Pangloss

Who me? Would I ever do such a thing? You know what an extremist I am. All hail King Sean Rush Franken Penn the First!

At risk of digressing too far, aren't there two plants of the "Chernobyl type" in the United States -- Hansen and Savannah River, the two nuclear weapons facilities? Or is that an unfair comparison when safety is fully taken into consideration? I'm just dimly remembering press stories here, so don't shoot me.

A little side note to this: Today Obama endorsed the Democratic National Committee's choice for its new chairman. No surprise there, but two items were a bit eye-opening. 1) He actually got the incoming DNC chairman, Tim Kaine, to agree to adopt a less partisan, more pragmatic approach to its work. Kaine is seen as a centrist or moderate anyway, so this is no great shock, but the contrast with Howard Dean's DNC message is pretty sharp (as anyone on their mailing list can attest). And it's especially interesting given that Tim Kaine has another job -- governor of the state of Virginia. 2) Obama turned over his 13 million email addresses from the campaign to the DNC. Not that that's directly related, but it does perhaps make sense in context with the above, since that list probably trends far more towards the middle than the DNC's own list. The message is clear: Now that it has the big tent back, it has every intention of keeping it inflated. (Sorry MoveOn.org.) Some info here: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iZ5wPD-HPy1q0dJvqRKK5Z14A_YQD95RPG200

Well this is why integrity in government is so critical, and one of the reasons people are so optimistic about the incoming (or is the proper word "new" now?) administration. There are so many ways around these rules, and consequences when they're spun, that it always seems to fall back on the quality of the people involved in making the decisions, both before and after. But then I'm optimistic about every incoming administration, so what do I know.

If memory serves, lobbyists are registered with the government, and are employed by companies (typically with addresses on K Street) with self-professed mission statements regarding their purpose. So when a lobbyist shows up and takes a meeting with a White House official on subjects that are covered by the basis of their employment, that's lobbying.

Well, it's a couple million people spending a little more than they would normally spend at home. Still pretty much a drop in the bucket, really. In terms of the money spent on the inauguration, it's a sheer pittance. It's a $14 trillion economy, after all.

The president had a briefing for the press a short while ago, and I rolled back the Tivo to watch it. I thought it was pretty interesting. CNN already has a story up about it (though it doesn't yet include most of what I'm talking about below): http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/21/obama.business/index.html He's laid down some new rules regarding transparency, but what's interesting about it is that he's changed the basis for information-handling from a presumption of secrecy to a presumption of public exposure. That's very different from previous administrations. Obviously he can't reveal private information (no more Valery Plames, one would hope), or information vital to national security (which could mean anything, as we know), but this does sound like a game-changer to me, at least on the surface. What do you all think? He also mentioned hiring freezes for senior staff. A nice gesture but not real important, since they're not there for salaries anyway. But I suppose that has a little more significance in light of the next point. He's also changed the rules for lobbying the administration. Now this is somewhat limited, because the most effective lobbying takes place on Capital Hill, but it's a significant change and he could be setting a precedent and Congress might feel pressured to adopt the new rules themselves. Most significant changes: - New hires in the White House cannot work in an area they lobbied in previously - Former employees cannot lobby the White House for the rest of his administration I think it's impressive and could be very effective, even if the effect is mainly in terms of appearances. What do you all think?

There's a law and they're being prosecuted. So I'm guessing you're thinking more along the lines of prevention? There's always more that can be done in that area. But as long as we operate on the basis of parents serving the dual (and sometimes conflicting) roles of primary caregiver and primary watchdog, there will always be this potential.

The definition sources you list above vary wildly, so you're still in "if it's anything more than simple confinement, we're gonna slap the "torture" label on it and declare that it is impossible for any such method to produce any positive result." And in that territory you're wrong, if it's true that such methods have produced information that lead to the prevention of further attacks, which is what we've been told (and that's a whole other argument that has nothing to do with the legitimacy of torture).

I agree with the above.

I don't think you'd be offering rewards for putting someone in a wheelchair if that person wasn't a Republican. But that's neither here nor there. My real concern is that one-sided political humor in a general-purpose humor thread has a direct impact on the atmosphere of acceptable commentary across this site. (Which is exactly why you do it.) I've suggested that we move political humor to a similar thread on the politics board, which I believe will not only solve that problem, but also make it easier to back-search for good political jokes.

What additional line do you feel needs to be drawn?

Yeah I don't mind the odd transfer now and then, but it's not something we can do on a regular basis. Build up your post count and then you can post on Politics. Thanks.

You know, I like political humor as much as the next guy, but I have a problem with this thread being used to spread political messages. I don't think it's appropriate, I think it's underhanded, I think it's cowardly (hiding), and I think it undermines our credibility as an open forum.

I've no idea if I'm even in the ballpark here with a correct answer, but I'll toss it out there for the sake of conversation. Let me go back to the OP: Expanding on Sherlock's post above, the original question sounds akin to the old question of whether or not it's better to increase word size. For example, to stick with 16-bit words, or increase it to 32-bit words. The advantage being that you can do more with each word. If we ignore current technological limitations (as requested), I believe the advantage set it infinite, i.e. it is correct to state that increasing data/instruction bandwidth increases computer speed in direct proportion, right up to the full speed of the processor. (And therein lies the rub, of course -- the processor's already at 100% utilization, making the real issue one of bottlenecks and Von Neumann limitations. But that's irrelevant for our current discussion.) The OP, however, asks a slightly different question -- what if we change the basis for the data itself? Instead of gates storing 1s and 0s, we use "gates" that store 8 states of information. Put in the context of a Von Neumann architecture, this could mean (in theory) shoving 8x as much data through per cycle. Again setting aside issues of technological capability (since the OP uses undefined "future computers"), the answer would seem to be the same -- more data, faster processing. This would seem to be a relatively straightforward path to an answer of "eight times" to the first question. The second question would seem to be answered with a simple "no" -- data is data, and we haven't changed the concentration of information here.

That may be, but it was an opinion piece, not a news article. Just something to bear in mind.

Those are valid sources, I agree.

Choosing to focus on Iraq and the economy is not "political expediency". It's national survival. There are going to be many issues upon which this administration is going to compromise, and I believe the result is going to be unprecedented forward progress on every front. And when he's done the country is going to thank him for it, not obsess over lost opportunities. Better strap in. We start in about eight hours.

Understandable, but I wouldn't read too much into it. It was really intended as an "inside message", and a kind of "high-five", to African Americans who lived through the civil rights movement. Don't quote me on this and I'm too tired to dig up my copy of "Eyes on the Prize" at the moment, but I believe he originally said it at Martin Luther King's funeral. It goes way back to that era, at least. It's important to understand that Joseph Lowery is a living icon -- he is the civil rights movement. For African Americans, having him at the inauguration was akin to having Lincoln himself there. He's the man who made Rosa Parks' effort mean something. The founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. The man who lead the march from Selma to Montgomery. He symbolizes the very movement itself. The fact that he's not as well known to white people is actually a strong statement about the man's character. Dr. Lowery IS one of those black leaders that equates poverty to inequality, but he was never the kind to blame all white people for black people's problems, and has many supporters amongst whites and Republicans. The non-violent message was as much Rev. Lowery's as it was Dr. King's. He was a frequent critic of the Bush administration, but that's his right and I never took it to be closed-mindedly partisan in nature, and it was never personal (he and Bush got along). He got into some trouble after Coretta King died when he said something like "billions more for the war but no more for the poor", but again, that's just how the man is -- he doesn't use that like you may recall seeing Jeremiah Wright in that famous video -- Rev. Lowery's about as opposite of Jeremiah Wright as can be. In fact if you grew up in Atlanta in the 1970s like I did, you really got used to hearing stuff like that all the time, and if you ignore the politics of it (or just accept it, as I did), it's incredibly lyrical and moving. Many of the great civil rights leaders (including MLK) had that gift. (They had a name for it, but it too eludes me at the moment.) At any rate, the man is 87 years old and I think he's entitled to his foibles.

Stand in his way? Why would you think that the AG would do anything of that magnitude without explicit instructions from the Oval Office? The Attorney General is not a congressional appointee or an elected official -- he serves at the pleasure of the President of the United States. His name is Eric Holder, and he was a senior adviser to Obama throughout the campaign. You don't think this subject was roundly debated well BEFORE Obama made the statement you quoted ealier? /bemused What can I say, it's good to have dreams I guess. Personally I think you and bascule are letting hatred color your assessments here. But hey, you could be right and I could be wrong. I guess we'll find out one way or the other.

No, he's quite serious about seeing informationclearinghouse.info as an unbiased source. (sigh) You're a good man for saying so, but I do have to point out that you did precisely what I predicted that you would feel compelled, and indeed be unable to do anything else but to do -- condemn the rocket attacks while laying responsibility for them at Israel's feet. Still, you condemn the rocket attacks, and good for you for that.

Did you all catch this bit from the speech?

Or maybe I'm just seeing an even bigger one. The reason there won't any charges is the same reason that Ford pardoned Nixon: Obama doesn't want it to dominate his presidency. Of course Ford turned out to be severely wrong (it probably cost him the election), but it seems unlikely to me that nobody will hate Obama for not prosecuting Bush over his alleged crimes, whereas if he did prosecute the country would be severely divided at the very time that it desperately needs not to be. But folks, if you don't think that position sends a message, after Republicans impeached the previous Democratic president over a blow job behind the Resolute desk, you really know nothing about politics. Democrats win this one without lifting a finger, and nobody, but NOBODY, in Washington will fail to get the message.

I thought that the highlight of the speech was his call for unity. He has an amazing talent for making that call without denigrating those he's accusing. It seems to be natural and heartfelt. Actually the shining moment of the day for me was Rev. Lowery, tired and cold and clearly not altogether as able as he once was, but still managing to summon the spirit of the civil rights movement. He used his famous magical line, and for a brief moment he was his old self again. And two million people said "Amen!" What a moment.

So he says. But hey, if the ABB crowd wants to miss the bigger picture and spend the next eight years stamping its feet about impeachment, they can go right on ahead. Because in spite of eight years of them telling us the contrary, it's still very much a free country.