Terry McMahon's Awesome Blog

Today's political lesson concerns the old adage that in politics, a few months can be a lifetime. When California treasurer Phil Angelides announced this winter that he would challenge Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006, I thought, like many other Democrats, "well, good that he's doing it, but yikes. Good luck."

Oh, how things can change. A new Field Poll shows that both Angelides and state comptroller Steve Westly are now ahead of Schwarzenegger, by four points each. Schwarzenegger's reelect stands at 39%, an atrocious number by any standard and worse for a governor once so popular that people were trying to rewrite the Constitution so that he could be president. Now granted, this election still has 16 months of change to go, but who ever would have guessed we'd be here now?

In a similar vein, you may have heard that President Bush's approval ratings these days is around 42 or 43 percent. Sure, that's bad, but I just found an American Research Group poll showing Bush's approval/disapproval among independents is an astonishing 17/75. That's right: only 17% of independent voters approve of the job Bush is doing. These numbers are worse than Schwarzenegger's, and it's yet another reminder of the difference in coverage of Bush and Clinton. Does anyone doubt that a Clinton with a 42% approval rating would be pelted with "failed presidency" coverage? In any case, this much is true: George W. Bush is an unpopular president.

Hopefully on the increasingly popular side of the ledger, the DNC just relaunched their website. I really like it. The old version just screamed, "hey look, we're diversity!" This one is a lot more snazzy. If you're into this kind of thing, I'd highly recommend a look.

Okay, one last note: you may have heard that the FEC has proposed limiting bloggers' political conversation and contributions the way they do for radio, TV and print. Here's a hilarious post that I think about sums it all up.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 11:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So I called up U.S. Sen. Christopher Dodd's DC office this afternoon, to see if that was actually him I saw out in front of the Dunes Club yesterday when I was jogging. The lovely young lady who answered the phone said, "I don't know, I'll go check" in a "the rest of the office is NOT going to believe this" tone that I recognized from when I've answered the phone on campaigns. (You don't have to be a dick to work in politics, but it helps.) Anyway, her response was, "I can't confirm that," the rough equivalent of, "who did you say you knew in the office again?" Bitch. You know what I love doing to people like that? Getting the last laugh.

I figured starting off with "This is probably a weird question" was probably a mistake, so I didn't use the same opening when I then called Dodd's Connecticut office. The people there were much more helpful, not surprisingly, and the guy who wound up taking my call didn't scoff when I related my admittedly uncommon concern. In fact, after he put me on hold to go check, he said, "Senator Dodd was indeed in Rhode Island yesterday. He played in a charity golf tournament."

That's confirmation enough for me, but when I related this story to some of my less politically intrigued coworkers, one of them mentioned yesterday's Steven Follett Memorial Golf Tournament before remarking that former Rhode Island Gov. Joe Garrahy goes to the Dunes Club a lot too. Sounded extraneous at the time, but I can tell you that Steve Follett was my year at South Kingstown High School, one town over from Narragansett, so the chances that Senator Dodd was playing golf around here yesterday are pretty good. And I also happen to know that Senator Dodd's sister is a Dunes Club member, so if he was in the area, no doubt he would have visited, especially since, as mentioned, the beach is awesome. So I conclude that I saw Christopher Dodd at the beach yesterday. Think this'll show up in The Note? (Also, the water was 63 degrees: now that's a real man.)

So, what's weirder here?

• I was jogging down the beach when I saw a guy enjoying the ocean surf, and my first thought was, "that guy looks like U.S. Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-CT);"
  
• I actually called around to find out if it was him;
  
• I was right.

And two lessons:

1. Jiminy H. Cricket, how hard is this to understand: don't give up easy.

2. DC offices are filled with assholes; local offices want to help you. Fight the power.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 11:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I mentioned earlier that there's plenty of good stuff being said by and about likely 2008 presidential candidates. I was perusing the PAC blog of Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana, who I like, even if he clearly ripped off the idea from John Edwards. But yikes, I found this blunder:

Energy is the national security issue of our time.

I'm sorry, I have to say it: bloggers making these remarks is okay for now, but if the senator actually goes ahead and agrees, his chances of winning the nomination will go - ready? - Bayh-Bayh. Oh I love it.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 11:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

All right, now this is funny. You guys all know I'm no Yankees fan, but I love politics and baseball and making fun of those I oppose in each. Look:

Karl Ravech: So what do you attribute to Randy Johnson's ballooning ERA?

Harold Reynolds: Oh, the lack of support from the spectators, definitely.

Karl Ravech: Really... you don't think there's a problem with his delivery?

Harold Reynolds: Now you're trying to divert the issue. This isn't about mechanics. When Yankees fans fail to cheer loudly enough, the opponents start to feel like they can win. That's what this is about.

Karl Ravech: But you don't think his age might be a factor?

Harold Reynolds: Shut up, Karl. Out of respect for the men who go out there on the field every day, just shut the hell up. I'm cutting your mike. Just shut up.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 10:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Percent foggier today's jog was, as compared to the above photo: 1000
Times I saw someone who I'm almost positive was a shirtless and ocean-bound U.S. Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-CT): 1
Seconds after I went just too far away that I realized I could have just shouted "Hey, senator!" and found out for sure, especially since I was wearing an Edwards for President T-shirt: about 3
Minutes later that I realized I should have asked Senator Dodd, if that were indeed him, what the story is with Rehnquist: about 3
Number of solid 9's who sat talking to each other on the wall the whole time I was there, presumably about that hot John Edwards supporter: 2
Number of bugs I inhaled during the homestretch: 1
Percent of remaining time I spent wondering whether the bug was still in my throat, if I should keep swallowing, or if I should keep hacking: 100
Times I had to stomp on the pavement to remind pedestrians ahead of me that they don't own the fucking road: 2
Times I've superkicked someone into the ocean, career: regrettably, zero

Posted by Terry McMahon at 8:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

A friend of mine recently told me she's thinking of making her move on a young man who happens to be a transplanted Boston native. Like any good New Englander, I informed/reminded her that young ladies wearing Red Sox hats are 20% hotter, perhaps even more so if they know Tim Wakefield's signature pitch, which player best personifies "clutch," and who won the 2003 batting title. She seems to be on board, so if the guy continues to be worth it I think she'll be all set.

That's what I thought of when I heard about a new statistic: chicks who like the Red Sox are hot. I know it's unfair and vaguely sexist for me to draw that conclusion when a young lady from Connecticut comes up with a simple and effective pitching stat called Bases per Batter (BpB). On the flipside though, it's rare to find chicks who are into baseball statistics, and rarer still when someone of either gender creates an interesting new one. As 12eight suggests, new stats come up all the time, but useful new stats are pretty rare.

In any case, BpB is pretty easy to understand: bases given up, divided by number of batters, and it comes out as a three-digit decimal that looks like batting average or OBP. (Here's a good post that uses some real examples.) I get the impression this is a recent formulation, i.e. it'll need a lot more fleshing out to see if it's a reliable indicator of anything. Still, Red Sox-loving ladies, hot new statistics, the Sox in first place and beautiful summer days. How lucky can you get?

Posted by Terry McMahon at 4:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Interesting set of columns from the New York Times recently, as I suspect bipartisanship as a theme is intentional. I am a firm believer that there are a lot of inefficiencies in solving problems in our current political climate, to use a Moneyball phrasing. Both Newt Gingrich and Hillary Clinton have advocated saving thousands of lives and millions of dollars every year by moving health care record-keeping to computers, but we're still not doing it. Are we really so divided that we couldn't work out the details over lunch? Maureen Dowd's current replacement has an odd debut in Saturday's paper, but she makes the same point in an astute paragraph:

When I find myself puzzled and even vexed by the opinions and beliefs of other people, I invite them to have lunch. Multiple experiments have supported what we will call, in Jeff's honor, the Limerick Hypothesis: in the bitter contests of values and political rhetoric that characterize our times, 90 percent of the uproar is noise, and 10 percent is what the scientists call "signal," or solid, substantive information that will reward study and interpretation. If we could eliminate much of the noise, we might find that the actual, meaningful disagreements are on a scale we can manage.

The president, with the skill of an actor, would begin: "Ev, I wouldn't treat a cut dog the way you treated me on the floor today."

Dirksen, with a mock somber expression, would answer, "Mr. President, I have a vow to be faithful to the truth, so I had no choice in what I said."

L.B.J. would laugh. Touché. Dirksen, pleased with his retort, would rumble up a laugh as well. They would trade stories and gossip.

Then the president would say something like: "Ev, I need three Republican votes on my civil rights bill, and you can get them."

Dirksen would frown. Without answering, he would reach into his jacket and pull out a list of nominees to just about every operational regulatory commission in Washington. He would also suggest that the president relax his opposition to a bill the Republicans found congenial to their aims.

They would ramble on, reminiscing and teasing each other. When the Frescas were finished, Dirksen would depart. There would be no summary of what they had said. Their relationship was built on something that is sorely missing today: trust. Both men knew that plenty of quarrels would be played out on the Senate floor and on the campaign trail. But they also knew that once a commitment had been made, it would be kept. If they disagreed, they would keep talking.

John Adams and Thomas Jefferson began as friends. The tensions and frictions of the early Republic took care of that. Then, after years of silence between them, a mutual friend persuaded them to write to each other. In 1812, they launched into a correspondence that continued until it was ended by their deaths.

That ending point was on their minds and drove their correspondence. As Mr. Adams wrote Mr. Jefferson, "You and I ought not to die, before we have explained ourselves to each other."

The trouble is that working well with others is easy in theory and harder in practice. You get a couple Frescas in you and all of a sudden you're conceding major parts of your Social Security plan. But to return to our friend Senator Clinton, she's made joint policy proposals with Newt Gingrich, Lindsay Graham and Tom DeLay, among others. Since she likes to focus on genuinely common-sense issues, Senator Clinton a) finds more opportunity to get more done and help more people and b) comes across as moderate. And every time Clinton stands up there with another conservative Republican, it gets harder and harder to attack her as a crazy liberal. Best of all, since she picks her issues well, you can't attack her for doing it, or you're attacking something like reducing hospital errors. So there's plenty of room to get more done in Washington.

Unfortunately, the challenge is that a willingness to work with the other side can be faked for political purposes. I'm sure you saw Karl Rove's ridiculous comment last week about how liberals wanted to offer "understanding" to the perpetrators of 9/11. One of the few Republicans to distance himself from those remarks so far is Rick Santorum: he has a really tough election to win next year, and acting like he values the other side of the aisle makes him come across as more moderate.

Right, right, despite his votes. Nonetheless, there's still hope for an effective American government. We've just got a ways to go.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 1:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Recently, conventional-wisdom political publication National Journal did an insiders' survey of who were the early frontrunners for the 2008 presidential election. (Look, otherwise they'd be forced to think about the issues.) The winner on the Republican side might be a surprise: it was Senator George Allen of Virginia. Allen's dad is an NFL Hall of Fame coach, and the son would be the first president since Andrew Johnson to have also been a governor and senator.

Anyway, apparently he's got a real moderate style, he's really conservative, and he's really driven, so the thinking is that he'd make a great presidential candidate. I was reading an interview with him and he made this remark:

The 9th Circuit is Exhibit A of activist judges who ignore the will of the people, who are reversed more than any other court by far in this country.

Rival candidates bring up each other's old quotes often enough that you might think they cover everything, but they don't. Candidates speak much more freely three years out of a presidential election, and it is not likely that all of their mistakes will get caught. So remember this one, and point out any others you see.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 12:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bill Maher wrote this great book after 9/11. Actually, it's more of a picture book: he looks at old wartime posters and updates them for how they can apply to the war on terrorism. Some of them are compelling, thought-provoking and sad, but my favorite was "Put a flag on your car - it's literally the least you can do," with the accompanying essay "Empty Gestures Don't Win Wars."

http://www.supportourribbons.com/detail.php?id=8&PHPSESSID=737cdf3c22fc7b47f7b9f88b958219e5

So true.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 11:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

So my hometown of South County, according to this headline, is a national leader in marijuana use. Those fortunate enough to have heard my passionate tales of the South Kingstown social scene may infer for themselves that I was not typically included in this South County marijuana use. As we know, though, I'll show them all someday, plus, this is still an interesting story. Look at the beginning:

South County, where pristine beaches and million-dollar houses provide a scenic refuge from the hustle and bustle of the cities to its north, has a surprising secret.

In many ways, the red and blue map that accompanies the report looks like an inverse of the 2004 election results, with a the dark red that indicates frequent usage lining the coasts and urban areas and a broad swath of abstinence blue lining the center of the map, excepting Colorado (and its population of itinerant ski bums).

Posted by Terry McMahon at 10:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

So I called the Narragansett Chamber of Commerce today to find out how long Narragansett Beach is, i.e. from Narrow River to where the beach meets the wall. "I don't think we keep that kind of statistics," says the woman who answers, in that tone that lets you know she resents you even asked. That tone always bothers me, so I decided to stretch out how long she had to talk to me. "Okay, great, thanks." (Half-beat.) "So do you know anyone else who might know?" "Well, I know the Narragansett Town Hall doesn't keep those statistics either. They keep statistics on property values and population information, but not what you're looking for." Thanks!

I didn't know the number of the Narragansett Town Hall, but I had Parks & Recreation, so it still counts as calling up the town. "Parks & Recreation." "Yeah, hi, I had a question you might be able to help me with. How long is Narragansett Beach? Like from Narrow River all the way back to the wall." "Uhhhh... let me check." (Long pause.) "1.2 miles."

Man, too bad nobody keeps those statistics. So the moral of that story is to trust the knowledge of people who actually deal with this stuff for a living. Anyway, the number itself is actually great news. For reference, these days I've been parking my car at the end of the wall, and starting my jog from there. (For out-of-towners, "the wall" is a sidewalk/wall combination they put up where the ocean just hits rocks instead of sand. So, ocean, rocks, wall. Very scenic too.) According to much more easily obtained information, the wall runs 0.8 miles from the end to where you can go down onto the beach. From there I jog the 1.2 miles to Narrow River, back, to the river again, back again, and then the 0.8 miles back to my car, for a sum total of, apparently, 6.4 miles. Now, I may go a bit less, because I can't really tell where the wall ends and I just go to the last trash can instead of ... well, I don't know what I'd be going towards. Oncoming traffic?

In any case, even if I'm cheating that's awesome, because my previous PR for distance was 5.35 miles, and now I'm doing about 6.4 every time I run (like, for example, today) with a large part of that on the beach. Plus, a few weeks ago I tried doing just the beach for three laps, and at 1.2 miles each way that puts my new personal record at 7.2 miles, and that's all beach running. That's awesome. Lung capacity is terrific.

Confidential to GBC: And I tried a protein shake! I got vanilla. Will I wake up tomorrow with cut muscles and spider-sense?

REMINDER: You can see what Narragansett Beach looks like from this webcam here. On clear days you can see the top of the wall at the bottom of the photo. So that's what I look at when I jog. How's the treadmill?

Posted by Terry McMahon at 9:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As you may have heard (look, I get behind during the week) Time magazine recently published a ten-questions interview with CIA head Porter Goss in which he says he knows where Osama is, but he can't actually get him because of sovereignty issues. I assume this means Pakistan will get pissed if we don't get him with Pakistani troops, or something, but here's what Goss actually said:

But when you go to the very difficult question of dealing with sanctuaries in sovereign states, you're dealing with a problem of our sense of international obligation, fair play.

I have an excellent idea of where he is.

Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.

Fortunately, as the Daily Show pointed out last night, this still left time for the final question: "You're into organic gardening. How did that happen?" My guess is that finding Osama only takes so much time once you already know where he is. Amazing.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 12:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

The AP helpfully informs us that Condoleezza Rice is suggesting that Bush may bypass Senate approval for John Bolton, his nominee for ambassador to the UN. Apparently the Democrats are stalling the nomination because the Bush administration isn't providing certain information about Bolton the Democrats think will doom his candidacy. Rice is suggesting, in response, that the administration might just go ahead and nominate Bolton during the July 4th recess, since the president can make temporary appointments during a congressional recess (since they're not in session to advise and consent). Here's what the AP says:

Under the Constitution, a president can make an appointment during a Senate recess without the chamber's approval of the nominee. That appointment lasts only through the next one-year session of Congress — which in this case would mean until January 2007.

The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session.

Also, I'm not sure this is related, but I don't think Condoleezza Rice is human.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 1:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Yeah, so, look, I'm linking Drudge. Monday morning Drudge broke news that GQ plans a feature on the soldiers guarding Saddam Hussein, and what they've told him. The whole Drudge article (NB: temporary link) is an enjoyable read, but here are my favorite revelations:

· While having little positive to say about either President George W. Bush or his father, George H. W. Bush, he expresses a desire to be “friends” with them.

· He also expresses a longing for the days when Ronald Reagan was still president.

· He says that he never had an association with Osama bin Laden.

· He loves Doritos chips and Raisin Bran Crunch cereal…but he won’t touch Froot Loops.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 12:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Can somebody look at this box score and tell me why David Wells got the win Monday night? (P.S. Not that I'm complaining.)

Posted by Terry McMahon at 12:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I just found out from a Roll Call article (sorry, it's subscription, get better connected, losers) that noted former Democratic consultant Bob Shrum is teaching at NYU's school of public service. Shrum, you may recall, is the first-among-equals of Democratic consultants who are awesome at winning the primary and not so much in the general election. The guy's presidential campaign record is 0-8 lifetime, which besides being the same win percentage that I have, prompted his assistants to make up "Reverse the Curse" T-shirts for him at the Democratic convention. (Man, if I had to predict one of those curses to be reversed...)

Anyway, think they'll let me audit one of his classes?

Posted by Terry McMahon at 12:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As part of my continuing quest to bring you the best examples of humanity triumphing over disaffection in journalism, here's a column by a Dodgers reporter on ace closer Eric Gagne's season-ending injury:

After Eric Gagne's first appearance in late March, in the quiet of the Vero Beach clubhouse, I approached him with the intention of writing a column.

He was altering his mechanics to compensate for an injured knee. He should stop pitching immediately or risk damaging his arm.

I had seen it a dozen times before. It was Baseball 101. The story was clear.

But Gagne talked me out of it.

He talked the Dodger organization out of it.

"I know my body, my arm is fine, my mechanics are the same, I would never do anything to hurt myself, it was a normal first day," he said at the time.

Today, far too late to make a difference, the Dodgers finally know different.

So it's an interesting question: should a reporter speculate about a player's on-field recklessness? I say yes: if a guy can stay out until 7am and still throw a shutout the next day, that's his own business, but if he's playing the wrong way (in this case, playing at all), the reporters are just interested in team play and whether they're going to do well. So, I say it's fair game. But the article, to me, raises an even more interesting question: what other important column ideas are getting dropped? What topics have reporters dropped after pressure from players or team management? And what other injuries did reporters see coming?

Posted by Terry McMahon at 9:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Now that he's become culturally irrelevant, I love Ralph Nader. Take a look at some of his more interesting comments from the other night:

Speaking Wednesday night at a Washington fund-raiser to retire the debt from his 2004 presidential campaign, Nader complained that Democratic Party powerbrokers had kept him off the ballot in such Southern states as Georgia and Virginia - which reminded him of the oppressive Jim Crow laws that denied African-Americans equal rights.

"I felt like a [n-word]," remarked the 70-year-old white multimillionaire graduate of Princeton University and Harvard Law School.

Thanks to Lloyd Grove at the New York Daily News for the writeup (Hamptons news too!!!), and for this witty rejoinder:

Yesterday, Nader told me he was using the word in the same spirit as the Black Panthers of the 1960s - "as a word of defiance."

But Sharpton retorted: "He's not a Black Panther."

Posted by Terry McMahon at 7:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In other news, the sun rose in the east, chocolate tastes good, and I took 17 minutes for my 15-minute break today. Let's go straight to the quotes:

"If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime - Pol Pot or others - that had no concern for human beings,'' Durbin said.

Said McClellan: "I think the senator's remarks are reprehensible. It's a real disservice to our men and women in uniform who adhere to high standards and uphold our values and our laws.''

I know this stuff should be boring me by now, but I just remain appalled. Make sure you don't fall for these GOP attacks, though, where they rush to defend the honor of those not impugned. It's the cheapest kind of politics.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 11:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Moving story in USA Today, uh, today. Apparently this pregnant woman had an undiagnosed brain tumor that caused her brain functions to fail last month, and they're trying to keep her alive long enough to give birth to a premature baby. There's no controversy here (everyone agrees she would have wanted them to keep trying) but it's a really sad story. Not only do you have the really sweet tale of a couple who clearly loved each other, but the story goes a lot emotionally deeper than you'd expect from USA Today:

Torres has quit his job as a commercial printing salesman and has moved into Susan's hospital room. He speaks to his wife, making small talk about the family and letting her know what's on his schedule for the day. For Torres, the routine is something solid to grasp in a life he says “was blown to pieces” nearly six weeks ago and continues to be rocked by aftershocks.

Susan, for instance, has had pneumonia recently and is fighting a persistent fever. Torres says the couple's son is staying with grandparents but continues to ask, “Where's Mommy?” Saying “in the hospital” is wearing out as an answer, Torres says. And Torres' relationship with God, whom he has loved since childhood, is showing signs of strain. “Some days,” says Torres, an active Catholic, “I am pretty damned angry with him.”
...
“How many rocks are they going to throw in your cart before you can't pull it anymore” he says he asks himself. “The answer, apparently, is a lot.”

Torres says he doesn't understand why his family has been singled out for suffering.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 10:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

OK, that title isn't true for a second, but energetic young GOP go-getters sure can get a lot of perks. I'm referring, of course, to the New York Times article yesterday about the awesome summer intern experience at the conservative Heritage Foundation, but also to another comment I saw on the topic.

Quick digression: My favorite class in college was Politics and the Mass Media in Fall 2000. I, a Haverford student, took it over at Bryn Mawr with Paul Waldman, a Swarthmore alum then a fellow at UPenn's Annenberg School of Communications. (Indeed, that's the preppy-Philly-colleges Grand Slam you have there.) Sure, the class was fun, thought-provoking and instructive, but more I'm happy to see my professor's sterling rise through the world of actually useful political commentary. He's written a book on why the media gives Bush such an easy time, he's the senior editor at Media Matters, and he runs his own liberal political site The Gadflyer.

Now I mention all this to point you to Prof. Waldman's Gadflyer post on the NYT Heritage internship story. I can't excerpt his post (which is short) without losing its wit, so I'll just urge you to read the whole thing yourself.

All right, here's one line:

What horrific trauma could young Ms. Rogers have endured to turn her into the terrifying beast she is today?

Posted by Terry McMahon at 10:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you're not from Rhode Island, your capital city's convention center is neither called the Dunkin' Donuts Arena nor conventionally known as "The Dunk." That's okay, because you too probably participate in the most common activity at The Dunk and most other convention centers: losing money! The Providence Journal (affectionately known as the ProJo) reports that the Dunkin' Donuts Arena only owes $2.4 million in unpaid bills. (Didn't NSync sell 2.4 million copies of one of their albums the first week?

Now, from what I've heard from steamed-ham and urban-planning experts, including those currently on vacation in Trenton, is that convention centers always lose money. As in, mayors will propose expensive new convention centers, on the idea that this will bring in conventions and thus give the city's whole economy a boost. Of course, these things cost a ton to build and maintain, and if it's in the middle of the city there's always the chance the land could be used for something better. As the chairman of the state House Finance Committee says, "That's what's important here ... what is the value of that building? If we're going to purchase the building and land -- the land is the valuable piece."

So I write with two purposes: one, to see if anyone has any insight to whether it's true that these things lose so much money, and two, to dissuade any future urban planners from thinking, yet again, that a new convention center will be a cure-all for the city's financial woes. At least look at past examples before you take a Dunk, if you will, on taxpayer money in an expanded Javits Center on Manhattan's West Side. OK?

UPDATE 6/17: She's hot as a tamale and smart as a whip, and Katy Hight lets us know in the comments that the nonpartisan Brookings Institution did a report confirming Team SOTW's hypothesis. Way to go!

P.S. Am I the only one who thinks the Brookings logo looks a little like the shape of RI? Have I been here too long?

Posted by Terry McMahon at 10:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

So the New York Times yesterday (sorry, I'm catching up) featured an op-ed from a couple of people on madrassas, and whether they're really using official state textbooks to teach Middle Eastern kids to hate America. I'm not hugely interested in that discussion (these folks argue no) but I found an interesting set of statistics about something I've been thinking about:

The 1993 World Trade Center attack involved 12 men, all of whom had a college education. The 9/11 pilots, as well as the secondary planners identified by the 9/11 commission, all attended Western universities, a prestigious and elite endeavor for anyone from the Middle East. Indeed, the lead 9/11 pilot, Mohamed Atta, had a degree from a German university in, of all things, urban preservation, while the operational planner of 9/11, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, studied engineering in North Carolina. We also found that two-thirds of the 25 hijackers and planners involved in 9/11 had attended college.

Of the 75 terrorists we investigated, only nine had attended madrassas, and all of those played a role in one attack - the Bali bombing. Even in this instance, however, five college-educated "masterminds" - including two university lecturers - helped to shape the Bali plot.

Frankly, I'm not completely sure why the terrorists do this stuff when they should know better, or at least know that they have better options. The refrain you hear is that terrorists hate America more than they love life, which, while true, leaves too much unsaid. My suspicion is that these kids are raised to believe America only wants to hoard the world's resources at the expense of everyone else, comes to America (or some other Western country), discovers that, indeed, we are that rich, vapid, and uninterested in befriending culturally unadjusted Middle Easterners, and sure enough they come home ticked off and ready to tell their fellow countrymen that all they had believed is true. Now, having read the preceding sentence means you've thought about the terrorists' thought process and motives, thus meaning they've already won, but does that have any sense to it? It's the best idea I can come up with.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 9:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Look, I've long suspected that Texans have foul judgment skills. I mean, the executions, the unrestrained ego, the Cowboys, the 31 statewide elected Republicans, but this takes the cake. SurveyUSA did a ton of polls on the popularity of all 100 senators, and who's the least popular senator in the country? That's right: John Cornyn. I mean, you send a guy to Washington to bring nothing new to the table, and jump onto whatever cruel method of discrimination is politically expedient, and then you don't even appreciate it? Assholes.

Thanks to DailyKos for the pickup.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 12:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Mickey Kaus points out how a third-party presidential candidate pretty much needs a majority (270 majority votes) to win:

the real problem is the House of Representatives which will choose the President from among the top three in electoral votes unless one of the three candidates gets an absolute majority of all electoral votes. Thus, if each of the major party candidates can simply scrape together one-fourth of the total electoral votes, the election will be decided by the House, each state delegation casting a single vote with the votes of 26 state delegations necessary to a win. Regardless of how their district and states vote, there will be very strong party pressure on both Republican and Democratic members of Congress to cast a party vote. There will be no Independent party members in the House, making it virtually impossible for McCain to assemble 26 states even assuming he runs first by a significant margin.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 11:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

From Slashdot, who should know better:

i-Love-to-blog writes "Blogs have revolutionized information delivery. They not only made the world much more smaller, but a lot more personal, united and un-afraid as well. Events like the September 11 attacks and the Iraq invasion made news channels take a back seat. Wired claimed blogs to be what Napster was to music. They even have a wager on Weblogs outranking the New York Times Web site by 2007. People got paid to blog. Then they got fired for that. Some lost money for blogging their ideas. Most just hand out links these days. When was the last time your favorite blogger talked sense? Have blogs reached a saturation point? Blogging burnout is a humorous look at the rise and fall of weblogs."

Posted by Terry McMahon at 11:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Apparently one of Bush's former chief economists is now claiming that the World Trade Center attacks were a "controlled demolition," i.e. the government blew them up. Admittedly, I'm not sure how well high-ranking economists are brought into the loop on military matters (or are experts in how large objects collapse) but wow, shouldn't a prominent member of the administration not fall for conspiracy theories? And shouldn't he shut up about it if he did? And why is the Washington Times reporting it?

Still, It reminds me of an incident I recall from deciding to go watch the 9/11 coverage on TV (yikes, what a mistake). I could have sworn I saw the second tower blow up in the middle while it was collapsing. I noted it at the time and someone said it was probably a gas leak, but I never saw this confirmed. I have asked around, and I seem to be the only one who remembers this. Could I really be wrong here?

Or have they gotten to you too?

Posted by Terry McMahon at 11:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I'm sure we're all vaguely familiar that polygamy still exists in the Utah hinterlands, and how funny it all is. But yikes, this shit is serious:

The freckle-faced 17-year-old said he was left to fend for himself last year after being forced out of Colorado City, Ariz., a town about 40 miles east of here, just over the state line.

"I couldn't see how my mom would let them do what they did to me," he said.

When he tried to visit her on Mother's Day, he said, she told him to stay away. When he begged to give her a present, she said she wanted nothing.

"I am dead to her now," he said.

Gideon is one of the "Lost Boys," a group of more than 400 teenagers — some as young as 13 — who authorities in Utah and Arizona say have fled or been driven out of the polygamous enclaves of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City over the last four years.

Some say they were sometimes given as little as two hours' notice before being driven to St. George or nearby Hurricane, Utah, and left like unwanted pets along the road.

Authorities say the teens aren't really being expelled for what they watch or wear, but rather to reduce competition for women in places where men can have dozens of wives.

"It's a mathematical thing. If you are marrying all these girls to one man, what do you do with all the boys?" said Utah Atty. Gen. Mark Shurtleff, who has had boys in his office crying to see their mothers. "People have said to me: 'Why don't you prosecute the parents?' But the kids don't want their parents prosecuted; they want us to get the No. 1 bad guy — Warren Jeffs. He is chiefly responsible for kicking out these boys."

The 49-year-old Jeffs is the prophet, or leader, of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The FLDS, as it is known, controls Hildale and Colorado City.

According to Gideon, he is one of 71 children born to his father, 73-year-old Dan Barlow, and his father's eight wives.

The Barlows were among Colorado City's first settlers and have served as political leaders and lawmen. Gideon's father was mayor.

But last year Jeffs called a meeting. He announced that Dan Barlow and 20 other men were being expelled. His reasons were never fully explained.

Then he "reassigned" their wives and children to other men, say local authorities and witnesses.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 10:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

To be honest, I'm not sure how to talk about Michael Lewis and the book I just read, Trail Fever: Spin Doctors, Rented Strangers, Thumb Wrestlers, Toe Suckers, Grizzly Bears, and Other Creatures on the Road to the White House. I should say first off that it's apparent Michael Lewis has a talent for finding the interesting side of life and seeing what's over there. I mean, he was wondering why the Oakland A's kept winning their division with one of the lowest payrolls in baseball, and his Moneyball changed baseball forever. Think of it: so many baseball books every year, and this guy's book had the biggest impact of any of them in the past 30 years. So you can imagine my interest in seeing Michael Lewis' book on politics, specifically the 1996 presidential elections. This is a much more personal book than Moneyball - there's a difference between the story of a campaign and the story of reporting on a campaign - so Michael Lewis lets us know a lot about what it means to be Michael Lewis.

Now, that's not necessarily a bad approach to take: after all, that's certainly how I write this blog. At first, though, Lewis' personal tack wasn't working for me. In other words, I thought he was an asshole. The original title he wanted didn't help; Losers: The Road to Everywhere but the White House sounds like a Wall Street alum (he is, as detailed in his first book Liar's Poker) wondering why everyone in politics is such an idiot. The opening of his book, set during the primaries, only makes things worse: blah blah blah, Clinton's campaign is soulless, blah blah, Dole's campaign is the Republican version of Clinton. If only there were a guy who meant business who could clean this up, right? (More on that later.)

Upon further reading, though, I discovered that Lewis is less an out-and-out asshole, and more just relentlessly honest. Now, I know, sometimes the difference between jerk and a smirking "hey, I'm just being honest" is slight, but true honesty, to muddle FDR, is sometimes the best policy. Sure, Lewis picks on Clinton and Dole and complains about the state of politics (and how Pat Buchanan's campaign lost his bags, the boredom of the press plane, and so on), but he's equally forthcoming in his compliments. He doesn't even do the backhanded compliments you'd expect. When Steve Forbes turns out to have an astonishing talent for disarming reporters' tough questions, Lewis comes across as genuinely impressed. The outsider credentials that I thought would create a tale of extended condescension and bemusement turned out to give Lewis a real objectivity. Because he doesn't obsess over politics like most political journalists, Lewis has a fresher outlook on the events as they unfold. Put another way, he doesn't care about the stuff anyone can tell you is pointless (he mentions Bob Dole's cavalcade of endorsements a few times, but never who these major political figures actually are) and actually finds real insight.

That's when I realized I had shifted my opinion again: I was actually finding Michael Lewis to be likeable. I mean, really so. Once I had gotten around the fact that he might be honest and not just a jerk, I saw that Michael Lewis is, simply, astonishingly insightful. You remember the political journalist's book I reviewed earlier? While that book offered up four or five real good insights and topics for discussion, Lewis does that at least once a page. I'm not kidding. I could literally devote a paragraph or so here to any of about 200 fascinating issues that Lewis casually tosses off in a sentence or two. Some of these revelations are about politics (on page 91, he realizes that the "rented strangers" who staff Dole's campaign and advise him on how to proceed have a huge personal interest in telling him to run, even if he can't win) and some not political (on page 163, he relates a story someone once told him on how to take a mental photograph and keep it). Michael Lewis is clearly a smart guy, and he applies it well to the subject matter. That's what makes this book worth reading.

It's not just Lewis' intelligence that makes Trail Fever a winner, though: the man knows where to look. He decides early on that Clinton and Dole are running campaigns specifically designed to avoid real issues, and his impressions thereof are the weak part of the book. Fortunately, he also realizes that this means he should go see other candidates and situations. For me, that's what makes the book: sure, Lewis spends a lot of time with candidates, discovering the genuine effectiveness of Alan Keyes and his apparently amazing speeches, and attempting to connect Pat Buchanan's newfound protectionism with the Republican pro-business ideal. But Lewis leaves the campaign trail too, to talk to Jesse Jackson, failed presidential candidates like Michael Dukakis and George McGovern, the head of conservative Christian group Focus on the Family, Bob Dole's sister who still lives in his childhood house, the guy down the street from Lewis's NYC apartment who started a mini-economy on can recycling, and so on, each more interesting than the last. In contrast to his disappointment in the overall intellectual crumminess of the Clinton and Dole campaigns, this is where Lewis finds inspiration, and he conveys it well. The book benefits as a result.

The first-among-equals of Lewis' digressions is relationship with Republican primary candidate Morry Taylor. Taylor, a Midwestern tire executive, just barely qualifies as a serious candidate; imagine, if you will, a right-wing Kucinich getting into the debates with no elected experience. What's interesting about Morry Taylor, on a superficial level, is Lewis' clear fondness for him: during the primary season Lewis repeatedly ditches the campaigns that could actually win in favor of another few days with Morry, and even does this a few more times during the general election. For someone who's spent a little more time reading Michael Lewis, though, a real parallel emerges. The brash rejection of conventional wisdom, the business-oriented approach, and the determined interest in combining disciplines describe not just Morry Taylor but Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane... and Michael Lewis himself. I can't tell if Lewis intends to draw these parallels, or if he's just driven towards subjects who share his outlook on life, but the connection is unmistakable. What's funny, though, is while Michael Lewis may not come off as an asshole in his book, Morry Taylor sure does. Morry does good things (he was genuinely enraged when his big secret came out, even though it was that he had anonymously donated $19,000 so a poor Iowa family could make their house wheelchair-accessible for their disabled son). Generally, though, Morry Taylor is the guy I feared I saw in Lewis: he jumps into a new profession and immediately makes fun of the people in it. He brags about being rich and calls people idiots if they don't have the all-important business know-how. He makes fun of political operatives for being fat to their face and hands out a ridiculous survey with questions like "Do you agree with my plan to truly reform government?" I suspect Lewis relishes not only Taylor's ability to cut through the bull-crap of politics to receive, say, a standing ovation for being pro-choice at a social-conservative Republican event, but also the fact that Taylor's aggressive style also ensures his downfall. To Lewis, without the guys like Morry Taylor (and Pat Buchanan and Alan Keyes) to tell the truth, the mainstream politicians would have nothing to steal.

Now, I have a probable future bride up in the Pacific Northwest with a crush here, so I'll indulge everyone and talk about my favorite part of the book. Everyone knows that John McCain decided to use his sincere honesty to "kill 'em with access" and open up to reporters about anything and everything, successfully winning them over so that they'd give his campaign the best possible coverage. So when a guy with McCain's honesty runs into a guy with Michael Lewis' desperate search for truth, the results are great. No less than three times do the two meet, and each is rife with insights. Here's my favorite paragraph from the entire book:

The senator appears to commit indiscretions by the score. But I have no idea whether these are indiscretions everyone has already heard, and thus part of McCain's political persona, or true gaffes that will get him in trouble and make me famous for my reportorial skills. Is it shocking that while every elected official in America is busy sucking up to Ross Perot, McCain not only describes Perot as "nutty" but also tells me that Perot calls him constantly to whine about even mild criticism? Should I stop the presses when he says that Buchanan drew more people to rallies in Arizona than he ever could? I don't know, and I'm not even sure I want to.

And I like Michael Lewis. His book is like the best of life: it starts with a solid plan, gets rid of the plan to do something better, and always pursues real insight, even if it's not where everyone else is looking. Maybe every reporter has a similarly haphazard and happy-go-luck lifestyle, but Lewis is the first one I've read to convey it in print. It's not that different from a current reporter's campaign blog; in fact the book is modified from Lewis's articles for the New Republic. (And I know people who write for that!)

So I wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone who's interested in politics. As a book, Trail Fever is just as good as Moneyball and better than Liar's Poker, and if you can stand the subject matter, you should read it. One final note: though it's not listed on the author's bio here, I know Lewis is now married to former MTV VJ Tabitha Soren and lives with her in Paris. I believe he meets her in this book, when he stops by a Rock the Vote event. Sure enough, his acknowledgements conclude with his thanks to a Tabitha Sornberger: "Some interviews never end." The best ones never do.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 8:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Boston Herald reports today that Theo's going to shake things up with the Red Sox. Sure, we've all had our laughs at the Yankees' recent foibles, most recently Joe Torre's "vote of confidence" from George Steinbrenner (which probably means he'll be fired). But while the Sox are still within striking distance of the Orioles, they haven't exactly torn up the AL East either.

So get out your tea leaves. Here are Epstein's quotes:

This is difficult to fix, to be honest with you... So many people are performing below our expectations and below our projections that this isn't easy to fix. If this is the best that this pitching staff can pitch, then I really miscalculated and it's time for changes.

This is my fault. The guys have to play better or we've got to make some changes. I think we've allowed something like (77) runs in our last 10 losses. We're out of games. It's time for changes. Soon.
...
We take [trades] very, very seriously... But what we have right now isn't working. It's clear. It's my fault and we have to fix it. The status quo is not really acceptable.
...
[Schilling]'s making some progress, but we can't count on him as a savior... If he comes back and has a dominating second half, great. But we can't count on that. He can't fix everything.
...
I think we're reluctant to give up on some guys who've performed for us and who have a track record... But it reaches a point where what you have isn't working and you've got to make some changes. It's a pain tolerance.

I'll tell you, though, I keep looking at "give up on some guys who've performed for us and who have a track record" and I think Tim Wakefield. He's 38 and he's got an ERA of 5.13. Releasing Wakefield would be worse than Dumbledore dying in Half-Blood Prince, but as we learned in Moneyball, sentimentality is one of the big impediments to efficiency. Let's hope getting rid of Wakefield isn't an option, because if it is, we might be forced to consider just how badly we want to win.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 5:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think it's important that I start preparing my vast audience (Hi Mom!) for the eventual reality of all my posts being about the law. Not "about law" or "on legal matters," but "about the law." You know I'm going to be a doctor of jurisprudence when I get out, right?

Anyway, interesting column yesterday (see, now I'm calling it Saturday) from right-wing nutball commentator Charles Krauthammer. He really supports Clarence Thomas for Supreme Court Chief Justice on the basis of Thomas' focus on the founders' original intent. I think, still in the prenatal phase of my law career, that original intent is a bunch of hooey, but I do appreciate the distinction between judging based on the law and judging based on who you'd like to see win. Here's the important line:

Two years ago, Thomas (and Scalia and William Rehnquist) dissented from the court's decision to invalidate a Texas law that criminalized sodomy. Thomas explicitly wrote, "If I were a member of the Texas Legislature, I would vote to repeal it." However, since he is a judge and not a legislator, he could find no principled way to use a Constitution that is silent on this issue to strike down the law.

Posted by Terry McMahon at 1:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Mark Leibovich in the Washington Post today (I'm still referring to Friday at this point) gives up and writes not about the Howard Dean/Harry Reid joint press conference, but about how screwed up the whole thing was. Here's an example:

About 60 reporters and cameramen attempted to shove their way into an office equipped to handle about 20. The resulting spectacle offered yet another distillation of why so many people believe that politicians and the media deserve each other.

The madness began at 10:30 a.m. when the media horde was invited to enter Reid's office. Photographers poured in first, equipment slamming into the sides of a narrow doorway and -- in one case -- the temple of a female staffer. Reporters were invited in next, but roughly 20 reporters were unable to crowd in and were left to shout objections through the bottleneck. "You can't start yet," one yelled from the back. "The reporters aren't in."

After several seconds, a booming voice cut through the noise. It belonged to Brian Wilson, a Fox News correspondent who was standing in the middle of the crowd. He asked Dean "if people are focused on the other things that you've said about hating Republicans, about Republicans being dishonest and then this latest comment about the Republican Party is full of white Christians. You say you hate Republicans -- does that mean you also'' hate white Christians?

Dean didn't respond and Reid talked about having a "positive agenda." Wilson was so insistent that at one point, Durbin asked, "Does he run the press conference?"

Posted by Terry McMahon at 12:58 AM | Permalink |