May 2005 Archives

Excuse me, Mr. "President"? If you're gonna be giving people English lessons, would it hurt you to actually understand the damn language first? To wit:

Amnesty International appeared to base some of its allegations on detainees, "people who hate America, people that have been trained in some instances to disassemble, that means not tell the truth. So it was an absurd report," Bush said.

Doth he protest too much?

• Indignation and Repetition
  Look out for feigned indignation out of all proportion to the question or comment. This is "The lady doth protest too much" syndrome and is often used to try and convince when the evidence doesn't. The liar attempts to appear completely outraged but is rarely authentic and as a result goes over the top. During the indignant outburst watch out for repetition of the same points of defence. If you are accusing somebody of infidelity watch out how they refer to them. They will be reluctant to use the person's name even if you do, they are more likely to refer to that woman or man.


• Speech
  Look out for the pitch of their voice going up as the vocal chords tighten under stress. Fear may also cause mumbling or faster speech as well as stumbling over words or misspeaking them completely. Look also for the speed at which the person answers the question, especially concerning attitudes rather than facts. The longer it takes to answer, the more guilty they are likely to be as they need time to come up with the right answer. Especially watch out for the length of time between the beginning yes or no and the story that follows. A strong indicator of deception.


• Relief
  Watch out for signs of relief or relaxation in the liar when the subject is changed. If somebody seems visibly happier and in a better mood it is often a sign of relief that they have been able to get away with something or the uncomfortable pressure is off. A good tactic is to pressurise the accused and then back off or change the subject to gauge their response and level of relief. If they are guilty they may well be so relieved as to be extra attentive and amenable.

 (Expect another high-profile arrest, runaway bride, or attractive vegetating young woman any second now)

Just have to hang on 3 1/2 more years before we're rid of this miserable excuse for a leader... 

Hey, I'm tired and grouchy, so what the hey...

First up is the family I just passed on the sidewalk outside. Their small boychild was outfitted in brightly colored shoes that emit a high-pitched squeal with every step. It's intentional; it's as if he had a squeaky toy on each foot. Dogs like squeaky toys; they sound like prey. So it's kind of like this kid's family put a big sandwich board on him that says, "FREE LUNCH FOR PITBULLS!" I don't know who's stupider, the family for buying this product, or the idiots who designed it.

Next up we have the American voters. They've finally registered the fact that Dubya is a wee bit out of touch with their priorities.  "Better late than never" hardly applies when we're stuck with the asshat for another 3 1/2 years. Come on people, like you couldn't have figured this out in, oh, I don't know... sometime before NOVEMBER 2004!?!?

And finally... we have Carey Tennis, an advice columnist with Salon.com. Now, Carey is a subject of some disagreement... some like him, some find him deeply annoying. Normally, I enjoy reading his stuff... it's kind of like an existential version of Dear Abby. But today, he really goofed big time.

If you don't have Salon access, here's the story: a woman wrote to him and asked what she should do about her brother, who, in the wake of a series of major personal setbacks, has retreated to his basement apartment, no longer appears to eat or bathe properly or interact with the outside world, and exhibits every sign of major depression and anxiety. The sister also mentions that she has a history of addiction and depression, and has been taking antidepressents.

So we have: 1) all the clinical signs of depression and 2) a familial history of depression.

So what does Carey advise? He casually tosses out a suggestion that yeah, maybe taking him to be evaluated by a doctor would be a good idea.

But then he goes off on a really weird tangent...

It could be that he is clinically depressed. If at all possible, have him examined. The stress of events may have triggered an episode. But I must be careful with such speculation; not only am I unqualified to diagnose, but as a writer, my bias is toward meaning, not pathology. So perhaps this is not illness at all. Perhaps it is a kind of journey.

What kind of journey could it be? You say that he is talented and attractive, but not proactive, and that his success at work was largely due to the favorable actions of others. You say that in his first relationship he deferred to the needs of his partner. That leaves the impression that he is affable and charming but somewhat passive. Perhaps in the past whenever he faced adversity he would give up until someone came along to rescue him. This time there is no one to help him to his feet -- not his dad, not his wife, not his co-workers -- only you, big sister, only you.

I always look for signs that the soul is seeking knowledge. The soul seeks knowledge through adversity. Sometimes that adversity is self-generated. People break the law and get locked up; we call it acting out; we call it antisocial, as if in a perfect world none of it would happen. We do not often pause to consider the value of our dark journeys, the priceless material we carry back with us when we return, shaken but sobered by what we have seen.

While we are sometimes too quick to assume that abnormality is illness, that deviation is pathology, as I say, I am no kind of doctor. (If I were, I would be a crazy doctor crawling in the muck, a scary bearded banger of bells, a gonger, a shouter, a vibrating and unreliable sage. I would be applauding the insane as they are led away in wagons. I would not be the kind of doctor you want to mend an arm or fix a tooth.) So, again, you should have a real doctor find out if he's clinically depressed, if he needs to be treated. If he is physically in danger, if he becomes suicidal, then perhaps to save a life a doctor has to intervene.

But perhaps he is struggling to accept adversity on his own. Perhaps, stricken by grief, alone in the world for the first time, he is trying to find out what difference it makes if he smells bad or not, if he answers the phone or not, if he succeeds or just sits alone in the dark with his dog. Perhaps he is on a twisted journey toward self-reliance. Perhaps in this way he is trying to become a man! As much as I want him to be OK, I also want to honor his decision to descend into a kind of funky, ugly madness.

I fired off a letter to the editor suggesting that Carey Tennis might want to extract his head from his posterior nether regions (not that I put it in quite those words) and read another article that appeared in Salon earlier that week, reviewing a book by the author of Listening to Prozac, Peter Kramer. His view: depression is a disease, not an artistic journey of discovery into your deepest self.

...Research in the past decade (since "Listening to Prozac" was published) suggests that serotonin and similar neurochemicals may ... serve a protective function. They help shield the brain from the negative effects of the stress hormones that prompt the body to respond to threats. Certain brains are rendered particularly vulnerable to stress hormones by genetics and sometimes, in addition, early childhood trauma. This kind of brain loses the ability to protect and heal itself from the effects of those hormones, and also loses the ability to turn off the production of the hormones. The stress response system can get stuck in the "on" position, eventually weakening and diminishing nerve cells and further eroding the brain's capacity to cope with the hormones. This vicious circle results in clinical depression.

The manifestations of the disease include "low mood, apathy, diminished energy, poor sleep and appetite, suicidality, loss of the capacity to experience pleasure, feelings of worthlessness," and so on. Some depressed people can't sleep; others sleep way too much. Some feel misery; most feel something closer to emptiness. But the cause, Kramer maintains, is measurable organic damage to the brain, damage that prevents the brain from repairing itself and leaves it ever more susceptible to further damage. This is why often very slight stressors can incapacitate a depressed person or trigger an episode of depression, and why a third or fourth episode is harder to treat than the first.

Rather than seeing depression as arising from a lack of certain chemicals, Kramer defines it as a deficit in resilience, the ability to bounce back -- neurologically and emotionally -- from stress. To treat depression you don't pump the afflicted full of artificial happiness, you restore their ability to absorb and recover from the unavoidable bumps, knocks and tragedies of life. That's why, Kramer feels, doctors should vigorously treat depression (using a combination of medication and psychotherapy), as soon as possible. Delayed or insufficient treatment risks further weakening of the brain itself...

...[T]reating depression doesn't consist of changing someone's personality, but of restoring it. Genetics and early trauma might have set Margaret up for depression, by making her brain more vulnerable to stress, but the depression was not her fundamental self, or a window into buried feelings -- in fact, it was quite the opposite.

So while the depressed brother may indeed need to take a journey through his innermost depths, it's kind of hard to do that with an impaired brain.

If someone wrote to Dear Abby and said, "Hey, my brother has stopped eating and he keeps talking about his stomach hurting, and he's throwing up blood," I'm reasonably sure Abby would say he needs medical treatment... no caveats, no "but I'm not a doctor!", no reservations, no theories about what psychological trauma might have set off the condition. Just the recognition that there's some illness at work, and illnesses get worse if they're not treated. But as usual, when we're talking about the brain, somehow that's a license to go off into woo-woo territory. It seems deeply irresponsible to me.

(One last thing that is stupid: Salon's search engine. I kept trying to find that book review. I typed in "depression" and then I tried "mental illness" and totally failed to find it. I had to go back to an email I'd sent to myself with the article in it.)

Updated to add: looks like I'm not alone in my assessment of the column! (http://tabletalk.salon.com/ webx?14@357.9MVjarbiw0M.10@.773a837c/4147)

I was infuriated by Cary's response to today's LW. Debilitating depression is not some groovy shamanistic state wherein one journeys to the Dark Gods and returns armed with arcane knowledge. It's a miserable fucking illness. As with all illnesses -- or other pesky setbacks on what Cary would probably call the Glorious, Agonizing, and Unknowable Road of Life -- some people are ultimately able to emerge with new-found strength and certainties, forged by the Fire of Adversity into more powerful beings. And many people just get made into toast. What's next? Hurrah for cancer! Bring on diabetes!

I'm sorry, this is bullshit adolescent romanticism at its most repellent. Depression is an illness, and one of its calling-cards is its ability to persuade those suffering from it that they are doomed to misery, that brighter lives are not an option, and that all attempts at help, change, therapy, etc. will be fruitless, irritating, and serve only to deepen everybody's sense of disappointment...

All those copies of Bullfinch's Mythology, The Golden Bowl, and R.D. Lang that Cary has sitting on his desk, marked with jaunty little Post-Its? They need to be forcibly confiscated. And then he needs to spend a little time on the locked ward of a county hospital and see just how much those poor souls and their exhausted, tapped-out caregivers come in for applause.

I missed this story that was in the L.A. Times a few weeks ago, but it's worth noting...

HARTOUM, Sudan, Apr 29, 2005 -- The Bush administration has forged a close intelligence partnership with the Islamic regime that once welcomed Osama bin Laden here, even though Sudan continues to come under harsh U.S. and international criticism for human rights violations.

The Sudanese government, an unlikely ally in the U.S. fight against terror, remains on the most recent U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism. At the same time, however, it has been providing access to terrorism suspects and sharing intelligence data with the United States.

Last week, the CIA sent an executive jet here to ferry the chief of Sudan's intelligence agency to Washington for secret meetings sealing Khartoum's sensitive and previously veiled partnership with the administration, U.S. government officials confirmed. 

Now, this church is CLEARLY bursting with Christian love...

Honestly. What is their point? Why not just put up a big sign saying "We're a bunch of hateful ingrown idiots and our preacher needs to be slapped?"

Getting into the spirit, I whipped up my own version of a church sign I'd like to see...

Updated to add: Well, now he's apologized. Still an ass, though.

Via Alas, A Blog, I found this story today:

A pregnant student who was banned from graduation at her Roman Catholic high school announced her own name and walked across the stage anyway at the close of the program.

Alysha Cosby's decision prompted cheers and applause Tuesday from many of her fellow seniors at St. Jude Educational Institute. But her mother and aunt were escorted out of the church by police after Cosby headed back to her seat.

"I can't believe something like this is happening in 2005," said her mother, Sheila Cosby. "My daughter has been through a lot and I am proud of her. She deserved to walk, and she did."

The father of her child, of course, was allowed to participate in graduation. I guess because... he wasn't sporting a big baby-filled tummy. Right.

Anyway, you've got education, you've got family values... what the heck was the school's problem with her, anyway? Perhaps they will be shamed into behaving correctly in future.

I hope next May Alysha Cosby has a really excellent Mother's Day. She seems like an impressive person.

What do you think of this?

One of the key problems with the Democratic Party is that single issue groups have hijacked it for their pet causes. So suddenly, Democrats are the party of abortion, of gun control, of spottend owls, of labor, of trial lawyers, etc, etc., et-frickin'-cetera. We don't stand for any ideals, we stand for specific causes. We don't have a core philosophy, we have a list with boxes to check off.

So while Republicans focus on building an ideological foundation for their cause, we focus on checking off those boxes on the list. Check enough boxes, and you're a Democrat in good standing.

Problem is, abortion and choice aren't core principles of the Democratic Party. Rather, things like a Right to Privacy are. And from a Right to Privacy certain things flow -- abortion rights, access to contraceptives, opposition to the Patriot Act, and freedom to worship the gods of our own choosing, or none at all.

Another example of a core Democratic principle -- equality under the law. And from that principle stem civil rights, gender equity, and gay rights. It's not that those individual issues aren't important, of course they are. It's just that they are just that -- individual issues. A party has to stand for something bigger than the sum of its parts.

 I have trouble considering somebody a Democrat when they're against the right of women to choose to have an abortion... or a baby. But I think I see his point...

Yes, they do.

Don't know why I should be surprised, but I certainly am sickened yet again! 

Even as the young Afghan man was dying before them, his American jailers continued to torment him.

The prisoner, a slight, 22-year-old taxi driver known only as Dilawar, was hauled from his cell at the detention center in Bagram, Afghanistan, at around 2 a.m. to answer questions about a rocket attack on an American base. When he arrived in the interrogation room, an interpreter who was present said, his legs were bouncing uncontrollably in the plastic chair and his hands were numb. He had been chained by the wrists to the top of his cell for much of the previous four days.

Mr. Dilawar asked for a drink of water, and one of the two interrogators, Specialist Joshua R. Claus, 21, picked up a large plastic bottle. But first he punched a hole in the bottom, the interpreter said, so as the prisoner fumbled weakly with the cap, the water poured out over his orange prison scrubs. The soldier then grabbed the bottle back and began squirting the water forcefully into Mr. Dilawar's face.

"Come on, drink!" the interpreter said Specialist Claus had shouted, as the prisoner gagged on the spray. "Drink!"

At the interrogators' behest, a guard tried to force the young man to his knees. But his legs, which had been pummeled by guards for several days, could no longer bend. An interrogator told Mr. Dilawar that he could see a doctor after they finished with him. When he was finally sent back to his cell, though, the guards were instructed only to chain the prisoner back to the ceiling.

"Leave him up," one of the guards quoted Specialist Claus as saying.

Several hours passed before an emergency room doctor finally saw Mr. Dilawar. By then he was dead, his body beginning to stiffen. It would be many months before Army investigators learned a final horrific detail: Most of the interrogators had believed Mr. Dilawar was an innocent man who simply drove his taxi past the American base at the wrong time.

Oh, there's so much many more stories like this in this article.

Anyone who still thinks this war was a good idea or we somehow have the moral high ground are sadly deluded. Amazingly, there are still people like that in the so-called liberal Bay Area...

From Josh Marshall.

You can think the filibuster is a terrible idea. And you may think that it should be abolished, as indeed it can be through the rules of the senate. And there are decent arguments to made on that count. But to assert that it is unconstitutional because each judge does not get an up or down vote by the entire senate you have to hold that the United States senate has been in more or less constant violation of the constitution for more than two centuries.

For all the chaos and storm caused by this debate, and all that is likely to follow it, don't forget that the all of this will be done by fifty Republican senators quite knowingly invoking a demonstrably false claim of constitutionality to achieve something they couldn't manage by following the rules.

This is about power; and, to them, the rules quite simply mean nothing.

We sleep with a noise generator... you know, one of those things you pick up at the Sharper Image. It comes with various soothing sounds, like "babbling brook" and "ocean waves."

Here are some sounds you would not want to find on your noise generator:

1. Burly construction workers drilling your foundation walls
2. Needy cats meowing
3. Flatulence
4. running toilet

O.K., I can understand it's bad to get a story wrong. I can agree that Newsweek should be really really really sure it can trust its sources. But hold them responsible for the deaths in the riots?

Afghanistan's government said Tuesday that Newsweek should be held responsible for damages caused by deadly anti-American demonstrations after the magazine alleged U.S. desecration of the Quran, and it suggested that foreign forces may have helped turn protests violent.

Pakistan joined the international criticism of the magazine's article and said Newsweek's apology and retraction were "not enough."

What if the story had been reported by an Afghani or Pakistani newspaper?  How many times have Egyptian or Saudi papers made some incendiary (and often anti-Semitic) accusation?

And what if the story is actually true? 

Erik Saar, a former Army translator at Guantanamo Bay who has written a book about mistreatment of detainees at the military prison, said in interviews and in his book that he never saw a Koran flushed in a toilet but that guards routinely ignored prisoners' sensitivities by tossing it on the ground while searching their cells.

And numerous detainees, whose stories are uncorroborated, have said to various media outlets that at detention facilities in Guantanamo Bay and Afghanistan, the Koran was stepped on, tossed on the floor and placed in latrines.

"They tore the Koran to pieces in front of us, threw it into the toilet," former detainee Aryat Vahitov told Russian television in June 2004.

Leah Garchik gently caps on Tom Friedman...

n the plaza outside Zellerbach Hall before the start of Thomas Friedman and Maureen Dowd's joint appearance at UC Berkeley on Friday night, 60 or 70 bicyclists whipped around in a large circle, like horses in a circus ring, one dragging a trailer carrying a large amplifier blaring "Time Warp" from "The Rocky Horror Picture Show.'' Inside, serious business was at hand: The heavyweight columnists of the New York Times were due, opinion-makers more or less responding to questions posed by journalist/Professors Cynthia Gorney and Mark Danner.

The "less'' was when Friedman, a man who at least once referred to himself in the third person ("This columnist has used his column ...''), responded to one of Danner's queries: "It doesn't strike me as a very interesting question.'' Perhaps he felt comfortable doing that because that's the kind of straight talk he shares with President Bush in their give-and-take, off-the-record White House gab fests, which the columnist made sure to mention.

Friedman had been on tour for six weeks promoting his book "The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century.'' That's six weeks of admirers hanging onto his every idea, which must be a pretty, oh, empowering experience. Friedman, who'd helicoptered to UC direct from speaking at Google, seemed pretty darned empowered, and it was mentioned several times that his book is on top of the best-seller lists.

It took Dowd to observe slyly that at the Times, "We were very excited when Tom overtook Jane Fonda. If it didn't happen this week, we were going to change the title to 'Flat World, Flat Abs.' But Tom didn't have any threesomes. ''

This drollery from Dowd, glamorous in a satiny yellow skirt and formfitting green sweater, got everybody laughing. But it was also a riff that tidily pricked the balloon of the best-seller list, on which the latest celebrity tell-all competes with a treatise on global economics.

Yet researchers at Columbia seem to be successfully using magnets to treat depression...

The treatment, called transcranial magnetic stimulation, or TMS, involves applying powerful electromagnets directly to the skull.

The procedure isn't effective for everyone. But "the ability to offer hope and some chance of improvement when other treatments have failed is something really significant," Linsaby said.

TMS uses electromagnets to send pulses of energy directly into the left side of the brain, which is thought to control mood. In patients who are depressed, there is often less activity in this part of the brain. The magnets create an electric current and get the brain cells to fire.

It sounds so new-agey, and yet, if it's working... wouldn't that be something?

The other weekend I was in the Montgomery Street BART station and saw some gross black stuff growing on the ceiling. So I sent an email to customer service.

 Subject: Mold growing in Montgomery Street station
 Feedback: Hello,

 I was waiting in the Montgomery Street station on Sunday around 1 p.m. I overheard somebody complaining that there was mold growing in the station, and that despite repeated complaints to BART, it was still there and had gotten even worse. I looked up and saw what they were talking about.

 I took a picture:

 I hope you do something about this ASAP -- this is a real health hazard.

 Let me know if you have any questions!

I got a reply...

Hello and thank you for contacting us.  I regret if the comments of others might have caused you undue alarm.

The condition viewed displays not mold, but a combination or escalator grease and normal dirt, confirmed via lab analysis.  The lubricant is trace lube which has seeped through concrete via access penetrations for other embedments such as the hangers for the perforated baffles.  Common airborne dust will adhere to the light filmy coating and accumulate, turning dark.  Yes, it is embarrassing and should be cleaned more often.  We have requested this be addressed.  It was thoroughly addressed when the APTA conference was held in SF in the fall of '02 and all stations were nearly immaculate.  However, the condition returned within a couple of months.  The location of these baffles require a safe platform (scaffolding) be erected to clear the area and with present resources is most difficult to accomplish without disrupting passenger access in the station.

Unfortunately, "mold" seems to be the topic of the moment and I have been told it is a subject of many false concerns.  Mold is as old as organic matter itself.  There are many varieties of mold with many being non-hazardous.  May be similar to exaggerated thoughts in the early days of microwave ovens, cell phones, and the red M&Ms, although it is safe to proceed cautiously.

Again, thanks for contacting us and for riding on BART. 

Uh-huh.

My reply to their reply... 

I'm glad to hear it's not mold. Dirt's no big deal.

I do have to disagree rather strongly with your comments on mold's health implications. Far from being a "false concern", mold can be a real problem in indoor spaces.

I worked at a home retrofitting magazine (Home Energy), and also lived for several years in an apartment with a mold problem, and I can attest both from professional and personal experience that it's far more of an issue than red M&Ms. Moldy cheese is no big deal, but getting spores into your airways is not good. I was on major allergy medication for years -- and my allergies magically cleared up when I moved into a mold-free building!

While there hasn't been a definitive linkage beyond all doubt (i.e., they haven't found the mold's fingerprints on people's lungs), there's enough evidence to suggest there is a connection.

If you'd like to educate yourself on this issue further, you can visit Lawrence Berkeley Lab's website: http://eetd.lbl.gov/newsletter/nl18/mold.htm or the Center for Disease Control: http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/airpollution/mold/links.htm,

Thank you and have a good evening,

Honestly. Did I ask for BART's expert opinion on indoor air quality or the latest literature on mold toxicity? Sheesh! Stick steroids up your nose for two years and see how you like it!

Remember that endlessly forwarded piece of email about the need to "SAVE PBS!" (and the suggestion that one could do so by adding one's name to a long numbered list of people and passing it on?) For years, I could dismiss it as a relic of the mid-1990s. No more.

In one of several points of conflict in recent months, the chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which allocates federal funds for public radio and television, is considering a plan to monitor Middle East coverage on NPR news programs for evidence of bias, a corporation spokesman said on Friday...

Top officials at NPR and member stations are upset as well about the corporation's decision to appoint two ombudsmen to judge the content of programs for balance. And managers of public radio stations criticized the corporation in a resolution offered at their annual meeting two weeks ago urging it not to interfere in NPR editorial decisions.

The corporation's chairman, Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, has also blocked NPR from broadcasting its programs on a station in Berlin owned by the United States government.

Mr. Tomlinson denied several requests last week to discuss the relationship between the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and NPR, but he issued a one-sentence statement saying that he looked forward to "working through any differences that may exist between our institutions." In a column last week in The Washington Times and in an appearance on Tucker Carlson's talk show on PBS, he repeated his belief that public broadcasting's reputation of being left-leaning was a problem.

Mr. Tomlinson has been waging a campaign to correct what he and other conservatives see as a liberal bias in public television programming. That effort has been criticized by leaders of public television who say it poses a threat to their editorial independence. At the request of two senior Democratic members of Congress, the inspector general at the corporation is examining whether Mr. Tomlinson's decision to monitor only one television program, "Now," with Bill Moyers, and his decision to retain a White House official who helped create guidelines for the two ombudsmen may have violated a law that is supposed to insulate public broadcasting from politics.

Oh, and

The corporation's board has told its staff that it should consider redirecting money away from national newscasts and toward music programs produced by NPR stations.

Sounds like a great idea. May I suggest a track list?

"We Got Back the Plague" - The Fiery Furnaces 
"When the President Talks to God" - Bright Eyes
"Fuck the Creationists" - MC Hawking
"Soldier In A Box" - Hot Hot Heat
"Paint By Numbers" - Danger Mouse & Murs
"Outside Of The Inside" - Richard Thompson
"16 Military Wives" - The Decemberists
"Helicopter"  - Bloc Party
"Free World" - Kirsty MacColl

and lastly

"There Won't Be Trumpets" - Bernadette Peters

Because somebody, or many somebodies, have to get us out of this mess eventually. Right? Just when we least expect it...

A simple question: after U.S. interrogators have tortured over two dozen detainees to death, after they have wrapped one in an Israeli flag, after they have smeared naked detainees with fake menstrual blood, after they have told one detainee to "Fuck Allah," after they have ordered detainees to pray to Allah in order to kick them from behind in the head, is it completely beyond credibility that they would also have desecrated the Koran?

Andrew Sullivan nails it.

Exhibit A: letter from PETA explaining why they ran the "Holocaust On Your Plate" advertising campaign.

"Look, it was some of your people who suggested it. How were we going to know you'd be so darn sensitive? Jeez!"

O.K., that's not exactly how they put it, but...

well, read for yourself. 

In my last post, I wrote about a billboard campaign that was clearly not designed by designers. Yet there's another campaign which demonstrates that you can throw a football stadium of designers and a whole lot of money at a project and still have no guarantee of success.

The advertiser in question? Microsoft. 

Here's a poster I saw outside the Macarthur BART station yesterday:

This campaign really gets on my nerves. I mean, what's the message?

• Microsoft's customers are members of an extinct species?
• They're unevolved?
• They have lumpy green skin and boring taste in clothing?
  
• If Microsoft customers were REALLY with-it, they'd buy every annoying update to Office?
  

I'm not making this up. You may not be able to read the tagline (click the photo to see a larger version) but it says "Microsoft Office has evolved. Have you?"

Microsoft's previous campaign was the gag-inducing, "Your potential. Our passion," a line which always put unwelcome images in my mind of a sweaty Bill Gates in a compromising position with a keyboard. But they seem to have decided that insulting their customers was a better way to go.

I suppose the market will decide... and I'll keep using OpenOffice on my Mac and Office 2000 on my PC.

Must do something about that scaley green skin, though. Anyone out there who can recommend a good exfolient? 

There's a very amusing debate going on over at DailyKos today.

Here's the billboard that started it all...

And the story...

Democrats are tired of letting Republicans own the faith and values message, so they are taking their case to the streets.

A billboard campaign was launched Monday by the Minneheha County's Grassroots Democrats, letting people know what their party stands for, says chairwoman Lisa Engels.

Green, black and white signs at Seventh Street and Minnesota Avenue and at Russell Street and Westport Avenue say: "Jesus cares for the poor, so do we. Democrats make America stronger."

"The whole thing behind it is to counteract the Christian right and their so-called monopoly on religion," Engels said. "They have been able to get out there and convince people that the flag wraps better around them than it does us, and that is not true."

Well and good. However...

• The black on green is a bit hard to read (not enough contrast.)
• The capitalization and punctuation aren't right. Shouldn't it be "Jesus cares about the poor; so do we?"
• Line break is odd where it is.  You're not supposed to end a line with the word "the;" it interrupts the thought, and hence undercuts it.
  
• The font is just... meh.
  
• Are the Democrats claiming that "we're bigger than Jesus?" (Beatles reference... nothing to do with the design, really.)
  

Apparently I'm not the only one with the negative reaction to the appearance of the board, because here's what some other Kos denizens had to say.

"Great ad, terrible typesetting!"

"In headline writing, it's acceptable to make conjunctions and short prepositional phrases lower-case, but you should only do this in the middle of a sentence or clause."

And then somebody got defensive:

"all you guys should get the nuts to put your own billboard up if you feel so damn compelled to rip on the message. at least there's a billboard that's up.  You guys represent the all words no action part of the Democratic party."

And much arguing back and forth ensued. The author of the passages below seems to believe that polished design = elitism and slickness.

"It's shitty english spoken by a dopey president that   trumped the Dem's hyper-analytical world view.  your "services" could be counter-productive in this environment.  yeah, that's right.  not every democrat is a lit. grad with a 580,000 word vocabulary."

"that billboard isn't dumbed down.  It made it's point.  What would your option be?  Some verbose Kerry type explanation?  Not me.  I'd rather have 100 high school grad votes than 1 vote from a Ph.d in Eng. Lit."

But as somebody said, and I'm quoting them because I agree...

Graphic designers use certain colors and styles because THEY WORK.  This is a very good idea, this billboard. I would like to see it like a few of the other commenters suggested. That's not a big deal.

You'd think it wouldn't be a big deal...

OK, this is very nit-picky of me...

But I keep walking by this billboard on Grand Avenue, and it's bugging me.

First of all, the event in question happened a few months ago, so shouldn't the sign come down?

But the other thing that bugs me is the typography.

It's an eye-catching image, all right. The black-and-white, high-contrast design also contrasts nicely with the usual fare on such boards.

But what's with the scripty, flowing, hard-to-read main font... and then the equally hard-to-read all-caps computery font? How do the two fit together? What's the theme? I feel like I have to have more information about this event in order to get it... and yet this billboard is all the information I'm ever likely to get.

The worst crime of all? Well, try this...

Go on, tell me who is sponsoring the event.

When was it held?

What time?

Who is sponsoring it?

Where is it being held?

And now, just for fun, try to pick out the website address! 

Spotted near Union Square on a rainy Sunday in May...

As they say in Blogland... SQUEEEEEEE!!!!!

Random music/political musings.

Driving to Trader Joe's today, I'm listening to KFOG. Bruce Cockburn's "If I Had A Rocket Launcher" is playing on the radio. I remember this song from high school. I don't remember liking it especially at the time; I think we gently mocked it at the time for its combination of tinkly synthesizers and earnest (as in, overly) vocals.

Then I notice the truck in front of me. It sports two bumper stickers: "Viva Bush" and "Support Our President And Our Troops." Also, incongruously, there's a "Senior Berkeley Parking" decal. (Biting the hand that feeds him?)

Meanwhile, Bruce is singing:

I don't believe in guarded borders and i don't believe in hate
I don't believe in generals or their stinking torture states
And when i talk with the survivors of things too sickening to relate
If i had a rocket launcher...i would retaliate

 
So I do the only rational thing. I turn up the radio. When my lane opens up I pass the truck, the driver and I glare at each other. A more sour and twisted face I hope not to see again for a while.

On the way home from Trader Joe's, the DJ says something about how, as you listen at various stages in your life to the song she's about to play, it sounds different. The song is John Lennon's "Imagine."

At first, I think it sounds exactly the same as it has every time I've heard it in my life since I was a kid, but then something strikes me.

We used to sing this song in my hippie middle school. I've heard it a million times. I think I know the lyrics by heart.

What everyone else but me has probably noticed already is that it's not just a "what-if-we-could-all-live-peacefully-together-and-pet-the-fuzzy-bunnies" anthem.

It starts with "Imagine there's no heaven," and suggests that "no religion too" would be a highly desireable state of affairs.

It is an anti-gospel song. And right now, that sounds a bit... subversive.

I grew up in Berkeley, but I can very much imagine some fundy parent in a righteous frenzy because her child is being taught to sing a song calling for a world without religion!

And that's the United States in 2005.

I'm noticing that we're starting to get some good protest songs again... they are starting to get more creative and catchy enough that they may last beyond the present administration. "Sixteen Military Wives" by the Decembrists, and "We Got Back the Plague" by the Fiery Furnaces are two of my favorites. I also really like "When the President Talks to God" by Bright Eyes (though generally, I can't see what the fuss is about yet.)

And that's about all for now. 

From Paul Krugman:

Now, about the image of Mr. Bush as friend to the poor: keep your eye on the changing definitions of "middle income" and "wealthy."

In last fall's debates, Mr. Bush asserted that "most of the tax cuts went to low- and middle-income Americans." Since most of the cuts went to the top 10 percent of the population and more than a third went to people making more than $200,000 a year, Mr. Bush's definition of middle income apparently reaches pretty high.

But defenders of Mr. Bush's Social Security plan now portray benefit cuts for anyone making more than $20,000 a year, cuts that will have their biggest percentage impact on the retirement income of people making about $60,000 a year, as cuts for the wealthy.

These are people who denounced you as a class warrior if you wanted to tax Paris Hilton's inheritance. Now they say that they're brave populists, because they want to cut the income of retired office managers.

 Yep... and...

Let's consider the Bush tax cuts and the Bush benefit cuts as a package. Who gains? Who loses?

Suppose you're a full-time Wal-Mart employee, earning $17,000 a year. You probably didn't get any tax cut. But Mr. Bush says, generously, that he won't cut your Social Security benefits.

Suppose you're earning $60,000 a year. On average, Mr. Bush cut taxes for workers like you by about $1,000 per year. But by 2045 the Bush Social Security plan would cut benefits for workers like you by about $6,500 per year. Not a very good deal.

Suppose, finally, that you're making $1 million a year. You received a tax cut worth about $50,000 per year. By 2045 the Bush plan would reduce benefits for people like you by about $9,400 per year. We have a winner!

I'm not being unfair. In fact, I've weighted the scales heavily in Mr. Bush's favor, because the tax cuts will cost much more than the benefit cuts would save. Repealing Mr. Bush's tax cuts would yield enough revenue to call off his proposed benefit cuts, and still leave $8 trillion in change.

The point is that the privatizers consider four years of policies that relentlessly favored the wealthy a fait accompli, not subject to reconsideration. Now that tax cuts have busted the budget, they want us to accept large cuts in Social Security benefits as inevitable. But they demand that we praise Mr. Bush's sense of social justice, because he proposes bigger benefit cuts for the middle class than for the poor.

Accuracy, however, may not have been his purpose here. When pressed by the same reporter on whether or not he thinks genocide is occurring in Darfur, Zoellick refused to endorse Powell’s affirmative finding. “It’s been a terrible series of events,” he said, “and as you know, there’s a debate. The [United Nations] did a legal analysis of whether this was genocide, and their conclusion was that it was crimes against humanity as opposed to genocide.”

Zoellick's equivocating on the genocide question was depressing to those who are closely monitoring the crisis in Darfur. "It was sucking up to the Sudanese regime in the worst way," the International Crisis Group's John Prendergast said. Worse, Zoellick’s backpedaling on Powell’s finding, which was reached after researchers interviewed more than 1,000 refugees from Darfur, may hint that there’s a new administration plan afoot for the situation.

"Zoellick is not some State Department official acting on his own,” Prendergast told me, “but was deliberately signaling a shift in administration policy."

The whole sorry story... 

Because I'm not sure I want these guys roaming around my state...

Curtis Stewart drives his truck to the Miracle Valley Bible College, where the Minuteman Project has set up its headquarters, a compound of ramshackle buildings situated in a high desert plain a mile from the barbed wire cattle fence dividing Arizona from Mexico.

"How many demonstrations have we had in the United States for women, lesbians, blacks -- minority demonstrations, right?" the San Antonio man asks from behind a windshield with a "Liberal Hunting Permit" sticker. "Never have you had the white, right wing say 'I've had it.' This is the first demonstration for the country since the Boston Tea Party."

Stewart and his fellow Minutemen could soon be headed for the California border if Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has his way.

More from the Chronicle

But just in case you are still reading, yes, it's official, our president really is a lying sack of shit. Actually, they got a truckload of shit-sacks in the White House...

British memo indicates Bush made intelligence fit Iraq policy

By Warren P. Strobel and John Walcott

Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - A highly classified British memo, leaked in the midst of Britain's just-concluded election campaign, indicates that President Bush decided to overthrow Iraqi President Saddam Hussein by summer 2002 and was determined to ensure that U.S. intelligence data supported his policy.

The document, which summarizes a July 23, 2002, meeting of British Prime Minister Tony Blair with his top security advisers, reports on a visit to Washington by the head of Britain's MI-6 intelligence service.

The visit took place while the Bush administration was still declaring to the American public that no decision had been made to go to war.

"There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable," the MI-6 chief said at the meeting, according to the memo. "Bush wanted to remove Saddam through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD," weapons of mass destruction.

The memo said "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."

No weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq since the U.S. invasion in March 2003.

The White House has repeatedly denied accusations made by several top foreign officials that it manipulated intelligence estimates to justify an invasion of Iraq.

 We now resume our regularly scheduled programming. Here's another sack o'shit.

She feel real sad and real bad:

At this time, I cannot explain fully what happened to me last week. I had a host of compelling issues which seemed out of control -- issues for which I was unable to address or confine.

Can somebody please explain to me what the heck that even means!?!?! Thank you!

Ah, that Scalia...

Justice Scalia critical of 'living Constitution'

COLLEGE STATION - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia portrayed himself in a speech here today as one of a dying breed of judges who strictly interpret the Constitution

"The Constitution, when it comes before a court, should mean exactly what it was intended to mean when it was adopted, nothing more, nothing less," Scalia told a generally supportive audience of several hundred people at the George Bush Presidential Library.

Yeah! Slavery should be OK! Women shouldn't be able to vote! Oh, except he isn't advocating those things either (not openly, anyway). So what the heck does he mean?

If it's just a quaint historic document, why are we forcing ourselves to follow its rules? Could that be the big Scalia idea all along? 

As Michael pointed out, there was no Air Force at the time the Constitution was written either, so how can it be legal? 

All I can say is, Scalia's breed can't die out fast enough.

TOPEKA, Kan. (Reuters) - A six-day courtroom-style debate opened on Thursday in Kansas over what children should be taught in schools about the origin of life -- was it natural evolution or did God create the world?

The hearings, complete with opposing attorneys and a long list of witnesses, were arranged amid efforts by some Christian groups in Kansas and nationally to reverse the domination of evolutionary theory in the nation's schools.

William Harris, a medical researcher and co-founder of a Kansas group called the Intelligent Design Network, posed the core question about life's beginnings before mapping out why he and other Christians want changes in school curriculum.

School science classes are teaching children that life evolved naturally and randomly, Harris said, arguing that this was in conflict with Biblical teachings that God created life.

"They are offering an answer that may be in conflict with religious views," Harris said in opening the debate. "Part of our overall goal is to remove the bias against religion that is currently in schools. This is a scientific controversy that has powerful religious implications."

Conservative groups are trying to convince state education officials to change guidelines for how evolution theory is taught in science classes at a time when Kansas education authorities are producing new science teaching guidelines.

The hearings -- organized by a committee of the Kansas Board of Education -- were taking place 80 years after the so-called "Monkey Trial" of John Scopes, a Tennessee biology teacher who was found guilty of illegally teaching evolution.

Yeah, well, I guess the fact that we're still having this stupid "debate" is proof that we're not evolving in the slightest!

I'm familiar with the cover, I don't need to read the book
I police the world of action, inside's where I never look...

There was this article in the paper today about the National Day of Prayer. "Some say" that it's too slanted towards Christians! But, oh look! The article quotes a rabbi! 

Rabbi Kevin Lind, leader of the messianic Brit Ahavah congregation that meets in Dublin, has participated in the National Day of Prayer several times because "prayer is extremely important, because people have to establish a relationship with God."

But he attributes the dearth of participating Jews, who are traditionally more politically liberal, to the fact that the day is organized by more politically conservative Christians.

"I'd like to do something where we could have participation from a lot of different communities, especially Jewish communities," Lind said. "The way it's been done, while it is technically open to everybody, it is largely evangelical. And that's a perception you'd have to deal with."

What a nice, open-minded rabbi. But who is this Lind fellow anyway and what's Brit Ahavah? A little digging around on Google found me this page:

B'rit Ahavah is a Messianic Jewish congregation in Livermore, California. The state that their mission is to "Express the L-rd's love in a Jewish way. They also happen to be a Chrisitan [sic] group, pretending to be Jewish.

I don't like to take anyone's word on things without checking it out first, so I followed some of the links on the page... and darn it all if the author wasn't correct.

B'rit Ahavah is an official member of the Southern Baptist Convention. A real Jewish group would never be part of that organization! Here is the link to the proof: Click Here

And that Kevin Lind dude...

Here is his biography from the Valley Christian Schools so you can see that he works there. His involvement with B'ri Ahavah is discussed at length. You will notice that there is no information that shows that he has any Jewish education:

"Kevin has been married for twenty years. He teaches Pre-calculus, Calculus, and Physics, and also serves as the Rabbi of B’rit Ahavah Messianic Jewish Congregation (currently meeting in Dublin). Dr. Lind has a B.A. from Rice University in Physics/Mathematics/Space Physics, and graduated at the top of his class, as well as serving student internships at two national observatories. He continued on to obtain a Ph.D. in Astronomy (Observational and Theoretical) from the California Institute of Technology, and went on to postdoctoral experience at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and the Naval Research Laboratory, with brief stints in England and The Netherlands. He left academia to work on massively parallel computers, first for Cray Research, and then for Digital Equipment and SGI. He has been involved in the application of high performance computing to science, technology, and industry in his secular work. As a Messianic Jewish Rabbi, he has been active in developing theology, liturgy, and outreach strategies locally and at the national level in cooperation with the International Alliance of Messianic Congregations and Synagogues."

Here is the link to the proof: Click Here

The parent organization of the Schools, the Valley Christian Center's mission statement certainly suggests it's no place for a nice Jewish boy:

To reach the lost (evangelism) with the Good News and transform them into authentic followers of Jesus Christ (discipleship).

And, in turn...

Well, who is the Valley Christian Center (and its schools) affiliated with? Why, the evangelical Christian group, the Assembly of God (most people refer to them as the Pentecostal movement). Here is the link to the proof, Valley Christian Center in Dublin are listed under "District Church Web Sites: Northern California" (Valley is the 17th listing): Click Here

So there you have it. I think this reporter got himself in a bit of a messianic mess. Better luck (and use of Google) next time? (And information about the real Jewish community can be found by calling Jewish Community Information & Referral at 415.777.0411.)

And yeah, I'll be praying... praying this country comes to its senses and stops treating G*d like a Christians-only vending machine. 

That's the law in Wyoming. Build a snow-penis, go to jail.

Funny, that. If you squint, it looks kind of like a Segway! Or maybe not.

A story on BoingBoing today talks about a movie chain which has promised to stop "lying" about its showtimes. You are no doubt familiar with the phenomenon: you go to a movie that's supposed to start at 7:15 p.m., but you're treated to 10-15 minutes of ads and previews first.

Look, people, it's really simple. When I was in the U.K. for a semester during my junior year of college, the movie theaters there listed their movie times something like this: "Program begins: 7:15 p.m.;  Feature presentation: 7:25 p.m." That way, you knew how late you could safely show up and not miss the film while still avoiding the ads.

On the other hand, the theater I went to sold tickets with reserved seating, plus British advertising is so much cleverer than ours, but that's a whole other story... 

Forwarded by a coworker today:

Bad title for a good cause.... now this can definitely be taken the wrong way!

=====================================

"Speed Petting" - a special singles event for animal lovers

May 11, 6:30-9:30PM
Animal Rescue Foundation, Lesher Area
2890 Mitchell Drive, Walnut Creek, CA
(At the corner of Oak Grove Road and Mitchell Drive)

Speed Petting - the union of the hottest dating craze with the sweetest little four-legged friends around!

Lonely nights are a thing of the past when you connect with one of the Realidate members you will meet at this fun evening of "speed dating." You'll enjoy short dates with 12 fellow animal lovers from the Realidate community.

You'll also make new furry friends of the K-9 or feline persuasion at ARF. These rescued animals are well cared for, but their lives are more complete with the joy of meeting and playing with new people. This event is the cat's meow with fun animal facts and questions to get your pet-friendly mind in motion. And get a sneak peek of pets available from our partner, ARF.

Wine and vegetarian-friendly snacks will be provided.

If you are a lover of animals, or just full of animal attraction, this is the PURRfect event for you since part of the evenings proceeds will benefit ARF… so don't delay; buy your ticket today, and be sure to tell a friend.

Find "puppy love"…while making a difference with animal welfare issues in your community!

=====================================
Register online:
http://www.realidate.com/SpeedPettingMay05.luv =====================================

Well, it's a little late now, isn't it?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A majority of Americans do not think it was worth going to war in Iraq with support at the lowest level since the United States launched the invasion in 2003, according to a CNN/USAToday/Gallup poll released on Tuesday.

Fifty-seven percent of those polled said it was not worth going to war compared to 41 percent who thought it was. In a February poll, 48 percent said the war was worth it and half said it was not.

A cool-looking Flash script that may allow me to use real fonts and typography in my headlines: http://www.mikeindustries.com/sifr/

And an interesting blog by a young female Rabbi: http://velvateenrabbi.blogs.com

From Monday's Washington Post:

As the president passed the 100-day mark of his second term over the weekend, the main question facing Bush and his party is whether they misread the November elections. With the president's poll numbers down, and the Republican majority ensnared in ethical controversy, things look much less like a once-a-generation realignment.

and

History suggests the possibility of major losses next year is not beyond imagination. The latest Washington Post-ABC News poll showed support for Bush's handling of Social Security at just 31 percent. That is several points lower than support for Clinton's handling of health care in the summer of 1994 -- just before the failure of what was widely perceived as an over-ambitious plan helped fuel the GOP takeover of Congress that fall.

but

Although politicians may be prone to over-interpreting their election mandates, some skeptics warn that political analysts are prone to over-interpreting short-term controversies. The factors causing problems for Bush, for instance, are less about political strategy than something largely out of his control -- the high price of gasoline.

William Kristol, the editor of the Weekly Standard and a conservative analyst, said that Bush's problems with Social Security will look small in retrospect next to a large achievement: last winter's Iraqi elections. "We are all missing the forest through the trees: January 30, 2005, was the most important thing that happened in the first 100 days," he said.

Nicole Devenish, the White House communications director, struck a similar theme. "There have been accomplishments that admittedly no one pays attention to," she said, "because the biggest thing we bit off [Social Security], something that has not been done in 20 years, has dominated the debate."

Those skeptics, of course, have no horse in this race. Oh, except they do. Oh, and of course, Bush's problems include the ongoing insurgency in Iraq, our insane budget problems, and the Social Security debacle... and last time I checked, he was running the show on those too.

Next year's gonna be interesting... 

Why did this couple plan a 600-guest wedding? Why did she need 14 attendants? Why did she run away? Why does he want her back? Why did CBS run this horrible picture of them? Why did they make faces like that in public? Why the hell am I reading or writing about this when more important things are going on?

From a conservative-ish blog:

When faced with a choice of this loose-knit coalition of frauds, bigots, hucksters, and letting the 'evil' loony left in charge, well, suddenly MoveOn doesn't seem that damned scary anymore, particularly when you consider how marginalized the Cynthia McKinney crowd is. They may tax the hell out of me and leave us with an impotent foreign policy, but I can count on them staying out of my bedroom, my science classes, my pharmacy, my marriage, and my Doctor's office.

Go ahead- force me to make a choice.