:: blame the extended gestation.... ::

:: Thursday, September 23, 2004 ::

Cafe Hayek: How the Media Works:

"We think the media goes out and finds the news. Sometimes it does. But a lot of the times, it's the news trying to find the media. "

This was one of the only blog postings on the Rathergate hoopla that I have liked.... he concludes by saying that

Memogate and Dan Rather's troubles should remind us that what you read in the newspaper and see on the news is not simply the events of the day. Much of what we read and what we see comes from an intense effort to influence us. Some of it is surely true. Some of it is untrue but accurate. Some of it is untrue and inaccurate. The lesson? Read widely and have lots of grains of salt at the ready.

:: Jim Nichols 9/23/2004 09:45:00 PM [+] ::
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AlterNet: Finding Justice with Arundhati Roy:

"The essence of what one is looking at is deeply political, but how one chooses to express that can change ? if for no other reason than that one wants to keep experimenting and not bore oneself to death, you know."

:: Jim Nichols 9/23/2004 07:19:00 PM [+] ::
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AlterNet: DrugReporter: The Raid on Medicare:

"The real cost of the Medicare prescription drug bill is finally emerging: The drug industry gets more than $100 billion in profits, while seniors and taxpayers get the tab. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/23/2004 07:17:00 PM [+] ::
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AlterNet: Vegan, Head to Toe:

"While vegan foods have crept into the mainstream over the intervening years, vegan leather is still an oddity. But a growing number of non-leather stores want to change that. They see offering non-leather alternatives as key to bringing more people over to the vegan way of life, as a way to send the message that you can be vegan without giving up style and sophistication."

:: Jim Nichols 9/23/2004 06:16:00 PM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Despite Bush Flip-Flops, Kerry Gets Label:

"One of this year's candidates for president, to hear his opposition tell it, has a long history of policy reversals and rhetorical about-faces -- a zigzag trail that proves his willingness to massage positions and even switch sides when politically convenient."

:: Jim Nichols 9/22/2004 10:45:00 PM [+] ::
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Cell Phone Ban May Not Reduce Wrecks:

"Laws against driving while using cell phones would have little effect on the number of accidents, according to a new analysis of driver statistics by UC Davis economist James Prieger.

In a new study issued by the American Enterprise Institute-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies, Prieger found that, while still at increased risk, drivers who use cell phones are less likely to have accidents by as much as 36 percent than previous studies predicted.

The report also found that people who opt for hands-free phones are already more careful drivers than similar drivers who use hand-held phones."

:: Jim Nichols 9/22/2004 10:31:00 PM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Actors Filming Robbery Scene Arrested:

"A group of Serbian actors filming a bank robbery scene played their parts so well that police mistook them for the real thing and hauled them off to a police station, a newspaper reported Wednesday. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/22/2004 10:29:00 PM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Man Shoots Wife, Mistakes Her for Monkey:

" A Malaysian man shot and killed his wife after he mistook her for a monkey picking fruit in a tree behind their house, the New Straits Times said on Wednesday. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/22/2004 10:28:00 PM [+] ::
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Cafe Hayek: Kudos to Draft Dodgers:

"There's nothing especially noble or glorious about dying in a military campaign. To believe otherwise is to succumb to the mystical belief that the state is god-like, and that men and women exist for it.

The state, at its best, provides protection against violence. It is a service. It is a valuable service, perhaps even an especially valuable service. But it is a service. The supplier of this service is entitled to no greater claim on the rights or property or lives of its customers than are suppliers of other services. If General Motors or Starbucks or The Wall Street Journal cannot supply their services without conscripting workers, they should go out of business. If the state cannot supply its service without violating the very rights that allegedly justify its existence, it should step aside and let some other provider supply this service."

:: Jim Nichols 9/22/2004 10:16:00 PM [+] ::
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Three Linked to DeLay Indicted in Texas Scandal:

"Three men with close ties to U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay were indicted on Tuesday along with eight companies for illegal fund-raising activities in a political action committee formed by the powerful Texan. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/21/2004 08:35:00 PM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Republican Senator Says He May Not Support Bush:

"U.S. Sen. Lincoln Chafee, a Republican moderate from Rhode Island, said on Monday he might not vote for President Bush in the Nov. 2 election. "

I wonder how many moderate republicans will be abstaining this year. I wonder how many progressive liberals will be abstaining this year? Or they might be like me and vote Green. Okay i'm more than likely voting Green. But I'm not positive yet.

:: Jim Nichols 9/20/2004 06:39:00 PM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Schwarzenegger Vetoes Minimum Wage Bill:

"Siding with his business allies, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed bills Saturday that would have raised the minimum wage to $7.75 an hour and required economic impact reports before local governments approve Wal-Mart-like mega-stores. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/20/2004 02:15:00 AM [+] ::
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Orcinus:

"It's pretty funny, really, how right-wing bloggers are serially breaking their arms patting themselves on the back for having exposed 'Forgerygate.' Actually, all they've really managed to prove is P.T. Barnum's famous adage, perhaps recast as 'There's a blogger born every minute.'"

:: Jim Nichols 9/20/2004 02:05:00 AM [+] ::
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Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Extremist parties exploit German anxiety:

"Germany's most overtly neo-Nazi party secured a footing in a regional parliament yesterday for the first time in more than a generation. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/20/2004 01:58:00 AM [+] ::
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When it looks like war and smells like war...

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Deadline for Briton facing Iraq execution:

"Despite George Bush declaring that combat operations were over more than 16 months ago, the growing hostage crisis and insurgency led Tony Blair yesterday to talk of a second war.

In a joint press conference with his Iraqi counterpart, Ayad Allawi, who was on his first visit to Britain yesterday, he said coalition forces were engaged in a 'new conflict' now that the 'first conflict' to remove Saddam Hussein was over."

:: Jim Nichols 9/20/2004 01:54:00 AM [+] ::
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The New York Times > Magazine > Questions for Ray C. Fair: Bush Landslide (in Theory)!:

"Are you a Republican?

I can't credibly answer that question. Using game theory in economics, you are not going to believe me when I tell you my political affiliation because I know that you know that I could be behaving strategically. If I tell you I am a Kerry supporter, how do you know that I am not lying or behaving strategically to try to put more weight on the predictions and help the Republicans? "

:: Jim Nichols 9/20/2004 01:27:00 AM [+] ::
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She pops pills, eats ice cream for breakfast and wanders the halls of the hotel without her clothes.

An excellent interview with Arthur Miller on his new play, making the Misfits, and Marilyn.

''I had to laugh,'' Miller said, referring to the reviews of the original production. ''As far as Monroe is concerned, I spent five years trying to keep her from falling off the cliff. How did she die? Did she self-destroy or not? Are we not to put truth on the stage?'' He asked the questions slowly, making them sound large and nearly biblical.
''There is no correct version,'' he continued. ''It's purely the way I see it.''
But what if the rest of us see it differently?
''It doesn't matter,'' he said. ''It's my truth. It's not your truth.''

and then this great insight...

''I like the company of women,'' he said. ''Life is very boring without them. Women are livelier than men and more interested in people. Men get abstract with their ideas.''

and it turns out Miller is quite political...

In conversation, Miller seems fully attentive to the present and its preoccupations. He spoke well of Michael Moore's ''Fahrenheit 9/11'' and lavished high praise on Philip Roth's about-to-be-published ''Plot Against America: A Novel,'' which he was in the middle of reading. (''Philip and I see each other regularly once every three years,'' he noted humorously.) An unreconstructed leftist, he still subscribes to The Nation. (''How can the polls be neck and neck when I don't know one Bush supporter?'' he asked with apparent earnestness.)

:: Jim Nichols 9/20/2004 01:08:00 AM [+] ::
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Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis - The Region - 2003 Annual Report Essay - The Industrial Revolution: Past and Future

:: Jim Nichols 9/20/2004 12:42:00 AM [+] ::
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I'm watching Titanic and something struck me that always strikes me when I see a movie with a lot of death in it; I wonder how many people are injured during filming.

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 10:35:00 PM [+] ::
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Kevin Drum over at Political Animal says the Charter School Crash in California is a cautionary tale about the 'ownership society' The Washington Monthly:

" The problem with privatizing public services is that, in the end, it's the government that picks up the pieces if the private sector fails. If you invest a piece of your Social Security in private mutual funds and your mutual fund collapses when you're 64, what happens? In theory, it's just tough luck and you're screwed, but we all know perfectly well that's not what would really happen. As with the S&L disaster in the 80s or the LTCM collapse in the 90s, if enough people are affected the government will step in and make them whole."

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 02:36:00 PM [+] ::
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ABCNEWS.com : GOP Mailing Warns Liberals Will Ban Bibles:

"Campaign mail with a return address of the Republican National Committee warns West Virginia voters that the Bible will be prohibited and men will marry men if liberals win in November. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 02:28:00 PM [+] ::
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BBC NEWS | World | Europe | German far right makes poll gains:

"Far-right parties have made gains in eastern Germany, poll projections show. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 02:20:00 PM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Republicans Criticize Bush 'Mistakes' on Iraq:

"Leading members of President Bush's Republican Party on Sunday criticized mistakes and 'incompetence' in his Iraq policy and called for an urgent ground offensive to retake insurgent sanctuaries. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 02:08:00 PM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - IAEA Inspectors in S.Korea for 2nd Investigation:

"Inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog arrived in Seoul on Sunday to conduct a second inspection of South Korea's nuclear experiments, a day after the South said it had no plans to develop or possess nuclear weapons. "

I don't think this has been getting near enough attention. How do you expect to get North Korea to not push for nuclear weapons if South Korea is making waves trying to get them.

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 09:13:00 AM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - True or false: Blogs always tell it straight:

"If that sounds particularly convoluted, welcome to the 'blogosphere,' the chaotic new media world where questionable truths joust with plausible fictions, agendas are often hidden, and motives are frequently mixed, and millions of ordinary citizens clamber to offer their own rumors, opinions and jeremiads. All of which is either very bad or very good for the republic and the future of the American free press, depending on your point of view. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 09:06:00 AM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Bush's Cut-and-Spend Plan Is Math-Challenged:

"But if he wins reelection, Bush will have tough choices of his own. Some analysts predict that much of his agenda would wither if he achieved what seemed to be his top priority: making permanent the tax cuts enacted in his first term. Doing so would cut government revenue by more than $1 trillion between 2005 and 2014. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 09:02:00 AM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - State GOP Likes Its Chances:

"Powered by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's popularity, Republicans are launching their most aggressive assault in a decade on majority Democrats in the Legislature. "

:: Jim Nichols 9/19/2004 08:53:00 AM [+] ::
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