EdDriscoll.com

Posted 4/6/2002 01:25:08 PM by Edward Driscoll
EXCELLENT ARTICLE BY David Brooks, the author of Bobos in Paradise, called "Among the Bourgeoisophobes", which would make a very good double feature alongside with Tom Wolfe's "In the Land of the Rococo Marxists" essay. Brooks starts with 1830s French intellectuals, and their irrational hatred of the bourgeois, and takes them to their final destination: communists, Nazis and the Taliban. While he doesn't feel American bourgeoisophobia is as virulent a strain, he does note that it falls into several categories:

There is straightforward, left-wing bourgeoisophobia from writers who think commercial culture has ravaged our souls. Then there is the right-wing variant that says it has made us spiritually flat, and so turned us into comfort-loving Last Men. Then there is the conservative pessimism that purports to be a defense of the heroic bourgeois culture America embodies while actually showing little faith in it. Writers of this school argue that the solid capitalist values America once possessed have been corrupted by intellectual currents coming out of the universities--as if the meritocratic capitalist virtues were such delicate flowers that they could be dissolved by the acid influence of Paul de Man. It all adds up to a lot of dark foreboding, and after September 11, it doesn't look that impressive. The events of the past several months have cast doubt on a century of mostly bourgeoisophobe cultural pessimism. Somehow the firemen in New York and the passengers on Flight 93 behaved like heroes even though they no doubt lived in bourgeois homes, liked Oprah, shopped at Wal-Mart, watched MTV, enjoyed their Barcaloungers, and occasionally glanced through Playboy. Even more than that, it has become abundantly clear since September 11 that America has ascended to unprecedented economic and military heights, and it really is not easy to explain how a country so corrupt to the core can remain for so long so apparently successful on the surface. If we're so rotten, how can we be so great? It could be, as the bourgeoisophobes say, that America thrives because it is spiritually stunted. It's hard to know, since most of us lack the soul-o-meter by which the cultural pessimists apparently measure the depth of other people's souls. But we do know that despite the alleged savagery, decadence, and materialism of American life, Americans still continue to react to events in ways that suggest there is more to this country than "Survivor," Self magazine, and T.G.I. Friday's. Confronted with the events of September 11, Americans have not sought to retreat as soon as possible to the easy comfort of their great-rooms (on the contrary, it's been others around the world who have sought to close the parenthesis on these events). President Bush, a man derided as a typical philistine cowboy, has framed the challenge in the most ambitious possible terms: as a moral confrontation with an Axis of Evil. He has chosen the most arduous course. And the American people have supported him, embraced his vision every step of the way--even the people who fiercely opposed his election.

It's a long article, but well worth reading. (Link found on InstaPundit.)

Posted 4/6/2002 11:48:08 AM by Edward Driscoll
THE SMARTEST CD EVER MADE: Glenn Reynolds picks up the recent flap over the new Celine Dion CD, which will apparently crash any computer that tries to play it.

And when you reboot the computer it'll crash it again. And you won't be able to get it out of the CD drive -- without prying it out with a paperclip -- because, of course, it's crashed the computer! They've shipped an intentionally defective product and it's causing lots of people problems with their computers. Not only will they be sued all over the place for this, and probably lose, but it occurs to me that there may be criminal liability under some of the antihacking and "computer sabotage" statutes. Anyone seen anything on that?

The normally extremely astute InstaPundit may be missing the big picture here. This may be a CD containing a computer program so intelligent that it makes the Turing Test look like something given to pre-schoolers. It's smart enough to not want to listen to Celine Dion. And it knows you don't want to listen to her, either! Seriously, the ham-handed attempts by the record industry to prevent listeners from copying products that they already own (I have a CD burner, as well as a 300 CD carousel "jukebox"--I make copies to keep in my car, so that I don't have to go rummaging through the jukebox to have some music to play while I'm driving has to be ultimately hurting the record companies, in the form of lawsuits and bad press than it helps. And people are already paying royalties on blank media for the ability to copy the stuff. Back in early January, Reynolds said:

I think some enterprising class-action plaintiffs' lawyer should sue and demand that they disgorge all their blank-media royalties, or something equally rotten. Serves 'em right, as they're rather fond of baseless lawsuits themselves.

The other problem that the record companies are facing is their current product is pretty lousy. It's very rare for me to hear new music that I want to buy. And I suspect a lot of other people feel the same way. The poor ratings of this year's Grammy Awards tend to indicate that as well.

Posted 4/6/2002 10:57:26 AM by Edward Driscoll
DOESN'T SOUND WOBBLY (at least to me): John J. Miller, writing on The Corner on National Review Online, has quotes from an interview President Bush did yesterday on Iraq, with Britain's ITV network:

Q I take your point about no immediate plans, but in a sense, have you made up your mind that Iraq must be attacked? THE PRESIDENT: I made up my mind that Saddam needs to go. That's about all I'm willing to share with you. Q And you would take action to make sure that happens? And, of course, if the logic of the war on terror means anything -- which you have explained -- then Saddam must go? THE PRESIDENT: That's what I just said. The policy of my government is that he goes. Q People think that Saddam Hussein has had no links with the al Qaeda network, and I'm wondering why you have -- THE PRESIDENT: The worst thing that could happen would be to allow a nation like Iraq, run by Saddam Hussein, to develop weapons of mass destruction and then team up with terrorist organizations so they can blackmail the world. I'm not going to let that happen. Q So you're going to go after him? THE PRESIDENT: As I told you, the policy of my government is that Saddam Hussein not be in power. Q And how are you going to achieve this, Mr. President? THE PRESIDENT: Wait and see.

Posted 4/5/2002 04:36:25 PM by Edward Driscoll
BUT WILL TK-421 BE THERE? The line up of fans outside of Grauman's Chinese Theatre to be the first in line to see Star Wars: Episode II: The Attack of the Clones has begun. They even have their own official site.

Posted 4/5/2002 03:30:47 PM by Edward Driscoll
PALO ALTO: AN 802.11 HOTZONE. Just got off the phone with Arturo Pereyra, co-founder and general manager of WiFi Metro, which has recently created an 802.11 "HotZone" in Palo Alto, California (about a half hour from Ed HQ here in San Jose). According to Silicon Valley Business Ink:

The main area of coverage in Palo Alto runs along University Avenue from the CalTrain station on Alma Street to Ramona Street on the eastern end, extending at least one block deep on either side of University Avenue. Anyone with a WiFi Metro subscription and an 802.11b networking card plugged into his or her laptop can logon within those boundaries.

For a map of that area, check out this page from WiFi Metro's own site. Now, just about any restaurant, or the local Borders, can be a "third place", complete with Internet access. Can't wait to try it out myself!

Posted 4/5/2002 02:48:05 PM by Edward Driscoll
....THEN THE RAZZIES, THEN THE RINOS, NOW THE SAP AWARDS: Larry Elder says that with the Academy Awards behind us, he now turns his attention to the SAP Awards, honoring the biggest Second Amendment Phony. And the nominees are...

Posted 4/5/2002 02:13:05 PM by Edward Driscoll
WELCOME NEWCOMERS FROM OPRAH! The Wall Street Journal is reporting that "talk-show hostess Oprah Winfrey is ending Oprah's Book Club, a monthly feature that provided a huge boost in sales to the authors lucky enough to be featured on the show." Clearly, the viewers of Oprah now have a void in their leisure time. And we stand here, ready to fill it! (Actually, we're sitting down. Sometimes we don't wear socks. Other times, we don't wear pants. But then, on the Internet, nobody knows this. Unless you tell them, like I just did. Where was I? Oh yeah...) For those of you who are here because you now have nothing to read, welcome! We're here to keep you up to date on the tastiest links on the Internet, on this page. For more to read, you'll find a list of articles and essays I've written on the left (when I'm not wearing pants, I'm also a freelance journalist for a variety of magazines), as well as links to numerous other sites on the Web. If it's those old-school, dead tree style books you're in the mood for, click on the Amazon banner below. There you'll find an unlimited supply of material to chose from, from our friends at Amazon.com. Used books? Visit Bookfinder.com. Need some help choosing a title? Stop by the Brothers Judd, and search their hundreds of reviews of books, many often more intellectually stimulating than Oprah's choices! And then stop back here. Because I know that losing a trusted source of book recommendations is difficult. But we'll get through this together. Honest.

Posted 4/5/2002 12:23:45 PM by Edward Driscoll
STEPHEN HAWKING, IMAGINARY TIME, AND THE DANGERS OF IMAGINARY REALITY: At Reason, there's a sharp profile of Stephen Hawking at Cambridge, talking of black holes, unified field theory, Marilyn Monroe, and imaginary time. While meanwhile, over at National Review Online, Dave Kopel has an essay on the founders of postmodernism, and the dangers of imaginary reality.

Posted 4/5/2002 11:16:42 AM by Edward Driscoll
ROPE-A-DOPE UPDATE: Stephen Green's VodkaPundit is back online after a quick server change, with lots of good content including an explanation of the term rope-a-dope. Apparently, there are people who don't know what the term means. People, where were you during the 1970s??

Encyclopedia Stevania Some of you are apparently unfamiliar with "rope-a-dope." Back in '74, Mohammed Ali fought George Foreman in the "Rumble in the Jungle" in Zaire. Ali was the underdog -- too old, too slow, too soft, to beat the young, brutal world champ. Most of the fight, Ali looked bad. He was up against the ropes, just fending off Foreman's punches. For round after round, Ali just stood there and took the beating. By the ninth round (I think) Foreman was punched out. He'd thrown so many blows -- to little apparent effect -- that he was just plain tired. And Ali came back swinging. Dropped Foreman to the mat and won on a disputed count. That is the rope-a-dope.

There's a brilliant documentary about that fight, which documents the term, Ali's incredible balls, magnetism, and (sadly) knuckleheaded politics (Ali thought Zaire would be paradise, only to discover that the ruler of Zaire was a brutal thug) released a few years ago called When We Were Kings. For those who only know Ali as a tired old man, or as somebody played by Will Smith, it's electrifying to see the real thing in action, in his prime. By the way, as much as I like Vodka in a Pundit, I'm sticking with gin in my Martinis and Gibsons (mmm...Gibsons....), unless I'm mixing it with vodka and Lillet blonde in the form of a Vesper.

Posted 4/5/2002 10:59:58 AM by Edward Driscoll
BOOKFINDER.COM is celebrating their fifth anniversary this year. I've purchased many a used book via their search engine, which searches the catalogs of a variety of new and used online booksellers. The result was that several books that I read as a teenager and then lost (for whatever the reason), as well as numerous out of print or had to constantly borrow through interlibrary loans I've since been able to own via Bookfinder's remarkable search engine. Bookfinder began in January 30, 1997, when nineteen-year-old UC Berkeley bibliophile and college student Anirvan Chatterjee put his new search engine of online sellers of new and used books online. Chatterjee recently typed up the history of Bookfinder.com in a brief retrospective. Like the Brothers Judd book review site, or all of the blogs out there, it's a nifty example of how a business has grown successfully on the Internet, without a zillion dollars in VC funding, an IPO or bond offering. I first heard about Bookfinder when a friend mentioned it to me (and warned me that she would not be responsible for my purchases there. If you've never tried it, I'll offer the same caveat--if you like used books, it can be a very addicting site.

Posted 4/5/2002 01:42:44 AM by Edward Driscoll
ARTHUR ANDERSEN STARTING TO CRUMBLE IN THE US: In the very early Cro-Magnon days of this site, just when our pixels were beginning to walk upright (oh, about three weeks ago), we mentioned the rumors that the rapidly asphixiating accounting firm formally known as Arthur Andersen was about to be aquired by Deloitte & Touche. A story on Yahoo! News says:

Paring down operations to raise revenue and trying to stay alive, Andersen announced a tentative agreement Thursday with Deloitte & Touche for a "significant" number of its U.S. tax partners and professionals to join the rival firm.

I'd say "advantage Ed", but this one could be seen coming a mile away, its sodium-vapor highbeam doublefront maximum headlines gleaming in the tunnel. When the Enron scandal first broke, Glenn Reynolds described Enron as a potential meta-scandal, infecting everybody. Here's one of the first suspects to get nuked from the fallout.

Posted 4/5/2002 01:30:29 AM by Edward Driscoll
THE NEW WELFARE QUEENS: Thomas Sowell on the dangers of America being bilked by the International Monetary Fund:

Where it is simply a matter of allowing people to survive in the short run � as with the Marshall Plan in war-devastated Europe or emergency aid during famines in India in years past � then, of course, immediate help is urgently needed. But a distinguished Indian economist warned long ago that continued shipments of American wheat to his country inhibited the development of India's own agriculture. Instead of continuing to rely on donations of wheat from America, India reformed its restrictive agricultural policies. Its own production of wheat then increased so much that today it has a surplus of wheat. Had we continued to supply India with wheat, no doubt the foreign aid bureaucrats could point to statistics on all the lives we "saved" in India with our food. But instead, those people have been kept alive with India's own food. Indeed, a few years ago, India was able to ship surplus wheat to Ethiopia to relieve a famine there.

Posted 4/4/2002 11:41:25 PM by Edward Driscoll
THE ARGUMENT AGAINST ARAFAT: Jonah Goldberg says that the official tough question on every cable news show seems to be:

"How can you expect Yasser Arafat to stop suicide bombers when he can't even use his cell phone?" ask one interviewer after another of any Israeli official they can find. I find this bizarre. When we put Mafia bosses in jail, we rarely pay them much heed when they complain that incarceration will make it difficult for them to stop their hit men from committing more crimes. When we catch Osama bin Laden, will the peaceniks who look so adoringly upon Arafat also nod sagely when bin Laden declares, "How can I stop more terrorist attacks from inside my prison cell?" And yet, for some reason, Western diplomats, activists and journalists seem to believe that Arafat cannot be held accountable for anything he's done. He can only be supported because "Israel has to negotiate with somebody." That he did nothing to stop suicide bombers when he could, means nothing.

Posted 4/4/2002 09:25:03 PM by Edward Driscoll
FCC URGES ADVANCES IN DIGITAL TV: CNET.com says that:

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell on Thursday proposed voluntary steps for the TV industry to advance the transition to digital, including setting deadlines, boosting available programming, and getting shows to run on cable. The proposals are "intended to provide an immediate spur to the transition by giving consumers a reason to invest in digital technology today, while we continue to work on resolving the longer term issues," he said in a letter to Congress.

Posted 4/4/2002 08:40:03 PM by Edward Driscoll
THE FORREST GUMP OF THE FAA? Writing in Slate, Joshua Green says that Bob Woodward made the secretary of transportation a false hero in Woodward and Dan Balz's six-part Washington Post epic, "10 Days in September":

Mineta's courageous performance has been widely praised, not least by Mineta himself in a Sept. 20 appearance before Congress, and again on 60 Minutes II a month later. Here's his congressional testimony:
I immediately called the FAA, told them to bring all the airplanes down right now. All that we have learned since that fateful morning leaves me convinced that this unusual command or order was the right thing to do.
For Mineta, the genuflection this tale has engendered has been a welcome distraction from less mythic performances, such as his department's problems getting the new airport security agency off the ground. Long considered a competent if unremarkable backbencher, Mineta has refashioned himself as a quick-thinking decision-maker with flawless instincts in an emergency. He may be that, but he isn't the hero Woodward and Balz make him out to be. According to insiders, that honor belongs to Monte Belger, at the time the No. 2 official at the FAA. A precise, diligent career bureaucrat known among colleagues as "the Forrest Gump of the FAA," Belger was on a phone bridge with controllers at the David J. Hurley Air Traffic Control System Command Center in Herndon, Va., and ordered flights grounded 15 minutes before Mineta was even notified of the attacks. So, when the secretary issued his blunt order�"Monte, bring all the planes down!"�Monte had already done so.

Found via Reductio Ad Absurdum.

Posted 4/4/2002 08:08:23 PM by Edward Driscoll
HERE'S A HEADLINE YOU DON'T SEE EVERYDAY: The BBC News says "Ozzy Osbourne invited to White House".

Posted 4/4/2002 07:56:37 PM by Edward Driscoll
YET ANOTHER REASON TO LIKE WAL-MART: Like Jonah Goldberg, I used to be a real anti-Wal-Mart snob. I thought of it as being only for folks who drink Yoo-Hoo and Mountain Dew and buy clothes made of materials to be found nowhere in nature. And yet, the more I began to read about them, the more I began to like them--a lot. (I think it all changed when I was shopping with my wife for party supplies this fall, and found Citizen Kane on DVD there, about a day or two after it was released). Shiloh Butcher, on her Dropscan Digest blog has another reason to like them:

Unlike many other large corporations, Wal-Mart no longer automatically settles to avoid the cost of further litigation. This strategy is one of the ways they keep their prices so low. Every year, thousands of people attempt to better their financial situation by suing their local Wal-Mart, often turning to lawyers who specialize in suing Sam. To combat this legal onslaught, the 'Mart aggressively fights those who would bleed them with torts and they usually win. If more corporations would follow their lead, there wouldn't be such a need for tort reform.

The USA Today article makes an interesting comparison in this paragraph:

Wal-Mart, which promotes itself as a down-home friendly business, is helping change the nature of corporate litigation by aggressively fighting many cases even when it would be cheaper for the company to settle, analysts say.

Why are the two incompatible? Isn't Wal-Mart also being friendly to its customers by keeping prices down by not knuckling under to lawsuits?

Posted 4/4/2002 04:22:24 PM by Edward Driscoll
A PALESTINIAN HONG KONG: Not a bad suggestion by James D. Miller:

Israel should take over the Palestinian cities and run them as the British administered Hong Kong. If the Palestinians got richer they might be less likely to become suicide bombers. Israel and the U.S. could subsidize these cities and make them tax-free havens. Free from taxation and corruption, the Palestinians would undoubtedly transform their despair into wealth.

Posted 4/4/2002 03:22:22 PM by Edward Driscoll
FRENCH "NO IT REALLY DIDN'T HAPPEN" CONSPIRACY UPDATE: Damian Penny has an update on L'effroyable Imposture, the book we mentioned on Sunday: the recent best seller in France claiming that a plane didn't crash into the Pentagon on 9/11 (I think they said it was sitting in the grassy knoll with Oliver Stone at the time--probably with Lyndon LaRouche at the controls).

Posted 4/4/2002 02:36:19 PM by Edward Driscoll
MICHAEL JORDAN VERSUS FATHER TIME: Skip Bayless on Michael Jordan's comeback: "How great and sad it was to watch him play."

Posted 4/4/2002 01:50:28 PM by Edward Driscoll
THE BIGGER, FASTER, STRONGER INTERNET: While the current Internet, running on a cable modem or 802.11 connection may seem fast, there's a reason why we're not watching TV on it, and downloading MP3s, as opposed to listening to them in real time. But that may change in a few years. I just received a copy (for my files) of the March issue of TecHomeBuilder, a magazine for builders specializing in network-equipped "smart homes". Inside is my article on Internet2, a research and development consortium of more than 180 universities, about 70 companies and 40 other organizations that are using high-performance networks to test new technologies and deploy new applications. Specifically, an Internet backbone network fast enough to support HDTV and other applications. It also mentions Canarie, which is Canada's high-speed Internet project. They have a program that could take modem-bonding to an extreme degree, using multiple fiber optic cables linked together to support an enormous amount of bandwidth. The text of my article is online, but unfortunately, it loses a little something in this translation, especially as it lacks graphics, bold headlines and subheads, etc. However, for more on Internet2, check out: The Internet2 Website Canarie's Website

Posted 4/4/2002 01:33:53 PM by Edward Driscoll
MEDIA WATCH: Found on the Media Research Center's CyberAlert page, it speaks volumes about television news when a comedian asks better questions than anchormen:

The host of a comedy show posed tougher questions to conservative-basher David Brock on Tuesday night than did Today co-host Matt Lauer or CNN�s Aaron Brown back in mid-March. On the April 2 Daily Show on the Comedy Central cable channel, a mock newscast, host Jon Stewart asked Brock: "Is the left-wing innocent in all this?" He wondered: "Don�t they have their own team of guys trying to dig up dirt on the right? Isn�t this a relatively balanced operation?" When Brock disagreed, Stewart pointed out: "Hustler, Larry Flint, offered millions of dollars to people for sexual material on right-wingers, on Gingrich and those folks. There is some balance to it."

Read the whole interview--it's surprisingly in depth, considering it was on a comedy show.

Posted 4/4/2002 12:39:38 PM by Edward Driscoll
HOW TO TANK EUROPEAN ECONOMY, PART II: Found on Reason's Daily Brickbat page:

Norway has banned fat fishermen from plying their trade. Worried that hard work might harm obese men, the government hopes to force them to lose weight by threatening their jobs. Many don't meet the official body-mass standards, so instead of a lot of overweight fishermen, Norway may soon have a lot of overweight welfare recipients.

Posted 4/4/2002 12:30:03 PM by Edward Driscoll
INSTAPUNDIT SAYS: AS BUSH WOBBLES, ED'S LOOKING BETTER. Oh wait, it's that damned Canadian sock puppet. Nevermind! Seriously though, it's not easy watching Bush wobble on Israel. UPDATE: The current consensus in "Blogistan" (thanks Alex!) is, ignore the headlines. Bush is playing rope-a-dope in the Middle East. Hope they're right.

Posted 4/4/2002 12:20:21 PM by Edward Driscoll
WHY MICROSOFT PRESIDENT QUIT: Wired News has an update to the story on Microsoft president's resignation yesterday:

sources inside Microsoft said that Belluzzo's control over projects had been systematically pulled away from him, "a sure sign on the Microsoft campus that you should start drafting an announcement indicating a need to spend more time with your family," another Microsoft employee said. Before being appointed amid much fanfare last year, Belluzzo focused on the company's consumer operations, including the Xbox game system, MSN Messenger instant messaging system and the Ultimate TV service. Belluzzo also was instrumental early on in the company's .NET initiative. "Rick enjoyed coming up with new ideas for products and services, but the ones he focused most on weren't our big money-makers," the games programmer said. "I think he didn't want to be just a guy who signed off on paperwork, and that's essentially what his job became. He had been pulled off the brainstorming committees for all his big projects over the past four months." Analysts also suspected that Belluzzo resigned in part due to loss of control over his pet projects. "They gave him a fun job and then took away the fun stuff," speculated Rob Enderle of Giga Information Group.

UPDATE: Yahoo News also has more information on Belluzzo's resignation.

Posted 4/4/2002 12:12:07 PM by Edward Driscoll
HOW TO HELP TANK THE EUROPEAN ECONOMY: Found on The Corner on National Review Online:

A NEW LOW [Andrew Stuttaford] Just when you think that the EU has finally plumbed the depths of stupidity, Brussels comes up with something worse. The London Times is reporting that the European Commission is proposing to impose a new tax of up to $75 a ticket on airline travelers. Its excuse? The tax will contribute to the cost of each flight's supposed contribution to 'global warming'. The levy would also help Europe's established airlines against low cost competition, but that, of course, is only a coincidence. For those concerned by recent reports (mentioned on The Corner) that Europe is no warmer than it was one thousand years ago, don't worry. Brussels will shortly be introducing a tax on all trips by horse and cart.

And clearly, it's only a matter of time before NATO will start patrolling European waterways looking for riverboat gamblers.

Posted 4/4/2002 11:59:52 AM by Edward Driscoll
802.11 UPDATE: Patrick Ruffini has a good essay on his blog regarding the implications of 802.11b wireless networking. Perhaps one of the most intriguing possibilities of 802.11 is a project that NTT Communications is planning in Tokyo, for 802.11 service over a range of several miles:

CNN.com - NTT unit looks at high-speed wireless access - April 2, 2002 TOKYO, Japan (Reuters) -- NTT Communications Corp, Japan's largest long-distance telephone and Internet services firm, said Wednesday it was seeking government approval to begin high-speed wireless Internet access services.

Later in the article, the range of the proposed network is mentioned:

Service providers and manufacturers see wireless LAN as an ideal technology for Japan because of the high cost of connecting its congested buildings. NTT Communications would use a different wireless LAN technology from DoCoMo's that would allow signals to be sent and received over a much wider area, with a radius of about eight kilometers (five miles) instead of a radius of a few hundred meters.

It will be interesting to watch the range of 802.11 networks expand in size--as I've been saying, I think 802.11 is going to be one the technology trends in this decade.

Posted 4/3/2002 11:28:01 PM by Edward Driscoll
MICROSOFT PRESIDENT RESIGNS: AP is reporting that Microsoft President Rick Belluzzo unexpectedly announced his resignation on Wednesday, after the markets had closed. Microsoft Corp. president and chief operating officer Belluzzo resigned after just over a year in the job, and Microsoft said it would eliminate his position.

Posted 4/3/2002 11:22:30 PM by Edward Driscoll
COMPANIES SLOWLY STARTING TO HIRE: While this has been a flat week for the stock market (due to Middle East tensions), The Tampa Bay Online says that ever so slowly, help-wanted signs are starting to replace the layoff notices:

Nurses and teachers are in short supply. Home furnishing stores are hiring, as are hotels, amusement companies and other recreation-type businesses. And temporary employment agencies are being asked to fill more jobs. The increased business at the nation's temp firms is significant as the country begins to recover from recession. Businesses, hesitant to hire new full-time employees, turn to temporary hires.

Posted 4/3/2002 09:13:01 PM by Edward Driscoll
THE RISE AND RISE OF THE USS CLUELESS: Steven Den Beste has a very good essay on the care and feeding of a Web log. Glenn Reynolds responds with a similar (if shorter) essay of his own. Taken together, they're the anti-Beams. Not surprisingly, they also make far more sense.

Posted 4/3/2002 08:23:41 PM by Edward Driscoll
D'OH! Joanne Jacobs, at readjacobs.com tells what's probably an ufortunately all-too-common Passover tale:

My daughter went to a second-night seder hosted by a UC-Santa Cruz friend whose parents have gone Jew-Bu (Jewish Buddhist); another guest is rebelling against her parents by rejecting her Hindu name for the original "Rachel.'' Then there's the half-Jewish guest who looked at the matzohs and asked, "What's that?'' No, he wasn't playing the "foolish son.'' He didn't know. Later, he asked, "So how does Easter tie in?'' Told that Easter was a Christian holiday, he said, "Really?''

Posted 4/3/2002 08:14:19 PM by Edward Driscoll
SPEEDY GONZALES UPDATE (Gee, those are three words I never thought I'd type in a row): First Fox News reported that the Cartoon Network pulled Speedy Gonzales off the air because "The rapid rodent has been deemed an offensive ethnic stereotype of Mexicans, and has been off the air since the cable network became the sole U.S. broadcaster of old Warner Brothers cartoons in late 1999." Then we found that "there is a place where Speedy can still be found zipping across TV screens � and, presumably, where the crude stereotypes he embodies don't touch a cultural nerve. That place: The Cartoon Network Latin America, where, ironically enough, Speedy Gonzales is "hugely popular," [Cartoon Network spokeswoman Laurie] Goldberg said. And now, CNSnews.com says that "the nation's oldest Hispanic-American civil rights organization has a message for the Cartoon Network: "I want my mouse back. Not Mickey, but Speedy." The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) is calling on the cable channel to show Speedy Gonzales cartoons because "Speedy's a cultural icon. He's a good mouse," according to Gabriela Lemus, director of policy and legislation for LULAC. I wonder what Pepe LePew thinks of all of this? Being the French intellectual he is, he probably views it all as an American byproduct of politically correct postmodern Looney Tunes desconstructionism.

Posted 4/3/2002 07:10:34 PM by Edward Driscoll
BLACK HAWK DOWN DVD DETAILS: A while back, I mentioned Black Hawk Down, and that it would be coming out on DVD. Here are the details, from The Digital Bits:

We've gotten details on Columbia TriStar's Black Hawk Down DVD (street date 6/11). The initial release will be basically a movie-only edition, including anamorphic widescreen video, Dolby Digital 5.1 audio, an On the Set featurette, theatrical trailers and filmographies (SRP $27.96). Fans of the film may want to hold off however, as a more elaborate special edition version of the film on DVD is already in the works for late in the year or early next year. You'll get audio commentaries and lots more if your patient. Just FYI. Columbia TriStar's DVD release strategy these days seems to follow this pattern - a standard edition initial release, followed by a special edition later and eventually a SuperBit or SuperBit Deluxe release for some select titles. And that would be fine... if they told you they were doing it so you could wait for the version you want, rather than buying multiple versions of the same film on DVD. Is it driving anyone else crazy?

Posted 4/3/2002 06:21:07 PM by Edward Driscoll
AMERICAN JOURNALISM IN PERIL: This Sunday's C-SPAN Booknotes guest will be Leonard Downie Jr., co-author along with Robert G. Kaiser of The News About the News: American Journalism in Peril. Both men are reporters and editors at the Washington Post for nearly four decades. C-SPAN's Booknotes page says that Downie will: "take us inside the American news media to reveal why the journalism we watch and read is so often so bad, and to explain what can be done about it." Of the book:

They demonstrate how the media�s preoccupation with celebrities, entertainment, sensationalism and profits can make a mockery of news. They remind us of the value of serious journalism with inside accounts of how great stories were reported and written a New York Times investigation of Scientology and the IRS, and a Washington Post expos� of police excesses. They recount a tense debate inside their own newsroom about whether to publicize a presidential candidate�s long-ago love affair.

I have my UltimateTV box set to record Booknotes every Sunday. This sounds like it could be a good one.

Posted 4/3/2002 12:37:55 PM by Edward Driscoll
SUBMARINE RACES: Found on NRO's The Corner Blog:

YOU MUST CHECK THIS OUT [Jonah Goldberg] The absolutely most brilliant and inspired law ever passed by a landlocked state.

And it is...

Posted 4/3/2002 11:56:16 AM by Edward Driscoll
FALKLANDS, PART DEUX: Orrin Judd sent me a link to Treasaigh.com, a Web log written by Tracy Wilson, an ex-US Navy pilot and information systems officer now living in Argentia. Here are his thoughts on the Falklands:

"Patriotism," Samuel Johnson observed, "is the last refuge of a scoundrel." Yesterday marked the 20th anniversary of the invasion of the Falkland Islands (Malvinas) by Argentine forces. Duhalde insisted yesterday that Argentina would one day claim sovereignity over the islands - this time though diplomacy not war. It has been 169 years since the Argentine flag last flew over the islands (barring a brief interlude in 1982), the inhabitants of the island are mostly of English descent, they speak English and... most importantly... they want no part of Argentina. To quote Don Henley and Glenn Frey: GET OVER IT!

Posted 4/2/2002 11:59:25 PM by Edward Driscoll
"WE WILL GET THEM BACK": Argentine President Duhalde says, "The Falklands are ours; we will get them back":

President Eduardo Duhalde reiterated Argentina's claim to the Falkland Islands in a ceremony paying tribute to the lives lost fighting Britain for control of the islands 20 years ago. "The Malvinas (Falklands) are ours. We will get them back," Duhalde said Tuesday before a crowd of 3,000, many of whom fought in the war against the British, in the town of Ushuaia, 3,000 kilometers (1,900 miles) south of Buenos Aires.

Take it away, Group Captain Mandrake! UPDATE: He has. In a post titled "You Just Might", the good Group Captain says:

Argentina is a troubled country � politically, socially and economically. Every time things come to a head, the reigning political twits make noises about the Falklands. They seem to have forgotten their unsuccessful attempted take-over bid of our South Atlantic office in 1982. I have been to the Falklands, while in the Air Force. They�re desolate, and have many more penguins and sheep than people. So whyinthehell, you might ask, are we trying to hold on to them. I am sure it has nothing to do with the fact that they are sitting on top of what may be the biggest untapped oil fields in the world, has it? Of course, with the Blair Brigade in power, the Argentine government should just try asking for the Falklands/Malvinas back � they might just get them without a fight.

Posted 4/2/2002 11:58:58 PM by Edward Driscoll
SULLIVAN'S BALANCE SHEET: Andrew Sullivan's Web log appears to be in the black--or close to it:

If we stay completely still, and don't grow at all, I will be able to pay myself a salary more than comparable to my salary at The New Republic. It won't make me rich, but it sure will pay the rent and then some. This is your achievement, and I don't think it's an exaggeration to say it's a small milestone in e-journalism. We may not have made much yet - but this site has now made more profit than Slate and Salon combined. Thanks again - and please keep this success growing. You've proved the nay-sayers wrong. Which is why the anti-blog backlash from the established media is now underway. Methinks they're a little rattled. As well they might be.

Posted 4/2/2002 11:42:52 PM by Edward Driscoll
AN AUSTRALIAN WHO GETS THE US: Christopher Cross links to a great essay by Owen Harries, founder of the Australian policy magazine, The National Interest. Harries' essay is titled "Understanding America." And he does--read the excerpt from it that Christopher posted, if not the whole article.

Posted 4/2/2002 11:10:52 PM by Edward Driscoll
THE VAST SELF-REFERENTIAL BLOGISTAN: Big, big jump in traffic over the past couple of days, thanks to everybody who linked to us in a Beam-ian orgy of cloying self-referential links. Special kudos go to the InstaPundit and Overlawyered.com, which said:

Blogger Ed Driscoll reminds us that AGs also have another constituency that wants them to keep the pressure on Redmond, namely trial lawyers who stand to gain a fortune from the private suits against the company (Mar. 31; see Jeff Taylor, "Symposium: Microsoft Endgame?", National Review Online, Nov. 5, 2001).

Posted 4/2/2002 09:17:36 PM by Edward Driscoll
SELF-TESTING AND THE AMA: In my midnight post about Luddite journalists and Web logs, I compared them to investment advisors and do-it-yourself investing, since the former was the field I worked in before becoming a pixel-stained wretch. Ronald Bailey, writing in Reason magazine, notes another field that's circling the wagons at the guild (sorry to put my metaphors through the Cuisinart): doctors, who don't want their patients being able to self-test themselves.

The AMA�s claim that test results are too complex for laypeople is also simply outdated. There is an enormous amount of good medical information on the Internet that can provide background for people with health concerns and help them understand their lab results. But clients must keep firmly in mind that the retail testing labs do not offer diagnoses. If a test is anomalous, all the labs advise clients to visit their physicians immediately. But what about false positives (a test that suggests a person has a problem when he or she doesn�t) or false negatives (a test that indicates a person is healthy when he or she is not)? "Any lab, including any that a doctor refers his patients to, can have false positives and negatives," says Vaughan. "That�s a risk that is just an inherent part of all medical testing." A more troubling reason for the AMA�s opposition to retail testing labs is a desire to make sure that licensed medicos get a piece of the action. Doctors have traditionally served as testing gatekeepers. In order to get a test, a patient would first have to see a doctor -- who of course charges for the visit. Good for the doctor, not necessarily good for the patient. With doctors acting as testing gatekeepers, doctors may feel constrained to recommend only tests that are covered by a patient�s health insurance. Retail lab testing allows clients to take immediate advantage of the scores of new tests that are emerging from biotech research companies, instead of waiting for insurance companies to agree to cover them. Since clients generally pay for tests out-of-pocket, they can order whatever they want or need.

Posted 4/2/2002 08:56:57 PM by Edward Driscoll
MUGGERIDGE'S LAW IN ACTION: UPI says that Louis Farrakhan is planning to visit the Middle East:

Nation of Islam leader Minister Louis Farrakhan blasted Washington for foreign policies that single out Muslims for blame and said Tuesday he wants to travel to the Middle East to try to resolve the differences between Israelis and Muslims.

But will he fly in via the Mothership?

Posted 4/2/2002 08:37:44 PM by Edward Driscoll
AMERICA'S VAST PESTILENTIAL WASTELAND: Last year, Jonah Goldberg wrote an article for National Review On Dead Tree (as he likes to call it), on drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (with the cover of that issue of NRODT bearing that headline, as best as I can remember it.) He actually flew out and visited the ANWR, and quickly came to the conclusion that it is not the home of Bambi (as in the deer, not a rampantly overflowing denizen of Maxim magazine, as Jonah would probably be quick to inform), but rather, dozens of varieties of vicious mosquitos, and endless miles of swamp:

I suspect that the majority of Americans who oppose oil exploration in ANWR would agree with me if they saw it firsthand. Indeed, they would probably agree that if America had to be struck by an asteroid, this would be the ideal impact point. Of course, I am not talking about ANWR's beautiful mountain vistas, the ones cooed over by cable-news hostesses. Not only is that stuff legally protected from oil exploration, it is far, far away from anywhere the oil companies want to drill-i.e., the thousands of football fields' worth of bog and marsh.

Using a similar strategy, last week, Interior Secretary Gale Norton sent a letter to major news outlets around the country describing the president's initiative to allow "environmentally sensitive energy production" in the far north slope of ANWR, the Secretary's letter included a videotape of the region. When Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) called Friday afternoon inquiring about how much the Interior Department had spent on the video, Mark Pfeifle, a spokesman for the Interior Department ran the numbers:

"ANWR videos: $95.81. Postage to send ANWR videos to network news anchors: $43.55. Informing Americans about what the real Alaska North Slope looks like in the dead of winter: Priceless." Pfeifle says providing the video to major television outlets was necessary, because most had been using video provided by opponents of energy exploration in ANWR. "Using footage from the anti-energy independence crowd is about reliable as having your fortune told by Miss Cleo on the Psychic Readers Network," he added.

UPDATE: Jonah Goldberg's own take on the videotape, Markey, and Pfeifle's response to him is now online.

Posted 4/2/2002 07:32:43 PM by Edward Driscoll
JUST SO LONG AS IT ISN'T BAJA: From the Washington Post, Israel Proposes Exile for Arafat.

Posted 4/2/2002 06:32:38 PM by Edward Driscoll
THE SECRET? IT'S THE PIGEONS! Found via "Mac's Temporary Blog", here's what powers Google technology.

Posted 4/2/2002 04:09:34 PM by Edward Driscoll
WHY THE CONCERN? Sgt Stryker (back from his one day mission over Macho Grande) wants to know why European leaders are displaying such concern over Yasser Arafat:

So, why all this precious concern over a terrorist thug? Where are the human shields surrounding the delis, supermarkets and discoteques of Israel? Where are the pronouncements over the life of each and every Israeli threatened with death by suicide bombers? It just strikes me as amazing that lunatic bastards can bomb and kill Israelis and fellow Arabs, and the world merely "denounces" the violence. Where's the world pressuring Arafat and his cronies? Where are the statements of concern over the Israelis? Why have we not seen press releases warning the Palestinian Authority to not "harm innocent civilians" lest there be dire and grave consequences?

Rod Dreher, on NRO's The Corner, has one possible answer.

Posted 4/2/2002 03:26:57 PM by Edward Driscoll
BEST OF THE WEB: The Wall Street Journal's OpinionJournal site always finds astonishing material for its Best of the Web page. Like this one:

Feminist Fantasyland Rep. Marcy Kaptur, an Ohio Democrat, has a Middle East peace plan: "The women of all these countries should all go on strike, they should all sit down and refuse to do anything until their men agree to talk peace." The suggestion is ditzy enough, but she made it in an interview with the Arab News, a Saudi paper. We'd love to see Kaptur organize a strike by Saudi women, who for the most part are not permitted to work.

And then there's this one:

Stupidity Watch Our critics have occasionally made fun of us for asking rhetorical question: Doesn't so-and-so know there's a war on? Fair enough. But we've found someone who actually doesn't know there's a war on. He's Dr. Sidney Wolfe, a co-founder of the Naderite group Public Citizen. He objects to President Bush's choice of Dr. Richard Carmona to be surgeon general, saying Carmona's "expertise in bioterrorism and his penchant for heroism" are irrelevant to the job. After all, Wolfe says, "It's not like there's an ongoing war in this country."

Posted 4/2/2002 02:49:41 PM by Edward Driscoll
WEBLOGS REDUX, PART DEUX: Alex Beam's essay is indeed out, and the InstaPundit links to it, and a variety of comments (including mine--thanks!) here and here. The best comment may be Glenn's own: "when you parachute in and try to do a story about something you don't understand overnight, you're going to look stupid. And you do."

Posted 4/2/2002 02:45:39 PM by Edward Driscoll
BACK TO THE FUTURE: Victor Davis Hanson in National Review Online says that we should judge the current proposed solution to the crisis in the Middle East by how Israel was treated prior to 1967:

As the current conventional wisdom goes, our diplomatic efforts should be directed toward that single goal. Israel must give back conquered land. In return its Arab neighbors will promise to recognize its existence, make peace, and normalize relations. One way of determining whether such an agreement would lead to peace would be to imagine what really might happen should Israel give up all of the West Bank, Gaza, and the Golan Heights. Fortunately, we need not be utopian about the future, but rather simply revisit the past before June 5, 1967. Then Israel possessed none of those territories. Yet there was no peace � but simply a series of pauses between wars not unlike the present predicament. A quick perusal of a number of general histories about the pre-1967 era � especially Michael Oren's forthcoming magisterial work Six Days of War � reveals a chilling similarity with the present calamity.

Posted 4/2/2002 12:06:18 AM by Edward Driscoll
WEBLOGS, REDUX: I had started an article on the backlash by reporters using traditional media against Web logs on Friday (when I had a few minutes to kill and the laptop was handy), but I didn�t have an ending. Fortunately, James Lileks has given me an ending, an introductory framing device, as well as great essay in and of itself (go read it, we�ll wait for you). Back? OK, as you just read, Lileks has gotten a wonderfully tactful email from from Alex Beam of the Boston Globe:

James, weren't you once a talented humor writer? Why are you churning out this web dreck? I can't tell if these bleats about Rod Serling or the Palestinians are diluting your humor work, because I can't claim to know it well enough, but I certainly have my suspicions. Feel free to respond: I am writing a column (deadline: Monday 11 am) on bloggers who might benefit from a less arduous writing schedule. Alex Beam, Boston Globe

It�s been fascinating watching the backlash of reporters used to traditional media against Web logs. Part of it, of course, is their reaction to self-publishing, the same way that investment advisors were terrified by do-it-yourself investing, from Charles Schwab discount brokerages in the 1980s to E*Trade in 1998. But another part of it is simply knee-jerk cynicism. When Gay Talese, Tom Wolfe, Jimmy Breslin, Truman Capote and Norman Mailer invented the New Journalism of the 1960s, the reaction by traditional reporters and media critics was one of cynicism and disdain. Capote called In Cold Blood a �non-fiction novel�, because novels had class, and he didn�t want to get his new book lumped in with this bastard form that non-fiction journalists had invented. It doesn�t help that much of the most successful existing online journalism has been slanted (in varying degrees) towards the right�Matt Drudge, Andrew Sullivan, and Jonah Goldberg all immediately come to mind. But almost anytime that something new comes along, such as Web logs in general, and this Instapundit guy specifically, reporters are by their very nature cynical. The irony of Web logs is that they allow people to build a following by bypassing the traditional avenues of publishing. So, as I said in my Spintech article, anybody can have a blog, and the more offbeat the topic or slant, the better. The very journalists, who claim they�re for �the little guy�, the individual over big business, are slanted against letting those individuals have a way to communicate their own viewpoints! (And incidentally, Beam is bitching about a guy�s writing which damn near brought tears to my eyes (his piece comparing Israelis getting slaughtered by a Palastenian suicide bomber with day to day life in the US). If my wife wasn�t sitting next to me, while I was reading it, I would easily have started blubbering�it was that powerful. When the last time an old school newspaper columnist could generate that level of emotion?) Speaking of losing it, where was I? Oh yeah, journalists, who claim they�re for �the little guy�, but slanted against individuals having a way to communicate their own viewpoints. Yes, it�s wonderful irony. But of course, it could just be that traditional newspaper reporters know that perhaps, just perhaps, the old ways of doing business are numbered. When I interviewed Kerry Northrup, an American who is the Executive Director for the German-based Ifra Centre for Advanced News Operations, he and his employer had a number of revolutionary ways for newspapers and reporters to do business, based on available, advanced technologies. But too many editors worship at the 1970s Watergate-era school of Ben Bradlee and Lou Grant, instead of Matt Drudge and other 21st century reporters. And yet, you can slow down progress and change, but you can't stop it--you simply go with it, or eventually get run over. Unlike Woodward and Bernstein, Lileks says:

people on the web are not paid to be important. They usually aren�t paid at all, of course, but the point of putting up a blog isn�t to be Influential, or to Redefine the Dialogue, or any other of the hoary old clich�s. People put up blogs because they have something to say. If they post six times a day and three posts blow chunks, so what? Better that than a columnist whose every piece is stooped with the awful weight of its author�s ego. (I�m not referring to any columnist in particular; choose your favorite.) In any case, the number of �amateurs� who warrant repeat business is amazing. Just found, via InstantMan, an Israeli blog. It�s on my list of daily visits. Took one click to put him in the bookmarks. For a newspaper to do this, several things would have to happen� So what do newspapers have going for them? Physicality. Presence. Persistence. Raise your hands: who saved a newspaper from Sept. 12? And who printed off an archive of website from that day? Reading a website will never have the same solid satisfaction as reading a paper, which is the old medium�s great advantage. If only they didn�t feel as if their heft and institutional weight conferred credibility or ingenuity, because it doesn�t.

Posted 4/1/2002 10:16:01 PM by Edward Driscoll
FINANCIAL FADS AND FASHIONS: Alan Reynolds explains how various economic fads get codified into law permanently by Washington.

Posted 4/1/2002 09:45:25 PM by Edward Driscoll
XBOX A FAILURE? Christopher Cross links to an article that says the Microsoft Xbox videogame console has failed. While I wouldn't be surprised, there are no sales figures, no statistics, no nothing, except, "A Microsoft spokesman has told the paper there is "strong demand" in Europe but admits there have been no stock shortages." Err, how is it doing in America, guys? Finally, people forget that the sales of the Atari 2600 didn't take off until "Space Invaders was released as a cartridge in 1980, and the home videogame industry we know and love today was born. On a similar note, I doubt UltimateTV has reached the initial sales figures that Microsoft set for it, but it's still a damn good product--even though it still doesn't have the broadband support Microsoft promised for it at CES in January of 2001. (Incidentally, didn't they also promise a broadband connection for the Xbox for multi-player games?)

Posted 4/1/2002 07:25:51 PM by Edward Driscoll
RED LIGHT DISTRICT: Glenn Reynolds, the Instapundit, links to terrific article by Matt Labash in the Weekly Standard called Inside the District's Red Lights:

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, it must be noted, is one of the staunchest advocates of automated enforcement, and views the 72 percent figure as a triumph. To which any reasonable person might ask, what other law enforcement tool snags the wrong guy over one-fourth of the time, and is still considered a success? Just to recap, consider: A private company is given police power to ticket citizens, has a monetary interest in generating as many tickets as possible, and, despite its low success rate, is often allowed to do so with minimal or no police supervision. It would seem that a trip to Lockheed IMS's processing center was in order to watch its employees fulfill their constabulary duties. But when I ask D.C. police spokesman Kevin Morison for a tour, he must check with Lockheed, though the police are purportedly running the operation. A few days later, Morison regretfully informs me that Lockheed said no--"They had privacy concerns." Morison at least plays at being oblivious to the richness of a vendor's claiming to be concerned about your privacy after taking a picture of your car and in some instances whoever's in your car, tapping into your DMV records, levying a fine against you, then mailing the whole care package to your house (in Italy, a senator's marriage faltered when his wife spotted his mistress in a photo radar citation).

Posted 4/1/2002 04:36:50 PM by Edward Driscoll

NO, IT�S NOT AN APRIL FOOLS JOKE: My article for Litewheels magazine about the Segway is now online. And yes, that�s me in the above photo, wearing a gray flannel double breasted ventless suit and looking quite silly being precariously balanced by the computers inside the Segway (and they�re so advanced, that I never once went splat.) In case you�re wondering what a Segway is, it�s that strange scooter with two parallel wheels that was top-secret, but leaked in carefully controlled segments. Matt Drudge spent much of last year teasing us with it those leaks. What is it like to ride one? Here's an excerpt from my article:

I hopped onto the 24-inch wide platform. Then Cohen took his hand off the unit. For a few seconds, the Segway bucked back and forth, as he said, "you're trying to balance on it, and it's trying to balance you. Just relax." I did. The rest was incredibly intuitive. I was standing between the two wheels, balanced like I was a few antigravity inches off the ground. Cohen explained that if I leaned forward, the Segway would move forward. If I leaned backwards, the Segway would reverse. And he pointed out the switch on the left handlebar that could be flipped to turn the unit. He then let me ride the Segway through the halls, up ramps, on several surfaces, and even over his feet.

The Segway article, and my companion piece for Litewheels� premiere issue have been quite interesting. See, I�m an internal combustion kind of guy. My dad owned a Chevrolet dealership in south Jersey for decades, and I acquired a similar love of cars from him. I�ve written numerous articles on Nissan Z cars for Sport Z magazine. I�ve interviewed Syd Mead, one of Detroit�s top car designers, before Hollywood beckoned in the late 1970s (he designed the flying Spinner police car for Blade Runner). And people who are into alternatives to automobiles tend to be really into them�to the point of wanting to ban cars, put limits on them, etc. Not surprisingly, that's something I can't identify with. The Litewheels gig grew out of my parallel love for technology, specifically home theater. I�ve written numerous articles for Smart TV & Sound, published and edited by the same folks who produce Litewheels. I justified my writing for the magazine (yes, the money wasn�t bad either) by reminding myself that clearly, in a free-market economy, people have a right to own whatever vehicles they want to own. And the Segway is a remarkable piece of engineering, one I was eager to learn more about. So it was a lot of fun, while I was visiting the east coast, to truck on down to Segway�s PR office in Manhattan and hop on the Segway. I certainly hope Litewheels keeps me around to write more pieces for them. But my wife and I aren�t planning to trade in our Dodge Intrepid or Toyota Land Cruiser just yet�. UPDATE: Litewheels didn't give Art Puliafico, my friend and frequent article photographer a photo credit on their Web site, but he shot several of the photos that accompanied my article. He also took a spin on the Segway.

Posted 4/1/2002 04:14:33 PM by Edward Driscoll
BOBBY BEATHARD TO FALCONS: AP says that Bobby Beathard, who served as general manager with Washington and San Diego and director of player personnel for Miami will serve as adviser to the Atlanta Falcons' new owner, Arthur Blank.

In his role as senior adviser, Beathard will advise and counsel on organizational structure, philosophy, systems and execution of football operations in the areas of college and pro player evaluation, athletic training and equipment, medical programs, information systems and salary cap management.

Even with Beathard on board, Blank will continue to search for a general manager for the Falcons.

Posted 4/1/2002 02:41:22 PM by Edward Driscoll
MONGOLIAN CLUSTERBLOG: Christopher Cross is inventing new Wired jargon-like language for all things blog:

The first entry: carpetblogging, (v.): a) a blogger who posts on a variety of issues on which he/she has no real knowledge or experience (see 'carpetbagging') b)posting in rapid succession, either covering all aspects of a single issue or posting about an extremely wide swath of issues (see 'carpet bombing')

Posted 4/1/2002 02:17:52 PM by Edward Driscoll
MONEY DRIVES MICROSOFT SETTLEMENT: Bob Novak's column today is all about the Benjamins. Specifically, the money donated to states' attorney generals from Microsoft competitors, including California's Bill Lockyer, which Novak says:

has his eyes on a future bid for governor. Heavily favored for re-election to a second term as attorney general this year, he has raised $5 million so far to make sure. His listed contributions from Microsoft competitors and their law firms, as of last December, totaled $75,500--with $50,000 from Oracle Corp.

Then there are the other dissenters:

The symbiotic relationship between state attorneys general and Microsoft's foes is shown in Utah. [Republican state AG Mark] Shurtleff, serving his first year as attorney general in 2001, waited until 15 minutes before the 11 a.m. deadline Nov. 6 before joining the anti-Microsoft group. But lawyers inherited from his Democratic predecessor long had collaborated with Novell. In open court last week, Microsoft lawyers revealed an April 2000 e-mail from the Utah attorney general's office to Novell asking help in drafting language in a possible negotiated settlement that would benefit the company's products. Lawyer Wayne Klein asked for ''guidance--preferably without involving too many people seeing this language.'' Another example of how Microsoft's enemies seek to utilize political contributions was disclosed in federal court proceedings. James Barksdale, former head of Netscape and a longtime critic of Microsoft, revealed in a recent deposition that he asked Bush administration science adviser E. Floyd Kvamme for help last year in trying to scuttle a settlement.

I wrote about the Justice's Department's efforts to wrap up the Microsoft trial last fall for National Review Online's Financial section. Back then, I interviewed Jeff Taylor of Reason magazine. Taylor said:

The state AGs essentially have a political decision to make. Do their constituents � trial lawyers � want them to continue a high-profile fight the rest of world doesn't understand? Attacking Microsoft has already achieved the goal of creating plenty of work for lawyers in the tech field, and the prospect of at least five years of close supervision of Microsoft means full-employment for tech lawyers.

Evidently, the AGs want to keep the job security going for a little while longer.

Posted 4/1/2002 10:38:16 AM by Edward Driscoll
THE POLLY AWARDS: In the spirit of Muggeridge's Law, check out John J. Miller on the Polly Awards in today's National Review Online. The Polly Awards are handed out by the Collegiate Network "to highlight the noxious tendencies of radical faculty and students at the nation's colleges." The University of California at Berkeley won two of five "Polly" awards today for outrageous political correctness.

Berkeley's first award came for a case of what the CN calls "multicultural hooliganism": In February, a group of left-wing students broke into the office of The Patriot, a conservative student newspaper, and stole its entire press run, valued at $2,000. Editors who filed a police report were then met with death threats. The incident apparently was occasioned by a Patriot article critical of a radical Hispanic group, MEChA, which calls for the revolutionary liberation of the "bronze continent for bronze people." The Berkeley chapter of MEChA receives $20,000 from the university. Berkeley's other award was for its now-famous sex-education class, which featured "an orgy at a class party and [a visit to] a strip club, where [students] watched an instructor have sex onstage."

For the rest of the award "winners", read Miller's article.

Posted 4/1/2002 06:30:42 AM by Edward Driscoll
MUGGERIDGE'S LAW: When Malcolm Muggeridge was the editor of the British satirical magazine Punch in the early 1960s, Khrushchev had announced he was going to tour England alongside its prime minister. Muggeridge wrote up a list of the silliest tour stops he could think of, and then put the article to bed, ready for publication. When the actual tour list was drawn up. he had to massively rewrite the article. At least half the tour stops in his satirical piece were actually on Khrushchev and the British PM's agenda! Which is why Muggeridge's Law is: there is no way that a writer of fiction can compete with real life for its pure absurdity. How else do you explain, orbiting around April Fools' Day, real headlines such as these?

CHART SHOCKER: ENRON MOVES UP 'FORTUNE 500' LIST * * * ABCNEWS.com : Serial Killer Action Figures For Sale Murder Incorporated Denver Sculptor's Serial Killer Action Figures Bringing in Profits and Raising Ire * * * EdDriscoll.com Posted 8:16 PM by Edward Driscoll FRENCH CONSPIRACY UPDATE: Back on March 9th, we mentioned a French conspiracy Web site, which claimed the US faked the crash into the Pentagon of Flight 77. Orrin Judd says that now, it's not only a Web site, it's a book! Naturally, it's a best seller in France.... (shaking head). * * * TheSanDiegoChannel.com - State Senator Calls For Tax On Bullets * * * (washingtonpost.com) Upset by the sight of bumper-to-bumper cars, vans and pickups lined up in residential driveways or spilling over onto lawns, lawmakers in [the Washington DC suburbs of] Fairfax and Montgomery counties have had enough. "Vehicles are not lawn ornaments," said Fairfax Supervisor Penelope A. Gross (D-Mason). "We measure success by the number of cars we have outside the house, and in some cases, it's gotten out of hand." Their proposed remedy? Prohibit drivers from parking on anything but pavement, and limit how much of a residential front yard can be paved. Fairfax would draw the line at 25 percent, Montgomery at 50 percent.

Posted 3/31/2002 10:44:55 PM by Edward Driscoll
HOSTILE TAKEOVER OF ARTHUR ANDERSEN? Lawrence Kudlow says that Paul Volcker--the man who licked inflation in the early 1980s as the then head of the Federal Reserve--is planning "a hostile takeover" (Kudlow's phrase) of Arthur Andersen:

At 74 years old, and with nearly four decades at the U.S. Treasury and the Federal Reserve under his belt, Mr. Volcker appreciates full well the importance of the regulatory fine print. He is aware that Andersen is responsible for a string of government scrapes that includes Lincoln Savings and Loan, Colonial Reality, Waste Management, Home State Savings Bank and the Baptist Foundation of Arizona � with the document shredding at Enron topping the list. Incredibly, not once did the accounting firm ever acknowledge wrongdoing, nor fire guilty executives, nor internally reform its operating practices following each of these cases. It was this inability to show any level of corporate contrition � in addition to the document shredding � that led the Justice Department to take such highly punitive action. But Mr. Volcker's survival plan would change Andersen across the board, on the condition that the government drop its criminal case against the firm and instead reach a large financial settlement. Also, Andersen must finally acknowledge wrongdoing.