C-SPAN Video Player – The 44th President

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Note: some of my friends watched the inauguration together (I wasn’t there)

(photos by Al Harkrader)

President Barack Hussein Obama

Yeah, I watched; I even wept during the music part prior to Obama’s speech. It happened.

Why am I so excited? Read this post from Robert Reich’s blog:

Almost every economist will tell you the stimulus has to be massive in order to have any real impact. Even Marty Feldstein, who headed Ronald Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisors, told Congress it had to be $800 billion. My own view is at least $900 billion. But a price tag like that scares Republicans and so-called “blue-dog” Democrats who worry about government debt.

So here’s our new president’s strategic choice. He can flight for the biggest stimulus politically possible – twisting arms and counting noses to get a bare majority in the House and sixty votes in the Senate. That’s how Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush got their huge tax cuts, and how Bill Clinton got his first budget through Congress.

Or Obama can aim to get the backing of a much larger majority than he needs to get the stimulus enacted – including a majority of blue dogs and Republicans. To do this he’d likely have to settle for a smaller stimulus package – one that may not be enough to jump-start the economy.

Why would he ever choose the second strategy? Because his goal is not just to get the biggest stimulus package he can squeeze through Congress. It’s to get a Congress that’s mostly united behind whatever stimulus package emerges. This would ensure that Republicans and blue-dog Democrats take some ownership of the package, and therefore responsibility for making it work. [...]

It’s not the strategy his predecessors used to get their economic plans enacted. It’s not hardball politics, and it may not be the best move for the economy in the short run. But given the challenges our new president and our nation face over the long run, this may be the smartest politics and smartest economics.

THIS is the kind of leadership I am longing for, even though I am partisan to the core. Our country doesn’t need hyperpartisanship at the moment; we’ve just had 8 years of that.

Now the hard work begins.

The full speech: (I’ve put in bold what especially struck me)

My fellow citizens:

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land – a nagging fear that America’s decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America – they will be met.

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted – for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things – some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sahn.

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions – that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act – not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology’s wonders to raise health care’s quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. And all this we will do.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions – who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them – that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works – whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public’s dollars will be held to account – to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day – because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control – and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart – not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort – even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus – and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West – know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world’s resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment – a moment that will define a generation – it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter’s courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent’s willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends – hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism – these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility – a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence – the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed – why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America’s birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:

“Let it be told to the future world…that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive…that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it].”

America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

Do ya ‘think?

It appears that some of my fellow bloggers are a bit excited.

Legal Satyricon has a humorous take.

Conservation Report Openly Gushes.

Mano Singham sees storm clouds ahead in Afghanistan.

Humor Do you think that, in general, women are pretty much worthless gold-diggers?

We read:

Scientists have found that the pleasure women get from making love is directly linked to the size of their partner’s bank balance.

They found that the wealthier a man is, the more frequently his partner has orgasms.

“Women’s orgasm frequency increases with the income of their partner,” said Dr Thomas Pollet, the Newcastle University psychologist behind the research.

He believes the phenomenon is an “evolutionary adaptation” that is hard-wired into women, driving them to select men on the basis of their perceived quality.

The study is certain to prove controversial, suggesting that women are inherently programmed to be gold-diggers.

Before you blow a gasket surf to the article that I linked to. Oh what the heck, I’ll show you Professor Moran’s take on it:

The entire field of evolutionary psychology is becoming a farce. It’s about as scientific as creationism. There must be some intelligent psychologists out there. Why aren’t they speaking out?

Though I laugh about this, in the long run, nonsense such as this (the “research” that Professor Moran rightly lampoons) hurts the perception of science by the general public.

Restless Evening

For some reason, I woke up at 2 am and couldn’t really fall back to sleep “hard” until 3:30. Mostly I was thirsty.

So, I hope to go to yoga class and then, say, run 6 on the treadmill and then walk for 2-4 more.

Update Yoga (Cathie), then 6 miles on the treadmill (57:50; 1, 2, 3, 1, 1, first 5 at 9:40 last mile at 9:20), 2 mile walk on the track in 26:03.

Inauguration To be honest, I am not that excited about it; for me it is largely symbolic. I was more excited about the cabinet picks.

Also, I am excited that competence is being heavily stressed:

Of course, Barack Obama has huge challenges and will face opposition; some of it principled and some of it not-so-principled:

I watch Keith Olbermann whenever I can. I like Keith Olbermann. It’s one of my goals in life to someday have coffee with Keith Olbermann. I tend to believe Keith Olbermann. I don’t always agree with him (as you’ll read in my post tomorrow morning) – but I tend to believe him.

Tonight, he said something that strained my sense of belief. So I looked it up. And well, well, Keith was right again.

I found it almost impossible to believe that anyone, much less someone currently running for Chair of the RNC would say that the stimulus package shouldn’t create jobs because the people who got those jobs would forever more vote Democratic.

Possible problems with President-elect Barack Obama’s economic stimulus plan must be thoroughly vetted. While only a few details are known, one overlooked issue is that it could create a major electoral advantage for Democrats at taxpayer expense. That would be unacceptable for what is being touted as a nonpartisan measure, and gives Republicans yet another reason to oppose it if not restructured. [...]

So if Mr. Obama creates 600,000 new government bureaucrats, those jobs should be expected to be kept around permanently, long after this economic crisis is resolved. After all, eliminating those jobs means laying off 600,000 people. Who wants to take responsibility for that?

But most federal employees, that are not political appointees, vote Democrat. Since Washington, DC is the seat of government, whenever new federal bureaucrats are created many live in Maryland and Virginia. In 2008, Virginia went Democrat for the first time since 1964, and Mr. Obama won it by 130,000 votes. Creating 600,000 new jobs might help cement Virginia in the Democrat column, making it harder for Republicans to retake the White House.

It’s hard to know where to start. Um, could people have voted for Barack Obama because he was more qualified than John McCain? Because they preferred his vision for America? Because they just plain liked him better?

If the GOP decides to be obstructionist in the enactment and implementation of a stimulus package and more people lose their homes, lose their jobs, lose their health insurance, and lose the ability to feed their children does Ken think that will help the Republicans win future elections? Hey Ken – hungry people vote, and they never vote for the people who made them hungry.

War on Science From Slate

The “war on science” is over. Or at least it is in the sense that I originally meant the phrase: We’re at the close of the Bush administration’s years of attacks on the integrity of scientific information—its biased editing of technical documents, muzzling of government researchers, and shameless dispersal of faulty ideas about issues like global warming.

The attacks generated dramatic outrage and considerable activism from the traditionally staid science community and the sympathy of politicians like Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. So it’s no great surprise to find the president-elect setting out to restore dignity to the role of science in government. George W. Bush didn’t even bother to name his White House science adviser until well into his first term, and his appointee (physicist John Marburger) didn’t win Senate confirmation until October 2001. In contrast, Obama has already named a Nobel laureate physicist (Steven Chu) to head the Energy Department and a climate specialist and prominent leader of the scientific community, Harvard’s John Holdren, as his Cabinet-level science adviser.

Scientists are ecstatic about these developments and about Obama’s recent promise to listen to them “even when it’s inconvenient—especially when it’s inconvenient.” But it would be the gravest of errors for researchers to simply return victorious to their labs and fall back on a time-honored stance of political detachment. If the war on science is over, we’re now entering the postwar phase of reconstruction—the scientific equivalent of nation-building. The Bush science controversies were just one manifestation of a deeper and long-standing gulf between the science community and the broader American public, one with roots stretching back to our indigenous tradition of anti-intellectualism (as so famously described by historian Richard Hofstadter in his classic work from 1963) and Yankee distrust of expertise and authority. So this is certainly no time for complacency. Scientists, with the support of the administration, should now be setting out to win over the hearts and minds of the American public, creating a stronger edifice of trust and understanding to help ensure that conflict doesn’t come raging back again. [...]

A seemingly immovable core of Americans don’t believe in evolution and think the Earth is less than 10,000 years old, nearly half of us, according to polling data. Americans are also more likely to reject the Big Bang theory than are people from other countries. Indeed, the public has become polarized about the nature of reality itself: College-educated Democrats are now more than twice as likely as college-educated Republicans to believe that global warming is real and human-caused. [...]

And so we find ourselves in a paradoxical situation. Science is more important than ever—something our new president fully recognizes. Yet for most Americans, science is probably becoming more distant, not less; it’s harder to locate and identify, and it’s often more aggressive toward their core beliefs. In this context, scientists certainly shouldn’t retreat to their labs. Rather, they should reach out to the public like never before. There’s a lot of work to do.

Fun with Animal Camouflage, Posters and Woos

Via Friendly Atheist:

Fun with nature
Conservation Report has a couple of interesting posts.

1. Can you find the iguana and the lizard in this photo? It isn’t that easy.

2. Check out these evolutionary adaptations.
Here is just a teaser to get you to look:

There are many other examples of mimicry to aid reproductive probability.

Fun with woos
PZ Myers has an interesting post about some fundies and other assorted woos being vexed by atheist bus signs; for your entertainment.

But here is the best part (of a very good) post; Myers goes on to explain what atheism really means. Some theists are a bit puzzled by signs that read “There is Probably No God so…”; they just don’t get the “probably” part. So Myers explains:

“There’s probably no God” is an accurate summary of the atheist position. There’s no virtue to be found in iron-clad certainty, and it is no sign of weakness that a statement might allow for acceptance of evidence in contradiction. People like Warner, however, think that certainty is a necessity. It is unassailable certainty in their positions that allowed good Christians to march people of another religion into ovens at bayonet point; that allowed good Christians to hang widowed old women for witchcraft; that led to wars and genocide over trivial matters of theology, like the degree of god-nature in Jesus’ existence; that allows racists and homophobes to declare a significant portion of our population to be second-class citizens; that encouraged priests to appease imaginary beings by burning babies; that led to monsters cutting the living hearts out of their neighbors so that the sun might rise. Let’s leave certainty to the oleaginous evangelists, the jingoistic war mongers, and the other con artists selling us bogus solutions to imaginary problems. A little uncertainty, a little willingness to accept that deeper knowledge might change our minds, is a good thing.

But if Mr Warner really demands some kind of absolutist comment, I can oblige. I am utterly certain that no god-walloping, bible-thumping, jesus-humping, apologetics-babbling theological dingleberry has ever provided a single scrap of the kind of rational evidence for a god that would convince a rational human being of normal or better intelligence. All they have is fear and ignorance and conformity to prop up their absurdities. Better? Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite fit into a short slogan. [...]

The rest is very good!

8 F, more snow (a little anyway), MLK day 2009

Workout notes 4000 yard swim (5 x 100 warm up, 5 x (25 front, 75 free), 10 x (25 fly, 75 free) on 2 (1:41 each), 5 x 100 IM on 2:15 (2:03-2:06 each), 5 x 200 on 3:30 (3:21, 22, 23, 23, 25), 10 x (25 drill, 25 free) fins.

Then 3 mile walk (12:30 pace) on the ‘mill; hill workout plus some cool down.

Note: I was the first one in the pool; then “Bluto” showed up (he is a good swimmer) then the dog-paddlers made their assault. Evidently the snow delayed them getting here too.

Topics:

Religion and honest behavior. Religion makes someone more honest, right? Well, maybe not. There was an experiment done with a paper machine in which you paid via the “honor system”.

Essentially, researches would clean out the coinbox and put one paper in the bag. After someone took the paper (and some time had passed), one researcher would check to see how much money that person paid. Another researcher would follow that person and, after enough distance had passed, stop the person “randomly” to interview him/her about a seemingly unrelated matter. By doing this, the researchers learned about the person’s “social behaviors.” (Not everyone was willing to be interviewed, and this was factored into the results.)

The people who had bought the paper had no idea there was a connection between the purchase and the questions they were being asked.

So what were the results like?

Not surprisingly, most people did not pay the 60 cents asking price for the paper. In fact, the average payment was only 26 cents.

What’s fascinating is the descriptions of people in relation to how much they paid.

Here is a list of characteristics compared to how much people paid more or less than the 26-cent average.

Look at who cheated the most!

Academia: school starts on Wednesday. My linear algebra and differential equations will be taught in a standard manner. But I’ll try to build my second semester abstract algebra course around a couple of “great results”: the fact that you can’t trisect an arbitrary angle and the fact that the degree 5 polynomial has to formulaic solution (in general).

Middle East Bill Moyers had a good essay which, gasp, criticized what Israel is doing. The wingnut that currently heads the Anti Defamation League attempted to chastise his; Moyers would have none of it!

First, this is what Mr. Moyers said:

BILL MOYERS:Their act of conscience could not have been more timely. For one thing, the “Washington Post” reports this week that the U.S. Army sent letters to the 7,000 family members of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Every letter began, “Dear John Doe.” Yes, it was a mistake and the Army has now apologized. But we were reminded of the anonymity that has been conferred on America’s fallen warriors whose homecoming in caskets the Bush White House has tried to keep from the public. They, their parents, spouses and children are far removed from the gaze of official Washington. The marchers along Pennsylvania Avenue this week were reminding us that every casualty, every victim of war has a name.

For too much of the world at large the names of the dead and wounded in Gaza might as well be John Doe too. They are the casualties and victims of Israel’s decision to silence the rockets from Hamas terrorists by waging war on an entire population. Yes, every nation has the right to defend its people. Israel is no exception, all the more so because Hamas would like to see every Jew in Israel dead.

But brute force can turn self-defense into state terrorism. It’s what the U.S. did in Vietnam, with B-52s and napalm, and again in Iraq, with shock and awe. By killing indiscriminately – the elderly, kids, entire families by destroying schools and hospitals — Israel did exactly what terrorists do and exactly what Hamas wanted. It spilled the blood that turns the wheel of retribution.

Hardly had Israeli tank fire killed and injured scores at a UN school in Gaza than a senior Hamas leader went on television to announce, “The Zionists have legitimized the killing of their children by killing our children.” Already attacks on Jews in Europe are escalating — a burning car crashes into a synagogue in Southern France, a fiery object is hurled through a window in Sweden, venomous anti-Semitic graffiti appears across the continent, and arsonists strike in London.

What we are seeing in Gaza is the latest battle in the oldest family quarrel on record. Open your Bible: the sons of the patriarch Abraham become Arab and Jew. Go to the Book of Deuteronomy. When the ancient Israelites entered Canaan their leaders urged violence against its inhabitants. The very Moses who had brought down the commandment “Thou shalt not kill” now proclaimed, “You must destroy completely all the places where the nations have served their gods. You must tear down their altars, smash their pillars, cut down their sacred poles, set fire to the carved images of their gods, and wipe out their name from that place.”

So God-soaked violence became genetically coded. A radical stream of Islam now seeks to eliminate Israel from the face of the earth. Israel misses no opportunity to humiliate the Palestinians with checkpoints, concrete walls, routine insults, and the onslaught in Gaza. As if boasting of their might, Israel defense forces even put up video of the explosions on YouTube for all the world to see. A Norwegian doctor there tells CBS, “It’s like Dante’s Inferno. They are bombing one and a half million people in a cage.”

America has officially chosen sides. We supply Israel with money, F-16s, winks and tacit signals. Our Christian right links arms with the religious extremists there who claim divine sanctions for Israel’s occupation of the West Bank. Our political elites show neither independence nor courage by challenging the consensus that Israel can do no wrong. Although one recent poll found Democratic voters overwhelmingly oppose the Israeli offensive by a 24-point margin, Democratic Party leaders in Congress nonetheless march in lockstep to the hardliners in Israel and the White House. Rarely does our mainstream media depart from the monotonous monologue of the party line. Many American Jews know, as Aaron David Miller writes in the current “Newsweek”, that the destruction in Gaza won’t do much to address Israel’s longer-term needs.

But those who raise questions are accused by a prominent reform rabbi of being “morally deficient.” One Jewish American activist told me this week that never in 30 years has he seen such blind and binding conformity in his community. “You’d never know,” he said, “that it is the Gazans who are doing most of the suffering.”

We are in a terrible bind — Israel, the Palestinians, the United States. Each greases the cycle of violence, as one man’s terrorism becomes another’s resistance to oppression. Is it possible to turn this mindless tragedy toward peace? For starters, read Aaron David Miller’s article in the current “Newsweek”. Get his book, “The Much Too Promised Land”. And pay no attention to those Washington pundits cheering the fighting in Gaza as they did the bloodletting in Iraq. Killing is cheap and war is a sport in a city where life and death become abstractions of policy. Here are the people who pay the price.

Mr. Moyers,

In less than a thousand words, you managed to fit into your January 9 commentary: (1) moral equivalency between Hamas, a radical Islamic terrorist group whose anti-Semitic charter cites the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East and perhaps America’s greatest ally in the world; (2) historical revisionism, asserting that Canaanites were Arabs; (3) anti-Semitism, declaring that Jews are “genetically coded” for violence; (4) ignorance of the terrorist threat against Israel, claiming that checkpoints, the security fence, and the Gaza operation are tactics of humiliation rather than counter-terrorism; and (5) promotion of an individual, the Norwegian doctor in Gaza, who has publicly expressed support for the September 11 attacks.

I have seen and read serious critiques of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, and I have disagreed with many of them. Your commentary, however, is different, consisting mostly of intellectually and morally faulty claims that do a great disservice to the PBS audience. It invites not disagreement, but rebuke.

On one point you are correct – “America has officially chosen sides.” And rightly so. Fortunately for our nation, very few of our citizens engage in the same moral equivalency, racism, historical revisionism, and indifference to terrorism as you. If the reverse held, it would not be a country that any decent person would want to live in.

Sincerely,

Abraham H. Foxman
National Director
Anti-Defamation League

In response, Bill Moyers sent Mr. Foxman the following message:

Dear Mr. Foxman:

You made several errors in your letter to me of January 13 and I am writing to correct them.

First, to call someone a racist for lamenting the slaughter of civilians by the Israeli military offensive in Gaza is a slur unworthy of the tragedy unfolding there. Your resort to such a tactic is reprehensible.

Earlier this week it was widely reported that the International Red Cross “was so outraged it broke its usual silence over an attack in which the Israeli army herded a Palestinian family into a building and then shelled it, killing 30 people and leaving the surviving children clinging to the bodies of their dead mothers. The army prevented rescuers from reaching the survivors for four days.”

When American troops committed a similar atrocity in Vietnam, it was called My Lai and Lt. Calley went to prison for it. As the publisher of a large newspaper at the time, I instructed our editorial staff to cover the atrocity fully because Americans should know what our military was doing in our name and with our funding. To say “my country right or wrong” is like saying “my mother drunk or sober.” Patriots owe their country more than that, whether their government and their taxes are supporting atrocities in Vietnam, Iraq, or, in this case, Gaza.

Contrary to your claim, I made no reference whatsoever to “moral equivalency” between Hamas and Israel. That is an old canard often resorted to by propagandists trying to divert attention from facts on the ground, and, it, too, is unworthy of the slaughter in Gaza. Contrary to imputing “moral equivalency” between Hamas and Israel, I said that “Hamas would like to see every Jew in Israel dead.” I said that “a radical stream of Islam now seeks to eliminate Israel from the face of the earth.” And I described the new spate of anti-Semitism across the continent of Europe. I am curious as to why you ignored remarks which clearly counter the notion of “moral equivalency.”

And although I specifically referred to “the rockets from Hamas” falling on Israel and said that “every nation has the right to defend itself, and Israel is no exception,” you nonetheless accuse me of “ignorance of the terrorist threat against Israel.” Once again, you are quite selective in your reading of my essay.

Your claim that “the checkpoints, the security fence and the Gaza operation” [I used the more accurate "onslaught"] are not humiliating of the Palestinians is lamentable. I did not claim that these were, as you write, “tactics of humiliation rather [emphasis mine] than counter-terrorism,” but perhaps it is overly simplistic to think they are one and not the other, when they are both. Also lamentable is your description of my “promotion” of the Norwegian doctor in Gaza when in fact I was simply quoting what he told CBS News: “It’s like Dante’s Inferno. They are bombing one and a half million people in a cage.” The whole world has been able to see for itself what he was talking about, and as one major news organization after another has been reporting, is reeling from the sight.

And, to your claim that I was “declaring Jews are ‘genetically coded’ for violence,” you are mistaken. My comment – obviously not sufficiently precise – was not directed at a specific people but to the fact that the human race has violence in its DNA, as the biblical stories so strongly affirm. I also had in mind the relationship between all the descendents of Abraham who love the same biblical land and come to such grief over it.

From my days in President Johnson’s White House forward, I have defended Israel’s right to defend itself, and still do. But sometimes an honest critic is a government’s best friend, and I am appalled by Israel’s devastation of innocent civilians in this battle, all the more so because, as I said in my column, it is exactly what Hamas wanted to happen. To be so indifferent to that suffering is, sadly, to be as blind in Gaza as Samson.

Sincerely,

Bill Moyers

Football: Conference Championship Sunday

Ok, I’ll say it: the “real” Supberbowl is the game that I am watching: Pittsburgh versus Baltimore.

Nevertheless, the Arizona-Philadelphia game was entertaining.

Arizona raced off to a 24-6 half-time lead and was dominating.

But the Eagles battled back; three touchdowns (with a missed extra point kick and a missed 2 point conversion) but them in front 25-24 with 3 minutes to go; the Cardinals responded with a beautiful touchdown drive and a two-pointer to win 32-25.

I felt a bit bad for McNabb but hey, the Eagles have had quite a bit of play-off success over the past few years, even if they haven’t won it all.

But if anyone thinks that players ONLY care about money…well…you should have seen the emotions on either side after the game.

Now in the second game, the Steelers are dominating 13-0 in the second quarter; it doesn’t look as if we’ll have a bird match-up in the Superbowl.

Aside: BJ has some opinions on those athletes who ascribe their success to the intervention of a deity.

But remember that these are athletes; I am far more irritated when those who should know better do this sort of thing.

Photos from yahoo.

18 January; Birds, Zombie Banks and other Topics

Workout notes 1:40 treadmill run (just about 10 miles; the POS clock reset itself at 50 minutes (5.1 miles?) and I went 5 miles further (for sure). Still this was my best 10 mile effort in a while; I set the treadmill to the “pace” setting and mostly kept it 9:30-10:00 (with a few slip ups in both directions)

My right hamstring was slightly sore prior to the run and the “crack” on the left heel hurt this morning (sore to the touch).

Birds and Planes: I had a video of birds (dead ones) being shot through a running jet engine. Conservation Report links to data which suggests that the number of bird-aircraft collisions is climbing and will climb even more; evidently the birds are getting a bit too used to humans.

They have a photo of the aftermath of a bird-helicopter collision.

Update Evidently, the plane struck far more birds than the engines had been designed to handle:

According to material posted on the FAA’s Web site, the type of engines on the US Airways jet were certified to be able to keep operating for five minutes at 75% of normal takeoff power after ingesting a total of five birds, each weighing 1.5 pounds. If a single bird weighing four pounds gets sucked into an engine, FAA standards require it to be able to shut down safely, without a fire or internal disintegration.

Aviation experts have said that some Canada geese can weigh as much as 12 or 13 pounds apiece, and the population of such birds has been growing steadily. Investigators haven’t yet identified the specific kind of birds involved in the latest accident.

According to interviews of the pilots by investigators, the A320 encountered a virtual wall of birds that somehow veered into its path, Kitty Higgins, a safety board member, told reporters earlier Saturday. The FAA rules also never envisioned a scenario in which relatively low-altitude collisions with birds could result in both engines of such an airliner catastrophically losing power. Over the years, however, the FAA has imposed tougher engine-performance requirements, tried to make engine-certification tests more realistic and supported research to reduce the dangers. [...]

Here is a test video

And an actual event

Zombie Banks These are banks that are being kept alive by outside support; the term comes from Japan. The trouble is that

1. It is difficult to tell which banks are headed toward a zombie state:

It took years for the Japanese government to deal with its zombie banks. Here, the government is already working with the banks to get bad loans off their books. Still, James Angel of Georgetown University says it’s not always easy to tell which banks are destined to be zombies and which will go on to lead healthy, productive lives.

James Angel: Have the regulators gone over the books in enough detail to determine whether this is a bank worth saving? You know, that’s the real question.

He says banks such as Citigroup may still be hiding bad news. He says even if Citi turns out not to be one of the walking dead, taxpayers have plenty to be sore about.

Angel: The danger in this case is that you know they require so many pints of blood to replenish their capital that the U.S. taxpayer winds up as the owner of the bank.

And if we rescue too many banks from a zombie nightmare they could end up bleeding us dry.

2. Sometimes, known bad banks (aggregator banks) are used to buy bad debts. This might work but :

A Bad Bank is surely better than the piecemeal, unpredictable, and opaque approach of TARP I. But in order that the Bad Bank not turn into another giant taxpayer-financed boondoggle for the benefit of shareholders, creditors, executives, traders, and directors of the banks that got us into this mess in the first place, any Bad Bank purchase of their toxic assets ought to carry conditions similar to the ones I suggested recently for dispensing TARP II funds.

Follow the link to see Robert Reich’s suggested guidelines.

Middle East Don’t read this diary if you don’t want to be depressed. It appears that most conflicts between waring ethnic/religious groups eventually end when one group or the other is liquidated. I sure hope that something can be negotiated here.

Science and Academia Should there be an academic day of “free for all” where all ideas get weighted equally?

Since the wingnuts and creationists are busily pushing a bogus version of intellectual responsibility that they have labeled “academic freedom”, which is really an excuse to peddle any old nonsense to children, some wag is now promoting Academic Free-For-All Day.

PZ Myers goes on to link to the idea:

On Academic Free-for-All day, everyone can have it their way. Don’t worry if 99.9% of the experts on some subject agree on one conclusion about the facts — if your ‘gut’ says differently, then go for it! No matter how wacky the idea is, you can usually find a handful of cranks with Ph.D.s to back you up!

Follow the link for a few laughs.

Speaking of laughs:

There is a movement in various parts of the world to have atheist themed bus signs (e. g.: “There is Probably no God”, “Be Good For Goodness Sake”, etc.

Some churches have attempted to counter with their own signs. Well some folks have had fun with photo-shop:

one

two

A Tribute To President Bush…

“Enjoy”; I am about to go to the Riverplex to run and walk as it is still icy outside, though it is a balmy 18 F.

But hope is on the way; these photos are from the crowds that were there to see Obama on his “whistle stop pre inauguration tour”.

I am not the only one who can’t wait to have a real President in office again.

(ps: if I seem confused by linking to the site that I did, read the post carefully. Norma-Jean’s alter ego is as eager as I am for this change!)

17 January 2009

It has warmed to a more seasonal (for us) 16 F ( -7 C); remember that is a 36 degree (F) increase from yesterday! (about 17 C)

Workout Notes
First, I participated in the Steve Foster Memorial Walk. (Steve is a friend of mine who died of pancreatic cancer in April, 2008 …)
This was a loosely organized “go your own distance on your own course” event; some stayed inside.

But Steve usually ran outdoors (I did his ICC loop with him a few times, even in snow). So I put on my hiking boots and trudged through the snow a bit; there were bits of runnable paths here and there. But I counted this as a 4 mile walk (12-13 minutes on the parts where you had some traction, a bit slower in others).

On the way back, Bob Corbett jogged about .25 miles with me; there were many others there.
I then said hi to a few people and then went to change into clothes for yoga.

I then took a yoga for runners class; Cathie taught it. That went fine.

Then I went the treadmill and ran a 4 mile workout; .5 mile easy (10 mpm); gradually raised the incline to 3 where I changed the speed from 9:50 to 9:30; I ran a mile at that incline, then dropped it to 1 and ran .25 miles at 9:50 to recover then increased the speed gradually to an 8:40 pace at the end of 4 miles (total time: 38:10).

Obligatory gym sights notes: (men and women)
a. One of the tri-babes was leaving to run trails with another tri-babe. She was wearing very tight, shiny spandex. That warmed me up a bit (the tri-babes have cuter physiques than the pure distance runners, I think).

b. There was this guy who was shadow boxing near the indoor track. When I went into the locker room; he was standing there shirtless. I am straight, but this guy had one of the most beautiful physiques I’ve ever seen; he had the definition of a slender person (you could see each of the smaller muscles that made up the bigger ones) but he also had a reasonable amount of bulk. But were you to face this guy in the ring, my guess is that you wouldn’t see much beauty!

When I faced guys (say, in wrestling) who had far less impressive physiques; well, let’s just say that I was whipped before the match even started.

c. When I was on the treadmill, this (20-30 something year old) woman came to get some equipment wipes; she had on tight spandex hip-hugger aerobic pants. The upper band of her underpants peeked above her pants waistband; they were the color of a dreamsicle (a type of orange popsicle which has vanilla ice cream inside)

Am I a compulsive overeater or what: I see a shapey woman’s underpants and I think of dreamsicles.

Other topics

This Leonard Pitts column caused some conversation between me and my wife and evidently in the blogosphere as well.

From Pitts:

As it happens, Eastwood was talking about a fellow for whom sensitivity is not a problem: Walt Kowalski, the retired Detroit auto worker he portrays in his latest film, Gran Torino. Kowalski is the unlikely hero of a tale of redemption and sacrifice — unlikely because he is a cantankerous cuss with a mouth full of bigotry and invective, a guy who has it in for the ”dagos,” the ”micks,” the ”hillbillies” and, most pointedly, the ”slopes” — i.e., the Hmong refugees, an influx of which has left his once white, working-class neighborhood unrecognizable.

In the years since he stopped acting opposite orangutans, Eastwood has become a fascinating filmmaker, willing like few others to confront the nettlesome gray areas of human existence. Gran Torino is a worthy addition to that canon, but for all the nettlesome grays it illuminates, the most nettlesome might be one it suggests only obliquely: the notion that we are drowning in our own sensitivity.

Here in the United States of the Aggrieved, there is no malady, mark, mannerism, mind-set or malformation too miscellaneous to have its own support group, along with a cadre of lobbyists and lawyers hyper-vigilant for any suggestion of mistreatment or actionable discrimination. Largely as a result, American English has become a morass of compound constructions and newly invented terminologies designed to leave no one out, give no one cause for offense. Sometimes you wonder if, in so radically revising the way we communicate, we have not compromised our ability to do so.

A few years ago, I showed one of my college classes an episode of All In the Family. The students were offended. Nor were they persuaded by my protestations that the show was: a) hilarious and b) a satire that condemned bigotry by making it ridiculous. They are children of a different era where you simply cannot say the things Archie Bunker did, even to ridicule them.

Some folks (like this blogger) are glad that many don’t see things like All In the Family as funny.

I suppose how one feels about things often reflects a combination of one’s own life experiences and of where one is right now. First, I’ll openly admit that people of Mexican heritage (e. g., myself) while being the targets of some of Archie Bunker’s slurs, have not had it nearly as hard as African Americans.

On the other hand, I am in a position to not be threatened by the likes for the fictional Mr. Bunker; I see him as someone who can be safely ridiculed and, aside from someone who makes bad votes, no threat to me; hence he is a safe target.

Wingnuts
The wingnuts continue to provide plenty of entertainment.

The leading lights of the right wing freak show (Anne Coulter and Rush Limbaugh) accuse Markos of having an unintelligible accent (he doesn’t, FWIW), and attacks the Democratic Party as the party of immigrants.

Which raises the question: what exactly is wrong with representing citizens who moved to the United States because they want to live in this great nation?

From the source:

COULTER: …What I think is interesting about Soros; and Marcos, whatever his name is, of Daily Kos; and Arianna Huffington are, you know, basically the three unofficial spokesmen of the Democratic Party and they all speak in foreign accents of their foreign upbringings. Can’t you wait a few generations? Let your grandkids do the America bashing, you know, not right away. You can barely understand them.

RUSH: Arianna, you need a translator.

COULTER: And George Soros!

RUSH: Yeah, him, too. I’ve never heard the Daily Kos guy speak.

COULTER: Yeah, he was brought up in someplace in Latin America. You can’t understand them. They speak in foreign accents. They represent the Democratic Party.

BTW, this is Markos Moulitsas:

Do you need a translator to understand him?

Of course, no conservative figures have accents, right?

Idiots.

Middle East:
The suffering in Gaza is very real.

This Al-Jazeera video (from Israeli televsion) drives this point home very bluntly:

Science The opinions of a whole group of people can indeed shape one’s own opinions; here is a study which shows this happening, even when the opinions of others aren’t necessarily those of one’s friends (or even really their opinions!)

Science and education I posted this blog post from a physics professor who was trying to give tips on applying to grad school.

Of course, there were some who took offense at what the professor said; scroll down to the comments.
Some people just don’t get it: the stronger graduate programs are designed to get someone to the level to which they can do independent, original research and contribute to their discipline.

1. Most people simply don’t have the natural ability to succeed at that level.

2. The vast, vast majority of people will not succeed if they lack the background in mathematics and science classes.

In short, it is reasonable for the applicants to have to prove that they belong in such a program.
After all, do you think that just everyone is, say, invited to training camp for an NBA (professional basketball) team? No; talent scouts search for people who have a bona-fide chance for success; others have to prove to the club that they aren’t wasting their time by letting them try out. Saying “hey, I love basketball; let me try out” is far from being enough!

Speaking of academia I found this to be the case: many students today have trouble reading.

I took your question to heart and this morning asked my 90 students to name ten world events from the past 500 years. I got 85 blank sheets of paper and five others with a mixture of Dwarf Fur (I’m translating that as Darfur) and AIDS and Viet Nam War. Next, out of curiosity I asked them how many hated to read. 80 hands went up; with answers to the question why ranging from time consuming to boring to stupid. Next I asked them why they would go to a four year activity (university) that centered around something that they hated so much. My example: I don’t like being shot at, so I am neither in law enforcement nor the military.

Here is what I have found: about 10-15 years ago, I had a few students who had trouble reading “application” questions on exams. They were almost always those who did poorly on the rest of the exam (which was more “straight computation”).

Now-a-days, even the students who do well on the computational parts of exams have trouble reading application questions.

My guess is that, yes, the internet, is part of the problem:

I can feel it, too. Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable sense that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory. My mind isn’t going—so far as I can tell—but it’s changing. I’m not thinking the way I used to think. I can feel it most strongly when I’m reading. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.

I think I know what’s going on. For more than a decade now, I’ve been spending a lot of time online, searching and surfing and sometimes adding to the great databases of the Internet. The Web has been a godsend to me as a writer. Research that once required days in the stacks or periodical rooms of libraries can now be done in minutes. A few Google searches, some quick clicks on hyperlinks, and I’ve got the telltale fact or pithy quote I was after. Even when I’m not working, I’m as likely as not to be foraging in the Web’s info-thickets’reading and writing e-mails, scanning headlines and blog posts, watching videos and listening to podcasts, or just tripping from link to link to link. (Unlike footnotes, to which they’re sometimes likened, hyperlinks don’t merely point to related works; they propel you toward them.)

For me, as for others, the Net is becoming a universal medium, the conduit for most of the information that flows through my eyes and ears and into my mind. The advantages of having immediate access to such an incredibly rich store of information are many, and they’ve been widely described and duly applauded. “The perfect recall of silicon memory,” Wired’s Clive Thompson has written, “can be an enormous boon to thinking.” But that boon comes at a price. As the media theorist Marshall McLuhan pointed out in the 1960s, media are not just passive channels of information. They supply the stuff of thought, but they also shape the process of thought. And what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski.

And yes, I’ve been affected too. Therefore, I’ve made it a point to always be reading a book (I am working on two at the moment) and to always be reading at least one research (math) article. I’ve had difficulty concentrating and I need to work on that.

Some local opinion
Peoria Pundit has an interesting take on how media phrases things:

Consider the following paragraphs from an Associated Press article:

President-elect Barack Obama is preparing to prohibit the use of waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques by ordering the CIA to follow military rules for questioning prisoners, according to two U.S. officials familiar with drafts of the plans. Still under debate is whether to allow exceptions in extraordinary cases.

The proposal Obama is considering would require all CIA interrogators to follow conduct outlined in the U.S. Army Field Manual, the officials said. The plans would also have the effect of shutting down secret “black site” prisons around the world where the CIA has questioned terror suspects — with all future interrogations taking place inside American military facilities.

The headline above this article: Sources: “Obama ready to ban harsh interrogations.”

Consider the words: “harsh interrogation.” This includes the practice of waterboarding. This includes the practice of shipping prisoners off to other countries, where they get the crap beaten out of them until they say something the interrogator wants to hear. [...]

Out here in the real world, we call that torture.

But the AP can’t call it that. That word is too judgmental for them. And the AP has to sell its services to news organizations headed, in some cases, buy people who have decided that George Bush is a great guy.

And that is the reason for the mainstream media practices “objective” journalism, to make it easier for news organization to sell their products to as many consumers as possible, regardless of ideology.

Hear, Hear!

Finally, a rant.
Remember the New York plane crash where the pilot managed to avoid populated areas by landing in a river and the passengers were promptly rescued?

Well, anytime such a thing happens, it is called a miracle. Yes, I know: by “miracle” many people mean an event that could have turned out to be a complete disaster but didn’t due to superb performance under pressure by lots of people, and yes, some plain old “good fortune”. There is nothing wrong with using that word in this manner; heck, I’ve found myself saying “if the Cowboys pull this out it will be a miracle” at a frigging football game!

But always, always, some woo (or lots of woos) start yapping about the “invisible hand” of some deity, and let’s just say that this grows old after a while. Hence, this diary.

While we are on this topic, I’d like to post a couple of videos; the first is of jet engines being tested to see if they will maintain power if they suck in a bird (don’t worry; they use dead birds) and the second is from Monty Python’s Life of Brian.