Bloggers have taken over The Line (KNME, Fridays, 7pm). Which should remind us all that talking and writing are not the same skills, though if anyone obscures the difference, it’s bloggers.
The ousted/retired creator of The Line, Steve Lawrence, disdained bloggers. New host, Gene Grant, is one.
Last Friday, every panelist but, um, uh, Professor Margret Montoya, was a local blogger. Scot Key, who teaches the 3 S’s in Albuquerque, joined Montoya’s side, opposed by Whitney Cheshire and Mario Burgos.
Burgos brags that Cheshire said, “Geez, you almost make me look like a Democrat.” That’s because she knew saying, “You make me seem almost reasonable,” wasn’t a big enough insult.
On the other hand, it’s harder to get furious with Mario Burgos looking at his cherubic face than reading his text.
At one point, Mario admitted sounding like a broken record in response to a question on public transportation downtown: if it were feasible, somebody would be providing public transportation already. Let the infinitely wise market decide for us! Consider the hilarious implication that everything that is profitable already has a supplier (bad news for future entrepreneurs and start-ups). Or does Mario mean we just need to be patient? Do nothing until someone sees a way to get rich doing it. Garbage would pile up in the street in the meantime.
Thank the creator that market-worship wasn’t the attitude of the Founders. Or does Mario believe corporations would have written the Constitution given enough time (after all, they’re re-writing it as fast as their pawns can — there’s a mutually profitable venture). But maybe Mario has a point: corporate devotion is politically profitable. Suggesting that all of us pay our fair share for the good of the community is much less profitable. mjh
Monthly Archives: September 2006
cosmos
Book ’em, Dan-o
This week, working on the book, I had alternating periods of productivity and backsliding as I cut out some of the text I had written. Early in the week, I struggled with a chapter on computer utilities. I want this book to be practical and I don’t regard many of Windows’ utilities practical for my needs. But I recognize that some of those utilities are very important among people supporting other users, especially on a network. I risk disappointing the more technical reader either by leaving out some tools or putting them in with a caveat to the more general reader, whom I risk insulting by suggesting this may be “more than you need.” But, hell, there are things here that I’ve never, ever needed.
On the other hand, I had great fun with the Photo Gallery chapter. This new application contains many cool features for working with photographs, as well as some maddening inconsistencies between it and other applications.
Next week, another dreadline, er, deadline. mjh
Major Problems At Polls Feared
Major Problems At Polls Feared By Dan Balz and Zachary A. Goldfarb, Washington Post Staff Writers
In the Nov. 7 election, more than 80 percent of voters will use electronic voting machines, and a third of all precincts this year are using the technology for the first time. The changes are part of a national wave, prompted by the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002 and numerous revisions of state laws, that led to the replacement of outdated voting machines with computer-based electronic machines, along with centralized databases of registered voters and other steps to refine the administration of elections.
But in Maryland last Tuesday, a combination of human blunders and technological glitches caused long lines and delays in vote-counting. The problems, which followed ones earlier this year in Ohio, Illinois and several other states, have contributed to doubts among some experts about whether the new systems are reliable and whether election officials are adequately prepared to use them.
In a polarized political climate, in which elections are routinely marked by litigation and allegations of incompetent administration or outright tampering, some worry that voting problems could cast a Florida-style shadow over this fall’s midterm elections. [mjh: Especially if Republicans defy all odds and polls and make gains in control of the House and Senate.] …
What is clear is that a national effort to improve election procedures six years ago — after the presidential election ended with ambiguous ballots and allegations of miscounted votes and partisan favoritism in Florida — has failed to restore broad public confidence that the system is fair. …
Twenty-seven states require electronic voting machines to produce a paper trail available for auditing during a recount, but an analysis of Cuyahoga County’s paper trail by the nonpartisan Election Science Institute showed that a tenth of the receipts were uncountable.
Nonlethal weapons touted for use on U.S. citizens
Nonlethal weapons touted for use on U.S. citizens By LOLITA C. BALDOR, ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
WASHINGTON — Nonlethal weapons such as high-power microwave devices should be used on American citizens in crowd-control situations before they are used on the battlefield, the Air Force secretary said Tuesday.
Domestic use would make it easier to avoid questions in the international community over any possible safety concerns, said Secretary Michael Wynne.
“If we’re not willing to use it here against our fellow citizens, then we should not be willing to use it in a wartime situation,” said Wynne. “(Because) if I hit somebody with a nonlethal weapon and they claim that it injured them in a way that was not intended, I think that I would be vilified in the world press.”
In a Pivotal Year, GOP Plans to Get Personal
In a Pivotal Year, GOP Plans to Get Personal
Millions to Go to Digging Up Dirt on Democrats
By Jim VandeHei and Chris Cillizza, Washington Post Staff Writers
Republicans are planning to spend the vast majority of their sizable financial war chest over the final 60 days of the campaign attacking Democratic House and Senate candidates over personal issues and local controversies, GOP officials said.
The National Republican Congressional Committee, which this year dispatched a half-dozen operatives to comb through tax, court and other records looking for damaging information on Democratic candidates, plans to spend more than 90 percent of its $50 million-plus advertising budget on what officials described as negative ads.
The hope is that a vigorous effort to “define” opponents, in the parlance of GOP operatives, can help Republicans shift the midterm debate away from Iraq and limit losses this fall. …
GOP officials said internal polling shows Republicans could limit losses to six to 10 House seats and two or three Senate seats if the strategy — combined with the party’s significant financial advantage and battled-tested turnout operation — proves successful. Democrats need to pick up 15 seats to win control of the House and six to regain power in the Senate.
Against some less experienced and little-known opponents, said Matt Keelen, a Republican lobbyist heavily involved in House campaigns, “It will take one or two punches to fold them up like a cheap suit.” [mjh: noble Republican rhetoric.]
Those in Power are Slanderous and Smug
Dana Milbank – A Reprise of the Grand Old Party Line By Dana Milbank
“I listen to my Democrat friends, and I wonder if they’re more interested in protecting terrorists than in protecting the American people,” House Majority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) said.
One of his listeners, offering Boehner the chance to rescind that charge, asked if he really meant to accuse Democrats of treason. “I said I wonder if they’re more interested in protecting the terrorists,” he replied, repeating more than clarifying. “They certainly don’t want to take the terrorists on in the field.”
The majority leader’s charge of treachery was no accident. Two months before Election Day, Republicans have revived the technique used with great success in 2002 and 2004: suggesting that the loyal opposition is, well, not so loyal.
Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) seemed to have the same talking points yesterday. In a fight for his political life, Santorum worked himself into a rage on the Senate floor, hollering: “If you listen to the Democratic leader, our lesson is: . . . Let’s put domestic politics ahead of the security of this country. That’s the message.” …
The aid-and-comfort line may not work as well this time, if only because polls show broad disenchantment with Bush and congressional leadership. And, unlike in 2002, Republicans have unified control of the government and find their security agenda being hamstrung by GOP holdouts as well as Democrats. But don’t discount the influence of Treason Season: A Zogby poll released yesterday showed Santorum closing the gap with Democratic challenger Bob Casey.
As is often the case, Vice President Cheney launched the current round of sedition suspicions. The idea “that we should withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq,” he told NBC’s Tim Russert on Sunday, “validates the strategy of the terrorists.” …
Santorum said Democrats “can’t face the reality that we have a dangerous enemy out there, an enemy that wants to destroy everything we hold dear.”
Boehner, giving reporters an off-camera briefing in his office, was decidedly calmer. In shirtsleeves and sipping a Diet Coke, he told the group coolly: “I have no fears about losing our majority. None.“
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MTP Transcript for Sept. 10 – Meet the Press, online at MSNBC
Cheney: So you look at situation today in Afghanistan or even in Iraq, and you’ve got people who have doubts. They want to know whether or not if they stick their heads up, the United States, in fact, is going to be there to complete the mission. And those doubts are encouraged, obviously, when they see the kind of debate that we’ve had in the United States, suggestions, for example, that we should withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq, simply feed into that whole notion, validates the strategy of the terrorists. …
MR. RUSSERT: But this stuff here is real important. This article says that in 2002, the U.S. pulled its Special Operation forces out of Afghanistan and, and really did lower down the volume in seeking—in going after Osama, which is at the exact time that President Bush said, “I don’t spend much time on him,” talking about bin Laden.
VICE PRES. CHENEY: He’s not the only source of the problem, obviously, Tim. If you killed him tomorrow, you’d still have a problem with al-Qaeda, with Zawahiri and the others. But bin Laden has been a top priority for us from the very beginning, he continues to be a top priority today. That hasn’t changed.