cabins. The refugees will be given two meals per day by FEMA. They will not be able to cook. In fact, the "host" goes on to explain, some churches had already enquired about whether they could come in on weekends and fix meals for the people staying in their cabin. FEMA won't allow it because there could be a situation where one cabin gets steaks and another gets hot dogs - and... it could cause a riot. It gets worse.

He then precedes to tell us that some churches had already enquired into whether they could send a van or bus on Sundays to pick up any occupants of their cabins who might be interested in attending church. FEMA will not allow this. The occupants of the camp cannot leave the camp for any reason. If they leave the camp they may never return. They will be issued FEMA identification cards and "a sum of money" and they will remain within the camp for the next 5 months.

Katrina Aftermath

2005-09-08T13:32:00.000-05:00

Here's some photos ad informatino of the aftermath of Katrina that you may not find in the mainstream media:

Photos from WLTV

Photos from the Astrodome - Flikr Feed

Note: I don't know about the validity of these reports, but here they are:

From BoingBoing: Katrina: "Rape, murder, beatings" in Astrodome, say evacuees

The land of missed opportunity

2005-09-06T18:50:00.000-05:00

I'm repeatedly told by those in positions of governmental leadership that we live in the greatest, most powerful country on the planet, which is why I share Brian Christianson's outrage at the snail's pace that aid and rescue efforts arrived in New Orleans. Where was Team America on this one? I don't usually agree with Christianson, but he's right on the money here.

From Free Will:

I wanted to see, no, expected to see, U.S. Army Rangers parachuting in; the sky clouded with cargo boxes of food, water, medicine, whatever, landing on every block of New Orleans.

I wanted to see, no, expected to see, U.S. Navy Seals and inflatable power boats throwing a wake; nearly capsizing from the weight of rescued children packed shoulder-to-chin.

I wanted to see, no, expected to see, U.S. Marines driving a convoy of 10,000 trucks from Camp Lejeune.

I wanted to see, no, expected to see, the U.S. Air Force, the U. S. Coast Guard, National Guard, Reservists, ROTC, even those currently in boot camp, deployed to New Orleans before the first nightfall.

Never, never, never, did I think I would ever see American refugees, dying in an American city, of starvation, dehydration, heat, lack of medical care.

The pictures I see on FOX, MSNBC, CNN are not images of Africa, Latin America, Haiti. This is America. And those are Americans, dying, in an American city.

Homeland Security? Rapid Response? I am disgusted by my government.

Additional comments circulating the blogosphere:

Keith Olbermann of MSNBC shares his own thoughts on the slow response

J-Walk blog highlights the Bush Administration's plan for recovery... of their reputation

The Republic of T appropriately rips Barbara Bush for her disparaging comments describing refugees in the Houston Astrodome.

From EditorandPublisher.com:

In a segment at the top of the show on the surge of
evacuees to the Texas city, Barbara Bush said: "Almost
everyone I’ve talked to says we're going to move to
Houston."

Then she added: "What I’m hearing which is sort of
scary is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is
so overwhelmed by the hospitality.

"And so many of the people in the arena here, you
know, were underprivileged anyway, so this--this (she
chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.

Brewers rated as #1 value in MLB

2005-09-06T12:54:00.000-05:00

Sports Illustrated ranked major league ballparks in terms of the value they offer fans. Using a combination of scores in categories such as average ticket price, average cost of souviners/concessions, amenities, atmosphere and team, the report placed Miller Park at the top of the list.

Details on Miller Park

Despite high ratings in most categories, the Crew earned a 3 for team performance. SI mentions the major potential of rookies like Weeks, Fielder and Hardy... but seemingly bases their grade solely on the team's record (64-67 at the time of publication). They fail to acknowledge that the Brewers are flirting with .500 in an attempt to finish the season over the mark for the first time since Molitor left in '92. It's not "breaking the curse," but for Brewer fans at least it's hope.

A #1 fan rating is something for Milwaukee to be proud. Having just visited Fenway and Shea stadiums in Boston and New York respectively, I can say that Miller Park is a MUCH more affordable experience. And that's what baseball should be, an opportunity for people of all demographics to take their families to a ball game without breaking their budget. As the Crew (hopefully) improves their play in the next few years, Miller Park's value will only increase and fans will begin to see a return on their investment.

And there's no doubt that Brew Town is living up to it's national reputation:

The 'hood here is merely an asphalt sea -- but it plays host to the greatest tailgating scene in all of Major League Baseball. College-aged Wisconsinites huddle around coolers and pledge their support for Miller products; adults kick back in lawn chairs, grilling meats and swigging MGDs, while their law-abiding kids play catch and have conversations like this one, which I can attest to overhearing in May:
Thirteen-year-old to his friend, while both excitedly observe a nearby tailgate party: "Dude, those guys are getting plastered."
Friend: "If you want to see plastered, just wait 'til I'm 21."

Maybe higher gas prices are exactly what we need

2005-09-04T18:26:00.000-05:00

Note: I know it's a little long, but I recommend reading this entire post if you've got the time.

Maybe this is blasphemy, but I'm not so sure that higher gas prices are a bad thing. I know that the price spike affects virtually every aspect of modern convenience, boosting the transportation costs of food and other products, but it could be what is needed to force what I'm going to call "gas reform". It should probably be "fuel efficency reform with an emphasis on the research of renewable energy sources", but that's a little long.

It's kind of like tort reform, but everybody wins. Well, at least in the long run.

Right now America has a bad habit of carelessly guzzling gasoline. Increased fuel prices force a change in habits. In manufacturing habits, in buying habits, in driving habits.

From "Gas prices too high? Try Europe" in the Christian Science Monitor:

"Societies adjust over decades to higher fuel prices," says Jos Dings, head of Transport and Energy, a coalition of European environmental NGOs. "They find many mechanisms."

Chief among them, say experts, is the habit of driving smaller and more fuel-efficient cars. While the average light duty vehicle on US highways gets 21.6 miles per gallon (m.p.g.), according to a study by the Paris based International Energy Agency (IEA), in Paris, its European counterpart manages 32.1 m.p.g.

"European consumers are very sensitive to fuel economy and sophisticated about engine options," says Lew Fulton, a transport analyst with the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP). "European car magazines are full of comparisons of fuel costs over the life of a vehicle."

When demand changes, manufacturers need to deliver. The Detroit-based auto makers will be forced to produce smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicles that exceed the fuel-efficency of today's hybrids and rival luxury cars with their comfort and style. The first step: don't make hybrid cars so damn ugly. The Honda Civic hybrid (Japanese, of course) is a good start. American auto makers aren't making more fuel-efficient vehicles because they don't have to.

Higher gas prices should also make cash-conscious drivers drive more slowly and safely.

"There is really good evidence that higher prices reduce traffic," says Stephen Glaister, a professor of transportation at London's Imperial College. "If fuel prices go up 10 percent ... fuel consumed goes down by about 7 percent, as people start to use fuel more efficiently, not accelerating so aggressively and switching to more fuel-efficient cars. It does change people's behavior."

The US authorities, however, "are unwilling to use resource price as part of their strategy" to conserve oil, says Lee Schipper, head of transportation research at the Washington-based World Resources Institute, an environmental think tank.

"The biggest hole in our policy today is fuel taxation," he adds. "Tax increases are something Americans should do but don't know how to do, and I wonder if they will ever be able to.

Some additional thoughts:

The gas tax holiday for Wisconsin is a bad idea. It'll save individuals a couple bucks and cost the state millions that could and should be used for other things, such as education. See previous post: Treating what's ailing Wisconsin

Hydrogen cars are the stupidest idea ever. Hydrogen is essentially a battery. It can't be harvested, it has to be created in process that splits the hydrogen from oxygen in a water molecule. For the process to occur, it has to be powered by electricity. How do we get electricity? From fossil fuels, such as coal and gasoline. That should probably proceed any article on the future of hydrogen cars, yeah? Oh, and it's expensive as hell.

The same thing goes for Ethanol. It's made from corn... great! Except that to grow corn you need to transport fertilizer and water. You've got to use machines to plant and harvest... machines that run on gasoline. And you've got to run a refinery to extract the ethanol from the corn. A refinery that, unless there's some new technology I'm not aware of, will run on electricity. And not electricity produced by wind turbines. In total, you're using a lot more energy to create the ethanol than you'll ever get from the final product.

Really, it doesn't help anyone except subsidy-receiving farmers. So, how about taking those subsidies and spending that money on education so that someone in state government can think to call someone who knows something about science and maybe create some public policy that actually helps people.

And well we're at it, maybe someone could tell a reporter to ask a couple questions when they're doing stories on renewable energy because we all know that these blog things are just a fad anyway

Treating what's ailing Wisconsin

2005-09-04T18:06:00.000-05:00

The number from the last census show that poverty has been growing more quickly in Wisconsin than any other state. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel highlights some of the specifics in an editorial, Taking our medicine:

In the state as a whole, the number of people in poverty jumped 109,960 between 2000 and 2004. In that period, the Milwaukee metropolitan area's number jumped 43,256, or nearly 40% of the total. That's sizable but still means that 60% of poverty growth was elsewhere. Overall, metro Milwaukee accounts for only about 32.6% of the state's total poverty number for 2004.

I share my opinion of the best solution to the problem with Essie Allen, who recently told the Journal Sentinel Editorial board, "Education leads to jobs, which leads to income, which leads to stability."

The JS builds upon her thoughts:

The solution is, as Allen's prescription suggests, getting more students through high school with the skill sets to go on to college or technical training that will land them the jobs capable of supporting families. This means more heat from the public on school boards to start thinking more creatively to achieve this.

Increased poverty, of course, means beefing up, not scaling back, safety net programs and very much calls into question the efficacy of the state's W-2 program. But, ultimately, we'd much rather have a community so rich with meaningful jobs that safety nets are not as necessary.

It's my opinion that public education, both the K-12 and University systems, is the single most important investment the state can make. Highway projects, gas price regulation, property tax "freezes" (I hate that term, by the way) on any level, even medical programs, are nothing when compared with education. Education has an impact on society and the economy at every level.

Maybe if some of our state legislators paid more attention in school themselves, they might realize that providing each young person in Wisconsin with a quality education will reduce the percentage of the state budget that's now spent on the welfare programs they dislike so much.

Spotlight: Slate's Jack Shafer

2005-09-04T17:49:00.000-05:00

Jack Shafer, Slate.com's editor at large has been focusing on media coverage of the Katrina aftermath in his last couple of articles.

In his latest piece, News You Can Lose: What I hate about Cable TV Journalism, Shafer focuses on Cable television's shortcomings when it comes to sharing which news is truly important as opposed to structuring a broadcast simply to maximize viewership and profits. They don't want you to check back every couple of hours to see if anything has developed... they want you to watch straight through. And during that time, they want you to watch the same dramatic images they took three days ago because they're better (and cheaper) than new shots.

… I hate the absence of context and continuity. Where are we in the story? What came before? What's next? More than once while watching reports, I've felt as disconnected from the narrative as that guy in Memento, who can only remember the last 20 minutes of what happened to him before his memory purges itself.

I appreciate the difficulty of covering this story, but if the news networks can't bring coherence to it, they can at least offer the disclaimer that circumstances will render their breaking-news accounts fragmented and flawed, and that they promise to sort things out in a 9 p.m. or 11 p.m. broadcast. With so much air to fill, why haven't they produced a 15-minute segment on the engineering of the levees or an animated 3-D representation of how the storm surged into New Orleans and broke upon the coast?

On Friday, Shafer posted an article titled The Rebellion of the Talking Heads about journalists taking on the role of public advocate in the face of politicians who have attempted to put an optimistic and innocent face on the handling of the situation.

Last Wednesday, Shafer was one of the first journalists to bring up that the major news outlets were skirting the fact that almost all of the victims remaining in New Orleans were black and poor. Lost in the Flood: Why no mention of race or class in TV's Katrina coverage?

But I don't recall any reporter exploring the class issue directly by getting a paycheck-to-paycheck victim to explain that he couldn't risk leaving because if he lost his furniture and appliances, his pots and pans, his bedding and clothes, to Katrina or looters, he'd have no way to replace them. No insurance, no stable, large extended family that could lend him cash to get back on his feet, no middle-class job to return to after the storm.

What accounts for the broadcasters' timidity? I saw only a couple of black faces anchoring or co-anchoring but didn't see any black faces reporting from New Orleans. So, it's safe to assume that the reluctance to talk about race on the air was a mostly white thing. That would tend to imply that white people don't enjoy discussing the subject. But they do, as long as they get to call another white person racist.

Steve Carell Interview

2005-08-31T09:43:00.000-05:00

The Onion's entertainment section, A.V. Club, has an interview with former Daily Show correspondent and star of the new movie 40-Year-Old Virgin, Steve Carell.

The A.V. Club: So, you're a big movie star now.

Steve Carell: Oh, yeah, right. I don't know about that, but man, this is all very surreal. Seriously, it's all very strange and surreal.

AVC: A good place to start would be at the beginning: Were you a funny guy growing up?

SC: No. Not at all. I tend not to be someone who's on all the time, or is always trying to make other people laugh. Because my wife [Nancy Walls] was on Saturday Night Live, and she's very smart and funny, people sometimes ask whether our home life is a continuous laugh riot, and it couldn't be further from that. We enjoy each other, we make each other laugh, but it's not George Burns and Gracie Allen banter constantly. It's changing diapers and chasing kids and... you know. We're very normal.

AVC: You're just an average everyday Joe?

SC: Just an average, everyday person with servants.

AVC: They take care of your children so you can feel free to—

SC: I have all the photo ops with my children so people perceive us to be very hands-on. You have to pick your moments.

The rest of the interview

The Onion also features a newly designed Web site, akin to the straight forward layout of serious publications like the Washington Post and NY Times.

They've also opened up free access to their online archives, previously a subscription service.

The Daily Nightly

2005-08-29T10:47:00.000-05:00

In addition to taking over for Tom Brokaw on NBC's The Nightly News, Brian Williams is also heading an NBC blog called "The Daily Nightly". The blog provides a transparent view into some of the decisions made in the NBC newsroom and an account of the news-gathering process, as well as a daily roundup of stories featured on the tv program.

Williams' latest post describes how the NBC crew is covering hurricane Katrina in New Orleans:

We're about to attempt to get a few hours sleep from our 10th floor hotel rooms. Our wake-up calls will come insanely early, and the few "down" hours we'll have can't really be called sleep.

New Orleans is ready and worried. Bourbon Street is desolate — the first time in my memory. This great, different world of a city is transformed by this approaching monster with a 32-mile-wide eye. We'll technically have to violate the curfew and take temporary leave of our senses to make the two-mile drive to our satellite truck. Weather permitting, we'll report for the Today show every hour on the hour.

But for now we're in a rain band, the wind is starting, there's brilliant lightning and we're under both a hurricane warning and a tornado warning. I will, like everyone else, have a flashlight at my side all night. The power will go out... it always does. We'll see what Katrina does to this sunken city, and we'll do it safely. See you on the air.

NY Times article: An Anchor by Evening, a Blogger Any Time

On a different note... this is The New Vernacular's 100th post!

McSweeney's Internet Tendency

2005-08-29T10:25:00.000-05:00

Dave Eggers, the author of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (a great read, by the way) is the founder and editor of McSweeney's, a publishing house that features the works of both prominent and upcoming authors in a somewhat quarterly journal.

The publishing house also has a Web site, McSweeney's Internet Tendency that features shorter bits by many of the same authors.

Michael Ian Black has a few features on the site, including "What I Would be Thinking About if I Were Billy Joel Driving Toward a Holiday Party Where I Knew There was Going to be a Piano".

I'm not doing it. I'm just not. I know I say the same thing every year, but this time I mean it—I am not playing it this year. Seriously, how many times can I possibly be expected to play that stupid song? I bet if you counted the number of times I've played it over the years, it probably adds up to, like, a jillion. I'm not even exaggerating. One jillion times. Well, not this year.

This year, I'm just going to say, "Sorry, folks, I'm only playing holiday songs tonight." Yeah, that's a good plan. That's definitely what I'm going to do, and if they don't like it, tough cookies. It'll just be tough cookies for them.

My birthday's coming up...

2005-08-26T10:29:00.000-05:00

Imagine how great this blog would look on eight 20" flat screens.

Although I'm sure no one cares, this Dell supercomputer has dual Xeon 3.2 GHz processors, 4GB 266 MHz DDR SDRAM, two 146GB 10K RPM SCSI drives, 8X DVD+RW/+R and 16X DVD, and two Colorgraphic Xentera GT 4 Video Cards.

Original Engadget post

A lot has changed in the last 20 years

2005-08-25T09:15:00.000-05:00

Beloit College puts out a "mindset" list each year of things that are true for the current freshman class that haven't been for their predecessors. Some examples from my class, the class of 2007:

1. Ricky Nelson, Richard Burton, Samantha Smith, Laura Ashley, Orson Welles, Karen Ann Quinlan, Benigno Aquino, and the U.S. Football League have always been dead.

3. Iraq has always been a problem.

22. They have never gotten excited over a telegram, a long distance call, or a fax.

23. The Osmonds are just talk show hosts.

24. Undergraduate college athletes have always been a part of the NBA and NFL draft.

33. Banana Republic has always been a store, not a puppet government in Latin America.

42. Michael Eisner has always been in charge of Disney.

Wisconsin = #1 party school

2005-08-24T11:27:00.000-05:00

According to the U.S. News and World Report college rankings, Wisconsin ranks #1 in beer drinking and partying.

Here's the story.

UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley dismissed the report as "junk science that results in a day of national media coverage."

The chairman of the campus student government, though, said many students would take pride in the ranking considering the university's other reputation as a top academic institution.

U.S. News and World Report ranked UW-Madison No. 34 among national universities in its annual survey last week.

"It just shows that we work hard but we play hard also," said Eric Varney, chair of the Associated Students of Madison.

The UW's response to the survey

Chancellor Wiley may be right in describing the study as "junk science", but he should also remember that it also attracts those East Coast kids paying their hefty out-of-state tuition.

Thanks to, interestingly enough, Rocketboom.

Google Speaks

2005-08-24T11:14:00.000-05:00

Google launched "Google Talk" today, an Instant Messaging client similar to AIM and Yahoo Messenger. Google raises the bar by including a phone-call type feature that lets you speak to others with Google Talk for free (I haven't tested the program yet so I can't comment on the quality). Also, in true Google form, the client lacks any sort of advertising besides the Google logo sitting atop the program window. The program seems similar to DeadAIM, the bare-bones 3rd party version of AIM that I use at home.

I really hate the pop-up windows and ads that AIM tries to make you view, and all of the stupid buttons and features that they try to include. I just want to talk to people. I have an internet browser for all that other stuff.

Jon Stewart and company on the future of television

2005-08-24T11:00:00.000-05:00

The cover story of the September issue of Wired magazine is an interview with Jon Stewart and the executive producer of The Daily Show, Ben Karlin on the future of television and the internet, and the role that The Daily Show plays in that evolution.

Some excerpts:

Wired: Let me ask you about the Crossfire thing - not about your critique of that show, but about the reaction to it.
Stewart: Ben was there, by the way. I remember looking out into the audience and seeing his face and realizing, "I guess this isn't going well."
Karlin: Well, we had hand signals, and before the show I made the mistake of saying that this [drawing his finger across his throat] meant "Keep on going, great, do the exact same thing." So I was frantically doing this [draws finger across throat fast].

What was the symbol for stop supposed to be?
Karlin: [Gives thumbs-up.]
Stewart: It was a stupid way to do it.

What do you make of the quality of television now?
Karlin: I firmly believe that the number of quality programs on television right now is probably higher than it has ever been.
Stewart: It's a constant level of goodness.

What is that level?
Stewart: I'd say it's around 12 percent. I'd say 12 percent goodness, 88 percent crapola. I'm calling it the Goodness Theorem. The goodness is a constant, like pi, and it stays that way. What happens is, as the environment expands around it, the goodness expands at the exact same rate. So the ratio of goodness to crapola remains the same. And the percentage of goodness on network TV is probably the same as 30 years ago.

So applying your Goodness Theorem, if you start putting real content online, then you're going to get more outlets for good stuff.
Karlin: Sure. But it's not done that easily. Obviously, there was this first wave of people during the bubble who thought, "Oh my god, we can put TV on the Internet," and all those people, all that money, went into all these digital things, Internet network plans, everything like that. And they are all pretty much gone. They were probably too soon, and the technology and the bandwidth weren't there. The stuff that works on the Internet right now is short things that don't really need production quality or anything that has an underground guerrilla quality to it.
Stewart: The Internet is just a world passing around notes in a classroom. That's all it is. All those media companies say, "We're going to make a killing here." You won't because it's still only as good as the content.
Yet there's a lot of venture capital going into video-delivery technologies that could allow more shows to go online. Isn't there something promising about new ways to watch television?
Stewart: Sure. But how much do you need TV to be available in convenient form? It already is convenient - we have the DVR. Do you need TV on your watch as you walk from your cell phone to your BlackBerry? At what point do we get saturated enough to say, "OK, I get it! We can get anything we want at any time! Let's go sit around a large table and eat a meal in silence"? Sometimes this shit's just overkill.

It's good to see that Stewart and the gang are focusing their efforts on the quality of their content, while still monitoring the way it's digested by their audience. These guys "get it", but they're not willing to waste their time overanalyzing the technology behind it. They leave that to "the guys in white coats". Essentially, it means that we'll continue getting quality material from the guys who coined the phrase "Mess-o-potamia".

Stewart's makes a great point about how media saturation can only go so far. There's no reason to be watching a screen every waking minute of the day. There's a lot to be said for a couple minutes of silent reflection, or staring off into space.

And we're back

2005-08-24T10:50:00.000-05:00

I just got back from vacation, my new room still has boxes all over, I'm already back at work and I realized I forgot to bring towels and sheets to my new apartment. That being said, I've got all kinds of stuff to post. It may take a while, but there's some good stuff coming. It's just going to be in small doses, over the period of however long I feel like it should take.

So as not to shock you with too much amazing new content, I'll start with a Dibert analysis of cable broadcast journalism.

Thanks to Lost Remote.

Audio post from Boston

2005-08-14T18:23:00.000-05:00

Vacation

2005-08-10T12:41:00.000-05:00

I'm moving over the next couple of days, then I'm heading out to Boston and NYC for vacation with my family next week, so I'll be "out of the office" for a while. Posting will be non-existent for a couple weeks, but hopefully I'll have plenty of pictures to post when I get back. We've got tickets to a Red Sox game and a Mets game, as well as visits to plenty of other places, so there should be plenty of photo opportunists.

I can't wait to sit in a cafe in the North End, hang out at Fenway, see the Statue of Liberty and hopefully catch Jon Stewart in action. Should be a good trip.

Any suggestions of other things I should do or see?

57-56 sounds great

2005-08-08T10:12:00.000-05:00

The Brew Crew (56-56) is at .500 coming out of the roadtrip to New York and Philadelphia. Let's hope they can get above the mark by eeking out a couple of wins in the three-game series with St. Louis (70-41) that begins tonite.

It's good to see media covering media

2005-08-08T09:30:00.000-05:00

Josh Mankiewicz of Dateline NBC just did a story on why the American media devotes so much airtime to missing white women, when they are only a fraction (albeit a large fraction) of Americans gone missing each year.

According to Mankiewicz's report: "No one is claiming that every missing-persons story should get a place on the news — there are almost 50,000 people in the FBI's database of missing persons cases. But consider this: most of those missing adults are men. Almost 30 percent of those abducted or kidnapped are black."

Obviously, these statistics aren't even close to representing the kinds of stories that appear every day on the evening news and cable news networks.

It isn't necessarily bad to be covering these stories. But I think that it begins to be harmful when cable news anchors go too far in speculation on the details of these cases and when these stories begin to overshadow many of the more important, and frankly, more interesting stories that are out there. My message to the media: It's a big world. Start covering it.

Steve Safran, editor of Lost Remote, has a post about his experiene in Aruba and his take on coverage of Natalee Holloway's disappearance. Link

MSNBC did another story about the same topic in late July:
Damsels in distress
If you’re missing, it helps to be young, white and female

A "student bill of rights"?

2005-08-03T12:23:00.000-05:00

I think it should be my right not to have to hear state lawmakers invoke the term "bill of rights" in any legislation without my direct approval.

One of my professors from last year, Greg Downey, is blogging about a "student bill of rights" that has been proposed in the state legislature by Rep. Marlin Schneider, D-Wisconsin Rapids.

Prompted by a few bad experiences Schneider had with the University system, the bill attempts to regulate weights for text books and prevent professors from assigning texts the professor has written without approval from the student government.

It's not like a professor might actually know, write and publish information about the subject she's teaching.

From the La Crosse Tribune Article:

Specifically, the bill would:

- Require an instructor to approve or deny a request to add a course within five days of the request.

— Require the suspension of all parking rules for the week preceding and following each semester.

— Require grades to be submitted no later than 10 days after the final examination for the course.

— Prohibit an instructor from requiring students to purchase or use a textbook the instructor has authored unless student government approves.

— Require the chancellor to revoke tenure of a faculty member or deduct six months' pay for an untenured instructor whose academic advising causes a student to be enrolled at least one semester more than he or she otherwise would have been enrolled.

— Prohibit an instructor from requiring students to complete a course evaluation until after the final examination is given.

— Requires by 2012 that audio or video recordings of all lectures and course sections be made available for downloading on the Internet.

— Require an instructor who adopts the policy of reducing the grades of a student due to illness resulting in absenteeism to state that policy in writing, and permit a student to appeal any decision based on that policy to the appropriate academic dean.

— Require an instructor to excuse the absence of a student whose family member, fiance, or fiancee dies or becomes extremely ill, and to allow a student to take any examination missed because of a funeral of a family member, fiance or fiancee.

— Require an instructor to meet with a parent or guardian who wants to discuss academic performance within a week, as long as the student approves in writing.

— Limit the work day of a medical intern to 16 hours.

— Prohibit the Board of Regents from entering into a contract that grants naming rights to a university arena, playing field or stadium.

— Direct the state Department of Public Instruction, the UW Board of Regents and the Technical College Board to adopt maximum weight standards for textbooks.

A "bill of rights" may sound good, but like the "taxpayer's bill of rights", this bill may end up putting harmful restraints on those whose job it is to create these policies in the first place. It just may be that, since it is their job, they might know a little more about the details of the administration process than a state representative.

Oh, and you'd think that in the creation of a "student bill of rights", they might ask for some input from students. As it stands, the bill is much more a "student's parents' bill of ways to intrude on the administrative process of the university system".

I doubt too many students feel that it should be their right to "Require the chancellor to revoke tenure of a faculty member or deduct six months' pay for an untenured instructor whose academic advising causes a student to be enrolled at least one semester more than he or she otherwise would have been enrolled." In fact, a good number of students would consider that to be some pretty good advising.

Professor Downey has some thoughtful analysis of the bill's extraneous nature:

Some of these wildly unrelated proposals might sound like "common sense" at first blush. But the idea that the state assembly needs to micromanage such rules and regulations for the whole university system (including the flagship research school UW-Madison, consistently ranked in the top tier of public universities across the nation) is something of an insult.

Unlike, say, regulation over privately-owned, non-democratic, secretive, individually-competing capitalist business firms, the state university system is a coordinated, cooperating, open to public scrutiny, and democratically-operating institution. Faculty serve both within departments and within the university as a whole to make policy and evaluate that policy. Paid administrators, lawyers, and human resources specialists balance those faculty decisions with professional, legal, and bureaucratic expertise.

If there is anything that legislators Schneider and Kreibich -- or any of their constituents -- would like to object to with regard to the way the university works, they already have a well-functioning mechanism to make those recommendations or air those issues.

Anyone interested in "the relations between information/communication technology, global political-economy, and the lived world of human labor" would benefit from visiting Professor Downey's blog, Uncovering Information Labor.

Frist changes his mind in stem-cell debate

2005-07-29T09:34:00.000-05:00

I turned on C-SPAN (yeah, that C-SPAN) this morning while eating breakfast and caught a bit of Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist's (R) speech to the Senate on his new stance stem stell research.

From the NY Times:

In a break with President Bush, the Senate Republican leader, Bill Frist, has decided to support a bill to expand federal financing for embryonic stem cell research, a move that could push it closer to passage and force a confrontation with the White House, which is threatening to veto the measure.
Mr. Frist, a heart-lung transplant surgeon who said last month that he did not back expanding financing "at this juncture," is expected to announce his decision Friday morning in a lengthy Senate speech. In it, he says that while he has reservations about altering Mr. Bush's four-year-old policy, which placed strict limits on taxpayer financing for the work, he supports the bill nonetheless.

"While human embryonic stem cell research is still at a very early stage, the limitations put in place in 2001 will, over time, slow our ability to bring potential new treatments for certain diseases," Mr. Frist says, according to a text of the speech provided by his office Thursday evening. "Therefore, I believe the president's policy should be modified."

Wow, maybe common sense and, dare I say, ethics beyond strict, almost-fanatical, positions do sometimes come out in national politics.

Hey Hillary, "The Kids are Alright"

2005-07-27T15:04:00.000-05:00

Steven Johnson, the author of "Everything Bad is Good for You: How Today's Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter" writes an open letter in the LA Times to Senator Hillary Clinton who is suggesting $90 million investigation into the effects of video games on children in the wake of hack to Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas that unlocks a sexually explicit mini-game.

While Rockstar Games, the company that produces GTA, was stupid to include the mini-game (even if locked) within the final version, most people are overlooking the fact that anyone playing the game has to download an outside program to unlock the mini-game (not something one could accidentally stumble upon).

In his letter, Johnson focuses on the benefits of today's complex video games:

The great secret of today's video games that has been lost in the moral panic over "Grand Theft Auto" is how difficult the games have become. That difficulty is not merely a question of hand-eye coordination; most of today's games force kids to learn complex rule systems, master challenging new interfaces, follow dozens of shifting variables in real time and prioritize between multiple objectives.

In short, precisely the sorts of skills that they're going to need in the digital workplace of tomorrow.

Johnson also cites several studies that show violent actions among adolescents has gone down since 1975.

Having read his book, I don't agree with all of Johnson's conclusions, but he makes some good points on the topic of video games. Not all games are bad, especially in comparison to the other activities that they often replace.

Basically, parents need to monitor what their children play and ensure that they only sit in front of a screen in moderation. Video games can't hold a candle to a good game of kick the can.

Bonus: Steven Johnson has a great blog too

Blogs and RSS - FAQ

2005-07-22T10:08:00.000-05:00

Once in a while, when I'm talking to family or friends about my blog or blogs in general, I get a few common questions that are difficult to answer without access to a computer. For the sake of convenience, I'll to answer some of them here (with links).

What blogs do you subscribe to?

A list is provided at the bottom of this post.

What is RSS?

RSS stands for "Real Simple Syndication" and is a way for the information from blogs to be exported in a format that can be read by applications called RSS readers. Most look similar to an e-mail program and allow users to read blog entries without having to go to each blog Web site individually. Recently, RSS has grown beyond the realm of blogs and has come to include comics, weather reports, sports recaps, headlines and pretty much everything under the sun.

Wikipedia article on RSS

About.com article on RSS feeds

Does The New Vernacular have an RSS feed?

Yes

What RSS reader (aka news aggregator) do you use?

There are two kinds of RSS readers, downloadable applications that run as a program on your computer and act similarly to e-mail programs like Outlook, and online applications that work more like online e-mail accounts like hotmail or gmail.

The reader that I use is Bloglines, an online application that allows you to access your feeds no matter what computer you are on. Bloglines is easy to use, has a clean interface and gives recommendations of new blogs you may like based on your current subscriptions.

Wikipedia article on News Aggregators

Blogs and RSS feeds I subscribe to (by category):

U.S. Politics

WI Politics

Tech

News

Fun Stuff

Comics

Get Fuzzy

Sports

Media

Celebrity Blogs

Zach Braff's Garden State Blog

Links

Culture

History

Odd Wisconsin

Movies

Ain't It Cool News

What I've been up to

2005-07-22T09:56:00.000-05:00

I haven't been posting much lately, mostly because I've actually been busy. But not today. Here's some of the stuff I've been working on at the Wisconsin Historical Society:

What are you waiting for? Go learn something already.

What happens when you combine Miller Lite, Mike Tyson's Punch-Out! and Scott McClellan?

2005-07-15T14:09:00.000-05:00

A casual-friday masterpiece from Rocketboom

From the July 13th White House Press Briefing

MR. McCLELLAN (speaking about the Karl Rove investigation): I think we've exhausted discussion on this the last couple of days.

Q You haven't even scratched the surface.

Q It hasn't started.

Full Transcript

And just in case anyone reading this is thinking that I believe Karl Rove should immediately be fired or removed from his position in the Administration, I don't. From what I've been reading, it seems like Rove acted in bad faith on partisan lines to punish Wilson for his comments on the Iraq War, but didn't necessarily commit a crime or do anything that would warrent dismissal.

To paraphrase McClellan: this is an ongoing investigation. I'll comment on it when the time is appropriate. And when I feel like writing more. I mean, come on, it's a sunny 80 degreees outside on a Friday afternoon.

I miss the couch

2005-07-13T15:13:00.000-05:00

My roommates and I were watching The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on Monday when the fake news show debuted it's new set design. We all agreed that the new layout, while a bit more "newsy", is also pretty damn ugly.

Although I missed last nights show, I just caught a clip of the beginning and noticed that J-Stew himself acknowledged that many people have a negative opinion of the new set.

People are talking about the new set, and they don't like it... some people don't like it, and others don't like it very much

Dana Stevens, TV critic for Slate.com, shares her opinions of the new set

The rest of the clip is about the Karl Rove's role in the Plame controversy. I recommend watching the whole thing, because Senior Journalistologist Stephen Colbert has some in-depth analysis of the ramifications of Rove's involvement.

Bonus: Watch White House Press Secretary get browbeaten by the White House press corps for not answering any questions about Rove's involvement or the investigation

Video from crooksandliars.com

Taking advantage of tragedy to make a buck

2005-07-07T19:22:00.000-05:00

Wow, it sure didn't take people long to try to take advantage of the tragic bombings in London this morning.

I visited Fresh Politics (a blog edited by Penn sophomore and fellow Nicolet-alum Taylor Buley) this afternoon and found an ad for the book "The Personal Security Handbook".

The description of the book on Amazon.com begins:

"The duct-tape-and-plastic-sheeting mania of early 2003 shows that most Americans need clear-headed information about how to stay safe in the post-9/11 world. This book is a practical resource in that effort."

The book itself seems fairly harmless. Buy it, don't buy it, whatever. But the headline for the ad read "Bombs in London - Storms in the Gulf". Not even 24 hours have passed since the bombings in London and already someone is trying to play upon our fears to sell a book. Pretty shady if you ask me.

It seems as though it's a handbook in how to deal with the fear created after 9/11 by the exaggeration of threats in the government (the Bush administration - remember WMD's?) and the media (Fox News ALERTS for Michael Jackson being seen in a Toys 'R Us).

Frankly, even with today's attacks in London, I'm really no more afraid for my life than I was four years ago. And I definitely don't need a guide book to tell me how to stay safe.

"The Personal Security Handbook" is Silver Lake publishing, which also published Taylor's blog-related book, The Fresh Politics Reader: Making Current Events And Public Affairs Relevant to Young Americans.

Don't throw a reporter into jail unless you want a five-part series

2005-07-07T10:50:00.000-05:00

Following the incarceration of Judith Miller for refusing to reveal her source, the Hartford Courant has come up with reasons (other than the obvious) that reporters shouldn't be thrown in jail.

Here are just a few of the reasons why it's not a good idea to be sending reporters to the Big House:

Order: Reporters would not set a good example when it comes to following directions. You can't just tell them what to do.

To get a reporter to do anything, a guard would have to: ask nicely; explain the order in detail; debate at length whether the reporter has a better approach; and then begin the process anew after the reporter failed to do what had been agreed upon.

Accommodations: In general, reporters are not the type of people to become overly concerned with things like clutter, organization, sanitation or the possibility of an epidemic. Confining a reporter to an 8-by-10 cell is the equivalent of institutionalizing a landfill.

Language: Prisoners may curse and swear, but they are amateurs compared to seasoned reporters.

After associating with reporters for any period of time, the average inmate would be so negatively influenced that he would be virtually unemployable upon release (except at a newspaper).

Attire: The prison dress code would be compromised to such an extent that the orange jump suit, the muscle T-shirts and the do rag would seem like high fashion when faced with a newsroom style that features khaki, knockoffs, comfortable sizing and a lack of commitment to the iron.

Original Courant article

Stalking Zack Braff in Madison

2005-07-01T11:54:00.000-05:00

All this week, Zach Braff has been in town shooting his new movie, The Last Kiss, with Rachel Bilson here in Madison. Part of the movie is set in Madison and they've been shooting on Bascom Hill, the Union and up by the Capitol. I wish I had known about it sooner so I could've been an extra. I've got no idea whether the film will be any good or not, but I'll recognize all the locations, so I'm sure I'll go see it.

On a creepy stalker note, I heard ZB was in Café Montmartre the other night, hanging out.

Pictures from the set (not taken by me)

More sports logos than you'll know what to do with

2005-06-30T10:19:00.000-05:00

This is one of the best pages I've found in a while. Sportslogos.net features a detailed history of professional sports logos from modern teams to the Seattle Pilots (a team that only existed for one year in 1969) and the Washington Senators.

Being the logo geek I am, this site is a great find. Sportslogos.net includes primary and secondary logos as well as scripts and jerseys and covers to sports spectrum including the Canadian Baseball League, the XFL and MLS. I should be able to make some pretty great computer wallpaper (and real wallpaper?) with this stuff. Now if I can only convince this guy to give me vector versions of everything....

Brewers Logos

Packers Logos

Bucks Logos

There's a ton more sports logos, including many obscure ones, at Logoserver.com

(Thank you Blogger for making "floatleft" so much easier)

The time has come

2005-06-29T11:20:00.000-05:00

From preshrunk:

Dear Hipsters

By Jason Cosper

No matter how much you loved "Napoleon Dynamite", Vote For Pedro shirts aren't cool anymore. Seriously, cut it out. You don't look cool, clever or irreverent. You look like a bandwagon hopping douche bag. Once there's a ready supply of any shirt design at Hot Topic, it's too late... Vote For Pedro tees have been on sale there for at least the last year. So give up already.

Do yourself a favor. Stash that fucker at the bottom of your drawer and forget about it for five to ten years. By then, the shirt has either become vintage [and cool again] or moth food. The objective here is to take as many of them out of circulation as possible.

Think about it, we'd both win here. You'll get a vintage shirt [well, eventally] and I wouldn't have to put up with seeing them. *shrug* Just an idea...

Love,
Jason

P.S. We're well aware of the irony of the content of our Google ads next to our anti Vote For Pedro tee rant. Actually, we think it's kind of funny.

P.P.S. Goddamn that cheeky Matt Haughey. Goddamn him straight to hell.

AFI's top 100 movie quotes

2005-06-22T15:35:00.000-05:00

The American Film Institute has come up with what they think are the top 100 movie quotes. But where is "Luke, I am your father"? Here's the top 10:

1. "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn," "Gone With the Wind," 1939.

2. "I'm going to make him an offer he can't refuse," "The Godfather," 1972.

3. "You don't understand! I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I could've been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am," "On the Waterfront," 1954.

4. "Toto, I've got a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore," "The Wizard of Oz," 1939.

5. "Here's looking at you, kid," "Casablanca," 1942.

6. "Go ahead, make my day," "Sudden Impact," 1983.

7. "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up," "Sunset Blvd.," 1950.

8. "May the Force be with you," "Star Wars," 1977.

9. "Fasten your seatbelts. It's going to be a bumpy night," "All About Eve," 1950.

10. "You talking to me?" "Taxi Driver," 1976.

the rest of the list

We spend a good chunk of last night watching these on TV before sitting down to watch The Godfather (1972), which placed #2 on the list with "I'm going to make him an offer he can't refuse."

I'd like to see a top 100 list of comedy movie quotes. I think that list would spur plenty of debate. Any ideas what should be on it?

I'll start: "Human sacrifice, dogs and cats, living together... mass hysteria!" - Ghostbusters (1984)

What would it take to be Batman?

2005-06-22T15:05:00.000-05:00

According to Forbes.com, $3,365,449.

Forbes calculated the costs of everything one would need to become the Dark Knight, from martial arts training to a butler. Batman is the only great superhero without any superpowers, so if you've got the cash and the will, you too can strike fear into the hearts of your enemies.

You may have to make a few sacrifices, not having access to the R&D Department of Wayne Industries. A hang-glider just won't look quite as cool as Batman's cape.

The Onion 2056

2005-06-22T13:31:00.000-05:00

In honor of their 300th anniversary, the king of newspaper satire, The Onion has produced an issue from the year 2056. They've even made an entirely new Web site devoted to it.

Some headline highlights:

Halliburton wins bid to rebuild Midwest

Democratic Middle Eastern Union Votes to Invade U.S.

Government may restrict use of genetically modified farmers

A simple explanation of the education funding increase/decrease

2005-06-20T11:33:00.000-05:00

The Sunday Milwaukee Journal Sentinel featured an article explaining the public education funding debate that is going on between Gov. Doyle and republican members of the state legislature.

Let's say your parents base your budget for gasoline for the year on $1.75 a gallon.

The next year, Mom and Dad say, we're increasing your allowance to cover $2 a gallon.

But gas now costs $2.30.

Have your folks given you an increase? Of course. A big one, if you look at the percentage.

Have they given you a decrease? Of course. There's no way you're going to be able to drive as far you did last year with less gasoline.

Welcome to the intense, real and genuinely important debate over state funding of education for the next two years.

It may not sway anyone's opinion on the issue, but it definitely clarifies an issue that needed clarifying. You know there's a problem when the Governor and the leader of the opposition party are calling each other liars, but both displaying hard facts and numbers in their claims.

To the Batmobile!

2005-06-16T09:29:00.000-05:00

Courtesy Warner Bros.; Photo: David James

I saw Batman Begins last night and from the first couple frames it was my new favorite movie. I don't usually want to movies right away again, but I would've sat through this one again as soon as the credits rolled. Christopher Nolan got the look and feel of Gotham's decline just right and Christian Bale makes Batman the scariest character in the whole film. All in all, absolutely outstanding, I can't wait for the next one.

Howstuffworks.com has a feature on the Batsuit, detailing the suit itself, the cape and all of Batman's fun toys.

They've also got a feature on the mentor/villian Ra's Al Ghul

The video game looks pretty good too, if only I had a console. Maybe I'll get one of those new ones I hear are coming out soon.

More on education

2005-06-15T15:21:00.000-05:00

English Teacher Jay Bullock has observations and reactions choice schools and other education issues over at Folkbum.

He's also a contributor to Sensenbrenner Watch, a critical look at the actions of U.S. Representative F. James Sensenbrenner from WI district 5 in southeastern WI. They've got some great posts on Sensenbrenner's walk-out during a hearing of the House Judiciary Committee on the Patriot Act last week as well as his Real ID act.

How is Milwaukee's school voucher experiment turning out?

2005-06-15T14:26:00.000-05:00

This week, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has a series on the school voucher system in Milwaukee (one of the few in the nation) and what it means for students, parents and the community.

For the seven-part series, Journal Sentinel reporters visited 104 of the 115 choice schools in Milwaukee. They were denied at the remaining nine.

According to the article: 9 voucher schools deny requests for classroom visits:
Together, the nine schools received more than $3.5 million in public money to educate children this year. Because they are private, schools in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program are not required to allow members of the public - even officials of the state Department of Public Instruction, which provides their money - into their buildings. Building inspectors, on the other hand, must be allowed to enter.

The most remarkable thing about all of the research the Journal Sentinel has done might be the "questionable scenes" they witnessed while visiting some of the schools:

Academy of Excellence Preparatory School, 4340 N. 46th St., seven voucher students: Basically, an early childhood center. The first two times reporters visited, no one was there. The third time, there was a teacher with two students, a 4-year-old and 5-year-old. They were about to go to McDonald's.

This and the other examples are an extreme, but under the voucher system, these schools are given thousands of dollars in public money to take in students that would otherwise go to public school.

Also included in the series are examples of several choice schools making gains.

The biggest problem I have with school vouchers it that, even if every choice school is doing extremely well and each student in the program is benefiting, you're only taking them (and money) out of the public school system. This is different from the Chapter 220 program in Milwaukee that takes kids from public schools and moves them to different public schools with more resources, with a financial benefit from the school they are leaving and a tax benefit for the school they are coming to.

There is an argument that school vouchers will pressure public schools to improve, to do better when threatened with fewer students and less money. But an MPS school isn't going to magically improve when the few resources they have are taken away. You're not going to attract more qualified teachers this way. You're not going to foster a community commitment to schools. You're not going to maintain funding for "extra"-curricular classes that are really essential to a quality education that will provide a student to achieve success beyond high-school.

Congratulations to the Journal Sentinel for engaging in such an ambitious and in-depth look at the voucher system.

Maybe something's the matter with Lawrence

2005-06-15T13:47:00.000-05:00

John Nichols, an editor for the Capital Times and Washington corresponent for The Nation, has a great article about progressive movements in urban areas around the U.S. Nichols highlights Lawrence, Kansas, a town located in the heart of conservative America (as identified in Thomas Frank's book "What's the Matter with Kansas")that recently elected a strongly progressive mayor.

Variations on the Lawrence story are playing out across the country, with local leaders and coalitions shaping a new, more aggressive politics in what has begun to be referred to as an "urban archipelago" of major metropolitan centers, aging industrial cities and college towns that represent progressive blue islands in what appears on electoral maps to be a red sea of conservatism.

Nichols also talks with Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz about the threats of corporatism facing the city leaders.

"Local governments are the only place where progressive ideas can get any traction--where big ideas are being tried," says Madison, Wisconsin, Mayor Dave Cieslewicz, 46, a former chief of staff in a State Senate office and an environmental leader who was elected in 2003. "Cities are where you can break through the big money, the media spin--everything that is wrong with our politics--and capture the public's imagination." Unfortunately, he says, traditional organizations of local officials have been slow to catch the wave of municipal resistance to the nation's conservative moment. "I went to my first US Conference of Mayors meeting after I got elected, and I was horrified. The corporate influence was pervasive," Cieslewicz says, recalling a dinner where toy trucks featuring the Waste Management, Inc. logo served as party favors. "Here we were, with education, transportation and housing programs that are essential for cities facing cuts, and I just didn't see the sense of urgency."

wisc.edu facelift

2005-06-11T17:57:00.000-05:00

The University of Wisconsin web site just got a much-needed face-lift. The page is organized much better than before and the site in general is more visually appealing. They've also integrated some CSS into the site in changing link colors and other dynamic portions of the site. Later this summer, the UW will be releasing the new version of MY UW, which from this screenshot, looks like it will be much better organized and more useful than the current version.

I apologize for the total geekiness of this post.

Trends in Logo Design

2005-06-09T09:56:00.000-05:00

For all you design geeks out there, Graphic Design USA has a report on the logo design trends of 2005. Their favorites include designs that break from the tradition vector mold and incorporate blurred perspectives and patches of empty space. Some of the latest trend include "line-dots", "hotdogs", "weaves", "whips" and "life leaves". There's some good analysis on what makes each of these styles a good design, their origins and where they are appropriate. Plus, lots of pretty pictures.

Bruno's Web site

2005-06-08T13:27:00.000-05:00

I've got a little down time right now, so I'm looking at random stuff on the Internet and somehow came across BruceWillis.com. It's actually a very well designed site and has all kinds of personal touches from Bruce himself. There's recepies and tracks from Bruce's band, the Accelerators (Bruce sings lead). He's got an interesting cover of Under the Boardwalk.

Apparently, Bruce also enjoys the movie "Winged Migration" and "Spongebob Squarepants". And he's a big supporter of Foster Care.

Thank you, Bruce Willis, for making my day. Oh, and Moonlighting too.

Bruce Willis Cornbread Pancakes **Cakes Recipe borrowed from Jiffy

1 pkg. "Jiffy" Corn Muffin Mix
1 egg
2 Tbsp. melted shortening*
3/4 cup milk

Blend ingredients (Makes 10 to 12 pancakes or three 7" waffles). Batter will be slightly lumpy. Bake on hot griddle, or waffle iron. Preheat griddle or waffle iron, grease lightly. Griddle is hot when a few drops of water dance on surface. For pancakes, turn when bubbles appear and edges begin to dry.

The Bruce Willis corncake version is loaded with butter... Don't be afraid, it adds to the flavor. The Bruce Willis Version is as follows: "The key to any good pancake or French toast recipe is to begin with a very hot griddle. Once you get the griddle hot, back the heat down a little and completely cover the surface with butter. (Butter should not blacken if so turn down the griddle). I use a lot butter here. I also microwave a cube in a coffee cup and mix part of it into the main ingredients. Using the rest for the griddle and the upcoming hotcakes.

Final tip to making it a success is to serve your corncakes up with real maple syrup and a little whole milk poured over the stack. You're going to have to trust me on this, but the milk somehow magically releases the internal flavor of the cornmeal mixture.

Be prepared and have enough batter on hand because I promise you, your kids or guests are going to want an additional helping. Enjoy!"

*Note: For authentic Bruce Willis Corncake Pancakes, substitute Butter for Shortening

Russ Feingold's new PAC Web Site

2005-06-02T10:35:00.000-05:00

Russ Feingold's Political Action Committee, The Progressive Patriots Fund has set up a Web Site to help in efforts to support progressive candidates in the 2006 elections and possibly seek support for Feingold if he pursues a presidential run in 2008. The site focuses a lot on Feingold's agenda and less on the other candidates that the group supports, although I'm guess that will probably change as the 2006 elections approach.

George Aldrich, Feingold’s spokesman, said the committee has already donated to three Senate incumbents who are up for re-election in 2006 — Sens. Bill Nelson of Florida, Debbie Stabenow of Michigan and Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico.

Aldrich said Feingold also is soliciting support for his proposed legislation — the Security and Freedom Enhancement Act, or SAFE Act — that would restore judicial oversight to some of the police powers granted by Congress in the Patriot Act following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

The committee’s most recent financial disclosure report shows it received $127,366 in donations through the end of April. It had $80,190 in available cash.

Appleton Post Crescent article

Teagan Goddard's Political Wire post

Eliminate Chapter 220? Bad idea.

2005-05-31T08:37:00.000-05:00

The Wisconsin Joint Finance Committee is contemplating the elimination of the Milwaukee's Chapter 220 program that allows students (4,150 last year) from Milwaukee Public Schools to attend and graduate at suburban schools, where more resources are spent on each student.

According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

School districts that receive Chapter 220 students get as much aid per student as they spend on their own students. At the same time, Milwaukee Public Schools gets to keep three-fourths of the Chapter 220 students going to suburban districts on their books for revenue purposes.

There's also major tax benefits for hosting districts:

Without the revenue that comes with bringing Chapter 220 students into the district, homeowners in Wauwatosa could expect property taxes to increase by about 15.5% to make up for the loss of about $4 million, according to Wauwatosa School District business manager John Mack. To the owner of a $200,000 home, that's about $235 more a year, Mack says. There would be an additional property tax increase of about 7.2% the next year because Wauwatosa would lose another $2.8 million in revenue because of the loss of students counted under the state's equalization aid formula, he says. [Aid is based on a three-year rolling average, meaning cuts in aid three years running for participating districts.]

As a graduate of a suburban Milwaukee school, Nicolet, I saw first-hand the benefits that the Chapter 220 program provides students. These students get a chance to study in a district that has a standard of instruction near or equivilent to that of most private schools. Without the Chapter 220 program, suburban schools wouldn't be nearly as racially or socioeconomically diverse as they are now, a benefit of the program for students living in the district that is often overlooked.

Whitefish Bay High School senior Marcus Switzer, 18, explains the benefits of the program (from the JS article):

"A lot of (Milwaukee) high schools are not up to college-bound standards," Switzer says. "It's a sad fact. But for many kids, to get that type of education, you have to go somewhere else."

Since the lawmakers in Madison aren't willing to spend the money to raise MPS up to the standards of it's suburban neighbors (I concede that it would be A LOT of money), they need to continue funding the Chapter 220 program to at least give a handful of kids a decent shot at a better education, especially if any of them want to claim that they support public education come the next election.

Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel article
Jay Bullock's post on the subject

What happens when you've got to sit at a computer for 8 hours with nothing to do...

2005-05-29T14:48:00.000-05:00

Unless you're reading this via rss aggregator, you've noticed that The New Vernacular has a new look. I had a lot of extra time at work this week, so I decided to experiment with a three column layout that is a little crisper and more concise then the old template. It's difficult to find three-column layouts for Blogger and it took awhile before I found one to work with at Ruthsarian Layouts.

I've been having problems getting the new layout to work with Internet Explorer, but you should be using Firefox anyway, so I'm not too concerned. I'll be tweaking the site in the next couple of weeks as I find the time. As always, any comments or suggestions for improvement are welcome.

Only for the truly politically addicted

2005-05-27T11:33:00.000-05:00

The Wispolitics Budget Blog written by Greg Bump covers the proceedings of the WI Joint Finance Committee and provides analysis of how they are adjusting Governor Doyle's 2005-2007 budget. It's been a great resource for me so far in my internship with the Governor's office, sharing information that would be difficult to obtain without actually being present at the committee meetings.

Bump provides every detail of the Committee's meetings:

The JFC Republicans have been accused repeatedly of breaking open meeting rules, most publicly by Assembly Minority Leader Jim Kreuser. The GOPers vehemently deny the charges, but hunger nearly drove them to a violation tonight.

During a break in the action, the Republican members had some pies delivered from Pizza Extreme to the conference room. Committee senators were already in the conference room, so when Assembly members stampeded in to grab a slice, they had to be held back by frightened but dutiful staffers to avoid a quorum.

“We averted it, so Rep. Kreuser can rest easy,” remarked one GOP staffer, still a little shaken by the memory of the horde of hungry lawmakers.

Pizza Quorum Narrowly Averted

Is this the way to Amarillo?

2005-05-27T11:19:00.000-05:00

Alright, so The New Vernacular is slowly becoming a "Rocketboom" link blog, but that's because they're so damn funny.

Today, as a Memorial Day tribute, Rocketboom is featuring a spoof of the song "Is this the way to Amarillo?" created by the British Royal Dragoon Guards at Al Faw base in Iraq.

I've played it five times already and I'm still cracking up.

The "Armadillo" movie in every format imaginable

The Beach Boys "Kokomo", Kosovo spoof. Just listen to the lyrics in this one.

Thanks Rocketboom.

Filibuster preserved, 3 nominees get vote, Feingold disappointed

2005-05-24T00:03:00.000-05:00

7 Republicans and 7 Democrats in the Senate finalized a deal Monday evening to preserve the filibuster and come to a vote on 3 of Bush's contentious Judicial nominees: Priscilla Owen, Janice Rogers Brown and William Pryor.

Cnn.com: The group's members also agreed that they would oppose attempts to filibuster future judicial nominees except under "extraordinary circumstances."

I'm thinking that the real weight of all this will come down if (more likely when) Bush selects nominees for the Supreme Court some time in the next three years.

Russ Feingold has come out against the deal, saying that it's bad for the Senate and the American people:

Democrats should have stood together firmly against the bullying tactics of the Republican leadership abusing their power as they control both houses of Congress and the White House. Confirming unacceptable judicial nominations is simply a green light for the Bush administration to send more nominees who lack the judicial temperament or record to serve in these lifetime positions. I value the many traditions of the Senate, including the tradition of bipartisanship to forge consensus. I do not, however, value threatening to disregard an important Senate tradition, like occasional unlimited debate, when necessary. I respect all my colleagues very much who thought to end this playground squabble over judges, but I am disappointed in this deal.

DailyKos Post

Full Cnn.com Story

Social Security alteration without representation

2005-05-23T13:28:00.000-05:00

I'd love to attend a George Bush town hall meeting and ask him a couple of questions, but it doesn't look like that will ever happen.

During Bush's recent visit to Milwaukee to hold a town hall meeting promoting his social security plan, all of the attendees were hand-picked because they agree with Bush's policy and fit the demographics he wants to have in photos and articles about the event.

From the LA Times: The memo went on to solicit several types of people "who he would like to visit with" -- including a young worker who "knows that [Social Security] could run out before they retire," a young couple with children who like "the idea of leaving something behind to the family" and a single parent who believes Bush's proposal for individual investment accounts "would provide more retirement options and security" than the current system.

I understand that Bush is trying to convince America that his solution is best (a tough thing to do when the political climate is so antagonistic on this particular issue), but I fail to see how he is really benefiting from these meetings. Ok, so he's talking to a small group of people who already agree with him... not winning any converts there. This particular event goes on the news, mostly local news in Milwaukee, where people see Bush talking to people who agree with him (and they know this because this is how his town hall meetings have been run since before the election). The major stories being written on the event are about how Bush doesn't allow opponents, like this one from the LA Times(again, no benefit here).

I don't know, maybe preaching to the pre-screened choir really is the way to go. Bush did win the election. It doesn't seem very faithful to the idea of being a true representative of the people.

It definitely isn't the way the British do it. From a Daily Show report. (it's not real news, but say what you want... the Daily Show is basically the most honest representation of politics out there).

My question is, what were the town hall meeting policies of previous administrations? I don't remember how Clinton's meeting were set up, or anyone's before that. Did they even have town hall-type meetings?

Anyone care to share some insights?

Daily Kos: Under 30? Want to talk to the President? Only if you agree with him.

Wonkette: Town Hall Appointees Not Helping President

Conan and the future of television

2005-05-23T12:57:00.000-05:00

First his show was broadcast in high definition, now Conan is using his superior knowledge of the television industry to predict what the future will hold for tv and the population of Earth.

Twenty-four-hour news channels, desperate for even more coverage, will conspire with NASA to alter Earth's orbit, creating a 25-hour day. Fox News's attempt to create a 26th hour will result in volcanic eruptions, and Bill O'Reilly will perish in a lava flow.

In an effort to bring Red and Blue states together, one giant plasma screen, four miles high, will rise from the central Plains, visible from both coasts. In accordance with the amended Constitution, the president will be the only one with the authority to touch the remote, which a nearby Marine will carry in a briefcase.

Newsweek Article: The Future of Television

My newest news obsession

2005-05-17T14:39:00.000-05:00

Amanda Congdon, anchor of the internet Web video log "Rocketboom," holds her copy at her desk before taping the quirky news show on New York's Upper West Side, Sunday April 17, 2005. (AP photo/Joe Tabacca)

It's more witty, entertaining and concise than cable news, and I can watch it on my computer.

It's Rocketboom, a 3-5 minute video segment produced out an apartment in New York that provides a daily summary covering major (and minor) stories of interest to younger adults, technophiles and news junkies (their main demographic is... me).

Usually served with a healthy dose of sarcasm and humor, today's edition had a more somber tone, addressing the recent Newsweek story that incited riots and including footage of John Bolton dismissing any claims that the UN might be a legitimate body for international cooperation.

Some more "standard" (if there are any) editions of Rocketboom:
May 16th
May 11th

And an article from the Washington Post on Rocketboom:
'Rocketboom' May Be Future of TV News

Oh, and Amanda Congdon is cute.

The lameness of cable news

2005-05-17T14:23:00.000-05:00

I was watching MSNBC this morning as I was eating breakfast and they broadcasting the trial of a man accused of opening fire in a courtroom and killing several people. Oh, and one of the pieces of the evidence from the case is video of the man engaging in the crime.

Headline-worthy news, yes. But I really don't need to know any more about the case than what he did and whether he was convicted. And, given that the guy was caught on video, I'm guessing he'll be found guilty. Basically, a waste of my time.

What the networks should be doing is showing this video of John Bolton talking about his opinions of the UN. He's going to have a tough job being an ambassador to an organization that doesn't exist. He's already said that the U.S. should just tell it what to do anyway.

I don't want to ruin the punchline

2005-05-12T17:20:00.000-05:00

Clip from the Daily Show:

" The White House shows it's independence from the powerful photosynthesis lobby."

Better than "6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon"

2005-05-11T14:07:00.000-05:00

We've all played the game where you try to connect one movie star to another in six co-stars or less. Omnipelagos.com takes the game to a new level and allows you to search any two people, places or things and find out how they're related.

For example, Omnipelagos can connect Kanye West to Dick Cheney in three steps:


Kanye West: which reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart. He also appears on Brandy's single, "Talk About Our Love"
Brandy Norwood: [Acting career / Afrodisiac (2004)] Jason Alexander, Whoopi Goldberg, and Bernadette Peters. The tele-film broke ratings records and garnered nine Emmy Award nominations
Whoopi Goldberg: " rally in which Goldberg repeatedly referred to President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney by pointing to her genital region.
Dick Cheney

or, The Muppets to Donald Trump


The Muppets: [Famous Muppets] newsmagazine 60 Minutes. Kermit the Frog was also interviewed early on in Jon Stewart's run on The Daily Show
The Daily Show: [The Daily Show as a "news source"] Interestingly, the National Annenberg Election Survey at the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania: [Noted alumni / Ivy Day] Donald Trump: Billionaire investor/financier
Donald Trump

As long as it's better than studying for exams, its good enough for me.

Customizing the web: Greasemonkey

2005-05-11T13:41:00.000-05:00

Greasemonkey is a Firefox extension that enables users to download scripts that alter web pages to make them more accessable and useful. For example, you can download a script to add a "delete" button to Gmail, because it doesn't have one. Or you can get rid of Google AdSense ads. Or get rid of the ads to the right of articles on CNN.com.

Right now, most of the available scripts add or remove elements from Web sites, but Greasemonkey has the potential to be much more powerful, actually altering the appearance of web pages and moving elements around. Once content leaves the provider and enters individual computers, people can manipulate it however they want.

nivi.com describes it well:

Greasemonkey lets you mash-up websites. It lets you extend and script websites and integrate that script right into the original site as if the designers had intended it to be there. It lets you use their web site, their data, their servers, their work to serve your purpose and function. There will soon be an army of hackers enhancing every site you use. Whether that site likes it or not.

While Greasemonkey may not be the future of the Internet, it's a glimpse into the customization that users are going to be demanding. Companies are going to need to embrace increased functionality in order to keep users from simply taking content from the source and molding it to fit their own needs.

Download Greasemonkey

List of Greasemonkey Scripts

Greasemonkey screencast walk-through

nivi.com article

Maybe I should start voting absentee from Milwaukee

2005-05-10T16:29:00.000-05:00

Hopefully I'll have time to write more on this later, but for now all I want to say is that my Congressman sucks.

No Real Debate for Real ID

Hundreds of civil liberties groups, immigrant support groups and government associations oppose the Real ID Act, a piece of legislation that critics say would produce a de facto national ID card, cost states millions of dollars and punish undocumented immigrants.

Yet despite widespread opposition to the bill, it passed through the House last week and is expected to easily pass through the Senate on Tuesday.

The legislation is raising questions not only about privacy and costs but about the ways in which critical legislation gets passed in Congress.

Critics, such as the American Civil Liberties Union, say lawmakers slipped the Real ID Act into the relatively uncontroversial spending bill in order to avoid a congressional debate over the ID measure.

"The legislation was created in the backrooms of Congress without hearings and without any real understanding or thought about what was being created," said Barry Steinhardt, director of the ACLU's technology and liberty program.

The Real ID Act, sponsored by House Judiciary Committee chairman James Sensenbrenner (R-Wisconsin), responds to recommendations made by the 9/11 Commission to make it more difficult for terrorists and undocumented immigrants to obtain legitimate identification documents and travel freely around the country. The bill also is designed to make it difficult for anyone to forge identification documents and use them for criminal purposes.

A spokesman from Sensenbrenner's office did not return a call for comment in time for publication. But proponents of the legislation say they are simply implementing recommendations that the 9/11 Commission wanted.
Full Wired.com Article

Sweeeeep!

2005-05-05T15:02:00.000-05:00

The Brewers extended their winning streak to seven today, sweeping the home series against the Cubs. Carlos Lee hit a looper just over the shoulder of the second baseman to drive in the winning run. The Crew looked downright giddy, coming out of the dugout to congratulate Lee with hugs and high-fives. It's great to win a home series against the Cubs, when there are more Chicago fans than Milwaukee fans at Miller Park.

Lately I've been reading Brew Crew Ball, a Brewers blog sponsored by SportsBlogs, a community of baseball blogs built by Markos Moulitsas Zúniga of DailyKos, a popular left-leaning political blog.

Wired News Story

The Colbert Report

2005-05-04T18:10:00.000-05:00

Stephen Colbert, correspondent for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, is being given his own late-night show by Comedy Central. The show, titled the Colbert Report, will mimick other single-personality news vehicles such as The O'Reilly Factor and Hardball with Chris Matthews. The NY Times has a good article detailing the new project.

That "The Daily Show" has reached the point that it is considered ripe for a spinoff is something of a milestone for the program and for Comedy Central, which is owned by Viacom. But in moving Mr. Colbert off "The Daily Show" - he is expected to make only intermittent return visits - the network is also risking diluting a recipe that has made it so popular.

To that end, Comedy Central is considering ripping an actual page from the cable news networks it so often mocks, and having Mr. Stewart, at the end of his half-hour show, share a split-screen with Mr. Colbert, in what is known in the news business as a "throw" or "toss."

"It could be kind of seamless," said Doug Herzog, president of Comedy Central and Spike TV, who presided over the debut of "The Daily Show" in 1996. "It would have the effect of extending 'The Daily Show' to a full hour."

I'll be looking forward to "The Colbert Report". The Daily Show is actually one of the most honest critiques of politics and the media on television. Stewart shows the utmost respect for guests on his show, much more than most other television journalists. I was watching his interview Monday with Zell Miller and the two actaully had a civil and meaningful conversation, despite the fact that Stewart noted they disagree on pretty much everything. It seems as though Colbert will attempt to retain that sense of civility.

"We're going to deal with truth on my program," Mr. Colbert said. "We're going to catch the world in the headlights of my justice."

Full NY Times Article

The NY Times also features the author of the article, Jacques Steinberg, giving a short video report on the story.

Loud noises!

2005-05-04T17:20:00.000-05:00

I've been browsing several soundboards, web pages with sound clips from movies or tv shows, and thought that I'd link to some of the best ones. In no specific order, here they are:

Animal House

Stewie from Family Guy

Darth Vader

Napoleon Dynamite (my personal favorite)

Office Space

Conan O'Brien

Arnold Schwarzenegger

Monty Python's The Meaning of Life

How Star Wars changed the world

2005-05-04T17:12:00.000-05:00

Wired Magazine has an eye-catching layout that displays the impact Star Wars has had on people and culture since its initial release in 1977. This month's issue also has an in-depth on George Lucas that goes beyond his Star Wars ties and addresses his motives for making the prequels and new television projects. There's also an exclusive Q&A with Lucas that in which he discusses his own films as well as Fahrenheit 9/11 and the impact that films can have.

Playing catch-up

2005-05-04T01:18:00.000-05:00

I've been working long hours on my journalism project (which I'll post a link to here when it's finally finished), so I haven't had the time to post everything I've wanted to lately. I've got some free time this afternoon, so hopefully I can post a few things I've been sitting on.

Mr. Baseball

An article from STLtoday.com on my favorite baseball announcer. Bob Uecker may not be the best baseball analyst, but he's definitely entertaining. I"m looking forward to grilling out on the porch this summer, listening to a Brewer game (they spanked the Cubs last night).

Bush playing Robin Hood?

2005-05-02T11:48:00.000-05:00

The NY Times has an excellent article providing details of Bush's newly proposed plan to retain Social Security benefits for low-income workers while cutting benefits for the middle and upper class.

Under Mr. Bush's approach of "progressive indexation," a typical low-income worker who earns about $16,000 a year today would be entitled to retirement
benefits equal to about 49 percent of his or her wages, the same amount that is promised today. But those earning an average income, about $36,500 in today's
dollars, would see big changes. Instead of replacing 36 percent of that person's working pay, as promised under today's system, benefits would cover only 26 percent of pay by 2075. And people who earn $90,000 a year in today's dollars
would continue to pay as much as ever in taxes but would receive benefits equal to only 12 percent of their pay.

More on this later, hopefully. I've got to work on my J202 web site all week and start studying for finals. It's going to be a week. If I have time at some point, I'll write about Feingold's latest blog post.

Update: Paul Krugman of the NY Times criticizes the Bush plan and explains why it hurts the middle class and sets up benefits for the poor to be cut in the future. LINK

Krugman makes a good point that this plan would hurt the middle class, but he makes it seem as though a better program would actually hurt the rich in order to help the poor. Just because the rich wouldn't notice their Social Security benefits being cut doesn't mean that it's not a worthwhile part of the plan... in fact, that's exactly why it would be effective: cut benefits for the rich and they don't even notice. Sounds pretty good to me.

Update: Two Washington Post Op/Ed pieces about the new Social Security Proposal

President's Plan Shields Benefits of Low Earners

The Challenge to Democrats

The other part of Bush's interruption of sweeps week

2005-04-29T14:13:00.000-05:00

I'm not totally opposed to Bush's new concept for Social Security: lowering benefits as people's incomes increase. The major problem I see is that the plan might encourage people to move income and investments to areas of the economy that wouldn't actually count as income (I'm no expert, so I'm not sure what those would be). Above a certain income threshold, social security benefits really become unnecessary, but it's my understanding that under the current system, everyone receives them.

With virtually every Democrat, as well as many Republicans, opposed to his plan for private investment accounts, Bush sought to shift the focus of the Social Security debate to a new proposal that would reduce benefits more as workers' incomes rise.

"I believe the reformed system should protect those who depend on Social Security the most," he said in a nationally televised news conference. "So I propose a Social Security system in the future where benefits for low-income workers will grow faster than benefits for people who are better off." This is the first time Bush has backed a specific plan to reduce future benefits for tens of millions of Americans.

What does anyone else think of this plan? Any major drawbacks?

The Bush Administration's plan for fighting terrorism: Superheros

2005-04-29T13:44:00.000-05:00

The Secretary of Defense announced the newest weapon in the war on terror in an appearance with Spiderman and Captain America in the Pentagon basement yesterday. Marvel Comics is producing a special "support our troops" comic book that will be distributed to U.S. troops overseas.

"Pure escapism," says Robert Sabouni, a Marvel executive. "A touch of home," said Allison Barber, deputy assistant secretary of defense. The story opens with some soldiers who stumble on a UFO-looking ship and call for help. Iron Man and Mr. Fantastic, the two scientist-superheroes, show up. They pry open the ship to find hostile aliens inside, and then KOOM! THWIP! etc.

A man dressed in a Spider-Man costume gamely squatted and did that web-squirt thing with his hands dozens of times to pose for photographs, while the Captain America look-alike flexed his muscles and kept his expression deadly earnest. At some point Rumsfeld too did a little muscle flex for the cameras, only he couldn't keep a straight face.
Are they saying these guys weren't the real deal? I guess I did expect spiderman's suit to be made out of something that offers a little more protection from evil villans than polyester.

Are they saying that these guys aren't the real deal? I guess I did expect Spiderman's suit to be made out of something that offers a little more protection against evil supervillans than polyester.

Original WashingtonPost.com Article

Bush's Energy Speech before "The OC"

2005-04-29T00:18:00.000-05:00

It makes so much sense

I missed Bush's speech tonite, but from what I'm reading, the leader from the free world is being informed by people who have never taken a high-school science course.

Mike O'Hare of the Berkley Goldman School of Public Policy wrote a summary/criticism of Bush's speech that sums up the nation's energy options (and the president's distorted view of them) nearly perfectly.

Bush deserves credit for highlighting energy conservation, at least in general terms. But it would have been a lot more useful if he had proposed to stop giving big SUVs and pickups a pass on fuel efficiency, and if he had asked whether we need to have such enormous houses, built so far apart that people have to drive thousands of miles a year because walking, bicycles, and public transportation are impractical. It would have been especially useful if he hadn't asked for those lower gas prices. (Does the man know which way demand curves slope?).

Bush also brought up nuclear power (our best long term solution in my opinion), but he failed to address any of the political obstacles preventing its mainstream use.

It may not have been because the President wasn't making any sense, but NBC, Fox and CBS all cut the President's speech short to return to regularly scheduled programming (including Survivor and The Apprentice).

Wow! It's just frustrating to hear that this is all the most powerful people in the world can come up with. It's not acceptable.

Mark A.R. Kleiman blog post

It's the bat, man

2005-04-27T10:27:00.000-05:00

MTV.com has the newest Batman Begins trailer up. Only problem is, they make you use Interet Explorer to view it. I can barely search their site with Firefox. Maybe they made a pact with Microsoft when they got the exclusive preview the new X-Box.

Update: The new trailer is up on the Apple Web site in Quicktime. You can even view a fullscreen version.

Conan, close up

2005-04-21T23:52:00.000-05:00

It's finally happened... Late Night with Conan O'Brien is going to be broadcast in high definition beginning next week Tuesday. Zooming in on Conan's face will never be quite the same. Conan commented, "I'm really looking forward to the extra hour in the makeup chair." Maybe I'll try to get back home a little more this summer, just so I can watch Pierre Bernard's Recliner of Rage up close and personal.

Lost Remote post

You'll need cable to watch Monday Night Football...

2005-04-18T19:21:00.000-05:00

The NFL just announced that Monday Night Football will be shown on ESPN instead of ABC next season and Sunday Night Football will be moved to NBC. ABC will be the only major network not to be carrying the NFL, although broadcasts will remain under the Disney company umbrella with ESPN.

Since so many people now have cable and games will still be shown on broadcast stations in local markets, I don't really see this as having a major impact on NFL viewership, although it may be an annoyance to some used to relying on broadcast television for their MNF fix. NBC hasn't had NFL games in a while... I always like to compare how different networks approach broadcasts of the same sport.

MSNBC.com story

ESPN.com story

Adobe + Macromedia = Adobe Systems

2005-04-18T18:28:00.000-05:00

Today Adobe (makers of Adobe Reader, Photoshop and InDesign) announced that they are aquiring Macromedia (makers of Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Flash). The deal consolidates some of the most-used software in Web design into a single company. I'm excited to see how Adobe might incorporate features of Photoshop into Dreamweaver and how the company will continue to develop Flash for web interactivity in mobile devices.

Blog post from Mike Chambers (Adobe Product Manager) explaining the aquisition and what it means for the future of the two companies.

Google Siteseeing

2005-04-18T18:21:00.000-05:00

Since Google aquired Keyhole, they have added a satellite photo feature to Google Maps, allowing easy navigation of locations across the world. While most of the high-quality photos are of urban areas in North America, the service has photos from all over the world at various altitudes.

The blog Google Siteseeing is a collection of satellite photos of famous landmarks taken from Google Maps. My favorite finds are the white house (which apparently has had its roof photoshopped), the washington monument and Oprah's likeness carved into foliage.

Googling The New Vernacular

2005-04-13T13:25:00.000-05:00

Right now, if you google, "The New Vernacular", my blog comes up as the 31st result. Not bad when you consider that "New Vernacular" is also a type of American architecture that a lot of people aparently like to write about on the web.

But... if you search "thenewvernacular", I'm number #1!

And if you Google "Mike Westling", my blogger profile is #1. I should probably take the time to actually write something in there, eh? A few of my posts follow in the top ten.

I'm also the third site if you search Google for "Feingold '08"! Just a little less significant now that Feingold and his wife recently announced that they will soon be getting a divorce
(which essentially trashes his chances for a presidental run in '08, considering the impact of the "values"in the last election. It's truly not something that should affect it, but it obviously will. It won't hurt him in Wisconsin, but it would have an impact in a national race. And seeing that Feingold said he would only run if he thought he would have the best chance of winning.... it doesn't look good. More than anything else, I'm just sorry that it happened. Actually being a good, thoughtful politician who goes to a listening session in every county would put a strain on any family situation.)

Anyway..
The New Vernacular has also been getting hits from people searching "Russ Feingold '08" on Technocrati. People actually searching for information that I'm writing about, and then coming to my site to read about it... that's the point, right? I find it exciting, anyway.

(if you hadn't noticed, I'm doing some excessive name dropping to try and bump that Google pagerank up a bit, [evil laugh])

Dear UW Athletic Dept....

2005-04-11T13:50:00.000-05:00

The UW Athletic Department has announced that they're putting the method of voucher redemtion for next year's football student season tickets to a vote.

Here are the details from the Badger Herald

Here's what the Daily Cardinal has to say about it

And here's the e-mail that I sent to everyone in the UW Athletic Dept. Ticket Office directory:

I an a UW sophomore who has had season tickets to football, basketball
and hockey and am writing to express my disapproval of the choices
being given to
students regarding turning in ticket vouchers for football games next
year.

The first choice, having students line up for tickets all at once
like they do for basketball and hockey will create a huge line,
considering that the number of student seats are more than three times
what they are for other sports. The line will also likely be created
weeks, if not months ahead of time, once again introducing the issue
of camping on campus due to nicer weather and a higher demand for
tickets. Students in the Madison area for the summer will have a
distinct advantage over those who are not, and if the redemtion date
is before the beginning of school, waiting in the ticket line will cut
into the Wisconsin Welcome activities that the university puts large
amounts of time and effort into preparing.

The second choice, having students redeem their vouchers on gameday,
is better, but still inferior to the current system. This plan
effectively moves the time and location of the current system from the
Kohl Center on Wed. afternoon to Camp Randall on Saturday morning.
While I agree that this system will encourage students to arrive
earlier for games, seeing as the student section has been criticized
for showing up late to games in the past, it will cause them to arrive
days, if not weeks earlier. It then follows that this solution does
not solve the problem of students missing class, but instead
encourages them to miss class on different days leading up to
gameday. As for camping, the same issues that are present in the
current system will arise.

Tailgating before football games is a Madison and Wisconsin tradition
for students and alumni alike... As the city of Madison is so adament
about upholding the tradition of having the Mifflin street block on
the first weekend of May, I hope that the UW athletic department
follows suit and preserves the tailgating tradition that makes UW
football games one up the greatest college sports experiences in the
country.

I fail to see how either of these options solves any of the problems
created by the current system. If I'm missing something and they
truly are better solutions, I hope that you will respond and explain
to me how these systems will benefit the students and the University
community. I will be voting for the second choice if forced to, but I
hope that the Athletic department keeps the interests of students, the
peers of those actually playing the game, at the forefront of their
decision making.

Building a good relationship with student fans is essential to having
a successful collegiate athletic program. I have yet to see a
concerted effort on the part of the athletic department to really
reach out to the student community. This may involve making
concessions, such as pushing for a change in university policy that
would allow students in the hockey ticket line to actually have
resources at their disposal (such as a blanket) to help counter
negative effects on students' health and academic performance. Just
because certain policies are in place now does not mean that they
can't be changed in the future. There's no reason for students to be
given tickets for having a blanket and pillow when the only way for
them to get great seats to support their favorite UW team is to sit
outside in the cold for weeks at a time.

Take a note from "Krzyzewskiville" at Duke University. Encourage
students to get
involved and show school spirit for their sports team and you'll
retain and grow the wonderful student fanbase you already have at the
University.

Thanks for your time. I hope to hear back from you soon,

Mike Westling

High-Rise in Madison?

2005-04-09T22:17:00.000-05:00

I just typed a much longer post about this article, but I lost it and am now very frustrated. So this'll be short. Written by the fabulous Meg Costello for the Badger Herald:

27-story complex stirs urban growth debate
A proposed 27-story building on the 900 block of East Washington Avenue is continuing to stir debate among Madison residents and officials. The complex, named the Archipelago Village, would overshadow all city buildings, by far exceeding the Capitol View Preservation Limit, but many agree developer Curt Brink has brought a positive and forward-thinking discussion to the Madison development table.

The city is grappling with the possibility of building a 27-story multi-use complex on the block where the Mautz Paint building lies. The reported cost for the Archipelago Village is estimated at $250 million, out-shadowing the $205 million Overture Center.

But Brink said the complex is designed to serve as a mass transportation hub that would bring in all forms of traffic. The building would also serve as conglomerate of 400,000 square feet of office space, 600,000 square feet of retail space, two hotels, a fitness center, a grocery store, more than 3,000 parking spaces and a possible water park.

By attracting visitors to the Archipelago Village, the complex would provide access to regional and local buses, the mayor’s proposed streetcar or several hundred bicycle lockers.

According to Brink, the “misnomer” of the project is “it just looks big” when, instead, the size could produce numerous opportunities for development in the East Washington Avenue area.

But Brink added that the size of Archipelago Village is not that big when compared to buildings in other cities, and due to the mass transportation traffic, the large design incorporates all the intersecting hubs.

“Looking at how it all works together and interacts, this is how the design comes out,” Brink said.

The building has spurred talk of Madison’s continuing urban growth. Mayoral spokesperson George Twigg said the battle between urban sprawl on the periphery or increasing city density is a current issue Archipelago Village tackles.

“Are we a small town or are we becoming a big city?” Twigg questioned. “While [the building] is a long way from breaking ground, it’s a good thing to have people coming forward.”

Twigg added Madison will have to look into options to secure this growth.

more...

I'm not tired.....ZZZZZZ

2005-04-07T16:47:00.000-05:00

My esteemed collegue, partner in crime and future roommate, Ben Kuss, just published an article about the documentary he's producing on sleep deprivation among college students at Brandeis University. I'm excited to see the final film.

OP-ED: You're getting sleepy, very sleepy
Sleep deprivation widespread among students at Brandeis
By Benjamin Kuss

For the last month or so I've been trying to create a documentary about Brandeis students who are sleep-deprived. My escapades have lasted well into the night as I've spanned the campus filming and interviewing those oh-so-sleepless individuals. Staying all night at the Justice's office with sports editor Dan Hirschhorn '07, spending all waking hours with Sarah Pipes '07, hanging out with the WBRS crew during the 2 to 6 a.m. shift, as well as interviewing roommates, classmates, friends and strangers, it seems that now I get even less sleep than my subjects.

Read the rest of the article at The Justice Online

What HDTV has to do with emergency communication

2005-03-29T14:49:00.000-06:00

One of my favorite blogs, BoingBoing, previews an article from the National Journal on the broadcast spectrum in the U.S., the fight in government over HDTV regulations and the effect both have had on the ability of emergency personnel to communicate in disaster situations:

This long, excellent article on the history of broadcast spectrum allocation in America is the single best explanation of the mess that we're in today. In short: greedy broadcasters tricked Congress into giving them free spectrum for a second set of digital channels, so that Americans who bought digital TVs would have something to watch. Then they did nothing with them. Meantime, cops and firefighters and EMTs are (literally) dying for some of that squat-upon spectrum so that they can coordinate their rescue efforts.

link to BoingBoing post

Feingold returns to Alabama

2005-03-29T14:34:00.000-06:00

Russ Feingold returned to Greenville, Alabama where he visited earlier in the year and made observations about the areas depressing economic conditions. Feingold was invited by the Greenville's mayor to observe parts of the city he missed upon the first visit, including two South Korean auto parts plants and the $18 million Greenville High School. He also shared a round of golf with the mayor. Feingold wrote an article about his initial trip on Salon.com.

original story from the Montgomery Advertiser

senatorrussfeingoldforpresidentin2008.com

2005-03-18T10:58:00.000-06:00

This really isn't that significant, but I'm going to post it anyway. Just another indications of Feingold's intentions three years from now. He said he's only going to run if he thinks he is the best candidate that can actually win. Judging from how the rest of the field looks right now, I'd say he had better go for it.

From the Wisconsin State Journal:

With rampant speculation on whether U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., will run for president in 2008, his Senate campaign made a few notable recent moves. It registered the domain name for the Web site www.russfeingold08.com as well as the .org and .net versions. And, no, he's not facing re-election to the Senate that year.
"We saw so many sites being snapped up out there that we reserved a few sites," says George Aldrich, Feingold's past campaign manager. He notes that many sites, such as www.russforpresident.com, seeking to draft Feingold, are already taken and some already have content. Others are parked by supporters in case Feingold decides to run.

link

update: Just found an in-depth C-SPAN interview with Feingold at www.russforpresident.com

March Madness

2005-03-17T18:31:00.000-06:00

CBS.Sportsline.com

March Madness has begun, with 12th seeded UW-Milwaukee beating 5 seed Alabama, a team that made it to the Elite Eight last year. I'm doing pretty well in Dan's pool so far, although I had Pitt. beating Pacific and UTEP beating Utah. I've got Wisconsin making it to the 2nd round, but getting beaten by Kansas. Here's my Final Four:

-Illinois
-Wake Forest
-UNC
-Kentucky

Illinois over Wake Forest

UNC over Kentucky

National Championship: UNC over Illinois

The rest of my picks

I've been using SI.com's bracket to keep up with scores. It updates every few minutes and fills in the bracket as games finish.

The Daily Show - On Demand

2005-03-15T15:18:00.000-06:00

Just in case you haven't gotten your daily fix of J-Stew, Comedy Central hosts dozens of Daily Show clips in Windows Media and Realplayer formats. One of the best ways to kill 10 minutes before class.

On a completely unrelated note: I'm looking for a place to sublet this summer with 3-5 friends. If you know of anything available, let me know.

AIM, Firefox and the O.C.

2005-03-11T14:27:00.000-06:00

UW housing just released a way to watch TV on your computer. Called Digital Academic Television (DATV) [and a pretty lame acronym], the service allows housing residents to watch ten channels including CNN and all local channels by using Quicktime.

Although I do have a tv less than 5 feet from my computer, it is nice to be able to watch something while I'm working on the computer, or while my roommate's asleep. Also nice for people who don't have a TV. I've been messing around with it and watching four different channels at the same time, just because I can.

Feingold is blogging, kindof

2005-03-11T11:17:00.000-06:00

Sen. Feingold wrote his first blog post on MyDD.com and then DailyKos.com Thursday. He wrote about his work on several issues such as the Patriot Act and Campaign Finance. In particular he addressed his concern with the FEC's proposal to limit the free speech of bloggers by not allowing them to link to the websites of political candidates, calling it an unfair campaign contribution. Other media outlets are exempt from this kind of censorship and blogs should fall under that umbrella.

Feingold is one of the first senators to reach out to the blogging community and has gotten favorable reactions. Both sites received plenty of reader comments supporting Feingold (many calling him to run for President in 2008). Feingold even took the time to post a response to the many comments. He also pledged to continue blogging in the future.

Just one of the many reasons Feingold kicks ass.

Doyle wants to tax downloads in WI

2005-03-10T14:46:00.000-06:00

According to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal, Gov. Doyle wants to put a 5% tax on downloaded material like music, books, and art.

A little-noticed provision of the Democratic governor's proposed state budget would extend the sales tax to those Internet transactions...

It's a matter of equity, said state Revenue Secretary Mike Morgan, defending Doyle's goal of having consumers voluntarily pay the sales tax on "intangible" items they buy and download from the Internet. Buyers would have to pay the 5% sales tax if they purchased those items at any Wisconsin store.

The oddest part about this is that the whole system would be voluntary. The article said that there would be no way to enforce this, it would be entirely on the honor system. Considering that I (and many other people) don't pay for downloads now, this is probably a poor way to spur Internet-based commerce in WI.

Wisconsin taxpayers are supposed to estimate what sales tax they owe on Internet and mail-order purchases, and voluntarily pay it when they file their income taxes. Compliance is "very low," Morgan conceded.

The songs on i-Tunes are already a little overpriced at $.99, I'm not going to pay the extra cash or take the extra effort to pay an additional tax.

This move makes it appear as though Doyle is against e-commerce and is attempting to tax the citizens of his state when no similar plans exist anywhere else in the country, except in South Dakota.

Wisconsin taxpayers are supposed to estimate what sales tax they owe on Internet and mail-order purchases, and voluntarily pay it when they file their income taxes. Compliance is "very low," Morgan conceded.

So what's the point? The state's budget is $53 billion and the this tax is only estimated to bring in $1.9 million. It waould make essentially no impact on the state budget, but give Republicans fuel to criticize Doyle for hurting business in WI. A bad idea financially and politically.

Also, just in terms of what's being taxed, state Revenue Secretary Mike Morgan's defense is: "Buyers would have to pay the 5% sales tax if they purchased those items at any Wisconsin store" No quite true though. If I'm buying songs from a store, I'm buying a plastic cd that holds them. If I buy a book, I'm getting a book, etc. There are material goods being taxed in these cases, wheras the internet tax applies to "intangibles". This may be something that eventually needs to be taken into account as more goods are bought on the internet, but it would have to be accompanied by some sort of enforcement mechanism, such as the tax being included in the price of the item.

I found it interesting that the J/S interviewed students in the Capitol doing the hunger strike for lower tuition about the tax. They were probably there anyway and wanted a student opinion, but it's cool that the strike got mentioned (it was actually the whole last paragraph of the article).

original article on arstechnica.com

The Sharpton Diet

2005-03-08T16:07:00.000-06:00

NY Times: Sharpton Diet: 2 Meals a Day and 3 Workouts a Week

Hopefully he didn't ruin it by indulging in cheese and brats while he was in Wisconsin.