TPMtv: A Chat with Juan Cole

Lucid dreaming

Definitely the cats meow

Going the way of the dodo

Could 2008 be the year that Democrats finally admit an old sweetheart is never coming back, and stop pandering to the white male voter?

WOC

The money says the surge isn't working

George Carlin

Endless war

and so it goes...

Poser

Two weeks

until thesis submission date...

and in the meantime:

Small and cheap is beautiful

Low Technologies, High Aims

Lieberman is a nut

Really, he scares me.

IPhone hacked

Finally, you can unlock your iPhone from AT&T's network using easily available online tools, without having to do any work on the hardware, for free (free as in no money, nada, zip).

The iPhone Dev Team has done it -- the crew of far-flung, IRC-addled teens and oldsters who for 74 days have been hacking away at Apple's AT&T-locked phone are now offering a full suite of software and a guide with which to do the deed. This isn't Lincoln's proclamation, but in certain circles it's huge. It's the only software-only iPhone hack that won't cost you a red dime to use, and it changes everything.

Conspiracy theory time - I'm sure that Apple helped this process somehow. They love the fact that it is free - now more people can buy... Oh and look, it happened around the same time they cut the price. Nice.

Costs and benefits

LA Times editorial: Another $100 billion for Iraq?

Iraq is too important to lose, so we've got to keep on trying, no matter the cost, and though it's not clear when we will succeed.

This is the essence of the two-day report to Congress by Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq. The general and the ambassador freely admitted that the situation in Iraq is frustrating, that U.S. military might cannot force Iraqis into the political reconciliation that is the only basis for real stability, and that it's impossible to predict when Iraqis will be able to run their country themselves. Nevertheless, they argued, the consequences of U.S. troops departing could be so horrific -- Iraq turning into an Al Qaeda haven plagued by ethnic cleansing and preyed upon by Iran -- that the only prudent course is to keep at least 130,000 soldiers in Iraq at least until July.

President Bush is expected to accept this recommendation in a speech Thursday. Despite Democratic protests, it's unlikely that this toothless Congress will stop him from continuing the de facto occupation of Iraq for the remainder of his term. We fear this is a grave mistake that will compound the colossal error of invading Iraq in the first place -- although we fervently hope that Petraeus, Crocker and the courageous people they lead will somehow manage to prove us wrong.

The president will ask the nation to pay for the next 11 months in Iraq with billions of dollars and hundreds of lives. We think this sacrifice will be in vain, because only Iraqis can heal their national wounds. And so we ask instead: What else could the United States do with a guesstimated $100 billion to reduce the strength and the appeal of Islamist terrorist groups worldwide?

That money may be needed to defend Afghanistan against the resurgent Taliban, or to track Al Qaeda elsewhere. But does our creative country have no better ideas for winning Muslim friends and thwarting terrorists? How about spending $20 billion on anti-poverty and education programs in Afghanistan and the tribal areas of Pakistan, to give the population a reason to fight the Taliban? Or distributing $20 billion in emergency support to impoverished Iraqi families? Wouldn't $10 billion help repatriate the 2 million Iraqi refugees abroad and resettle the 2 million inside Iraq who have fled sectarian violence? Would $10 billion for child-health programs in Islamic nations help demonstrate that Americans are not, in fact, at war with Muslims? Certainly another $10 billion could pay for more than 55,000 bright students (from anywhere in the world) to spend four years studying Arabic, Islamic thought and counter-terrorism at the University of California. And heck, that would still leave $30 billion to beef up domestic and international law enforcement, intelligence and homeland security.

Is staying the failing course in Iraq truly the only prudent course of action?

SNAFU

For Iraqis, General’s Report Offers Bitter Truth

I've never heard of this guy

Petraeus Report: A Prebuttal

The neurobiology of politics

Study finds left-wing brain, right-wing brain - Los Angeles Times

Exploring the neurobiology of politics, scientists have found that liberals tolerate ambiguity and conflict better than conservatives because of how their brains work.

Previous psychological studies have found that conservatives tend to be more structured and persistent in their judgments whereas liberals are more open to new experiences. The latest study found those traits are not confined to political situations but also influence everyday decisions.

The results show "there are two cognitive styles -- a liberal style and a conservative style," said UCLA neurologist Dr. Marco Iacoboni, who was not connected to the latest research.

So this gets even more interesting when you consider the plasticity of the brain. I bet there are ways to train someone into either of the two directions. My question is, how can we train the majority of people to be more open-minded and flexible?

Beaker

Krugman

Time to Take a Stand

Here’s what will definitely happen when Gen. David Petraeus testifies before Congress next week: he’ll assert that the surge has reduced violence in Iraq — as long as you don’t count Sunnis killed by Sunnis, Shiites killed by Shiites, Iraqis killed by car bombs and people shot in the front of the head.

Here’s what I’m afraid will happen: Democrats will look at Gen. Petraeus’s uniform and medals and fall into their usual cringe. They won’t ask hard questions out of fear that someone might accuse them of attacking the military. After the testimony, they’ll desperately try to get Republicans to agree to a resolution that politely asks President Bush to maybe, possibly, withdraw some troops, if he feels like it.

There are five things I hope Democrats in Congress will remember.

First, no independent assessment has concluded that violence in Iraq is down. On the contrary, estimates based on morgue, hospital and police records suggest that the daily number of civilian deaths is almost twice its average pace from last year. And a recent assessment by the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office found no decline in the average number of daily attacks.

So how can the military be claiming otherwise? Apparently, the Pentagon has a double super secret formula that it uses to distinguish sectarian killings (bad) from other deaths (not important); according to press reports, all deaths from car bombs are excluded, and one intelligence analyst told The Washington Post that “if a bullet went through the back of the head, it’s sectarian. If it went through the front, it’s criminal.” So the number of dead is down, as long as you only count certain kinds of dead people.

Oh, and by the way: Baghdad is undergoing ethnic cleansing, with Shiite militias driving Sunnis out of much of the city. And guess what? When a Sunni enclave is eliminated and the death toll in that district falls because there’s nobody left to kill, that counts as progress by the Pentagon’s metric.

Second, Gen. Petraeus has a history of making wildly overoptimistic assessments of progress in Iraq that happen to be convenient for his political masters.

I’ve written before about the op-ed article Gen. Petraeus published six weeks before the 2004 election, claiming “tangible progress” in Iraq. Specifically, he declared that “Iraqi security elements are being rebuilt,” that “Iraqi leaders are stepping forward” and that “there has been progress in the effort to enable Iraqis to shoulder more of the load for their own security.” A year later, he declared that “there has been enormous progress with the Iraqi security forces.”

But now two more years have passed, and the independent commission of retired military officers appointed by Congress to assess Iraqi security forces has recommended that the national police force, which is riddled with corruption and sectarian influence, be disbanded, while Iraqi military forces “will be unable to fulfill their essential security responsibilities independently over the next 12-18 months.”

Third, any plan that depends on the White House recognizing reality is an idle fantasy. According to The Sydney Morning Herald, on Tuesday Mr. Bush told Australia’s deputy prime minister that “we’re kicking ass” in Iraq. Enough said.

Fourth, the lesson of the past six years is that Republicans will accuse Democrats of being unpatriotic no matter what the Democrats do. Democrats gave Mr. Bush everything he wanted in 2002; their reward was an ad attacking Max Cleland, who lost both legs and an arm in Vietnam, that featured images of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.

Finally, the public hates this war and wants to see it ended. Voters are exasperated with the Democrats, not because they think Congressional leaders are too liberal, but because they don’t see Congress doing anything to stop the war.

In light of all this, you have to wonder what Democrats, who according to The New York Times are considering a compromise that sets a “goal” for withdrawal rather than a timetable, are thinking. All such a compromise would accomplish would be to give Republicans who like to sound moderate — but who always vote with the Bush administration when it matters — political cover.

And six or seven months from now it will be the same thing all over again. Mr. Bush will stage another photo op at Camp Cupcake, the Marine nickname for the giant air base he never left on his recent visit to Iraq. The administration will move the goal posts again, and the military will come up with new ways to cook the books and claim success.

One thing is for sure: like 2004, 2008 will be a “khaki election” in which Republicans insist that a vote for the Democrats is a vote against the troops. The only question is whether they can also, once again, claim that the Democrats are flip-floppers who can’t make up their minds.

The problem with losing credibility

Just 39% Believe Iraq Report Will Honestly Present Petraeus Views; 35% Say It Will Not

It makes long-term policy difficult. Well, unless you have an opposition party with no spine.

APEC The Chaser Prank George W Bush Hotel

Ron Paul on the Web

Red State Update

Snap

Countdown Special Comment: You have no remaining credibility about Iraq, sir.

Olbermann is (rightly) pissed.

OOh the goodness.

Clowns KKKick KKK ass!

Read the whole story. It gave me happy chills.

See, that wasn't so hard

The environmental argument

Protesters turn attention from 4x4s to meat-eating

US activists are turning their fire from four-wheel drives and focusing on meat eating as the greater culprit in global warming.

To get the point across, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Peta, are preparing a Hummer car with a driver wearing a chicken suit and banner proclaiming meat as the main cause of global warming. They plan to park it near a White House-sponsored climate forum in Washington in September.

As proof, they cite a 2006 UN report, which concluded that raising animals for food generates more greenhouse gases than all the cars, trucks, planes and ships in the world combined. The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation report concluded that the livestock business generates more greenhouse gas emissions – 18 per cent as measured in CO2 equivalent which is greater than that produced by all other forms of transportation.

Another reason not to mass process our animal friends.

Bananas!

Does make me wonder what the design of the pineapple was all about.

The intertubes

Will probably never cease to amaze me.

Top 10

Letterman top ten reasons why Gonzales stepped down.

Visual pollution

Your Ad Here, on My S.U.V.? And You’ll Pay?

Why not?

Overcompensation

GOP Senator Convicted of Lewd Conduct

Man, they just keep confirming my general belief that the more you bark about it, the more you are trying to cover it up. I just hate that these conservative social conservatives try to legislate for their own personal foibles. Join a support group or something, just leave the rest of us out of it.

more details here

Update: of course, this is nothing new:

Krugman

A Socialist Plot

I've been waiting for someone to say make this comparison. People don't think of universal education as a socialist plot - so why health care?

Suppose, for a moment, that the Heritage Foundation were to put out a press release attacking the liberal view that even children whose parents could afford to send them to private school should be entitled to free government-run education.

They’d have a point: many American families with middle-class incomes do send their kids to school at public expense, so taxpayers without school-age children subsidize families that do. And the effect is to displace the private sector: if public schools weren’t available, many families would pay for private schools instead.

So let’s end this un-American system and make education what it should be — a matter of individual responsibility and private enterprise. Oh, and we shouldn’t have any government mandates that force children to get educated, either. As a Republican presidential candidate might say, the future of America’s education system lies in free-market solutions, not socialist models.

O.K., in case you’re wondering, I haven’t lost my mind, I’m drawing an analogy. The real Heritage press release, titled “The Middle-Class Welfare Kid Next Door,” is an attack on proposals to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. Such an expansion, says Heritage, will “displace private insurance with government-sponsored health care coverage.”

And Rudy Giuliani’s call for “free-market solutions, not socialist models” was about health care, not education.

But thinking about how we’d react if they said the same things about education helps dispel the fog of obfuscation right-wingers use to obscure the true nature of their position on children’s health.

The truth is that there’s no difference in principle between saying that every American child is entitled to an education and saying that every American child is entitled to adequate health care. It’s just a matter of historical accident that we think of access to free K-12 education as a basic right, but consider having the government pay children’s medical bills “welfare,“ with all the negative connotations that go with that term.

And conservative opposition to giving every child in this country access to health care is, in a fundamental sense, un-American.

Here’s what I mean: The great majority of Americans believe that everyone is entitled to a chance to make the most of his or her life. Even conservatives usually claim to believe that. For example, N. Gregory Mankiw, the former chairman of the Bush Council of Economic Advisers, contrasts the position of liberals, who he says believe in equality of outcomes, with that of conservatives, who he says believe that the goal of policy should be “to give everyone the same shot and not be surprised or concerned when outcomes differ wildly.”

But a child who doesn’t receive adequate health care, like a child who doesn’t receive an adequate education, doesn’t have the same shot — he or she doesn’t have the same chances in life as children who get both these things.

Gonzo is outta here

Gonzales Resigns as Attorney General

I've seen a rumor that Chertoff will be put up as his replacement.

36 Hours in Ottawa

Ottawa: A lovely place to visit

Slide show here.

They say that Ottawaonians are nice people too.

Whistleblowers on Fraud Facing Penalties

This isn't the country I thought I grew up in

For daring to report illegal arms sales, Navy veteran Donald Vance says he was imprisoned by the American military in a security compound outside Baghdad and subjected to harsh interrogation methods.

There were times, huddled on the floor in solitary confinement with that head-banging music blaring dawn to dusk and interrogators yelling the same questions over and over, that Vance began to wish he had just kept his mouth shut.

He had thought he was doing a good and noble thing when he started telling the FBI about the guns and the land mines and the rocket-launchers - all of them being sold for cash, no receipts necessary, he said. He told a federal agent the buyers were Iraqi insurgents, American soldiers, State Department workers, and Iraqi embassy and ministry employees.

The seller, he claimed, was the Iraqi-owned company he worked for, Shield Group Security Co.

"It was a Wal-Mart for guns," he says. "It was all illegal and everyone knew it."

So Vance says he blew the whistle, supplying photos and documents and other intelligence to an FBI agent in his hometown of Chicago because he didn't know whom to trust in Iraq.

For his trouble, he says, he got 97 days in Camp Cropper, an American military prison outside Baghdad that once held Saddam Hussein, and he was classified a security detainee.

Mechabolic

This year Burning Man participants will encounter a 120-foot long slug crawling across the desert floor, spewing columns of fire and ingesting garbage. Named Mechabolic, this monstrosity has been created by a team from Berkeley, California to demonstrate a novel way of creating energy: gasification. As it slowly moves across the dust of the playa, participants will be encouraged to dump anything that burns into its intake. The material is burned in a special chamber that restricts oxygen flow, with only three simple byproducts: water, inert fixed carbon and hydrogen gas. The hydrogen gas is then fed into an internal combustion engine, which powers the machine. The water drips out the tailpipe, and the carbon can be turned back into the soil. This giant art car is actually carbon-negative. The principles can be applied to any vehicle with a carburetor, without modifications to the engine. "This thing can run on coffee grounds," laughs Price.

See Catalyst magazine article

Leo

Physical exercise

Good for the body, and apparently, it builds your brain

This spring, neuroscientists at Columbia University in New York City published a study in which a group of men and women, ranging in age from 21 to 45, began working out for one hour four times a week. After 12 weeks, the test subjects, predictably, became more fit. Their VO2 max, the standard measure of how much oxygen a person takes in while exercising, rose significantly.

But something else happened as a result of all those workouts: blood flowed at a much higher volume to a part of the brain responsible for neurogenesis. Functional M.R.I.’s showed that a portion of each person’s hippocampus received almost twice the blood volume as it did before. Scientists suspect that the blood pumping into that part of the brain was helping to produce fresh neurons.

The hippocampus plays a large role in how mammals create and process memories; it also plays a role in cognition. If your hippocampus is damaged, you most likely have trouble learning facts and forming new memories. Age plays a factor, too. As you get older, your brain gets smaller, and one of the areas most prone to this shrinkage is the hippocampus. (This can start depressingly early, in your 30’s.) Many neurologists believe that the loss of neurons in the hippocampus may be a primary cause of the cognitive decay associated with aging. A number of studies have shown that people with Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia tend to have smaller-than-normal hippocampi.

The Columbia study suggests that shrinkage to parts of the hippocampus can be slowed via exercise. The subjects showed significant improvements in memory, as measured by a word-recall test. Those with the biggest increases in VO2 max had the best scores of all.

And other interesting things that encourage neurogenesis:

The human brain undergoes neurogenesis — the creation of new cells — throughout a person’s life, although the amount depends on a variety of factors, not just exercise.

MARIJUANA: A 2005 study on rats found that stimulation of the brain’s receptors for marijuana increased neurogenesis.

ALCOHOL: A 2005 study found that mice that swallowed a moderate amount of ethanol showed more neurogenesis than teetotalers. Other studies on mice have suggested that heavier drinking can be damaging to the brain.

SOCIABILITY: One study suggests that rats that live alone and have access to a running wheel experience less neurogenesis than those that have access to a running wheel and live in group housing. So go ahead and join that singles running club you’ve been avoiding.

DIET: A diet high in saturated fat and sugar sharply diminishes the brain’s production of the proteins and nerve-growth factors necessary for neurogenesis. Exercise may mitigate that effect somewhat.

STRESS: Mice that are subjected to uncontrollable stress (like electric shock) suffer substantial deterioration in their ability to produce new neurons.

CHOCOLATE: In a study published this year, an ingredient in cocoa, epicatechin, was shown to improve spatial memory in mice, especially among those that exercised. Epicatechin can also be found in grapes, blueberries and black tea. “I plan to start ingesting more epicatechin,” says Henriette van Praag, a neuroscientist at the Salk Institute, “as soon as I can’t find my car keys anymore.”

So go smoke a doobie and have a glass of wine with your vegetarian meditation running group and you will have like totally a massive brain.

Battle at Kruger

"Asset Deployment Teams"

Waxman Confirms Existence Of Rove’s Politicization ‘Teams’

In practical terms, that meant Cabinet officials concentrated their official government travel on the media markets Rove’s team chose, rolling out grant decisions made by agencies with red-carpet fanfare in GOP congressional districts, and carefully crafted announcements highlighting the release of federal money in battleground states.

This is the same kind of thing (only more extensive it seems) as what brought down the Liberal party in Canada.

Sleights of Mind

Magic and cognitive science - taking advantage of our innate desire for impose patterns and cause and effect.

Red State Update

Stopping food dumping

CARE Turns Down Federal Funds for Food Aid

Rudy, Bush foriegn policy on steroids

This guy has a serious authoritarian streak with all the ego issues that go with it. If he gets a hold of this country... man oh man.

Big News on Congress's iPhone Hearings

Chenguin vs. Peaceman

So far I like the way online video is impacting the dynamic of presidential elections.

A metaphor

Blurry Expats

Americans

This is what some of them look like.

Great quotes

Animals are my friends... and I don't eat my friends
- George Bernard Shaw

Probably to spend more time with his hell hounds

Karl Rove to Resign At the End of August

Dick Cheney gives himself some advice

Happiness Formula

A BBC report

Positive psyc 101

As I am watching the video lectures (instead of working) of the positive psychology course at Harvard I can't help but think that it is (and will be) a major blow against the conservative, strict-father, punishment oriented model of child rearing. If Lakoff is right (linking value systems with, positive pysch could be a boon for more liberal oriented politics. Oprah should do a show on this course rather than on "The Secret".

If this becomes more legitimate watch as it is disparaged and labeled as cooky far-left hippy happy self-help blah blah by the religious right.

Pray Bush stays healthy

Cheney urging strikes on Iran

Or, better yet, lets get the impeachment process going.

Positive psychology

Harvard's crowded course to happiness

The course (Psychology 1504: Positive Psychology) is all online here including lecture videos and readings and more. How cool is that?

Lecture video 16 is on mindfulness and happiness (lecture power point #10). He argues that one of the few interventions that work to bring about change to one's life is mindfulness meditation - good stuff.

A bigger threat than bears

http://view.break.com/345028 - Watch more free videos

The Power Memo

"Barack Obama Was Right"

August 3, 2007
To: Interested Parties
From: Samantha Power -- Founding Executive Director, Harvard University Carr Center for Human Rights Policy
Re: Conventional Washington versus the Change We Need

It was Washington's conventional wisdom that led us into the worst strategic blunder in the history of US foreign policy. The rush to invade Iraq was a position advocated by not only the Bush Administration, but also by editorial pages, the foreign policy establishment of both parties, and majorities in both houses of Congress. Those who opposed the war were often labeled weak, inexperienced, and even naïve.

Barack Obama defied conventional wisdom and opposed invading Iraq. He did so at a time when some told him that doing so would doom his political future. He took that risk because he thought it essential that the United States "finish the fight with bin Laden and al Qaeda." He warned that a "dumb war, a rash war" in Iraq would result in an "occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences."

Barack Obama was right; the conventional wisdom was wrong. And today, we see the consequences. Iraq is in chaos. According to the National Intelligence Estimate, the threat to our homeland from terrorist groups is "persistent and evolving." Al-Qaeda has a safe-haven in Pakistan. Iran has only grown stronger and bolder. The American people are less safe because of a rash war.

Over the last few weeks, Barack Obama has once again taken positions that challenge Washington's conventional wisdom on foreign policy. And once again, pundits and politicians have leveled charges that are now bankrupt of credibility and devoid of the new ideas that the American people desperately want.

On each point in the last few weeks, Barack Obama has called for a break from a broken way of doing things. On each point, he has brought fresh strategic thinking and common sense that break with the very conventional wisdom that has led us into Iraq.

Diplomacy: For years, conventional wisdom in Washington has said that the United States cannot talk to its adversaries because it would reward them. Here is the result:

The United States has not talked directly to Iran at a high level, and they have continued to build their nuclear weapons program, wreak havoc in Iraq, and support terror.
The United States has not talked directly to Syria at a high level, and they have continued to meddle in Lebanon and support terror.
The United States did not talk to North Korea for years, and they were able to produce enough material for 6 to 8 more nuclear bombs.

By any measure, not talking has not worked. Conventional wisdom would have us continue this policy; Barack Obama would turn the page. He knows that not talking has made us look weak and stubborn in the world; that skillful diplomacy can drive wedges between your adversaries; that the only way to know your enemy is to take his measure; and that tough talk is of little use if you're not willing to do it directly to your adversary. Barack Obama is not afraid of losing a PR battle to a dictator - he's ready to tell them what they don't want to hear because that's how tough, smart diplomacy works, and that's how American leaders have scored some of the greatest strategic successes in US history.

Barack Obama's judgment is right; the conventional wisdom is wrong. We need a new era of tough, principled and engaged American diplomacy to deal with 21st century challenges.

Terrorist Sanctuaries: For years, we have given President Musharraf hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid, while deferring to his cautious judgment on how to take out high-level al Qaeda targets - including, most likely, Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri. Here is the result:

Bin Laden and Zawahiri - two men with direct responsibility for 9/11- remain at large.
Al Qaeda has trained and deployed hundreds of fighters worldwide from its sanctuary in northwest Pakistan.
Afghanistan is far less secure because the Taliban can strike across the border, and then return to safety in Pakistan.

By any measure, this strategy has not worked. Conventional wisdom would have us defer to Musharraf in perpetuity. Barack Obama wants to turn the page. If Musharraf is willing to go after the terrorists and stop the Taliban from using Pakistan as a base of operations, Obama would give him all of the support he needs. But Obama made clear that as President, if he had actionable intelligence about the whereabouts of al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan - and the Pakistanis continued to refuse to act against terrorists known to be behind attacks on American civilians - then he will use highly targeted force to do so.

Barack Obama's judgment is right; the conventional wisdom is wrong. We need a new era that moves beyond the conventional wisdom that has brought us over-reliance on an unreliable dictator in Pakistan and an occupation of Iraq.

Nuclear Attacks on Terrorist Targets: For years, Washington's conventional wisdom has held that candidates for President are judged not by their wisdom, but rather by their adherence to hackneyed rhetoric that make little sense beyond the Beltway. When asked whether he would use nuclear weapons to take out terrorist targets in Pakistan and Afghanistan, Barack Obama gave the sensible answer that nuclear force was not necessary, and would kill too many civilians. Conventional wisdom held this up as a sign of inexperience. But if experience leads you to make gratuitous threats about nuclear use - inflaming fears at home and abroad, and signaling nuclear powers and nuclear aspirants that using nuclear weapons is acceptable behavior, it is experience that should not be relied upon.

Barack Obama's judgment is right. Conventional wisdom is wrong. It is wrong to propose that we would drop nuclear bombs on terrorist training camps in Pakistan, potentially killing tens of thousands of people and sending America's prestige in the world to a level that not even George Bush could take it. We should judge presidential candidates on their judgment and their plans, not on their ability to recite platitudes.

Vision: American foreign policy is broken. It has been broken by people who supported the Iraq War, opposed talking to our adversaries, failed to finish the job with al Qaeda, and alienated the world with our belligerence. Yet conventional wisdom holds that people whose experience includes taking these positions are held up as examples of what America needs in times of trouble.

Barack Obama says we have to turn the page. We cannot afford any more of this kind of bankrupt conventional wisdom. He has laid out a foreign policy that is bold, clear, principled, and tailored for the 21st century. End a war we should never have fought, concentrate our resources against terrorists who threaten America. End the counter-productive policy of lumping together our adversaries and avoiding talking to our foes. End the era of politics that is all sound-bites and no substance, and offer the American people the change that they need.

Barack Obama's judgment is right. It is conventional wisdom that has to change.

Predictability and propoganda

Iraq Timeline: The Broken Record on "the Next Few Months"

a Theory of Affluence

for you social scientist / economist types: In Dusty Archives, a Theory of Affluence. here is a synopsis.

Historians used to accept changes in people’s behavior as an explanation for economic events, like Max Weber’s thesis linking the rise of capitalism with Protestantism. But most have now swung to the economists’ view that all people are alike and will respond in the same way to the same incentives. Hence they seek to explain events like the Industrial Revolution in terms of changes in institutions, not people.

Dr. Clark’s view is that institutions and incentives have been much the same all along and explain very little, which is why there is so little agreement on the causes of the Industrial Revolution. In saying the answer lies in people’s behavior, he is asking his fellow economic historians to revert to a type of explanation they had mostly abandoned and in addition is evoking an idea that historians seldom consider as an explanatory variable, that of evolution.

Everybody is a hero

Heroism and the language of fascism

Banning visual pollution

São Paulo: A City Without Ads

In 2007, the world’s fourth-largest metropolis and Brazil’s most important city, São Paolo, became the first city outside of the communist world to put into effect a radical, near-complete ban on outdoor advertising. Known on one hand for being the country’s slick commercial capital and on the other for its extreme gang violence and crushing poverty, São Paolo’s “Lei Cidade Limpa” or Clean City Law was an unexpected success, owing largely to the singular determination of the city’s conservative mayor, Gilberto Kassab.

I hope this idea spreads far and wide... kindof like banning smoking.

A reason to live in Canada

Warrantless Surrender

Administration officials, backed up by their Republican enablers in Congress, argued that they were being dangerously hamstrung in their ability to collect foreign-to-foreign communications by suspected terrorists that happen to transit through the United States. The problem is that while no serious person objects to intercepting foreign-to-foreign communications, what the administration sought -- and what it managed to obtain -- allows much more than foreign-to-foreign contacts. The government will now be free to intercept any communications believed to be from outside the United States (including from Americans overseas) that involve "foreign intelligence" -- not just terrorism. It will be able to monitor phone calls and e-mails of U.S. citizens or residents without warrants -- unless the subject is the "primary target" of the surveillance. Instead of having the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court ensure that surveillance is being done properly, with monitoring of Americans minimized, that job would be up to the attorney general and the director of national intelligence. The court's role is reduced to that of rubber stamp.

So much for New Hampshire's, Live Free or Die motto. The Dems really caved on this one.

Global warming

Walking to the shops ‘damages planet more than going by car’

The argument is that the CO2 production in the food production and delivery processes is so high that the food we burn by walking (and thus requiring more food) creates more C02 and relaxing behind the wheel.

So, what to do? Well a good start is to 1) realize that food production system is harmful, 2) try to buy local products (flying in foods is costly), 3) stop eating beef, and 4) don't buy pre-made meals (refrigeration is expensive)

Free Tibet

China tells living Buddhas to obtain permission before they reincarnate

The 14-part regulation issued by the State Administration for Religious Affairs is aimed at limiting the influence of Tibet’s exiled god-king, the Dalai Lama, and at preventing the re-incarnation of the 72-year-old monk without approval from Beijing.
...
For the first time China has given the Government the power to ensure that no new living Buddha can be identified, sounding a possible death knell to a mystical system that dates back at least as far as the 12th century.

Unfriggin' believable.

Meditation as your psychologist

Mindfulness meditation & Depression

I chatted this weekend with my clinical psychologist uncle who told me all about how mindfulness meditation techniques are being used to treat several "disorders" including depression and even schizophrenia!

Anyway, I don't have any data on it, but he says it has a great impact on reducing recurrent episodes, like a jump of 60% over just drug treatments alone.

Is our children learning?

The answer must be yes. Just now I walked into the lobby and overheard someone talking about how someone "misunderestimated" something.

I guess the question should really be, what is our children learning?

Green-collar jobs

Green Jobs Act of 2007

This ground-breaking legislation will make $120 million a year available across the country to begin training workers (and would-be workers) for jobs in the clean energy sector. When the bill becomes law, 35,000 people a year will benefit from cutting edge, vocational education in fields that could literally save the Earth.

Vermont

Who knew? It is one pretty place.

The uncontrollable mob

Looks like the GOP is going to opt out of the YouTube debate

Such democracy is so unruly. Nothing like reinforcing the fact that the GOP rich white men are out of touch with current culture.

I bet they'd agree if the questions came from Jack Bauer...

and just another reason why the GOP is not so hot with the 18 to 35 crowd

The half truth, the partial truth, and anything but the truth

Senate Press Conference Calling For Gonzales Special Prosecutor

.. and Rove finally issued a subpoena as part of attorney firing investigation.

Gonzales

This guy really is a piece of work.

It looks like he may have lied yesterday, and unless he revises his testimony, may face perjury probe.

A video update here: Leahy Doesn’t Buy White House Lies (with the extra bonus clarification of the Cheney f*ck you to Leahy story).

The Whitehouse Coup

Document uncovers details of a planned coup in the USA in 1933 by a group of right-wing American businessmen.

The coup was aimed at toppling President Franklin D Roosevelt with the help of half-a-million war veterans. The plotters, who were alleged to involve some of the most famous families in America, (owners of Heinz, Birds Eye, Goodtea, Maxwell Hse & George Bush’s Grandfather, Prescott) believed that their country should adopt the policies of Hitler and Mussolini to beat the great depression.

Mike Thomson investigates why so little is known about this biggest ever peacetime threat to American democracy.

This looks interesting. How come I have never heard of this? Thank god they failed. And it looks like fascism runs in the Bush family.

One-quarter

Political Wire: Bush Hits 25% Approval

Wow. That's low.

The YouTube Debate questions

For democrats

Joe Biden on republican malarkey

Malarkey!

Slow posting

For the next two 1/2 months... or until my thesis is finished. Until then I will be posting at a very reduced rate...

have a good summer!

Inside The Surge

To continue...

The discussion on this post, here is another perspective on the current practice of development.

Wow

Want to ogle at the sad state of our media today, check this out

from here

these people really haven't left high-school.

Executive privilege trumps all

Another Bush surge: Escalating his own powers

Bush administration officials unveiled a bold new assertion of executive authority yesterday in the dispute over the firing of nine U.S. attorneys, saying that the Justice Department will never be allowed to pursue contempt charges initiated by Congress against White House officials once the president has invoked executive privilege.

The position presents serious legal and political obstacles for congressional Democrats, who have begun laying the groundwork for contempt proceedings against current and former White House officials in order to pry loose information about the dismissals.

Under federal law, a statutory contempt citation by the House or Senate must be submitted to the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, "whose duty it shall be to bring the matter before the grand jury for its action."

But administration officials argued yesterday that Congress has no power to force a U.S. attorney to pursue contempt charges in cases, such as the prosecutor firings, in which the president has declared that testimony or documents are protected from release by executive privilege. Officials pointed to a Justice Department legal opinion during the Reagan administration, which made the same argument in a case that was never resolved by the courts.

"A U.S. attorney would not be permitted to bring contempt charges or convene a grand jury in an executive privilege case," said a senior official, who said his remarks reflect a consensus within the administration. "And a U.S. attorney wouldn't be permitted to argue against the reasoned legal opinion that the Justice Department provided. No one should expect that to happen."

The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the issue publicly, added: "It has long been understood that, in circumstances like these, the constitutional prerogatives of the president would make it a futile and purely political act for Congress to refer contempt citations to U.S. attorneys."

Mark J. Rozell, a professor of public policy at George Mason University who has written a book on executive-privilege issues, called the administration's stance "astonishing."

"That's a breathtakingly broad view of the president's role in this system of separation of powers," Rozell said. "What this statement is saying is the president's claim of executive privilege trumps all."

Uzodinma Iweala

Stop Trying To 'Save' Africa

Perhaps most interesting is the language used to describe the Africa being saved. For example, the Keep a Child Alive/" I am African" ad campaign features portraits of primarily white, Western celebrities with painted "tribal markings" on their faces above "I AM AFRICAN" in bold letters. Below, smaller print says, "help us stop the dying."

Such campaigns, however well intentioned, promote the stereotype of Africa as a black hole of disease and death. News reports constantly focus on the continent's corrupt leaders, warlords, "tribal" conflicts, child laborers, and women disfigured by abuse and genital mutilation. These descriptions run under headlines like "Can Bono Save Africa?" or "Will Brangelina Save Africa?" The relationship between the West and Africa is no longer based on openly racist beliefs, but such articles are reminiscent of reports from the heyday of European colonialism, when missionaries were sent to Africa to introduce us to education, Jesus Christ and "civilization."

There is no African, myself included, who does not appreciate the help of the wider world, but we do question whether aid is genuine or given in the spirit of affirming one's cultural superiority. My mood is dampened every time I attend a benefit whose host runs through a litany of African disasters before presenting a (usually) wealthy, white person, who often proceeds to list the things he or she has done for the poor, starving Africans. Every time a well-meaning college student speaks of villagers dancing because they were so grateful for her help, I cringe. Every time a Hollywood director shoots a film about Africa that features a Western protagonist, I shake my head -- because Africans, real people though we may be, are used as props in the West's fantasy of itself. And not only do such depictions tend to ignore the West's prominent role in creating many of the unfortunate situations on the continent, they also ignore the incredible work Africans have done and continue to do to fix those problems.

Why do the media frequently refer to African countries as having been "granted independence from their colonial masters," as opposed to having fought and shed blood for their freedom? Why do Angelina Jolie and Bono receive overwhelming attention for their work in Africa while Nwankwo Kanu or Dikembe Mutombo, Africans both, are hardly ever mentioned? How is it that a former mid-level U.S. diplomat receives more attention for his cowboy antics in Sudan than do the numerous African Union countries that have sent food and troops and spent countless hours trying to negotiate a settlement among all parties in that crisis?

The true North, stoned and free

Canada is a nation of stoners

Well, only 16.8% of those between 15 to 64 use marijuana, compared to a global average of 3.8%. Not exactly a nation of stoners, but not bad.

'Give me your money'

make that a hug

It started about midnight June 16 when friends were finishing dinner outside a D.C. home, authorities and witnesses said. That's when a hooded man pointed a handgun at the girl's head.

''Give me your money, or I'll start shooting,'' he said, according to the witnesses.

One guest replied, "Why don't you have a glass of wine with us?'' said Cristina Rowan.

The intruder had a sip of Chateau Malescot St-Exupery and said, ''Damn, that's good wine.''

The would-be robber took another sip and put the gun in his sweat pants.

Then the man apologized.

''I think I may have come to the wrong house,'' he said. ''Can I get a hug?''

Rowan wrapped her arms around the man, and the four other guests followed.

The man walked away a few moments later. The group called 911.

Damn hippies.

Because our viewers demanded it

Iraq PM says...

Country can manage without U.S.

At what point to we honor their sovereignty?

Well, my guess is never because, well, Bush doesn't really understand the term:

Impeachment Panel Excerpt

"Impeachment is the cure for a constitutional crisis."

The Moore-Gupta spat continues

this time on Larry King Live

Although, now it is less interesting - just squabbling over facts, all of which still make Moore's point. Overall however, the more press the better. Finally, people willmight wake up to the problems with the system.

No more Friedman Units

Friedman finally gives up hope. Friedman argues for a time table withdrawal from Iraq. No more Friedman Units for him.

Actually, he argues that we should consider an 'all in' or 'all out' strategy. Since the 'all in' strategy is not politically feasible, then he is left with the 'all out' strategy. This means setting timetables for withdrawal, although not without first one last ditch diplomatic effort! But, what makes this more interesting is that it should be UN led not US led.

For all these reasons, I prefer setting a withdrawal date, but accompanying it with a last-ditch U.N.-led — not U.S. — diplomatic effort to get the Iraqi parties to resolve their political differences. If they can, then any withdrawal can be postponed. If they can’t agree — even with a gun to their heads about to go off — then staying is truly pointless and leaving by a set date is the only option.

While in general I am a fan of diplomacy, this is a silly idea. Why? Because Bush and Co. will never allow that to happen. Period. End of debate. I guess it comes down to withdrawal.

Panel moves to cut off funds to Cheney

WASHINGTON - Senate Democrats moved Tuesday to cut off funding for Vice President Dick Cheney's office in a continuing battle over whether he must comply with national security disclosure rules.

A Senate appropriations panel chaired by Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., refused to fund $4.8 million in the vice president's budget until Cheney's office complies with parts of an executive order governing its handling of classified information.

Michael Moore VS Wolf Blitzer - Round II

Going with the gut

This will show up on Colbert next week: Homeland Security chief warns of 'Increased risk’: Chertoff bases 'gut feeling' on history, al-Qaeda statements.

"Summertime seems to be appealing to them," he said of al-Qaeda. "We do worry that they are rebuilding their activities."

Still, Chertoff said there are not enough indications of an imminent plot to raise the current threat levels nationwide. And he indicated that his remarks were based on "a gut feeling" formed by past seasonal patterns of terrorist attacks, recent al-Qaeda statements, and intelligence he did not disclose.

DC Madam

Holy cow. The DC Madam has put all the phone records online. You can even go and download them... I downloaded one and they are in TIF image format.

Give the people a call :)

The first to admit

Michael Moore slams CNN, Wolf Blitzer on live TV

Scroll down and watch

And by the way, Lou Dobbs is a right Git, with a capital G.

France ruins all the Chili!

The Path to Happiness

Compassion

“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” - Dalai Lama

In experiments run by Davidson and published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers studied the brain functions of experienced meditators. Each of the practitioners - six were Buddhist monks and two were lay people - had completed over 10,000 (and up to 50,000) hours of meditation, which is about the same amount of time it takes to become expert in a musical instrument.

These experienced meditators were compared with a group of 10 students who had undertaken a week of meditative training involving 45 minutes of practice a day.

Davidson’s principal tool for examining the meditators was functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans, which reveal in real time which parts of the brain are most active. In earlier experiments Davidson had shown that fMRI can image where different emotional states take place in the brain. When people experience negative states such as anxiety or depression, brain areas that are most active are the amygdala and the right prefrontal cortex. When people experience positive emotions — happiness, love, confidence, etc — activity in the left prefrontal cortex is heightened. So remember: left is positive, right is negative.

In the more recent study, brain activity was studied both when the meditators’ brains were in a neutral state and while they cultivated unconditional loving-kindness (metta) and compassion. For the beginners there were only minor changes in brain activity between the neutral state and the meditation on lovingkindness, but for the experienced meditators there were massive changes — the degree of change being correlated with the number of hours of meditation each individual had done.

When the experienced meditators generated strong feelings of compassion there was a strong increase in activity in the left (or positive) side of the prefrontal cortex and a decrease in activity on the right (or negative) side. Developing compassion, then, results in the same kinds of brain activity that are shown when someone is in an particularly strong state of wellbeing and happiness. Meditators of course have long known experientially that feelings of love and compassion are accompanied by feelings of happiness, wellbeing, and even of bliss, but in scientific circles these subjective observations have to be backed up by measurements before they can be trusted as reliable data.

A DOJ Lawyer speaks out

Bush justice is a national disgrace

Playing catch-up

Stanford on iTunes U, Stanford's answer to MIT Open CourseWare

Good stuff.

Seeing Al Qaeda Around Every Corner - New York Times

Seeing Al Qaeda Around Every Corner

Why Bush and the military are emphasizing Al Qaeda to the virtual exclusion of other sources of violence in Iraq is an important story. So is the question of how well their version of events squares with the facts of a murky and rapidly changing situation on the ground.

But these are stories you haven’t been reading in The Times in recent weeks as the newspaper has slipped into a routine of quoting the president and the military uncritically about Al Qaeda’s role in Iraq — and sometimes citing the group itself without attribution.

And in using the language of the administration, the newspaper has also failed at times to distinguish between Al Qaeda, the group that attacked the United States on Sept. 11, and Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, an Iraqi group that didn’t even exist until after the American invasion.

There is plenty of evidence that Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia is but one of the challenges facing the United States military and that overemphasizing it distorts the true picture of what is happening there. While a president running out of time and policy options may want to talk about a single enemy that Americans hate and fear in the hope of uniting the country behind him, journalists have the obligation to ask tough questions about the accuracy of his statements.

Strange. Don't they know how the MSM is supposed to work?

Strange... blogger seems to be bloggered. Can't change the title.