island⁹⁴

We just had our AmeriCorps*VISTA orientation last week—which to our delight and hard work turned out great—and one of the things I’ve been ruminating on since then was one of the powerful dialogue we had around poverty. AmeriCorps*VISTA’s mission is to help individuals and communities out of poverty rather than focus on making poverty more tolerable; so it should come as no surprise that we talked a lot about poverty. But the substance of the discussion made me think a lot about how I view poverty. Making it doubly interesting, of course, is that I was running the orientation and manage our VISTA program.

I realized I take a very broad view of poverty; perhaps as broad as they come. One of the activities involved each of us (about 40 people in all) writing on a tacky note their definition of poverty. My definition I gave was:

Poverty is the inability to fully participate in or benefit from society.

…read more

Looks like the FCC has “demonstrate[d], once again, that at present it is difficult, if not impossible to apply public interest pressure to TV stations via the Commission’s license renewal process.”

A Chicago/Milwaukee appeal was made to the FCC over a lack of local and regional political coverage from area broadcasters: less than 1% went to non-federal election coverage in the month prior to the election.

Also interesting how they cut up the types of coverage:

As for the style of the stories, or “frame,” as the CMPA study put it, most went to “horse race” stories (guesstimating a candidates’ electoral chances at the moment) and “strategic” stories (”how the candidate was using an event to reach particular groups of voters”). Strategy and horse race items dominated coverage. Issues-oriented features counted for less than a fifth of air time.

It’s another election year which means that politics are flying.

From a story on NASA forcibly downplaying global warming:

The report did not directly accuse them of lying, but used more nuanced terms such as “mendacity” and “dissembling.” The space agency complained those terms were unjust.

And I enjoy how the New York Times describes a John McCain statement:

Like Mr. Bush, Mr. McCain has steadfastly refused to set dates for withdrawals of troops and envisions a long-term American presence in the country. But last month, in the general election battleground state of Ohio, Mr. McCain did a semantic dance and said he expected that most American troops would be home from Iraq by 2013.

“Limiting the CIA’s interrogation methods to those in the Army Field Manual would be dangerous because the manual is publicly available and easily accessible on the Internet…”

President W. Bush on his veto of a CIA waterboarding ban. Of course, the Operating Manual for Guantanamo Bay Prison is on the internet too. But then again, apparently Guantanamo isn’t effective either.

I got one of those “write your congress-critter right now!” emails and tried to do so. But apparently Free Press’s anti-telecom immunity form didn’t like me: We’re sorry, but based on your address, you are not eligible to take this alert. This may be because the alert is restricted to particular states or to constituents of particular representatives. Guess I’ll try emailing him direct.

Update:Just got an email saying that Free Press was having some technical issues that are now fixed (PS they use Convio to route representative messages).

Dear Michael Capuano,

Please do not grant legal immunity to telephone companies for turning over our private phone records to the government. This is not an issue of national security but of one of the upholding due process and the rule of law in our great country.

As a patriotic and freedom loving American, I understand that extraordinary measures must be taken when those freedoms are in peril. But such measures must take place legally and through the time-tested methods our forefathers established within the Constitution and our system of laws.

Please do not reward the White House for seeking to overturn the checks and balances of the Constitution and our rule of law. Please do not excuse the unlawful actions of telecom companies in turning over private information without legal cause.

Thank you,
Ben Sheldon

As so often happens in politics, the quarrel between Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton came down to a matter of direct objects. Both “reject” and “denounce” are transitive verbs — they act upon a direct object — but the candidates weren’t talking about the same objects. The object of Mr. Obama’s denunciation was Mr. Farrakhan’s opinions, particularly his anti-Semitic comments, whereas Mrs. Clinton was urging her opponent to reject the minister’s support. The thrust of Mrs. Clinton’s challenge was that her opponent was merely highlighting a particular disagreement with Mr. Farrakhan, while still accepting his — and his organization’s — backing.

From an article in the NY Times on Clinton and Obama’s differing arguments regarding Farrakhan. Noting this for it’s interesting perspective that they’re essentially arguing about different direct objects.

In September 1963 [George] McGovern became the only senator who opposed U.S. involvement in Vietnam during the Kennedy administration. He came by his horror of war honorably in 35 B-23 missions over Germany, where half the B-24 crews did not survive—they suffered a higher rate of fatalities than did Marines storming Pacific islands. McGovern was awarded a Distinguished Flying Corss with three oak-leaf clusters. In his 70s he lost a 45-year old daughter to alcoholism. Losing a presidential election, he says softly, “was not the saddest thing in my life.” Time confers a comforting perspective, giving consolations to old age, which needs them.

McGovern and the outcomes of the 1968 Democratic Convention are big news what with the current affairs. From the Last Word of Newsweek’s February 25, 2008 issue.

I think that last sentence is unnecessary; or upon closer reading, is supposed to dismissive of McGovern (old people need to be comforted/coddled).

I saw the movie King Corn last night at Harvard. It was ok. The best part I thought was when they interviewed Earl Butz, a Secretary of Agriculture in the 1970s that instigated a major food production policy shift.

Earl said that his change in policy led to a decrease in the amount of money people spent on food (from ~40% to 15-20%) which led to the economic prosperity of today. (eg more disposable income, more consumption, expanded economy).

Clever. Though after reading his wikipedia entry, apparently he wasn’t so clever in other respects. Definitely didn’t mention that in the movie.

Deregulation in the utilities industry results in higher costs whenever those costs are not expected to greatly affect consumption (also in the oil industry), contrary to the consequentialist arguments of deregulation proponents. The same thing is happening in the communications sector.

From a BoingBoing comment on a broadband penetration related post. I have no clue if that’s a standard economic opinion.

There are so many overlapping assumptions and statements in this congressman’s statement it’s amazing. It’s also amazing how 40 years of history inures you to something viciously contested by minds great and small.

On September 21st [1964], Congressman Donald C. Bruce of Indiana lashed out at the Daisy and Ice Cream ads at a Republican Ward dinner. He suggested that the spots aided Soviet political goals by “repeating as fact a Communist-sponsored lie which for years has been Kremlin-directed propaganda aimed at neutralizing the American will to resist the Communist program for world conquest by promoting fear of ‘the bomb.’”

William Bernbach himself defended the Daisy spot in no uncertain terms to the New York Times in October of 1964:

“The little girl commercial was deplored on absolutely erroneous grounds. The central theme of this campaign—whether you like it or not—is nuclear responsibility. Perhaps that theme is not a tasteful one; there is no way to make death pleasant.”

The divisiveness of the ad seems understandable considering the studies of mortality awareness.

from CONELRAD’s history of Lyndon Johnson’s atomic responsibility, anti-Goldwater Daisy Ad. (via BoingBoing)