An end and a beginning

Today was my last day at Rust Consulting, the place I've been working since the end of October. I started as a temp, and then a couple of months ago they decided they liked me enough to hire me on as a regular employee. It was a nice job-I got to work downtown, which meant I got to walk around the skyway system everyday and familiarize myself with a part of Minneapolis I didn't know that well. But the best part was the people-I don't know that I met anyone at Rust that I didn't like-coworker or superior. So it was a little sad to leave. Not really sad, mind you, since I'm incredibly excited for my program to start and psyched to be returning to England, but I am going to miss the people I worked with.

So that was today. Since getting home my time has been entirely dedicated to getting my new laptop up and running. It's a Dell Studio XPS, and it's shiny and very cool. I haven't transfered any of my personal files yet, but I have downloaded several of the programs I use every day (chrome, itunes, skype) and started to configure things to my liking. So in the space of one day I've left my job and received what's going to become my link to the rest of the world. Exciting stuff.

Damn Damn Damn

I'm a big fan of Kevin Smith's movies. Hell, I even thought Jersey Girl was ok. And I also love the Evening with Kevin Smith dvds that have come out over the last few years. Not only do they contain some absolutely hilarious stories (the Superman story and the Prince story from the first dvd are classic), but Smith is also more open and honest about himself and his relationships than pretty much anyone I've ever seen in a similar senario. Intimate details about his sex life with his wife? Done. Horriffic personal health details? No problem. And of course he lampoons himself left and right (albeit in front of an adoring audience). He's always funny, always intelligent and almost always interesting.

So naturally when I saw his name on the marquee of the State Theater, I was psyched. Until, that is, I noticed the date that he'll be here: September 17th, a week after I leave for England. Suck.

Although I did just discover he'll be in London on the 10th of October. Hmmm...

One Short Post on Farvemas

In case you've been knocked by rampaging beavers for the last 12 hours or so, you know that Brett Farve is a Viking. As someone who has long wanted him to make up his damn mind already, I'm glad it's over, in the sense that he's now playing for the team. Honestly I don't know how things will work out (or how much of it I'll get to see in England), but I thought this was particularly insightful, from Souhan's column in the Strib:

Favre is a football Elvis. We just don't know yet whether he's going to be like young, dynamic Elvis or old, decrepit Elvis.

One thing's for sure-the Vikes will not have a boring season. Nor will they lack national media attention, as ESPN will most likely be doing its evening reports from Farve's locker from now until February.

A New Beginning

As you may or may not have heard, in September I'll be starting a graduate program at Oxford Brookes University in Oxford, England. The program will last a year, and I'll come out with an MA in Publishing. I'm extremely excited about returning to England, where I studied for four months during my junior year at Carleton. While I'm over there, I'm going to start blogging again and use it as a forum for people to keep up with what I'm doing. I'll still get in my thoughts about issues, but many posts will be more like short updates on my life in general.

So while I'm still in the states I'm going to try and get back on the blogging horse (soon to be aided by the purchase of my very first laptop). So I thought I'd start by linking to this article in the Star Tribune, which takes a shot at one of the craziest politicians in the country, MN's own Michelle Bachmann, who's been working overtime since the election to establish her insanity bona fides. Now it seems her own family is out to get her. I'd love to see a comment on this, but somehow I don't think it's going to happen.

Walker, Texas President

Ahh, Chuck Norris.  You brought us the supreme ridiculousity of Walker, Texas Ranger.  Now you've brought us this: an offer to run for President of Texas once it secedes from the union, which is apparently going to happen "sooner than we think."  I'm sorry, but did we think it was going to happen at all?  Was Texas seceding on the schedule somewhere?  And did Norris just call for the creation of "cells" around the country dedicated to breaking up the US?  

Maybe this is what this Russian dude keeps talking about when he says the US will break up in 2010.  Which would mean that Chuck Norris is in bed with the Russians.  Walker would be furious.  

WTF

I have no idea what this movie is, or is about. But I love the trailer. Also, if I went to India (which I hope to do one day), would I see a big stone arch that said "India" welcoming me? Because that would be awesome.

Giving a Man a Crumb

Ok ABC, here's the deal: Lost is over a month away from coming back. That's a long time from now. I've got two holidays, two plane flights, one wedding, one tequila party, and one sister coming home and then leaving to go back to Japan again before I get to see the first episode on January 21st. I mean, that's next freaking year, man! Think about it this way: Obama will be sworn in as the 44th President before Lost premieres. Anyway ABC, I really think you should knock off the teasing. It's really not very nice. Just let us try and forget all about it until after New Year's, then when we start getting psyched about it it won't be so far away. Thanks for listening.

TBA 2008

My lack of posting since the election has had a little to do with the fact that I'm working every day, but more to do with my decision to take all the footage I shot of TBA this year and cut it together into a short retrospective. I'd never done anything like this before, and it took me a little while to figure out what I was doing. Nevertheless, I'm pleased with the result. I've posted it here so you see for yourself the yahoos I play with. Carleton people will recognize Java Fortran, Dr. Evil, Pat Smith and myself (although I'm only in two scenes, since I was taping the rest of the time). Anyone who wants to watch this without straining their eyes can get in touch with me, and I'll see if I can get them the file on cd or dvd.

O Freaking Bama

I realized it about 30 minutes after Ohio was announced for Obama by CNN. At the time, I was arguing the merits of Obama v. McCain with a friend of my sister's, so I only took time to turn to the TV, yell YES! at the top of my lungs, and then go back to my point. A half hour later, I realized that Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania had all been called for Obama, and he was sitting at 207 electoral votes before CA, OR, WA and HI were counted. When I took the time to add them up (no small feat considering the booze I had consumed), I realized that, barring the most insane of miracles, Obama had just become the President-Elect.

Holy S#*t.

I can't believe it. In 2004 I wanted to be able to vote for this man, and the fact that he's actually going to be the next President blows my mind. The fact that his grandmother died a day before being able to see this must tear at his heart.

I can't remember exactly what the line from his speech was, but I believe it was something along the lines of "a new day has dawned in American leadership." For America, and for the world, I have hope that Obama will deliver on his promise. Today, America decided to act on that hope. Go Obama.

Holy Crap

He's going to f#$*ing win.

My prediction

Let there be gloating or mocking.

Obama by 10 points nationally, 350+ in the electoral college.
Franken wins the MN senate seat by 2 points. The Dems get 58 seats, enabling them to burn Joe Lieberman, and not in effigy.

Man, I hope I'm right.

Election Eve

I have several posts I want to get to, including a review of Kevin Smith's new film, Zack and Miri Make a Porno, and an account of the Blues Traveler concert I went to last night. But I feel I should address the moment we find ourselves at right now.

No one knows the future, and those who guess are wrong much more often then they're right. But I find it hard to shake the feeling that my vote tomorrow may be the most imporant one I'll ever cast. This is far from certain: just about everything is far from certain right now. The economic, military and diplomatic challenges that face the country in general and the next president in particular are staggering-probably the worst since FDR died and Harry Truman took office. Truman met his challenges by combining common sense with an extraordinary dedication to getting the correct information, either by learning it himself or by getting the advice of people he trusted. It is perhaps this that gives me so much confidence in Obama: that he will make his choices based on the best information available and that he will listen to dissenting opinions and take them into account. Neither Obama nor McCain will be able to deliver everything they've promised during the campaign, but no president ever does. The next president will face ridiculous challenges. I'm not sure McCain is up to the task. I believe Obama is. Do I know he is? No. No one does. But I do believe it. Go vote.

You can read The Economist's endorsement of Obama here.

You can read Andrew Sullivan's final pre-election statement here.

The Youtube Election

With voting (or the end of voting) only a week away, and SNL, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report and every other comic about to lose their free-comedy meal ticket, I thought I would post my favorite videos from this election season. I'm not including actual speeches, otherwise Obama's More Perfect Union Speech would be in here, but instead videos that I thought were alternately awesome, hilarious, touching or disturbing.

(Also, I think that if you deconstruct the Hilary For You and Me video you'll come up with a fairly comprehensive picture of why she lost the primary.)

Time for Some Campaignin' | Funny Jokes at JibJab

Awesome

See, makers of 17/20ths of the commercials out there? Being good and funny while getting your point across isn't so hard.

Martin chimes in

Roland Martin takes a solid shot at Palin for talking a lot of trash without confronting any tough questions of her own. Martin brings up her most egregious statement, that the report on troopergate cleared her of any legal or ethical wrongdoing. Pay attention, now, Sarah: the report cleared you of legal wrongdoing, but stated that you violated the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. I could be insane, but that's pretty much the definition of ethical wrongdoing.

Time's analysis of the troopergate report, which delves into the report in more detail, can be found here.

Wackjobs

I've never really clips from al Jazeera before, but this is pretty well done, in the sense that if you watch it you get the sense that America is populated by a bunch of dumb, ignorant hicks. I can't believe I share a country with these people.




I have to give major props to the guys waving the Obama signs along the road to the rally. Given the makeup of that crowd, I don't know if I'd have the courage to do that.

I also need to give credit to Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish, since that's where I saw this. It's an excellent site, and he posts a lot of interesting political coverage.

Electoral

First let me say I think the Electoral College is outdated and should be abolished, especially in the wake of what happened in 2000. However, I'm not surprised that it hasn't been, nor am I surprised at the lack of movement in that direction. Earlier this summer I read an article on the possibility of McCain winning the college but Obama winning the popular vote-and not by a little, like Gore did in '00, but by several million. At the time is wasn't hard to imagine: Obama winning big in the states he took and losing only by a little in the states he lost. The article quoted an anonymous campaign (McCain's, I think) source as saying that the American public could take an election like that (meaning 2000) once every hundred years, but not twice in eight. I agreed at the time, and I still do, but it's starting to look more and more like that won't happen.



On and off for the past week or two I've been fiddling with CNN's Electoral Map Calculator. It's pretty cool-it let's you assign the states to either candidate, and starts it out based one what their current poll numbers show: safe Obama/McCain, leaning Obama/McCain, or tossup. Before the market blew up I thought there were four possibilities: Obama wins big, Obama wins small, McCain wins small, or a tie, with Obama winning small being the most likely possibility. But over the last couple of weeks Obama winning with an electorally significant margin has become a greater possibility. While there's a decent bit of time left yet, and victory is by no means assured, the math is starting to look imposing for McCain.



CNN's map (again, guided by their current poll numbers) has 264 electoral votes safe or leaning Obama. This includes Maine, who gives 2 votes to the statewide winner, and then one each to the winner of the two congressional districts. I've heard McCain has a shot at one of the district votes (the 2nd, I think), so let's say 263 for Obama. This includes the western seaboard and Hawaii, NM, MN, IA, WI, MI, IL and everything north of DC (including PA). This is hardly an optimistic projection, and it means all Obama would have to do to win is take OH, FL, VA, CO, NC, IN or MO. CNN lists all of these at tossups, but you can get more detail from pollster on each one of those key races. I would be shocked if Obama didn't come away with at least one.



So the question starts becoming how many electoral votes can Obama get? Fivethirtyeight.com lists the most common Obama totals as 375, 380,383, 338 and 381. Personally, when I go through the map I end up coming out somewhere in the 330s. There's one thing in the back of my mind, though. There's been a lot of talk recently about the Bradley effect, which basically is the fear that people are saying they're going to vote for Obama out of fear of appearing racist. The race that keeps coming back to me, however, is the MN gubernatorial race in 1998, when Jesse Ventura won a three-way race because of his ability to get non-traditional voters to the polls. This meant that going into election day, polls of likely voters that had been put in the field hadn't given him much of a chance. Now, I have no idea if or how the 2008 national polls take likely vs non-likely voter into account. But since Obama's candidacy, backed by an excellent organization, turned a lot of first-time voters out to the polls in the primary, it's a good bet that they'll do so in the general (something backed up by the significant new voter registration numbers that have started to come out across the country). If this gives his election-day numbers an unexpected bump, we could see something even more remarkable than anyone expects.

"More fun than Shark Week!"

I've liked Nathan Fillion ever since I saw the first episode of Firefly, so I'm pretty psyched about this new cop show that's coming out on ABC. Granted, it looks a little like Bones, but since Fillion's last show got canned before I could start watching it, I'm hoping this one is good enough to hang around. It certainly looks like it.

RS article

If you have 15-20 minutes, take some time and read this article about McCain that's coming out in the latest Rolling Stone. It's long-10 web pages-but it's in-depth and an important look at McCain's behavior during his life. Essentially it's closer look at the biographical story the GOP has made so much of during the campaign. It's a damning article, but well-supported and thoroughly researched. I wasn't voting for McCain before, so it didn't change my vote, but it did change my opinion of him as a public servant. I recommend reading it.

Scary as hell

If you've been paying any attention to election news over the last week, you've heard about some of the stuff McCain supporters have been shouting during his (and Palin's) rallies. Someone will wait for him to pause, then shout "terrorist", "traitor", "off with his head", and other completely insane comments. If you need to see some of the wackjobs I'm talking about, you can check out this, this and this.

For me, the scary part was that the last clip was from a town hall meeting that McCain held in Lakeville, MN, just a few miles north of Carleton, where I went to college. The crazies have invaded my own state. Damn it. Not only that, but this Star Tribune article quoted the Obama-is-an-Arab lady as saying after the meeting

"You can't trust Barack Hussein Obama because he is a Muslim and a terrorist."

Now, I'm a big Obama guy. I have no problem with people supporting McCain, but my hope would be that they do so because of some policy stance he takes or some conception of his leadership skills, despite the fact that I may disagree with them about said policies or skills. However, I am seriously disturbed by these morons who are so willfully ignorant that they believe Obama is an Arab, a Muslim, a terrorist or whatever other totally false, loony charges they level against him. And now, on election day, my vote for Obama will be cancelled out by this crazy woman's vote for McCain. My only hope is that her inability to discern truth from fiction will cause her to spend election day hiding in a field after hearing a rebroadcast of War of the Worlds.