Snickering While Rome Burns

Michael Kinsley, in a piece entitled Like I Care in today's Washington Post, is still in denial. His chosen profession, journalism, has almost been a matter of faith for people in his demographic - boomers in the coastal centers. And in recent years journalism has been transformed (some would say destroyed) by the Internet.

Information flows differently now - it's decentralized, and everyone has the potential to have "a voice". Once upon a time notions like these would probably enthuse a Lefty ideologue who wants change, but for Kinsley and his peers, the shock is too much, and there's a sting that comes with the loss of power and it's vanities.

And so he indulges in the same tired device that we have seen since the late 90s from journalists with an edge of anger and a looming sense of their lessening relevance: He goes out to the Internet, he surfs around for some of the most pointless and silly examples of how it is being used, and he writes about it with snickering disdain and no real point. An asinine Myspace page, a time-waster website - his implication is that these are representative of what's out there, these days, what is coming to replace the saintly dignity of older media. His target audience, the fifty-something paper Post readership (who also doesn't quite grasp it) is supposed to titter and add the obligatory remark about how - goodness me - people expect this medium to replace real journalism?

Instead of bothering to respond thoughtfully, I'll think take the same glib tone - after all, the Internet is a silly place: Whatever you gotta tell yourself, Mike.

Tags: Michael Kinsley, Washington Post, Denial

The Government Spending Problem

Some thought-provoking analysis from Nixguy today on the practical nature of political conservatism, and what can and cannot be given up to win a political majority. By and large he comes down in favor of fiscal responsibility as the one key issue that delineates the real deal from the charlatans. And that - being less generous with the government buck - is an issue on which most people on the Right can agree. We need to back away from any politician with the mindset that government can (and should) take more and more money away from the citizens and use it to "solve problems" and "help people".

A conservative intuitively believes that, while there are some problems that only the government can solve, the list is very short. And when it comes to "helping people", the government tends to make the problem worse, over time. The best that can be done is to foster a civic environment where people can help themselves, often with opportunities in markets and education, and occasionally with local or state-specific solutions. Positive human behavior and the common social good cannot be legislated, sadly - but we can hope that average men and women are good enough, possessed with virtue, judgment, and compassion, that people will help each other. It involves a transformation in thinking from victimhood to self-empowerment, and looking at possibilities, not limitations.

The problem with the spending issue is that there are occasions when government should expand. And usually this happens during wartime. It doesn't make sense to ask each state to monitor the influx of international shipping containers for security risks - to centralize information themselves and negotiate contracts with specialized subcontractors and providers of detection equipment. In a time of national crisis the federal government needs to spend money towards the national, collective well-being on something like Homeland Security. It has done things like this in the past, and while it never does them particularly well (or efficiently) - it is the best of the bad alternatives.

The GOP, in the past few years, has lost touch with fiscal conservatism because there has been some genuine cause to expand spending in some areas. But, like a boozer after one drink, there is little restraint that stops them from open-ended indulgence. Soon enough they became addicted to pork, and attempted to buy off many issues (that cannot be solved by government) with more and more spending.

(Nixguy offered more on the key elements of conservatism. See the post. I'll try and add more analysis if and when time permits.)

Tags: GOP, Government Spending, Conservatism

Blindness, Hype, and Danger

Can you spot the big, fat blazing irony here?

Time magazine is publishing a cover story about how Americans misperceive real risks and constantly worry about foolish things that, from a statistical standpoint, have almost zero chance of actually doing them harm. From the summary:

Shoppers still look askance at a bag of spinach for fear of E. coli bacteria while filling their carts with fat-sodden French fries and salt-crusted nachos. We put filters on faucets, install air ionizers in our homes and lather ourselves with antibacterial soap.

"We used to measure contaminants down to the parts per million," says Dan McGinn, a former Capitol Hill staff member and now a private risk consultant. "Now it's parts per billion."

At the same time, 20 percent of all adults still smoke; nearly 20 percent of drivers and more than 30 percent of backseat passengers don't use seat belts; two-thirds of us are overweight or obese.

And where does this skewed perception of risk originate?

One answer is our faulty educational system, which places undue emphasis on cultural and social education to the detriment of math and science. Engineering jobs go overseas, American students lag behind other countries in basic math, and more and more college graduates are produced with degrees "in cinema" - with the final result being a population that lacks the facility to perform cogent, logical analysis about the real risks surrounding them, and prone to believe any dramatic claim.

Which leads us to the second answer - and the irony: The media, typified by publications like Time, has exploited the uninformed gullibility of Americans for decades. Shark attacks, DDT, random violence, ambiguous environmental dangers - items like these are the currency of breathless media freakouts when the news cycle is slow.

They often start with inconclusive lab results from funding-hungry researchers who can show faint correlations in the part-per-billion range - and they end in the neurotic minds of the average Soccer Mom who has catalogued yet another danger to the kids. Americans end up with a notion of risk that has been distorted, repeatedly, by wild inaccuracies. And the only people who profit along the way are litigious attorneys and the media companies who give these stories publicity in the first place.

Could we even be trusted to recognize real threats? Everyone from the apocalyptic environmentalist to the staunchest neocon answers "no" - but they're pleased to tell us what we really should be worrying about ...

Tags: Time Magazine

Over-the-Rhine in the Times

Today's New York Times has the headline In Cincinnati, Life Breathes Anew in Riot-Scarred Area - and the article that follows describes the effort underway to restore the city's most crime-ridden and historic neighborhood. There are some good things happening:

"To hear the jackhammers and the booms and the nail guns," Mr. Baum said, "it's music to me."

Vine Street runs through the heart of Over-the-Rhine, a neighborhood of narrow streets and ornate brick buildings built by German immigrants from 1865 to the 1880s. After decades of decay in the area, gentrification is spreading north from downtown and south down the steep hillside of Mount Auburn. New condominiums, art galleries, theaters and cafes are bringing people and investment.

And there are familiar problems:

But poverty remains, as do drugs, violent crime and the stigma of the three days of riots in 2001. The riots effectively killed an earlier Over-the-Rhine renaissance, in the late 1990s.

In the national mindset, of course - the last thing in the mental file about Cincinnati was the riots that took place five years ago. And for many years before that it was the provincial overreaction - in the esteem to coastal sophisticates - to the Mapplethorpe exhibit several years before. The narrative has been written, and every few years the national media check back around to see where things stand in the Ohio backwater.

So this is good news. Positive attention in national media outlets may help replace the old narrative. But renovated lofts and new art galleries do not a city make. They are one external gauge of the health of an urban area. Jobs, infrastructure, a skilled workforce and companies willing to invest - these are the backbone of long-term growth. These things are happening slowly, behind the scenes.

I firmly believe we are seeing the tide beginning to turn.

Turkeys, Birds, and Labor

It may be as long as next Saturday (when she is scheduled to be induced) - or it may be any moment - but soon enough Mrs. Spacetropic will be ready to deliver the holiday bird. The nursery is in order, a seemingly infinite number of "cute outfits" have been gifted our way from friends, the family golden retriever has been put on notice, and Daddy is looking to the future with a vague sense of anxiety and hope.

This is all very normal, right?

So we're staying close to home for the holiday, and I've decided to make a turkey. Longtime readers know that I like to cook, and try to do my share around the house. And one of the original intentions of this blog was to write, on occasion, about my culinary misadventures. But ... it turns out that there's a gazillion other food blogs, and I'd have trouble adding anything original. Any how interesting can it be - a post about a flan that went awry?

Nevertheless, I'm looking to Alton Brown, the geeky 'Bill Nye' of the TV food personality pantheon, for advice on how to hack the perfect bird. The key seems to be brine, a salty osmosis that infuses the meat with moisture in a way that surpasses the basting technique (which Mr. Brown dismisses as a complete waste of time). The brine approach involves getting things ready several days in advance and feats of logistics that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers would find daunting. But by golly we're going to do this right. The mashed potatoes and stuffing might end up being a little slapdash - but as long as the turkey tastes right, a spud's a spud.

More updates as things develop. I'm burned out on politics, and the most interesting things in the popular culture consist of a comedian who flipped his nut and the KFed sleaze tape. So around here we're worried about very normal things like babies, Thanksgiving, and making sure the dog doesn't leap on the counter and devour the dinner rolls when nobody is looking.

Tags: Thanksgiving

Neighborhoods and Fighting Back

It would be easy enough to feel some sense of satisfaction at the news that people in Cincinnati have had enough of crime. Instead of the potential controversy of a police crackdown we have evidence of Joe and Sally Q. Public drawing the line at being attacked, robbed, and beaten (often for a few dollars) by an underclass that is caught up self-destructive, glorified thug culture.

What's incredibly sad is that the fighting back is too often an extension of the culture of death. Nine of the homicides this year may qualify as self-defense. Pulling a gun and killing an aggressor is the ultimate solution when you are faced with your own immediate extermination, but there should be no doubt that it takes an incredible toll on citizens who, after all, are usually not trained in law enforcement or the military. According to the article:

Even if they survive the encounter, they often face significant legal, financial and emotional costs.

"I still have nightmares," said Samson Aregawe, the deli owner from Winton Place who shot and killed a would-be robber last month.

Prosecutors cleared him of wrongdoing, but he's still coming to terms with taking a life.

"I'm really depressed," Aregawe said. "I cannot sleep."

The best defense is simpler. It involves knowing your neighbors, keeping the lights on, and simply walking down the street. I live in the city, next to a park, and I know the neighborhood. And for every Quavale Finnell there are ten kids who are just teenagers, trying to look tough, bragging in front of girls, and without enough parental supervision. These are the common characteristics of kids everywhere.

Once in the year we have lived here there were a couple of kids smoking weed in the park around dusk. (And if you think that doesn't happen in Westchester or Mason, you're embarrassingly naive.) One of my neighbors didn't hesitate to walk up to these kids and tell them to leave or he was going to call the cops. He didn't stay in his house in fear, nor did he pull out a gun. And he certainly didn't bother to call the cops - he just told them to get lost, or else.

There are times when that isn't enough, of course. Hardcore criminals who have been the system over and over have little to lose, and they're going to use force and fear to get what they want from any easy target. There is no choice but to use the police or even lethal self defense in those situations. And the word is out that the tide may have turned, and the next time these criminals without a conscience try to prey on innocent criminals they may end up getting hit right back.

Tags: Cincinnati, Crime, Police, Self Defense

Red Exurban

In 2004 the keystone political story of the election was the voting pattern and demographics in the Cincinnati exurbs - Warren and Butler counties, where the population has exploded in recent year. Jonathan Martin from the National Review analyzes the two key counties that turned red and shifted the Senate towards the Democrats - Fairfax County, Virginia and St. Louis County, Missouri.

RSS Newsfeed Problems

My apologies to loyal readers who check out the site on RSS newsfeeds - I've had to make many technical changes recently since my hosting company went ass over kettle. I just fixed the Spacetropic feed - now it should be correctly updated now with each new post.

A technical side-note - I will be making some changes behind the scenes to make the transition from Google 'Blogger' software to Wordpress. If you're a normal person with a social life that probably means nothing to you - but when the transition does happen you will see a new look for this weblog, AND you will need to reset your newsfeed situation to point to a different address.

It's not happening yet - it will soon - and I'm sorry for the inconvenience. There will be advance warning and very explicit instructions when the changeover does occur.

RIP Milton Friedman

Milton Friedman passed away yesterday at the age of 94, leaving behind a country that was improved by his existence. The contributions he has made to the field of economics are invaluable. Every patchouli-addled Green and more than a few so-called free market types could benefit from a strong dose of Friedmanesque positive economics. And if there's any justice in the world all of the workers at the Fed and the BEA should pour into the parking lot after work tonight with candles while Chairman Bernanke stands on the hood of a car strumming tribute songs on his trusty guitar.

Friedman advocated smaller government, freer markets, monetarism as a means to control inflation, and a purely negative income tax as a way to eliminate welfare. He also took a deregulated view to human behavior, and was a strong libertarian on everything from drug policy to school vouchers. A child born to family of Jewish/Hungarian immigrants died a century later as one of the greatest thinkers in the American pantheon. His work ultimately helps mark the difference between the way the Western world should work and the way it actually does - and shows us why the results are more fair and generous than you would ever expect.

Tags: Milton Friedman, Monetary Policy, Capitalism

New Blue Dogs vs. The Establishment

Ronald Reagan was a political titan. He was adored by the American public and loathed by the liberal Left even while he defined the tone of conservatism for the next generation. His impact on history cannot be underestimated, as he played a key role in the end of the Cold War with his allies Pope John Paul II and Margaret Thatcher. And furthermore, his presidency played out next to a Congress that was dominated by Democrats.

There a lessons that can be learned here. Today's Opinion Journal presents a perspective on the choice that exists for the president and the beaten remains of the GOP. Either an "establishment" coalition can be formed between Republicans and the Democratic leadership, or the GOP can reach out to the new generation of Blue Dog Democrats, who also controlled a large swath of the political turf in the Reagan Era. According to a guy by the name of Newt:

These two choices are strikingly interrelated. An establishment bipartisanship between the White House and liberal congressional leaders will almost certainly make it necessary to focus narrowly on how to minimize difficulties in Iraq and postpone consideration of the larger threats to America for the remainder of this and into the next presidency. By contrast, a conservative bipartisanship that knits together the House Republicans and the Blue Dog Democrats into a floor majority, working with a White House that emphasizes popular issues at the grassroots, would make it much easier to focus on the larger threats to American safety. (Such a bipartisanship could stress making the cap gains tax cut permanent; controlling set-asides and discretionary spending; oversight on failing bureaucracies and waste; English as the language of government; and biofuels as part of an energy policy.)

This potential political calculus is formulated on the idea that government should actual accomplish a few things in the next two years instead of position themselves for the next presidential election. It also relies on a degree of political dexterity that hasn't hithertofore been on display from the White House. To effectively reach around the blood-hungry partisans that may be steering the congress and the key committees - that level of Reaganesque savior faire and charm seems beyond the skill set of current management in the executive branch, but it may be possible - especially if a few key brokers emerge from the Republican side.

And how about some new leadership? Corruption was one of the key items that voters cited in the election - it's almost laughable that not only are the Democrats elevating Jack Murtha, but the Republicans are actually return a notorious pork-addicted pol like Trent Lott.

Maybe there is a small chance for Panetta-like delusions of comity. But there's only about 12 months before full-frontal partisan warfare breaks out in the run-up to the nominations. Savvy politicians on both sides might be able to use this narrow window of opportunity to circumvent the entrenched powers and actually get something done.

Update: Captain Ed breaks it down better than I ever could ...

Tags: Blue Dog Democrats, Ronald Reagan, Bipartisanship

The Conservative Political Map

There's a heated debate that is about to emerge and which needs to take place between the religious, far-right wing of the Republican party and the moderate center. The most recent elections suggest that much has changed in the political landscape, and it's part of a larger trend. According to the Weekly Standard:

Republicans have now been all but wiped out in the Northeast. Beginning with the 1996 election, the GOP tide, as it receded, did so unevenly. The South stayed strong, still recording GOP takeaways from Democrats until this year, but the two coasts and the upper Midwest were becoming much more difficult territory for the GOP. By now, the de-Republicanization of these regions is about complete, and the problem has spread to the high plains, the Midwest, and the noncoastal West, such as [New Mexico's Heather Wilson's] district in and around Albuquerque.

It's depressing for me personally to think that the days of New England conservatism may be over, and that one of the last examples of this once-great tradition was an unimpressive character like Lincoln Chaffee. Fiscal responsibility, national defense, and traditional, mind-your business values were the stock and trade of many rock solid Republicans in states like New Hampshire and Maine - places where I'm rooted in terms of politics and culture.

But honestly, by the time Ohio and the rest of the Midwest starts turning blue on the political spectrum - and with the next congressional elections putting 28 GOP seats in danger (many more than the Democrats) - it just seems crazier and crazier to imagine that a southern-focused strategy that caters exclusively on religious conservatives is going to work. I'm not arguing that we should throw them under the bus - but I am claiming that they cannot claim exclusive right to the GOP party and policy.

(The article in the 'Standard concludes that the only place to enlarge the party is the center - and that it can be done by a mix of issues with broad appeal - none of which is at odds with the old-fashioned vein of conservatism. Read the whole thing.)

This blog has many readers from the Left because of the frequent satire and the fact that I don't write exclusively about politics. But I think there's a need here - and I may write more posts in the next two years that takes on this debate between the far, religious right and centrist conservatism.

Panetta Lovefest 2006

Oh, Leon.

On one hand you're one of the most likable Clinton alumni. When the others were out defending and spinning during Monicagate you still stood by your man, the president - but you at least had the dignity to look a little green at the tawdriness of his personal actions. You're still prone to all of the same, tired families-are-hurting rhetoric and dreary anti-growth economics of liberalism, but you try to get along with people on the Right, and on talk shows you are thoughtfully engaged.

So now you write an op-ed in the NYT talking about reconciliation and cooperation between the president and our newly-elected congressional overlords. Here's the nut of it:

While both sides are speaking the words of reconciliation, nothing will really change until they can trust each other. After six years of partisan trench warfare, that will not be easy. It begins with a cease-fire on the rhetoric of cheap shots and ultimatums. Karl Rove and other political consultants need to take a long vacation. Both sides need to speak honestly with each other and be willing to compromise.

It's pretty to think that grown-ups, in the absence of immediate danger, will still work together for the common good despite our differences. But based on the noises that have been made in the past few days by Carl Levin, Chuck Rangel, and even Hillary (who let her feigned moderation slip long enough to gasp something about universal health care) - I'm thinking the post-election honeymoon might already be over. And this president has never spent much time going out of his way to play nicely with the Democrats either (with the exception of Kennedy and NCLB) - so there may not be any love coming back in the other direction.

The rancor will, in all likelihood, continue until 2008 unless some external threat or international crisis forces the grown-ups to stick together in consensus, and act in the best interests of America. Maybe there's even a good chance, with the deadly atmosphere developing between Israel and Iran and it's proxies, and the menacing noises that continue to be made by al-Qaeda. We should be so lucky as to have the problems of partisan warfare, instead of the old fashioned kind of warfare - or the new-fashioned terrorism.

But it's a noble thought.

Tags: Leon Panetta, Congress, Partisanship

More News About Rockets

On Monday Blue Origins, the start-up aerospace company founded by Jeff Bezos (of Amazon.com fame) reached a minor milestone. They have been building a spaceport in an enormous expanse of West Texas scrub, and for the first time there was a rocket launch at the facility yesterday. Few details are known publicly, and accrding to FAA documents it was a small effort - but nevertheless, a first step.

And the slow and steady progress of the nascent human spaceflight industry continues. Bezos' slow-and-steady approach of innovation and investment is a contrast to the early success of Burt Rutan or the marketing glitz of Virgin Galactic. But there can be no doubt that progress is being made.

And relationships have started to form between start-up companies and the giant old aerospace companies of yore. Lockheed-Martin and Bigelow Aerospace recently announced a partnership to study the conversion of the Atlas V launch vehicle into a "human rated" vehicle - taking a known, developed technology asset and making it safe for private manned launch.

This represents one of the first times that an entrenched, experienced aerospace company like L-M has moved in the direction of human spaceflight without the federal dollar being dangled in front of it's nose by NASA in the form of cost-plus government contracts. It may be very good news indeed.

[Via the indispensable NasaWatch]

Tags: Spaceflight, Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos, Lockheed Martin

Googling Azerbaijan

http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,1946235,00.html

Legalized Sandwiches In Massachusetts

Finally some good news. In what may become one of the landmark judicial rulings of the new century, Judge Jeffery Locke of Worcester Mass has settled a dispute between Panera Bread Company and Qdoba Mexican Grill. At stake was the clause in the Panera lease that permitted them the exclusive right to serve sandwiches at the White City Shopping Center. They saw the new Qdoba Mexican restaurant as a violation.

So Judge Locke cleared it up:

"A sandwich is not commonly understood to include burritos, tacos, and quesadillas, which are typically made with a single tortilla and stuffed with a choice filling of meat, rice, and beans," Locke wrote in a decision released last week.

During the trial various experts gave testimony on behalf of the lowly burrito.

Among them was Cambridge chef Chris Schlesinger, who said in an affidavit, "I know of no chef or culinary historian who would call a burrito a sandwich. Indeed, the notion would be absurd to any credible chef or culinary historian."

And, thanks to George W. Bush's appointment of sensible judges to the Supreme Court like Roberts and Alito - what may be his greatest (and only?) legacy - we can have confidence that such absurd, expansionist definitions of the sandwich will be struck down by higher courts, and traditional values will prevail.

A sandwich is between a slice of bread and another slice of bread.

[Via Opinion Journal's Best of the Web]

Yankee Republicans

http://frontier.cincinnati.com/blogs/gov/2006/11/yankee-repubicans-nearly-extinct.asp

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=2648572

Aftermath 2: Acting Like Conservatives

The soul-searching continues on the Right.

People like Sean Hannity - by far the weakest and most inane of the radio talk show hosts - continue to tell the "base" that when conservatives "act like conservatives" they get elected. And that's the crux of it, without any further explanation. Some obvious issues like federal spending are cited as supporting detail. Again, this means either:

1. The GOP grassroots stayed at home instead of voting for the least awful option - the incumbent conservatives who were, instead, "acting like politicians" on issues like immigration because they balked at the prospects of throwing millions of people out of the country.
2. The voters who really wanted conservatives didn't actually stay at home, but they somehow thought the Democrats would be the next best thing - either because they are fatalistic or confused.

And it isn't clear what "acting like conservatives" means in terms of the war in Iraq, the single issue where sticking unquestioningly to plan seems to yield the least results. On the toughest, most painful and costly issue of the day are people on the Right still suggesting that we conservatively, loyally, and dutifully toe the party line? Or are the polls (and media) wrong when they report that this was a key item in the voters minds? In the final analysis the ballot may have looked, to many, like a choice between "more of the same" and "change direction", regardless of who wore which jersey.

Results. Results are conservative. They may not be conclusive, roll-up-the-troops and go home in victory results, they may be a progressive, hard-fought result only incrementally better than last year. But they are results - and they may need to be communicated forcefully to the citizenry above the distortion of the media. Even on domestic issues, we need results. Republicans, if they aren't going to become irrelevant in the long haul, are going to have to account for Hispanic voters, to answer the political question by showing them which political party has the best answers for their prosperity - while simultaneously delivering results in the area of our out-of-control borders. A tough problem, but it takes more wits and leadership than seems to exist in the politicians pushed forward by the GOP.

Politics is still a game of communication - appealing to constituents and controlling a message. Republicans have too often ceded this battle to the Democrats and their media allies - and they have still managed to achieve some success, because there have been some noticeable results (which are often claimed by opportunistic Democrats). But without visible results or a vigorous plan to communicate and manage expectation - nobody should be surprised when the average voter yearns for a change of direction.

Next Up: Is this good news for weasely centrists like me? There are some signs - McCain is still a front-runner, the return of Lieberman the Triumphant, and all of the newly elected quasi-conservative Democrats (people who will rip off their masks in January, according to talk radio, to expose themselves as godless socialists). Are the times a-changin'?

All Tomorrow's Conference Afterparties

It was a 'Web 2.0' conference sponsored by AOL. For those of you with meaningful lives this is simply some of the fancier programming that can be done on the Internet - but in any event it's always a geek fest, with plenty of braying, adnoidal guys jabbering away on Blackberries and partying like it's 1999 with their paunch and blather about agile methodology or whatever buzzy flim-flam thy think will impress the venture capital guys.

And there's Lou Reed on stage on a small stage in one of the reception areas for an after-party sponsored by Ask.com - if you can imagine it. According to Paul Sloan:

He ended a song, looked out and, in that distinctive Lou Reed voice, said to the crowd: "Maybe you can talk louder."
He continued: "I can turn the sound up and hurt you."
Some people cheered.
Lou gave the order to the sound guy: "Turn it up."
He strummed a blaring chord, then spoke some more, turning up the irony.
"This is the moment I've waited for my whole life. When I was on St Marks Place I thought, someday there'll be a cyberspace and I'll be playing for AOL."

He went on to actually rock the place pretty hard, and the geekerati seemed to enjoy the music. Even Lou Reed has to pay the bills, but he's still got his guitar and his irony, and he's just not going to suffer this indignity without taking something back.

Under Construction (Vizaweb Meltdown)

Sorry folks, MAJOR technical difficulties lately.

My web hosting provider, Vizaweb, has apparently destroyed itself in one final, spectacular act of incompetence. No response to support emails, and most impressively, their own website is unavailable. I'd call the phone number, but every time I've ever called I've gotten voicemail and a full message box. The owner, Rick Mueller, always sent lovely, thoughtful emails explaining different outages and failures. Wonder what he's up to these days?

So I had to switch everything over to a new hosting provider, Lunarpages. I've done some research on this company and I think this should be a good move. Things may be a little rocky for the next few days, but there should be no more complete absence or file not found errors. Thank you for you patience.

Update: I see people hitting this site searching on 'VizaWeb'. Apparently I am one of the first people to get clear of the wreckage and make it to a new hosting provider. The rest of you - it's over. VizaWeb is a nightmare. I pray you made backups.

Update 2: My new hosting plan name servers are still "propagating" throughout the Internet, so if you're viewing this you're in the lucky half. I can't even see it from my ISP yet (but I can preview it on Blogger and update posts).

Tags: VizaWeb, Lunarpages

Aftermath

Why did Republican lose? Some say it's because they strayed too far from their core values. Fiscal responsibility, states' rights, and immigration - with four years of single-party rule there have been ample opportunities to set conservative policies in motion, and make some permanent changes to American government.

Some pundits are taking this further by claiming that if Republican politicians truly acted like hardcore, uncompromising Republicans, and eschewed the need to "be liked" - then they would have been, quixotically, liked enough to be returned to office. Many of the people making this argument are also claiming that many of the Democrat congresspeople who were elected were trying to fool the voters somehow by coming off as moderates.

That theory confuses me, because it implies that what voters really want is hard Right politics - but if they can't get it they'll go for moderates instead of the softer Right offerings that made up the red half of yesterday's ballot.

The answer may be more simple. Iraq has been a mess, and people were willing to keep with the program for quite a long time, even while noticing that very little seemed to be changing - not the situation on the ground, and not our plan of attack (at least in any way that was made visible to the public). Katrina didn't help the average voter's growing suspicion that this administration has the capacity to bungle up a problem. This was enough to lose many voters in the middle. Add back in the key items mentioned previously (spending money like Democrats, offering no solutions on immigration, and losing their marbles over items like Shiavo) - and some combination of these will lose many on the Right - from the libertarians to the Buchanan sympathizers to the free market crowd.

That's how you lose an election.

There's much more to say about this, and the lead up to 2008, and the implication of today's announcement about Rumsfeld. To be honest I'm still trying to get my head around it ...

Electioneering Day 2006

Scroll down for updates ...

6:42 AM - After all of the posturing, spin, and build-up it's finally time to sort the wheat from the Lincoln Chafee (RINO, Rhode Island), and participate in the rich pageant of Democracy. Last minute efforts are underway in states across America - and in more than one district there are dead people and felons on the streets, headed towards the polls. And thanks to a wildly expansive definition of 'civil rights' there are legions of attorneys poised to litigate any important district where the Democrats fall slightly short and there's the faintest hint of ballot box error or uncertainty.

I'll be updating this post as time permits throughout the day. Don't forget to vote. The next two years will be filled with acrimony and bitterness no matter what happens - you don't want to feel left out of the game when everyone is hollering at each other!

7:18 AM - One local blogger does his part to document the pre-written disenfranchisement narrative. You've got to get up pretty early in the morning to beat the litigation-minded activists!

8:10 AM - I hauled off and voted! It was not a complicated process. The election workers were well organized and unflinchingly polite. There were signs on the walls everywhere that explained the process in single-syllable words, and my paper ballot scanned neatly into a machine. On the way out I considered disenfranchising other voters by turning around the 'Vote Here' arrow so that instead of pointing to the cafeteria with the ballot boxes it pointed to the men's room across the hall - but I couldn't bring myself to such an act of treachery. (I hope word doesn't get back to High Commander Rove.)

9:31 AM - There's Trouble In Mount Orab - somebody kicked out the power cord. And the AP is reporting that many locations in Indiana and Ohio have turned back to paper ballots. Does anyone know the number for the Help Desk?

Also: It's raining in the East. The conventional wisdom has been that this is bad for Democrats. But it may simply be bad for whoever is least motivated to vote - which has historically been Democrats, but may, this year, be Republicans. Go figure.

11:48 AM - Here's a useful link on when states close across America. Ohio is 7:30 PM, Kentucky is 6:00 PM, and it goes all of the way to midnight for the folks in Alaska. John Fund's 'On the Trail' has been excellent election coverage overall, although he has been very vocal in his concerns over this one falling within the "margin of litigation".

12:02 PM - If Fund and the WSJ has too much of a Republicany aftertaste for you, the same information is presented at Swing State Project in the form of a colorful map.

12:09 PM - Wow, Kristie Alley is making progress.

12:11 PM - Talk of strong turnout in the heavily GOP districts of Ohio. Take it with a grain of salt - the source is the (indispensable) Righty blog 'The Corner' at NRO. But one of my sneaking suspicions has always been that the polls have under-represented the Red, booming exurbs.

12:16 PM - Andrew Warner does the forensics on the notifications that were sent to voters on a change in their polling place locations.

12:55 PM - The big media story is 'intimidation' in the Virginia race - phone calls made (by Republicans, of course) asserting that voters will be arrested if they go to the polls. Some commentators are claiming this is a tactic used to stoke outrage and get people out the vote, others say it's a ploy by Democrats to smear Republicans. The factual details of the phone calls are hazy, but the FBI is involved so ... the truth is out there.

1:37 PM - The news story with the least controversy is turnout. Many different sources are claiming it's very high. Prior to 2004 the received wisdom was that high turnout is good news for Democrats - as if folks with liberal political sensibilities are everywhere - the 'dark matter' of the electorate. After 2004 - the largest rate of voter participation in decades - we know it cuts both ways.

2:45 PM - Howard Fineman: The Borat Election.

4:54 PM - I've been doing my part for voter suppression. Mrs. Spacetropic is ripe with child - we're down to the last month - and her politics veer more to the Left. I keep saying things like "honey, maybe you should go home and lie down", knowing she hasn't made it to the polls yet.

4:56 PM - The ne plus ultra of conservative Ohio blogger groups, the SOB Alliance, has a meta-index of other Election Day livebloggers. (They also describe me as a "friendly non-member" which is actually on the mark. Politically I'm close, but too much in the McCain camp - plus I use fatuous terms like ne plus ulta.)

5:18 PM - It's over between Britney and K-Fed. Rove, damn you!

5:22 PM - From here through the evening I'm online - surfing, switching back and forth between the news networks, and updating as necessary. And enjoying malt beverages.

5:26 PM - A very important milestone: Exit polls are available to the media now (also corroborated on conservative radio). Now is the time to watch the disposition of notorious Mediacrats like Matthews and Couric. They will get this news immediately. Dour expressions mean good news for the GOP. Barely-concealed glee means Speaker Pelosi.

5:54 PM - This story has been getting some national attention - apparently a poll station worker in Louisville has been charged with assault. Few details are available.

6:03 PM - ABC News: Voters disapprove of Iraq and the way Bush is handling things. This is breaking news? This isn't news.

6:07 PM - MSNBC's Keith Olbermann has a seat at the big desk like he's a nonpartisan journalist. But he is decidedly lacking in glee.

6:29 PM - The Journal Online has a page just for election blog updates - the biggest news is no news. You'd think somebody would claim to have exit poll data by now - heck, it's almost an hour since the information was available. The second biggest news is that Joe Lieberman may not necessarily be a shoo-in in the nutmeg state.

6:40 PM - Been surfing both the hard Left and hard Right sites, and nobody is starting to get happy about the results. This may be bad news. From a purely civic perspective the last thing this country needs is a squeaker.

6:56 PM - I'm talking the dog for a walk. I still think the House goes to the Democrats and the Senate stays barely Republican. The networks are promising "real results" in the next 1/2 hour.

7:20 PM - Emerging news of very high Republican turnout, especially in Virginia - according to Fox News. SOB Alliance has more turnout news.

7:39 PM - Gay marriage in Virginia went down in - er ... flames with the apparent passage of the constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a mister and lady. This blogger thinks these types of conservative social issues are a waste of time - but nobody should assume this means anything for Webb/Allen. More grassroots Democrats than you would ever expect are against gay marriage. (No reax from Sully, yet.)

7:47 PM - Strickland beat Blackwell in the nationally watched race for Ohio governor. Not a surprise to anyone, really.

11:27 PM - Looks like the House of Representatives is going to the Democrats. Ohio (local) has been a near-sweep. And the Senate is still in play, but it looks like it may narrowly remain in Republican control. There will be plenty of time for analysis in the weeks ahead - but this is essentially what all of the sober pundits expected.

11:52 PM - Did Republicans get what they deserve? And if so, why did they deserve it? And more importantly, what are we getting as a substitute? These are the questions. The United States will survive two years of Speaker Pelosi, but I still don't have even the faintest concept how the Democrats intend to do anything "better" than the lackluster Congress we've had recently. Not Bush / Iraq Bad is still not a policy for governance, and tomorrow is the first day of the 2008 campaign. If the next two years consist of little more than investigations and retribution we might still have a sore need a new directions and strong leadership by the time that election rolls around.

Election Music and GOTV

One of the more interesting things about this campaign season is the sheer number of political commercials on the radio that go like this:

First they play ominous and despairing background music - minor chords on acoustic guitars and discordant piano - while reviewing the political record the opponent: "Did you know Tom Montgomery sponsored a bill to roast babies on spikes over large fire pits? Is that what we want for America?"

Then suddenly the topic shifts to the preferred candidate, and within a couple of notes the theme shifts to a jaunty optimistic theme with a slight patriotic march and a hint of Aaron Copland. And the narrator is saying things like "Larry Norton thinks babies are precious, lovable creatures, and will do what it takes to keep them safe. We can trust Larry to protect our values in Washington."

The assault is relentless.

And as a cherished swing-state household our phone is ringing off the hook with robot campaign calls, and in the next twenty-four hours we will be besieged with get-out-the vote people coming to the door to remind us cheerfully that Tuesday is Election Day and they’d be happy to provide a map to our polling location.

That location happens to be about a block away. It’s the Catholic church where we are parishioners, and the same place where I bring our children for school on a daily basis, and where I vote regularly. And I’m a political and media junkie – but thanks for the map, pally.

Most of these are from Ohio-based, pro-Democrat organizations, and there’s a part of me that wants to toy with them by taping a poster of Ronald Reagan to the front door – or making jokes about how I still have the skins drying out in my basement from the people who came knocking on Election Day 2004. But they’re so friendly and civic minded, even if most of them are dewy-eyed liberal kids – I want them to enjoy their last few years of optimism before the all-consuming bitterness sets in …

Tags: Ohio Election

Coffee Shop Sociology

An article in today's paper describes the importance of the neighborhood coffee shop as a social hub of the community. Our lives are increasingly spilt between work, home and consumer purchases at stores and restaurants, and rarely do these cross over. Serendipity is a casualty of the modern condition - we don't run into our neighbors and mingle by accident much anymore, and our lives are a series of appointments managed by cell phone and email.

Hence the looming significance of what sociologists call "third spaces" - places where we can linger after a purchase and occasionally run into people without an appointment. Places like coffee shops.

The article mentions two - one in the booming exurb of Mason, and the other in my city neighborhood, Pleasant Ridge. And therein lies the contrast. What goes unmentioned in the article:

• These places are fewer and fewer overall. Large companies buy up the commercial real estate developers, and they have performance goals. Despite all of the warm fuzziness on the Olive Garden commercial it's all about volume and paying off the expensive capital outlay, and there are hungry customers who want your seat.


• Conversely, when these places do exist, they are more likely to be locally owned. The teenager at the Barnes and Noble Starbucks doesn't care about you -- despite the motivational poster in the break room -- but the lady who owns the coffee shop (the one on the verge of going out of business) has a very genuine incentive to remember your name.


• And when these places do exist, they are more likely to be in neighborhoods - the older commercial zones where neighbors out walking the dog can bump into people leaving a restaurant. That never happens in the exurbs, where the automobile is the primary tool for managing a compartmentalized life.

Again - I've said it many times on this blog, before - there are benefits to living in these subdevelopments in the outer communities. But it's the liabilities - the creeping isolation and the sense that life is reduced to a series of transactions - that's a part of the trade off that is involved.

A story that might be relevant: I get my hair cut at Gil's Barber Shop in the same city neighborhood mentioned above, Pleasant Ridge. It's a couple of blocks from my house. The place is packed every Saturday, and there's always lots of talking. And almost every time I ever go there, in addition to all the locals, there there is at least one man getting a haircut who used to live in Pleasant Ridge and who now lives in an exurb like Mason. Why don't they get their haircut at one of the places near where they live? The answer may not be simple, but it's certainly clear that if you're going to get in your car anyway, why not drive to a place where they know your name - and where everything hasn't yet been reduced to staged interactions at a point of sale?

[HT Cincinnati Blog]

October Surprise Turnover

If you didn't think the New York Times was going to cut loose with an anti-Bush nastigram only days before the election then you don't know much about vicious modern politics. They tried, but they missed - for a very strange reason.

You're supposed to harrumph over the fact that documents were made available by the government, over the Internet, to the public at large which could have helped Iran build nuclear weapons. On cue: And these Republicans claim they're the party of national security?

But wait for the kicker. The documents themselves are evidence that Iraq was only a year away from acquiring nuclear weapons in 2003, and furthermore, Mr. Hussein had plenty of ties to terrorist organizations. (Read that twice, if necessary.) It requires an amazing amount of cognitive dissonance to keep harrumphing over the administrations lack of discretion in making these documents publicly available while simultaneously nursing our rage at Bush for a trumped up case for war when the contents of the documents are evidence of the very real threat that was gathering prior to the war.

Perhaps nobody at the Times thought we'd notice?

Don't worry - there's still plenty of room to be miffed about the way Iraq is progressing these days, regardless of how we got there, and we may see it in the polls on Tuesday. Although it still isn't clear what the voters will have voted for in the event congress goes to the Dems - but we'll find out soon enough! And sooner or later, after these folks have finished attacking each other, we're going to need leadership and a consistent, strong response to the dangers in our world - instead of nasty politics.

Tags: October Surprise, New York Times, Iraq, Attack Journalism

Botched Joke Forensics

Let's do some comparison of two political scandals.

In the case of Trent Lott he apologized profusely and repeatedly for "lighthearted" remarks at a social event that inadvertently offended a large segment of the population. Pundits in the media were quick to assume the absolute worst implications from his remarks, and the affair was dragged out; with blood in the water the only satisfactory resolution was his resignation as Senate Majority Leader.

In the case of John Kerry he offered several defensive non-apologies for what he claimed afterwards was a "botched joke" - one which inadvertently offended a large segment of the population. Pundits in the media were quick to "explain what he really meant" and claim that it was actually the other side that was somehow on the attack. A satisfactory resolution to the matter consisted of "putting it behind us" the second he sounded the correct note of truthiness in an apologetic PR statement.

The political forensics are not very difficult to perform, even by the average voter. There is a marked difference with the way the dinosaur media handles these types of situations, especially in a lead-up to an election, and the reaction of the political parties does illustrate a few things about how they differ on key issues.

But having made the difference clear we shouldn't let the Kerry incident eclipse the larger issues at stake in the election. Everyone needs to turn out on Tuesday, and in many cases choke down the nausea that will rise in their gullet - and pull the trigger on the issues and politicians that are closest to where they stand on the events of the day. The next few days are going to be a feverous blaze of machine-gun politics - and there's plenty of time for another nasty October surprise from either side. Part of our civic obligation is to cut away the spin and confusion and cast our vote anyway.

Tags: John Kerry, Trent Lott, Media Bias

The Geek Canon

Wil Wheaton, erstwhile TV star and geek icon has taken up a gig at the Suicide Girls site (soft-core Goth porn, and NSFW). His latest post identifies the five most important geek books - and being true to my nature I find all kinds of problems with the list immediately. (No William Burroughs, Neal Stephenson, or Philp K. Dick?) But he does nail it down nicely on William Gibson - who deoes, of course, belong on the list. About Neuromancer:

Its opening line is one of the most repeated and well-known in the geek universe, "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel." Of course, when Neuromancer was written, that meant the sky was a dull grey color, perhaps broken in places by swirling eddies of darkness in the clouds, but if it were written today, it would actually mean the sky was a clear, bright blue color, creating quite a different mood in the heavens above Chiba, and for the entire novel.

How strange that our metaphors depreciate so quickly, and already so many have grown up without any memory of a time when an untuned television displayed a spray of black, grey, and white.

Regardless, the book remains a indispensible modern classic - and it has an underappreciated influence on the more textural aspects of literature. Everyone knows that Gibson invented the template for thinking about cyberspace - but it's the clipped and condensed formalism that is an silent but very influential contibution to the way we write about ourselves in these modern times.

Tags: William Gibson, Wil Wheaton