R.I.P., TimesSelect

Now that the New York Times has thrown in the towel on its subscription-only access to online columns, I (and you, dear reader(s)) no longer have to rely on the selectivity of others for your Dowd, Krugman or Rich fix. We celebrate the occasion with my favorite source for cut-and-paste blogging: Maureen Dowd.

Alan (Not Atlas) Shrugged
By MAUREEN DOWD
It’s a lost art, slinking away.

Now the fashion is slinking back.

Nobody wants to simply admit they made a mistake and disappear for awhile. Nobody even wants to use the weasel words: “Mistakes were made.” No, far better to pop right back up and get in the face of those who were savoring your absence.

We should think of a name for this appalling modern phenomenon. Kissingering, perhaps.

In Las Vegas, there’s the loathsome O.J., a proper candidate for shunning and stun-gunning, barging back into the picture.

And on Capitol Hill, Larry Craig shocked mortified Republicans by bounding into their weekly lunch. You’d think the conservative 62-year-old Idaho senator would have some shame, going from fervently opposing gay rights to provocatively tapping his toe in a Minneapolis airport toilet. (The toilet stall, now known as the Larry Craig bathroom, has become a hot local tourist attraction.)

But no.

As though Republicans don’t have enough problems, Mr. Craig said he is ready to go back to work while the legal hotshots he hired appeal his case. He even cast a couple votes, one against D.C. voting rights. (This creep gets to decide about my representation?)

Even if President Bush is “the cockiest guy” around, as the former Mexican President Vicente Fox writes in a new memoir critical of W.’s “grade-school-level” Spanish and his grade-school-level Iraq policy, he can’t be feeling good about the barbs being hurled his way by former supporters and enablers.

Rummy’s back in the news, giving interviews about a planned memoir and foundation designed to encourage “reasoned and civil debate” about global challenges and to spur more young people to go into government.

It’s rich. Maybe more young people would go into government if they didn’t have to work for devious bullies like Rummy who make huge life-and-death mistakes and then don’t apologize.

In The Washington Post, he blamed the press and Congress for creating an inhospitable atmosphere that drives good people away from public service. Maybe that’s why he and his evil twin, Dick Cheney, did their best to undermine the constitutional system of checks and balances so they could get more fine young people to serve.

Does the man blamed for creating civil disorder in Iraq even know what the word “civil” means? Wasn’t he the prickly Pentagon chief who got furious with anyone who didn’t agree with him on “global challenges”?

He shoved Gen. Eric Shinseki into retirement — and failed to show up at his retirement party — after the good general correctly told Congress that it would take several hundred thousand troops to invade and control Iraq. And he snubbed the German defense minister when Germany joined the Coalition of the Unwilling.

Interviewed by GQ’s Lisa DePaulo on his ranch in Taos, N.M., with another mule named Gus nearby, the “75-year-old package of waning testosterone,” as the writer called him, was asked if he misses W. Offering a wry smile, he replied, “Um, no.”

He now treats the son with the same contempt he treated the father with, which is why it’s so odd that the son hired his dad’s nemesis in the first place.

He actually had the gall to imply to Ms. DePaulo that he was out of the loop on Iraq and dragged out a copy of a memo he had written outlining all the things that could go wrong.

In fact, he was the one, right after 9/11, who began pushing to go after Saddam. He and Cheney were orchestrating the invasion from the start, guiding the dauphin with warnings about how weak he would seem if he let Saddam mock him.

The ultimate bureaucratic infighter wrote the memo as part of his Socratic strategy, asking a lot of questions when he was already pushing to go into Iraq. He never did any contingency planning in case those things went wrong; the memo was there simply so that someday he could pull it out for a reporter.

In the same issue of GQ, Colin Powell tried to build up the objections he made to the president, too, in an interview with Walter Isaacson. But nobody’s buying.

Even though he rubber-stamped W.’s tax cuts, Alan Greenspan is now upbraiding the president and vice president for profligate spending and putting politics ahead of sound economics.

He also says in his new memoir that “the Iraq war is largely about oil,” telling Bob Woodward that he had privately told W. and Cheney that ousting Saddam was “essential” to keeping world oil supplies safe.

Irrational exuberance, indeed.

Free at last

Times Select, that hateful NYTimes pay-per-read firewall, is dead! As of midnight tonight, anyway, and along with it, I expect, is the Dowd Effect: the increase past a handful of hits a day whenever Lonnie posts a column here procured from his subscribing friend. OH WELL. Not a popularity contest we're running here, but if you do read, you should probably prepare for all Krugman all the time.

Bienvenido

It's the shoes that will give him away. Funny how that's always the case. Manage to come up with jeans and a t-shirt, and you think you'd be set, ready to blend in and just be a kid, just some kid, here in this high school that's full of 'em, at least while you walk down the halls. But it's always the shoes that say, "Hi, I am an exchange student from Germany," or, today, "I am a refugee from Honduras, and I have no idea what this place is, or what I am really doing here," even before, as the saying goes, the mouth opens to remove all doubt. Black dress shoes, by the way, from some Sunday long past.

Before this student arrived today, I admit to wishing he wouldn't. Flipping through his file--indeed, he had one, from the Department of Homeland Security, even--I willed him to someone better equipped, but my influence with the universe is minimal. Either that or whomever's in charge (of the universe, that is) just has too wicked a sense of humor. Too bad the joke's going to be on my new Honduran friend. Who has, best I can tell and according to his brother, never been to school before. In any language. Ever.

Doesn't mean he's not smart. Doesn't mean he's not capable. But dios mio. I so do not have the time. But that's not his fault, and, regardless, all I can do is all I can do. Which, tomorrow, first thing, will have to include a little talk between the new boy and me with the help of one of my dozens of interpreters. I've got some Spanish, but we need to get this right, and it's something those other kids know absolutely. American high school lesson number one: this place is neither what you want or need, not even remotely, but Ms. P. will try.

Help wanted?

If it weren't for the cell phone and department store ads, there'd be no Sunday paper at all, so when I saw it, I figured this photo (minus the bald guy) must be for Macy's, until I saw the text:

GREAT JOBS. AMAZING BENEFITS.
NOW HIRING.

Um, what? I mean, I know slightly drunk girls are always in demand, but this ad wasn't even in the Sports section, where the naked bars advertise. Besides, those places would never spring for three-fourths of a page, and I suspect they have no need. Instead, this turned out to be an ad from the latest riverfront casino, the one they're building across from the Ed Jones dome as part of plan number 1029 to rescue downtown.

Now, I know I'm not the target audience (not that I'm sure who that is), but what exactly is this ad saying? Get a job here, and you'll get to touch random men? Or, conversely, get a job here, and random women will touch you? Or, get a job, and stand around and not work? Maybe they're supposed to be dancing. The small print does say it's "a place that blurs the line between work and play." I bet. I almost have to give them credit for the full-on fantasy mode; maybe that's part of the pre-employment test. If you can will yourself to believe that our clientele will look anything remotely like this, well, then, welcome aboard!

somebody's mom

"Hi, this is Julie. I mean, Willow's mother."

I kind of feel like I should get credit for not just hanging up the phone. Don't get me wrong: I know that in certain circles I'm "Madison's mom," and I'm glad to be, proud to be, even, and given my admitted thing with names, it's nice to have a fall-back position. But to self-correct away from one's own, actual grown-up name? Give me a break. Oh, well. I know who you are, Julie, but it's not like we'd ever be pals.

For one thing, she's a Girl Scout leader, and I'm sure my reputation there is of big time slacker, one who drops off and scoots instead of hovers, but aren't scouts all about independence and accomplishment? I mean, 90 minutes is 90 minutes. And it's probably good for the girl, too.


Now that the girl is ten, I'm deep into these mom years, living our lives in concentric circles. Oh, I'm still me, and that's probably maintained more easily given that she's an only, but I make no apologies, despite the sideways glances of all the professional mothers out there. I'm still a mom. And I still have a few mom-friends, women I only know because our girls know each other. Life's just better when I like some of the people that my child compels me to spend so much time with, and it's good to have someone to easily doublecheck all the endless minutia .

This year I scanned her new class list as eagerly as the actual fifth-grader did, and, lucky for us, we both found what we were looking for in another mother-daughter pair. Oh, the daughter's name is not the first that my own child volunteers when asked to identify her best friend, but it's probably a close second, and we're working on it. They get along great, and so do her mom and I, though she's at home with four and I work with one. Compared to my non-mom friends, I don't yet know her particularly well, but we have the sense that we agree on what matters, and we laugh when we sit at softball or school.

The fact that, inspired by our family room decor, she just recited the 1980-81 Blues roster, complete with numbers, when she picked up her daughter just endeared her to me forever, but, she's also not nuts or unpredictable or a bigot like the current best friend's mom. Always a plus. And when we pick up the phone or send an e-mail to make plans or bum a ride to girl scouts or to see if the other can take one adorable and intelligent yet crazy-making child, we call ourselves by our names. I'm not sure if I should tell my daughter than she and Maddie will be friends for the next seven or eight years, or just let her figure it out for herself, but that is certainly my intention.

Haven't we all

"Over the past two and a half years, I have seen tyranny, dishonesty, corruption and depravity of types I never thought possible."

--Alberto Gonzales, having a moment of clarity as he left the Justice Department today.

A Surge, and Then a Stab

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Back in January, announcing his plan to send more troops to Iraq, President Bush declared that “America will hold the Iraqi government to the benchmarks it has announced.”

Near the top of his list was the promise that “to give every Iraqi citizen a stake in the country’s economy, Iraq will pass legislation to share oil revenues among all Iraqis.”

There was a reason he placed such importance on oil: oil is pretty much the only thing Iraq has going for it. Two-thirds of Iraq’s G.D.P. and almost all its government revenue come from the oil sector. Without an agreed system for sharing oil revenues, there is no Iraq, just a collection of armed gangs fighting for control of resources.

Well, the legislation Mr. Bush promised never materialized, and on Wednesday attempts to arrive at a compromise oil law collapsed.

What’s particularly revealing is the cause of the breakdown. Last month the provincial government in Kurdistan, defying the central government, passed its own oil law; last week a Kurdish Web site announced that the provincial government had signed a production-sharing deal with the Hunt Oil Company of Dallas, and that seems to have been the last straw.

Now here’s the thing: Ray L. Hunt, the chief executive and president of Hunt Oil, is a close political ally of Mr. Bush. More than that, Mr. Hunt is a member of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, a key oversight body.

Some commentators have expressed surprise at the fact that a businessman with very close ties to the White House is undermining U.S. policy. But that isn’t all that surprising, given this administration’s history. Remember, Halliburton was still signing business deals with Iran years after Mr. Bush declared Iran a member of the “axis of evil.”

No, what’s interesting about this deal is the fact that Mr. Hunt, thanks to his policy position, is presumably as well-informed about the actual state of affairs in Iraq as anyone in the business world can be. By putting his money into a deal with the Kurds, despite Baghdad’s disapproval, he’s essentially betting that the Iraqi government — which hasn’t met a single one of the major benchmarks Mr. Bush laid out in January — won’t get its act together. Indeed, he’s effectively betting against the survival of Iraq as a nation in any meaningful sense of the term.

The smart money, then, knows that the surge has failed, that the war is lost, and that Iraq is going the way of Yugoslavia. And I suspect that most people in the Bush administration — maybe even Mr. Bush himself — know this, too.

After all, if the administration had any real hope of retrieving the situation in Iraq, officials would be making an all-out effort to get the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to start delivering on some of those benchmarks, perhaps using the threat that Congress would cut off funds otherwise. Instead, the Bushies are making excuses, minimizing Iraqi failures, moving goal posts and, in general, giving the Maliki government no incentive to do anything differently.

And for that matter, if the administration had any real intention of turning public opinion around, as opposed to merely shoring up the base enough to keep Republican members of Congress on board, it would have sent Gen. David Petraeus, the top military commander in Iraq, to as many news media outlets as possible — not granted an exclusive appearance to Fox News on Monday night.

All in all, Mr. Bush’s actions have not been those of a leader seriously trying to win a war. They have, however, been what you’d expect from a man whose plan is to keep up appearances for the next 16 months, never mind the cost in lives and money, then shift the blame for failure onto his successor.

In fact, that’s my interpretation of something that startled many people: Mr. Bush’s decision last month, after spending years denying that the Iraq war had anything in common with Vietnam, to suddenly embrace the parallel.

Here’s how I see it: At this point, Mr. Bush is looking forward to replaying the political aftermath of Vietnam, in which the right wing eventually achieved a rewriting of history that would have made George Orwell proud, convincing millions of Americans that our soldiers had victory in their grasp but were stabbed in the back by the peaceniks back home.

What all this means is that the next president, even as he or she tries to extricate us from Iraq — and prevent the country’s breakup from turning into a regional war — will have to deal with constant sniping from the people who lied us into an unnecessary war, then lost the war they started, but will never, ever, take responsibility for their failures.

Evel prevails!

Sure, "Big Brother 8" is only down to the final two, but my new hero -- Evel Dick Donato -- is in a can't-lose situation. If his formerly estranged daughter, Daniele, doesn't walk off with the half-mill prize, then he does. Either way, if he hasn't done enough to prove his worth to his snotty daughter, that's on her. I don't pretend to know them at all, but I do have some experience in familial dysfunction. $500,000 would heal a lot of wounds.

$500K

Fine a guy that much, and he might start showing up to work in an old, crappy sweatshirt.

Oh, right.

That's my girl

So my daughter's body has decided to leap into womanhood, despite the fact that she's not even ten and a half. Whether it's the hormones in the milk or a just something insistent in her DNA (she didn't get it from me), she has completed the puberty checklist in what seems like record time. And, oh, how she's grown. On the inside, thank baby Jesus, she's still a kid, not even a wanna-be 'tweener, but the contrast between what she looks like and what she is sometimes makes me think we're in some junior version of the movie Big, just without Tom Hanks.

Today turned out to be her mark-it-on-the-calendar-girl-you-are-a-woman-now day; she got her period--already!--and though she didn't want her mother, she wanted the dog-eared book she'd been reading over and over for the past year or so. By miraculous fluke of sick day timing, I could do that for her, so I did. By the time I got there, or because I was coming, she was fine. It was good to see that growing girl, so confident in those hallways (I'm almost never at her school), even if she had no use or time for the motherly words I'd come up with on the drive over.

But then we had our moment. She still hugs me, any time, anywhere, though she's too tall to fit under my chin--and I'm tallish myself--and when she did I noticed something.

"What's this?" I asked, fingering the stained neckline of the Supergirl t-shirt we found in the Junior department, now that nothing in the Girls' section fits.

"Huh, what?"

"Did you spill something at lunch?"

"Um, no. . . oh, wait. I know! I ran out of tissues. That's where I blew my nose!"

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Appearance is everything. Is that the message I carried out of my parents' home? As I stack up the papers and transparencies, workbooks and notes that have obscured the top of my desk since school began four weeks ago, I wonder. I carry the detritus of the last month across the room and throw it onto a cabinet shelf. At least my aide will have something to do on Friday, I muse. And the sub will have a clean desk to work from tomorrow. Because I'm not coming back, at least not for twenty-four hours.

Oh, it's legitimate. I have at least one doctor's appointment, maybe two, a full-blown migraine in progress despite the daily meds that should make that impossible, and 7.6 weeks of sick time at my disposal. I wouldn't feel guilty if I didn't realize I've brought it on myself. Do the right thing even if it kills ya: that's really what the younger me learned. I look at the classroom clock, read 7:30 for the second time that day, and wish some time management skills had been included in those life lessons.

As much as I am enjoying my job, as much as I'm glad to be here, what I'm doing is not really sustainable. It's not that I'm really working so hard--hell, it's not even midterm. But it takes a while to get home, to have a family and life, and then, suddenly, it's late. So very. Which feels just fine, given my own rhythms, but the alarm goes off at 4:45. You can see the problem here, can't you?

Normally, I'd just soldier on, but my brain called me on it this time, in front of my class, and then later, in front of some teachers. Aura, seizure, spell, whatever. Panic. Breakdown. Mortification. There's a word. You're overwhelmed, says my counselor friend. Ask for help. Oh, no. I think I can do it, really. I can. But first, I've just got to sleep.

ENG 101n

I'm terrible with names, as a rule. I don't mean to be; I just get so busy meeting the person that the next thing I know I'm muttering to myself behind my smile.

"Crap," I think, "I did it again." I don't even try to fake it. "I'm sorry. I'm Allison. I know you just said, but you are?"

But sometimes the names stick, along with the faces and stories that I carry around, so many people that I'll never forget, whoever they are.

I look at the picture and see the kid from Kenya who taught me about his tribe's weddings, the silent Japanese teenager who wrote about fish. The warmly vivacious woman from Zambia who had a little boy, a job in a grocery store, and a laugh I can hear even now. What's his name--I've almost got it, something with an N--from Turkey. I bet it would come back to me, but man, it's been so long. I see Olga the Russian doctor with the American husband and the plagiarized paper I stumbled upon in a textbook. It was the end of the semester, she knew how to write, and, sleep deprived and overworked, she couldn't come up with a reason not to do it. She may have been right. I see the the sweet girl from the United Arab Emirates and the most unlikely appellation: Melanie Rodrigues! Sometimes even I remember. Especially when it's so hard to forget.

We talked about it at the time, there in the Fall of 2001, how it would undoubtedly become even more complicated to be a guy from Pakistan named Muhammad in the United States of America. Whether being out in the middle of nowhere was in fact a plus; as I recall, the consensus was yes. In mid-September we wouldn't have been a class for very long, but he was already a favorite student: funny and bright and articulate, confident and charming without being overbearing--an engineer or a computer guy who'd put off English 101 until he couldn't any longer. Lucky timing for me; he helped make a good class better, and regardless I was just glad to have met him.

So I wonder, as every teacher does, how he's doing or what became of him. I hope the complications of his post-9/11 world were minor, whether he stayed here or went back home. I hope his talents gave him a visa and a choice. He was from Lahore, I know, where trucks have been known to explode. Given that I cannot ID him more specifically than as being Muhammad from Pakistan, it's safe to say I'll never know. He could be anywhere, even sharing a zip code with me. The world changed that day; I don't dispute that truism. But I also think the odds are--and do we really think of this?-- it changed for some of us more than others.

I hate homework

Am I smarter than a fifth grader? Who's to say; the one who lives in this house is plenty bright. I have, however, finished at least 18th grade, and to be honest I have no desire to even think about whatever the crap kind of homework they're assigning in the upper elementary these days. For one thing, I have my own lessons to do before the tardy bell rings, that being the catch of still occupying a classroom desk, even the big, disorganized one in the corner. If I were a burned out member of the social studies department with a semester's worth of worksheets at the ready, it'd be a different life, but alas and thank God, that's not my lot.

And, in a perfect world, neither would book reports made out of shoe boxes or coffee cans, video taped speeches, place mats about Africa, or hanging mobiles. My daughter's teacher, she's the queen of projects, and I just cringe at what awaits. The unnecessary drama, the pointless angst, the last minute runs to Target. A procrastinating perfectionist? Who'd have thought I'd have spawned one of those.

Ahem.

But, even without the psychological trials, the fodder for therapists and eventual memoirs, I do wish it would all go away, even on a normal night, when the assignment is Xeroxed and not diorama-ed. It's not that she needs much--at all--in the way of help or supervision. I just don't wanna: I'm spoiled. And I'm pretty sure this new-new math curriculum makes absolutely no sense at all. Lattice? Squeeze method? What?

But even when I do understand and am apparently happy to explain whatever has been hauled home in that backpack--my daughter seems to think that having a teacher for a mother gives her some kind of extra "in"; if she only knew--I still wish we could be spending our time doing something else, or even nothing else at all. She's not an over-scheduled kid, but she has an acting class at the Y, and an overactive girl scout troop, and a flute to practice, and a bible class with Grandma, and sometimes a kid needs time to relax, or time to put off 'til tomorrow what could be done today. Or at least her mom does. Maybe I should get her a blog.

Say it ain't so

It's true that he was a pitcher then, and a recuperating one at that. A doctor's signature did validate the prescription, and no anti-HGH rules were in effect. My heart breaks nonetheless.

I've been accused of being a baseball cynic, and sometimes that label rings true. Despite last October's miracle, there's only so much credit I've been willing to give a team that's struggled to find .500 in a division that nobody's seemed interested in winning. Mudville's always right around the bend. The last month has been something else, though, an exception to the doomed rule, mostly thanks to the kid in right field. "Feel-good" is the cliché no sports writer has been able to resist, and no thanks to the mental Mötley Crüe soundtrack it inspires, the adjective did fit. Witnessing Rick Ankiel's unlikely ascent back to the majors has been quite literally a joy; I don't remember enjoying any August game as much as the one I watched him play against the Dodgers. It was just so fun. Only yesterday I nearly posted his stats from this last home stand--capped by a 7 RBI rain-shortened game--just to marvel at them. And then today, when the dawn cracked, so did the dream.

I have no I told you sos, no I knew it all alongs. I did say, here and elsewhere, that I hoped that no pharmeceuticals were involved, but that wish was little more than reflex. I didn't really expect it would come to this, whatever this may prove to be. A blip on the radar gun. A harmless foul, deep into the stands. A runaway fastball to the gut.

Has this whole month been a sham? I don't think so, or at least can't bear to. Add an -e, though, and I'm your girl. For a shame it is at the very least that this sporting miracle now carries the tragic stink of cheat. His career will never quite be what it could have been, either for him or us, no matter how successful he may yet become. How sad. How reality-based. All I wanted, I've come to realize, was to watch, and to cheer, and to believe.

Double eviction night (squared)

Tonight’s double eviction on Big Brother 8 was well advertised (more on that later), but who knew I’d be in for a twofer when I headed for my son’s 9th grade football game in Iowa City.

While I was pleased, at least, that there was no admission charge, (though I had cash in pocket, just in case) I would gladly have paid West High parents to work the chains. Instead, we were given jersey-wearing West High sophomores who made up the most ill-equipped chain gang I’ve ever seen. These guys made the referees look competent – no small feat.

Anyway, I brought my work camera and opted to roam the sidelines shooting photos. The first three quarters weren’t very photogenic as the Warriors battled the Trojans to a 0-0 tie. The green-and-gold clad chain gain grew increasingly vocal – and partisan – as the game wore on.

The game ended with a fourth quarter flurry. West strikes first with a three-yard touchdown run. Extra point makes it 7-0 with maybe five minutes left. The Warriors answer with an eight-yard touchdown pass and take timeout before failing to convert an unimaginative two-point conversion attempt with two minutes left. West 7, Wash 6. West works the clock to :20 and, facing a fourth-and-five, opts to punt for the first time in the game.

You know the rest. The punt is blocked. Wash inherits the ball in striking distance. Center snap is fumbled, but the electrifying quarterback picks it up, scrambles, heaves a prayer into the end zone to the biggest hands-of-stone player on the team. Touchdown! Warriors win 12-7.

Meanwhile, two friends of the chain gang have joined their teammates on our sideline. I see them talking smack to our players – oh the profanity these days – and roaming our bench at will. Not surprisingly, they address our star player directly, and within arm’s reach.

Instinctively, I shoo them away, noting they have no business on our sideline. They suggest that they’re helping the chain gain, but we all know it’s not true, and they comply. That was before our first score.

As the play clock winds down, they become increasingly brazen to the point I have to shoo them away again, only this time they’re less threatened by the old man with the camera. Short of calling one of them a punk, I maintained my cool (thank you blood pressure meds) even as they asked me to take their picture. (In hindsight, that would have been good evidence to send along with my e-mail to the athletics director.)

A post-game meal at The Vine (not the neighborhood bar where I spent most of my student loans but the mega-sports-bar one on the strip) allowed us to rehash higher aspects of the game and watch Indianapolis and New Orleans kick of the NFL season on larger-than-life screens.

Then it was home for two weeks of Big Brother wrapped into a single episode (has the TIVO/DVR inventor won the Nobel Prize yet?). Finally, the pace quickens! “Someone’s going to have a panic attack,” I tell my wife, not sure if I mean Jameka, Eric or me.

In a made-for-reality-TV series of events, cheerleader Jessica and “America’s player” and oddball boyfriend Eric are sent packing – finally!, mercifully! (Given US voting history, I can’t believe CBS would leave it in our hands to decide such things as who he should kiss or vote to evict .)

Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio? Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you.

Woo, woo, woo!

The perfect job

As far as I'm concerned, anyone who'd pay $600 for a cell phone gets exactly what she deserves, especially if it falls into a puddle in the parking lot on the way out of the store. I'm not malicious--okay, maybe a teeny bit;schadenfreude is fun--but come on! It's a phone! Even if a pretty one.

Despite how attractive the products may be, I just don't relate to the iPhone fixation or any Apple mania. While there are three iPods in the house, including one with video, mine is the discontinued $29 Shuffle, a model so outmoded I'm surprised that Steve Jobs's Asian minions didn't scrape the logo off before they shipped it out. It's an item that this guy would have been thrilled to own a few years ago but horrified by today, and thus doesn't he--quoted here discussing today's surprise iPhone price drop-- have the absolutely perfect job? Perhaps someday he will cure himself.

"If they told me at the outset the iPhone would be $200 cheaper the next day, I would have thought about it for a second - and still bought it," said Andrew Brin, a 47-year-old addiction therapist in Los Angeles. "It was $600 and that was the price I was willing to pay for it."

No Counterfeit Bill

Add another story to Cedar Rapids' list of underdog athletes who took harder paths than most to get to the major leagues of their sports. Fredrick Jackson’s long and winding road to the National Football League came to a fairy-tale end Saturday, when his name was on the final 53-man roster of the Buffalo Bills.

Jackson, a 2003 Coe College graduate and two-time Iowa Conference MVP from Fort Worth, Texas, defied serious odds by advancing to the NFL as an undrafted free agent out of the NCAA’s Division III. He joins Carey Bender ’95, who showed up on Buffalo’s active roster for one game in 1996 and spent two years on the Bills’ practice squad, as the only Coe graduates to advance to the NFL as players.

It didn’t hurt to have Marv Levy (Coe class of 1950) in their corner – as Buffalo’s coach when Bender was added to the team and as general manager when Jackson signed a free agent contract in 2006. But both players earned their NFL paychecks. (In Jackson’s case, the NFL minimum for a first-year player is $285,000. Not bad for a sociology major four years out of college.)

In 2004, Jackson began a two-year stint with the Sioux City Bandits of United Indoor Football. He was the league’s MVP in 2005 with 1,770 rushing yards, 442 receiving yards, 1,467 return yards and 53 touchdowns.

After signing with the Bills, Jackson was allocated to NFL Europe and led the Rhein Fire in rushing with 731 yards. He spent the 2006 season on the Bills’ practice squad.

This summer, Jackson led the Bills in four preseason games with 130 rushing yards and three touchdowns on 30 carries. He also led the team with 10 receptions for 142 yards. His five kick returns for 114 yards also led the Bills.

After making the most of his opportunities in Buffalo, other NFL teams took notice and it was clear the Bills could no longer hide him on their practice squad. A few other NFL clubs – including the Green Bay Packers – let Jackson's agent know they'd be interested in picking him up if he didn't make Buffalo's active roster.

The Bills’ cuts were announced shortly after the NFL’s 5 p.m. Saturday roster deadline, and Jackson’s name was not on the list. Instead, he was one of five running backs retained by Buffalo.

"It's definitely fulfilling," Jackson told buffalobills.com lead journalist Chris Brown. "It was a long road traveled and not the most common road traveled but it was definitely worth it to put in the work. I met a lot of great people along the way and I'm glad about the opportunity I'll have now."

Jackson first spoke to his mom by phone after getting word that he made the team. That was followed by phone calls to a host of family and friends. In a conversation with Coe Head Coach Erik Raeburn, Jackson was reportedly more interested in Saturday’s two-touchdown performance by junior cornerback, receiver and returner Tom Breitbach than his own great fortune.

Breitbach’s family all-but adopted Jackson and his twin brother, Patrick, while they were at Coe and those ties remain strong.

Those close to Coe are tickled pink about Jackson making the rare leap to the NFL, where fewer than 10 former DIII players are among the 1,700 on NFL rosters. But we knew then that he was special.

``He was completely unselfish when he was with us,” Raeburn told Gazette sports columnist Mike Hlas. “One game, we kind of used him as a decoy on a screen pass to the other side of the field to Matt Wycoff. One guy was about to make a tackle, but he got blindsided. Here was Freddie, getting down the field to make the block.''

One play is seared into the memory banks of my son and I. We were viewing from the press box when Coe ran Freddie on a sweep to the right into a sea of defenders. Though we knew he was capable of running over each and every one of them, he turned on a dime and reversed field before scoring from about 40 yards out.

That was 2002, Jackson’s senior year. He led the Kohawks to a 10-2 record, a share of the conference championship and a second round appearance in the playoffs. He was so talented, Coe went the entire season without so much as attempting a field goal. Coach knew his odds were better with Freddie.

``Now that he's in the NFL,'' Raeburn said, ``I think there's a lot of former Iowa Conference players who feel a little bit better about themselves after trying to chase him down.''

I’m sure thrilled to have had the opportunity to watch him play for two years. I wonder if Zach still has that autographed program.

Looking ahead

The Consumer Product Safety Commission is the withered arm of our government that's been so busy lately sending out recall notices for the entire inventory of Toys "R" Us. Technically, I exaggerate, but if any of the imported product that flows in and out of our stores actually meets the safety standards our government claims to uphold, it would seem to be nothing more than a fluke. It's not as if they actually know.

The CPSC is less than half the size it once was and has, get this, one part-time inspector to cover the 15 million containers that move through the Port of Los Angeles--just for one example cited in the article linked below. The reductions started, not so shockingly, under Reagan, but Bush has continued to cut its staff, and thus the number of investigations it has been able to complete has fallen precipitously even as the amount of shoddy merchandise on store shelves has continued to increase. Remember when conservative Grover Norquist said he wanted a government so small he could drown it in the bathtub? I detect a change in tactics. I think they're going to try to either burn it or choke it to death, given the state of the art conditions at the Commission's testing labs:

"One lab worker used a magnifying glass and a mechanical stop watch to help conduct a fabric flammability experiment — the same equipment she has used for three decades. The toy laboratory, down the hall, is an office so cramped that the only space dedicated to a drop test to see if toys will break into small pieces and cause a choking hazard is the spare space behind the office door. “This is the toy lab for all of America — for all of the United States government!” said Robert L. Hundemer, the one agency employee who routinely tests toys, as he held up his arms in the air. “We do what we can.”

As an agency, though, the CPSC is not doing what it can, since, as is the Bush way, most of the top posts are now filled by pro-industry types who work to protect business, not you and me. Bush's nominee for commissioner was withdrawn back in March, so indefensible were his blame-the-baby's parents-for-his-unsafe-baby-walker attitudes, but something tells me that leaving the post empty was no accident. Since nobody's filling that top spot, action on mandatory recalls and regulation cannot proceed. Imagine. Foot-dragging has become official policy, maximizing profits as it does, whether for a hair relaxer that burns kids (but warning labels would cost a few cents a bottle, and pennies make dollars, and dollars make stock options) or an unsafe-at-any-speed Chinese-made ATV that cannot be taken off the market without a permanent commissioner.

But, there is a bigger problem here, even for those of us who feel as if they'd be smart enough not to suck the lead out of Thomas the Tank Engine or buy a gasoline-powered anything from China even without the government telling us it's a bad idea. The federal government is historically staffed with thousands upon thousands of people who are experts in whatever it is their agencies are responsible for, from product safety to justice. Thanks to the Bush misAdministration, thousands of them do not work for the government anymore, and after January 20, 2009, they still will not work there. A certain number of cronies and political appointees may be cleared out, assuming the voters don't get all irrational again next year, and the way back to functional may begin, but we'll still be left with this decimated shell of a government, and where's the recall notice for that?

An equal opportunity copy and paste: George Will

From this week's Newsweek, because anyone who recognizes AG the outgoing AG es un idiota grande is welcome here.

And speaking of the tone-deaf, Alberto Gonzales could not even leave high office without advertising his unfitness for it. As he habitually has done, he reminded the nation that he has "lived the American Dream," which he evidently thinks is epitomized by his success in attaching himself to a politician not known for demanding quality in assistants. Gonzales then demonstrated how uncomprehending he is of essential American values. He said: "Even my worst days as attorney general have been better than my father's best days."

Well. His father married and had eight children—nine wonderful days, days even better, one would have thought, than any of the days his son spent floundering at the Justice Department. Furthermore, Gonzales's father had the fulfillment of a lifetime spent providing for his family. But what is any of that, Gonzales implies, compared with the satisfaction of occupying, however unsatisfactorily, a high office? This implicit disparagement of his father's life of responsibility and self-sufficiency turns conservatism inside out. It is going to take conservatism a while to recuperate from becoming associated with such people.

Just between you and me, George, I think it might take this nation of ours a while to recuperate from being associated with such people, too.

Where every day is labor day

My dad was indeed a union man, a master machinist who worked forty-plus years for a pension even my fifth-grader wouldn't need a calculator to figure. I'll work far less hard for a far better retirement if I complete even half that many years, but I hesitate to credit the NEA, if they're even identifying as a union these days. They certainly pocket the dues. At any rate, the workers I most admire are not card-carrying members of any such association, though wallet-sized cards to carry are what they covet most.

Like any teenagers working their first jobs in America, the kids I'm thinking of spend some on gas and clothes and movie tickets, but they also hand most of it over to their parents or uncles or older brothers for food and rent. Everybody takes care of each other, and thus, everybody works. All. the. time. Life, here in the promised land, is hard.


I don't know that the details that this op-ed writer proposes are the right solution, but I know we need some solution, and sending them all back home--or to their former nations; their homes are here-- ain't it. Our economy is built on the backs of illegal labor, and if you bristle at that thought, I suggest you stop eating anything you haven't harvested or killed or cooked yourself, to start, because otherwise I guarantee you that undocumented hands have touched your dinner. But I digress.

The bigger economic picture is important, and, in the end, what the policy makers should be considering, though they could do worse to think of the younger generation, these kids who grow up in this adopted country, living a typical life, nearly as American as their neighbors, though, in my experience, more respectful and with a better work ethic. "Land of opportunity" has always been a more complicated idea than that three word phrase implies. And, certainly, these families are existing on a much higher standard of living than they were in Chihuahua or Michoacán. After all, their homes are not made of "stuff [her] dad found," and the children's makeshift playground is not on the grounds of a lead smelter. To escape that is, undeniably, an opportunity. But for these kids to be refused opportunities found in their new communities seems un-American, especially when it creates a drain on the nation as a whole.

But, frankly, the nation as a whole is outside my purview. I just wish I had more to offer the kids who are looking for a reason to stay in school when they know there really isn't one. Indentured servitude requires no diploma, not even a GED.

Immigrants' Labors Lost

By MARK LANGE
Published: September 3, 2007
NY Times.com

IMAGINE we wanted to create a huge Latino underclass in this country. We would induce more than 500,000 illegal immigrants to enter annually. We would see Latinos account for half of America’s population growth. We would turn a hardened eye toward all 44 million Latinos, because 12 million jumped our borders to meet our labor demand.

We would financially motivate but morally deplore illegal immigrants’ determination to break our laws and risk their lives to work for us. We would let nativist, xenophobic amnesiacs pillory the roughly 25 percent of Latinos who were here illegally, at the expense of the 75 percent who were legal. CNN and Fox News would reduce Latinos to fodder for fear-mongering, and the documentariat would make them objects of pity, when they wanted and warranted neither.

We would know that if we paid them, they would come, but we would offer no legitimate employment. We would adopt a let’s-pretend labor policy in our fields, yards, factories and restaurants, and for child care, construction and cleaning, with a wage fakery worthy of the Soviet Union. There, the joke was “we pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us.” Here they would work, hard — and we would pay them, sort of, but pretend not to, denying ourselves the future tax revenue needed to pay for services we faulted them for needing.

We would ensure that the education system failed them, lamenting a dropout rate more than twice that of blacks and four times that of whites. Keeping incomes impossibly low, we would sanction Mexican-American welfare receipts twice those of natives. We would let the states launch loads of legislative half-fixes. We would have the Immigration and Naturalization Service and Homeland Security Department start an “even tougher” and more futile paper chase. We would see desperate workers fake new Social Security numbers or go underground for the next boss seeking this shabby labor discount.

We do all of this — and let it cost us more as a country — because it is a little cheaper for us as individuals and employers. And whether we knew it or not, we are deliberately fencing in our own economy.

It is in our self-interest to support labor mobility, development and advancement. Growth in productivity, fundamentally, is how we raise everyone’s standard of living. It starts with the first rung.

This month, Congress can avert a replay of the 1986 amnesty debacle by reserving permanent residency and citizenship for those who get in line and play by existing rules. Let nobody’s status be “adjusted” or “granted.” Instead, have employers sponsor anyone on their shadow payrolls to apply for a tamper-proof holographic guest worker card. Deport, adequately south of the border, anyone not sponsored. That won’t mean all 12 million. In 1954, when illegal Latino immigration was twice what it is now, a manageable number of deportations motivated the majority to repatriate.

To enforce sanctions against employers, grant the states (who bear the social costs) federal transfer payments for every undocumented worker they find, which will keep Congress and future administrations honest about paying for enforcement. If agriculture needs a lower minimum wage, negotiate and legislate it. To address the supply side, in the next trade agreement insist that Mexico adequately ensure its workers’ right to organize — to support wages and worker retention there, and a fairer fight for American exports.

The strength of an abstraction like “the economy” comes from the hands and minds of motivated and prepared people. Whether or not the left is committed to social equity — or the right, to equality of opportunity — we have at least 12 million pragmatic reasons to turn a potentially permanent underclass into a productive asset. Rather than fencing aspiring contributors out, comprehensive reform means Congress getting serious about entry-level job training and midcareer education programs for all workers. They deliver better economic returns than border patrols do.

The guy with the leaf-blower not only can learn English, he — like the unemployed steelworker — should have a chance to learn auto repair or programming. He’ll start with the jobs “ordinary Americans” won’t do. But we impair our economic future if we leave him there, imagining that’s all he or his children will ever do.

Mark Lange was a presidential speechwriter from 1989 to 1991.

Ah, who needs summer

Appalachian State Stuns Michigan
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Julian Rauch’s 24-yard field goal with 26 seconds left put Appalachian State ahead of Michigan and Corey Lynch’s blocked field goal in the final seconds sealed one of college football’s biggest upsets.

The long weekend

Although I have no personal experience with this particular Fall phenomenon, I'm told that school traditionally starts after Labor Day, and indeed I have some friends who are either preparing to start teaching or sending their kids to the bus stop this Tuesday next. My first impulse was envy, considering we've been back in the homework/permission slip/lunch box swing of things for weeks now as they've just summered on, but, for this weekend anyway, I think we may have the better end of the deal.

For all of us, I suppose, Labor Day marks the last days of summer, if not the end (kudos to anyone who actually pauses to recognize the workers), not that in these parts September still won't be hot. One of the last cookouts or ballgames or trips to the lake. If only we lived close to an actual beach, I'd be there, count on it, from sun-up to sundown. But if I had to head back to school the next day, I'd be a little antsy with the anticipation and the unknown, with a thousand and twelve things I'd need to get done before that Tuesday, and some version of that must be true for our friends who've had the extended break. That's no holiday, at least not to me.

But for us, it is, and I'm exceedingly grateful, even though there's no sand awaiting my toes. Transition is too gentle a word to describe the leap from summer to school year; it's zero to sixty in no seconds flat. So yes, I'm a little too glad to have this early holiday, that extra 24 hours that I hope seem to last much longer. As I sit here, trying to determine what feels different this Saturday, I realize it's the utter lack of tension. I've been behind for three weeks, and I still am, but this one bonus day gives me both some breathing room and some time to not think about it.
All weekends should be three days: a day to relax and recover, a day to enjoy, a day to maybe get something done. Perhaps I'll move to France. In the meantime, I hope all my friends appreciate this long weekend as much as I will, but you're really going to have to try.

Not exactly Friday Night Lights

I figure it would have been too embarrassing to get kicked out of my son’s first high school football game before it even started. So while I complained about the $3 admission charge for a ninth grade game, I borrowed $6 from another parent so my wife and I could watch our son play for one public high school against another. But I wasn’t happy about it.

The return to school has been a most-expensive proposition (especially since I’ve determined our tax dollars are spent on postage), and I’m cash poor until payday mercifully arrived today. Besides, the gate wasn’t equipped to take plastic.

We eventually gained entry and my boy put on an acceptable performance at cornerback. He got burned for a touchdown once, but it was on an exceptional pass to a receiver who had the skills (and the facial hair) of a third-year freshman. I took some satisfaction in that he burned other defenders too.

I took even more satisfaction in the assurance from other dads that it was ok to hate a ninth grader, especially one who reentered the game after we thought he had been ejected for arguing with an official after getting flagged for a personal foul. One dad even suggested it was ok to hate our own ninth graders, which I dismissed with a laugh even though I know it's true. Not mine, mind you, but I already have a few candidates in mind.

I got my financier's $3 worth when Zach broke up a pass later in the game, although it might have been an interception if he had held his position. It reminded me of all the times I’ve seen him misjudge, but usually recover, a fly ball. It also reminded me how much I prefer watching him play baseball.

Our Warriors were victorious by a score of 16-15, with our quarterback taking a knee inside the Wahawk five-yard-line to run out the clock. Too bad the classy move had to be followed (after the obligatory “fifth quarter” -- a 15-minute effort to ease the transition from "everyone plays" to "no they don't") by a rousing chant and rendition of the school fight song.

You don’t tug on Superman’s cape, you don’t spit into the wind, you don’t pull the mask off the old Lone Ranger, and you don’t taunt your opponent, especially on their turf. At least, that’s how I roll.

I did take great satisfaction in shunning the concession stand -- even when my newfound sugar daddy offered -- since I knew our post game intentions. I even mapped out the route from the field to Famous Dave's, which doesn't charge admission and never leaves you with a sour taste in your mouth.

Who needs reality when there's reality TV?

During a time that saw the resignation of Bush cronies Karl Rove and Alberto Gonzalez, the two-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina (I hear they had a roof party in Crawford, Texas), Mike Vick’s fall from grace and inevitable turning himself over to God, and cancer forums with (some) presidential candidates and Lance Armstrong in my hometown, you’d think reality would be entertainment enough.

Alas, I’m a reality TV addict, even with the alleged “reality” involves grown-ups playing pirate games in the Caribbean. “Pirate Master” wasn’t long for primetime, but CBS mercifully finished out the series with online episodes (even after one of the contestants committed suicide). I took pride in the thought that I might be its only viewer.

If you didn’t hear, Ben found the $500,000 treasure and walked away with $587,624. Buxom blonde stay-at-home mom Christa, whom I cheered from the start, came up short. She pocketed $70,416 for her trouble, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if she winds up on another reality TV series.

She would certainly be a sight for sore eyes on “Big Brother 8.” The show airs three times a week, yet I can’t seem to get enough of the train wreck. Seldom has a group of less likable people been assembled on network TV (save, perhaps, “The View”), yet I’m pulling for the least likable one of all – Evel Dick.

The show will end about the time “Survivor China” arrives to fill the void in my shallow lifestyle. Surely, there’s another “Amazing Race” around the corner too.

For now, however, I must return to reality. My fantasy football team needs some attention.

Two years ago today

And it still ain't right, not even close.

Perhaps it would be different, or seem so, if there appeared to be a good-faith effort to do what needs to be done, or, especially, to make up for the man-made disaster that followed the natural, but what am I saying? Good faith? Insert bitter laughter here.

I know my mood would be less dark if I hadn't gone to see No End in Sight, the documentary about the other brown people suffering at the hands of that same malevolently incompetent American administration on the banks of those other rivers on the other side of the world. At least, I guess, the Tigris and Euphrates didn't flood, though at least that might have given Baghdad some running water for a time. No End in Sight is the story of how the occupation of Iraq--not that it should have happened at all--was mucked up beyond all reason, told by those who tried to do it right only to learn this administration is only interested in doing wrong. As film-making, it's a bit like paying to watch old news, though cogently presented. The impact is less in the video clips than in the expressions of those who tried, or who would've if given the chance, and how they know even better than you or I that there really is no end in sight.

Adios, Fredo

Proving, once again, that he is both utterly shameless and incapable of making it through two sentences without screwing up a three syllable word, this was part of Dubya's statement today:

"Al Gonzales is a man of integrity, decency and principle, and I have reluctantly accepted his resignation with great appreciation for the service that he has provided for our country. . . ."

"It's sad that we live in a time when a talented and honorable person like Alberto Gonzales is impeding [sic] from doing important work because his good name was dragged through the mud for political reasons."*

Just wow. And vomit. And IF ONLY that were what's sad about the time we live in.

*This was on the back:

"Fredo here has covered my ass for years. And don't think I don't 'preciate it. I mean, this dude will do ANYTHING me and Turdblossom tell him, well, Turdblossom mostly, heh heh. You know I ain't got no ideas 'cept about gettin' more and more of that power. Power's cool. Constitution? He knows it's just some old paper. Shit. We got all kinds of paper. Anyway, that Fredo did some awesome lawyerin'. Made up all kinds of crap, then talked in circles 'til Congress was all pissed off and I don't think they'll catch us, er, them, 'til it's too late, maybe. And he said we could beat people silly and spy on anybody and and all kinds of supercool crap, too. Real presidentin'. None of that sissy business. Terror! Woo! See you around, Fredo, unless, you know, we got to hang you out to dry. Damn, we'll miss ya.

The payoff

"I think her students are lucky to have her."

The compliment is deliberate, and public, and probably unnoticed by anyone but me, its object. I'm curious why she--my mother--has said so during this obligatory Sunday lunch, but she doesn't elaborate, and I don't ask. That's how it goes in my family. We say, "I love you," with twenty dollar bills and drop meaningful phrases into random conversations instead of ever speaking directly. But something's going on with my job and me. Who knows: maybe she can tell.

Maybe it has something to do with this semester not being last semester, when I had no choice but to use up all those sick days and my students' most common question was, "Are you going to be gone again?"

Maybe it has something to do with finally hitting tenure, six years into my current position. It was never a question of job security; my qualifications are rare enough, and I'm good enough at what I do. But maybe the fact that the folders full of school stuff on my home computer are still labeled with the name of the school district, as if I were on my way to some other, greener educational pasture at any time, reveals something about the attitude with which I signed that original contract. After all, it's so far from home.

Which of course, it still is, but that is neither here nor there--it's all the miles in between. But, besides being another post, it's an expensive inconvenience that I'll be overlooking for the duration. Somehow, I seem to have arrived at someplace new without changing my route or my employer.

My predecessor always seemed to relish her imagined helplessness, and I suppose it does make for an easy job. "Ohhh, you can't do that," she told me time after time. And, every time, I stumped her simply by asking why not. I am no firebrand, but I have made things happen--good things--that were never before attempted. It's easy enough to be a force for change when one is willing to haul all the necessary crap over the bar alone; it's not as if that barrier weren't set awfully low.

My students now have classes in which they can learn something more than how to sink or swim and get graduation credit to boot; I now have a job that I want. Oh, it's still impossible, maybe more impossible that it ever was, now that I've tried to make it what it should have been all along, but I love trying, and everyone knows it, and what more can one person do?

Well, sometimes, one person can pull out a magic wand, or appear to, in the eyes of a 17-year old who has done everything she thought she was supposed to do and has yet been failed by the system that does not get it, because systems never do. And if you are the person who has finally stayed in a job long enough to know where the strings are and how to pull them, who has banked enough personal credibility that, "Oh sure, for you," is the automatic answer, and for whom a literal happy dance in the middle of the cafeteria is clearly just the thing to do and nothing to be sheepish about, well, then you might almost be looking forward to going to work on Monday, too.

A Draft Worth Remembering?

In the 15th annual draft of the fantasy football league I run so capably, I retained Donovan McNabb and Jeremy Shockey with Plan B and C selections (don't ask). I then proceeded to take Willie Parker-rb-Pitt, Cedric Benson-rb-Chi, Brandon Jackson-rb-GB, Randy Moss-wr-NE (even after puking in my mouth a little), Santana Moss-wr-Wash., Santonio Holmes-wr-Pit, Terry Glenn-wr-Dal, Jake Delhomme-qb-Car, Chris Henry-rb-Ten., Michael Pittman-rb-Atl., Brandon Jones-wr-Ten., Stephen Gostkowski-pk-NE, Miami's defense, and Coe College graduate Fred Jackson-rb-Buf.

Immediately after the draft, I dispatched Brandon Jackson and Randy Moss to a rival for Fred Taylor-rb-Jack and Lee Evans-wr-Buf.

Time will tell whether this was time well spent.

Then and now

A dozen more summers have come and gone, so my memories are minimal: running out of the big show at the Marcus, finally (the sound system was a disaster) and across the Summerfest grounds to where I really wanted to be. Standing on rickety wooden benches to improve our late-arriving view. A string of white lights across the black Wisconsin sky. That song.

I recall it as a perfect summer night, one of my favorite shows by my then-favorite band, but the fact that I have the idea that the weather (in M'waukee in July) was breezy and agreeable reminds me that the mind plays tricks. It was still a great moment in my time.

What it was for the principals was perhaps another thing.

That year was the end of the Jayhawks, and within months, one of the founders, Mark Olson, took his half of the harmonies and left the band for a musician whose stuff always sounds like a bag of wet cats, at least to me. He seems to be a pretty good guy, to have taken care of Victoria Williams for a chunk of years through her MS (just don't make me listen to her sing), and to have recorded an entire anti-Dubya album (see previous parens), but as I confirmed last night, I have virtually no interest in his last decade of music-making.

He had a good band now, though-- perhaps the most versatile I've ever seen--including a guy who played the violin or fiddle or whatever he'd call it with a particularly Italian enthusiasm and a Norwegian woman whose harmonies gratified the room when they got around to the Jayhawks songs (why yes, he has spent a lot of time in Europe). I'm sure it's a drag to feel the audience perk up when they recognize the stuff you tried to leave behind so long ago, but when one is hawking an album with the tag line, "A two year journey through loss and redemption" in the basement of a bar, it's only to be expected.

I'll never listen to that new album--it's just not my thing; even the tracks that reunited Olson and Louris, the heart of that old band, aren't what I want to hear, but that doesn't disappoint me like it once would have. Then again, I don't really listen to the old records anymore, either. It was fun to hear a few of those songs live one more time, though, and it was worth going just to see the current state of what once was. But I tell ya, if Mark Olson ever wants to expand on the story he alluded to last night, and record the the tale of taking his new international bandmates to visit his family on its dairy farm in rural Minnesota, I'd definitely listen. I might even pay.

What is the sound of one hand not typing?

This may be my favorite work e-mail ever.

It's almost a zen koan for the passive-aggressive work avoider.

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Friday, August 24, 2007 8:10 AM
To: Staff

Just FYI: I do not have access to email either, so please email also.

Today

Oh, my heart goes out. It does. And yet I can't help turning the scenario over in my mind. Could it really happen? Is it possible? Allison, it did. Could one really not notice a seven month old baby in the back of a four-door sedan? Seven months. Probably in one of those backwards infant seats: safety first. Agony and torture. Didn't they talk about it? Oh, probably not. Automatic assumptions. Daily favors. The baby was right there. At least they'll have have access to serious drugs. Two parents in medicine, one a pediatrician. Not that it matters, but that'll be the talk. One hot car. Where's the baby? Didn't you take her? I thought you did. Dear God. One hot car.

The plan for peace

Among the many, many examples of W's ineptitude as an illegitimate president is that he had no plan for peace. Yet, we learn from the Washington Post's Peter Baker that he had a plan all along; a manual in fact. Read on, if you can stomach any more.

White House Manual Details How to Deal With Protesters

By Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writer

Not that they're worried or anything. But the White House evidently leaves little to chance when it comes to protests within eyesight of the president. As in, it doesn't want any.

A White House manual that came to light recently gives presidential advance staffers extensive instructions in the art of "deterring potential protestors" from President Bush's public appearances around the country.

Among other things, any event must be open only to those with tickets tightly controlled by organizers. Those entering must be screened in case they are hiding secret signs. Any anti-Bush demonstrators who manage to get in anyway should be shouted down by "rally squads" stationed in strategic locations. And if that does not work, they should be thrown out.

But that does not mean the White House is against dissent -- just so long as the president does not see it. In fact, the manual outlines a specific system for those who disagree with the president to voice their views. It directs the White House advance staff to ask local police "to designate a protest area where demonstrators can be placed, preferably not in the view of the event site or motorcade route."

The "Presidential Advance Manual," dated October 2002 with the stamp "Sensitive -- Do Not Copy," was released under subpoena to the American Civil Liberties Union as part of a lawsuit filed on behalf of two people arrested for refusing to cover their anti-Bush T-shirts at a Fourth of July speech at the West Virginia State Capitol in 2004. The techniques described have become familiar over the 6 1/2 years of Bush's presidency, but the manual makes it clear how organized the anti-protest policy really is.

The lawsuit was filed by Jeffery and Nicole Rank, who attended the Charleston event wearing shirts with the word "Bush" crossed out on the front; the back of his shirt said "Regime Change Starts at Home," while hers said "Love America, Hate Bush." Members of the White House event staff told them to cover their shirts or leave, according to the lawsuit. They refused and were arrested, handcuffed and briefly jailed before local authorities dropped the charges and apologized. The federal government settled the First Amendment case last week for $80,000, but with no admission of wrongdoing.

The manual demonstrates "that the White House has a policy of excluding and/or attempting to squelch dissenting viewpoints from presidential events," said ACLU lawyer Jonathan Miller. "Individuals should have the right to express their opinion to the president, even if it's not a favorable one."

White House spokesman Tony Fratto said that he could not discuss the manual because it is an issue in two other lawsuits.

The manual offers advance staffers and volunteers who help set up presidential events guidelines for assembling crowds. Those invited into a VIP section on or near the stage, for instance, must be " extremely supportive of the Administration," it says. While the Secret Service screens audiences only for possible threats, the manual says, volunteers should examine people before they reach security checkpoints and look out for signs. Make sure to look for "folded cloth signs," it advises.

To counter any demonstrators who do get in, advance teams are told to create "rally squads" of volunteers with large hand-held signs, placards or banners with "favorable messages." Squads should be placed in strategic locations and "at least one squad should be 'roaming' throughout the perimeter of the event to look for potential problems," the manual says.

"These squads should be instructed always to look for demonstrators," it says. "The rally squad's task is to use their signs and banners as shields between the demonstrators and the main press platform. If the demonstrators are yelling, rally squads can begin and lead supportive chants to drown out the protestors (USA!, USA!, USA!). As a last resort, security should remove the demonstrators from the event site."

Advance teams are advised not to worry if protesters are not visible to the president or cameras: "If it is determined that the media will not see or hear them and that they pose no potential disruption to the event, they can be ignored. On the other hand, if the group is carrying signs, trying to shout down the President, or has the potential to cause some greater disruption to the event, action needs to be taken immediately to minimize the demonstrator's effect."

The manual adds in bold type: "Remember -- avoid physical contact with demonstrators! Most often, the demonstrators want a physical confrontation. Do not fall into their trap!" And it suggests that advance staff should "decide if the solution would cause more negative publicity than if the demonstrators were simply left alone."

The staff at the West Virginia event may have missed that line.

Real life lessons

Some of my students, unexposed to the wider world or that social studies teacher's e-mail account, are under the impression that I know everything. I don't disabuse them of their mistaken notion: "That's right," I say, "I do."

I hope, of course, that their illusions will be shattered. That, soon enough, they'll be literate enough to figure out for themselves that all I really know is how to read. And that because I've spent so many years reading one article and another by that one guy about that one thing, I know a little bit about a lot, and far more than enough to finesse my way through almost anything that may come up in these not-so-hallowed halls. It is, after all, only high school.

Sometimes, though, I'd really rather not know, would really rather not understand the latest article or story. This is one of these times. Only the details, however, are new to me. The themes, as the English teachers down the hall would say, are tragic and eternal.

After neglecting the Utah miners story for several news cycles, I finally started to read. I don't do cable news if I can help it, but, it should come as no surprise, I'll catch up on the web. If you've followed the story, you know the phrase that keeps repeating is "retreat mining." In retreat mining, pillars of coal hold up the mine's roof until they're intentionally pulled or cut away; then the last bit of profit is extracted as that section of the mine caves in. It's as dangerous as it sounds, and at first I was flummoxed: why ever operate that way? I forget that life is cheap.

Sections of the Crandall Canyon mine were also longwalled, which I now know means that long sections, or rooms, were left with no roof support; the new owners wanted to take out as much coal as possible, even though the old owners had decided the risks couldn't be justified. Despite prior concerns, Bush's Mine Safety and Health Administration took a whole week to approve the new money-grubbing plan, which likely lead to a "bump" in March, and now nine men are dead after another man-made collapse. Meanwhile, the collusion and corruption are exposed to be deeper than even that mine shaft, and yet the mountain--the mountain--is what is called evil in public and nobody blinks.

So, this time, my vocabulary has expanded, but, in the end, I have no words, and I've learned nothing that I didn't know before. Goddamn it all to hell.

No really, I'm not

In recent days I've learned all my students' names and how to prounce them, (c'mon, America--for the love of dios, do not pronounce German like the language they speak in Berlin), performed miracles of modern scheduling, created and taught lessons without benefit of sleep or time, tutored algebra, physical science, biology, Spanish, geometry, history, and English simultaneously and I'm not even kidding, mostly got my paperwork and grades out on time, and kept the attention of teenagers, through my wardrobe if nothing else. So you'd think I could stop looking like an idiot in front of that new social studies teacher. Alas, no. Repeatedly, no.

Better to focus all my screw ups in one spot, I guess, that to scatter them about the building, but damn. For the record, I am not the stupid one. A little scattered sometimes, and last week, for sure. But really, I'm actually competent. I swear.

the long road home

I have a stupid commute: this much is well-established. Two states, three bridges, two major rivers, three counties, and a canal? If only Phil were there to check me in to the parking lot, my drive would be an especially tedious, asphalt-heavy leg of The Amazing Race. I mean, technically, there's even a ferry between here and there; I just don't need a passport to board it.

My dirty little secret, though, is that except for the hours out of my day and the thousands of dollars it costs me, and, well, the times I've been hit from behind, I don't really mind my time in the car. There's something to be said for my job being there and my life being here; a buffer zone is a valuable thing. Then again, I'm not sure my peace of mind runs three dollars a gallon.

Close to home having undeniable advantages, I did try, this Spring, to eliminate my twice-daily cross-country chase. The hiring committee, however, didn't see things my way, and really, it was probably just as well. All that potential job had going for it was proximity; it would've been nothing more than a convenient hell. While, admittedly, being able to sleep even slightly past sun-up would have been wondrous, I no longer know how to stay sane--relatively--without trailing most of my job stress in the exhaust cloud behind me. If I had gotten that job, I may well have spent 40 minutes a day driving through town with the CD player turned up ridiculously loud. After this many years of commuting, I don't know how else to get home.

McLovin it

"So did you see Spiderman?"

"No."

"Saw?"

"No."

"Hostel?"

"No!"

"Borat?"

"Absolutely!"

"Saw 2?"

"Are you serious? You know better than that."

Every Monday morning for years, the countdown to the first bell has included my students' version of Entertainment Tonight, er, This Morning, a habitual query to see if my weekend movie-going matched up theirs. Thanks to graduation and a couple of moves, I'm not sure if anyone's left to carry on the tradition, and that pretty much figures, given that I put my ten bucks down to see the über-high school Superbad late last night.

You'd think I'd get enough of foul-mouthed adolescence for free during my work week, but my students aren't Americans, so they still watch what they say in front of grown-ups, and since my classroom was moved out of the freshman hallway, I hear little cursing at school these days beyond my own mental profanity. And besides, the high school kids I know aren't working off a script--a script I found hilarious despite being so far outside the target demographic I'm surprised they let me into the auditorium. The stories say Seth Rogen started writing Superbad when he was thirteen--in the 90s--but at least Judd Apatow is older than I am, a little. (Because, clearly, I could make up all that wild success in 18 months.)

I'm never sure how to answer, "What's your favorite movie?" because mostly it just depends, but as for current comedies, I'm not sure I can remember laughing more than in Superbad and Knocked Up and The 40 Year-old Virgin, so sure I'll go see whatever those guys make next, and maybe even talk about it the next Monday (along with the caveat to the Filipina that her step-father is right: she should never, ever see any of them). Either high school has gotten to me, or I just have a thing for filthy, funny, good-hearted boys.

Such a small town

Every now and again, this small city where I was born, raised and have lived most my life really embarrasses me. Case in point, a consultant has recommended the city change the name of its recently-closed landfill to something less unpleasant than "Mount Trashmore." Except that's not even the official name of Cedar Rapids/Linn County Solid Waste Agency (formerly Bluestem) Site No. 1.

A county supervisor I support is even advocating a naming contest. Really?

This could be fun, but isn't that like giving yourself a nickname?

The story in the local paper where I once worked (first as a paper boy, later as a reporter and, briefly during the meltdown, stuffing ads into the paper before distribution in the wee hours), was written by a former bowling team partner. Could this place be any less cosmopolitan?!

Right now "Trashmore" fits the looming brownish hill, but it will look better once the capping process now in progress is finished -- or so we're led to believe. "It's going to get 'greened' up and flowers will be planted on it. It's going to look nice one of these days -- very park like," the supervisor said.

How about "Park Like Place" for a name?

"The name Mount Trashmore likely was playfully attached to the site some 30 years ago by the media when it was not a high hill," The Gazette "reports." "There was talk then, perhaps not all that serious, of making it a ski hill when it was done."

Why not "Aborted Ski Hill" for a name?

The possibilities seem endless as I recall the stench that greets users of the cool urban trail that now skirts the former dump.

Mount Methane?

Hold Your Breath Hill?

Stinky's?

Or, perhaps the "greening-up" could include blueberrys so we could have our own Blueberry Hill. Adolescents in this town could use an alternative to First Avenue for finding their thrill.

Submit your ideas here and I'll pass them along. There's gonna be a contest, don't ya know? Please stop them from making a reference to the "City of Five Seasons." Come to think of it, what does the consultant have to say about that silly moniker?

Death by Cheap Crap

When my daughter was very young, two and three and four, and even for years after, her most favorite toys were Thomas and his dozens of friends-- the pricey wooden engines from those odd English stories. We had track and bridges and viaduct and tunnels, and thus a living room floor that was often a hazard, but mostly she played with them as dolls with wheels and smokestacks, converting the shed and the long-coveted roundhouse into group homes. She is, after all, a girl, if, nonetheless, a girl who did not potty train 'til she was bribed with locomotives. Though they currently occupy some prime closet space that could probably be more wisely allocated, those trains are the toys I'll never get rid of, the ones that I'll pass down to future generations, or at least let them play with, or at least touch. I have no intention of letting go of the stuff that a childhood was made of.

So it was a relief when our sets were too old to be included in that lead paint-spurred recall; it would have been awkward to issue respirators and rubber gloves to my potential grandkids someday.

I admit that I was surprised that Thomas was poisoned, though I would not have been shocked to learn his writers were on drugs. The fortune I invested in those small blocks of wood, combined with the British cloud that obscured its origins, created the illusion of a good and presumably safe toy. It's not as if they came out of a grocery store machine. And besides, wood is always the Expensive Toy Story code for Better For Your Baby. If that stuff can't be trusted, what can be?

Nothing, apparently. Mattel has recalled millions of pieces of plastic, and you know if that's the stuff they feel they need to draw our attention to, there must be billions more trinkets out there that are nearly as bad. And that's Mattel. Which still leaves the billions of doo-dads from Wal-Mart and the Dollar Tree, the carnival and Chuck E. Cheese. And, as yesterday's headlines reported, the baby bibs and junk jewelry. And the toothpaste, and the dogfood, and the seafood and fish. Rely on a nation known for neither public disclosure nor public safety to produce everything for nothing and get less than the very best? Who would have thought!

Now apparently Chinese pigs have some mysterious dread disease , though the Chinese won't say, since that's what they (don't) do, that's wreaking havoc there and potentially other places, markets and food chains being as entwined as they are. Maybe someday it will matter, maybe not (see SARS and Bird Flu), but it does not seem to bode well, since we seem to be fighting an undeclared war of death by stuff.

It's almost tempting to say that we get what we deserve, that it's only logical that if something costs nothing even after it's been shipped across the world one shouldn't assume that it's okay, regulation and conscientious employees costing money (even when there's not a culture gap to bridge) but we do, after all, live somewhere the government took on that role of protecting its citizens from stuff quite some time ago, back when it was a little dangerous to take even American-made products at their word. So now we assume we're protected, but unless one is a corporation, the answer seems to be no. The rest of have been sold out in this race to the bottom. Hope they at least got a good deal.

Maybe next year

When you're born on a Friday the 13th and, in my case, the same day (but not year) as Fidel Castro, gift-getting options are limited, or so has been my experience. It's not like being born on Christmas, New Year's Day, Valentine's Day or, even, Cinco de Mayo.

But it pays off every once in awhile. Take Monday, for instance, when I received the third best present I could have hoped for. Here's the Daily Show's take on the matter, which should tell you what gifts number 1 and 2 would be.

1 of 176

This time of year, certain grown ups have just one question for the school age kids they see: "Are you looking forward to going back to school?" Being her mother's daughter, my favorite ten-year old's reply isn't a simple yes or no. Instead, she's taken to overexplaining, "I'm looking forward to the first day, but none of the days after that." I'm not sure if she's just withholding judgment, or if she'd really rather fifth grade were just a one-shot deal. Still, I can kinda relate.

I love the first day of school.

I'm sleep deprived already--5 a.m. is too damn early--I'm not yet entirely prepared for tomorrow, and I left my desk a disaster. But today? Oh, today was great. Sure it's taking the new counselor a little longer than I'd like to learn why we do things my way (the right way), and if the bus hadn't been 20 minutes late, that would have probably been nice, but we've got weeks to work that out--months in fact.

The first day is for reconnecting and welcoming and rescuing the confused. It's little gestures that will pay off way down the line, when a kid remembers how I helped that time in the hall. But mostly it's the energy of that initial class meeting that makes the first day for me. It still amuses me, when I think of it, that I could be the same person who once suffered through a year of college French (taught by a fiercely intimidating Russian, natch) rather than complete ten weeks of public speaking, I love being in front of a class so much, but it's true. It's just my element, I guess, or one of them.

I've always been curious what my friends and family would make of Teacher Allison. I mean, she's pretty much me, though perhaps with slightly more patience and a slightly kinder wit. Maybe bigger gestures. She definitely does still laugh a lot, and will do anything for anybody on her side (just ask that counselor). So, not really that different, and neither is the first day. But still, there's a little something that makes those first meetings distinct (though less off-putting than referring to oneself in the third person. I swear never to do it again.). On this first day of class, there's no tedium or tension, and more than the usual measure of possibility. Most of the time, it's just fun, or at least enjoyable enough to make us all willing to come back-- at least for one more day. I love it, and I can't wait to do it again. Maybe even tomorrow.

Hometown Heros

My hometown isn't what you'd call a sports mecca, so we tend to cling to our local heroes. Of recent vintage, we have this year's Masters champion Zach Johnson and former NFL MVP Kurt Warner.

I don't think Kurt ever loved us as much as we loved him, but Zach is the real deal. He thinks so much of his hometown, he returns secretly to enjoy quality time with his family and friends while also doing his civic duty through charitable causes and public appearances.

I'm not even a Sox fan, White or Red, but I felt a little civic pride in learning Chicago closer Bobby Jenks tied a major league record for most consecutive batters retired. Jenks, who played minor league ball for the Cedar Rapids Kernels, and Jim Barr (San Francisco, 1972) are now the only major leaguers to retire 41 consecutive batters.

Think about it: 41 straight. That's nearly 14 innnings -- though not consecutively -- without a hit, walk, error, nothing but walking back to the dugout. Phenomenal. Now go get Orel Hershiser's consecutive scoreless innings record (59) and we'll talk.

But I've rarely been prouder of a Cedar Rapids product than Friday night, when Coe College graduate Fred Jackson broke tackles, stiff armed and dove his way to a 17-yard touchdown for the Buffalo Bills. They're in the NFL, you know?

Sure it was only a pre-season game and it was against the second or third team defense, but there aren't many Division III athletes competing for jobs in the NFL and there are even fewer more deserving than Fred.

A back-up running back in high school in Texas ("Friday Night Lights" is not entirely fictional), Fred and his twin brother, Patrick, came to Coe with the encouragement of one of their high school coaches, Wayne "Phiz" Phillips, who happened to be a Kohawk football player (under fellow Coe alumnus and Buffalo GM Marv Levy, I should add) and later head coach.

Fred and Patrick blossomed at Coe, each excelling on opposite sides of the ball (Fred at running back and Patrick at defensive back) and special teams. In 2002, their senior year, the Kohawks were 10-2 and advanced to the second round of the NCAA DIII playoffs WITHOUT SO MUCH AS ATTEMPTING A FIELD GOAL ALL YEAR! That's what kind of college football player Fred Jackson was. Equally impressively, they raced home from the NCAA DIII track championships that spring to receive their college degrees.

With the help of the aforementioned connections, Fred got some NFL looks he may not have otherwise. That's not a knock on him, by any means, but a fact of NFL life. Ultimately, Levy's Bills signed him to a contract and sent him to NFL Europe, where he starred. After spending last season on the Bills' practice squad, Jackson is looking to earn a roster spot in the National Football League.

With guys like Kurt, Zach and Bobby earning local fame, why not Freddie too?

Um, pimp my ride?

Carburetors have fantasies, too? Frankly, I've never been so glad to drive a fuel-injected car.

Quik Trip's ad agency seems to have decided that their customers would be amused by the thought of their vehicles having some kind of relationship with the gas pump. Or would feel a little bit better about forking out fifty bucks every four or five days if they're giving their cars fuel that is "like a fine wine, only it tastes nasty." Am I supposed to be bringing in my car for a date? Thank goodness for small favors; the images could be worse. Unlike our neighbors to the North, the QTs here haven't been bought out by the Kum & Go.

The Vacation President

My job allows me a disproportionate amount of vacation time and I struggle to use it all, yet I'm no match for W.

On Thursday, Bush left for a weekend in Kennebunkport, Maine, and his family's summer compound, Walker's Point. On Monday, he heads to his Crawford retreat, where he has spent all or part of 418 days of his presidency.

The presidential vacation-time record holder is the late Ronald Reagan, who tallied 436 days in his two terms. At 418 days, and with 17 months to go in his presidency, Bush is going to beat that easily.

Even so, this year's August vacation for Bush is a contrast to previous years such as 2005, when he dragged out vacation in Texas to five weeks. That was also the year Bush remained on vacation immediately after Hurricane Katrina hit.

Vice President Dick Cheney generally takes August off, often heading to Wyoming or coastal Maryland. Congress left last weekend and is gone until Sept. 4. The Iraqi parliament is taking August off, too.

Considering the damage they've done, I should probably be pleased by this break in political action. Then again, all hell could break loose -- again.

August

Our grass is dead, but that's okay: so is everyone else's. The signs around town have us justified--no outdoor watering permitted--and the temperature has hovered around 100 since the calendar flipped to August. Where are we, Arizona? No, the humidity's a dead give away, and the football team's uniforms are wrong now, but I suppose once things start bursting into flame, given the parched conditions, we can pretend to be in California.

Too bad there's no In-N-Out Burger. Or beach.

The fires are on my list of million and twelve reasons that CA is a better place to visit than to live, but everything's a trade off. And given that it's been a year since I've seen the ocean, and given that tomorrow's forecast is for 102 individual degrees, and given that school starts on Tuesday and I've got so much to do that I can feel the stress in my chest even now at 8 o'clock on this Saturday morning, I'm pretty sure that a day in the sand and the salty breezes listening to the crash of the waves--is there any better sound?--'til the sun sets, and the sweatshirts come out, and the bonfire (the good kind of fire) lights, and I stay and stay and sit some more would cure what ails me, even if there were the faintest smell of smoke in that cool California night air.