Responding to a rumor that McDonalds added moosebergers to the menu.

Adding moose lyrics to Bolero

Too old to cut the mustard anymore --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qG1dIFRlV28

You can have her, I don't want her --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJfotPO_Xkk

More moose pictures --- http://www.douglloydphotography.com/8504.html

I've not yet taken any pictures of a moose on my camera. Erika did see one feeding under the snow in our yard last week at about 2:00 a.m. when the moon was full. About a month ago, during rutting season, we had to stop for a large male in the middle of the back woods road leading up to our home. The other night there was a moose beside the highway (Route 116) on our way back from a dinner party. Twp years ago, before I retired from teaching and had to catch a plane in Portland, I had to stop for a huge male about 5:00 a.m. on New Hampshire's famous and very beautiful Kancamagus Highway --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kancamagus_Highway .
On average, over 200 cars hit moose each year on New Hampshire roads. Maine has a much larger moose population and more than twice the number of collisions of cars and moose ---
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1D81438F930A35755C0A967958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=print
Deer accidents are more common, but moose are harder on cars.

What's a moose? --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moose
Although the average height of a moose is only about six feet at the shoulders, the head reaches eight feet or higher. Some big bulls reach over ten feet. One of our friends, Anita, at a dinner party said that, while walking alone with her dog in a field, she confronted a huge female moose. Anita laid down off the path while the moose became agitated by her dog. The moose ignored Anita and charged down the path and into the woods. My neighbor had trouble when a moose repeatedly walked right through his electric horse fence (apparently the moose did not get much of a charge out of it).

In the summertime, moose feed mainly on leaves and vegetation in our many shallow ponds in these mountains. They prefer underwater vegetation, which may account for why their legs and head evolved to be so huge. In the wintertime our ponds are frozen over. In order to conserve on energy consumption and a starvation diet, moose stand like statues in the winter while they live on stored fat.

Bull moose have been known, rarely, to fall in love with pastured farm cows. But I don't think the romantic feelings are mutual. In recent years, moose are prone to a brain disease that makes them disoriented. Sometimes they swim endlessly in circles. At other times they wander into town streets and back yards --- http://www.wcax.com/Global/story.asp?S=6922102

Two Bulls Gently Sparing --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPa4Z69YYT0
Bull Moose in Anchorage --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8m5Kq2Bbzg
Moose Babies (the ears are huge for wireless reception) --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kr9L_xYj6Ws 
Woody Allen Shot a Moose --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmnLRVWgnXU
It was not Woody Allen that this moose attacked --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qD4xOOIkDc
Bear vs. a Moose --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ANqAZvT3uc
Face-in-Camera Female Moose --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIfA4nANfLI
Moose and Dog Video (the moose was eating Halloween pumpkins) --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94sa7pGoRHk
Speed Painting in Watercolor --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pL3flxa-QNQ

Moose Sings Da Blues --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_wqvGVhYxk
Rocky & Bullwinkle --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQXEny-BzKc

 

Tidbits on November 29, 2007
Bob Jensen

For earlier editions of Tidbits go to http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm
For earlier editions of New Bookmarks go to http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookurl.htm 

Click here to search Bob Jensen's web site if you have key words to enter --- Search Site.
For example if you want to know what Jensen documents have the term "Enron" enter the phrase Jensen AND Enron. Another search engine that covers Trinity and other universities is at http://www.searchedu.com/.


Bob Jensen's past presentations and lectures --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/resume.htm#Presentations   


Bob Jensen's Threads --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm

Bob Jensen's Home Page is at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/


You can read about Erika's surgeries and see her pictures at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Erika2007.htm
Personal pictures are at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/PictureHistory/
Some personal videos are at http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/EdTech/Video/Personal/ 

Bob Jensen's blogs and various threads on many topics --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm
       (Also scroll down to the table at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ )

Set up free conference calls at http://www.freeconference.com/  

Songza
Search for a song or band and play the selection --- http://songza.com/
I tried it for Arturo Toscanini, Stan Kenton, and Jim Reeves.
The results were absolutely amazing!

World Clock --- http://www.peterussell.com/Odds/WorldClock.php

If you want to help our badly injured troops, please check out
Valour-IT: Voice-Activated Laptops for Our Injured Troops  --- http://www.valour-it.blogspot.com/




Online Video, Slide Shows, and Audio
In the past I've provided links to various types of music and video available free on the Web. 
I created a page that summarizes those various links --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/music.htm

The Educational Multimedia Visualization Center (video) ---  http://emvc.geol.ucsb.edu/

BioEd Online: Food and Fitness --- http://www.bioedonline.org/workshops/workshop.cfm?cme_activityid=72&cmepage=cme_info#cmeinfo

Small Business Administration: Free Online Courses (video) ---  http://www.sba.gov/services/training/onlinecourses/index.html

The New York Times Video (Menu of Available Videos) --- http://video.on.nytimes.com/index.jsp

CNN/YouTube Debate: Submit Your Question Today! --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6R1oXCRY6pE

Garrison Keillor's Writer's Almanac (audio) --- http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/

Bored Night --- http://www.bored-night.com/?p=694

This footage was recently released on Russian television. A Nikolaev, Russia businessman tipped off the police that he was about to be hit and/or robbed by the mafia. The police set up cameras inside and outside the businessman's apartment.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=868_1192540876

David Letterman Performs Naked (full-fronted) --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UYHqPYIQJE

MIT's Video Lecture Search Engine for Finding Topics Within Lectures: Watch the video at --- http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/
Researchers at MIT have released a video and audio search tool that solves one of the most challenging problems in the field: how to break up a lengthy academic lecture into manageable chunks, pinpoint the location of keywords, and direct the user to them. Announced last month, the MIT
Lecture Browser website gives the general public detailed access to more than 200 lectures publicly available though the university's OpenCourseWare initiative. The search engine leverages decades' worth of speech-recognition research at MIT and other institutions to
convert audio
into text and make it searchable.
Kate Greene, MIT's Technology Review, November 26, 2007 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/19747/?nlid=686&a=f
Once again, the Lecture Browser link (with video) is at http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/
Bob Jensen's search helpers are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm

Find free video lectures from free universities at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

Bob Jensen's threads on how to capture streaming video --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

From The Washington Post on November 26, 2007

How many DVDs does Netflix ship per day?

A. 500,000
B. 1.2 million
C. 1.6 million
D. 2.3 million
Right-click here to download pictures. To help protect your privacy, Outlook prevented automatic download of this picture from the Internet.


Free music downloads --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/music.htm

Songza --- the best free music database I've ever encountered
Search for a song or band and play the selection --- http://songza.com/
I tried it for Arturo Toscanini, Stan Kenton, and Jim Reeves.
The results were absolutely amazing!

Ear Chives --- http://www.the-earchives.com/

A Thanksgiving Feast With Handel
Handel’s Oratorio 'Belshazzar' in Concert in New York City --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16465921

Verdi's 'Aida' From Houston Grand Opera (Act 1) --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16505142
Giuseppe Verdi's 'Falstaff' From Houston Grand Opera --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=8901076
Verdi's 'Macbeth' (full concert) --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=14058055

An opera dedicated to the trauma of Argentina's Dirty War recently opened in the Argentine town of La Plata, a focus of resistance during the dictatorship that ruled from 1976 to 1983 --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16221023

As a part of Carnegie Hall's first major international festival — Berlin in Lights — conductor Simon Rattle and the revered Berlin Philharmonic have taken up a week's residency at the hall with more than a dozen performances --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16227797

Lyle Lovett and His Big Band Go 'Large' --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16221831

Pepe Romero and the Art of the Spanish Guitar --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15203122

The March King: John Philip Sousa --- http://memory.loc.gov/diglib/ihas/html/sousa/sousa-home.html

Songs about alcohol and its effects are common currency in country music. But in "Drinkin' Problem," Lori McKenna goes in a different direction, sidestepping the usual moralistic dimension in favor of getting under the skin of someone for whom the issue is an immediate concern --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16318418

Drummer Men and Women --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drummer
Listing of Notable Drummers --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_drummers
List of Notable Percussionists --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_percussionists
Listing of a Few Notable Jazz Band Drummers --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_jazz_drummers

Drumming Videos from Jazz Bands

Percussion --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percussion

Boston Pops --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Pops


Photographs and Art

Beautiful America --- http://mybeautifulamerica.com/mybeautifulamerica.htm

NOAA Photo Lab --- http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/

Galeria Foto --- http://www.galeriafoto.com/photos/showphoto.php/photo/33591/cat/556

Photograph Shows Soldiers at Camp Dodge, Iowa in in 1918 forming a huge Statue of Liberty --- http://www.snopes.com/photos/patriotic/liberty.asp

Georges Seurat: The Drawings --- http://www.moma.org/exhibitions/2007/seurat/

Travel Photography --- http://www.momentaryawe.com/

Modern Day Cave People --- http://www.yousaytoo.com/user/kitty/4544

Pete Turner Photographs --- http://www.peteturner.com/

"The Price of the Ticket It costs a lot to see a Broadway show. Is it worth the expense?" by Terry Teachout, The Wall Street Journal, November 24, 2007 --- http://www.opinionjournal.com/la/?id=110010904

Time for a pop quiz inspired by the stagehands' strike that shut down most of Broadway. Who said this--and when did he say it?

"It is not for nothing that New York is the place where the critics are the most powerful and the toughest in the world. It is the audience, year after year, that has been forced to elevate simple fallible men into highly priced experts because, as when a collector buys an expensive work, he cannot afford to take the risk alone: the tradition of the expert valuers of works of art, like Duveen, has reached the box office line. So the circle is closed; not only the artists, but also the audience, have to have their protection men--and most of the curious, intelligent, nonconforming individuals stay away."

That quotation is from "The Empty Space," an influential book about theater by Peter Brook, the avant-garde British director whose celebrated version of "A Midsummer Night's Dream," set in an all-white space and played by actors who walked on stilts and swung on trapezes, was one of the most admired Shakespeare productions of the '60s. Mr. Brook wrote "The Empty Space" 39 years ago, when the top ticket price on Broadway was $11, $64 in today's dollars. Nowadays it will cost you anywhere between $51.50 and $121.50 to see "Young Frankenstein"--unless you're prepared to fork out $450 for a premium-priced weekend seat.

Speaking as one of the simple, fallible New York critics Mr. Brook had in mind, I feel obliged to ask: Is Broadway really twice as good today as it was in 1968? I recently looked up the theater listings in the "Goings On About Town" section of the Nov. 23, 1968, issue of The New Yorker. Zoe Caldwell was starring in "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie," Lee J. Cobb in "King Lear," Dustin Hoffman in "Jimmy Shine," James Earl Jones in "The Great White Hope," Lotte Lenya in "Cabaret," Donald Pleasance in "The Man in the Glass Booth" and Maureen Stapleton in "Plaza Suite." You could also see new plays by Brian Friel and Arthur Miller, as well as the long-running original productions of "Fiddler on the Roof," "Hair," "Hello, Dolly," "Mame" and "Man of La Mancha." Case closed? Well, maybe not quite. As I look back over my pre-strike Broadway reviews of the past year or so, I find lurking amid the dross a fair number of memorable shows, including Tom Stoppard's "Coast of Utopia" trilogy and "Rock 'n' Roll," the Manhattan Theatre Club's unforgettable revival of Mr. Friel's "Translations," the Roundabout Theatre Company's "110 in the Shade" and "Pygmalion," John Doyle's perception-changing rethinking of Stephen Sondheim's "Company" and Frank Langella's sensational star turn in "Frost/Nixon." I would gladly have paid a hundred bucks to see any one of these shows--but would I have paid $1,800, not including dinner, to go to all of them with a date?

 

 


Online Books, Poems, References, and Other Literature
In the past I've provided links to various types electronic literature available free on the Web. 
I created a page that summarizes those various links --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm

World Wide Words --- http://www.worldwidewords.org/index.htm

eScholarship Editions --- http://content.cdlib.org/ucpress/

The Oscar Wilde Collection --- http://www.oscarwildecollection.com/
Oscar Wilde Collection --- http://www.planetmonk.com/wilde/

Garrison Keillor's Writer's Almanac (audio) --- http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/

Magma Poetry --- http://magmapoetry.com/poem.php?article_id=186

Rogue Scholars --- http://roguescholars.com/opus/default.html

The Essays of Francis Bacon --- http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/mike_donnelly/lottwo.htm

"Man Bites Dog," by Scott McLemee, Inside Higher Ed, November 21, 2007 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2007/11/21/mclemee 

Roger Gathman’s “The Academic Presses” debuted on Sunday in The Austin American-Statesman with a discussion of Gregory Clark’s A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World (Princeton University Press) and James Simpson’s Burning to Read: English Fundamentalism and Its Reformation Opponents (Harvard University Press). Gathman has contributed to The American Scholar, The New York Observer, and Salon, among other publications. He has lived in Austin since doing graduate work in the philosophy department at the University of Texas in the 1980s; since then, aside from writing, he’s worked as a freelance editor and translator.

His inaugural piece was striking, not just for the kinds of books it covered, but for how it handled them. Academic publishing now includes a wide range of more or less popular nonfiction – not to mention cookbooks, or guides to state bicycle trails, or whatever else must be done to pay the bills. But Gathman took on two specialized (if controversial and widely discussed) works of scholarship; and he engaged with their arguments in as much depth as one humanly can, given the length restrictions of any newspaper other than the New York Review of Books.

Austin is a university town, of course. Still, such a venture as this is simply not supposed to happen nowadays. As everyone knows, book sections are shrinking, when not disappearing entirely. But even pointing out that obvious trend hardly begins to account for what is happening.

A recent commentary by Doug McLellan (founder of Arts Journal and head of the National Arts Journalism Program) stresses a point that has largely been forgotten. The people running newspapers once understood that it was a good thing to serve niches of readers who don’t find their interests met elsewhere. And so it made sense to have a bridge column for people who love bridge, for example, and the comic strip “Nancy” for whoever the hell it is that enjoys that enjoys “Nancy.”

Attract enough such niches, and give them a reason to be loyal to your publication, and you might build up an audience. But start jettisoning “niche content” — and just about any cultural coverage not involving the mental health issues of Hollywood celebrities is going to count as “niche content” — and something bad starts to happen. The audience has ever less reason to remain loyal. Why would anyone go to a newspaper to learn about the meltdowns of the stars? Who would want to read about it, anyway? That’s why YouTube was invented, after all.

This paraphrase of McLennan has been very loose indeed. For his ongoing discussion of mass media and the audience for cultural coverage, check out his blog Diacritical. One implication that may follow from McLennan’s analysis seems counterintuitive: Regular attention to academic titles might make a newspaper far more appealing than reviews of the latest legal thriller or movie novelization — in some markets, anyway.

I wondered how it came to pass that the experiment was tried in Austin. During all my years of residence there, the American-Statesman never seemed like anything but a very stolid and conventional newspaper. Whenever the Butthole Surfers, a local punk band, was listed in an advertisement, they became the B Surfers. Going against the current did not seem in its nature. How did it come to pass that the paper had made such an unexpected departure? It made sense to call Roger Gathman and ask.

He had done a lot of freelance reviewing for the Statesman, Gathman said, but the idea to launch a column on university-press titles had not been his. It came instead from Jeff Salamon, the books editor. “He thought it was a way to liven the section up,” Gathman said, “to give it more of a distinctive identity.” (I later tried to contact Salamon, but he is on leave until mid-December.)

The plan for now is to run “The Academic Presses” every couple of months, focusing on two or three new books that Gathman will choose. “The ones I wrote about for this first column weren’t really related,” he said, “but in the future I’m going to try to make selections that seem more connected.”

When asked if there were any discipline he would rule out as a possible focus, he thought for a moment and said, “Well, I don’t think I would cover ... accounting.” Other than that, the door seems wide open.

His next column, running in late December, will cover two volumes on the history of science. I’ve agreed not to mention the titles, but the odds of another newspaper assigning them for review are roughly equal to those of an asteroid hitting the city in the meantime.

It turned out he has not been following Doug McLennan’s reflections on newspaperdom and niche audiences, but some of Gathman’s remarks during our chat sounded broadly similar in their logic.

“Running articles about books,” he said, “is never going to make money. It’s a loss leader. But it gets people to pay attention. You have to give them something they can’t find on television.”

For newspapers to survive, he said, “the people making decisions have to realize that it is in their interest to encourage reading. They have to start thinking about the need to generate an audience. At that level, it makes no sense for all of your cultural coverage to point to activities that don’t involve reading.”

So, indeed, have I thought as well, from time to time — usually in the spirit of Sisyphus trying to give himself a pep talk.

Gathman’s points would make perfect sense to anyone who gave the matter two minutes of serious consideration. That implies a very big “if,” however. Two minutes of thought seems hard to come by when the sky is falling, which is how it seems around most newspapers lately.

Whether or not anybody else ever imitates the American-Statesman in this, it is entirely to the paper’s credit that it is willing to take such a chance. But if far-sighted people did follow its example, the pool of possible contributors might be substantial. “There are a lot of people like me,” as Gathman put it, “with loads of cultural capital and no money.” You don’t say!

 




Which leading U.S. political party most represents the wealthiest people in America?
The latest income data supplied by the Internal Revenue Service said the Democratic Party, which likes to define itself as representing poor and middle-income Americans, has become the party of the rich, The Washington Times reported Friday. A state-by-state, district-by-district comparison of wealth concentrations by the Heritage Foundation shows a majority of the nation's wealthiest congressional districts are represented now by Democrats. The Heritage study based on IRS data found that more than half of the wealthiest U.S. households are concentrated in the 18 states where Democrats hold both Senate seats. Contrary to the Democrats' tendency to define the GOP as the party of the rich, the Heritage study says, "the vast majority of unabashed conservative House members hail from profoundly middle-income districts," The Times reports.
"Democrats Said No Longer Party of the Poor," SmartPros, November 26, 2007 --- http://accounting.smartpros.com/x59895.xml

Candace Jennings rescued Anna, an abused stray dog, from the animal shelter. During a Thanksgiving Day fire, Anna returned the favor — twice. Anna, a blond heeler, nudged Jennings about 3:30 a.m., whining and howling. Jennings, who had fallen asleep on the couch, awoke to find her mobile home engulfed in flames. "Anna woke me up," Jennings said. "I had an awful headache. The place was filled with smoke." Jennings and Anna ran outside, but then Jennings remembered items she couldn't let burn. "I'm a janitor in town," she told the Idaho Statesman. "I had everyone's keys in my backpack. I had to go back and get them." She crawled back into her burning home in Idaho City, about 40 miles northeast of Boise. Anna followed her in, keeping close by her side. But Jennings, an artist who has lived in the mountain town since 1975, said she became disoriented and was quickly overcome by smoke. She tried to get back out but crawled in the wrong direction, heading toward the pantry instead of the door. Anna showed the correct way.
"Abused Canine Rescues Owner From Burning Mobile Home Twice," Fox News, November 25, 2007 --- http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,312764,00.html
Also see http://www.kivitv.com/Global/story.asp?S=7403394&nav=menu536_2
The term "heeler" for a dog refers to a herding dog that nips at the "heels" or hocks. Best known are Australian blue heelers ---
http://www.tagalongprairie.com/herding-terms.shtml 

Heeler
A dog that nips at the hind legs (heels or hocks rather than the meaty part of the leg). Dogs can be low heelers (below the hocks), moderately low heelers (at the hocks), body-biters, cherry pickers (genital area biters), or tail riders (grabbing the tail).

Heeler Puppies in the Snow (video) --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE7-Uidfwz0
In Deeper Snow (fun video) --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80WKcqXQY98
Patti Page (old video) --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-zXsqrA-9s

Hey, Hey, Ho, Ho,
Western Civ Has Got to Go

Jesse Jackson --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Jackson

The problem is that our students choose very bland, low nourishment diets in our modern day smorgasbord curricula. Their concern is with their grade averages rather than their education. And why not? Grades for students and turf for faculty have become the keys to the kingdom!
Bob Jensen

The title of this week's column was a student protest chant started by Jesse Jackson at Stanford University in the 80's. The idea was to throw out the university's required courses on Western Culture because they were filled with "European and Western male bias" and replace them with courses that teach non-Western cultures and "works by women, minorities, and persons of color." Jackson was successful - today almost all colleges and universities stress A.C.B.W. (Any Culture But Western) courses and ignore the classic teachings of Western civilization's "white men." Looking back now, over two decades later, we can see the results of Jackson's efforts. How do you like it?  . . . So farewell to Plato, Galileo and Isaac Newton. Goodbye to St. Paul, Gutenberg, Columbus, da Vinci and Michelangelo. So long St. Augustine, Homer, Voltaire, Francis Bacon, Beethoven and Johann Bach. See ya, Einstein, Pasteur, Shakespeare and Oliver Cromwell. Adieu to George Washington, Ben Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson. Ta,ta Wright brothers, Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell. And rest in peace Judeo-Christian worldview. "Hey, hey, ho, ho, Western Civ has got to go!" It is. It's going. It's going fast. Jesse Jackson will get his wish. As one of the songs say in the Broadway musical Wicked - "I hope you're happy. I hope your happy now."
Greg Crosby, "Hey, Hey, Ho, Ho, Western Civ Has Got to Go," Jewish World Review, November 23, 2007 --- http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/crosby112307.php3
Jensen Comment
It's at last possible to avoid all these Western Civ classics in the new general education smorgasbord of eligible courses and topics. See Page 20 of Stanford's Course Bulletin at http://www.stanford.edu/dept/registrar/bulletin/pdf/0708_Bulletin.pdf
The debate over smorgasbord collegiate education in the media focused more on Harvard than Stanford, but in reality the general education smorgasbord quickly became reality in most colleges and universities. Tom Brokaw is probably right. Faculties changing the general education requirements were virtually all impacted by the Woodstock Countercultural Generation of the 1960s. For example, read Tom Brokaw's Voices of the Sixties Personal Reflections on the '60s and Today ISBN 1-40006-457-0, hardback). 
You can listen to the NPR account at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16425745&ft=1&f=1032

Hey, Hey, Political Correctness
PC's Big Brother Decides What's Left for Us

I was distressed to read that the administration (at Brandeis University) is assigning human apparatchiks to monitor Brandeis classrooms to assure linguistic conformity and political orthodoxy. Surely the administration knows that the technology of authoritarian surveillance has advanced far beyond the primitive methods employed by the likes of J. Edgar Hoover and Erich Honecker. A laptop and a webcam can do the job far more cheaply and efficiently. Just position one unit per class in the back of the room, then patch the feed into a mainframe system... This simple expedient would not only provide an accurate audio-visual record of conversational malfeasance by faculty and students, but the real-time administration would allow the administration to dispatch agents immediately into the classroom to stop the utterance of verboten words or ideas
Thomas Doherty
as quoted by UD, "UD Gives Thanks to Thomas Doherty," Inside Higher Ed, November 22, 2007 ---
Jensen Comment
This is McCarthyism in reverse. It makes look like free speech. UD envisions this technology used in tandem with a new product called SynchronEyes. While, in the back of the room, the university monitors speech, in the front of the room, the instructor, outfitted with SynchonEyes technology, views the laptop screens of all students who bring computers to class. SynchronEyes lets professors “access thumbnails of every computer screen in the class and block websites” they don’t like. You can read about the cause of all this fuss at http://www.thehoot.net/?module=displaystory&story_id=2434&format=html
Bob Jensen's threads on political correctness are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#PoliticalCorrectness

Hey, Hey, New Russian History
Truth Becomes Putin's Mystery
Seventy-five years ago the Ukrainian people fell victim to a crime of unimaginable horror. Usually referred to in the West as the Great Famine or the Terror Famine, it is known to Ukrainians as the Holodomor. It was a state-organized program of mass starvation that in 1932-33 killed an estimated seven million to 10 million Ukrainians, including up to a third of the nation's children. With grotesque understatement the Soviet authorities dismissed this event as a "bad harvest." Their intention was to exonerate themselves of responsibility and suppress knowledge of both the human causes and human consequences of this tragedy. That is reason enough for us to pause and remember . . . The Holodomor was an act of genocide designed to suppress the Ukrainian nation. The fact that it failed and Ukraine today exists as a proud and independent nation does nothing to lessen the gravity of this crime. Nor does it acquit us of the moral responsibility to acknowledge what was done. On the 75th anniversary, we owe it to the victims of the Holodomor and other genocides to be truthful in facing up to the past.

Viktor Yushchenko, "The Holodomor," by  The Wall Street Journal, November 26, 2007 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119602928167703318.html
Jensen Comment
Vladimir Putin recently commissioned the rewriting of Russian history that minimizes Russian genocide and whitewashes Stalin into a pretty nice guy in the new Russian history. The blame for all the evils of the world is placed squarely upon Hitler and the United States. I wonder if Historians will flock to at last discover the real truth in history as blessed by Putin (who supposedly did not even read the doctoral thesis that he plagiarized) --- http://kosmopolit.wordpress.com/2007/06/28/rewriting-history/
Also see http://www.theotherrussia.org/2007/10/02/rewritten-history/
Test yourself in the new Russian history --- http://terraslon.blogspot.com/2007/07/test-yourself-in-new-russian-history.html

Large parts of an economics thesis written by President Vladimir Putin in the mid-1990s were lifted straight out of a U.S. management textbook published 20 years earlier, The Washington Times reported Saturday, citing researchers at the Brookings Institution. It was unclear, however, whether Putin had even read the thesis, which might have been intended to impress the Western investors who were flooding into St. Petersburg in the mid-1990s, the report said. Putin oversaw the city's foreign economic relations at the time.
"Putin Accused of Plagiarizing Thesis," Moscow Times, March 27, 2006 --- http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2006/03/27/011.html

Harvard's aims and aspirations are in many ways admirable. According to this year's Report of the Task Force on General Education, Harvard understands liberal education as "an education conducted in a spirit of free inquiry undertaken without concern for topical relevance or vocational utility." It prepares for the rest of life by improving students' ability "to assess empirical claims, interpret cultural expression, and confront ethical dilemmas in their personal and professional lives." But instead of concentrating on teaching substantive knowledge, the general education at Harvard will focus on why what students learn is important. To accomplish this, Harvard would require students to take single-semester courses in eight categories: Aesthetic and Interpretive Understanding, Culture and Belief, Empirical Reasoning, Ethical Reasoning, Science of Living Systems, Science of the Physical Universe, Societies of the World, and The United States in the World. Unfortunately, the new requirements add up to little more than an attractively packaged evasion of the university's responsibility to provide a coherent core for undergraduate education. For starters, though apparently not part of the general education curriculum, Harvard requires only a year of foreign language study or the equivalent. Yet since it usually takes more than a year of college study to achieve competence in a foreign language -- the ability to hold a conversation and read a newspaper -- doesn't Harvard, by requiring only a single year, denigrate foreign-language study, and with it the serious study of other cultures and societies?
Peter Berkowitz, "Our Compassless Colleges," The Wall Street Journal, September 5, 2007; Page A17 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118895528818217660.html 
Also see http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#Berkowitz
Dr. Berkowitz is a senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.

Obviously, students these days wouldn’t use snail mail for an actual letter. But as The New York Times reported, students love to shop online and that has resulted in many college mailrooms receiving unusual items for which the mailrooms were not designed. Among them: car tires, ant farms, pool cues and air conditioners.
Inside Higher Ed, November 21, 2007 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/11/21/qt
Jensen Comment
Not to mention boats, canoes, bicycles, mattresses, skis, etc.

In 1991, Daniel Tavares Jr. stabbed his mother to death. A plea bargain resulted in a 17-20 year sentence. After 16 years, the Massachusetts prison system released Tavares because he earned "automatic good time" off, according to the Boston Herald. But Tavares was no model prisoner. From behind bars, he threatened to kill then-Gov. Romney and other state officials - and scuffled with prison guards. Immediately upon his release in June, Tavares was re-arrested on two counts of assaulting correctional officers. In July, Massachusetts Superior Court Judge Kathe Tuttman overturned two $50,000 bail orders on Tavares and released him on the condition that he work, live in-state with his sister and call probation officials three times a week. This month, Tavares was arrested in the grisly murder (to which he confessed) of newlyweds Brian and Beverly Mauck in Washington, reportedly after a dispute over a $50 debt. "It's because of the stupidity of Massachusetts that my daughter is dead," . . . Beverly's father, Darrell Slater, told the Herald. Assistant D.A. William Loughlin argued in court that besides killing his mother, Tavares had been charged with robbery and assault. As for the prison assault charges, Loughlin said, "He has a history of crimes of violence, and he committed crimes of violence while he was even serving a crime of violence." Loughlin asked Tuttman to order that Tavares wear a GPS-tracking device. Tavares' attorney had said that his client requested a monitoring device. But, a transcript shows, Tuttman concluded that there was "no indication" Tavares presented a flight risk and refused Loughlin's request.
Debra J. Saunders, "Willie Horton 2008," San Francisco Chronicle, November 27, 2007 ---
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2007/11/27/EDCQTJ71Q.DTL 

Eric Fehrnstrom, a Romney spokesman, said that Judge Kathe M. Tuttman should never have freed Daniel T. Tavares Jr. on personal recognizance in July, after he was charged with assaulting two prison guards. Tavares, 41, was near the end of a 16-year sentence for stabbing his mother to death in 1991 and had threatened in a letter —- intercepted by prison officials in February 2006 — to kill Romney and other state officials, Fehrnstrom said. On Monday, after five months in hiding, Tavares was arrested for allegedly shooting to death Brian Mauck, 30, and Beverly Mauck, 28, newlyweds who lived near him in a rural area south of Tacoma, police said . . . Romney is now seeking the Republican presidential nomination, touting his record as governor. Some of his female supporters have highlighted the number of women he appointed to the judiciary. "‘There was a system-wide failure in this case starting with the judge," Fehrnstrom said in a statement. "Her decision represented an inexplicable lapse in judgment and was inexcusable. Unless there are facts unknown to us, Governor Romney believes Judge Tuttman should resign."
Michael Levenson, "Romney calls on judge to resign after releasing alleged killer Accused of murdering newlyweds, Daniel T. Tavares Jr. threatened to kill former Mass. governor," Boston.com, November 23, 2007 --- Click Here
Also see http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,312743,00.html
Jensen Comment
This begs the question about what this former murderer could do to be held without bail? What are the odds that he will return to hiding and/or kill again? I'd bet on it!

Rudy Giuliani can play a little rough at times, but there are some moments when an inner light turns on and he turns downright idealistic. One of those moments came on Oct. 10, 1996, as he stepped on the podium at the Kennedy School of Government to deliver a speech on immigration. “I’m pleased to be with you this evening to talk about the anti-immigrant movement in America,” he said, “and why I believe this movement endangers the single most important reason for American greatness, namely, the renewal, reformation and reawakening that’s provided by the continuous flow of immigrants.” Giuliani continued: “I believe the anti-immigrant movement in America is one of our most serious public problems.” It can “be seen in legislation passed by Congress and the president.” (Republicans had just passed a welfare reform law that restricted benefits to legal immigrants.) “It can be seen in the negative attitudes being expressed by many of the politicians.” Giuliani said, somewhat unfairly, that the anti-immigrant movement at that time continued the fear-mongering and discrimination of the nativist movements of the 1920s and the Know-Nothing movement of the 19th century. He celebrated Abraham Lincoln for having the courage to take on the anti-immigrant forces. He detailed the many ways immigration benefits the nation. Then he turned to the subject of illegal immigration: “The United States has to do a lot better job of patrolling our borders.” But, he continued, “The reality is, people will always get in.”
David Brooks, "The Real Rudy," The New York Times, November 23, 2007 ---
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/23/opinion/23brooks.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin

To hear the candidates tell it -- especially those on the stump in Iowa -- ethanol is the answer to America's energy-security woes. And back in Washington, politicians since 1978 have been putting your money where their mouths are: Ethanol is currently subsidized to the tune of 51 cents per gallon when blended with gasoline. To make sure foreigners don't share the ride on the ethanol gravy train, moreover, Congress has imposed a 54-cent tariff on imported ethanol. President Bush, for his part, has targeted a 20% reduction in gasoline use, mostly by substituting the renewable fuel . . . But the emphasis here should be on the word "little." In 2005, the ethanol program used about 15% of U.S. corn supplies but displaced less than 2% of gasoline use. Even if all corn produced in the U.S. were devoted to distilling ethanol, the renewable fuel would amount to about 12% of the gasoline demand in 2005. And the more corn used to make alcohol, the greater the potential for collateral damage. Beef producers, not to mention Mexico's tortilla makers, are already upset with high corn prices. Environmentalists, too, seem to be waking up to the fact that ethanol from corn is no panacea . . . Congress might never have bet so much of the taxpayers' money on corn-based ethanol if an unbiased accounting of the consequences had been available early on. We could use a separate agency, shielded in part from political considerations, whose sole mission would be to analyze the costs and benefits of regulations and government programs. Without such an agency, interest-group logrolling will continue to trump science and economics in major policy choices.
Robert Hahn, "Ethanol's Bottom Line," The Wall Street Journal, November 24, 2007; Page A10 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119586796227702741.html
Mr. Hahn is executive director of the AEI-Brookings Joint Center and was co-chair of the U.S. Alternative Fuels Council under President George H.W. Bush.

The park, in a shallow sound between Sweden and Denmark, testifies to the remarkable rise of wind energy — no longer a quirky alternative favored by environmentalists in Denmark and Germany, but a mainstream power source used in 26 nations, including the United States. Yet Sweden’s gleaming wind park is entering service at a time when wind energy is coming under sharper scrutiny, not just from hostile neighbors, who complain that the towers are a blot on the landscape, but from energy experts who question its reliability as a source of power . . . For starters, the wind does not blow all the time. When it does, it does not necessarily do so during periods of high demand for electricity. That makes wind a shaky replacement for more dependable, if polluting, energy sources like oil, coal and natural gas. Moreover, to capture the best breezes, wind farms are often built far from where the demand for electricity is highest. The power they generate must then be carried over long distances on high-voltage lines, which in Germany and other countries are strained and prone to breakdowns .
Mark Landler, "Sweden Turns to a Promising Power Source, With Flaws," The New York Times, November 24, 2007 --- Click Here

One week after a Chinese subcontractor manufacturing computer hard drives for sale in America was discovered to have been placing a Trojan horse on them that would upload users' passwords to a website in Beijing, the manufacturer says it doesn't believe the Chinese government was involved . . . The report first surfaced in Asia in a story by the Taipei Times, which said some 1,800 Maxtor Basics 3200 hard drives manufactured in China contained two Trojan horses programmed to upload secretly to websites in Beijing anything the computer saves on the drive. Webopedia.com defines "Trojan horse" as "a destructive program that masquerades as a benign application." Unlike viruses, the site says, Trojan horses do not replicate themselves "but they can be just as destructive."
WorldNetDaily, November 22, 2007 --- http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=58819

Thanks to lax background checks, even after 9/11, the Hezbollah spy who managed to obtain sensitive jobs at the FBI and CIA is not the first terrorist supporter to infiltrate the U.S. government. An alleged al-Qaida operative also infiltrated the Environmental Protection Agency, according to federal investigators and court documents obtained by WND. The case, details of which are revealed here for the first time, involves Waheeda Tehseen, a Pakistani national who obtained a sensitive position with the EPA in Washington as a toxicologist even though she was not a U.S. citizen. Like the Lebanese national suspected of passing secrets to Hezbollah, Tehseen lied about her citizenship on her government application, a falsehood that the government failed – in both cases – to catch in its security background investigation.
"Is U.S. gov't infested with terrorist moles? Intelligence official: 'FBI might as well put out a sign – Double agents wanted'," WorldNetDaily, November 20, 2007 --- http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=58798

To activists concerned about AIDS and prisoners' rights, it's an urgent, commonsense step that should already be nationwide policy — letting inmates have condoms to reduce the spread of sexually transmitted diseases behind bars. Yet their efforts have run headlong into a stronger political force: Authorities' desire not to encourage inmates who flout prison rules against sex. Only one state, Vermont, and five cities regularly hand out condoms to inmates. Mississippi does so only for inmates receiving conjugal visits from their spouses. Left out are the vast majority of America's 2.2 million prisoners — many held in facilities where sex between men is common and the risk of STDs is far higher than in the general population.
David Crary, Yahoo News, November 19, 2007 --- http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071120/ap_on_re_us/condoms_for_inmates

Al Qaeda in Iraq may be down, but it is not out. While al Qaeda has suffered a major setback after US and Iraqi forces launched multiple offensives throughout Iraq, the terror group still retains some capacity to conduct attacks. Today, al Qaeda attacked the Awakening movement two villages north and south of Baghdad. The battles resulted in scores killed on both sides, including 10 al Qaeda fighters. Meanwhile, Iraqi and Coalition forces have killed or captured several senior al Qaeda leaders over the past week . . . As al Qaeda attempts to bring down the Awakening movements, US and Iraqi Security forces continue to target al Qaeda's leadership network nationwide. Over the past week, US and Iraqi forces killed or captured three senior leaders of al Qaeda in Iraq's network. The most senior leader captured this week was Saadi Ibrahim, the oil minister in al Qaeda in Iraq's Islamic State. Iraq police captured Ibrahim and "found several plans for attacking Iraqi oil pipelines and fields in his possession." Ibrahim is the second senior Islamic State of Iraq leader captured over the past five months. In July, US forces captured Khalid Abdul Fatah Da’ud Mahmud Al Mashadani, also known as Abu Shaeed, the media emir for the Islamic State of Iraq.
Bill Roggio, The Long War Journal, November 22, 2007 --- http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2007/11/al_qaeda_attacks_the.php
Jensen Comment
By all means let's get out of Iraq as soon as possible so al Qaeda can have all the oil and undo all the progress being made to date. It's is very difficult to impatiently fight an enemy that hides among innocent civilians and never surrenders just to have a better life for himself and those around him. His ignorance and trusting in false promises of the pleasures that martyrdom sustain his willingness to fight on. Fortunately, many in al Qaeda leaders are in it for the money rather than  religious fanaticism.


Patience is the support of weakness; impatience is the ruin of strength.
Charles Caleb Colton

Patience, that blending of moral courage with physical timidity.
Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles

We shall sooner have the fowl by hatching the egg than by smashing it.
Abraham Lincoln, White House speech 11 April 1865

Our patience will achieve more than our force.
Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France

Patience is a bitter plant but it has sweet fruit.
German proverb

To be sure, Baghdad and the surrounding belts are not yet safe. But culminating points are psychological events. What I witnessed firsthand in Iraq was a shift in opinions and a transfer of will among Iraqis, not a classic military takedown. This change was palpable and unmistakable. Whether this military culminating point can translate into a political and economic culminating point remains to be seen. But the campaign that took place from spring until late summer reinforces the classic tenet of warfare, that success on the ground sets the conditions for diplomatic and political success. Gens. Petraeus and Ray Odierno have achieved success on the ground at an unprecedented speed in the history of counterinsurgency warfare. Now it's time to apply the same sense of urgency and commitment to the task of reuniting the tragically fractured nation and bring it back from the brink of annihilation.
"Petraeus's Iraq," Retired General Robert H. Scales, The Wall Street Journal, November 21, 2007; Page A18 --- Click Here 
Jensen Comment
Progress toward peace in Iraq comes at a very bad time before the 2008 election.

From the Wall Street Journal's Opinion Journal on November 21, 2007

Could it be that we are watching the same phenomenon with the whole global-warmest hysteria? Our bet would be yes.
One Cheer for
(Bush/GOP hating) New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/20/world/middleeast/20surge.html?pagewanted=all 

So far as we know, pigs have not flown, and hell has not frozen over. But something almost as unusual happened: The lead story in today's New York Times--stretching two-thirds of the way across the front page--is about Baghdad, and it's good news:

*** QUOTE ***

The security improvements in most neighborhoods are real. Days now pass without a car bomb, after a high of 44 in the city in February. The number of bodies appearing on Baghdad's streets has plummeted to about 5 a day, from as many as 35 eight months ago, and suicide bombings across Iraq fell to 16 in October, half the number of last summer and down sharply from a recent peak of 59 in March, the American military says.

As a result, for the first time in nearly two years, people are moving with freedom around much of this city. In more than 50 interviews across Baghdad, it became clear that while there were still no-go zones, more Iraqis now drive between Sunni and Shiite areas for work, shopping or school, a few even after dark. In the most stable neighborhoods of Baghdad, some secular women are also dressing as they wish. Wedding bands are playing in public again, and at a handful of once shuttered liquor stores customers now line up outside in a collective rebuke to religious vigilantes from the Shiite Mahdi Army.

Iraqis are clearly surprised and relieved to see commerce and movement finally increase, five months after an extra 30,000 American troops arrived in the country.

Just two months ago, the paper gave MoveOn a price break to run an ad that accused General David Petraeus of treason and perjury even before he testified about the security improvements. The editorial board called Petraeus' testimony " empty calories http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/11/opinion/11tue1.html   and complained of his "broken promises and false claims of success" and asserted that Petraeus had not given an "honest accounting" in his Congressional briefings.

The Times waited until the success of Petraeus could no longer be denied to publish the truth.

But pigs will fly and hell will freeze over before liberal commentator NBC Keith Oberman will give any credit for progress in Iraq (video) ---
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQT4JOYhNLg

And pigs will fly and hell will freeze over before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi stops trying to pull the plug on funding of military in Iraq even if all the recent progress to date is wiped out by being too impatient for our surrender to the retreating insurgents.
And what is the reaction of the war critics? Nancy Pelosi stoutly maintains her state of denial, saying this about the war just two weeks ago: "This is not working. . . . We must reverse it." A euphemism for "abandon the field," which is what every Democratic presidential candidate is promising, with variations only in how precipitous to make the retreat.
Charles Krauthammer, "On Iraq, a State of Denial," Washington Post, November 23, 2007, Page A39 ---
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/22/AR2007112201089.html
See the Bush impeachment promotion video at http://freewayblogger28.cf.huffingtonpost.com/

Campaigning in northwestern Iowa on Saturday, Hillary Rodham Clinton told voters that a Senate resolution on Iran she supported has helped bring that country to the negotiating table while stemming the violence in Iraq. Clinton said tougher economic sanctions have been "a contributing factor to Iranians' backing off." Though brief, Clinton's remarks were also a rare acknowledgment of progress in Iraq.
Louise Roug, "Iran sanctions are getting results, Clinton tells Iowans," Los Angeles Times, November 25, 2007 ---
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-clinton25nov25,0,5128065.story?coll=la-politics-campaign

Abu Nawall, a captured al-Qaeda in Iraq leader, said he didn't join the Sunni insurgent group here to kill Americans or to form a Muslim caliphate. He signed up for the cash. "I was out of work and needed the money," said Abu Nawall, the nom de guerre of an unemployed metal worker who was paid as much as $1,300 a month as an insurgent. He spoke in a phone interview from an Iraqi military base where he is being detained. "How else could I support my family?"
Amit R. Paley, "Iraqis Joining Insurgency Less for Cause Than Cash," Washington Post, November 20, 2007 ---
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/19/AR2007111902022.html

More than 40% of the foreign fighters who entered Iraq to join the insurgency in the past year were citizens of Saudi Arabia, America's key partner in the Middle East, according to detailed information seized from a camp used by them. Documents and computers found by the US army at Sinjar, on the Iraqi-Syrian border, revealed that the other single largest group came from Libya, which is now being rehabilitated as a reliable western ally. Overall, US officials reported that the number of foreign fighters entering Iraq this year dropped from 80-110 a month in the first half of the year to around 40 in October, partly due to the Sinjar raid. After the raid the number of suicide bombings in Iraq fell to 16 in October - half the number seen during the summer months and down from a peak of 59 in March. US military officials believe that 90% of such bombings are by foreigners.
Guardian, November 23, 2007 --- http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2215798,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=networkfront
Where Boys Grow Up to Be Jihadis --- http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/25/magazine/25tetouan-t.html

Overwhelmingly, with one exception, Democrats supported the war in Afghanistan. We continue to support the war in Afghanistan.
Barnie Frank in a speech in the House of Representatives (video) --- http://youtube.com/watch?v=bcaGHIM1ppI

The conflict in Afghanistan has reached "crisis proportions," with the resurgent Taliban present in more than half the country and closing in on Kabul, a report said on Wednesday. If NATO, the lead force operating in Afghanistan, is to have any impact against the insurgency, troop numbers will have to be doubled to at least 80,000, the report said. "The Taliban has shown itself to be a truly resurgent force," the Senlis Council, an independent think-tank with a permanent presence in Afghanistan, wrote in a study entitled "Stumbling into Chaos: Afghanistan on the brink."
"Resurgent Taliban closing in on Kabul: report," Yahoo News, November 21, 2007 --- http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071121/ts_nm/afghanistan_taliban_report_dc
Jensen Comment
This confirms what most leading Democrats have contended all along. Powerful Democrats like Barnie Frank and Barach Obama have been arguing all along that we should pull out of Iraq and take more troops into Afghanistan. Obama even made an unpopular suggestion that troops be attack parts of Pakistan that hide terrorists (video) ---
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Dc4qnpu3N0M

We are thankful for the Washington Post, which reminds us that a newspaper can be liberal without being as dreadful as the New York Times has lately become. Today Post columnist Ruth Marcus devastates Times columnist adviser Paul Krugman, whom she actually mentions by name. Marcus notes a Krugman column from last week in which the former Enron adviser http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/20/AR2007112001651_pf.html pooh-poohs concerns about the solvency of Social Security.
Wall Street Journal's Opinion Journal, November 21, 2007

If you are very lucky and honored, you may penetrate the Kumsusan Memorial Palace. This was the home of the Great Leader when he was ordinarily alive, kept going in his later years by a special diet of extra-long dog penises. Today, it is his mausoleum, where he lives forever in the extraordinary fashion devised for him by whoever actually controls this country. This is no mere Lenin’s Tomb but a temple of awe, where devotees must have the dust blasted from their clothes and shoes before approaching the sacred body and bowing deeply . . . North Korea is a small, isolated, stagnant pond left over from the flood of Marxism-Leninism, which long ago receded. But it has nowhere to drain away. Far too many people, not all of them in Pyongyang, have an interest in keeping it as it is. It still has the capacity to do terrible things but mainly to its own citizens. A serious policy would aim to find a way to help it escape from the political and economic trap in which it finds itself. Threats, name-calling, and the pretence that this shambles of a country is a serious world power are unlikely to achieve this. It is more to be pitied than to be feared.
Peter Hitchens, "
Prisoners in Camp Kim:  Strange, secretive, and desperately poor, North Korea tests the limits of social control," American Conservative, November 19, 2007 --- http://www.amconmag.com/2007/2007_11_19/feature.html

“It is another thing to go in on the assumption that a quick burst of violent action will somehow clear the decks and that you can move on and other people will put it back together — Iraq, for example.” In the interview in Emel, a Muslim lifestyle magazine, Williams makes only mild criticisms of the Islamic world. He said the Muslim world must acknowledge that its “political solutions were not the most impressive”. He commends the Muslim practice of praying five times a day, which he says allows the remembrance of God to be “built in deeply in their daily rhythm”.
London Times, November 25, 2007 --- http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article2937068.ece
Jensen Comment
No mention is made of U.S. efforts to stop genocide in Bosnia, Saddam's atrocities, 9/11 infernos, terror attacks in Britain subways and elsewhere, boycotting of Jews in U.K. academia, or Tony Blair's recent abandonment of the Archbishop in favor of Roman Catholicism. Rowan Williams consistently leans to the far left on virtually every issue. He's criticized for being
"loathsome with Jews, complacent with Muslims" --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Rowan_Williams/Archive_up_to_September_2007#Serious_Revision 

When in England at a fairly large conference, Colin Powell was asked by the Archbishop of Canterbury if our plans for Iraq were just an example of empire building by George Bush. He answered by saying that, "Over the years, the United States has sent many of its fine young men and women into great peril to fight for freedom beyond our borders. The only amount of land we have ever asked for in return is enough to bury those that did not return." It became very quiet in the room.
Discussion at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Rowan_Williams/Archive_up_to_September_2007#Colin_Powell

Several hundred activists of the radical Islamic group Hizb ut Tahrir staged protests here before the arrival of two ships of the US Navy for distributing relief supplies among cyclone-affected people. Two warships, USS Essex and USS Kearsarge -- each carrying 20 helicopters and 3,500 marines on board with emergency relief supplies, medical and emergency evacuation teams -- are scheduled to enter Bangladesh waters Saturday and Tuesday. The protesters Friday carried a banner reading 'Prevent American ships from entering the Bay of Bengal in the name of distributing relief' and chanted slogans 'Go back to America'...
"Islamists protest US naval presence for cyclone relief," Earth Times, November 24, 2007 --- http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/147173.html

Vicious Mexican-based gangs are increasing their attacks on outmanned and outgunned law-enforcement authorities along the border. And The Washington Times reports the enemy arsenal includes assault rifles, high-tech radios, computers, cell phones, Global Positioning Systems and low-tech Molotov cocktails. Since the agents are mired in a no-man's land, a free-fire zone with little help from either side of the border -- yet continue to soldier on -- Congress should mandate they be treated as active duty military personnel and given all military benefits.
"Border wars," Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, November 24, 2007 --- http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/opinion/archive/s_539488.html

It is one of Emory University's most environmentally friendly buildings, a hallmark of the institution's efforts to "go green." To hear John Wegner describe it, it's also a slaughterhouse. The soaring glass windows in Emory's Mathematics and Science Center reflect the woodsy view, confusing hapless birds who smash into it at full speed. "The building killed 60 birds in the first year," said Wegner, Emory's chief environmental officer. "It was the wall of death." Wegner, a professor in Emory's Department of Environmental Studies, began documenting the deaths shortly after the building opened in 2002. He found an average of two birds a day were losing their lives during the height of the migration season. Magnolia warblers, Swainson's thrushes, ovenbirds — no species was safe. After getting the brush-off from the administration and architects, Wegner stuffed a couple of dead birds into his pockets and whipped them out during a meeting with his boss. Suddenly, he had an audience. Now Emory drapes parts of the $40 million building with black mesh netting for about three months each fall, and migrating birds bounce off safely.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution, November 23, 2007 --- http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/stories/2007/11/23/evbirds_1123.html

Much is being made of the fact that, in accepting the administration's invitation, Syria apparently reversed a previous decision, coordinated with Iran, to boycott the conference. This plays into the view that Syria can be persuaded to abandon its 25-year-old ties to Iran and return to the Arab fold, thereby severing the encircling chain that links Tehran to Damascus to southern Lebanon to the Gaza Strip. High-profile ridicule of the conference by Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (who called it "useless") and spokesmen for Hezbollah and Hamas add to the impression that Mr. Assad may be prepared to chart an independent course--all for the modest price of the U.S. agreeing (with Israel's consent) to put the issue of the Golan Heights on the conference's agenda. It really would be something if the Syrian delegation could find their own road to Damascus on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay. But that would require something approximating good faith. The Syrians' decision to be represented at Annapolis by their deputy foreign minister--his bosses evidently having more important things to do--is one indication of the lack of it. So is the Assad regime's declaration (via an editorial in state newspaper Teshreen) that their goal at Annapolis is "to foil [Israeli Prime Minister Ehud] Olmert's plan to force Arab countries to recognize Israel as a Jewish state." And lest the point hadn't been driven home forcefully enough, the Syrian information minister told Al Jazeera that Syria's attendance would have no effect on its relations with Iran or its role as host to the leadership of Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups.
Bret Stephens, "Condi's Road to Damascus:  The price America will pay for her Syrian photo-op," The Wall Street Journal, November 27, 2007 --- http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/bstephens/?id=110010912

The Audrey Underwear company in Taizhong city named November 21 Camisole Day to celebrate record sales. All 500 women working in the firm’s headquarters were encouraged to wear only camisoles and knickers - much to the excitement of their male colleagues. More than 90% of female workers reportedly went along with the spirit of the day and worked in their underwear. Huang Bihui, PR manager of the company, explained: “We introduced eight new camisoles into market and sold more than 20,000 in less than two months so we named the 21st as Camisole Day.” Employment lawyers said there was nothing illegal in the move so long as it was voluntary but it had its critics. Wu Juanyu complained: “Some women may feel forced to join in because of peer pressure and job competition. I don’t know if the company is selling underwear or women’s bodies.”
Daily Times, November 24, 2007 ---
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007%5C11%5C24%5Cstory_24-11-2007_pg9_14

Wife's at a loss to find husband after he wins the lottery
A former beauty queen is suing her airline-mechanic husband, claiming he tried to hide his lottery jackpot from her.
Miami Herald, November 12, 2007 --- http://www.miamiherald.com/top_stories/story/313117.html 

Econometric Haiku
From econometrician Keisuke Hirano (as linked by the Unknown Professor on November 18, 2007) --- http://financialrounds.blogspot.com/

T-stat looks too good.
Use robust standard errors--
significance gone.

The bonds ($3 billion worth issued in January 2006), which mature in 2028 and until then pay 2.9 percent on their face value twice a year, so almost 6 percent per annum, are trading at a steep discount (currently about a 40 percent discount, which jacks up the yield to almost 10 percent--almost $6 for a bond that costs $60). This means that purchasers of the bonds (which are actively traded) are demanding compensation for bearing a substantial risk of default. The most interesting conclusion in Greenstone's study is that, after correction for other factors, the surge is correlated with a 40 percent increase in the bond market's estimate of default . . . There are two general questions that Greenstone's interesting study raises. The first is the relation between default risk and U.S. failure. . . The second general question raised by Greenstone's paper is whether financial markets are better predictors of the outcome of wars and other political crises than experts are, including the experts who staff intelligence agencies.
Richard Posner, "Is the Bond Market the Best Predictor of the Outcome of a War?" The Becker-Posner Blog, November 18, 2007 ---
http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/
Richard Posner was a highly regarded plenary speaker at the 2007 Annual Meetings of the American Accounting Association Meetings in Chicago.

I agree with Greenstone and Posner that prices of these bonds offer a valuable way to determine expectations about the stability of the Iraqi government held by the savvy investors in the international bond market who are placing substantial financial resources at risk. This does not mean that these investors are never wrong, or do not change their views as the evidence unfolds, but rather that bonds prices offers relevant information about the assessments of Iraq's future by persons who have an important financial stake in whether they are right or not . . . Whatever the final conclusions about the evidence on the political future of Iraq provided by its bonds, financial markets are an underutilized source of information about the expectations of investors about political outcomes. To be sure, financial expectations can be very wrong. For example, Eugene Lerner has shown that the Confederate currency did not depreciate very rapidly (relative to the growth of the money supply) until only a few months before the end of the Civil War, even though historians are unanimous that the South had effectively lost the war long before that. Still, I generally would have more confidence in the accuracy of the expectations of persons with a serious financial stake in outcomes than in the forecasts of most others who express their views on future political outcomes.
Nobel Laureate Gary Becker, "Is the Bond Market the Best Predictor of the Outcome of a War?" The Becker-Posner Blog, November 18, 2007 ---
http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/


Where have all the top teams gone,
Long time passing?
Notre Dame, one of the most storied programs in college football history, set a team record for losses in going 3-9. Why is this happening? After Stanford, a 41-point underdog, defeated the perennial power Southern California, the question was asked. After the third time a No. 1 team lost to an unranked opponent, the question was asked again. Scholarship limits have prevented programs from stockpiling talented players, leaving plenty of players for previously overlooked teams. Spread offenses have neutralized larger programs’ speed and size advantages. Increased coverage on television and the Internet has created more interest among more teams and players. And more universities have committed millions to enhancing their programs.
Pete Thamel, "Missouri, No. 1? College Football Surprises Again," The New York Times, November 26, 2007 --- http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/26/sports/ncaafootball/26bcs.html
Jensen Comment
Just proves the obvious --- academic standards are hazardous your competitive edge.
See http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies.htm#Athletics




MIT's Video Lecture Search Engine for Finding Topics Within Lectures: Watch the video at  --- http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/ 
Watch the video demo at
--- http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/

"Searching Video Lectures A tool from MIT finds keywords so that students can efficiently review lectures," by Kate Greene, MIT's Technology Review, November 26, 2007 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/19747/?nlid=686&a=f

Researchers at MIT have released a video and audio search tool that solves one of the most challenging problems in the field: how to break up a lengthy academic lecture into manageable chunks, pinpoint the location of keywords, and direct the user to them. Announced last month, the MIT Lecture Browser website gives the general public detailed access to more than 200 lectures publicly available though the university's OpenCourseWare initiative. The search engine leverages decades' worth of speech-recognition research at MIT and other institutions to convert audio into text and make it searchable.

The Lecture Browser arrives at a time when more and more universities, including Carnegie Mellon University and the University of California, Berkeley, are posting videos and podcasts of lectures online. While this content is useful, locating specific information within lectures can be difficult, frustrating students who are accustomed to finding what they need in less than a second with Google.

"This is a growing issue for universities around the country as it becomes easier to record classroom lectures," says Jim Glass, research scientist at MIT. "It's a real challenge to know how to disseminate them and make it easier for students to get access to parts of the lecture they might be interested in. It's like finding a needle in a haystack."

The fundamental elements of the Lecture Browser have been kicking around research labs at MIT and places such as BBN Technologies in Boston, Carnegie Mellon, SRI International in Palo Alto, CA, and the University of Southern California for more than 30 years. Their efforts have produced software that's finally good enough to find its way to the average person, says Premkumar Natarajan, scientist at BBN. "There's about three decades of work where many fundamental problems were addressed," he says. "The technology is mature enough now that there's a growing sense in the community that it's time [to test applications in the real world]. We've done all we can in the lab."

A handful of companies, such as online audio and video search engines Blinkx and EveryZing (which has licensed technology from BBN) are making use of software that converts audio speech into searchable text. (See "Surfing TV on the Internet" and "More-Accurate Video Search".) But the MIT researchers faced particular challenges with academic lectures. For one, many lecturers are not native English speakers, which makes automatic transcription tricky for systems trained on American English accents. Second, the words favored in science lectures can be rather obscure. Finally, says Regina Barzilay, professor of computer Science at MIT, lectures have very little discernable structure, making them difficult to break up and organize for easy searching. "Topical transitions are very subtle," she says. "Lectures aren't organized like normal text."

To tackle these problems, the researchers first configured the software that converts the audio to text. They trained the software to understand particular accents using accurate transcriptions of short snippets of recorded speech. To help the software identify uncommon words--anything from "drosophila" to "closed-loop integrals"--the researchers provided it with additional data, such as text from books and lecture notes, which assists the software in accurately transcribing as many as four out of five words. If the system is used with a nonnative English speaker whose accent and vocabulary it hasn't been trained to recognize, the accuracy can drop to 50 percent. (Such a low accuracy would not be useful for direct transcription but can still be useful for keyword searches.)
 

Once again, the Lecture Browser link (with a video demo) is at http://web.sls.csail.mit.edu/lectures/

Find free video lectures from leading universities at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

Bob Jensen's threads on tools and tricks of education technology --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on how to capture streaming video --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/thetools.htm#StreamingMedia

Bob Jensen's search helpers are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm


Watch for this Jury Duty Scam

November 27, 2007 message from Georgia Lotz

JURY DUTY SCAM

This has been verified by the FBI (their link is included below). Please pass this on to everyone in your email address book. It is spreading fast so be prepared should you get this call. Most of us take summons for jury duty seriously, but enough people skip out on their civic duty, that a new and ominous kind of scam has surfaced. The caller claims to be a jury coordinator. If you protest that you never received a summons for jury duty, the scammer asks you for your Social Security number and date of birth so he or she can verify the information and cancel the arrest warrant. Give out any of this information and bingo; your identity just got stolen. The scam has been reported so far in 11 states, including Oklahoma, Illinois, and Colorado. This (scam) is particularly insidious because they use intimidation over the phone to try to bully people into g iving information by pretending they're with the court system. The FBI and the federal courts system have issued nationwide alerts on their web sites, warning consumers about the fraud. Check it out here:

http://www.snopes.com/crime/fraud/juryduty.asp 

http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/j/jury_duty_scam.htm 

http://www.fbi.gov/page2/june06/jury_scams060206.ht 



"Americans Are Reading Less," University of Illinois Issues in Scholarly Communications Blog, November 19, 2007 --- http://www.library.uiuc.edu/blog/scholcomm/

The National Endowment for the Arts today released an interesting and disturbing report of American reading today. Gathering and collating available data, it reports that the data are simple, consistent, and alarming. Although there has been measurable progress in recent years in reading ability at the elementary school level, all progress seems to stop as children enter their teens. There is a general decline in reading among teenagers and adults and both reading ability and the habit of regular reading have greatly declined among college graduates.

The report reaches three conclusions:
* Americans are spending less time reading.
* Reading comprehension skills are eroding
* These declines have serious civic, social, cultural, and economic implications.

These conclusions are, as the report notes, "unsettling." Clearly, more research is needed to explore factors that might contribute to this trend and to weigh the relative effectiveness and costs and benefits of programs to foster lifelong reading and skills development.

Bob Jensen's threads on electronic literature are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm

 


Read This First
Amazon Kindle, an electronic device that he hopes will leapfrog over previous attempts at e-readers and become the turning point in a transformation toward Book 2.0
--- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Kindle

Then watch this video --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKUKQ7QqOHw
Other Videos

$399 Amazon Kindle --- Click Here

Read This Next
The Future of Reading (beyond mere hard copy and electronic books as we know them)

"Amazon's Jeff Bezos already built a better bookstore. Now he believes he can improve upon one of humankind's most divine creations: the book itself.," Newsweek Cover Story, November 26, 2007 --- http://www.newsweek.com/id/70983

"Technology," computer pioneer Alan Kay once said, "is anything that was invented after you were born." So it's not surprising, when making mental lists of the most whiz-bangy technological creations in our lives, that we may overlook an object that is superbly designed, wickedly functional, infinitely useful and beloved more passionately than any gadget in a Best Buy: the book. It is a more reliable storage device than a hard disk drive, and it sports a killer user interface. (No instruction manual or "For Dummies" guide needed.) And, it is instant-on and requires no batteries. Many people think it is so perfect an invention that it can't be improved upon, and react with indignation at any implication to the contrary.