tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31962121606480219742024-02-20T09:14:54.383-08:00Opinions UnlimitedUnsolicited Opinions on Almost Anything.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger180125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-74712814695674179932011-12-07T11:44:00.000-08:002011-12-07T15:08:28.249-08:00The Kindle Fire - A Review (incl. a 1-Click fix)<span style="font-weight:bold;">Updated 12/7/2011, 3pm.<br /><br />Background</span>:<br />I've never owned a tablet or e-reader. Apple products have always been a no-go for me because at least 90% of the web sites I visit use Flash. And I've never seen the point in spending $400-$800 for a tablet with limited functionality when I could buy a laptop (admittedly low-end, clunky, unsexy) with more functionality and expandability for the same amount of money.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Why the Fire?</span><br />Price, price, price, price and price. When I looked at the price of the Fire, and the one month free Prime, and compared that to the potential advantages of a tablet for me, well, it was pretty much a no-brainer.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">iPAD Owners</span><br />First, I envy you the disposable income that lets you buy multiple tablets.<br /><br />Second, if the KF doesn't compare to the iPad, I can only ask if you read the description or purchaser comments before buying. It's smaller and at least half the price. What did you expect?<br /><br />Third, one word: Flash. At least 90% of the web sites I visit regularly use Flash, often for such mundane tasks as site navigation or text display. I happen to hate Flash for a number of reasons, but a tablet that doesn't support Flash would be essentially useless for me. OTOH, the KF or Silk don't seem to support Microsoft's Silverlight.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Expectations Matter</span><br />It should go without saying that expectations matter. If you want a camera, this isn't for you. 3G would be nice - my U-verse DSL/Wi-Fi is not exactly a speed demon - but I'm not willing to pay yet another monthly fee for a modest increase in speed or accessibility.<br /><br />Microphone: why?<br /><br />So what did I think a tablet might offer that would make it an attractive alternative, at the right price, to a low-end laptop?<br /><br />1) The ability to quickly look something up on the web. I turn off computers when they are not in use and even my near-top-of-the-line desktop takes 5 minutes to go from a cold-start to the Windows 7 desktop (via login and loading of startup apps). So when I'm reading a magazine or book (the real kind) and suddenly want to check something on the web, well, it's a hassle. And why turn it on if I'm going to turn it off in 5 minutes?<br /><br />2) The ability to engage in recreational computer activities from a comfortable location (sofa, lounger, bed). Specifically, I have become interested in a number of free education web sites. But I spend enough time working at my desktop computer not to want to spend any more time there than necessary. But if I could access these sites from a comfy chair? Well, that would be appealing. And it would be nice to be able to play games (yes, Angry Birds), access internet radio stations or otherwise waste time comfortably.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PRELIMINARIES</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Criticisms - Caveat Emptor:</span><br />Before buying, I read reviews (esp. the negative ones), on Amazon and elsewhere, and checked the forums. Some of the criticisms appear accurate, some are user-specific, and some are inaccurate. I have done my best to verify that my criticisms are based on fact not ignorance or inexperience, but, please, if something I say is a deal-breaker, research it on your own before taking my word for it.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Packaging</span><br />Some users complained that the pre-registered (linked to your Amazon account) KFs came in boxes with Kindle Fire prominently displayed (an invitation to theft). I ordered the KF and the USB cable together. Both came in plain boxes inside a larger plain box. (I recently had two different vendors ship a DVR in the manufacturer's box - talk about theft potential.)<br /><br />If however, you are concerned, you can order the KF as a gift and register it when you get it. NOTE: I'm not sure if it is possible to use an unregistered KF, but at the very least, if you don't register it, you are bound to lose some functionality.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Essential Accessories</span>:<br />Get a cover! The KF arrives naked as a baby, in a very flimsy, tightly fitting plastic envelope. Even if you are not sure you will keep the KF, get a cover, even a real cheap one, at the same time.<br /><br />USB cable - if you don't already have a USB cable (USB 2.0 A male to Micro B) and do own a computer, you might want to order one if you have, for example, music or e-books you want to transfer.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">USABILITY</span><br />This is not for your computer-phobic Uncle Harry whose cell phone does nothing but make phone calls. The documentation, online and on the KF, is minimal. Amazon appears to assume that people know how to pinch, swipe, tap, double tap. The built-in documentaion only describes the icons, doesn't display them.<br /><br />I think the videos on Amazon's support page (http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=hp_k6_updatesi?nodeId=200769050) should run automatically the first time one turns on the Kindle. They are, perhaps not surprisingly, more useful than the written documentation.<br /><br />I'm pretty computer-saavy and yet have spent hours searching the web, the documentation, and Amazon's forums trying to get answers to all kinds of questions.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Power Button</span><br />There have been a lot of complaints about the power button being on the bottom where it can be easily and accidentally pressed. True, but all you have to do is turn the KF 180 degrees with the power button at the top. It works just fine for almost everything (only the opening swipe and a few web pages won't turn around) - and I don't know why Amazon didn't make that the default.<br /><br />Note: If you just press the power button, it goes into a "semi-sleep" state so that pressing it again will bring you to the swipe arrow at once. If, however, you hold down the power button and tell it to shut down, it will take about 30 seconds to start back up. I'm not sure what the consequences for battery power are for the "semi-sleep" option.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Touch Screen Gremlin</span><br />I'm convinced there is a gremlin in the touch screen.<br /><br />When I'm reading a book, the merest hint of a whisper of a touch will turn a page backwards or forwards.<br /><br />On the web, when I want a double tap to work, it does some times and doesn't other times. On the other hand, when I just want to scroll down a page and not click on anything, something I pass will get activated and off I go to a screen I didn't want. Pages display in desktop mode and then because of something I don't even know I've down get switched to mobile mode. When I want to increase or decrease the size of a page, I may have to double tap or pinch multiple times. When I don't want the page display size or type to change, it does. Obviously, I'm touching or doing something to cause these unwanted actions to occur, but the problem is that I haven't figured out how to control the use of the touch screen so that it does only what I want when I want it.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Navigation</span><br />I'm obviously spoiled by years of multi-window displays on wide LCD monitors and the W7 task bar. On the KF, it seems that the most frequent things I do are press the back arrow or the Home icon. To get from one app or book or function to another, you must get the Home icon, touch it, select the option you want on the home screen, then do something with that option. It has become really annoying.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Wireless Connectivity</span><br />The strength of the Wi-Fi signal in our home varies significantly on the KF from second to second. It appears that any change in position or even where one is holding the KF can affect the strength of the Wi-Fi signal. It's steady only when the KF is near to the router. It's difficult to say if the problem is with the KF, or if we need to buy wireless access points in order to get the best possible signals for the KF throughout our home.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">BOOKS</span><br /><br />I'm not a fan of e-books for all the well-known reasons we "real book" lovers give. So I will comment only on a couple of usability issues.<br /><br />Books downloaded from sites such as Project Gutenberg show up in the Docs section rather than the Books section. That's OK. What is annoying is that they show up on the carousel with just a big blue icon and no title. (For testing, I set up Kindle on my PC. The same big blue icon appears but, importantly, with title.)<br /><br />I find the KF too heavy to hold comfortably while reading. Now, if I want to read a hardback that's bigger and heavier than the KF, I might consider the KF as an alternative, but since most of my books are paperbacks, that's not likely to be a frequent occurrence.<br /><br />I generally read while flopped on a sofa or in bed. It is not uncommon for a book to land on the floor with little negative consequences other than, perhaps, a crimped cover. While reading with the KF, it would be only a small exaggeration to say that not a minute passes without my worrying that I will accidentally drop the KF with consequences all too awful to contemplate. In bed, I build pillow "guards" to prevent its falling on the floor.<br /><br />Minute shifts in position cause the KF to switch quickly from portrait to landscape mode. (While on the Web, it takes time to create the orientation shift.) However, there is a setting in the options at the top that lets you lock the KF's orientation.<br /><br />No page numbers. That's right. Not supported. Maybe e-readers get used to the location numbers and % completed, but I find it disconcerting. There is also no indicator for how/where to tap to move forward or back. In fact, you can tap or swipe almost anywhere, but a bottom of page indicator would be a nice addition. And I don't understand why the KF can't give one the sense of a 3-dimensional object - as even Zinio's awful reader or The New Yorker's similarly awkward reader can do.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Library Checkout</span><br />Works fine but you must have Wi-Fi. You can download directly to the KF or to a computer and then transfer the books to the KF via USB. It's a multi-step process: library to book selection to Overdrive to Amazon but not difficult. Its usefulness will depend on the e-book catalog of the library you have access to and the popularity of e-books. My library has around 500 e-books in various genres and about 2/5 were available for a lending period of 21 days. There were as many as five holds on the most popular books.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">OFFICE TOOLS </span><br />The KF comes with Quickoffice, but I was surprised to discover that when I clicked on Quickword, I was presented with a screen with two options: Internal Storage and Recent Documents. The app installed on the KF can read existing docs (that you transfer, presumably, one way or another) but not create new ones. For that, you must upgrade.<br /><br />I simply can't imagine using the KF keyboard to do anything more extensive than tweet 140 characters, so I didn't spend any time here.<br /><br />Email - you can set up multiple email accounts. Gmail is a snap. To set up an AT&T account, I had to check my Thunderbird to get all the system settings right. I've not spent much time yet with the email since I rely on Thunderbird to manage multiple email accounts.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">SILK</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Backend</span><br />Almost all the attention paid to Silk has been on its backend, its split processing. Technically and theoretically, the model makes sense. The KF has limited storage relative to other tablets, so one doesn't want to waste space on cache. And the idea that Amazon's servers will be faster than local processors & internet connections because web pages will already be in cache on its servers is technically sound. But, the performance depends on a balance of factors: enough, but not too many (probably not an issue unless the KF is astoundingly successful), users accessing the same pages. Users with fast internet connections who visit the less-traveled web sites may do better on their own. To turn off the Amazon "backend", when you are in Silk, click the menu item at the bottom select options and uncheck the "Accelerate page loading" under the Advanced section near the bottom of the page.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Front End</span><br />The best that can be said for it is that none, zip, of the existing browsers on the market (inc. IE) need worry about losing market share. It is a disaster in almost every respect and bears about as much resemblance to a modern browser as the Gopher Client did to Mosaic (Netscape's predecessor) .<br /><br />Note: I do not expect the functionality of Firefox or even the lesser usability of Chrome but really. It takes 3 steps to bookmark a web page. and the default order of display of the bookmarks appears to be either (I've not used it enough yet to tell) the most frequently accessed or the most recently accessed.<br /><br />You can't order bookmarks alphabetically or group them into folders (categories). This won't matter if the web browsing you do with the KF is limited to a dozen or so web sites. If, like me, you visit a lot more than that, it is painful. (Hint: To go from thumbnails to a list, you need to tap in a blank search box while using Silk. You can speed things up by typing the name of the web site.)<br /><br />You can't import or export bookmarks. It took me close to an hour to manually enter the 20 sites I most wanted access to from the KF. And then I had to go searching through my documentation to find the IDs and passwords for most of them since, of course, my password manager won't work under Silk. Being able to export bookmarks & then re-import them is important if one accidentally or purposefully unregisters your KF. (See section on security). I've not been able to locate any add-ons for Silk akin to Firefox's enormous library.. Since I visit a number of foreign language sites, I really miss the ability to use Google to translate a phrase or a page.<br /><br />Opera Mobile is available for the KF. Firefox is not yet approved by Amazon and Ive found no way to get it onto the KF. Easy Installer can't find it even though I downloaded it to the Downloads section. I suspect, based on the Opera Mobile .apk file that East Installer expects the .apk file to be in an sdcard directory which I can't see or access. Apparently one can get Firefox to work on the KF by using an Android smart phone with an SD card. Google for instructions on how to do it. I've seen the process referred to as sideloading.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Tabs</span><br />I thought there was no way to open a page in a new tab. But if you press down on the link, a popup window gives you the option. It's slow but maybe there's no other way to do it on a tablet? (I should have watched Amazon's video on using Silk instead of just jumping in on my own.) Go to the Options section to instruct the KF to open the new tab in front or in back of the current tab.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Page display</span><br />You can set options for the KF to use its best judgment, mobile or desktop formatting. I prefer the desktop formatting, but even with it selected, some web sites still display in mobile view. There is an option under the Advanced Settings called "Website settings" but it does not seem to have been implemented yet. If you choose to rely on KF's "autoformatting" or find the mobile setting best for most of your web sites, you may find that some web sites offer a mobile/desktop option somewhere on the page (check the top and bottom). This is one area where the 7-inch size works against the KF. It is too large for the mobile setting to be appropriate and too small for the desktop view to be easy to read. I do a lot of pinching and double tapping.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PDF Support</span><br />When you click on a PDF link on a web site, the PDF is downloaded. Tap at the bottom of the screen to bring up the menu of options and select "Downloads" to find it. I strongly, strongly, strongly, strongly recommend getting the free Adobe Reader app. I found Silk's default PDF reader inadequate to say the least.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">SECURITY and SHARING</span><br />The KF is not designed to be shared. There is a "Locked Screen Password" option under More/Security that will limit access to the KF (you are prompted for the password when you swipe the entry screen), but will also add to the time it takes you to get into the KF especially if you choose a strong password.<br /><br />The KF is tightly integrated to your Amazon account. You register the KF to your Amazon account. You can manage the KF from your Amazon account. Books, for example, that you have on your KF appear in your Amazon "Manage Kindle" section, so if you don't want somebody else to see what you are reading, you are out of luck.<br /><br />In short, there is no way to set up the KF for multiple users. This is NOT as some critics have suggested an easy thing to fix.<br /><br />Consider what Amazon would have to do:<br /><br />Have an "administrator" on the KF who can assign userids and passwords.<br /><br />Let multiple userids have access to the same Amazon account (say for credit card access) but, in this case, set up the "Manage Kindle" function on the Amazon account to prompt for a KF userid/password and, of course, limit the books and apps available to each user on the KF itself.<br /><br />In addition, it should allow each userid on the KF to be associated with its own distinct Amazon account.<br /><br />Then there is Amazon Prime. If you have multiple users on the Kindle, each with a separate Amazon account, would you need an Amazon Prime for each (assuming you want the benefits of Prime)? I've read that Amazon Prime can be shared for shipping but not for videos.<br /><br />In short, Amazon could develop software to make sharing safe & practical but it is not in the company's bottom-line interests to do so. It wants families to buy multiple Kindle Fires.<br /><br />I do not know how this compares to the security on other tablets.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">AMAZON PRIME</span><br />The 1 month free trial was a nice add-on and smart marketing.<br /><br />Limitations: the free 2-day shipping applies only, as far as I can tell, to products shipped directly from Amazon rather than from 3rd parties. So the value of the $70/year for fast shipping will depend on your shopping habits.<br />Second, you get some free TV shows and movies with Amazon Prime on the KF but the number is sufficiently small, limited, and, quite frankly, bizarrely displayed (no way to alphabetize that I could find), that it appears to be mainly a loss-leader, designed to encourage you to buy content. (It is more than a little annoying to scroll through the TV section, for example, and see what appear to be multiple instances of the same program but which turn out to be, when selected, different seasons or episodes. OTOH, you get the first 6 seasons of Buffy for free!)<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">1-CLICK</span><br />1-Click for the KF is a different animal from 1-Click for your standard Amazon account.<br /><br />You can turn your Amazon account's 1-Click On or Off.<br /><br />Some members have commented that there is a "turn off 1-click for mobile" option, but I found no such option on my account and wonder if by "mobile" what is meant is a smart phone.<br /><br />You have to set up 1-Click separately for the KF and once you have done that, there is no way to turn it off for the KF. And you cannot set up 1-Click to work with a gift card on the KF which would be one way of preventing a shopping spree.<br /><br />Unfortunately, you need 1-Click to get even free apps from the Kindle Store and to borrow library books.<br /><br />According to an e-mail I got from an Amazon rep, this is because those services are available only to U.S. residents and the credit card associated with the 1-Click proves one is a resident. I find this an absurd explanation. The KF is tightly linked to one's Amazon account, and if Amazon can offer credit card options for the KF 1-Click, it can surely ascertain that at least one of one's credit cards has a U.S. address. (Apparently, Amazon wouldn't mind if you had other credit cards with addresses outside the U.S.?)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Re gift cards</span>:if your Amazon account has a gift card balance, 1-Click on the Kindle will default first to the gift card balance before starting on the credit card. I don't know if you get any kind of warning when the gift card balance goes to 0.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">This is major security problem</span>. And not, as some critics have suggested, a problem only for families with ill-behaved and untrustworthy children. The KF, by its very size, is designed to be portable. Forget it someplace, leave it lying around and anybody could go on a shopping spree. If you are going to take it away from home, at a minimum set up a "Lock Screen Password" with a very strong password. (This, unfortunately, makes it less easy to simply pick up the KF, turn it on and start using it.)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Workaround</span><br /><br />I added a credit card to my Amazon account that I rarely use, then changed the credit card associated with the Kindle Fire to that card. Then I deleted that card from my Amazon account. 1-Click for Kindle disappeared. Apps I had "bought" (they were free but all turned up on said credit card) still worked. This is a pain. But if you have or can get a credit card with a very, very, very low limit, it might be a half-baked solution. If you have only one credit card and have turned on 1-Click for the KF, wait until all your purchases have hit the credit card, delete it, then put it back after your 1-Click for the KF is gone.<br /><br />I am hoping that Amazon doesn't realize some people are doing this and make it impossible to delete the credit card associated with 1-Click for the KF rather than just switch it to another credit card. If Amazon does something like this, we will learn something important about the company.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Summary:</span><br />If you've never owned a tablet, this is a good one to start with - if only because of the price. You're very likely to find it useful or fun in one way or another - provided you understand its limits before you buy - at least enough to justify the price, and by using it, you will figure out 1) whether you really want or need a tablet and 2) what features or functions are important to you.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Bottom Line:</span><br />I'll be keeping the KF because, bottom line, the tradeoff between price and functionality is acceptable for my purposes.<div style="position: fixed; display: none; z-index: 2147480000; background-color: rgb(0, 0, 255); padding: 4px; color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-radius: 7px 7px 7px 7px; font-size: 12px; max-width: 400px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: 100%; text-align: left; border-style: none; border-width: 1px; border-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); opacity: 1;"></div><div style="display: none; position: fixed; max-height: 5295px; width: 450px; padding: 3px; border-width: 0px 0px 2px 2px; border-style: dashed; border-color: grey; border-radius: 0px 0px 0px 5px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); overflow: auto; min-height: 200px; z-index: 2147479999; text-align: center; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); right: 0px; top: 0px;"><textarea spellcheck="false" style="height: 80px; width: 444px; border: 1px solid grey; padding: 2px;"></textarea><select><option value="af">Afrikaans</option><option value="sq">Albanian</option><option value="ar">Arabic</option><option value="hy">Armenian</option><option value="az">Azerbaijani</option><option value="eu">Basque</option><option value="be">Belarusian</option><option value="bg">Bulgarian</option><option value="ca">Catalan</option><option value="zh-CN">Chinese (Simplified)</option><option value="zh-TW">Chinese (Traditional)</option><option value="hr">Croatian</option><option value="cs">Czech</option><option value="da">Danish</option><option value="auto" selected="selected">Detect language</option><option value="nl">Dutch</option><option value="en">English</option><option value="et">Estonian</option><option value="tl">Filipino</option><option value="fi">Finnish</option><option value="fr">French</option><option value="gl">Galician</option><option value="ka">Georgian</option><option value="de">German</option><option value="el">Greek</option><option value="ht">Haitian Creole</option><option value="iw">Hebrew</option><option value="hi">Hindi</option><option value="hu">Hungarian</option><option value="is">Icelandic</option><option value="id">Indonesian</option><option value="ga">Irish</option><option value="it">Italian</option><option value="ja">Japanese</option><option value="ko">Korean</option><option value="la">Latin</option><option value="lv">Latvian</option><option value="lt">Lithuanian</option><option value="mk">Macedonian</option><option value="ms">Malay</option><option value="mt">Maltese</option><option value="no">Norwegian</option><option value="fa">Persian</option><option value="pl">Polish</option><option value="pt">Portuguese</option><option value="ro">Romanian</option><option value="ru">Russian</option><option value="sr">Serbian</option><option value="sk">Slovak</option><option value="sl">Slovenian</option><option value="es">Spanish</option><option value="sw">Swahili</option><option value="sv">Swedish</option><option value="th">Thai</option><option value="tr">Turkish</option><option value="uk">Ukrainian</option><option value="ur">Urdu</option><option value="vi">Vietnamese</option><option value="cy">Welsh</option><option value="yi">Yiddish</option></select><span style="font-weight: bold; cursor: pointer; color:lightgrey;" >⇄</span><select><option value="af">Afrikaans</option><option value="sq">Albanian</option><option value="ar">Arabic</option><option value="hy">Armenian</option><option value="az">Azerbaijani</option><option value="eu">Basque</option><option value="be">Belarusian</option><option value="bg">Bulgarian</option><option value="ca">Catalan</option><option value="zh-CN">Chinese (Simplified)</option><option value="zh-TW">Chinese (Traditional)</option><option value="hr">Croatian</option><option value="cs">Czech</option><option value="da">Danish</option><option value="nl">Dutch</option><option value="en" selected="selected">English</option><option value="et">Estonian</option><option value="tl">Filipino</option><option value="fi">Finnish</option><option value="fr">French</option><option value="gl">Galician</option><option value="ka">Georgian</option><option value="de">German</option><option value="el">Greek</option><option value="ht">Haitian Creole</option><option value="iw">Hebrew</option><option value="hi">Hindi</option><option value="hu">Hungarian</option><option value="is">Icelandic</option><option value="id">Indonesian</option><option value="ga">Irish</option><option value="it">Italian</option><option value="ja">Japanese</option><option value="ko">Korean</option><option value="la">Latin</option><option value="lv">Latvian</option><option value="lt">Lithuanian</option><option value="mk">Macedonian</option><option value="ms">Malay</option><option value="mt">Maltese</option><option value="no">Norwegian</option><option value="fa">Persian</option><option value="pl">Polish</option><option value="pt">Portuguese</option><option value="ro">Romanian</option><option value="ru">Russian</option><option value="sr">Serbian</option><option value="sk">Slovak</option><option value="sl">Slovenian</option><option value="es">Spanish</option><option value="sw">Swahili</option><option value="sv">Swedish</option><option value="th">Thai</option><option value="tr">Turkish</option><option value="uk">Ukrainian</option><option value="ur">Urdu</option><option value="vi">Vietnamese</option><option value="cy">Welsh</option><option value="yi">Yiddish</option></select><div style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(235, 239, 249);">Detect language » English</div><div style="width: 444px; max-width: 444px; padding: 2px; min-height: 80px; border-width: 1px; border-style: solid; border-color: grey; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="display: none;" class="afterthedeadline-button"> </div></div><div style="position: fixed; display: none; z-index: 2147480000; background-color: rgb(0, 0, 255); padding: 4px; color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-radius: 7px 7px 7px 7px; font-size: 12px; max-width: 400px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: 100%; text-align: left; border-style: none; border-width: 1px; border-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); opacity: 1;"></div><div style="display: none; position: fixed; max-height: 5295px; width: 450px; padding: 3px; border-width: 0px 0px 2px 2px; border-style: dashed; border-color: grey; border-radius: 0px 0px 0px 5px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); overflow: auto; min-height: 200px; z-index: 2147479999; text-align: center; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); right: 0px; top: 0px;"><textarea spellcheck="false" style="height: 80px; width: 444px; border: 1px solid grey; padding: 2px;"></textarea><select><option value="af">Afrikaans</option><option value="sq">Albanian</option><option value="ar">Arabic</option><option value="hy">Armenian</option><option value="az">Azerbaijani</option><option value="eu">Basque</option><option value="be">Belarusian</option><option value="bg">Bulgarian</option><option value="ca">Catalan</option><option value="zh-CN">Chinese (Simplified)</option><option value="zh-TW">Chinese (Traditional)</option><option value="hr">Croatian</option><option value="cs">Czech</option><option value="da">Danish</option><option value="auto" selected="selected">Detect language</option><option value="nl">Dutch</option><option value="en">English</option><option value="et">Estonian</option><option value="tl">Filipino</option><option value="fi">Finnish</option><option value="fr">French</option><option value="gl">Galician</option><option value="ka">Georgian</option><option value="de">German</option><option value="el">Greek</option><option value="ht">Haitian Creole</option><option value="iw">Hebrew</option><option value="hi">Hindi</option><option value="hu">Hungarian</option><option value="is">Icelandic</option><option value="id">Indonesian</option><option value="ga">Irish</option><option value="it">Italian</option><option value="ja">Japanese</option><option value="ko">Korean</option><option value="la">Latin</option><option value="lv">Latvian</option><option value="lt">Lithuanian</option><option value="mk">Macedonian</option><option value="ms">Malay</option><option value="mt">Maltese</option><option value="no">Norwegian</option><option value="fa">Persian</option><option value="pl">Polish</option><option value="pt">Portuguese</option><option value="ro">Romanian</option><option value="ru">Russian</option><option value="sr">Serbian</option><option value="sk">Slovak</option><option value="sl">Slovenian</option><option value="es">Spanish</option><option value="sw">Swahili</option><option value="sv">Swedish</option><option value="th">Thai</option><option value="tr">Turkish</option><option value="uk">Ukrainian</option><option value="ur">Urdu</option><option value="vi">Vietnamese</option><option value="cy">Welsh</option><option value="yi">Yiddish</option></select><span style="font-weight: bold; cursor: pointer; color:lightgrey;" >⇄</span><select><option value="af">Afrikaans</option><option value="sq">Albanian</option><option value="ar">Arabic</option><option value="hy">Armenian</option><option value="az">Azerbaijani</option><option value="eu">Basque</option><option value="be">Belarusian</option><option value="bg">Bulgarian</option><option value="ca">Catalan</option><option value="zh-CN">Chinese (Simplified)</option><option value="zh-TW">Chinese (Traditional)</option><option value="hr">Croatian</option><option value="cs">Czech</option><option value="da">Danish</option><option value="nl">Dutch</option><option value="en" selected="selected">English</option><option value="et">Estonian</option><option value="tl">Filipino</option><option value="fi">Finnish</option><option value="fr">French</option><option value="gl">Galician</option><option value="ka">Georgian</option><option value="de">German</option><option value="el">Greek</option><option value="ht">Haitian Creole</option><option value="iw">Hebrew</option><option value="hi">Hindi</option><option value="hu">Hungarian</option><option value="is">Icelandic</option><option value="id">Indonesian</option><option value="ga">Irish</option><option value="it">Italian</option><option value="ja">Japanese</option><option value="ko">Korean</option><option value="la">Latin</option><option value="lv">Latvian</option><option value="lt">Lithuanian</option><option value="mk">Macedonian</option><option value="ms">Malay</option><option value="mt">Maltese</option><option value="no">Norwegian</option><option value="fa">Persian</option><option value="pl">Polish</option><option value="pt">Portuguese</option><option value="ro">Romanian</option><option value="ru">Russian</option><option value="sr">Serbian</option><option value="sk">Slovak</option><option value="sl">Slovenian</option><option value="es">Spanish</option><option value="sw">Swahili</option><option value="sv">Swedish</option><option value="th">Thai</option><option value="tr">Turkish</option><option value="uk">Ukrainian</option><option value="ur">Urdu</option><option value="vi">Vietnamese</option><option value="cy">Welsh</option><option value="yi">Yiddish</option></select><div style="text-align: left; background-color: rgb(235, 239, 249);">Detect language » English</div><div style="width: 444px; max-width: 444px; padding: 2px; min-height: 80px; border-width: 1px; border-style: solid; border-color: grey; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="display: none;" class="afterthedeadline-button"> </div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-76799050197934781772011-06-15T15:07:00.000-07:002011-06-15T15:09:12.926-07:00Pro-choice needs new sloganWith increasing attacks on Roe v. Wade and on contraception, the Pro-Choice Movement needs to go on the offensive, starting with a new slogan.<br /><br />Two Suggestions:<br />To whom does your uterus belong? You or the government?<br />Who owns your uterus? You or the government?Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-90007664606463113312011-05-04T07:37:00.001-07:002011-05-04T07:50:17.080-07:00Bin Laden - misc. thoughtsWhether we show pictures or not, we can be sure of two things:<br /><br />1. He will now become a martyr to the terrorists who took their lead from him.<br /><br />2. Many will not believe that he is dead. Call it the Elvis phenomenon (where even a body & a burial ceremony did not stop random sightings).<br /><br />3. They found only 5 computers, 10 hard drives and no internet access? Hard to believe that anybody in charge of an ongoing world-wide conspiracy managed to do this with so little electronic technology.<br /><br />4. I have no idea what Bin Laden wanted to accomplish when he ordered 9/11, other than to prove that we were vulnerable. But with that one act, he set the U.S. well along the path to becoming a police state. 10 years later, one needs a passport of some kind to travel to Canada or Mexico. Flying means the equivalent of a full-body search, either electronic or manual. Guantanamo and torture are supported by our leaders and way too large a proportion of our population. Torture, thanks to Bin Laden, is now only wrong when other countries do it because they do it without justification while we do it with justification. (Needless to say, those who use it in other countries probably use the same justifications that we do.) <br /><br />10 years on, we have become a harsher country, a less free country. But Bin Laden only provided the push. As a nation, we did not have to fall off the cliff. We chose to respond to terror with terror. Bin Laden proved just how thin the veil of "civilization" is and how easy it is to breach it.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-65950770823938841382010-09-22T13:07:00.001-07:002010-09-22T13:09:58.490-07:00House Republicans Flexing Their MusclesIt's clear from several House hearings this week, including today's with Geithner, that House Republicans fully expect to be in control come January.<br /><br />I'm against Republican control for lots of reasons but most of all for the loss of Barney Frank as Chair. No Republican on his committee has anywhere near his breadth of experience or knowledge and Bachus (?), the current Sr. Rep. is a total loss.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-18934263124463561452010-09-18T10:17:00.000-07:002010-09-18T10:18:26.020-07:00Porteous impeachment trial - more thoughts on perjuryI don't think Porteous deserved to be made a Federal Judge, but I think these charges smell almost as bad as Porteous' behavior and to non-lawyer me show yet again how dishonest prosecutors at all levels of government use the technicalities of the law to punish people they can't otherwise punish.<br /><br />What do I mean? First, there is all this talk about what Porteous did prior to being named to the Federal Court. It's obvious that he was part of a crony system not uncommon, I suspect, in various parts of the country other than Louisiana. He was, at best, a moocher. But the Senate - which has been holding up most of Obama's judicial appointments for two years, either didn't bother to study his past or ignored it when they confirmed him. <br />Second, and to me even more troubling, is the use of the perjury club against Porteous and the related attempt to impeach the testimony of witnesses like Gardner. So Porteous signed a fake name to the bankruptcy petition to avoid publicity and submitted a "corrected" form the next day? To the ordinary citizen, this is clearly a "no harm, no foul" situation. It is being used against Porteous only because some people somewhere decided they wanted him off the Federal bench and this is a valid charge to bring against him. As for his lying on the bankruptcy documents about his income & debts in spite of swearing to tell the truth. I would, quite frankly, be surprised if even 10% of bankruptcy filings by individuals (or corporations, for that matter) were complete and honest. People lie. And people lie most about their income and debts. Think divorce trials if you have no experience with bankruptcy.<br /><br />Should we expect better behavior from lawyers and judges than from ordinary citizens? Theoretically, yes, But the ethics bar for lawyers has always struck me as being both rather low and rarely enforced. As for judges: if you can prove to me that no other judge on the State or Federal circuit has ever engaged in behavior similar to that of Porteous, than I will concede that the impeachment is justified. I'm willing to bet, however, that he is being singled out for reasons that I don't understand and therefore find highly suspicious. These impeachment charges seem to be the judicial equivalent of the charges brought against President Clinton: motivated by politics rather than justice.<br /><br />Lastly, I absolutely loathe the way trial attorneys use previous testimony to impeach witnesses, and I loathe the fact that they are able to do so. So Gardner today (Thursday, Sept. 16, 2010) said "no" to the posed question that Porteous was one of his best friends in the world, would only admit to his being a "very good friend". No ordinary person would under normal circumstances have accused Gardner of lying either before or now. Maybe he exaggerated before, maybe he no longer feels quite the same way, maybe he's just decided that his previous description of the friendship was juvenile. Big deal. (As for the bail bondsmen and lawyers who gave the FBI a "thumbs up" on Porteous, come on. How many people asked to give a future employer a fair assessment of a candidate don't, if they like the person, emphasize the good stuff and ignore the bad stuff? If this is a crime or evidence of undue influence, than I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a citizen who isn't guilty of such behavior.)<br /><br />It seems to me that way too many people are being sent to jail for "lying" in circumstances where ordinary people will lie - even under oath. (How many people who sign off on software license agreements have ever actually complied with all the terms let alone even read them?) It may be legal to use "perjury" charges to send people to jail, but in most* of the cases I've seen over the years, it seems to be used awfully selectively - like charging Al Capone with income tax fraud when the government couldn't get a conviction for any of his real crimes.<br /><br />*The only exception I can think of would be for people who lie under oath during a trial in order either to convict an innocent person or help a guilty person go free.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-61203242013815605332010-09-18T10:14:00.000-07:002010-09-18T10:17:32.258-07:00Porteous and recusalAs near as I can figure out, the undelying reason for impeaching Porteous was his refusal to recuse himself from a trial in which one of the attorneys was a friend "with benefits".<br /><br />If this is grounds for impeaching a judge, then why is Scalia still on the Supreme Court. He, as I recall, heard a case in which his duck-hunting partner, Dick Cheney, was a party.<br /><br />Yet another example of the selective application of certain standards of conduct.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-61407876863663157682010-09-16T13:35:00.000-07:002010-09-16T13:42:04.472-07:00Porteous Impeachment - Using Prior Testimony to ImpeachWhen Court TV first started, I watched it almost endlessly. And the more I watched, the more disenchanted I began with the legal system on show. Instead of trials being designed to find the truth, to reach justice, it turned out that trials were games with bizarre rules and the winner wasthe team that played the game better, that manipulated the rules better. No wonder so many citizens do their best to avoid jury duty.<br /><br />Future major trials (such as Simpson's and Clinton's) simply reinforced my opinion. And these hearings confirm them.<br /><br />In particular, I hate, nay loathe, the way prior testimony is used to impeach current testimony. Heaven forbid that your answer to a question today differs by so much as one word or two from one's testimony 5 or 10 years ago. One doesn't need to be an expert on how memory works to know that it is flawed, and this legal fiction that any variation in one's words from one time to another is proof of dishonesty or perjury is absurd, unfair and makes a mockery of the idea that our legal system cares about justice.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-60174286709283645902010-09-16T11:41:00.001-07:002010-09-16T12:12:46.932-07:00Impeach Porteous to Send a Message?Turley's basic argument for not impeaching Porteous is not that his behavior is exemplary, but that the misdeeds do not meet the standard demanded by the Constitution - especially since most of the charges date to his time as a State Judge and the bankruptcy issues were both personal and, my reading of Turley's position, trivial.<br /><br />As Turley points out, the Justice Department declined to prosecute Porteous for his acts while a State Judge - and for lying to the FBI - because it didn't think it could meet the evidentiary demands of a trial. In short, it passed the buck, telling the House and Senate to do what it could not do.<br /><br />The two main issues with the bankruptcy seem to be that the Judge signed a false name, on advice of his attorney, when he filed and didn't fully report all his income and debts. He did sign a false name, apparently (and there's no reason to doubt this) to avoid the embarrassment of having his name appear as a bankrupt in the local papers. The filing was amended the following day, under his real name. The House argues that he perjured himself. Period. Yes, but. This smacks all too much of how the system uses a technical but non-material matter to punish somebody for some activity that one disapproves of (either with or without substantive grounds for that disapproval). In short, if this kind of legal misdeed, even by a judge, is enough to justify impeachment then any judge who angers the PTB could be removed for some misdeed of some kind since few of us get through life without doing something we wish we hadn't.<br /><br />The second issue has to do with the judge's failure to fully and honestly report all his income (including an income tax refund)and his gambling debts as well as his incurrence of additional debt (gambling) while in bankruptcy (something he swore not to do). Since he signed the bankruptcy papers under threat of perjury, he is guilty of perjury and therefore deserves to be impeached. My problem with this is that, once again, perjury is being used as a weapon in a situation that, under most circumstances, would not result in any action against the individual. Indeed, in my own non-legal opinion, it seems to me that perjury is used all too often to impose political and legal penalties when the accusers have no other tools at hand. <br /><br />In other words, if he were not a judge, if he were an ordinary citizen, neither of these acts would, I suspect, result in any legal action against the debtor involved.<br /><br />Turley's other main, unspoken, argument is that Porteous as a State Judge did not act differently than any other Judge in his part of Louisiana and that the entire impeachment is, in essence, due to a decision the Judge made in a case that angered the PTB. And it would set a bad precedent to impeach a judge because, in essence, of a decision he issued as a judge.<br /><br />OTOH, the main unspoken argument for his impeachment seems to be that it would send a message to State Judges and potential judicial appointees that certain types of behavior can be expected to be punished - even if they are not disclosed prior to the receipt of a judicial appointment. This is the "long-term jail terms and the death penalty prevent crime" argument.<br /><br />Quite frankly, I think Porteous should have resigned and it is obvious to me that he didn't because he needs the income of a lifetime appointment - as well as the pension. He is by no means a sympathetic defendant.<br /><br />So the issue comes down to which is worse: using essentially spurious charges to unseat a Federal Judge - thus considerably lowing the bar for impeachment (like the impeachment of Clinton dud) - or telling the legal community that unethical if not outright illegal behavior is no bar to getting a Federal Judgeship.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-1700277215711937082010-09-16T11:38:00.000-07:002010-09-16T11:40:50.092-07:00Claire McCaskill - Impeachment Hearing - kudosI've seen McCaskill often during the past two years and she represents exactly the kind of person one would want a Senator to be: principled, articulate, willing to compromise.<br /><br />But one of her best characteristics is on view during this impeachment hearing. She is, in contrast to windbags Hatch and Whitehead, direct, no-nonsense, and to-the-point.<br /><br />CheersUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-82254776573449529662010-09-14T12:46:00.001-07:002010-09-14T14:37:34.239-07:00Impeachment Trial for Judge Porteous - Painful Testimoney on Tues. 9/14/2010As of the 2nd day of this trial, the most painful (difficult to watch) witness examinations were those of the bail bondsmen, esp. those by Rep. Hank Johnson of Jeffrey Duhon & Aubrey Wallace. The questions, as have been many by all of the attorneys on both sides, were often needlessly repetitive* - but neither Representative Johnson nor the witnesses (esp. Duhon)were particularly effective speakers - to put it mildly. Indeed, the personal discomfort of these witnesses was so obvious, I felt almost as if I were watching adults abusing puppies. And, yes, this is a question of class. Most of the people who testify in Congress are both rich and powerful or, if ordinary citizens, are people who have been selected for what might be called their "acceptability". I was saddened by the obvious lack of education of these (mainly) men - but, in spite of their illegal acts, the effort they put into their work differed only in quality & remuneration from that of many of the CEOs who we see daily. <br /><br />I've seen Johnson in a number of House hearings and Floor speeches and his performance today pretty much confirmed my impression of him: a man either of middling intellect or a remarkable, for a politician, inability to express himself fluently.<br /><br />*a majority of the Senators on the panel are/have been lawyers &/or prosecutors so the endless repetition of the instances of influence peddling so far alleged (free meals, trips to Las Vegas, hunting & fishing trips, etc.) is bizarre to watch esp. since the Defense doesn't deny that these actions occurred but only seems to be questioning whether or not such actions were customary at the time they occurred (almost all, it appears, happened before Porteous became a Federal Judge and a lot go back 15-25 years).Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-79738026914216449652010-08-17T18:39:00.001-07:002010-08-17T18:56:05.814-07:00For-profit colleges: This is Private EnterpriseAccording to a Wall Street Journal article (Aug. 17, 2010, Page B6), for-profit colleges are upset by proposed new rules from the DOE re government aid.<br /><br />According to the article, "the DOE in late July proposed rules intended to measure how well for-profit schools train students for "gainful employment" in a recognized occupation."<br /><br />It turns out that many (most?) of these wonderful examples of private enterprise "derive more than 80% of their revenue from federal student aid. Students attending for-profit schools, in general, are twice as likely to take on debt for an associate's degree and, when they do, they take on nearly twice as much debt compared with students who attend nonprofit and public institutions. While both groups would be entering the same job market, students with higher debt may find it more difficult to repay their loans."<br /><br />"According to the Institute for College Access & Success, an advocacy group promoting affordable higher education, 98% of for-profit school associate's degree recipients in 2007-2008 had loans in 2008, with average debt of $19,700. At public and nonprofit colleges, 40% of associate's degree recipients had loans, with average debt of $10,900."<br /><br />The proposed DOE guidelines hardly seem onerous. "Schools would face no penalties if they posted student-loan repayment rates above 45% or if students maintained debt-to-income ratios below 8% of total income."<br /><br />So, in essence, the Federal Government, i.e., you and me, are giving money - via student loans - to private companies, listed on stock exchanges with, no doubt, highly-paid CEOs and stockholders, to saddle young people who want an education with, probably, unacceptable levels of debt.<br /><br />Why, exactly, is this kind of government-funded education OK with Conservatives but the more normal direct support given, say, to public universities is criticized as being wasteful?<br /><br />One could, and should, of course make similar arguments about defense spending. How many so-called private companies that make products or provide services for the Defense and related Departments depend largely or wholly on government money for their profits? Is there any justification, other than Conservative economic philosophy, for assuming that such so-called private companies are any more competitive or efficient or innovative than, say, a non-profit run directly by the government - with no billion-dollar executives or profits that had to be distributed - would be? <br /><br />Just asking.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-88467531579599816602010-08-10T11:57:00.000-07:002010-08-10T12:11:57.600-07:00Smart Energy Meters - Overrated?Well, PG&E installed smart meters on our building, although we still don't have the promised computer access to monitor our usage.<br /><br />However, I fail to see how more detailed information will help most of us be better energy consumers, especially since the general goal seems to be to reduce usage during the day and time-shift it to the evening.<br /><br />Consider. If everybody in your home is elsewhere during the day (office, school, whatever), you are unlikely to use much energy during the day which means, logically, that your heaviest energy usage will be in the evening and night. <br /><br />Conversely, if one or more of you spend most of the day at home, there is a limit to what you can do to reduce consumption. In hot weather, you will need to run fans or a/c and probably won't do a lot of cooking. During the winter, you will need heat during the day as well as at night. Most people at home probably watch TV, listen to the radio or music, use a computer, etc. The degree to which those at home during the day can reduce or limit their energy usage is, I suspect, limited.<br /><br />I can see that smart meters might identify the most energy-intensive equipment but I suspect the surprises will be few. Most of us know that a/c uses a lot of energy and, if we have dishwashers, washing machines & dryers that they will use more energy than the radio. <br /><br />So I can see that the meters might affect usage at the margins, and maybe that's enough, but promises of significantly lower electric costs are unlikely to be met.<br /><br />And, as some people have realized, the effect on personal privacy and safety could be high since anybody monitoring usage by apartment or house would have a pretty good idea not only what the people inside are doing minute by minute but whether or not the dwelling is occupied and when it is most likely not to be occupied.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-33619258254425769822010-07-20T12:11:00.001-07:002010-07-20T12:15:00.150-07:00Microsoft Word 2000 & Windows 7 x64For reasons I won't go into, I needed to install Word 2000 (part of Office 2000 SR-1) under Windows 7 (x64). It installed, and Word launched - but there were no icons & it hung.<br /><br />I found a solution in a PC World Forum (http://forums.pcworld.com/index.php?/topic/73733-microsoft-word-2000-in-windows-7/page__gopid__381736&#entry381736): one person got it to work by uninstalling Windows Live Add-in 1.3 and Office Live Connector. <br /><br />I didn't have Office Live Connector, but I did have Windows Live Add-in. I uninstalled the latter, which I don't need, and Word began to work.<br /><br />Next I'll see if I can re-install Office 2010 (minus Live)and get the two to live together.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-48606895133454094632010-05-27T11:05:00.000-07:002010-05-27T11:17:23.754-07:00Worst Committee in the Congress? House Natural Resources CommitteeI've watched a lot of C-SPAN in the past two years, which means a LOT of Congressional hearings, and the quality of our representatives leaves a lot to be desired.<br /><br />But never have I seen such uniform incompetence as was on display May 26, 2010 when Acting Inspector General Mary Kendall testified to the House Natural Resources Committee about the audit of MMS (Minerals Management Service).<br /><br />Unlike Neil Barofsky, the Inspector General for TARP, who relishes finding problems, Ms. Kendall seemed determined to minimize their findings. As did all the members of the committee, Republican and Democrat, asking if the problems were really much worse than in other agencies, if the issues of fraternization were not common in other agencies, if proposed changes to ethics rules would be unfair in being limited to MMS, etc., etc. <br /><br />Worse, when the committee members weren't subtly defending MMS, their questions were uniformly unthoughtful and poorly phrased (to be kind). Half the time, quite frankly, I couldn't figure out what they were asking and I suspect that they didn't know either.<br /><br />Again, poor questions and demagoguery are not uncommon in Congressional hearings. But there are usually at least a few competent committee members. Not here.<br /><br />I suggest that the House dissolve this particular committee and find some people with an interest in and real knowledge of the issues.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-70346007609062517112010-05-11T15:14:00.000-07:002010-05-11T15:21:09.313-07:00Congressional Hearings on Gulf Oil Spill & Market CrashSigh. Believe me, I hold no brief for BP (or any of its associates) or for the automated trading systems which buy/sell in nanoseconds.<br /><br />But one must give the panelists in both hearings (on the Gulf Oil Spill and the market crash) for their patience when dealing with committee members whose general & specific ignorance was on high display.<br /><br />This is not to excuse the Republican committee members who used their time to opine (Bachus) on how technology really hasn't changed anything important (hard to believe he was the chair of this committee for years; the man is an idiot), to explain that regulation is never the solution, and to harp on how Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac have destroyed the economy. <br /><br />Are Democrats simply too dumb to use committee questions in their campaigns? I can't believe the average citizen, even in a red district/state, wants to elect somebody who believes that business as usual is good enough.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-45251257042848053372010-04-20T13:02:00.000-07:002010-04-20T13:18:50.624-07:00Lehman Failure - Spencer Bachus & Fuld agree: it's the Fed's faultWell, if proof were needed that Republicans have decided the financial crisis was the fault of the government and not of Wall Street, Bachus's questioning of the April 20, 2010 panel (with Fuld, former CEO of Lehman) during the hearing should put any such doubt away.<br /><br />Fuld's testimony was, in effect, that neither he nor Lehman did anything wrong. The regulators said they did nothing wrong. So they didn't. And if the Fed had opened up its window to them, or backed Barclay to let it buy Lehman, or .... well, you get the idea. <br /><br />So did Bachus question Fuld's denial of all responsibility? No he questioned a regulator from another government agency, not the Fed or the Sec, to elicit agreement that the Fed, in spite of protestations by Geithner, as former head of the New York Fed, and Bernanke, that it did have the authority to regulate Lehman, to stop its doing bad things and didn't do it.<br /><br />I simply do not understand how the media let Republicans get away with their continuing defense of the very companies responsible for the financial meltdown.<br /><br />Also clear from Republican declamations throughout this day's hearings is their belief, in spite of the meltdown following Lehman's collapse, that a "bailout" fund isn't necessary to assist in the orderly shutdown of failed institutions because the market should just let them fail. The market just let Lehman fail - and that caused the world's financial system to go into freefall.<br /><br />The media, in their continued obeisance to Republican talking points, allow Republicans to characterize a fund to be funded by the financial institutions themselves as a government guarantee or taxpayer-funded bailout when its sole purpose is not to save an institution but to shut it down, fire its management, zero out its creditors, and use the money from the fund to help in the unwinding of positions. <br /><br />But, of course, that would require the media to do their job, to do actual research. And that, of course, would be too much work. Indeed, since the SEC suit against Goldman Sachs was announced last week, our esteemed members of the press have wallowed, even gloried, in their inability to explain something very simple. Goldman sold a package of securities without telling the potential buyers a very critical piece of information: that the securities had been selected by a hedge fund which expected them to fail.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-77122090104696304382010-04-01T15:12:00.000-07:002010-04-01T15:15:08.444-07:00April !, 2010: Topeka'dThis is why I love Google, excuse me, Topeka - and why the company is not Microsoft. The former has always demonstrated a sense of humor; the latter, never.<br /><br /><a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/different-kind-of-company-name.html">Google changes it's name</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-51769402036068706622010-01-09T15:10:00.000-08:002010-01-09T15:14:46.355-08:00BBC News & The Christmas "Bomber"Cheers to BBC Reporter Mark Marvel (sp?) on the Sat. Jan. 9, 2010 3PM PST broadcast for his rational analysis of the media hysteria surrounding this failed attack. <br /><br />If only there were somebody, anybody, in the U.S. media capable of doing something more than repeating shrill right wingers ad nauseum. Campbell Brown may take the cake for cable hysteria, but if so, only by a bit.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-38488433037412817192009-10-23T09:54:00.000-07:002009-10-23T10:08:57.568-07:00Jon Stewart Skewers CNN - Fact Checking? (Oct. 12, 2009)Jon Stewart skewered CNN Oct. 12, 2009 (rebroadcast Oct. 22, 2009) although, to be fair, he could have done the same to MSNBC, FOX, or, quite frankly, every news organization on TV. Perhaps the best, and most illustrative, clip comes near the end (around the 8 min. mark), when a CNN anchor asks the reporter if there is any way to check the numbers. The reporter's obvious surprise at even being asked such a question tells it all. Reporting has sunk so low that, today, it doesn't even occur to anchors or reporters that when someone they are interviewing throws out a statistic or says "the American people know" that, just maybe, they should check the facts.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-october-12-2009/cnn-leaves-it-there">Stewart Skewers CNN</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-47670392041522860422009-10-22T14:25:00.000-07:002009-10-22T14:43:27.069-07:00Best and Worst Questioners in CongressWhen one watches House and Senate hearings, one soon notices several different methods of questioning:<br />1. The question that is a statement worded so that the person being questioned will/can answer only one way. These are generally self-motivated statements that are either thinly disguised praise of the policy or issue in question or even less thinly disguised disgust with the witness.<br /><br />2. Written<br />I think everyone I've watched has, at some time or another, read prepared questions. But even here, there are differences. In some cases, Jim Bunning and Richard Shelby come to mind, they seem not to have read the questions beforehand and more than occasionally, don't seem to understand what they are reading.<br /><br />3. Extemporaneous<br />The most engaged and brightest people in Congress usually ask questions without notes that demonstrate both their understanding of the issue at hand and their attention to the matters under discussion... which is not to say that a lot of dumb questions don't also get asked.<br /><br />Best questioner: Dingell in the House. Whether he reads prepared questions or asks them off the cuff, they are almost always short, direct, and to the point. Most hearings could be cut in half if other members followed his lead.<br /><br />Worst questioner: Emmanuel Cleaver, without question. Mr. Cleaver is one of those who rarely reads prepared questions but ought to because he hems and haws and doesn't seem to know when he starts a question, even if he has been present through most of the hearing, where he wants to go with it. Watching and listening to him is painful. He actually makes George W. Bush look good.<br /><br />Alan Grayson comes in a close second. On the House banking committee he routinely embarrasses himself. Grayson thinks he knows how to read income statements and balance sheets. He doesn't. And the poor witnesses, usually financial experts of one sort or another, are faced with the unenviable task of trying to answer a question so stupid it is meaningless without telling a member of Congress that he is a blithering idiot.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-85473926533503146382009-10-22T14:14:00.000-07:002009-10-22T14:25:25.785-07:00Best Chairman in Congress? Barney FrankI've been watching House and Senate hearings on C-SPAN almost incessantly this past year and while I've probably not seen every hearing, I think I've seen enough to be confident that Barney Frank is, hands down, the best Chair in either House. He may also be the smartest (intellectually and politically) politician in Congress.<br /><br />Although Frank can be darn difficult at times to understand, he knows his subject, he knows the parliamentary rules, he knows the people on his committee, both Republican and Democrat. There is a limit to his patience with Republican shenanigans, and he has both a sharp tongue and a sharp wit.<br /><br />Although I don't always agree with him, it is clear to me that often, when he veers rightward, he does so because he knows just how far the Dems can go and still get something passed.<br /><br />I'm also coming to appreciate Stupak, who chairs a sub-committee for both the way he manages the committee and for the clarity and relative succinctness both of his opening statements and questions.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-46675409915340325282009-10-21T16:22:00.000-07:002009-10-21T16:51:34.845-07:00Denmark - Not Socialism, CivilizationOn Oprah's Oct. 21, 2009, she visits Denmark, Dubai, Rio, and Istanbul. In talking to two Danish women, Oprah commented that although Denmark is a democratic country, it is also socialized. The women responded that they didn't think of it as being socialism but civilization - that taking care of the old and the sick is what it means to be civilized. I like that.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-14084147058327081792009-10-12T17:29:00.000-07:002009-10-12T17:34:46.286-07:00Sen. Jim Bunning (Ky.) - Most Sexist SenatorOK, it's obvious from discussions of various pieces of legislation that a lot of Senators are sexist, esp. the older male Senators.<br /><br />But I've noticed something "special" about Bunning. When he questions women who appear before committees on which he is a member, he addresses them by their first names, although he uses titles or full names for the men who appear before him.<br /><br />Sheila Bair (FDIC) is, thus, "Sheila" (accompanied by a paternal smile). And in an Oct. panel of experts on Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the mortgage industry, Prof. Susan Wachter (Wharton) became "Dr. Susan". <br /><br />I'm not sure which is worse: that he does it without knowing he does it or that he does it on purpose to indicate his lack of respect for female professionals.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-41506885850744240632009-10-10T05:58:00.000-07:002009-10-10T06:03:34.618-07:00Alan Grayson - Idiot Representative Gets MediaPlease, before you crown Grayson as the newest Democratic light in the House, watch some of Barney Frank's hearings on the financial mess. Grayson makes a fool of himself time and time again, asking questions about financial reports that prove only how little he understands them. One can see the amazement/distress in the eyes of people like Geithner and Bernanke who, faced with one of Grayson's illogical, ignorant questions, tries to figure out how to answer him without telling him that he's a blithering idiot.<br /><br />Yes, he does get points for taking down Olympia Snowe - I, too, am damn upset that the health care system for the next two decades may be decided by Senators from Maine, Nebraska, Montana, and North Dakota - but he's a publicity hound who has discovered that politicians who make outrageous statements get air time while politicians who don't, don't.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3196212160648021974.post-68180917779170678502009-10-10T05:13:00.000-07:002009-10-10T05:29:43.312-07:00Keith Olbermann - Hour Long, Self-Indulgent Rant on Health Care ReformWednesday night (Oct. 7, 2009), Olbermann outdid himself with an embarrassing, self-indulgent, hour-long rant supposedly in support of health care reform - brought about by his experience with his father's serious illness.<br /><br />First off, he surely embarrassed his father with details of how the problem began - just a day or two after a comment that he had missed a number of shows because of his father's illness but didn't want to invade his father's privacy with details.<br /><br />Second, it was quite clear that his father got excellent care, for which Olbermann is grateful and which, apparently, did point out to him how lucky he was in contrast to the experience of so many others without his financial resources.<br /><br />That's fine. I would have given him 5 or 10 minutes to let us know why he is so emotional about the issue.<br /><br />But the hyperbole went on and on and on and on - and he contributed zip to the conversation. <br /><br />The media, focused as always on the politics of the issue, have been MIA when it comes to informing people about the details of the various bills and the various trade offs (e.g., why a mandate is necessary - to have a large pool in which to spread risk; the difficulties of establishing the "sweet point" for a fine: if the price is too low, it will be cheaper to pay the fine than buy health care; if too high, the risks of non-compliance, effect on employment, etc.).<br /><br />I had hoped, when I first heard about his plans for an hour-long "special comment", that he might focus on the key issues. Silly me. Just an endless series of hyperbolic statements about health care being about death, speculations about how those less fortunate must feel in similar situations, repeated details about his experience, mention of his sister, more details about his father.<br /><br />The whole hour was a waste, a self-referential, poorly written, poorly argued mess.<br /><br />Anybody who truly cares about health reform must have writhed in pain at the thought of what they could have done with a full hour in which they need not interview anybody or present opposing opinions.<br /><br />Why couldn't MSNBC have given the hour to Uwe Reinhardt, a brilliant speaker on health care reform who knows the facts and how to present them.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0