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| Friday, March 22, 2002 |
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Think he'll wipe out? 
The Meg Way
A journal is a journal is a journal
| | In respect to the blogologue between Tom and Dave... |
| | I think we're passing the point where the distinctions between types of journals is more taxonomic than anything else. |
VisiBob
To everything
| | The discipline of poetry is in overhearing yourself say difficult truths from which it is impossible to retreat. Poetry is a break for freedom. |
The short answer: yes
| | Tauzen-Dingell removes the quid pro nihilus regulations TA96 offered CLECs, and lets local incumbent monopolies act like rational local incumbent monopolies. Is this ideal? No. But it's better than making them act like local incumbent monopolies with no incentive to upgrade equipment. |
| | My follow-up question: What's going to get symetry back into the Net? I want to see a world where anybody can supply as well as demand equal sums of bandwidth. Is that asking to much? |
Floating up from Foggy Bottom
| | Wow, what an interesting idea he's put out there. Jeez - scares the hell out of me AND it makes sense. But no, I don't think that he is putting out feelers FOR the Bush Administration, but I do think he is putting out feelers FROM WITHIN the Bush Administration. |
| | Here's how I think it works. |
| | First, Friedman is connected, and he is respected. But he is also a real professional at understanding foreign policy and a brilliant writer who can articulate concepts and get them the attention they deserve. |
| | Second, I suspect that the people who spend their lives in foreign policy are very worried about an Administration that is paranoid about its own government, wrapped up in secrecy, owned by or owing to corporate/big business interests, and trying to avoid/correct all the mistakes of the previous Bush Administration. These professionals are worried that the Administration cannot see the big picture: That we cannot afford to make enemies any more in the Islamic world; that we have to make connections and earn their trust; and that Israel has lost the moral high ground in this conflict - lost it when Sharon went to the Mount - and cannot be trusted to act from of any motivation but short-sighted revenge and punishment. I think these professionals in the Administration have ideas, and good ones, but they cannot get a hearing because they aren't at the table. Ideas get proposed and diluted. I've worked on too many staffs, and that's just how it works. You have to write it ou, and then send it up the chain with a wish and a prayer. And if it hits a roadblock, it can become roadkill. |
| | Thomas Friedman, however, can propose in print. His proposal is not staffed, diluted or diverted. I doubt he's flacking, but I'll bet he is using sources from within the Administration. Not from the West Wing, but from the rank and file at State. OK, maybe Powell - who I sould see thinking outside the box like this and who has been so marginized by Bush that he is no longer at the table. |
| | And if Friedman thinks we need to be sitting down to read his piece (Pull Up a Chair), the Pentagon is flat on the floor. Troops in Israel working with the Palestinians is a nightmare of gargantuan proportions for the military. And possibly the best solution. |
| | I don't have a position on this, other than the suspicion that Friedman is floating something from somewhere. I'm not even sure if you're supposed to capitalize "administration." Still, I thought it was interesting enough to share. |
My oldest kid is just 1.5 years younger
| | I remember when I turned 34, I wrote a piece for The Sun that started this way: |
| | My body turns 34 today. I think of 34 as the age at which you discover that all the time you thought you were breaking your body in, you find you've only been breaking it down. |
| | Something like that. I quote from memory, which isn't as hot as it used to be. |
| | Whatever. Happy Birthday, dude. |
Every time we say Duh is gonna cost ya
| | Says here that Norwegian "content" companies are gonna charge for their goods. |
| | There is much hand-wringing about this. Frankly, I don't have a problem with it. If CNN wants to charge for video, fine. If they want to charge for everything they do, and hide it away from Google's bots —, so none of it is part of the Web and all of it is available only to paying customers, fine. Their loss. Screw 'em. |
| | It's amazing to me that after seven years so few media companies understand that the Net isn't a medium. It's a place. It's an ideal place, in fact, to make yourself and your goods interesting and valuable. It's a lot cheaper than advertising, and a lot more useful, too. |
| | But if you only see it as a pain in the ass, well, fine. Take your stuff down and hide it away. Whatever. Soon you'll lose the employees who'd rather operate in the marketplace than in your closed system. If you're a newspaper or a magazine, you'll lose writers who prefer to see their work, and their authority as a source, participating in the world. |
| | And eventually you'll lose customers too. After killing their local papers' Web sites, I expect Knight-Ridder will see a gradual decline in offline readership. There's a limit to how long readers will continue to support papers that care so little about their own authority — and, for that matter, their communities. |
Ouch
| | One minute I tune into the game, and Duke is up by 17. Then I tune back and they've lost by one point. The fist thing that came into my mind was "free throws." I was sure they missed at least one critical gimme in the clutch. And I was right. Jason Williams made a spectacular play to pull within one and get fouled at the same time. Then he blew the free throw that would have sent the game into OT. |
| | Ah well. There are some happy Hoosiers among us. Hope they go all the way. (Although I still think Maryland is the best team out there.) |
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