firehand

Prometheus 6   

Do not make the mistake of thinking that because my conclusion is the same as another person's that my reasoning is the same

July 05, 2003

The bad thing about hanging out

You come back and see googles that piss you off, like "mistress ass negro slave" (this time from net.il). And you're buzzed enough to blog that shit.

You know what? I'm thinking about saving these obnoxious searches so the next time somebody says "Racism isn't a problem anymore" I can show them one *&$#%)!!ed up query per day. At least.

And I have no problem naming the domain these queries come from. Let idiots know they're not as anonymous as they think they are… if they ever come back, because this is ALWAYS the wrong site to find such crap on.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 08:55:36 PM |

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The Black Commentator

Seriously the most progressive Black editorial force on the net, this cartoon is embedded in, and link to, this weeks's cover story: ""The Slow and Tortured Death of Affirmative Action."

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 10:23:43 AM |

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Buzzflash is at it again

If you don't have Flash installed (unimaginable, but hey...) this animation is worth the effort of getting the player.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 10:09:58 AM |

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Yeah, they're getting that desperate

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 09:59:59 AM |

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Kind of foul, but I like it anyway

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 09:58:00 AM |

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That about says it

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 09:55:07 AM |

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I guess this explains the weird mood I was in the other day

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 09:48:06 AM |

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posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 09:39:56 AM |

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Holy...

Microsoft Mulls at Least $10 Billion Dividend
7/3/2003

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. is considering paying its shareholders a special dividend of more than $10 billion to reduce its $46 billion cash pile, according to the Web site of London's Financial Times, citing a report in its affiliated French newspaper, Les Echos.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 09:12:31 AM |

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Good answer!

The rest of the piece is worth reading.

Was Liberia Founded By Freed U.S. Slaves?
By Mary Kay Ricks
Posted Thursday, July 3, 2003, at 7:49 AM PT

In Tuesday's Washington Post, an editorial urging President Bush to send peacekeepers to civil war-wracked Liberia noted that the country was "founded by freed U.S. slaves." Is that true?

Not quite. Although some freed American slaves did settle there, Liberia was actually founded by the American Colonization Society, a group of white Americans�including some slaveholders�that had what certainly can be described as mixed motives. In 1817, in Washington, D.C., the ACS established the new colony (on a tract of land in West Africa purchased from local tribes) in hopes that slaves, once emancipated, would move there. The society preferred this option to the alternative: a growing number of free black Americans demanding rights, jobs, and resources at home.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/5/2003 07:40:28 AM |

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July 04, 2003

Hey, guy from co.za googling for "africans inferior race"

Wrong blog.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 02:43:15 PM |

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OK, one more thing

I use Blogger because it's free and lets me use my existing free web space (for various reasons that would turn into whining if I went into them, free is a Good ThingTM at this point in my life), and I don't really like the idea of my stuff existing soley on another guy's server.

But you know, MT looks good, especially with some of the modifications I've seen, like a sidebar that lists the most recently updated comments.

I've seen two sites now that offer free MT hosting. One looks like vanilla MT and is so new it's not actually running yet. The other would require me to install MT myself… and Perl is not my friend. But once it's running, it cold really kick ass.

Yet Blogger seems to be making a serious move to resolve its issues. Archives look good at last… because I had the practice of regenerating the most recent on after a fairly significant posting spree my problems weren't as bad as some folks'. And my site loads pretty quickly since it's straight text. And Earthlink has the volume thing down pretty well— this site moves well hen Blogger-hosted sites are dragging.

So I'm looking for advice. I'm sufficiently techie that no one has brought me an unsolvable problem yet. Do I leave well enough alone because the current setup is sufficient unto the call? Or do I mess with Perl and MT so I can be like da cool kids?

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 12:02:17 PM |

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And that's the holiday edition of Prometheus 6

See ya tomorrow.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 10:34:48 AM |

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And while I'm on a pseudo techno rant

My conclusions about the nastiness of the RSS crew.

WHen Netscape dropped RSS, Dave Winer picked up the ball. The RDF crew is upset because RSS 0.9x didn't pass the XML purity test, or maybe it's personal… I ain't that deep into it and won't be. Naming RSS 1.0 as such was a slap at Dave Winer. He, in return slapped back with RSS 2.0.

RDF crew slapped first, so I blame you for the mess. You should have named your format RDFS (RDF Syndication) and fought your battle on technological grounds. But you didn't, and your whole RSS community (1.0 and 2.0 factions) is now known as much for pissy-little-hissy fits as the much needed syndication tech. And the more important article syndication grows, the more the tech will be used and the more you all will be heard of AND THOUGHT OF AS TOTAL ASSES.

Grow up, or the tech will be taken by BigCo. And as long as I can use it, I don't care if it is. But YOU do.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 10:34:18 AM |

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From Economics: information technology

Organize This

A story goes that Hell was created when God took Satan to see Heaven. "It's beautiful," Satan said, appreciatively. "Here--let me organize it for you."

In that spirit, we have the idea of organizing blogs by topic or by location.


I wasn't going to post this because the comment arose in the Necho (TheAPIThatWouldHaveBeenFormerlyKnownAsEcho) context and it REALLY makes me want to comment on this whole mess which looks like it's getting messier. See, the same people who aren't getting along for essentially technoreligious reasons are working on Necho, and you know what? A wiki is a good collaboration tool… but that assume you want to collaborate (although a commenter on inessential.com said his biggest problem was "the total assness of Wiki," which still cracks me up).

No matter what the tool, what the plan, what the method, the outcome depends on the intent of the participants.

Not to jerk ya nerves too hard Mark (and Sarah Lai, duck— here comes another non sequitur), this is a perfect example of the mechanics behind my concern over how the anti-"affirmative action" crew will respond if Project Excite (quite deservedly) became the model approach to our education gap.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 10:23:38 AM |

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We interrupt our rant to bring you this exciting information

The BBC has done a fairly deep thing.

The Story of Africa

The Story of Africa tells the history of the continent from an African perspective.

Africa's top historians take a fresh look at the events and characters that have shaped the continent from the origins of humankind to the end of South African apartheid.

See the rise and fall of empires and kingdoms, experience the power of religion, the injustices of slavery, and chart the expansion of trade between Africa and other continents.

Hear what it was like to live under colonialism, follow the struggle against it, and celebrate the achievement of independence.


See what that says? HEAR what it's like.

I've only glanced around, but it looks like one hell of a resouce, and the link has a permanent home in "Dropping Knowledge."

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 10:05:36 AM |

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US Africa Policies Look Good but Lack Substance, Say Critics

allAfrica.com
NEWS
July 3, 2003
By Charles Cobb Jr.
Washington, DC

Apparently compassionate U.S. initiatives for Africa such as the promise of $15bn to help fight HIV/Aids are "at this moment, fictitious, because they remain unfunded" and President Bush's forthcoming Africa trip is "lacking in substance," says Salih Booker, Executive Director of Africa Action.

"The President may be callously manipulating Africa's suffering to present a veneer of compassion and the American public is being misled," Booker said at a briefing Wednesday on Bush's five-nation tour of Africa scheduled to begin next week.

TransAfrica Forum President Bill Fletcher, the Co-Director of Foreign Policy in Focus, Emira Woods, and Njoki Njoroge Njehu, Director of the U.S. Network for Global Justice's 50 Years is Enough, were also harshly critical of U.S. Africa policy.

"Although the Bush administration continues to promote trade as an engine of growth, U.S. policy continues to promote interests that are antithetical to Africa," said Booker. Furthermore, the U.S. "fails to provide its fair share" of foreign assistance and "the U.S. footprint in Africa is growing" while, at the same time, its "refusal to participate in multilateral peacekeeping efforts are undermining African peacemakers."

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 09:58:07 AM |

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Is it brought on yet, Mr. President? Huh? Huh?

Attacks Leave U.S. Soldier Dead, 18 Hurt
By AMY WALDMAN 9:02 AM ET
The attacks seemed to affirm the comments of the commander of allied forces in Iraq, who acknowledged that the United States-led coalition in Iraq was still at war.

Anger Rises for Families of Troops in Iraq
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN

ORT HOOD, Tex., July 3 � Luisa Leija was in bed the other morning, she recalled, when her 9-year-old daughter bounded in the room, saying, "Mommy, mommy, there's a man in uniform at the door."

Ms. Leija, the wife of a young artillery captain in Iraq, threw on a robe and took a deep breath. She dashed to the door, thinking: "This is not happening to me. This can't be happening to me."

A soldier in full camouflage was on the doorstep. It was a neighbor locked out of his house.

Ms. Leija is still upset. The panic has passed, but not the weariness. Or the anger. Anger that her husband, Capt. Frank Leija, has not come home yet, even though President Bush declared two months ago that "major combat operations in Iraq have ended." Anger that the end of that stage has not meant the beginning of peace, that the Army has assigned new duties for her husband and his men that have nothing to do with toppling Saddam Hussein.

And anger that the talk in Washington is not of taking troops out of Iraq, but of sending more in.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 09:43:12 AM |

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Sic 'em! Rowf! Rowf-rowf!!

Democrats See Opening for Attack on Economy
By RICHARD W. STEVENSON

WASHINGTON, July 3 � The jump in the unemployment rate gave Democrats a new opening today to attack President Bush's management of the economy and question the effectiveness of his signature tax cuts.

In strikingly similar terms, many of the Democratic presidential candidates attacked Mr. Bush's policies as misdirected and unfair. The continuing loss of jobs from the economy allowed them to call into question Mr. Bush's vow that his latest tax cut, the third in three years, would create a million new jobs.

"This president has a failed economic policy on his hands, and he has no inclination to be flexible and change it," Representative Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri, one of the nine Democratic presidential candidates, said in an interview. "He keeps doing more of the same thing he's been doing, which is more tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. It's a repeat of the Reagan program times three. It didn't work then, and it isn't working now."

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 09:39:02 AM |

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So THAT'S where the flying saucers come from

Similar Solar System Found Only 90 Light Years Away
By DENNIS OVERBYE
A team of British, Australian and American astronomers announced on Thursday that they had found a hint of home 90 light years away in the constellation Puppis.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 09:32:31 AM |

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And for the ladies, there's little fingers in the center

I know the title is foul, but this is ridiculous.

There's a Bug in My Seat Cushion
By ALAN COWELL

ARNBOROUGH, England, June 30 � Deep in the Hampshire woodlands, southwest of London, at an installation ringed with barbed wire and guarded by security cameras and men in yellow slickers, scientists are working, among many other things, on what has been called a "smart seat."

Advertisement

It is an airline passenger seat studded with hidden sensors and linked to a computerized monitor screen that cabin staff can read for clues about their passengers.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 09:30:57 AM |

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BTW

I checked out The Diner at Penda's Realm (except she signs her posts "Fresh"). She stays on the blogroll.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/4/2003 12:46:23 AM |

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July 03, 2003

Take THAT Uncle Clarence

The biggest hypocracy in Clarence Thomas' dissent in the UMich case was his shameless twisting… his decontextualization… of Frederick Douglass' words.

To clarify what Mr. Douglass meant when he said "leave us alone," I present in its entirety his speech on the meaning of the Fourth of July national holiday to a people purposely excluded from nationality and holidays.

The speech was given to abolitionists, of course or he wouldn't have survived the hour, much less the day. Much has changed since those days, but this much remains the same: those who need to hear it are never those who are willing to listen.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 10:51:26 PM |

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At the stroke of Midnight

I return to my normal erudite posting style. And it's midnight somewhere right now…

It'll be a very quiet posting weekend on my part. I may write something or other, but you'll do well to pick a time and check no more than once a day for the next three days. Not that I don't love the traffic, but we all got better thngs to do than check an essentially static page, right?

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 10:26:36 PM |

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I'm famous!

James R MacLean at the Watch has a whole post about me!

Aight, a previous incarnation. But it's still cooler'n a mug.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 08:31:30 PM |

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Whut?

Dystopia says some Republicans in Cali thinks the Davis recall is a bad idea? That it'll lead ta endless political instability?

Hell, I knew that. But Republicans?? Y'all screwing around wit my conception of the universe.

Heh.

Serious, that's why I be flippin' on Republican extremists. Republicans is just peeps wit stupid ideas. They don't mean no harm. Republican extremists is peeps wit evil ideas. They don't give shiznit bout nuffin but they wallet.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 08:25:38 PM |

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So I'm flippin the blogroll, right? And I'm checking who's supposed ta be on there on the political tip, and I owe Hi, I'm Black an appearance even though he ain't but so political because I'm waiting for da brotha to git all cynical 'n shiznit like me an' I wanna see it.

Being a lazy muhfugga, I pop overso's I can just hit da BlogRoll It! button 'cause I ain't about typin a damn thing, know what I'm sayin'? And he's like visit this sista Penda and you oughta link ta her.

So I visit, and there's this little picture in the in the upper right and I'm like, "Whoa. She's a hottie rather attractive from that angle."

So I'm blogrolling her, cuz (all together, now)

it's my damn blog.

And baby girl, if I find out that ain't you, I'm cutting ya until you say something all cynical.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 08:15:01 PM |

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Jeezuz!

I just took a look at the wiki for TheAPIThatWouldHaveBeenFormerlyKnownAsEcho.

Yo, that shiznit's bugged.

Not the wiki itself. That's more orderly than I remember a wiki to be. And it do look like a nice way ta play together.

But daaaaaaamn. Check out the preliminary definition of a post:

  • author
    • There is exactly one Author of an Entry, and that Author is identified by a non-empty name and an optional URI of a person, organization, or system. Note that if there are other Contributors to the entry they can be acknowledged using the BiblioGraphy extension.
  • permalink, the persistent URL of the entry on the Web
  • publication date
  • one or more content items (all of which are semantically equivalent)
    • media type
    • language (optional) (not optional - see below, [MaciejCeglowski, RefactorOk])
    • content link
    • file size
    • data
  • Optional extension modules (status in parentheses):
  • BiblioGraphy: title, subtitle, summary, timestamps, version (planning)
  • Related: related resources and how they're related (proposal)

  • Categorization: topics and categorization systems (planning)
  • Identity: pgp keys, detached signatures (planning)
  • Security: encryption (consensus to defer)
  • License: licensing terms (proposal)
  • GeoLocation: the geographic location the entry was posted from or describes (planning)
  • SponsoredLinks: advertisements that people want, and are clearly labeled as such (planning)
  • BlogRoll: an external list of feeds the site's author(s) subscribe to (planning)


And then there's the talk a' dumpin' XML-RPC, which is how ALL da current tools work, for SOAP or straight-up HTML posts, fillin' da headers with the data.

Yo. Peeps.

Y'all ain't building a weblog system. You're buildin a fukkin career. You're buildin' a l'il sum-sumpin you can make a weblog with, and I remember M$ releasing something they said you can build a weblog with an' y'all just snorted at it.

Y'all about to to do blogging systems what all them modules and EJBs did to Java, and peeps is still talking about how to make Java easy. YOU CAN'T WRITE JAVA BY HAND ANYMORE. Ya NEED a toolset like JBuilder… nice but try making a useful Java thang in Notepad. HA!

You know what a weblog is? It's a goddam web page, that's what. And folks are designing TheAPIThatWouldHaveBeenFormerlyKnownAsEcho like they's pissed the Obfuscated C Contest is outta style.

Do what ya want. But with the tools at hand and some discipline you can do alla this stuff already. Do ya jobsecurity thang, but don't play like you're gonna save the blogworld.

Oh, yeah. It's still interestin, and I'm still gonna follow it. An' I'm still glad I ain't a tech blogger.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 07:27:37 PM |

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My boy Max

MaxSpeak's calling the Shrub out on his promise to make some jobs by sucking cash outta normal folks and giving it to peeps what don't give a damn.

Well, the first month of our little marathon has rolled around. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has released its report for June. Did we get 344,000 new jobs? No, we got 30,000 fewer jobs. That's net; jobs gained minus jobs lost. (This means that to get back to quota, we need 344,000 + 344,000 + 30,000 jobs next month. It's the 'Establishment Survey' that we are following here. The household survey shows a much bigger job loss -- over 100,000.

…It is amusing to note the panic setting in among some righties like Robert Novak, whining this morning in the Post that the Fed isn't doing enough. But the Fed has done most of what it can, since it can't drive the interest rate much lower. Zero beckons. IT'S THE TAX CUTS STUPID! THEY AREN'T WORKING!!


In the comments somebody say the cuts is doing what they supposed ta. Prolly right.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 07:00:25 PM |

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I been Shizzolated!

For real, yo!

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 05:02:29 PM |

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I'm in a mood

See below. I don't know how long it'll last.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 09:34:06 AM |

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Editorial run

Free Speech for Firms Too

It's tough enough now to pull meaningful answers from corporate executives about anything even remotely controversial. But that information could slow even more unless California courts rule swiftly on the reach of free-speech protections for corporations.

The U.S. Supreme Court, in one of its final rulings of the year, declined to deal with a case concerning a suit against Nike Inc., instead sending the matter back to a San Francisco courtroom. A lot is hanging on the outcome, for Nike, the news media and the public.

…Microsoft Corp., Tribune Co. (which owns The Times), the AFL-CIO and the Public Relations Society of America, among others, were disappointed last week when the U.S. Supreme Court unexpectedly dismissed the case on procedural grounds. No matter what jurors in San Francisco decide about Nike's labor practices, the courts must reaffirm the distinction between commercial speech and constitutionally protected free speech.

[p6: I am soooo feeling this case, and Nike needs to be pimp-slapped. Corporations only got these free-speech "rights" by perverting the 14th amendment at a time the courts SHOULDA been covering Black people's azzes wif it. Fuk Nike. I don't even by they shoes…]

Trials for 'Enemies of All Mankind'? Count the U.S. Out
By Reed Brody
The extradition of the notorious Ricardo Miguel Cavallo from Mexico to Spain last week has given comfort to victims of Argentina's "dirty war." It's a comfort the United States would deny.

[p6: USofA don't wanna be held accountable. Hey, Bush. Listen to Ashcroft, man… if you ain't done nothing wrong, you ain't got nothing to fear, right?]

Cartoons
Yo, Boondocks is so right, they ain't right.
Ben Sargent's kickin shit correct about broke-ass state governments.
And Steve Benson is crackin' on the Federal Reserve. Heh.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 09:33:31 AM |

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Want a job? Tough

Jobless Rate Hits 6.4 Pct., 9-Year High
LEIGH STROPE
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The nation's unemployment rate shot up to 6.4 percent in June, the highest level in more than nine years, in an economic slump that has cost nearly a million jobs in the last three months.

Businesses slashed 30,000 jobs just last month, with cuts heavily concentrated on factory assembly lines, the Labor Department reported Thursday.


Yeah? And?

And you know this record is made under, ahem revised accounting rules. Which means da shit's even worse'n they admitting to.

daaaamnn…

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 09:11:30 AM |

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Frankenfood

Europe Acts to Require Labeling of Genetically Altered Food
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ

LONDON, July 2 � The European Parliament approved legislation today to require strict labels for food and feed made with genetically altered ingredients, a move that was hailed by environmentalists but pilloried by American farmers.

Intended to better inform wary European consumers, the legislation would require supermarkets to label all food containing more than 0.9 percent of a genetically modified organism. So, for example, a cookie made with genetically modified corn oil would carry a label that states: "This product contains a genetically modified organism."

The legislation also ensures that genetically modified (or G.M., as they are called here) foodstuffs like grains will be traced from the moment of their inception to their arrival in the European Union through the processing stage and into the supermarket.

"This should give consumers greater confidence," said David Byrne, the European commissioner for health and consumer protection.

The new laws are expected to receive final approval by the European Union's 15 member states this fall. They would not take effect until early next year.

The Bush administration criticized the legislation today, saying it would be burdensome for food producers, could prejudice consumers against genetically modified food and become a barrier to free trade.

"The European Union's practice may lead other countries to block trade by imposing detailed information, traceability and labeling requirements and prompt a host of new nontariff barriers just at a time we are trying to stimulate world trade," Richard Mills, the spokesman for the United States Trade Representatives, said in a statement released today.

Genetically modified foods, which are common in the United States, are passionately opposed by many Europeans, who call them "Frankenfoods" and fear they may pose long-term health and environmental risks. These crops have been biologically altered to build in a number of desirable characteristics, from insect resistance to faster growth to greater sugar retention.


This is the move, and I wish we could get such a rule here. I ain't feeling the whole Frankenfood thang, and I'd go totally organic if I could.

You know the USofA is fulla shit on this right? They wanna sell Frankenfood on accounta we the ones that produce the most of it. Yeah, get creative, crossbreed shit, come up with seedless watermelons the size of softballs an'' shit, but I'm not happy eating something that coldn't ever be produced by natural means. That's like ating food from another planet, know what I'm sayin'?

And the African famine is more 'cause a European and USofA tarriffs than anything else. The cost of entry into they markets' too damn high and that screws wit' everything because you can't get currency for trade when your biggist product is priced outta da market by tarriffs.

Hmph. FUK outta my face, boyee…

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 09:02:37 AM |

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Plagiarism alert

I have to post the whole article because of the closing line.

Libraries Planning a Meeting on Filters
By JOHN SCHWARTZ

Officials of the American Library Assocation will call a meeting with the makers of Internet filtering software next month to voice concern over a federal law that requires libraries and schools to use Internet filters or risk losing federal money.

The law, the Children's Internet Protection Act, was upheld last week by the Supreme Court after the librarians challenged the law on constitutional grounds.

Judith Krug, director of the Office of Intellectual Freedom at the American Library Association, said that in the meeting, tentatively scheduled for Aug. 14, librarians will ask the companies to ensure that their software can easily be turned off and on again by librarians.

The group will also demand that the companies reveal their database of blocked sites to libraries so they can determine which programs best suit the libraries' needs, or they may work with third parties to develop new filtering software.

"If we can't get what we want from the filtering companies, I say let's make our own," Mr. Krug said.

A representative of one of the leading filtering companies said the industry was ready to cooperate with the librarians. David Burt, a spokesman for N2H2, said his company's product made disabling the software easy. But he said there might be more disagreement about releasing the list of blocked sites, which would be valuable to the company's competitors.

Besides, he noted, "we would be making available the world's largest and best collection of porn sites, and that's not the business we want to be in."


Yo, nobody asking yo punk ass to give it to your competition. You have to make it so our customers can add and subtract blocked sites because your blocked lists is flawed than a muhfukka. An' THAT'S why you ain't tryna give it up.

Punks. Betta raise up offa them librarians. They doing more for you than you EVA did for them, yo.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 08:50:11 AM |

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Things that annoyed me on the bus

Two sistas talking, one with daughter (looks ~14 yrs, but with Flintstones vitamins who can tell nowadays?). One sista's like, "Oh yeah, we more like sisters than mother and daughter." The other's like, "Yeah, that's how it has to be," and I'm thinking "No hell it ain't. That's about the opposite of how it has to be." Mom is tight, yo, 'bout my age but too foolish to talk to on da rizzle.

FOINE girlie, with baby son in tow. Had to look on accounta the cleavage (I'm a beast, sue me). But baby boy is loaded down with phony bling-bling, eight or nine "gold" chains.

Not strickly on the bus, boy got ear buds jacked into a cellphone, having an out-loud conversation like he's a telepath and making a big show of having his hands in his pockets.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 08:42:57 AM |

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Windows palmtops

The NY Times reviews three upcoming Windows palmtops. Which I mention because a friend just plopped down half a $K for one of the Samsung phone/Palm PDA combinations and is she ever happy. Says her laptop may never see use again because she has one of them roll-up keyboards— waved the whole rig under my nose like, "Nyah, nyah, I'm cooler than you…"

I do like the idea of a really small computer with Wi-Fi built in that I can stick in my pocket. A real keyboard would be nice, however small. I don't use more than 3-4 fingers at a time anyway

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 08:33:14 AM |

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Just say no

Justice Dept. Asks Court to Reconsider Ruling on 9/11 Suspect
By NEIL A. LEWIS

WASHINGTON, July 2 � The Justice Department has asked a federal appeals court to reconsider its decision declining to prevent Zacarias Moussaoui from interviewing captured people linked to Al Qaeda to support his defense that he was not involved in the Sept. 11 terrorist plot.

In a brief filed late on Tuesday, prosecutors argued that the three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit had erred when it ruled on June 26 that it could not yet intervene in the case. The panel said that a lower court's order to allow Mr. Moussaoui's lawyers to interview one captured Qaeda figure had not yet reached the stage at which it could be reviewed.

But Justice Department officials argued that the court had misinterpreted a statute used to allow the government to go forward in cases involving national security secrets. The appeals panel said that the law was designed to limit disclosure to the public of classified information at a trial and did not apply to information being given solely to a defendant.

"The provision is not limited to disclosure to 'the public,' " the Justice Department said, "but rather permits an appeal of any decision by a district court authorizing disclosure of classified information."

The government said that the panel's interpretation "would have a profound impact on the ability of the United States to prosecute not only this case but other international terrorism cases and even traditional espionage cases."


Oh, bullshit. Haven't espionage cases been successfully tried before the P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act? This is the kind of hyperbole that sets my teeth on edge.

MY hyperbole is just fine, though.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 08:22:47 AM |

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And this surprises you… why?

Bush's Record on Jobs: Risking Unhappy Comparisons
By DAVID LEONHARDT
George W. Bush finds himself in danger of becoming the first president since Herbert Hoover to oversee a decline in the country's employment.

Picking Workers' Pockets
By BOB HERBERT
I wonder how many Americans agree with the Bush administration that working longer hours for less money is a good thing.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/3/2003 07:57:13 AM |

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July 02, 2003

Not for nothing, just 'cause I agree

from Rantavation

You see, as long as you can be consistant in your belief system, then I don't have an argument to hang you with. I can disagree with your reasoning, but your reasoning is consistant and thoughful. If, on the other hand, you get rhetorically lost three steps outside of the RoveCorp talking point of the day, then you're buying a bill of goods and trying to sell it on to me, and I'm having none of it.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 09:42:32 PM |

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I shoulda never looked

You know Adam Felber is funny as hell. Well, he has a roundup of the dissenting opinions on lesser known SCOTUS decisions that, well…

Turling vs. Black People: Ruling found a new Texas law making black people illegal to be unconstitutional.
Vote: 8-1
From the dissenting opinion (Thomas): "Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that it�s "okay" to be black. This is affirmative action at its most dangerous. Honestly, I don�t know what the other guys were thinking on this one."


I think Felber needs to be medicated. I love that in a man…

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 08:38:48 PM |

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Where have I been?

Schlock 'N' Roll is now on the mandatory weekly read list because of this and this and this.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 07:07:59 PM |

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What, they ain't brought enough already?


thorswitch at differents strings is astounded. So am I.
Shrub actually said:
"There are some who feel like that conditions are such that they can attack us there," Bush told reporters at the White House. "My answer is: Bring them on. We have the force necessary to deal with the situation."

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 06:13:59 PM |

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Racism - an incidental post

Scroll down to Project Excite again and read both the post and the comment ZenPundit left.

Toward the end of a really, really tense conversation in the comments of Alas, A Blog I asked the conservative guy, Joe, what he thought of the project. He said:

Prometheus 6: Your citation to Project Excite looks like something I would definitely and excitedly support. Like I said above, I would support efforts to get black kids really learning and excelling at education from the very first. Then when they're 17, universities will be able to accept them on their own academic merit without having to spot them 300 points on the SAT.

Truthfully, I think anyone who expects the Connerlys and Scalias of the world to back any program that exclusively addresses minority issues has better weed than I ever did back in the day.

I'm asking here a slightly modified version of what I asked at Ampersand's place.

Is there a problem excluding white kids from this program?

Let me tell you all what my problem with the anti-"AA" crowd is. It's all rhetoric and no alternative. The fact is minorities are at a disadvantage because of the remnants of historical racism (no discussion about whether or not racism is a current problem because I don't want to get sidetracked).

Liberals have tried to address this. We called it affirmative action, (collective)you called it reverse racism. And the positions and actions taken by those in a position to affect things are based on rhetoric rather than reason. At the moment, the pendulum is in the extreme right position,

Conservative rhetoric has said, in effect, no consideration of race is to be taken into account. I say, how do you correct a problem afflicting a specific people without taking into account that which we all… from progressive to Republican extremist… use to identify the afflicted population?

Conservative rhetoric has been to deny all consideraton of race. And nothing about how to actually address the real, recognized problem, much as economically it's been all tax cuts and no programs to reduce. But from your answer, it seems there are areas in which you feel it appropriate to consider race. Where are those areas? How would you do it?

I guarantee you, if (collective) you come up with a solid, workable plan for K12 development that addresses us minorities and guarantee funding of it you will get not just agreement but acclaim.

Yes, guarantee funding. Because a large part of the problem is the physical plant in which kids must learn is decayed, overcrowded, understaffed and filled with outdated books which the children must accord with to pass… which means they must learn the wrong information. And instead of help, we get crap like "No Child Left Behind" which is a threat not a promise. So I also ask, how would you fund the program?

The problem of racism and its legacy will not be solved by pretending there's no problem. Everytime someone complains about 'focusing on the differences that divide us' all I can hear is "let's pretend there's no problem so that whatever makes you different from the mainstream withers from neglect." And I want to say, if Procrustes' bed looks so damn comfortable, why don't YOU lay down in it?"

Which brings me to my final questions of this post: who among conservatives is willing to bring this to the fore? Who is willing to get to their elected officials and make them look at the problem honestly, make them bring forth a positive suggestion rather than just tearing down admittedly imperfect efforts? Who will give a real response… and what will that response be?

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 05:30:30 PM |

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I know I got my ticket

I'll be going on a nice ocean cruise, courtesy of information provided by Combustable Boy at Sound and Fury. I hear Coulter was going to be in the bikini contest, but she kept putting both her legs in one hole of the bikini bottom.

The shame of it is, they had to put "Parody" in big ol' letters on the thing.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 04:50:29 PM |

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Cartoons

Can I do this by just pointing at the Boondocks, Pat Oliphant, Ben Sargent (yes, Ben has one link per name), and Tony Auth? I'm feeling less than clever right now.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 11:09:09 AM |

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That actually makes sense

Clay Shirky explains why Echo…the new blog syndication format under development.

And the Great and the Good of the weblog syndication world are doing this work...in a wiki. There are lots of good reasons for using a wiki, of course, instead of a trackbacked weblog conversation. Though both weblogs and wikis support conversational patterns, weblogs are "conversation as published comments" while wikis are "conversation as shared editing." Weblogs tend towards polarized or divergent views, while wikis tend towards convergent ones, which is just what you want for a conversation around standards.

But there is a second reason, under the surface but possibly more important -- wikis denature personality. Echo exists not because there are things wrong with the RSS markup -- there are, but they could be easily fixed. Echo exists because there are things wrong with the RSS process. RSS is having not a technological crisis but a constitutional one, where who decides what concerning RSS is not clear, and will never be clear, because the people doing the deciding don't even see themselves as being part of a decision making body.

Ruby is attempting to cut that Gordian knot by launching the new standards work in a wiki. When the problem with the process is social, the solution should be social too:

That last line is critical. As I said the other day, the RSS and RDF camps just don't get along, and it's stupid and unnecessary. Technology is too often treated like religion. And to be clear, everything I've read shows Dave Winer trying like hell to get along (while trying like hell to get everyone to use RSS 2). This is competitiveness at its worst, because both formats are useful and used. And to whine about little flaws in one or the other spec is stupid. If we treated RFCs the was RSS and RDF have been treated, we wouldn't even HAVE a web. And if we treated RSS and RDF the way we treat RFCs, it would all be smoov like butta.

As a side note, in the comments to Mr. Shirkey's explanation, Richard MacManus says:
This is something that makes me a little queezy about weblogs. If I had my way, I'd rank the importance of topics as number 1. I would like my RSS Aggregator to deliver RSS feeds to me based on topics that I subscribe to, rather than by author...continued on my weblog
Maybe it's me, but I found it rather humorous that he would refer you to his weblog to read about what makes him queezy over weblogs. I've never used a wiki. I've looked at one or two and they seemed… messy to me. But from what I've read about the de-emphasis on authorship a wiki entails, I can understand the part of Mr. MacManus's comment that didn't make me chuckle.

I think I'll be checking out the wiki for this endeavor.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 10:50:41 AM |

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Side effects

When you defund the federal govenment, you disrupt all local governments as a side-effect.

As California Borrows Time, Other States Adopt Short-Term Budgets
By JOHN M. BRODER

… For the 17th time in the past 25 years, California's Legislature failed to pass a budget by the constitutional deadline of June 30. Lawmakers and statewide elected officials will receive no paychecks until a budget is signed into law, and some payments for community colleges, local street repairs and the university systems will be delayed. The state will continue to operate as long as it can on a dwindling balance of $5 billion from the June sale of revenue anticipation notes, a pool that will run dry sometime in August, budget officials said.

California's problem remained the most intractable in the nation as other states staggered across their budget deadlines with stopgap solutions, short-term spending plans and continued debate over the most contentious budget items.

Legislatures in New Hampshire and Oregon passed short-term budgets, while the governors of Massachusetts and North Carolina signed last-minute budgets on Monday, the last day of the fiscal year. Gov. John G. Rowland of Connecticut signed an executive order on Monday to keep the state government operating for a week.

Even though the final details of several state budgets have yet to be completed, it is clear that spending at the state level will fall in absolute terms for the first time in 20 years, according to the National Association of State Budget Officers.

"That is a very, very unusual occurrence and it shows that the fiscal crisis is much worse than we anticipated," said Scott Pattison, executive director of the group.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 10:22:54 AM |

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Judge Orders Malvo Sniper Trial Moved to Southeast Virginia
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

FAIRFAX, Va. (AP) -- A judge ordered a change of venue today for the trial of sniper suspect Lee Boyd Malvo, moving the case from Fairfax County to Chesapeake, 200 miles to the south.

Circuit Court Judge Jane Marum Roush wrote that she worried Malvo might not be able to get a fair trial in the Washington, D.C., suburbs, where the attacks were carried out last fall.

"I believe that venue should be transferred to a jurisdiction outside the Washington-Richmond corridor, where many citizens lived in fear during the month of October 2002 as a result of the crimes with which the defendant is charged," Roush wrote in ordering the move.

Defense lawyers had requested a change of venue for two reasons. They argued that massive pretrial publicity had tainted the jury pool against their client. They also argued that every resident of Fairfax County could be considered a victim in the case, citing the locked down schools and wave of fear that gripped the region during the three weeks of attacks.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 10:16:21 AM |

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Who wins?

Apparantly the new unfinanced mandate, drug coverage for Medicaid, benefits corporations more than humans.

Gee. Who'd have ever guessed the Bush administration would do something like that? I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you…

Employers Seek to Shift Costs of Drugs to U.S.
By MILT FREUDENHEIM
The bills to provide drug benefits through Medicare that were passed last week offer some of the country's largest employers a long-sought prize.

How Not to Fix Medicare
By JACOB S. HACKER
Congress stands on the threshold of the biggest overhaul of Medicare since its inception, one that would come at the peril of America's elderly and disabled.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 10:13:07 AM |

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Blogger and Mozilla

After testing the new Dano editor with Mozilla 1.3, I only have two problems:

  • When you use the bold and italic buttons, the cursor jumps to the vey end of your entry. This is annoying because I often type a lot then go back and format stuff
  • I got used to using [alt-tab] to move between browser instances, and I have to use [ctrl-tab] with Mozilla to go between tabs. That's just me, not Mozilla, but it's a problem
I'm going to check out Mozilla 1.4 this week. And I'm going back to Mozilla as my blogging browser.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 10:05:48 AM |

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Coulter

I pay no attention to this thing, so if it weren't for Resonance I'd have never known that Chris Matthews took it to task over it's book, "Treason."

And there's a transcript.

MATTHEWS: Yes, but the problem I have is that a lot of Republicans...
COULTER: They do not oppose...
MATTHEWS: ... in fact, most Republicans in the country opposed the Second World War...
COULTER: Let met finish...
MATTHEWS: No. I want to make a point in response to that, because I think a lot of Republicans have opposed a lot of wars over time, and you haven�t called them traitors. Why do you call Democrats traitors when they oppose a war?
COULTER: To get back to this point. Once you have an entire series of incidents-why is it that the Democratic Party keeps consistently taking the position that is most contrary to this country�s national interest? When you have someone like Pat Buchanan or Novak, you say, well, we disagree on this issue. The Democrats fight unwinable wars. They lose continents to communism. They�ve consistently been on the wrong side of every issue.
MATTHEWS: Was World War II a Democrat war?
COULTER: That�s why it�s 50 years and not 60.
MATTHEWS: Were the Republicans willing to oppose World War II before Pearl Harbor right? And they vigorously opposed getting involved in the war in Europe.
COULTER: As I describe in my book, they were wrong and I have to describe this...
MATTHEWS: The Republicans were wrong?
COULTER: Yes, they were.
MATTHEWS: Were they traitors?
COULTER: No. They came around...
MATTHEWS: But when liberals oppose wars, they are treasonists.
. . . .
MATTHEWS: Well, I tell you. If you want it at that level, you got it right here. Anyway, she�s a great writer. I don�t agree with her, but she�s a hell of a writer. And thank you very much for coming on. She�s a real charmer. Ann Coulter. The last book was called �Slander.� Maybe this one should have been called that too.


Oof. And that was Chris Matthews.

You think the media might actually be waking up? Or is it just that as the stories they dutifully repeated continually fall apart they're trying not to become more hated than lawyers?

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/2/2003 12:04:31 AM |

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July 01, 2003

You know what?

Stuff like this could make a brotha change his blog name.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 11:40:37 PM |

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What he said

Digby said:

We don't hate Thomas because he's black or because he was a recipient of affirmative action. We hate him because he's an extreme right wing radical who nonetheless claims the mantle of racial victimhood and uses it dishonestly in the service of bigotry. Instead of recognizing that the same old racists are using the epithet "affirmative action admission" as a way of saying that racial minorities are inferior, he blames those who are trying to mitigate that bigotry by developing systems like affirmative action.

If Clarence finds himself feeling ashamed of being the beneficiary of affirmative action then Clarence needs to take up the issue with those who really do see racial minorities as being less qualified because of it.


… and I heard about it from Ampersand

That's the problem with not being able to read your whole blogroll every day. You often wind up needing two links instead of one.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 11:33:34 PM |

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Project Excite again

I just read ZenPundit's explanation of why this program won't run into the same problems other "affirmative action" programs have, and I'm afraid I don't find it very realistic.

Ask yourself this, Mark: Are there white kids who would benefit from this program? Can they be enrolled in it? Why?

The anti-affirmative action forces don't care if the outcome of Project Excite would be beneficial. In fact, they specifically argue that we should follow (their interpretation of) the 14th amendment and let the chips fall where they may. Don't they?

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 11:10:12 PM |

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Sometimes the Onion is better than the Times

Did I say "sometimes"?

Bush Asks Congress for $30 Billion To Help Fight War On Criticism
WASHINGTON, DC�Citing the need to safeguard "America's most vital institutions and politicians" against potentially devastating attacks, President Bush asked Congress to sign off Monday on a $30 billion funding package to help fight the ongoing War On Criticism.

"Sadly, the threat of criticism is still with us," Bush told members of Congress during a 2 p.m. televised address. "We thought we had defeated criticism with our successes in Afghanistan and Iraq. We thought we had struck at its very heart with the broad discretionary powers of the USA Patriot Act. And we thought that the ratings victory of Fox News, America's News Channel, might signal the beginning of a lasting peace with the media. Yet, despite all this, criticism abounds."

Critical activities, Bush noted, have not returned to pre-Sept. 11 levels, when well-organized, coordinated attacks on his administration were carried out on a near-daily basis. But in spite of the National Criticism Alert Level holding steady at yellow (elevated), administration officials warn of severe impending attacks.


And their "Man on the Street" asks people's opinion of the SCOTUS "affirmative action" ruling.

And the op-ed on why it's not nice to be smarter than other people.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 10:20:18 PM |

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I'll probably see a small peak in traffic

I read most of the blogs the Corante hosts on a daily basis. The other day Sarah Lai Stirland used what I thought was an excellent quote from George Soros.

Frankly, I never expected to get a referral from any of Corante's blogs (though Dana Blankenhorn surprised me here once or twice). So I go to see what's up:

Meanwhile, this previous post of mine elicited these reactions from both the left and the right. I would like to point out that I am not advocating anything here. I just think that it's a shame that we're covering Cyberspace as a pure market opportunity, when it is so much more than that. Covering Cyberspace only as a business story is like treating everyday society like a supermarket. Why should we bother with Congress and the Constitution when we can just have a free market??

In a way, this is why I feel that the whole blogging thing is overblown. It's impossible to illustrate what I'm trying to say without doing a whole magazine article. Blogs just don't do the job. They're the digital equivalent of standing around a bar trying to explain something while the listener just tunes you out and regurgitates their own boiler-plate political views.

… and I'm the referenced leftie.

Ms. Stirland is focused on tech, as is appropriate for a blog named CONNECTED: nodes & networks. On the other hand, I (as well as my right-wing counterpart, who I'll get to in a minute) am at least somewhat focused on politics and economics, as is appropriate. And Soros was definitely taking a political position with the statement.

I feel your pain, though. It's hard when a writer sees a clear parallel between a well expressed idea in another realm and her own position, only to have her thing glossed over when she expresses it. And I'm not trying to draft you into the culture wars, though. I really do collect clever statements. My favorite comes from an old Thor comic book. Not just that, but you're still stuck with me as a daily reader—I need my tech fix, especially nowadays.

I do have to say this, though: in reality, cyberspace (ugh, that term…) is a thin scum on the surface of the planet, which is where the real action is…ask the Napster kid which world has more power. And if it's a shame to treat a shadow world like nothing more than a business story, treating the planet that way is much worse… and fixing my problem will likely fix yours.

As for the referenced rightie:
WHAT'S THE DIFF
In a Corante blog entry dated last Thursday, Sarah Lai Stirling voices the typical collectivist view of intellectual property � that there is a compelling public or societal interest in limiting intellectual property rights. I find this entire concept to be abhorrent in the extreme. It is to my mind the perfect demonstration piece of the absolute moral bankruptcy of any social, economic, or political model that denies in any way shape or form the sovereignty of the individual.

To me, the difference between the denial of intellectual property rights and slaveholding or any other form of thuggery is merely one of degree. They are of the same kind � crimes against humanity and the essential humanity of the individual.


I don't think I need to comment.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 08:24:47 PM |

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Politics and culture

The other day, when I chose to go uptown and hang with devorah instead of correcting the grammar and such on the blog, she was staying with Jeffery and Meg Henson-Scales. Meg, an artist, writer photographer and activist, used to run a site called Meg-a-world, which I don't link to only because there's some serious restructuring going on.

There's a couple of chunks of it still on the net, though. The Environmental Justice/ Environmental Racism page is still up because she's rather annoyed at the disregard our Republican extremists have for the environment in general and the environment of minorities in particular. It's a page of links to important environmental racism projects. A couple of random samples (she got this centering thing going on, don't blame me):

West Harlem Environmental Action
presented a national conference and community dialogue in Harlem on:
*** Human Genetics, Environment, and Communities of Color:
Ethical and Social Implications ***
Keep an eye on them at www.weact.org.
They have a vision.

The National Lead Information Center
has a lot of useful information- stuff you'd never dream of having to know-
yet you must-- Proof that what you don't know can hurt you,
especially if you have young 'uns.
This is also the home of the National Safety Council,
with sites devoted to what they call Environmental Health Center,
Air Quality, Hazardous Chemicals, and as they
jubilantly announce, "and More!"

Dr. Alx Dark has put together this exhaustive page
of links about Native Americans & the Environment
for you, God and the world to see. Help yourself, and thank Dr. Dark
for his fine effort, while you're there. He's mighty busy.

The BELIZE RIVER VALLEY DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM
is an interesting new site about Belize, that just came
to my attention. Belize is paradise. I know it (been there),
the people who put together this site know it,
and you can know it too..

If she wasn't my girl, I'd just steal all her links for this site.

She also has a couple of Womanist (as opposed to Feminist) essays still available, Man, God, & the Okey-Doke, and Tenderheaded, as well as a photography/essay collaboration with Jeffrey called (In) the Visible Man. You want to talk some truly excellent photography, check the essay then try this and this. These are some more names I'm proud to drop.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 06:50:07 PM |

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It's kind of stupid to complain about Uncle Clarence cherry-picking a quote from Frederick Douglass for his own purposes. After seeing what Conservatives—and not just the extremists—have made of the legacy of Dr. King's quotes, what would you expect?

Clarence Thomas Hides Behind Frederick Douglass Quotes
by Artelia C. Covington
NNPA National Correspondent

WASHINGTON (NNPA)�When one thinks about Frederick Douglass, the famous abolitionist, several familiar quotes come to mind.
�Without a struggle, there can be no progress,� is one.
Another is: �Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.�
And there�s this one, �If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are the men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lighting.�

However, when U.S. Supreme Court Clarence Thomas selects a Douglass quote to use in his dissenting opinion in the University of Michigan�s law school case that upheld affirmative action, he chooses one that many African-Americans have never heard. And if they have heard it, they don�t go around quoting it.

�The American people have always been anxious to know what they shall do with us,� Douglass told abolitionists 140 years ago. �� I have had but one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us!�

Douglass continued, �If the Negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is give him a chance to stand on his own legs! Let him alone! Your interference is doing him positive injury.�

In his opinion, Thomas wrote: �Like Douglass, I believe Blacks can achieve in every avenue of American life without the meddling of university administrators. Because I wish to see all students succeed whatever their color, I share in some respect, the sympathies of those who sponsor the type of discrimination advanced by the University of Michigan Law School.�

Thomas�s critics are outraged that he is trying to use one of Douglass� lesser known quotes to defend his opposition to affirmative action.

�When you consider the many quotes you could have used from Fredrick Douglass, he clearly really looked for one that would suit his purposes and decided to omit the more salient ones and it�s reflective of the skewed logic that he uses in his opinion,� says Barbara Arnwine, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 10:46:12 AM |

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It seems the problem, in Connerly's eyes, is that he and his ilk don't get their way right now.

Conservatives Seek to Circumvent Pro-Affirmative Action Ruling
by Hazel Trice Edney

WASHINGTON (NNPA)�Ward Connerly, the Black conservative who spearheaded the Proposition 209 anti-affirmative action ballot initiative in California seven years ago, says he may try the same thing in Michigan.

�Since neither the judiciary nor the Congress are going to be disposed to solve this problem, then we will be looking at other states to carry the battle there and certainly the state of Michigan would be one that would be ripe for such an initiative,� says Connerly, a member of the California Board of Regents and chairman of the Sacramento-based American Civil Rights Institute, a conservative group that opposes affirmative action.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 10:40:20 AM |

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from BlackAmericaWeb.com

First HBCU Business Summit held in St. Louis

By Alvin A. Reid
Special to the NNPA from the St. Louis American

ST. LOUIS (NNPA)�The first Historic Black Colleges and Universities Schools of Business summit concluded last week in St. Louis, and Harris-Stowe State College President Dr. Henry Givens called the gathering �a watershed in African-American history.�
HBCU presidents, deans of business schools and other educators took part in the four-day conference, held at the Marriott Pavilion. �The Power of Partnerships� was held in collaboration with the White House Initiative on HBCUs.
�The fact that so many African-American business leaders are graduates of historically Black colleges and universities suggests that HBCUs are doing an outstanding job of preparing graduates for success in business,� Givens said. �By (HBCUS) pooling our resources, we can do an even better job.�
Sixty deans met with private business leaders and government officials to address opportunities and challenges associated with enhancing business programs and initiatives.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 10:36:12 AM |

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It just occurred to me that I should note BlackAmericaWeb.com requires a free registration, though anyone who's interested knows that by now.

from BlackAmericaWeb.com

A few folks can make it bad for everyone
2003/06/30 10:12 PM EDT

By David Person

Just when it seemed safe to take a bite, we learn the Big Apple has another worm in it.

This worm�s name is John Sprizzo. He�s the federal judge in Manhattan who ruled on June 24 that three other worms, former firefighters Jonathan Walters and Robert Steiner and former cop Joseph Locurto, shouldn�t have been fired for wearing blackface and Afro wigs and mocking the brutal lynching of James Byrd during a 1999 Labor Day parade.

Sprizzo believes that the right to free speech allows public servants to be racial bigots. And this means that the three may get their jobs back as well as a hefty amount of back pay.

This would be a horrible miscarriage of justice. Those who are paid by tax dollars have a higher level of responsibility than average citizens, and must be held to a higher level of accountability in both their public and private lives.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 10:33:01 AM |

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Editorial run

Better Presidential Campaigns for Only $2 More
By SCOTT E. THOMAS
To keep America's public financing system for presidential campaigns enticing to candidates, Congress must raise the primary spending ceiling.

The Scramble for Hard Money
Now that the era of unlimited "soft money" donations is over, the Democrats can only envy the Republicans' longstanding edge in organizing donors.

Rescuing Liberia
The United Nations' secretary general, Kofi Annan, makes a compelling case for dispatching an American-led international force to Liberia

Afghanistan's Future, Lost in the Shuffle
By SARAH CHAYES
America backs President Hamid Karzai, but it can't relinquish its alliances with the enemies of all he stands for.

Cartoons
Doonesbury's last two panels are worth the price of admission
Joel Pett, whose work I am appreciating more every day
Bill Schorr asks a stupid question

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 09:03:27 AM |

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We work longer, pay more for medicine and are jailed more than any other people in the world

Americans, not just Black folks. It looks like we're going to get our equality, all right…

Democrats Protest Changes to Overtime Rules
By STEVEN GREENHOUSE

orty-two Democratic senators and more than 100 Democratic House members urged the Bush administration yesterday to withdraw proposed regulations that they said would eliminate overtime pay for millions of workers.

The lawmakers made their plea on the final day of a 90-day comment period in which the administration received tens of thousands of criticisms of its proposals, which are the first effort to update overtime regulations since 1975.

"Our citizens are working longer hours than ever before � longer than in any other industrial nation," the senators wrote to Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao. "At least one in five employees now has a workweek that exceeds 50 hours. Protecting the 40-hour workweek is vital to balancing work responsibilities and family needs."

When the administration proposed the rule changes in March, it called them an evenhanded effort that would exempt an additional 640,000 white-collar workers from overtime coverage while adding 1.3 million low-paid workers to the group that automatically qualifies for overtime pay.

Many business groups praised the proposals, calling them a needed effort to modernize what they said was a thicket of confusing, obsolete rules.

"On balance, the proposed regulations do a very good job bringing our workplace regulations into the 21st century," Katherine Lugar, vice president for legislative affairs at the National Retail Federation, said yesterday at a news conference.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 08:39:25 AM |

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Or, they need to stop screwing around

I'm having a problem being clever about rampant greed today. Sorry.

Private Health Insurers Begin Lobbying for Changes in Medicare Drug Legislation
By ROBERT PEAR

WASHINGTON, June 30 � Private health insurance plans began lobbying Congress today for major changes in the Medicare drug legislation passed just three days ago.

Without increased subsidies and more stability, they said, few private plans will enter the Medicare market, and the legislation will not work as intended.

Lobbyists for the health insurance industry praised Congress for its efforts to inject market forces and competition into Medicare. But they said Congress needed to change the rules for such competition and to increase payments for private plans to make Medicare an attractive business proposition.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 08:30:23 AM |

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It's amazing how many things there are that aren't

Much that we think of as law is actually custom.

Across U.S., Redistricting as a Never-Ending Battle
By DAVID M. HALBFINGER

AUSTIN, Tex., June 30 � For most of the past century, redistricting has been a fairly predictable though often contentious ritual. Every 10 years, state legislators would use the new census data to redraw Congressional district lines, and the party in power would usually manage to draw maps that gave it an advantage.

Now, thanks to a determined effort by United States Representative Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, with the quiet support of the White House, that tradition may be crumbling, as legislatures draw new districts whenever they have a partisan advantage.

Today, the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature opened an extraordinary special session devoted solely to redrawing the state's 32 Congressional districts. If Republicans succeed in doing so, they could remove five or more Democratic congressmen and help their party consolidate its hold on power in Washington.

Republicans did much the same thing last month in Denver, pushing a new map through the Colorado Legislature specifically to shore up the seat of a freshman congressman who won office with a 121-vote margin. And Democrats are threatening retaliation in New Mexico and Oklahoma, while dropping hints about taking the redistricting battle to big-game territory: Illinois and California, where far more seats are at stake.

This amped-up partisanship on the state level could soon make redistricting battles a recurring feature of the political landscape, experts say, reviving the 19th-century practice of redrawing political maps every time a legislature changed hands.

Democrats warn of an even more corrosive effect if local governments, too, begin to treat redistricting as simply another arrow in the quiver of political tactics.

State Representative Garnet F. Coleman, Democrat of Houston, said, "This would be like on any city council, if they said, `We're going to redistrict because nobody likes Joe � the majority of us just don't like him,' and guess what, Joe's constituents can't even stop it."

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/1/2003 08:24:31 AM |

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June 30, 2003

See that BIG POST ERROR down there? That is where a post that I actually feel was important once lived. I have made longer posts in the old Blogger.

I am close to rage, but how do you complain about a free service?

LATER: Fortunately, it crapped out before overwriting the archive so I was able to recover the pre-BIG POST ERROR post. I need to re-write the part I was adding as a separate post, but not now.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 11:33:01 PM |

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And now for something different

Just being nosy in George's comments, I ran across Peace Dividend. The link is to the photo log, not the blog.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 07:15:37 PM |

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Really fixing a problem

Hopefully we're almost near the end of the noise over the SCOTUS decision on affirmative action for a few weeks. I know it's not the overall end; never mind that the court has effectively put a 25 year limit on the practice, never mind that its opponents have essentially won (Shelby Steele's rant makes it clear that he and Clarence Thomas are so deep in bed together they should be happier about the striking down of sodomy laws than gay folks are). It's truly troubling how people who rail against European anti-Semitism, a truly worthy position, have little to nothing to say about the American equivalent—anti-Black racism.

Twenty-five years only sounds like a long time. When you're talking about a multigenerational problem, a 400 year old problem, it's merely the twinkling of an eye. Time to get on it. Well past time.

The other day I quoted Zenpundit who stated a simple truth: to eliminate educational disparities between the races will take nothing less than a comprehensive K12 effort. And he gave a link to Project Excite, run by Northwestern University's Center for Talent Development.

WHAT IS PROJECT EXCITE?
It is a research project designed to increase the number of minority students in the accelerated track of the Elementary School District 65 and in honors and advanced classes at Evanston Township High School. It is the result of the collaboration between the School of Education of Northwestern University through its Center for Talent Development, the Evanston Township High School, and the Elementary School District 65. It is a seven-year program that begins with third graders from four local elementary schools, namely Lincoln School, Lincolnwood School, Orrington School, and Timber Ridge Magnet School.


This is an interesting idea. I rooted around a bit, even found some resources I intend to forward to a home-schooling friend of mine. It is the sort of program that, widely implemented, can make a significant dent in the problem.
IDENTIFICATION AND SELECTION OF MINORITY STUDENTS
Minority students who participate in the EXCITE Project are selected on the basis of teachers� recommendations and their excellent performance on the Naglieri Nonverbal Ability Test. The identification process begins in the second grade. Second grade teachers are asked to fill out an evaluation sheet on each one of the minority students in their classes. These preliminary evaluations are then used by the coordinators of the EXCITE Project to draw up a list of potential candidates who are asked to take the Naglieri Nonverbal Ability Test at the start of the third grade. The results of the two evaluation tools are finally used to select the students for the EXCITE Project.


The Naglieri Nonverbal Ability Test, being non-verbal, is specifically designed to test problem solving ability in a way that gets around language and socialization problems. In fact, it gets around physical disability issues as well. There seems to be a significant body of evidence that this test is a fair indicator of problem solving ability across cultural boundaries. And the EXCITE Project site gives me the feeling this is a well planned effort.

In the real world, however, I'm afraid it's going to come up short.

Why?

WHAT STUDENTS ARE CONSIDERED MINORITY STUDENTS?
Only students from minority groups that are traditionally under-represented in the scientific community are accepted in the program. This means that only African-Americans, Native Americans, and Hispanic students can participate in the EXCITE Project.


This is not the sort of thing the SCOTUS will approve of, yet it's exactly what is needed to address the education gap. If this program became wide-spread, it will be called racial preferences and either opposed or thinned out by an insistance on the (in my opinion) inappropriate application of the 14th amendment. I say it's inappropriate because the amendment and the several civil rights bills that have been passed since were created to combat specific ills. They were created to protect the children of Africa, and to aid them in joining a society that violently opposed their inclusion. Yet the major use of these laws nowadays has been to protect the turf of the mainstream… how else can you explain their use to exclude Asians? How else can you explain their use to oppose the very programs whose creation they enabled?

How could this be?

Well, years ago I used to watch a distance learning channel on my local cable networks at odd times. One particular show which I never forgot was an introduction to business law. The professors started out by explaining why law should be studied relative to business, or at all.

What an enlightening discussion.

Key things I got out of it:
  1. Law is important because we are affected by it at every point


  2. Getting to understand how the law works can change it from an adversary to a force with which you can enhance your business

    This means laws are like the rules of chess: you need to know them to play the game. You need to master them to win. And it is possible to make no errors and still lose.


  3. When studying law, the answer you get isn't as important as the analysis you do, because the results of applying legal principals depends on the actual events you apply them to

    This means if you apply a law that was created for a specific purpose to a situation outside that purpose the outcome has nothing to do with the reason the law was passed


  4. Law consists of two parts. . . the part that defines rights and obligations, and the part that tell how to invoke the first part (statuatory and procedural)

    This means you can claim to support the statuatory law and gut the procedural law.


  5. Law and ethics do not coincide, and law is enforcable while ethics are not


    6. This is critical, and puts the lie to those who claim racism must be addressed morally rather than legally. It is an unfortunate fact that "law and order" <> "right and wrong."


The sad thing is, it will take a strong dose of morality to correct this… a morality I'm pretty sure the average person either has or would find acceptable if the talking heads, K-Street boys and Republican extremists dominating the media would just tell the truth.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 05:35:01 PM |

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Vodkapundit is Sun Myung Moon in disguise

The boy has suggested mandatory miscegenation as the solution to race problems in America. A practice the Unification Church supports with their arranged marriages.

All I can say is, from the comments Hale Berry would be severely bow-legged in a few months' time.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 01:24:25 PM |

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BWAAHAHAHAHAHA!

Not trying to embarass anyone, but I saw someone used Google to translate this page into German! I wish I knew how it turned out; typically American, typically provincial, that's me.

My favorite part:


Begl�ckw�nschen Sie mich, ich erhielt mein erstes Arschloch

Ein Pinhead, der von I.P-Adresse 205,188,209,103 bekanntgibt, war, also incensed durch den Pfosten direkt unten, er glaubte der Notwendigkeit, einer kreativen Anmerkung, wit(less) zu �berlassen:

"haben Sie etwas Malzgetr�nk, Arschloch"

und unterzeichnet ihm mit dem gleichm��ig gescheiten:

"' Ursache sind Sie ein fucking Idiot"

In der Antwort sage ich, ich bask in Ihrem opprobrium. Und ich entschuldige mich bei jedermann, das so nah an diesem Ruck lebt, da� ihr IP in der Strecke 205.188.209.xxx ist.


I can see using "Arschloch" instead of "asshat," which is so popular with my peers.

For some reason this drives home to me the international aspect of the Internet for me. And it makes me think about some to the ebonics I use here that will seriously be lost in the translation.

Another interesting thing is, the posts were translated but the sidebar was untouched. Not just the blogrolling.com stuff, but all of it went untranslated.

If you're curious about it here's the link that did the translating.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 12:56:44 PM |

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Huh?

And what's up with people searching for "crips" and landing here?

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 11:29:20 AM |

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I'm glad I'm not a tech blogger

There's a big mess where folks are trying to come up with a "mature" blog syndication format, as though RDF and RSS aren't enough. Of course, the RDF and RSS camps have never gotten along (and I have to say from what I've read it's the RDF guys who are just rude, aside from any technical arguments).

So now a format called Echo is in the works, and I have yet to find the spec-as-it-exists. All I know so far is that Echo is getting a lot of corporate backing and therefore a lot of independant developer backing. And there's a hell of a lot of dispute over some vaporware.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 11:27:20 AM |

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Anudder editorial

I actually have to get back to the NY Times' editorial page today. Someone's trying to be reasonable in looking at Uncle Clarence's opinion on the UMich case. He still comes up wrong in the editorial, but it's an interesting read.

Now, let's hope I remember.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 10:55:50 AM |

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Editorial run

The Bedroom Door
By WILLIAM SAFIRE
I used to fret about same-sex marriage. Maybe competition from responsible gays would revive opposite-sex marriage.
[p6: Thsi one gets the Stupid Nosy Idiot Award. First of all, the solution to fretting about same-sex marriage is to mind yo' bidnizz. Second of all, the idea of gay folks ("responsible" or otherwise… sheesh…) "competing" with hetro marriages is just more of the same paranoia that the SCOTUS finally got around to admitting was unconstitutional.]

Oblivious in D.C.
By BOB HERBERT
The president, buoyed by the bountiful patronage of the upper classes, seems indifferent to the harsh struggles of the working classes and the poor.
[p6: I need to meet this brother.]

The Legacy of Hans Blix
Monday is the last day of work at the United Nations for Hans Blix, and his carefully calibrated judgments are looking ever more credible.
[p6: Now, lets see how many Americans care.]

Resistance Isn't Futile
Harley Sorensen, Special to SF Gate

I bit off more than I could chew.

In last week's column, I asked readers for ideas on how to get George Bush and his merry nation-wrecking crew out of the White House. The readers responded. I got almost 700 e-mails; about one in four offered a suggestion or two.

Unfortunately, they were more than I could handle. I didn't get to read them all. For that, I apologize.

The overall impression I got from your suggestions is there is no magic bullet. There is no one single thing we can do that will succeed in sending Bush back to Texas or wherever he's from.

What those of us who love America and don't want to see it destroyed have to do is fight on several fronts ... more or less like those who hate America have been doing every since Brown v. Board of Education and Roe v. Wade.

Cartoons
Ben Sargent shows the SCOTUS doing performing its proper function
Tony Auth shows who's really not happy about that
Don Write shows who is
And Joel Pett is so good, he gets three listings.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 10:21:30 AM |

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This is a test

I'm trying out the new Dano editor in Mozilla. It's tabbed interface makes one part of blogging much simpler, while IE's in place editing made another easier. If this is acceptable (and so far, the differences are that when you bold or italicize selected text IE leaves it selected while Mozilla/Netscape doesn't, [ctrl-z] doesn't undo and [esc] doesn't delete the whole entry) I'll be blogging in Mozilla going forward.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 10:09:36 AM |

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Eschaton

Would it be, like, rude to say I like Eschaton better now that Atrios has help? Not that the Middle C himself is weak, but Leah keeps finding stuff like the lone dissent to the Plessy vs. Ferguson case, and follows it up with stuff like this:

Beautifully written, it's also quite stirring, although if you read carefully, you'll notice the shadow of white supremacy hovering over the opinion.

Also notice that the notion of the Constitution as color-blind is central to Harlan's argument.

On a bitterly ironic note, assorted opponents of every civil rights victory from Brown to the Civil Rights Act to the various benchmarks in case law made by Federal Appellate Judges like Frank Johnson of Alabama, which confirmed the most expansive meaning of the 54 decision and the 65 legislation, often use Judge Harlan's dissent, which was clearly the precursor of the Civil Rights revolution that is still going on, (see the U of Michigan decision of last week) to bash those committed to making sure there is no retreat, no turning back from our committment to the completion of that revolution, as being the "new" racists.


It's something of a follow-up to Atrios' link to the majority opinion and Rehnquist's position on the case. But you know, it never occurred to me to look for a dissent to the opinion in that case.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/30/2003 12:06:49 AM |

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June 29, 2003

Congratulate me, I got my first asshole

A pinhead posting from I.P address 205.188.209.103 was so incensed by the post directly below, he felt the need to leave a creative comment, to wit(less):

"Have some malt liquor, asshole"

and signed it with the equally clever:

"'cause you're a fucking idiot"

In response I say, I bask in your opprobrium. And I apologize to anyone who lives so close to this jerk that their IP is in the 205.188.209.xxx range.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 11:34:16 PM |

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Old but interesting

Study: Young Blacks See More Alcohol Ads
By REBECCA CARROLL, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Young blacks see far more than their share of the $333 million worth of advertising placed in major magazines by the nation's alcohol industry, a university study says.

A report by Georgetown University's Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth, released Thursday, said blacks from 12 to 20 years old saw 77 percent more of these ads in 2002 than their non-black peers did.

The disproportionate exposure was amplified when the report broke down types of alcohol. Young blacks saw 81 percent more magazine ads for distilled spirits, the study found.

… The magazines that most exposed young blacks to alcohol ads were Sports Illustrated, Vibe, Cosmopolitan, ESPN The Magazine, Jet, Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, Ebony, In Style, Playboy, GQ, Essence and People.

The Center said young blacks were over-represented in the readership of most of these magazines and that market surveys of consumers showed that youths in general saw more advertising for alcohol than adults.

The report also found that alcohol companies spent $11.7 million in 2002 on advertising in the 15 television shows that are most popular among black youth, including "The Bernie Mac Show," "The Simpsons," "King of the Hill" and "George Lopez."

Young blacks were also more likely than their non-black counterparts to hear radio ads for alcohol products.

Because most radio alcohol advertising is placed locally, the report examined the information by region. Five areas � New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston-Galveston and Washington � accounted for 70 percent of black youth exposure to alcohol advertising on the radio.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 07:42:56 PM |

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Bitch-slaps for everyone involved

http://lightskinpeople.com/

Unlike Rent-a-negro.com, this is not satire. There's nothing there but a graphic that looks like the Flash animation will, and they say they're opening for business mid summer.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 07:25:11 PM |

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TTLB

I took a quick look at the Microbes on Parade listing today. And what did I see?

PrometheusSpeaks
"Social and Political Observations and Commentary"
Blogging Since 2003-06-22

Seems leftie. Too new to really judge, but you gotta love anyone with such excellent taste in names. No one's going to confuse the two of us any time soon, but he is starting with more than a quote and a snark so there's likely potential there.

The Right Christians
"Answering the Christian Right from a biblical perspective"
Blogging Since 2003-05-18

Let me just say "it's about d*** time," the specific entry is probably correct in the conclusions it draws, and I'm pleased with the blog as a whole.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 05:37:17 PM |

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Reality check

Down in the middle of this article at the Christian Science Monitor

Enough assistance?

Is 40 years enough time to have pushed affirmative action as a means of ending discrimination? It depends how one defines the action and determines the goal.

According to recent polls, Americans are against "preferences," but they favor "assistance" and "special efforts" to help minorities in jobs and education. They clearly value racial diversity in higher education, and they approve of affirmative action in jobs and education for those coming from "an economically disadvantaged background," regardless of race or ethnicity. At the same time, they apparently believe the job is not finished.

"How close do you think we are to eliminating discrimination against racial and ethnic minorities in America for once and for all?" a Los Angeles Times poll asked earlier this year. Just 38 percent said the goal was "close" to being achieved, while 59 percent said "not too close" or "not close at all."

For most Americans, the issue may be felt strongly. But it's more idealistic or political than it is personal. "Relatively few people, white or black, report having real-life experiences with affirmative action," the Pew Research Center reported last month. Of those polled, 11 percent (mostly whites) said they had been hurt by affirmative action and 4 percent (mostly blacks and Hispanics) said they had been helped.


Eleven percent of the numerically greater group feels damaged by a policy that only four percent of the lesser group feels benefitted them.

Isn't that interesting?

Later: My first genuinely lazy post and Ampersand busted me in the comments… I hate when that happens.

Okay, playing with the numbers, if they interviews 100 folks and the folks "look like America" then about 12 of them will be Black and about another 12 will be Latino. Four of them, "mostly blacks and Hispanic," feel they've been helped by "affirmative action." That works out to about 16% of the minorities interviewed, while some 14% of white folks feel they've been hurt by it (11 out of 76). We're not talking great numbers of people who have been affected by it at all.

And since I'm cleaning stuff up here, I have to say I'm heartened by that fact that most people value diversity in jobs and higher education.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 04:00:53 PM |

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from The Nation

Diversity Over Justice
by ERIC FONER

[from the July 14, 2003 issue]

In the current political climate, the Supreme Court's decision upholding the right of colleges and universities to take race into account in admissions must be considered a victory for those committed to racial justice. Celebration, however, should be tempered by some unpleasant facts about American history and society, and the Court itself.

When first developed in the 1960s, affirmative action formed part of a far broader program for attacking both poverty and racial inequality, including a domestic Marshall Plan to reverse urban decay and create jobs, and government action to end housing segregation and drastically improve urban public education. This program has virtually vanished. Affirmative action, the one surviving element, must be defended, but with no illusions that it alone can adequately address the enduring legacy of 250 years of slavery and a century of Jim Crow. In the long run, the Court's decision will be cause for cheer only if it serves to reinvigorate a broader struggle for racial equality.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 03:38:49 PM |

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Serious question

If you lived in the cross-hairs of the Bush agenda, which would be your greatest fear: getting bombed, of what they'd do to your country afterward?

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 03:16:34 PM |

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A truly obnoxious, arrogant, flagrantly racist bastard

Also known as a Republican extremist.

I ain't quoting a damn thing. See what Jim Daly the Chairman of the Technology Committee of the Seminole County Republicans thinks is funny is you wish.

Thanks, Jesse. I think.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 02:39:11 PM |

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I absolutely must reorganize the blogroll

Let me show you the snippet Technorati listed in my link cosmos for OneWomanWreckingCrew

1: one w o m a n wrecking crew 3 inbound blogs, 3 inbound links (Last updated 12 hours 46 minutes ago)
Su Tzu's Chinese Philosophy Page The Golden Elixir Kuan Yin Prophecies Lightworker Cards Osho Zen & Transformation Tarot The Alchemist Facade Tarot.Com Times To Come Matrix Oracles Llewellyn Web Tarot *I Visit These Too* The Deep Pink Furo.com Whiskey Bar Prometheus 6


Sun Tzu? The Golden Elixir? There is no way I do not check this out.

Not only does this woman wander a parallel universe very similar to mine, she is to my knowledge the only grandmother in the known universe successfully running Linux. And to top it off, I'm on the same blogroll as Enya. The mind boggles.

Fact is, I could drop her right in there with the rest of the lefties on the list. But it's the eclectivity rather than the politics that intrigues me.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 01:47:56 PM |

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Almost there

Well, my keyboard is fixed, all my bookmarks for both IE and Mozilla have been copied to the new machine, security fixes have been installed, Blogger seems to have worked a few kinks out of the new editor (like it doesn't scream on me for using style and class attributes in my div tags anymore)… we 'bout good ta go.

It's curious, though… back in the day (MSDOS 3.x) the first things I'd put on a new computer were my "productivity applications." Got to the point that I'd install my programming environments first, then the office suites. Now I feel I can barely use a machine that's not on the net… and don't even talk to me about dial-up anymore. Put me somewhere without either DSL or able modem and you'll be looking at one depressed brother.

Anyway, I have a few more things to move around and clean up, but nothing that will get in the way of blogging… and I know nobody but me cares about the rest of my life so that all you'll hear about mechanical difficulties around here for a considerable amout of time.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 12:51:50 PM |

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Cartoons

Stuart Carlson asks the question we all have… and gets the answer we all have as well.
Paul Conrad show what the greatest opponents of "affirmative action" most fear.
Rob Rogers, on why we should worry more about the Potomac virus than the West Nile virus.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 12:34:14 PM |

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Another nice line!

THE FRANKENSTEIN CANDIDATE
How to Build the Perfect Democratic Contender
By ADAM NAGOURNEY


Still, as Jano Cabrera, a senior adviser to Mr. Lieberman, points out, perhaps Democrats should be careful what they wish for. "I suppose it depends on what qualities one were to pick," he said. "You might end up only representing the aloof, Breck-haired, meticulous notebook-keeping wing of the Democratic Party that doesn't like to work after sundown."

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 12:16:13 PM |

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Nice line!

From Nino's Op�ra Bouffe By Maureen Dowd:


(Note to the panicked right: Newsweek just reported married heterosexuals were strangers to sex. So, if you want gay couples to stop having sex, let them get married.)

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 12:05:58 PM |

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About damn time

I so want to put the whole article up here. We're talking symbolic gesture again, but sometimes symbols do have impact and I feel this is one of those times.

Long Quest, Unlikely Allies: Black Museum Nears Reality
By LYNETTE CLEMETSON

WASHINGTON, June 28 � Standing on a stretch of land northwest of the Capitol on a recent afternoon, Representative John Lewis took a chest-swelling breath and surveyed the space around him � a 5.25-acre expanse dotted with sweet gum and elm trees, park benches and a temporary parking lot.

"It would be very powerful," Mr. Lewis said with a pensive sigh. "The healing we could foster. The message we could send from here."

That morning Senator Sam Brownback, a Republican from Kansas who shares little political ground with Mr. Lewis, a liberal Democrat from Georgia, jogged by the same piece of land. "Just passing it," he said. "Filled me with a sense of hope."

On the same day, Robert Wilkins, a tenacious 39-year-old lawyer, sat in his downtown office with detailed sketches of the ground. The space, and the struggle it symbolized, have "become an obsession of sorts," he said.

The civil rights stalwart, the conservative Republican and the impassioned lawyer represent a coalition of allies in a nearly century-long quest to build a national museum of African-American history and culture here on the National Mall. And in an improbable alignment of the social and political stars, proponents of the museum say they believe the project may finally come to fruition, given a crucial push from President Bush and a Republican-controlled Congress.

A presidential commission, sanctioned in late 2001, conducted a feasibility study for the museum. The commission's report advocating a museum formed the basis for legislation that the Senate passed by unanimous vote on June 23. The House is expected to pass the measure before its August recess.

The land, in the shadow of the Capitol, though just one of four proposed sites, is favored by most of the museum's supporters. Recently uncovered historical documents show that it was there that a group of black Civil War veterans gathered in 1915 to rally for a memorial honoring black contributions to the country.

Republican support for the current effort has raised the eyebrows of some supporters of the museum, who question whether it is a calculated effort to court black voters before next year's presidential election. But Mr. Lewis, who has introduced bills for the museum every year since 1988, takes a more pragmatic view.

"It took Nixon to go to China," he said. "Sometimes it takes a blending of political forces. I just want to see it done."

Congressional approval is the first of many hurdles. Though the Senate authorized $17 million in startup money for 2004, consultants on the project estimate that the museum will take several years and more than $300 million to build. Choosing the museum's leadership could prove contentious, as could shaping the content and tone of its exhibits.

The museum would cover a sweeping history from the Middle Passage to the modern black diaspora. Detractors have long expressed concern about how it would deal with slavery and how it would portray the South.

However painful the subject, supporters argue that the project is long overdue. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. The National Museum of the American Indian is to open on the Mall next year.

"You cannot tell American history without telling African-American history," said Claudine Brown, vice chairwoman of the presidential commission.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 6/29/2003 11:54:20 AM |

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