Class is out. Off to Tahoe.

Wednesday I submitted the grades for my course and I'm surprised at how happy I am with how the class progressed over the summer. I had a busy time planning and teaching, going out of town/state almost every weekend, and spending the rest of my time with a good guy in Co Springs (alas, he is moving). In the midst of it all I was too busy to reflect much on the course. But two weeks before the end of the class a few students explained to me that their religious backgrounds had biased them against the idea of evolution. They thought that evolution was itself opposed to religion and I had made them see otherwise. I had explained that evolution doesn't really comment on religion and that many of the early prominent biologists (eg, Mendel) were members of the clergy. I think explaining evolution and natural selection without comment on religion is exactly what made them see that there is no need for religion to attack evolution, for evolutionary theory isn't attacking religion. They directly told me "thats not what I thought evolution was" or, paraphrasing, 'my wife doesn't like evolution becuase the church tells her not to, but I can see they're very different.'
I couldn't ask for greater praise from my students. I'm looking forward to the fall when I'll be teaching another section of the same ecology course and two sections of biology for non-majors.

This summary works

Bush Tours America To Survey Damage Caused By His Disastrous Presidency

Wall E - I can't wait

John Lasseter is the biggest name in film you don't know. He's been the director or producer of every Pixar film to date. It is an unparalleled track record and Wall E will continue the streak.

The reviews are glowing - some of them comparing the first 40 minutes of Wall E to the best of the silent film era.

Here is the trailer.

McCain supports wiretapping without warrants

In another shift from the right position to the wrong position, McCain backs Bush's wiretapping program, here. Anyone who wants to vote for the year 2000 version of John McCain needs to wake up and realize that person does not exist anymore.

Update to the scorecard.

[Another update as Obama loses a point for his support of a windfall profits tax on gasoline. Tax gas, yes, but not this way.]

Obama

Frank Rich nails it:

"Mr. McCain only reminded voters that he, like Mrs. Clinton, thinks that change is nothing more than a marketing gimmick. He has no idea what it means. “No matter who wins this election, the direction of this country is going to change dramatically,” he said on Tuesday. He then grimly regurgitated Goldwater and Reagan government-bashing talking points from the 1960s and ’70s even as he presumed to accuse Mr. Obama of looking “to the 1960s and ’70s for answers.”

Remarkably, neither Mrs. Clinton nor Mr. McCain had the grace to offer a salute to Mr. Obama’s epochal political breakthrough, which reverberated so powerfully across the country and throughout the world. By being so small and ungenerous, they made him look taller. Their inability to pivot even briefly from partisan self-interest could not be a more telling symptom of the dysfunctional Washington culture Mr. Obama aspires to mend."

Obama plays better in the rest of the world than I think most Americans will ever realize, here, here, here, and here - The Economist's take. Moreover, a change in look, approach, and rhetoric is, in itself, substantial to the rest of the world.

I completely agree with this Hillary supporter...

Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell (a Clinton supporter) on Clinton's posturing following her loss of the nomination, on the idea of Obama asking her to be VP, and on the difficulties posed by Bill.

Clinton loses, gives victory speech....what the fuck?

I'm buying into the egomaniac ideas about her. Bringing up the bullshit that she won the popular vote doesn't help either. (Parts of the speech are pretty good, but still...)

McCain's speech. He looks tired. I half expected him to read aloud the word "smile" that was clearly sprinkled throughout the script.

Obama soars:

Read Sullivan's coverage on Obama's victory, Clinton's speech, (2), McCain's speech, (2), Obama's speech.

It's over ...... right?

The difference between Hillary's response to Obama's "bitter" comment (article, video: massive political attack "Obama, the elitist") and Obama's response to Hillary's "assassination" comment (article; she was probably tired and didn't mean any offense) is a striking example of the character differences between these two.

Hillary Clinton certainly is a fighter. Does she ever know when to stop?

In the running for worst policy of the Democratic Party

The New Yorker: The free trade paradox:
"At times, the campaign has looked like a contest over who hates free trade more: Obama has argued that free-trade agreements like NAFTA are bought and paid for by special interests, while Clinton has emphasized the need to “stand up” to countries like China."

One Point McCain

One point to McCain. McCain opposed the farm bill. Obama supported it.

As Greg Mankiw pointed out, both the NY Times and the Wall Street Journal opposed the bill.

I'm very bothered by Obama's support for this piece of legislation.

The Scorecard begins.

How awesome

Here's an article.

Here's the youtube video.

Sort of like Buzz Lightyear once he spreads his wings.

Marriage

One of Andrew's readers on why marriage matters:

"My partner of 16 years and I have a 6 year old son and he asked us recently if "Daddy and Papa" were married. I took a deep breath, lied, and said "yes". I said yes because, for him, our relationship is the foundation of his existence. And, even at 6, he understands that marriage is the way two people come together to make a family. How could I give him any other answer? Hopefully some day our country will make an honest man of me."

Our last party

Thanks for a good time everyone. Keep in touch.

Our last party - May 2008

"Yup. Looks like we're doing it for real."

My friend Bjorn, on his pending civil union, strike that, marriage, to my friend David.

Congratulations you guys.

One of the blessings I've been counting in the wake of this...I'm only 29 years old. Presumably, I'll live the majority of my life in an era in which I can marry. Young gay guys do not always speak kindly of older gay men. Today, we must thank the gay men and women who came before us.

On gay marriage

Andrew Sullivan, writing in 2004. Although the details of my story are different from those of his, I very much share his feelings about family and marriage. 

California supreme court overturns gay marriage ban. 

"Our state now recognizes that an individual's capacity to establish a loving and long-term committed relationship with another person and responsibly to care for and raise children does not depend upon the individual's sexual orientation," the court wrote.

A Beautiful Morning

And someone else's fun with perspective and clouds, here.

States won with 60%

Clinton: Arkansas, West Virginia. (update: and Kentucky)

Obama: Mississippi, Wyoming, Hawaii, Virginia, Maryland, DC, Nebraska, Illinois, Georgia, Minnesota, Colorado, North Dakota, Kansas, Idaho, Alaska.

(From RCP)

Two days ago I filled up my gas tank for the second time in eight months.

Two friends have moved out of town.

Two inches of snow have fallen tonight.

Two weeks from now I start my new job in a new town in a new state. I'm not really ready to leave this place though.

I'd much rather be doing this (more pictures from spring here)


than dealing with this

Filmed from my house in Laramie, today.

The Economist calls it like it is

A few years ago, for Christmas, my dad started sending me The Economist magazine. Lately, for Christmas, he renews that subscription (at my begging). 

Today a reporter for The Economist called the shots as he sees them:

"I’m not exactly sure when it happened, but my will has been broken. I’ve realised that covering Mrs Clinton's campaign without explicitly stating that it has turned into a win-at-all-costs operation fueled by phony outrage, hypocritical proclamations and absurd notions of who is electable and who is not is an exercise in deliberate deception, and I can't do that. Perhaps I am weaker than my colleagues, but a certain fatigue sets in when trying to sort through it all. Mrs Clinton does have substance, and some well-thought-out policy prescriptions, but did you know Barack Obama is an elitist? Never mind that the Clintons largely agree with what Mr Obama said, or meant to say.

Perhaps it is because Mrs Clinton is the underdog that the tone of her campaign is so different from Mr Obama’s. Her efforts to connect with different voting blocs have not worked—one day she’s a sniper-dodging commander-in-chief, the next she’s a gun-shooting woman of the people. Most of the time she simply looks like a caricature of the voters she’s trying to lure. And when it comes down to policy, there are simply not enough big differences between the two candidates to allow her to catch up. So she must make Mr Obama look unelectable. She must go negative. And she has.

That’s fine, but let’s be forthright about it. This is no longer a campaign based on ideas. It is a campaign focused on tearing down Mr Obama. We all know that’s her only shot at the nomination. I’m tired of pretending otherwise." (Tip to Sullivan.)

Torture

President Bush, May 24, 2004: Abu Ghraib is a "...symbol of disgraceful conduct by a FEW American troops who dishonored our country..." (my emphasis). Bush's speech is here.

The Bush Administration in a 2003 internal memo: "we do not believe that Congress enacted general criminal provisions such as the prohibitions against ... torture pursuant to any express authority that would allow it to infringe on the president's constitutional control over the operation of the armed forces in wartime."
The long memo is here. Read about it here and here.

Humor Break

This is pure joy. It's a short clip and you'll be smiling when you're done, guaranteed. Hope you're all doing well.

Hillary: "I remember landing under sniper fire.."

Life

On planet Earth: The Encyclopedia of Life
On a distant planet: Hubble finds methane

History in the making

Barack Obama, March 18, 2008:
"...but race is an issue that I believe this country cannot afford to ignore right now....The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through, a part of our union that we have not yet made perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care or education or the need to find good jobs for every American.

For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away, nor has the anger and bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends, but it does find voice in the barber shop or the beauty shop, around the kitchen table. At times that anger is exploited by politicians to gin up votes along racial lines or to make up for a politician's own failings, and occasionally it finds voice in the church on a sunday morning in the pulpit and in the pews.... That anger is not always productive. Indeed all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems, it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity within the African American community in our own conditions. It prevents the African American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real. It is powerful. And to simply wish it away, to condemn it with out understanding its roots only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races...

This is where we are right now. its a racial stalemate that we've been stuck in for years.... but I have asserted a firm conviction..that working together we can move beyond some some of our racial wounds. In fact, we have no choice, no chioice if we are to continute on the path of a more perfect union. For the African American community that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victems of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice, in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances, for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs to larger aspirations of all Americans. The white woman struggling to break the class ceiling, the white man who has been laid off, to the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means also taking full responsibility for our own lives, by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair and cynicism. They must always believe that they can write their own destiny..."


[after the fact update and descent into pundit-land: It seems to me the media has missed the strongest point about Obama's race speech: its sheer honesty about what black and white people sometimes think about each other (often even with the understanding that we shouldn't think that way). Perhaps it's simply that the talking heads don't want to talk about the real issue, race in America, versus Obama's-pastor-said-what...My two cents: watch the speech in its entirety, yourself]

M & Ms

Me: "Mom, would you like some yogurt for lunch."

My grandmother: "Maybe later. Right now I'm eating M&Ms."

Humor break

At stuffwhitepeoplelike...

The Clinton politics as usual

"The Clintons are comfortable with this polarisation. They need it. Even when running against a fellow Democrat, they instinctively reach for it. Last week, in response to the Obama camp’s request that they release their tax returns, Clinton’s spokesman called Obama a new Ken Starr. For the Clintons, all Democrats who oppose them are . . . Republicans. And all Republicans are evil.
And evil means that anything the Clintons do in self-defence is excusable – even playing the race card, and the Muslim card, and the gender card, and every sleazy gambit that the politics of fear can come up with. This is how they have arrested the Obama juggernaut. It’s the only game they know how to play." Here.

Mrs. Clinton, exactly what foreign policy experience of yours are you talking about?

The original article in the Chicago Tribune. Sullivan's take.
"Pressed in a CNN interview this week for specific examples of foreign policy experience that has prepared her for an international crisis, Clinton claimed that she "helped to bring peace" to Northern Ireland and negotiated with Macedonia to open up its border to refugees from Kosovo."
....But....read on.

Here is what David Trimble, the former First Minister of Northern Ireland had to say about it: "...being a cheerleader for something is slightly different than being a principle player."

And...while I'm getting angry...(and damn Andrew Sullivan for pointing this out) Clinton talks about being vetted. But where are the Clintons' tax returns and a complete list of donors to Bill's various causes? I'm afraid I'm beginning to buy into the view that the Clintons care more about themselves than about their party...it was looking that way in general, and then Clinton started singing McCain's praises over Obama (sounds a little like, if I can't be the nominee, then I'll take you down with me) and her campaign compared Obama to Ken Star. Really, where does she come up with this? And uh, yeah, I stand by everything I previously said about Clinton representing politics as usual.

[The one bit of optimism: super delegates realize that Clinton's negativity is damaging to the party and throw their support behind Obama to seal the deal and shut her down.]

[Update March 22; Hillary March 17, 2008: "I remember landing under sniper fire ... we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles." Again, tip to Sullivan.]

[Update March 14; And with respect to SCHIP, the Boston Globe reports that Clinton doesn't really deserve credit for that either, here.]

Pocket computing

...down the road Apple's announcement yesterday of the software development kit for the iphone/ipod touch interface may prove an even bigger deal than the initial announcement of the iphone. This was a huge step forward for palm sized computing.

$ 3,000,000,000,000

The cost of the war in Iraq (3 trillion) by a Nobel Prize winning economist.

Number 4

61,655 passing yards, 442 touchdowns, 160 regular season victories, 3 MVPs, 17 seasons. Favre retires.

These are not "just words"...this is action by speech

While Hillary takes up the Karl Rove politics of fear, Obama admits to occasional homophobia amongst blacks and addresses it directly. This is a perfect example of words that are so much more than "just words." Imagine another candidate going to a constituency and trying to get their votes by challenging them rather than appealing to their base, rather than handing out more platitudes. It doesn't happen.

An hour and a half with Barack Obama.

Marc Andreessen is one of Netscape's co-founders and he recently wrote about an hour and a half that he had in early 2007 with Barack Obama, here (tip to Sullivan). "With most politicians, their curiosity ends once they find out how much money you can raise for them. Not so with Senator Obama -- this is a normal guy....But it's also apparent when you interact with him that you're dealing with one of the intellectually smartest national politicians in recent times...Put the primary campaign speeches aside; take a look at his policy positions on any number of issues and what strikes you is how reasonable, moderate, and thoughtful they are...He's a post-Boomer." You should also read his description of Obama's answers to his "experience" and "foreign policy" questions.

I've never watched American Idol but this was really good:

Here. If that link gets taken down I think a search for "David Archuleta Imagine American Idol Youtube" will find something.

I didn't expect to quote the Wall Street Journal in the primary season, but here it is:

"The assumption behind much of this criticism is that because Mr. Obama gives a good speech he cannot do substance. This is wrong. Mr. Obama has done well in most of the Democratic debates because he has consistently shown himself able to think on his feet. Even on health care, a complicated national issue that should be Mrs. Clinton's strength, Mr. Obama has regularly fought her to a draw by displaying a grasp of the details that rivals hers, and talking about it in ways Americans can understand.

In Iowa, long before the race became the national campaign it is today, Mr. Obama spent much of his time at town halls in which he took questions from the audience. His answers in such settings were often as good or better than the rhetoric in his stump speech, and usually more substantive. He spoke about issues like immigration and national service in a thoughtful manner -- not wonky, not pedantic, but in a way that suggested he'd spent some time thinking about them before."

From this article in the Wall Street Journal that warns Republicans against making the same mistake Clinton has made: she never took him seriously. She assumed eloquence meant absence.

Recipes

I posted some of the recipes from Christmas here. Recipes included: enchilada casserole, tamale pie, and dutch baby among other things that caught my eye in peoples' recipe collections. Hopefully more to come. This link is also in the links sidebar.

Obama and the power of hope

From Peter Drier and the Nation, here.
"A onetime organizer himself, Obama knows that, if elected, his ability to reform healthcare, improve labor laws, tackle global warming and restore job security and living wages will depend, in large measure, on whether he can use his bully pulpit to mobilize public opinion and encourage Americans to battle powerful corporate interests and members of Congress who resist change."

...and including this from Obama:
"Nothing in this country worthwhile has ever happened except when somebody somewhere was willing to hope."

The Los Angeles Times for Barack Obama

"Clinton would be a valuable and competent executive, but Obama matches her in substance and adds something that the nation has been missing far too long -- a sense of aspiration."

Here.

Substance and hope are not mutually exclusive.

The other day I was trying to say that Obama has substance and hope while Clinton only has substance. Here, Andrew Sullivan puts it much better than I. With respect to the idea that Obama is lacking in substance he writes:
"I find this criticism bewildering. Obama has a host of policy positions, on taxes, healthcare, Iraq, Afghanistan, immigration, climate change, and this blog has mentioned or debated many of them. There seems to be a meme that because someone is inspiring, there has to be no substance. But they are not mutually exclusive categories. In the Democratic race, the only real substantive difference is healthcare mandates, which I've aired a great deal. And compared with McCain, Obama is a wonk."

Sullivan wrote more about Obama's substance here.

Joseph Wilson for Clinton

Joe Wilson gives his endorsement to Clinton and offers up some worthwhile considerations about Obama.
The full article is here.
The strongest parts:
"Senator Obama claims superior judgment on the war in Iraq based on one speech given as a state legislator representing the most liberal district in Illinois at an anti-war rally in Chicago, and in so doing impugns the integrity of those who were part of the debate on the national scene. In mischaracterizing the debate on the Authorization for the Use of Military Force as a declaration of war, he implicitly blames Democrats for George Bush's war of choice. Obama's negative attack line does not conform to the facts. Nothing could be farther from the truth. I should know. I was among the most prominent anti-war voices at the time -- and never heard about or from then Illinois State Senator Obama.
...
In his tendentious attack, Obama never mentions that Hans Blix, the chief United Nations weapons inspectors, declared that without the congressional Authorization for the Use of Military Force the inspectors would never have been allowed into Iraq. Hillary's approach -- and that of the majority of Democrats in the Senate -- was to let the inspectors complete their work while building an international coalition. Hillary's was the road untaken. The betrayal of the American people, and of the Congress, came when President Bush refused to allow the inspections to succeed, and that betrayal is his and his party's, not the Democrats. "

Yes we can

Obama for President

Hillary will be a liberal version of politics as usual. The most pointed evidence I can offer is the way she and Bill went after Obama in South Carolina. She is qualified, she is prepared, she has good ideas, she would probably make a great president, and she will continue the mud fight in Washington because she's been a part of it for 16 years. I believe Obama is only slightly less prepared but that he has the only true chance of being a transformative president. Not only that, I'm not sure she can beat McCain in November. They would split the country like normal because they are normal - a liberal and a conservative still fighting the same fights. They both play better with the other team than Bush II, but neither has a fundamentally different play book.
Obama is something different. Listen to him and it's obvious. When the questions are detailed questions - HE DOES have detailed answers, and the differences between him and Clinton are slight (2 points to Clinton for her better health care plan). But what he chooses to talk about when he has free reign over the microphone...the way he applies the language of the civil rights movement to the entire country...the way he demonstrably tries to be inspiring: THAT IS DIFFERENT. He's not attacking anyone, he's taking everyone with him. Yes, it's soft and fuzzy. But I repeat - he can answer the questions the way Clinton and McCain do - he can go on and on with policy declarations with the best of them. But what he CHOOSES to talk about, that's different. He's talking about prosperity and opportunity. It is hopeful. It is forward thinking, it is inclusive ... it is NOT politics as usual.
Some say Obama is all hope and no substance. I say Obama is substance and hope and I wonder why we don't ask for the same from Clinton and McCain.
Moreover, I don't think she can beat McCain. The people driving the record participation levels in this primary season are coming out for Obama, not for Clinton. McCain and Obama appeal to independent voters. I do not think the same thing of Clinton. I admit, I worry about his lack of experience - it's why I wasn't for him initially. Now I've accepted the argument that his lack of experience is exactly what gives him the greatest potential to be transformative.
I think Obama can talk the policy wonk talk (not as well as Clinton but) well enough to be President. He chooses not too. That is different.

Election 2008

John Stewart to Mitt Romney following Mitt's failure in the GOP primary: Fuck You.

I never liked Romney the Barbarian, so I'm glad John Stewart put it so elequently.

What if everyone around you froze at the exact same moment?

More from Improve Everywhere.

My Dad

I wanted to let everyone know that my Dad is doing pretty well almost a week after the cryotherapy procedure/surgery that he had to treat his kidney cancer. That said, the surgery took more out of him than I, and I believe than he, expected. In the mornings he doesn't have much energy but over the course of the day he becomes stronger and more alert. Today the doctor explained that about 25% of the kidney was affected by the surgery and I was relieved to realize it was such a small fraction of his kidney. He is feeling better but he still gets tired very quickly at times.

Some Christmas Pictures

DSC01320
Originally uploaded by p-a-k

Flickr (where these pictures are hosted) is not as good as Picasa, but if you look around you'll find a bunch of pictures from Christmas 2007.

Into the Wild, in one word: Awesome

In a few more words: Beautiful and with a great cast. I loved the book so much I almost didn't see the movie. That said, this is one of the best adaptations I know of, one which I feel almost enhances the book.

Walking around town

In the Life-in-Wyoming category of things, I love a town where you can walk around. When I got back to Laramie after four months my car registration was expired, my auto insurance was expired, and my battery was dead. Without a car for a week? No problem, I just walked everywhere (fortunately my housemate took me grocery shopping). Yesterday I walked to one of the high schools for work as a substitute and in the evening we walked to the further of the two theaters in town to take in a movie. I love it.

There was a falcon, not sure what kind, sitting on my back fence for five minutes today.

...too bad my camera was on the wrong shelf.

Martin Luther King, Jr.......and a small Pinkville update

A friend pointed out recently that I haven't posted in a while so I thought, on this Martin Luther King Jr. Day, that I'd point everyone to an episode of This American Life, the Chicago Public Radio show usually broadcast once a week on your local NPR station. The episode is here and part 1 (not the prologue) is the relevant bit. On the left (not the top) click on the orange "full episode" link to listen.

This American Life is available as a podcast automatically downloaded into iTunes or into Google Reader or other such RSS service. This American Life uses an hour to cover one topic from different perspectives. Sometimes its funny, sometimes poingant, sometimes an in depth look at an under-reported news story. Always good.

And this story about Oliver Stone's next movie makes clear that Pinkville (in which I was cast before the writers' strike) is not going to happen. About Pinkville, Stone says that he "had a great script and one of the best casts of any of [his] films, with 40 young actors and Bruce Willis." I'm pretty sure I'm one of those 40 young actors. Damn. It's not everyday you get an important role in a major filmmaker's next movie. I wasn't looking for a life changed forever - my getting cast was a complete fluke. But dealing with the aftermath of this movie would have been more fun than my job applications. And a new civic would have been nice.