Interesting

We’re getting fatter, and according to health alarmists and nannies, that means we’re all unhealthier, will die more often and earlier of cancer, heart disease, and stroke. The obesity “epidemic” is horrible for our collective health in America.

Really?

According to a recently released report:

ATLANTA - In what appears to be an amazing success for American medicine, preliminary government figures released Wednesday showed that the annual number of deaths in the U.S. dropped by nearly 50,000 in 2004 — the biggest decline in nearly 70 years.

The 2 percent decrease, reported by the National Center for Health Statistics, came as a shock to many, because the U.S. is aging, growing in population and getting fatter. In fact, some experts said they suspect the numbers may not hold up when a final report is released later this year.

Nevertheless, center officials said the statistics, based on a review of about 90 percent of death records reported in all 50 states in 2004, were consistent across the country and were deemed solid enough to report.

The center said drops in the death rates for heart disease, cancer and stroke accounted for most of the decline.

I know that lower death rates don’t equate to lower incident rates of these diseases, and that fewer deaths probably only mean delayed deaths from these diseases. I’d be interested in seeing how the rates of actual occurrences have changed over the last few years. It’ll also be interesting to see what happens with the final numbers.

Rent

I finally got the movie version from Blockbuster for a trip, and I will be buying it. Maybe it’s because of everything I was dealing with in the summer of 1997 when Stacy, Erica, and I saw this on stage. Maybe it’s the message. Or both. Definitely – both.

525,600 minutes. 525,600 moments so dear.
How do you measure a year in the life?

There’s a lot of this movie that I don’t agree with politically. But this is just one of those where the politics just don’t matter to me. It hits me somewhere many other things (music, movie, stage, whatever) don’t.

There is no future
There is no past
Thank God this moment’s not the last
There’s only us
There’s only this
Forget regret
Or life is yours to miss
No other road
No other way
No day but today

And the voices! Those voices. It just takes my breath away every time I listen to it. Yeah, I bought the Broadway recording immediately after I saw the show almost nine years ago. I still can't believe it's been nine years.

Traveling...

My recent and future schedule, April 14 through May 10.
two days - Charleston, SC - personal
one night, one day - Austin - work
(I really wish I could have stayed longer)
one day home
four days - Boston - personal
half day home
two days - Cleveland, OH - work
a week home
five days - Key West - personal
three days - Orlando - work
HOME

I'm not complaining, just a bit overwhelmed. Yikes. I'm also happy that it's split work and personal. Of course, I'll be working during some of the personal. Oh well. It's still a kick-ass life.

New web addiction

Previously my web addiction, besides the blogs and political commentary, has been the Internet Movie Database. I can hardly watch a movie at home without the laptop open and IMDB pulled up online.

For a few months, I've been lamenting the lack of a music version of this kind of database. I don't know why I didn't just do a google search before tonight, because when I thought to do that, I found AllMusic (by AMG - the guys who keep all the CD information that shows up on your burned CDs).

This is fantastic! Enter a name, and it pulls up several tabs, including Overview, Biography, Discography, Songs, Credits, and Charts & Awards. Within the overview tab, you'll see links to similar artists, influences, other writers whose songs they've performed, a timeline of their musical life, genres, pictures, etc. etc.

Don't question an arrogant 20-something year old "man"

Tonight, Dave and I decided to go try a sushi place down the road that we'd heard was great. It was good, but we still prefer the place close to our house.

We were enjoying ourselves, and the atmosphere was nice and relaxing. That is, until two guys came in and sat next to us at the bar. The first impression came when they sat down, leaned back in their chairs, and put their knees up against the sushi bar. Sure, I've done this before in some places, but never in an austere sushi restaurant.

Then the conversation begins. The one who monopolized the entire conversation begins talking about work (sounds like he's a sales manager), and lamenting the disrespect he feels is directed his way "because he's in his twenties." I'm sure that's it. It doesn't have anything to do with the fact that he's an arrogant jerk. No, that couldn't be it. His view...

"There's this woman at work who's like 55, and tells me how she has 25 years of experience in the industry. Listen, anyone in their fifties and still working in the same industry - no, anyone in their fifties who doesn't own their own business is a schmuck."

Seriously, this guy's enourmous ego is so fragile that someone discussing her experience in the industry (I do know time doesn't necessarily translate into knowledge and success) is immediately percieved as disrespect.

The definition of schmuck:
Shmuck: another of the many Yiddish words for "penis." Although it has the same basic meaning as putz, a shmuck often refers to someone with greater power or social/emotional status; someone who's intentionally nasty or uses their power for ill, whereas a putz is more ineffectual, easier to dismiss because he's beneath consideration or has no real effect on your life. (It's the difference between "jerk" and "total a$$hole.") (It's a very subtle difference, I grant you, and the line is often blurry...)

Turns out he's the schmuck.
Hehe.

Tishamingo

Hey, I've heard of them, but would love to know if any of you have heard their music or seen them live. We're thinking about going to see them at The Windjammer on Isle of Palms tomorrow night. For $8, I'm sure we can't lose, but I'd like to have some ammunition, if I need to convince my dad to go, and our friends to meet us there. Any help is much appreciated. Thanks!

And have a wonderful Easter.

How hard is it to understand?

Some people just don't get it, but Gunner does.

I think that most of you who read this will certainly appreciate Gunner's response to an editorial writer at Athens' student-run (not affiliated with the University) Red and Black newspaper.

Well-said, Gunner.

One Nation

Issues of the Patriot Post are emailed a few days each week. This is a conservative newsletter with which I agree more often than not. Their newsletters are heavy, chock full of well-researched and interesting information. Though I don't always agree with the opinions in the larger essays, they are consistently well-reasoned and detailed.

Today's essay covering immigration was particularly good, though. I believe it requires a subscription - well worth it.

E PLURIBUS UNUM?

Out of many, one.

That was the national motto proposed by Benjamin Franklin, John
Adams and Thomas Jefferson in 1776. Both simple and elegant, it
embodied the notion that all who had come to America's shores, and
all who would come, must be united---must all form one front---in
defense of freedom and liberty. For 200 years, we were, largely,
one people united behind constitutional republicanism. But soon
after the social turbulence of the '60s and the economic woes
of the '70s, that unity began to crumble. This was the era in
which multiculturalism emerged---the era in which ethnocentricity
became chic.

Arthur Schlesinger, a former Harvard professor and senior advisor
to JFK, published a retrospective on this era in 1991 called
"The Disuniting of America." Schlesinger wrote primarily about
the orthodoxy of self-interested hyphenated-American citizen
groups---who, rather than unifying to become one, were diversifying
to become many. He warned that the cult of ethnicity would result
in "the fragmentation and tribalization of America," the natural
consequence being that these special-interest groups would be
co-opted by the political parties...

Security Concerns...

... A formidable security wall along our border with Mexico would also
provide a measure of safety against terrorist incursions, but there
are already serious security problems brewing within our borders.

...The Hispanic reconquest movement is on the verge of violent
nationalism---if it hasn't already become just that---with all its
terrorist implications. If they do in fact resort to violence, all
bets are off in regards to the status, guest worker or otherwise,
of any illegal alien in this country from south of the border.

Economic Concerns...

The essential protectionist argument against the provision
of guest-worker permits is that these workers take jobs away
from Americans and reduce wages for everyone. There is, however,
little factual basis for those arguments. As Former House Majority
Leader Dick Armey was fond of noting, "Demagoguery beats data." In
other words, an emotional rant tends to be louder than a reasoned
analysis.

With U.S. unemployment now at 4.8 percent (with most of these
being the chronically unemployable), we need immigrant workers
regardless of the ruckus that protectionists might raise...

Social Concerns...

... We are now beginning to bear the social consequences of
multicultural politicization in both American and immigrant
minority populations. "Progressive" policies---bilingual education
being the worst offender---have the effect of insulating and
ultimately ghettoizing otherwise hardworking and well-intentioned
immigrants. For fear of appearing "culturally imperialistic"
by forcing newcomers to learn our language, history and laws,
we've condemned them to permanent impoverishment. But then,
such policies have always bred Democrat votes.

Conclusion...

... Additionally, we strongly endorse free enterprise and free trade,
including the regulated in-sourcing of low-skill labor through
time-limited guest-worker visas.

I can't possibly quote all that I want to from this without just copying the entire piece, which isn't fair to its authors or the site on which it was originally published.

Iraq

Oliver North provides a point by point rebuttal to John Kerry's the-Iraqis-must- have-a-functioning-government-in-30-days plan here. Good stuff.

For Dave D.

Just for you...

Freedom? Nah, we don't want that...

We want to be sure that we'll have a house, tv, car, and cell phone; never hurt or be hurt; never be hungry; and never die of something unpleasant.

As usual, The Agitator sums up the new American view of Freedom.

Advocates for liberty are increasingly facing a new challenge. Used to be that our main fight was against the ever expanding size and scope of government. But it's fast becoming the case that half the battle is convincing people that freedom is actually a good thing in the first place. People would rather have a massive government that makes all of their decisions for them, ostensibly because they'd rather have someone other than themselves to blame when they make the wrong decisions. Hence, the uncomfortable number of smokers who support smoking bans because they think it'll help them kick the habit.

Is it time for a revolution, yet?

Aha

I've seen something like this before, but this is a more detailed explanation about why men don't listen to women. Interesting.

Radney Foster

Ah, he's got a new CD coming out (so does Keane! - June 20), and he's playing the Opry on Saturday. If you live in Nashville, or will be there, you should totally go see him. He actually doesn't play outside of Texas too much anymore, so it's a great chance. I hope he comes back to Georgia for this album.

What I did on Saturday

Stacy and I drove to the Sheraton on Courtland downtown and met up with Russ. From the outside, this is a hotel clearly built in the 50s or 60s. On the inside, it has a pool, lots of trees, and the balconies make it look like New Orleans. It's really really cool.

Anyway, we went down there to try out with Russ for the VH-1 World Series of Pop Culture Trivia. Russ has a full breakdown of the experience, but he has left it to me to tell the story of my middle name.

If there's any question about my connection to and love of pop culture, it is put to rest when the story of my middle name is told.

When I was born, my parents did not give me a middle name. There's a bit of a legacy here, but just for simplicity's sake, I'll leave it at that. Anyway, when I was about six or so and going to school, I realized that everyone else had middle names. At the same time, I was a big fan of The Facts of Life, and tomboy through and through. I thought Jo was the coolest girl ever. Today, she'd be a lesbian, but back then, she was just a cool tomboy with a motorcycle. So, in school, I started putting Whitney Jo on everything. The school even sent my progress report home with that name on it. My parents had no idea where it came from and why I started using it. I kind of moved on beyond it for a while, but in the seventh grade or so, starting using it again. And as a Christmas gift that year, my parents legally changed my name. This is not expensive, but also not an easy task, and they went to a lot of trouble to do it. It was such a great gift.

So that's the story of Whitney Jo. It's not, like most people think, because I'm from the South, but because I loved Jo on Facts of Life. Actually, there's an irony there that I've never realized before. And it goes back to the reason I never had a middle name in the first place that I wasn't going to tell. My grandmother and some of her 10 brothers and sisters all had good small town southern names like Betty Ruth, Emma Lou, Hugh Frank, etc. My grandmother hated it, so when she had children, she insisted on only giving them one name. Because of that my mom and her sisters only have one name. And, when my parents had me, they only gave me one name. Then, I ended up with a very southern name, when in fact the single name thing goes back to my grandmother's distaste for the classic southern double-naming tradition. I never thought of it that way.

OK, moving on. It's time to do lots and lots around the house: laundry, clean the kitchen and bathroom, vaccuum, and catch up on my DVR watching. Hope you have a nice Sunday.

So out of it

I was in NYC yesterday and gave six hours worth of presentations. It was actually the same presentation four times. I enjoy visiting New York and wish I could have stayed a little longer. I've been five times now, and two of thsoe times, my hotel room had a view of the Empire State Building. I've still never been there, though. I also rode by it in a cab on the way to my hotel Wednesday night.

Day trips are so hard, though, and I'm completely out of it today. Traveling is getting harder for me, not easier. What's up with that?

More on SWAT

How long is it going to take before people realize this REALLY is a problem?

Elderly couple injured by SWAT team invading the wrong house.

From The Agitator - link on the blogroll to the right.

SWAT

While watching V for Vendetta, I kept coming back to the agitator's focus lately on the over-use of SWAT teams in our country. More and more often SWAT teams are being used to serve warrants for non-violent crimes. Regardless of whether or not I agree that gambling with your friend in your own home or smoking a little pot should be illegal, it's ridiculous that SWAT teams are being employed to bust these type of criminals.

Balko links to a recent BBC piece on SWAT teams, and does his own review primarily of the study often used to debunk the claim that SWAT raids are often excessively violent.

2) Those who cite Klinger's study as evidence that that the massive increase in SWAT deployments is harmless wrongly assume that the only harm done by paramilitary raids is done is when shots are fired. That's most certainly not the case. I've documented dozens of cases in my upcoming paper in which SWAT teams have broken down the door to the wrong home, and needlessly terrorized an innocent family -- and it's almost certain that the number of actual botched raids like these is exponentially higher than the number reported in the media.

In other words, there's significant harm done when heavily-armed tactical units break down doors in the middle of the night, and drag innocent men, women, and children out of their beds at gunpoint, even if shots are never fired. Two of the more infamous botched SWAT raids resulting in death -- Alberta Spruill in New York and Accelyne Williams in Boston -- involved no gunfire at all. Both died from heart attacks after SWAT teams mistakenly raided their homes. There are also several cases of botched SWAT raids resulting in the death or injury of innocent people due to misuse or malfunction of the "flashbang" grenades police often use to distract the targets of a raid.

3) We also need to ask ourselves, quite simply, if we want to live in a society where its appropriate to serve warrants on nonviolent offenders with cops dressed in battle garb. I sure as hell don't. Does a pot smoker really deserve to have his door beaten down while he's sleeping? To be sworn at, forced to the ground at gunpoint, and handcuffed? Go back to that Churchill quote: "Democracy means that when there's a knock at the door at 4 am, it's probably the milkman." What does it mean that we've reached the point where not only can we no longer be sure it's actually the milkman, but that police don't even bother to knock?

I certainly know how I feel about this. Do you? If you don't see that this is a problem, why not?

V for Vendetta

Saw it this weekend. As a movie and entertainment, it was great. Fun, good acting (especially Stephen Rea and Stephen Fry), pretty well-directed, and enjoyable. As a political statement, it was heavy-handed, especially when it showed a flag made out of the American and British flags with a big swastika in the middle.

I can't get behind the idea that this movie is all that risky, either. It's nothing people haven't been saying for years. The book was written in the early and mid-eighties, actually, referencing the Thatcher government. And of course there's the obligatory pharmaceutical companies are in league with the government conspiracy bit. Also nothing new.

But it was still fun to watch. I think that says a lot, since I generally disagreed with the message.

And I do agree that governments should be afraid of their people, just not because I think our government is going to outlaw homosexuality and Islam.

SP, Isaac Hayes, etc.

In my first post on this topic, I wondered about the Isaac Hayes protest being staged. Another interesting tidbit here.

So now I wonder again, if the whole thing wasn't staged for publicity's sake, even the Tom Cruise protest and all.

South Park ... I'm pissed

So after Comedy Central advertises the showing of "Trapped in the Closet" on both TV and their website for last night, they show the stupid Sundance Film Festival episode! I'm furious.

Update: So apparently, as a sue-happy Scientologist, Tom Cruise has his panties in a wad over this episode. Comedy Central and Paramount (which is distributing Mission Impossible 3) are both owned by Viacom. So very aware of his power it this situation, Cruise decided to let Viacom know that he wouldn't do publicity for MI3 if Comedy Central aired the episode (that has already aired once). Well, I guess figuring they'll make more off of MI3 than they do off of South Park, Viacom and Comedy Central caved.

(Props to my friend Adam who called it within five minutes of the wrong episode starting on Wednesday night. He said, "I bet Comedy Central pulled it for some reason. They've caved before.")

I bet Matt and Trey are so angry and can't wait to see how they cover this in another episode.

I don't have contacts at any of these companies to verify this story, of course. It's simply a rumor traveling the web.