Monday, July 28, 2008

I miss Marc Morial

Reading this Politico post about the National Urban League, and it's current President Marc Morial made me realize how great New Orleans had it. I remember when this city was on the upward tract, now it seems like we are stagnating.

Shreveport sounds nice

Wow... for the first time in my life, I've felt like it would have been pretty cool to live in Shreveport. If only I had a couple acres there now, maybe I could be a multi-millionaire too.

This just in from the NYT:
A no-holds-barred, all-American gold rush for natural gas is under way in this forgotten corner of the South, and De Soto Parish, with its fat check from a large energy company this month, is only the latest and largest beneficiary.
Another part that stood out was this:
The experts say the hype appears to be justified, which is why companies like the Chesapeake Energy Corporation and the Petrohawk Energy Corporation are now paying top dollar for land that was once hoarded to eke out miserly timber sales, at best.
I work for an Oil/Natural Gas company, and while those companies listed above are respectable middle-sized names, it surprised me that none of the big Louisiana Natural Gas companies were mentioned in the article. I wonder if there is a reason for that beyond general market forces. I know our company is tied up with big Gulf of Mexico drilling project right now, but I would think that they would still be interested in this if it were that promising.

State Sen. now in halfway house

So, in an update to my previous post, the Times-Picayune is reporting this:
State Sen. Derrick Shepherd was ordered to a halfway house by a federal judge this afternoon as authorities seek to revoke his bond in a federal mail fraud and conspiracy case after the senator was arrested last weekend after a fight with his ex-girlfriend.
It also turns out that he confronted his ex-girlfriend's mother and sister after the assault/theft. His lousy defense can only come up with this:

Defense lawyer John Reed said outside court Monday that details of the latest arrest had unfairly skewed the incident.

"The incident over the weekend was unfortunate for everyone," he said. "It was a personal matter. ... I think when the whole story comes out, which it will eventually, I think you'll see a very different cast put on it than the spin put on by the print and media in particular and by the government as well."

I hope he gets his bail revoked - maybe then I can get some adequate representation.

Song of the day

How did I miss Dar Williams?



This song is called "Christians and Pagans."

Conservatives attack!

I love it when the Conservatives attack McCain for his flip-flops, if only because they will generate media coverage:

via First Read, here is the Club for Growth:
We listened with concern yesterday to your interview with George Stephanopoulos on Social Security," the club's president Pat Toomey writes in a letter to McCain. "When asked if you would be open to raising the payroll tax, you refused to rule out a tax increase, saying 'There is nothing that’s off the table.' This statement was particularly shocking because you have been adamant in your opposition to raising taxes under any circumstances.
I wish that the MSM had actually covered this earlier, because McCain has often attacked Barack Obama on this very issue.

Word

I totally agree with Arianna Huffington. Polls taken three months before the election are a waste of time.

Deep thought

If Belgium split into two countries, would they fight over who got to retain the name?

I'll say it again

The only reason McCain is still in the race is because the media repeats his lies for him. See also this

"Likely voter" models are flawed

Okay... so apparently the BIG BREAKING GOOD NEWS for John McCain is that he leads Obama 49% - 45% among "likely voters". Here is what is wrong with that lede:

  1. It was conducted only on the weekend, which underestimates Sen. Obama's support, as his younger voters are less likely to be home.
  2. Sen. Obama leads among registered voters 47% - 44%
  3. "Likely voters" means whomever the pollster thinks is going to vote, but who knows in July who is going to vote?
  4. As detailed here: "From registered voters to likely voters, they took 8 voters from McCain's total while taking 67 from Obama."
  5. That means that despite the "enthusiam gap", the pollster decided that only 2% of McCain's supporters weren't going to vote, versus 16% of Obama's supporters

People, we can't afford to be cocky, but seriously, the article surrounding the poll says it best:

Gallup editor Frank Newport tells Jill that "registered voters are much more important at the moment," because Election Day is still 100 days away.

Debra Bartoshevich is dumb

In case you don't know, Debra Bartoshevich, former Hillary Clinton delegate from Wisconsin, was kicked out of the delegations due to her support for Sen. John McCain. No matter what you think Sen. Barack Obama's campaign did, there is absolutely no reason to vote for the GOP candidate.

She says:
"I disagree with a lot of his [Obama's] policies"

Like what? Sen. Obama and Sen. Clinton agree 95% of the time... Their differences were two: 1) Gas Tax and 2) How to create universal health care.

By contrast, Sen. McCain's idea of making health care better is to get rid of employer-based health care, which 60% of this country (including me) rely on. McCain is literally opposed to everything that Hillary stands for, especially women's' rights. They also have policy disagreements when it comes to the economy, Iraq, labor rights, Social Security, immigration reform, Don't Ask Don't Tell, gay adoption, civil unions, safety regulation, toxic toys, GSEs, mortgage reform, the GI Bill, abortion, affirmative action - I could go on, but I'll spare you.

Also, Debra refers to the "Democrat primaries," which is a partisan GOP construction and tells me she's been hanging out with a lot of Freepers. She has entered the land of the DUMB. Thankfully, media reports to the contrary, it appears that the vast majority of Hillary supporters support Sen. Obama, because they realize that those aforementioned issues are more important than their hurt feelings.

Your local government at work

I bet most of you have a State Senator who does things like "draft bills", "talk to consituents", or even the general "help people". Mine, while not laundering money, like to relax from a busy day of court appearances by punching ex-girlfriends.

According to the article:
State Sen. Derrick Shepherd was released early Sunday morning after being arrested Saturday night, accused of punching his ex-girlfriend and stealing her cellular phone and $100, the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office reported.

Oh, and trust me, like all legislators, he always uses money wisely:
Shepherd was arrested at his residence in Stonebridge. The sheriff's office said there were two women in the house, one of whom appeared to be performing a lap dance on Shepherd.

Between him, Ray "Chocolate City" Nagin and "Dollar Bill" Jefferson, I think my "Representatives" have every vice.

Cuil is awesome!

So I tried Cuil and it's pretty cool. I'm not going to stop using Google, but I enjoyed the layout. However, I loved what the search of John McCain revealed:


That's right, two of the five pictures on the screen are of him hugging GWB... Hmmm, could this be the librul blogosphere at work?