Disregard previous post

It appears that Obama did indeed deliver a thumpin'. As of 9:10 Central, CNN's reporting at least 60/40 splits in all 3 states voting today--76/24 in DC.

And the media is starting to notably not buy into Hillary's explanation of why none of this matters (8 consecutive states since Super Tuesday is a little hard to brush off) and point out the remaining challenges from here.

But never fear--these are Democrats. They can be counted on to shoot themselves in the foot at least once during a campaign.

Drinking the Kool-Aid?

The voters are doing their thing in the "Potomac Primary," and the media is full of Hillary lowering expectations and how this is Obama's chance to pull into the lead.

Meaning, of course, if he delivers anything less than a thumpin', it's going to be a "moral victory" for Hillary.

I'm afraid the media are being played by the Clinton spin machine... Again. But I'm willing to be proven wrong.

Update: smell the irony

Pam Spaulding has posted on the Washington mess, and points out something quite relevant.

Gee, Huck...

If you have the 2000 general election Tivo-ed, you can refresh your memory as to how that can happen. Can I assume you were supporting Al Gore then?

I didn't think so.

How can he be so shocked, shocked, that the Republican Party can be engaged in election shenanigans?

More blatant than ever

So the vote counting has stopped in Washington State, because with a lead of 242 votes (and 1500 ballots left to count), John McCain has it so locked up there's no point in counting the remaining ballots.

I'm no Huckabee fan, but he's right to be outraged. Anyone who cares about the state of American democracy should be outraged. (They should have been outraged most of the last several years, but that's another rant.)

It's a basic principle that all the ballots are counted. Particularly when the leader's lead is narrowing as the remaining ballots are counted. Simply saying we have enough to know how it's going to end--not good enough. If the difference is greater than the number of outstanding ballots (a 10,000 vote lead and 1,500 ballots left to count), that's one thing--even if all the ballots are for one candidate, it won't change the outcome. But this isn't that situation.

It's no surprise that the power brokers of a party are willing to steal an election. (The Democrats aren't immune in this regard, of course.) But usually they at least try to cover it up. Not unlike the brave man who finally confronted Joseph McCarthy:

"Have you no shame, sir? At the end of the day, have you no shame?"

The answer: Evidently not.

It's all in the terminology

Andrew Sullivan had a link to this Beliefnet article, which poses the question that maybe Romney lost because he was too Christian.

On reading the headline, I thought it was an interesting thesis. Was he too forgiving? Too humble? Too willing to turn the other cheek? Too focused on the Kingdom of Heaven rather than on temporal power?

But that's not what it's about.

Romney believed that to win the nomination he had to win over evangelical Christians. He figured the way to do that was to get all Jesusy. So he declared, "I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the Savior of mankind." In so doing, he showed a fatal misunderstanding of the attitude of evangelicals toward Mormonism.
. . .
"When he goes around and says Jesus Christ is my Lord and savior, he ticks off at least half the evangelicals,'' Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention said. "He's picking a fight he's going to lose."

You see, the problem was, he used the wrong words in talking about his magic invisible daddy in the sky, using the same words other people use, implying that his magic invisible daddy in the sky is the same one as theirs, which they totally disagree with because there's, like, a different book of stories!

He had the temerity to suggest that everyone who follows Jesus is a brother in the spirit. And he used a label that didn't respect GOP identity politics. That's what "too Christian" means--nothing to do with your beliefs or behavior, everything to do with what label you use for your magic invisible sky-daddy.

Election night thoughts, such as they are

Got an email from a friend asking what I thought, here's what I told him. This is current as of post time, subject to change as late results come in.

===
The delegate count is looking good. Everyone's made a big deal about MO being a bellwether, and it looks like he's going to fight her to a draw here (12-point gap earlier, currently at 3%). Exit polls show the Latino vote is breaking heavily for Hillary, which is going to be a problem in CA. But all in all it's about what people expected... Neither is going to land a knockout blow, he's actually beating expectations (and the margins for Obama are huge in the south) and doing well in delegates. (In fact, the delegate counts so far look like it's going to be almost a draw.)

She's going to keep arguing she's inevitable, but the numbers don't really support that. She's trumpeting her wins in OK & AR, that she really can win something midwestern/southernish... meanwhile, in the *real* south, Obama's kicking her butt.

Romney's gotta be hurting. Speculation at one blog [can't find the darn link now, drat] that Huckabee's going to get the call from McCain about a slot on the ticket... Usually that sort of thing carries a "...provided you drop out of the race now" contingency. In this case, it may be "...provided you stay in until the end and keep sucking votes away from Romney."

And the BBC seems vaguely amused by it all.

So all in all, not the blowout I'd hoped for, not the trashing I'd feared. Not a bad night. And MA's not a surprise, in spite of Her Inevitableness's bloviating. She's been ahead there for weeks--by 14 points a week ago. So there wasn't anything unexpected about it. Yes, a bigger bounce from the Ted-loving would have been nice. Oh well.

Leaping to (probably wrong) conclusions

CNN has already decided that there's going to be a jobless recovery, "again." You remember, just like that last jobless recovery? The one that turned out to add lots and lots of new jobs?

Yes, it did. It wasn't really jobless at all. The employment statistics are mostly estimated based on what's happening at large companies. Smaller companies and new companies tend not to get sampled sufficiently; that's why the early numbers are always subject to revision, sometimes as much as a year later. And the later revisions showed that the "jobless" recovery wasn't jobless at all; it's just that most of the new jobs were added by smaller businesses, those with 50 or fewer employees, so didn't show up in the early statisitcs; it wasn't until the numbers were revised with more complete information, much after the fact, that the truth became known. By which time, of course, it was (literally) last year's news, so was ignored by the media.

I see no reason to expect any current "jobless" recovery to be any different. I'm willing to be proven wrong, but in this case using the latest statistics is actually one of the weakest arguments.

Oh, by the way, welcome to post #200.

OK, even we Yanks aren't this out of touch...

Apparently many Brits have trouble telling where reality ends and fiction begins...

Britons are losing their grip on reality, according to a poll which shows nearly a quarter think Winston Churchill was a myth, while the majority reckon Sherlock Holmes was real.

The survey found that 47 per cent thought the 12th Century English King Richard the Lionheart was a myth.

And 23 per cent thought World War II prime minister Winston Churchill was made up.

Hmmmm..... I can't help wondering if there isn't a whiff of a setup in this, much like the poll about 10 years back showing more Gen-Xers believed in UFO's than believed that Social Security would be there when they were 65. (Moral of the story being, ask 2 widely-separated questions, make sure the wording on one is heavily slanted, and you can get whatever results you want.)

Still... Even assuming there's a modicum of truth in this. But what were the actual questions? That Richard the Lionheart existed? Or that he actually did all of the various things attributed to him? (After all, there was a Saxon warlord named Arthurius...but that hardly makes the grail-quest legends historically accurate.)

[h/t: Paddy, at Cliff Schecter's]

The scourge (and stupidity) that is postmodernism

Sometimes it's not just academic follies, sometimes it spills out into the real world. Seems there's a recent law review article posted that makes the argument:

• The government is required by the constitution to be neutral on matters of religion, and therefore to treat all "ways of knowing" as equal;
• Science (specifically evolution) focuses on natural causes, rejecting supernatural causes out of hand, without even considering them, and is therefore itself a belief system, a type of religion;
• Therefore for govt to endorse science, particularly evolution, is to forcibly indoctrinating students into the "religion" of secular humanism, and compelling them to undergo religious instruction;
• while instead the constitution clearly requires government to remain "neutral" and teach "alternative" theories, explicitly including supernatural ones.

Yes, the fundamentalists are adopting the language of postmodernism to "prove" that creationism should be taught in schools.

See, this is why us geeks make such a big deal about rigorous logic, clear definitions, etc. It can be shown (relatively easily) that if a logical system has a contradiction anywhere, it is possible to prove anything in that system, no matter how absurd. Of course, there are several problems with this argument, including weasel words, non sequiturs, and so on; it's not a solid argument. But why didn't the law journal catch that? Don't they review articles? Doesn't anyone notice such leaps of logic? I was under the impression lawyers were trained in such things... Perhaps I was misinformed.

Fortunately, in this particular case at least, there's a blistering point-by-point rebuttal... But the fact the original article ever got published in the first place is scary.

[h/t: Ed Brayton]

Out of control?

I suppose, in good blogosphere fashion, I should congratulate Greg Mankiw for saying what I did already. On the other hand, he has actual data to back him up, and so has some claim to actually know what he's talking about. So instead I'll just make the standard "Yeah, what he said!" post:

A rise in expected inflation is not consistent with the conventional wisdom that the economy is on the verge of a serious slump driven by inadequate aggregate demand. It is, however, consistent with the hypothesis that policymakers are overreacting to some bad economic news with excessive monetary and fiscal stimulus.

If the problem with the economy is that we're coming off an asset bubble caused by too much easy money (i.e., too low interest rates) for too long, lowering interest rates isn't going to fix it. We can have a mild recession now, or a much worse recession later, possibly combined with inflation. Yes, recessions are uncomfortable. Runaway inflation is worse. (Recessions make it difficult to accumulate more capital, due to sluggish economic activity; inflation takes away capital you've already accumulated, via erosion of purchasing power.) Of course, the inflation won't hit until after the election. Could that be it? Naw, I'm just being cynical.... not.

Memo to new president: do what you have to, to get the economy under control early in your term. If you have the recession early, the voters will forgive you by the time you're up for re-election.

[h/t: Andrew Sullivan]

Am I reading too much into this...?

The Times has an article about Kennedy's endorsement of Obama. This line jumped out at me:

Both the Clintons and their allies had pressed Mr. Kennedy for weeks to remain neutral...

And all I could think of was the passage from The Prince where Machiavelli explains that if two nearby states are in conflict, the one asking for your armed support is your friend, and the one asking for your neutrality is not.

For some reason, watching the Clintons lately has brought Machiavelli to mind quite often the last few weeks.

Tall and Nasty...

No, that's not the title of a bad porn movie... Just one person's summary of a Starbucks, which matches up with my views fairly well.

My drink was disgusting. A bland half-pint of milk with as much coffee flavour as if someone sipping an espresso had sneezed over my cup. A coffee for someone who hates coffee, but uses the bitter adult nectar as a cloak of sophistication for their babyish suckling on warm, creamy sweetness.

I was tricked into drinking one of those vile concoctions once. Never again. And don't call them coffee, please, when they're no more than coffee-flavored glop.

I'm in the wrong line of work

Notwithstanding my last post...

Okay, here's the setup. Suppose I run a company that works with the federal government... say, helping to administer a government program. Further suppose that I overbill shamelessly, to the point that the government's inspector-general finds that I got $34 million more than I should have.

What do you think should happen? Should I have to pay back the $34M?

No, silly, of course not!

I get to decide how much I should pay back. And if I can justify it on paper...

Keith New, a spokesman for the Pennsylvania agency, said it was “very pleased” with the department’s letter, and that it would continue to negotiate with the department over any repayment obligation.

“We could wind up with zero liability,” Mr. New said.

I'm not surprised he was "very pleased." I would be, too, if I could keep $34 million I wasn't supposed to have. Really, the depth of corruption and cronyism in this (mal)Administration continues to boggle.

Why Teach?

There's a meme going around, and though I wasn't specifically tagged, this being the blogosphere, I'll feel free to jump in anyway.

Why do you teach? Why is academic freedom crucial to that effort?

Several reasons why I do this.

1) It's important work. I'm preparing students to take their place not only in their careers, but as citizens. That means it's important to hold them to high standards, and to model the sort of behavior I want them to exhibit in society--reliability, honesty, integrity, etc.

2) Let's face it, it's fun. Yes, sometimes the 'performance' aspect gets a little scary--how do I get their attention? How do I keep it? How do I make this interesting? And the feedback--for better or worse--is pretty immediate.

3) It keeps me on my toes. Every semester there's something new to learn. I get a question no one ever asked before. A student asks something that forces me to go out and learn a little more. I find myself reading farther and farther afield, and saying "I can use that in class..." New technologies, new fads, new controversies. It's all good.

4) Because it's an interesting, exciting subject. Seriously. This stuff is just cool. And I get to explain how it works and help other people learn how to do cool stuff with it. How great is that?

And as for academic freedom.... One of the courses I teach is on the societal and ethical impact of computing. We discuss how tech is used and misused, and why it matters. Along the way I usually manage to get at least a few students, on both sides of the aisle, seriously offended. I try to point out inconvenient truths that annoy both sides, and make students who happen to agree with me defend their positions just as rigorously as those who don't. This means I sometimes say some politically extremely-incorrect things at the front of the classroom. Part of education is having one's preconceptions challenged. If I have to start watching what I say and not saying something that someone somewhere might find offensive, I have a much more difficult time being effective. [Do I go out of my way to be offensive for its own sake? No. Do I let it stop me from doing my job? Also no.]

Calling out the quackery

Background: The full story is over here, but suffice to say a quack by the name of Joseph Chickelue Obi got called out on his quackery on a blog... So he did what any called-out quack does. He demanded the ISP pull down the offending blog posts. Under UK law (much more plaintiff-friendly in libel suits), the ISP had little choice.

Because I happen to believe in the importance of calling out the quacks on their quackery, and discouraging the use of lawsuits to silence legitimate criticism, I'm reposting the offending articles in their entirety. And a fine job of calling out the quackery it is!

Articles from Le Canard Noir follow:

Right Royal College of Pompous Quackery - Dublin, Thursday, September 28, 2006

I had to share this with you. Following on from my recent Quack Word 'Doctor' blog, I came across the Royal College of Alternative Medicine (RCAM) , a Dublin based - well, I'm not sure quite what it is...

What caught my eye was just the shameless aggrandisement of the site. It is quite hilarious, if not a little repetitive at times. Calling yourself 'Doctor' is somewhat pompous when all you have done is paid for some international postage. However, the man behind RCAM has absolutely no shame and titles himself as the:

Distinguished Provost of RCAM (Royal College of Alternative Medicine) Professor Joseph Chikelue Obi FRCAM(Dublin) FRIPH(UK) FACAM(USA) MICR(UK)

Wow! Probably, just Joe to his mates. Naturally, when you Google the qualification FRCAM(Dublin), there is only person who appears to revel in this achievement. I'll leave the rest as an excercise for the reader.

The distinguished provost looks like he is just another pseudoscientific nutritionist, his spin being "Nutritional Immunomodulation". This is obviously a lot more clever than Patrick Holfords mere 'Optimum Nutrition', but having only one 'omnipill' is probably a poorer commercial decision that Patrick's vast range of supplements.

Obviously, Professor Obi has had a few problems with what probably amount to bewildering comments about his site as the legal threats and press releases concerning his 'ethical' responses to criticisms cover more space than anything else. 'Ethical' is a favourite word on the site.

The most recent press release states,

7th September 2006 : The Distinguished RCAM Provost, Professor Joseph Chikelue Obi FRCAM(Dublin) FRIPH(UK) FACAM(USA) MICR(UK) has formally accepted appointment as Chief Professorial Examiner for the Doctor of Science (DSc) programme in Evidence Based, Alternative Medicine (EBAM) of a highly respected International University in one of the British Commonwealth Protectorates.

This new qualification is primarily aimed at Medical Graduates, Physicians, Surgeons, Pharmacists, Dentists, Osteopaths, Chiropractors, Opticians, Wellness Consultants, Herbalists, Acupuncturists, Naturopaths , Healers, Podiatrists , Chiropodists , Scientists , Healers ,Therapists, Homeopaths, Chinese Medicine Practitioners and Nurses wishing to ethically upgrade their current Qualifications in Alternative Medicine over an exceedingly intensive 12 - 36 month period of study.

British Commonwealth Protectorates? Could that be Dublin?

I really have no idea what this organisation is all about. But it looks like it could be getting quite big soon...

RCAM currently has International Vacancies for One Million (1,000,000) 'Foundation Fellows' ('Movers and Shakers') ; who will independently play a highly pivotal role in diligently mentoring (and regulating) it's future Global Membership.

So if you really think that you seriously have what it takes to become a 'Leader' in Alternative Medicine , then (perhaps) RCAM may definitely be exactly what the Doctor ordered for you.

One million. That's a lot of quacks! And they are just to mentor (and regulate) the wider quack membership! This man has ambition.

The Big J really hates real doctors. This is his most recent press release...

RCAM would like to warmly commend the various Chieftans of the National Health Service of the United Kingdom for ethically and appropriately ignoring utterly misguided calls (from a rather amusing Group of thirteen Clinical Yestermen) to compel Hard-Working (and Tax-Paying) British Citizens to additionally pay for Life Enhancing Alternative Medicine Interventions out of their very own pockets - rather than get such treatments free via the NHS. RCAM would like to also categorically state that such exceedingly flawed 'G-13′ demands that the National Health Service of the United Kingdom expediently abandon Alternative Medicine altogether (in total favour of Conventional Medicine) be diplomatically treated with the very utmost contempt which such unguarded verbal flippance duly deserves ; as none of these 13 'Eminent UK Scientists' behind such calls has professionally attained Globally Acceptable Fellowship Qualifications in Alternative Medicine and as such cannot be deemed competent enough to make such sweeping 'Shilly-Shally' statements about the noble independent specialty of Alternative Medicine.

RCAM therefore publicly advises the General Public to lawfully go about their normal Wellness-Seeking Behaviour as usual - without any unwarranted prejudice or fear resulting from such highly self-serving, morally unethical , abjectly crude , totally unprofessional, utterly unstatesmanly, morbidly barbaric, wantonly uncivilized, profanely undemocratic and unspeakably sacrilegious perpetual affronts on the therapeutically formidable institution of Alternative Medicine.

Now, I do not have 'Globally Acceptable Fellowship Qualifications' in Santa Clause Studies to know he does not exist. But hey. I must be a morbidly barbaric and profanely undemocratic, unethical duck.

So, struggling around the acres of pomposity I find one place where Prof Joe might be making some money. You can call him to seek his wisdom, after pre-booking an hour's slot (and handing over your credit card) for a mere 300 Euros. Alternatively, you can pay by the minute on the contact line for a trifling $10 per minute.

Its going to cost you $20 just for Joe to say Hello and to read out his numerous titles, qualifications and names. Not bad 'ethical' work.

Ethical Quackery, the Monarchy and Kate Moss - Thursday, October 12, 2006

No, this is not about our Defender of Quackery, our Quack-in-Chief His Royal Quackiness, Prince Charles, but about the Distinguished Provost of the Royal College of Alternative Medicine, Professor Joseph Chikelue Obi. And yes, it is just a rather lame story written solely to get a picture of Kate on my blog.

I've written a rather lazy blog on the distinguished professor before that was just a bit of a gawp at his quacktastic website and what looks like a health phone-line scam.

Well, I've done a little more digging with Google and it has revealed a few quack gems. It has been pretty hard work, since Google returns some 6,000 pages, the vast majority just appears to be Prof Obi's self-promotion. However, if you persist in digging a few interesting facts turn up.

So, what has the little black duck found out about the "most Controversial Retired Physician and 'A-List' Medical Celebrity, Dr Joseph Chikelue Obi"?

Here we go...

1. The Irish Independent reports that his college does not exist at the Dublin address given on the web site. There's a surprise! It's just a front.

2. The Independent goes on. "In January 2003, he was suspended by for serious professional misconduct at South Tyneside District Hospital. Among the allegations made were that he failed to attend to patients, wrote strange notes about colleagues and at one point gave a dating agency phone number to a psychiatric patient."

3. He was being investigated by the police for taking thousands of pounds of a 58 year old woman to in order to cure a long standing illness.

4. The GMC strike Dr Obi off their register for "serious professional misconduct". So much for him being retired.

5. On another tack, Dr Obi has been involved in a little cyber-squatting. This looks as if it took place while he was a doctor - always after a few quid!

6. Since then, now self-titled Prof Obi, a few new avenues have been opened, including trying to entice Kate Moss away to one of his 'safe-houses' in Ireland. Hat's off!

He is quoted as saying:

Under the European Convention on Human Rights, Miss Moss still has fundamental rights, just like anyone else out there, and as far as I am concerned, she is not guilty of anything until an Ethical Jury says so.

(I mentioned before that 'ethical' was one of his favourite words.)

7. Prof Obi has been developing a Penis Enlarger (watch out Kate) that his own Royal College has now endorsed.

8. At least one person (out of the targeted million) has paid Prof Obi the fees for his college to accredit them. Dr Michael Keet (8 Canards) of the Central London College of Reflexology handed over 'hundreds'. Do we feel sorry for out-quacked quacks? I guess we ought to.

9. For those of you wanting to see behind the grand titles and see the real human being, Joseph lists his interests as Comedy in London, Whole Food Nutrition and Christian Music. On this 'Meetup' site, he describes himself as "Just a very ordinary guy . . .". That's nice.

10. His name appears very often on the blog Abolish The General Medical Council (GMC), often reporting something he has got up to. The blog describes itself as:

An ethical blog for those who publicly feel that the General Medical Council (GMC) should be Statutorily Abolished in favour of a Medical Licensing Commission (MLC) to solely register and revalidate Doctors who practise Conventional Medicine in the UK. The Blog also recommends that the GMC/MLC hands all disciplinary functions over to an Independent Clinical Tribunal (ICT) in keeping with the EU Convention on Human Rights ; to avoid (both) Institutional Bias and Multiple Jeopardy.

Oooh. There is that word 'ethical' again. And 'European Human Rights'. No name is given for the blog author but the avatar is a portrait of the queen. Another apparent obsession of Prof Obi - royalty. Could the author be none other than the Professor himself, a little agrieved for his ticking off? I hope you all click through to the blog. Maybe we will show up in his stats and whoever the writer is can get in contact and confirm one way or another.

I rather hope it is, as the final thing I turned up would just be fantastic...

11. Is the Distinguished Provost of the Royal College of Alternative Medicine, Professor Obi now selling ethical ring-tones? I do hope so.

Watch out Crazy Frog! Here comes the Crazy Provost...

Ouch!

Gotta watch that oversight, there...

PARIS (AP) -- French bank Societe Generale said Thursday it has uncovered a $7.14 billion fraud - one of history's biggest - by a single futures trader who fooled investors and overstepped his authority.

As usual with this sort of thing, it was done (as it only could have been) by someone on the inside.

It said a trader at the futures desk had misled investors in 2007 and 2008 through a "scheme of elaborate fictitious transactions."

The trader, who was not named, used his knowledge of the group's security systems to conceal his fraudulent positions, a statement from the bank said.

Any system can be subverted. And subversion usually does not happen because of weak algorithms (although that's only because most professional systems use peer-reviewed algorithms and protocols).

The problem, of course, and it's not a trivial problem at all, is making a set of procedures and checks that can't be gamed or subverted, but are still usable. (Who watches the watchers, etc.)

Wrong Action, Wrong Time

So the government is ready to step in, after already cutting interest rates in the biggest drop in 20 years.

Because, you see, the problem was caused by too much easy credit and free spending, so we're going to fix it by easing credit and giving people money to spend. We'll borrow the money from foreign governments--it's okay, they've got lots.

We can go through a relatively mild recession now, or a much worse one later. The housing bubble cushioned us from the effects of the dotcom crash. Now they're looking for something to cushion us from the housing crash.

I'd rather get it over with, take our medicine now, and get back on track. Trying to put it off only makes it worse.

More liars for Jesus

Autumn Sandeen has a story up at Pam's about the latest stunt from the Anything-For-Jeeezus brigade.

The problem with cheap publicity stunts is that it's too easy to reveal them as cheap publicity stunts. Not that the TV station that got duped will admit it, of course.

Buried in cables

I currently have yet another workstation set up, this one putting together the disk image for the programming contest in April. My office is beginning to resemble an electronics workshop. Which wouldn't be a bad thing, I guess, if I'd had (or taken) the time to get the end-of-semester piles cleared out from last time.

I can still find my chair, and have a clear space big enough to write on. I guess that's something.

What a week.

We've seen the Clinton slime machine kick into full gear.

Huckabee has come right out and said we should bring the Constitution into line with his view of the Bible.

Wall Street continues to implode. The CEO's who brought it about are enjoying their $100M bonuses. Republicans think the solution is to cut corporate taxes.

So not much new happening in politics.

Here at Chez Geek, we've had some network emergencies and a new router. We also had a brain-cramp moment and deleted some data that we really shouldn't have. We recovered most of it and had backups of some of the rest. We also started referring to ourself in the plural, and we think we like it.