HinesSight

Bellydance Superstars shimmy up Salem

Wow. Wow. Wow.

That's my three word review of the Bellydance Superstars "Bombay Bellywood" show that my wife and I saw last night at Salem's historic and marvelously restored Elsinore Theatre (a beautiful place that matched the gorgeous'osity of the dancers).

I love belly dancing. Whenever I can, I watch a live performance. These superstars lived up to their name for me. The two hour show was the most riveting display of belly dancing I've ever seen, or may ever see.

Yes, I readily admit that my male eyes were nearly popping out of my head during some of the most sensual, sexy, and scintillating performances.

But at the same time, I was fascinated by how natural it looked for women to be dancing with each other, and really, for each other -- not just for men (even though the times one woman danced to the beat of the excellent tabla player were the most erotic moments of the show for me).

Browsing through the Bellydance Superstars web site, I came across a review called "Belly dancing celebrates the beauty of femininity."

I LOVE BELLY dancing! I have always regarded it as a divine dance that celebrates the sacred feminine. Belly dancing requires balance, grace and strength, yet it is accessible for every woman regardless of age, weight or ethnicity.

Now, before you get your feminist panties in a bunch, belly dancing is not a dance to seduce men. That's a western-cultural misperception. To the contrary, belly dancing is one of the oldest-documented dances, and it was created by women, for women.

...Moria Chappell, 31, is one of Superstars' amazing dancers. She recently spent an afternoon with me, sharing her passion about this womanly art.

Q: Moria, many people have misperceptions about belly dancing. What are your thoughts on that?

A: It's a women's art. You dance more for yourself than anyone else. The audience can watch and be inspired. It's a sense of appreciation for women's bodies. It's a very different standard. It's a celebration of curves and how to move in a women's body.

Belly dancing is decidedly a woman's dance, so bringing it to the public sphere gives women a chance to be women in a place of power.

I can testify to that, since I was powerless to take my eyes away from the stage during the entire Bombay Bellywood show (the only thing that came between me and the dancers from our center section, Row K seats was the wide David Crosby'eque gray hair of the guy who sat in front of me, but at least he wasn't also tall).

Every dancer was transfixing, but one stole the stage in my utterly subjective Wow! opinion. Meera.

She wasn't the sexiest dancer. She didn't have the most beautiful body. I don't even think she was technically much better, if at all, than other lead dancers in the show.

What she had was an inexpressible presence, a quality shared by the other Bellydance Superstars standouts. Skill and technique can only take a dancer so far, as the movie "Black Swan" demonstrated. Beyond that, some inner essence propels an artist onward.

Meera had it. She clearly was the most proficient classical Indian dancer, and the show's Bollywood expert. More importantly, she had a certain more.

Which was expressed on her face with every move. I loved how she could go in an instant from an engaging smile to a pouty compression of her lips, and then into another expression that somehow resonated perfectly with each beat of the music.

Less attractive to me, yet undeniably intriguing, was the only male dancer, the androgynous Samir. A few times I've seen men belly dance and this never seemed right to me.

It didn't last night either, though his contortionist abilities elicited a different sort of Wow! in my psyche.

Boycott Cabela's -- a store that sponsors coyote cruelty

I've never been to a Cabela's store. Reportedly this is a great place to shop for outdoors gear. A Cabela's is opening about an hour south of us in Springfield, Oregon soon. My wife and I will be tempted to check it out, except...

Predator Defense, an organization based in Eugene that we heartily support, is urging a boycott of Cabela's so long as the store sponsors cruel coyote-killing contests where these canines are shot just for fun.

Coyotes are an important part of natural ecosystems. Usually there's no reason to kill them. Killing tends to increase their numbers, anyway, because the breeding females respond with larger litters.

Here's an email that we got from Brooks Fahy, Executive Director of Predator Defense. I added the links and photos, and made a few minor edits. Read on.

Then: Boycott Cabela's.

January 26, 2011
 
Dear Friends of Predator Defense,

I just received this alert from a colleague in Idaho to boycott Cabela's Outfitters. The store continues to sponsor senseless coyote killing "derby" events like this Saturday near Boise, Idaho. Also, Cabela's hosts forums on its website that promote killing animals "for fun": https://forums.cabelas.com/showthread.php?t=18707


Last year in Idaho, it wasn't just coyotes that were the target, but also wolves and bobcats. This weekend, January 29th, the Boise Cabela's store is helping to sponsor the 1st Annual Idaho Coyote Classic, hosted by Idaho Varmint Hunters (IVH).


 For those of you in Oregon, please note that Cabela's will open its first store in the state at the Gateway Mall in Springfield in Spring 2011. If you like coyotes and other predators or dislike predator-killing contests, Cabela's will be a powerful new entity to reckon with. We must try to convince Cabela's to rethink their promoting of predator killing contests, weapons, and hosting predator forums.

The Idaho Varmint Hunters (IVH) are linked to a well-known anti-predator group, Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife (SFW). Cabela's and SFW are "conservation partners" according to the Cabela's website. Here's a photo gallery link from IVH that prominently displays Cabela's banner: http://ivh.devstu.com/coyote-calling-2010/nnccc-2010-photo-gallery
 

TAKE ACTION

(1) BOYCOTT CABELA'S
I would encourage you to boycott Cabela's as I and many of my colleagues are doing. I'm urging my friends and relatives to do the same until Cabela's changes its position and attitude toward the senseless slaughter of predators. This is not hunting for food. For those of you who support ethical, responsible hunting for sport, this is not that either.
 
(2) MAKE A PHONE CALL
Corporate headquarters in Sidney, Nebraska - 308.254.5505. There are two people to ask for: Tommy Millner, CEO, and/or Joe Arterbun, Public Relations department. It's likely neither will be available so either leave a message with the secretary (or the recording) or ask to be called back. Be polite. Mention how important coyotes are to a healthy ecosystem and that these type of contest are unethical and blatantly cruel.

Thank you for your support.

Beautiful sight: "Trader Joe's coming soon to Salem, Oregon"

It warms my Trader Joe's longing-for heart to see a building on south Commercial Street here in Salem being remodeled for a store opening this year.

This visual evidence reassures me that last September wasn't a dream -- when a liquor license application on the old Albertson's door alerted Salemites that their healthy-shopping starved city (no Whole Foods either) was about to be fed with a Trader Joe's.

But I wanted additional solid evidence. A beautiful sight of which I found on the TJ website under "see where TJ's is opening soon."

Ah, almost as intoxicating as Two-Buck Chuck.

Let's let Texas opt out of Medicare

Last night I was inspired by President Obama's State of the Union speech.

He seemed like the adult in the room, rising above childish political pettiness with his call for Americans to come together and work to improve our country's position in an increasingly competitive world economy.

But it doesn't take a crystal ball for me to predict that almost all Republicans in Congress will ignore Obama's urging to put patriotism above politics, and idealism above ideology. So they'll keep on spouting platitudes about creeping socialism, reckless spending, liberty being threatened, blah, blah, blah.

Which drives me nuts.

As does fundamentalist religion, because the current incarnation of right-wing ideology bears a lot of resemblance to faith-based dogma. Both are almost entirely devoid of factual connections to demonstrable reality. So true believers preach ethereal abstractions rather than concrete prescriptions for effective living.

I've blogged before about how this plays out in the Republican screamfest to Repeal Omabacare! These two screechy words have no relation to the serious problems in our hugely over-expensive and under-effective health care non-system.

And there isn't any substance lurking elsewhere in Republican policy circles.

I keep looking for the replace side of John Boehner's repeal and replace mantra, but so far there's no sign of a Republican plan to insure 50 million or so Americans at a "price" that the Congressional Budget Office says will reduce the federal deficit by several hundred billion dollars over the next ten years, and more thereafter.

Paul Ryan is the new Republican poster boy for deficit reduction and fiscal responsibility. I didn't listen to his response to Obama's State of the Union address. However, I've checked out his plan to ditch Medicare as we know it for those currently under 55.

Ryan's plan to replace Medicare with vouchers that can be used to buy private insurance was slammed by Democrats at a hearing today.

Democrats on the House Budget Committee deflected hard questions Wednesday about their healthcare reform law's fiscal consequences by seeking to make panel Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and his Roadmap for America's Future the stars of the show.

Ryan has proposed replacing Medicare with healthcare vouchers in the future for younger Americans.

Well, the future is now, according to panic-stricken Republicans like Ryan who want drastic cuts in federal spending immediately. If Ryan's Roadmap for America's Future is so wonderful that he was made chair of the House budget committee, I think we should let his Medicare proposal be tested out in some states right away.

Like Texas and Florida.

Both states have large retiree populations. If dumping Medicare and giving seniors vouchers to buy private health insurance is supposedly such a great idea, let's start experimenting and see how it works in Texas and Florida.

Texas Governor Rick Perry has fantasized about his state seceding from the union, so he should jump at the chance to secede from Medicare. Congress can give him and Florida Governor Rick Scott, a fellow Republican, a waiver that offers them the chance to provide seniors with health care coverage through private insurance for, say, 10% less than Medicare is paying out now.

It'll be interesting to see how the 65+ folks in Texas and Florida like being forced to give up their Medicare (and how many vote Republican in the next election).

I'm also looking forward to learning how private insurance companies will be able to provide comparable levels of health services for 10% less money, after factoring in their additional adminstrative expenses and profit margins.

But, hey, Republicans say they are opposed to a government takeover of health care, and Medicare is exactly that -- a government-run insurance program for the elderly.

Sure, it is a highly popular program. Yet if Republicans want Americans to take their airy-fairy policy prescriptions seriously, we need to start seeing some concrete proof that they will work in the real world.

Texas and Florida voted Republican, by and large, in the last election, so these states should be open to trying out a Dump Medicare experiment for a couple of years.

(I hope they'll start on this ASAP, because I suspect that it won't take long for seniors in these states to vote solidly Democratic once they get a taste of what Republicans want to serve up for health care policy.)

Most Americans don't want to repeal health care law

Republicans keep saying that the 2010 midterm election was a mandate from the American people to repeal the health care reform bill, a.k.a. "Obamacare."

That's not true, like so much else that leaves the lips of Republican leaders these days. A  New York Times/CBS poll found that only 20% of people said they want to do away with the entire bill.

And of those, it turns out that when asked about specific parts of the bill, very few wanted to repeal anything.

The poll first asked people a straight-up question -- should we do away with the law completely, or let it stand -- and found that 40 percent favor repeal, versus 48 percent who want to leave it as is. That near-split mirrors virtually all other polls that asked the question this way -- they all find some solid support for repeal.

But here's where it gets interesting. The NYT/CBS poll then asked the pro-repeal camp whether they want to "repeal all of the health care law, or only certain parts of it." Suddenly the number who favor full repeal drops to 20 percent -- one-fifth -- while 18 percent peel off and say they want to repeal "certain parts."

It gets even better. The poll then asked people who support repeal an open-ended question: Which parts of the law do you want done away with? The number who said "everything" drops again, this tiime to eight percent. Eleven percent want the individual mandate repealed. But guess what? The number who called for repeal of other key individual items in the bill -- the pre-existing conditions piece; the coverage for people up to age 26; and so on -- was consistently one percent or less for each of them.

One freaking percent! That's no mandate for repeal.

It's a sign that Senate Dems and President Obama need to stand firm and respect the will of the people: smooth and improve the rough edges of the legislation, but otherwise tell the Republicans to keep their damn hands off of our nation's much-improved (but still flawed) health care system.

Question 71 of the poll asked how well people thought the impact of the health care law on themselves and their family had been explained to them. Fifty-six percent said "not too well" or "not well at all."

This indicates that support for the health care reform bill should increase as Obama and the Democratic leadership explain what it does and how Americans will benefit from the legislation.

For example, the mandate for everyone in the country to have health insurance is necessary if the very popular ban on insurance companies denying coverage because of pre-existing conditions is to remain in place.

Why? For the same reason you can't buy fire insurance and file a claim after your house has burnt down.

If all citizens weren't required to have health insurance, but health insurance companies had to issue a policy regardless of someone's pre-existing conditions, then many people would wait to buy insurance until they became seriously ill. This would raise premiums for other long-term policy holders, since a basic premise of insurance is sharing risk broadly.

Hopefully Senate Democrats will press ahead with their notion of requiring Republicans to vote on repealing specific pieces of the health care reform bill. This will force them to say whether or not they want to deny coverage to children with pre-existing conditions, along with other provisions of the bill that are hugely popular.

Nothing's been finalized, including precisely how they'd go about it. But the point would be to turn a global health care repeal push into something more piecemeal -- should seniors pay back their $250 doughnut hole check? Should children with pre-existing conditions be stripped of insurance?

"Senior staff are giving serious consideration to the strategy of forcing Republicans to take tough votes on extremely popular elements of the health care law, including the doughnut hole provision, as well as pre-existing conditions," the aide said.

"Portlandia" makes this Salemite envious

Last night my wife and I watched the first episode of IFC's Portlandia with more than a little city-envy. Portland is just way hipper, greener, progressive, and energetic than our sleepy Salem.

I can't begin to imagine what a comparable Salemandia TV series would be like. All I know is that it'd be boring.

Comparatively, I have to admit. Meaning, Salem has the geographical misfortune of being located between two of the most interesting cities in the United States, Portland and Eugene.

So the yawn with which we Salemites describe our town is a relative evaluation, not absolute. Case in point: I just got back from a vegan potluck gathering, which shows that some people in Salem are as culinarily cutting edge as Portlanders are.

At the potluck I talked with a youngish (late twenties?) girl about Portlandia and what it's like for someone her age to live here. She said, "Recently I lived in Grants Pass for six months, so that colors how I look at Salem. I'm much happier here, though admittedly it's nothing like Portland or Eugene."

She then made an interesting point which I hadn't thought of before during my thirty-three years of Salem living.

"I like Salem because it forces me to be more creative than I'd be in a more with-it city. If I want to be with fellow vegans, I need to organize a group, or otherwise reach out. In Portland there's lots of alternative lifestyle options right at hand; here, often you have to fashion them yourself."

Good point.

I then told her, mistakenly it turns out, that since the first episode of Portlandia showed a newly arrived girl about her age being stripped of a nose ring and earrings (too San Francisco'ish), she'd have to give up her own piercings and earrings if she moved to Portland.

However, upon a second watching of that scene, I realized that the girl's piercing got the Portland hipster OK, so I was only half right.

My other favorite scene in the Portlandia premiere (which had some decided cinematic rough spots) was at the restaurant where an excruciatingly ecologically conscious couple is grilling their server about how humanely the chicken they're thinking of ordering was raised.

I used to be a member of an India-based, guru-centered meditation system which was strictly vegetarian. So much so, we weren't supposed to eat cheese made with animal rennet.

I didn't think it was a big deal if I ate some specks of cow hoof, or whatever rennet is made of, but sometimes I'd be at a restaurant with fellow disciples who considered this to be horrible karma.

So they'd grill the hapless waiter or waitress while I looked on in embarrassed quasi-horror. "Does the cheese on your pizza contain animal rennet? What brand is it? Please go and check, we can't eat anything that isn't purely vegetarian."

Thus I found the Portlandia restaurant scene entirely believable, up to a point. (I never knew anybody who took a drive to check out a cheese source, but the group I was part of did put a lot of effort into analyzing the vegetarian vs. animal rennet ingredients of every major cheese producer in the United States.)

My favorite line in the show was, "Portland is the city where young people go to retire." 

Being retired myself, though old, I'm entirely on board with the Portlandia lifestyle of getting up at eleven and, maybe, working a few hours a week at a coffee shop. Only difference is, I don't work at a coffee house; I drink the brew and blog there.

Otherwise, aside from a lack of piercings and failure to ever attend Clown School, I could easily be a happy resident of Portlandia.

(The Portland Oregonian asked readers to write their own reviews of the show. I looked over some of them. Here's one I liked from "Valdez":)

I think this show is HILARIOUS! I thought it was a fairly spot on parody of the city that I live in and love so much. Come on, you guys don't know the various characters in this show?

The bike nazi guy that I saw in the previews/web exclusives is my best bud at work -- a guy that while riding his bike will scream at cars and kick them if they get too close or invade his "space." My wife has a friend that went to CLOWN SCHOOL. And all the hot chicks really do wear glasses!

My wife and I used to drive out to Corbett to buy chickens from our own personal chicken farmer, taking great solace in the well-being and "happy lives" the chickens led - before we ate them! ha ha ha

This show cracks me up. The "put a bird on it" stuff is SO true, too! I posted the advance Hulu exclusive on Facebook and ALL of my friends thought it was hilarious. Good job Fred and Carrie! Thanks for exposing Portland's funny idiosyncrasies in a fun and hip way. LOVE THE MUSIC, choices, too!!!

2010 Hines Holiday Letter belatedly shared

It's so passe to send out a Christmas ("Holiday," for us non-Christians) letter in December. That's so conventional, so traditional, so commonplace. This is an age of individuality, quirkiness, personal expression.

Also, in my case, procrastination and laziness.

So for both culturally artistic and personally flawed reasons, I'm only now getting around to sharing our 2010 creation online. The theme is...shuuuush...secrets.
Download 2010 Christmas Letter

Those who want more Christmas in January can read my entire Holiday Letter oeuvre, 1995-2010, here.

I'm closer to getting a Mini Cooper S (no thanks to God)

Though I'm not at all a religious sort of guy, back in 2003 I considered it a message from God when, right after reading an early review of the recently released Mini Cooper, I saw one of the rare (at that time) cars in downtown Salem.

Anyway, until today I have seen only one Mini-Cooper on the streets of Salem, Then, waiting for a light to change at the corner of Court Street and Commercial this morning, walking to my martial arts class, I espy a yellow Mini-Cooper with a white top tooling down Commercial.

I ogle it (though that color scheme doesn't do much for me). I go to the class. After class, I walk back along Court Street, heading for my boring Volvo station wagon. And there, going down Court Street this time, but at the very same intersection I saw it two hours before, is the yellow Mini-Cooper with a white top.

Clearly, a message from God. I am destined to have a Mini-Cooper. And not just any old Mini-Cooper, because God is good, and God is generous. And because I really want a supercharged Mini-Cooper, if I am to have one at all. Which I am, because God wants it so.

However, my wife wasn't convinced that I was meant to have a Mini Cooper, given the state of our savings account. So a few years later, after I'd started my Church of the Churchless blog, I made another stab at invoking a miracle with "Pray for me, I need a Mini Cooper."

Happy National Day of Prayer. In honor of this day I invite everyone to pray for a worthy cause: me. To make things easy for you I’ve written out the prayer, complete with annotations:

“Almighty _______ [fill in name of your chosen higher power], I beseech you to grant the unselfish desire of Brian Hines, who lives on Lake Drive in Salem, Oregon [this is needed to direct the prayer away from the other undeserving Brian Hines’ in the world, and also to make sure my desire is delivered to the right place].

“Please place a supercharged  Mini Cooper, racing green with the sunroof, in his driveway as he has been beseeching you for so long [well, just a bit over two years, but the prayer has more pathos with ‘for so long’].

“Brian’s desire is unselfish because this car will bring him so much joy, it [joy, if the higher power asks what this admittedly grammatically imprecise pronoun refers to] will flow out behind his speeding wheels everywhere he journeys, raising the spirits of all who glimpse the Mini Cooper blur. I thank you in advance for your grace and remain your humble servant,_______ [fill in your name if you want to be sure the higher power knows who is praying].”

Sadly, after five years this prayer has proven to be a bust. No Mini Cooper has miraculously manifested in our driveway.

But entirely secular Social Security checks have started to appear in my checking account, which offer a much better chance of producing a Mini in my life. So today I decided to ditch my hope in the supernatural.

I put my physical body in our physical Toyota Highlander Hybrid and journeyed up physical I-5 to Portland's Rasmussen Mini for a test drive.

The experience was thoroughly enjoyable, largely thanks to Larry Larson, the Mini "motoring advisor" (they don't have salesmen/women apparently) who acquainted me with all things Miniful.

On one of my two test drives -- I wanted to try out both the base Mini and the more powerful S model -- I told Larry that I appreciated the relaxed, low-key, non-hard sell approach that I sensed as soon as I walked into the Rasmussen dealership.

Three salespeople were hanging out by the front door. One asked, "Can I help you?" Given my prior experiences with barracuda-like car salesmen who latch onto a prospective customer and won't let go until you violently shake them off, I somewhat nervously said, "I'm interested in a Mini." (Rasmussen sells BMW's also.)

A woman simply said, "Follow me," which I did. She led me past a bunch of BMWs into the Mini section, then introduced me to Larry. We started off with a chat about car-related this and that, reminiscing about days long gone from our decidedly aged perspectives.

The conversation felt pleasantly Chinese/Japanese'ish, not that I've ever had any business dealings in those countries. I've read, though, about how it isn't polite to jump right into negotiations without quite a bit of getting to know you talk.

I mentioned to Larry how I was turned off by a recent encounter with a old style salesperson, which I wrote about in "How to sell expensive stuff to someone like me."

If you're a salesman (oops, salesperson) who deals with spendy items like appliances, autos, computers, or such, here's some advice on how to close a deal with someone like me:

Don't act like a used  car salesperson.

Or even like a new car salesperson. Forget whatever sales techniques you've learned on your own or had drummed into you by your boss. Simply act like a normal human being and treat me the same way.

Larry did just that.

He talked straight about discounts from Mini list price (forget about it) and the possibility of better factory incentives in coming months (probable). Plus, he seemingly stayed relaxed during my test drives, even though I wasn't comfortable with the Mini's rather quirky controls and likely was breaking some speed limits on the twisty, hilly southwest Portland streets he guided me on.

Just as I feared -- and predicted way back in 2003 -- if a Mini Cooper is in my future, it has got to be a spendier "S."

I liked the extra power, a lot, and was environmentally reassured when Larry informed me that tweaks to the 2011 Mini Cooper S resulted in both more horsepower and better mileage, which now is just a few MPG under the base Mini fuel consumption.

When I got home, I played around some more with the "build a Mini" feature on the company's web site.

I'm attracted to a white Cooper S hardtop with a black top. In the unlikely event that a benevolent divine presence, or a rich human fulfiller of blog post desires, is reading this, here's the specifics of the Mini I want:
Download White:black Mini S traction:zenon

Our mailbox is politically correct now

Jeez. I didn't realize how long it would take me to get the front door of our mailbox properly non-sexist and non-authoritarian. Here's the final result:

Yesterday I headed up our driveway with some stick-on letters in hand, prepared to handle a long-procrastinated chore on a pleasingly dry and sunny day.

Last year we got a Fort Knox mailbox, which are made a few I-5 hours south of us in Grants Pass, Oregon. We chose the slam lock door option, because we get quite a few packages -- largely because of my Amazon addiction.

The door is left ajar so the mail can be put inside. Then the mail deliverer pushes the door shut, locking it without a key. When we get the mail, the door is unlocked and the mail retrieved, leaving the door ajar for the next delivery.

Only problem has been, sometimes the mail deliverer forgets to do the slam lock thing.

When this happens, I've left a note reminding him or her to push the door closed after putting our mail inside. But since substitutes sometimes deliver the mail, and I was getting tired of dealing with the notes, I figured that attaching a reminder to the front of the door made sense.

Kneeling on the pavement, it didn't take me long to afix my first draft:

MAILMAN

PUSH DOOR
TO LOCK

Pithy. Precise. Yet with a few problems.

I went inside for some lunch before tackling the next outdoor chore. "I put the letters on the mailbox," I said to my wife. "It says Mailman push door to lock. I had to go with Mailman because only three 'Os' came in the stick-on package, and I needed to use all of them on Push door to lock."

Laurel wasn't pleased. "But our mail deliverer is a woman. She's going to be offended. You need to change it. Can't you say Mailman/woman?"

I told her, "There aren't any special characters in the package. And I'd still be short an 'O,' though I guess I could use a zero. A bigger problem is that there isn't room to add woman after mailman without peeling off mail and moving it over to the left, which might not be possible now that the letters have been on for a while."

Laurel had stirred up some politically correct anxiety in my psyche, though, so I headed back to the mailbox to ponder what I could do to correct my incorrectness.

I toyed with changing Mailman to Mailhuman. I'd even peeled off an "h" and "u" and was ready to demasculinize the term for our deliverer. However, it struck me that man would still be part of the word. Wouldn't this also be subtly sexist?

I decided to go with the zero for an "O" idea, and put up...

- MAILPERSON -

PUSH DOOR
TO LOCK

I added some dashes to the beginning and end of Mailperson in an attempt to disguise the now-uncentered placement of the word (since I didn't want to unpeel Mail). But something still didn't feel right.

The message was too blunt, too stark, too commanding. The front of our mailbox now sounded like a drill sergeant barking out an order. I didn't want our deliverer to feel like she was an inferior public servant being told what to do by domineering, unhappy taxpayers.

So I added Thanks. That made the door front wordier, but "thanks" is a pleasant word.

Today the door was pushed shut and locked after the mail was delivered. As it usually has been, admittedly.

Still, I hope our mailwoman/mailhuman/mailperson appreciated the tone of our gentle reminder message.

And for what it's worth, we definitely have the most politically correct mailbox on our street.

My bumper says, "Friends don't let friends deny global warming"

I've never been big on putting bumper stickers on my car. Obama didn't even rate one in 2008, though I made an exception for John Kitzhaber's gubernatorial campaign in 2010. Since he is now Oregon's governor, obviously the sticker made a difference.

I'm hoping the same will be true of my new bumper sticker message: "Friends don't let friends deny Global Warming." I bought two of architect David Stockbridge Smith's creations after learning about them via a Climate Progress post.

It's more than a little strange that this bumper sticker is necessary. After all, there's no need for "Friends don't let friends deny Quantum Mechanics" or "Friends don't let friends deny DNA."

But even though the evidence for global warming is nearly as strong as that for other generally accepted scientific facts, anti-science types (often funded by the oil industry) continue to do their best to obfuscate the truth.

Which is...

2010 tied with 2005 as the hottest year on record, was the wettest year on record, and was part of the hottest decade on record.

To measure climate change, scientists look at long-term trends. The temperature trend, including data from 2010, shows the climate has warmed by approximately 0.36°F per decade since the late 1970s. “If the warming trend continues, as is expected, if greenhouse gases continue to increase, the 2010 record will not stand for long,” said James Hansen, the director of GISS [Goddard Institute for Space Studies].

Paleoclimate data suggests carbon dioxide "may have at least twice the effect on global temperatures than currently projected by computer models"

The atmospheric CO2 concentration currently is 390 parts per million by volume (ppmv), and continuing on a business-as-usual path of energy use based on fossil fuels will raise it to ∼900 to 1100 ppmv by the end of this century (see the first figure) (1). When was the last time the atmosphere contained ∼1000 ppmv of CO2?

Recent reconstructions (2–4) of atmospheric CO2 concentrations through history indicate that it has been ∼30 to 100 million years since this concentration existed in the atmosphere (the range in time is due to uncertainty in proxy values of CO2).

The data also reveal that the reduction of CO2 from this high level to the lower levels of the recent past took tens of millions of years. Through the burning of fossil fuels, the atmosphere will return to this concentration in a matter of a century. Thus, the rate of increase in atmospheric CO2 is unprecedented in Earth’s history.

Massive floods reflect that global warming is real, is happening, and is scientific fact.

The pictures today from around the world of dramatic rooftop rescues from raging waters, makes it seem as though natural disasters are becoming an everyday occurrence. But they're not all that natural; climate scientists say man-made global warming is the sudden force behind the forces of nature.

..."If left unchecked, climate warming will continue so the things that we're having hints of now, foretastes of now, will come stronger," Richard Sommerville, a climate scientist at the University of California at San Diego and author of "The Forgiving Air: Understanding Environmental Change," said.

The extreme weather the world has seen is part of a larger trend, he said. "The world is warming up ... It's warming for sure and science is very confident that most of the warming is due to human causes."

These pictures tell the tale.

 

Never forget the big BCS question: was Dyer actually down?

Remember the Maine. Pearl Harbor. The first moon landing.

Last -- and most certainly least, though still worthy of remembrance -- the controversial key play in the 2010 BCS national championship game between should-have-won Oregon and Auburn.

Tomorrow is the one week anniversary of Auburn running back Michael Dyer's miraculous 37 yard jaunt down the field in the closing minutes of the game.

"Miraculous," because it sure looked like he was down after being tackled, yet upon urging from the Auburn sideline he came back to life and kept on running for an annoyingly long time.

So let us Duck fans remind ourselves of how the refs may have cheated Oregon out of a national championship.

And may our quacks of outrage upon viewing this video in a certain Oregoncentric light not sound like whines, even though if an Auburn fan had written this post in an alternative universe where the Ducks had won the BCS championship, I'd be echoing the video's closing message: DEAL WITH IT

 

Great commentary on Tucson shootings and violent rhetoric

Oregon has some terrific writers and thinkers. John Daniel is one I hadn't known about until I read an essay of his in today's Portland Oregonian.

"When blood is not a metaphor" is a terrific commentary about the shooting a week ago of Congresswoman Giffords and the murder of six others by crazed gunman Jared Loughner.

Regarding Sarah Palin's crosshairs metaphor, Daniel says:

Neither Palin nor anyone on her political action committee intended that a warped 22-year-old or anyone else should use a firearm to shoot Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.

But language set loose in public is instantly nationalized and globalized in the media, and like language exchanged between two people in private, it has power. Words stir passions in unpredictable ways. In the wilderness of a particular human psyche (to use a metaphor), language can form an intention, or prepare the way for an intention to be formed, or affirm an intention already forming.

The language of public discourse matters. Metaphors matter.

In my own recent musings about this subject, I noted:

Now, it seems obvious that both mentally ill and mentally healthy people are affected by public discourse and messaging. If this wasn't true, advertising wouldn't work. Or political ads. Or inspiring speeches.

It makes no sense, then, when people claim that vitriolic political discourse has no effect on mentally unbalanced individuals like Jared Loughner. This is like saying that a million dollar ad for Coke or Pepsi during the Super Bowl has no effect on soft drink consumption.

You can bet -- a lot -- that it does, because corporations don't spend huge amounts of money on messages promoting their products if words and images were powerless to affect human behavior.

Daniel's concluding words also made a heck of a lot of sense to me. He starts out by talking about the Tea Party'ers and other right-wingers who loudly scream about the "tyranny" of Obama and the Democrats.

They are not suffering under tyranny. Their liberty is greater now than it was in Jefferson's time and is in no way threatened. They want their country back, but no one has taken their country away. Its democratic institutions remain intact, equally for them and for those of us who disagree with them -- institutions put into place precisely to avoid soaking the soil once again with actual blood.

The only problem of the mad-as-hells is that the president of the United States is pursuing the measures he said he would pursue, if elected, and that Congress has passed some of those measures into law, in most cases watered down.

When a president I thought a poor choice for the job was running the country in the last decade, neither I nor anybody I know wailed with Glenn Beck tears or stormed with Bill O'Reilly choler that we wanted our country back. We didn't rant of bull's eyes, or reloading, or irrigating with blood. We worked peaceably for change.

But yes, all of us commit excesses of speech. Democrats, Republicans, liberals, conservatives, anarchists, constitutionalists, vegetarians, all of us have thoughtlessly bandied metaphors. And so all of us should choose our words carefully.

Because language matters. Strong phrases may feel good and righteous in the saying, but their influence goes far and viral these days. The blood that flowed from Gabrielle Giffords, and U.S. District Judge John Roll, and 9-year-old Christina Taylor Green, and the others killed or wounded in Tucson, was no metaphor.

Pineapple Express brings Hawaii to Oregon, sort of

My wife and I enjoy our Hawaii vacations. But they're kind of expensive. So it's nice when Hawaii makes an effort to come to us. Some of its weather, at least.

This is today's satellite image from a free Mac app, Swackett, that I installed when Apple unveiled the new App Store feature. It shows the Northwest being hit by a stream of warm watery weather that is bubbling out of the vicinity of the Hawaiian islands.

That explains why the temperature is a relatively balmy 55 degrees at this afternoon moment. I can almost pretend I'm in Hawaii. On a rainy, overcast, chilly beach.

Well, on the bright side, it's a no-cost vacation -- courtesy of the Pineapple Express (which may not be in full operation in this particular weather system, but it sure feels like some sort of PE).

Progressives are ready for civil discourse. Are Tea Party'ers?

Driving home tonight, I heard part of President Obama's speech at the memorial service for the victims of the Tucson shooting and liked what he said. He called for a new era of civility in American politics.

Nate Silver, one of the most savvy commentators on politics and current events, wrote:

President Obama’s speech in Tucson tonight seems to have won nearly universal praise. I suspect it will be remembered as one of his best moments, almost regardless of what else takes place during the remainder of his presidency.

...Mr. Obama’s decision to focus in some detail on the victims of the tragedy — not just Gabrielle Giffords but the others, and not just in a perfunctory way but in one that seemed heartfelt — showed a lot of dexterity for the emotional contours of the moment. And at times, his speech showed an intellectual dexterity as well. This passage, in which Mr. Obama refocused the discussion about civil discourse without trivializing the tragedy, struck me as especially strong:

"And if, as has been discussed in recent days, their deaths help usher in more civility in our public discourse, let’s remember that it is not because a simple lack of civility caused this tragedy, but rather because only a more civil and honest public discourse can help us face up to our challenges as a nation, in a way that would make them proud."

l'm not a religious person. Still, I'll say Amen to that.

Here comes my But, though:

But it'll be interesting to see how strongly each opposing camp in our nation's warring political factions supports Obama's call to civility. My suspicion is that progressives will find it much easier to embrace "a more civil and honest public discourse" than Tea Party types and ardent right-wingers will.

After all, progressives haven't been bringing guns to political rallies and talking about Second Amendment remedies if governmental actions don't turn out as they desire. Insurrectionist violence, or the promotion thereof, has been a right-wing thing.

And progressives haven't done much, if any, disruping of meetings held by Congressional representatives, shouting down their elected officials and preventing a courteous discussion of public policy issues (such as how to deal with our health care problems) from taking place. Tea Party types have been guilty of this.

Nor have high-ranking Democrats been casting blatantly untruthful aspersions on the character and motivations of Republican party leaders. It has been Republicans who have calling Obama a "socialist" or "communist," denying that he is an American citizen, and asserting that he is a Muslim rather than the Christian that he is.

Finally (though I could keep going in this vein), it wasn't Democrats who were responsible for PolitiFact's Lie of the Year. It was dishonest Republicans, who termed the health care reform bill "a government takeover" when it wasn't that at all.

By selecting "government takeover' as Lie of the Year, PolitiFact is not making a judgment on whether the health care law is good policy.

The phrase is simply not true.

Said Jonathan Oberlander, a professor of health policy at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill:  "The label 'government takeover" has no basis in reality, but instead reflects a political dynamic where conservatives label any increase in government authority in health care as a 'takeover.' "

As a progressive, I can confidently speak for my comrades (uh oh, now some rightie is going to think I'm a communist) on the left side of the political spectrum.

We're ready and willing to leave all mention of guns out of political discourse (along with political meetings), forego name-calling, and demand that domestic and foreign policy decisions in Congress be made on the basis of truthful facts and courteous open dialogue.

Are Republicans and Tea Party'ers willing to do the same? We'll see.

A good beginning next week would be for John Boehner to embrace the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office finding that repealing the health care reform legislation would add several hundred billion dollars to the deficit.

Honestly admitting that human-caused global warming is real, as some 98% of the world's leading climate scientists agree is true, would be another step forward by the Republicans toward "a more civil and honest public discourse."

I'll agree that both sides of the political spectrum have been guilty of incivility and lies. But I don't believe that the left has incurred the worst offenses. Regardless, Obama has correctly urged the nation to look forward, not backward.

Let's progress, with Democrats and Republicans equally committed to forming a more civil and honest United States.

"Becking" is now a word -- a politically dirty one

I consider Glenn Beck to be dangerous, untruthful, and hugely irritating. So even though I don't like to see his name get used more often than it already does, I was pleased to see that "Becking" has become a new word.

As in, the Becking of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

From a moral viewpoint Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is the victim of demagogues such as Glenn Beck and his allies at Fox News and in the Tea Party Movement. This is not about legal liability but about moral culpability. This is about a nation that has lost its moral compass.

...Now the shootings have created a new word floating across cyberspace: “becking.” To be “becked” is to be held up as such an evil and destructive person that someone, somewhere, will interpret it as a call to eliminate that problem through violence.

Now, it seems obvious that both mentally ill and mentally healthy people are affected by public discourse and messaging. If this wasn't true, advertising wouldn't work. Or political ads. Or inspiring speeches.

Surprisingly, though, quite a few people have been arguing that Jared Loughner (who shot Congresswoman Giffords and killed six others) wasn't influenced by anything in our nation's increasingly divisive, vitriolic, and hate-filled political culture.

This makes no sense. Which is why "Becking" is a word that does make sense. Let us count some of the reasons why.

(1) A CBS poll found that 28% of Republicans feel it is justified to take violent action against the government (only 11% of Democrats and Independents felt the same way). And the poll was taken after the Giffords shooting. When over a quarter of a major political party says violence against the government is justified, won't this attitude affect people like Loughner who are inclined toward picking up a gun and shooting a government official?

(2) Jon Stewart had a terrific The Daily Show commentary on the shooting last Monday. Here's part of what he said:

I do think it’s important for us to watch our rhetoric. I do think it’s a worthwhile goal not to conflate our political opponents with enemies. If for no other reason, than to draw a better distinction between the manifestos of paranoid mad men and what passes for acceptable political and pundit speech.

It would be really nice if the ramblings of crazy people didn’t in any way resemble how we actually talk to each other on TV.

Let’s make troubled individuals easier to spot.

Absolutely.

The non-sensical ramblings of Glenn Beck aren't much different from the non-sensical ramblings Jared Loughner left on the Internet. For example, they both are big on gold and mistrust the government, big time.

(3) Crazy violent stuff has gone on in Gifford's district for a long time.

The rampage on Saturday that left six dead and Ms. Giffords gravely wounded may prove to be an isolated act of violence by a mentally disturbed man. The suspect attended at least one of Ms. Giffords’s town meetings before the event Saturday.

Still, the shootings came after a disconcerting run of episodes in this district of mountains and desert, raising temperatures here in a way that some of Ms. Giffords’s friends argue fed an atmosphere that might encourage violence.

(4) Tea Party supporters need to own the rhetoric of their movement, which has been filled with angry threats. So says Nick Christensen, who wrote a great piece for Blue Oregon:

"If this Congress keeps going the way it is, people are really looking toward those Second Amendment remedies.” – Sharon Angle

For a good deal of America, the Second Amendment represents freedom – freedom to protect yourself, freedom to hunt. For many, it also represents freedom to protect your family from the government, if and when such a time comes that it's necessary to take up revolution.

Make no mistake – the message has been clear. From Glenn Beck's "If you must shoot, shoot to kill," to Sarah Palin's "Don't retreat, reload," there's been an thinly-veiled pushing of a right-wing agenda for revolution, a coddling of the notion that everyone has their limits, an embracing of the idea that sometimes, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another.

So here's where I get confused. The war drums have been pounding for almost two years, with the implication that sometimes, armed revolution is justified. Then someone goes and follows through, someone gets just enough crazy in them to start shooting at a congresswoman and a federal judge and a little girl, and somehow they've crossed the line?

The Tea Party is having it both ways! You can't in one breath say there's a time and a place for warfare, and in another breath disown it every time it happens. Take it one way or the other, Tea Party.

(5) Arizona has become #1 in the nation for political vitriol and bile. How likely is it that Jared Loughner was unaffected by all this crap?

When news bulletins first flashed on Saturday that a congresswoman had been shot at a public event, it didn't take too much imagination to correctly surmise that it was Arizona, and that the victim was Gabrielle Giffords. Nor were you shocked, as some clearly were, when Pima County sheriff Clarence Dupnik declared his home state to have become "a mecca for prejudice and bigotry." The grim, blood-soaked crossover from death threats and broken windows to actual murder and mayhem seemed inevitable.

(6) Jared Loughner's political views were closer to far right than leftist, says a LA Times story.

The ramblings of accused Arizona killer Jared Lee Loughner are difficult to tie to a coherent political philosophy, yet in them can be discerned a number of themes drawn from the right-wing patriot and militia movements, experts said.

...Most wind up concluding that Loughner suffered from mental problems. But experts said that several oft-repeated phrases and concepts — his fixation on grammar conspiracies, currency and the "second United States Constitution" — seem derived from concepts explored with regularity among elements of the far right.

...Berlet wrote an article this week noting that similarly disjointed talk of government currency and money manipulation plots was found in the case of antiabortionist John C. Salvi III, convicted in the 1994 clinic shootings in Massachusetts that left two women dead and several people injured.

Potok said it appeared that Loughner's frequent references to government control of the public through grammar ("The government is implying mind control and brainwash on the people by controlling grammar," Loughner said in one video) were drawn from David Wynn Miller, a far-right activist in Milwaukee.

(7) Mental illness experts say that we should be asking whether the political climate in Arizona and the nation helped trigger the shooting. Greg Sargent wrote:

A leading expert in mental illness tells me that asking whether the Arizona shooter's violent behavior might have been partly triggered by the nation's political climate is a wholly appropriate line of inquiry -- even if the shooter is found to be insane.

"It's a reasonable question to ask," Dr. Marvin Swartz, a psychiatry professor at Duke University who specializes in how environment impacts the behavior of the mentally ill, said in an interview this morning. "The nature of someone's delusions is affected by culture. It's a reasonable line of inquiry to ask, `How does a political culture affect the content of people's delusions?'"

..."We know the manifestation of mental illness is affected by cultural factors," Dr. Swartz said. "One's cultural context does effect [sic] people's thinking and particularly their delusions. It gives some content and shape to their delusions. While we don't know whether there was a specific relationship between the political climate that he was exposed to and his thinking, it's a reasonable line of inquiry to explore."

...In other words, even if the shooter is a complete nut, we should be asking whether the tone of our political discourse might also have played a role in triggering the shooting -- and if so, whether such a thing could happen again.

For sure.

I changed the Statesman Journal front page!

I rule! The Salem (Oregon) Statesman Journal bowed before the powerful blog command that I issued yesterday: put a story about Congresswoman Giffords' shooting on your front page.

Such didn't happen on Sunday, when it should have, but the editors took my advice and made up for their unfortunate oversight today. Here's the evidence:

Portland blogger Jack Bogdanski picked up on my post with his pithy "You thought the O was bad."

The folks running the daily newspaper down in Salem appear to have even less sense and a worse attitude.

My post and that on Jack Bog's Blog got some interesting comments.

One of my favorites came from t.a. barnhart, who is referring to Statesman Journal editor Dick Hughes' assertion that the S-J is a local newspaper which doesn't run stories about big news that people already know about from TV, radio, and the Internet:

i'm guessing, because of all the coverage today, they'll skip anything about the inauguration [of Oregon's governor]. or the Ducks game [national championship]. because people will already have those details.

Salem Statesman Journal blows off Congresswoman's shooting

I've been surprised at how many people here in Salem (Oregon) don't read the city's newspaper, since we've always subscribed.

Looking at the front pages of today's Salem Statesman Journal and the Portland Oregonian, I better understand why.

Here's the email that I just sent to the Statesman Journal editorial board:

If you ever wonder why people in Salem don't take your newspaper seriously, line up the front pages of today's Oregonian and Statesman Journal.

The biggest story in the nation yesterday, which dominated the TV, radio, and Internet "airwaves" is relegated to page 11 of the Statesman Journal, with a barely noticeable mention next to a Les Schwab ad at the top of the first page.

By contrast, this is the Oregonian's main headline, "Arizona Shooting Shakes Nation." A commentary on the shooting by Steve Duin also is on page 1.

Wow.

Do you guys really think that inconsequential pieces about the opening of the Oregon legislature, or the BCS Championship game, are more important for readers to know about than the killing of six people and the near-death of a Congresswoman at a political event in Tucson?

Your news and editorial staff need to look at yourselves in your journalistic mirrors today and ask yourselves, "Am I acting responsibly?"

      --Brian Hines

Update: I just got a response (see below) from Dick Hughes, the Statesman Journal editorial page editor. This points to another reason why people don't take the newspaper seriously. My critique of the paper was ridiculed in a childish fashion.

Hughes is good at criticizing individuals, organizations, and policies in one-sided editorials, but when it comes to engaging in dialogue with one of the subscribers to the Statesman Journal, a.k.a. a "customer" who has a right to point out problems with the journalistic product he is paying good money for, Hughes shrinks from the challenge.

Dick Hughes' first paragraph is wildly wrong. He's obviously way out of touch with the modern American and Salemite, who is underinformed about current events -- not overinformed. This morning I had coffee with a friend who is intelligent, well-educated, and interested in what's going on in the world.

But he knew next to nothing about the shooting of Congresswoman Giffords, and the murder of six innocent people in Tucson. He certainly won't learn anything from the front page of the Statesman Journal, which doesn't bother the paper's editorial page editor (who needs to proof read his email messages before he sends them out, but I'll leave the typo as is).

Email from Dick Hughes:

Brian: Thank you for making the case for our being a local newspaper. "The biggest story in the nation yesterday, which dominated the TV, radio, and Internet "airwaves"" -- so they already knew the details of that.

Thank you also for making the case for why people in Salem take the newspaper seriously. You do; otherwise, you would have not responded with this note.

Thank you also for making the case for why people who complain all the time have little credibility, whereas people who aren't predictable complainers have a voice of reason that can influence change.

We know return you to your regularly scheduled whining.

Dick

Dick Hughes and his Statesman Journal colleagues should take a look at Newseum, a web site that shows the front pages of newspapers in the United States and around the world.

I checked out eight Oregon dailies. Six of the eight had a front page story about the Congresswoman's shooting. Only the Salem Statesman Journal and the Bend Bulletin (a notoriously right-wing paper) didn't.

So my criticism wasn't "whining," Dick. It was based on a reasonable and factual analysis of the Statesman Journal's failure to properly inform its readers about what is happening in the world.

Here's the front page proof.

 

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[Update 2: Got a response from Dick Hughes after I emailed him an invitation to read my blog post and check out how other local newspapers in Oregon covered the attack on the Congresswoman. Dick said:

Nah, no need. Figured you would.

Well, such is the state of journalism at the oft-pathetic newspaper in our state capital. Readers are more interested in improving the quality of news coverage than the editors are. Like I said, pathetic.]

If Congresswoman Giffords was shot by a Tea Party crazy...

Today a Democratic Congresswoman from Arizona, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, was shot in the head by a young man at a public event in Tucson.

MSNBC is reporting that she is still alive and in surgery.

If it turns out that the murderer was a Tea Party crazy, targeting Giffords for her support of causes he detested...

Giffords, 40, is married to U.S. astronaut Mark Kelly. She took office in January 2007, emphasizing issues such as immigration reform, embryonic stem-cell research, alternative energy sources and a higher minimum wage. In November, she edged a tea party favorite.

...Then a lot of people, a lot, need to get very, very, very angry.

At Sarah Palin for putting Giffords on her "crosshair target list" for elimination in the 2010 elections. At Fox News for firing up the right-wing lunatics and failing to stamp out the vicious lies that fuel the flames of Tea Party extremism. At many, many people.

If this guy was a Glenn Beck-loving, gun-toting, take-back-our-country fanatic, it's time for all out war against immoderate Republicans. No more compromising. No more shading of the truth.

These assholes are out to destroy America, and all that it stands for: the rule of law, open and civilized debate, peaceful dissent.

Note: I said "if." I'm just saying...if.

[Update: when asked if Giffords had any enemies, her father said "Yes, the whole Tea Party."]

[Update 2: The sheriff of Pima County, where the attack occurred, wasn't shy about pointing out the responsibility talk radio and cable news (a.k.a. Fox "Noise") voices who spout anti-government vitriol have for pushing mentally balanced people over the edge into violence.

Paul Krugman, ditto.

You know that Republicans will yell about the evils of partisanship whenever anyone tries to make a connection between the rhetoric of Beck, Limbaugh, etc. and the violence I fear we’re going to see in the months and years ahead. But violent acts are what happen when you create a climate of hate. And it’s long past time for the GOP’s leaders to take a stand against the hate-mongers.

Along the same line, Gary Hart nails the dangers of over-the-top right-wing rheotric in "Words Have Consequences." Yes, they do. Six people died, including a 9 year-old girl. Are you proud of what you've wrought with your words, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, Fox News, etc. etc. etc. etc.? Read on for what Hart wrote.]

House Republicans' health care crap is making me sick

I thought it would take a little longer, but after just one day of John Boehner's Republicans taking control of the House I'm already seriously sick from their crazed commitment to repealing 2010's hard-won health care reform legislation.

The craziness starts with the name they've given to H.R. 2, inaccurately termed “Repealing the Job Killing Health Care Act.” Actually the facts are exactly opposite -- which is common with the truth-killing B.S. Republicans like to spew.

Here's what is genuinely job-killing: the hugely inefficient and ineffective American health care non-system, which costs businesses and individuals double what other industrialized nations pay, and gives us poorer results.

A paper on "Healthcare costs and U.S. competitiveness" discusses the burden this places on companies that have to compete with overseas firms enjoying much lower labor costs.

The United States spends an estimated $2 trillion annually on healthcare expenses, more than any other industrialized country. According to data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the United States spends two-and-a-half times more than the OECD average, and yet ranks with Turkey and Mexico as the only OECD countries without universal health coverage. Some analysts say an increasing number of U.S. businesses are less competitive globally because of ballooning healthcare costs.

...Some economists say these ballooning dollar figures place a heavy burden on companies doing business in the United States and can put them at a substantial competitive disadvantage in the international marketplace. For large multinational corporations, footing healthcare costs presents an enormous expense. General Motors, for instance, covers more than 1.1 million employees and former employees, and the company says it spends roughly $5 billion on healthcare expenses annually. GM says healthcare costs add between $1,500 and $2,000 to the sticker price of every automobile it makes.

Sure, the cost control aspect of the health care reform bill, a.k.a. "Obamacare," doesn't go far enough. But by insuring tens of millions of additional Americans, the cost of the charity (uncompensated) care they get now won't be passed on by health care providers to those with private insurance -- as it is currently.

And there are numerous provisions in Obamacare which stand a good chance of bending the health care cost curve downward. Encouraging studies of what sorts of medical care are most effective, for one; promoting electronic medical records, for two.

Indeed, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) concluded that Obamacare will reduce the federal deficit by $230 billion over the next ten years. Conversely, of course, that's how much the deficit will increase if the Republicans had their repeal way (which they won't, thankfully, owing to a Democratic Senate and President).

"But wait," you may be thinking, "how can this be when Republicans campaigned in the mid-terms on a promise of fiscal responsibility and deficit reduction?" Good question.

Now we're learning the answer.

Boehner and company aren't serious about these goals; they simply wanted to make empty promises in order to fool voters into choosing "R" over "D." This is why the House Republicans are ignoring the Congressional Budget Office figures which show that Obamacare will reduce the deficit substantially.

House Speaker John Boehner said today that the Congressional Budget Office is "entitled to their own opinion" - a striking statement in light of the deference usually shown information from the nonpartisan CBO from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

Boehner was objecting to a preliminary CBO finding that repealing the health care reform legislation, as Boehner's House GOP plans to vote to do, would cost the government roughly $230 billion over ten years.

CBS News asked Boehner whether that finding prompted concern that he is sending a signal that he is not serious about addressing the debt and deficit when "the first major legislative action you take will increase the debt."

The Daily Kos has a great post that documents how much deference Republicans gave to the CBO in the past. But since truthiness is their watchword -- facts and reality are whatever they want them to be, even if people are dying and taxes are wasted --  the House Republicans are embracing hypocrisy and hoping citizens won't notice.

Well, I am. And I'm sickened by what they're doing.

Keep your damn hands off of my health care reform, Boehner! I've got no interest in giving greedy private insurance companies any more power than they already have to interfere with medical decisions that should be the province of a person and his/her physican.

Read "When Insurers Put Profits Between Doctor and Patient," which describes how an evil insurance company sentenced a 17 year old girl to death by denying coverage for her liver transplant.

This shows that Obamacare isn't any sort of danger to our health. It's our current health care system. The sooner it gets reformed, the better -- for both our wellbeing and our pocketbook.

I spot a cigarette smoking scooter rider

So I'm driving along in south Salem, after taking our recycling stuff to the D & O Garbage drop off site, and I find myself behind a 40-something woman on a scooter. We're both waiting for the light to change so we can turn onto Commercial Street.

Being a scooter rider myself -- albeit a much larger one than this lady was riding -- I'm always interested in how people are outfitted, especially in 32 degree weather like it was today.

The first thing I noticed were her bare hands, one of which, her left, was holding a cigarette. She'd take a puff, then return her hand to the handlebar grip, with the cig protruding between a couple of fingers.

That was a first for me, the sight of a motorcycle or scooter rider smoking while on the road. I also had never seen anyone riding around in (literal) freezing weather barehanded.

And the last "never before" was her helmet. It clearly was a bicycle helmet. The shape was bicycle'ish, and the grooves/vents running front to back were bicycle'ish.

As the light turned green, she went right and I went left at the "T" intersection.

I thought, Wow, that woman was defying discomfort and death in so many ways: smoking, riding a scooter without gloves when it's 32 degrees, protected (minimally) by a bicycle helmet.

That seemed both cool, in the non-climate sense, and stupid. Well, at least she made an impression on me.

A few blocks further on, I decided to get a non-fat vanilla latte at a drive-up coffee stand. The place was under new management, and apparently new baristas, because the latte was way hotter and less milky than my previous purchases.

My next stop was grocery shopping at Fred Meyer. I pictured the Starbucks within the store, especially the containers of cool milk sitting on the counter, conveniently mostly hidden from view of the Starbucks staff.

I pondered the ethics of the situation. I considered how often I buy coffee at Starbucks, the one in Fred Meyer and elsewhere, along with the special perks of my oft-used Starbucks Gold Card.

Did this include pouring Starbucks milk into an overly hot latte bought at a competing coffee stand? Probably not, legalistically. But I wondered, What would the woman on the scooter do?

Why, she'd do just what I did: choose a grocery cart with one of those drink holders, put the latte into it after removing the black "obviously not from Starbucks" lid, park the cart as much out of sight of the Starbucks baristas as possible, and confidently pick up the nonfat container, take it over to the cart, and pour some cool milk into my still steaming latte.

Afterwards I felt deliciously like a rebel, an outlaw, a marcher to the beat of my own drummer. Like that woman. Sort of. Well, just a little.

(Note to the Starbucks Blog-Post-Watching Security Force: when I order my usual grande Pike Place after Tai Chi class tomorrow, I shall put thirty-five cents into the tip jar rather than my usual quarter. This should even up our karmic milk account.)

Stanley Security in dark ages by requiring IE or Netscape

Wow, that was a rare (and unwelcome) blast to the past -- finding this on the Stanley Security web site:

Sign Up for eAccountManager or eAccountManager Plus
Please note the PC system requirements for eAccountManager/eAccountManager Plus:

IBM compatible computer
Internet Explorer 5.0 or newer; Netscape 6.0 or newer

It's been a long time since I've come across an Internet site that hasn't noticed there are other computers than IBM PCs, and other web browsers than Internet Explorer and Netscape. (Netscape stopped being supported in 2008, and few people used it after 2002.)

This makes me wonder whether our security company communicates with police and fire departments by telegraph. Or maybe smoke signals? When I was stymied from being able to sign up for online access to our account, I sent Stanley Security a message:

You have to be kidding: With my bill I get an invite to sign up for online access to my account, only to find that I need to have a Windows PC and Internet Explorer?

Are you out to lose your Apple customers? And don't you realize that when it comes to security, Apple computers are much safer than PCs? I urge you to rethink your online policies, as they are insulting to customers who have (happily) changed over to Apple computers.

Global warming is causing disasters -- Republicans ignore reality

With one exception, I'm not particularly worried about the damage Republicans can do in the new Congress, now that they're about to take over control of the House. A Democratic Senate and President will prevent them from enacting any batshit crazy laws.

What's the exception? Acting on much-needed global warming and energy policy legislation.

This is a policy area that can't wait for voters to come to their senses in 2012 and kick the do-nothings out of office. Obama is doing what he can administratively, but it'd be a heck of a lot better for the United States and the world if a majority in both houses of Congress were in touch with climate change reality.

Since Christmas I've been collecting stories about weather disasters and global warming on an ever-expanding series of browser tabs. The truth is there to see, but unfortunately almost all Republicans are members of the Head in the Sand club.

On December 25, Judah Cohen explained in "Bundle Up, It's Global Warming" how nastier blizzards and global warming can go hand-in-hand.

The earth continues to get warmer, yet it’s feeling a lot colder outside. Over the past few weeks, subzero temperatures in Poland claimed 66 lives; snow arrived in Seattle well before the winter solstice, and fell heavily enough in Minneapolis to make the roof of the Metrodome collapse; and last week blizzards closed Europe’s busiest airports in London and Frankfurt for days, stranding holiday travelers. The snow and record cold have invaded the Eastern United States, with more bad weather predicted.

All of this cold was met with perfect comic timing by the release of a World Meteorological Organization report showing that 2010 will probably be among the three warmest years on record, and 2001 through 2010 the warmest decade on record.

How can we reconcile this? The not-so-obvious short answer is that the overall warming of the atmosphere is actually creating cold-weather extremes. Last winter, too, was exceptionally snowy and cold across the Eastern United States and Eurasia, as were seven of the previous nine winters.

On December 28, it was noted that snow storms in the Northeast were heavier than any seen in over half a century.

New York commuters and travelers face further disruptions today as winds hinder efforts to clear roads and runways following the heaviest December snows in six decades...The snowfall was the fifth-largest on record for the city, Sanitation Commissioner John Doherty said on Dec. 26.

On December 30, Climate Progress presented "The 2010 Climate B.S.* of the Year Award" (*Bad Science, and also what the initials usually mean). Here's the finalists, with an excerpt from the description of the winner.

Fifth Place. Climate B.S. and misrepresentations presented by Fox “News.”
Fourth Place. Misleading or false testimony to Congress and policymakers about climate change.
Third Place. The false claim that a single weather event, such as a huge snowstorm in Washington, D.C., proves there is no global warming.
Second Place. The claim that the “Climategate” emails meant that global warming was a hoax, or was criminal, as Senator Inhofe tried to argue. In fact, it was none of these things (though the British police are still investigating the illegal hacking of a British university’s computer system and the theft of the emails).

First Place goes to the following set of B.S.: “There has been no warming since 1998” [or 2000, or…], “the earth is cooling,” “global warming is natural,” and “humans are too insignificant to affect the climate.” Such statements are all nonsense and important for the general public to understand properly.

The reality is that the Earth’s climate is changing significantly, changing fast, and changing due to human factors. The reality of climatic change can no longer be disputed on scientific grounds – the U.S. National Academy of Sciences calls the human-induced warming of the Earth a “settled fact.” The evidence for a “warming” planet includes not just rising temperatures, but also rising sea levels, melting Arctic sea ice, disappearing glaciers, increasing intense rainfalls, and many other changes that matter to society and the environment. The recent and ongoing warming of the Earth is unprecedented in magnitude, speed, and cause.

Also on December 30, the New York Times had a story, "E.P.A. Limit on Gases to Pose Risk to Obama and Congress," that talked about how Republicans are determined to reward their oil industry contributors with efforts to derail policies aimed at preventing further disastrous climate change.

Representative Fred Upton, the Michigan Republican who is set to become chairman of the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee, said he was not convinced that greenhouse gases needed to be controlled or that the E.P.A. had the authority to do so.

“This move represents an unconstitutional power grab that will kill millions of jobs — unless Congress steps in,” Mr. Upton wrote this week in a Wall Street Journal opinion essay.

His co-author was Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity, a conservative group financed by Koch Industries and other oil companies that has spread skepticism about global warming and supported many of the Tea Party candidates who will join the new Congress.

On January 1, the Guardian reported that "Australia faces 'Biblical' floods," the worst in 100 years.

Army helicopters dropped supplies to stranded towns, police patrolled in boats looking for looters, and families were warned of the risk from giant saltwater crocodiles and poisonous snakes being washed into urban areas.

An estimated 200,000 people have been affected by the floods, the worst in a century in some parts of the north-eastern state.

The cost in damage to infrastructure is expected to run into billions of pounds.

“In many ways, it is a disaster of biblical proportions,” Andrew Fraser, the Queensland Treasurer, said in the flooded city of Bundaberg on Saturday.

And today, January 2, Climate Progress explained why we can expect to see more disastrous snowstorms and flooding as human-caused global warming bites the civilizations that have caused it.

One of the most basic predictions of climate science is that global warming will cause more intense precipitation.  As Dr. Kevin Trenberth, head of the Climate Analysis Section at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, explained it, “there is a systematic influence on all of these weather events now-a-days because of the fact that there is this extra water vapor lurking around in the atmosphere than there used to be say 30 years ago. It’s about a 4% extra amount, it invigorates the storms, it provides plenty of moisture for these storms and it’s unfortunate that the public is not associating these with the fact that this is one manifestation of climate change. And the prospects are that these kinds of things will only get bigger and worse in the future.”

Last year appears to have been the hottest year on record — and it saw an astonishing amount of intense rainfall from Nashville’s ‘Katrina’ to the great Pakistani deluge.” And so it should be no surprise that the year ends with another unprecedented deluge of “biblical proportion.” 

Since most Congressional Republicans consider themselves to be all godly and Christian'y, hopefully some of them will start paying attention to the commandment that is being communicated through nature:

Thou shalt take steps to combat global warming, or humanity -- thou art screwed.