Month: October 2011

Not so easy:

Hordes of reporters have been dispatched in anticipation of tomorrow’s conflict. Tourists too are looking for a thrill. Zuccotti Park has become a panopticon. When any voice rises above a conversational level, microphones circle and descend like buzzards, flashes snap, and cell phones are raised and set to record. Reporters, academics, and writers shoulder through the crowd in search of “gets.” We approach each other, spot notebooks half-opened and held low to avoid attention, and withdraw. Interviewing has never felt quite so useless.

Michael Morgenstern is turned off by the Occupation’s media handlers:

I walked to a large group of people, blocked by a makeshift wall with a table covered in laptops. They were blogging away, editing with Final Cut Pro, and browsing Twitter. A sign had the words scrawled on it: “Media section. Do not enter. Occupiers only, not corporate media.” I was a bit confused – was the sign trying to keep me out, make a point, or what? I walked in anyways, getting into a conversation with a filmmakerwho was documenting the event and wanted my help. I was then approached by a man who asked me if I was media. “What do you mean, media?” I asked…a reasonable question in a movement that declares it is for and by everyone, that everyone has equal say and no claim to leadership over anyone else. I was told that having a blog did not qualify me as media; that if I wanted to count as media, I would have to attend a media leadership training the next day, and until then I would have to leave. Not wanting to start a fight, I walked out of the media section…Only a month into a movement that considers itself leaderless, egalitarian, and anarchistic, having a section of the “people’s park” cordoned off and restricted is not a good thing.

(Photo via Flickr user pameladrew212)

You will notice the widespread hostility to Obama, caused by frenzied right-wing opposition and angry left-wing disillusionment. But also notice how Perry's favorable coverage hasn't helped him much at all.

Breaking news:

I found…. a total of five paragraphs on "national security."  That's it.  No white papers, fact sheets, bullet points, or list of advisors. 

Another cue that Cain isn't very well versed in foreign affairs: he doesn't know what a neoconservative is. I envy him, don't you? And the party that is so unserious about national security that it would make him its front-runner.

The old and the uneducated. The abstract of a new report:

Fair trade holds the promise of economic gains for the United States and our trading partners alike, but these gains do not come without a cost. Older workers and those without a college education are more vulnerable to the job losses that result from free trade – and these are precisely the same groups that face the most difficulties getting back on their feet in the current economy.

While young people and college-educated workers may have the freedom and resources to move across the country in search of better opportunities, older Americans and those with less education often lack this mobility. The poor state of the housing market further constrains mobility, especially for those struggling to pay off their existing mortgages. Moreover, jobs are hard to come by for individuals without a college degree, and opportunities are likely to remain scarce in the years ahead, since most of the jobs expected to be created are in sectors that require education beyond high school. 

(Hat tip: Economix)

Sometimes the contradictions overwhelm.

"Thank you for what you are doing and for your leadership. Getting out Dr. Jeffress [sic] message, juxtaposing traditional Christianity to the false god of Mormonism, is very important in the larger scheme of things," – David Lane, a key Christianist Perry supporter and fundraiser, to a radio talk show host.

A reader asks:

I'm skeptical of Ron Paul's "baby in a bucket" story. If this appalling situation happened, why did Paul just keep on walking? Or was that "life" just not worth his time that day? If such a thing happened and I were a doctor, I'd make a scene. Short of that, I'd take it out of the "bucket" and give it comfort for its last few moments. Really, he's either telling a tall tale or guilty of the same heartlessness he's condemning.

Another writes:

Ron Paul's ad is the truth of abortion as claimed by the Pro Life movement and you know this because it's so simplified as to be an exercise in fantasy. You heard the real truth in the stories you received from women and men who had to face the painful choice of a late-term abortion. You got to hear, in their own words, the pain, the suffering, the difficulty that such a choice involved. THAT is sincere.

Ron Paul making a political ad in which he bases an entire philosophy of life on what seems, at most, to be a quick impression based on absolutely NO background medical knowledge of the cases is not sincerity; it's bullshit and pandering. What are the chances that these so called operating rooms actually existed side-by-side and Ron Paul walked into them, completely by chance? What are the chances that these two operating rooms happened to have absolutely uncaring, cruel medical professionals in one room, and the committed, caring, dedicated professionals in the other? The entire ad is a fantasy and it's gross and disgusting because people like you, people who should know better than to be taken in by such rhetoric (and would laugh at it if it was presented by someone like Sarah Palin), consider it sincere because it comes from Ron Paul.

Another spot-on spoof:

Bachmann's treatment here and Perry's here.

The president is sending 100 "military advisors" to Uganda to target Joseph Kony, leader of the infamous Lord’s Resistance Army, and his minions. David Axe gives important background on Obama's new intervention. Thoreau measures the true military footprint:

What fascinates me about military advisors is the idea that they merely offer advice and this is somehow enough.  I don’t doubt that the Ugandans need advice.  Hell, I could use advice on a lot of things.  And I am willing to believe that the 100 openly-acknowledged, uniformed Americans will only do exactly what they are billed as doing.  But this “advice” is probably based on intelligence.  How is that intelligence collected?  What sorts of unacknowledged people are collecting it?  Are any aircraft without insignia (maybe drone aircraft these days) spotted doing anything?  And since contractors “don’t count” as The Troops, how many contractors are there to “support” the military advisors?

Max Fisher recalls some of the Lord Resistance Army's most heinous acts. Joyner remains wary:

Kony is a Class A Bad Guy. But there are a lot of really bad dudes running around Africa and other parts of the developing world and I’m not at all eager to take them all on.

Limbaugh, amazingly, portrays the LRA as a sympathetic "Christian" group:

Lord's Resistance Army are Christians.  It means God.  I was only kidding.  Lord's Resistance Army are Christians.  They are fighting the Muslims in Sudan.  And Obama has sent troops, United States troops to remove them from the battlefield, which means kill them.  That's what the lingo means, "to help regional forces remove from the battlefield," meaning capture or kill. 

Erick Erickson corrects the record: 

The group claims to be an emissary from God capable of channeling the Holy Spirit. The group has notoriously gone through Uganda capturing children and turning them into soldiers and, when not successful, murdering them. The group engages in sex trafficking, slavery, murder, mutilation, and the list goes on and on.

LRA members have been hunted by George W. Bush and now by Barack Obama. They are an evil group and while we can debate the policy implications of the President sending troops off to Africa, we should not make victims or political points off the group the President will hopefully eradicate.

Dust off your photosynthesis knowledge:

[Chlorophyll] absorbs the sunlight, which makes it critical for photosynthesis, and it is responsible for the green in leaves. During the growing season, it acts as a dominant pigment, masking pigments underneath. But here's the thing: Chlorophyll is not a very stable compound. It requires sunlight and warm temperatures, which means photosynthesis is going gangbusters all summer. But in autumn, a few things happen. Chlorophyll gets sluggish as nights grow longer and sunlight hours shrink. … As this happens, the trees break down the chlorophyll and a yellow pigment called carotene get[s] unmasked. Carotenoids and another pigment, xanthophylls, are responsible for the yellow and orange colors in corn, carrots, pumpkins and daffodils, as well as leaves.

This foliage map of New York state shows how the leaves of various geographic regions change at slightly different times.

(Photo by Kevin Dooley)