PSoTD

Brilliant! Of course I want my domain registrar to be in charge of my public relations!

Another arrest in the British peerage case, this time Lord Levy. A short synopsis of the case so far:

The police are investigating whether peerages have been offered in exchange for donations and loans to political parties after it was revealed at the beginning of last year that all three major parties were given secret loans before the last general election. Traditionally there is no wrongdoing in lending political parties money however the suspicion is that the lenders are trying to buy influence.

Tony Blair has been accused of selling peerages after four businessmen, who gave Labour 4.5m in unpublicised loans, were subsequently nominated for peerages. Labour went on to reveal it had been secretly loaned nearly 14m ahead of the last election. The Conservative Party revealed they had borrowed 16m from 13 wealthy backers and the Liberal Democrat party 50,000 from three backers.

So he starts today with a spray of... something.

I know I said I wasn't interested in January 2007 polls on the Democratic primary, but this one is a little different...

Joe Biden's Campaign
When Will Joe Biden Officially End His '07-08' Campaign for President?	Before March 2007 Before June 2007 Before October 2007 Before January 2008 Before April 2008 Not Until The Convention Are You Crazy? He's Going to Win This Thing!
	Current Results

Is that they listen, and give fantastic facial expressions, while and after you tell incredibly corny jokes.

Yeah, I just had one of those moments.

If Bigfoot did, that would make it easier for Kathy Strain to find him or her.

Amanda Marcotte is going to be the Blogmaster/blogatrix at John Edwards’ presidential campaign blog. Among many others, Roxanne from Rox Populi will be guest blogging at Pandagon. All good.

The TPM Cafe roundtable with Senator Schumer didn't work as well as I would have hoped. Two days to develop questions, 40 minutes for Senator Schumer to type out his responses - he answered 7, and a couple of those were in the "of course we should" quality. I'm not sure live blog discussions work that well if the time for response is so limited and the time to develop questions is this long.

Having said that, it sure seemed to me that TPMCafe could use their "rating" option to determine a priority of questions to be asked. There were several good questions asked that weren't answered, and I'm not just talking about my own question. Room for improvement on the process, I guess.

He's playing near Philly in late February, I'm thinking about going. I've seen him twice, in San Francisco in the late 1980s, and both shows were great.

So... what's your favorite Graham Parker song?

(And a sneak listen from Parker's "Don't Tell Columbus", scheduled to be released March 13, 2007: Stick to the Plan)

When the reporter goes from reporting the story to being part of the story - to the point where he may be called to testify - should he stay on the post of reporting the story? What should Slate do in this particular case?

Talk 2 Action has an interesting post about how little some of the Dover School District board members knew about Intelligent Design before approving it for curriculum. The blog is right. It was negligence by the Board. There's still one member on the Board that voted for ID: Heather Geesey. She wasn't up for election when the rest of them were voted out.

I'm not sure I believe it's going to happen like this, but it does seem to me that about.com is a sand island slowly disappearing in an ocean of blogs.

Chuck Schumer is starting to make me really wonder what his whole point is with his book. At first, I thought he was a policy stalking horse for Hillary Clinton, laying out some ideas, hearing the feedback, and allowing Clinton to clean up on what sells. He supports her candidacy, so why not be a good scout? And then there's the need to feed some sort of Senatorial egomania, it's not like Schumer doesn't have 99 other compatriots in that department. But this Bailey thing. I watched him a bit on Tavis Smiley tonight, and Schumer went out of his way to explain the jobs of the fictional Baileys, and their life. It's kinda weird. It occurs to me that maybe Schumer ought to quit ignoring that inner voice, and write that damn screenplay about the Baileys.

Looking for a Beatific vision?

If you were going to buy one, what kind would you buy?

Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro was euthanized this morning at Kennett Square.

“We just reached a point where it was going to be difficult for him to go on without pain,” co-owner Roy Jackson said. “It was the right decision, it was the right thing to do. We said all along if there was a situation where it would become more difficult for him then it would be time.”

Even with the finest care available on the planet, Barbaro could not be saved. No expense was spared yet still the best veterinary doctors in the world failed. A petulant refusal by Barbaro's owners to admit failure would have only caused the horse to suffer towards no good end.

Compare the President of the United States who would countenance the pain, suffering and deaths of thousands rather than admit to failure. Just as the best medical care and intentions of all concerned couldn't save a champion thoroughbred with a shattered leg, the best military in the world can't be expected to reassemble a shattered Iraqi society. All possible outcomes are not within our control. But Bush's retort is to chant over and over and over "Failure is not an option", no matter how clear it becomes that failure is the right option.

Rest in peace, Barbaro. Suffer no more.

There really are no other words to use.

I just thought this link was worth posting.

I've had 4 or 5 people now email me asking whether Family Watchdog - a search engine for a national sex offender registry - is real. Of course it's real. And depending on where you live, a little bit scary. But if I've gotten that many emails, the word-of-email promotion of this site must be astounding.

Baseball, Yugioh, and now, football. My kids are getting into trading cards.

Most prized cards - Yankees in baseball and Steelers in football. I don't know where I'm going wrong with these kids rooting for the Yankees and all, but it's a bit of a disappointment. Rooting for the Steelers is completely expected in this area, especially after last year's success. They've reached the age where they think it's funny to root against my team - the Chicago Bears - so I've given up for now trying to get them to root for them.

It's like a time capsule watching them pour over these cards. I still have some of my baseball cards when I was a kid, and they were always prized possessions. My daughter likes looking at them - those players are from the old days! Yet Johnny Bench, Willie Mays, Tom Seaver, Lou Brock... those are just names to her. Where's Babe Ruth, and Joe Dimaggio? Cursed Yankee education, who's giving her those names?

Last week my wife bought each of the kids a binder and the plastic trading card holder sleeves. They both spent time this weekend carefully putting their cards in the order they felt was appropriate, and then fitting them into the sleeves. Our six year old likes to review his Yugioh cards every afternoon anyways, it seems, so this makes it easier for him.

Funny how much things can continue from generation to generation.

He discourages Americans.

Senator Chuck Schumer needs to quit wearing them. Then he needs to quit talking about what he sees in the future - because it bears no responsible relationship to reality. From today's Meet the Press:

SEN. SCHUMER: Well, I think the bottom line is that the president will have no choice but to begin a withdrawal come this summer or fall of 2007. And that’s why I think the 2008 election, Tim, is going to turn on a positive platform. That’s what I’ve written...

MR. RUSSERT: Not Iraq.

SEN. SCHUMER: Not Iraq. I think we do have to discuss how to deal with the war on terror in the future. But I think that the president has shown so little veering from this plan, which is a disaster, that by 2000--early 2008, even he is going to be forced to withdraw troops from Iraq.

Relying on Bush to withdraw troops is not a plan. Expecting him to do so without major pushing by Americans is not realistic. It's much more likely that we'll still be there, just outside of Baghdad, trying to keep the civil war in Baghdad and Iraq from spreading to other countries. Iraq isn't going away as an issue in 2008, although it is likely to be seen as part of a bigger issue - Middle East politics. Not necessarily the issue of terrorism, but actual foreign policy.

In general, a good thing - but I can't help but wonder what the businesses they compete with think about this.

Saving souls is serious business for Annandale, Va., pastor Steve Reynolds. So is losing weight.

Which is why he stepped out from behind the lectern during a service one recent weekend to deliver a blunt message to those crowded into the pews below.

"About 40 percent of you need to lose weight,” he told his congregation at Capital Baptist Church. "When you love potluck more than God, it's serious.”

And with that, the preacher, who has lost 70 pounds by relying on God and low carbs, launched a mission to lead his followers into the burgeoning world of religious dieting. "Our body was given to us by God and for God,” he said. "He is the owner. We need to take care of what He's given us.”

Reynolds, the pastor of Capital, is joining a movement that got its start in Christianity but has picked up steam and spread to other religions. Faith-based diet clubs, books and advice programs are prospering. Books advise Buddhists to practice "transformational nourishment,” Hindus are told to eat low-fat vegetarian fare.

It's still newsworthy.

Should Congress try to stop President Bush from deploying more U.S. troops in Iraq?

* 40651 responses

Yes 80%

No 16%

Not sure 4%

Seven states (at least) have it in place.

If you're looking for more Hot Pocket material...

Maybe this explains some of the boats anchored overnight near the islands of the river in the summer.

It's time for newspapers to grow up.

Although President Bush's annual State of the Union address touched on a host of topics, most of us listening were focused solely on what he had to say about the Iraq war.

Essentially, he asked the nation to give his unpopular plan to send more troops to Iraq a chance to work. He's imploring the nation to take a leap in faith that the new strategy will work.

We haven't a clue as to whether the new strategy will make any difference.

We hope it does. But we doubt it.

It sounds plausible that the war on terror has kept the battle over there and the U.S. is more prepared to thwart terrorism than it was on Sept. 11, 2001.

We sure hope so. But it's hard to take national security for granted, or measure accomplishments when events can suddenly alter that perceived success.

While the president's critics keep calling for a new direction, they stop short of offering any real solutions.

Where's Superman when we need him?

There are problems in which there is nothing we can do that can provide the solution. The policeman can't cure cancer. The doctor can't prevent murder. Apparently, we couldn't stop our government from pursuing a horrible policy in Iraq. And, unfortunately, it appears the news media can't consider whether it is reasonable to think that America can prevent civil war from happening in another country.

Yes, it is horrible that America has released all these things into motion in Iraq. But at some point we have to consider what we're doing as damage control, as opposed to solving the problem. We cannot solve this. And the kind of thinking that America can somehow control another country - and its people - is exactly how we got into this mess in the first place.

A nation needs to know its limitations.

I wonder how many of the creators of these web pages were confused by that rule.

From Earthtimes.org:

Members of the electric utility industry testified recently at a Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission hearing to promote time-of-use pricing.

The commission is considering charging customers based on when they use electricity. During times when energy use is heavier, prices will be higher, The Patriot-News reported. The utilities already pay higher rates to suppliers during times of peak use.

Customers pay a flat rate that accounts for both peak and off-peak use. Proponents of time-of-use pricing say it will make customers more aware of how much electricity they are using and create more energy-efficient consumers.

Though the new pricing scheme may promote energy conservation the charges are highly varied and may create major lifestyle changes for customers, said Steve Carrico, a utility consultant and witness at the PUC hearing last week.

I did not know that Stuart Malina, Music Director of the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra, had a blog. Now you know too.

For those that visit that have your own blogs:

When was the last time you added a blog to your blogroll?

Just more of my curiousity as to how static these things become.

The Dark Wraith does not appreciate receiving unrequested email from the Hillary Clinton campaign. I can't say I blame him.

I really don't know very much about this guy, but at least Alaska can say they've had a primary candidate for President now.

Kerry had his chance. I voted for him in 2004 and wanted him to win, but since that didn't occur, I am ready for other candidates. I'm not sure he has much weight to throw towards any particular candidate but it will be curious as to who he chooses to support, if any, in the primary. The Massachusetts primary will be March 4th, 2008, and unfortunately the race could well be over by that date, so I suppose there's a chance Kerry won't have to declare a preference.

According to Vice President Dick Cheney, it's the number three man in Al Qaeda!

We have not gotten Osama bin Laden, obviously, because he's very careful and, say, he doesn't communicate and he's not sort of in direct contact on a regular basis. But we've taken out several times that whole layer of leadership underneath Osama bin Laden and Zawahiri. One of the most dangerous jobs in the world is to be number three in the al Qaeda organization, because a lot of them are now dead or in custody.

Hey Dick, could we make the most dangerous job in the world being Al Qaeda's top guy?

Ed Rendell's administration is giving money to a brewery. Where's your dough?

The reviews are in on last night's SOTU from the style mavens at the National Review's conservative coffee klatsch. Not much on Bush but K-Lo found Nancy Pelosi's suit "unexpected and classy" and noted she had to change earlier in the day due to a chocolate mishap. Meanwhile, J-Go was simply appalled by Jim Webb's coiffure! Eewwww!

You go, girls.

Poor Gary Locke, perhaps to be forever remembered as the standard of lame-ass wuss responses to the State of the Union Message.

Maybe Bank of America got some negative feedback on their prior aggressive lobbying. Maybe it was impacting them on other fronts. I can't quite figure why BofA would publicize an effort to reduce a lobbying focus, unless it was hurting them elsewhere. But they still want the 10 percent federal deposit cap repealed.

I'm always curious to see the traffic numbers of celebrity's web sites, particularly the section in which they post "personal" photos of themselves and their lives. Is there really demand to see the special moments and highlights of last year for Suze Orman? Her web developer seems to think so...

Hunters blaming global warming for messing up their hunting.

In recent years, hunters appear to have been missing their target during woodcock season - without even firing a shot.

With winter seeming to arrive later each year, some hunters are concerned that the birds aren't migrating through the area during the hunting season, and only arrive after the season is over.

Paul Brook, owner of Woodman's outdoor sporting goods in downtown Norway, says the late winter is to blame.

"I don't know if it's global warming or what, but the last four years the woodcock hunting season has missed the migration," Brook says.

In Maine, woodcocks can be hunted in October when their migration pattern typically draws them through the state as they flock south from Canada for the winter.

"Lately, the migration misses the season," Brook says.

"There have been people out deer hunting and they've seen the birds come in," Brook explains. "But it was two weeks after the woodcock season ended."

Although it may be easy to say that winter is arriving later than it has in the past, Brook offers some more concrete explanation.

"What makes the woodcock migrate south is their food. Their diet is worms. They probe for worms on the ground and, as the ground freezes, they start migrating south," he says.

With the ground not freezing until later in the season, the woodcocks have no reason to begin their annual southerly shift.

Woodcock feeding habits aside, Brook says he's noticed other signs that the winters have been delayed in recent years.

Here's your chance to vote for who should be in the Hall of Fame. It won't count for anything, but it's interesting nonetheless.

Terrell Owens speaks about Parcells' retirement.

I don't pity John McCain, but it's pretty easy to recognize the trap he now finds himself in as a future Presidential candidate. For years he has cultivated a "maverick Senator" reputation, although it's really quite difficult to see how he really earned it. And after losing to Bush in the primaries in 2000, he was set to be the milquetoast "anti-Bush" for the party. He'd support the President, even on bad ideas, as long as they were ideas that were identified as Bush's. Where he could find a way to differentiate his position from the President without appearing to really badmouth Bush, he would do so, presenting himself as the Republican that wouldn't do what Bush was doing, exactly, but would do what Bush was doing with Tweak A and New Paint Job B and Twist of Phrase C. All the while, he was looking at 2008, realizing that Bush could screw things up a bit, but his clever positioning would allow him to cast himself as the candidate that actually could accomplish what Bush tried to do - that it was a question of intelligence and execution for the policy, and not a question of a particular policy in itself.

And that's where McCain made his first mistake - thinking Bush couldn't fuck it up so bad for any Republican that visibly followed his lead. But Bush has failed that badly. I don't see any way that a Bush toadie can win the Presidential election in 2008. I don't see any way that John McCain can avoid being painted as a Bush toadie, in both the primaries and the general election. Just as Lieberman was trapped with the kiss, McCain has "the hug". There are now potential Republican primary candidates that have positioned themselves further away from Bush than McCain has, limiting McCain's wiggle room. And prominent Republican Senators as well. And Bush has now adopted the "McCain Plan of Escalation" with his own Tweak A and Paint Job B and Twist of Phrase C. McCain finds himself utterly, completely screwed by being seen as so close to Bush on the Iraq policy. He's stuck, with no future political choice but to let this play out and hope for a miracle.

Most of us do hope for a miracle, but at some point reality must be the premise of policy. There will be no miracle for McCain. His presidential aspirations are just another victim of George W. Bush, who finds a way to taint anything near him. McCain got too close to Bush, which would be ironic for a "maverick" if indeed McCain had ever been one.

I think the New Orleans Saints season was probably the best feel-good stories of 2006, and it looks to me that the team only has upside. They have a good coach, a very good offense, and just need to improve pass coverage defense to take the next step. If you take a look at the Louisiana papers on Monday, they are full of coverage of the Saints, and despite the loss, are generally happy stories, full of photos and quotes from relatively-satisfied fans.

But will it be like this again? Or will Saints fans and Louisiana news media have higher expectations next year in what may be the toughest conference in the NFC, and reporting of satisfaction and enjoyment will disappear?

One of the things about the Saints coverage that stood out this year over any other sports coverage was the impact of the team on the fans, and the fans relationships with the team. I think this is good for sports to cover this dynamic more, because it is a crucial part of professional sports, in both value and concept - to bring entertainment to a community that also makes them feel good. Good teams do that. And good fans reciprocate the good feeling. So much of sports reporting is based on numbers - performance statistics, money, years of contract - that we're taking the humanity out of professional sports. The Saints coverage this year returned humanity in sports it to where it belonged - in newspapers, on television - and maybe there's a chance that a bit of that will rub off on the rest of the sports reporting world now. We can hope.

Makes about as much sense...

If office work has taken a back seat to football chatter, it must be the annual Super Bowl slowdown.

Excitement over what has become the biggest single sporting event of the year in the United States may actually end up costing employers some $800 million in lost productivity the week before the big game, a report said on Monday.

In Chicago and Indianapolis, the two cities whose National Football League teams will face off on February 4 in Miami, losses could reach $85 million in the run-up to the game, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc.

Assuming employees, for example, spend 10 minutes a day talking about the game, making bets, surfing the Internet or shopping for a new television, their bosses will lose some $162 million per day. In a five-day workweek, that adds up to $810 million, based on average earnings and expected viewership.

Then there is the day after the championship when people discuss the game's plays, the TV commercials, or simply call in sick, resulting in more money lost, the outplacement consultant reported.

I hope nobody is paying these people to make this guess. I know lots of people who don't care about the Super Bowl one bit, and the likelihood they spend 10 minutes each workday involved in Super Bowl discussion above and beyond the time they normally spend talking about whatever personal interest they have is incredibly slight. Then there's that whole part of the question - is this supposed ten minutes per day spent on the Super Bowl in addition to the time spent discussing and doing more personal stuff at work, or just replacing something else as a priority for that week? Is this a daily ten minutes they'd normally be talking about their house or their kids' sports or the next doctor appointment or how drunk Sheila in accounting was last weekend?

But my biggest annoyance in this PR exercise committed annually by Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. is that this somehow costs "the bosses". Really. Like the bosses take home less money because of this. No, if it costs anyone, and that is a big if, it costs the marketplace, because costs are transferred eventually. So let's cut out the "this is costing the employers" talk, because that's not the way companies operate in reality. And let's quit reporting the ballooning the supposed cost into such ridiculous numbers, because there's the only point of it is to get this firm in the newspaper in the first place.

I know that campaign web sites want to keep it casual, but Pets for Hillary?

But I can't explain why. Must have been the timing. Albert Hammond - the elder:

Interesting blog post commenting on the BBC's lack of coverage on the newest Tony Blair scandal.

I think a primary campaign based on the power of money, the inevitability of result, and the attacking of opponents is doomed to failure. Maybe not in the primary, but definitely as a general election result. Campaigns that are pissing people off in January 2007 for their tactics are going to face the wrath of bloggers for two years.

I did not know that "on any given day, approximately 600 people experience homelessness in the County of Dauphin and the City of Harrisburg." Last week Harrisburg Mayor Stephen R. Reed and Dauphin County Commissioner George Hartwick III unveiled a plan to "end homelessness" in the county, called Home Run. You can see the plan here.

and I'm going to try this home remedy. What the doctor prescribed worked a bit, but I want over this.

What is up with the idea of Donkey Basketball? We had that as a fundraiser at my highschool as well. Who first came up with the great idea of playing basketball while riding a donkey? Was it the owner of the donkeys, looking for some way to rent them out? Was it the donkeys - were they always sneaking off and walking around the court?

But I'm sorry, something is obligatory...

20 U.S. service members killed in Iraq in a day. What will it take for those who support the surge to realize their folly? What does Joe Lieberman say if one of the Congressional delegation that visits Iraq eventually gets killed? Go nuclear?

America has already spoken about this. Bush has picked his failure - will Congress allow him to pursuit it - again?

I'm pretty sure that if the California primary date is moved up, that may be one of the biggest political stories of 2008 - but I don't know how. Here's what some other bloggers think as well, but I fully expect the real story is an unknown one as of yet, one of those law of unintended consequences things...

Hotline on Call

Earlier this week, I made an argument that the Dem race for the WH could last well past Feb. 5, the date most conventional wisdom worshipers are predicting will be the last day of the primary season. While I stand by the idea that the Clinton v. Obama race could turn into a delegate-for-delegate slugfest, the likelihood of Feb. 5 ending things does rise sharply if California moves up.

California Uber Alles

Gender and race are less likely to be an obvious issue in California than they are elsewhere. Particularly the South. This would seem to benefit both Hillary and Obama. Although, to be honest, my time spent living in NorCal makes me think that this will not help Hillary nearly as much as everyone thinks. I don't exactly know how to explain this, but she is just so not California.

News from Me

I just read an item about how the California presidential primary may get moved way up, maybe becoming the second or third in the land. That might bode well for Hillary Clinton grabbing the Democratic nomination. With the right kind of campaign — and Bill stumping for her — she might do well enough in this state to make her unstoppable.

Political Animal

And since Hillary's announcement is the big news today, it's probably worth mentioning that this would be pretty helpful to her cause, right? Not only is she pretty popular among the fundraising set here, but she's one of the few candidates with enough money to seriously contest California and still run decent campaigns in the other early states.

At least, that's my initial reaction. Am I missing something obvious?

Check out Jim Gaffigan's Hot Pockets spiel...

Every once in a while I find active blogs that still link to my old blog address from over a year ago in their blogroll. What gives? Do they really not check out their blogroll that often? And if not, is there really a reason to have a blogroll in the first place?

Apparently everyone's snagging them for Super Bowl Sunday.

I got some interesting suggestions from the Philly area about starting up a West Shore Drinking Liberally.

Draw an illustration showing the prevention or impacts of stormwater runoff pollution in the environment and you could win a prize!

And no, you don't have to draw Binky.

It's pretty clear that the scope of the problem hasn't been figured out if local governments are required to hire lobbyists in order to coordinate with state legislatures and the Federal Government.

From the Rockford Register Star:

Rockford Mayor Larry Morrissey has proposed forming a nonprofit group to hire someone to represent the city's interests at the state Capitol, and possibly, in Washington, D.C.

Certainly, we have lawmakers in both places, but their attention is split among a thousand priorities, and they sometimes work at cross-purposes in their own little groups. They are elected to represent constituents and regional interests, but their efforts are diverse and divided.

And there are times when they could use a heads up when something is of particular interest to local government. They should welcome the help.

So, call it a hired gun. Whatever. Other Illinois cities, most of them smaller than Rockford, have lobbyists. In the past, some local governmental entities, including the airport and the convention and visitors bureau, have had lobbyists looking out for their specific interests in Springfield. The idea is to have someone on site to identify proposed legislation that could affect the client and lobby for or against it. The lobbyist also is in place to identify opportunities, such as in grants or specific programs, that may benefit clients.

Had Rockford had a lobbyist last year, Rockford may not have missed out on the River Edge development program grants that renew tax credits or are targeted toward cleanup and redevelopment of contaminated "brownfield" sites in cities situated along Illinois' rivers.

Aurora and East St. Louis snagged the $2 million in grants before Rockford even knew about the project. There was some sniping back and forth between Morrissey and former Mayor Doug Scott, who heads up the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, which awarded the grants. Some local people thought Scott should have given the city a heads up that the money was available. In his state position, Scott argued, he can't play favorites. Rockford just missed the boat, he said.

He's not our lobbyist, after all.

Some members of the Rockford City Council say we don't need a paid lobbyist. They propose a six-person, bipartisan group of aldermen to do the job in Springfield. A few road trips and a little face time at the Capitol won't do it. This is a job for professionals, not amateur hour. The city needs someone on the scene, in the halls and back rooms where deals go down, on a regular basis.

Just more bullshit for the bullshit fire. The problem is structural. Does every city, every town, every village need to hire a lobbyist? Is that the most effective way we can figure out for governance? If there's a problem - and believe me, lots and lots and lots of cities and towns will be hiring lobbyists this year just because they perceive themselves to be on the wrong side of the money-giving equation at the state or federal level - then perhaps the process is the problem. Maybe local governments need to advocate a change in the process. Otherwise, the tax costs across this country for local government hired lobbyists are going to be causing increases in taxes, because there's a cost to this, whether the lobbyist fails or succeeds.

He's probably the best candidate the GOP has for the 2008 general Presidential election, but I have no idea what his chances might be of surviving their primary process.

How does one determine the educational history of writers of any particular publication, such as The Washington Post? You can get the editor information from the website:

Leonard Downie, Jr. - BA and MA degrees in journalism and political science from Ohio State University. He received an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Ohio State in June 1993.

Philip Bennett - degree in history from Harvard College.

Milton Coleman - bachelor of fine arts degree in music history and literature from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, which in 1998 named him as a Distinguished Alumnus. In 1971, he was a Southern Education Foundation Fellow, and in 1974 a fellow in the Michele Clark Summer Program for Minority Journalists at the Graduate School of Journalism, Columbia University.

But I can't even find bio information at their web site on Fred Hiatt, Colbert I. King, or Jackson Diehl, let alone the rest of the writers on staff.

In honor of Freedom of the Campus Press Day I post this, because wouldn't it be useful to students considering a career in journalism to know what today's journalistic stars studied, and where they went to school? The journalists of tomorrow may want to know what educational path is currently successful.

And so might consumers.

And so today, I declare the Pennsylvania Cable Network blog experiment failed, at least as far as I'm concerned. Two posts in two months does not a blog make.

Dear Newsweek,

I saw this movie, and remember the performance of Darren Harris, so I really don't need to read about Howard Fineman's high school experiences.

Hey, my questions of the day have been mocked by a blogger who shall not be identified, but now I feel I have to ask:

What is your favorite color of fluff?

Catherine McLin has guts. Good for her.

I did not know this:

“Idiot,” “moron,” and “imbecile” are now just insults, but early last century they were legitimate medical classifications. Morons were said to have the emotional and mental capacities of 9-year-olds; imbeciles, 5-year-olds; and idiots, 2-year-olds.

Next time you're called this, remember to ask the name-caller if they have the proper medical training to make these determinations.

Web sites for businesses that hold contests that kill participants can look so cheesy.

Prince is the Super Bowl Half Time Entertainment...

In entertainment news, Prince will perform at halftime of the Super Bowl. This breaks the string of aging Brit acts, though sustaining the string of Super Bowl halftime performers whose best work was done before many current spectators were born. During the period he used a glyph as a name, the singer in question was called The Artist Formerly Known as Prince. Now that he once again goes by Prince, this makes him The Artist Formerly Known as The Artist Formerly Known as Prince.

Yeah, I'm not a Prince fan.

It's pretty clear that if you accept the gig for playing at halftime at the Super Bowl, you're admitting that your creative career is over and you're really a replay artist at this point. Take a look at this roster of performers during the SB Halftime show. Prince is the Carol Channing of 2007, or the Up With People (THEY PERFORMED THREE DIFFERENT TIMES!?!?!?), or the New Kids on the Block, or the Blues Brothers with James Belushi, or whatever.

Whatever happened to the former Yankee?

According to Wikipedia, he washed out of Japanese baseball last year. The clip is his final at bat in Japan.

Hey, I'll be blogging over at Suburban Guerrilla some now as well. Different but similar kind of stuff from me.

From Spinwatch:

Several states, responding to the federal scandals as well as their own statehouse imbroglios, have already adopted more sweeping gift and travel bans, broader measures to end the central role of lobbyists or government contractors in financing campaigns and new public campaign financing intended to reduce lawmakers’ dependence on big donors.

To enforce their rules, about half the states have also created independent ethics watchdogs, outside the control of the lawmakers they police — something federal lawmakers have so far resisted. House Democrats recently said they would create a panel to study the idea.

John Hurson, a former member of the Maryland General Assembly and president of the National Council of State Legislatures, remembers marveling at the goings-on just a few miles away in the United States Capitol. He was barred from letting a lobbyist buy him a cup of coffee under rules enforced by the Maryland Ethics Commission. Meanwhile, congressmen were flying across the country for golf trips with lobbyists and enlisting them as major fund-raisers for their re-election campaigns. "It was amusing in a sad kind of way,” said Mr. Hurson, who now works as a Washington lobbyist himself, for a cosmetics industry trade group. “At the state level in Maryland a lobbyist can’t even have his name on a campaign flier. And at the federal level some of these guys are basically running campaigns."

At some point, there has to be responsibility for personal ethics. The idea that Hurson can tut-tut the federal lobbying activities while he's a state legislator, and then turn around and become part of the process at the federal level, speaks volumes. If you really think a profession has gone awry, why would you then enter it? Is money the ONLY DRIVING FACTOR with these people?

I believe there's plenty of room for focused "ethics" legislation, but the fact that it takes government regulation to provide the standards of what is ethical for both legislators and lobbyists is a sad vignette on how gross our culture has become. How can we expect these folks to legislate right and wrong for our society when they need government to tell them what is ethical in determing that legislation?

Looks like they finally determined that in order to generate more paying business, they couldn't provide referral URLs for free.

So how long until Starbucks opens up a store in Nuuk, Greenland?

Because I smell development and population growth in Greenland. It'll probably even be pitched as one of the real benefits of global warming.

What a great story.

Playing basketball isn't ladylike. That's what Jewell Chapman's high school principal told her in 1961 when he banned the girls basketball program.

"We were very frustrated," said Chapman, a forward for her high school team in Des Moines.

Nearly 50 years later, Chapman is back on the court. She's 62 and plays for the Hot Pink Grannies, joining about 10 other women on a team whose uniforms are black bloomers and hot pink socks. They play in the Iowa Granny Basketball League.

It's one of dozens of basketball leagues for women over 50 that have sprung up across the country. For some, it's an opportunity to exercise and socialize; for others, it's a once-denied chance to compete.

"You see more and more senior women's teams participating in state and national competitions and more recreational leagues," said Michael Rogers (news, bio, voting record), an associate professor in sports studies at Wichita State University. "In the future it will be commonplace to have leagues like this."

Annual surveys by the National Sporting Goods Association indicate the number of women 55 and older who play basketball at least 50 times a year has grown from 16,000 in 1995 to nearly 131,000 a decade later.

Play stuff until you're dead. That's my plan.

When I was a little boy, I was given this book, and I read it and read it and read it. It's a classic tale of a good brother and a bad brother, and the maturation of a son intent on saving his family. Of course, until last night I didn't really remember the plot too well, except there was a good and bad brother and a son that hid a sword in a tree.

I gave this book to my daughter at some point, and the past few days she read it - and really liked it. And she asked me questions about it, and some of the things she asked me about I couldn't remember. So I read it last night, and it was an enjoyable revisit to my childhood reading experiences. It was a bit strange, reading a book that was intended for 6-10 year olds, almost like sitting in a child's chair, but brought back memories of laying in the top bunk of bunk beds my brother and I slept in, reading this and other books on winter evenings.

I guess what I'm saying is, if you're looking for an interesting experience, re-read one of your childhood favorite books now.

For those that are emotionally invested in the performance of a professional sports team:

What is the most heartbreaking event you've felt personally in following professional sports?

Michael is trying to start up a West Shore Drinking Liberally.

Sounds good to me! Let him know if you agree.