Monday, October 30, 2006

Great Stuff About Pittsburgh

From David Schneider's sister)

Pittsburgh (and some surrounding areas) was the first city in the world to do a lot of neat things! Here are a few of the most well-known.

First Heart, Liver, Kidney Transplant - December 3, 1989. The first simultaneous heart, liver and kidney transplant was done at Presbyterian-University Hospital.

The First Internet Emoticon - 1980. The Smiley :-) was the first Internet emoticon, created in 1980 by Carnegie Mellon University computer scientist Scott Fahlman.

First Robotics Institute - 1979. The Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University was established in 1979 to conduct basic and applied research in robotics technologies relevan t to industrial and societal tasks. The college is still working on Robots ~~ in fact it is their robots used in the unmanned air crafts that fly over Iraq.

First Mr. Yuk Sticker - 1971. Mr. Yuk was created at the Poison Center at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh after research indicated that the skull and crossbones previously used to identify poisons had little meaning to the children of today (for most children it means exciting things like pirates and adventure). Covering 27 counties and 33 percent of Pennsylvania's population, the Pittsburgh Poison Center at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh is the largest such center in the United States.

First Night World Series Game - 1971. Game 4 of the 1971 World Series was the first night game in Series history. Pittsburgh tied the series in that game with a 4-3 win and went on to win the series, 4 games to 3. This was one of the last big moments in the career of well-loved Pirate, Roberto Clemente. Fourteen and a half months after the 1971 World Series, he died in a plane crash off the coast of his native Puerto Rico as he attempted to take food, clothing and medical supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua.

First Trained Ambulance Service - 1967 Trained by Dr Safar, the "Father of CPR", the Freedom House Enterprises Ambulance Service was beginning a quiet revolution to develop the national standards for prehospital emergency care. Ultimately this became the standard of care which is used today in emergency medicine.

First Big Mac - 1967. Created by Jim Delligatti at his Uniontown McDonald's, the Big Mac debuted and was test marketed in three other Pittsburgh-area McDonald's restaurants in 1967...Bellevue and Butler. By 1968 it was a mainstay on McDonald's menus throughout the country and eventually, the world.

First Pull-Tab on Cans - 1962. The pull-tab was developed by Alcoa and was first used by Iron City Brewery in 1962. For many years, pull-tabs were only used in this area.

First Retractable Dome - September 1961. Pittsburgh's Civic Arena boasts the world's first auditorium with a retractable roof. (This is still being used although the Hockey team wants to tear it down and build a new building)

First U.S. Public Television Station - WQED - April 1, 1954. WQED, operated by the&nbs p; Metropolitan Pittsburgh educational Station, was the first community-sponsored educational television station in America and was also the first to telecast classes to elementary schools (1955).

First Polio Vaccine - March 26, 1953. The polio vaccine was developed by Dr. Jonas E. Salk, a 38-year-old University of Pittsburgh researcher and professor, and his staff at the University of Pittsburgh.

First All-Aluminum Bui lding - ALCOA - August 1953. The first aluminum-faced skyscraper was the Alcoa Building, a 30-story, 410 foot structure with thin stamped aluminum panels forming the exterior walls. (This building is still being used today.)

First Bingo Game - early . Hugh J. Ward first came up with the concept of bingo in Pittsburgh and began running the game at carnivals in the early 1920s, taking it nation-wide in 1924. He secured a copyright on the game and wrote a book of Bingo rules in1933.

First U.S. Commercial Radio Station - KDKA - November 2, 1920. Dr. Frank Conrad, assistant chief engineer of Westinghouse Electric, first constructed a transmitter and installed it in a garage near his home in Wilkinsburg in 1916. The station was licensed as 8XK. (Now there's a real trivia question) At 6 PM. on Nov. 2, 1920, 8KX became KDKA Radio and began broadcasting at 100 watts from a makeshift shack atop one of the Westinghouse manufacturing buildings in East Pittsburgh. (The station is now KDKA)

The First Gas Station - December, 1913. In 1913, the first automobile service station, built by Gulf Refining Company, opened in Pittsburgh at Baum Boulevard and St. Clair Street in East Liberty. It was designed by J. H. Giesey.

The First Baseball Stadium in the U.S. - 1909. In1909 the first baseball stadium, Forbes Field, was built in Pittsburgh, followed soon by similar stadiums in Chicago, Cleveland, Boston, and New York. Forbes Field closed in 1970 when Three Rivers Stadium opened. PNC Park is the newest replacement, opening in 2001.

First Motion Picture Theater - 1905. The first theater in the world devoted to the exhibition of motion pictures was the "Nickelodeon," opened by Harry Davis on Smithfield Street in Pittsburgh.

First Banana Split - 1904. The banana split was invented by Dr. David Strickler, a pharmacist, at Strickler's Drug Store in Latrobe, Pennsylvania.

The First World Series - 1903. The Boston Pilgrims defeated the Pittsburgh Pirates five games to three in baseball's first modern World Series in 1903. The Pirates lost the final game 4-3, before a crowd of 7,455 in Boston. Four of the series' games were played in Pittsburgh.

First Ferris Wheel - 1892/1893. The first Ferris Wheel, invented by Pittsburgh native and civil engineer, George Washington Gale Ferris (1859-1896) was in operation at the World's Fair (Columbian Exposition) in Chicago. It was over 264 feet high and was capable of carrying more than 2,000 passengers at a time.

Long-Distance Electricity - 1885. Westinghouse Electric developed alternating current, allowing long-distance transmission of electricity for the first time.

First Air Brake - 1869. The first practical air brake for railroads was invented by George Westinghouse in the 1860s and patented in 1869. In the same year he organized the Westinghouse Air Brake Company. With additional automatic features incorporated into its design, the air brake became widely accepted, and the Railroad Safety Appliance Act of 1893 made air brakes compulsory on all American trains.

The STEELERS were purchased by Art Rooney Sr. for $2500...they were originally the Canton Bulldogs. They are the first team to win four super bowls, now five after six appearances, and the first team to ge t in the playoffs as a wild card and go all the way to win the Super Bowl. The Pittsburgh Rens played basketball at the Civic Arena but are no longer in existence. The Rolling Stones came to Pittsburgh first and played at West View Park Danceland. It cost $.50. They were considered too weird and went back to England and came back after the Beatles broke the ice. Now go have a good day and know where all the great stuff starts. !!

Saturday, October 28, 2006

Stay the Course

George Bush never heard of the phrase, “stay the course,” except he’s on tape saying it about a million times. This phrase is so old fashioned and goofy that I never EVER used it, and almost laughed when the elder Bush did. It’s like, “by cracky!” It’s like a pack of Lucky’s for a quarter! It’s like Rock and Doris! Say, that’s swell, old man. Maybe they just talk that way at Skull and Bones.

What worries me is Bush’s hearing. Maybe the echo of his speech is too pronounced in his head to clearly hear his own words, but the rest of us hear them okay. And he gets to see them in that teleprompter (yes, people, he can read), so that may have convinced him that the words weren’t his. Can he be as stupid as he seems? I don’t think so, but I’m also not much for conspiracy theories, so maybe it’s a limitation of my imagination.

Or maybe it’s that conservatives, in general, are as stupid as they seem. When Bush claims not to have said something, he’s not trying to convince the opposition. He’s always speaking to his constituency, and maybe they react to him as followers of a charismatic leader. I don’t mean JFK’s or WJC’s sort of lady-killer charisma, but an older, more classical kind that’s expressed by the likes of Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, Gandhi, and Hitler. Maybe Bush has that sort of quality and has millions of true believers under his spell. Can’t prove that shit by me because I just don’t see it any more than I see Santa Claus in the same terms as Mother Theresa.

All the same, I’ve gotta admit that the goofiest people I ever met were also the ones who kept that Santa Claus-Tooth Fairy stuff up the longest. Incidentally, they were also conservatives, but not Branch Davidians. The scary ones, as opposed to the goofy ones, are the ones who think that Santa Claus is a heresy--a false god. That’s a serious accusation, by gum, by gosh, by golly. Believing Bush’s doublespeak is at least as bad as the quasi-worship of Santa Claus. After all, they both promise good things to the little boys and girls who were nice, except kids don’t really get very excited about tax breaks for the rich or Attorney General appointments for under-qualified latinos. Iraqi Sunni kids certainly don’t get very excited about no Shi’ah left behind, or democracy through the barrel of a gun, but they like the guns.

Recipe for a Restaurant

Everyone who likes pubs wants a watering hole where they’re known by name. I am offering a real opportunity for my reader(s). Buy The Patio for, say, $60K, and find 10 investors to split the cost with. With ten $6,000 investors, two can work a single day a week and split the fifth Saturdays. In fact, since I already know that Berkeley will let the business remain open until midnight, there’s every reason to believe that every investor will take $100-200/mo in pay, over the cost of running the business. Even at $100/mo, your buy-in costs will be repaid in 5 years (60 months x $100 = $6,000); faster if more than minimally profitable.

Charge yourselves for what you eat and drink, but only at half price to cover costs. I’ll give you all the recipes and stay long enough to teach you what you need to do. Alex will be living in the area, even if I’m not. This is not a bad idea, and you might be able to leverage Captain Phil for a sizeable investment (but I wouldn’t ask him to work in the business). It’s a way for people to join up to make a little profit, and it’s also relatively easy to sell your small share to another person down the road. Remember, you won’t even need to after five years.

It’s a way to get serious without the daily worry. Split the rather simple business and buying tasks among yourselves (the one who works today is responsible for making the bank deposit and leaving the right coins and bills the next morning for the new shift, and they do the same). I’ll provide some bookkeeping software, and one of you can spend 15 minutes per day entering in the day’s purchases/deposit.

It’s also a way to have your cake and eat it too! You’ll all have a key, you can do private stuff on Sundays…whatever you want. Those who don’t have $6,000 can probably get it from friends and family. I think a couple of those Kensington lads would be interested, especially if it gave them a chance to show their fathers how serious they are. And add-ons, like a license to play live music, might be possible with the new midnight hours!

Cheap price, plenty of people to split the work duties, and a hundred a month or more in profit. If you can’t see the value in this one, maybe you’re forever doomed to Neverland.

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Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Berkeley City Elections

I have only two points to make about the Berkeley City elections, from the perspective of The Patio:

1. Vote for Chris Worthington.

2. Vote AGAINST Tom Bates.

Worthington has only learned about our problem in the past week or so, and has already met with the City Manager about trying to get an administrative exception to allow us to stay open until 10:00pm. He asked me to give him a couple of weeks to see whether jumping through hoops is required.

Bates knew about this problem from Amita, who he met on a visit to Treasure Island Job Corps Center and who first broached the subject with him. He asked for follow up, so I sent a fax that detailed the issue we face about making a living under such weighty restrictions. Not only did he do nothing, he did not even call or write to say he would do nothing.

So how come an Assemblyman can do so much so quickly, and the Mayor can do so little and take so long. Because the assemblyman is working while the mayor is hondling (you may need to look that one up).

Vote for Chris Worthington!

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Skilling

"I am innocent of these charges. I am innocent of every one of these charges."
"We will continue to pursue my constitutional rights."
These were the words of Jeffrey Skilling as he stood convicted of 19 criminal counts and faced 24+ years in a North Carolina prison. A better choice might have been the Houston area where all those former Enron workers live and can freely interfere with his parole hearings as his name comes up on the schedule.

Did Skilling get what he deserved? That remains to be seen. If he gets out of prison on parole, I guess that would be how I would define no. If he dies in prison, I suppose that’s how I would define yes because he would never have a chance to bounce on the bed with piles of money anymore. We don’t bankrupt women and children to get back all the money of a white white-collar criminal anymore, so that means if he gets out of prison he will be free to enjoy what’s left of his stolen capital.

He can’t have a book deal today and profit from it (as I understand the law), but when he’s out he can write a book, tell brand new lies, and get brand new money for it. Maybe someone will see him as a perfect guy for a start-up venture and he’ll be into new and even higher finance within three years of his release.

In a perfect world, there are no Skillings. This isn’t a perfect world (not even The Patio, in Berkeley, is perfect, but it’s got as close as you’ll get to a perfect burger), and that means all bets are off. So maybe you’ll recall my “Emperor” piece (look in the archives) and decide what seems appropriate for a man so greedy that he didn’t just steal a little from a few, but everything from many.

One thing we should do is immortalize the boy by calling any massive white collar crime a “Skilling”. Won’t his family be proud? Actually, this is America and by the third generation his grandkids at Andover will probably take pride in the sheer greed of the crime. “You’re that Skilling’s grandson? I know W’s grandson, but Skilling’s! That’s real money!” And, that, my children, is exactly what’s wrong with capitalism.

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Monday, October 23, 2006

Software, Curricula, or Widgets: Products are Created by Similar Processes

Processes are processes, and their common feature is that they start at some place and end at some place. “Modern” processes have a feedback loop so that they are continuously subject to review and improvement. Let’s focus on essentially identical processes that remain inappropriately proprietary depending upon which of us is laying claim. Trainers claim the Systems Design process. It begins with Analysis—whether Needs, Gap, or Job Task, and a quality check to be sure everything has been thought of. Analysis is followed by Design, which creates a flow diagram, or a map of the entire curriculum. It’s here that tests are created because every important element of the course has been laid out. Again, there’s a QA step with a design review team as a cross check. Now that you have a map, you Develop material to flesh out the content. As in the other steps, QA looks at the developed course to check sequencing, examples, accuracy, and so on. Finally, you Field Test the material to work out bugs in presentation, content, and timing. After the final tweak, you are ready to present the course, evaluate understanding, and immediately revise, as necessary. You will also want to measure ROI, but that will only happen over time when you see whether, for instance, the time to do a task has shortened significantly or that numbers of mistakes drop significantly. Software engineers also claim the Systems Design process. Software developers meet with customers to define the scope of work. They need to find out exactly what the customer wants the product to do. This is the Analysis phase, and includes both functional and technical requirements. Once the customer’s requirements are known, an engineering design is created to “illustrate” the product to be developed. It is also called conceptual prototyping or modeling. This is the Design phase, and it’s also the point at which QA test plans are created that test the performance of both the component parts and the final system against the requirements as established in the Analysis phase. Then, there’s the development of the pieces that, when linked together, become discrete modules in the system. This is the Development phase in which a working prototype is developed. As each piece is completed, it is tested, and as each module is completed, it is tested. Finally, the entire system is tested, which is the equivalent of Field Testing a curriculum. When the final system testing is carried out, ostensibly for customer verification, acceptance, and payment, that is the equivalent of teaching the curriculum. If there are downstream measures of ROI, they are measured only after the system is operational in the customer’s environment, just as in the case of training. The GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice), so coveted and “owned” by manufacturers, is nothing more than a quality assurance process that verifies that your manufacturing process is operating as intended. The processes very closely resemble those already described. When I last consulted to a computer product manufacturer, I discovered that the problem they told me was a training problem with the manufacturing line was, in fact, a failure to stick to the GMP. The didn’t pay attention to document control issues for Manufacturing Process Instructions (MPIs) on the line. It wasn’t a people problem, but a failure to adhere to the process model. Trainers, software developers, and manufacturing engineers all operate in different environments, but product development processes are essentially the same. The observed differences between them are more easily accounted for by a personal lack of experience across industries than by any real differentiation. Those of us who use this product development process as a routine part of our work lives will see that our skills are readily transferable across businesses, industries, and functions, much the same as accounting and marketing skills are. Building a hard drive, a software application, and a training program require the same skills in the process designer. Beyond that, all sorts of skilled people with specialized knowledge are required to complete the product. That’s why trainers need SME reviewers, why software functional analysts need technical and systems analysts, and why plant process managers need mechanical engineers. Look how broadly we can each apply our own hard won process skills!

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Saturday, October 21, 2006

Word Magic

Words have magical power. This is true, of course, in old cultures where there is a strong oral tradition and also a strong sense of magic. Think of common sayings about “speaking ill of the dead”, and so on. The magical power of words also presents itself in contemporary societies in contemporary ways.

There exists in America what I think of as the “Blue Sky” cult. “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything.” That’s their mantra. They tell you that all things emanate from the internal and external conversations we have, and the world is filled with those things you really have been asking for, including bad luck, poverty, and failures of every stripe. Aren’t Rich? Think about acquiring money and it will come. Aren’t happy? Think about being happy and it will come. Aren’t gettin’ any? Well concentrate on gettin’ some! These people have a DVD out called “The Secret”, and I guarantee they have never heard of the difference between transitive and intransitive verbs.

There’s also a political consideration with word power, as in the case of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Arabs have a deep rooted connection with the magical power of words. The idea of “throwing the Israelis into the sea”, once said, is as good as done. It is a sincere pledge that, once uttered, need not be made physical. The Israelis, however, being wily to the ways of the Arabs, came to America with those comments and laid claim to millions of dollars in support from fearful Jews who were not so sophisticated.

So what happens when such magical powers are diluted by repetition? What happens is that physicality must follow words when words cease to be powerful. What were only words in 1975 became suicide bombs by 1995. A generation had grown up listening to those once magical words and seeing their fathers as feckless as Israel grew stronger by the week. On the other side, what was once a hollow threat that was only used to curry favor suddenly had weight and dimension. It was now something to heed. Words now resulted in bloodshed. The magic one might argue, became stronger as the utterances inevitably failed to be enough to satisfy not the speaker, but the listener.

We now have new magical words. For Toyota it’s Hybrid Synergy Drive. The words have no meaning independent of the one Toyota provides, but a certain sort of Northern California pomposity relies on them. What are your magical words? Are there any such words anymore?

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Tuesday, October 17, 2006

The Patio's Hours - update #1

Thanks to the persistence of August, a Burger-Fries-Root Beer regular who smokes those nice smelling clove cigarettes, I just now called Chris Worthington, the Berkeley City Councilman who runs the neighborhood where The Patio is, and explained our story.

He said he thought the city could handle 10:00pm extensions to hours without the fuss and bother of a public hearing, and I mentioned that after being told the same by Sr. Planner Greg, a Ms. Sanderson called to tell me he was wrong and that the Beer and Wine license required a public hearing, no matter what time the extension sought.

Chris Worthington said he wanted to speak to the city lawyers about whether there were any loopholes through which The Patio could pass, and would call me back “in a few days” and let me know what he learned. One thing I learned is that I should have called Chris Worthington months ago. He seems like the sort of man you can deal with, and he’s far from the stereotypical officious bureaucrat; he answered his own phone when I called.

Here’s another thing I learned. Chris Worthington, this past Wednesday, put before the Council a proposal to amend the zoning rules such that businesses in the Telegraph neighborhood could all stay open until midnight without seeking any specific permission to do so. In other words, all Use Permits, once the law is written and enacted, will be automatically adjusted to midnight for all businesses. Any later than midnight requests, I assume, will be under similar terms as exist today – approval will be required. I do not know whether stores currently allowed to remain open later than midnight will have to adjust their hours of operation to midnight, but of the rest I am sure. His proposal won in a 6-3 vote, so the change is probably going to become law before Spring, 2007.

The important question for The Patio is whether we can last until the law is enacted, which may be six months away. The answer is absolutely “no” if we cannot get the incremental adjustment until 10:00pm, and only “maybe” if we can. In any case, a failure to garner 10:00pm hours within a month means no more Patio, and that will make me sad. Vote for Chris Worthington no matter what happens to The Patio!

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Friday, October 13, 2006

Education v. Training – Lesson One

Training and education are not the same. They employ similar tools, but they are not the same. Let me illustrate the difference with the following example that you might follow every morning.

Making a Good Cup of Coffee:

Training - Terminal Objective: Given a drip coffee system, pot, clean water, filters, coffee, a measuring spoon, and a source of electrical power, make a pot of coffee that tastes good to those who claim to be regular coffee drinkers.

Training – Process:
1. Fill coffee pot with clean water until it is filled to level marker 8.
2. Pour water into system’s water reservoir.
3. Place a paper filter in the filter basket
4. Using a 1 Tbs. measuring spoon, measure 8 level tablespoons of coffee into the filter.
5. Close the filter basket.
6. Plug the coffee maker in to the outlet.
7. Turn on the coffee maker.
8. Wait for the red light to come on indicating that the cycle is complete.
9. Remove the coffee pot carefully from the system’s hotplate and pour one cup of coffee.
10. Replace pot onto hotplate.
11. Check color, smell, and flavor for goodness, and evaluate.
12. Serve coffee to others for their evaluation.
13. If too strong, use less coffee or more water. If too weak, do the opposite.
14. Repeat process until coffee is rated “good” by coffee drinkers.

If any of Steps 1 through 7 fails, then the coffee making process fails. Steps 11 through 14 represent an improvement process that let’s you know not only that coffee was made, but that it was evaluated as “good”.

Now, for Education.

Education – Learning Objective: Learn about where coffee grows, how coffee is processed, and one method for making a cup of coffee.

(1) Coffee is a drink derived from beans grown at usually high elevations that are warm and sunny, like the Hawaiian Islands, Columbia and Peru in Latin America, and Kenya, in Africa. Many other locations also grow coffee beans.
(2) The bean first ripens, and the peel is removed. The remaining bean is dried and shipped all around the world in this raw, dry state.
(3) When a coffee company wants to release the flavor of the bean, it roasts it over fairly high heat until the bean “pops” and turns brown. The bean can then be ground into the powder we commonly see in our stores.
(4) Many people make coffee in the morning. They fill the coffee maker with water, put in the coffee, and in about 10 minutes the coffee is ready to drink.

Okay, so there’s more general information in the Education Process, and more specific information in the Training Process. That’s one difference, for sure, at least in this example. Education can also be comprehensive and detailed. Think of your last math or lab science class. In fact, think exactly of your last lab science class. In that class, you used a lab procedure to carry out a specific task or set of tasks. That was training, and if you think about it, the lab stuff was often more interesting than the education stuff you heard in the lecture hall.

The point is that training is about preparing to perform work, and education is about preparing to understand the kind of work or life you’d like to live. There’s plenty of room for both, but the profound neglect of training in America’s educational system is at the root of unemployment and the dependence on federal, state, and municipal programs, like food stamps. The Job Corps program at the U.S. Department of Labor exists, in great part, because there are practically no more vocational programs left in regular school systems. The Community College system has taken over some of that work, but nothing has fully replaced it.

The Brits have it all over us in this regard. Accountants do not need university degrees to become accountants, and the same holds true of engineers, estimators, and a host of other professions. They have a set of nationally recognized diploma programs that train professionals. One may also be able to acquire such training in a university program(me), but university education has still not replaced these professional apprenticeships. Here, in America, each profession has rooted out all of the apprenticeship programs and handed the process over entirely to colleges. Now, you can take the CPA exam immediately upon graduation and, assuming you passed, you will become a CPA when you satisfy the work requirements (three years working as an accountant, or less). Before, you could only take the exam after you had worked as an accountant for three years, despite your excellent university performance. The accountant had to experience the profession over three years before even being allowed to sit for the exam. And you absolutely know that three years working on more progressively complex accounts is deeper experience than four years earning a BSBA, or BA in Accounting.

The one field that still recognizes the importance of training is medicine. Doctors will regularly talk about graduating from college and “getting my training at the XYZ Hospital”. An MD degree doesn’t allow you to practice medicine. First, you must be trained to treat live patients in an internship, and even after your internship, your residency is usually another several years of training; even more for surgical specializations. I'm guessing that a doctor with practical training on live patients is the kind of doctor you prefer, unless you run a morgue. The combination of lab training and education you get in medical school is not enough for society to allow a person to practice medicine. How would you like to ride in a plane where the pilot only studies the physics of flight and sits behind the controls of a simulator?

Stay tuned for your next lesson: What’s Wrong with Teaching to the Test?

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Thursday, October 12, 2006

Weak Arguments

Dad’s weak argument: “Because I said so!”

Junior’s weak argument: “Everybody else is going!”

Sis’ weak argument: “You just don’t understand anything!”

Mom’s weak argument: “It’s just how I feel, that’s all!”

Bush’s weak argument: “God told me to.”

Cheney’s weak argument: “Bush told me to.”

Rove’s weak argument: (he only argues from strength)

Berkeley City Government’s weak argument: “There’s nothing we can do about the rules so stop asking us before we send legions of inspectors out there without even calling you to inquire about whether the reported problems even exist, you vermin!

Berkeley City Government’s strong argument: “Because I said so, and where else can you go.”

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Wednesday, October 11, 2006

My Favorite Pub

The Patio is my favorite pub in all the world. Great food (one of the owners is a chef and the other’s a damn good cook), great conversation from owners and (some) customers, alike, and great beer. So why is this place going out of business?

Berkeley, a fascist enclave in northern California, runs the place with special interests like no others. On the one hand, there are the downtown boys: city government. Think of the Old West. The guys who got to town first took control of its assets, decided which streets would get the hookers and which the opera, and paved the way for their children. The last is a reasonable aim, but the rest were signs of the oligarchy that included Wyatt Earp and that sort. The my-way-or-the-first-stage-out-of-town type prevailed. That’s Berkeley’s city government.

The second bunch is that feckless University of California crowd that doesn’t see itself as a bureaucratic organization, but as a college. Do yourself a favor and go to their website, look at their careers page, and then talk to me, okay! I am proud of their Nobel Laureates just like you are, but come on—gardeners wanted? The Cal cops get $65,000, and there may be more cops than English Department faculty, even including 3rd year doctoral students.

The third crowd is that old hippie bunch who bicycle their way to the recycling stand, drop off their empties, proceed to Starbucks for tea (not coffee), and then finish the morning by feeling the organic tomatoes at the “This Tomato’s Better Than You” store. In the afternoon, they smoke dope, walk dogs, and join the inevitable protest whenever anyone wants to un-people People’s Park.

So how does all this affect the Business prospects of The Patio?

To put it simply, the City wants to improve downtown Shattuck Avenue’s business climate (the government’s downtown, too) so they don’t much care about Telegraph Avenue’s business climate, where The Patio is. The University is afraid to take the heat it will certainly take if they move to reclaim People’s Park and do something useful with the land, like make a dorm or a parking lot, both of which are needed. Did I mention that The Patio borders People’s Park? And, the ageing hippies—most of whom are property owners and as far from “free of encumbrances” as any stock broker, constantly fuss over changes to any old thing, and that includes that “Monument to Blather”, People’s Park.

The “free speech” movement is no more entitled to worship that every fireman in NYC. In fact, living firemen are infinitely more important than an idea whose early proponents have drifted into latte filled complacency. If we had some god damned leadership in Washington, and if we could get along without constantly having to deal with our national fascination with god (in Berkeley, it’s spirituality), then free speech would mean something more than that which comes with tenure.

These old attitudes: resistance to change, vested interest, and denial of responsibility, are how the City of Berkeley, its University, and its denizens ruin ordinary things like The Patio. They are petty, self-absorbed people and institutions who sacrificed their very birthright (what would Berkeley be without the free speech movement) for their “fair” share of the say-so in their little smokeless world. (What’s hubris? It’s Berkeley declaring itself a “nuclear free zone”. WHAT?! Explain this, please!)

So they tell us, at this little restaurant-pub called The Patio, that we cannot remain open later than 8:30pm without paying nearly $2,700 in fees to the City, and even then they cannot guarantee that we would be able to remain open a single minute later. Why? Maybe the public will object. How many publics! How many decibels of objection! What if our supporters are louder than the assholes who object? What then? Are we defined as trouble makers? Nonsense! Any fool can see that this is complete bullshit, so why is it done? It’s broke, hoss, so let’s fix it!

I cannot afford to gamble my scant resources by playing Russian roulette with the City government. If they cannot tell me whether it takes three grandmothers, four hobos, and seven children under twelve to carry the day, what can I expect of the public hearing process? It’s a process that is vague enough to guarantee that the city can do anything it wants. Ergo, I will win or lose my appeal based on the whim of these oligarchs. Am I making any sense here? Who do they think they are, and where’s the free speech beyond my own voice!

Thursday, October 05, 2006

Test

This is a test of an email blog system.

NeoCons, encore.

Blogs are strange. You write things out there and send 50 people an email to alert them. You then tell 50 others as moments occur. The result is that three people read your blog steadily. So, you end up writing things to stimulate aggressiveness, sex, or anger in the futile hope that more people will respond and, therefore, read you, even out of some sort of prurience. I prefer politics and international stuff to these other things, and it also looks like none of that works anyway.

So, here goes: Yesterday, the “Oakland Tribune”, not the West Coast’s flagship paper, had an enormous editorial that came to the conclusion that U.S. policy in Iraq was a failure. Okay, Mr. Bush, they’ve got your number now! The citizens of Oakland and environs who read the editorial page now know that you’ve botched the war. Now the voices rise to speak about how the feckless Mr. Bush could have done things differently, but few are saying that the war was “unwinable” from the beginning.

There’s a certain sort of American who believes in war. We’ve been in so many of them that they’re hard to avoid. For that American, war is the first recourse. That American is George W. Bush, and there are countless, faceless others. In fact, Mr. Bush has changed this nation’s historic policy of waiting until we’re struck to strike back. Imagine the cowboy doctrine stood on its head. Instead of challenging someone to a duel and waiting for them to draw first, all it now takes is the inkling that the other guy’s carrying a gun and it’s slap leather! Isn’t that what Bush did? Didn’t he say that (1) we’re not gonna wait fer somebody to attack us. From now on we’re gonna attack them if they look like they’re gonna attack us; and, (2) Iraq has weapons of mass destruction. How Bush got from weapons of mass destruction to a threat to America (Homeland) is still a big puzzle, but Bush watchers seem to shrug when things like this are pointed out.

Mr. Bush is the sort of President who will send others to war, but the kind of personal coward who will not, himself, go to war. Oh, Bush is the kind who would take a swing at you when he was 20 and drunk, but that’s not the same. I’m guessing that ridiculous Cheney character is exactly the same, only without any remorse. Rumsfeld, as I recall, did serve in the military as a regular soldier or sailor, but he’s one of the few in that Administration who wouldn’t have used family privilege or lies to escape the battlefield. So what we have is a bunch of guys who are armchair soldiers making war because they have no clue what battle is like, but they revel in its glory. They’re throwbacks!

I was foolish enough to think that when Bill Clinton was elected everything would change in American politics. Out with the pre-Depression cats and in with the Baby Boomers. What I forgot was there was a YAF just like there was an SDS. And the heirs to YAF are the NeoCons, and the heirs to the SDS are stockbrokers. Where did I fail?

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Sensuality? What's Your Profile.

For some people, it’s the hands that feel the world in the most sensual way. It’s hands on breasts, hands between legs, hands on buttocks, hands moving down the back into that downy spot near the coccyx. Others find sensuality through the eyes. They admire the look of things and touch what they see more for confirmation than for contact. For some it’s smell that drives sensuality. For them, the scent of perfume is a come-on, but more personal smells are the phermones that attract. Nose to ass, just like the dog, and tongue not going very far to touch something wet. Oral people are also used to odors, but it’s the tongue that stimulates them. They push into things with it. They move between soft and firm via contractions. Who have I left out? Who are you? Who am I?

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

What the Court Didn't Hear

The Supreme Court today declined to hear a case in which Christian parents of seventh graders in a school in Contra Costa, CA, claimed that a three-week course in Muslim culture, taught in the Fall of 2001, was tantamount to teaching religion. (Good timing or bad; let your personal Fall 2001 politics decide.)

This must be one of the few times that Christians have used the Separation of Church and State doctrine this way. Usually, it’s the atheists complaining about Christians and school prayer, religious groups meeting on school property or using public resources, etc. Oh, I have no objection to this. I think it’s good for Christians to familiarize themselves with the Constitution whenever possible. Maybe then they’ll begin to realize that it is designed to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority (or the tyranny of the word police).

The teacher responsible for teaching students Muslim culture had a three week set of lessons that included giving up candy or TV for a day to simulate fasting during Ramadan, asking them to use Muslim names, and asking them to recite prayers they had been asked to learn. This teacher did well, as far as I can see, to teach so interesting a class. She also fairly well simulated the way Arab Muslim children traditionally acquired language skills: by reciting the Quran. Yeshiva kids learn Hebrew similarly. Seems to me if you’re attempting to teach 7th graders “culture”, then this is the way to do it. Some would spitefully argue that the teacher omitted the part where Muslim kids learn terrorist tactics. Well, you can take your spite and stuff it.

The more kids learn, the better off they are, even if they come to conclude that those “other” people are wrong or stupid for believing what they believe. What Christians can’t tolerate is that anyone would believe that Christian beliefs are inferior. They do not apparently want to put this to the test, do they? Obviously they’re worried about that assumption or they wouldn’t care what other religious opinions were conveyed in schools. I can argue the same point for Muslims, who are often quite intolerant of other religions, and would never sanction their teaching in “public” schools in Saudi Arabia, or in the Middle East, in general. Let’s arm wrestle for who’s superior.

Monday, October 02, 2006

When Faggot Should Yield to Gay

I finally got a response to an article on my blog! That’s the good news. Here’s the bad news: it was from the word police! Yes, I used the word faggot. Is there anyone over 13 years old who hasn’t heard it? I know it’s not a nice word, but my mother is dead and I don’t recall asking for resumes. It’s funny. When you have a rather complex vocabulary, like most of the people I know, it provides you with an opportunity to choose a word that better conveys meaning. When I talk about George Bush liking Don Rumsfeld because he’s macho, I feel I have the right to insert the word faggot. Homosexual just won’t do when you’re talking Administration macho, nope. So, you see, it’s about choosing the word that fits the context best, not about childish sensibilities over nasty words that offend or aren’t used with the good silver. I have a strong hunch that this is coming from our ardent Muslim hater out there, but it could be anyone. It could even be someone very close to me, but I think that email would have been the way that such a person would have communicated. True, faggot is a bad word, but so is asshole, fuck, and so on. It’s also a word that describes a person rather than an act or an orifice, and that does make things worse. I hope no faggots are reading this because I wouldn’t want to offend them. The homosexuals I know will get the idea, partly because they know me, and partly because they understand the rules of written words versus the rules of speech. They also, I think, get the entire allusion comparing Princeton to Oxford, and the sex and spy scandals that abounded at Oxford. Or is it that you think I believe Bush and Rumsfeld are gay? Those faggots! Are you nuts! (See, I'm trying to be insulting to Bush and Rumsfeld, and that's why I wouldn't use gay to describe them. I'm not trying to be insulting to male homosexuals, who are still "gay".) Perhaps you’ll want to think about moving to PC-istan where the word police make sure that everything stays holy and offenders have fingers cut off. Lucky I have IBM Via Voice for when I lose my fingers, huh! Lucky for me, but not so lucky for you, eh! Keep writing. I enjoy the sparkling reparTIT.

Child-lovin' Congressman Foley

Congressman Foley (R-Florida), the latest “out-ed” pedophile in government, has resigned from the House and has dragged his perverted ass into rehab because he’s a self-described alcoholic. First, being a lush doesn’t give anyone license to molest children. Second, what’s the point in resigning from a filthy little club like the republican-controlled House? What! Is he worried about Hastert’s honor? The good of the Union? The people of his congressional district? Hell, no, he’s not worried about any of that high-minded shit! He’s just doing things by the numbers. First, you resign to get out of the line of fire. Then, you seek rehab for something that is socially tolerable, while trying to deflect the socially less desirable truth. Finally, you hope it goes away before your family and friends completely withdraw from your sick fucking life. I know a child molester, and he’s still keeping it a secret from his own kids twenty years later. What else can he do? He believes god will forgive him, but he ain’t so sure about his sons, who may think twice about letting him bounce his granddaughters on his lap. No, these guys aren’t like those of us who like tits and ass on the same bodies, who crack jokes about sex, and who look at dirty pictures when our friends sent them in emails. No, guys like Foley either cover up completely by claiming to enjoy the same stuff as I do, or they go the other way. They say they’re disgusted by such things, and that our children ought to be protected. When they’re in the House, like Foley, they make even bigger fusses by sponsoring bills that outlaw specific behavior that, in fact, they are interested in. I fully expect Foley’s next move will be to say that having looked at the issue, and having gone into that world as an observer and researcher, he decided to see whether such predators can really attract young boys, and that he tried an experiment. If he’s smart, we won’t hear this, but how smart can he be! Just so we’re clear on one thing: the Congress is not a place that a child molester should feel obliged to resign from. Are we clear? Okay.

Imminent Financial Ruin

A guy who trades commodities and works at the Monterey Market in Berkeley (the best produce at the best prices in the SF Bay Area), told me today that I should sell my positions in the stock market and go to cash. He believes that the economy will be melting down in November (it will begin precisely tomorrow, but we won’t notice until November), and that the only way to fend it off is to go to gold coins. I’ve heard this kind of talk before. In fact, I hear it every ten years or so, but I haven’t yet seen Americans scrounging for berries and gnawing at yellow metal discs to see whether the supposed gold coins are real. It doesn’t mean it can’t happen, but it doesn’t mean it will, either.

I never know whether to believe guys like him. They “know” things about precious metals, pigs, and cotton—arcana that the average person can only begin to glimpse on late night TV infomercials—that I will never know. They are like Milo from “Catch-22”, and if I only listen to them then I will have a share. A share in what? In everything! It’s the American way.

I am not ashamed to say that I have no sense about money. Some in my family, and some among my inlaws, are good about those things. It’s easy when you have enough to start with, but it’s not guaranteed. I was always comfortable, but I’m also practically immune to risk. For me, telling people what’s on my mind is exercising freedom of speech. In the “worker friendly” United States, this is a bad thing. All of America wants that asshole Rumsfeld fired, but Bush likes a macho man and Donny’s as macho as they can possibly get at faggot-ridden Princeton! (Christ, the place is like Oxford—full of homosexual potential spies for the commies! But I digress.)

If the economy is going to have a meltdown, how come my cousin Dick didn’t call to tell me. He’s an economist, spent practically his whole career at Harvard (very unlike Princeton, my friends), and understands things like rice. Now a guy who understands rice ought to understand cotton and, by extension, pigs and gold. What’s the diff? Anyhow, I haven’t heard from Dick so everything must be just fine, don’t you think? Hmm? Goodnight, everyone. Dream of bags full of deutschmarks and the number of apples they will buy. It’s 1930 again, but nobody told you. Goodnight, Moon. Got ammo?