How can so many people miss the point?

There’s been a lot of buzz today about Bill Bennett’s Freakanomics quote / comment regarding raising the abortion rate among african americans to reduce the crime rate (for the record, he calls this “morally reprehensible”). Everyone (both right and left) are focusing on whether or not he was advocating african american abortions as a crime prevention tool.

To me, the real point is that he assumes (himself, not Freakanomics, not anyone else) that “poor equals black”. I just read a transcript of Mr Bennett’s radio show, where the statement was made, and he is the one that jumps from “poor person” to “black person”. Just how is this not a racist comment? Again, for the record, Steven Levitt, one of the authors of Freakanomics, says in his blog, that once economic factors are levelled, there is virtually no difference in crime rates between white people and black people.

Maybe I’m missing the point.

But, I don’t think so …

 

9/30/2005 2:20:28 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  politics

Boo (not a Haloween post)

For those interested in dynamic languages, or maybe just .NET programming languages, Scott Hanselman’s talking about Boo, a Python-like .NET language. I’m wondering if there’s some traction there…

 

9/30/2005 11:48:03 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  development

I Saw Commander In Chief

I watched Commander in Chief a couple of days ago, and (since I’m reading a review via Instapundit) I figured it was time to post my two cents.

First of all, I think that making the protagonist an independent is incredibly stupid. The premise is that the President selected Macenzie Allen, and independent (sheesh), to shore up his position with women. This completely ignores the fact that there are tons of female politicians actually in the Republican party. Contrary to what the great unwashed of Hollywood might think, the party must approve his selection of a Vice Presidential nominee. And there’s no way that a real independent is going to get the nod from either party. They could fix this in future scripts. It could turn out that she’s really an “independent” Republican rather than an Independent (as in no party affiliation). Frankly, I think it makes a much better story, because then the President has to balance party needs against her own values rather than just thumbing her nose at everybody.

That being said, there really hasn’t been any “screaming Liberalism” in the show (so far). And Geena Davis has been very “Presidential” in her demeanor in the first episode. Much more so than (groan) Jimmy Smitts on the West Wing (but that’s a different rant). Also the concentration on how Mac’s presidency affects her family brings something new to the screen, especially how her husband is dealing with being the (I don’t know what? First Gentleman? First Husband? What do you call the guy? Unneeded appendage?) husband of the President in a role previously held by women in a very traditional role.

All in all, the show definitely deserves another look. It’s not as good as the West Wing was at its prime, but its a heck of a lot better than the show is today (and Alan Alda should be elected over that lightweight, Jimmy Smitts!).

9/30/2005 8:34:39 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  TV

History Lesson

Yesterday, Michael Barone posted some comments regarding the shuttle program on his blog. He talks about how the shuttle technology is basically ‘70s technology stretched out to the 21st century, and how Gregg Easterbook wrote about this in 1980.

All I have to say is “bravo”. I’m old enough to remember the inception of the shuttle program (heck, I remember the first moonwalk). Even back then, the whole tile thing was considered faulty, but the US was tight on money and we went ahead and did it anyway. The cover blurb for the Washington Monthly issue that included Easterbook’s article exclaims “Beam Us Out of This Deathtrap, Scotty!”.  No one should be surprised about the problems we’ve been having with the shuttle lately. The surprise should be that we haven’t had more trouble over the years. If you listen to the NASA apologists the right way, what’s obvious is that the reason we didn’t see more problems before was that we were ignoring the existing problems (they say that the reason that we “see” more problems now is that we’re looking harder for problems  ).

Inexpensive space flight (relatively speaking) is a laudable goal, but this shouldn’t mean “cheap”.

9/29/2005 11:25:51 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  politics

Civics PS

Now that I’ve finished reading the article, it brings up an interesting point:

The government's position is strongly supported by the former high officials and ex-diplomats, among others. Their attorneys bluntly declared in a brief: "When treaties are at issue, the states disappear and the President and Senate act, in the words of the Supremacy Clause, with the sole 'Authority of the United States.'"

This would imply that, via the Supremacy Clause, the Federal government has the power to “negotiate away” any of our guaranteed rights. Sounds pretty un-American to me…

9/29/2005 9:20:49 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  politics | world affairs

A Civics conundrum

An article on SCOTUSBLOG raised an interesting question in my mind, probably core to the issue they’re talking about:

According to the Constitution, the Federal government, through the Executive branch, has the sole power to negotiate treaties. However, the power of the Federal government is limited, and there’s a whole slew of powers that are left to the states and to the people.

What happens if the Federal government signs a treaty that agrees to something for which they have no power to enforce? Who wins?

The short answer, I guess, is this is why we have a Supreme Court. The long (and decisive) answer, I expect, will be forthcoming from them when they hear the case.

As an aside, its official: John Roberts is the new Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Hooray!

9/29/2005 9:13:12 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  politics | world affairs

Welcome Back!
Welcome back, Desperate Housewives and Grey’s Anatomy! Lately, I’ve only been writing about the new shows on TV (at least as far as TV-themed postings go), but both of these shows were fabulous last night, better than anything new that’s been premiered so far. Who says that there’s nothing “good” on TV?
9/26/2005 8:42:04 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  TV

Another one bites the dust

Fox has already cancelled Head Cases. That was fast. The show wasn’t that bad; I was planning on giving it another chance. But, I guess it didn’t do well against Lost. I think that Fox is short sighted to use this as a measure, because I doubt that they’ll find something to run that does better. I guess they could always run something that at least doesn’t cost as much to show (maybe reruns of Trading Spouses  ).

9/23/2005 2:43:15 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  TV

More on Bill Frist: Fair's Fair

In the spirit of fairness, I want to admit that I was wrong about Bill Frist.It turns out that he (and just about every other bigwig with the firm) had posted his intent to sell of shares with the SEC earlier, and there was nothing shady about his sell-off. Thank you Yahoo News for pointing that out. It sure would have been helpful if the Huffington Post had done the same (you hear that, Ariana?).

9/23/2005 8:28:10 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  politics

Bill Frist and the SEC

The Huffington Post is reporting that Bill Frist unloaded all of his stock in a family-owned hospital chain just before it announced disappointing earnings.

Remember Martha Stewart? If this were done by a private citizen, instead of the leader of the Senate, there would be both SEC and Justice Dept. investigations going on. We’ll see how this is handled…

I have to admit, I’m still a bit steamed at how Martha Stewart was treated by the feds. There is no doubt in my mind that they treated her as an “example” rather than truly believed that she was some horrible perpetrator.

9/21/2005 8:48:52 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  politics

Ah...

The end of How I Met Your Mother was really bugging me (it still is!), but I found a comment on the Internet (the source of all knowledge  ). They speculated a plausible answer to the “riddle” of the ending. Now, I have to see if it’s right!

9/19/2005 9:25:35 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  TV

Wha?
Okay, I just watched How I Met your Mother. It’s everything that the critics said: almost good. And then, they had to spoil my whole impression: it had a weird surprise ending. I’m not saying what it was (it’s a surprise, remember?), but now I’m hooked (and confused). I’ve got to see what happens next…
9/19/2005 9:06:06 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  TV

Threshold Premiere

Friday night, Threshold, the first of the “invasion” movies, premiered. I had high hopes for this show, because it has Brent (Data) Spiner and Carla Gugino (who was in Karen Sisco). Unfortunately, it didn’t live up to my hopes. It wasn’t really bad, just kind of blah.

Molly Caffrey (Carla Gugino) is supposed to be this great contingency analyst, who creates these “worst case scenarios” and the procedures to follow if/when they happen. She’s suddenly thrown into one of her own scenarios, “Threshold”, first contact with suspected aliens. Cute huh? That’s the high point.

Molly never really “leads” the group, even though she’s supposed to be leading them. Everyone just sort of mills around, without any real investment by the characters in what’s going on.

I’m hoping that the future episodes get better…

9/19/2005 8:50:27 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  TV

Arrr!

Arrr! Today be Talk Like a Pirate Day! So, me maties, be sure to pay proper attention to yer speakin’!

 

Arrr!

9/19/2005 4:09:32 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  general

My latest book

Here’s my latest “What I’m Reading” entry: I just finished Magic Street by Orson Scott Card. It isn’t very long, but it’s quite interesting: fantasy with an African-American twist. Haven’t you wondered why all those fantasy heros were white guys? Well, this story shows what happens when its the African-American that have the fairy trouble.

It’s quite good, if a bit short. Other than the before mentioned African-American twist, it’s a pretty pedestrian story, but what a twist! I wouldn’t mind seeing this one on Sci-Fi or as a movie (are you listening, Hollywood?).

9/19/2005 3:28:00 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  general | books

Jon Galloway is afraid of DLINQ
In his Blog, Jon Galloway says that DLINQ scares him. He says that he’s afraid of code maintainability and people “abusing” the feature. He could make the same statement about UI development, or threading. Frankly, making it easier to do something increases the chances of abuse. That’s a given. Whether its queries integrated into the language, operator overloading, or even public attributes. This is where standards and discipline come in. Frankly, I think LINQ is ground breaking technology, and DLINQ is just what the doctor ordered for SQL Server queries.
9/19/2005 8:44:40 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  PDC 05 | development

PDC's over

Well, that’s it. PDC ‘05 is officially history. I can’t even get to the online site to post my evaluations of the sessions I saw today.

So, today I spent most of my time at panel discussions. It was great to have the bulk of the panels all day Friday. It made it a whole lot easier to figure out what to see. Which leads me to my central theme for this posting:

This was the best organized conference I’ve ever been to. Now, I’ve been going to development conferences for over 10 years. I’ve seen really big ones, like the year that Software Development was held with the first Java One conference, and I’ve been to really small ones, like the Software Development conference that coincided with the start of the Iraq war. And, yes, I’ve been to conferences other than Software Development too! But, let me reiterate: this was the best organized conference I’ve ever been to. Here are some of the things I think that others should be emulating:

1. Food: There was food available at all times. Easy to eat stuff that included both the typical “junk” food that so many developers run on as well as more “healthy” stuff like tons of fruit. Coffee was also always available in copious quantities. While lunch was also served, I neither partook of it or missed it. I never had to stop going to sessions in order to eat. Instead, I was picking all day long, while packing in the sessions.

2. Lounges: There were lounges set up in the Big Room, each of which was dedicated to a different track. People could hang out in the lounges and talk to experts in that particular field. Okay, so MS was mainly interested in using this venue to push its products. That’s always the case. The main thing was that this created yet another place were attendees could get together with each other as well as speakers they may have heard.

3. Computers: There were PC’s everywhere! In fact, all reviews were done online, so there weren’t the usual little pieces of paper you had to deal with at the end of each session. You could also use the PC’s to get up to date info on the conference as well as just do general Internet stuff, like checking your e-mail.

4. Network Connections: This leads to the next great thing. WiFi everywhere (nearly) and tons of tables set up with both power and wired connections. It was trivial to stay connected with both the conference and the outside world while here, thanks to the ubiquitous network connections available. In fact, I didn’t even attend Bill Gates’ keynote; I watched it on my laptop! No crowds, no lines. And I could read the news while listening.

5. BOF’s: There were tons of BOF sessions. And, these were real BOF’s, not just marketing opportunities for various consultants (or MS for that matter). My only real beef was that the sessions were always late at night (starting at 9:00), and since I wasn’t at a conference hotel, this made attending inconvenient.

6. Shuttles: All of the conference hotels (not mine, unfortunately) were on a shuttle route, with the shuttles running continuously. So, if you wanted to go back to your hotel for an hour or so, and then return you could do it (fairly) easily.

7: Panels: Lots of panel discussions. We tech heads love panel discussions. Get the experts on stage together and give us a chance to ask them the hard questions. And better yet, they reserved a day for these panels, so I didn’t have to give up some other activity to see them.

I don’t know how much money MS spent on this shindig (A lot, I think), and I don’t know how profitable another conference that offered these features would be. I do know that all of these things would attract tons more people than I’ve seen at other conferences recently.

The folks at SD Expo should especially take note.

9/16/2005 3:47:16 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  development | PDC 05