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"I am the world crier, & this is my dangerous career...

I am the one to call your bluff, & this is my climate."

—Kenneth Patchen (1911-1972)

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Thursday, February 22, 2007

Bush's Plan for Bin Laden 

from Chris Floyd's Empire Burlesque - High Crimes and Low Comedy in the Bush Imperium

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Here comes Newt 

Dick Morris: "Newt, consigned by many observers to Elizabeth Dole or Dan Quayle status in this GOP nominating process, appears to be moving up into contention, overtaking former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and battling to be the conservative alternative to either former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani or Arizona Sen. John McCain. " (The Hill)

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Last of the True Believers 

"Even if Congress moves next to fiddle with funding the war, [Bush] might just have the upper hand.

History is on the president’s side. Even in unpopular wars, Congress has failed to sustain major efforts to control the purse strings. As unpopular as the Vietnam War was, Congress never cut funding while U.S. troops were on the ground in Indochina.

While tolerating the right of lawmakers to “express their opinion” in a resolution, Bush is signaling that a fierce fight awaits those who aim to cut war funds. For starters, he will not shy away from accusing Congress of abandoning the troops, no matter how clever Democratic leaders might be in crafting measures that undercut Bush policy without restricting the flow of resources for troops on the ground." (CQ)

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Duh 

Iraq withdrawal a defeat: UK press: "An admission of defeat dressed up as a victory was how many sections of the British press today summed up Prime Minister Tony Blair's decision to pull troops out of Iraq." (news.com.au)

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Hell hath no fury like Hillary 

Toby Harnden: "A delicious spat between the Obama and Hillary camps today after coruscating anti-Clinton comments from Hollywood mogul David Geffen that vividly encapsulated every concern about Hillary and Bill that nestles in the hearts of Democrats wary of the couple.

What did it reveal? That this will be a bloody campaign. That Team Obama is prepared to do battle. That Team Clinton wants to bury Obama early. And that Hillary will respond to every slight with ferocious indignation while protesting with a straight face that she only wants to run a positive campaign.

Geffen's comments to Maureen Dowd of the New York Times were incredibly damaging to Hillary. Dowd is one of the most influential political journalists in the US. Two decades ago, she sunk the presidential campaign of Joe Biden. Hillary wants to make sure Maureen doesn't do the same thing to her." (Telegraph.UK)
Geffen's major misgivings speak to the unelectability of Clinton and the vulnerability to giving the election easily to the Republicans if she is the nominee.

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Meme Watch 

Google Search compares the current insurgent attacks in Iraq to the 1968 Tet Offensive. The congruities go beyond recent fears voiced by McCain.

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Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Emotional Decisions 

"Emotions are ordinarily conceived as irrational occurrences that cloud judgment and distort reasoning. This view is well entrenched, despite work in both philosophy and psychology that establishes a strong connection between emotion and cognition. During recent years there has been an explosion of research which indicates that rather than being natural adversaries, rational and emotional processes function together. Barnes and Thagard (in press) argue that emotions and inferences are both necessary when we empathize with other people. Social psychologists have explored the function of emotions in social perception and judgment (Forgas, 1991). But the interdependence of emotional and cognitive processes is perhaps most powerfully presented in recent neurobiological studies which establish that emotion is indispensable in rational decision making." (— Barnes and Thagard)

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Monday, February 19, 2007

Some sweet news 

"Scientists funded in part by the Mars Inc. candy company delivered the not-unwelcome news Sunday morning during what was described as the first systematic review of chocolate's effects on learning and memory.

A two-hour symposium on the neurobiology of chocolate, billed as a potentially 'mind-altering experience,' drew a standing-room-only crowd during the annual meeting in San Francisco of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Five years ago, a similar meeting popularized evidence suggesting that flavanols, a chemical found in the beans from which chocolate is made, have beneficial effects on cardiovascular health.

Now it seems chocolate might do even more." `(San Francisco Chronicle)

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It could happen here 

"...[For] the first time since the resignation of Richard M. Nixon, Americans have reason to doubt the future of their democracy. " — Joe Conason (Salon), in an excerpt from his new book It Can Happen Here: Authoritarian Peril in the Age of Bush

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Sunday, February 18, 2007

With One Word, Children’s Book Sets Off Uproar 

A Newbery-winning book has been banned from some school libraries around the country.: "The word “scrotum” does not often appear in polite conversation. Or children’s literature, for that matter.Yet there it is on the first page of The Higher Power of Lucky, by Susan Patron, this year’s winner of the Newbery Medal, the most prestigious award in children’s literature. The book’s heroine, a scrappy 10-year-old orphan named Lucky Trimble, hears the word through a hole in a wall when another character says he saw a rattlesnake bite his dog, Roy, on the scrotum." (New York Times )

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