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Thursday, January 29, 2004
CBS: "Bug off, MoveOn"
CBS is refusing to sell ad space on the Super Bowl to Democratic supporters MoveOn.org. Between this and the way they bent over for the Republican/conservative machine by not airing controversial documentary "The Reagans," I'm becoming convinced that CBS has gone over to the dark side. Not normally a big deal; media outlets that don't take sides are about as common as open-minded fundamentalists. I'm just adding them to my list of businesses to avoid.
You're invited to sign a petition in the following email from MoveOn:
Dear friends,
During this year's Super Bowl, you'll see ads sponsored by beer companies, tobacco companies, and the Bush White House. But you won't see the winning ad in MoveOn.org's "Voter Fund's Bush in 30 Seconds" ad contest.
CBS refuses to air it, deeming it too 'controversial'.
To check out the ad and ask CBS to air ads like this one, go to:
http://www.moveon.org/cbs/ad/
Aren't these the same clowns that put the Victoria's Secret "Fashion (no, it's not softcore, dammit) Show" on the air?
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You're invited to sign a petition in the following email from MoveOn:
Dear friends,
During this year's Super Bowl, you'll see ads sponsored by beer companies, tobacco companies, and the Bush White House. But you won't see the winning ad in MoveOn.org's "Voter Fund's Bush in 30 Seconds" ad contest.
CBS refuses to air it, deeming it too 'controversial'.
To check out the ad and ask CBS to air ads like this one, go to:
http://www.moveon.org/cbs/ad/
Aren't these the same clowns that put the Victoria's Secret "Fashion (no, it's not softcore, dammit) Show" on the air?
|
Governments Get GM Crop Pressure
Apparently there's a huge backlash against GM crops in Europe. I hope we're next (see Ruth's rant).
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Wednesday, January 28, 2004
Super Bowl Erection?
Not one... Not Two... But THREE erectile-dysfunction ads planned for the Super Bowl!
Well, I guess I can take solace that I am apparently not the only man with said problem... =;-p
Who's buying what at the Super Bowl
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Well, I guess I can take solace that I am apparently not the only man with said problem... =;-p
Who's buying what at the Super Bowl
|
Fun, yes...
France: The Seat of Culture
Boundin' Gets Noticed
Greg recently made mention of the new short from Pixar. It looks like someone else noticed them, too.
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Tuesday, January 27, 2004
Biology for Fun & Profit (It's all fun & games until someone pokes an eye out...)
Okay, here’s something I feel qualified to rant about. I did actually graduate with several degrees in biology and chemistry. I studied the life cycle and genetic rules of inheritance in Drosphila Melanogaster to exhaustion. I steeped in chemicals that have no doubt shortened my lifespan. I am not by any means anti-vivisectionist or even vegetarian so this is not a granola/hemp/Birkenstock/PETA-style rant. However, I promise to be long-winded, as usual.
Get ready for the biotech pollution problem.
For years scientists and biotech companies have been producing genetic chimeras like the geep (half goat, half sheep; why? Don’t ask...) to genetically modified crops like bacillus thirengiensis corn (kills pest corn borers but probably cross breeds with wild plants to inevitably kill the 99% beneficial larva/worms) to glow-in-the-dark tobacco (useless, harmful and useless). Not all, but some of these are going to be a blight, and the public will be left holding the bill when it comes time to try to clean up the aftermath. Extinctions will mean that in many circumstances there will be no going back. Some experiments have research validity, but these are not the ones rushing to produce a product for sale.
When humans started traveling effortlessly around the globe we took organisms we admired (and their pests) from the places we visited and brought them to our home ecosystems. Voila! Ecosystem destruction was underway. Gypsy moths, Asian beetles, house finches, kudzu, grasses, the list of pests that we now have to battle to maintain our native species is seemingly endless. The pests don’t just eat our native species or their food, they rarely provide us with any benefit at all, in fact we routinely inherit the jobs of the ousted species. Native species manage to feed us or maintain our food supply, generate (or moderate) our climate, combat erosion, and support other ecosystems downstream or downwind. Kill a forest here and there is no clean, oxygenated air to the east. Pollute the water and kill organisms that helpfully “breathe” our extensive CO2 emissions. You do not have to “develop” a forest to kill it, just drive off a seemingly harmless species like a gray squirrel.
Biotech companies are bargaining that few people understand or care about the necessity for naturally selected biodiversity. Granted, the topic is very complex and the majority of us have had little relevant education, especially in science. Fewer yet understand the subtle mechanisms for natural selection. Some species are slated to die off as their mutated offspring turn out to be even more successful and useful to the ecology. Biologists spend lifetimes trying to understand the inter-relatedness of species and each individual’s contribution. Each tiny participant has a place where it survived long genetic selection and adaptation. All species are interrelated in each ecosystem and you cannot pluck one out and not expect dire repercussions to the rest. Take away the food something has been bred to eat and it suffers. Take a predator away and another species breeds until it exceeds it’s own food supply, devastates other populations or becomes diseased. Note that most species do not have as varied a diet as humans try for, so a single omission is catastrophic.
In the grand scheme of science, gene splicing is relatively easy to do. Compared to natural selection it is obscenely easy to wreak havoc. We have techniques that can allow scientists to isolate bits of genetic sequencing and extract a certain trait from a species. They then splice this into another species, one that would have never been able to breed with the first, and see what happens. Just like in natural selection, the results are not always favorable. Sometimes the result doesn’t live, or lives a short, unproductive, even tortured life. Sometimes the plant or animal lives, and then everyone congratulates themselves for being so cool, patents it and the race to get someone to buy it begins. Do these scientists really know all of the things they just spliced in and their consequences? No, of course not. It’s an only slightly educated gamble. Keep in mind that the relatively short genetic sequence of the fruit fly (14,000 genes with 165 million bases compared to humans at about 70,000 genes and 3.3 billion bases) was mapped only about three years ago. Mapping is only a first step in understanding genotypes and phenotypes. Many more years of research are required to be able to conclusively understand an organism. We’re not even this far along with more complex species.
An example of low-tech gene mixing was the liger or tigon (tiger and lion mix, names depend on which species was the father). Here is a cat that has no idea what it wants; is it solitary or pride-oriented? These species would never have existed naturally and have no environment in which they are comfortable. Was it good to create some just because we could? Zoologists and others reacted badly to the discovery of these animals mainly because some redneck with his roadside zoo developed them as side show freaks. Luckily, most of these animals are sterile. If a major biotech interest had come up with it as a ‘means to provide genetic diversity to the two declining species’ we might have had a different result. Would this be any better for the resulting animals? No. Would the argument have been valid? No. But you only have to lobby a bureaucrat to back your argument to get your marginal value species to market. Gene spliced species are not sufficiently tested for their potential hazards to the natural environment.
Cloning is another issue. Suppose your geep grows faster and stronger than any other. Now you want to clone it so all geeps everywhere are just as sturdy; in fact, identically sturdy. You can now guarantee your stakeholders that a designated number of pounds of geep will hit the market within exactly so-and-so many months. But now one disease, even a congenital one that was unpredicted, can wipe out all geeps just as fast as they were created, and along with them go all the geep-industry jobs. Mutations and variations within a species promote long-term viability. They just don’t make for tidy, predictable profit margins. This generation will likely see the extinction of a number of food species resulting from this kind of short-sightedness, including readily available (but no longer genetically diverse) bananas.
Impossibly large chemical companies are no longer satisfied with the production of poisons to deal with early species contaminations. Don’t get me wrong, they do still love their chemicals. One of them came up with a pill that now circulates poison in your pet’s blood to kill fleas (let’s hope Spot isn’t prone to cancer). Another came up with a hormone that makes cows produce milk like they’re made of udders, even though the milk industry was already in a glut (serving only to drive family farms out of business). They are even suing organic farmers who carry the “No BGH” label for implying that the hormone-driven, molecularly-altered milk is somehow less desirable.
According to Jeremy Rifkin, author of The Biotech Century, the biotech/agtech industry have set their commercial ambitions on planting the whole globe with genetically modified crops within eight(!) growing seasons. Few of these refined, homogenized crops have done much good for human health. Note the daily revelations about diseases linked to tobacco use and high-carbohydrate, low-nutrition foods.
Even the beef industry is proving to be more trouble than they’re worth. Growing today’s high-cholesterol cows takes more resources in air, water, land and calories than they return in food value (yes, they’re tasty, I know). Don’t get too excited about substituting other animals in your diet, though. Questionable industry practices and human disease links are probably out there, waiting to be discovered as ag firms ramp up production to take up the slack in beef consumption. Pigs, for example, have a nasty retrovirus that’s just itching to jump into a new host.
Remember the EPA Superfund? Did you notice the massive chemical contamination cleanup costs? Probably not, since they just came quietly out of your taxes. Are you aware of how much these cleanups still cost? Admittedly less lately, since this administration doesn’t place much emphasis on the environment, but just wait: the chemicals are still out there. Chemicals and inorganic contaminants have the nice habit of remaining, well, chemicals and inorganic contaminants and staying relatively put. A few unfortunate individuals happen to consume them and die, but rarely do they annihilate a whole class of organisms. Life forms, however, will run away, far away, and end up in all kinds of environments where they may prove useless but strangely more successful than the useful native residents. Rarely, we luck out and they’re just a nuisance. For example, as flood escapees Chinese carp are making the Missouri river a bit hazardous to boaters. However, there’s always the risk that once the errant species runs off to do its worst, we’re left with an unbearably large cleanup that makes our chemical problems seem petty in comparison.
Recent news of commercial gene twiddling gives me pause. I envision a scenario where some well-meaning youngsters, just after seeing Finding Nemo, decide to let their genetically modified glow-in-the-dark fishies swim free. This is not uncommon; people let pretty outrageously unsuitable pets go all of the time. Cats, snakes and alligators are often turned loose on the wild. Let’s say these cute little fish monstrosities breed with a local population and yield a species that no longer does its job in the environment. Yippee, one more victory for the freedom of commerce.
And don’t tell me that all fish that you flush die. I remember a few years ago when fish lovers lamented the cleaning of the sewage tanks in Malta, Illinois. Draining these tanks resulted in the deaths of 5,000 or so goldfish. Malta’s system was thankfully landlocked. Some wastewater systems dump into waterways every year, especially during floods. I realize that many cosmetically gene-altered fish are saltwater fish that would die in the fresh water of a toilet (like Nemo should have, actually - clownfish are saltwater fish). Still, kids with tropical aquariums know that they can’t use fresh water in them. Determined to liberate his fish friends, he might find a beach, a salt marsh, or whatever. The risk that a gene-hacked pet can get into the wild is still there.
I have worked for other biotech companies that have get their profits from finding natural compounds and producing analogues of them to battle diseases like cancer. Their ambitions are no less commercial, but the resulting products provide no species destruction, including the species that gave them the initial compound. In fact, die-offs are not in their best interests as they will have fewer compounds to test for their value. These companies may have the most to gain from promoting healthier, diverse ecosystems.
Not since the end of the Cretaceous period have the ecosystems of the world been under more stress. Mass species die-offs are here. Less ROI-motivated scientists and bioethicists refer to it as "the sixth extinction." Extinctions tend to roll uphill, just like the chemical contamination. The top of the food chain is the most likely to suffer, today that means humans. The upshot of redesigning the speciation of the globe by those with more power than knowledge may leave us with less need to join groups like VHEMT. Our extermination may already be certain.
Theists are calling this the “next genesis.” Their arguments would be scoffed at less if they stopped yelling about biotech “playing God” and spent more time explaining to the simpler set that it takes more than average human knowledge to successfully play with the natural balance. Clearly we have been given (divinely?) the knowledge to do the damage, perhaps a little patience would bring us to the point where we could do the tinkering to good effect. Faith aside, morality should still come in to play and the scientific community as a whole should “do no harm.”
Well, time to buy those heirloom, organic garden seeds and native garden plants...
|
Get ready for the biotech pollution problem.
For years scientists and biotech companies have been producing genetic chimeras like the geep (half goat, half sheep; why? Don’t ask...) to genetically modified crops like bacillus thirengiensis corn (kills pest corn borers but probably cross breeds with wild plants to inevitably kill the 99% beneficial larva/worms) to glow-in-the-dark tobacco (useless, harmful and useless). Not all, but some of these are going to be a blight, and the public will be left holding the bill when it comes time to try to clean up the aftermath. Extinctions will mean that in many circumstances there will be no going back. Some experiments have research validity, but these are not the ones rushing to produce a product for sale.
When humans started traveling effortlessly around the globe we took organisms we admired (and their pests) from the places we visited and brought them to our home ecosystems. Voila! Ecosystem destruction was underway. Gypsy moths, Asian beetles, house finches, kudzu, grasses, the list of pests that we now have to battle to maintain our native species is seemingly endless. The pests don’t just eat our native species or their food, they rarely provide us with any benefit at all, in fact we routinely inherit the jobs of the ousted species. Native species manage to feed us or maintain our food supply, generate (or moderate) our climate, combat erosion, and support other ecosystems downstream or downwind. Kill a forest here and there is no clean, oxygenated air to the east. Pollute the water and kill organisms that helpfully “breathe” our extensive CO2 emissions. You do not have to “develop” a forest to kill it, just drive off a seemingly harmless species like a gray squirrel.
Biotech companies are bargaining that few people understand or care about the necessity for naturally selected biodiversity. Granted, the topic is very complex and the majority of us have had little relevant education, especially in science. Fewer yet understand the subtle mechanisms for natural selection. Some species are slated to die off as their mutated offspring turn out to be even more successful and useful to the ecology. Biologists spend lifetimes trying to understand the inter-relatedness of species and each individual’s contribution. Each tiny participant has a place where it survived long genetic selection and adaptation. All species are interrelated in each ecosystem and you cannot pluck one out and not expect dire repercussions to the rest. Take away the food something has been bred to eat and it suffers. Take a predator away and another species breeds until it exceeds it’s own food supply, devastates other populations or becomes diseased. Note that most species do not have as varied a diet as humans try for, so a single omission is catastrophic.
In the grand scheme of science, gene splicing is relatively easy to do. Compared to natural selection it is obscenely easy to wreak havoc. We have techniques that can allow scientists to isolate bits of genetic sequencing and extract a certain trait from a species. They then splice this into another species, one that would have never been able to breed with the first, and see what happens. Just like in natural selection, the results are not always favorable. Sometimes the result doesn’t live, or lives a short, unproductive, even tortured life. Sometimes the plant or animal lives, and then everyone congratulates themselves for being so cool, patents it and the race to get someone to buy it begins. Do these scientists really know all of the things they just spliced in and their consequences? No, of course not. It’s an only slightly educated gamble. Keep in mind that the relatively short genetic sequence of the fruit fly (14,000 genes with 165 million bases compared to humans at about 70,000 genes and 3.3 billion bases) was mapped only about three years ago. Mapping is only a first step in understanding genotypes and phenotypes. Many more years of research are required to be able to conclusively understand an organism. We’re not even this far along with more complex species.
An example of low-tech gene mixing was the liger or tigon (tiger and lion mix, names depend on which species was the father). Here is a cat that has no idea what it wants; is it solitary or pride-oriented? These species would never have existed naturally and have no environment in which they are comfortable. Was it good to create some just because we could? Zoologists and others reacted badly to the discovery of these animals mainly because some redneck with his roadside zoo developed them as side show freaks. Luckily, most of these animals are sterile. If a major biotech interest had come up with it as a ‘means to provide genetic diversity to the two declining species’ we might have had a different result. Would this be any better for the resulting animals? No. Would the argument have been valid? No. But you only have to lobby a bureaucrat to back your argument to get your marginal value species to market. Gene spliced species are not sufficiently tested for their potential hazards to the natural environment.
Cloning is another issue. Suppose your geep grows faster and stronger than any other. Now you want to clone it so all geeps everywhere are just as sturdy; in fact, identically sturdy. You can now guarantee your stakeholders that a designated number of pounds of geep will hit the market within exactly so-and-so many months. But now one disease, even a congenital one that was unpredicted, can wipe out all geeps just as fast as they were created, and along with them go all the geep-industry jobs. Mutations and variations within a species promote long-term viability. They just don’t make for tidy, predictable profit margins. This generation will likely see the extinction of a number of food species resulting from this kind of short-sightedness, including readily available (but no longer genetically diverse) bananas.
Impossibly large chemical companies are no longer satisfied with the production of poisons to deal with early species contaminations. Don’t get me wrong, they do still love their chemicals. One of them came up with a pill that now circulates poison in your pet’s blood to kill fleas (let’s hope Spot isn’t prone to cancer). Another came up with a hormone that makes cows produce milk like they’re made of udders, even though the milk industry was already in a glut (serving only to drive family farms out of business). They are even suing organic farmers who carry the “No BGH” label for implying that the hormone-driven, molecularly-altered milk is somehow less desirable.
According to Jeremy Rifkin, author of The Biotech Century, the biotech/agtech industry have set their commercial ambitions on planting the whole globe with genetically modified crops within eight(!) growing seasons. Few of these refined, homogenized crops have done much good for human health. Note the daily revelations about diseases linked to tobacco use and high-carbohydrate, low-nutrition foods.
Even the beef industry is proving to be more trouble than they’re worth. Growing today’s high-cholesterol cows takes more resources in air, water, land and calories than they return in food value (yes, they’re tasty, I know). Don’t get too excited about substituting other animals in your diet, though. Questionable industry practices and human disease links are probably out there, waiting to be discovered as ag firms ramp up production to take up the slack in beef consumption. Pigs, for example, have a nasty retrovirus that’s just itching to jump into a new host.
Remember the EPA Superfund? Did you notice the massive chemical contamination cleanup costs? Probably not, since they just came quietly out of your taxes. Are you aware of how much these cleanups still cost? Admittedly less lately, since this administration doesn’t place much emphasis on the environment, but just wait: the chemicals are still out there. Chemicals and inorganic contaminants have the nice habit of remaining, well, chemicals and inorganic contaminants and staying relatively put. A few unfortunate individuals happen to consume them and die, but rarely do they annihilate a whole class of organisms. Life forms, however, will run away, far away, and end up in all kinds of environments where they may prove useless but strangely more successful than the useful native residents. Rarely, we luck out and they’re just a nuisance. For example, as flood escapees Chinese carp are making the Missouri river a bit hazardous to boaters. However, there’s always the risk that once the errant species runs off to do its worst, we’re left with an unbearably large cleanup that makes our chemical problems seem petty in comparison.
Recent news of commercial gene twiddling gives me pause. I envision a scenario where some well-meaning youngsters, just after seeing Finding Nemo, decide to let their genetically modified glow-in-the-dark fishies swim free. This is not uncommon; people let pretty outrageously unsuitable pets go all of the time. Cats, snakes and alligators are often turned loose on the wild. Let’s say these cute little fish monstrosities breed with a local population and yield a species that no longer does its job in the environment. Yippee, one more victory for the freedom of commerce.
And don’t tell me that all fish that you flush die. I remember a few years ago when fish lovers lamented the cleaning of the sewage tanks in Malta, Illinois. Draining these tanks resulted in the deaths of 5,000 or so goldfish. Malta’s system was thankfully landlocked. Some wastewater systems dump into waterways every year, especially during floods. I realize that many cosmetically gene-altered fish are saltwater fish that would die in the fresh water of a toilet (like Nemo should have, actually - clownfish are saltwater fish). Still, kids with tropical aquariums know that they can’t use fresh water in them. Determined to liberate his fish friends, he might find a beach, a salt marsh, or whatever. The risk that a gene-hacked pet can get into the wild is still there.
I have worked for other biotech companies that have get their profits from finding natural compounds and producing analogues of them to battle diseases like cancer. Their ambitions are no less commercial, but the resulting products provide no species destruction, including the species that gave them the initial compound. In fact, die-offs are not in their best interests as they will have fewer compounds to test for their value. These companies may have the most to gain from promoting healthier, diverse ecosystems.
Not since the end of the Cretaceous period have the ecosystems of the world been under more stress. Mass species die-offs are here. Less ROI-motivated scientists and bioethicists refer to it as "the sixth extinction." Extinctions tend to roll uphill, just like the chemical contamination. The top of the food chain is the most likely to suffer, today that means humans. The upshot of redesigning the speciation of the globe by those with more power than knowledge may leave us with less need to join groups like VHEMT. Our extermination may already be certain.
Theists are calling this the “next genesis.” Their arguments would be scoffed at less if they stopped yelling about biotech “playing God” and spent more time explaining to the simpler set that it takes more than average human knowledge to successfully play with the natural balance. Clearly we have been given (divinely?) the knowledge to do the damage, perhaps a little patience would bring us to the point where we could do the tinkering to good effect. Faith aside, morality should still come in to play and the scientific community as a whole should “do no harm.”
Well, time to buy those heirloom, organic garden seeds and native garden plants...
|
Huge shift in the social makeup or just television?
Dennis Miller, in case you haven't heard yet, signed on at CNBC as a talk show host. I'm surprised to find that he's now calling himself a conservative, since I typically associate conservatism in America with working-class poverty and blind faith (in whatever – if a conservative chooses to believe in something, he goes whole hog and no amount of reason will change his mind).
I remember liking Dennis Miller's SNL and HBO stuff quite a bit. He seemed to question pretty much every slightly irrational thing with equal opprobrium. His rants always seemed to indicate some critical thinking, albeit taken to a comic extreme.
I don't associate critical thinking with conservatism. (The fact that George W. Bush enjoys an amazingly high approval rating in spite of massive job losses, flagrant pandering to business interests and a “war on terrorism” that isn't going anywhere suggests this idea has some merit.) Watching Dennis Miller come out of this particular closet is a surprise.
Maybe he's simply blowing with the wind. Taking a job at a conservative media outlet probably requires a certain amount of “old boy” proselytizing, and I'm reasonably sure that he, like everyone else today, is willing to make a little extra effort for a steady paycheck. After all, he is just a face-for-hire, like any other entertainer. Still, it feels dirty.
On the flipside we have Michael Moore. He's an award-winning documentary maker and a professional goad, best known for throwing searchlights on ethically gray business practices. He's had at least two TV series (I was a fan of NBC's TV Nation, although by the end of it's relatively short run it had gotten a little shrill). Most of all, Michael Moore is a liberal.
Many very large corporations evolve behaviors designed to farm people for their money. For example, most people don't realize that when their banks process their checks, they process the largest ones first. This allows them to drain an account more quickly, which, if they can get to a zero balance, permits them the maximum number of overdraft fees. While this is perfectly legal, it also sucks, and Michael Moore tells everyone about it. He's a counterbalance, trying to keep us from being simply picked clean and discarded.
He must have some kind of brain to spot this sort of thing, and he does keep talking people into putting him on camera. I had pigeonholed him as an intellectual liberal, which is fine with me. I like intellectual liberals. They tend to build schools, and avoid invading other countries.
Surprise, again! Moore's latest book, Stupid White Men, is offensively jingoistic and painfully, obviously dumbed-down. Wha...?!?
Politics seems to break down into two broad schools. In one, important ideas are broken down into bumper stickers and thrust at the public using techniques perfected in infomercials and multi-level marketing schemes. The goal is just to get your vote. Representing you comes a distant second. This is a bad thing.
In the other, discourse critical to the government of our country is reserved to a few people who can demonstrate both an understanding of the issues and an ability to make good decisions for their constituents. The goal is the best outcome for the greatest number. This is a good thing, when it's not corrupted in some way.
Stupid White Men seems to be doing the bad thing, albeit for the good guys. Is this okay? Shouldn't the good guys be taking the high road? Or does the end justify the means? The Democratic National Committee's web site is also becoming a little light on issues and much heavier on bumper sticker politics. This is a disturbing trend.
It looks like maybe American society underwent some fundamental shift while I wasn't looking. Dennis Miller and Michael Moore absolutely fail to behave in the expected manner. The Republicans somehow manage to run away with election after election and the bulk of public support. The Democrats have lost the ability to lead and flail around at one another. I'm going to give it a couple more years, but if things don't straighten up after that I'm going to have to re-assess my options. Maybe I can join that moonbase thingie.
|
I remember liking Dennis Miller's SNL and HBO stuff quite a bit. He seemed to question pretty much every slightly irrational thing with equal opprobrium. His rants always seemed to indicate some critical thinking, albeit taken to a comic extreme.
I don't associate critical thinking with conservatism. (The fact that George W. Bush enjoys an amazingly high approval rating in spite of massive job losses, flagrant pandering to business interests and a “war on terrorism” that isn't going anywhere suggests this idea has some merit.) Watching Dennis Miller come out of this particular closet is a surprise.
Maybe he's simply blowing with the wind. Taking a job at a conservative media outlet probably requires a certain amount of “old boy” proselytizing, and I'm reasonably sure that he, like everyone else today, is willing to make a little extra effort for a steady paycheck. After all, he is just a face-for-hire, like any other entertainer. Still, it feels dirty.
On the flipside we have Michael Moore. He's an award-winning documentary maker and a professional goad, best known for throwing searchlights on ethically gray business practices. He's had at least two TV series (I was a fan of NBC's TV Nation, although by the end of it's relatively short run it had gotten a little shrill). Most of all, Michael Moore is a liberal.
Many very large corporations evolve behaviors designed to farm people for their money. For example, most people don't realize that when their banks process their checks, they process the largest ones first. This allows them to drain an account more quickly, which, if they can get to a zero balance, permits them the maximum number of overdraft fees. While this is perfectly legal, it also sucks, and Michael Moore tells everyone about it. He's a counterbalance, trying to keep us from being simply picked clean and discarded.
He must have some kind of brain to spot this sort of thing, and he does keep talking people into putting him on camera. I had pigeonholed him as an intellectual liberal, which is fine with me. I like intellectual liberals. They tend to build schools, and avoid invading other countries.
Surprise, again! Moore's latest book, Stupid White Men, is offensively jingoistic and painfully, obviously dumbed-down. Wha...?!?
Politics seems to break down into two broad schools. In one, important ideas are broken down into bumper stickers and thrust at the public using techniques perfected in infomercials and multi-level marketing schemes. The goal is just to get your vote. Representing you comes a distant second. This is a bad thing.
In the other, discourse critical to the government of our country is reserved to a few people who can demonstrate both an understanding of the issues and an ability to make good decisions for their constituents. The goal is the best outcome for the greatest number. This is a good thing, when it's not corrupted in some way.
Stupid White Men seems to be doing the bad thing, albeit for the good guys. Is this okay? Shouldn't the good guys be taking the high road? Or does the end justify the means? The Democratic National Committee's web site is also becoming a little light on issues and much heavier on bumper sticker politics. This is a disturbing trend.
It looks like maybe American society underwent some fundamental shift while I wasn't looking. Dennis Miller and Michael Moore absolutely fail to behave in the expected manner. The Republicans somehow manage to run away with election after election and the bulk of public support. The Democrats have lost the ability to lead and flail around at one another. I'm going to give it a couple more years, but if things don't straighten up after that I'm going to have to re-assess my options. Maybe I can join that moonbase thingie.
|
Monday, January 26, 2004
MXC
Okay, I've put off telling people long enough about this show...
Most Extreme Elimination Challenge
I have literally been watching this from the first episode last fall...
It is truly one of the funniest shows I have seen in many a moon!!
(Yes, that gets not one, but TWO exclamation marks!!)
The gist is that they have taken a old 80's Japanese game show called Takeshi's Castle (where people willingly tried to do goofy and weird stunts anyway), re-edited it down to 30 minutes, showing only the funny/painful mishaps. And, yes, "funny/painful" can be in the same phrase here because, unlike shows like "America's Funniest Home Videos" (which I refuse to link here, BTW), where you are supposed to laugh at people having unplanned accidents of fate (which are usually quite painful and embarrasing, especially ones of kids), ALL of the contestants chose to be on the show, and KNEW they would probably be banged up in some way. So when you see someone crunch one of their appendages... yes, it usually is quite funny.
But what truly makes it consistently over-the-top funny is that the fact that they have also re-dubbed the original Japanese voice-over with some of the wackiest, funniest snide comments by two new guys. And they invent two teams to play against each other... for example, here's one episode's tease:
We pit the hard-working Home Improvement industry against the even harder-working Adult Entertainment profession, plus a very special musical competition featuring the brutally honest Elimination Idol judges. Games included: ROTATING SURFBOARD OF DEATH, DASH TO DEATH, DOPE ON A ROPE, and ELIMINATION IDOL.
Trust me, it is damn funny. Check it out at various times all week on SpikeTV, channel 325 on DirecTV (which is way better than cable here in Chicago anyway).
|
Most Extreme Elimination Challenge
I have literally been watching this from the first episode last fall...
It is truly one of the funniest shows I have seen in many a moon!!
(Yes, that gets not one, but TWO exclamation marks!!)
The gist is that they have taken a old 80's Japanese game show called Takeshi's Castle (where people willingly tried to do goofy and weird stunts anyway), re-edited it down to 30 minutes, showing only the funny/painful mishaps. And, yes, "funny/painful" can be in the same phrase here because, unlike shows like "America's Funniest Home Videos" (which I refuse to link here, BTW), where you are supposed to laugh at people having unplanned accidents of fate (which are usually quite painful and embarrasing, especially ones of kids), ALL of the contestants chose to be on the show, and KNEW they would probably be banged up in some way. So when you see someone crunch one of their appendages... yes, it usually is quite funny.
But what truly makes it consistently over-the-top funny is that the fact that they have also re-dubbed the original Japanese voice-over with some of the wackiest, funniest snide comments by two new guys. And they invent two teams to play against each other... for example, here's one episode's tease:
We pit the hard-working Home Improvement industry against the even harder-working Adult Entertainment profession, plus a very special musical competition featuring the brutally honest Elimination Idol judges. Games included: ROTATING SURFBOARD OF DEATH, DASH TO DEATH, DOPE ON A ROPE, and ELIMINATION IDOL.
Trust me, it is damn funny. Check it out at various times all week on SpikeTV, channel 325 on DirecTV (which is way better than cable here in Chicago anyway).
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Friday, January 23, 2004
Dean Go Boom
I've been a solid Howard Dean supporter up to this point, but that concession rant/speech in Iowa was pretty tough to take. With the media smelling blood in the water, I'm wondering how much longer he's got. I need to do some more reading, I don't know enough about Kerry yet. Sadly, Dean is the only candidate I've ever seen offer concrete, workable solutions for any contemporary problems. Everyone else is still functioning in sound bite mode. Hopefully there's some substance on his web site. Whatever, anyone but Bush.
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Technical Difficulties...
We seem to have had a couple of posts disappear into the bit bucket. I'd blame Blogger, but they don't seem to actually know anything either (their support guys, while willing to reply to requests for help, generally stick to copy & paste answers to technical problems - not usually helpful). We'll see if we can get them back shortly.
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Thursday, January 22, 2004
I'm burning for you…
Since my original SuperDrive (that's a DVD-R burner for you non-apple plebeians) melted (post warranty, natch), I've been hankerin' for a replacement, but unwilling to pay the perpetual $200 price tag that Pioneer drives go for (is that a run-on sentence or what?). Especially since other low-end drives have dropped to about $80.....
So why don't I get the el cheapo drives since I am an admitted el cheapo, you may ask? Well, I wanted the Pioneer model since that is virtually the only model Apple supports with its iLife Suite of applications (iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD). I don't do a whole lot of movie burning, but I've been wanting to learn more about it (and experiment). And that can't be done without said dern superdrive, so it chafes me... (no really, it does!)
Well, a nice rush project gave me a sweet payday, and I was ready to splurge. El cheapo of course has to scout around for a good deal. I googled then pricewatched, and came upon a very good deal from a site called ACCUPC.com.
Pioneer DVR-106 4X DVD +/- R/RW Internal IDE Drive OEM (No Software)
Order Total: $116.75
Sweet! Much less than I intended on paying, and only about a $20-30 premium (with no annoying rebates to send in, ala OfficeMax)!
Me happy now. And apologies to Blue Oyster Cult.
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So why don't I get the el cheapo drives since I am an admitted el cheapo, you may ask? Well, I wanted the Pioneer model since that is virtually the only model Apple supports with its iLife Suite of applications (iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD). I don't do a whole lot of movie burning, but I've been wanting to learn more about it (and experiment). And that can't be done without said dern superdrive, so it chafes me... (no really, it does!)
Well, a nice rush project gave me a sweet payday, and I was ready to splurge. El cheapo of course has to scout around for a good deal. I googled then pricewatched, and came upon a very good deal from a site called ACCUPC.com.
Pioneer DVR-106 4X DVD +/- R/RW Internal IDE Drive OEM (No Software)
Order Total: $116.75
Sweet! Much less than I intended on paying, and only about a $20-30 premium (with no annoying rebates to send in, ala OfficeMax)!
Me happy now. And apologies to Blue Oyster Cult.
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Tuesday, January 20, 2004
Pixar - Boundin'
The wife and I may be the only ones in the world who were disappointed in "Finding Nemo" (visually stunning, but just not as funny as their earlier works) but I still love Pixar. Hell, I owned Pixar Typography, back when Pixar was only a software company...
Well, they have another film in the works, so...
Pixar - Boundin'
Get a sneak peek!
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Well, they have another film in the works, so...
Pixar - Boundin'
Get a sneak peek!
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Monday, January 19, 2004
Cheese?
Okay, I realize this is going to sound absurd, but have you noticed a shortage of Swiss cheese lately? In the course of trying to assemble a very nice French onion soup, I went to the local Jewel (Albertson's for you California people) and found that they were completely out of stock. Normally, not even worth mentioning, right? But, they haven't consistenly stocked it for almost a year now. I quizzed the stock manager for the dairy section, and he tells me that they do seem to run out a lot. When pressed, he frowned and agreed that they have a harder time getting it into the store than other cheeses.
I asked him if there had been some huge Swiss cheese accident somewhere. He paused, visibly subtracted a few points from his estimate of my intelligence, and said, "No, I don't think so." I thanked him and fled to the checkouts.
Take a look next time you go to the store. How much Swiss cheese is there in comparison to the other stuff? Pretty weird.
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I asked him if there had been some huge Swiss cheese accident somewhere. He paused, visibly subtracted a few points from his estimate of my intelligence, and said, "No, I don't think so." I thanked him and fled to the checkouts.
Take a look next time you go to the store. How much Swiss cheese is there in comparison to the other stuff? Pretty weird.
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Sunday, January 18, 2004
Google: 2003 Year-End Zeitgeist
Since graphic design is mainly information design with window dressing, I admit to be sometimes fascinated by what John Q. Public's interests are... And who has the best pulse of said public? Why, GOOGLE, natch!
That said, there is quite an interesting assortment of what people were searching for in the last year... Zeitgeist indeed!
But why was Marilyn Manson the #9 for Popular Men?? Are we even sure he is a he?
Of course, the same could be said of UK's #1 search.... Prince Charles?? Was Sir Charles really that much more interesting than Paris Hilton?
My favorite is still Japan's #5 パナウェーブ研究所. But be scared... The most popular food-related search term for 2003 in Japan was McDonald's. And the most popular health-related query was viagra.
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That said, there is quite an interesting assortment of what people were searching for in the last year... Zeitgeist indeed!
But why was Marilyn Manson the #9 for Popular Men?? Are we even sure he is a he?
Of course, the same could be said of UK's #1 search.... Prince Charles?? Was Sir Charles really that much more interesting than Paris Hilton?
My favorite is still Japan's #5 パナウェーブ研究所. But be scared... The most popular food-related search term for 2003 in Japan was McDonald's. And the most popular health-related query was viagra.
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Friday, January 16, 2004
Of all the things to get upset about in the world today...
Geez, are some people (and apparently some reporters as well) completely out of touch with the world...
Here's my favorite quote...
'I think it's monstrous,' David Thomson, a critic, said. 'It's one of those signs of the decadence in our film business altogether.'
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Here's my favorite quote...
'I think it's monstrous,' David Thomson, a critic, said. 'It's one of those signs of the decadence in our film business altogether.'
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Thursday, January 15, 2004
Now that's an expensive bird!
some info on archiving
The other day, I was having a chat with a friend, who has jumped into the digital revolution whole-heartedly for digital filmaking... G5, superdrive, digital videocam, etc, etc. He was so proud of himself on how much money he would be saving on media costs, since he was planning on compressing all his DV and burning it on DVD-Rs, and then re-using his DV. Which is all good, except he thought he'd be able to build this massive library of all his video work for the rest of his life.
I tried warning him that, while the CD-R/DVD-R manufacturers of the world have (seemingly) gotten their shit together in terms of producing consistent quality of media (remember the early days of CD-Rs, when you prayed you did not buy a faulty batch?? Okay, well I do...), they still are not perfect. Plus, CDs and DVDs do not make a good long-term backup solution. Of course, he did not believe me, saying industry experts all said it was the best option, blah blah blah....
Why do people not believe me?
The definitive reference has to be The Library of Congress, where specifically they talk about "Building Digital Collections".
Another cool one (no pun intended) is CoOL, a project of the Preservation Department of Stanford University Libraries.
This one is a bit old, CD-R Media Survey, but still proves the point that you can't trust the media itself to be reliable.
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I tried warning him that, while the CD-R/DVD-R manufacturers of the world have (seemingly) gotten their shit together in terms of producing consistent quality of media (remember the early days of CD-Rs, when you prayed you did not buy a faulty batch?? Okay, well I do...), they still are not perfect. Plus, CDs and DVDs do not make a good long-term backup solution. Of course, he did not believe me, saying industry experts all said it was the best option, blah blah blah....
Why do people not believe me?
The definitive reference has to be The Library of Congress, where specifically they talk about "Building Digital Collections".
Another cool one (no pun intended) is CoOL, a project of the Preservation Department of Stanford University Libraries.
This one is a bit old, CD-R Media Survey, but still proves the point that you can't trust the media itself to be reliable.
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Tuesday, January 13, 2004
My wish list…
MoveOn.org's Ads - Must See...
Go look at MoveOn.org's Bush ad contest winners. If there is anything you can do to help get these seen on the air in your community, please do it. "Child's Pay" in particular is the most moving message I've seen about our modern economic nightmare, especially since I have two kids.
Americans now face a foreign policy that has galvanized our every enemy in the world; a corporate environment that has killed the biggest tech industry on earth and continues to ship every job it can out of the U.S.; rapacious war profiteering by Halliburton and The Carlyle Group; cynical and unconstitutional abuse of our due process rights; Huey Long-style, old-boy, buddy-network dealmaking; and leadership with an obvious disdain for critical thinking in favor of "taking action," whatever the result.
For some reason, Bush keeps polling well, especially against the current batch of Dem candidates. How in the world is anyone voting for this man? What am I missing? Please, someone start a public discussion of this in the national discourse. Democratic National Committee, why aren't people screaming day and night about this? The media is full of no-spin or pro-Bush-spin coverage, and there is literally no one getting traction on the other side of these issues. The candidates are knifing each other instead of taking the real issues on the stump. Help! Start getting some issue rallys going! Get some people without any political capital at stake to start saying something provocative. Get some coverage on them! Now! Or mass opinion will have too much momentum to ever get turned around during Bush's $120 million campaign media blitz.
The Bushs' have a history of one-term presidencies. Let's keep it going.
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Americans now face a foreign policy that has galvanized our every enemy in the world; a corporate environment that has killed the biggest tech industry on earth and continues to ship every job it can out of the U.S.; rapacious war profiteering by Halliburton and The Carlyle Group; cynical and unconstitutional abuse of our due process rights; Huey Long-style, old-boy, buddy-network dealmaking; and leadership with an obvious disdain for critical thinking in favor of "taking action," whatever the result.
For some reason, Bush keeps polling well, especially against the current batch of Dem candidates. How in the world is anyone voting for this man? What am I missing? Please, someone start a public discussion of this in the national discourse. Democratic National Committee, why aren't people screaming day and night about this? The media is full of no-spin or pro-Bush-spin coverage, and there is literally no one getting traction on the other side of these issues. The candidates are knifing each other instead of taking the real issues on the stump. Help! Start getting some issue rallys going! Get some people without any political capital at stake to start saying something provocative. Get some coverage on them! Now! Or mass opinion will have too much momentum to ever get turned around during Bush's $120 million campaign media blitz.
The Bushs' have a history of one-term presidencies. Let's keep it going.
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Sunday, January 04, 2004
A Keyboardless Keyboard
Stole this one from Gizmodo [another excellent blog, BTW]... Another one of those too-cool-to-ever-be-real products.
Virtual Keyboard
Looks like it may indeed be real instead of just vaporware, but most likely too expensive to be anything other than a "I got this, aren't I cool??" purchase.
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Virtual Keyboard
Looks like it may indeed be real instead of just vaporware, but most likely too expensive to be anything other than a "I got this, aren't I cool??" purchase.
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