Stoopid Ads in Iowa

And different spins on it, too, for your enjoyment and edification:

Conservatives fire new shot at Dean, by Helen Kennedy.
Conservatives launch TV attack ad on Dean, by Ralph Z. Hallow.

Sigh.

You know what I hate about politics? The lowest common denominator that professional campaigners and admeisters and all those jerkoffs aim for is so goddamn low. Make no mistake, that remark is directed squarely at Club for Growth and all those other idiots who think 'Volvo-driving' is somehow demonic. Aren't they the safest cars, in, like, ever?

*rolls eyes*

I am not an idiot, and I have the sneaky suspicion many Iowans aren't either.

Meanwhile, Lies.com hits the nail square on the head:

I really am looking forward to this election. It's going to be a perfect test case of whether or not this country deserves to survive. On the one hand we have an incumbent who is an objective failure in every area, who has amply demonstrated his contempt for everything this country stands for, and who seeks to be reinstalled solely with blatant deception, good visuals, and truckloads of money. On the other hand we have a short, unfriendly Yankee who speaks the truth without much, if any, regard for how the other side will twist his words. He just tells it like it is.

Will we, as an electorate, choose the guy who tells us what we want to hear, even when it's obvious with almost any degree of analysis that it's horseshit? Or will we choose the guy who tells the truth, but doesn't bother to sugarcoat it?

Me? I'm a truth fan.

CoI

The nice thing about working this contract in Rowland Heights/City of Industry is...no, not the commute...the Ranch 99 market just down the street, and all the little Viet and Thai and Japanese and Korean restaurants.

Red bean buns! Yum. Tuna seaweed roll! Yum!

Only a buck-seventy-five -- even yummer. And silk scarves for $10.00. Yummest.

Someone's got to do it

Somebody Has To Be The Control Freak. Via Medley, my Evil Triplet.

I have three things to say: Yep. Yep. Yep.

I agree completely. Because I would be totally happy to have the world take care of itself, I would. It'd save me a lot of grief. But you know what? When people like me stop watching...the world goes to hell in a handbasket. So we keep watching, because we live in the world. If it was just you, we wouldn't care quite so much. But it's us, too.

Hooray for the control freak!

Civit Cats Culled in response to SARS

China SARS Patient Recovers

I'm confused. I knew a new SARS case had been reported in China (the aforementioned recovering patient), but for a layman I followed SARS pretty closely and wasn't aware of any proposed correspondence between these animals (civit cats) and SARS. Are they a proposed repository? Why isn't WHO in charge of this?

Pricing and architecture of the Internet

Pricing and architecture of the Internet: Historical perspectives from telecommunications and transportation, by Andrew Odlyzko.

Looks interesting from the abstract...

Abstract: With telecommunications in a slump, the search is on for ways to re-invigorate this key industry. The main problems are clearly economic much more than technological, and many of the proposed remedies would lead to new architectures for the Internet that would provide for greater control by carriers. They would drastically reduce the role of the end-to-end principle, the main foundation for the success of the Internet, in which functionality resides at the edges of the network. The proposals to restrict voice over Internet (VoIP) are just one part of this trend.

Historical precedents from telecommunications for introduction of differentiated services and sophisticated charging methods on the Internet are discouraging. The almost universal trend has been towards decreasing price discrimination and simpler pricing.

The history of transportation presents a different picture, with frequent movements towards increasing price discrimination and more complicated pricing (although with many noteworthy reversals). Charging according to the nature of the goods being transported has been and continues to be the norm. Since the incentives to price discriminate are increasing, and the ability to do so is also growing, it is conceivable that telecommunications might break with its historical record and follow the example of transportation. It is therefore of interest to examine the evolution of pricing and quality differentiation in transportation.

Some historical sketches on the evolution of pricing in transportation are presented. Their implications for telecommunications, and especially for Internet pricing and architecture, are discussed.

Score!!

Literally! I got > 160 on the LSAT.

I am quite pleased with this result.

Astute, as always

Doug Merrill, over at A Fistful of Euros, wins game, set, and match on Bush v. Dean:

"Former Vermont governor Howard Dean stands on the brink of a remarkable achievement in American politics, having transformed himself from rank obscurity to clear favorite for his party's presidential nomination. But rarely has a front-runner begun an election year with as many questions swirling around him as the man who rewrote the rules in presidential politics the past 12 months."

Coming from someone whose profession is supposed to be reporting on American politics, the second sentence is rankest stupidity.

For confirmation, look no further than the challenger from the party out of power four years ago. No primaries had been held, but GW Bush was a front-runner who had rewritten the rules of presidential politics, and he had an enormous number of questions swirling about him. And they were far more serious than those swirling around Gov. Dean right now: Bush was an admitted alcoholic until the time he turned 40; he was governor of Texas, a post the quirks of history left with far less political power than the state's Lieutenant governor; he had a poor record of convincing people to do his bidding; most of his career involved questionable business deals that traded on his name. None of that, of course, kept him from the White House.

...

...tagging Dean as someone who rewrote the rules is actually an astute observazion [my emphasis -- Sid], maybe even the most important one he could possibly make. Because rewriting the rules is precisely what GW Bush did in 2000, what Bill Clinton did in 1992, what GHW Bush did in 1988, what Ronald Reagan did in 1980, and what Jimmy Carter did in 1976, which is about as far back as my political memory reaches. If Dean really is rewriting the rules, then he is exercising the single most important presidential skill: dominating the national agenda.

Life and all that Crap

It's occurred to me I've been posting a lot of politics and not much else. This is unlikely to change in the immediate future, as to say I care passionately about getting some change in the executive branch ASAP, rolling back some of the recent affronts to my civil liberties, and protecting the voting process, merely to mention three items off the top of my head, would be an understatement of such magnitude as to border on untruth.

However. I *do* have a life.

Point the First: The novel is in stagnant water. I suspect the last 20% will be the hardest to actually *write*. And that's not counting the excruiciating re-writing to come.
Point the Second: I'm working a contract for requirements and system analysis up in LA. This will cut into my rant time, what with the long commute, but it's not driving me crazy yet. Get it? Driving me crazy? Commute? Ha ha ha. I crack me up. This gig has no coding, which is both odd, and rather a treat. It's been much easier to leave the work at work, so far. And working for Hot Topic is simply the end. Yep. Relentlessly untrendy me, working for Hot Topic. One of life's little ironies. I'm listening to audio tapes of Lincoln's Prose and Lincoln's Letters on the drive home at the moment. Yes, Abraham Lincoln, the dead president. Him. He's not doing the reading himself. I definitely would like to get dead tree copies of his prose and letters.
Point the Third: My submission to the Writer's of the Future contest from last year has apparently been stuck in a box somewhere and only recently emerged into the light of day. It is now submitted for this quarter's contest. I am not exactly 'pleased' with this turn of events, although "lost" is a step up from "so bad you didn't warrant a letter telling you how bad it is".
Point the Fourth: The Christmas gifts were well received, so far as I can tell. Meinen Bruder has not been in touch.
Point the Fifth: I haven't sold a single story this year, dammit! The novel-as-excuse can only work for so long! But I did a rewrite on "Song of the Ghost Ship" and sent it...um...somewhere. I think it's quite improved, and I was pretty happy with it to begin with.
Point the Sixth: Parental types are coming down for New Year's Eve. Should be fun. We had a *fantastic* meal Christmas day, I've no idea if I can top it. Which reminds me...must email maternal relative recipe for pickled ginger.

That's everything I can think of at the moment.

Yep, America

Fascism, Anyone? by Dr. Lawrence Britt.

Read it.

Soot Matters

Soot 'makes global warming worse'

The effects of soot in changing the climate are more than most scientists acknowledge, two US researchers say.

In the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, they say reducing atmospheric soot levels could help to slow global warming relatively simply.

They believe soot is twice as potent as carbon dioxide, a main greenhouse gas, in raising surface air temperatures.

Marriage Poll

Go tell 'em what you think.

Marriage Poll

Saddam's Capture

This is good news. I'm genuinely surprised, but it's good news. I wonder what the spin on this will be -- I mean, Bush can't continue linking Saddam's name and the Sept 11, 2001 attacks like before we invaded. Can he?

Ebola

WHO WER and Epidemiological Bulletin E.Mail subscription service

Item(s)published on World Wide Web
http://www.who.int/csr/don

Ebola haemorrhagic fever in the Republic of the Congo - update 5
12 December 2003
Disease Outbreak Reported

As of 11 December, the Ministry of Health of the Republic of the Congo has reported a total of 31 probable cases, including 29 deaths, of Ebola haemorrhagic fever (EHF) in Mbomo District, Cuvette Ouest Department (see previous report http://www.who.int/csr/don/2003_12_03/en/). Other suspect cases are still under investigation. Forty-seven contacts are being followed up.

Surveillance and social mobilization activities are continuing.

You Know You've Arrived When

You're in Snopes.

To some people, even-handed means "just and fair". To others, apparently, it means "anti-Israel".

Electronic Voting in Ireland

(via Crooked Timber)

Electronic Voting in Ireland: A Threat to Democracy?