Pangloss

Kinda makes you wonder what might have happened had he accepted John Kerry's offer and the combined pair had won in 2004. Kerry would be running for re-election this year, and that would mean McCain running as a kind of Jeffersonian (ala election of 1800) heir apparent in 2012 -- at age 75! (Quick, somebody call Harry Turtledove!)

I wonder where the WTO sits on that distinction. It's an interesting way around free trade disputes. Bailing out a bank is a pretty gray distinction from funding a nationalized industry. It'd be interesting to compare that with the difference between US complaints against Europe for Airbus vs Europe's complaints against the US for its tax breaks for Boeing.

I suspect so. I wonder if our perceptions here are colored by the even worse appearance of Fred Thompson during the primary season, i.e. he has generally looked better than Thompson so he hasn't seemed as old in comparison.

When I first read this it was just that headline, her quote, and the photograph you see below, so my initial reaction was "right-wing spin". Then I noticed the source: The Washington Post! Apparently this is for real. So I think this is an interesting example of how useful scrutiny of candidates can be on the campaign trail. We never really get to know these people -- we have to use the press as a surrogate. That's what makes real spin and ideological partisanship so dangerous -- it distorts and defends things like this, making them harder to detect and expose. I have no doubt that if Hillary were the sole Democratic candidate at the moment that this story would be under far more attack and parsing than it currently is. The quote: The photograph: The video of her arrival that day, courtesy of CBS News, along with her quotes defending what she said: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOsGo_HWP-c Washington Post article: http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/03/hillarys_balkan_adventures_par.html Gotta love this quote from comedian Sinbad, who was actually on the trip with her, questioning why Bill Clinton would send her into a war zone! Hehe!

I moved this into a new thread and out of the joke thread so we can look at it in the more serious light that it deserves. I also commented on this here -- I think I'll just copy that post over to this thread to help get things started. (Edit: Okay, that's bizarre -- I meant iNow's post to be on top and my copied post from the other thread to appear below this one (see how it carries the subject line?). I wonder why my copied, older post came out on top? Maybe based on date?)

I don't want to keep the music. I just want to rent it a while. But I definitely see those points. I totally agree with bascule's point about checking in with a central DRM server. In my case the music files played for 30 days after the service went down, iirc, then went belly-up. A grace period is nice (who's connected ALL the time?), but I can see how it might have timed out for other reasons and been an inconvenience even if the service was still running. Isn't it interesting, though, that the general perception out there is that on-demand movies are going to overwhelm platter-based movie media in the next few years? Most people don't collect movies the way they collect music, of course, or play movies in the background while working or driving (although I keep seeing people with in-car monitors, pointed at the driver, playing DVDs while they're driving on the highway! who are these idiots?!). But if the advantage of on-demand movies is that you can see what you want when you want, couldn't the same advantage apply to music? I think it's interesting that we're okay with temporary rental with movies, but not typically with music.

Oh of course, he's picking on me a bit, copying my subject line and first-post text and replacing "Obama" with "McCain" (in case anybody missed that). I always get a chuckle out of bascule's barbs. But it's an excellent reflection of how real spin is actually produced. That's how partisanship works -- isolate and marginalize. Of course here the argument fails because of the invalid comparison logic, but of course that would never stop a Rush Limbaugh or Al Franken from using it -- they live and breathe that stuff. Look around some of the liberal blogs and you'll see this very comparison being used and considered valid, just as conservative blogs are still ranting about Wright and Obama's "refusal to distance himself", blah blah blah. I'm glad we don't fall for that sort of thing here!

Well I think Obama did answer for Wright, and I'm disappointed that it's still in the public, national discourse, but I guess I have to accept that other people feel differently. A number of my conservative friends have expressed similar sentiments even as my liberal friends are completely outraged by it. This is just spin, though. Rev. Wright baptized Obama's children and married the man to his wife. McCain has met this guy a couple of times? Come on. This is like when McCain was roasted over the woman who asked him how they were going to "beat the b*tch". THIS is guilt by association.

Why do you say that? That situation has been pretty under-reported here in the States, IMO. I've heard that he was blasted over dating and then marrying some supermodel shortly after divorcing his wife (if I got that right). Beyond that my general impression (right or wrong?) is that he's being slammed because he's conservative, which makes him pretty much automatically evil in French political practice. But I've no idea what the specific gripes are and I'd love to hear more. I can break it off into a separate thread if it gets interesting.

McCain has had a number of policy mis-steps lately. Actually kind of a staggering number of them. It's almost as if he decided it was time to start taking policy positions, but hadn't quite gotten around to talking to an advisor about it. Yesterday Joseph Lieberman had to step up to McCain while he was still at the microphone and correct him after he claimed that Iran (shiites!) was helping Al Qaeda (sunnis!), which of course is their blood enemy! It's more than a little embarassing, and if so much attention wasn't being focused on the Democratic "civil war" at the moment I think it would be getting a lot more attention.

McCain has had a number of policy mis-steps lately. Actually kind of a staggering number of them. It's almost as if he decided it was time to start taking policy positions, but hadn't quite gotten around to talking to an advisor about it. Yesterday Joseph Lieberman had to step up to McCain while he was still at the microphone and correct him after he claimed that Iran (shiites!) was helping Al Qaeda (sunnis!), which of course is their blood enemy! It's more than a little embarassing, and if so much attention wasn't being focused on the Democratic "civil war" at the moment I think it would be getting a lot more attention.

Y'all might find this amusing: Oliver Stone to make movie about George W. Bush. It's cute how he tries to play fair... while never once using the word "President". I wonder if he had to take a shower after the interview. (I loved Nixon, btw. Especially the deleted Sam Waterston scene. Spooky!)

Random thoughts: "Like taking candy from a baby." "Never chain Paris." "Woohoo, party tonight in Berlin!" "Wait, France had nukes? Oh snap."

OK, that's just unacceptable. You need to either back that up or knock it off, and the racists addendums just need to be jettisoned right now.

Worst (mlb) President Evar! (Yeah I know, he was an owner, not a team president. It's just funnier this way!)

Heh, that's an interesting (and amusing) point.

Rofl... I've been fighting for weeks now to point out the extent of silly and counter-productive PC behavior here. If only I'd known that all I had to do was start an anti-Bush poll, I could've saved myself a lot of effort!

It's a good point about sharing may rise again. The recent onslaught of DRM-free providers would seem to be pointing in that direction. I'd love to use iTunes, I just don't want to pay $10,000 for 10,000 songs. I'd rather pay $20/month for 10,000 songs. Makes a lot more sense. I love the fact that I can download new artists or old artists that come recommended from friends without having to spend any extra money. I should explain that I like to do that a lot -- exploring different artists and musical styles. I go through music like most people go through bottled water. Maybe I need to revisit the sharing issue. I just don't like the legal aspect of it.

Meanwhile the IOC has apparently added a new sport: "Closing the Barn Door After the Horse Gets Out". World record currently held by one Jacques Rogge.

Methane spotted in a planetary atmosphere in a system in Vulpecula. It's not an Earth-like planet but it's a promising development in the search for life outside our own ecosphere. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/20/science/space/20planetw.html

Isn't it interesting, by the way, that they included the phrase "well-regulated" with regard to the first clause? It seems to support the notion of regulation and licensing, if obliquely.

What do you prefer? Paying a fixed cost per download, or paying a monthly, all-you-can-eat subscription fee? (Illegal downloads do not count here -- take your pirating ways elsewhere, yarr!) I've been a subscription fan for a while now, but I recently had to deal with the down side of this approach when the service I was using went out of business (Microsoft's Urge) and all my toons expired leaving my player full of unplayable songs. Still, I would have had to pay almost $4,000 for that same set of music had I bought them all individually. That's a lot of cash, and the only real inconvenience was that I had to hit the delete button. Word came yesterday along the Internet grapevine that Apple is finally considering a subscription service for iTunes. http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2008/tc20080319_503917.htm?chan=rss_topStories_ssi_5 What do you all think?

Well I respect your opinion ecoli. The ironic thing is that Wright is supposedly known for his speeches on self-motivation and -reliance. Here's what Nicholas Kristof had to say at the New York Times: Note the part about how it "derives power from" its "acknowledgement of... grievances on many sides". It's like Kristof reads my posts here! http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/20/opinion/20kristof.html?em&ex=1206158400&en=cd02deeeb508e822&ei=5087 Unfortunately the story today has been that the speech hasn't put the issue to rest for Democrats either. Clinton took the lead over Obama in one national poll, and Clinton surrogates have begun attacking Obama over the Wright issue. And the Wall Street Journal talks about fence-sitting superdelegates waiting to see if the issue is dead. And this quote is from Clinton supporter Lanny Davis in the Huffington Post: He goes on to question whether Democrats will continue to support Obama if it is found that Wright used the N word. Hmm, I don't like that, that strikes me as true guilt by association, especially in the sense that he's using a surrogate ("those evil Republicans will just hit him with it in the fall, damn them!"). In fairness, he did praise the speech as "brilliant". I guess this thing's not over yet. That's unfortunate, because it should be, IMO.

Absolutely, I think that's a valid observation. That's one of the factors making the problem difficult, and one of the reasons threatening to leave has an impact. I agree with that aspect of your message.