Daniel Drezner and Henry Farrell (PDF):
Weblogs occupy an increasingly important place in American politics. Their influence presents a puzzle: given the disparity in resources and organization vis-à-vis other actors, how can a collection of decentralized, nonprofit, contrarian, and discordant websites exercise any influence over political and policy outputs? This paper answers that question by focusing on two important aspects of the “blogosphere”: the distribution of readers across the array of blogs, and the interactions between significant blogs and traditional media outlets. Under specific circumstances – when key weblogs focus on a new or neglected issue – blogs can socially construct an agenda or interpretive frame that acts as a focal point for mainstream media, shaping and constraining the larger political debate.Via Robin Good
Public Integrity's site has some very useful lobbying data. This link shows the organizations that have contributed to Tammy Baldwin along with the amounts. Perhaps this lobbying is why we are stuck in the mud on true broadband?
Geico, however, lived up to its marketing. Its slick Web site was easy to use and returned a quote of $711.90 for six months. USAA, which covers only current and former members of the U.S. military and their families (that's us), came in at about $10 more when we called. But the rep noted USAA offers a $50 rebate to customers who buy child car seats. Plus, he told us, it pays an annual dividend averaging 7% to all policyholders depending on how the company performed that year. USAA also had a high J.D. Power ranking.
GE said the IDX acquisition would significantly its health care offerings and aid in its drive to accelerate the transition to electronic health records. IDX's administrative, clinical and imaging products will complement GE's Centricity-brand applications, the company said.
"GE and IDX have a shared vision on how to accelerate the adoption of electronic health records across the globe," Joe Hogan, president and CEO of GE Healthcare, said in a statement.
The seven vendors who built test hotzones for Grand Rapids, Mich., all showed they had the right stuff: The local paper reports that the city was very satisfied with the results of their vendor face-off. The next goal is figuring out how to set up a no-taxpayer-dollar network, as is the charter of all new municipal efforts. They’re looking at a public/private partnership with a plan ready to bid by December. The town is eyeing local and federal legislation that might restrict their ability to deploy.
Our good Senators may soon try to force Hollywood's broadcast flag on us, via "piggybacking on a Commerce Committee reconciliation" bill, due 10/26/2005. I wonder if our Senators, Russ Feingold and Herb Kohl will do the right thing for Wisconsin residents, or simply slide up to the bar with the Hollywood types? Click on the links above and tell our Senators to stop supporting Hollywood power grabs to the detriment of our fair use rights.
Following in the footsteps of defunct webvan as well as Sentry Hilldale's ongoing web shopping service, Sheboygan based Fresh Brands will rollout online grocery services starting 10/10.
Muniwireless’s latest report is out on the scale and composition of the municipal wireless broadband market: This latest report states that $700 million will be spent on muniwireless over the next three years in the U.S., with $400 million spent in 2007 alone. Esme Vos, operator of Muniwireless.com and the organizer of the MuniWireless 2005 conference this week in San Francisco, writes that the growth of networks is irrespective of the size of the town or city. As is often overlooked, public safety operations remain the number one application for these networks, despite the focus on public-access broadband for free or fee.
Kristian Knutsen nicely rounds up the local blogosphere's review of Friday's sold-out Sigur Ros performance at the Orpheum:
The Daily Page, unlike many others, was lucky enough to attend the Sigur Rós show last Friday night. Sold out some two weeks in advance, the concert (previewed in last week's edition of Isthmus) was held at the Orpheum Theatre on State. The line for the general admission show began forming in the late afternoon and eventually wrapped around the corner of E. Johnson St.
Suspects arrested or detained by federal authorities could be forced to provide samples of their DNA that would be recorded in a central database under a provision of a Senate bill to expand government collection of personal data.The controversial measure was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee last week and is supported by the White House, but has not gone to the floor for a vote. It goes beyond current law, which allows federal authorities to collect and record samples of DNA only from those convicted of crimes. The data are stored in an FBI-maintained national registry that law enforcement officials use to aid investigations, by comparing DNA from criminals with evidence found at crime scenes.
Professor Bainbridge on Senator Bill Frist's HCA stock sale - two weeks before a disappointing earnings announcement which caused the stock to fall 15%. I've noted before that a recent study demonstrated that Senators beat the market 12%, while corporate insiders are 5% better than the market and the typical US household underperforms. Unsurprisingly, the SEC is NOT investigating this interesting fact.
The fact that news of this probably has never reached you attests to what an impossibly distant and godforsaken place Bouvet Island is. Only a few dozen humans have ever left their footprints on it, and it's a safe bet most of them would happily have passed on the honor.
But there is a small and obsessive group of people scheming, plotting, cajoling and ultimately trying to buy their way there. They are known as country collectors, and they spend their lifetimes journeying to the farthest and most obscure reaches of the globe, from Abkhazia to Umm Al Qaiwain, filling their passports with rare and exotic stamps. Bouvet Island is to them what Everest is to peak baggers, what the British Guiana 1c magenta is to philatelists, what the Apple Tree Girl 141X is to collectors of Hummel figurines.
Only a tiny handful of country collectors -- precisely eight by one estimate, "not quite 20" by another -- have ever managed to cross Bouvet off their lists. The most recent is a 40-year-old dot-com millionaire from San Francisco, Charles Veley, and he believes this, along with all his other peregrinations, qualifies him as the most well-traveled person in the history of the world.
Ben Stein writes well about the Art of Selling, and a good salesperson truly practices art:
In other words, align your interests with those of the buyer. Don't try to shove something down his throat. Don't try to hoodwink him. Just listen to what he needs and wants, see if you have the good or service he needs and wants and then arrange to make it easy to buy. Make sure that the buyer is a real buyer with a real need, a real timetable to buy and the real means to buy. Then satisfy that need.It is also important to be a friend to your buyer. In fact, I observe that almost all success in life comes down to being a friend to someone: a friend to the voter, a friend to the judge, a friend to your spouse, a friend to the client, a friend to your parents. As Miller said so aptly, you have to not just be liked, but "well liked."
Other things to watch: Will Brian Calhoun, who has been stellar in UW’s first three games, run well against Michigan’s bigger, tougher and more experienced defense? And will the UW offense unveil the rumored wrinkles that allegedly include splitting Calhoun out wide at receiver on some plays? Will John Stocco continue in the tradition of UW quarterbacks that do just enough to win, but never quite enough to earn respect, let alone love, from Badger fans? And will the kicking game, a sore spot for Wisconsin in recent years, continue to perform ably in a game that might be determined by special teams?The Michigan Daily forecasts a Wolverine victory 28-24.
Over the next 10 years, Americans will not receive nearly $750 billion in tax cuts sponsored by President Bush because the cuts will be offset by the alternative minimum tax, a new report by Congressional tax specialists shows. The report, prepared by the staff of the Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation, said that from 2006 to 2015, Americans would pay as much as $1.1 trillion more under the alternative minimum tax, partly as a result of the Bush tax cuts. The Bush tax cuts reduced the bill for millions of taxpayers to a level that will subject them to the alternative minimum tax instead of the standard tax rate. As a result, the report said, their tax savings would be reduced by a total of $739.2 billion over the 10 years. Congress has passed a modest adjustment to the alternative minimum tax to allow more taxpayers to take advantage of the Bush tax cuts, but that expires at the year-end. Even if it is extended, the report said, the alternative minimum tax would take away $628.5 million in tax savings, with $416.5 billion of that attributable to the Bush tax cuts over the 10 years. George K. Yin, the joint committee's chief of staff, wrote that the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 account for just under two-thirds of the increase in collections under the alternative tax. The report was prepared in response to a request from John Buckley, chief tax lawyer for Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee. Families with children who own their homes will be hit hardest by the increased alternative tax.
Great application of a mix of old an new technologies in a way that makes sense. Kudos to the SkySails folks for bringing this to market. The Economist has more:
But the SkySails approach does away with masts and is much cheaper. The firm says it can outfit a ship with a kite system for between €400,000 and €2.5m, depending on the vessel's size. Stephan Wrage, the boss of SkySails, says fuel savings will recoup these costs in just four or five years, assuming oil prices of $50 a barrel. Jesper Kanstrup, a senior naval architect at Knud E. Hansen, says the idea of pulling a ship with an inexpensive kite—attached to the structurally solid bow like a tugboat—had never occurred to him. “It's a good idea,” he says.Skysails reveals the essence of any successful (We'll see) idea: economics, application, timing and luck!
Stepping up the battle against entertainment piracy, Verizon Communications Co. have entered a long-term programming deal that calls for the phone company to send a warning to Internet users suspected of pirating Disney's content on its broadband services."
Under the deal, one of the first of its kind in the television industry, Disney will contact Verizon when the company suspects a Verizon customer of illegally downloading content. Without divulging names or addresses to Disney, Verizon will then alert the customer that he or she might be violating the law. Disney will be able to identify suspicious customers through an Internet coding system.
The term Trappist describes the source of these ales rather than a particular brewing style. In fact, the beers vary considerably. Some are dark as chocolate stout and some are amber-gold, bordering on orange. They can be intensely sweet or dry enough to pucker. Sometimes they can be both, reaching a full, rich, complex sweetness as you turn the ale over in your mouth, yet turning dry and refreshing as you swallow. They can all be wonderfully fragrant, with aromas of spices, flowers and fruit, and they are always strong, ranging in alcohol from about 7 percent to 12 percent, as opposed to the 5 percent of a typical lager.I've always enjoyed an occasional Chimay, available at Steve's Liquor among other local stores.
Two especially surprising findings from the study are: (a) that the Latino rate of entrepreneurship increased from 0.38 percent in 1996 to 0.48 percent in 2004, which was higher than the white, non-Latino rate of 0.39 percent; and (b) that immigrants have substantially higher rates of entrepreneurship than native-born individuals. The average rate of entrepreneurship for immigrants was 0.46 percent compared to 0.35 percent for the native-born.New entrepreneurship activity is highest in the West. Other regions have similar rates of entrepreneurship.
The Eye Between the Storms
by Michael Vickerman, RENEW Wisconsin
Petroleum and Natural Gas Watch, Vol. 4, Number 1
September 21, 2005
On its way toward the Gulf Coast states of Louisiana and Mississippi, Hurricane Katrina cut a swath through a hydrocarbon-rich zone of the Gulf of Mexico, the largest domestic source of petroleum and natural gas. When fully operational, this offshore oil and natural gas complex accounts for about 30% of domestic oil supplies and 20% of domestic natural gas supplies.
Fueled by exceptionally warm waters, this Category 4 storm KO’ed nearly 50 production platforms and four drilling rigs. Extensive damage was reported at 20 platforms and nine drillings rigs. The force of the winds and the waves tore six rigs loose from their moorings and sent them adrift; one rig in Plaquemines Parish was found beached on Alabama’s Dauphin Island. At the storm’s peak, on August 29, more than 90% of the Gulf’s oil extraction capacity and nearly 90% of its natural gas extraction capacity was off-line.
The storm’s devastation extended beyond structures protruding above the water’s surface. Parts of the underwater piping network that collect the raw fuel and carry it to onshore processing facilities need to be rebuilt. Mobilizing all the boats, helicopters, divers, and steel needed to repair this infrastructure will be a monumental undertaking. However, until these pipelines become operational again, many of the undamaged wells will remain idle, with no place to pump the oil to.
Onshore facilities like shipyards and refineries were also hit hard. The Mineral Management Service, which issues daily bulletins tracking Katrina’s impact on the Gulf of Mexico’s hydrocarbon complex, estimates that “35% of shut-in oil is due to onshore infrastructure problems.” The rebuilding effort is bound to be slow and costly, but absolutely necessary as this region is one of the few remaining centers of (real) wealth-production in the nation.
Three weeks have now passed since Katrina landed her roundhouse blows to our energy underbelly, and more than 55% of the region’s oil capacity and about one-third of the natural gas capacity still remain off-line. So far, the reduction in output amounts to about 1.5% of expected U.S. crude oil production this year. Also off-line are four refineries with a combined daily capacity of nearly one million barrels, about 4% of total U.S. refining capacity. Expectations are that these facilities, especially the 400,000 barrel per day Pascagoula unit, are three to six months away from being restarted. In an industry where production volumes lately have averaged between 90 and 95 per cent of capacity, making up a 4% loss shapes up to be an impossible challenge. This is very bad news indeed to a country that was, before Hurricane Katrina, not producing enough gasoline to keep pace with this summer’s driving demands.
In an effort to calm panicky oil markets, the Bush Administration has pledged to tap the Strategic Petroleum Reserve for as much as 30 million barrels of crude oil, an amount the Unites States consumes in 36 hours. Though gasoline prices have fallen 10% from the Labor Day weekend, releasing reserve oil is nothing more than a symbolic gesture when there is no spare capacity available to crack the crude into jet fuel, gasoline and diesel fuel. The nation has no choice but to import greater volumes of gasoline for the duration of this year. Even so, the supply-demand equation looks precarious. Only a nationwide slowdown in driving will keep fuel prices from heading higher. Nothing short of that will suffice.
Katrina’s path took it through the oil-heavy eastern half of the Gulf’s hydrocarbon complex. The natural gas production platforms that populate the western half were spared the flattening winds and 20-foot storm surges visited upon Bay St. Louis and Biloxi. Even so, the accumulated reduction in output so far represents 0.7% of U.S. extraction volumes expected this year. This deceptively puny number spells real trouble for Americans residing in colder climates, for unlike crude oil and its refined products, natural gas cannot be easily shipped across oceans. There are only four operating terminals in the United States where specialized tankers bearing liquefied natural gas (LNG) can offload their contents, and they are operating pretty much at full capacity right now.
Unless natural gas output from the Gulf of Mexico can be revved up to pre-Katrina levels in the next week or two, the likelihood that the United States can scramble its way out of a slow-motion supply squeeze this winter is poor. Earlier this year, several investment banking services that track energy supply-demand trends projected lower output from domestic sources this year. If the monthly production results reported by the Texas Railroad Commission are reliable guides, extraction volumes are already tailing off, compared with previous years’ results. The injection rate of gas into storage for winter use has slowed as well.
When one stops to consider all the factors at play here—a still booming housing sector, more gas-fired power stations on-line (including four new ones in Wisconsin this year), a declining resource base in North America (including Canada and Mexico), and insufficient infrastructure for importing more than 5% of domestic consumption through 2008—it’s not difficult to imagine natural gas prices, now at $12/MMBtu, to ratchet up towards the $20/MMBtu level this winter. And to think that only six months ago one could have bought a January 2006 gas contract for under $7/MMBtu.
The prospects for a rapid recovery became dimmer when a storm named Rita crossed the Florida Keys heading west toward Texas. The abnormally warm waters on which Katrina fed can easily transform Rita into a tempest of similar intensity. For the moment the very best outcome one can expect from Rita’s menacing presence in the gulf is a production interruption that lasts five to seven days followed by a full resumption of extraction activity. But if it strengthens as Katrina did, it is likely to cause even greater damage than Katrina wrought, due to its more westerly track. Texas and its coastal waters, it should be remembered, account for fully one-third of domestic natural gas output. Another hit to Gulf of Mexico hydrocarbon complex and natural gas futures will warp out of orbit.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Even more amazing than the destructive capacity of these hurricanes is the degree to which we as a nation are totally unprepared for dealing with their aftermath. The default assumption among policymakers is that the U.S. economy will grow in an uninterrupted fashion, and that high quality energy sources will magically appear in time to sustain this expansion. But how can this outcome be guaranteed when the U.S. government cannot control either the actions of foreign countries or the weather? In fact, the country does not appear able to exercise even the slightest hint of discipline or restraint over its own appetite for energy. As the nation’s energy infrastructure contracted relative to the domestic economy, the federal government’s ability to shape our energy future atrophied along with it. All of the planning functions that a healthy government is typically responsible for have been ceded to the marketplace. And the marketplace has one very powerful mechanism for allocating scarce but essential resources to a society’s constituents. It’s called price.
Author’s note: Given Hurricane Rita’s potential to add to the devastation caused by Katrina, I plan to update this article in one to two weeks.
Sources:
Center for Energy Efficiency and Resource Efficiency (CEERT), Risky Diet 2005: Global Energy Resource Adequacy.
Minerals Management Service (U.S. Department of the Interior. See MMS web site also for daily shut-in statistics reports.
Simmons and Company: Outlook for Natural Gas: 2005 and Beyond
“Texas Monthly Oil and Gas Production by Year,” Texas Railroad Commission
The Oil Drum: A Community Discussion About Peak Oil. Numerous postings on the web site from August 29 – September 21, 2005.
Petroleum and Natural Gas Watch is a RENEW Wisconsin initiative tracking the supply demand equation for these fossil fuels, and analyzing its effects on prices, consumption levels, and the development of energy conservation strategies and renewable energy alternatives. For more information on the global and national petroleum and natural gas supply picture, visit "The End of Cheap Oil" section in RENEW Wisconsin's web site.
Commerce is making ready a team of intellectual property (IP) specialists to deploy to nations giving us fits on piracy. Sort of a WTO-enforcing SWAT team.The lead experience here is China, and that is all fine and good. This is where our "conflict" with China should really be centered: in economics and in rules.
Other countries targeted are all either New Core (Russia, India, Brazil) like China, or key Seam States (Thailand) or places where we're making a special trade effort to shrink the Gap (Big Bang-land Middle East).
Good move, I say. One the White House can point to in upcoming trade pact battled with Congress, which, in its infinite wisdom, is moving more and more toward protections as a catch-all answer for America's economic woes. Bad, stupid, ahistorical choice, but there it is.
At the August 5, 2005 meeting of the FCC, following the Supreme Court's decision that cable modem connectivity is an information service, the FCC leveled (lowered) the playing field by declaring that DSL, too, is an information service. These decisions remove the common carrier obligation of the line owner to share -- non-carrier ISPs like Earthlink are left to twist slowly in the wind. The industry is, for all intents, re-verticalized.More worth reading on blocking useful network apps here.The central idea of the Telecom Act of 1996 -- that competition would replace regulation -- is all but dead. Regulation has systematically fought competition since 1996. Regulation has won.
The report argues that, while broadband adoption has grown quickly in recent years, there are reasons to believe that it is slowing. The report develops a model of broadband adoption that hypothesizes that the intensity of online use is the critical variable in understanding the home high-speed adoption decision and the trajectory of the adoption curve. Using national survey data from 2002 and 2005, the paper shows that the role of online experience in explaining intensity of internet use has vanished over this time frame; the explanatory effect of having a broadband connection has grown. This suggests that relative to 2002 there is not much pent-up demand for high-speed internet use at home.[PDF]
The Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce and its partners were successful last night in gaining the council’s approval of a fair and workable lobbying ordinance. With a vote of 15-4, a new lobbying ordinance was passed into law by the Madison Common Council. After months of hard work on this issue, the ordinance that passed was supported and endorsed by the GMCC and will have minimal impact on the business community’s access to local government. Thanks to all of our partners that worked so hard over the past months: Downtown Madison, Inc., the Small Business Advisory Council, Smart Growth Madison, and the Realtors Association.
This compromise ordinance creates wide-reaching exemptions for Madison business owners and employees, allowing them expanded access to local government officials. It allows business owners and employees to speak with city officials about their needs and concerns without the burden of going through a registration process. We believe that this ordinance will promote open government and encourage civic involvement and participation in the public process. Voting in favor of the compromise ordinance were: Alders Sanborn, Cnare, Verveer, Brandon, Skidmore, Gruber, Olson, Knox, Bruer, Palm, Compton, Rosas, Van Rooy, Radomski, and Thomas. Voting against this compromise were: Alders Konkel, King, Benford, and Webber. Alder Golden was absent. Thanks to all of you that attended public meetings, wrote letters, and talked to your elected officials, helping us fight for business rights to open access to government. Please feel free to contact us with any additional questions. Thank You, Jennifer Alexander President, Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce
Sun Rising Over New Orleans
John F. Wasik
September 20, 2005
As hundreds of thousands of souls return to the birthplace of jazz, one of the most critical questions facing the Big Easy is how to rebuild the estimated 200,000 homes that were damaged by Hurricane Katrina.
Let’s take some of the estimated $100 billion or more it will take to fix the city and create the nation’s largest, most sustainable solar city.
The logic for creating a solar city is powerful: Not only would innovative, energy-producing housing save thousands of dollars on operating costs for financially strapped homeowners—many of whom weren’t covered by flood insurance—but it would jump-start a new industry, build a badly needed alternative energy infrastructure, and reduce the emissions that cause global warming.
There are now only about 20,000 people working in the solar equipment industry, which is growing at a 20-percent annual rate. At least that many again would be required to provide the equipment to outfit New Orleans as a solar-powered city, adding up the manufacturing, installation and utility-support jobs. Why not give a boost to an industry that benefits our entire country?
Already there is a lot of discussion about how to rebuild New Orleans to ensure that the insecurity and injustice uncovered by Katrina do not return. Yet however that larger land-use debate plays out, many homes will have to be completely demolished. Ideally, the wood, stone and metal from the houses being razed could be recycled and re-used for building materials or levees. That leaves a lot of empty lots and the critical question of home design. If we are to leverage the reconstruction of New Orleans to launch the American solar power industry, this is where we must begin.
The first thing to do is have architects compete to design attractive, sustainable, low-cost panelized homes that could be manufactured in factories and quickly assembled on site. The homes would range from updated yet spacious “shotgun” shacks to antebellum deluxe models.
These new homes would be graced by solar collectors to heat water and photovoltaic panels to provide electricity. Passive-solar designs would capture winter heat and high-efficiency heat pumps would keep them cool in summer.
If all this sounds excessively idealistic, it’s not. The technologies, designs and products exist. The recently passed federal energy bill already has a number of tax incentives for installing solar and energy-efficient appliances. The bill didn’t go far enough, though. For the alternative energy industry to thrive, it needs even more government funding and tax breaks and large scale use. Enter New Orleans.
At present, tax incentives for building solar homes in Louisiana are practically non-existent. While the state grants you a minor break from property tax valuation if you have a solar appliance installed on your home, there are no state tax credits offered. Contrast that with the state of Oregon, which, through a non-profit and state partnership, offers up to $10,000 in incentives to homeowners and up to $35,000 to businesses. Even the new 1,700-page federal energy law gives some carrots to homeowners for installing solar equipment. If you install a solar hot water heater, for example, you may receive a tax credit of up to $3,000. The more generous tax breaks, however, don't go into effect until 2006.
To make solar energy economically competitive with conventional forms of power, the cost of producing it needs to drop by a factor of three. Only mass production of solar appliances and homes can make that possible. That’s why New Orleans is the perfect place to start, requiring only that far-sighted state and local politicians adopt solar-friendly rebuilding codes. That’s because the challenge in front of solar power is not technological. We already have the technology and brainpower on the shelf, courtesy of the U.S. Department of Energy’s many national laboratories, including the National Renewable Energy Lab. What solar power needs is widespread commercialization.
New Orleans has already given birth to innovative food, music and culture, leaving an indelible mark on the American character. Up until Katrina, she’s always had a sunny disposition. Now it’s time to bring that back and share it with the rest of the country.
John F. Wasik writes for Bloomberg News and is the author of the upcoming book, Merchant of Power: Samuel Insull, Thomas Edison and the Creation of the Modern Metropolis (Palgrave-Macmillan).
This is big and potentially scary news, for a couple of reasons. The first is fairly obvious: If the reports of Google's purchasing of "dark fiber" -- unused bandwidth and network infrastructure -- are true, the firm could conceivably roll out a "last-mile" Internet delivery service. Maintaining and operating all that infrastructure (along with servicing all those WiFi hubs) would be very expensive. But the idea makes more sense if you assume that the company will deploy its real capital once the new WiMax standard, which broadcasts wireless Internet over a much wider area than WiFi, rolls around. Coupling this with an upgraded version of Google Talk could conceivably make the tech startup a force in telecomGoogle WiFi traffic is subject to their privacy policy, which everyone should be fully aware of.
Bob Lutz on diesels, hybrids and fuel cells:
The addition of a second hybrid mode to the drive system improves efficiency, and reduces the need for large electric motors found in typical single-mode systems available today. And we’re putting it on our largest vehicles first, where it will have the greatest effect on fuel consumption.However, the two-mode system will be scalable, meaning it’s suitable for use in a variety of front-drive, rear-drive and all-wheel-drive vehicles.
In the long-term, GM sees the hydrogen fuel cell as an opportunity to transform our entire industry. Our progress in fuel cell research has been seen before, especially in our show cars the GM AUTOnomy, Hy-wire and Sequel. These vehicles clearly demonstrated that fuel-cell-powered cars can become a reality.
Tonight's Madison City Council meeting is likely biggest of the season, as they will take up several items regarding the tavern smoking ban that was enacted on July 1. Since that time, various tavern owners and their political and media allies have inveighed against that ordinance, making it into the hottest and most divisive issue in the city at least since the casino referendum last year. In fact, the amount of interest this has generated probably surpasses that, generating more media heat and public interest in any city policy in years. In addition, the city's lobbying regs are on the table as well, an issue that has also been a subject of considerable discussion.An amazing example of sausage making at its finest.
Anthony Shadid's new book is Night Draws Near: Iraq's People in the Shadow of America's War. Shadid is the Baghdad correspondent for The Washington Post. The book culls stories from Shadid's many visits to Iraq over the past eight years.audio
Take Diego Valderrama, an economist with the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco. If he were an economist 40 years ago, he may have used a paper, pencil and slide rule to figure out and chart by hand how the local economy might change with a 1 percent boost in taxes. But because he's a thoroughly modern guy, he uses knowledge of the C++ programming language to create mathematical algorithms to compute answers and produce elaborate projections on the impact of macroeconomic changes to work forces or consumer consumption.Does that mean he's not as bright as an economist from the 1950s? Is he smarter? The answer is probably "no" on both counts. He traded one skill for another. Computer skills make him far more efficient and allow him to present more accurate--more intelligent--information. And without them, he'd have a tough time doing his job. But drop him into the Federal Reserve 40 years ago, and a lack of skill with the slide rule could put an equal crimp on his career.
Their problems were that they got caught in the headlights by fuel prices that went up a lot faster than they could adjust to quickly. True, both were in the process of getting their labor costs down - something that American, Continental, and United have already done. When jet-A went to over $2 a gallon, the immediate need was to conserve cash while labor and other cost reductions were achieved.Lots of "experts" go into diatribes about how these legacy carriers have unsupportable cost structures and route systems, dating from the days of regulation in the 1970s. Sounds great, but it is more nonsense. It's missed by these grand prognosticators - most of whom have never worked within the airline industry - that if oil had stayed right where it was at the beginning of last year, as most of us expected, these filings would not have taken place.
On Tuesday officials from the Minnesota Vikings and Anoka County will formally announce that they have reached an agreement for a new football stadium. The $675 million, retractable-roof stadium would be built on a 700-acre site in Blaine. The total cost of the project, with roads and other infrastructure, could be as much as $790 million. The Vikings are expected to contribute up to $280 million with the rest of the funding to come from Anoka County and state taxpayers.I wonder if any NFC North team actually needs a new stadium, given the dreadful outlook this fall. Perhaps they will all finish 3-13? Beyond that, I'm sure we can use this money in much better ways, than by subsidizing the rich.
Kudos to Isthmus. They've started to tally Rep. Tammy Baldwin, Senator Herb Kohl and Senator Russ Feingold's voting record (not committees - unfortunately!). Some of our elected official's votes make me wonder just who they are working for.
Hear a full concert by Iceland's ambient rock group Sigur Ros, recorded live from the Music Center at Strathmore in North Bethesda, Md. The band's performance originally webcast live on NPR.org Sept. 11 as part of NPR Music's ongoing concert series from All Songs Considered.
This is not merely an abstract business ethics issue: Yahoo's behavior in China could have real consequences for U.S. foreign policy. Over the past two decades, many have argued -- ourselves included -- that despite China's authoritarian and sometimes openly hostile government, it is nevertheless right to encourage American companies to work there. Their very presence has been thought to make the society more open, if not necessarily more democratic. If that is no longer the case -- if, in fact, American companies are helping China become more authoritarian, more hostile and more of an obstacle to U.S. goals of democracy promotion around the world -- then it is time to rethink the rules under which they operate.
I visited a Sears store last week for a washer, dryer and microwave. The salesman couldn't give details about specifications on the machines. A microwave was priced at $119; the salesman said that was wrong price and that it should be $148. I had a terrible conversation with the credit people from the home office. They tried to sell me disability insurance. I said I didn't need it as I hadn't purchased anything. Finally, I ended up buying a Sears long-distance phone card and paid cash. After ringing up the sale, they said card wasn't good until 24 hours had transpired. What a horrible shopping experience. It took over two hours. Sears lost $960 in sales. I went to Home Depot the same day and bought a washer, dryer and microwave for the new home. The transaction took 35 minutes and all the goods were delivered the next day. Mr. Lampert: you've got a very serious problem.
The rise of China as a regional force has shaken assumptions that had governed this vast region since the end of World War II, including that of uncontested U.S. naval and air power from California to the Chinese coast. With those days soon to end, senior officers said, the U.S. military in Asia is retooling to reflect new war-making technology, better prepare for military crises and counter any future threat from the emergent Chinese navy and air force.
It begins as fresh snowmelt, streaming from Mount Ritter's gray granite faces into Thousand Island Lake, a bouldered mirror. The clear blue water spills out through a narrow canyon, and the San Joaquin River is born.
When conservationist and mountaineer John Muir first explored these upper reaches, the narrow gorge barely contained the power of the living river, which carried the continent's southernmost salmon run, sustained Indian tribes and set the rhythm of life in the valley below with floods and droughts.
"Certainly this Joaquin Canyon is the most remarkable in many ways of all I have entered," Muir wrote in 1873.
The Dutch government will begin tracking every citizen from cradle to grave in a single database, opening a personal electronic dossier for every child at birth with health and family data, and eventually adding school and police records.
As a privacy safeguard, no single person will be able to access someone's entire file. And each agency that contributes to the records will maintain its own files as well.
But organizations can raise "red flags" in the dossier to caution other agencies of potential problems with children, said ministry spokesman Jan Brouwer. Until now, schools and police have been unable to communicate with each other about truancy records and criminality, which are often linked.
During the four centuries when printed paper was the only means by which texts could be carried across time and distance, everyone engaged in politics, education, religion, and literature believed that reading helped to shape the minds, opinions, attitudes, and ultimately the actions, of readers. William St Clair investigates how the national culture can be understood through a quantitative study of the books that were actually read. Centred on the romantic period in the English-speaking world, but ranging across the whole print era, it reaches startling conclusions about the forces that determined how ideas were carried, through print, into wider society. St Clair provides an in-depth investigation of information, made available here for the first time, on prices, print runs, intellectual property, and readerships gathered from over fifty publishing and printing archives. He offers a picture of the past very different from those presented by traditional approaches. Indispensable to students, English literature, book history, and the history of ideas, the study’s conclusions and explanatory models are highly relevant to the issues we face in the age of the internet.
- The first study of actual reading using quantification and economic analysis
- Sheds new light on aspects of reading and its effect on the nation
- An indispensable resource for scholars working on literature, reading, and the history of publishing and printing
As the moon rose in the evening sky, a crowd gathered at Glacier Point to relive an iconic scene captured by photographer Ansel Adams more than 50 years ago.
About 300 amateur photographers, astronomers and other spectators came Thursday to watch conditions align to repeat the scene in the famous Adams image "Autumn Moon."
Astronomers nailed down the exact time and date that Adams snapped the photograph in Yosemite National Park in 1948 — and determined that the sun and moon would return to the same positions Thursday.
We found that statutory requirements are not consistently followed. Among our survey respondents:Greg Borowski and Stacy Forster have more:Because of such inconsistencies, registration lists contain duplicate records and the names of ineligible individuals. For example, when we reviewed more than 348,000 electronic voter registration records from eight municipalities, we identified 3,116 records that appear to show individuals who are registered more than once in the same municipality.
- only 85.3 percent of municipalities removed the names of inactive voters from their voter registration lists;
- only 71.4 percent sometimes or always notified registered voters before removing their names; and
- only 54.0 percent reported removing the names of ineligible felons.
Among the 348,000 electronic voter registration records checked were 105 potentially improper or fraudulent votes including:
- Ballots cast by 98 ineligible felons, including 57 in Madison.
- Two people who appear to have voted twice.
- Four cases of voters whose absentee ballots were included in official election results even though they died in the two weeks before the election.
- One instance of a 17-year-old in Madison who apparently voted.
The 77-page draft legislation, released to generate discussion from broadband providers and other stakeholders, would also require broadband providers to allow subscribers access to lawful content, even though some broadband providers have suggested a so-called 'Net neutrality requirement isn't needed.
Representatives of Verizon Communications and SBC Communications in the past have said a 'Net neutrality requirement could prevent them from cutting off service to bandwidth hogs or customers posing a security risk.
My good friend Bill Steinberg has published, via business partner Mark Baker a very useful look at the leadership vacuum that is the Katrina Response:
so for the mayor, the governor, the president and how many of the president’s men, those so-called law-makers on the hill, what goes around, comes around, we’re still left with the same unanswered question, how could you be so ___ stupid? all will ask ‘what happened?’ only so long as it takes them to find out who’s to blame – then they’re done learning anything from it that will give us a different outcome the next time it happens. and, as someone once said, doing the same things but expecting a different outcome is the definition of insanity. welcome to ‘one flew over the cuckoo’s nest.’ keep everyone sick, it’s easier to get them to do what you want them to do that way.
The Customers First! Coalition hosts its third annual energy conference on Monday, October 17th, 2005, at American Family Insurance headquaters in Madison to explore:
- The role that high voltage transmission lines could play in the cost of electricity in Wisconsin;- The growth of wind energy;
- The the new federal energy policy act of 2005.
This year’s conference will include notable speakers such as James Togerson, President and CEO of Midwest ISO, Rob Gramlich of the American Wind Energy Association, Deborah Sliz of the Transmission Access Policy Study group (TAPS), and Mark Williamson of American Transmission Company. Discussion panels comprised of representatives of utilities, regulatory agencies, the Wisconsin Legislature and public interest organizations will react to the conference presentations and share their views.
Iceland's quite interesting Sigur Ros plays the Orpheum on September 23.
I included track 8 in a 2004 Mad City Marathon slideshow here Quicktime. The music fit the very wet '04 marathon.
Jason Kottke reviewed their performance at New York City's Beacon Theatre last night and included links to some photos of the show.
The band offers a handy Icelandic pronunciation guide on their website.
Governor Doyle's top aide, Marc Marotta offered up a few comments as he left that post for private law practice (and help raise money for Doyle's re-election campaign).
*Although Marotta said he found "a lot of good, dedicated" employees in state government, he said the most frustrating part of his job was the "tremendous inertia" that buries every decision -- large and small -- in bureaucratic quicksand. "Every little issue has its own political world," he added.
On a Tuesday night two weeks ago, the letter showed up in the mail. It is included below, so you can see for yourself the kind of verbal mastery it takes to make a legal document sound like Keillor's forlorn nostalgic prose.via GlennLet's quickly review the situation: Garrison Keillor -- a liberal comedian! -- is threatening to sue MNspeak -- some blog! -- that uses a t-shirt to poke fun of his mega-gigantic media empire. You'd think we shot Guy Noir or something.
Brenda Konkel posts some useful information on the City of Madison's growing appetite for debt.
Very handy US Government RSS Feed Index Page. NetNewsWire is the best RSS newsreader.
Rajesh Setty [PDF]:
Why should you distinguish yourself?
Short answer: Being part of the commodity crowd erodes your value.
Long answer: Technology professionals worldwide are getting caught in a tsunami of massive commoditization. Technologies are changing very fast. What seemed hot today is not hot anymore. There is a constant pressure to give more, be more effective, be more efficient and be more productive. This forces most technology professionals to go after “short-term skills”. Of course, going after “short-term skills” will provide “short-term results” but will hurt them in the “long-run”. Competency in technical skills is necessary to succeed in this world but they are not sufficient to thrive. The question is what can one do differently so that he or she can distinguish and move above the commodity crowd ? The goal of this manifesto is to provide 25 ways to do just that.Bonus: You have reached where you are by doing whatever you have done so far. If you need to leapfrog and succeed beyond dreams, continuing to do whatever you have done in the past may not be the answer. You need to think and be different. In other words, you need to distinguish yourself!
Robert Austin: By "broadband explosion" we mean the coming together of real-time communication and rich media technologies to produce a truer form of interactivity across geographic distance than has been possible up until now. We've had some forms of interactive technologies for a long time (e.g., telephone) and many kinds of media too, but real-time interactivity at a distance that comes anywhere near what we experience in face-to-face communication has been elusive. That's too bad, because people have been anticipating profound effects from the ability to collaborate in real time at a distance for a long time. One of our favorite examples of this is described in a paper written in 1968 by Internet pioneers J. C. R. Licklider and Bob Taylor, called "The Computer as a Communication Device." These guys imagined human capabilities moving to a new level when real-time interactivity was realized. They expected an acceleration of our abilities to innovate and work creatively. The vision is compelling. The only thing they got wrong was how long it would take us to get there. We are suggesting that the day may finally be arriving. The implications, if so, will be numerous and important. Various chapters in the book describe how business strategy, production technologies, and marketing—to name just a few—may be changed dramatically.
David Isenberg: Qwest -- the former disruptive fiber player that wisely bought an ILEC so it'd be too big to shut down -- is suing the City of Portland for running a municipal network. The Oregonian reports.
Bruce Springsteen is playing at the Coliseum (Interesting venue) 10/15. Tickets were still available late this morning via tickmaster.
Back on the highway, Doc and I followed the Mississippi as it curved wide and muddy between skyscraping bluffs sculptured by glaciers and smoothed by wind and water. We passed through Wabasha, where posters remind visitors that the town was the setting for the "Grumpy Old Men" films and the National Eagle Center offers tips for birders who flock to the surrounding bluffs to watch bald eagles make their seasonal migrations.At Lake City, where the Mississippi widens into Lake Pepin, strollers on a two-mile riverfront walkway can look out upon waters where an 18-year-old Ralph W. Samuelson is said to have "discovered" the sport of water skiing in 1922.
 Photos here | 2.4 Mile Swim, Start [17MB] 2.4 Mile Swim, Start 2nd Loop [9MB] 2.4 Mile Swim Ends, Remove Wetsuits [3.5MB] 2.4 Mile Swim, Stepping out of Lake Monona [17MB] 2.4 Mile Swim, Scenes [12MB] 2.4 Mile Swim, Scenes II [5MB] |
Nassim Taleb publishes a useful website that includes a number of useful articles following up on his wonderful book, Fooled by Randomness. His latest is: The Scandal of Prediction (PDF):
"My major hobby is teasing people who take themselves & the quality of their knowledge too seriously & those who don’t have the guts to sometimes say: I don’t know...." (You may not be able to change the world but can at least get some entertainment & make a living out of the epistemic arrogance of the human race).
After 10 years in the business, Anonymizer has two million active users. The US government pays it to promote the service in China and Iran in order to help promote free speech.But these programs are becoming popular in the West too.
The software encrypts all your requests for webpages. Anonymizer's servers then automatically gather the content on your behalf and send it back to you.
No humans are involved and the company does not keep records of who requests what.
However, there is some censorship. Anonymizer does not support anonymous uploading to the web, and it blocks access to material that would be illegal under US law.
Benjamin Stephan and Lutz Vogel created a very useful short film on the oxymoron "Trusted Computing".
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On 20 September 1985, international wire service reports carried a statement distributed by the official Soviet news agency TASS that one A. G. Tolkachev, whom it described as a staff member at one of Moscow’s research institutes, had been arrested the previous June trying to pass secret materials of a defensive nature to the United States. Subsequent news stories said Tolkachev was an electronics expert at a military aviation institute in Moscow who was compromised by former CIA officer Edward Lee Howard.Fascinating and well worth reading.
In October 1985, The Washington Post ran a story that described Tolkachev as “one of CIA’s most valuable human assets in the Soviet Union.” According to FBI affidavits related to the Howard espionage case that were made public, Tolkachev had provided information on Soviet avionics, cruise missiles, and other technologies. The Soviets subsequently publicly confirmed that they had executed Tolkachev in 1986 for “high treason.”
"MI5 has recently let it be known that it is in favour of making telephone intercept evidence admissible in court. Previously the intelligence and security services had expressed concern such that evidence might reveal operational details. Meanwhile, Home Secretary Charles Clarke has been calling for EU states to keep mobile phone and e-mail records for longer, to help fight terrorism and crime."
Seth Godin has a free ebook that is a quick effective read. He explains blogs, rss and why you should care. It is the most informative and balanced write-up I've seen.
Check it out here or send around the link
What were the disappointments? Some controversies that I found disappointing in terms of human behavior. They tried to put a jail next to the ballpark ... putting a jail next to a ballpark isn't exactly an entertainment complex. And then the whole stadium controversy. And, look, I understand taxation. But here we are trying to keep baseball in Milwaukee ... and it happens in a lot of places, this is not the only place it happens, but the Machiavellian behavior was just sad. And someday when I write a book I'll describe it as it's never been described. The personal abuse that the ownership took, I took, my daughter took, the organization took, baseball took -- was inexcusable. And today, well how bad is it? Milwaukee has a Major League team for the next two generations. ... It's a great tribute to a lot of people. ... Will Milwaukee in the future be a better place for your children and grandchildren? You bet it will.I appreciate Bud's gumption in making baseball happen. BUT, I think the location (should have been downtown - see Denver and San Francisco) and process that lead to Miller Park was a big mistake.
But it turns out cities get to sort of cheat, cite eminent domain, and place a lot of gear on their own light poles and radio towers. No startup gets that deal. And new mesh technologies mean Philly can plug into the Internet just once, paying wholesale rates, unlike the folks that run Starbucks or hotel hotspots, who overpay (probably to Verizon) for the Internet connection their Wi-Fi users share.But the real whopper is that - as Ms. Neff claims - by the third year, Philly will be saving $2 million a year on their $150 million IT budget by not having to pay Verizon for Internet access at their 24,000-employee city offices. Hmmm. That whole disadvantaged thing is just icing. Sounds like some sort of arbitrage.
Prosecutors say that they usually do not seek to learn what advice a lawyer provides to a client, but are trying only to learn the facts. In an interview in 2003, James B. Comey, a former United States attorney, said, "They are just seeking the facts, including factual attorney work product." Lawyers for former KPMG partners have already excoriated the firm's cooperation and, in particular, its acknowledgment of wrongdoing, contending that the firm did not undertake a thorough internal investigation to justify such a statement. (The statement is unlikely to be admitted in evidence in the criminal case against the former partners, though, lawyers said, and, in any event, it does not identify specific wrongdoers.)
Peter DeLorenzo on the state of the SUV, long a profit engine for many auto makers, including Toyota and Nissan, who both have large volume truck businesses. GM Janesville, will, I hope continue in the face of these changes.
Singapore's first Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew speaks with Der Spiegel on Asia's rise to economic power, China's ambitions and the West's chances of staying competitive:
Mr. Lee: Right. In 50 years I see China, Korea and Japan at the high-tech end of the value chain. Look at the numbers and quality of the engineers and scientists they produce and you know that this is where the R&D will be done. The Chinese have a space programme, they're going to put a man on the Moon and nobody sold them that technology. We have to face that. But you should not be afraid of that. You are leading in many fields which they cannot catch up with for many years, many decades. In pharmaceuticals, I don't see them catching up with the Germans for a long time.
Judge Kaplan also showed a hint of testiness about the pace of the government's case, commenting that if prosecutors could spend a year and a half investigating before bringing one criminal charge, they should not need another three months to add any new charges or new defendants. He also warned prosecutors against lengthy proceedings. Prosecutors said they anticipated a three-month trial.A complex case would confuse jurors and make it harder for them to convict, Judge Kaplan said. "The idea of a three- or four-month tax trial, well, it's a daunting prospect" for potential jurors, he added.
According to Reporters Sans Frontieres (Reporters Without Borders), Information supplied by Yahoo! helped Chinese journalist Shi Tao get 10 years in prison
The text of the verdict in the case of journalist Shi Tao – sentenced in April to 10 years in prison for “divulging state secrets abroad” – shows that Yahoo! Holdings (Hong Kong) Ltd. provided China’s state security authorities with details that helped to identify and convict him. It reveals that the company provided the Chinese investigating organs with detailed information that apparently enabled them to link Shi’s personal e-mail account (on the Chinese Yahoo! service at yahoo.com.cn) and the specific message containing information treated as a “state secret” to the IP address of his computer. More details from RSF here.
Shi Tao was jailed because he e-mailed sensitive political information to be posted on dissident websites hosted outside China. His case is a cautionary tale to bloggers around the world: If you are publicizing information and views that your government doesn’t want exposed - even if you believe you have the right to do so under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights - companies like Yahoo! will not shield you from your government.
Click here for the full text in both Chinese and English of the Shi Tao verdict (PDF document) courtesy of the Dui Hua Foundation, a San Francisco-based non-governmental organization.
"Occasionally menu costs kick in...Dylan Alexander sends me the following: Gas at the pump in downtown Birmingham: $3.99/g. Gas from Hertz when you return it: $3.05/g.
"We're basically hardening the watersheds and feeding them a high-salt diet. There is a direct connection between the number of driveways and parking lots we have and the quality of our water," said Sujay Kaushal of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science in Frostburg, Md.
www.opengovernment.org (PDF):
The government is withholding more information than ever from the public and expanding ways of shrouding data. Last year, federal agencies spent a record $148 creating and storing new secrets for each $1 spent declassifying old secrets, a coalition of watchdog groups reported Saturday. That's a $28 jump from 2003 when $120 was spent to keep secrets for every $1 spent revealing them.Slashdot discussion
Chart of the Day looks at how the stock market has responded to significant increases in gasoline prices over the past 25 years.
Daniel Yergin, Author of the excellent: The Prize on the coming energy crisis:
Man's technical ingenuity has collided with nature's rage in the Gulf of Mexico, and the outcome has been an integrated energy disaster. The full scope will not be understood until the waters recede, the damage to platforms and refineries is assessed, and the extent of damage to underwater pipelines from undersea mudslides is determined. Yet what has happened is on a scale not seen before, and the impact of the price spikes and dislocations will roll across the entire economy. Even as we confront the human tragedy, the consequences will also force us to think more expansively about energy security, and to focus harder on a matter which other events have already emphasized: The need for new infrastructure and investment in our energy sector.
Mike Beebe, Arkansas's attorney general and a Democratic gubernatorial candidate, said some complacent things about the state property rights after Kelo. Republican Asa Hutchinson pounced. The tussle suggests that takings will be an issue in the campaign, with each candidate trying to demonstrate his property rights bona fides. The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports:
The State of Massachusetts is moving its workers away from Microsoft Office toward open source tools.
Glenn Reynolds interviews Kurzweil, with some interesting charts on US science and technology education.
Electronic Frontier Foundation:
Many digital music services employ digital rights management (DRM) — also known as "copy protection" — that prevents you from doing things like using the portable player of your choice or creating remixes. Forget about breaking the DRM to make traditional uses like CD burning and so forth. Breaking the DRM or distributing the tools to break DRM may expose you to liability under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) even if you're not making any illegal uses.In other words, in this brave new world of "authorized music services," law-abiding music fans often get less for their money than they did in the old world of CDs (or at least, the world before record companies started crippling CDs with DRM, too). Unfortunately, in an effort to attract customers, these music services try to obscure the restrictions they impose on you with clever marketing.
Don Park has posted satellite photos before and after Hurricane Katrina, via GlobeXplorer.
Are the deals illegal?
The IRS says so, but the courts have not yet ruled on the matter. The IRS has a mixed record in shuttering such transactions. Under what is known as the economic-substance test, the IRS has claimed that shelter deals done solely to reduce taxes are improper. But federal courts have sometimes ruled that such transactions are O.K., even if they carry no economic risk or opportunity for reward beyond their tax savings.
Theoildrum.com carries a post on hurrricane damage to oil production facilities in the Gulf of Mexico:
There are MANY production platforms missing (as in not visible from the air). This means they have been totally lost. I am talking about 10's of platforms, not single digit numbers. Each platform can have from 4 to 100+ wells on it. . . .We are looking at YEARS to return to the production levels we had prior to the storm. The eastern Gulf of Mexico is primarily oil production...
YEARS, people. I know what this means - hope everyone else gets it too...
Click here to read the full post.
The Economist reviews UW Madison grad and Pulitzer Prize winner Anthony Shadid's ("who speaks Arabic like a native and writes English like an angel") new book: Night Draws Near: Iraq's People in the Shadow of America's War
Much more than these bold facts, however, the average western newspaper reader will not know. It is not easy to understand fully what is going on; still less so to make any accurate predictions about how it will end. Targeted by head-chopping Muslim fanatics, most foreign journalists do not leave the generous, if inevitably jaundiced, embrace of American and British troops. And even those who do must rely heavily on official sources—mostly Americans who are out of touch with the complex and changing world outside their fortress compounds, and who, like their government, have tended also to invent good news where there is none.More on Shadid.Thank goodness, then, for those reporters, both western and Iraqi, who are prepared to take risks in search of a more nuanced reality, among them Anthony Shadid, a correspondent for the Washington Post, whose words begin this article. Mr Shadid, an American of Lebanese descent, who speaks Arabic like a native and writes English like an angel, has put his best reporting into this book. Even-handed and keenly observed, containing just enough (and no more) of the author to suggest a decent man worthy of our trust, it is written for the inexpert but has fresh material for scholars. Mr Shadid calls his work story-telling rather than serious criticism, and so it is. But stories this insightful—of dead Iraqi insurgents and their motivations; of a 14-year-old Iraqi Anne Frank, with extracts from her wartime diary—are more than journalism; they are valuable chronicles.
Going online to buy the latest bestseller or those photos from summer vacation may be tax free for most people today, but it won't last forever. Come this fall, 13 states will start encouraging - though not demanding - that online businesses collect sales taxes just as Main Street stores are required to do, and more states are considering joining the effort
