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Next Supreme Court "Nominee’s Image Will Be Set by Senate Panel"

Much is being written and reported about a successor to Justice John Paul Stevens. Beyond all the hype and drama associated with the president’s selection of a nominee and the media’s commentary about every conceivable factor involving potential candidates, what will stand out as the center of activity in the weeks and months ahead is the constitutional concept of “advice and consent,” especially the confirmation process and committee hearings that will soon commence on Capitol Hill.

At the heart of this crucial confirmation process will be the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings that are certain to extend for many days, to be followed, if the nomination is reported out of committee, by an up-or-down vote by the full Senate. These committee hearings will likely be scheduled soon after the president announces his nominee. The Senate hearings will be the key to bringing information into the public domain for consideration by the Judiciary Committee and the full Senate. Committee witnesses will include President Barack Obama’s nominee plus others who are in a position to provide information about the nominee’s background, credentials, qualifications, judicial temperament, character and general fitness for service.

"Nominee’s Image Will Be Set by Senate Panel," by Bill LaForge, Roll Call, April 29, 2010

(Bill LaForge is a lawyer/lobbyist with the Winstead law firm in Washington, D.C., and author of a new book, “Testifying Before Congress,” published by TheCapitol.Net and scheduled for release in mid-2010.)

See also

Supreme Court Nominations

Supreme Court Nominations:
Presidential Nomination, the Judiciary Committee, Proper Scope of Questioning of Nominees, Senate Consideration, Cloture, and the Use of the Filibuster

Compiled by TheCapitol.Net
Authors: Denis Steven Rutkus, Elizabeth Rybicki, Betsy Palmer, Todd Tatelman, Richard S. Beth, Michael Koempel and Judy Schneider

he procedure for appointing a Supreme Court Justice is provided for by the Constitution in only a few words. The "Appointments Clause" (Article II, Section 2, clause 2) states that the President "shall nominate, and by and with the Advise and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint…Judges of the supreme Court."

The process of appointing Justices has undergone changes over two centuries, but its most basic feature--the sharing of power between the President and Senate--has remained unchanged. To receive lifetime appointment to the Court, a candidate must first be nominated by the President and then confirmed by the Senate. Although not mentioned in the Constitution, an important role is played midway in the process (after the President selects, but before the Senate considers) by the Senate Judiciary Committee. Since the end of the Civil War, almost every Supreme Court nomination received by the Senate has first been referred to and considered by the Judiciary Committee before being acted on by the Senate as a whole.

This book explores the appointment process--from Presidential announcement, Judiciary Committee investigation, confirmation hearings, vote, and report to the Senate, through Senate debate and vote on the nomination.

2009, 208 pages
ISBN: 1587331586 ISBN 13: 978-1-58733-158-9
Softcover book: $19.95

For more information, see SCOTUSNominations.com

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April 30, 2010 09:47 AM   Link    Judicial Branch    Comments (0)

Advanced Media Relations, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net, May 5, 2010

Advanced Media Relations

Do your competitive media campaigns target the right audience? Are you tracking and evaluating media coverage or using social media sites and the Internet to their full advantage? In this course, instructors discuss these topics and more.

Learn how to develop a communication strategy, coordinate and prepare for interviews, deal with the media hog and the media mouse, and use social media sites to your advantage. Students work with each other and our experienced faculty, discussing best practices and professional strategies for handling internal and external challenges.

Our Advanced Media Relations course is geared toward practicing public relations professionals with at least three years' experience.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010, 8:30 am to 4:30 pm.

Approved for 0.7 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW), Washington, DC (McPherson Square station)

This is an elective course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see AdvancedMediaRelations.com

Continue reading "Advanced Media Relations, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net, May 5, 2010"

April 30, 2010 08:47 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Assorted Links 4/30/10

Policing for Profit: The Abuse of Civil Asset Forfeiture

• Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals, May 4, 2010
• Advanced Media Relations, May 5, 2010
• Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, May 6, 2010
• Crisis Communications Training, May 7, 2010
• Understanding Congressional Budgeting and Appropriations, May 13, 2010
• Strategies for Working with Congress: Effective Communication and Advocacy on Capitol Hill, May 21, 2010
• Congress in a Nutshell: Understanding Congress, June 3, 2010
• Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process, June 4, 2010
• Capitol Hill Workshop, June 9-11, 2010
• Wi-Fi Classroom - How to Find, Track, and Monitor Congressional Documents: Going Beyond Thomas, June 24, 2010
• Wi-Fi Classroom - How to Research and Compile Legislative Histories: Searching for Legislative Intent, June 25, 2010
• Persuading Congress: Candid Advice for Executives - "Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.
  
  This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction."
• The Forfeiture Racket: Police and prosecutors won't give up their license to steal. - " Over the past three decades, it has become routine in the United States for state, local, and federal governments to seize the property of people who were never even charged with, much less convicted of, a crime. Nearly every year, according to Justice Department statistics, the federal government sets new records for asset forfeiture. And under many state laws, the situation is even worse: State officials can seize property without a warrant and need only show 'probable cause' that the booty was connected to a drug crime in order to keep it, as opposed to the criminal standard of proof 'beyond a reasonable doubt.' Instead of being innocent until proven guilty, owners of seized property all too often have a heavier burden of proof than the government officials who stole their stuff.
  
  Municipalities have come to rely on confiscated property for revenue. Police and prosecutors use forfeiture proceeds to fund not only general operations but junkets, parties, and swank office equipment. A cottage industry has sprung up to offer law enforcement agencies instruction on how to take and keep property more efficiently. And in Indiana, where Anthony Smelley is still fighting to get his money back, forfeiture proceeds are enriching attorneys who don’t even hold public office, a practice that violates the U.S. Constitution."
• How Dependent Are Police On “Asset Forfeiture” To Pay Police Salaries? - "Americans should be alert to a problematic increase in “police property seizures” as the economy worsens: Police departments having a budget crisis, faced with having to layoff police officers, may increasingly look to civil asset forfeiture of Citizens’ property to pay their salaries and operating costs.
  
  Police corruption abounds [in] U.S. Cities: Citizens are illegally shot, falsely arrested, prosecuted and imprisoned. Every American is at risk of being falsely imprisoned despite the conviction standard 'evidence beyond a reasonable doubt.' Frequently reported, Police falsify evidence and or purchase testimony from paid informants to convict Citizens. Imagine how easy it would be for corrupt police to forge evidence to cause 'civil asset forfeiture' of a person’s property like their home. Civil Asset Forfeiture requires a lower standard of evidence than criminal evidence, 'only a Preponderance of Civil Evidence' to seize property: government can use as civil evidence to forfeit someone’s real property, the fact the owner reported to police that a tenant was dealing drugs to show that the owner--had prior knowledge of the activity. "
• Myths About Capitalism: Confronting the biggest lies about American business - "Remember the last time you went into Starbucks, and then remember the last time you went into the DMV to get your license,' Medved said. 'Where did you get better treated? And it's not because the barista is some kind of idealist or humanitarian. She wants a tip. She wants you to come back to the Starbucks ... .'"
  
  Why do so many people apparently want their government to be as warm and cuddly as a barista at Starbux? Maybe some people prefer a state that shows contempt for and disinterest in its citizens.
  
  
• The Financial Crisis: Are We All Responsible? - "The overwhelming majority of people are hard working, honest in their dealings, more concerned with raising families than ruling others, if anything distracted by their day to day problems. Long suffering, patient to a fault, too willing to the give the Wall Street bankers the benefit of the doubt for the very reason of their own good natures. They could not imagine themselves doing the things of which these men stand accused, so they cannot believe that others would so willingly lie and deceive, cheat and steal, attack the very heart of the nation, while wrapping themselves in a flag of hypocrisy, for a few more dollars that they can hardly need or even personally spend. And why? Because it feeds their sickened hearts, their pathological egos, and the need to make others suffer loss for their own gains. It makes them feel superior, as gods."
• The anti-market narrative of the crisis - "Those poor impulsive bankers. They can’t seem to stop themselves and that’s how we know that markets aren’t self-correcting. Ignore the weird (and common) conflating of the efficient market hypothesis and market stability. Let’s just look at market stability and the idea of leaving bankers to their own devices. That’s supposed to mean 'unregulated.' Ignore the fact that financial markets are regulated in all kinds of ways.
  
  Just focus on that phrase 'can’t seem to stop themselves.' They just keep driving the financial vehicles off the cliff using all that borrowed money. Does the fact that the government often reimburses the lenders in the name of preserving financial stablity have something to do with bankers’ inability to stop themselves?
  
  Does the quest for complete stability have something to do with the failure to achieve stability?"
  
  See Crony Capitalism
  
  
• Greece: Dead Man Walking? - "I’m mystified as to the cheerleading in some circles on Greece. It is not clear that its €45 billion EU-IMF band-aid will be deployed (among other things, it faces a legal challenge in Germany) and even if it is, it falls well short of Greece’s anticipated needs beyond one year. More important, a successful deal does not mean the rescue will prevent default. The austerity program for Greece (in terms of reduction of fiscal deficit) has no successful precedents, and street protests indicate that the populace is not on board. And Ed Harrison sees eerie parallels to the rescue of CreditAnstalt, which kicked off more bank runs, ultimately precipitating the second leg down of the Great Depression.
  
  While stock markets are perking up in Asia, credit default swap spread for the other Club Med countries rose on Friday, signaling that investors are worried about the risk of contagion. And in the UK, several savvy investors told me they expect a 20% pound depreciation once the election is over. Europe is clearly on a deflationary path."
• This is What a Greek Debt Crisis Looks Like - "[This chart] shows how much additional yield the market is demanding to hold Greek versus German bonds, in other words, 'the collapse of Greece’s perceived creditworthiness.'"
• Gangster Government becomes a long-running series - "Almost a year ago, in a Washington Examiner column on the Chrysler bailout, I reflected on the Obama administration's decision to force bondholders to accept 33 cents on the dollar on secured debts while giving United Auto Worker retirees 50 cents on the dollar on unsecured debts.
  
  This was a clear violation of the ordinary bankruptcy rule that secured creditors are fully paid off before unsecured creditors get anything. The politically connected UAW folks got preference over politically unconnected bondholders. 'We have just seen an episode of Gangster Government,' I wrote. 'It is likely to be a continuing series.'"
• The money is gone - "Education funding isn’t going to rebound, writes Mike Petrilli, who’s taking flak for TV interviews in which he said, 'The money is gone and it’s not coming back anytime soon.'"
• Ghana Think Talk: the world majority solves the first world's problems - "By applying a typical process of community development against the grain, traditional power-roles are inverted, places are exchanged, and stereotypes clash with reality as disconnected cultures work together in detached but physical ways.
  
  This project is an attempt to transpose parts of one culture into another, exploring the friction caused by solutions that are generated in one context and applied elsewhere, and revealing the hidden assumptions that govern cross-cultural interactions."
• Obama for Entrepreneurs, but Not American Ones - "The Obama administration and today’s Democrats are driven by regulatory zeal, lust for higher revenues, and apparent ignorance of the workings of the market economy. I don’t think they planned it this way, but their anti-market actions are accumulating cut by cut, threatening major long-term damage to America’s standard of living."
• Small business and big government don’t mix - "My job is basically to report the facts that undermine The Big Myth -- the fable that Big Business loves free markets, and that the effect of Big Government is to curb Big Business. In fact, Big Business often lobbies for and profits from Big Government.
  . . .
  As government gets bigger, more businesses are forced to turn to government as a customer -- which gives more of an advantage to big business.
  
  If you want to help small businesses, shrink the government."
• Sentences to ponder - "'About a quarter of Indonesian boys aged 13 to 15 are already hooked on cigarettes that sell for about $1 a pack or as little as a few cents apiece, according to WHO. A video on YouTube last month prompted outrage when a 4-year-old Indonesian boy was shown blowing smoke rings and flicking a cigarette. His parents say he's been smoking up to a pack a day since he was 2.'
  . . .
  How many of you will bite this bullet?"
• Health Care Cost Control? Don't Count On It. - "Remember all those cost controls that were supposed to be in the health care bill? The bill that just last month President Obama said was supposed to be about 'bringing down the cost of health care for families and businesses and for the federal government?'
  
  Yeah, well, not so much."
• Mayor Daley and other Mayors: Seek “redress against the gun industry” in the World Court - "April 27 was the tenth annual 'Richard J. Daley Global Cities Forum,' held in Chicago. Over a hundred mayors and other local government leaders assembled to discuss global issues. As reported in the Chicago Sun-Times, 'Daley convinced more than a dozen of his counterparts from around the world to approve a resolution urging ‘redress against the gun industry through the courts of the world’ in The Hague.'
  . . .
  from the comments: "I will take Daley’s anti-gun stance seriously when he gives up his 24 hour-seven-days-per-week-taxpayer-funded-armed security. Also when he moves to change the law allowing Chicago’s alderman to carry."
  

No More Beer Summits: Tea Party ‘N-Word’ Incident Didn’t Happen, And the Congressional Black Caucus Owes America an Apology

• "How Restaurants Get You Drunk" - "All that noise in restaurants I find increasingly annoying allegedly has a purpose: higher profits.
  
  'And a study completed in the summer of 2008 in France found that when music was played at 72 decibels, men consumed an average of 2.6 drinks at a rate of one drink per 14.51 minutes. When the sound level was cranked up to 88 decibels, the numbers spiked to an average of 3.4 drinks, with one consumed every 11.47 minutes.'"
• Not Inherently Unsafe - Photo slide show of aircraft having done or doing interesting things
• Ban Portable Electronics Before Bed for More Restful Sleep - "Three years ago we shared some research with you indicating that people who used electronic devices before bed reported feeling less rested the next morning.
  
  The subjects in the study weren't just imagining that working late on their laptop in bed or spending time text messaging was make them more tired--they slept the same number of hours as the non-electronics users--they were actually experiencing the effects of exposure to bright and intense light late in the evening. The Los Angeles Times reports on the science behind it:"
• Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
• Common Market Food Co-op - "Common Market Food Co-op was a 'new wave food co-op' located at 1329 California Street in Denver, Colorado, from 1975 - 1980. It started as a buying club at the University of Denver in the early 1970s, and for a few years prior to moving to the old Safeway at 13th and California Streets, Common Market operated out of a small storefront on Champa Street."
• WMATA Rule Number 2: Go Before you Go - "On Tuesday evening, at around 8:30, I was at the Bethesda station and wanted to use the restroom before finishing my commute to Columbia Heights.
  
  I tapped on the booth window, and the attendant turned to me and grimaced, like WMATA employees always do upon realizing they will soon be asked to perform a task.
  
  I smiled and asked 'can I use the restroom?'
  
  She huffed, turned her back to me and started typing on the computer again.
  
  I stood at the window waiting for some indication that a plan was being set into motion that would lead to the restroom door being opened.
  
  She glanced at me once again, closed some windows on the monitor and stood up. I moved back so she could open the door.
  
  When she stepped out and growled 'why the hell you still standing there?'
  
  I was speechless."
  
  
• Let There Be Light. Weight - "When I was a kid copywriter on the Volkswagen account, grumpy but thorough VW engineers drummed one tenet of green into me: You don’t save gas with secret carburetors which the oil companies hide. You save by shedding weight. The less weight to push around, the less energy is needed to do the pushing. From the First Law of Thermodynamics to Einstein, all will agree. Like we agree on the need for a balanced diet. Then we go to the next Wendy’s, and order a triple Whopper. Despite the wisdom, cars tend to gain heft over the years like an erstwhile skinny Italian bella ragazza after the age of 30.
  . . .
  But they overlooked another immutable law in the auto business: People love to save the planet when asked by a researcher. People love to get the best bang for the buck when it comes to buying."

Apollo 11 slow-motion launch

. . . . . . . . .



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April 30, 2010 08:37 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

Advanced Media Relations, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net, May 5, 2010

Advanced Media Relations

Do your competitive media campaigns target the right audience? Are you tracking and evaluating media coverage or using social media sites and the Internet to their full advantage? In this course, instructors discuss these topics and more.

Learn how to develop a communication strategy, coordinate and prepare for interviews, deal with the media hog and the media mouse, and use social media sites to your advantage. Students work with each other and our experienced faculty, discussing best practices and professional strategies for handling internal and external challenges.

Our Advanced Media Relations course is geared toward practicing public relations professionals with at least three years' experience.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010, 8:30 am to 4:30 pm.

Approved for 0.7 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW), Washington, DC (McPherson Square station)

This is an elective course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see AdvancedMediaRelations.com

Continue reading "Advanced Media Relations, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net, May 5, 2010"

April 28, 2010 08:47 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Capitol Hill Workshop, 3-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net

Capitol Hill Workshop: Politics, Policy, and Process

Intensive 3-day congressional operations workshop

Congressional decision-making is driven by politics, policy and process. In this engaging workshop, Washington-based experts discuss these 3 P's and help you understand the complete policy-making process.

You’ll get a solid understanding of:

• Congressional operations and the legislative process
  
• How public and foreign policy become law
  
• Congressional politics and leadership
  
• Congressional budgeting today
  
• The role of OMB in the legislative process
  
• Effective communication with Congress
  
• How the media covers the Hill
  
• Current campaign and election trends
  
• How members of Congress advance their legislative, public policy and political agendas
  
• How personal and committee staff work
  
• How you can build win/win relationships with staffers

Attend a congressional hearing and see the process in action.

June 9-11, 2010, 8:30 am - 4 pm all three days.

Approved for 1.7 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: In Washington, DC

This is a required course for the Certificate in Congressional Operations and for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see CapitolHillWorkshop.com

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April 27, 2010 07:57 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Assorted Links 4/26/10

Wham-O
"It's gotten so bad the Mexicans are hiring Americans to do the jobs the Chinese don't want to do."
"[We, the Chinese] don't want the crappy jobs."



South Park death threats

• Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals, May 4, 2010
  
• Advanced Media Relations, May 5, 2010
  
• Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, May 6, 2010
  
• Crisis Communications Training, May 7, 2010
  
• Understanding Congressional Budgeting and Appropriations, May 13, 2010
  
• Strategies for Working with Congress: Effective Communication and Advocacy on Capitol Hill, May 21, 2010
  
• Congress in a Nutshell: Understanding Congress, June 3, 2010
  
• Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process, June 4, 2010
  
• Capitol Hill Workshop, June 9-11, 2010
  
• Wi-Fi Classroom - How to Find, Track, and Monitor Congressional Documents: Going Beyond Thomas, June 24, 2010
  
• Wi-Fi Classroom - How to Research and Compile Legislative Histories: Searching for Legislative Intent, June 25, 2010
  
• Persuading Congress: Candid Advice for Executives - "Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.
  
  This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction."
  
• School lunches called a national security threat - "Hey Kid: Every time you eat a tator tot, you're letting the terrorists win!"
  
• Fire and Ice - "Der Spiegel examines the chain of events that led to the cancellation of 17,000 flights over Europe, including the diversion of medevacs from Afghanistan and rerouting of the German Chancellor’s flight home. Ash clouds from an Icelandic volcano disrupted flights all over Europe. The question is whether the policy makers over-reacted to the thread. As volcanoes go Eyjafjallajökull was accounted by Icelandic volcanologists as 'a weary old man'. It’s recent eruption was unremarkable.
  . . .
  The military historian Max Hastings wrote that 'the great volcanic shutdown was the price we pay for a society that overreacts to any risk'. Hastings argued that societies had forgotten the concept of accepting risk. An accident, no matter how statistically insignificant, could be magnified by press coverage into a Grecian tragedy. The result was that many systems, including those which were unprecedentedly safe, spent huge marginal costs to attain the last word in perfection.
  . . .
  Hastings cites fiascos which are less failures to assess risk than to recognize uncertainty:
  
  - In 1988, health minister Edwina Currie almost destroyed Britain’s egg industry when she said that salmonella in eggs might cause a human catastrophe -- only for it to be later discovered that salmonella could not get into eggs.
  
  - In 1996, Britain spent £7 billion killing millions of the nation’s cows in response to the alleged threat of CJD killing humans eating burgers made from cattle infected by BSE. We now know that the likelihood of this was almost infinitesimally slight.
  
  - In 2009, the government spent £1 billion on unneeded vaccines against swine flu, which we were told might kill half a million people. The SARS virus, said some ‘experts’, could prove more devastating to humanity than Aids. It was once suggested that bird flu might kill 150 million people worldwide."
  
• Orszag! Don't go! - "Panic in the Beltway! Bloomberg is reporting that President Obama is pitching woo to Budget Director Peter Orszag, to prevent his early defection from the administration. Peter! No!
  . . .
  Inconceivable. What would we do as a nation without his smoldering gaze, inscrutable budget presentations and horrifically messy personal life? We doubt there is an aspiring budget director on the bench with nearly as much to give to public service as Orszag."
  
• Daniel Okrent's *Last Call*, a history of prohibition - "The introduction of the income tax made Prohibition fiscally feasible. Women's suffrage made it politically feasible. World War I created a surfeit of patriotism, a willingness to sacrifice, and an embrace of the expansion of federal power. By 1920 everything was in place for a bold new government intrusion into everyday life."
  
  "Last Call," by Daniel Okrent
  
  
  
• 10 Things You Don’t Know (or were misinformed) About the GS Case - "I have been watching with a mixture of awe and dismay some of the really bad analysis, sloppy reporting, and just unsupported commentary about the GS case.
  
  I put together this list based on what I know as a lawyer, a market observer, a quant and someone with contacts within the SEC. (Note: This represents my opinions, and no one elses).
  . . .
  2. Robert Khuzami is a bad ass, no-nonsense, thorough, award winning Prosecutor: This guy is the real deal -- he busted terrorist rings, broke up the mob, took down security frauds. He is now the director of SEC enforcement. He is fearless, and was awarded the Attorney General’s Exceptional Service Award (1996), for 'extraordinary courage and voluntary risk of life in performing an act resulting in direct benefits to the Department of Justice or the nation.'
  
  When you prosecute mass murderers who use guns and bombs and threaten your life, and you kick their asses anyway, you ain’t afraid of a group of billionaire bankers and their spreadsheets. He is the shit. My advice to anyone on Wall Street in his crosshairs: If you are indicted in a case by Khuzami, do yourself a big favor: Settle.
  . . .
  I have $1,000 against any and all comers that GS does not win -- they settle or lose in court. Any takers? My money is already in escrow -- waiting for yours to join it. Winnings go to the charity of the winners choice."
  
• Philosophy for the All-Too-Common Man - a review by John Gray of "Ideas that Matter: The Concepts that Shape the 21st Century," by A. C. Grayling.
  
  "Seeing themselves as fiercely independent thinkers, bien-pensants are remarkable chiefly for the fervor with which they propagate the prevailing beliefs of their time. Bertrand Russell, John Stuart Mill’s godson and a scion of one of England’s great political dynasties, exemplified this contradiction throughout most of his life. British philosopher A. C. Grayling can now be counted amongst his number.
  . . .
  Industrial style authorship of this kind is a triumph of the will rather than a display of intelligence. The effect is one of wearisome repetition, and one wonders what Grayling imagines he has achieved by the exercise. All of these volumes preach the same sermon: history is a record of crime, oppression and superstition; but salvation is at hand through rational inquiry, the gift of the Greeks that was lost in the Dark Ages and rediscovered in the Enlightenment. Repeating this as Grayling does, over and over again, suggests that he believes the lesson has still not been understood, and throughout his extensive corpus of polemical writings he has the manner of a querulous teacher hammering rudimentary lessons into the heads of refractory schoolchildren. For Grayling, it seems, few if any of the difficulties of ethics and politics are insoluble. The remedies for human ills are obvious, or would be so if only humans were not blinded by superstition. Never doubting that he is free of this vice, Grayling writes as one conveying the simple truth.
  
  The result is a style of argument that, in passing over the human experience that some dilemmas are not fully soluble, is rarely persuasive and often amounts to not much more than high-minded silliness.
  . . .
  As Grayling sees things, it is only irrationality that makes human conflicts intractable. If only he had been around in the dark years of the Second World War, he seems to imply, and in a position to instruct Allied war planners on the finer points of ethical theory, the terrible struggle could have gone so much more smoothly. Certainty of this kind is comical, but it also raises a question about the origins of the principles that Grayling maintains so mechanically. He is insistent that liberal values apply universally. He is also insistent that these values have nothing to do with religion.
  . . .
  The history of the last century is testimony to the destructive power of rationalism, not fideism. Nazism and Communism were at one in their hatred of religion. Both claimed to be founded in science--'dialectical materialism' and 'scientific racism.' Of course these sciences were bogus, but they show what horrors can be justified by appeal to reason. The worst acts of the twentieth century were committed by atheist regimes that claimed a scientific basis for their policies.
  . . .
  This is why it is so silly to argue that hostility to religion had nothing to do with Nazi and Communist oppression; it was this hostility that animated a significant part of the repression. If Grayling cannot see this, the reason is that for him, atheism cannot be implicated in anything undesirable; an inevitable conclusion of rational inquiry, it is intrinsically virtuous. It is true that no type of action follows from atheism as a matter of logical necessity. The rejection of theism can go with a variety of moral and political attitudes, including a positive evaluation of the role of religion in human life. By any standards, Santayana was an atheist. He was also consistently friendly to religion--partly on the basis of its ethical and aesthetic qualities, and partly because he viewed religion as being closer to poetry than to science. Atheism of this kind is rare, however. Militantly evangelical unbelief of the kind practiced by Lenin and Stalin, Hitler and Mao has been far more influential."
  
• From The Old Farmer's Almanac - "If Patrick Henry thought taxation without representation was bad, he should see how bad it is with representation."
  
• Immigrants and Nazis, Communists and Cardinals - "I finally had a chance to read Arizona’s new law on illegal immigration. It’s rather different from the press portrayal. Maybe I’ll blog about that, but I want to start with the astonishingly vituperative attack by Cardinal Roger Mahony on what he calls 'Arizona’s Dreadful Anti-Immigrant Law.'
  . . .
  The problem with this stance is that it comes awfully close to declaring in advance that the church intends to “harbor or shield from detection” illegal immigrants. So Cardinal Mahony has to ask himself whether his priests are courting liability under the new law if they continue to give shelter and transport to parishioners whom they know or suspect are illegal immigrants. (He can take some comfort from the fact that federal law has long made harboring illegal aliens a federal offense without producing any serious liability, but federal law says that only ICE can bring such charges, and ICE has made clear, at least by its actions, that it has no intention of prosecuting church groups. There’s also a bit of ambiguity in the Arizona law about whether you have to be committing a separate offense at the time of harboring, and that could make prosecutions of legitimate groups problematic. But the risk of an investigation, and even a prosecution, at the hands of a fed-up local official, has surely gone up since the bill passed.)
  
  That’s a big deal. Suddenly Cardinal Mahony’s outburst about the evils of spying and turning in parents makes a little more sense. The law is going to put his church in a newly awkward position. Complying with Arizona’s tough new legal obligations will be hard to square with the bold moral stance taken by the church in a more forgiving era. The prospect of paying a much higher price for what had been a pretty comfortable form of civil disobedience is bound to engender a lot of emotion. And that, I suspect, is the source of the Cardinal’s otherwise inexplicable outburst."
  
• Emanuel as the successor to Daley is a scary thought - "What is clear is that for the first time in more than two decades, Daley is visibly weakening. Otherwise, Emanuel wouldn't dare broach the subject. Daley's time is coming to an end, either this term or the next.
  
  He won his last election by a landslide. But only a small percentage of eligible voters actually voted. And that was before all the new problems.
  
  Shortshanks' parking meter rate-hike fiasco won't go away. His son and nephew had a hidden multimillion-dollar stake in a city sewer contract, and the mayor said nobody told him.
  
  He also didn't know about his nephew getting $68 million in city pension funds to invest. When he was at the height of his power, Chicago eagerly forgave him for not knowing basic details, and a few in the media made excuses. But those days are over. Nobody buys his Fedzheimer's act anymore.
  
  The economy is in the toilet. He's spent all the money on deals, and the city government is broke. His friends are rich, but the city workers hate him and the taxpayers are angry. He'll need to pick a fight, so look for him to provoke a strike by the Teamsters union as he moves toward re-election."
  
• Soy Biodiesel Worse For Global Warming? - "This is funny. Maybe politicos should do more research before imposing half-baked energy mandates?
  . . .
  Okay, I know some of you might be angry at the thought that good intentions are resulting in a bad outcome. But it is kinda hard to see biomass energy as a matter of good intentions even before considering the report above. The problems with it have been evident for quite a while, so much so I've gotten bored of the topic.
  . . .
  My worry is that advances in biomass energy technology will so improve the EROEI (Energy Return on Energy Invested) that biomass energy become far more cost effective. Then it'll take off, driving food prices much higher while also speeding soil depletion."
  
• Baltimore vs. Wells Fargo, cont’d - "'One year, they file a suit saying that the lender didn’t make enough loans in minority communities: redlining. The next year, they file a suit saying that they made too many loans in minority communities: reverse red-lining,' Sandler said. 'This is just a commercial enterprise for these lawyers. … The same lawyers have been shopping the same complaint to various municipalities for two years.'"
  
• Challenging the Education Monopoly - "Kudos to the New York Board of Regents, for a plan to break the monopoly held in the state by education schools in the licensing of public school teachers. Under current law, all New York schoolteachers have to obtain a masters' degree (or the equivalent in undergraduate education classes) from a state-certified Education program. The Regents propose giving alternative programs---like Teach for America---the opportunity to set up their own M.A. programs. The proposal, the New York Times notes, 'could make education schools extraneous.'"
  
• The Intellectually Naked Economist: A late response to Charles Wheelan’s 2008 article Confessions of a Maturing Libertarian - "Wheelan gingerly babbles 303 words of…well, something about smarts kids in classrooms and New Hampshire and his twenty years of study before delivering the backbreaker to our camel of liberty, and I quote
  
  'What’s the libertarian point of view on stoplights?'
  
  So without further ado, there it is! Defeat in eight words!
  
  Now, I don’t have a PhD but let me give such an innovative question a cursory attempt. Charles, we libertarians support the stoplight! We believe it is within the markets ability to offer such a complicated device from the seclusion of a private road.
  
  Not only this, but Charles, we also support the stop sign!"
  
• Epistemic Closure In Macroeconomics - "There’s been a huge outpouring of blogospheric discussion about 'epistemic closure' on the right: a complete refusal to look at evidence or arguments that don’t come from the like-minded. I don’t have much to say about all that aside from the fact that it’s obvious, and has been going on for years.
  
  But I think it’s worth pointing out that something similar has long been true in macroeconomics. And like the political version of epistemic closure, it’s not a 'both sides do it' issue. It’s a fresh-water phenomenon; salt-water macro isn’t subject to the same problem."
  
  Ah yes, close mindedness is a problem afflicting only a certain part of humanity, namely, the part that doesn't agree with me.
  
  aka "pot calling kettle black"
  
• Is it a good idea to buy a car for your son or daughter? - "Our results show that some complementary actions before college, such as parental praise, foster academic achievement above what natural ability would predict. Conversely, we find that some substitutionary actions before college, e.g. providing cars as gifts, are associated with lower effort in college and underachievement."
  
• The Forfeiture Racket: Police and prosecutors won't give up their license to steal - "Over the past three decades, it has become routine in the United States for state, local, and federal governments to seize the property of people who were never even charged with, much less convicted of, a crime. Nearly every year, according to Justice Department statistics, the federal government sets new records for asset forfeiture. And under many state laws, the situation is even worse: State officials can seize property without a warrant and need only show 'probable cause' that the booty was connected to a drug crime in order to keep it, as opposed to the criminal standard of proof 'beyond a reasonable doubt.' Instead of being innocent until proven guilty, owners of seized property all too often have a heavier burden of proof than the government officials who stole their stuff."

Jim Lahey Reviews The New Domino's Pizza from Ozersky.TV

• Curbside Classic: The Best European Car Ever Made In America: 1965 Corvair Monza - "But if a car ever inspired one to emote and wax poetically, it was the Corvair, especially the 1965. So I’ll try hard to restrain myself: the 1965 Corvair was the best European car ever ever made in America. And if that alone doesn’t explain the Corvair’s inevitable failure, lets just say that in 1965 Americans were eating a lot more Wonder Bread than baguettes.
  . . .
  But a rear-engined small car intrinsically offered great enthusiast potential, as Porsche had shown so convincingly. In fact a Porsche 356 was used as a test mule for the Corvair engine. The Corvair had great potential, but its intended mission in life was as confused as its buyers. The Falcon made a much better compact for most Americans’ needs in schlepping hte kids and the groceries, and GM realized it instantly. The highly pragmatic Chevy II was rushed into production, and the Corvair was quickly dressed up with bucket seats, a higher output engine, and an available four speed: the Monza. Out of desperation and necessity, GM invented a new genre: the small sporty car; for American cars, that is. The Europeans had been chasing that for quite some time.
  
  The fact that GM bean counters didn’t give the early Monzas that sway bar and other suspension upgrades that the Corvair’s father Ed Cole bitterly wanted every Corvair to have from day one is very telling, and perhaps the most significant aspect of the Corvair story and its failure to compete against the imports: GM perpetually elevated style and flash over substance. With just a few more bucks and a costless change to a faster steering ratio, the early Corvairs could have been as brilliant as they inevitably had to make the 1965."
• Last Atlantic Yards Property Owner Agrees to Sell His Land Under Threat of Condemnation - "The last property owner in the condemned Atlantic Yards area of Brooklyn, New York has agreed to sell his land in order to avoid the condemnation of his property by the city government."
• Not Really Simple - "It was the $380 'bona fide horse-riding boots' that got me clued into the simple life. There they were, sleek, polished to the sheen of black pearls, and taking up an entire page of Real Simple magazine. 'You'll never want to take them off,' the accompanying copy promised. It was the first time I'd ever picked up Real Simple, the women's magazine that distinguishes itself from other women's magazines by its lack of tips for getting rid of belly fat, its Zen-lite self-help pages ('learn to live with uncertainty'), and its tastefully minimalist layouts characterized by snowdrift-sized expanses of white space. Here's a food article picturing six balloon-sized Brussels sprouts scattered over the page and not much else. There's a photo essay featuring elegant mothers and their poetically posed toddlers that actually seems to be about hand-tatted lace, which appears in the foreground or background of nearly every picture. And here's one about jewelry crafted out of the original brass door numbers at New York's Plaza Hotel - the pin goes for $260. I closed my issue of Real Simple, stuffed with equally tasteful and equally minimalist ads for wines, Toyota Priuses (the automobile of choice for simple people), and many, many wrinkle creams, and thought: gee, all this simple living can set you back.
  
  Welcome to the simplicity movement, the ethos whose mantras are 'cutting back,' 'focusing on the essentials,' 'reconnecting to the land' - and talking, talking, talking about how fulfilled it all makes you feel. Genuine simple-living people - such as, say, the Amish - are not part of the simplicity movement, because living like the Amish (no iPod apps or granite countertops, plus you have to read the Bible) would be taking the simple thing a bit far. Modern simplicity practitioners like Jesus (although not quite so much as they like Buddhist monks, who dress more colorfully) because he wore sandals and could be said to have practiced alternative medicine, but they mostly shun religious movements founded in his name. Thus, simplicity people are always eager to tell you how great the Amish are, growing their own food (a highly valued trait among simplicity people), espousing pacifism (simplicity people shy away from even just wars), and building those stylishly spare barns (aesthetics rank high in the simplicity movement), but really, who wants to have eight kids and wear those funny-looking hats?
  . . .
  But it has been only in the last decade or so that the simplicity movement has come into its own, aligning itself not only with aesthetic style but also with power. Thanks to the government-backed war against obesity (fat people, conveniently, tend to belong to the polyester-clad, Big Mac-guzzling lower orders) and the 'green' movement in its various save-the-planet manifestations, simplicity people can look down their noses at the not-so-simple with their low-rent tastes while also putting them on the moral defensive. Thus you have Michael Pollan, whose zero-impact ethic of food simplicity won't let him eat anything not grown within one hundred miles of his Bay Area home, and preferably grown (or killed, milked, churned, or picked) himself. He bristles with outrage not only at McDonald's burgers, Doritos, and grapes imported from Chile (foreign fruit destroys people's "sense of place," he writes in The Omnivore's Dilemma) but even at Walmart's announcement in 2006 that it would start stocking organic products at affordable prices. Walmart, like factory farms, SUVs, wide-screen TVs, and outlet malls, is usually anathema to the simplicity set, but here you would think the giga-chain would be doing poor people a favor by widening their access to healthy, less-fattening produce. Not as far as Pollan is concerned. Instead, as Reason magazine's Katherine Mangu-Ward reported, Pollan worried on his blog that 'Walmart's version of cheap, industrialized organic food' might drive the boutique farms that served him and his locavore neighbors out of business.
  . . .
  The problem with the simplicity movement is that its proponents mistake simplicity, which is an aesthetic lifestyle choice, for humility, which is a genuine virtue. Humility is an honest acknowledgment of one's limitations and lowliness in the great scheme of things and a realization that power over other human beings is a dangerous thing, always to be exercised with utmost caution. The Amish, as well as monks, Eastern and Western, cultivate humility because they know they have a duty toward what is larger than themselves. Leo Babauta of the foregone grooming products cultivates simplicity because it makes him feel 'happier,' as he writes on his website. For humble people, their own happiness or other personal feelings are secondary."
• Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
• Common Market Food Co-op - "Common Market Food Co-op was a 'new wave food co-op' located at 1329 California Street in Denver, Colorado, from 1975 - 1980. It started as a buying club at the University of Denver in the early 1970s, and for a few years prior to moving to the old Safeway at 13th and California Streets, Common Market operated out of a small storefront on Champa Street."
• Controlled Chaos: A Day Working the Rikers Island Book Cart - "Another day of volunteering at Rikers Island with the NYPL has come to a close. Thursday I went to one of the male detention houses along with my mentor and two other staff members from NYPL. We were there for 'book cart service,' which is a little different than what I remember from Shawshank Redemption.
  
  We delivered books to both solitary confinement and two different 'houses,' which are the names of blocks within the building. The inmates in solitary confinement are allowed to request books off a list, so we filled these requests from the 'library' within this particular building, which was really just two tall shelves of paperback books in the back of the Chaplain's office." Their Amazon Wish List is here. ht The Browser
• Puppy Linux Install - "Puppy can be easily installed to many different media. Having downloaded the live-CD 'ISO' file, you would normally burn that to a CD or DVD and then 'boot' the computer from it, and you have a running Puppy.
  . . .
  Finally, Puppy is so tiny and fast, he is most at home on the new breed of baby laptops hitting the market..."
• Charting the Carnage from eBanking Fraud - "Aaron Jacobson of Authentify put together this map of all 43 of the U.S. commercial e-banking victims I’ve mentioned in stories at Krebsonsecurity.com and at the Washington Post’s Security Fix blog.
  . . .
  What’s interesting that I hadn’t realized before seeing this map is that the victims appear to be heavily clustered in the East Coast and Midwest. I’m not sure if there is a connection, but the thieves perpetrating these attacks typically recruit their money mules almost exclusively from these regions. The thinking is that the criminals -- most of whom reside in the Eastern European Time Zone (EET), don’t want to spend all night managing these mules."

The Hollywood Stars of the Hollywood Politicians--Reagan, Arnold, Murphy, Temple (videos)

• How to Migrate Email from One Gmail Account to Another - "I'm sure you're not alone--some people simply don't like the username they chose out of the blocks and want to move all of their email to a more professional-sounding email address. Unfortunately, this is one of Gmail's biggest drawbacks--it doesn't let you migrate from one Google account to another with any amount of ease. There are likely a few ways to do it yourself, but if you really want to preserve everything, you're probably best off using a mail client, like Outlook or Thunderbird, to drag and drop the messages between accounts. Here's how it works:"
• What do you think will make more people *want* to repair things? - "Repairing things yourself is almost always cheaper than replacement, so convincing people that repair is a good thing actually isn't that hard. The tricky thing is convincing them that they can do it. So I think the biggest thing we can do is to make repair as easy as possible, and accessible to as many people as we can. We've found that providing people with step-by-step photo instructions ahead of time makes all the difference in the world. Rather than saying 'I don't know if I could ever fix my iPod,' they look at the photos and say 'Oh, is that all it takes? I can do that!'
  
  We need to get back to the days when repair was something we took for granted. When my dad was growing up, it was commonplace for people to maintain their own cars. People don't tinker with cars as much anymore, and that's a shame. This is partly because our culture doesn't value things as much, and partly because cars are much more complicated now.
  
  Fortunately, technology can make it easier for us to fix things. Tinkerers worldwide are connected now better than ever before, and we are planning to collaborate with them to write a free, open repair manual. Our hope is that comprehensive, easy to follow service documentation will make repair accessible so that people will be excited about making their things last longer."
• Bow down before this mighty volcano! - "Like an ancient cult of nature-worshippers, some are celebrating the way the volcano has thwarted modern life.
  . . .
  What we effectively have is a new, modern version of ancient man’s fear and humility before volcanoes. As one study of volcanology argues, in ancient times people thought ‘volcanic eruptions were the work of angry gods, determined to punish us for deeds that displeased them’. The birth of the science of volcanology, from the nineteenth century onwards, helped us to understand that volcanic eruptions were in fact natural phenomena with no moral meaning or sentience. Only now they are being given meaning once more, with some suggesting that maybe ‘Mother Earth is having her revenge on mankind for disrupting the balance of the world’. In short? The gods are displeased and they are punishing us."
• GMail Notifier - Email In The Cloud - "In my recent zest to avoid proprietary software, and use open source (free) tools in my law practice, I have abandoned Microsoft Word and Office for OpenOffice and Google Calendar. They are accessible from any web browser, and work great. I have also abandoned proprietary email clients for the ubiquitous GMail, which also works great. One problem I had, however, was the fact that clicking an outgoing email link in other software brought up whatever email client set as a Windows default. What to do? Gmail Notifier is the answer, and it is also free. In addition to allowing me to set GMail as my default email program, it contains a handy little taskbar icon that notifies me when new email arrives. I have a Google Chrome extension that does the same thing, but Notifier gives a little window with a blurb of the actual email text, allowing me to separate the wheat from the chaff. I paid a fortune for Microsoft Office 2007, just to get Outlook and Word. But, when I swapped hard drives in a new computer, it asserted that I needed to activate, and I went through telephone hell trying to do so. After an hours of phone calls, I gave up, and have uninstalled Microsoft Office 2007 completely."
• Google Street View logs WiFi networks, Mac addresses - "Google's roving Street View spycam may blur your face, but it's got your number. The Street View service is under fire in Germany for scanning private WLAN networks, and recording users' unique Mac (Media Access Control) addresses, as the car trundles along.
  
  Germany's Federal Commissioner for Data Protection Peter Schaar says he's 'horrified' by the discovery."
• Bryan Caplan on adoption - "I think Bryan understands the selfish reasons for having children differently than I do, though I will defer to his own statement of his view. I put a big stress on how children help you see that a lot of your immediate concerns aren't nearly as important as you might think, and how spending time with children brings you closer to -- apologies, super-corny phrases on the way -- The Great Circle of Being and The Elemental Life Force. In some (not all) ways, adopted children may be teaching you those lessons more effectively than do biological children. It's an oversimplification to say that "children make you a better person," but they do, or should, improve your ability to psychologically and emotionally integrate that a) you want lots of stuff, b) what you end up getting remains, no matter what, ridiculously small and inconsequential, and c) you can't control your life nearly as much as you think.
  
  I would sooner say that these realizations are gifts which children give to us rather than calling them 'selfish reasons' to have children. The concept of selfish requires an understanding of our interest and children, very fundamentally, change our understanding of our interests rather than fulfilling our previous goals."

. . . . . . . . .



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April 26, 2010 09:07 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

Glossary of Legislative Terms: "Account"

Account: Control and reporting unit for budgeting and accounting.

This definition is from the Glossary in our Congressional Deskbook. Perfect reference tool of Congressional jargon and procedural terms. Congressional Deskbook: The Practical and Comprehensive Guide to Congress, by Michael Koempel and Judy Schneider.

TheCapitol.Net offers training and a Certificate in Congressional Operations and Federal Budgeting. We show you how Washington and Congress work. ^TM

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April 24, 2010 06:07 PM   Link    Tips and Terms    Comments (0)

Energy: Ethanol: The Production and Use of Biofuels, Biodiesel, and Ethanol; Agriculture-Based Renewable Energy Production Including Corn and Sugar; and More

Energy: Ethanol

Energy: Ethanol
The Production and Use of Biofuels, Biodiesel, and Ethanol; Agriculture-Based Renewable Energy Production Including Corn and Sugar; The Ethanol "Blend Wall"; Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS and RFS2); Cellulosic Biofuels; 2007 Energy Bill; 2008 Farm Bill; Food and Livestock Feed Price Inflation; Caribbean Basin Initiative; and U.S.-Brazil Energy Cooperation

Compiled by TheCapitol.Net
Authors: Brent D. Yacobucci, Randy Schnepf, Salvatore Lazzari, Megan Stubbs, Fred Sissine, Remy Jurenas, Scott A. Malcolm, Marcel Aillery, Marca Weinberg, Kelsi Bracmort, Tom Capehart, Joe Richardson, Geoffrey S. Becker, and Clare Ribando Seelk

Biofuels have grown significantly in the past few years as a component of U.S. motor fuel supply. Current U.S. biofuels supply relies primarily on ethanol produced from Midwest corn. Today, ethanol is blended in more than half of all U.S. gasoline (at the 10% level or lower in most cases). Federal policy has played a key role in the emergence of the U.S. biofuels industry in general, and the corn ethanol industry in particular. U.S. biofuels production is supported by federal and state policies that include minimum usage requirements, blending and production tax credits, an import tariff to limit importation of foreign-produced ethanol, loans and loan guarantees to facilitate the development of biofuels production and distribution infrastructure, and research grants.

Since the late 1970s, U.S. policy makers at both the federal and state levels have enacted a variety of incentives, regulations, and programs to encourage the production and use of agriculture-based renewable energy. Motivations cited for these legislative initiatives include energy security concerns, reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, and raising domestic demand for U.S.-produced farm products.

Ethanol and biodiesel, the two most widely used biofuels, receive significant government support under federal law in the form of mandated fuel use, tax incentives, loan and grant programs, and certain regulatory requirements.

Ethanol plays a key role in policy discussions about energy, agriculture, taxes, and the environment. In the United States it is mostly made from corn; in other countries it is often made from cane sugar. Fuel ethanol is generally blended in gasoline to reduce emissions, increase octane, and extend gasoline stock.

U.S. policy to expand the production of biofuel for domestic energy use has significant implications for agriculture and resource use. While ongoing research and development investment may radically alter the way biofuel is produced in the future, for now, corn-based ethanol continues to account for most biofuel production. As corn ethanol production increases, so does the production of corn. The effect on agricultural commodity markets has been national, but commodity production adjustments, and resulting environmental consequences, vary across regions. Changes in the crop sector have also affected the cost of feed for livestock producers.

2010, 444 pages
ISBN: 1587331918 ISBN 13: 978-1-58733-191-6
Softcover book: $25

For more information, see TCNEthanol.com

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April 23, 2010 01:07 PM   Link    Publications    Comments (0)

Persuading Congress: How to Spend Less and Get More from Congress: Candid Advice for Executives

Persuading Congress

Persuading Congress
How to Spend Less and Get More from Congress: Candid Advice for Executives

By Joseph Gibson

Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.

What happens in Congress affects all of our lives and extends into every corner of the economy. Because so much is at stake there, businesses and other interest groups spend billions of dollars each year trying to influence legislation.

Yet, most of these efforts are doomed to futility from the outset. Only a small percentage of the bills introduced in Congress actually become law, and most interested parties do not fully understand why those few bills succeed. More importantly, how to get Congress to do what they want remains a mystery to them.

This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction.

Because you have limited time, this book sticks to the basics and its chapters are short so that it can be digested rapidly.

2010, 150 pages

Hardbound, $27
ISBN 10: 158733-173-X
ISBN 13: 978-1-58733-173-2

Softcover, $24
ISBN 10: 158733-164-0
ISBN 13: 978-1-58733-164-0

For more information, see PersuadingCongress.com

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April 23, 2010 11:17 AM   Link    Publications    Comments (0)

Media Relations 101 for Public Affairs Professionals, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net, May 4, 2010

Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals
How to develop your message, press release, media kit, and communications plan.

This course is designed to help newer public or government affairs professionals. Our media training explores essential skills to help maximize your message in the Washington media environment. Instruction includes hands-on exercises, an overview of key media players, basic message development, and effective press release and media kit preparation.

Students then put everything together to form a powerful communications plan involving both the Internet and traditional message distribution. Students also gain a core understanding of basic crisis communication planning.

Tuesday, May 4, 2010, 8:30 am to 4:30 pm.

Approved for 0.7 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW), Washington, DC (McPherson Square station)

This is an elective course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see MediaRelations101.com

Continue reading "Media Relations 101 for Public Affairs Professionals, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net, May 4, 2010"

April 22, 2010 10:17 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Assorted Links 4/22/10

Seat Selection




The Hollywood Stars of the Hollywood Politicians--Reagan, Arnold, Murphy, Temple (videos)

• Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals, May 4, 2010
• Advanced Media Relations, May 5, 2010
• Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, May 6, 2010
• Crisis Communications Training, May 7, 2010
• Understanding Congressional Budgeting and Appropriations, May 13, 2010
• Strategies for Working with Congress: Effective Communication and Advocacy on Capitol Hill, May 21, 2010
• Congress in a Nutshell: Understanding Congress, June 3, 2010
• Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process, June 4, 2010
• Capitol Hill Workshop, June 9-11, 2010
• Wi-Fi Classroom - How to Find, Track, and Monitor Congressional Documents: Going Beyond Thomas, June 24, 2010
• Wi-Fi Classroom - How to Research and Compile Legislative Histories: Searching for Legislative Intent, June 25, 2010
• Persuading Congress: Candid Advice for Executives - "Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.
  
  This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction."
• The public choice economics of spending cuts - "The column also offers up some general reasons for considering spending cuts and not just tax increases. Maybe Arnold Kling won't like this column, but when I look around the globe for episodes of successful spending restraint I see Canada, Finland, Sweden, and now possibly (probably) Ireland, which is in the midst of fiscal restructuring. I see change coming from elites and I see relatively left-wing governments (Ireland, admittedly, is harder to classify) which are trusted by their citizens. The Greek government, in contrast, doesn't operate with the same level of social cohesion and thus it is likely to fail.
  
  I believe the 'social trust' scenario for spending cuts is overlooked because it raises the relative status of groups which people who favor spending cuts do not wish to raise.
  . . .
  The Timothy Lewis book ['In the Long Run We’re All Dead: The Canadian Turn to Fiscal Restraint'], by the way, deserves far more attention than it has received."
• A Rape Accusation At Brown - "Brown University is being sued by a former student, William McCormick III, over its handling of a charge of rape on campus. Because of McCormick's allegations, the case is bound to attract major publicity. In court papers, he argues that the female student was reluctant to name him, and that Brown officials yelled at her, pressing her to escalate her initial complaint (that he was following her) into a rape complaint, written by her with the help of her resident coordinator. The court papers also argue that the father of the alleged victim, a Brown alumnus and donor, made phone calls to top university officials, which led to a private settlement: if he withdrew from Brown, she would not file criminal charges.
  
  Neither the accuser nor the university reported the alleged crime to Providence police or campus police. McCormick, who later rejected the deal with the university, says Brown failed to follow its own disciplinary policies. The lawsuit claims that Brown interfered with his access to potential witnesses and refused to provide documents that might exonerate him."
• Now charlatans will know to beware the geeks - "A year ago, I went to a London pub to speak at a meeting for the apparently doomed cause of libel reform. Simon Singh had written an article which was true and important about the dangers of the quack therapy of chiropractic healing. Then, like so many authors and publishers before him, he learned English law persecuted rather than protected honest argument and that he was in trouble.
  
  The British Chiropractic Association was suing him for saying that there was 'not a jot of evidence' that its members could help sick children by manipulating babies' spines in accordance with the teachings of a more-than-usually nutty American faith healer.
  
  Well-run societies do not defend men who make money from worried parents and, more seriously, fob off their children with bogus 'cures'. In his wisdom, however, Mr Justice Eady decided that the law would intervene to silence a debate on public health and ruled that it would not be enough for Singh to show that there was no reliable evidence that alleged treatments worked, which Singh would have difficulty in doing because there wasn't. Because he had written that the chiropractic association 'happily promotes bogus treatments', the judge said he had to jump the insuperable barrier of proving that the therapists were lying rather than merely deluded and face costs of £500,000 or more if he failed.
  . . .
  One year on, the Singh case has led to the Court of Appeal issuing the most ringing defence of freedom of speech in living memory. Senior judges, who previously had not appeared to have known the difference between John Milton and Milton Keynes, quoted from 'Areopagitica' as they severely limited the ability of libel lawyers to censor scientific debate. The BCA realised that it could not hope to win and dropped its case. The Lib Dems, Labour and the Tories responded to an outcry which was turning into a popular movement and included commitments to libel reform in their manifestos. We're not there yet, but a hopeless cause has become a national issue."
• Robert McCartney’s Love Affair with Government - "Washington Post columnist Robert McCartney says he 'differ[s] strenuously with the [Tea Party] protesters on about 95 percent of the issues.' Considering that the closest thing to an official center of the Tea Party movement, the Tea Party Patriots network, says that it seeks 'public policy consistent with our three core values of Fiscal Responsibility, Constitutionally Limited Government and Free Markets,' that’s disappointing to hear.
  . . .
  Unfortunately, it is a constant frustration to McCartney and his Post colleagues that, as economist Gregory Clark bemoaned that same day in a Post guest column, 'The United States was founded, essentially, on resistance to taxes, and to this day, an aversion to the grasping hand of the state seems fundamental to the American psyche.>br>. . .
  McCartney also writes, 'The tea party has been called an heir of Alabama’s segregationist governor George Wallace. It certainly shares his anti-government worldview, if not his aggressive racism.' This is just a smear. McCartney acknowledges that he didn’t find any racism at the Tea Party he attended. I doubt that most of the Tea Partiers even know who George Wallace was. And I’m not sure McCartney does, either, as Wallace was certainly not “anti-government' in any coherent way. He was a big-spending, 'soak the rich' populist, both as governor and as presidential candidate."
• The Party's Over: China's Endgame - "On October 1 last year, China’s Communist Party celebrated the country’s National Day, marking the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic. As they did ten years before, senior leaders put on a military parade of immense proportions in their majestic capital of Beijing. Like the Olympic Games in 2008, the parade was a perfectly executed and magnificently staged spectacle, but instead of international fellowship, the theme was the power of China’s ruling organization and the rise of the Chinese nation.
  
  But did Beijing need two hundred thousand soldiers and school children to demonstrate its strength or ascendancy? The dominant narrative about China today is that it will, within a few short decades, become the preeminent power in the international system. Its economy, according to the conventional wisdom, was the first to recover from the global downturn and will eventually go on to become the world’s largest. Geopolitical dominance will inevitably follow.
  . . .
  So will ours be the Chinese century? Probably not. China has just about reached high tide, and will soon begin a long painful process of falling back. The most recent period of China’s fast growth began with Deng’s Southern Tour in early 1992, the event that signaled the restarting of reforms after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Fortunately for the Communist Party of China, this event coincided with the beginning of an era wherein political barriers to trade were falling and globalization was kicking into high gear, which set the table for a period of tremendous wealth generation.
  . . .
  China’s economic model, which allowed the Chinese to take maximum advantage of boom times, is particularly ill suited to current global conditions. About 38 percent of the country’s economy is attributable to exports--some say the figure is higher--but global demand at this moment is slumping. (Last March, the normally optimistic World Bank said the global economy would contract in 2009 for the first time since World War II and that global trade would decline the most it had in eighty years.) Globalization, which looked like an inevitable trend in early 2008, is now obviously going into reverse as economies are delinking from each other. So China is now held hostage to events far beyond the country’s borders.
  . . .
  So the Chinese economy, once in an upward super-cycle, is now headed on a downward trajectory. Beijing’s leaders had the opportunity to fix these problems in a benign period of growth, but they did not because they were unable or unwilling to challenge a rigid political system that inhibits adaptation to changing circumstances. Their failure to implement sensible policies highlights an inherent weakness in the system of Chinese governance, not just a single economic misstep at a particular moment in history.
  . . .
  In addition to its outdated economic model, China faces a number of other problems, including banks with unacknowledged bad loans on their books, trade friction arising from mercantilist policies, a pandemic of defective products and poisonous foods, a grossly underfunded and inadequate social security system, a society that is rapidly aging as a result of the brutally enforced one-child policy, a rising tide of violent crime, a monumental environmental crisis, ever-worsening corruption, and failing schools and other social services. These are just the most important difficulties.
  
  Worse yet, even if the Communist Party could solve each of these specific problems in short order, it would still face one insurmountable challenge. The economic growth and progress of the last three decades, which makes so many observers believe in the inevitability of China’s rise, is actually a dagger pointed at the heart of the country’s one-party state."
• A Theory on Why the SEC Hit Goldman - "The theory goes that the SEC slammed Goldman hard in order to push the case of R. Allen Stanford -- who ran a $7 billion Ponzi scheme -- out of the headlines. The SEC delayed investigating Stanford for 13 years."
• A Modern Greek Tragedy May Soon Turn Into a Broader PIIGS Disaster - "Public debt sustainability has exploded as a serious issue in advanced economies, most notably in the eurozone’s 'PIIGS'--Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain--but also in many larger OECD economies, including the United States. These issues within the eurozone stem primarily from a loss of competiveness, high wage growth and labor costs which outstripped productivity, undisciplined fiscal policies and, crucially, the appreciation of the euro between 2002 and 2008."
• Start-Up Rents Out Tokyo's Tight Spaces - "Japan is famous for its ability to make the most of limited space. The cocoon-like capsule hotels were first developed here and many single city dwellers live in tiny studio apartments known as rabbit hutches.
  
  Now, a new online real-estate marketplace is taking that trait to new levels. Nokisaki.com, named after the Japanese word for the space that juts out from the edge of a building, seeks pockets of 'dead space' around cities and converts them into short-term rental property.
  . . .
  Those spaces can be reserved at Nokisaki for short periods of time--starting from three hours--and for as little as $15 total. The spots are granted on a first-come, first-served basis and the rental times and prices are set by landlords."
• And People Trust Government? - "I have total sympathy with those who distrust corporations. Distrust and skepticism are fine things, and are critical foundations to individual responsibility. History proves that market mechanisms tend to weed out bad behaviors, but sometimes these corrections can take time, and in the mean time its good to watch out for oneself.
  
  However, I can’t understand how these same people who distrust the power of large corporations tend to throw all their trust and faith into government. The government tends to have more power (it has police and jails after all, not to mention sovereign immunity), is way larger, and the control mechanisms and incentives that supposedly might check bad behavior in governments seldom work."
• Joe Klein: The Howling Beast on the Borderline Separating Speech From Sedition, Since at Least 2009 - "Since sedition is a legal term, I don't know how Klein concludes that 'seditious speech' is 'not illegal,' but the important thing here is that there's a lot of the stuff out there.
  . . .
  The 'borderline' formulation is a transparent dodge; I am confident Klein's intellect is sufficiently razor-sharp to determine whether someone has crossed the legal threshold of sedition or not. And I would think that if you're a journalist playing the S-card--that is, if you're a free speech practitioner invoking one of the most notorious anti-free speech categories of law--you should at least have the basic stones to state definitively which of the people you disagree with should be locked up."
• Waco - "With President Clinton wagging his finger at the Tea Party movement and claiming that the movement is inciting violence, it is worthwhile to remember the role the Clinton administration in perpetrating and covering up numerous violent and other crimes at Waco. The subject is treated at length in my book, co-authored with Paul Blackman, No More Wacos: What’s Wrong with Federal Law Enforcement and How to Fix It.
  . . .
  Just to be clear to the trolls who comment without reading: The book describes the Branch Davidian false prophet Vernon Wayne Howell (a/k/a David Koresh) as a predatory sociopath and a criminal. And of course nothing in the book attempts to justify that other sociopath Timothy McVeigh. Nor does the book claim that federal agents deliberately started the fatal fire, although it does point out that before the fire began, at least some of the victims had already been killed by the CS chemical warfare bombardment and tank attack."
• Storytelling in Warren Buffet Shareholder Letter - "Sing a country song in reverse, and you will quickly recover your car, house and wife."
• Our socially concerned business leaders - "To summarize the modus operandi: Place huge bets that mortgage portfolios will suffer losses in value. Then plow millions into advocacy efforts whose effect is to worsen those losses. Maybe this is business as usual in some sense, but it’s curious to imagine lauding Paulson for his public-spiritedness."
• Kudos to Mike Munger - "Duke University political science professor and Libertarian candidate for NC governor Mike Munger responds to an op-ed by Chris Fitzsimon in the News & Observer that argued taxes are what we pay for civil society and we should therefore be grateful for what we get. Munger's gem:
  
  Slave-owners in the old South were genuinely surprised, and hurt, when their ungrateful slaves ran off after the Civil War. After all, the slave-owners had fed, clothed, housed and in some cases educated the slave in blacksmithing or other trades.
  
  The point is that the slave-owners came up with elaborate lists that said, 'Look at all the things Master does for you. Why aren't you grateful?' And those lists looked, well, pretty much exactly like the Fitzsimon article.
  
  I say you keep your services, I'll keep my taxes, and we'll just call it even."
• NY Times: Up to 300,000 public school jobs could be cut - "These cuts will make the employment situation worse. This is also a reminder that the Federal stimulus spending peaks in Q2, and then starts to decline in Q3."
• The Timing of Political Points - "We hear …
  
  A NY based news source is preparing a FOIA request of the entire SEC related to potential SEC -- White House -- DNC collusion.
  
  Stay tuned.
  . . .
  Wow, things really escalated quickly."
• Would the U.S. Shoot Down an Israeli Jet? Top Officer Won’t Say - "I’m not going to make a big deal of this, although some dug deep in the trenches of the Middle East debate might. But America’s top military officer wouldn’t rule the possibility today of U.S. forces firing on Israeli jets, if Israel launched a pre-emptive strike on Iran.
  
  In a town hall on the campus of the University of West Virginia, a young Air Force ROTC cadet asked Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen to respond to a 'rumor.' If Israel decided to attack Iran, the speculation went, those jet would need to fly through Iraqi airspace to reach their targets. That airspace is considered a 'no-fly' zone by the American military. So might U.S. troops shoot down the Israeli jets, the airmen asked the chairman, if they breached that airspace?
  
  Mullen tried to sidestep the question. 'We have an exceptionally strong relationship with Israel. I’ve spent a lot of time with my counterpart in Israel. So we also have a very clear understanding of where we are. And beyond that, I just wouldn’t get into the speculation of what might happen and who might do what. I don’t think it serves a purpose, frankly,' he said. 'I am hopeful that this will be resolved in a way where we never have to answer a question like that.'"

Further Adventures in Lawyer Advertising: 'That Hellhole You Call a Marriage'




Harvard Sailing Team - Boys Will Be Girls

• I Provide A Helpful Disclaimer - "On the topic of Tea Parties, anger and Bill Clinton Michael Moynihan of Reason offers this:
  . . .
  The fertilizer I spread around here will not explode. Just so you know."
  
• A Religious, Cultural, and Personal Right To Eat Bacon -- Even When Your Foster Parents Don’t Allow It in Their Home - "The CFS decision described in the letter strikes me as quite unjustifiable. True, some parents’ religious practices might indeed make them unsuitable as foster parents, especially given that the foster care system probably can’t carefully tailor each placement to the child’s and parents’ preferences. But an insistence that the child not bring pork into the home -- the only item that the letter mentioned -- strikes me as a modest imposition on the child, one that doesn’t require the child (for instance) to actually say prayers or engage in rituals that belong to a religion that he doesn’t share, or require the child to forego things that are genuinely deeply valuable to the child’s happiness. Such house rules appear to me to be well within the discretion that foster parents should normally be allowed to run their home as they like, even while they share their home with a foster child that’s placed with them by the government. That CFS is balking at this particular rule thus seems likely to me to stem from hostility to the religious nature of the parents’ beliefs, and not from a sense that a child’s 'religious, cultural and personal rights' indeed include the right to have pork in his home when his foster parents insist otherwise."
  
• Euroschirm Trek: Budget trekking umbrella - "At 10 ½ inches long closed and 8 ½ ounces, the [Euroschirm - Eberhard] Trek’s bigger and heftier than the previously reviewed Knirps umbrella, but also less expensive. It also costs less than the previously reviewed Go-Lite umbrella. Forget about parkas and pants, umbrellas are the way."
  
• Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
  
• Common Market Food Co-op - "Common Market Food Co-op was a 'new wave food co-op' located at 1329 California Street in Denver, Colorado, from 1975 - 1980. It started as a buying club at the University of Denver in the early 1970s, and for a few years prior to moving to the old Safeway at 13th and California Streets, Common Market operated out of a small storefront on Champa Street."
  
• The Cost of Counterfeits? GAO Doesn't Know - "Among those who concern themselves with all things counterfeit, it's been an open secret for some time: Despite the massive numbers thrown around, nobody really knows how large the counterfeit trade is in monetary terms, or the extent to which it affects the targeted industries or the national economy as a whole. The number most frequently thrown around is $200 billion, the amount of money that U.S. businesses allegedly lose to counterfeiting each year. But when the the U.S. Government Accountability Office tried to trace this number back to its source, it turns out that there is no source."
  
• Trend Toward Working More Years - "The impetus to work longer is going to grow because governments have overpromised on old age benefits and are going to be too poor to deliver. The tax increases needed to make good on all those promises would be too large and would elicit too much opposition among those still working. So I expect retirement ages to be raised and benefits cut. My advice: plan your career so that you have a path that'll allow you to keep working at a bearable job until you are 70 or older.
  
  Office jobs are easier for aging bodies and since more people are doing office jobs more can keep working. Working in one's 60s is a lot harder to do in construction. I know guys having a hard time with construction in their 50s due to work injuries.
  . . .
  Time to start planning for a longer life."
  
• Publish or Perish - "Jane Friedman, who served as president and C.E.O. of HarperCollins, left in 2008 and established Open Road Integrated Media, an e-book venture. She plans to acquire electronic rights to backlists, sign up new authors (with fifty-per-cent profit-sharing), and form a self-publishing division. 'The publishers are afraid of a retailer that can replace them,' Friedman said. 'An author needs a publisher for nurturing, editing, distributing, and marketing. If the publishers are cutting back on marketing, which is the biggest complaint authors have, and Amazon stays at eighty per cent of the e-book market, why do you need the publisher?'
  
  Publishers maintain that digital companies don’t understand the creative process of books. A major publisher said of Amazon, 'They don’t know how authors think. It’s not in their DNA.' Neither Amazon, Apple, nor Google has experience in recruiting, nurturing, editing, and marketing writers. The acknowledgments pages of books are an efficiency expert’s nightmare; authors routinely thank editors and publishers for granting an extra year to complete a manuscript, for taking late-night phone calls, for the loan of a summer house. These kinds of gestures are unlikely to be welcomed in cultures built around engineering efficiencies.
  
  Good publishers find and cultivate writers, some of whom do not initially have much commercial promise. They also give advances on royalties, without which most writers of nonfiction could not afford to research new books. The industry produces more than a hundred thousand books a year, seventy per cent of which will not earn back the money that their authors have been advanced; aside from returns, royalty advances are by far publishers’ biggest expense. Although critics argue that traditional book publishing takes too much money from authors, in reality the profits earned by the relatively small percentage of authors whose books make money essentially go to subsidizing less commercially successful writers. The system is inefficient, but it supports a class of professional writers, which might not otherwise exist.
  . . .
  Publishers have another recently converted ally: Google, which not long ago they saw as a mortal threat. In October, 2004, without the permission of publishers and authors, Google announced that, through its Google Books program, it would scan every book ever published, and make portions of the scans available through its search engine. The publishing community was outraged, claiming that Google was stealing authors’ work. A consortium of publishers, along with the Authors’ Guild, filed a lawsuit, which was resolved only in the fall of 2008, when Google agreed to pay a hundred and twenty-five million dollars to authors and publishers for the use of their copyrighted material. John Sargent, who was part of the publishers’ negotiating team, said the agreement is a huge accomplishment. 'The largest player in the Internet game agreed that in order to have content you have to have a license for it and pay for it, and that the rights holder shall control the content,' he said. If the settlement is ultimately approved by the U.S. courts, Google will open an online e-books store, called Google Editions, by the middle of the year, Dan Clancy, the engineer who directs Google Books, and who will also be in charge of Google Editions, said.
  
  Clancy said that the store’s e-books, unlike those from Amazon or Apple, will be accessible to users on any device. Google Editions will let publishers set the price of their books, he said, and will accept the agency model. Having already digitized twelve million books, including out-of-print titles, Google will have a far greater selection than Amazon or Apple."
  
• A Bloody Grin and a Downpour -- Eden’s Indoor Garden Party - "I looked down at my baby -- my little chubby-sweet Eden, shaking her rattly egg and giggling a full-belly giggle, in a room packed with people who cared enough to spend a rainy afternoon helping her celebrate her first year. In the Tilty-Floored Farmhouse with its skylights and wood beams, and all the familiar echoes of home.
  
  And then we were all of us stuffed into the living room gathered around one small high chair, belting out Happy Birthday, Schmoopy wide-eyed and happy. She brought fist fulls of cake to her mouth to wild applause and cheers and I thought how very lovely is the world and how no one should ever plan anything too much.
  
  Because the stories that just happen are so much better than the ones we think should happen."
  
  Serendipity in life is grossly under appreciated.
  
  
  
• Amazon fights demand for customer records - "Amazon.com filed a lawsuit on Monday to fend off a sweeping demand from North Carolina's tax collectors: detailed records including names and addresses of customers and information about exactly what they purchased.
  
  The lawsuit says the demand violates the privacy and First Amendment rights of Amazon's customers. North Carolina's Department of Revenue had ordered the online retailer to provide full details on nearly 50 million purchases made by state residents between 2003 and 2010.
  
  Amazon is asking a federal judge in Seattle to rule that the demand is illegal, and left open the possibility of requesting a preliminary injunction against North Carolina's tax collectors.
  . . .
  Because Amazon has no offices or warehouses in North Carolina, it's not required to collect the customary 5.75 percent sales tax on shipments, although tax collectors have reminded residents that what's known as a use tax applies on anything 'purchased or received' through the mail. The dispute arose out of what had otherwise been a routine sales and use tax audit of Amazon by North Carolina's tax agency.
  . . .
  Amazon did provide the state tax collectors with anonymized information about which items were shipped to which zip codes. But North Carolina threatened to sue if the retailer did not also divulge the names and addresses linked to each order--in other words, personally identifiable information that could be used to collect additional use taxes that might be owed by state residents.
  . . .
  North Carolina's aggressive push for customer records comes as other states are experimenting with new ways to collect taxes from online retailers. California may require retailers to report the total dollar value of purchases made by each state resident, as CNET reported last month, and Colorado already has enacted such a law. A decision is expected at any time in a related case that Amazon filed against New York state.
  
  Last year, Amazon discontinued its affiliate program in North Carolina, which provides referrers with a small slice of the transaction, after the state legislature enacted a new law that would have used that program to force the company to collect sales taxes.
  
  A North Carolina legislator said at the time that the state would be able to force online retailers to collect even retroactive taxes; tax officials have reportedly sent letters to online retailers in the last few months saying they're required to pay retroactive sales taxes. Stevenson, the spokeswoman for the state tax agency, said that her office would provide a more detailed response by Friday. "
  
• Blogs about the professions and what they are like - "I'd like to get a non-glamorized, relatively even-handed inside view of other professions. I certainly would have loved to have had a few dozen of these to follow when I was trying to make career choices..."

From "Great Silence" to "Greater Love"

• New Flip camcorder jumps on touchscreen bandwagon - "Cisco has unveiled another new Flip camcorder design, a big departure from what we've become accustomed to. The Flip SlideHD has a touchscreen that lets users navigate through recorded videos and watch them in full widescreen mode, eliminating the need for traditional buttons. The screen also slides up (hence the name) to expose a 'slide strip,' though this feature is more a gimmick than anything else.
  
  The Flip SlideHD can record for up to four hours and store up to 12 hours of video in its built-in 16GB of memory. The touchscreen is 3 inches on the diagonal (the iPhone's screen is 3.5 inches, by comparison, so the Flip's is decently large) and the camera can record 720p video (1280 x 720) at 30 frames per second. The battery is a rechargeable li-ion battery that charges over USB, is not removable, and lasts for up to two hours on a charge."
• The iPad isn't a computer, it's a distribution channel - "'You don't want your phone to be an open platform...' and with that brief statement, Apple justified the closed iPhone and then quickly followed it with the monitored and controlled app store. But Steve, the iPad isn't a phone at all so why not open it up again? If people are concerned about the safety of their apps or need you to protect them from porn, you can do an 'app store approved' program or something can't you? And really, do we even need an app store to tell us which apps are good in an era of ubiquitous user feedback and preferential attachment?
  
  The thing is, Jobs' argument was always a bit disingenuous. Closed follows from his brain architecture, not from an argument on behalf of his customers or their network providers. Those are post facto justifications supporting an already-held point of view. And the reason the iPad is going to stay closed isn't because it is good for users, it's because it is good for Apple.
  
  The bottom line is that the iPhone was a relatively open phone and we accepted it, but the iPad is a relatively closed computer, and that's a bummer. Jobs probably believes that he is doing it for the users, finally giving them a post-crank-the-handle-to-start-it experience, but it doesn't take a genius to see how it benefits Apple.
  . . .
  the iPad isn't a computing device at all. Jobs is using his knack for design and user experience to build, not a better computer, but a better distribution channel. One that is controlled, constrained, and can re-take distribution as the point of monetization. You aren't buying a computer when you buy an iPad, you are buying a 16GB Walmart store shelf that fits on your lap - complete with all the supplier beat downs, slotting fees, and exclusive deals that go with it - and Apple got you to pay for the building."
• How to Skip to the Trailers & Commercials on DVDs and Blu-ray Discs - "Just press Stop, Stop, then Play on many DVDs to skip right to the movie. This method won't always work, so if it doesn't, don't give up hope! If twice doesn't work, Salon.com's Richard Rider says pressing Stop three times, followed by Play, will do the trick."
• Antimatter Triggers Largest Explosion Ever Recorded in Universe - "Late in 2009 year we witnessed the largest explosion ever recorded: a super giant star two hundred times bigger than the sun utterly obliterated by runaway thermonuclear reactions triggered by gamma ray-driven antimatter production. The resulting blast was visible for months because it unleashed a cloud of radioactive material over fifty times the size of our own star, giving off a nuclear fission glow visible from galaxies away.
  . . .
  Most astronomers today believe that one of the plausible reasons we have yet to detect intelligent life in the universe is due to the deadly effects of local supernova explosions that wipe out all life in a given region of a galaxy.
  
  While there is, on average, only one supernova per galaxy per century, there is something on the order of 100 billion galaxies in the observable Universe. Taking 10 billion years for the age of the Universe (it's actually 13.7 billion, but stars didn't form for the first few hundred million), Dr. Richard Mushotzky of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, derived a figure of 1 billion supernovae per year, or 30 supernovae per second in the observable Universe!"
  
  Now what we need is a Supernova Containment project....
  
• Scrawled in the Margins, Signs of Twain as a Critic - "By the end of his life, Samuel Langhorne Clemens had achieved fame as a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi, a globe-trotting lecturer and, of course, the literary genius who wrote 'The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn' and other works under the name Mark Twain.
  
  He was less well-known, but no less talented, as a literary critic. Proof of it has resided, mostly unnoticed, in a small library in Redding, Conn., where hundreds of his personal books have sat in obscurity for 100 years. They are filled with notes in his own cramped, scratchy handwriting. Irrepressible when he spotted something he did not like, but also impatient with good books that he thought could be better, he was often savage in his commentary.
  . . .
  For decades, Twain’s books were allowed to circulate. Some may have worn out, and in the early 1950s, when space got tight, a librarian, whose name Ms. Morgan said she did not know, weeded the shelves of books that had not been borrowed in a while. A book dealer carted off a truckload for what is believed to be $20. Only belatedly, when the books began popping up at auctions, did the library realize that it had tossed treasures and sought to safeguard what was left."
• OhGizmo! Review -- Apple iPad - "Since it was officially announced, I have openly ridiculed the iPad for its shortcomings. I’ve mocked the name (who hasn’t?), the fact that it’s just a big iPod Touch, and numerous other things. Most of all I stood resolved that I would not waste my money on one. So naturally I’m doing a review on the iPad, which I purchased for myself a little over a week ago.
  
  How did I find myself in this situation? It started when I was reading a book a couple of weeks back. The particular one was part of a trilogy, the entirety of which was compiled into one giant 1,191 page tome. It’s not the first time I’ve read the books, and once again I despised its great size. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy an epic tale, it’s the physical book I could do without. It’s tiring to hold for any real length of time (I’ll read for hours on end some days) and terrible to lug around. Thus, for perhaps the hundredth time I pondered purchasing an eReader.
  . . .
  I’ve read about a number of hacks that have been done to the Nook to give it a little more functionality, such as a web browser. Unfortunately these don’t get the best results and are novel at best. Thus I began to wish there were an eReader that could also browse the web and perhaps do a few other things. It was at this point that I realized that I wanted something more like an iPad.
  
  Now the leap from $260 to $500 (for the base iPad) isn’t exactly a small one. However, I have been considering purchasing a netbook for a little while, as I don’t always want to be lugging around my MacBook, but would still like to do some web surfing and light writing. If the iPad could replace both the e-reader and netbook, that $500 price didn’t seem so bad.
  
  Since I finally convinced myself that the iPad might actually be a worthwhile purchase, I then had to consider my options. When it came to size, I wasn’t too worried. I had no intention of putting my music collection on it, as my iPhone took care of that. The 16GB would be sufficient for a few videos and whatever else I wanted to store on it. That left the option of a 3G card. I pay for my home internet service, a 3G connection for my iPhone and a separate 3G wireless card from Sprint. I have absolutely no intention of giving anyone else money to connect to the internet. I’ll find another way to keep connected.
  
  So there you have it, my fall from grace. My purchase has made me the butt of numerous jokes from my friends, and not undeservedly so.
  . . .
  Since reading books was the primary motivation for purchasing the iPad, this was a make-or-break thing for me. I’m pleased to say that I absolutely love reading on my iPad. There are a number of apps built for reading, including the Kindle from Amazon, but I’ve pretty much stuck to Apple’s iBooks app. The bookshelf look is classy, but definitely not why I prefer it over Kindle. Honestly, graphical differences aside (the iBooks app does have a really nice looking page transition) the main draw is the built-in dictionary. You can tap-and-hold on any word to bring up a menu, and one of the selections is a dictionary. It will then bring up a definition in a separate box without leaving the page. A quick tap elsewhere on the page will take you back to your reading.
  
  I do have to say that I am a little disappointed that I cannot take notes in iBooks like you can in Kindle. If I’m not just reading for pleasure and want to take notes, then I would probably switch to Kindle for that book. I’m hoping that this is something Apple will consider adding in a future update.
  . . .
  Aside from my rant about 3G pricing, I’m pleased with the WiFi functionality in the iPad. I never have an issue connecting to my wireless network, and the speeds are perfectly acceptable. It’s the times when I’m away from a hotspot that frustrate me.
  . . .
  Am I satisfied with my purchase? Definitely. Should everyone rush out and buy one for themselves? Probably not. Whether or not this device is for you depends greatly on what you’re hoping to get out of it. If you’re looking for something to replace your laptop or even your primary PC, then this isn’t for you. It’s great for reading books, watching videos and surfing the net. So if you’re looking for a hybrid netbook/eReader, then you’ll most likely enjoy the iPad just as much as I have."
• Sprint Wants To Give Your iPad 4G Speeds - "Sprint has announced a new case for the iPad, which has a rather unique front pocket. Okay, so the pocket isn’t that unique, but rather it’s what lies inside that pocket that matters. In that pocket you can place one of their Overdrive 3G routers, which will provide an internet connection to your iPad (or any other devices) via WiFi. You’ll be able to connect up to 5 devices at once (you’ll have to authorize them so that no one leeches off of your internets) to Sprint’s 3G or 4G network, depending on your area."
• Are you still faxing? - "Well, if your office is like most law offices, you still have the trusty fax machine and a business phone line dedicated to your fax number. You may not be motivated to change that at the moment, but I hope to make you reconsider that with a few links and a few observations. Failing that, I want you to at least think about the issue and revisit this blog post when the old fax machine dies.
  
  Internet faxing (aka virtual faxing) has been around for quite a while now. Those who converted to these services years ago still maintain it was a great business decision. But the current generation of these services provides even more compelling reasons to consider a switch. First of all, you can save money. In many cases, the monthly charge for an Internet faxing service may be less than the monthly charge for the business phone line that supports the machine. Even if you have avoided having an additional business phone line for the fax with custom ring tones or some other method, it is still probably cheaper when you consider paper, toner and the cost of purchasing new fax machines-- and you will avoid a phone line being busy when sending/receiving faxes."
• This is Your Brain on Training - "A new study in Nature is calling into question whether cognitive training games/software such as CogniFit and Brain Age are actually beneficial. The study found that there was no significant difference in cognitive test performance before or after cognitive training for either the experimental or control groups.
  . . .
  As the debate rages on, people continue to spend time and money on cognitive training and talking into their Nintendo DS's in public."

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Continue reading "Assorted Links 4/22/10"

April 22, 2010 09:47 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net

Public Affairs and the Internet
Advanced Techniques and Strategies

Are you maximizing your organization's use of the Internet? The Internet is the console to all communications in the digital age. Learn how public affairs professionals must adopt new ways of thinking and working in the digital age. Effective communication requires you to evaluate where your colleagues, clients, and competitors are on the Internet adoption curve, and to adjust your messages and methods of communication accordingly. We discuss the use of email, blogs, social media, podcasting, and much more.

May 6, 2010, 9 am - 4 pm

Approved for 0.5 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW) in Washington, DC

This is an elective course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see PublicAffairsAndTheInternet.com

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April 21, 2010 09:57 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

May 2010 Legislative, Communication, and Media Training from TheCapitol.Net

Our latest email update:
http://www.thecapitol.net/PublicPrograms/email2010/email_2010_April20.html

If you don't have time to attend our live training, see our Capitol Learning Audio Courses.

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April 20, 2010 10:27 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Advanced Media Relations, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net, May 5, 2010

Advanced Media Relations

Do your competitive media campaigns target the right audience? Are you tracking and evaluating media coverage or using social media sites and the Internet to their full advantage? In this course, instructors discuss these topics and more.

Learn how to develop a communication strategy, coordinate and prepare for interviews, deal with the media hog and the media mouse, and use social media sites to your advantage. Students work with each other and our experienced faculty, discussing best practices and professional strategies for handling internal and external challenges.

Our Advanced Media Relations course is geared toward practicing public relations professionals with at least three years' experience.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010, 8:30 am to 4:30 pm.

Approved for 0.7 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW), Washington, DC (McPherson Square station)

This is an elective course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see AdvancedMediaRelations.com

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April 19, 2010 07:57 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Assorted Links 4/18/10

Bill Black: Not Dead Yet - Part 5


Governor Christie on Death Threats, the Teachers Union, and New Jersey's Budget Crisis

• Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals, May 4, 2010
• Advanced Media Relations, May 5, 2010
• Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, May 6, 2010
• Crisis Communications Training, May 7, 2010
• Understanding Congressional Budgeting and Appropriations, May 13, 2010
• Strategies for Working with Congress: Effective Communication and Advocacy on Capitol Hill, May 21, 2010
• Congress in a Nutshell: Understanding Congress, June 3, 2010
• Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process, June 4, 2010
• Capitol Hill Workshop, June 9-11, 2010
• Wi-Fi Classroom - How to Find, Track, and Monitor Congressional Documents: Going Beyond Thomas, June 24, 2010
• Wi-Fi Classroom - How to Research and Compile Legislative Histories: Searching for Legislative Intent, June 25, 2010
• Persuading Congress: Candid Advice for Executives - "Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.
  
  This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction."
• Guest Post: Prospectus For The United States - Would You Invest? - "The tables summarizing our accounts are, of course, terrifying but nothing compared to our Risk Factors, which include:
  
  * Improper payments by the Federal government continue to increase despite the Improper Payments Information Act of 2002.
  
  * Material weakness from ineffective internal controls over financial reporting that resulted in a disclaimer of opinion by the Government Accountability Office.
  
  * The dollar may not continue to enjoy reserve currency status and may decline in the future.
  
  * The Federal Reserve, as part of its response to the financial crisis, may be exposed to signifcant credit risk.
  
  * Foreign official institutions hold a significant amount of U.S. Government debt.
  
  * The United States is the dominant geopolitical power and has significant overseas commitments.
  
  * The Government is exposed to large contingent liabilities from its intervention on behalf of various financial institutions during the 2008-2009 crisis.
  
  * Mandatory outlays for retirement insurance and health care are expected to increase substantially in future years.
  
  * Ratings agencies may withdraw or downgrade the U.S. Government’s current AAA/Aaa rating without notice.
  
  * The U.S. economy is heavily indebted at all levels, despite recent de-leveraging.
  
  * U.S. states and municipalities are experiencing severe economic distress and may require intervention from the Federal government.
  
  * Elected officials may not take necessary steps to ensure long-term debt sustainability and may take actions counter to the interests of bondholders."
• Small Business Optimism "Very Low and Headed in the Wrong Direction” - "If the US economy was about to reach 'escape velocity' as Larry Summers says, small business optimism would not be in the gutter and sinking.
  
  Thus, proof that Larry Summers is in Fantasyland can be found in a NFIB report that shows Small Business Optimism Declines in March."
• Georgia Insurance Commissioner Balks at Request on New Health Law - "The insurance commissioner of Georgia has chosen not to comply with a federal request to create a state pool for high-risk insurance plans, opening a new front in the resistance by state Republican officials to the new federal health care law."
• The California Tax Break Window – Combining California Tax Credit with Federal Credit for $18,000 in Tax Credits. Southern California Housing Update. Giving $200 Million in Home Buyer Tax Credits While the State has a $20 Billion Budget Gap. - "California in its infinite wisdom is allocating $200 million in tax credits for home buyers. This is a very generous credit since existing home owners can use the $10,000 credit on a new home and new buyers can use it on either an existing home purchase or a new property. And for a limited time, you will be able to combine the California tax credit with the expiring $8,000 federal credit (if you close escrow between May 1st and June 30th) for a stunning $18,000 reduction in taxes. But of course, most typical families will not use every penny of this credit and it is really a boost to a segment of our population that is doing better in this economic crisis (maybe we want to look at the 15 million unemployed first?). Do we also need to point out that California will now have $200 million less to plug the $20 billion budget gap?
  . . .
  So last month, roughly 40 percent of all home purchases in SoCal were FHA insured meaning absolutely rock bottom down payments. Another 27 percent were all cash buyers and I would imagine many are buying out in areas like the Inland Empire as investors. Most are looking to flip and this game is getting thin because the rental market is flooded in these areas. Investors are not looking to hold and are aiming to find a diamond in the rough, shine it up, and make some money on it quickly. This is the bulk from what I have seen. We do have cash flow investors in California but not many."
• Is making public data more accessible a threatening act? - "InfoUSA. Imagine a thought experiment where I downloaded the income, charitable donations, pets and military service information for all 89,000 Boulder residents listed in InfoUSA's marketing database, and put that information up in a public web page. That's obviously pretty freaky, but absolutely anyone with $7,000 to spare can grab exactly the same information! That intuitive reaction is very hard to model. Is it because at the moment someone has to make more of an effort to get that information? Do we actually prefer that our information is for sale, rather than free? Or are we just comfortable with a 'privacy through obscurity' regime?" ht O'Reilly Radar
• "Contempt of cop" - "People are regularly charged with public disorderly conduct, breach of peace, or interference with a police officer and arrested and imprisoned by police officers for questioning their authority, asking questions, using profanity, or doing anything in general that pisses off the cop. Many people may not realize that all of the above is protected conduct under the First Amendment, unless the person's conduct arises to the level of 'fighting words,' which is defined by the U.S. and S.C. Supreme Courts as conduct or words that would tend to immediately incite violence.
  
  This has been the law according to the United States and South Carolina Supreme Courts for over 30 years, and it is well established. The police know that this is the law - they are specifically trained on First Amendment law at the academy and they are told that they cannot arrest a person for speech unless the person speaking is causing violence.
  
  Despite this, they also know that most people can not afford to retain an attorney - that they will plead guilty to the misdemeanor charge in the morning and most likely pay a fine. They know that they have made their point - piss me off and you will spend the night in jail. Attorneys call it 'contempt of cop' - analogizing to 'contempt of court,' where a judge can put you in jail if you disrupt the courtroom. Police are not judges, and they have no such power.
  
  This widespread practice of police is an abuse of power. The problem is a lack of training, a lack of supervision, a lack of discipline in the police departments that allow it to happen."
• One more bad apple - "Given the recent slew of blog posts around the country on police abuse, this latest story is timely. Just another bad apple, the batch is fine:
  
  A Streamwood police officer has been charged with aggravated battery and official misconduct after a camera mounted on his squad car dashboard caught him repeatedly beating a motorist with his baton, prosecutors said.
  
  James Mandarino, 41, beat the motorist 15 times as the man knelt on the ground March 28, according to Assistant Cook County State's Atty. Alexander Vroustouris. The man received seven stitches to his ear and was treated for a concussion and multiple contusions, abrasions and bruises, Vroustouris said.
  
  'At no time during the time period when the defendant is beating the victim with his baton does the video reflect that the victim had anything in his hands, nor does the video reflect the victim making any threatening motions toward the defendant,' said Vroustouris. 'The victim is completely compliant.'"
  
  Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1joImpo4l0
  
  
• University of Maryland Beating Editorial - "McKenna was fortunate that his family had the resources to hire a private investigator to find the video. Not everyone is so lucky, and it makes the case for changing Maryland’s unanimous consent law for recording conversations, as this case highlights. Laws that prevent the recording of interactions with police prevent transparency in what is supposed to be an open and free society."
• Filing For Bankruptcy, Setting It To Music - "If banks are 'too big to fail' does that mean the rest of us are just the right size?"
• Washington Post "Shopping Guide" is a very wasteful - "If you live in the Washington, DC, area, you probably receive 'The Washington Post 'Shopping Guide'' in your mailbox.
  
  Or in the case of some of us, it is shoved through a mail slot, where it scatters all over the floor, and is a royal pain to pick up. Especially if you have a physical handicap.
  
  We have several acquaintances who have attempted to stop delivery of this hugely wasteful mailing, to no avail. And so have others: see 'If You Don’t Get It, Good!' in the Washington City Paper, by Erik Wemple, September 25, 2008.
  
  They have been unable to find a 'remove me from this list' option anywhere on the Washington Post site or the Washington Post Ads site, and thus this hugely wasteful mass of paper continues."
• Obama's nuke summit dangerously delusional - "In years to come -- assuming, for the purposes of argument, there are any years to come -- scholars will look back at President Barack Obama's Nuclear Security Summit and marvel. For once, the cheap comparisons with 1930s appeasement barely suffice: To be sure, in 1933, the great powers were meeting in Geneva and holding utopian arms-control talks even as Hitler was taking office in Berlin. But it's difficult to imagine Neville Chamberlain in 1938 hosting a conference on the dangers of rearmament, and inviting America, France, Brazil, Liberia and Thailand ...but not even mentioning Germany.
  
  Yet that's what Obama just did: He held a nuclear gabfest in 2010, the biggest meeting of world leaders on American soil since the founding of the United Nations 65 years ago -- and Iran wasn't on the agenda.
  . . .
  Iran has already offered to share its nuclear technology with Sudan. Sudan? Ring a vague bell? Remember that 'Save Darfur' interpretative-dance fundraiser you went to, where someone read out a press release from George Clooney, and you all had a simply marvelous time? Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed -- with machetes. That's pretty labor-intensive. In the Congo, five and a half million have been slaughtered -- and, again, in impressively primitive ways.
  
  But a nuclear Sudan would be a model of self-restraint?
  
  By the way, that's another example of the self-indulgent irrelevance of Obama. The mound of corpses being piled up around the world today is not from high-tech nuclear states but from low-tech psycho states. It's not that Britain has nukes, and poor old Sudan has to make do with machetes. It's that the machete crowd are willing to kill on an industrial scale, and the high-tech guys can't figure out a way to stop them. Perhaps for his next pointless yakfest the president might consider a machete nonproliferation initiative.
  . . .
  As we learned the hard way in Iraq and Afghanistan, stupid, ill-trained illiterates with primitive explosives who don't care who they kill can inflict quite a lot of damage on the technologically advanced highly trained warriors of civilized states. That's the 'asymmetric warfare' that matters. So virtuously proclaiming oneself opposed to nuclear modernization ensures a planet divided into civilized states with unusable weapons and barbarous regimes happy to kill with whatever's to hand."
• High-achieving students sailing through life without a degree - "Ponting is one of a new breed of high-achieving students who have looked hard at what higher education has to offer and decided that the innovative new courses available at their local further education college are plenty good enough.
  . . .
  so if high-achieving non-graduates are now able to get the same type of job as those who have a degree, why is higher education still seen as the be-all and end-all?
  
  Parental aspirations and pressure from teachers could be part of the reason, if a survey by student advice website www.notgoingtouni.co.uk is to be believed.
  
  Nearly three-quarters of 1,180 A-level pupils surveyed by the site said they felt going to university was viewed as a necessity rather than a choice. Over half said that parents contributed to this feeling, while a fifth said pressure from school was to blame."
• Switch College Admissions to a Single Lottery - "Now consider for a second that you are a high school junior and you see these rates. It’s becoming easier than ever to apply for multiple schools, so what is your rational course of action?
  
  You’re going to apply for tons of schools, thinking that at least one will let you in. And the next year, when the acceptance rates go even lower (they’ve been falling for years), students will apply to even more schools. The chances of any one student getting into any one school will become smaller and smaller, even as the number of spaces at those schools keeps pace with demographic changes. The spaces themselves are not becoming more scarce; it’s the admissions craze that’s making them look that way.
  . . .
  The medical residency program was solved by a coordinated matching system. All students and schools submitted their preferences to a national non-profit designed specifically for this purpose. Schools got their seats filled, and students were placed in one and only one university. There were no more waiting lists, no more lottery-like admissions processes held at individual schools. The system has been in place with few changes ever since.
  
  To work for colleges and universities, they would have to see a problem. They would have to begin to understand that their admissions department cannot continue to grow apace with applications. It’s simply too arbitrary of a process when Harvard gets more valedictorians and more students with perfect SAT scores than they have available seats.
  
  Next, they would have to accept that the admissions process is no longer about crafting the perfect freshman class as if each student was a Lego piece in a giant, fragile sculpture that would collapse without the perfect amount of Florida students, or oboists, or whatever else. We’re way beyond that now.
  
  Then, they would have to form some common admissions unit. Each school could submit their cutoff SAT scores and high school GPA. Students would apply to this third-party unit and list their preferences in order, and then a calculation would be run that would place students and fill school slots. Similar matching systems are run for 90,000 students applying for New York City public high schools, for the medical residency program, for fraternities and sororities, for kidney exchanges, and for college football bowl match-ups. It’ would not be impossible to create one for colleges and universities, and it would put an end to the madness we know as the college admissions process."

The voices behind the Simpsons

• Beyond parody: Lerach plans to teach law at Irvine - "Released from prison, the felonious class-actioneer plans to join Dean Erwin Chemerinsky’s left-leaning new University of California law school to lecture students on the topic of 'Regulation of Free Market Capitalism -- Why Have We Failed?'. He also apparently intends to claim the time spent in this propagandistic effort toward his community service obligation."
• Research Finds STEM Classes Have Lower Grades, Higher Dropouts - "Research recently presented at the Cornell Higher Education Research Institute conference shows that low grades in introductory STEM -- science, technology, engineering and mathematics -- classes “push” students away from their STEM majors. Ben Ost grad conducted the study, which demonstrates how grading gaps between science and non-science courses encourage higher STEM dropout rates.
  . . .
  While some students in his sophomore-level engineering courses changed majors after receiving low grades, Prof. Nicholas Zabaras, mechanical and aerospace engineering, said dropout rates in higher-level classes were near zero because juniors and seniors know what to expect.
  
  When asked about the necessity of difficult grading in STEM courses, Zabaras said, 'Do you want to fly on a plane that was designed by someone who is lazy? Do you want a doctor who is clueless? The problem should not be addressed at the university level; it should be addressed in high school.'"
  
  Uh oh. We need grade inflation in STEM courses!
  
  
• Turning the Other Cheek: North Face v. South Butt - "St. Louis-area native Jimmy Winkelmann, now a freshman at the University of Missouri Columbia, started The South Butt to help pay for college. When The North Face's trademark action against Jimmy and retailer Williams Pharmacy followed, Jimmy's attorneys offered a highly original and colorful answer, including at least 7 non-salacious synonyms for 'butt' and reproducing the company's 'disclaimer':
  
  We are not in any fashion related to nor do we wish to be confused with The North Face Apparel Corp. or its products sold under 'The North Face' brand. If you are unable to discern the difference between a face and a butt, we encourage you to buy North Face products."
• Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
• Common Market Food Co-op - "Common Market Food Co-op was a 'new wave food co-op' located at 1329 California Street in Denver, Colorado, from 1975 - 1980. It started as a buying club at the University of Denver in the early 1970s, and for a few years prior to moving to the old Safeway at 13th and California Streets, Common Market operated out of a small storefront on Champa Street."
• The Blind Side - " I came away from these experiences more convinced than before that major, rewrite-the-rules change is imminent in this marketplace, and that some current institutions simply won’t survive in recognizable form. You should read the media accounts of the Georgetown Law Firm Evolution event, from observers like Aric Press, Rachel Zahorsky, Ron Friedmann, Greg Bufithis , and various Twitter correspondents (as well as a response from Robert Sawhney), to get a sense of the scope of change that was discussed.
  
  But for me, the penny dropped during the dinnertime address by Richard Susskind, whose remarks included a heartfelt plea for conference delegates to lead a change for the better that the profession and justice system desperately need. One of Richard’s topics was the Legal Services Act in England & Wales, and its soon-to-be-active provisions allowing alternative business structures (ABSs), including non-lawyer equity investment in law firms and legal enterprises (here’s a sampling of articles, from last September to last week, describing scenarios under which law firms might invite such investment).
  . . .
  For many other firms, though, the challenges are extremely serious. The prospect that emerges from all this is a legal services marketplace in which many law firms are simply irrelevant -- they’re not structured in ways that deliver maximum value to clients and they can’t compete with rivals that are. There was a lot of talk at the Georgetown event about whether 'BigLaw is dead,' and I have to agree with those managing partners who dismissed the notion: these firms are obviously up and about and making a great deal of money, and it’s absurd to pretend they’re dead men walking.
  
  The worry, for me, is that many firms, of all sizes, aren’t ready for the radical ways in which the playing field is about to change. Their focus is either straight ahead, on their clients, or internal, on their own condition and competitiveness. They’re like a quarterback whose gaze is either locked downfield on his receivers or focused dead ahead on the defenders in his path. As a result, he never sees the hit coming, from his blind side, that flattens him and turns the ball over to the other team. It’s not just lawyers and clients who matter anymore. New players, with an unprecedented combination of size and speed, are charging onto the playing field like a storm and rewriting the rules of the game as they come."
• Dog Gone Sinners - "Ever watch that dog whisperer fellow? Sister Mary Fiacre loves watching that man. I think she likes all the dogs. The dog whisperer is a dog trainer who has a TV show where he goes to some one's house who has an incorrigible dog and the second he gets there, the dog behaves for him. Then he has to teach the owners to treat the dog like a dog and not a furry person who eats off the floor.
  
  His motto is that the dog is a dog first, then a specific breed of dog, then your pet. Or something like that. Dogs are pack animals and once the owner understands that he is the pack leader and not the daddy of the dog, things fall into place. Just because a dog is a dog doesn't mean we allow the dog to eat our shoes."

Felony Charges for Recording a Plainclothes Officer

• Verizon and Sprint handled 16 billion more MB of data than AT&T in 2009 - "AT&T might be the first carrier you think of when you picture the largest mover of wireless data in the US, but according to a new study published by ABI Research, the honor actually belongs to Verizon. In fact, not only does Verizon beat out AT&T, but so does Sprint with the two networks having handled a grand total of 63% of wireless data in 2009. To give you a idea of how much data that equates to, last year Verizon and Sprint moved a whopping 16 billion MB (or 15,625,000 TB) more data than AT&T."
• The Number of People Giving Up TV for the Web Is Slowly Gaining Pace - "A new report estimates that some 800,000 American households now watch TV only via the Web, as the move to abandon cable, satellite or OTA broadcasts starts to gather pace. This represents a small percentage of the pay TV industry's 101 million subscribers, but the number is expected to double by the end of next year. These are the earliest adopters, though, and they account for just 3 percent of all full-episode online television viewing -- meaning that plenty of people are already supplanting their standard TV viewing with online episodes. It's clear already (and has been for some time) that TV viewers are undertaking a fundamental change in how they want to access and view content. The combination of the Web and DVRs allowing on-demand viewing has made the linear TV channel something of an outdated concept, and at some point, TV providers will need to realize that on-demand shows are now how a growing number of people want to receive their programming."
• Prexiso X2 Laser Distance Measurer - "The X2 measures with an accuracy ≤ ± 1/8″ over a range of 4″ to 100′. It can display the results in feet & inches, inches, or meters. It also -- as you might expect from this company -- calculates: areas, volumes, and, via Pythagoras, indirect measurements of height (measure to top; measure to bottom; it solves for height) or width (measure near point; measure far point; it solves for width) -- you measure two sides of a right triangle, and it calculates the third side."
• Consumers Like Medical Toys Too - "A new segment of medical technology has been born and its infantile life is being coddled and shaped -- not by incumbents in the world of healthcare technology -- but largely by entrepreneurs. They're creating products to fill a void not possible with yesterday's technology, a space previously untapped, and the early results are in: consumers are ripping open their wallets to take advantage of the benefits these products provide. The big players in the medical technology world would be smart to take notice, both for their own benefit and the benefit of consumer health.
  . . .
  Another player that has their product flying off the shelves is Fitbit, a pedometer on steroids that allows you to monitor how active your daily habits are, how many calories you're burning, and if you toss and turn in your sleep, all on a simple and attractive web interface. The data collected from the Fitbit is automatically and wirelessly synced with your computer, allowing you to never think about the device besides when it needs to be charged, a fantastically infrequent once every ten or so days. In one swoop, the Fitbit rethought the pedometer, taking the device from a simple step-counter with one readout, to a detailed accelerometer collecting a flood of data allowing a more precise glimpse into your daily activity. You'd think that a $99 pedometer might not sell well, but the current one month wait to get your hands on one says otherwise.
  
  Then there's the Withings wifi scale that automatically uploads your weight and fat composition so you can access it either through an online web application or via the device's very own iPhone application. This sort of precise tracking allows the consumers to monitor their progress and set goals over time. Again, at $159, this is a high-end scale, yet the demand is there and it's gotten significant attention, once again showing that personal data tracking is useful and consumers want an easy way to monitor their health and habits."
• More No-Depression Alt-History - "A couple of years ago I posted some speculations dealing with the alternative-history topic of what if the Great Depression had only been a normal recession. I mostly focused on possible political consequences; now, I want to ponder art, architecture, industrial design and such.
  
  Many people might assume that the Depression stifled innovation, but that might not be so. Histories of the Industrial Design field suggest that the dramatic slowdown in sales pushed many manufacturers to try almost anything to entice buyers -- including hiring those artistes such as Raymond Loewy, Norman Bel Geddes, Henry Dreyfuss and Walter Dorwin Teague for product design modernization. If this speculation is true, then the non-Depression alternative would have been, say, a much longer timeline from boxy to quasi-streamlined automobiles. ('If our stuff's selling well, what's the point in making radical changes?')
  
  On the other hand, prosperity could not have prevented consolidation in the automobile industry: that process is unavoidable, if history is any guide. But the consolidation process would surely have slowed. Also, the surviving companies might have been different. For example, Hudson was a strong seller at the end of the 1920s and, with a few judicious mergers, might have been a strong fourth after General Motors, Ford and Chrysler. Or perhaps Studebaker might have filled that role."
• Kushi Izakaya (DC) - "I am very enthusiastic about this place, which serves up surprisingly genuine Japanese menus. The omikase is only $60 and every one of the courses was excellent. Very good sashimi. Most of the restaurant is devoted to a’la carte and small courses. They cook with wood, charcoal, and sous vide, no gas. Overall the seafood is more special than the meats. Excellent décor. Right now this is one of the best places to go in [DC]."
• Gallery: 8 Tablets That Aren’t Made by Apple - "Few product categories get a second chance to make it big. Wristwatch calculators, 8-track tapes, mopeds, unicycles and Polaroid film are never going to be wildly popular again. But tablets are poised to make the kind of comeback that would make Robert Downey Jr. proud.
  
  PC makers have offered slates and convertible notebooks for nearly a decade, and they’ve never caught on. But now, a new generation of attractively designed and low-priced screens are looking to lure in consumers. Most of these sleek slabs of glass rely on simplified touch interfaces and will probably work best as content consumption devices: Something you’d use for reading, web browsing and watching movies.
  
  The new generation of tablets might just pull it off. So far, Apple has sold more than 500,000 iPads and it says it can’t keep up with the demand, suggesting that computer makers are right to jump on this trend now.
  
  As they do, they’re exploiting the iPad’s weaknesses. Typing on the iPad isn’t easy and it is an underpowered device for its price tag -- the same money could buy you a nice laptop. Its browser doesn’t support Adobe Flash, and you can’t run software on it unless that software comes from Apple’s App Store.
  
  So if you don’t want to buy into the Apple hype machine, there are plenty of alternatives. From Dell to HP, almost every major PC manufacturer is working on a tablet. And there’s no dearth of upstarts. Asian brands and European startups are vying to get their tablets out, too.
  
  Wired looks at some of the most interesting screens that will get into consumers’ hands this year."
• Be careful swallowing that tablet - "Unlike the other two tablets, the iPad is unable to surf sites built around Flash technology -- used widely for video clips and interactive content. This is not necessarily as inconvenient as it sounds. Many of the most popular Flash websites, including YouTube, offer dedicated apps for the iPad, so you can still enjoy what they have to offer.
  
  To type messages or write documents, tablets use virtual keypads that pop up onscreen when you need them. Forget about touch-typing on any of them, though, as hitting small keys on a flat screen is no substitute for a physical keyboard. The iPad does at least offer a clever auto-correct feature that learns to recognise and rectify your most common typing mistakes, making it the fastest virtual keyboard here.
  
  Tablets have been touted as replacements for ebook readers such as the Amazon Kindle but even the iPad -- which is the lightest of the three at 680g (1½lb) -- is too heavy for one-handed reading. The iPad does show promise, however, when handling specially created interactive books, as opposed to staid text-on-a-page. Colourful children’s ebooks, in particular, were beautifully rendered within Apple’s free iBooks app.
  . . .
  Verdict: Gorgeous for sofa-surfing, but less portable than a smartphone and less practical than a laptop."
• Researcher warns of impending PDF attack wave - "A design flaw in Adobe's popular PDF format will quickly be exploited by hackers to install financial malware on users' computers, a security company argued today.
  
  The bug, which is not strictly a security vulnerability but actually part of the PDF specification, was first disclosed by Belgium researcher Didier Stevens last week. Stevens demonstrated how a multistage attack using the PDF specification's "/Launch" function could successfully exploit a fully-patched copy of Adobe Reader.
  . . .
  In a blog post Tuesday, Adobe Reader group product manager Steve Gottwals recommended that consumers block attacks by unchecking a box marked 'Allow opening of non-PDF file attachments with external applications' in the programs' preferences panes. By default, Reader and Acrobat have the box checked, meaning that the behavior Stevens exploited is allowed.
  
  Gottwals also showed how enterprise IT administrators can force users' copies of Reader and Acrobat into the unchecked state by pushing a change to Windows' registry."

. . . . . . . . .



Continue reading "Assorted Links 4/18/10"

April 18, 2010 10:17 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

Washington Post "Shopping Guide" is a very wasteful

If you live in the Washington, DC, area, you probably receive "The Washington Post 'Shopping Guide'" in your mailbox.

Or in the case of some of us, it is shoved through a mail slot, where it scatters all over the floor, and is a royal pain to pick up. Especially if you have a physical handicap.

We have several acquaintances who have attempted to stop delivery of this hugely wasteful mailing, to no avail. And so have others: see "If You Don’t Get It, Good!" in the Washington City Paper, by Erik Wemple, September 25, 2008.

They have been unable to find a "remove me from this list" option anywhere on the Washington Post site or the Washington Post Ads site, and thus this hugely wasteful mass of paper continues.

One wag has suggested that after removing the address label, put the already wasteful mess into a large envelope with both the From: and To: addresses as "The Washington Post/ Post Plus, 1150 15th Street NW, Washington, DC 20071" and put the envelope, with no postage, into any USPS mail box. As the wag said, "No postage and no address label seems like fair play since the Post makes it impossible to stop this wasteful mess of paper from being delivered." We, of course, would never advocate such a tactic - put at least one stamp on the envelope and leave your address intact and request that the Post remove your address from its database.

Alternatively, you can contact the Postmaster and declare that you consider "The Washington Post 'Shopping Guide'" to be unsolicited pornography and that you do not want it delivered to your home. Request a 1500 form from the U.S. Postal Service to stop the delivery of sexually explicit material.

Update: We received an email that you can be removed by calling 202-334-7730. Let us know if that works.

Also See

• Junk Mail - from the Washington State AG
• How to Stop USPS Junk Mail - from eHow
• Form 1500 from the U.S. Postal Service (5-page PDF)
• Unsolicited Mail, Telemarketing and Email: Where to Go to “Just Say No” - from the FTC
• How to Stop Receiving Junk Mail - from About.com
• Stopping Junk Mail Is Easy, and Good for the Environment - from SmartMoney
• FairfaxUnderground discussion

April 17, 2010 02:27 PM   Link    Living in DC    Comments (0)

Understanding Congressional Budgeting and Appropriations, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net

Understanding Congressional Budgeting and Appropriations
Federal Budgeting in the Age of Deficits

Who has the most to gain in the budgeting process? Where are you most effective? Where does your power lie in the budget process?

This real world overview of the congressional budget process explores basic congressional budget process concepts along with key players, their roles and relationships. Learn about discretionary and mandatory spending, the budget resolution and reconciliation process. Students also learn about the relationship of authorization and appropriations legislation. Hear real, modern-day examples that illustrate the process, and gain ample time to discuss concerns and roadblocks encountered with the budget process.

This course covers:

• The big picture of federal budgeting and spending
  
• The crucial difference between authorizations and appropriations
  
• What to expect and when in the budget process
  
• The relationship between appropriations and the budget resolution
  
• Using Internet resources to track and research congressional budget action

May 13, 2010, 8:30 am - 4:10 pm

Approved for 0.6 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: Goethe-Institut, 812 Seventh Street NW, Washington, DC (Gallery Place / Chinatown Metro stop)

This is a required course for the Certificate in Congressional Operations.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see TheFederalBudget.com

Continue reading "Understanding Congressional Budgeting and Appropriations, 1-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net"

April 16, 2010 08:57 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Glossary of Legislative Terms: "Pocket Veto"

Pocket Veto: Act of the president in withholding approval of a measure after Congress has adjourned sine die.

This definition is from the Glossary in our Congressional Deskbook. Perfect reference tool of Congressional jargon and procedural terms. Congressional Deskbook: The Practical and Comprehensive Guide to Congress, by Michael Koempel and Judy Schneider.

TheCapitol.Net offers training and a Certificate in Congressional Operations and Federal Budgeting. We show you how Washington and Congress work. ^TM

Continue reading "Glossary of Legislative Terms: "Pocket Veto""

April 15, 2010 08:57 AM   Link    Tips and Terms    Comments (0)

Assorted Links 4/14/10

Bill Black: Not Dead Yet - Part 4




John Cleese on Extremism

• Word Workshop: Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, April 15, 2010
• Word Workshop: Writing to Persuade: Hone Your Persuasive Writing Skills, April 16, 2010
• Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals, May 4, 2010
• Advanced Media Relations, May 5, 2010
• Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, May 6, 2010
• Crisis Communications Training, May 7, 2010
• Persuading Congress: Candid Advice for Executives - "Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.
  
  This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction."
• Ohio Judge Tells Residents to 'Arm Themselves' - "When asked what advice he would give to residents of Ashtabula County Ohio because of cutbacks in official law enforcement budgets, Judge Alfred Mackey said they should:
  
  arm themselves. Be very careful, be vigilant, get in touch with your neighbors, because we're going to have to look after each other."
• Get a job or your tuition money back - "In a county with 11.7 percent unemployment, Lansing (Michigan) Community College is offering a money-back guarantee, reports Time Magazine. If you pass a six-week training course for a high-demand job and don’t get hired within a year, you’ll get your tuition back.
  
  This offer applies to training for jobs as call-center specialists, pharmacy technicians, quality inspectors and computer machinists; pay rates range from $12.10 to $15.72 an hour. Training costs about $2,400."
• Supply, Demand and Consequences - "Before the big 1960s ramp-up in college and university numbers and enrollments in the USA due to pressure from the postwar Baby Boom and the encouragement of Lyndon Johnson's happy band of Great Society government spenders, college graduates were distinctly a minority of adults. Ability to fund a college education aside, the assumption was that college graduates fell into the upper part of the IQ bell curve -- perhaps an IQ of 110 being the threshold.
  
  Aside from the bleak Depression years, the American economy was modern enough and strong enough to absorb college graduates in occupations requiring ability and drive; such occupations were often financially rewarding.
  
  Elitist? You bet. But the system makes a lot of sense from the practical standpoint of running an economy.
  
  Nowadays a majority of high school graduates go on to one kind of "higher education" or another. That throws away the notion that college is for above-average people: 60 percent (or whatever) of the population can't have IQs greater than 110. (I'll avoid that sad topic of what kind of "education" many colleges provide these days.)
  . . .
  Looking at post-1945 history, country after country that was once a cheap labor market has graduated to comparative affluence or is well on the way. Assume this trend continues. Eventually, all countries will become nearly equally affluent and there will be no pockets of inexpensive labor to be found. That suggests low-priced good will become a thing of the past where the supply of cheap labor has been destroyed by the demand for it."
• Older America Made Recession Look Better - "As the chart shows, the 'composition-adjusted' unemployment rate -- the light blue line -- was at a record high of 11.3 percent in the last quarter of 2009, surpassing the peak of 1982.
  
  In other words, yes, in terms of unemployment milestones, this was the worst recession since the Great Depression."
• Ron Paul has Barack Obama’s number - "Don’t be bamboozled by Republican propagandists telling you Obama is running left or that he is a ‘socialist.’ This is nonsense – kabuki theater, if you will. They are merely using Obama’s weakness to gain control of the historical political narrative. In reality, Leftists are absolutely outraged at his legislative agenda.
  
  Obama is a corporatist like other New Democrats of the neo-liberal mold. The schtick -- as also used by Schroeder in Germany, Koizumi in Japan and Tony Blair in the UK -- is to say the things that progressives want to hear, but do the things that big business wants to be done. You have to give a sop to the base here and there like exempting unions from the healthcare bill’s Cadillac policy tax. But, the goal is to curry favor with big business, which is the paymaster of both established parties in the U.S."
  
  See "Crony capitalism"
  
  
• Further to Andrew Ferguson on Behavioral Economics - "Long before reading Cass Sunstein as a risk-expert, I read him as a jurisprudential philosophe. I mean, going back to his writing on 'deliberative democracy,' going way back. It seems to me that the move from traditional economics here to behavioral economics is precisely the same move in moral philosophy that he, and others of the same tendency, made in the deliberative democracy literature. What was it, after all, that characterized 'deliberative democracy' as an intellectual move, in the hands of Amy Gutmann, Sunstein, and others? A theory of meta-deliberation, a theory of how people would ideally discuss all the deeply divisive issues of the day -- abortion, affirmative action, on and on.
  
  And yet somehow, some way, the conclusion was always that the right process of thinking must ineluctably lead one to think they way Gutmann, Sunstein, all good and honorable liberal thinkers thought about these hot button issues. Not just good people -- but rational people -- would all think affirmative action a good thing, abortion okay, etc., etc. The most stunning intellectual move was not merely the claim that these were the right moral conclusions, but that to reach some other conclusion meant that you hadn’t deliberated enough, or deliberated in the right way."
• Carbon Dioxide Causes Near Death Experiences? - "If CO2 opens the gates to the afterlife then will rising atmospheric CO2 cause some people pass over to the other side? I'm just asking."
• Liberty, “Group Status Issues,” and the Tea Party - "What I really, really care about is liberty. If the culture and the law denies liberty to some groups, then I think we ought to fight culturally and politically to win equal freedom for the members of those groups. If people have been denied liberty on the basis of group membership, caring about liberty then entails caring about the 'group status issues' standing behind historical oppression.
  
  I am not scared of the fact that older Americans are more racist, sexist, and homophobic that younger Americans. I regard this as a hopeful sign that historic inequalities in status and freedom are on their way out. And I’m not frightened of the Tea Party movement (which is not especially old.) In fact, I hope it helps deliver divided government by helping Republicans win a bunch of seats. I just don’t think it’s very substantively libertarian. It is a populist movement centered on a certain conservative conception of traditional American identity. Libertarian rhetoric is definitely part of that, but rhetoric is rhetoric."
• Aljazeera TV promotes the lie that prediction markets are “eerily accurate”, sucking up to InTrade’s PR and Hanson’s spinning. - "Here for the debunking."
• Stop Fishing and Start Feasting: How Citable Public Documents Will Change Your Life - "Making it possible to create timestamped permalinks at a paragraph level of granularity would be a huge leap forward in increasing government transparency through its online documents. The same principles apply when producing citable government data. When recovery.org decided to display visual representations of the data coming in about recovery money around the nation, it quickly became clear that some amount of data was erroneous. When the errors were reported and the data was later modified, there wasn't any way to go back and compare the two versions to see what changes had taken place. A blogger, reporter, statistician or scientist should be able to run a query against any specific collection of government data, as it was published, for a given version or moment in time."
• 'Young invincibles' imperil health reform - "One of the biggest risks to the success of health reform, comes not from the sick but from the young and healthy, a former top official in charge of Medicare and Medicaid administration said Friday."
• Mish Mailbag: IBM Abandons U.S. Workers - "Outsourcing jobs has been going on quite some time. Let's address why.
  
  For starters, global wage arbitrage is one huge factor in play.
  
  Unfortunately, wage equalization and standard of living adjustments between industrialized countries and emerging markets will be a long painful process for Western society.
  
  On that score, there is little that can be done except reduce wages and benefits in the public sector and stop wasting money being the world's policeman. We simply can no longer afford it. Besides, neither of those things ever made any sense anyway.
  
  US Tax policy is another reason for outsourcing, and that can easily be addressed, at least in theory.
  
  US corporate tax policy allows deferment of profits overseas, but profits in the US have a tax rate of 35%. This policy literally begs corporations to move profits and jobs, overseas."
• Health insurance mandate as a privacy right violation - "Among the lawsuits filed against Obamacare is a class action in the Southern District of Mississippi. Class representatives, for residents of Mississippi who do not wish to be subject to the health insurance purchase mandate, include State Senator Chris McDaniel and Lt. Governor Phil Bryant.
  . . .
  Para. 35: The Constitution gives Congress the power to regulate commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes. The tripartite enumeratation shows that the 'substantially affects' test for regulation of interstate commerce does not imply an infinite power. Since everything affects everything else, at least in some degree, a regulation of Indian or foreign commerce might be justified on the ground that it 'affects' interstate commerce. However, the text separates interstate, foreign, and Indian commerce. 'Had the Founders intended the commerce power to be unlimited, enumerating three categories of commerce for Congress to regulate would have been wholly unnecessary.' (And as Justice Thomas pointed out in Lopez, the theory of an unbounded interstate commerce power is also contradicted by Article I’s enumeration of a separate bankruptcy power.)
  . . .
  Indeed, the insurance purchase mandate is considerably more intrusive than other purchase mandates which would become constitutional if the insurance mandate is upheld. For example, if Congress required that every family purchase a General Motors ACDelco automobile battery at least once every 5 years, the mandate would be financially burdensome, but would not necessarily require the disclosure of any private information. In contrast, the insurance mandate is a mandate for the involuntary disclosure of many of the most intimate details about one’s life--and making that disclosure to a corporation that in effect functions as a highly-regulated public utility, and which will turn the information over to the government under certain conditions."

Interview with Robert Lawrence and Kevin Odom from FairWarning on Vimeo.

Your GM Pickup Could Explode And Kill You

• The Ten Fastest States In America - "Some states dole out more tickets per capita than others, and DriverSide has worked up a list of the top 10 speediest states according to traffic citations. Of course, a lot goes into these statistics besides how fast residents are driving, including the number of law enforcement officers on the road and the population of each individual state. Do drivers up north really cruise at higher speeds than their southern counterparts? Take a look at our list of speediest states to find out for yourself.
  . . .
  It's not really a state per se, but the District of Columbia takes the crown as the location with the most citations per capita. The capital of our nation boasts an astounding 553,523 residents with 434,301 tickets. That means a full 78.5 percent of the population has at least one traffic violation to their name! So much for law-abiding citizens in the land of law and order."
• Why do colleges care about extracurricular activities? - "Colleges want to expand the heterogeneity of the selection criteria so they can pick who they want. If it's a top college or university, mostly this means limiting the number of Asians and maximizing the number of future donors and by the way those two goals tend to move in tandem. Other than legacy admissions, I wonder what other features of applications predict future donations? Might extra-curricular activities be one candidate here?"
• Top colleges squeeze parents dry - "The richest institutions could pay all operating expenses from endowments, Manshel writes. But 'there are qualified paying customers lined up at the door,' so why not make ‘em pay? Leaders of the elite private colleges could control costs and end inflation-busting increases, raise endowment payouts and 'rededicate themselves to providing opportunity to the talented regardless of means.'
  
  Wealthy grandparents can’t pass much on to their grandchildren directly, but they can pay unlimited tuition, notes George Leef. And colleges know that."
• Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
• Common Market Food Co-op - "Common Market Food Co-op was a 'new wave food co-op' located at 1329 California Street in Denver, Colorado, from 1975 - 1980. It started as a buying club at the University of Denver in the early 1970s, and for a few years prior to moving to the old Safeway at 13th and California Streets, Common Market operated out of a small storefront on Champa Street."
• How "elite" dating websites scam people - "My ex-girlfriend called me a few weeks ago, her voice shaking. She asked if it was possible to get money back from a website. I asked her what the website was, and she did not want to tell me. So I told her to call the credit card company and ask them to refund the money. She did, called me a few days later to thank me and I did did not hear about it again.
  
  Till last week, when she called me, crying on the phone. She was being sued by the dating website for not paying the fee of a bit more than $800.
  
  (I'm not going to mention any of the websites by name, because they are extremely litigous, and I don't want it to be said I directly accused any particular company of scamming. You can use the quotes I include here to discover the websites or use the search term 'elite' to find the sites)
  
  I'm going to describe the techniques that these websites are using to squeeze a lot of money out of people with a service that gives them nothing in return."
• "Crony Capitalism" - "Crony capitalism is a pejorative term describing an allegedly capitalist economy in which success in business depends on close relationships between businesspeople and government officials. It may be exhibited by favoritism in the distribution of legal permits, government grants, special tax breaks, and so forth.
  
  Crony capitalism is believed to arise when political cronyism spills over into the business world; self-serving friendships and family ties between businessmen and the government influence the economy and society to the extent that it corrupts public-serving economic and political ideals."

Is it Time to Lower The Drinking Age?

• Octopus vs. Sea Lion--First Ever Video - "New National Geographic Crittercam footage shows never before seen eating habits of the Australian sea lion--including video of a sea lion hunting a large octopus. The footage is from a project intended to help save the endangered sea lions, in part by uncovering where and how the animals eat."
• Spray Bandages Closer to Human Testing - "Researchers at Wake Forest University reported that they have mounted an "ink-jet" type device, capable of spraying skin-cells directly on burns, onto a frame that will allow human testing. At the Translational Regenerative Medicine Forum the researchers reported on results from testing the device on mouse models, where the rate of wound healing was sped up significantly. They hope to begin human testing soon."
• Feel Free To Get Lost With The Lost Balloon - "There are already a bunch of options for getting yourself rescued from the wilderness (where there are bears that want to eat you). Most of these options are fairly situational… A cell phone is great, but you need reception and batteries. A flare gun is great (and fun!), but it only works once. A signal mirror is great, but you need to have sun. What you really want is something simple, reliable, portable, and effective, which (it turns out) means big inflatable rescue balloon."

. . . . . . . . .



Continue reading "Assorted Links 4/14/10"

April 14, 2010 08:27 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

Supreme Court Nominations: Presidential Nomination, the Judiciary Committee, Proper Scope of Questioning of Nominees, Senate Consideration, Cloture, and the Use of the Filibuster

Supreme Court Nominations

Supreme Court Nominations:
Presidential Nomination, the Judiciary Committee, Proper Scope of Questioning of Nominees, Senate Consideration, Cloture, and the Use of the Filibuster

Compiled by TheCapitol.Net
Authors: Denis Steven Rutkus, Elizabeth Rybicki, Betsy Palmer, Todd Tatelman, Richard S. Beth, Michael Koempel and Judy Schneider

he procedure for appointing a Supreme Court Justice is provided for by the Constitution in only a few words. The "Appointments Clause" (Article II, Section 2, clause 2) states that the President "shall nominate, and by and with the Advise and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint…Judges of the supreme Court."

The process of appointing Justices has undergone changes over two centuries, but its most basic feature--the sharing of power between the President and Senate--has remained unchanged. To receive lifetime appointment to the Court, a candidate must first be nominated by the President and then confirmed by the Senate. Although not mentioned in the Constitution, an important role is played midway in the process (after the President selects, but before the Senate considers) by the Senate Judiciary Committee. Since the end of the Civil War, almost every Supreme Court nomination received by the Senate has first been referred to and considered by the Judiciary Committee before being acted on by the Senate as a whole.

This book explores the appointment process--from Presidential announcement, Judiciary Committee investigation, confirmation hearings, vote, and report to the Senate, through Senate debate and vote on the nomination.

2009, 208 pages
ISBN: 1587331586 ISBN 13: 978-1-58733-158-9
Softcover book: $19.95

For more information, see SCOTUSNominations.com

Continue reading "Supreme Court Nominations: Presidential Nomination, the Judiciary Committee, Proper Scope of Questioning of Nominees, Senate Consideration, Cloture, and the Use of the Filibuster"

April 13, 2010 08:57 AM   Link    Judicial Branch ~   Publications    Comments (0)

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, from TheCapitol.Net

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing

How to Compose Clear and Effective Reports, Letters, Email, and Memos

Do you need to improve your writing skills? This intensive one-day course helps students understand the three dimensions of professional writing: organization, format and style. In addition to reviewing and teaching specific writing techniques, our faculty show you how to:

• Apply critical thinking to the writing process
• Use the four keys to effective writing
• Understand the five-step writing process
• Develop an effective writing style

Communication skills are the key to efficient and effective operations in business and government. New employees should brush-up on their basic written communication and plain English skills, while experienced professionals, burdened by the additional workload caused by downsizing and budget cuts, can also benefit from this refresher course.

Our writing courses have been described as "really about how to get better job reviews and get promoted" because they help you improve one of your most important, and visible, job skills: written communication.

April 15, 2010, 9 am - 4 pm.

Approved for 0.6 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW) in Washington, DC

This is a required course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see WordWorkshop.com

Continue reading "Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, from TheCapitol.Net"

April 12, 2010 09:57 AM   Link    Career ~   Training    Comments (0)

"Likely D.C. traffic problems during nuclear security summit"

Washington commuters know about the demands of hosting national and international events. Still, they are in for a rare and challenging experience Monday and Tuesday [April 12-13, 2010], when world leaders gather at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center for a nuclear security summit.
. . .
We know which streets are marked for closing, but police can block other streets for security at their discretion. And we'll have more than 40 world leaders in town. That's a lot of motorcades.

Likely D.C. traffic problems during nuclear security summit, The Washington Post, April 11, 2010

April 11, 2010 11:27 AM   Link    Living in DC    Comments (0)

Assorted Links 4/10/10

Bill Black: Not Dead Yet - Part 3

• Word Workshop: Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, April 15, 2010
• Word Workshop: Writing to Persuade: Hone Your Persuasive Writing Skills, April 16, 2010
• Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals, May 4, 2010
• Advanced Media Relations, May 5, 2010
• Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, May 6, 2010
• Crisis Communications Training, May 7, 2010
• Persuading Congress: Candid Advice for Executives - "Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.
  
  This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction."
• The strange but true tale of a phony currency, shame, and a grass-roots movement that could go global - "What good is a currency that is not even worth the paper it’s printed on?
  
  That’s the intriguing question raised by the new 'zero rupee note' now circulating in southern India. It looks just like the country’s 50 rupee bill but with some crucial differences: It is printed on just one side on plain paper, it bears a big fat '0' denomination, and it isn’t legal tender.
  
  The notes do, however, have value to the people who carry them. They’re designed as a radical new response to the pervasive problem of petty corruption. Citizens are encouraged to hand the notes to public officials in response to the bribery demands that are almost inescapable when dealing with the government here. Bribes for access to services are so common they even have an accepted euphemism -- asking for money 'for tea.'
  
  The notes, printed and distributed by a good-government organization called 5th Pillar, include the phrase that the bearer 'promises to neither accept nor give a bribe.' The idea is that by handing one of these zero rupee bills to an official, a citizen can register a silent protest -- and maybe even shame or scare a corrupt bureaucrat into doing his duty without demanding a bribe for it."
  
  Hat tip to and from the comments at MR:
  Now if we can only get the "Zero Attitude" note that we can hand to police and surly bureaucrats at the DMV and IRS, we'd be set!
  
  Or the "Zero Confidence" note we can hand to any incompetent public servant, like a lousy teacher, rude city bus driver, all politicians, etc.
  
  
• Facts vs. the Narrative - "The narrative is that small business credit markets are frozen. John Stossel argues the facts say otherwise?
  . . .
  So does our science-based President address the narrative or the facts? Here is a hint: narratives can affect elections, while facts are often ignored. Therefore, Obama is proposing to use $30 billion of TARP money to so something about the $8 billion drop in small business lending."
• Reis: Strip Mall Vacancy Rate Hits 10.8%, Highest since 1991 - "The 8.9% is the highest since Reis began tracking regional malls in 2000. Lease rates fell for the seventh consecutive quarter."
• Unions and State Government Management - "State and local governments that have high levels of unionization have a harder time efficiently managing their finances and other aspects of their operations. At least, that’s my argument. The other day, I showed that states with higher levels of debt had higher levels of unionization. The statistical correlation was very strong.
  
  Today, let’s look at the quality of state management, as measured by a major report by the Pew Center on the States. The Pew report gave letter grades to the 50 state governments for management of finances, employees, infrastructure, and information. Pew also provided an overall state score.
  . . .
  The bottom line: public-sector unionization is not a good idea, as it apparently leads to lower-quality government management and to higher debt levels. As such, I’ve argued that collective bargaining in state and local government workforces should be banned."
• Even With a Recovery, Job Perks May Not Return - "Workers have seen everything from 401(k) contributions to educational reimbursements cut by their employers during the recession. While some companies are slowly restoring some benefits, experts say workers shouldn't expect a return to pre-2007 levels any time soon.
  
  'Those days are gone,' says Tim Prichard, head of BridgeStreet Consulting, a benefits administration consulting firm. 'Benefits across the board are no longer sacred cows.'
  
  A survey of 522 human resources professionals conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management in February 2009 found that fringe benefit offerings--which include stock options, paid family leave and business class airfare--have decreased significantly since 2005."
• UPS Thinks Out of the Box on Driver Training - "Driver training is crucial for Atlanta-based UPS, which employs 99,000 U.S. drivers and says it will need to hire 25,000 over the next five years to replace retiring Baby Boomers.
  
  Candidates vying for a driver's job, which pays an average of $74,000 annually, now spend one week at Integrad, an 11,500-square-foot, low-slung brick UPS training center 10 miles outside of Washington, D.C. There they move from one station to another practicing the company's '340 Methods,' prescribed by UPS industrial engineers to save seconds and improve safety in every task from lifting and loading boxes to selecting a package from a shelf in the truck."
  
  Let's read that again: "a [UPS] driver's job, which pays an average of $74,000 annually,"
  
  
• Embarassing Graduation Rate Data? - "I was struck by the title of an article that appears in the Chronicle of Higher Education this morning, 'Education Dept. Data Show Rise in Enrollment and Student Aid but Flat Graduation Rates.' Unless the purpose of student aid is simply to boost enrollments, it sounds like some people -- taxpayers come immediately to mind -- aren't getting their money's worth, not to mention the students lured to college who don't get out.
  
  Moved by curiosity actually to read the article, I was then struck even harder by something that turned out not to be mentioned in it: any reference to graduation rates by race. That omission seems seriously odd, I thought, since race is always on the Dept. of Education's mind (or whatever), and surely a Dept. of Education report on graduation rates could not ignore racial data, could it?"
• We Hold These Truths To Be Self-Evident - "Human nature being understood, and moral language being understood, one can make some observations.
  
  Human beings are more likely to thrive under conditions of liberty. The chances of fulfilling a person's preferences by coercing him are much lower than his own chances of fulfilling his preferences by his own discovery of those preferences, decision as to how to fulfill them, and freely undertaking to act on his decisions. If his betters have wisdom on the matter he can seek it out by inquiring of them. If someone decides to control and coerce him, it will unlikely be his better and even if it is, it will unlikely be a man who could fulfill the preferences of his subjects as well as they could fulfill their preferences."
• Injustice System: Fox News' Judge Andrew Napolitano on repealing the 17th Amendment, "constitutional activism," and his bestselling new book Lies the Government Told You. - "Reason: You end the book [Lies the Government Told You] with a call for a 'major political transformation.' What is the single most important reform?
  
  Napolitano: I would repeal the 17th Amendment [which provides for the popular election of U.S. senators]. Can an amendment to the Constitution itself be unconstitutional? Yes, that one. If you read Madison’s notes from the constitutional convention, they spent more time arguing over the make-up of the federal government and they came up with the federal table. There would be three entities at the federal table. There would be the nation as a nation, there would be the people, and there would be the states. The nation as a nation is the president, the people is the House of Representatives, and the states is the Senate, because states sent senators. Not the people in the states, but the state government. When the progressives, in the Theodore Roosevelt/Woodrow Wilson era, abolished this it abolished bicameralism, the notion of two houses. It effectively just gave us another house like the House of Representatives where they didn’t have to run as frequently, and the states lost their place at the federal table.
  
  That was an assault, an invasion on the infrastructure of constitutional government. Even kings in Europe had to satisfy the princes and barons around them. And that’s how they lost their power, or that’s how their power was tempered. Congress believes it doesn’t have to satisfy anybody. Its only recognized restraint is whatever it can get away with.
  
  Reason: What do you make of the recent attacks on the idea of states’ rights, linking it directly to evil things like the defense of slavery?
  
  Napolitano: Probably the best act of nullification of which I’m aware, whereby a state government nullified an act of the federal government, was the state of Massachusetts nullifying the Fugitive Slave Act. The state of Massachusetts said don’t even try it here. We’ll prosecute anybody that kidnaps anybody else in this state. So nullification has a beneficial and salutary history as well as the sordid one.
  
  Reason: You wrote that the notion of being innocent until proven guilty is 'probably the least questioned and most believed government lie.'
  
  Napolitano: It’s drawn from my professional experience. The defendant is dragged into the courtroom and the jurors assume he’s guilty. Why would the government be wasting our time? When I would charge jurors--explain the law to them--I would insist on saying, 'in order for him to be convicted you must be satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt and to a moral certainty of his guilt.' The state always objected to that phrase (“and to a moral certainty”) until I pulled out the case law by appellate courts saying that it was perfectly appropriate.
  
  There are some horror stories in my book of people who were punished without trial. In the Herrera case, [defendant Leonel Torres Herrera] was executed, with the state knowing that somebody else had committed the crime. They just didn’t care because he filed his petitions too late. Chief Justice John Roberts, when he was Judge Roberts, was asked at his confirmation hearing, does the Constitution prohibit the execution of the innocent by the state? He paused and said yes. Who could possibly pause? If it prohibits anything it prohibits that."

James Randi Speaks: My Fortune

• Growth of Unpaid Internships May Be Illegal, Officials Say - "With job openings scarce for young people, the number of unpaid internships has climbed in recent years, leading federal and state regulators to worry that more employers are illegally using such internships for free labor.
  
  Convinced that many unpaid internships violate minimum wage laws, officials in Oregon, California and other states have begun investigations and fined employers. Last year, M. Patricia Smith, then New York’s labor commissioner, ordered investigations into several firms’ internships. Now, as the federal Labor Department’s top law enforcement official, she and the wage and hour division are stepping up enforcement nationwide.
  
  Many regulators say that violations are widespread, but that it is unusually hard to mount a major enforcement effort because interns are often afraid to file complaints. Many fear they will become known as troublemakers in their chosen field, endangering their chances with a potential future employer.
  
  The Labor Department says it is cracking down on firms that fail to pay interns properly and expanding efforts to educate companies, colleges and students on the law regarding internships."
• Student Internships and Minimum Wage Laws - "Are any VC readers of the view that enforcement of these minimum wage laws will lead to increased employment of the interns? I’m not being cute; I’d be curious to know if anyone wanted to make that argument in a serious way, as it is hard for me to fathom, but perhaps I am wrong."
• Q&A: Discovering the World on the Most Dangerous Buses, Boats, Trains and Planes - "Author Carl Hoffman has written extensively about some of the most technological and advanced forms of transportation on the planet. Whether it be Burt Rutan’s quest for space, or Larry Ellison’s quest for the America’s Cup, Hoffman enjoys how people express their creativity with machines.
  
  So, it comes as a bit of a surprise that his new book, The Lunatic Express, features no carbon fiber, no breakthrough designs or alternative fuels. Instead, Hoffman sets off on a trip around the world using only the most dangerous and decrepit forms of transportation he finds along the way.
  
  He travels the Andes in buses more famous for cliff dives than on-time arrivals. In India, he packs himself onto trains so overcrowded there are as many people sitting on the roof as there are in the seats. For a trip across the islands of Indonesia, he skips the ease of a short flight, opting instead for a questionable ferry like the ones that sank several years earlier killing more than a thousand people. In his defense, Indonesian air-safety records aren’t exactly inspiring, either.
  
  But as Hoffman details so eloquently in his book, this is how most of the world’s population travels. The complaints we hear at the airline ticket counter are petty compared to what most people must contend with when they need to get to work or visit family. The Lunatic Express isn’t about the interesting ways tourists traipse across foreign countries and the frustrations they experience. It’s about the people who must contend with danger and discomfort every day to simply get from place to place, and the incredible kindness they so often display despite what they have to endure."
• Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
• Common Market Food Co-op - "Common Market Food Co-op was a 'new wave food co-op' located at 1329 California Street in Denver, Colorado, from 1975 - 1980. It started as a buying club at the University of Denver in the early 1970s, and for a few years prior to moving to the old Safeway at 13th and California Streets, Common Market operated out of a small storefront on Champa Street."
• Some Papers Are Uploaded to Bangalore to Be Graded - "Lori Whisenant knows that one way to improve the writing skills of undergraduates is to make them write more. But as each student in her course in business law and ethics at the University of Houston began to crank out--often awkwardly--nearly 5,000 words a semester, it became clear to her that what would really help them was consistent, detailed feedback.
  
  Her seven teaching assistants, some of whom did not have much experience, couldn't deliver. Their workload was staggering: About 1,000 juniors and seniors enroll in the course each year. 'Our graders were great,' she says, 'but they were not experts in providing feedback.'
  
  That shortcoming led Ms. Whisenant, director of business law and ethics studies at Houston, to a novel solution last fall. She outsourced assignment grading to a company whose employees are mostly in Asia.
  
  Virtual-TA, a service of a company called EduMetry Inc., took over. The goal of the service is to relieve professors and teaching assistants of a traditional and sometimes tiresome task--and even, the company says, to do it better than TA's can."
• What Is Barack Obama? - "I don’t doubt that our president has his issues--just look at his nutty mother, consider the impact of being abandoned by dad--but I don’t think that just putting Obama on the couch is the best way to understand him.
  
  Put him in the classroom instead. Because he’s the stereotypical American undergrad at a stereotypical Ivy League college in the age of political correctness."

Congressman’s War Hero Son Would Have Wanted Highway Bill Passed

• Michelin’s Smart Jumper Cables - "As if having a dead battery in your vehicle wasn’t bad enough, there’s also the risk of doing some serious damage if you incorrectly hook up a set of jumper cables while trying to bring it back to life. Not so with Michelin’s Smart Jumper Cables. An electronic box in-between the sets of clamps lets you know when everything’s hooked up, properly completing the circuit, and once both batteries are connected any issues with polarity are automatically taken care of to keep sparking and ’splosions to a minimum."
• People Want Mobile Broadband, But Not Personal Hotspots - "User confusion about personal hotspots may be one reason for decreasing sales. Whenever I take the MiFi out at coffee shops or around other people, I’m invariably asked what it is and what it does. Although these small routers debuted just prior to the January 2009 Consumer Electronics Show, people simply don’t know about them -- a point driven home by Novatel in an earnings call.
  
  Is this lack of knowledge encouraged by carriers? With the same monthly fee as a single-use 3G solution, I have to wonder how actively carriers promoting the MiFi devices. Why sell one mobile broadband enabler that shares the connection when you can sell multiple solutions and multiply revenues?"
• The Best Fire Starter Ever Invented - "The ability to start a fire is the number one survival skill you can have, without which you will likely be in serious trouble during an emergency survival or disaster situation.
  
  But there is a problem; those butane lighters and supposedly 'waterproof' matches you use in civilization may very well fail you in an emergency when you need them most.
  
  There is a solution to this problem, one that I stake my life on for always being able to start a fire any time I need. This incredible product has never failed me, even under the most adverse outdoor conditions.
  
  The best fire starter ever invented is the Survival Topics firesteel."

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April 10, 2010 08:47 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

Capitol Hill Workshop, 3-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net

Capitol Hill Workshop: Politics, Policy, and Process

Intensive 3-day congressional operations workshop

Congressional decision-making is driven by politics, policy and process. In this engaging workshop, Washington-based experts discuss these 3 P's and help you understand the complete policy-making process.

You’ll get a solid understanding of:

• Congressional operations and the legislative process
  
• How public and foreign policy become law
  
• Congressional politics and leadership
  
• Congressional budgeting today
  
• The role of OMB in the legislative process
  
• Effective communication with Congress
  
• How the media covers the Hill
  
• Current campaign and election trends
  
• How members of Congress advance their legislative, public policy and political agendas
  
• How personal and committee staff work
  
• How you can build win/win relationships with staffers

Attend a congressional hearing and see the process in action.

June 9-11, 2010, 8:30 am - 4 pm all three days.

Approved for 1.7 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: On Capitol Hill in Washington, DC

This is a required course for the Certificate in Congressional Operations and for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see CapitolHillWorkshop.com

Continue reading "Capitol Hill Workshop, 3-day course in Washington, DC, from TheCapitol.Net"

April 9, 2010 08:27 AM   Link    Capitol Hill Workshop    Comments (0)

FREE Pocket Constitution

A free download of our Pocket Constitution is available on Scribd.

Free Copy of our Pocket Constitution:

• Free copy with every book order and every audio CD order from our web site.
  
• Single copies of this Pocket Constitution are available at no charge by sending a self-addressed stamped envelope (SASE) with first class postage for two (2) ounces to: TheCapitol.Net, Pocket Constitution, PO Box 25706, Alexandria, VA 22313-5706. Requests with insufficient postage will be returned or destroyed. Only 1 copy per request.
  
• Social Studies and Government Teachers: You can combine up to 35 of your students' separate SASEs (each SASE must have first class postage for two (2) ounces attached) into one large envelope that you mail to us for free copies for your students. Enclose a note with your name, name of your school, course taught, grade, and school address. Requests with no school info or insufficient postage will be returned or destroyed.
  
• No phone, fax, or email requests will be accepted for complimentary copies.
  
• Available while supply lasts.

Also see our FREE pocket edition of Thomas Paine's Common Sense.

. . . . . . . . .

April 8, 2010 08:27 AM   Link    Publications    Comments (0)

How to get better job reviews and get promoted

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing

How to Compose Clear and Effective Reports, Letters, Email, and Memos

Do you need to improve your writing skills? This intensive one-day course helps students understand the three dimensions of professional writing: organization, format and style. In addition to reviewing and teaching specific writing techniques, our faculty show you how to:

• Apply critical thinking to the writing process
• Use the four keys to effective writing
• Understand the five-step writing process
• Develop an effective writing style

Communication skills are the key to efficient and effective operations in business and government. New employees should brush-up on their basic written communication and plain English skills, while experienced professionals, burdened by the additional workload caused by downsizing and budget cuts, can also benefit from this refresher course.

Our writing courses have been described as "really about how to get better job reviews and get promoted" because they help you improve one of your most important, and visible, job skills: written communication.

April 15, 2010, 9 am - 4 pm.

Approved for 0.6 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW) in Washington, DC

This is a required course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see WordWorkshop.com

April 7, 2010 04:37 PM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Glossary of Legislative Terms: "Adoption (Adopted)"

Adoption (Adopted): Usual parliamentary term for approval of conference report.

This definition is from the Glossary in our Congressional Deskbook. Perfect reference tool of Congressional jargon and procedural terms. Congressional Deskbook: The Practical and Comprehensive Guide to Congress, by Michael Koempel and Judy Schneider.

TheCapitol.Net offers training and a Certificate in Congressional Operations and Federal Budgeting. We show you how Washington and Congress work. ^TM

April 7, 2010 08:27 AM   Link    Tips and Terms    Comments (0)

Assorted Links 4/6/10

So, you think YOU can drive? Ha!




Bill Black: Not Dead Yet - Part 2

• Word Workshop: Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, April 15, 2010
• Word Workshop: Writing to Persuade: Hone Your Persuasive Writing Skills, April 16, 2010
• Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals, May 4, 2010
• Advanced Media Relations, May 5, 2010
• Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, May 6, 2010
• Crisis Communications Training, May 7, 2010
• Persuading Congress: Candid Advice for Executives - "Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.
  
  This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction."
• Obama Wants More Preferences - "The Obama administration has weighed in on behalf of the University of Texas's use of racial and ethnic preferences in its undergraduate admissions, filing an amicus brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, as reported here. This is unfortunate if not surprising, but the scope of the brief is noteworthy in three respects.
  
  First, it goes out of its way to endorse the use of preferences to achieve diversity not just in this particular case at this particular school, but in all "educational institutions"---K-12, undergraduate, and graduate. The Supreme Court has never found there to be a compelling interest in the former instance---nor, for example, in post-doctorates for chemistry---and it is aggressive and wrong to argue that, because the Court found there to be compelling educational benefits in diversity at the University of Michigan law school, therefore any educational institution can make that claim.
  
  Second, the University of Texas is arguing not just for campus-wide diversity but for classroom-by-classroom diversity. To achieve this, needless to say, the use of racial and ethnic preferences will be increased significantly."
• In defense of Hank Johnson - "By now you may have heard of a recent episode involving Congressman Hank Johnson, who represents the Fourth District of Georgia in the House, one of the most Democratic Congressional districts in the US.
  . . .
  However, I would like to offer a spirited defense of the unjustly-maligned Representative Johnson. First of all, although this is a little-known fact, he and Admiral Willard, the man he is questioning in the video, are old friends. They met in 1986 on the set of the film 'Top Gun.' Willard was a consultant and actor in the film (you can look it up), but the telegenic Johnson also played a bit role in the film as one of the other pilots.
  
  Willard and Johnson struck up an acquaintance on the set, finding that they shared a remarkable gift for deadpan humor. They developed a number of routines that had the other 'Top Gun' actors and extras in stitches, and were both known for keeping a straight face throughout the silliest exchanges, a skill that served them remarkably well during their recent encounter in Congress."
• Political Promiscuities: Naomi Wolf and the "Patriot Movement" - "In her monumentally stupid book The End of America, feminist author Naomi Wolf predicted that the Bush years would end in a full-blown fascist dictatorship. (I detailed the many errors of fact and logic in Wolf's book here. My favorite claim in The End of America is this one: 'The Communist revolutionaries of 1917 were opposed to torture, having suffered it themselves at the hands of czarist forces.') But the interminable Bush years ended as planned--and to Wolf's evident disappointment, without a putsch.
  
  But paranoia is a stubborn thing, and America's most successful anti-fascist is keeping hope alive. In this interview with Alternet, Wolf has kind words for the libertarian participants in the Tea Party movement, accuses President Obama of being like Hitler, and explains how she and Glenn Beck are, in fact, very different. When she says that 'Obama has done things like Hitler did,' she does it with an academic degree:"
• "Stealth Bailout" - "Obama’s mortgage modification extravaganza has touched-off a gold rush in toxic paper. Subprime securitizations, which had been worth next to nothing, are now the hottest trade on Wall Street. It’s a subprime bonanza! The investment sharpies are scarfing up all the crummy MBS they can get their hands on, because they know they can trade it in for Triple A FHA-backed loans when the program get’s going. It’s another swindle cooked up by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to keep the brokerage clan in the clover. Here’s how a Wall Street veteran explained it to me:
  It looks like the investors in securitizations will be swapping underwater real estate for govt-insured paper… I think the scam here is just to provide some cover so the hedge funds and other high net worth individuals can trade their low grade paper for Triple AAA mortgages insured by the FHA at the taxpayer expense.
  That’s it, in a nutshell. The faux-foreclosure prevention program has nothing to do with helping homeowners. That’s just diversionary gibberish to confuse the public. The real objective is to create a government landfill (aka-FHA) where the banks and other financial institutions can dump their toxic MBS-sludge and walk away with gov-backed loans."
• Reich Levels Broadside at Greenspan, Rubin, and Summers, and Phony Financial Reform - "There were plenty of enablers to this financial fraud. There always are many more people who do not act out of principle, or inside involvement and knowledge, but out of their own selfish bias and greed or craven fear that compels them to 'go with the flow.'
  
  And there is little better example of this than the many people who are even now turning a willful eye away from the blatant government manipulation of the stock and commodity markets, in particular the silver market. They do not wish to believe it, so they ignore it, and even ridicule it depending on how deeply it affects their personal interests. But the overall body of evidence is compelling enough to provoke further investigation, and the refusal to allow audits and independent investigation starts to become an overwhelming sign of a coverup. I am not saying that it is correct, or that I know something, but I am saying to not investigate it thoroughly and to air all the details, is highly suspicious and not in the interests of the truth. I did not know, for example, that Madoff was conducting a Ponzi scheme, but the indications were all there and a simple investigation and disclosure would have revealed the truth, one way or the other.
  . . .
  The perpetrators of this latest fraud, this unleashing of darkness upon the world, will count on the fear and apathy of the many, and the cynical contempt of the fortunate for the disadvantaged, to make them all the unwitting accomplices in their own inevitable destruction. It has worked for them in the past.
  
  One cannot fight this sort of evil with hatred and violence, or hysteria and intemperate accusations, for these are its creatures, and it uses them always to further its ends. The only worthy adversary of the darkness is transparency, openness, justice, and truth based on facts, in the light of reason, with the guidance of the light of the world. We are not sufficient of ourselves to stand against it, and if we knock down the law, the Constitution, to chase it with expediency and private justice, what will protect us when it turns around to devour us? But we should never be a willing victim, and even worse, a silent bystander or mocking accomplice."
• Does incarceration make people black? - "In a paper in Social Problems, Saperstein and Penner find that there is a surprising amount of variability in racial identification in the NLSY. Some of this variation is due to error or other random factors but some of it also appears to be systematic. In particular, the authors find that if someone has been incarcerated they are more likely to self-identify as black as well as to be independently identified as black."
• New adversary in U.S. drug war: Contract killers for Mexican cartels - "A cross-border drug gang born in the prison cells of Texas has evolved into a sophisticated paramilitary killing machine that U.S. and Mexican officials suspect is responsible for thousands of assassinations here, including the recent ambush and slaying of three people linked to the U.S. consulate.
  
  The heavily tattooed Barrio Azteca gang members have long operated across the border in El Paso, dealing drugs and stealing cars. But in Ciudad Juarez, the organization now specializes in contract killing for the Juarez drug cartel. According to U.S. law enforcement officers, it may have been involved in as many as half of the 2,660 killings in the city in the past year.
  
  Officials on both sides of the border have watched as the Aztecas honed their ability to locate targets, stalk them and finally strike in brazen ambushes involving multiple chase cars, coded radio communications, coordinated blocking maneuvers and disciplined firepower by masked gunmen in body armor. Afterward, the assassins vanish, back to safe houses in the Juarez barrios or across the bridge to El Paso."
  
  That Drug War thingy, how's that workin' out?
  
  
• What We Know About North Korea, and Kim Jong Il, From His Defected Staff - "Another former employee of North Korea's secretive dictatorship — a personal shopper — has escaped to tell his story. Here's a roundup of the bizarre details he, and two chefs, told of their time working for the world's weirdest dictator.
  
  The people of North Korea have, for decades, been starving to death while a madman spends the country's dwindling fortune on weapons and himself. And, of course, on propping up his totalitarian regime. As Nicholas Kristof wrote 'entire families [are] sometimes executed if one member gets drunk and slights the Dear Leader.' The country's nickname, the hermit kingdom, is hard-earned. Very few reports have emerged from the highest levels of government, and even fewer from the court of Kim himself. Here's what we know from the few who have escaped -- forced stripteases and all."
• Is the Obama Mortgage Foreclosure Plan Legal? - "Many, including myself, have criticized the TARP as a massive delegation of spending power from Congress to the Treasury Department. Such delegation is, in my mind, clearly unconstitutional. However, even within such a broad delegation, there are parameters in which Treasury must act. Treating TARP as simply a large pot of money to spend however Treasury chooses is nothing short of illegal."
• Bank of Mom and Dad Shuts Amid White-Collar Struggle - "When Maurice Johnson was laid off a year ago from his six-figure salary as a managing director at GE Capital, it wasn't his future he was worried about.
  
  It was his children's.
  
  The family income of the Johnsons is a fifth of what it used to be. And the children are about to feel the pain. Mr. Johnson's two oldest are attending his alma mater, Johns Hopkins University, at an annual cost of $50,000 apiece. And his youngest daughter, 15 years old, recently began her own college search. Mr. Johnson isn't sure whether he'll be able to help her to go to college, or even to get the older kids to graduation.
  . . .
  'I know, I know--cry me a river and then build a bridge and get over it, right?' Mr. Johnson says. 'Still, there was a set of expectations we established, consciously or not, and they are not being met any more.'"
• Straws in the wind (part two) - "'Losses in state retirement fund create $1 billion crisis for [Oregon] agencies, local governments'
  . . .
  'Cash-Poor Cities Take On Unions'
  . . .
  'What Politics Looks Like in a Union-Run World That Has Run Out of Money'.
  . . .
  'How the Coming Union Pension Plan Collapse is Affecting White House Decisions'."
• Sniper Finder Rushed To Afghanistan - "If you want proof that Robert Gates and Ash Carter are serious about pushing the Pentagon to be the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan then look no further than the wonderfully named Gunslinger Package for Advanced Convoy Security (GunPACS).
  . . .
  Mounted on the ready-to-rumble MTVR, the system locates snipers using the acoustic Boomerang system and feeds that data to a map and cues a CROWS II remote weapons system (pictured above). The CROWS camera gives the crew a rapid look at the possible target and the picture can be shared in near real time with a tactical operations center. That gives everyone a chance to avoid killing civilians, a key capability in a counter-insurgency fight."

Here’s another of our fabulous Representatives




More on the (Un)Constitutionality of Obamacare

• Bad Retro:The Federally-Planned City - "An under-discussed development in the Obama Administration is the re-animation of a policy better left in faded journals:federal urban planning.
  
  The idea behind 'federal blight removal' in the 1950s and 1960s was to pave over old neighborhoods, often derided as 'slums' by the planning elite, and replace them with the fad du jour, Le Courbousier inspired high-rises.The intent was social engineering by constructing 'cities of the future,' made of superhighways and towering apartments. As Martin Anderson documents in his 1964 book The Federal Bulldozer, the effect was the destruction of housing stock and neighborhoods, and the displacement of people."
• The 2009 Pigasus Awards - "Tonight, we are pleased to present this year's Pigasus Awards to the following very-deserving people. It was a hard call -- there seem to be millions all over the world clambering to make it onto the following shortlist -- but these folks had that special something that commanded our attention and, in the end, impressed us like no others. No matter if it was blatant cynicism, shocking callousness, lazy ignorance, or merely old-fashioned pig-headedness -- these men and women took those qualities that most vex us to their wild, crazy extremes. We'd salute them, but we're too busy gaping."
• The Growth Managed Death of Oregon's Pear Farms - "Oregon became a nationwide leader in statewide growth management when it passed its law in 1973 to protect farmland and open space. It turns out, an unintended side effect is the undermining of the financial viability of the state's agricultural industry, specifically fruit farms.
  
  Farms are unable to sell their land to underwrite their farm operations. As a result, they are going under.
  . . .
  Of course, this is the inherent problem with central planning of any kind. All human and government actions have unintended consequences. The question is which institutions are more effective and resilient in addressing these problems."
• Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
• Common Market Food Co-op - "Common Market Food Co-op was a 'new wave food co-op' located at 1329 California Street in Denver, Colorado, from 1975 - 1980. It started as a buying club at the University of Denver in the early 1970s, and for a few years prior to moving to the old Safeway at 13th and California Streets, Common Market operated out of a small storefront on Champa Street."
• Kraft: Management Incompetence Visited On Cadbury Employees - "The Kraft acquisition of Cadbury provides a vivid illustration of why the US model of screwing workers to preserve executive bonuses does not go over well abroad.
  
  Brief synopsis: Kraft acquires the 200 year old British confection-maker Cadbury after a heated battle. The chairwoman and CEO Irene Rosenfeld (already not a good sign, best practice is to separate the two roles) was awarded a 41% pay increase, bringing the total to $26 million for 2009 for her 'exceptional role' in the Cadbury transaction, as well as her 'commitment to fiscal discipline.'
  
  Huh? Doing deals is part of a modern CEO’s job. Unless her role was SO exceptional that it saved Kraft several million in deal fees, this just looks like a trumped up excuse. It is far too early to tell if the Cadbury acquistion was a good deal or not, thus special bennies look mighty unwaranted."
• Easter lamb a tradition that predates religion - "The men will drift outside to the fire, hypnotized by it, laughing, reaching out to pull pieces off the lamb, just for the taste, as an end to the long fast. We'll have fun being together, and I hope you enjoy the day with your friends and families, too.
  
  How long has this been going on, this turning of the lambs over fire? Since before religion, before words.
  
  Our pagan ancients made burnt offerings to the gods, holding up the choicest thigh pieces, pouring libations on the ground.
  
  And also Father Abraham made offerings to God, and Moses brought the law to the Jews, and the generations upon generations did the same, through the Passover Supper and to the present day."

Recently at Reason.tv: 3 Reasons Why Public Sector Employees Are Killing The Economy

• Cheaper RFID Printed on Paper - "We previously mentioned a study where it was shown that traditional RFID tags could be used safely as patient wristbands in a medical setting, but now a technology from Korea could help make it cheap enough to be widespread."
• How to Teach a 3-Year-Old to Drive in the Snow - "Growing up in California I didn’t get much experience driving in the snow and I had a steep learning curve when I moved to Chicago. So it’s pretty important to me to make sure that my kids get an early start. My 3 year old made a lot of progress with his driving lessons last fall and so I wanted to strike while the iron was hot and get him out on the road in some snow this winter.
  
  There are certainly some new challenges involved. For safety reasons I wanted him to learn in a car with all-wheel-drive."
• NYT Fooled Twice on April Fools' Day - "The paper of record fell for two blogs' April Fools' jokes—one required a retraction and one went so far over their heads, the Times sent a publicist to quell an "inaccurate" story. Update: Prankster tells all."
• The Fool's Gold At The End Of The iPad Rainbow - "The media has been making a huge deal about how the iPad is supposed to 'save the business,' because suddenly everything will return to apps, and people pay for apps, and toss in a big dose of 'Steve Jobs!' and there's some sort of magic formula which includes some question marks and inevitably ends in profit! Now, the iPad does look like a nice device, and I have no doubt that it will do quite well for Apple, and many buyers will be quite happy with it. But it's not going to save the media business in any way, shape or form. It's just the media chasing a rainbow in search of gold that doesn't exist.
  
  A few months back, I tried to ask a simple question that we still haven't received a good answer to: all of these media companies, thinking that iPad apps are somehow revolutionary, don't explain why they never put that same functionality online. They could. But didn't. There's nothing special about the iPad that enables functionality you couldn't do elsewhere. But, it goes deeper than that. People are being taken down by app madness. Because the iPhone has sold a bunch of apps, suddenly old school media players are suddenly dreaming of the sorts of control they used to have, and pretending it can be replicated on the iPad. But that's a big myth."
• Vinaigrettes-- Egged, Bunnied and Snotted-Upon - "And I know she is thanking me for fixing it, and for not getting mad at her.
  
  'You’re so welcome,' I say. Because I have to land on her when she won’t stay in bed, and I have to ignore her when she screams, and it is my sacred duty to put her ass in time out when she smacks her big sister.
  
  But I’ll never kick her when she’s down."

. . . . . . . . .

April 6, 2010 06:47 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

Certificate in Congressional Operations, In Washington, DC

Certificate in Congressional Operations

Our Certificate in Congressional Operations explores the legislative process and congressional communication. This program gives government employees, legislative affairs professionals, interest groups, law firms, NGOs, and media organizations the background needed to effectively participate in the legislative arena.

Our courses, held in Washington, DC, help students understand the legislative process, prepare Congressional testimony, draft federal legislation, research legislative histories, monitor legislation, communicate with Congress, and work with federal regulatory agencies.

Some of the training opportunities in this Certificate include

• Capitol Hill Workshop: Politics, Policy and Process
  
• Congressional Dynamics and the Legislative Process
  
• Understanding Congressional Budgeting and Appropriations
  
• Drafting Effective Federal Legislation and Amendments
  
• Preparing and Delivering Congressional Testimony

If you are a Congressional Fellow or administer a Congressional Fellowship, contact us for information about special training opportunities.

For more information about the Certificate in Congressional Operations, see CongressionalOperations.com .

April 5, 2010 09:17 AM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Congressional Pay and Perks: Salaries, Pension and Retirement, Franking, Travel, and Other Benefits for U.S. Senators and Representatives

Congressional Pay and Perks

Congressional Pay and Perks
Salaries, Pension and Retirement, Franking, Travel, and Other Benefits for U.S. Senators and Representatives

Compiled by TheCapitol.Net
Authors: Ida A. Brudnick, R. Eric Petersen, Patrick J. Purcell, Mildred Amer, Matthew Eric Glassman, Jennifer E. Manning, Michael L. Koempel and Judy Schneider

Congress is required by Article I, Section 6, of the Constitution to determine its own pay. Prior to 1969, Congress did so by enacting stand-alone legislation. From 1789 through 1968, Congress raised its pay 22 times using this procedure. Members were initially paid per diem. The first annual salaries, in 1815, were $1,500. Per diem pay was reinstituted in 1817. Congress returned to annual salaries, at a rate of $3,000, in 1855. By 1968, pay had risen to $30,000. Stand-alone legislation may still be used to raise Member pay, as it was most recently in 1982, 1983, 1989, and 1991; but two other methods--including an automatic annual adjustment procedure and a commission process--are now also available.

2010, 294 pages
ISBN: 1587331659 ISBN 13: 978-1-58733-165-7
Softcover book: $19.95

For more information, see CongressPay.com

April 5, 2010 08:47 AM   Link    Congress    Comments (0)

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, live course in DC April 15, 2010

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing

How to Compose Clear and Effective Reports, Letters, Email, and Memos

Do you need to improve your writing skills? This intensive one-day course helps students understand the three dimensions of professional writing: organization, format and style. In addition to reviewing and teaching specific writing techniques, our faculty show you how to:

• Apply critical thinking to the writing process
• Use the four keys to effective writing
• Understand the five-step writing process
• Develop an effective writing style

Communication skills are the key to efficient and effective operations in business and government. New employees should brush-up on their basic written communication and plain English skills, while experienced professionals, burdened by the additional workload caused by downsizing and budget cuts, can also benefit from this refresher course.

April 15, 2010, 9 am - 4 pm.

Approved for 0.6 CEUs from George Mason University.

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW) in Washington, DC

This is a required course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see WordWorkshop.com .

April 4, 2010 07:17 PM   Link    Training    Comments (0)

Common Sense Rules of Advocacy for Lawyers now in Paperback

Common Sense Rules of Advocacy for Lawyers: A Practical Guide for Anyone Who Wants To Be a Better Advocate, by Keith Evans, is now available in paperback .

Common Sense Rules of Advocacy for Lawyers

The classic advocacy guide for trial lawyers, Common Sense Rules of Advocacy for Lawyers has been hailed by attorneys, mediators and professors nationwide. It's the practical advocacy guide designed for anyone who must persuade others including attorneys, lobbyists, negotiators, account executives, law students, sales professionals, and parents.

This guide provides tips and rules that will help anyone - lawyer or lobbyist, account executive or negotiator – improve their advocacy skills in less than 10 minutes a day.

Available from most booksellers.

More information, including complete Table of Contents and sample sections, available at RulesOfAdvocacy.com.

Mug with cover also available!

Common Sense Rules of Advocacy mug by TheCapitolNet

April 3, 2010 10:37 AM   Link    Comments (0)

Assorted Links 4/2/10

Bill Black: Not Dead Yet - Part 1 (ht Global Guerillas)

• Word Workshop: Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, April 15, 2010
• Word Workshop: Writing to Persuade: Hone Your Persuasive Writing Skills, April 16, 2010
• Media Relations for Public Affairs Professionals, May 4, 2010
• Advanced Media Relations, May 5, 2010
• Public Affairs and the Internet: Advanced Techniques and Strategies, May 6, 2010
• Crisis Communications Training, May 7, 2010
• Persuading Congress: Candid Advice for Executives - "Persuading Congress, by Joseph Gibson, is a very practical book, packed with wisdom and experience in a deceptively short and simple package.
  
  This book will help you understand Congress. Written from the perspective of one who has helped put a lot of bills on the president's desk and helped stop a lot more, this book explains in everyday terms why Congress behaves as it does. Then it shows you how you can best deploy whatever resources you have to move Congress in your direction."
• For top pay, major in engineering - "Why aren’t more students pursuing engineering degrees, wonders Mark Bauerlein on Brainstorm. He links to a survey on the bachelor’s degrees that earn the top 10 starting salaries: Petroleum engineering starts at $86,220, followed by six other engineering specialties, computer science and information systems."
• ObamaCare: More Ambiguity Than a David Lynch Movie? - "No matter how much time you spend staring at it, you can never be quite sure just what it all means. I've already asked whether the individual mandate might be unenforceable. Here are some other questions about the law and its possible outcomes:"
• Why Envy Dominates Greed - "Economists generally think of self interest as maximizing the present value of one’s consumption, or wealth, independent of others. Wealth can be generalized to include not just their financial assets, but the present value of their labor income and even public goods. Adam Smith emphasized a self-interest that also recognized social position and regard for society as a whole, but this was well before anyone thought of writing down a utility function, which is a mathematically precise formulation of how people define their self interest.
  
  But what if economists have it all wrong, that self interest is primarily about status, and only incidentally correlated with wealth? A lot, it turns out.
  
  In a book titled Human Universals, professor of anthropology Donald Brown listed hundreds of human universals in an effort to emphasize the fundamental cognitive commonality between members of the human species. Some of these human universals include incest avoidance, child care, pretend play, and many more. A concern for relative status was a human universal, and relative status is a nice way of saying people have envy and desire power [status seeking, benchmarking, all fall under this more sensational description, envy]."
• “Related Blog Posts” PlugIn is the Latest Spammer Trick - "Earlier this month, I asked 'What Is With All The TrackBack Spam?' We suddenly began getting an inordinate amount of spammy trackbacks, and I had no idea why.
  
  It didn’t take long to figure out the source: A WordPress plug in called “Related Blog Posts.” This is a dishonest way to try to grab some Google juice by auto-linking to other unrelated sites. It is auto-generated noise -- uncurated, unfiltered, unedited, and worst of all not actually related -- that tries to look like human generated linkfests and/or related content.
  
  It is not. It is nothing more than trackback spam.
  
  Andrew Wee describes them as a 'new generation of made-for-Adsense blogs.' I just call them splogs. There are now 1000s of spam blogs that have started to use this plug in, and they pollute the comment stream of other blogs. If we allowed these unrelated 'Related Blog Posts,' half of the comment discussion section would be splog trackbacks."
• Paywall/Open Debate Applied To University Education As Well - "DV's summary above is great, but I wanted to highlight one more specific point from the article, which is a quote from James D. Yager, a dean at Johns Hopkins University, who basically presents the other side of the story from Professor Argenti, by actually articulating the difference between the content (infinite) and all of the scarcities that the content makes more valuable:
  
  'We don't offer the course for free, we offer the content for free,' Mr. Yager said by telephone in February. 'Students take courses because they want interaction with faculty, they want interaction with one another. Those things are not available on O.C.W.'
  
  Exactly. That's the point, and it's too bad that a professor at Dartmouth (which is generally a pretty good business school) would so confuse the basic economics of information, and not realize that even if all of the course info is free, there are always aspects that are scarce."
• All hail God-King Roosevelt! - "Roosevelt seemed to be setting up the equivalent of the most ancient forms of tyranny, the god-king--combining magic and religion, as anthropologist Gordon Childe put it"
• Pretending that no law professors question Obamacare - "Back in 1989, National Public Radio reporter Nina Totenberg attempted to portray the individual rights view of the Second Amendment as a fringe position with no academic support. She claimed that the National Rifle Association had been unable to provide her with names of any professors who thought the Second Amendment was an individual right.
  
  According to the NRA, Ms. Totenberg was lying, and the NRA had given her three names: Robert Cottrol of George Washington, Joseph Olson of Hamline, and Sanford Levinson of Texas. The latter, of course, was (and is) well-known as the co-author of a major constitutional law textbook, and had just published an article in the Yale Law Journal, titled 'The Embarrassing Second Amendment,' which stated that the arguments in favor of an individual right were very strong.
  
  Indeed, the individual right arguments were so strong that when the Supreme Court finally got around to announcing a new Second Amendment decision, in District of Columbia v. Heller, all nine Justices readily agreed that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right. There was a 5-4 split on the scope of the right, but all Justices recognized that the right belonged to individuals, not to states or to some 'collective.'
  
  Earlier this week at the University of Washington Law School, a 'debate' was held on the constitutionality of Obamacare. All four of the debaters said that the new law is unquestionably constitutional. According to moderator Hugh Spitzer, the reason that the 'debate' featured only one side was that 'we tried very hard to get a professor who could come and who thinks this is flat-out unconstitutional...But there are relatively few of them, and they are in great demand.' The Center for American Progress touts this story as proof of the constitutionality of Obamacare, and the comments on the blog post are a self-congratulatory frenzy about the stupidity of anyone who doubts Obamacare.
  
  Well, all I can say is that if I had some legal problem that required modestly diligent research, I sure wouldn’t hire any of those Washington panel organizers."
• Control Fraud - "Control fraud, with looting as the objective, occurs when the CEO manipulates accounting rules to make the company he runs wildly profitable. These manipulations usually involve the creation of intangible and very difficult to understand assets (think derivatives), that can be valued very highly but be in reality worthless. This complexity makes unwinding the fraud from the outside almost impossible."
• Will 8,000 Sailors Sink Guam? - "It is very rare occasion that I am rendered utterly and absolutely speechless--and in this case I mean it quite literally--but this clip of Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), picked up on by Washington Examiner editorial writer Mark Hemingway, might contain the dumbest statement ever uttered on the floor of Congress. And believe me, I understand that this is a bold claim, considering the long and distinguished history of Congressional sophistry."
• I'm not the messiah, says food activist -- but his many worshippers do not believe him - "'I don't think a messiah figure is going to be a terribly good launching point for the kinds of politics I'm talking about – for someone who has very strong anarchist sympathies, this has some fairly deep contradictions in it.'
  . . .
  While he struggles to cope with this unwanted anointment, his friends and family are more tickled by the situation.
  
  'They think it's hilarious,' he said. 'My parents came to visit recently, and they brought clothes that said 'he's not the messiah, he's a very naughty boy'. To them, it's just amusing.'
  
  There have been similar cases in the past, including Steve Cooper, an unemployed man from Tooting, south London, who was identified by a Hindu sect as the reincarnation of a goddess and now lives in a temple in Gujurat with scores of followers."
• The EYM Lays Down Some Smack - "Oh, where, WHERE did I go wrong? Clearly, I failed as a father. A kid who doesn't realize that "sustainable" is something we worship.... well, I blame the LMM. She's a lawyer, and tends to think that words have meanings, rather than emotions."

Channeling Bastiat

• Theodore Dalrymple on Self-Esteem vs. Self-Respect - "With the coyness of someone revealing a bizarre sexual taste, my patients would often say to me, 'Doctor, I think I'm suffering from low self-esteem.' This, they believed, was at the root of their problem, whatever it was, for there is hardly any undesirable behavior or experience that has not been attributed, in the press and on the air, in books and in private conversations, to low self-esteem, from eating too much to mass murder.
  
  Self-esteem is, of course, a term in the modern lexicon of psychobabble, and psychobabble is itself the verbal expression of self-absorption without self-examination. The former is a pleasurable vice, the latter a painful discipline. An accomplished psychobabbler can talk for hours about himself without revealing anything.
  
  Insofar as self-esteem has a meaning, it is the appreciation of one's own worth and importance. That it is a concept of some cultural resonance is demonstrated by the fact that an Internet search I conducted brought up 14,500,000 sites, only slightly fewer than the U.S. Constitution and four times as many as 'fortitude.'
  
  When people speak of their low self-esteem, they imply two things: first, that it is a physiological fact, rather like low hemoglobin, and second, that they have a right to more of it. What they seek, if you like, is a transfusion of self-esteem, given (curiously enough) by others; and once they have it, the quality of their lives will improve as the night succeeds the day. For the record, I never had a patient who complained of having too much self-esteem, and who therefore asked for a reduction. Self-esteem, it appears, is like money or health: you can't have too much of it.
  . . .
  Self-respect requires fortitude, one of the cardinal virtues; self-esteem encourages emotional incontinence that, while not actually itself a cardinal sin, is certainly a vice, and a very unattractive one. Self-respect and self-esteem are as different as depth and shallowness."
• L. Ron Hubbard's Dystopia On Earth: An Ex-Scientologist Speaks Out - "If, as is claimed to prospective members, Scientology is the 'only major religion to have emerged in the 20th century,' then it is currently experiencing a growing pain common to all religions entering adolescence: The schism. David Miscavige, the slick little salesman who took over the Church of Scientology after the death of noted junkie and fugitive L. Ron Hubbard, has lately been accused of abusing his underlings and lying to his flock to obfuscate his own failures as a spiritual leader. Scientologists around the world are breaking off from the official Church, claiming that it has 'strayed from the original philosophy and purpose of the group which Hubbard first researched and developed.'
  
  But some ex-Scientologists have less regard for the teachings of L. Ron Hubbard. One of them is Aaron Saxton, a New Zealander who spent eight years -- from his mid-teens through his early 20s -- as part of Scientology’s elite paramilitary corps, Sea Org. Read on to learn his thoughts on Independent Scientologists, Sea Org, violence, coerced abortion, rape, false imprisonment, and the many other delights allegedly awaiting those who take seriously L. Ron Hubbard’s declaration that 'your search is over, but the adventure has just begun.'
  
  Aaron Saxton was born into The Church of Scientology in 1974 and left it in 2006. In the intervening years, he says, he tried coercing female Sea Org members into undergoing abortions, falsely imprisoned his fellows in the Church, both witnessed and engaged in the psychological abuse of children, and was denied even routine medical treatment. (He has alleged that he was once forced to remove his own teeth without anesthesia.)"
• A Census ad on a Metro bus, socialist calculation debate edition - "If we don't know how many people there are
  How will we know how many buses we need?"
• Wheat Ridge High School Class of 1970 - "The reonion committee is working away planning the 40th reunion the weekend of August 13-15, 2010. Wheat Ridge, Colorado WRHS1970.com"
• Common Market Food Co-op - "Common Market Food Co-op was a 'new wave food co-op' located at 1329 California Street in Denver, Colorado, from 1975 - 1980. It started as a buying club at the University of Denver in the early 1970s, and for a few years prior to moving to the old Safeway at 13th and California Streets, Common Market operated out of a small storefront on Champa Street."
• We get customers - "From her business card I learned that she is on the corporate staff of a large national chain of casual dining restaurants. I should have reframed her surprise at our price in the following manner: You believe the price on the menu for your cheeseburger is too high, so you decide to travel on down to The Mansion on Turtle Creek and tell the chef you want a cheeseburger, an item not on the menu, and you are surprised at the price?
  
  Geez." ht Kids Prefer Cheese

Policing for Profit

• On Holy Week and why I am attending Easter Mass - "not even God can force a man to belong to a Church whose moral teachings he rejects.
  
  But to the first objection, we are now seven centuries past Dante putting dozens of popes and bishops in Hell in his Inferno. We are eight centuries past Saint Dominic’s warning to the Pope that his greed had crippled the Church’s mission. And we are twenty centuries past the apostle Judas betraying Jesus Christ for 30 pieces of silver.
  
  Perhaps millennia of experience can confirm that it is too much to expect men of the cloth to be either holy or competent. This is no excuse for what any of them did or allowed to happen -- especially to children: remember what Christ said about the millstone. But the clergy’s shortcomings present the feeblest, lamest excuse for skipping Mass. It would at least be understandable if Fernholz pleaded out on account of unbelief or a desire to smoke weed instead behind the bell tower.
  
  Catholics don’t attend mass because they approve of the pope, the bishop, or the priest. We attend because we want to share in the Body and Blood of Christ. If Fernholz believes it is the holiness of its members or leaders that makes the Church holy, then he is unfamiliar enough with the Gospel from Holy Week that he should do himself the favor of attending the Good Friday service (which is not a Mass). It serves as a good reminder of what we did to Jesus the last time we had a crack at him in the flesh."
• 10 Simple Google Search Tricks - "I’m always amazed that more people don’t know the little tricks you can use to get more out of a simple Google search. Here are 10 of my favorites."
• Java Patch Plugs 27 Security Holes - "A new version of Java is available that fixes at least 27 security vulnerabilities in the ubiquitous software.
  . . .
  If you don’t have Java, then you probably don’t need it. My personal philosophy is that if I don’t need it, I don’t install it or keep it. Java vulnerabilities increasingly are being targeted in automated exploit kits that are sewn into hacked and malicious sites, so by all means if you don’t have a use for it, I say get rid of it. Eliminating unnecessary programs helps reduce what security wonks call the 'attack surface' of a system: You’re basically bricking up potential windows and doors into your computer. At any rate, if it turns out you do in fact need Java for some reason, you can always reinstall it."

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April 2, 2010 08:07 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

All hail God-King Roosevelt!

Roosevelt seemed to be setting up the equivalent of the most ancient forms of tyranny, the god-king--combining magic and religion, as anthropologist Gordon Childe put it, with magic being "a way of making people believe they are going to get what they want" and religion "a system for persuading them that they ought to want what they get." The combination of alphabet agencies, Social Security, and relentless barrages of war whooping and propaganda, plus a reign that seemed to be growing as long as any pharonic family with term after unprecedented term--what did all this add up to? All hail God-King Roosevelt!

"Radicals for Capitalism," by Brian Doherty (Public Affairs 2007), page 65 (footnote omitted).

Conservatism vs Libertarianism - Brian Doherty







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April 1, 2010 08:47 PM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

Answering constituent mail, in the old days

“One of the countless drawbacks of being in Congress is that I am compelled to receive impertinent letters from a jackass like you in which you say I promised to have the Sierra Madre mountains reforested and I have been in Congress two months and haven’t done it. Will you please take two running jumps and go to hell.”

– Congressman John McGroarty, engaged in constituent service (1934).

Answering constituent mail, in the old days

April 1, 2010 09:47 AM   Link    Caught Our Eye    Comments (0)

FREE pocket edition of "Common Sense" by Thomas Paine

A free download of our Pocket Edition of Common Sense is available on Scribd.

Free Copy of our Pocket Edition of Thomas Paine's Common Sense:

• Single copies of this Pocket Edition of Thomas Paine's Common Sense are available at no charge by sending a self-addressed stamped envelope (SASE) with first class postage for two (2) ounces to: TheCapitol.Net, Common Sense, PO Box 25706, Alexandria, VA 22313-5706. Requests with insufficient postage will be returned or destroyed. Only 1 copy per request.
  
• Social Studies and Government Teachers: You can combine up to 35 of your students' separate SASEs (each SASE must have first class postage for two (2) ounces attached) into one large envelope that you mail to us for free copies for your students. Enclose a note with your name, name of your school, course taught, grade, and school address. Requests with no school info or insufficient postage will be returned or destroyed.
  
• No phone, fax, or email requests will be accepted for complimentary copies.
  
• Available while supply lasts.

Also see our FREE Pocket Constitution.

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April 1, 2010 09:07 AM   Link    Publications    Comments (0)