Is this necessary?

Really?  Is this actually necessary to be a front-page headline on MSNBC.com?  Sheesh.  That is kind of depressing.  Well, on the bright side, maybe some people will read it.

Ugghhhhhh-Rod

Remember this from 2007?



Well now there is this.



Sad day for baseball fans. What a mess.

Powell's Endorsement

If you have not yet done so, I encourage you to listen to/watch/read Colin Powell's explanation of his recent endorsement of Barack Obama. I know I'm not alone in my respect for and admiration of Powell for reasons beyond his political affiliation - his personal story, career accomplishments, and service to our country are all very impressive. Coming from someone with his degree of foreign policy experience, I believe Powell's backing of Obama - in particular over McCain - says volumes about his ability to lead on a world stage, despite the McCain campaign's efforts to propogate an image of inexperience and naivete. Hopefully Powell's message will reach some of the people out there that still think Obama is a Muslim (but as Powell says, "So what if he was?") who cavorts with terrorists. Then they would at least be making a more informed decision on Nov. 4.


Also, it's nice to hear Colin Powell speak without the shock collar of the Bush administration tight around his neck.

Iranians need some Photoshop training

Did anyone else read this story, about how it appears a photoshopped image of the recent Iranian missile test made its way onto the front pages of most major US news outlets?

I find it interesting that:

1. The Iranian state media would release such an obviously altered image, knowing it was going to get international scrutiny, and
2. US media outlets, such as the NY Times, Yahoo News, LA Times, and many others, were so quick to post such an image on their front pages without enough investigation into its integrity to reveal some pretty clear evidence of digital tampering.

As the story explains:
Agence France-Presse retracted its four-missile version this morning, saying that the image was “apparently digitally altered” by Iranian state media. The fourth missile “has apparently been added in digital retouch to cover a grounded missile that may have failed during the test,” the agency said. Later, it published an article quoting several experts backing that argument.

McClellan's Memoir

Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan's book about his time spent with the Bush Administration comes out next week, and today I read the excerpted preface of the book. The memoir is apparently harsh on Bush and insiders such as Cheney, Rove, Rice, and others, as well as on himself. In reading the excerpt, what appears to be a main theme of the book is a good example of why I can be optimistic about the possibility of an upcoming Obama presidency, as opposed to either HRC or McCain:

Most of our elected leaders in Washington, Republicans and Democrats alike, are good and decent people. Yet too many of them today have made a practice of shunning truth and the high level of openness and forthrightness required to discover it. Most of it is not willful or conscious. Rather it is part of the modern Washington game that has become the accepted norm.

As I explain in this book, Washington has become the home of the permanent campaign, a game of endless politicking based on the manipulation of shades of truth, partial truths, twisting of the truth, and spin. Governing has become an appendage of politics rather than the other way around, with electoral victory and the control of power as the sole measures of success. That means shaping the narrative before it shapes you. Candor and honesty are pushed to the side in the battle to win the latest news cycle.

Of course, deception in politics is nothing new. What’s new is the degree to which it now permeates our national political discourse.

Much of it is barely noticeable and seemingly harmless, accepted as par for the course. Most of it is done unconsciously or subconsciously with no malicious intent other than to prevail in the increasingly destructive game of power and influence.

Some of it is self-deceit. Those engaging in it convince themselves to believe what they are saying, though deep down they know candor and honesty are lacking. Instead of checking their political maneuvering at the door when the campaign ends, they retain it as part of the way Washington works. The deception it spawns becomes the cancer on our political discourse, greatly damaging the ability of our elected leaders to govern effectively and do what is best for America.

Too many politicians and their followers have become passionately committed to a preconceived, partisan view of reality that allows little room for compromise or cooperation with the other side. The gray nuances of truth are lost in the black-and-white ideologies both parties embrace. Permanent division, gridlock, and a general inability to constructively address the big challenges we all face inevitably follow.

...

In exploring this syndrome and the way it helped damage at least one administration, I’ve tried to contribute to our understanding of Washington’s culture of deception and how we, the American people, can change it.

As an extreme outsider to the whole Washington scene it is of course difficult for someone like me to really know how genuine campaign promises of "change" and the like are; as McClellan points out, even Bush's 2000 campaign promised to change the Washington culture. However, I do have some measure of hope (appropriately enough, or maybe I'm just brainwashed) that as a relative newcomer to the Washington scene and someone with a clear message and respectable track record, Obama and his team would be able to at least start breaking the cycle of political deception and misguided priorities that McClellan laments.

Of course, as Karl Rove pointed out on Fox News, it could have been a rogue ghost-writer:

“First of all, this doesn’t sound like Scott. It really doesn’t,” he said. “Not the Scott McClellan I’ve known for a long time. Second of all, it sounds like somebody else. It sounds like a left-wing blogger." (Hey, that's me! And also, phew! - that sounds exactly like the Karl Rove I've known for a long time, so we don't have to worry about any misquoting there.)

Looks to be an interesting book, at the least. Let me know what you think if anyone reads it.

Police Blotter, Hanover Edition

I always get a little nostalgic for the slow-paced, small-town lifestyle of the Upper Valley when I read the Hanover, NH police blotter, as printed in The Dartmouth student newspaper. Here are some of the recent highlights:

Mar. 27, 5:24 p.m.
Greensboro Road
Hanover Police received a call reporting that a large pig was blocking the roadway. Hanover Police left a message for the owner, requesting that she corral her pig. There is no record as to whether the owner retrieved her animal.

April 4, 12:50 a.m.
South Main Street
Hanover Police received a call that a subject was sitting in the lobby of the closed Bank of America building. He was holding a laptop and had left the door open. Around the same time, Hanover Police were contacted by New Hampshire’s 911 dispatcher to respond to an alarm from the same location. The subject informed Hanover Police that he was installing an alarm system and had wanted to test its effectiveness. No charges were filed.

April 5, 12:37 a.m.
Etna Road, Etna, NH
A Hanover Police officer arrived at the First Baptist Church to find a car entirely covered with “For Sale” signs. There was no apparent owner nearby, so the officer ran its plates. He eventually made contact with the vehicle’s owners, and informed them that they could not use the church as a place to display a personal item for sale.

April 5, 3:17 a.m.
Webster Avenue
While on patrol, a Hanover Police officer observed three males carrying what appeared to be open cans of beer. The officer questioned the males and discovered they were not Dartmouth undergraduates, but of-age students from Germany who were on campus visiting friends. No charges were filed, although in compliance with New Hampshire’s open container laws, the German students had to dump out the beer.

Apr. 12, 1:54 a.m.
Lebanon Street
Hanover Police responded to a “stray beaver” call. The beaver was subsequently struck by a car. (hmm, kind of sad)

April 26, 12:35 a.m.
East Wheelock Street
Two female students found a Co-Op Food Store shopping cart near the Hopkins Center and decided to ride it down the street. Hanover Police intercepted the students and suggested that riding a shopping cart at midnight is “not a good idea.” The students then offered to return the cart and left without further incident.

April 27, 12:43 a.m.
South Main Street
A clerk at CVS Pharmacy reported that an apparently intoxicated male had entered the store carrying a red snow shovel. The subject proceeded to growl at the clerk, according to Hanover Police. Police records did not indicate whether the clerk was male or female. CVS surveillance tapes revealed a subject who appeared to be a redheaded, college-aged male and could barely stand. Although Hanover Police searched the area, the shovel-carrying subject is still at large.

April 28, 7:37 a.m.
Appalachian Trail
A Lebanon Street resident reported a homeless person sleeping beside a trail in the woods behind the Hanover Co-Op Food Store. Officers located the man, who is a native of Tennessee. Hanover Police said the man has been making campsites at various locations along the trail since the winter. At one point, officers encountered a campsite 30 to 40 feet from a field near the Co-Op, which they said looked messier than a landfill because it was full of items he had gathered. The site was subsequently cleaned though, officers do not know who cleaned it. If he makes U.S. Service Forestland his permanent residence, Hanover Police explained, the man is not permitted to stay in any given shelter for more than two or three consecutive days.

Lesbians sue Lesbians

Saw this article today about the people of Lesbos, Greece - home to the ancient Greek poet Sappho (who praised love between women, hence the present-day term lesbian) - filing a lawsuit against a Greek gay persons association for using the term 'lesbian' in their name. After scratching my head and checking my calendar to make sure it wasn't April 1st or that I had secretly been redirected to the Onion, I cracked up. Seriously? I guess the crux of the argument is this:

"My sister can't say she is a Lesbian," said Dimitris Lambrou. "Our geographical designation has been usurped by certain ladies who have no connection whatsoever with Lesbos," he said.

But this part in particular I found pretty confusing/funny:

Lambrou says Sappho was not gay. "But even if we assume she was, how can 250,000 people of Lesbian descent — including women — be considered homosexual?"

First of all, thanks for clearing that up, Dimitris. Second, huh? I'm not sure how that logic could possibly make any sense. Is that really what he's concerned about? Just in case he's wrong and Sappho was gay, maybe a quarter-million people thousands of years later that happen to live in the same area might also all be gay? And isn't it a just a little to late to suggest that LGBT women stop calling themselves lesbian? I mean, the cat has long since left the bag on that one, I'm afraid. Hasn't that term been in use for hundreds of years now? (According to wikipedia, since 1732, was in the 1890 Oxford-English Dictionary). Anyways, good luck with that, Lesbians.

Votehelp.org

Last post of the day, I promise. But my sister told me about Votehelp.org, a neat little website that asks your opinion on 15-30 of the current major issues in the political scene, how important they are to you, and then shows you how your positions match with those of the major candidates - so I thought I'd share. It also can show you a color-coded grid of policy agreement for the left-brained out there. Here's mine:

Granted, this may be a little late seeing as Super Tuesday has come and gone, and over half of the candidates are out of the race now. One strange (subliminal?) thing about the site is the Democratic candidates are pictured with a red background, and the Republicans with blue. Go test your self and see if you voted for the right person.

China's industrial might

Seriously? China, the rising industrial and economic powerhouse that everyone claims it to be, can build fancy cable-stay bridges (see picture) but doesn't have snowplows and instead resorts to using like 900 guys in uniform with shovels? I know, those snowstorms were unusual and widespread, but still. Seriously?

The somewhat outdated photo is from MSNBC's "The Week in Pictures."

Obama and McCain: Same Difference?

I found these two interestingly opposing headlines in the news today:

NYTimes: Two Hopefuls Share Little but Youth Appeal

Slate: The Surprising Similarities of McCain and Obama

I think I tend to agree with the NYTimes one more, as beyond the fact that they both are somewhat "anti-Washington" candidates, appeal to independents and young people, and have written popular books with the word "Father" in the title, they would operate pretty differently as president.

As an aside, there is a picture of some Dartmouth students looking through the windows at Alumni hall at a McCain event as part of the overflow crowd - that was me 4 years ago at a Dean speech. How time flies...

Things I don't expect to encounter while hiking

Pretty high up there on the list would have to be a man with a sword attacking another man with a baseball bat.

"Three men set off Sunday to meet a friend along the trail when an argument escalated and one of the hikers started swinging a baseball bat and another pulled out a large sword, investigators said.

"Evidently, he always goes hiking with a sword," [LA Sheriff's Detective] Barker said Monday."

And I thought the bachelor party we saw in Big Sur hiking with the blow-up doll was bizzare...

Home Run

You probably all heard that Barry Bond's 756th home run ball sold for $752,467 recently on e-bay. What you might not have heard is that the new buyer, (fashion designer Marc Ecko) has decided to "democratize" the ball's fate and take votes on his website to determine what he should ultimately do with it. The choices are:

A) Bestow it

Give the ball to Cooperstown. The ball that broke Hank Aaron’s career home run record belongs in the Hall of Fame.

B) Brand it

Burn an asterisk into the ball with a branding iron, adding a permanent footnote to the record. Then, send it to Cooperstown.

C) Banish it

Put the ball on a rocket ship and launch it into orbit, a moon shot for the ages. Out of sight, out of mind.

I thought that was a pretty creative way to deal with the ball and will be curious to see how it turns out. If you want to vote, click here.

Smoke on the water

Quite literally, actually. Not the Deep Purple song.

The last few days I noticed ashy black crud accumulating in Banjo's water bowl. It took a little while to figure out, but with smoke from 2 wildfires being pumped into the Bay Area by somewhat unusual weather patterns, we're certain that was the cause.

The first (and smaller) fire is just south of San Jose in Henry Coe St. Park, and is likely the cause of the heavier particulates in the air that we are finding in water bowls, etc. Here's a map showing where it is, in relation to some places you may or may not know about.

The other fire is the Moonlight Woodland Fire 200 miles north of us in the mountains, but it's pretty big. Because we have a high pressure system over the Bay Area, the normal eastern flow of air (that keeps the Bay Area's air clean and usually clear) is reversed and the smoke from that fire is getting sucked down the central valley and out over the Bay Area, as you can see in this satellite photo:

The smokey haze in the air is pretty eerie, casting a subtly dark shadow over what would otherwise be a bright sunny day. It did, however, make for quite a spectacular sunrise this morning. I doubt this picture really captures it well, but here's what it looked like from outside our house:

There is an article about the fires here.

Greensburg, Kansas

I'm sure most if not all of you have heard about the F5 tornado that destroyed basically all of Greensburg, Kansas last week. There are some pretty amazing images of the town before and after the devastation that GoogleEarth has just released, via DigitalGlobe. Pretty amazing and sobering. It's kind of hard to believe anybody in the tornado's path survived looking at them. Hopefully they can recover and begin to rebuild with the few National Guard resources that aren't currently on the other side of the globe. Click on the pictures for the link.