] Increased seismicity overnight prompted raising the alert
] level to Volcano Advisory (Alert Level 2) at 10:40 A.M.,
] PDT, this morning. Throughout the day the seismic energy
] level has remained at an elevated with a rate of 3-4
] events per minute including an increase in the number of
] events between Magnitude 2 and 3.

[ Holy crap! -k]

Pacific Northwest (Washington and Oregon) Seismicity Press Release

] MOJAVE, Calif. Sept. 29, 2004 %u2014 After recovering
] from a wild corkscrew roll on its ascent, the first
] private manned rocket soared to space and returned safely
] to Earth on Wednesday in a bid to earn a $10 million
] prize.
]
] SpaceShipOne, with astronaut Michael Melvill at the
] controls, climbed to an unofficial altitude of more than
] 330,000 feet, about 2,000 feet above its target altitude
] of 62 miles.

ABCNEWS.com : Private Rocket Unofficially Reaches Space

] The RadioSHARK can record any AM or FM radio broadcast in
] real time. You can also program it to record a scheduled
] show, or to %u2018pause%u2019 live radio so you can
] return right where you left off moments or even hours
] before.

[ Bout time. Pretty cool gadget for radio fiends. -k]

Griffin Technology radioShark

] Before I begin, let me state that I am a soldier
] currently deployed in Iraq, I am not an armchair
] quarterback. Nor am I some politically idealistic and
] naïve young soldier, I am an old and seasoned
] Non-Commissioned Officer with nearly 20 years under my
] belt. Additionally, I am not just a soldier with a
] muds-eye view of the war, I am in Civil Affairs and as
] such, it is my job to be aware of all the events
] occurring in this country and specifically in my region.
]
] I have come to the conclusion that we cannot win here for
] a number of reasons. Ideology and idealism will never
] trump history and reality.

[ Nothing original in these words, but they're lent credence by the source. Frivolous or unreasoned use of the military turns them against you, and this bastion of traditional conservatism is swinging away from the President. -k]

Why We Cannot Win by Al Lorentz

] Washington -- President Bush portrays his position on
] Iraq as steady and unwavering as he represents Sen. John
] Kerry's stance as ambiguous and vacillating.
]
] "Mixed signals are the wrong signals,'' Bush said last
] week during a campaign stop in Bangor, Maine. "I will
] continue to lead with clarity, and when I say something,
] I'll mean what I say.''
]
] Yet, heading into the first presidential debate Thursday,
] which will focus on foreign affairs, there is much in the
] public record to suggest that Bush's words on Iraq have
] evolved -- or, in the parlance his campaign often uses to
] describe Kerry, flip-flopped.
]
] An examination of more than 150 of Bush's speeches, radio
] addresses and responses to reporters' questions reveal a
] steady progression of language, mostly to reflect
] changing circumstances such as the failure to discover
] weapons of mass destruction, the lack of ties between
] Iraq and the al Qaeda terrorist network and the growing
] violence of Iraqi insurgents.

[ Holy shit! More honest reporting? I can't believe it! -k]

NEWS ANALYSIS / Record shows Bush shifting on Iraq war / President's rationale for the invasion continues to evolve

] Were Dean the nominee, the Bush campaign would probably
] be going after him not as a flip-flopper but as a lefty.
] Lefty isn't exactly a term of endearment. But at least it
] evokes issues rather than character. Character debates
] sank Al Gore and threaten to sink John Kerry now. A
] debate about issues, on the other hand — especially the
] biggest issue of all, Iraq — is something Democrats
] could win.

[ A good, if pointless, article on the hypothetical of Dean being the nominee rather than Kerry. -k]

TIME.com Print Page: TIME Magazine -- If Howard Dean Were the Candidate ...

Elonka wrote:
] It's clear hypocrisy: Accusing Bush of misleading the American
] public, while Kerry is systematically doing misleading of his
] own!

[ Even if that's true, at the very least, you have to admit that Bush is doing the same. And I think a fair analysis indicates that Bush is doing it more, and in more destructive ways. He says every day that Iraq is better, it's "turning the corner" or it's people are free as they never were under saddam. This is patently bullshit as the CIA, senior military staff, Colin Powell, prominent members of congress (many of them Republicans) have all recently indicated that the opposite is true. It's getting worse. Bush continues to frame the Iraq war in terms of the global war on terror when most credible analyses made in the past year (9/11 commission; CIA report, for examples) indicate that they were previously unlinked and only now is Iraq a hotbed of foreign terrorists. Framing Saddam in the same context as bin Laden is a nice rhetorical device, but it's not accurate.

As for Kerry's apparent misleading, I guess, yeah, I'm not a big fan of big declarative statements either. I don't think that Bush has been wrong on every decision and yes, the political rhetoric is abominable, on both sides. The point is that thinking people like us don't have to rely on the public face these guys are putting forward for the benefit of the general populace, who vote on amorphous qualities like "attitude" and "confidence" or notions of simpathetic identities. Bush knows that photos of him clearing brush are effective in exploiting that aspect of people, and it's also why the "rich, liberal, intellectual" frame is so good at demolishing populist appearances on the left. I'm not denying that those aren't valid things to take account of, but they should never have attained the primacy that they have. That's what this editorial is talking about. Most people don't analyze issues in depth, which is why the republican/Right tactic of framing the issues in linguistic constructs favorable to themselves is so incredibly effective. But we're all capable of seeing past the rhetoric, as infantile and simplistic and, yes, false as it is most of the time, and take a hard look at what the record *actually* shows about these two men.

For me, the record shows that Bush is largely incompetent. He didn't finish the job in Afghanistan, he's pursued a war on provably false pretenses which has cost us billions and, worse, thousands of lives, he's alienated our long time allies and marginalized the UN, he's spent my and my childrens money on benefits for the rich and for corporations, demolished environmental protections, worker protections and the public school system, and gutted the medicare system, not to mention lost millions of jobs while playing games with the numbers to achieve even that awful record.

That's my analysis, but I don't claim it has to be anyone elses, as long as they used logic to reach their decision and aren't basing their response on some intangible emotional response to flags and burning buildings or what a good guy they think Bush is. That's fine for the masses, or at least, it's not something i expect to change for the masses, but it's not a signifigant asset on either side of a logical debate.

At any rate, I understand and agree with your criticism to a large degree -- marketing, even marketing a candidate, tends to distort reality. Nonetheless, the reality is there, and I don't think being unhappy with the rhetoric is a reason to stop listening, and it certainly doesn't prevent us from looking at all the other extant information available to us. -k]

RE: The New York Times -- Op-Ed Columnist: Swagger vs. Substance

] Welcome to TiddlyWiki, an experimental MicroContent
] WikiWikiWeb built by JeremyRuston. It's written in HTML
] and JavaScript to run on any browser without needing any
] ServerSide logic. It allows anyone to create
] SelfContained hypertext documents that can be posted to
] any web server, or sent by email. If you like it, do
] please EmailMe and let me know. If you're interested in
] FuturePlans for TiddlyWiki, keep an eye on this site.

This is very cool.

[ Yeah it is. -k]

TiddlyWiki - a reusable non-linear personal web notebook

] The main culprit, according to the study's authors, is
] not so much sprawl all by itself as the circular
] dependence on the automobile that both creates and is
] created by urban creep.
]
] What remained constant in the more sprawling areas was
] the amount of time people spend in their cars, the number
] of drive-through fast-food meals they eat and the fact
] that, after they have done all that, they have neither
] the time nor the place to do the one thing that makes
] most people healthier.
]
] They can't go for a walk.

[ Your city is killing you slowly. I want to see the actual study results though. If only to check out the top of the list... -k]

Driven to death

The result of this emphasis on the candidates' acting skills rather than their substance was that after a few days, Mr. Bush's defeat in the debate had been spun into a victory.

[ Thanks NYT. Will we see you doing any different this year? -k]

The New York Times -- Op-Ed Columnist: Swagger vs. Substance