By Sheila
Lennon
Bottom-up' journalism from the pros
Fair and balanced, too!
Dress your candidate
for trick or treating
Upload your entry!
October 22, 2004, 6:40 p.m. -- Last
week's weblog
Weekend mix:
Mystery
Pollster explains all.
Weird-shaped guitars
10
Things That You Should Never Buy Used: From wet suits to beds, it pays
to buy new. Detroit News. Not mentioned, but obvious: underwear.
Munchies for a World Series on the couch: Ballpark
Caramel Corn, Shrimp Nachos and Coney Island Sauce, from the Baxter Bulletin
in North Central Arkansas.
Link
to this item | Comment
Guardian calls it quits in Clark County fiasco: The Telegraph reports,
The Guardian yesterday ran up the white flag and called a halt to "Operation
Clark County", the newspaper's ambitious scheme to recruit thousands
of readers to persuade American voters in a swing state to kick out President
George W Bush in next month's election....
One senior local politician, speaking off the record to avoid offending
his neighbours, said: "They picked the wrong county for many reasons.
One is, we're very parochial. When people talk about The Guardian of London,
they
think you mean London, Ohio, which is in the next-door county. Another is,
we have some issues with literacy round here."
Mr Katz acknowledged that an ever-growing number of Democrats, among them
Sharon Manitta, the spokesman in Britain for Democrats Abroad, tried warning
The Guardian: "This will certainly garner more votes for George Bush."
Mr Katz wrote yesterday that the paper had considered the possibility, but "we
didn't believe it". He insisted: "Folks in Clark County itself
have best recognised the spirit of the enterprise. Local media coverage has
been
consistently fair and good humoured."
"Good-humoured" headlines in the local newspaper, the Springfield
News-Sun have included "Butt Out Brits, voters say" and "Trashing
letter campaign" - a reference to the fact that the first woman to receive
a letter from a Guardian reader, Beverly Coale, threw it away, fearing it
was from a terrorist....
Link
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Three good strikes: Doc
Searls is on a roll: Here's a bit of Doc's post
to Michael Powell, chair
of the
FCC. Here's a bit:
...the way the Net manifests in the world, and the way it supports all
kinds of activities, and especially the way it allows markets to grow — where
everybody is in a position to supply as well as demand, to produce as well
as consume — demands appropriate conceptualization. We won't find that
in the basket of words provided by transportation.
Our biggest challenge — yours and mine — right now is to keep
the Net free of the regulatory assumptions that applied to the undeniably
transportational
nature of few-to-many communications that have been around since the FCC was
the Federal Radio Commission. To do that, we need an appropriate vocabulary.
Politics
as conversation is a series of emails from his sister, a retired
Navy Commander.
And there's a bit of appalling
news (news to him and me, at least) from the
past:
Somebody just told me that Jimmy
Carter, in an interview on Terry Gross' Fresh Air show today, disclosed that he was at an unusual disadvantage in
his presidential
debate with Ronald Reagan — the one where Reagan famously said, "There
you go again." I just listened to that section of the show (nice of
them to provide the audio). Here's Carter...
We found out later that one of Ronald Reagan's supporters, inside the
White House,
had stolen my briefing book — my top secret briefing book — that
prepared me for the debate. And a very prominent news reporter was the one
who took the briefing book to Ronald Reagan, and helped drill him on the
things that
I might say...
Terry Gross asked, "What prominent reporter was that?" Carter's
reply:
It was George Will. And it was later known that he did that.
I'm surprised I'd never heard that before. But it's been kicking
around,
apparently, for some time.
Link
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Blogger bonding: From Patrick Blake, formerly Ye Olde Phart:
It's nice to be missed but the pressure of catching up on neglected matters
plus the bleary eyes I was getting searching for stuff to post got the better
of me. I'm maintaining my
railroad site but for the time being that's it.
That, and watching his beloved Red Sox in the World Series.
Right
on the Edge: Paul Krugman talks about the war, the election, and the
nakedness
of the emperor. In Texas Monthly
3:35 p.m
Fear
and Loathing, Campaign 2004: Dr. Hunter S. Thompson sounds off on the
fun-hogs in the passing lane. HST is back -- in Rolling
Stone, where it
all started -- and he's in rare
form. Here's the conclusion:
Back in June, when John Kerry was beginning to feel like a winner, I had a
quick little rendezvous with him on a rain-soaked runway in Aspen, Colorado,
where he was scheduled to meet with a harem of wealthy campaign contributors.
As we rode to the event, I told him that Bush's vicious goons in the White
House are perfectly capable of assassinating Nader and blaming it on him. His
staff laughed, but the Secret Service men didn't. Kerry quickly suggested that
I might make a good running mate, and we reminisced about trying to end the
Vietnam War in 1972.
That was the year I first met him, at a riot on that elegant little street
in front of the White House. He was yelling into a bullhorn and I was trying
to throw a dead, bleeding rat over a black-spike fence and onto the president's
lawn.
We were angry and righteous in those days, and there were millions of us.
We kicked two chief executives out of the White House because they were stupid
warmongers. We conquered Lyndon Johnson and we stomped on Richard Nixon --
which wise people said was impossible, but so what? It was fun. We were warriors
then, and our tribe was strong like a river.
That river is still running. All we have to do is get out and vote, while
it's still legal, and we will wash those crooked warmongers out of the White
House.
Related: Enjoy the draft: Face it, no campaign promise will tamp that fear.
"Vote on the issues" quiz: Pick your positions,
see which candidate agrees with you.
Link
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Exclusive
for Local Reporter: Ex-CIA Chief Tenet Comes to Town. (E&P) Scoop of
a lifetime for Anna Clark, 24, correspondent for The Herald-Palladium of
St.
Joseph, Mich. Here's her story: Tenet:
CIA made errors
Link
to this item | Comment
What the Bleep? I've
been wanting to see this movie, based on some
reviews and
web chatter. Marlee Matlin stars in a portion of it.
This is an approximation of its actual title, since most keyboards can't do
the whole thing, which is
The physics notation hints at its topic, which the film's site explains as
This outrageous film plunges you into a world where quantum uncertainty
is demonstrated – where neurological processes, and perceptual shifts
are engaged and lived by its protagonist - where everything is alive, and
reality
is changed by every thought.
It has been called by some theater goers “The Handbook to ‘The
Matrix.’” Like “The Matrix” it shows you a greater
reality behind the one we all accept as true, and you have the ability to
create absolutely anything from your own thought while laughing all the way!
The difference between this film and that movie is that this isn’t science
fiction. It’s even stranger. It’s real. And it’s the first
film to say it. And it does so boldly and with a BLEEP of a lot of humor. And
it’s being proven every day by minds like these.
The PBS series NOVA:
The Elegant Universe ("Eleven dimensions, parallel universes and a world
made out of strings," as in guitar strings) was fascinating, although string
theory and quantum physics are way over my head.
A good movie about it seems more digestible.
I bugged Michael Janusonis, the ProJo movie reviewer who sits a few feet away,
and he found it was only playing in Newport (about 25 miles away) at the Jane
Pickens theater.
This morning, I was wondering if the
ferry is still running (it is, through
Oct. 31) and considering trekking to Newport tomorrow when Michael
appeared in front of me, asking, "Do you have a DVD player?"
When I said I did, he said, "I have a surprise for you. I just got the press
kit for What the Bleep, and the entire film is here on DVD. Do you want to
borrow it?"
And that, I think, is what the film is all about -- a more fluid and flexible
reality than than mama ever knew.
Related: I'm reading Jonathan
Carroll these days. Currently, The
Wooden Sea,
in which the chief of police buries a three-legged dog which drops dead at
his feet, then reappears in the trunk of his wife's car... (Of course I had
dragged the PPL link above the blogroll up to my toolbar, and from the Amazon
page linked to the title, requested it from the library. A few days later
a stilted electronic voice on my home voicemail told me it was waiting for
me to pick it up.)
Link
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Balls in the air: All the World Series games are at night, so there's nothing
to interfere with the Patriots-Jets matchup Sunday at 4.
Bush
and Kerry on Technology: Computing Technology Industry Association
submitted questions to both candidates. Here are their answers. via /.
politics
Link
to this item | Comment
American
Passports to Get Chipped: Wired reports,
New U.S. passports will soon be read remotely at borders around the world,
thanks to embedded chips that will broadcast on command an individual's name,
address and digital photo to a computerized reader.
The State Department hopes the addition of the chips, which employ radio
frequency identification, or RFID, technology, will make passports more secure
and harder
to forge, according to spokeswoman Kelly Shannon.
"The reason we are doing this is that it simply makes passports more secure," Shannon
said. "It's yet another layer beyond the security features we currently
use to ensure the bearer is the person who was issued the passport originally."
But civil libertarians and some technologists say the chips are actually a
boon to identity thieves, stalkers and commercial data collectors, since anyone
with the proper reader can download a person's biographical information and
photo from several feet away.
"Even if they wanted to store this info in a chip, why have a chip that
can be read remotely?" asked Barry Steinhardt, who directs the American
Civil Liberty Union's Technology and Liberty program. "Why not require
the passport be brought in contact with a reader so that the passport holder
would know it had been captured? Americans in the know will be wrapping their
passports in aluminum foil." ...
Link
to this item | Comment
October 21, 2004, 5:55 p.m. -- Last
week's weblog
A
big Catholic shift to Kerry? Two new polls show a sudden movement
of undecided Catholics toward Kerry. At BeliefNet.
Two new polls show a significant shift of white Catholics to John Kerry--which,
if it holds up, could be a decisive development in the election.
A Pew Research Center poll released Wednesday has Kerry winning among white
Catholics 50%-43%--a huge change from the October 3 poll which had Bush leading
49% to 33%.
By comparison, George Bush beat Al Gore among white Catholics by about seven
points.
An October 14 ABC News poll showed a similar dramatic shift.
Kerry's favorable vs. unfavorable rating among white Catholics before the
debates was 36% vs. 50%. After the debate: 50% vs. 41%. Kerry improved across
the board, but the shift was more stark for white Catholics than just about
any other group the poll measured....
Speculation about why abounds (much of it involving Kerry's discussion of
his faith and abortion in the debates). Here's my thought: Catholics have always
trusted their own consciences in the face of absolutes.
When my parents were first married in the 1930s, my mother got pregnant right
away. When her labor began, the baby was breech -- feet first -- and refused
to be born. The doctor came out of the delivery room and told my father, "I
can save the mother or the baby. Which?"
My father -- a devout Catholic throughout his life -- told me this story decades
later, with emotion heavy in his voice. "The priest told me that Church
teaching was to save the baby, but I couldn't. I disagreed with the Church
on this one issue. The mother has a family, people who love and depend on her.
I couldn't follow the Church's teaching. I said, 'Save my wife.' "
The doctor used forceps, which crushed the baby's brain. He was named Paul,
baptized and died the same day. My mother was also damaged, and suffered lifelong
complications.
Many years later, my parents went on to have two more children.
(I don't know what Church teaching is or was in this situation. In general,
a procedure that will save the mother's life but kill the child is an abortion.
This is what the priest my father consulted told him.)
Related: Ad
in Pittsburgh Catholic opposes one-issue voting. The Post-Gazette reports,
Fifty priests and several hundred sisters and laity from Western Pennsylvania
have signed an ad in the Pittsburgh
Catholic, saying that voting decisions
cannot be reduced to the single issue of abortion.
The ad is in response to the bishops and conservative lay organizations that
have declared it wrong for a Catholic to vote for a candidate who does not
publicly oppose legal abortion, such as Democratic presidential candidate Sen.
John F. Kerry.
The ad, sponsored by Pax Christi USA, a 60-year-old group advocating pacifism
and nonviolence, says, "Members of the media -- and indeed a few of
our own religious leaders -- do a great disservice to our church and nation
when
they attempt to use one or another issue as the benchmark for Catholic
identity.
"A candidate for office must understand that the Church stands against
any policy or course of action which diminishes life, dignity or the rights
of the human person: abortion, capital punishment, war, scandalous poverty,
denial of health care, mistreatment of immigrants and racism to name but
a few. All are essential issues to a 'pro-life' voter."
The Rev. Regis Ryan, parochial vicar at St. John of God in McKees Rocks
and executive director of Focus on Renewal, a social service center, said
he hoped
the ad had a "calming effect" on Catholics.
"There is certainly nothing doctrinal about voting for Kerry or voting
for [President] Bush, but when you listen to some of the statements of some
of the bishops, it seems like doctrine," he said....
Link
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Brown Seniors 'Crack' Cuneiform Tablets
Link
to this item | Comment
p2p-politics.org is
collecting video clips in support of candidates; if you like
one, you can email it to a friend from that site. They're especially looking
for video clips created by fans of Bush-Cheney.
There are plenty of Kerry-Edwards clips -- some from MoveOn.org's contest,
others from the Kerry campaign -- but they've gotten no response to their invitation
to the Bush campaign. (They invite you to nag them for some.)
Read the FAQ for more details.
Here are the credits:
This site was designed by J Christopher Garcia and
Aaron Swartz, with some ideas by Lawrence
Lessig.
If you have questions, please contact Elaine
Adolfo. None of this would
be possible without the generous support the
Internet
Archive gives
to free resources on the Internet.
Link
to this item | Comment
Monster Slash: Remember
the perennial Halloween song, Monster
Mash? Bobby "Boris" Pickett has recorded a new version to
accompany a Flash animation titled Monster Slash (mp3).
The song begins,
We were hiking in the forest late one night
When our eyes beheld an eerie sight
Our president appeared and began to frown
Then he and his friends cut the forest down.
(he did the slash)
they did the forest slash
(he did the slash)
it was brutally brash
(he did the slash)
public opinion was mashed
(he did the slash)
they did it for the cash
Here's the blurb:
The song that defines Halloween – “Monster Mash” – is
being brought back to life today with the help of the original recording
artist as a new Web-based
appeal from the Campaign
to Protect America’s Lands (CPAL) and Defenders
of Wildlife Action Fund to oppose the Bush Administration’s controversial
plan to permit logging, mining and other commercial exploitation of roadless
federal forest areas. The comment period on the Bush administration’s
widely criticized bid to repeal forest protections ends November 14, 2004....
At the end of the Flash cartoon you can add your name to a petitition to the
Forest Service to retain the Roadless Rule..
The Monster Mash CD clips
page offers tastes of some timely twisted classics such as Transylvania
Twist, Skully Gully and Irresistible Igor.
Link
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IT Kitchen is Shelley
Powers' brainstorm: Create together "A Community-based Online Book
about Weblogging." It begins Monday, and there's a blog
where you can watch this come together.
The IT Kitchen is a two-week workshop starting October 25th and ending
November 5th, 2004.
The audience is composed primarily of webloggers or people interested in
weblogging, but any person who uses the Internet will find something of interest.
Everyone is invited to participate: by writing essays in any of the weblogs
being set up to support the site; providing kitchen-related photos or graphics
and other help with the site designs: participating in the forums or IRC;
or by adding questions and answers to the companion Wiki* for Webloggers
(built
with the same software, and based on the same community spirit as Wikipedia).
From the Overview:
The
clinic will start on a Monday and continue until Friday, the following week.
Each day we’ll feature a different topic (see Clinic:Schedule),
which forms the basis of the essays contributed that day. ...
Instead of inviting specific people and making much of them, giving them
the star treatment, this entire effort is completely open: from the essays
written
at the weblogs to the contributions at the Wiki* for Webloggers. Everyone
is invited to participate
*WhatIsWiki from
wiki.org:
Wiki is a piece of server software that allows users to freely create and
edit Web page content using any Web browser. Wiki supports hyperlinks and has
a simple text syntax for creating new pages and crosslinks between internal
pages on the fly.
Wiki is unusual among group communication mechanisms in that it allows the
organization of contributions to be edited in addition to the content itself.
Like many simple concepts, "open editing" has some profound and
subtle effects on Wiki usage. Allowing everyday users to create and edit
any page in a Web site is exciting in that it encourages democratic use of
the
Web and promotes content composition by nontechnical users.
Click the "edit" tab on the IT Kitchen wiki (the headline link above takes
you there) to see how this works. See you there Monday, when we'll all find
out how this kitchen works.
Link
to this item | Comment
Oil discipline: Reader Cathy Porter Brooks of Pasadena, Calif., emailed
last week (I've added some paragraph breaks for readability),
The reason that most economists cite as the single greatest reason for the
rise in oil prices (a fact about which most Americans, who generally don't
pay any attention to the world around them, are clueless) is that the Chinese
are making great strides in industrial production. Thus the competition for
oil supplies is increasing and thus the prices are rising.
No true visionary
should lament the fact that the third world is developing economically. No
true citizen of the world should complain that finally Americans are beginning
to encounter high costs for a limited commodity - just like the rest of the
planet has for some time.
As other nations begin to prosper, our standard
of living will go down. That's called a redistribution of wealth. I believe
the
single biggest reason we are hated is our wealth, along with our wastefulness
and our insularity.
As others begin to catch up, compete for goods and
share in the wealth, I believe the dividends for us will include peace. Among
the
other consequences of globalization is that our citizens will accept
lower wages or the work will go to other countries.
We will accept the unpleasant
aesthetic and limited environmental consequences of drilling for the
oil
we have in our ground or pay handsomely for that drilled by those nations
who can live with the rigs in their landscapes. We will cut back on usage
and incent
alternative energy research and development or face a crisis in the
production of even essential goods and services.
Why can't we accept a proportional
rather than the lion's share of the world's wealth? And how can any
American leader
do what is right in the world at large (and ultimately in our own
interests) and keep 230,000,000 spoiled children happy?
I replied with a question:
What do you say to people working for companies so squeezed by the need
to show profits to Wall Street that there are and will be no raises, while
the
cost of heating their homes, getting to work and everything else they purchase
goes up?
Goodwill toward the world is certainly laudable, but the fear of losing one's
home, one's job, one's ability to provide for the family is a very personal
reality.
And Cathy replied,
On an immediate basis, I would impose (electronically) a federal tax on
gas at the pump that would go (electronically) directly into a federal fund
to subsidize heating oil for households under a certain real income level
and gasoline rations for the rural poor. No cash would be dispensed. Rather,
the heating oil companies would be reimbursed for proven delivery of heating
oil to eligible addresses and gasoline vouchers would be provided to eligible
recipients and exchanged by the gasoline station for payment from the fund.
Buses, van services and independent truckers would be exempt from this tax.
I would form "transportation districts" around all metropolitan
and high density population areas to create public transportation plans for
their areas and federally insure bond issues by the districts to implement
the plans. I would federally preempt any state or local law that would enable
any town or municipality to balk at participation in such a plan. I would
impose a federal tax on heating oil in "sun rich" areas and provide
a tax exemption for the installation of solar powered systems, as well as
tax incentives across the board for the installation of insulation and energy
efficient windows and doors. I would federally preempt all state and local
laws, except safety regulations, that interefere with these activities. I
would provide substantial tax incentives to American car manufacturers for
the production (not R&D - if they get a good incentive upon production,
they'll find the money for the R&D) of alternative energy and high mileage
vehicles and to the producers and distributors of alternative fuels.
Yes, this would mean prices at the pump would skyrocket. I believe it is
time that they do so. The first step toward reform of the American view of
the use of fossil fuels, the realization that supply is limited and must
be shared, is to set priorities. Heat and safety are more important than
rides in the country. Relief should be provided only to those who have absolutely
no alternative, such as public transportation or ride sharing, and absolutely
must use their vehicles in order to earn a living and provide for basic needs.
The pain will force the use of our national genius to find solutions. And
we do have the ingenuity and, when confronted directly with unpleasant realities,
the toughness, to transform ourselves. We cannot do this, however, as long
as energy policy is used as a political football with politicians blaming
their opposing party or "big business" and promising that they
can find a painless solution. It isn't going to happen.
Comments, anyone?
Related: Breaking
free: New
plans would use new technology to make the United States energy. At the
Christian Science Monitor,
Ray
Kopp enjoyed tooling around in a hydrogen- powered Honda prototype vehicle (pictured
at right) so much that, for a moment, he pictured driving one home.
Then Mr. Kopp, an economist at Resources for the Future, remembered the car's
price tag - $1.5 million - and his hopes were dashed.
Therein lies the core of America's energy problem. Short of radically altering
America's driving habits, the United States cannot achieve energy independence
without spending billions of dollars on new initiatives. And no political consensus
exists to spend those sums despite decades of promises to cut oil imports.
But new plans are emerging that might sway lawmakers....
Link
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October 20, 2004, 7:21 p.m. -- Last
week's weblog
TV-B-Gone's
inventor rejoices as TVs go dark: TV-B-Gone is subversive. It's
a little gadget that turns off TVs. Not your own TV, but TVs in bars, airports,
anywhere they bother you. Here's a clip from the Wired story:
Standing on the corner of 18th and Castro, watching people staring past
their beers in bars, spacing out behind the wheel at red lights and ignoring
one another on the bus, it was clear that it would take more than a gadget
to snap people entirely back to reality.
"What I really want," (Mitch) Altman said, "Is Life-B-Here."
A response from a reader:
God knows the irritation described here is real, but the response is no
less constructive ("Inventor Rejoices as TVs Go Dark," Oct. 19,
2004). There is ever an endless stream of those who would control us. We
have the media moguls trying to control what we see, when and how. Now we
have the anti-media moguls who want to do basically the same thing. The problem
remains. Other people wanting to control OUR experience....
Of course, the TVs that Altman is turning off are attempts to control your
experience, too:
Responding to the accusation that it sounded like unaccountable power, Burke
said, "You've heard about the battle for eyeballs. They're your eyeballs.
You should not have your consciousness constantly invaded. Television people
are getting better and better at finding ways of roping us into TV where
we can't get away."
With the spread of TiVo and downloadable movies, he said, the traditional
30-second spot is dying. Now, advertisers want waiting rooms, elevators and
urinals -- and they don't want anyone to be able to turn the screens off.
Alas, TV-B-Gone's site
is off, too -- bandwidth exceeded.
Link
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World Food Day: Iraqi farmers aren't
celebrating: From GRAIN--
"an international non-governmental organisation (NGO) which promotes the sustainable
management and use of agricultural biodiversity based on people's control over
genetic resources and local knowledge." It's based in Spain.
When the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) celebrates biodiversity
on World Food Day on October 16, Iraqi farmers will be mourning its loss.
A new report [1] by GRAIN and Focus on the Global South has found that new
legislation in Iraq has been carefully put in place by the US that prevents
farmers from saving their seeds and effectively hands over the seed market
to transnational corporations. This is a disastrous turn of events for Iraqi
farmers, biodiversity and the country's food security. While political sovereignty
remains an illusion, food sovereignty for the Iraqi people has been made near
impossible by these new regulations.
Their report (in
collaboration with Focus
on the Global South of Bangkok) leads
with,
When former Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) administrator L. Paul
Bremer III left Baghdad after the so-called "transfer of sovereignty" in
June 2004, he left behind the 100 orders he enacted as chief of the occupation
authority in Iraq. Among them is Order 81 on "Patent, Industrial Design,
Undisclosed Information, Integrated Circuits and Plant Variety." [1]
This order amends Iraq's original patent law of 1970 and unless and until
it is
revised or repealed by a new Iraqi government, it now has the status and
force of a binding law. [2] With important implications for farmers and the
future
of agriculture in Iraq, this order is yet another important component in
the United States' attempts to radically transform Iraq's economy.
It is absurd to try to prevent people from saving seed. If this is an oversight,
let's fix it. If it's not, do we really intend to have grain police? In Iraq?
Link
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Schwarzenegger
supports stem-cell research and former Boston mayor Ray Flynn jumps all over
him:
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Anti-abortion activist Raymond Flynn, a former ambassador
to the Vatican, called on Arnold Schwarzenegger Wednesday to "reconsider
why you are a Catholic" after the California governor voiced support
for a $3 billion bond measure to fund human embryonic stem cell research.
Flynn, a Democrat and president of the lay Roman Catholic organization Liberty,
Life & Family in Washington, questioned the governor's Catholic faith
because of his endorsement of Proposition 71.
"I seriously question whether you understand the teachings of our Catholic
faith on the importance of promoting a culture of life in our country," Flynn
wrote in a letter he said he sent to Schwarzenegger on Wednesday.
A spokesman for Schwarzenegger, a Republican, declined comment....
Related: Less
piety, more plans: Boston Globe columnist Eileen McNamara, before
the last presidential debate:
...Flynn can be forgiven. When his political career dried up, the former mayor
of Boston launched another as a professional conservative Catholic. He has
spent the last few years as manservant to a corrupt hierarchy in the Archdiocese
of Boston, defending the indefensible and refusing to acknowledge that the
good bishops have something of a credibility problem in the Catholic Church
in America.
...Abortion and embryonic stem-cell research are contentious issues for people
of faith. Religions do not all agree about the moral questions. But John
Kerry and George Bush are not applying to be church deacons. They are running
for
president of the United States.
Maybe at tonight's debate the candidates could focus less on their piety and
more on their plans for the future.
Maybe Ray Flynn could just focus on finding a parish in need of a deacon.
Link
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Vatican
Says Anti-Kerry Lawyer Hoodwinked Them: Meanwhile, the Vatican
says it was "hoodwinked" by a California lawyer who has formally filed a
heresy suit
against John Kerry: In Wired,
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - A conservative U.S. lawyer's attempt to enlist the
Vatican in his drive to declare Senator John Kerry a heretic over his abortion
views backfired Wednesday when the Holy See said it had been hoodwinked....
...Father Augustine Di Noia, third-ranking official in the Congregation
for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican's doctrinal office, told Reuters
that
Balestrieri had hoodwinked the Church by misrepresenting himself..
...Di Noia said: "His
claim that the private letter he received from Father Basil Cole is a Vatican
response has no merit whatsoever."
"I thought I was advising a student who was working on a project. I referred
him to a reliable theologian on the matter. I was acting in my capacity as
a theologian trying to be helpful to a young person," he told Reuters.
"I had no idea his aim was actually to build a heresy case against John
Kerry or against anyone else. I feel that we have been instrumentalized," Di
Noia told Reuters.
Di Noia told Reuters that Balestrieri did not identify himself as head of
De Fide and did not disclose that he had already filed a heresy suit against
the Massachusetts senator with the Archdiocese of Boston.
I suspect hoodwinking the Vatican might be a sin.
Link
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Separation of church and state keeps our multicultural,
multifaith nation from turning into a series of warring religious
states. No
matter what your religion, do you want someone else's religious beliefs forced
on
you through
legislation or executive order?
Look at the last two stories above. Are we exporting democracy or importing
religious fundamentalism?
Imagine: Depending on who is president -- and how many others share his or
her beliefs -- the rules might change:
No hamburgers may be sold on Friday. Bacon is outlawed. Sunday church attendance
is mandatory. Polygamy is mandatory. Women are banned from voting by a constitutional
amendment. Beer is banned. Roolz aplenty, Deuteronomy revisited.
This nation was built deliberately on the civic principles and values we hold
in common. Jostling for the supremacy of our own brand
of belief is the surest way to splinter us into warring tribes.
Could civil war be far behind?
Link
to this item | Comment
TVs, cameras top holiday plans, say the jolly folks at the Consumer Electronics
Association, based on interviews with 1,000 U.S. households this month. Buried
in the story:
"Peace and happiness" was the No. 1 most-wanted gift among adults,
followed by clothes and more time with their family. Kids, bless their greedy
little hearts, showed more consistency by demanding toys and video games.
Link
to this item | Comment
The
Engadget Interview: Mike Ramsay, CEO of TiVo: J.D.
Lasica is the
intervviewer:
Should the FCC be in the business of regulating new technologies like this
one?
Definitely not. It’s scary when you feel that you have to go to the
FCC for permission to do something. So we’re not very comfortable with
that. I think the broadcast flag stuff is less onerous than some other things,
like the INDUCE Act. That we’re much more concerned with because that
could lead to prosecution of individuals who induce copyright infringement.
That just opens up a whole can of worms. If you upset consumers enough, they’ll
become pirates, and that law has the potential to do that.
You’ll notice that everything on the table in Washington being pushed
by the media companies doesn’t target regular television. It’s
targeted at things like ripping DVDs, how long you can keep movies pay-per-view
movies, and so on.
Link
to this item | Comment
Web
radio royalty deal only benefits commercial stations: Arts Technica
reports,
Web radio accord reached: A new licensing deal struck between the American
Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) and the Radio Music License
Committee (RMLC) representing commercial radio stations in the US will cover
(press release) streaming over the web. Valued at US$1.7 billion, the deal
gives commercial radio stations the freedom to stream the same music on the
web that they broadcast over the air.
ASCAP, which is responsible for collecting royalties on broadcast music,
and RMLC had been locked in a battle over licensing fees for the past couple
of
years with the ASCAP looking for a separate fee structure for webcasts. The
new deal, which was approved by a US District Court judge, is backdated to
cover fees for 2001-03 and will extend through 2009. However, the deal
does not cover webcasters with an online-only presence. Hence, Internet-only
broacasters
are unaffected by the deal....
Doc Searls' overline on this story reports
the impact on webscasters: "And therefore, still on death support."
So you can hear the same canned programming on the web as on the radio, but
not the little guys with great record collections.
Link
to this item | Comment
Endorsements: Editor
&
Publisher is tracking the newspaper endorsements. Strangest may be the Tampa
Tribune, which offered a long analysis headlined, "Why
We Cannot Endorse President
Bush For Re-Election" but also declined to endorse his opponent.
Many papers traditionally endorse only the Sunday before election day, so
the lists will grow.
Reason
Magazine is collecting
glitterati votes. Most want "none of the above." Overall, this is an arch group.
Responders include P.J. O’Rourke, R.U. Sirius, Camille Paglia, Stewart
Brand, Drew Carey,
Penn Gillette, Nat Hentoff and more who aren't household words in my house.
Robert Anton
Wilson is
voting for himself, and his Guns
and
Dope Party page urges, " EVERYBODY
FOR PRESIDENT!" He suggests you vote for yourself too.
Link
to this item | Comment
Da Momma
Blog: "A peek inside the absurd mind of an American Mormon living
in Pakistan, married to a Pakistan Muslim." Here's a bit from a post titled,
The Queen of Cultural Confusion:
Those of you who know my family or read the girls' blogs know that in my home
I am the lone Mormon surrounded by praying, fasting, beardie/hijabi wearing
Islamic-types. I love 'em and they love me, but you know I'm an irrascable
brat and the self proclaimed Queen of Cultural confusion. With that disclaimer
out of the way, I now blog on.
Ramadan is the Muslim holy month of fasting to commemorate the revealing of
the Holy Quran. It is a time of self-evaluation, a celebration of the spiritual
over the physical self. My family totally loves the fasting, and the sundown
gatherings to read Quran and break the fast. It's their favorite holiday of
the year.
But here's how I see Ramadan: Through the Eyes of an Infidel. ...
...This year Halloween falls in Ramadan. I've recommemded a fusion event
as follows: Just before sundown the fasters, wearing costumes and masks stand
outdoors. When the sundown siren goes off they ring the door bell and yell, "Time
to eat!" They then rush indoors, break their fasts with miniature candy
bars, Hot Cider and popcorn balls. Later, when walking towards the mosque
for the evening Quran reading, they ring doorbells, collecting candy and
throwing tolet paper in the trees of people (chose one: they like, they hate
or who have run out of candy).
Bodacious Ramadan to all and to all a Good Night
Thanks to Jeneane Sessum for the pointer.
Link
to this item | Comment
In
my arms: There's room on the Web for every niche interest. This
one focuses entirely on movies in which the monster or the hero walks off
with a bodacious
beauty in his arms. (She's usually horizontal and unconscious, and you can
seldom see her facial features.)
There's name for this, apparently: The "carry phenomenon."
Here you'll find posters, comics, pulps and TV screen captures with an assortment
of males (human and not) carrying women who have fainted. It's a wierd, huge
niche.
Link
to this item | Comment
Cruisin's losin': My colleague Journal TV writer Andy Smith reports
today,
There's been a shakeup at oldies station B101 (WWBB), which broadcasts at
101.5 FM.
Long-time disc B101 jockeys Cruisin' Bruce Palmer and Big John Bina are
no longer on the air.
...Palmer said he was only told that the station was moving in a different
direction, and he didn't fit into their plans.
His departure has been particularly upsetting to classic car fans. An auto
enthusiast himself -- he owns eight classic cars -- Palmer was a familiar
host at car shows and cruises throughout the area.
Bruce Palmer was the inspiration for our Cruise Night Calendar and our Classic
Wheels slideshow, which boasts 60 photos of cherished cars, most of them
probably polished and buffed while their owners listened to Palmer's oldies
tunes.
The Cruise Nights gathered owners and fans in parking lots for the kind of
no-cost friendly gatherings there are way too few of these days.
I hope they both land on another local station whose consultants value radio
personalities who create more than a buzz between jingles.
Link
to this item | Comment
October 19, 2004, 6:45 p.m. -- Last
week's weblog
A bit under the weather, so a short blog today. (I will not blame the Red
Sox, but...)
The
National Student/Parent
Mock Election happens Oct. 28. Much more information, a form to enroll
your group,
curriculum
resources and more at that link.
It's non-profit, non-partisan, free, the curriculum materials are free, and "Every
American student and parent is invited to join."
How to Vote
2004 National Election Headquarters will be at the New Jersey Division of
Elections, Office of the Attorney General at (this
link). Every state will have a State Election Headquarters. Votes will
come in via the internet, by phone, fax or email to State Election Headquarters
and then to National Election Headquarters.
Ballots for all 50 states and Washington, D.C. will be up by October 2nd.
All enrollees will receive the contact information listing their state’s
Election Headquarters by email or fax from the National Student/Parent Mock
Election or from their state coordinator.
If you do not have your state Election Headquarters site, you will be able
to send your tallies directly to “National Election Headquarters”.
Most votes will be cast on October 28th, but if you need to send your tally
in earlier for any reason, we will make special arrangements for you.
The national results will be available from the New Jersey Division of Elections
after 10 pm on October 28th.
Link
to this item | Comment
The
Snowboarding Yeti game: Yeti's back, not whacking anything this
time except an ibex who seems willing to be a catapult.
Link
to this item | Comment
Sinclair's bad day #2: Building on yesterday's
bad news (a libel suit against
the filmmaker, Sinclair firing its Washington bureau chief who objected to
presenting the film as news), today brought more grief for the media company
that had ordered its TV stations to broadcast the anti-Kerry film.
Sinclair
Broadcasting Shareholders Demand Officers Return Profits From Insider Trading
Sinclair says will not air Kerry show in entirety
Sinclair Documentary Angers Shareholders
Nader Challenges Sinclair Station Managers to Defy Orders
And the stock dropped 20 points (after having been down 34 at one point in
the afternoon).
Link
to this item | Comment
Modern
Humorist's MediaGossipNews is a parody of Romenesko,
Jim Romenesko's media news blog at Poynter.org, a journalism education site.
Via Romenesko,
of course. "MediaGossip.com"
was Romenesko's original
blog name, but when poynter invited him to blog there,
it was uncomfortable about hosting "gossip" and
the blog became MediaNews. Then William Dean Singleton's MediaNews
Group Inc. got
uncomfy, and, since everybody
called the blog Romenesko anyway, that's its name today.
Many people spell it wrong, though. (There is no A in Romenesko!)
Link
to this item | Comment
October 18, 2004, 7:26 p.m.
Are you running
a Halloween webcam? Will it show your decorations to those
who'd beat a path to your well-decorated door but could never find your
dead-end street?
Please let me know if you are. We'll publish the link, and give your ghouls
their due.
There's a Colorado man who takes it a step or two further. After I found Alek's
Halloween Webcam, I learned that The Inquirer (U.K) has also found Alek (Lights
chap is one pumpkin short of a party)
:
If you log onto Alek's Halloween Webcam you can see an image of Alek's house,
lit up in festive glee. Check back at 2000 Mountain time (10 p.m. EDT),
however, and all hell breaks lose.
Alek has hooked up the lights to an internet-controllable X10 switch, which
means you can switch different sections on and off, pan and zoom the webcam,
and even illuminate lights to show the world (and presumably Alek's wife) your
choice of Presidential candidate - at the moment, the Incredible Hulk leads
George Bush.
Are you mounting
a webcam to show your halloween decorations to those who'd never find your
dead-end street?
Please
let me know if you do. We'll publish the link, and give your ghouls
their due.
Link
to this item | Comment
Iraq's
Barbed Realities: A Reporter Reflects on How the U.S. Got Caught in
a Trap of Its Own Making. Rajiv Chandrasekaran is back from 18 months
as the WaPo's Baghdad bureau chief. Saturday he reflected on his time there,
and the state of Iraq. (Today, he did an online chat about the story. Here's
the transcript.)
In a city (Fallujah) where residents often began conversations with diatribes
against the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq, (Sheik Khamis) Hassnawi was
a refreshing exception. Although he appeared to come from central casting,
with his prominent nose, weathered face and checkered headscarf, he talked
for much of the afternoon -- over Dunhill cigarettes and takeout from Haji
Hussein -- about how Fallujah could be saved with the help of the U.S. military.
The Americans, he said, needed to find a way to employ the legions of former
soldiers and other disaffected young men milling about the city. Unlike Shiites
in the south, who had grown accustomed to unemployment and poverty, Sunnis
in Fallujah had thrived on government contracts, smuggling and graft. Postwar
joblessness was a new, embarrassing -- and dangerous -- phenomenon. "Either
you put them to work," Hassnawi said, "or they will turn to the
resistance."
...Lured by his willingness to speak freely, I periodically dropped in on
the sheik after our first meeting to get his take on the deteriorating security
situation in Fallujah. He knew the ringleaders and their lieutenants. He
was among the first to warn of the arrival of foreign fighters. He represented
the city council in early talks with the U.S. military. But in our discussions,
he always returned to the same point: Commence reconstruction projects and
create jobs. To his dismay, many of his unemployed tribesmen were joining
the insurgency, lured by $500 payments to participate in attacks.
Reading this, I recalled a
post by Riverbend, an Iraqi woman blogging as Baghdad
Burning, addressing exactly this expectation that Iraqis would rebuild
their own country and by so doing rebuild their own lives. The date of this
post: Thursday, August 28, 2003
...Listen to this little anecdote. One of my cousins works in a prominent
engineering company in Baghdad- we’ll call the company H. This company
is well-known for designing and building bridges all over Iraq. My cousin,
a structural engineer, is a bridge freak. He spends hours talking about pillars
and trusses and steel structures to anyone who’ll listen.
As May was drawing to a close, his manager told him that someone from the
CPA wanted the company to estimate the building costs of replacing the New
Diyala Bridge on the South East end of Baghdad. He got his team together,
they went out and assessed the damage, decided it wasn’t too extensive,
but it would be costly. They did the necessary tests and analyses (mumblings
about soil composition and water depth, expansion joints and girders) and
came up with a number they tentatively put forward- $300,000. This included
new plans and designs, raw materials (quite cheap in Iraq), labor, contractors,
travel expenses, etc.
Let’s pretend my cousin is a dolt. Let’s pretend he hasn’t
been working with bridges for over 17 years. Let’s pretend he didn’t
work on replacing at least 20 of the 133 bridges damaged during the first
Gulf War. Let’s pretend he’s wrong and the cost of rebuilding
this bridge is four times the number they estimated- let’s pretend
it will actually cost $1,200,000. Let’s just use our imagination.
A week later, the New Diyala Bridge contract was given to an American company.
This particular company estimated the cost of rebuilding the bridge would
be around- brace yourselves- $50,000,000 !!
Something you should know about Iraq: we have over 130,000 engineers. More
than half of these engineers are structural engineers and architects. Thousands
of them were trained outside of Iraq in Germany, Japan, America, Britain
and other countries. Thousands of others worked with some of the foreign
companies that built various bridges, buildings and highways in Iraq. The
majority of them are more than proficient- some of them are brilliant.
Iraqi engineers had to rebuild Iraq after the first Gulf War in 1991 when
the ‘Coalition of the Willing’ was composed of over 30 countries
actively participating in bombing Baghdad beyond recognition. They had to
cope with rebuilding bridges and buildings that were originally built by
foreign companies, they had to get around a lack of raw materials that we
used to import from abroad, they had to work around a vicious blockade designed
to damage whatever infrastructure was left after the war… they truly
had to rebuild Iraq. And everything had to be made sturdy, because, well,
we were always under the threat of war.
Over a hundred of the 133 bridges were rebuilt, hundreds of buildings and
factories were replaced, communications towers were rebuilt, new bridges
were added, electrical power grids were replaced… things were functioning.
Everything wasn’t perfect- but we were working on it.
And Iraqis aren’t easy to please. Buildings cannot just be made functionary.
They have to have artistic touches- a carved pillar, an intricately designed
dome, something unique… not necessarily classy or subtle, but different.
You can see it all over Baghdad- fashionable homes with plate glass windows,
next to classic old ‘Baghdadi’ buildings, gaudy restaurants standing
next to classy little cafes… mosques with domes so colorful and detailed
they look like glamorous Faberge eggs… all done by Iraqis.
...instead of bringing in thousands of foreign companies that are going
to want billions of dollars, why aren’t the Iraqi engineers, electricians
and laborers being taken advantage of? Thousands of people who have no work
would love to be able to rebuild Iraq… no one is being given a chance.
The reconstruction of Iraq is held above our heads like a promise and a
threat...
My
friend, the kidnap victim: Also blogging from Iraq, Chris
Albritton:
...As frightening as John's experience was for him, it shows that journalists'
plans for “security through obscurity” has been blown out the
window. John's captors said they received a phone call that he was on the
move and that the time for taking him was now. This fits in with our intelligence
that there are kidnap teams up and down Jadirya Street looking for us. His
captors said they had penetrated the staff at the Hamra Hotel, where many
of us live. They have people in the compound watching us. They know who we
are and they're looking for “soft targets” -- reporters moving
around with little security or few precautions.
John was lucky -- very lucky. He was picked up by nationalists who, we hear,
are getting out of the kidnapping and beheading business. He wasn't an American.
He had a pedigree of lefty, anti-war reporter. And he fell in with a (more
or less) kind-hearted bunch who were just doing their job as national resistance
fighters. (He said they expressed concern that he wasn't married and that
his living arrangements in the Hamra weren't safe. Bizarrely, they offered
to let him stay with them the next time he came to Iraq -- I'm sure.)
John's story is indicative of the situation facing reporters -- and other
Westerners -- in Iraq. They told him they were really looking for security
contractor or CIA staffer. I haven't left the compound since I returned from
Beirut; I haven't had a specific reason to. And now, without a specific reason,
I won't be going out. This is why you won't be seeing any “Iraqi on
the street” stories here. They're too hostile; the population has turned
against Westerners and the press. While they may not be actively assisting
the resistance, I fear they would stand by idly if I were dragged into a
car and taken away. The police won't be much help either. Once, when John
was being transported from one house to another, his kidnappers let him take
off his blindfold. A cop car was cruising by just as he did so, making no
move to stop a car carrying a blindfolded Westerner....
Link
to this item | Comment
The Path to Florida: SCOTUS blog (SCOTUS is "Supreme Court of
the U.S.,"
i.e. "High court" in headlines) got permission to post a pdf of the
print-only investigative
story in
the current
issue of Vanity Fair. Here's the blog
item by Tom Goldstein:
Vanity Fair Investigative Piece
Many of you will have heard of and read the lengthy October 2004 Vanity
Fair article by David Margolick et al. on the 2000 election litigation,
with a focus on never-before-reported details about what happened inside
the Supreme Court. The piece has received a great deal of attention inside
the Court because, as the article details, "[a] surprising number of [law]
clerks [from that term] talked to Vanity Fair." Tony Mauro did a short
piece on the article (subscription required), but given the new details
the article contains, it has received surprisingly little press attention
otherwise. Vanity Fair does not have a web-site, but we're grateful to
have received permission to post the piece itself, as it appears in the
magazine. So here you are, in two pieces: Part
1 and Part
2.
Link
to this item | Comment
Do
you want a marketer inside your hard drive? Last week I published the
link to Google's Desktop Search Toolbar. Today I read Mitch
Ratcliffe's detailed
blog post about what information Google collects with this tool. Here's his
conclusion:
Google's goal with all its services, from GMail to Orkut and Desktop Search,
is to gather more information about our individual interests. This allows Google
to place ads in context wherever you go that Google AdWords-based ads are displayed.
Today, those ads usually have something to do with the content of the page
you are looking at, but in the future, Google wants to be able to target you
personally with ads for the things you may be talking about on GMail or in
Orkut. If Google can find out that you are searching for particular terms on
your hard drive it gives the company another way to see inside your interests
in order to target ads based on your most pressing needs.
It's a profound vision, for sure, but one that offers such deep insight
into our personal preferences that we should be discussing more completely
what
it means to our privacy. Google's constant claim that it is "not evil" seems
designed to prevent people from considering the implications of the company's
access to personal information. But unbridled power has a vast potential
to corrupt.
Before this business model becomes too entrenched, people should be thinking
about what they are getting in return for their valuable personal information.
Some cheap software isn't worth opening a door on your life to a marketing
organization. Maybe Google should be paying us to use this software. Maybe
we shouldn't be using this software at all. None of these are questions to
take lightly.
When I went to install it on my laptop, it wanted me to use
I.E. I don't, and don't want to. So I'm not going to use Google to search my
hard drive. Later -- after dinner, the Sox game and Monday Night Football,
I might look for a utility that will do that with Google getting into my head
and my files.
Link
to this item | Comment
A polaroid a day,
every day: Nice idea.
Link
to this item | Comment
Furious feedback: Last week, I linked to
a Guardian (U.K.) story (My
fellow non-Americans) and sidebar .
Here's the gist of it:
Writing to a Clark County voter is a chance to explain how US policies effect
you personally, and the rest of the world more generally, and who you hope
they will send to the White House. It may even persuade someone to use
their vote at all.
Apparently, it persuaded a lot of people to write to The Guardian. The headline
they slap on the letters they publish begins, Dear
Limey... but I can't publish
the noun that follows or my boss will be at my elbow saying, "You said ____."
Link
to this item | Comment
Next US chief has to heal the meanness: This just vanished into the archive
of Straights Times, but this interview with John Zogby while he was in Singapore
still lives on the pollster's site:
IN MR John Zogby's mind, there's little question that the electorate in the
United States is divided into what he calls 'two warring nations' - one favouring
President George W. Bush in the upcoming Nov 2 presidential election, the other
siding with his Democratic challenger, Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts.
The increasingly sharpening divisions are over ideology - conservative versus
liberal - and over the very core values of the American system, which has long
prided itself on tolerance and magnanimity.
'Each side feels that if the other wins, it would be the end of the Republic,'
Mr Zogby told The Straits Times during an overnight visit to Singapore sponsored
by Reuters.
'Whoever the next president is, he is going to have to be, first and foremost,
a healer - or at least someone who stops this widening, this deepening of ideological
divisions in the US. The ugly thing is, this meanness has spilled over from
the halls of Congress to Main Street, US.'
This seems especially troubling:
'Republicans and Democrats aren't talking to each other across the aisle,'
he said. 'In Congress, they used to swim together, play tennis and racquetball,
and they used to party together. Now they don't even know one another's names.
The civility has gone.'
Zogby predicts a Kerry win Nov. 2.
Link
to this item | Comment
Sinclair
employee decries planned program on Kerry: The Baltimore Sun
reports,
The Washington bureau chief for Maryland-based Sinclair Broadcast Group's
news division angrily denounced his employer last night for plans to air an
hourlong program that is to include incendiary allegations against Democratic
presidential candidate John Kerry for his anti-war activism three decades ago.
"It's biased political propaganda, with clear intentions to sway this
election," said Jon Leiberman, Sinclair's lead political reporter for
more than a year. "For me, it's not about right or left -- it's about
what's right or wrong in news coverage this close to an election."
...Leiberman spoke out yesterday after a mandatory staff meeting attended by
Sinclair's
corporate news division at company headquarters in Hunt Valley.
"I have nothing to gain here -- and really, I have a lot to lose," Leiberman
said. "At the end of the day, though, all you really have is your credibility."
Leiberman, 29, is a Baltimore native who has a degree in journalism from Northwestern
University and has worked at stations in Topeka, Kan., and Albuquerque, N.M.,
as well as Sinclair's WBFF in Baltimore.
... Sinclair staffers were told the show would be presented as news, not opinion,
Leiberman said.
...Leiberman said he was anguished by his decision to speak out. But, he
said, the influence of commentator Mark Hyman and Chief Executive David D.
Smith
has been devastating. "There is going to be a concerted effort on the
part of my colleagues to make this as balanced a program as they can," Leiberman
said. "But the selection of the material -- dumping it on the news department,
and giving them four days, and running it this close to the election -- it's
indefensible, in my opinion."
Leiberman said he told Sinclair's vice president for news, Joseph DeFeo,
that he would not contribute to the program and that DeFeo suggested the
reporter
could lose his job....
The Sinclair
page at Yahoo
Finance includes a
message board detailing grass-roots activism
at the investor level. And, Sinclair
Broadcast initiated with "underweight" -
update. (JP Morgan has "initiated" coverage -- assigned a stock analyst
-- to watch it.)
And a Vietnam veteran who appears in the film, Stolen Honor, is suing
the filmmaker for libel.
Here's a
wrap.
Link
to this item | Comment
Toymakers
Disappoint, Warn on Holidays: Trouble at the North Pole?
Link
to this item | Comment
Hawks drop the ball against Patriots: From the Seattle Times,
Link
to this item | Comment
Investigative
journalist Seymour Hersh spills the secrets of the Iraq quagmire and the
war on terror: Here's how J-Log describes this,
After the second Presidential debate, Seymour Hersh spoke with Michael Krasny of KQED. Krasny tried to interview him, but Hersh did most of the talking. A webcast
of the interview is available on Berkely's servers, all one hour and
twenty some minutes of it. Hersh has a lot to say about Iraq and what's
really happening over there.
Link
to this item | Comment
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