Me: Frank Lynch. Bio These are my daily rants, mostly political. For something less spontaneous, I maintain The Samuel Johnson Sound Bite Page (over 1,800 Johnson quotes), perhaps your best online resource for insight into his thinking.
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Monday, November 23, 2009
The joys of local news. An anchor on Chicago's Fox affiliate used a pie chart instead of a bar chart, and the pie summed to 193%... It's all logical of course, when Republican voters don't have to choose.
This error is so fundamental, I doubt that Tufte even covers it.
Here's how little John Hindraker knows. John Hindraker is one of the brainiacs at Powerline, and apparently he really thought tonight's vote on health care reform was a cloture vote (to overcome a filibuster), and not merely a vote to allow debate.
Mary Landrieu announced today that she will vote for cloture...
UPDATE: Well, I suppose we shouldn't jump the gun. The Democrats will need 60 votes one more time, as today's vote just kicked off debate.
Before he updated his post, I know I emailed him to alert him to his foolishness. Presumably others did, too. But it's staggering that anyone wuold be swayed by someone who doesn't understand the nuts and bolts of the process, or doesn't bother to learn them, when it's an issue as important as this. This morning I wasn't so sure about the process, but I knew better than to launch the old blogging machine before I did.
And yes, even though he's shown he's a fool, he has to be watched. Sorry.
UPDATE: Joel points out (in the comments) that last night's vote was actually a cloture vote - - one to end a filibuster against discussing the bill. He's correct. (Anyone who was listening to the Republicans yesterday would have thought they were debating the merits of the bill, but that's aside the point.) As for Hinderaker, what launched me was his equating the vote with proceeding to vote on the bill. I didn't include his full quote: "Mary Landrieu announced today that she will vote for cloture on the Democrats' government medicine bill tonight. The Democrats now have 60 votes and will be able to pass their version of government medicine." It also reads as if he forgot Senator Lincoln was a potential hold out.
In praise of Jon Stewart. From Brian Williams, who writes that he has become "indispensable." And no mention of how Stewart basically killed Crossfire in one appearance.
How does America feel about it? Well, one should never look to popular opinion for guidance, but most Americans think the bow was appropriate, even a majority of Republicans.
Returning the meaning of 9/11. So Rudy Giuliani may not be running for Governor. Which would mean that 9/11 can return to just being the date of the most horrendous terrorist attack on American soil, instead of a date taken in vain and uttered when a coherent foreign policy fails to come to the speaker's tongue.
Unless he runs for Senator.
The astonishing thing about the Republican party in New York State is that Giuliani... or Rick Lazio... this is the best they can do.
e-books and hefty dead tree editions. Last night, T. J. Stiles was given the National Book Award in nonfiction, deservedly, for his biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt. In his accepting the award, he made a comment resisting threats which he sees from ebooks and ereaders:
Mr. Stiles, whom the judges praised for his "deep and imaginative research," took a swipe at the recent move toward electronic books as he thanked a wide range of supporters, including editorial assistants, copy editors and marketing staffers, at his publishing house, Alfred A. Knopf.
"The advent of the e-book is fooling people into thinking that none of these people are necessary anymore," Mr. Stiles said. "If they cease to exist, the books will only be worth the paper they are not printed on."
I don't doubt that's a concern, as I'm sure there are people whose perception of books have been devalued by their existence in the form of data rather than atoms. There is something to be said for the texture of paper, and selection of fonts, as well as all the underappreciated efforts which accumulate in the publication of a book.
At the same time, there's another segment of ereaders like me — and I won't speculate as to the size. I started the dead tree edition of his book on Vanderbilt, and got about 40% into it. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. But it's a hefty bit of atoms, too heavy to carry on the subway, and momentum gets lost. The more so when I choose a physically lighter book one day. I bought Jean Edward Smith's "FDR" when it came out about two and a half years ago, and it was delightful. Seriously. But it fell by the wayside simply because of its heft. When I bought my Kindle, FDR was the first book I downloaded, and finishing it was a breeze, as it no longer weighed a thing.
Although the prices of ebooks is usually lower than the dead tree editions, that's not where my economic value is: I'm actually finishing the books I buy, thus getting more out of them. On a hefty book I would be willing to pay the same price as the going rate for the dead tree edition. (True, there is a sting for the publishers, as I'll be making fewer purchases.)
As an aside, I also like the way footnotes are linked in ebooks. Move the cursor to the supersript and click; no more needing two bookmarks.
I expect to download the Kindle edition of T.J. Stiles's Vanderbilt bio very shortly, so he and his publisher will get a double dip from me... and I will finish the book.
(Regrettably selection can be an issue: only one of Robert Caro's four books are available, for instance.)
UPDATE: Stiles's acceptance speech is here. His comment about e-books came at the end of a long list of publishing house positions which don't get noticed or enough thought from book buyers. In that context, his brief comment on ebooks seems like a mere concluding point to all that he appreciates.
Should we do away with the filibuster and just increase the required majority on bills? Senator Evan Bayh, a Democrat, thinks there should be no difference between the way you vote for a bill's passage and the way you vote to allow voting to proceed: i.e., if you're against a bill, vote with those who want to filibuster. Ezra Klein (linked) thinks this suggests there should be a new threshold for a bill's Senate passage, requiring 60 votes, not a mere majority. I don't think this is something he seriously wants, he wants an open discussion about it and en end to the theater. There's value to keeping the filibuster, but the implication of a 60-vote majority on bills is daunting: nothing would get done. It's unfortunate that when Klein is calling Bayh's bluff, and asking him to see the implications, that Bayh isn't in the room.
