White House Reveals Obama Is Bipolar, Has Entered Depressive Phase
August 19, 2009
The Favrapalooza continues
Jim Souhan looks at the circus that has taken over the Vikings’ preparation for Friday night’s preseason game:
If you can get past the nagging facts in this story of a 40-year-old, self-absorbed, surgically repaired, still-injured, flipflopping quarterback who shunned training camp and manipulated his way onto the roster of the rival of the team that made him a record-breaking legend, you must come to this realization:
Brett Favre signing with the Minnesota Vikings ranks among most stunning stories in the history of sport.
If you can get past Favre signing a deal worth a potential $25 million and showing up for his introductory news conference looking like the Unabomber, if you can withhold all of the “You might be a redneck…” jokes after seeing him in his cargo shorts, gray stubble and sweat-stained golf cap, you must recognize the uniqueness of this event.
The most iconic quarterback of his generation, a player who mastered the most important and scrutinized position in sports while revitalizing the quaintest franchise in football, in two years maneuvered his way from the team that not too long ago regarded him as a deity to the team that not too long ago regarded him as Diablo.
While I don’t think the story is quite as big as Souhan does, I can’t disagree with this summary:
If Favre fails, the Vikings can’t be faulted for investing money, time and patience in the one position they had failed to upgrade since Childress’ arrival. If Favre succeeds, the Vikings will become the No. 1 story in the No. 1 sport in America. They will sell countless jerseys and tickets, and perhaps even raise the profile of their stadium pursuit in the Legislature.
I’m willing to see Favre succeed in his quest, if only because it would also mean the Vikings will succeed as well. I still mentally picture him wearing the wrong uniform, though.
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August 18, 2009
On the plus side, at least the “coming out of retirement” stories are over ’til 2010
Well, it’s apparently official:
I wouldn’t call myself a Favre-hater, but I didn’t want to see him wearing the purple. Now that this is no longer a question, I’ll have to re-arrange my thoughts . . . I hope that this season does work out the way Coach Childress and the owners hope it will (that is, with a Superbowl win in 2010).
Update: Sage Rosenfels and Tarvaris Jackson try to avoid saying anything newsworthy to the media. Hard to blame them . . . they’ve each just had their best chance for professional success kicked out from underneath them. I’m sure each is thinking “it’s only a one-year deal . . .”
Of course, there’s the other aspect: most NFL teams only carry three quarterbacks into the regular season — who’ll be the odd man out? Rosenfels played well in the pre-season opener, and was brought in for a 4th round draft choice. Jackson was a 2nd round pick, but still hasn’t shown that he’s able to be consistent. Booty is still the total unknown. Who will be given their walking papers?
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The economic value of high speed passenger trains
Another article pointing out the economic issues with the current US administration’s sudden love for high speed rail:
In April, President Barack Obama claimed “my high speed rail proposal will lead to innovations in the way we travel” and new rail lines “will generate many thousands of construction jobs over several years, as well as permanent jobs for rail employees and increased economic activity in the destinations these trains serve.”
Even House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.), who voted against the stimulus bill, now wildly praises rail’s job-creation potential, writing, “It is estimated that creating a high-speed railway through Virginia will generate as many as 185,500 jobs, as much as $21.2 billion in economic development, and pull nearly 6.5 million cars off the road annually. Providing a high-speed rail service from Washington, D.C. to Richmond will drive economic development throughout our region for many years to come.”
High speed railways (HSR) work well in certain conditions: in areas of high passenger density over medium-length journeys. HSRs can’t replace regular passenger trains running on joint freight-passenger rail lines because the HSR trains require more expensive dedicated lines with different signalling and control systems. Running an HSR train on unimproved track would merely give you a slightly faster passenger train: it would not allow the much higher running speed required to allow the HSR to show its capabilities.
The need for dedicated lines in high population areas means that no private railway could afford to buy the necessary right of way and additional land for associated station, maintenance, and storage facilities. Inhabited, densely developed land is expensive: governments need to get involved by using their powers of eminent domain to condemn and requisition land from private owners.
The proposed HSR line from Washington to Richmond might be economically feasible, setting aside the costs to the individuals and companies whose property will be taken to build the new line, but it will be politically difficult because the people whose property will be at risk will be highly motivated to oppose the development in any way they can.
Passenger rail currently carries a very small portion of city-to-city travel — the market targeted by high-speed rail — and it’s likely to remain modest well into the future. In 2008, Amtrak carried 28.7 million passengers. By comparison, there were 687 million airline passengers in 2008, in part because air service provides frequent high-speed travel to geographically distant cities. Then there’s our well-developed highway network that makes automobiles very competitive with rail for distances under 200 miles. In most cases, once travel and wait times to train stations are factored in, travelers will spend as much time in route on the train as they will in a car.
That last point is why the “high speed” part of HSR is critical . . . if you’re going to use the train for part of your journey, you need that portion of the trip to be appreciably faster than the other options, or you won’t make the extra effort to use the service. For example, commuting into Toronto using the (non high-speed) GO train service saves me an average of 5-10 minutes per trip, but if I miss the train, I’ll be an hour later getting there. Driving in is more flexible, time-wise, but a bad traffic jam or construction en route can make an already long commute that much more frustrating . . . and I can’t read while driving. It’s a bit of a wash, from my point of view. The costs are slightly in favour of taking the train, counting parking and gas costs (but the GO train fare is subsidized by the provincial government, so I’m only paying half the actual cost of my ticket: everyone else in Ontario pays the other half).
This is very much an unwelcome technical discovery
DNA evidence can be created to match a known profile:
Scientists in Israel have demonstrated that it is possible to fabricate DNA evidence, undermining the credibility of what has been considered the gold standard of proof in criminal cases.
The scientists fabricated blood and saliva samples containing DNA from a person other than the donor of the blood and saliva. They also showed that if they had access to a DNA profile in a database, they could construct a sample of DNA to match that profile without obtaining any tissue from that person.
“You can just engineer a crime scene,” said Dan Frumkin, lead author of the paper, which has been published online by the journal Forensic Science International: Genetics. “Any biology undergraduate could perform this.”
H/T to Radley Balko.
August 17, 2009
I hope he’s right
Publius has some interesting insights into the evolution of the Canadian economy from highly dependent on regional conditions (that is, largely tied to US markets) to a more independent one:
What the FTA and NAFTA did was to help fundamentally restructure the Canadian economy over the last two decades. While economic nationalists warned of increased dependency on the American juggernaut, the exact opposite has happened. NAFTA in particular allowed Canada to follow the laws of comparative advantage, shifting our economy away from manufacturing toward services. Nations have historically traded with countries nearest to them due to obvious transaction costs. When the wealth of nations is increasingly intellectual (which includes figuring out how to extract natural resources), those transactional costs become nearly irrelevant. A service economy is one less dependent on trading with nearby partners, instead it can reach out to the world. Buoyed by Canada’s traditional strength in natural resources — fur, fish, timber, wheat and now oil — we have become to a surprising extent decoupled from the American economy. Even in bulk products like oil and minerals, our clients are increasingly global. There is a massive glut of cheap shipping — refer to the Baltic Dry Index — to take our natural bounty where ever customers beckon.
We weathered the 2001 American recession easily, and we are weathering this one rather well. Harper knows this. He knows Barack Obama is shackling and regulating the American economy into near term stagnation. In the past this would have proven disastrous for Canada, today it will be an advantage. For decades Britain and the City of London have proven a relative free market haven to international businesses seeking to invest in Europe. There is no reason Canada cannot, and will not, play that same role in North America. In a year or so Canada may very well be leading other OECD countries in economic growth, all while the American giant is stuck in a slow motion recovery. The Prime Minister’s moderately statist approach will seem to many voters as a work of pragmatic genius. Not too much intervention, not too little. Just right. Harper the Helmsman. More image than reality. Such is the game of politics.
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Like a zombie, the Favre story just won’t die
I’m on record as hoping that Brett Favre stays retired. I’ve been saying it for a long time now, so stories like this just depress me:
Thus, here we go (again). Jay Glazer of the Fox Sports website speculates, predicts, forecasts in his Glaze Across America reports that Brett Favre will be joining the Vikings in the next few weeks, or at least attempt to join the team in that time frame. (That cup of coffee that just got spit out belonged to Sage Rosenfels. Tarvaris Jackson simply rolled his eyes.)
No, this isn’t a joke, although Glazer is basing his information on a feeling he had after having conversations with those involved with the Vikings during his stop in Mankato a few weeks back.
Here’s what Glazer wrote: “Granted, my camp stop occurred before Sage Rosenfels lit up the Colts in the preseason opener to the tune of 10-of-13 passing for 91 yards. And if Rosenfels can continue like this, he could squash this prediction as the preseason continues.
“But until I see it more consistently, I’m absolutely convinced. Why? For starters, because everyone else on the Vikings seems to be convinced of the same thing. I mean damn near everybody! During my two days in Mankato, nearly everyone I talked to within the team talked about Favre joining not as an ‘if’ but rather a ‘when.’
For what I hope is the last time: NO! Stay retired, Brett!
Oh, and no disrespect at all to Sage Rosenfels, but you can’t say he “lit up the Colts”, when he was playing against the second-or-third-string backfield. Neither starting corner was in the game, so you’d expect the Colts to give up more than the usual yardage to the passing game. It would have been much more upsetting if the Vikings hadn’t “lit up” the Colts’ defence under those conditions.
Update, 18 August: Oh, no, no, no, no, no:
Judd just received a text from a very good source with confirmation that Brett Favre will sign with the Vikings today and possibly could practice this afternoon.
Favre is expected to land in the Twin Cities anytime now.
Yahoo.com’s Jason Cole is reporting that Favre will receive a one-year contact worth $12 million. Here is his report.
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Reducing the NFL pre-season
Mark Craig thinks the NFL preseason is too long (and it’s hard not to agree):
Let’s hope the commish steps up his goal of reducing the number of preseason games soon. VERY soon.
There’s never been another sport that’s so good in the regular season, great in the postseason and so completely awful and unwatchable in the preseason.
It’s bad for business, insulting to fans who have to buy full-price tickets to this garbage as part of season-ticket deals and pretty much useless for judging what’s going to happen next month.
For example, the Lions beat Atlanta 27-26 Saturday night. Way to go Lions. Way to start the Jim Schwartz Era. Restore the Roar, baby!
Oh, wait. The Lions were 4-0 in the preseason last year. That makes their preseason winning streak five and keeps their regular season losing streak at 17.
And that doesn’t cover the risks to starting players, as there always seems to be higher risk of injury during preseason games than regular season ones (this is not something I’ve seen stats on, and may just be a mistaken impression based on news coverage).
There’s much to be said about coaches needing a chance to see what players can do in game situations — there are some who look like superstars in practice but who can’t rise up to average in real games, and others who excel in games, but don’t look like much in practice. Talent is only part of what makes a good football player, and without some opportunity to play against real opposition, you really don’t know which category any given rookie player may be in.
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Al Stewart at Hugh’s Room
This was an unusually musical weekend for me, as I’d heard “The Jailer’s Daughter” on Saturday, and I got to see Al Stewart and Dave Nachmanoff at Hugh’s Room in Toronto yesterday.
It was my first visit to this particular venue, and (as always seems to happen) it took me longer to find it than I’d hoped. I actually passed it twice before noticing it — construction and road closures again figured in the disruption — and found parking a block or so away. The show was scheduled to start at 8:30, so I thought getting there by 6:30 would be more than enough time to get a good seat.
I got the very last table . . . and that only because there’d been a last-minute cancellation. The table was right at the back of the room, so my photography plans were already gang aft agley.
The food was very tasty, the wine list was okay (I ended up with a Chateau des Charmes Gamay Noir), but I’m not as comfortable eating at a tall table: my toes barely touched the ground while sitting on the barstool.
Photography was a bit fraught, as I was too far back from the stage to use my fastest lens or, for that matter, my slowest lens without adding in a 2x teleconverter. In the lighting conditions, using a 80-200mm zoom and the teleconverter, I was surprised any of the shots turned out, frankly (using a flash would only have illuminated a few dozen backs-of-heads, not the stage). I got lots and lots of not-quite-in-focus shots, and lots of nice-composition-ruined-by-camera-shake (hand-held shooting at 1/15s is very much not best practice for photography). By the end of the night, I was so happy to put the camera down . . . even with a light-body SLR, hanging a long lens and extender off the front makes for an awkward and heavy object.
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QotD: The perils of being a retail customer
Of course, it’s entirely possible I was simply bored. Numbingly bored after meetings with financial planners over the preceding two days and being forced to repeatedly use the, impossibly awkward to enunciate, word arithmetic to correct suggestions from across the table that mathematics was in some way directly relevant to my cash flow model questions which arise when considering any investment model strategy. Then again, maybe I just wanted to be recklessly adolescent in that rather staid, middle aged, considered manner one does when one throws their Infinity VISA card at the clerk who a moment ago was convinced you were invisible and who then has to dispel his anxiety over whether or not you are going to hit him up for spare change or a smoke, maybe with an offer to squeegee his cash register monitor or, in exchange for a 10% discount, offer to blow him over there behind the flat panel 1080p display.
Such moments, me the cash — them the goods, remind me why I hate being a consumer. “Hey, Buddy! It’s money. My money. Take it. Take it!” You’d think, by now, Sony would know that the only reasonable outcome to expect from hanging a crisp white shirt and Windsor knot tied tie on a monkey is only slightly better than, well, a perhaps well dressed monkey dressed well. “Buddy! Wake up. Can’t you stop grinding that organ for one second?” But, even dressed up, it’s just a monkey which can’t seem to speak intelligently to confirm information and facts I’ve already fully digested from online product reviews and support documents. “Can’t we skip a beat to do things a little different this time? How about you agree to take your hand off your organ long enough to take my money. That’s it, Buddy. A little closer, now. Sorry?” What’s my monkey up to now? “Of course I don’t want to buy an extended monkey warranty. Do I look totally bananas to you?” I’m more certain than ever before the monkeys were different when I was young. “Hey! Don’t lick my credit card. Stop that.” Stupid monkey. “And I expect you to wash it before handing it back to me.”
Dark Water Muse, “The Stupid Monkey (or ‘Why it sucks to be a consumer’)”, Dark Water Musings, 2009-08-09
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eBay now hosting “Sleep with Marilyn Monroe” auction
That is, they’re running an auction for the burial plot immediately above the one occupied by the mortal remains of Marilyn Monroe:
When it comes to sleeping with a bona fide Hollywood sex symbol, death need not necessarily be an impediment. Thanks to Los Angeles widow Elsie Poncher, who is auctioning off a burial plot atop that occupied by Marilyn Monroe, it may even count as an advantage.
Poncher’s advertisment on eBay offers prospective corpses the chance to “spend eternity directly above Marilyn Monroe”. Bidding opened last week at $500,000 (£300,000) and has already topped $4.5m, with more than seven days left to run.
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August 16, 2009
A visit with The Jailer’s Daughter
The trek to Stratford (or, as some of the locals call it, St. Ratford) took much longer than usual. Between the heavy summer traffic, road closures, and accidents en route, we were well over 3 hours in transit. It was essential that we got there, however, as we were bringing most of the protein for dinner (steak and chicken for 12).
The Jailer’s Daughter (Facebook page) is a new band with Brendan McKenna, Chris Huggins, and Calder McKenna. This was only their third performance, so the play list was necessarily short.
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August 15, 2009
The high cost of coping with Celiac Disease
An article in the New York Times discusses something near and not-particularly-dear to our hearts — Celiac Disease:
Seven years after receiving his diagnosis, Mr. Oram, who is married and has one daughter, is symptom-free, but the cost of staying that way is high. That’s because the treatment for celiac does not come in the form of a pill that will be reimbursed or subsidized by an insurer. The treatment is to avoid eating products containing gluten. And gluten-free versions of products like bread, pizza and crackers are nearly three times as expensive as regular products, according to a study conducted by the Celiac Disease Center at Columbia University.
Unfortunately for celiac patients, the extra cost of a special diet is not reimbursed by health care plans. Nor do most policies pay for trips to a dietitian to receive nutritional guidance.
In Britain, by contrast, patients found to have celiac disease are prescribed gluten-free products. In Italy, sufferers are given a stipend to spend on gluten-free food.
Some doctors blame drug makers, in part, for the lack of awareness and the lack of support. “The drug makers have not been interested in celiac because, until very recently, there have been no medications to treat it,” said Dr. Peter Green, director of the Celiac Disease Center at Columbia University. “And since drug makers are responsible for so much of the education that doctors receive, the medical community is largely unaware of the disease.”
Elizabeth has suffered from gluten intolerance for most of her life, so we’re very aware of the difficulty (and added cost) of finding food that doesn’t contain wheat gluten. Wheat is a very cheap way of adding bulk and body to foods that traditionally do not contain it . . . it’s distressing the number of times we’ve discovered that a packaged food that used to be gluten-free has been “improved” . . . and the extent of the improvement has been to add wheat in place of more expensive non-gluten ingredients.
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