Chuck - As someone who really supports space travel and colonization in the future, I have this to say to that: Bush's space policy is a cynical publicity ploy designed to cut off funding to other projects like the Hubble and global warming monitoring. Just like his support for hydrogen fuel cells, he passes over worthwhile existing projects to support pie-in-the-sky endeavors that wouldn't bear any fruit until long after he'd be gone, if ever.
With these people, it's always jam yesterday and jam tomorrow, but never jam today.
"If the mayor of Chicago is supporting gay rights because he calculates that it is the politically astute thing to do, we're further along in this revolution than I'd dared to hope."
Yes. The first thing I thought when I heard this was, 'boy, Gavin Newsom will be able to get re-elected as mayor of SF for the rest of his life if he wants.' After narrowly squeaking by a Green, he had nothing to lose but his margin.
"There are, quite unfortunately, many people who claim that Kerry would be no improvement on Bush. They are the same people who said that Al Gore would have been no different than Bush.
Many of them now work for Howard Dean. The Irony."
Not especially ironic, no. Many of us would maintain that the party has been losing its distinctions in the mind of the general public, caving, and not standing up for us. I'd like that not to be the case anymore, but I have come to believe that steady pummeling and support (depending) from engaged party members could force the change we want anyway.
This is why I've decided to encourage Dean supporters, delegates, and the supporters of other candidates who fear that Dean supporters will go to a third party (I've heard the rumblings & almost wavered myself after the tricks that were pulled in Iowa and NH, it shouldn't be taken lightly), support Dean for the chairmanship of the DNC if he doesn't win the nomination.
All of his 'negatives' would be huge pluses for the party chair position, including the willingness to say things that would be impolitic for an elected official or candidate, and the ability to cheer on the most partisan and ideological of the troops. He would have a loyal following, be able to raise lots of money, and draw plenty of attention to the party's talking points. Think about how much more traffic Kicking Ass would get, and how many donations would flow to the DNC. The media loves to cover an argument, and it would be nice to see more coverage of Democrats arguing about how liberal we should be, as opposed to the current coverage of *everybody* arguing about how conservative we should be. Think about Dean going head to head with Gillespie, unmuzzled by the concern that what he said would hurt his election chances.
(Terry MacAulliffe is, btw, planning on stepping down soon anyway.)
Greens generally like Dean, Libertarians and independents like Dean, and he even has a moderate Republican following. I'll work to encourage fellow Dean supporters to throw in behind the party, but it would be easier if we had the promise of a concrete reward for it. Treat us like loyal Democrats who have the best interests of the party at heart, and we might just be able to persuade each other to rise to expectations. Mull at will.
And in that spirit, I'm glad that Dean will stay in the race to the end. It'll continue to give Dean supporters delegates and clout (this is no time for 'my way or the highway' from any party to this), and keep the press from going straight to the general election horserace. Our party hasn't, as has been noted by many others, had this much coverage in ages. Our issues have gotten airtime, and Bush has been tanking, improving the eventual position of whoever ends up with the nomination.
Just please don't talk as though some very dedicated, and very disappointed people, had already cast, or refused to cast, a vote that cost the Democratic party the presidency. It's a little early to write us off, plenty of time for persuasion.
Gosh (brushes tear), I've never been so proud to be a geek.
It seems that a distinction could be made between additional subjects studied for the sake of ticking off a box on a checklist and additional subjects studied in relation to each other. I'm hoping, for example, that I'll be able to get into a class next spring that's microeconomics and ecology taught together as an exploration of the intersection of these. Otherwise, taking another quarter of econ might seem a little tedious, but the context makes all the difference.
A random assortment of rote facts is boring and useless. Facts put into context of each other become an interesting narrative about the Way Things Work. Too much K-12 teaching is rote, and it fosters and feeds the 'do I need to know this for the test' mentality. You may want to cultivate a laser focus when trying to do well for some particular knowledge measurement event, but that mindset should be the special case.
You've probably all read the Programmer's Stone site, but if you haven't, it's interesting.
It's kind of hard sometimes to function in environments where a geek may feel that they have to apologize for even their vocabulary. But then, on other occasions, you get to hang out with people who pepper their conversations freely with both sci-fi and greek mythology references. And then you know: It's all worth it.
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2004 | 4 |
| 2003 | 1 |
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