Prior to Obama’s Acceptance Speech

Workout notes am: 3150 yards; 500 in 8:45, 500 of alt drill/swim (fins), 10 x 100 on the 1:45 (one 1:36, one 1:39, the rest were 1:37-1:38), 100 easy, 1000 pyramid in 17:45. 50 easy.

PM: 3 mile walk in 36:30.

Topics

Health and Science: why poor Americans are more likely to be fat than richer ones:

The abundance of corn has made the economics of food shift towards unhealthier foods. If you have a limited budget, you can buy more calories based on corn-based fast-food products that you can from healthier foods. $1 buys 1,200 calories from potato chips and cookies vs. 250 calories from whole foods like carrots; 875 calories from soda vs. 170 calories from fruit juice from concentrate. (p. 108) Is it any wonder that poorer people, in order to feel satiated, are more likely to eat potato chips and follow it up with a soda than they are to eat carrots and follow it up with juice, since the cost of a calorie is five times as much for the latter meal?

In fact, an article published in the January 2004 edition of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition by Dr. Adam Drewnowski (director of the Center for Public Health Nutrition in the University of Washington School of Public Health and Community Medicine) and Dr. S.E. Specter (research nutrition scientist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture Human Nutrition Research Center in Davis, Calif.) reports that the correlation of obesity with income levels is striking. Unlike in the developing world where obesity is often the result of wealthy people eating a lot of rich and fancy food, in the US, obesity afflicts a lot of poor people trying to save money on food.

The study says that:

Energy-dense foods not only provide more calories per unit weight, but can provide more empty calories per unit cost. These foods include French fries, soft drinks, candy, cookies, deep-fried meats and other fatty, sugary and salty items. The review shows that attempting to reduce food spending tends to drive families toward more refined grains, added sugars and added fats. Previous studies have shown that energy-dense foods may fail to trigger physiological satiety mechanisms – the internal signals that enough food has been consumed. These failed signals lead to overeating and overweight. Paradoxically, trying to save money on food may be a factor in the current obesity epidemic.

Teaching: in many cases, kids can teach themselves! Even more striking, this speaker makes the case that we should be focusing on providing technology to poorer school districts rather than richer ones.

Mathematics: someone working on a “popular” calculus book talks about her research. She mentions one of my University of Texas mathematics professors.

Few science bloggers have the good fortune to write off a Vegas trip as “research”, but that’s exactly what it was: my next book for Penguin is all about my experiences as a former English major learning calculus, inspired by a series of blog posts I wrote in 2006. (Current working title: Dangerous Curves: How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love the Calculus. “Love” is rather a strong word. “Grudging appreciation” would be more accurate, but it just doesn’t make for a snappy subtitle.) It’s a testament to how far I have come over the years in breaking out of the kneejerk “mathogynist” mindset that I would even contemplate writing such a book, never mind relish the prospect. Perhaps that’s because my pedagogical approach flies in the face of how the subject is usually taught; in fact, the Spousal Unit once observed that I was learning calculus “inside out.” (He could have said “ass backwards,” but he’s far too polite.)

It all started with an impulse purchase of a series of DVD lectures offered by the Teaching Company: “Calculus Made Clear,” with a math professor at the University of Texas, Austin, named Michael Starbird. (He also has a DVD lecture series on probability.) The Spousal Unit noted approvingly that there were actual equations/derivations involved in the lectures, so it wasn’t just a lightweight “concept” course. Whatever. The two need not be mutually exclusive; a truly good teacher, like Starbird, will include both. He presented the underlying concepts beautifully, plus he told little historical anecdotes along the way about Buffon’s Needle, the Newton/Leibnitz debate, Archimedes, even the famed “Dido’s Problem” in the Aeneid. Nothing makes an English major happier than a strong, compelling narrative. Give us a good story, and we’ll follow you anywhere — even into the minefield of solving scary equations.

Professor Starbird is a topologist with a specialty in low dimensional manifolds.

Politics

Evidently the Clinton speeches helped Barack Obama. I have to admit that this is a case where I don’t understand politics. I suppose that because I am a hard-core Democrat and I know about Barack Obama, I need little or no convincing. But there is that large group of more conservative Democrats who don’t understand Obama all that well, and perhaps many of them don’t know that McCain doesn’t know what he is doing.

Enthusiasm Gap: Democrats draw 75,000, Republicans can’t even give their tickets away.

One standard GOP tactic, which they’re good at getting the media to bite on, is to attack a Democrat’s strength and try and turn it into a weakness. The Swiftboat attacks against Kerry and the Celebrity attacks against Obama are cut from the exact same cloth. For Obama, they’re trying to use one of his advantages, the ability to attract large crowds with great enthusiasm, and turn it into a negative. The crazy comments about the set at Invesco are the same thing.

But when it comes down to it, Obama will have 75,000 people in Invesco tonight. McCain is trying to counter that with 10,000 people in Ohio tomorrow to announce his VP pick. Only one problem. They can’t even get 10,000:

Tickets are still available for Sen. John McCain’s Friday, Aug. 29, rally at Wright State University’s Nutter Center in Fairborn. – Dayton Daily News

They’re giving away free tickets in several states and plan to bus in supporters. The VP announcement can’t be overshadowed by a less-than-capacity crowd. – Marc Ambinder

Rednecks for Obama?

No, this isn’t photoshop:

Obama does have a “Rednecks for Obama” group on their web community.

Democrats who hunt and fish?

McCain: congratulates Obama?

Well, maybe not. He also released this ad.

Yes, the world is dangerous and we want someone who knows what they are doing to be President. McCain does NOT know what he is doing:

He lacks the deportment as well:

Democratic Convention John Kerry’s and Bill Clinton’s Speech (Biden’s too)

First I just watched Bill Clinton. Barbara said “Bill still has it”. He does, from the podium. The difference is that, in the days of old, he was this cool, even when not at the podium.

Nevertheless, this is vintage Bill Clinton; the President that I loved.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I also saw John Kerry’s speech. A transcript is here; I’ll post a video when it becomes available.

Here it is:

Let’s put it this way: I wonder where in the hell this fire was 4 years ago???? Dang; this Kerry might have won!

Right now, I am listening to Biden’s speech on CSPAN live stream.

What is helping matters is the cluelessness of the McCain advisors. One actually claims that there are no uninsured Americans (since we all have emergency room services):

* TexasTom’s diary :: ::
*

The following is from today’s Dallas Morning News (bolding is my own):

But the numbers are misleading, said John Goodman, president of the National Center for Policy Analysis, a right-leaning Dallas-based think tank. Mr. Goodman, who helped craft Sen. John McCain’s health care policy, said anyone with access to an emergency room effectively has insurance, albeit the government acts as the payer of last resort. (Hospital emergency rooms by law cannot turn away a patient in need of immediate care.)

“So I have a solution. And it will cost not one thin dime,” Mr. Goodman said. “The next president of the United States should sign an executive order requiring the Census Bureau to cease and desist from describing any American – even illegal aliens – as uninsured. Instead, the bureau should categorize people according to the likely source of payment should they need care.

“So, there you have it. Voila! Problem solved.”

Here’s the full article: Texas still leads nation in rate of uninsured residents