tell me one thing you remember about me

2009-01-22T13:23:00.002-05:00

Surprise! Someone finally posted after all these years. Welcome back.

check out THWUGA.net for a few good laughs.

Daniel

2009-01-22T12:47:00.002-05:00

this blog is only 6.5 years old. but yeah, still, a long time. amazing how social media (facebook, twitter) has come into play during that period.

2009-01-22T12:33:00.002-05:00

haha! that freaked me out when this came up in my rss feed.

with facebook, I guess no one needs to post arguments on here.

and I killed my other blog also (five years was enough).

I think the eight years beat us down.

2009-01-22T12:27:00.000-05:00

does anybody read or post to this any more?

2008-03-26T19:59:00.000-04:00

The new Counting Crows album "Saturday Nights and Sunday Mornings" is available now!!

You should go out immediately and buy it.

So far I like it, but not as much as Hard Candy the first time I heard it, but more than Recovering the Satellites the first time I heard it. = )

P.S. Happy Birthday Sarah

2008-03-18T18:09:00.001-04:00

For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances — for better health care and better schools and better jobs — to the larger aspirations of all Americans: the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man who has been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for our own lives — by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.

You should listen to this whole 30 minute speech.

2008-03-06T16:53:00.000-05:00

probably nobody reads this anymore. but I'm stumped - help me out.

I realized today that Clinton is not trying to win the Democratic nomination. Unless I am completely unaware of something, it's impossible for her to win - she would need 65% of the remaining 1,003 delegates - including the remaining uncommitted superdelegates to reach 2,025 (or thereabouts, using NY Times numbers).

On the other hand, it's fairly easy for her to NOT LOSE. A meager 45% of the remaining delegates will result in... neither candidate having 2,025.

Then what?!?!

P.S. Don't even say "what if they seat the delegates in Florida and Michigan?" Sure, that adds another 350 delegates to the mix, but I don't hear anyone from the DNC offering to pay for the more that $50M in expenses to have those states vote again.

2008-03-04T00:40:00.002-05:00

sometimes it's scary living by yourself. it's past midnight and the bathroom caddy in my shower just clattered to the ground in my tub on it's own accord. that was loud and SCARY. it sounded like a bookshelf collapsed. so crazy!

2008-02-26T17:05:00.000-05:00

Are you as excited about the new Counting Crows album as I am?

Saturday Nights and Sunday Mornings comes out next month.

Listen here for a live preview performance from NPR in Philadelphia!!!

2008-01-31T15:32:00.000-05:00

meant to post this here - when it was snowing in ATL. The irony of these just killed me.

Breaking News from from WSB!

Essential 2 Life Leadership Program
Cancelled

Club 249 Winter Wonderland
Postponed (due to snow)

Beacon of Hope
Cancelled

God's City of Refuge
Closed Sunday

God's House of Prayer
Closed Tomorrow

Good life
Closed Sunday

Jesus Christ Center of Truth
Cancelled

Loves and Hugs
Closed Sunday

Manna from Heaven Leadership Training
Cancelled

New Beginnings
Closed Tomorrow

New Birth
Cancelled

Noon Day Baptist Church
11AM Service Only

Open Door Baptist
Closed

Reach for Excellence
Cancelled

Sunrise Baptist Church
Closed Until 10AM

2007-10-19T19:54:00.000-04:00

About to head to Buzz Bash for GT Homecoming tonight, but thought I'd have a quick post.

I saw this article in the USA Today: "Most fake bombs missed by screeners". Yet they have done a tremendous job at finding and throwing away dangerous items like shampoo, toothpaste, toenail clippers, bottled water, etc. Ah, the brilliance of government in action.

I'd like them to get rid of their liquids rule, and their shoe screening rule. Both of those don't help safety in my opinion. I also think going to government screeners by the TSA was also a bad idea. I'd like to go back to privatized screeners.

Go Jackets! Beat Army!

2007-07-23T19:22:00.000-04:00

This blog seems pretty dead... I'm trying to put it on life support. :-)

An article on 18 year olds drinking turned deadly, and moreso how we treat these adults as kids. If the drinking age was 18, then we could focus on overconsumption rather having a sip at all. Most of my friends didn't drink as heavily upon turning 21, and I think it is because once alchohol was legal it wasn't as appealling because you were no longer doing something "only adults could do".

I'd vote for a law where the drinking age was 21, or upon graduation from high school. Whichever came first. You could have people underage or not yet graduated from high school to take their picture sideways to make it easy to identify who is not legal to purchase alcohol. Perhaps some small population of students would actually stick through school just to drink earlier, and that would make it worth it. :-)

2007-07-18T08:04:00.000-04:00

Another reason to lock down the border: FBI: Iraqis Being Smuggled Across the Rio Grande (link from ABCnews.com)

That is why I am against "comprehensive immigration" as defined by the latest bill. I support the idea of securing the border first, and then we can consider additional or modified laws. But we should enforce current laws on the books, as the rule of law is important in this country.

I think McCain had this issue wrong, and I think it is the largest factor in his campaign sinking. (Money would be up there as well.) He's not my choice for the Republican candidate. Actually "none of the above" leads in current polling of likely Republican voters. :-) Democrats seems very satisfied with their choices. It should be an interesting year. Any of you pulling for or against a particular candidate?

2007-07-05T19:28:00.000-04:00

I hope everyone had a happy 4th! The Peachtree Road Race was a blast again. I had my best time yet, but we were having family over so we didn't get to stick around to see all the costumes and interesting runners.

Carter, don't forget that the President is the ultimate authority in declassifying information. So the president can choose to release the name of an agent if they wish. So if Bush approved the information being linked, he legally has the right. You can disagree with the decision, but it is not illegal. I would say, was there any damage done by revealing the agent? A full pardon for Scooter would be fine with me, as he was likely doing the orders of his supervisors.

2007-07-02T22:12:00.000-04:00

Let me get this straight -

The advisers to the Pres and VP
committed treason by revealing the names of a CIA agent
because they were mad at them for not agreeing with a senseless war
and then when questioned about it
they lied

No one is charged with the crime of revealing the agent?
And the only person charged with lying about it
is let off the hook by the very guy that probably told him to do it?

Folks, I am really confused about this one. Happy "Independence" day.

2007-06-30T10:47:00.001-04:00

Make yourself into a simpson character.

http://www.milkandcookies.com/link/41026/detail/

2007-05-05T11:26:00.000-04:00

Hey everybody! I was just surfing Adam's blog and I ran accross this:

The Himalayans CD!!!

So... Adam has started his own label (tyrannosaurus records) and with that label, he's cleaned up and release a CD of his old band just before Counting Crows (The Himalayans) which never had a CD released, but they did record the songs many years ago...

Sarah, Leila, and I will probably know all the songs on this CD already - some of them everyone knows (Round Here was orginally recorded by the Himalayans) but it's apparently better quality than the junky mp3's we downloaded on Napster. So buy it immediately!!

2007-05-04T23:10:00.000-04:00

I found the American Idol appearance by George to be wildly offensive. The man has fires burning due to an unprovoked attack on a county he won't leave, a FEMA disaster where Americans are still not home two years after a hurricane, unethical people in charge of the World Bank and leading the legal system. But that's ok. He can make it all better with a 30 second advertisement sponsored by FOX on the most popular show on television.

Fox is not a cable station, it's broadcast television. They should revoke their broadcast license unless I see a Democratic candidate on American Idol next week.

2007-05-04T22:54:00.000-04:00

so, I think I figured it out. I needed to change the nameservers to reflect a service that supports web forwarding. I don't know.

2007-04-30T23:28:00.000-04:00

so, I axed the hosting for greenwriting.com. meawhile, I just assumed I could reidirect that site using my domain registration service. turns out I can't.

without hosting, and without using your domain registration provider, anyone know how you can redirect a URL to a blogspot address?

2007-04-24T07:40:00.000-04:00

Crazy news last week with the Va Tech shootings and then NASA. Sarah and Becca, we're glad you're safe. I'm disappointed with the way the media coverage is so intense, and seems to encouarge copycat killings.

What do you guys think about Sheryl Crow suggesting that the way to save the environment is for everyone to only use one piece of toilet paper? Some people have said it was a joke, but most have said it was serious. Regardless, that idea seems stupid to me.

Saw this suggesting cutting airport security to pre 9/11 levels. I agree and think we should be smarter in how we protect ourselves.

I think we should ratchet passenger screening down to pre-9/11 levels. I like seeing positive bag matching. That’s something that was done in Europe for decades. The U.S. airlines screamed and screamed and refused to do it, and now they are.

Really, I would take all the extra money for airport security and have well-trained guards, both uniformed and plainclothes, walking through the airports looking for suspicious people. That’s what I would do. And I would just give back the rest of the money. If we secure our airport and the terrorists go bomb shopping malls, we’ve wasted our money. I dislike security measures that require us to guess the plot correctly because if you guess wrong, it’s a waste of money. And it’s not even a fair game. It’s not like we pick our security, they pick their plot, we see who wins. The game is we pick our security, they look at our security, and then they pick their plot. The way to spend money on security – airport security, and security in general — is intelligence investigation and emergency response. These are the things that will be effective regardless of what the terrorists are planning.

2007-03-25T19:55:00.000-04:00

I don't think it makes sense to expect an energy conscious polititian to be some kind of solar power dwelling small house living power saver. Yes, that would lead by example, but that would lead to very few sweeping changes. I would expect to require more resources to really get things going.

It's interesting that Gore's light bill is of interest to anyone while meanwhile, yet another Bush appointee has been on trial for immoral conduct and abuse of the judicial system. It makes you wonder if every appointee is a cronie and a criminal? Who was it that said "the president doesn't have to be smart as long as he's surrounded by smart advisors"??? The two go hand in hand my friends.

2007-03-22T12:04:00.001-04:00

James I definitely agree with you on how Gore is being hypocritical. However, I think it is misleading to think that he is the only one doing this. One thing that bothers me about Bush is how his politics are supposedly based on Christian values and ethics but clearly he violates this so much (love thy neighbor and so on). But that is just one example of MANY politicians who say one thing and do another. Sadly I think hypocrisy is one of the most ubiquitous characteristics of our politicians today, but it gets the most news when someone actually begins to get a lot of attention for some issue. I fear that if we wait until someone with a perfect environmental record is ready to lead the movement to reduce oil use or carbon use, we will be waiting a long time.

2007-03-19T07:04:00.000-04:00

One more update on the Al Gore being green.

Last week, the Tennessean was asking questions about Al Gore's ownership and leasing of property/minerals to a zinc mine with a horrible pollution record. Al Gore then sent a letter to the company asking them not to damage the environment. They finally published their full story on the zinc mine.

He has owned this mine since 1973, and has been leasing out the rights to farm the minerals for some time. This mine was pumping out 3-4 million pounds of toxic substances into the air, water, and land each year. In his own letter Al Gore says, “pollution releases from the mine in 2002 placed it among the ‘dirtiest/worst facilities’ in the U.S.”

Now you have explained to me that Al Gore's huge energy bill and extremely wasteful charter jet are a net benefit to the environment because of his message. So now I'm guessing the millions of pounds of toxic substances being pumped out of this mine which Al profitted $570,000 from is also a net benefit to the environment, because this money helps subsidize Al's message? :-)

I'm not against mining, but I am against Al lecturing America on their pollution and energy use when he is unwilling to walk the walk.

2007-03-07T10:19:00.000-05:00

Sure, Gore is wasteful in that he has a large house. But his house probably supports more than just him and his wife. He probably hosts visitors, live in help, etc., so his carbon footprint from the house would have to be fairly divided amongst them. Likewise, traveling with a message is important. Even in the day of mass media, meeting a candidate or otherwise interacting with someone bringing a message is way more likely to influence people than seeing them on t.v. It would be better if he used commercial travel.

I'm not sure what to think of Speaker Pelosi's jet. On one hand it seems wasteful. On the other, the reason she requested it was not size, it was because the previous jet can not make it non-stop on one tank of fuel to California (the previous Speaker did not have this problem). If she shuttles frequently to her home district, she'll be wasting hours of her and her staff's time waiting for fuel stops. The purpose of providing a jet to high ranking government officials is specifically to avoid time wasted in commercial travel. Still, bad way to start off her new position. But the Speaker is always a target for criticism.

2007-03-07T10:15:00.000-05:00

You know my favorite topic for this blog is bashing FoxNews... this screen shot is definitely a doozy. Scooter Libbey was convicted of 4 of 5 charges against him, and Fox News uses the headline that he's found "Not Guilt of []" the remaining charge. Ha ha.

2007-03-03T17:08:00.000-05:00

Gore is not a hypocrite. He is a leader. Obviously it would lower his CO2 footprint if he lived in a well insulated box, grow his own food in the yard, never travel farther then walking would allow and I am sure big oil would love him to stop talking about Global Warming. Instead he lives a wealthy lifestyle and buys his carbon back with money. Unless you are now advocating an extremely progressive tax system the few extremely wealth will continue to spend absurd amounts of money.

What annoys me to no end about this faux or Fox scandal (and others such as Pelosi's Air Force 3 being too big) is that it distracts from the real issues. The article below discusses the lack of fuel efficient (<40mpg) href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17344368/from/RSS/">U.S. 'stuck in reverse' on fuel efficiency (MSNBC)

I would guess that the lack of fuel efficiency choices has more of an impact on the environment then the Gore mansion's power bill (which is offset by investments in renewables).

2007-02-27T20:58:00.000-05:00

I would say instapundit is a reliable source, because it most always links to source documents. Instapundit is spreading "radical right wing lies". Gore's response did not dispute any of the figures (which came from public records), they only attempted to justify the energy use with his donations. Can you give any justification on why the claim would be a lie?

Daniel, do you not see the hypocrisy in Gore saying to the public, "I want you to make sacrifices I am unwilling to make personally. I just have enough money to make donations that you can't afford." I agree with Katie that I'd like to see politicians and celebrities cut their travel. It made me sick about Nancy Pelosi requesting this massive plan to fly her direct back to California non-stop with 100 seats etc. rather than the current plane used by the speaker. The waste of resources is crazy, even for the smaller plane used by the previous Republican speaker.

Finally, what am I doing to reduce pollution:

We are looking at smaller houses closer to town for a shorter commute, rather than a larger house with a longer commute
I purchase fuel efficient cars
We use far less heating and cooling in our house
I recycle
I strongly support clean, nuclear energy
Unlike Al Gore, I only fly commercial

2007-02-27T14:08:00.000-05:00

I think what the Gores do is good, but I still object to the idea that if you just buy carbon credits it's a-ok to consume more and more energy. What would really reduce carbon emissions is for people to stop buying ridiculously huge homes and air conditioning them like crazy (which is no doubt the reason for the bill being highest in August). The Gores might be able to afford offsetting their energy use, but there are a lot of people who can't or don't care enough to.

It's really funny that you brought this up James because Joel and I had the "walk the walk" conversation last week. I think all the celebrities and politicians who travel so much are extremely wasteful. I feel like those people could get their desired messages out with only a fraction of the travel that they do. I would be really impressed if, instead of spending millions (or billions?) of dollars on the presidential campaign, a candidate spent a fraction of that and donated the rest of their money to healthcare or education causes. Politicians of all parties are so wasteful in terms of money and resources and I would really like to see that change.

2007-02-27T10:52:00.000-05:00

Carter, I got everything to work, no need for a new invite.

Instapundit is hardly a reliable or objective source. In this case he is spreading radical right wing lies:

"The Gores and all the employees of Generation lead a "carbon-neutral" lifestyle, reducing their energy consumption when possible and purchasing so-called offsets available on newly emerging carbon markets. Gore says he and Tipper regularly calculate their home and business energy use - including the carbon cost of his prodigious global travel. Then he purchases offsets equal to the amount of carbon emissions they generate. Last year, for example, Gore and Tipper atoned for their estimated 1 million miles in global air travel by giving money to an Indian solar electric company and a Bulgarian hydroelectric project. "

So it looks like Gore does walk the walk. Through his travels and speeches he influences others and policy. This helps the environment (but harms the radical right wing movement) much more then him staying home.

What have you done to be reduce your carbon footprint?

Two things I can think of are:
- all compact fluorescent bulbs ( I really like the 100watt equivalent)
- I ride public transportation to and from school

2007-02-26T22:56:00.000-05:00

AN INCONVENIENT UTILITY BILL: "Gore’s mansion, located in the posh Belle Meade area of Nashville, consumes more electricity every month than the average American household uses in an entire year, according to the Nashville Electric Service (NES). . . . The average household in America consumes 10,656 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year, according to the Department of Energy. In 2006, Gore devoured nearly 221,000 kWh—more than 20 times the national average. Last August alone, Gore burned through 22,619 kWh—guzzling more than twice the electricity in one month than an average American family uses in an entire year. As a result of his energy consumption, Gore’s average monthly electric bill topped $1,359."

(Credit to instapundit.com)

I'd also like to see "green" celebs cut their personal jet travel, which produces far more pollution than travelling commercial like the rest of us.

2007-02-07T23:07:00.000-05:00

I'm not sure why I can't add this blog to my Google Reader - If you haven't tried that out, you can view most blogs via RSS feed and have one dashboard for all your websites. But I can't get this one to work... Or Katie's for that matter... Am I doing something wrong? h

2007-02-07T12:25:00.000-05:00

Tech seems pretty amazing at home... Too bad we can't win one on the road.

Check out this shot from last night.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=JB5OTh3V4ok

2007-02-06T14:35:00.000-05:00

So, I managed to port us over to newblogger. Success!

Please let me know if there are any problems with this.

2007-02-03T22:52:00.000-05:00

Thanks for sharing a fine work of fiction by OSC James. I've always said he was a good sci-fi writer. Trouble is, his imagination has run away with him.

The truthful part of his essay (which is hard to find) is his analysis of the quote from Bush - "We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We will interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. We sill seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq."

"This is a declaration that our enemies," Orson opines, "who are already at war with us though no official declaration has been made, will no longer be safe in their own territory, because America will not respect a boundary that they have already violated countless times. It is a declaration that we will take military action in Syria and Iran."

A preemptive attack on a sovereign nation fueled by fear and undeterred by logic, information, and diplomacy was not a good plan the first time. It seems relatively certain the administration is gearing up to try this again (or, as OSC hopes - twice more!). It doesn't seem right to me. Forget about the question of troop levels - just stop being the aggressor. Just stop, that's all Congress is asking.

2007-02-01T19:38:00.000-05:00

No one has a preference of Obama versus Clinton?

I saw this long political article, and thought at least Carter might be interested. A quote:

However, years of vocal and increasingly effective Democratic anti-Bush propaganda, designed to achieve no higher purpose than the political defeat of George W. Bush, have emboldened our enemies everywhere. Democratic Bush-haters can claim that Bush has lowered our prestige in the world, but the opposite is true. Where it counts -- among those nations that support terrorism -- Bush vastly raised our prestige, and the Democrats have shockingly lowered it.

The result is that nations that for a while were cowed by Bush's boldness are once again sponsoring terrorism -- as witness Sudan's revived genocidal policies in Darfur. Ironically, the American and European Left are highly critical of Bush for not "doing something" about Darfur. No one has the brains or the courage to admit that the only "something" that would be effective is the military defeat of the Sudanese government.

The Left always wants someone to "do something," but never wants to do anything that works. And never wants to admit that President George W. Bush has ever done anything right.

Happy Thursday!

2007-01-21T20:57:00.000-05:00

Quick question for you all before I make my responses. Obama or Clinton? I know Carter is an Obama fan... the rest of you?

I actually do support having ticket prices to pay a significant portion of the athletic fees. I suggested that earlier, as I saw that for UGA students. I articularly agree when demand for tickets is higher than supply, which is most cases for football.

I disagree with two points below... First, to say that for those who didn't go to football or basketball games sports does not contribute much doesn't make sense. It is like saying the Student Activity fee doesn't contribute anything to Tech for people who never do any student activities. It is a strong contributor to school spirit, and is the single greatest element in keeping alumni engaged and financially supportive of the school.

Secondly, to say that which will have a longer lasting impact... sports or science. I can tell you a whole lot about the 1990 sports season - winning the national championship in football
, and going to the final four in basketball. (Most alumni would be close to my point of view as well.) I can't tell you anything that any of the grad students we funded that year did. That being said, I don't think sports is more important as this is an academic institution. But sports does a lot more for the culture, and bonding of the student body does than a few extra academic scholarships.

On the rising costs of collegeI think schools should start cutting some ammeneties. Rather than raise costs, why not quit the trend of having TVs in every single piece of workout equipment in SAC and try to slow the increases in costs for non-academics.

2007-01-18T12:11:00.000-05:00

I think its simplist to look at the fees and say "scholarship pay for it, don't worry about it." I would guess over 50% of Tech's students are from either out of state or graduate students, plus all those not on HOPE, have to pay for it. A lot of people pay for college on loans that take 10 years or more to pay off. So a $100 fee (even assuming a modest 5% interest rate) could cost double that once paid off. Not to mention, even HOPE is impacted by rising fees. The collective cost of paying more athletic fees for all the students on HOPE would cut down on the amount of money it has to spend all together. For every 50 people on HOPE paying $100's more in athletic fees means $5000 less in scholarship money that could go to another Georgia student. I know that HOPE has had a problem staying solvent, so piling up more fees on it would only make things worse.

For those of us who don't attend football and basketball games, I don't think it contributed to the university experience at all... how many times did you actually interact with a varsity sports player? share a class with one? socialize with one? Its not like you're learning about a different walk of life from them... the athletic department separates and isolates them from the student body. The only reason I knew any athletes is becaue my priority registration put me in some of the same "easy A" electives that they were in, and overall, I wasn't impressed by their academic accomplishments. I ran into one varsity tennis player in his junior year that didn't even know what a co-op was (that's how separated from the student body they are!).

2007-01-16T17:12:00.000-05:00

The fees at tech disproportionately hurt graduate students. One third of the students at tech are graduate students and the majority of them are on stipends and tuition waivers. The fees are not included in the tuition wavier. They come out of the stipend, which is already quite low for the cost of living in atlanta. I would bet that graduate students on a whole don't take advantage of athletic events.

I am surprised that there is so much support for this fee from our token republican. From a free market point of view, it is very inefficient to impose fees for the athletic events. The tickets should be traded on the free market so that people who are willing to pay for them pay for them and they people who do not want to pay for them do not pay for them.

I doubt there would be so much support for this fee if it was going to build a new science building. Science also makes GT well known, and in a better way. I would rather have an employer know tech because of a technology or science breakthrough then because we made it to the final four.

Sports memories are quite short. I would bet that lots of people have forgotten that Tech made it into the Final Four. Fees are not are not quite so short to those graduate students toiling away in the lab.

2007-01-16T16:07:00.000-05:00

I am okay with raising the athletic fee. I agree with Carter's point that raising the knowledge of the school by any means is good. Many people out west did not know where Joel was going to school when he told them Georgia Tech. Though those people might not be the people that "matter," if my future employer thinks "hmm, Georgia Tech, oh yeah that team that went to the Final Four" and that recognition gives me an edge, I'm all for that. I understand how people can object to funding more athletes on full scholarship, but GT has also been making good strides in funding merit scholarships over the past few years (increased PSs, full PS, etc) so it's not as if athletics are being funded at the expense of other students. There is a lot of money that GT would not receive if athletics were not as well-known, so while I think athletes do get a lot of perks, in my mind athletes also contribute to Tech as a whole.

At the same time, I oppose having students pay for athletic tickets... but maybe I am swayed by my free tickets to UNC-GT basketball this weekend. :) In a way GT does charge students for the *best* seats to football and basketball already, through the Swarm now. Seriously though, I think getting in free to sports games was a nice perk. Going to games was a fun social part of my college experience and also made me feel closer ties to my fellow students and the college as a whole. That may sound corny but one of the best days I remember at GT was when we went to the Final Four and everyone was just walking around so happy and yelling "go Tech" and stuff at random. I would like to know how many schools charge for sports versus do not charge - I believe that most offer tickets for free at least in the ACC. I think that most schools that charge for tickets do so because there is overwhelming demand and they don't want to deal with the hassle/conflict of doing ticket lotteries or other distribution methods.

Now onward: UNC is attempting to implement a unique tuition arrangement that allows incoming students to pay $4000/year above the tuition costs at time of enrollment in exchange for having that tuition guaranteed over their four years in undergrad. What do you think about this? Does it really address the problem (rapidly rising education costs)? Is it a good attempt to provide some stability as federal and other policies try to address costs of higher education? I think it is good that they are trying to implement stability, but students will still be faced with large student loans after graduation. FYI, tuition has been rising as much as $1500/year over the past few years and is projected to continue rising at that rate or higher. This plan would just affect out-of-state students, as in-state tuition increases are capped at 6.5% per year. I am curious what you all think about this.

2007-01-15T21:17:00.000-05:00

I can't switch us to the new blogger... our blog is too big! hahaha. Apparently blogger imposed a limit on the size of blogs and > 1000 or so posts won't port over to the new version... (we are well over 2000 posts). I assume they will fix that soon.

Cool Senior Design project, Daniel. I wonder what new space breakthroughs we will make in our lifetime.

2007-01-15T15:02:00.000-05:00

I thought everyone (at least the AEs) would be amused to know I am TAing senior design this semester. The design is a White Knight (SpaceShipOne's carrier) type air launch vehicle. The proposal calls for a supersonic high altitude launch of a large rocket. I do not know the full specs, but I am sure I will learn them. I believe it is ~7 person teams and ~6 teams.

Carter, when are you switching us to the new blogger?

Daniel

2007-01-15T14:52:00.000-05:00

I agree with you Sarah that b/c students don't care shouldn't be a reason to raise fees. I'm just saying it is a fact that most people wouldn't notice it. There is a large group of HOPE folks, and then others who pay their own but won't notice a $100 change.

Daniel, I agree the country should be more fiscally responsible than it is. I think the numbers that you are quoting though are the estimates, which the article says are going to be updated with the new positive data. I think Bush has done a horrible job of adding government spending. The prescription drug bill, and greatly expanding government with Homeland Security Dept. were two of his agenda items that I opposed. I don't remember anyone crediting Bush for the home market. I always hear the media talk about the "housing bubble", saying that housing is overpriced. Other than his tax cut, I'm not sure of anything else he did to impact that. Just as I am sure Clinton had very little to do with the surplusses during his tenure. The internet drove higher productivity, regardless of any government action.

Talking about NFL, I'm cheering for the Bears, since Liz is such a Bears fan.

2007-01-14T22:24:00.000-05:00

I saw Bush on 60 minutes today. He looked old and sad. I say that without any kind of sarcasm - he has aged so much in his presidency, but most people do. And he really did seem sad about things, not his usual joking self. He was talking about all these mistakes - WMD, his choice of words, his strategy in Iraq. Somehow it doesn't make me feel better. One good thing about government is that it's hard to change things. On the other hand, it's hard to dig yourself out of a hole.

On a totally unrelated note - I'm happy the Saints have won! Go Saints!!

2007-01-14T10:05:00.000-05:00

I was initially annoyed by the fee increase, but the fact the GT sports are free is great. I know I hardly ever used it, but it is better then getting charged for everything (even minor sports).

I followed James' link about the deficit and read till the end (it is not long). The last 3 months the deficit is down 32%. It is still not a surplus the Clinton ran. The estimates from Congress Budget Office ($286 billion) and Bush administration ($339.2 billion) are still greater then last year's deficit of $248.2 billion. While the news is good, it is far from great.

I can think of a good news story that use to be hyped constantly: Housing. Bush was only partially responsible, interest rates and other factors were much more important. I know the last few months have been tough on the housing market, but earlier every press organization sung good news of housing with people getting rich and laid lots of praise at the foot of Bush.

2007-01-13T13:25:00.000-05:00

Come on James -- you think people don't care about fees just because someone else (HOPE) pays them? That may be somewhat true, but it's not a reason to just accept the fees being raised. There are plenty of students at GT who aren't from Georgia, and don't have HOPE. You might not have had to pay the fees, but out-of-staters like Becca, Kent, Christina and I did. Not to mention that *anyone* without a full scholarship, state resident or not, would and will have to pay them.

The athletic fee is for just that -- athletics. So in my opinion, you shouldn't get a say on which athletics (football vs equestrian, for example) your money goes to. It's important for a school to have football & basketball for visibility, but it's also important for a school to have the less visible sports as well just for well-roundedness!

I agree with you that GT maybe should consider having students pay for tickets (it's not uncommon at most other schools, though getting tix for free was a nice perk at GT if you were interested in sports). But to say that students don't care about raising fees is silly.

2007-01-13T12:06:00.000-05:00

I heard on NPR that more Americans felt optimistic about their personal lives (something like 75%) but fewer happy about the state of the US (like 40%). They were talking about all kind of theories why people would claim they are happy when they are not. I was not surprised to see that they didn't advance the theory that people were happy, but the media's incredibly negative coverage was to blame for the negative overall state.

For example, just yesterday there was tons of great economic news. The stock market is at an all time high, and the federal deficit falls to its' lowest in four years. Unemployment is at a low steady 4.5% or so. Do you hear any hooray from the media about our financial prosperity? No. (I bet if Clinton were still in office we would.) Aside from political bias, the media doesn't have interest in reporting positive news. People are less likely to tune in when things are great. The media thinks viewers want to hear shocking negative news such as murders, disasters, and new topics to worry about.

My thoughts on a lazy Saturday...

2007-01-13T10:54:00.000-05:00

A few responses:

First regarding raising athletic fees. I think that GT should move like UGA and have a fee for season football tickets. Then people who actually wanted to attend would pay, and students who didn't care about football would pay less of a share. More "pay as you go", as I generally like. Also, most students don't care about higher fees, becuase HOPE pays for it. I would also prefer to raise an athletic fee to pay for scholarships in sports that I care about, rather than a new equestrian team that I am not ever going to enjoy. Most students (and alumni) care about football and basketball.

I agree with Carter that athletics makes our degree stronger. You can't consider MIT or Harvard, (Harvard used to have THE top football team) but think about schools in Idaho. I know Boise State from football, and because it is the only school I know in Idaho I would be more positive on their graduates than others in that state. When Tech went to the National Championship basketball game, our applicants the next Fall went up something by like 30% which allowed us to offer to better students.

I also agree with Carter (scary!) that our unique status in athletics plus academics does really make us stand out.

We shouldn't strive to be U of F, but we should continue to make strides in athletics. I think the NCAA should limit how much money can be spent on athletics facilities etc, because it can get out of control in the ammenities wars.

2007-01-11T22:17:00.000-05:00

I liked the fact that Tech does both. It's rare to have a Reasearch 1A school plus a Division 1 atheletics school. Tech rulez.

2007-01-10T15:43:00.000-05:00

Yes, winning at a sport does increase name recognition of the school. But I think the more advanced in your field you are the less that type of name recognition matters. UF just had a big football win, does that mean when I'm hiring an aerospace engineer I'm going to think that his degree is better than one from MIT? (Actually, I'm not much of a school snob, so it would probably depend on both their qualifications beyond school.) My point is the only thing sports does for Georgia Tech is make some people who have never heard of the school know about it. I think GT is a high enough caliber school that the people who matter know about it because of the academic quality. Certainly for graduate students there is almost no value added to their degree coming from a school with a good sports program.

I guess what I'm saying, does your earning potential, ability to get a job, post-graduation skills and education, etc. increase by $XX by being able to go to football games for free (something that is not common at Div I schools) or graduating from a school that is nationally ranked (though rarely top) in well-known sports? (Where $XX is the cost to the students to have a Div I football & basketball team through both the direct athletic fee but also the other money that the school receives and puts into athletics rather than academics)

GT is no Cal Tech or MIT or Harvard but I feel like it should strive to be like one of those places - known because of its brilliant academics - rather than striving to become a University of Florida.

2007-01-07T17:53:00.000-05:00

Yes, I used to be for capital punishment "in some cases" but I've realized that is totally impossible. No human being is capable of making that judgement over another. I scored on the right side of liberal for the tiny quiz. I was happy that it was so short. Perhaps it's my indecision that scores me closer to the middle. I

I'm ok with the AA fee. I think what you're overlooking Becca is that atheletics makes the school well known. If our team wins in basketball -- as crazy as it seems -- your degree is worth more. I look at hundreds of resumes, and it says a lot to come from a school that everyone has heard of and that everyone has a great respect for. Atheletics is an important part of that.

2007-01-07T16:10:00.000-05:00

Happy New Years!

Actually, this post reminded me that I wanted to post about something. Not that this directly effects any of us anymore, but I read in the Technique (yes, I still read it occasionally when I'm bored) that the AA is proposing raising the athletic fee almost 75% (from $100something per semester to $200something). The AA uses athletic fees mainly to subsidize paying for athlete scholarships, facilities, marketing, etc. One of their reasons for asking for an increased fee is because tuition has gone up so their scholarship expenses have gone up.

Anyway, I know you all are huge sports fans and I'm not.

The question is how would you feel about paying extra tuition so that a football player can go to school for free? As a recipient of a merit based scholarship myself, I find it hard to criticize too much - merit is merit, and a school wants to attract excellent people. But I find it hard to accept that the students would be asked to fund scholarships of others with their tuition so directly. I particularly ask people who went to college on loans - we're talking an extra $1600 over the course of 4 years to fund athletic scholarships and programs. Would you be willing to take out a loan of that much money tomorrow in order to fund the scholarships of Georgia Tech athletes? How would that improve your education? When I went to Rice, the athletic fee was even steeper than Techs, and it always annoyed me that since it was mandatory, my employer was paying for it, and as a part-time graduate student, basically got nothing in return.

I agree that having an athletic program as important to a university as a music program or art program or student activities that makes campus a richer experience for the students. But is providing 100 football players with scholarships doesn't seem necessary to encourage the spirit of college athletics? For instance, if they said "we want to raise fees so we can add 100 more new positions on teams, or new teams, or new programs" I think I would be more supportive than just covering the costs of already existing scholarships.

2007-01-06T14:10:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year!

Yes, this blog is dead. At least with a personal blog one person can just be busy, but with a group blog then everyone has to stop posting. But perhaps we're seeing signs of life.

My initial thought about the new congress is that the press is going crazy over Nancy Pelosi. Talking about her being a grandmother, and all these positive press stories on her. I saw commentary that her national approval rating is actually below Bush's. Bush was at 45% approval and she was at 43%. You wouldn't know that her beliefs are way out of wack with the rest of the country unless you looked into it. But we shall see. I disagreed with most of her agenda, but I liked the idea of making earmarks more public. I'm all in favor of porkbusters.

Carter's changed on capital punishment! He used to be for it if it was public. I am still for it, though I disagree with the way it was done in this particular case.

Also, to test where you are politically here is the world's smallest political quiz. I was economics 100%, Personal 60%. That made me fall libertarian. Several of the Personal ones I was more flexible on... not sure if I've posted this survey here before. But it is always interesting to see how we land.

2007-01-05T22:36:00.000-05:00

This coming from the guy who didn't post to his own blog for three months?

I was so happy that Reggie did not play in the final game. It actually gave me hope we might win. The result, sadly, was the same. Taylor played his shoes off though.

I'm certain that I qualify for everything related to internet addiction, but I realized just today that I didn't send any email last week. None at all! Go Carter.

Speaking of the audacity of hope, how great is it that the government once again has checks and balances? What a relief.

I was irritated by the murder of Hussein. Which is to say that I have finally decided that capital punishment is absolutely crazy no matter what the circumstances. He may have yet had a role to play.

2006-12-21T07:32:00.000-05:00

Boy is this blog dead... :-)

Carter to you post below, I thought I might have internet addiction, but I didn't have problems in Africa. We just got back and had a great trip seeing Egypt and Tanzania for 16 days. I have a post on my blog with some initial trip details. Our first trip to Africa, and I would highly recommend it.

One other note on our quarterback. Reggie Ball's football career at Georgia Tech is over. He is academically inelligible (likely meaning he didn't pass 6 hours of class this fall) for our January 1st bowl game against West Virginia University. After his poor performance to end the season against UGA and Wake Forest, many Tech fans are happy to see our back-up quarterback Taylor Bennett as Reggie's passes did not look good at all. Even though Reggie has caused us pain, I will still remember his good contributions. Beating Auburn twice (once as a Freshman), winning at Virgina Tech, winning at Miami, and helping us to the ACC Championship game this year. Sadly, these positives will be forgotten due to his 0-4 record against UGA, with some very memorable bad plays on his part.

Merry Christmas everybody! I hope to see some of you over Christmas break!

2006-10-18T13:58:00.000-04:00

Hi Leila!!! Did you see the Counting Crows on their last tour? They rocked my face off.

Re: Presentations - my work also overdoses on PPT. When we were first acquired, I missed some key details, because someone would attach it to a long PPT instead of just saying: hey, y'all need to sign up for this with this deadline. Now I know that I have to actually read the PPT. Corporate culture shift... And I'm in meetings all day long too... now we have meetings about what should go in the powerpoint decks.

Meanwhile, check here to find out if you qualify for internet addiction.
"More than one in eight adults in the US show signs of being addicted to the internet, a study has shown. "

I probably fit most of the symptoms... But I can quit whenever I want... ;)

2006-10-08T15:38:00.000-04:00

Hey all. I know I've been MIA from here for more than a while. We'll it takes quite a topic to get me out of my introverted comfort zone so I'm hoping I get some good response here.

For those that don't know I changed companies about 1.5 years ago from a ~500 person company to a ~20,000 person company. Then 4 months ago I changed jobs within the company to a project management position. More then half of my job at this point is battling communication issues and there is one particular item that has been bothering me for a while but nobody at my company seems to agree with me on.

At my last company we had meetings and presentations. Meetings never required a lap top or an overhead. They were for working issues and were usually limited to less than 15 people. If information needed to be disseminated it was via hard copy and it was expected that people would need to make notes on the data that was handed out. Presentations had presenters. The people who were invited were there to receive information from the presenter. Laptops and projectors were required.

At my new company, there is no such thing as a meeting and NOTHING is ever put down in anything except power point. This would be perfectly achievable for management summaries where the audience would likely not even be able to comprehend the technical stuff anyway but these slides are being used to present technical details and conclusions to fellow engineers. I just done see how anybody can give detailed analysis or data in 16pt font. Something gets lost.

At any rate, I found this article about the space program and power point and thought it might illicit some interesting responses from the AE folks. Does anybody have an opinion on this.

2006-10-04T18:21:00.000-04:00

Is fox news biased? I think the pretty obvious answer is yes. But in case you had any doubt, check this out and this. They are apparently repeatedly misidentifying Congressman (former) Foley as a Democrat when they are talking about his illicit e-mails to his paiges...

2006-09-19T09:11:00.000-04:00

Buzz is in the running for Mascot of the Year... vote for him online at http://capitalonebowl.com/!!

2006-08-26T14:08:00.000-04:00

I'm not familiar with all the specific housing policies, but I believe the policy is particularly enforced about what types of messages people could put on their door.

In my book, I think the policy should allow people to post whatever they want to say on their doors, "I hate purple people" whatever, but it is another thing for me to send a letter to a specific person saying, "I hate you because you are purple". To me then you start getting more into harrasment.

Only 7 days until Georgia Tech kicks off against Notre Dame!!! August is gone on way too long. Bring on the full time college football coverage, I'm tired of hearing how bad the Braves are doing! (It is sad to see the end of that era though...)

2006-08-20T10:10:00.000-04:00

Oh, one more thought. Though death threats are clearly illegal and should be dealt with by the police, giving her twinkie snack cakes and making life difficult for her because of her race is now allowed at Georgia Tech because of a rule she helped get rid of -- clearly ironic but now no longer banned by GT's code of conduct, just another expression of free speech.

2006-08-18T15:56:00.000-04:00

I remember one year during Women's Awareness Month, there were more posters and chalkings that said "Repeal the 19th Amendment" than there was for WAM. I never heard anything about any attempt being made to catch or prevent this type of behavior. I'm not sure that their should have been, either, since I do believe that people should have the right to say what's on their mind. And that's not maligning fellow students. Though how difficult do you think it is for women to attend a university where your classmates (even as a joke) are contesting your right to vote?

2006-08-18T15:50:00.000-04:00

To be honest, while I was at Tech, I always felt like I was in the minority as a liberal. It particularly amused me when professors invited the class to speak with them about their personal relationship with Jesus Christ. How inappropriate is that? (Though I did use it to justify a convenient Easter vacation with my family).

To me, having a "do not malign other students on the basis of race, etc." is no different than having a "do not cheat off someone else's test." Neither of those activities are illegal (nor should they be, with the 1st Amendment), but it doesn't mean the university shouldn't have a code of ethical conduct. If you wanted to make the code "Respect your fellow students", it would have the same effect of banning slurs and hate speech. And we can all agree that though you have the right to make racial, sexist, ethnic slurs, that it is 1. wrong to do so 2. creates an environment that is difficult to learn 3. in the extreme, can insight violence (which is illegal)

2006-08-17T22:45:00.000-04:00

Update: the person who filed the suit at Tech is now receiving death threats per the AJC:

Someone stuffed her campus mailbox with Twinkies snack cakes --- implying that she was yellow on the outside (Malhotra is Indian) but white on the inside.

2006-08-16T13:30:00.000-04:00

I wasn't even aware that such a thing existed at Tech! I'm glad they got rid of it, since obviously no one pays attention anyway. I think, however, that the lawsuit that motivated this change is not warranted. If those students had freely expressed their opinions there would be no room for Tech to sanction them or punish them. One of the students was in public policy and said that she didn't feel that she could express her opinions without ramifications (or something to that effect). Coming from that department, I have to say there were always conservative students in my classes who shared their opinions quite readily. It made for some hearty and even uncomfortable debate because people disagreed so much, but actually I found it very educational. Anyway, I applaud Tech for getting rid of the unnecessary and unknown-to-many regulation.

2006-08-15T21:38:00.000-04:00

"Tech nixes political correctness" in the ajc.

U.S. District Judge J. Owen Forrester ordered Tech on Monday to abide by an agreement to change the code. Tech took out wording that prohibits students from any attempt to "injure, harm" or "malign" a person because of "race, religious belief, color, sexual/affectational orientation, national origin, disability, age or gender."

Personally, I agree with this. I think it is stupid to have a "zone of censorship". Way to go freedom of speech! Agree? Disagree?

2006-08-09T07:33:00.000-04:00

Technically, I always say "The summers die one by one; how soon they fly on and on"

and I am old and will be gone...

Sorry, the misquote of the song was bugging me.

2006-08-04T17:41:00.000-04:00

It is hard to believe it is already August. As Carter would say, "How the summer's die one by one...". It has almost been three years since Chrissy and I were married. Carter's birthday will be shortly thereafter. Also we are less than one month away from the GT-Notre Dame football game over Labor Day weekend. Mark your calendars, because it will be an awesome game with ESPN gameday there on campus.

I wanted to throw out a neat website since most of us on this blog like boardgames such as Risk, Settlers, etc. http://www.boardgamegeek.com I have enjoyed it, as you can find games similar to ones that you have enjoyed in the past. There is a lot of discussion, reviews, questions, etc. I have recently been going to a board game night, and have played some fun games. I try to post reviews on my blog as we play them.

I hope you all have a good weekend!

2006-07-09T19:49:00.000-04:00

I also want to go to Japan. I don't know how the world politics right now would affect that decision. Maybe holding off for now is wise. You're reading Major Winter's book. That's what my Dad is reading. Haha. Lounging by the pool with a good book is just about the best thing that you can spend time doing.

OK -- for anyone who has the new Counting Crows "live" album from 2003 in Amsterdam, you know that there's only one song on it that is previously unreleased. It's called "Hazy" and I had listened to it a few times at which point I hypothesized that he made the song up on the spot while he was playing it. I mean, I've written songs, and sometimes you do just hammer around and sing what you feel and you have no idea what the lyrics are. Turns out I was right!! Crazy.

I was just sitting at the piano in the Heineken Hall getting ready to play "A Long December" and I started trying to remember the music to "Hazy" and making up the rest as I went along. It's all stream of consciousness. I wrote it and sang it off the top of my head. It's just me trying to express exactly how I felt at that moment.

2006-07-08T18:37:00.000-04:00

This is our first "weekend in Columbus". We had a relaxing day starting with a short 3 mile run at one of the local parks, which was quite nice. I am thinking of a triathalon, but I have no bike and have never done swimming. :-) Would love to hear thoughts on a good first one, Sarah. I also did a few tasks I had been putting off, and then lounged by the pool reading. It is nice to have easy access to a pool.

Chrissy is reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, while I'm reading a autobiography by the main character from "Band of Brothers". Interesting stuff. We're going to meet friends for BBQ tonight. We must be quickly adjusting to Columbus life. ;-)

We have free movie rentals here at the complex, so we are watching some random movies we might not normally pick. We liked the Count of Monte Christo.

2006-07-08T18:29:00.000-04:00

What do all the AEs here think about North Korea launching all these missles on July 4th. Apparently one of them was aimed at Hawaii. Someone on the news was saying it wasn't a big deal since the missle tests had failed, but to me this is pretty serious. Aparently we moved one of our ships that tracks and potentially shoots down missles to Japan.

Chrissy and I were thinking of travelling to Japan, but I think we'll put that trip on hold now... :-)

Thoughts?

2006-06-30T20:36:00.000-04:00

OSU did win it all. Crazy. 4 ACC teams in the final 8, and OSU wins. Although I wouldn't have predicted UNC to be the ACC team in the finals either.

And now Italy and Germany are in the semis of the World Cup. Germany/Argentina was close. It's hard to believe games are won or lost on penalty kicks.

4th of July weekend is here. 4 days of rest will be great, and the Peachtree will be fun. Sarah, we look forward to seeing you in ATL!

2006-06-23T10:14:00.000-04:00

Rice is out now too.

I'm going to claim birthright (and two siblings and a mother from the school) and root for Carolina! Rah-rah Carolina-lina.

Too bad my low-down good-for-nothing brother-in-law is going for OSU. Something about his parents went there. LAME.

2006-06-22T14:39:00.000-04:00

Good thing I'm also an alumnae of Rice! Go Owls. Hoot hoot. Or something. Never actually been to a game, not sure if they hoot as a rallying cry. Seems a little Texan at least.

2006-06-21T19:56:00.000-04:00

I know google was pushing their ads heavily, but I didn't think they would go as far as taking over Carter's account to blog an ad... :-)

Poor GT was eliminated from the College World Series. They were 45-0 during the regular season when leading in the 7th inning. They were 0-2 in the CWS when leading in the 7th. :-(

2006-06-20T22:33:00.000-04:00

*NEW AMSTERDAM: LIVE AT HEINEKEN MUSIC HALL: RELEASED TODAY!

Today's the day! *New Amsterdam: Live at Heineken Music Hall is released NATIONWIDE in the US today. Pick up your copy now. Here are a couple of great promotions in conjunction with its release:

- Best Buy releases a limited amount of CD's that include the bonus track of "Big Yellow Taxi"

- Barnes and Noble releases a limited amount of CD's that include the bonus track of "Blues Run the Game"

- iTunes is releasing an exclusive bonus track of "Black and Blue"

Buy *New Amsterdam: Live at Heineken Music Hall now!

2006-06-16T15:31:00.000-04:00

In French, the Netherlands is <> (at least I think that's how you spell it). "The low country". Sounds like everyone has their own name for it.

I like calling it the Netherlands. It makes it sound like a distant extoic semi-formed mass clouded in myst at the edge of the world. The nether land. I always have an infatuation with romantic notions like that.

2006-06-13T23:42:00.000-04:00

Oh! I totally wasn't counting Holland. My ninth one was Australia. But I guess it's ten now that I realize that Amsterdam is in Holland. That country always confuses me... is it Holland? Or the Netherlands? Or what?

2006-06-13T22:47:00.000-04:00

I have been to 10 (11 if you count airport visits): Ecuador, Germany, England, Mexico, Czech Republic, Italy, USA, France, Switzerland, and Spain. (The Amsterdam aiport for Holland would make 11.)

Chrissy has been to 9: Ecuador, England, Mexico, Italy, USA, Australia, France, Switzerland, Spain.

My sisters have us all beat by a couple with their round the world trip. Good poll, Carter!

I am cheering for Ecuador. I have an Ecuador soccer jersey I'm going to have to break out...

2006-06-13T14:39:00.000-04:00

10 -- US, Mexico, Argentina, England, Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, France, Spain.

Carter, have you forgotten your time down under entirely? The Socceroos will be upset with you...

2006-06-13T13:55:00.000-04:00

Carter, a few clues:

We arrive at an airport, and Sarah attempts to cash in all her change at an exchange booth, and they reply "We don't take small change" and Sarah says "Well what am I supposed to do with it?" and the change lady shrugs and says "Give it to the Red Cross!"

A very boring museum with stupid paintings made by some guy who cut off his ear (I think y'all had more fun than I did there).

A hidden annex behind a bookcase.

Being very excited about free refills and ice at a Hard Rock cafe.

Kent sitting inside a giant wooden shoe.

We get on a bus, and each of us pays our ticjet seperately and the bus driver says: "You know, we have a saying for that here." Carter says "Whhaaa?" Bus driver says: "Going Dutch."

That's your 9th country.

2006-06-12T21:40:00.000-04:00

Spain, Germany, Argentina, Italy, US, France, Switzerland, England... I might have miscounted, that seems like eight.

2006-06-12T18:16:00.000-04:00

I've been to 9 as well ... Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Spain, Switzerland, USA. All mine are in either Europe or North America, but hopefully I'll get to visit South America eventually. Meanwhile, go USA!

2006-06-12T15:38:00.000-04:00

I've been to 10 of them if you count the USA. If I took that long awaited tropical vacation, I could get Mexico and Costa Rica too.

(My list: Ecuador, Argentina, Germany, England, France, Holland, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, USA)

2006-06-12T15:24:00.000-04:00

There are 32 countries in the World Cup. I have been to 9 of them... probably most of you have me beat. Anyone think they have the most?

2006-06-08T08:44:00.000-04:00

I think the largest problem with creating competition between schools is that failing schools cannot just go out of business. Where would students go from the schools that fail? Private schools will not be able to accomodate all the students, for example, who are currently in failing schools. I am not extremely knowledgeable about how vouchers would work. What would happen if more people want to use vouchers to go to a school than that school can accomodate? Where do the extra students go? Who is going to want to start up a private school to compete with public schools in the inner city of NYC, LA, St Louis, or other cities with major problems? The voucher system would also rely on parents to choose the schools which their children go to. This could be problematic in situations where parents don't care or don't know enough about the schools. There would need to be some safety net to help children who are in bad family situations, because a system which relies on parents could fall victim to apathetic and uneducated parents. These are questions which I don't think advocates of vouchers have addressed well.

I think increasing accountability is necessary in public education. But I think there should be a focus on recruiting more well-educated teachers (who actually have degrees in what they are teaching) and recognition of the fact that even the best teacher cannot change every student they encounter. Teachers that encounter more low-achieving students and affect a small number are judged as failing by many current standards, where teachers that encounter a small number of such students and help them are viewed as being successful. There is just a lack of acknowledgment that some teachers have a more difficult job to reach every low-performing student. Perhaps providing lower teacher-student ratios in low-performing schools would help, as teachers could have one-on-one time. I don't believe we have tried hard enough to truly help the public schools, and thus I don't think it is the time yet to completely change how education in America works (which I think public vouchers do).

2006-06-04T11:58:00.000-04:00

Don't know if you saw this story, but Canada's National Post is reporting on the 17 men arrested in Toronto for planning a terrorist attack. A few interesting notes:

There have been reports in the AJC that this group may have had communication with the Georgia Tech student arrested on terrorist charges
From the article - "Linking the international probes are online communications, phone calls and in particular videotapes that authorities allege show some of the targets the young extremists considered blowing up." So it appears that the electronic surveilance was effective, and is happening in Canada too.
It is not widely reported, but that some of these suspects were originally tracked from their usage of a website promoting Islamic extremism. (It is hard to find references in most of the news story that those arrested were looking to do terrorism in the name of Islam.)

I just thought that was interesting. I don't have problem with the government being able to review my phone records to look for patterns that could identify terrorist activity. As long as there are strict controls to make sure this widespread search for info isn't used for basic domestic issues.

2006-06-03T17:42:00.000-04:00

Now I am all for more school competition, whether it be vouchers or school choice. Carter - do you really think my agenda for doing this is segregation? I believe the private school I attended was more diverse than the public school I would have attended. I think more competition between schools could be a major step towards bringing our high school education up to our #1 university status in the world.

Becca - I agree that not all experts agree about walls, but in certain urban areas I am quite sure that is the consensus. Why don't we hire Mexicans to help us build it to keep costs down? ;-) Also on the 20% of Mexicans moving to the US - according the S.F. Chronicle article 1 in 7 Mexicans "migrates" to the US. That's pretty close to 20%, and keep in mind that number would likely be higher if it was legal and easy to do.

I also don't think border security becomes a lot easier regardless of our policy towards legal immigration. We still have to watch the border for felons, terrorists, and "OTMs".

Becca - What do you think the solution is for Mexican corruption? It sounds like you think it is more foreign aid, but I think that only props up the current government. I think instead it is helping them on how to fight corruption. For instance, in the past 3 years, Guiliani went down there to talk about how he cleaned up NYC.

Here is a cartoon if Americans were illegally coming into Mexico. It's actually kind of funny - not that I agree with all of it.

Becca - I'm glad you agree with the healthcare idea I suggested. I agree it wouldn't solve everything, but it would be a huge step in the right direction. Also on "too many independent publishers" - meant there were too many to prevent a book from coming out. Not that there should be less. I think we're saying the same thing.

Do you really think instapundit is crap? I believe it is the number one read blog, and wins tons of "blog of the year" type awards. I think he is heavy on facts and links to other sources, and doesn't offer a lot of opinion so it would be hard to really hate it.

I agree that a raid on a Congress office should be very carefully monitored, and only in a case where there is already a great deal of just cause. Also if the issue is corruption I would be more supportive than going for some other types of crimes. I just believe that the raid was likely carefully approved before making a move.

Hope you all are doing well!

2006-05-30T10:21:00.000-04:00

On the building the wall for border security, I'm not sure all the experts are in agreement that its the best way to increase security one a dollar to dollar basis. I've seen articles that have quoted the cost of the wall at about $3 MILLION per MILE. But I'm open to arguments that its the best option. I'm just not convinced yet.

I don't think 20% of Mexico would try to come in right away. Hell, if that much of Mexico wanted to come in, we'd probably be better off annexing Mexico as the 51st state! You're right, though, James, there does need to be a limit. I don't know what that limit needs to be, but we're clearly not at it, even with the estimated millions of illegal immigrants living in the US already -- so, making those illegal immigrants legal (and tracking and registering them for our own security needs) as well as increasing the number of Mexicans allowed to immigrate legally will decrease the number of Mexicans scrambling over the border in remote areas. Then, security will be easier, because we would know the ones crossing outside of established points must have something to hide, must be security risks, otherwise, why wouldn't they be crossing legally?

You're right, Mexico does have a corruption problem. But ignoring it until it goes away doesn't stop the immediate problems of its citizens. We do have to be careful how foreign aid money gets spent by foreign governments. As long as we allow suffering at our doorstep, this "problem" of immigration will continue to plague us.

James, I think your revamp of the medical system isn't a bad idea compared to the current system. It solves a lot of problems, and if there wasn't so much poverty in this country, I think it would work (actually, its very similar to the insurance system in Switzerland, and it works there -- but there, everyone, from janitor to waitress to businessman is paid a living wage that they can support their family in comfort with!) However, with people here struggling to afford to feed and house their family, I feel that they would probably still not purchase the insurance because they couldn't afford it. We'd still have an "underclass" of poorly insured people (and even worse, poorly insured children).

I think you also misinterpretted me, I don't think there are "too many independent publishers." I actually think its great that the freedom of the press in this country allows anyone to print or say what they think. Its just hard for us to sort through all the crap. (and there are still some people out there that read the crap, like instapundit :) ).

Finally, on the FBI raid, I don't think either the Republicans or Democrats are saying that the congressman didn't do something illegal and the law enforcement agencies should be allowed to collect the necessary evidence. Also, I know there's not specific wording in the Constitution that prevents the Executive Branch from raiding Congressional offices (though the precedent of not doing so was set in 17th century England!) However, I think the argument is that greater care should be taken when this happens. Consider that Congressmen of both parties might have work documents in their offices for policies and legislation they are working on that is contrary to what the Executive branch wants. A raid would make these documents available to the Executive. If the raid was carefully monitored, maybe by a neutral party to both branches of government, to only take evidence of corruption and leaving work documents behind, it would have been far less offensive, I think.

I'll get to my definition of fiercely patriotic in a later post...

2006-05-29T22:08:00.000-04:00

I begin to wonder if an online forum useful in towards helping to clarify some points. I've always like active discussion, but there has to be some common starting point.

I'm not sure exactly what the questions are asking beyond what I've already answered, but in the effort of clarification --

Why are vouchers (for instance) an archaic idea? Because I believe the result of the agenda will not promote better education for everyone. The ideas will withdraw support from schools that I feel are clearly already underfunded and will support instead schools that are not required to provide equal opportunities for everyone. I think it's an agenda of segregation. That makes it archaic and of course radical, but not progressive. But we've gone over all that before.

2006-05-29T15:22:00.000-04:00

Thought I'd post one note about google. For a while I had heard a lot of complaining about google, from a privacy perspective. But lately they have done several things to annoy me - I mentioned the China censorship issue in the past. I believe they have also annoyed Scott Adams since a recent Dilbert was making fun of them.

One thing that annoys me today about Google (also the owner of blogger.com FYI) is that for Memorial Day today, there is no special google front page. They have a page last week for Arthur Conan Doyle's birthday, but nothing for a significant national US holiday. Ask.com and dogpile.com did have special pages.

I used to be a google enthusiast, and now I'd like to see them have a little more competition.

2006-05-29T10:04:00.000-04:00

Happy Memorial Day! Thank you to all our veterans - without you we would not enjoy the freedoms we do today. Both my grandfathers served in the pacific in WWII. My dad's father served in China, preparing for the eventual attack on mainland Japan, which was thankfully averted saving millions of lives. I hope everyone gets to enjoy today.

Carter my guess is that most everyone in your family, no matter how "liberal" they are would not be open minded to school choice / vouches / etc. Are you more or less politically liberal than your dad?

Also Carter, I don't believe school privatization would be "active segration". Why do you say those ideas is steeped in "archaic principles". What makes it archaic? What makes it radical? I thought you liked radical ideas...

Becca, I'm glad we are closer in agreement on border security. About building a wall - we can guess, but the experts who monitor the border say a wall is needed to protect our borders in urban areas where people cross freely. Sure people can go over/under/around, but it at least makes it easier to monitor. We can't just allow everyone to come in freely, or 20% of Mexico would probably try to come in right away. As we were discussing earlier - where do you draw the line?

I don't think increased foreign aid to Mexico will help Mexico either. We need massive reform of their incredibly corrupt government. In fact you could argue that the $20B a year from illegals plus our foreign aid is helping to prop up this corrupt government.

In terms of medical services, and reducing ER visits, my vote would be towards revamping the medical system. Make healthcare companies offer easy plans that anyone can purchase regardless of employment status. (The government should eliminate the tax break for companies providing health insurance, and do something to encourage insurance companies to offer policies to individuals rather than groups of employed people.) If it were as easy to go to a dentist as a doctor without insurance (or buy car insurance), that would solve a lot of the problem.

Becca - interesting about your family. How would you define if someone was fiercely patriotic? I also agree with you that there are too many independent publishers, plus now with web content it is virtually impossible to keep something from being published.

I personally don't see a crisis on separation of powers. I have many issues with president Bush, but the ones you listed aren't on my list. I think we have discussed those topics (feel free to pick one if you want to discuss) except the recent FBI raid. In case you didn't hear the story, a Democrat congressman was caught on video taking a $100,000 bribe from a FBI informant. They got a warrant and found $90K hidden in his freezer - literally cold hard cash. They got a search warrant for his congressional office as part of their investigation. I say - go FBI. Regardless of party, corrupt officials need to be removed harshly from their positions of power. Republicans were stupid to object to this, and if you read legal analysis (such as at instapundit.com) you will see the separation of powers does not apply to this situation. Members of congress are not above the law, despite their arrogance. I am tempted to believe that perhaps some of the Republicans speaking out against this, might have their own corruption they are afraid of the FBI finding... Go FBI - get them all!!!

2006-05-25T10:48:00.000-04:00

Enemy Combatant is due to be released in the U.S. in Sept, 2006, published by New Press. You can pre-order on amazon.com. Don't know why the separation in publishing dates, maybe it had trouble finding a U.S. publisher until the reviews were in from its European release (that's fairly common, it happened with the first Harry Potter book!)

2006-05-24T23:39:00.000-04:00

To restate -- what I said was "Why is this book not available in the US?" I did not post a theory on the answer. It was not meant to be a trick question nor a rhetorical one. I would honestly be interested in anyone finding out why this is not published here as it seems to me to be extremely relavent.

Also, to correct James' misquote -- Carter claims to be "open to new ideas". What I said was "Are you... asking me who... is the most "open to new ideas"?... I would hope I would be the most tolerant... but I do NOT think I win the prize".

Lastly, I strongly disagree with James' assement that conservatives are more willing to push new agenda. The root of those ideas are not new, but radical outside the mainstream ideas steeped in achaic principles. I love that he cites a regressive tax system and privatizing education to facilitate active segregation as pillars of tolerence and openmindedness.

2006-05-24T10:10:00.000-04:00

I'm going to *try* to keep this short because blogger totally ate my entry yesterday.

James, I think in some ways I'm more in agreement with you than with Carter on the issue of border security (surprise surprise!) I think we have every obligation to do what we need to do to prevent illegal immigrants from crossing into this country. I don't really feel like building a wall will do any good at all, though, it will just be another barrier (like deserts, or mountains) for illegals to risk their lives climbing over. Personally, I think that if we reduce the barriers to legal immigration it will be better all the way around -- I imagine most illegals would prefer to have legal status if there was a way for them to achieve it, and I think the security of the US would be improved if they had legal status because then we would be able to track immigrants in the US instead of having a hidden underclass.

I also think there's step two to the problem of reducing immigration to the US -- make the countries that immigrants are coming from better places to live! You bring up a good point, James, our ENTIRE foreign aid budget is less than the amount illegal immigrants sent home to Mexico. Don't you see this as a problem? Wouldn't helping other countries improve their internal quality of life help us in the long run in this area? I mean, giving up your life, your home, moving to a country where you don't speak the language to work menial labor at a sustinence income -- that's not desirable unless things are really bad in your home country!

Obviously, there has to be some limits on the number of immigrants, if 1 billion people showed up at our doorstep tomorrow, we obviously could not accomodate. But I don't think our resources are even coming close to being strapped right now, so we're not at that limit. I think we could even do things to improve our resource situation -- for instance, right now, people without health insurance are forced to rely on the emergency room for medical situations -- and emergency room visit is orders of magnitude more expensive than regular medical care. So maybe the state should shoulder some of the burden of regular medical care to take some of the stress off of the ER's!

Yes, James, there are many stories of immigration in my family, as I am only a few generations removed from immigrants on all sides of my family. On my mom's father's side, my immigrant ancestor was denied legal entry through Ellis island because of a medical defect, though his wife and child were allowed in (I believe his child was either my great-grandfather or a sibling of his). So, he immigrated to Canada, and then snuck across the border to Pennsylvania. On my father's side, my great-grandfather entered illegal, started a successful resteraunt in NY City, I believe catering mostly to other immigrants, and didn't gain legal status until marrying my great-grandmother, herself an immigrant that was smuggled into the country on a ship as a small child. Even when my great-grandparents were old, and I was just a child, I remember how they barely spoke English because I had a terrible time understanding them, but they managed to raise children who were successful and thrived. I don't know the stories of all my immigrant relatives, lost for different reasons. They were German, Polish, Italian, and Greek, and during the time they immigrated (early 1900s, pre-WWII) none of those ethnicities were popular or respected.

(BTW, on the censorship issue, I don't think the book is being censored directly by the administration. But I do feel the big publishing houses censor indirectly based on a number of factors. Luckily, we have a small, but thriving, independent publishing industry in this country that the author can turn to as an outlet.)

Another question for discussion: Do you think the President is creating a crisis in separation of powers? He's definitely using some over arching executive authority. He's been criticized for not briefing key Congresspeople on important security information, and circumventing the judicial system in searching and surveillance within the U.S. Today I read he got criticized by House Republicans for allowing an FBI raid of Congressional work documents.

2006-05-24T07:32:00.000-04:00

Lots of topics to respond to, so I'll have to be brief. But Carter, I do appreciate you responding to posts. Even if you think a topic is not worth debating, we can talk about why.

Carter - can you give an example of any single book that has been censored in the Bush presidency? What would make you think the book was being censored. I bet if we asked Steve how likely it was that the government could censor a book, he would say very unlikely. There are too many publishers out there, even if they wanted to.

On leaking classified information. Don't forget that the president has the authorization to declassify information. If Bush wants to make some information public, he can, whether that be for a speech to the US or the UN. So you're right - there are no consequences, because if he authorizes it there is no crime.

I find it amusing that in the same blog post that Carter claims to be "open to new ideas for progress, tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others, and broad-minded" that he also says the topics I bring up are so "offensive by their very consideration" that he does want to address them. I find that in the past decade, conservatives are more tolerant and open to ideas than liberals are. Most liberals don't want to talk about the FairTax, school choice, for example.

I think it is ridiculous to say that Mexican immigration is a non-issue. Here is a story from the San Francisco Chronicle (not a conservative media source), with a few key facts:

Ten percent of Mexicans now live in the United States.
Fifteen percent of the Mexican workforce lives in the U.S.
One in every 7 Mexican workers "migrates" to the U.S.
Mexicans make up 56% of what the Chronicle refers to as the "unauthorized U.S. migrant population." (That must be the politically correct way of saying "illegal aliens")
There are some Mexican communities that have almost no workers left. They've gone to the U.S.
Mexicans in the U.S. send about $20 billion a year back to their homes in Mexico. This amount exceeds Mexico's income from all oil exports and is much higher than Mexico's revenue from tourism.
The $20 billion that Mexicans send back home exceeds the entire foreign aid budget of the United States.
In five Mexican states the money sent home by those who have come to the United States exceeds total locally generated income.

With those facts, how can you say it is not an issue? The unspoken issue is that the Mexican government is horribly corrupt, and without that $20 billion a year the country would go under. Even though they are getting that money, think how damaging it is for their country when perhaps the most risk taking, entrepreneurs are leaving the country. 1 in 7 is huge, and has a big impact on their country. Instead of those people starting up a business in Mexico they are just leaving to go to the US. So that aspect is hurting Mexico's ability to become self sustaining.

Katie, I would ask you the same question as Becca - where do you draw the line? If 1 billion people living in poverty all requested to come to the US tomorrow, should we let them? Is that the solution to world poverty - have everyone move to the US and become citizens?

Lastly Carter - I was of course referring to politically liberal. If you were to ask me who is more conservative, my father or me, I wouldn't judge on who is more marked by moderation or caution. And for the record, my father is more conservative than me. I know that scares some of you... I don't see where in my post I used it as a swear word. I was just surprised at his being on the far left, and curious where you saw yourself.

2006-05-22T16:46:00.000-04:00

It is quite easy as we sit in our comfy houses with our college degrees to say "keep them out, they are going to overwhelm our schools, bankrupt our social services." But take a step across the border just 5 or 10 miles and live like that for awhile. You might feel different then. Of course we cannot let every single person in (criminals, etc) but I feel that we should not deny those people who truly want to come here, honest, hardworking folks who just happened to be born outside our borders. Of course I am biased because I worked in a border ministry and saw the hopelessness and poverty that is overwhelming to those who live within a few miles of the U.S. And I saw how hopeful they were that coming to America, getting a job, and becoming a citizen would improve their lives. It's hard for me to be persuaded to wall off Mexico and cut off immigration when I have seen that.

2006-05-21T22:14:00.000-04:00

I don't know why that book is not published here. I can only hope it is not being sensored, but given that many civil liberties are in jeopardy, I can only raise the question.

I'm fairly convinced that top secret data was cleared to be released to the media by the highest ranks including Rove, VP on up. I seriously doubt there will be any consequences or accountability... but, that is a recurring theme.

For why I do not respond to each item posted -- I think that we're so far apart on most topics that it seems difficult to address them all. Furthermore, some topics I find offensive by their very consideration. Of course we should not militarize our boarder nor should we build a wall. We have no reason to offend our closest neighbors. There are better ways to address issues of immigration. It's a difficult policy point -- one I don't think we need to solve immediately with so many other problems receiving so little attention. I intentionally changed the subject because it is drives me crazy that this topic gets media hype because of presidential doon buggy photo ops. There is no issue here. It's designed only to distract from other critical issues.

Of course there are many goons in Washington - both awkward and slow witted. And yes, the goons should be voted out. Hopefully sooner rather than later!

I don't know how to respond to your attempt at using "liberal" as if it's a swear word. Are you seriously asking me who in my family is the most "open to new ideas for progress, tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others, and broad-minded"? Gee, I would hope I would be the MOST tolerant and broad minded. Thanks for the compliment, but I do not think I win the prize... I am far too traditional in my views to be considered the most progessive.

2006-05-21T21:07:00.000-04:00

FYI - Derek and Cori Gilman (friends from Tech) had their first child, Kaley, on Friday. Melissa Dolgetta and Shane Owens (other friends from Tech) were married on Saturday night. Congrats to all of them.

Some quick notes - Carter, do you think the book is being censored? I can't believe that. I just believe no one has chosen to publish yet due to a perceived lack of interest, or maybe someone is working a deal to publish it now. Who knows? Not of interest to me.

The reason why we are not having a press conference about Karl Rove is because that is a fake rumor. The website issuing that claim offered a partial apology for the fake story.

Carter, tell me why do you think it is NOT a good idea to build a wall in city like areas where there is heavy population? They do it in other countries across the world...

To Carter's "just" rant. I think one of the reasons this blog is dying is because people don't respond to other thoughts, they just post their own new topics. Thus losing a lot of the benefit of a group blog... (Kudos to Becca, as she most always acknowledges and responds to points.)

That being said, I would like to see conservatives/Bush shown a message too, but it is for a different set of reasons. I think the immigration policy is not smart, there has been a bloating of the federal government. Domestically, Bush has not done a lot I have been pleased about other than the tax cuts. I disagree on most of the reasons you think Bush is bad. Do you really think Bush is a goon? (Out of curiosity, do you think you are more or less liberal than your Dad. I was surprised at how liberal and how Bush hating he was after reading his blog.)

To Becca - so if you were queen for a day, you would allow everyone to come in the country that wants to without restrictions? Say for instance that 250 million of the poorest people around the world all wanted to come, that you would allow them all to come at once? To me that would be a disaster. I disagree with you on the "drain on social services", and I am grateful that I am not required to pay the many numerous "dues to live in a free society" that you think we should be mandated.

I agree with you that we should allow more legal immigration. I would say expand the H1B visa programs. There are a lot of people waiting to get into the US.

Even if we greatly expanded legal immigration (I wouldn't want it to the extent you suggested) I would still want us to guard our borders. I would want to prevent criminals, terrorists, and anyone else we don't want from entering the country.

Becca, out of curiosity, tell me what you mean when you say you are "fiercely patriotic". I am also curious how you say you are the descendent of illegal immigrants. What's the story there?

2006-05-20T00:36:00.000-04:00

Can anyone explain to me why this book is not available in the US??? This seems like a best seller to me...