tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-230789322024-03-07T13:44:36.293-05:00The Mind of JoeThese are some random insights into the mind of Joe DeShon.
If you read this, you'll be amused, entertained, and occasionally enraged.
But at least you'll understand where I'm coming from.Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.comBlogger163125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-14814994652041622032022-09-09T16:36:00.001-04:002022-09-10T10:06:27.735-04:00We Are All British Today<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDExpHkfSYukuhGeSU8hS5GeNLamJcuvCA89mmN2gZTjGfFTdKg7YVkWQm6iHcpuG4wZ0J40NrF_5b6iuJMw2lK1Gjp9XCMPED1_y8yco0x3mUiw-wiX_nAuWpdVStbGovGpEVpB6sHcG4xd_Q56ksqbBzqk0JR085posx0yxdjEHcBvxeBp8/s825/flags.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="825" data-original-width="825" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDExpHkfSYukuhGeSU8hS5GeNLamJcuvCA89mmN2gZTjGfFTdKg7YVkWQm6iHcpuG4wZ0J40NrF_5b6iuJMw2lK1Gjp9XCMPED1_y8yco0x3mUiw-wiX_nAuWpdVStbGovGpEVpB6sHcG4xd_Q56ksqbBzqk0JR085posx0yxdjEHcBvxeBp8/s320/flags.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />In the wake of the passing of Queen Elizabeth, I am reminded of my own British heritage. Despite my anglicized French surname, a DNA analysis tells me almost all my ancestry hails from the British Isles.</div><div><br /></div><div>Still, as an American, it’s interesting to watch the British react to news from the Monarchy. This news wasn’t unexpected as was the news of Dianna 25 years ago, or even of King George VI in 1952. But it is rightly met with grief and sorrow. Ninety percent of the world population has never known a “King” of England in their lifetime. The notion of anybody except Elizabeth sitting on the throne will take some getting used to.</div><div><br /></div><div>In America, we have no established “royalty”. Perhaps the Adams family or the Roosevelts or the Bushes or the Kennedys would come close. But their royal-ness pales in comparison to the crowns and titles and regality that subjects enjoy in Britain. (Indeed, Americans are not “subjects” to a crown; we are “citizens” -- and proudly so.)</div><div><br /></div><div>But there is one institution that Americans hold as dear to our heart. There is one item that we hold in reverence, much in the same way as Britons revere the Monarchy.</div><div><br /></div><div>It is the flag.</div><div><br /></div><div>When we are young, we are taught to pledge allegiance to the flag. Not to the president, not to the government, but to the “flag”. Is there something special about a swatch of nylon or polyester that demands allegiance? </div><div><br /></div><div>No, not the “flag” itself. In fact, we are constantly reminded that the fabric of the flag is ephemeral. When it is inevitably worn-out, it is not to be preserved; it is to be respectfully “retired”.</div><div><br /></div><div>The flag is merely an image, a representation of something much greater. It represents a nation of vast resources, and the capacity and motivation to properly manage them. A nation that comes to the defense of our friends. A nation that, for the most part, fights wars of <i>liberation</i>, not of <i>conquest</i>.</div><div><br /></div><div>The flag does none of the above, but it represents everything about the nation and the people who live here that make this country so great. </div><div><br /></div><div>That was the purpose behind laws forbidding the wanton destruction of our flag. That’s why we respect it enough to forbid it from touching the ground. That’s why we salute it and fold it in a triangle.</div><div><br /></div><div>Even our national anthem speaks to the power and meaning behind the flag. The “Star-Spangled Banner” is not a song about war (as has been claimed). It is about the enduring power of the flag. “The rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air, gave proof through the night that our FLAG was still there.” Francis Scott Key was rejoicing not in the victory of the army, but in the resilience that was demonstrated by the flag.</div><div><br /></div><div>Such it is with the British and their Monarchs. Kings and Queens are skin-and-bones -- basically carbon-based life forms, if you will. They may be long-lived, but not immortal. They may be regal, but not gods.</div><div><br /></div><div>Just as America changes the flag with the addition of each new state, the national anthem of Great Britain will now be “God Save the King”. The Monarchy is above politics, and thus deserves and receives the blessings of God, in the minds of the Britons. The Windsors are thus royalty only in the sense that they represent the hope of the future for the great British Empire.</div><div><br /></div><div>For the next few days, I think it would be appropriate for the entire world to consider themselves British. <b>The Queen is Dead; Long Live the King!</b></div><div><br /></div><!--<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_is_it" target="_blank">what is it</a>
<blockquote></blockquote>--> Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-83558889779801245712022-08-18T10:43:00.001-04:002022-08-18T10:43:17.670-04:00Who shot who?<p class="MsoNoSpacing">I have often been accused of over-thinking.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">But I believe I don’t over-think, I think <i>just the right
amount</i>, which is usually a little more than the average person.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing"><i>Case in point:</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">In Barry Manilow’s 1985 hit “Copacabana”, the climax of
the lyrics states: “There was blood and a single gun shot, but just who shot
who?”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing"><i>Who shot who, indeed?</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">Did Tony off Rico for hitting on his girl Lola?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">Or did Rico kill Tony in self-defense?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">The song employs a technique known as “deliberate
ambiguity”. During the ensuing chorus
and instrumental interlude, the listener is forced to ponder the fate of both
men. A sense of satisfaction develops as
one comes to one’s own conclusion with the limited number of facts presented.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">This sense of satisfaction is fulfilled in the final
verse. We learn that Lola has “lost her
youth and she lost her Tony, now she's lost her mind”.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">Yes, it is now certain that Rico shot and killed Tony.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing"><i>Or did he?</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">The lyrics only say that Lola has “lost” Tony. It doesn’t say she lost him to death.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">Perhaps she lost him to prison?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">Maybe, in the struggle, Tony got the gun away from Rico,
turned it on him and shot him. Then Tony
would have gone to prison for the death of Rico. And maybe that’s how Lola “lost” him.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">On the other hand, that’s pretty shallow of Lola to “lose
her mind” over Tony when she could easily visit him in prison.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">Unless ... Tony received a death sentence and was
executed!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">Please don’t mention in the comments that a 1985 TV film
(and subsequent musical) settled the issue.
This isn’t a story about the star-crossed lovers Tony and Lola. It’s an essay about “deliberate ambiguity”.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNoSpacing">It can be very effective when used as a plot device in a
novel (or a song lyric). By not
answering <i>all</i> the questions, it gives the reader (or listener) an opportunity
to “fill in the blanks” for oneself. My
version of Lola’s story will almost certainly be different from yours. And that’s okay, because that allows <i>me</i> to
own <i>my</i> version.</p><!--<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_is_it" target="_blank">what is it</a>
<blockquote></blockquote>--> Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-55793061012851831242022-01-24T19:25:00.005-05:002022-01-28T11:44:39.524-05:00Just Keep Playing! Fixing the NFL Overtime Rules<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh2i_bJLMsKdElFopik5ac5P8Ob2k8h0R82xlXxI0-ZFMdTxGdrvfihYCu5Ssj3SWL6ZfgmCySU0ptyrMNchd5QiqeBt8i1R8CSjDdEPA7ERd6DkTpeyEtJaxHJ1og8UB58v7XJIckhsiUpesNJXDzAGAVCzJc6x0pB0udyYtuCoKgRVsIPvRk=s500" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="261" data-original-width="500" height="167" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh2i_bJLMsKdElFopik5ac5P8Ob2k8h0R82xlXxI0-ZFMdTxGdrvfihYCu5Ssj3SWL6ZfgmCySU0ptyrMNchd5QiqeBt8i1R8CSjDdEPA7ERd6DkTpeyEtJaxHJ1og8UB58v7XJIckhsiUpesNJXDzAGAVCzJc6x0pB0udyYtuCoKgRVsIPvRk=s320" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div>Here’s a novel solution to the NFL’s overtime rules conundrum: <i>Forget the coin toss and <b>just keep playing!</b></i></div><div><br /></div><div>It’s actually a very elegant solution. If the score is tied at the end of regulation, whoever has the ball just keeps it, and the game continues until one team scores by touchdown, field goal, or safety.</div><div><br /></div><div>The problem with the current NFL rules is that it places far too much importance on the coin toss. The winner of the toss gets to receive a kickoff – regardless of the status of the game when time expired. And the receiver of the overtime kickoff is the winner in an overwhelming number of games.</div><div><br /></div><div>What about the argument that the defense is just as important as the offense? Well, nobody told that to the rule-makers. The rules of football overwhelmingly favor the offense (ostensibly for both player safety and for fan satisfaction). The poor defense in overtime has very little chance of holding their own and preventing a score from an offense who is already pumped for victory and has the rules stacked in their favor.</div><div><br /></div><div>So, I propose: <b>just keep playing</b>.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Here are a few details:</i></div><div><br /></div><div>The game would be played in as many 15-minute quarters as necessary to declare a winner. But the clock would never stop. Since it’s irrelevant, it would simply keep running, primarily for statistics-keeping purposes.</div><div><br /></div><div>The <i>play clock</i>, however, would be enforced. Teams could not call a time-out; they would have to abide by the play clock. Officials could call time-outs for injuries or other official business.</div><div><br /></div><div>No challenges from the bench; all challenges would be called from the booth. <i>(That’s actually one overtime rule the NFL got right.)</i></div><div><br /></div><div>And here’s a game changer: <b>No punts in overtime!</b> A team would get four downs to advance the ball ten yards or score. If they fail, the other team takes over on downs. (Just think of how much that would advance the tempo of the overtime!) In the case of a failed field goal, the other team takes over on the former line of scrimmage.</div><div><br /></div><div>If regulation ends with a score which ties the game, overtime begins with the scoring team kicking off. Then the game continues with the above rules.</div><div><br /></div><div>In the case of the divisional playoff game on January 23, 2022 between the Bills and the Chiefs, since regulation ended with a Chiefs field goal tying the score, overtime would have begun with the Chiefs kicking off to the Bills. And the game <i>may</i> have turned out differently. But at least <i>every person on each team and every fan in the stands and every person watching on television would know what was about to happen</i>. And <b>nobody</b> could blame the Chief’s win or the Bill’s loss on a <b>coin toss!</b></div><div><br /></div><div><i>The following could have happened:</i> Chiefs kick off, Bills start on, say, their own 25. But after four downs, if they haven’t advanced ten yards – and without a punt available to them – the Chiefs could have taken over deep in Bill’s territory and won on a field goal.</div><div><br /></div><div>There’s no way of knowing how it would have turned out. But one thing is for sure: There is no reason to have a coin toss at the beginning of overtime and start the game over completely from scratch. Simply start the game from the position that existed at the end of regulation and just keep playing.</div><div><br /></div><div>It’s that simple.</div><!--<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_is_it" target="_blank">what is it</a>
<blockquote></blockquote>--> Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-49206654243412138292020-10-03T06:00:00.012-04:002020-10-07T10:38:31.348-04:00Virology knows no political bounds<div>I have friends on the right who suggest that the President was infected by his enemies during one of his Covid tests.</div><div><br /></div><div>I have friends on the left who suggest that the president is faking his infection to receive more attention and sympathy from the press, as well as to avoid another debate appearance.</div><div><br /></div><div>Politicizing a virus makes as much sense as politicizing a chocolate chip cookie recipe.</div><div><br /></div><div>The virus has political implications, but not political intent.</div><div><br /></div><div>Viruses are mini-microscopic. They are invisible and almost impossible to detect.</div><div><br /></div><div>They are also difficult to study and their behavior is difficult to forecast. Conclusions based on the best research are aggravatingly ambiguous at best.</div><div><br /></div><div>Masks, hand washing, social distancing, and other protocols are effective, but not fool-proof.</div><div><br /></div><div>In spite of his outward bravado, the President exists in the most sterile environment possible for any world leader. But even that wasn’t enough to protect him. He was infected just as was Herman Cain, Boris Johnson, Placido Domingo, and Tom Hanks.</div><div><br /></div><div>If he can get it, anybody can. Virology knows no political bounds.</div><div><br /></div><div>Instead of making political statements, I’m asking my friends of both ideologies to join me in wishing and praying for a speedy recovery for the President and First Lady, and an end to this madness, hate, and divisiveness.</div><!--<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_is_it" target="_blank">what is it</a>
<blockquote></blockquote>--> Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-64531818681064855092020-07-23T06:00:00.004-04:002020-07-23T17:04:29.213-04:00What About Your Child's Art?<div>Many parents wonder how much of their children’s pre-school and elementary art they should keep. My answer: all of it. Or, at least most of it.</div><br /><div>Label and date everything and store them in a large secure box somewhere. Then leave them there and let them simmer -- like a pot of good chili on a cold winter’s night. Let them simmer in that box for about twenty years or so.</div><br /><div>By then, your child be in graduate school or starting a career of his own. At that time, you can take everything out of the box and go through it.</div><div>Your reaction to many of these things will be, “Why in the world did I save this?!” Those things, you can throw away.</div><br /><div>The few art pieces left over may be true masterpieces. At one time, they were precariously mounted on your refrigerator door with a kitschy magnet. But now, they are worthy of spending a couple hundred dollars on professional framing. Display them proudly!</div><div><br /></div>
<div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfb8g_LRdW0NDbABVebUk40BKKx7x-WUC5-V7DkYwX5gssrFxbwMRxNXDTeqU0AjuV5QS6JzlsbUZTYmJktzq60YkoTjX9RwwnBHGdcajwJZ2tQ1q1caakmVqZMl3XaaZx17tzMg/s2048/20200722_134200.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1857" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfb8g_LRdW0NDbABVebUk40BKKx7x-WUC5-V7DkYwX5gssrFxbwMRxNXDTeqU0AjuV5QS6JzlsbUZTYmJktzq60YkoTjX9RwwnBHGdcajwJZ2tQ1q1caakmVqZMl3XaaZx17tzMg/s320/20200722_134200.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8-petnplnaorvPnqO1fT3pffjsts8PI9Ad4F55ZkOplZ45hyPmZtOJgkyTmRw7nJ1QiMWTGj-OcPhtvhPka6AqITfQoH5Qm0pm_0y3MJVwgwLhwwWY_NPmyDBMzSSFrvKwEYa0w/s2048/20200722_134241.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1356" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8-petnplnaorvPnqO1fT3pffjsts8PI9Ad4F55ZkOplZ45hyPmZtOJgkyTmRw7nJ1QiMWTGj-OcPhtvhPka6AqITfQoH5Qm0pm_0y3MJVwgwLhwwWY_NPmyDBMzSSFrvKwEYa0w/s320/20200722_134241.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMvY3jvl4PV9h8mAgXFI-NqJT9vMV-Dl-0jB4DuRqVnbJQoiXammIXljsWdHg2f3BcOhAvEbR5bu0_9TNA7E5TcAEGDE1er_YB6y41V4sJUi-VFneUBr_QP5OKUHLKOiP0wFfVVw/s2048/20200722_134252.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1548" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMvY3jvl4PV9h8mAgXFI-NqJT9vMV-Dl-0jB4DuRqVnbJQoiXammIXljsWdHg2f3BcOhAvEbR5bu0_9TNA7E5TcAEGDE1er_YB6y41V4sJUi-VFneUBr_QP5OKUHLKOiP0wFfVVw/s320/20200722_134252.jpg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIfVkjlaBdq3ckT2qLhT_myCi17lkjQk6KNE8bDQHJLVgQOiADCepgT15g4XPbZjsJy4TPoC9XpqasSu9dihZZc2fGr5prYJpOTlMJDSAtNdRaGjmdrU5fa_9ygVHcfFXnh9VYTQ/s2048/20200722_134211.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1487" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIfVkjlaBdq3ckT2qLhT_myCi17lkjQk6KNE8bDQHJLVgQOiADCepgT15g4XPbZjsJy4TPoC9XpqasSu9dihZZc2fGr5prYJpOTlMJDSAtNdRaGjmdrU5fa_9ygVHcfFXnh9VYTQ/s320/20200722_134211.jpg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjekpAD3w1pYhbF2majQg6VAIoReXz6Dwsd2V9aY2zDKh_QHT9qLU6hRZis3nQ0Q3s3LZ0OJjvYO_Rc5-IXrUNMsDN8BMDTiLTAPFjOcxOUKqv2EeCFzaIZPqCMqQKGEeN_uirO9Q/s2048/20200722_134217.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1341" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjekpAD3w1pYhbF2majQg6VAIoReXz6Dwsd2V9aY2zDKh_QHT9qLU6hRZis3nQ0Q3s3LZ0OJjvYO_Rc5-IXrUNMsDN8BMDTiLTAPFjOcxOUKqv2EeCFzaIZPqCMqQKGEeN_uirO9Q/s320/20200722_134217.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div><!--<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_is_it" target="_blank">what is it</a>
<blockquote></blockquote>--> Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-27621129479002482252017-02-20T07:00:00.000-05:002017-02-20T07:00:04.814-05:00Ranking the Presidents<!--
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_is_it" target="_blank">what is it</a>
<blockquote></blockquote>
-->
C-SPAN has just published the 2017 results of their <a href="https://www.c-span.org/presidentsurvey2017/?page=overall" target="_blank">Presidential Historians Survey</a>.<br>
<br>
As any good data geek would do, I threw all the data into Excel to see what I could discover. You can download my work <a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=1hQl3zcSqq4Lo-acAQaDFWFCPaicxMXjv-L0mvVrG16o" target="_blank">here</a>.<br>
<br>
I’ve always been interested in these types of studies because, on the one hand they advertise themselves as being totally objective, it’s really hard to squeeze the subjectivity out of them.<br>
<br>
After all, any historian — no matter what he claims — brings to the table a certain amount of historical bias. Today’s political climate tends to make that bias even more obvious.<br>
<br>
For example, Glen Beck — admittedly nobody’s example of political objectivity — ranks Woodrow Wilson as the <a href="http://www.glennbeck.com/dreamers/wilson/" target="_blank">most evil man</a> in all of American history. But the survey ranks Wilson a respectable 13th out of 45.<br>
<br>
And James Polk — not on the general public’s list of great American Presidents — ranks number 16 — proof that the C-SPAN academic advisors sure know their pre-Civil War history.<br>
<br>
To produce the rankings, C-SPAN asked a team from academia to rank all presidents using ten “qualities of presidential leadership”:
<ul>
<li>Public Persuasion</li>
<li>Crisis Leadership</li>
<li>Economic Management</li>
<li>Moral Authority</li>
<li>International Relations</li>
<li>Administrative Skills</li>
<li>Relations with Congress</li>
<li>Vision/Setting An Agenda</li>
<li>Pursued Equal Justice for All</li>
<li>Performance Within the Context of His Times</li>
</ul>
<br>
It’s probably a good idea that such a panel is used and that they don’t ask me or Glen Beck to serve on that panel.<br>
<br>
All those categories gave me plenty of data to load into Excel. Let’s see what I discovered.<br>
<br>
I thought it would be interesting to measure the presidents on a combination of rank and “consistency”. I measured consistency based on the rank of the standard deviation of the rank in for that president in all the categories.<br>
<br>
A consistent president is one who ranks the same in all categories. A president may be consistently good, consistently bad, or consistently mediocre. Is there anything to learn from this?<br>
<br>
Here is a scatter plot of the results:<br>
<br>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmh-M4Wq9gs7f2ln28Cm_rw6ydwA5Vln0WfXZzBT81pGbIwoZYfEBPulwtmyMfQdSGX0lYg_-sW5dkwRSLjRj2DSz9SbpJ4ssRMRDaoQ58_FG5Jk8MhBtnYnYEtFJjfMArFUnUeQ/s1600/presidential_rankings_cspan2017_scatter_plot_by_consistency.png" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmh-M4Wq9gs7f2ln28Cm_rw6ydwA5Vln0WfXZzBT81pGbIwoZYfEBPulwtmyMfQdSGX0lYg_-sW5dkwRSLjRj2DSz9SbpJ4ssRMRDaoQ58_FG5Jk8MhBtnYnYEtFJjfMArFUnUeQ/s640/presidential_rankings_cspan2017_scatter_plot_by_consistency.png" width="570" height="413" /></a>
<br>
To validate the data, let’s look at a couple of corners. Yep, not only does Abraham Lincoln rank as the number one president, he ranks as the <em>most consistent</em> president. That places him in the lower left corner. A good president all around.<br>
<br>
In the other corner are both Lincoln’s predecessor <em>and</em> his successor. Wow. We always knew that James Buchannan did more to cause the Civil War than any other individual. And we know that Andrew Johnson did more to screw up Reconstruction than just about anybody else. Bad presidents all around. <em>Thanks for the legacy, guys.</em><br>
<br>
Here’s another way of looking at things:<br>
<br>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8GJXCSYWz7M3U3yFpGAIkzk5Qhk1dxMNY7fJQ4nIT3g_xF_bDpmyCCwVVgwcT1vH0IhXIKosvkhSdbmQDfkRNNLKWxVC-IOBEetyXgceo-fwQYVagBC3jNxJHOXeqQ2V75bkd7g/s1600/presidential_rankings_cspan2017_color_coded_by_category.png" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8GJXCSYWz7M3U3yFpGAIkzk5Qhk1dxMNY7fJQ4nIT3g_xF_bDpmyCCwVVgwcT1vH0IhXIKosvkhSdbmQDfkRNNLKWxVC-IOBEetyXgceo-fwQYVagBC3jNxJHOXeqQ2V75bkd7g/s640/presidential_rankings_cspan2017_color_coded_by_category.png" width="570" height="523" /></a>
<br>
This graph color codes the presidents by their rank in each of the ten categories. Since they are ordered by the final score, any place you see “islands” of a different color, that’s an anomaly that’s worthy of discussion.<br>
<br>
For example, Lyndon Johnson was a pretty decent president. He ranks at the top for “Relations with Congress” (he had to fight his own Democratic Party to get the Voting Rights Act of 1965 passed; a greater percentage of Republicans voted for the bill than did Democrats). But he rightfully ranks near the bottom for international relations for getting us deeper in the Vietnam war.<br>
<br>
Bill Clinton ranks a decent number 15 overall, but comes in near the bottom in for “Moral Authority” because of his fondness for oral activities.<br>
<br>
It’s a little harder for me to explain the person that I believe to be the nicest, worst president of them all: Jimmy Carter. A dreadful president who ruined both the American economy and our relations with Iran, I don’t know how he ranked as high as number 26. On the other hand, he’s a decent man in a strong, loving marriage, a Baptist deacon and Sunday School teacher, and a Habitat for Humanity volunteer into his 90s; doesn’t he deserve to be ranked higher than number 14 in “Moral Authority”?<br>
<br>
And how did Barack Obama perform in his debut appearance? He came in at number 12, between Woodrow Wilson and James Monroe. That’s probably fair.<br>
<br>
He ranked near the bottom in “Relations with Congress”. The only way he got ObamaCare passed was with back-door deals and a “gotta-pass-the-bill-before-you-read-it” mentality, even though his party controlled both houses of Congress at the time.<br>
<br>
He also scored pretty low on “International Relations” by touring the world while apologizing for America’s past policies, weakened our position with Russia, and managed to worsen our relationship on <em>both</em> sides of the Middle East — quite an accomplishment!<br>
<br>
He scored the highest in the category “Pursued Equal Justice for All”. That sounds about right for somebody who thinks <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_the_Plumber#Encounter_with_Barack_Obama" target="_blank"> “it’s good for everybody” to “spread the wealth around”</a>.<br>
<br>
We’ll have to wait a few years to see what historians think of our Mogul-in-Chief. My guess is his drain-the-swamp and build-the-wall dreams will score high in the “Vision/Setting an Agenda” category.<br>
<br>
Fortunately for Mr. Trump, there is no category for “Relationship with the Press”.<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-30700211219694842042017-02-17T07:00:00.000-05:002018-06-05T21:00:28.766-04:00On Being a Grammar Nazi<!--
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I’ve been conflicted lately over whether I want the reputation of being a <a href="https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/grammar_Nazi" target="_blank">Grammar Nazi</a>. There’s no doubt that I <em>am</em> one; I’m just not sure if I want that out there for everybody to see.<br>
<br>
I’ve been especially troubled lately over the tendency of people to say “one of the only”.<br>
<br>
“He’s one of the only people who can understand this policy.”<br>
<br>
“Mary is one of the only people in the office that can program in COBOL.”<br>
<br>
Ambiguity is a very bad thing. How many people in the office can program in COBOL? Three? Then Mary is one of the few. But is there really only one? Then Mary is the only one, not one of the only ones.<br>
<br>
So I arrogantly proclaimed my Nazi-ness to the world, eager to rid it of this literary travesty.<br>
<br>
Until I read on the Google-nets that it’s actually <a href="https://motivatedgrammar.wordpress.com/tag/one-of-the-only/" target="_blank">okay</a> to say “one of the only”.<br>
<br>
<a href="https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rats#Interjection" target="_blank">Rats</a>.<br>
<br>
My career as a Grammar Nazi can be traced to a 1977 episode of <em>All in the Family</em>. In “Michael and Gloria Split”, Archie tells Michael that he will “loan” him some money. Michael corrects him, saying he had to “lend” him money because “loan” is a noun and “lend” is a verb.<br>
<br>
Yea for Meathead, I thought. Archie is just <em>sooo</em> uneducated! (Archie was not impressed. Our grammatical skills are so underappreciated.)<br>
<br>
That is, until I discovered that Merriam-Webster — and who can argue with them? — says that “loan” <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/loan-vs-lend" target="_blank">has been a verb for 700 years</a> — and still is.<br>
<br>
The famous dictionary site has been wrong before. In my opinion, they completely missed the mark with the whole <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/video/try-and-vs-try-to" target="_blank">“try and” vs. “try to” argument</a>.<br>
<br>
On the other hand, they totally understand the concept of the extended meaning of the word “<a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Nazi " target="_blank">Nazi</a>”. (You have no right to be offended if I use the word to describe myself.)<br>
<br>
Being a Grammar Nazi is bad enough. Being a Closet Grammar Nazi is a fate I have chosen for myself, to avoid the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_be,_or_not_to_be" target="_blank">slings and arrows</a> of outrageous <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ostracism" target="_blank">ostracism</a>.<br>
<br>
I think I need somebody to pat me on the head and say <a href="https://youtu.be/ia7J-s468EI" target="_blank">“there”, “their”, and “they’re”</a>.<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-38414106306590018292017-02-06T07:00:00.000-05:002017-02-21T21:07:35.783-05:00Citizen-in-Chief<!--
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Bill O’Reilly’s Super Bowl <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74DAI2hr9Kk" target="_blank">interview with Donald Trump</a>
gave us the famous quote: “There are a lot of killers. You think our country is so innocent?” Everybody’s talking about it.<br>
<br>
So many people are talking about it, I have nothing further to say about it.<br>
<br>
Instead, I’m going to analyze an exchange near the end of the interview.<br>
<br>
Attempting to humanize the President, O’Reilly asked: “Do you ever say to yourself, ‘I can’t believe I’m here’?”<br>
<br>
The President gave a typical Trump-esque ramble:<br>
<blockquote>“The other day, I walked into the main entrance of the White House, and I said to myself, this is sort of amazing. Or you walk into Air Force One, it’s like a surreal experience in a certain way. But you have to get over it because there’s so much work to be done, whether it’s jobs or other nations that truly hate us; you have to get over it.”</blockquote>
<br>
I think he missed the chance to make a good point so I guess I’ll have to make it for him.<br>
<br>
Much has been made of the fact that Donald Trump is our <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Presidents_of_the_United_States_by_previous_experience" target="_blank">first President with neither previous political or military experience</a>. Heck, most of our presidents had an abundance of both.<br>
<br>
The fact that can even happen is a testament to the genius of our representative form of government.<br>
<br>
In many countries, the head of state is actually required to be a member of Parliament, because the office is elected from their ranks.<br>
<br>
In other countries, you have to be a member of a particular family or blood line to be King.<br>
<br>
And in still others, the General of the victorious army becomes the de facto leader.<br>
<br>
But in America, we can actually elect a Citizen-in-Chief. And that’s exactly what we’ve done this time. It’s amazing that it took us this long.<br>
<br>
George Washington literally came out of retirement to become President. And he immediately returned to retirement at the end of his service. His concept of a perfect country was a party-less system run by a citizen administration.<br>
<br>
Thomas Jefferson and John Adams screwed that up. They started a string of professional politicians in the form of diplomats, governors, senators, and congressmen to become President. Even in their private life, more than half of our presidents have been lawyers. Very few were successful businessmen (both Bushes, Carter, and Truman). One was even an actor.<br>
<br>
Maybe this is the start of a trend. Maybe it’s a good idea to let our lawmakers be professional lawmakers, but demand our Presidents be professional administrators. Maybe that’s the kind of division in power the Founding Fathers had in mind.<br>
<br>
So if I had been the President, and O’Reilly had asked me “Can you believe it?”, my response would have been:<br>
<blockquote>“Bill, it’s an honor to be here. I am humbled that the voters of this great country put their trust in me. But yeah, I can believe it. Because this is what is meant to be. It’s the very nature of a Republic. The citizens hiring a fellow citizen to go to Washington and make sure that the government is administered in a fair and equitable way and that laws are enforced and that their money is well-spent. That’s what this office is about; and that’s why I’m here.”</blockquote>
<br>
Maybe some day Donald will hire me as his speech writer.<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-917906515515168282017-01-31T07:00:00.000-05:002018-06-13T20:23:46.685-04:00Exoplanets Obey Kepler<!--
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Many years ago, this young, budding astronomy geek was just a naïve 10-year-old kid, marveling at the wonders of spaceflight, living the history of Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo literally as it happened.<br>
<br>
Even as we reached for the Moon, we stretched toward the stars. There were a few scientific dogmas that we learned, and we were taught that these truths were pretty much established as fact for all eternity.<br>
<br>
First, in spite of the fact that we were reaching the Moon in about three days, other inter-planetary travel was expected to be much, much more difficult. Mars could take a year to reach. Other planets even much longer. And inter-stellar travel? <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Original_Series" target="_blank">Captain Kirk</a> might be able to put the Enterprise into warp drive, and the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_Space" target="_blank">Space Family Robinson</a> could reach <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_Centauri" target="_blank">Alpha Centauri</a> after a few years in suspended animation, but we shouldn’t expect it soon.<br>
<br>
No, it would take hundreds or thousands of years to reach the closest stars given the technology available. Space is very large and very, very empty. That’s why they call it “space”.<br>
<br>
The second fact we learned was that stars could never be imaged as a disk. We really don’t see the stars; we see the <i>light</i> emitting from the stars. There’s a difference. Remember that first rule about space being really big and really empty? Stars will never be anything more than a point of light.<br>
<br>
And planets around other stars? (We now call them <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exoplanet" target="_blank">exoplanets</a>.) Well, the Enterprise and the Jupiter 2 seemed to bump into them all the time. But their existence was only hypothesized.<br>
<br>
Yeah, stars <i>probably</i> had planets orbiting around them — why should Sol be the only lucky one? But — remember the first rule about space being really big and really empty? — <i>we would probably never see them</i>. After all, the stars were too bright and the planets too small. Stars generated their own light, but planets only reflected back a tiny part of that light into space. Our lifetime could only hope for the <i>possibility</i> of planets, not the <i>reality</i> of them.<br>
<br>
The first rule still holds; space is still really big and really empty. But the ability to see stars and planets beyond our Solar System’s influence has been greatly improved over the last few years. We can now "see" exoplanets, but most are observed <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methods_of_detecting_exoplanets#Transit_photometry" target="_blank">indirectly</a>; we can see them only as the brief dimming of a star if their orbit lines up exactly with the Earth. Consider watching a mosquito fly in front of a searchlight a hundred miles away. It’s like that.<br>
<br>
But since 2008, we have been able to spot a few planets <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methods_of_detecting_exoplanets#Direct_imaging" target="_blank">directly</a>. New advances in things like adaptive optics and the ability to block out the disk of the star are just a couple of tools that can now be used to directly observe planets. <i>Yes, they are real!</i><br>
<br>
It’s easiest to spot exoplanets directly when three conditions are true:<br>
1. The planet is very large in relation to its host star — dozens of times larger than Jupiter helps.<br>
2. The planet orbits far enough from the host star that it doesn’t get washed out in the star’s light.<br>
3. The plane of the orbit is close to a right angle to the plane of the Earth and the host star. Observing planets by transit is only possible when the planet is in the same plan. Observing directly is easiest when it’s in a 90-degree angle. It’s a three-dimensional geometry thing. Work it out for yourself.<br>
<br>
Fortunately, all those factors have come together to give us one of the most remarkable astronomical movies ever filmed. Seven years in the making. But worth the time and effort. It’s a thing of beauty:<br>
<br>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiWXCwyJH4gB5duLT-HYCLjMQX6GZb_NZN_9rt4NsEMeWSn_ebjAWcVqsTQPCd4hKVK7sazpIhSe9MfQjBu5NmaSfSaCf5b_c4OxSX_5ZK8NOsYoyK_6XCou1Yy3aZsg6GtScUgw/s1600/2017_01_27_09_56_33.gif" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiWXCwyJH4gB5duLT-HYCLjMQX6GZb_NZN_9rt4NsEMeWSn_ebjAWcVqsTQPCd4hKVK7sazpIhSe9MfQjBu5NmaSfSaCf5b_c4OxSX_5ZK8NOsYoyK_6XCou1Yy3aZsg6GtScUgw/s400/2017_01_27_09_56_33.gif" width="400" height="300" /></a>
<br><br>
Check the <a href="http://www.vox.com/2017/1/28/14412866/exoplanets-orbit-star-time-lapse" target="_blank">original article</a> to see the picture in motion.<br>
<br>
There they are: four beautiful planets, just as hypothesized. Each orbit obeying <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johannes_Kepler" target="_blank">Kepler</a>’s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kepler%27s_laws_of_planetary_motion" target="_blank">laws of planetary motion</a> exactly as they should. In every case, the square of the orbital period of the planet is proportional to the cube of the semi-major axis of its orbit. Beautiful.<br>
<br>
It’s been a long time coming. I haven’t yet seen <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_car_(aircraft)" target="_blank">flying cars</a> or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoverboard" target="_blank">hoverboards</a>. My <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roomba" target="_blank">Roomba</a> is the closest thing I have to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_The_Jetsons_characters#Rosie" target="_blank">Rosie</a> the robot maid. And I’m still looking for my personal <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jet_pack" target="_blank">jet pack</a>!<br>
<br>
But, hey, I’ve seen a movie of a remote planetary system. My life is now complete. <br>
<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-54065648599144493802017-01-27T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-29T17:12:26.983-05:00Taxi Cab Numbers<!--
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The number 1729 is very dear to the hearts of mathematicians.<br>
<br>
The story goes back to a 1919 conversation between the famous British mathematician <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._H._Hardy" target="_blank">G. H. Hardy</a> and the Indian genius mathematician <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srinivasa_Ramanujan" target="_blank">Srinivasa Ramanujan</a>. Ramanujan asked the taxi number that Hardy had ridden in on the way. Hardy replied that it was number 1729 and mentioned that the number “seemed to be rather a dull one”.<br>
<br>
“No”, Ramanujan replied, “it is a very interesting number; it is the smallest number expressible as the sum of two [positive] cubes in two different ways.”<br>
<br>
And it’s true. The number 1729 can be expressed as 1<sup>3</sup> + 12<sup>3</sup> and also as 9<sup>3</sup> + 10<sup>3</sup> and is the smallest number for which that is true.<br>
<br>
In the world of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recreational_mathematics" target="_blank">recreational mathematics</a> — yes, there is such a thing — such numbers are now known as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxicab_number" target="_blank">Taxi Cab Numbers</a>. They even have their own <a href="https://oeis.org/A001235" target="_blank">web site</a>. <br>
<br>
The next number in the sequence is 4,104 = 2<sup>3</sup> + 16<sup>3</sup> = 9 <sup>3</sup> + 15 <sup>3</sup>, then 13,832 = 2<sup>3</sup> + 24<sup>3</sup> = 18<sup>3</sup> + 20<sup>3</sup>, then 20,683 = 10<sup>3</sup> + 27<sup>3</sup> = 19<sup>3</sup> + 24<sup>3</sup> and so on.<br>
<br>
This gives rise to a variety interesting math problems. For example, can you write a computer program that calculates such numbers? Sure. In fact, <a href="http://rosettacode.org/wiki/Taxicab_numbers" target="_blank">here are 25 of them</a>.<br>
<br>
The series is infinite. In other words, given enough computing power, you will always be able to find a next-higher number. Always.<br>
<br>
And this why stop at <i>two</i> different ways? For example, what’s the smallest number that can be expressed as the sum of two cubes in <i>three</i> different ways? That number is 87,539,319 which is 228<sup>3</sup> + 423<sup>3</sup> and 167<sup>3</sup> + 436<sup>3</sup> AND 255<sup>3</sup> + 414<sup>3</sup><br>
<br>
How about in <i>four</i> ways? It’s 6,963,472,309,248, which is 13,322<sup>3</sup> + 16,630<sup>3</sup> and 10,200<sup>3</sup> + 18,072<sup>3</sup> and 5,436<sup>3</sup> + 18,948<sup>3</sup> and 2,421<sup>3</sup> + 19,083<sup>3</sup> .<br>
<br>
You can imagine, they get crazy-big after that.<br>
<br>
Oh, why stop with just adding <i>two</i> numbers together? What about adding <i>three</i> numbers? Why not include <i>negative</i> numbers? And exponents other than <i>cubes</i>?<br>
<br>
In other words, the sum of <i>A</i> numbers raised to the power of <i>B</i>, <i>C</i> different ways.<br>
<br>
Yep. There are an infinite number of all these variations. I didn’t even get into the possibility of <i>subtracting</i> numbers, not just <i>adding</i> them.<br>
<br>
That’s the cool thing about math. Almost everything in math is infinite. No matter what cool thing you find, somebody with enough imagination — and perhaps enough computer power — will be able to figure out the next thing one bigger.<br>
<br>
Want a billion digits of pi? <a href="https://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb/contrib/pi/" target="_blank">Okay</a>. Heck, how about <a href="https://as-com.github.io/pi-viewer/" target="_blank">five billion</a>?<br>
<br>
How about <a href="https://apod.nasa.gov/htmltest/gifcity/sqrt2.10mil" target="_blank">ten million digits of the square root of two</a>?<br>
<br>
I could do this all day.<br>
<br>
Numbers extend forever. And since numbers are really just a construct of our mind, you could argue that the mind could extend forever. <br>
<br>
And only you can decide if that’s a comforting thought ... or a scary one.<br>
<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-65155345936685386182017-01-23T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-23T07:00:09.264-05:00CEO-in-chief<!--
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In the world of TV journalism, only <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Krauthammer" target="_blank">Charles Krauthammer</a> has the cred and the guts to interrupt <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_O%27Reilly_(political_commentator)" target="_blank">Bill O’Reilly</a> in mid-sentence.<br>
<br>
But there he was on <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/shows/the-oreilly-factor.html" target="_blank">The O'Reilly Factor</a>, cutting into Bill’s Prose. Bill graciously allowed it because, hey, he’s Charles Krauthammer.<br>
<br>
Krauthammer — only barely a fan of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump" target="_blank">Donald Trump</a> — was making the point that The Donald, in his <a href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Donald_Trump%27s_Inaugural_Address" target="_blank">Inaugural Address</a>, seemed to be making extraordinary promises.<br>
<br>
Not just that we’re going to “drain the swamp” to “make America great again”; he also promised that the carnage in our cities stops right here, right now. It was reminiscent of his speech at the convention where he was going to end violence in America. Not diminish it -- end it.<br>
<br>
Krauthammer reminded O’Reilly that Trump said that he was going eradicate <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jihadism" target="_blank">Jihadism</a> from the face of the Earth.<br>
<br>
Bill tried to dismiss it as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperbole" target="_blank">hyperbole</a>. He said Trump has never been understated; he’s always been bombastic...<br>
<br>
Charles wasn’t going to let him off the hook. “... But he’s never been President!!”<br>
<br>
He’s right.<br>
<br>
Donald Trump is the first American president to assume power without military or political experience. Most Presidents have both; Trump has neither.<br>
<br>
That’s a pretty big deal. But it’s not a show-stopper.<br>
<br>
Neither military experience (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulysses_S._Grant" target="_blank">Ulysses S. Grant</a>) nor political experience (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Buchanan" target="_blank">James Buchanan</a>) is a guarantee of a successful presidency. As a transformative figure, Donald Trump comes to us as a CEO-in-chief. Maybe that’s just what we need right now.<br>
<br>
As a businessman, Trump is accustomed to making rash claims. That’s his negotiating style. Demand the stars, settle for the Moon.<br>
<br>
Charles may be right to criticize him for his hyperbole. But we must remember that Trump got where he was because he’s a successful negotiator. <br>
<br>
He doesn’t need to be a military genius or a political genius. He’ll surround himself with those people. Meanwhile, he’ll be with leaders in Congress and leaders of the Free World cutting deals to make America great again.<br>
<br>
And you gotta hand it to a guy who names his son “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_of_Donald_Trump#Barron_Trump" target="_blank">Baron</a>”. That’s a sign he is projecting his hope into the future.<br>
<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-88267320060043925492017-01-20T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-23T20:22:54.854-05:00Featured Articles are a Funny Phenomena<!--
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Regular readers of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org" target="_blank">Wikipedia</a> know that the front page always includes a “featured” article. Such <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_articles" target="_blank">articles</a> are those that “are considered to be the best articles Wikipedia has to offer, as determined by Wikipedia's <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedians" target="_blank">editors</a>”.<br>
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Once an article is nominated for featured status, it goes through an extensive process of review, refinement, and voting before it is placed on the most-treasured space of real estate on the world’s <a href="http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/wikipedia.org" target="_blank">fifth-most-visited</a> web site.<br>
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It’s quite an honor, indeed, for an article to receive such a status. And it’s a very exclusive club. In the English version of Wikipedia, fewer than 5,000 articles have been designated as “featured”. That’s less than a tenth of one percent of all eligible articles.<br>
<br>
Although Wikipedia started in 2001 (and almost immediately exploded in size and popularity), the “featured” feature wasn’t a feature at first. It wasn’t until February 22, 2004 that the front page took on more-or-less its present-day format and the first featured article was highlighted.<br>
<br>
This most have been quite an event at the time. After all, there were a million articles to pick from. What leader, what event, what significant citizen of the universe would be deemed worth to have its Wikipedia article declared the very first “featured” article of the day?<br>
<br>
That honor went to the article about <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Amadeus_Mozart" target="_blank">Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart</a>.<br>
<br>
A noble choice. The first few lines of the article informed us that Mozart “was one of the most significant classical composers” and that he “lived just a little over half of Beethoven's life span, yet was amazingly prolific from early childhood until his death in 1791.”<br>
<br>
Yep, a wonderful article about a truly one-in-a-millennium genius.<br>
<br>
I’m sure the readers of Wikipedia in 2004 welcomed the new “featured” feature. I’m sure they could hardly wait for 24 hours to pass so they could find out what article would be bestowed the honor on the <i>second</i> day.<br>
<br>
The Internet world held its collective breath. Finally, the evening and the morning became the second day and a new “featured” article appeared. The subject of the article:<br>
<br>
“<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Houses_of_Parliament" target="_blank">Irish Houses of Parliament</a>”.<br>
<br>
Oh. Hmmmm...<br>
<br>
The Irish Houses of Parliament, also known as the Irish Parliament House, was the world's first purpose-built two-chamber parliament house. Today it is called the Bank of Ireland, College Green, due to its use by the bank. It served as the seat of both chambers (the Lords and Commons) of the Irish Parliament of the Kingdom of Ireland for most of the 18th century until that parliament was abolished by the Act of Union of 1800, when Ireland became part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.<br>
<br>
It’s a lovely building, I’m sure. But it’s an odd choice for the best article that can be offered by a world class encyclopedia site.<br>
<br>
This is a reminder of an important concept in the weird world of the Web. Although the English version of Wikipedia is an <i>English</i> site (Wikipedia operates in more than 50 word languages), Wikipedia is not an <i>American</i> site. It literally belongs to the citizens of the world.<br>
<br>
True, Mozart isn’t American, either. But he is much more popular in America than a government building in Ireland.<br>
<br>
The selection of an article about such a building sent a signal to the world. The Wikipedia editor value <i>quality</i> over <i>popularity</i>. They value a <i>world</i> view over an <i>American</i> view. And they are a fiercely independent lot.<br>
<br>
Over the years, articles have been featured that honor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinosaur" target="_blank">dinosaurs</a> (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dromaeosauroides" target="_blank">Dromaeosauroides</a>), items of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexillology" target="_blank">vexillology</a>, (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Singapore" target="_blank">Flag of Singapore</a>), and corporations (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cracker_Barrel" target="_blank">Cracker Barrel</a>). Beyond Mozart, other honored musicians include <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fr%C3%A9d%C3%A9ric_Chopin" target="_blank">Frédéric Chopin</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dmitri_Shostakovich" target="_blank">Dmitri Shostakovich</a>, and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Jackson" target="_blank">Michael Jackson</a>. Oddly enough, not <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_van_Beethoven" target="_blank">Ludwig van Beethoven</a>.<br>
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Go figure. The merits are of the <i>article</i>, not the <i>subject</i>. And the decision is of the editors, not a consensus of the world.<br>
<br>
The Irish Houses of Parliament can be proud. The building’s article was determined to be among the first of the best of the best. Nobody can take that away from them. Fifteen minutes of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Warhol" target="_blank">Andy Warhol</a> fame became 24 hours of Wikipedia fame. That’s more than I could ever hope for.<br>
<br>
In fact, not even Andy Warhol’s article has yet been so honored. And that puts Andy in good company with Ludwig.<br>
<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-72322138589314703022017-01-19T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-20T08:33:48.741-05:00False Sense of Plus-ness<!--
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I just got a piece of solicitation mail. Some people call it “junk” mail. But I don’t call it “junk”. It’s a numbers game to them .. they wouldn’t send it if it didn’t work.<br>
<br>
On the outside was stamped in red ink (and slightly askew): “DO NOT BEND”.<br>
<br>
Hmmmm. Must be a photograph inside. Or a special reward. Or a secret prize.<br>
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Whatever it is, it must be important, because after all, they forbid me from bending it!<br>
<br>
Nah, it was just a letter asking for money for a local charity.<br>
<br>
But the purpose of the envelope in solicitation mail is to be opened. And it succeeded.<br>
<br>
It worked because of one of the oldest tricks in marketing: the attachment of a false sense of worth. Whatever was in that envelope was precious enough to be preserved in an un-bent state. Therefore, I was compelled to investigate.<br>
<br>
I call it the false sense of plus-ness. Sometimes it’s urgency. Sometimes it’s value. Sometimes it’s rarity or popularity.<br>
<br>
In every case, it’s the false sense that this product is better, cheaper, or more desirable than it really is. It has more “gotta-have-it”; it has more “plus”.<br>
<br>
<i>“If the lines are busy, keep trying.”</i> Wow, a lot of people want this product; phones are literally <a href="https://themindofjoe.blogspot.com/2017/01/technology-in-perspective.html" target="_blank">ringing off the hook</a>.<br>
<br>
<i>“If you call in the next 15 minutes ... “</i> But if you call 16 minutes later, you’ll be out of luck.<br>
<br>
<i>“But wait! We’ll double your order!”</i> At the beginning of the commercial, they were only going to sell me one. But they had a change of heart 30 seconds later. I’m so blessed!<br>
<br>
Marketing is as old as the world’s oldest profession. A good marketer knows how to squeeze every ounce out of the value of his product. The paradox is that when the value gets “squeezed”, it may very well be “stretched”.<br>
<br>
Hyperbole? Perhaps. Over-used? Definitely.<br>
<br>
But inappropriate? Nah. Our 21st century mind can filter the noise and distinguish what’s really true and really valuable.<br>
<br>
Besides. I wanted to open that envelope anyway. Woulda done it even if it hadn’t said “DO NOT BEND”. Really. I’m not that dumb. <br>
<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-53041435528647120742017-01-18T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-18T23:21:29.460-05:00I Get It<!--
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My high school English teacher hated the word “get”. Absolutely despised it.<br>
<br>
She actually forbade us from using it in written work that we turned it. Her contention was there is always a better word that can be used in its place. ”Get” is the word with a million synonyms and no one meaning peculiar to itself.<br>
<br>
If “get” were a person, it would have a roomful of friends, but very low self-esteem. Lots of companionship, but no real meaning in life. A sad situation, indeed.<br>
<br>
Okay, I get it.<br>
<br>
The <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/get" target="_blank">dictionary</a> lists 38 definitions of “get” as a transitive verb (which require an object), 11 definitions as an intransitive verb (which do not allow an object), and at least 62 distinct variations of its use as an auxiliary verb (when used in conjunction with another verb).<br>
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Where did the word come from? We have the Vikings to blame for that.<br>
<br>
You see, according to everybody’s favorite lexicographer, <a href="https://korystamper.wordpress.com" target="_blank">Kory Stamper</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ER9-LxcCcXU" target="_blank">English is a mongrel of a language</a>. English words come from a variety of peoples, cultures, and languages. Nothing we say is really native to English itself.<br>
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The English word “get” comes from the Old Norse “geta”, which means, uhm, “to get”. (Nobody accused them of being original!)<br>
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As often happens in linguistic history, the word evolved into an all-purpose verb. It was short, simple, and to the point. If you had a problem conveying exactly what you meant, you could use this generic word and your audience would “get” it.<br>
<br>
Thus, dozens of definitions have been attached to “get”, many of which have something to do with obtaining, or retrieving, or receiving something (get an “A”, get a second helping).<br>
<br>
I’m particularly fond of the language’s tendency to attach “get” to some other verb to enhance the meaning (get up, get down, get out, get ahead).<br>
<br>
In the process, “get” has become the <a href="https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/get" target="_blank">fifth most-used verb</a> in the English language.<br>
<br>
And I’m jealous that the humble word “get” got something that I never did get: its own <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Get" target="_blank">Wikipedia article</a>.<br>
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It may not be the most elegant word in English. It doesn’t have flourishing French roots like “croissant” or “façade”. It doesn’t have the comical nature of Spanish words like “mosquito” or “piñata”. And it doesn’t have an aboriginal flavor of “kangaroo” or “boomerang”.<br>
<br>
“Get” is a word like no other. A word that means what it needs to mean when it needs to mean it. A versatile, useful, flexible word. A word that trips off the tongue and lands squarely in the appropriate context to be understood by all.<br>
<br>
It’s mildly ambiguous, yet always appropriate. On its best days, English teachers label its usage as “informal”. At worst, it’s banned.<br>
<br>
But it’s <i>our</i> word, and it ain’t going anywhere soon. (Yeah, more on <i>that</i> word on another date...)<br>
<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-790514835238508582017-01-17T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-19T11:47:25.011-05:00The Perfect Food<!--
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Food is my friend. Just about any food. Eat to live; don’t live to eat. Devour vast quantities of it and ask questions about it later.<br>
<br>
No wonder I’m a tub of lard.<br>
<br>
Nevertheless, I do have my standards. If it still looks like what it did when it was alive, I’m not interested in it. Chicken is great if it doesn’t look like it was a chicken. You know those slow-roasted whole birds at the super market? I’m not interested.<br>
<br>
And if it used to swim, well, that’s a strike against it, too. Unless it’s tuna.<br>
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Lobster? Fails on all counts.<br>
<br>
Food also must be low-maintenance. If I have to work at it to eat it, it’s generally not worth it. Shelling pistachios verses grabbing an armful of peanuts — you get the idea.<br>
<br>
And there is such a thing as a <I>perfect</I> food. Oh, yes, there is ... as long as I get to define what “perfect” means.<br>
<br>
Actually, there are several criteria that can qualify a food as perfect. One is variety in each byte. Extra points for including all four food groups in each byte. A slice of peperoni pizza is about as perfect as you can get: meat, cheese, vegetables, and bread in every mouthful. (What? If <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketchup_as_a_vegetable" target="_blank">ketchup is a vegetable</a>, so is pizza sauce!)<br>
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Chicken pot pie makes the list for much the same reason. Who knows what all those vegetables are in there. Who cares? As soon as the fork punctures the top crust and that sweet steam fills my nostrils, I’m in Heaven. Yeah, maybe steam should be one of the major food groups.<br>
<br>
Even if the food is homogenous, anything that enhances its variety helps. Plain vanilla or chocolate ice cream? Pshaw! Ice cream is merely a vehicle of other food; it must have “stuff” put in it. Rocky road. Butter brickle. <i>Rocky butter brickle road!</i> It’s all good!<br>
<br>
Another feature of “perfect” food is how much of it is “left over” when I’m done with it? How clean can I get my plate. As good as it is, biscuits and gravy fails on this score. It’s almost impossible to achieve the perfect biscuit-to-gravy ratio. But that never stopped me from trying.<br>
<br>
The winner in the how-much-is-left-over category must go to the ice cream cone. Eat the sweet stuff, then eat the container! Wipe your mouth, and carry on with your life. Perfection! <i>(Remember <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sammy_Davis_Jr." target="_blank">Sammy Davis, Jr.</a> singing that “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Candy_Man" target="_blank">you can even eat the dishes</a>”!)</i><br>
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I realize I’ve probably stepped on a few toes. You probably have your own ideas about what constitutes a “perfect” food. You may be in the camp that says the preparation experience is worth as much as the food itself.<br>
<br>
Yeah, while you’re chopping your onions, I will have already microwaved a chicken pot pie and downed an ice cream cone.<br>
<br>
Save the last slice of pizza for me. It’s for breakfast.<br>
<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-51533833255737096202017-01-16T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-16T21:35:32.372-05:00Art of Constrained Art<!--
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I’ve always been a fan of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constrained_writing" target="_blank">constrained writing</a> — where an author has self-imposed a rule (or a “constraint”) and vows to adhere to that rule throughout the creation of the work.<br>
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Lots of types of rules are available to choose from. Some are more-or-less already well-defined, such as the 5-7-5 syllabic nature of a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haiku_in_English" target="_blank">Haiku</a>:<br>
<blockquote>When fire sets its course<br>
It does not need a compass<br>
For it travels light. [<a href="http://www.thejapaneseconnection.com/haiku/haiku.htm" target="_blank"><i>source</i></a>]</blockquote>
Or the reversible nature of a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palindrome" target="_blank">palindrome</a>:<br>
<blockquote>Satan! Oscillate my metallic sonatas! [<a href="http://www.fun-with-words.com/palindromes.html" target="_blank"><I>source</I></a>]</blockquote>
The whimsical rhythm of a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limerick_(poetry)" target="_blank">limerick</a>:<br>
<blockquote>A bather whose clothing was strewed<br>
By winds that left her quite nude<br>
Saw a man come along<br>
And unless we are wrong<br>
You expected this line to be lewd. [<a href="http://www.webexhibits.org/poetry/explore_famous_limerick_examples.html" target="_blank"><i>source</i></a>]</blockquote>
Ever hear of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilish" target="_blank">Pilish</a>? That’s a form of writing where the number of letters in each successive word conforms to the digits of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pi" target="_blank">pi</a>:<br>
<blockquote>How I need a drink, alcoholic in nature, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics! [<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilish" target="_blank"><i>source</i></a>]</blockquote>
Taken to an extreme, constrained writing can be interesting, but a bit boorish. Consider
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Vincent_Wright" target="_blank">Ernest Vincent Wright</a>’s 1939 novel “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gadsby_(novel)" target="_blank">Gadsby</a>”, which contains 50,000 words, but nary the letter “E” among them. A noble endeavor, for sure. But the necessarily stilted language makes reading it somewhat a challenge.<br>
<br>
A more satisfying example of constrained writing came from “Deb in Brooklyn”, who wrote a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-Word_Memoirs" target="_blank">Six Word Memoir</a> for a contest on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WNYC" target="_blank">WNYC</a>’s “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Lopate#The_Leonard_Lopate_Show" target="_blank">The Leonard Lopate Show</a>”:
<blockquote>“Living in existential vacuum; it sucks.” [<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-Word_Memoirs" target="_blank"><i>source</i></a>]</blockquote>
Let’s go beyond constrained writing and consider constrained “art”. A musical composition in a major key tends to constrain itself to only seven of the available twelve chromatic notes. An artist painting a water color tends to constrain himself to water-based pigments. A sculptor tends to constrain himself to one material, be it marble or clay or something between.<br>
<br>
A television situation comedy generally must fit neatly into a 30-minute time slot. A TV crime drama must wrap things up in exactly one hour.<br>
<br>
And I’ve heard writers of Sunday School literature complain to their editors about the “divinely-inspired <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_count" target="_blank">word count</a>”.<br>
<br>
Constraint has also found its way into business cultures. Consider the concept of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PechaKucha" target="_blank">PechaKucha</a>, where speakers are constrained to a 20-slide PowerPoint presentation, which auto-advances every 20 seconds. The art form has a devout following and its own <a href="http://www.pechakucha.org/" target="_blank">web site</a>.<br>
<br>
Constraint is good for the soul. Not only does it keep us driving the speed limit while staying in the right lane, it forces us to realize that the presentation is as important as the content. As creators of expressive literature, it makes us sit inside the minds of our audience and experience our creation as others experience it.<br>
<br>
And empathy is the best gift we can give our audience.<br>
<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-42504462012595337672017-01-13T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-13T09:17:32.432-05:00Oh, that Wild, Whimsical Web!<!--
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The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet" target="_blank">Internet</a> was built by a bunch of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Science_Foundation_Network" target="_blank">university snobs</a>.<br>
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The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Wide_Web" target="_blank">World Wide Web</a> — not the same thing as the Internet! — was built by a bunch of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Berners-Lee" target="_blank">intellectual scientists</a>.<br>
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The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_superhighway" target="_blank">Information Superhighway</a> was built by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Gore" target="_blank">Al Gore</a>. (Just ask him, he’ll tell you!)<br>
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But the soul of all digital information delivery systems was built by a bunch of long-haired <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Valley" target="_blank">Silicon Valley</a> nerds.<br>
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Want proof? Just look at company names.<br>
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For decades, what was the name of the company that was the world leader in computer technology? <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM" target="_blank">IBM</a>. It stands for International Business Machines. They made their mark with adding machines. And time clocks. Uh. Huh.<br>
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In the early 1980s, what was the name of the company that created the world leading operating system for personal computers? Micro. Soft. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft" target="_blank">Microsoft</a>. Get it? Micro-computer software. Had to think a long time about that one, didn’t you, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Gates" target="_blank">Bill</a>?<br>
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But what company emerged as one of the first Internet search engines, later to become a leading portal for information delivery? <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo!" target="_blank">Yahoo!</a> With an exclamation point! Literally!<br>
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And what company came up a few years later to become the leader in search and just about everything else digital? <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google" target="_blank">Google</a>. Without an exclamation point — but with a really cool name. It’s a play on the word “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googol" target="_blank">googol</a>”, which means a number with a hundred zeros — literally greater than the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddington_number" target="_blank">number of protons</a> in the observable universe.<br>
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And it kinda looks like the word “giggle”, which amplifies its coolness.<br>
<br>
The world of Internet branding is littered with little nuggets of <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/triviality" target="_blank">triviality</a>. The name “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon.com" target="_blank">Amazon</a>” originally stood for the world’s largest bookstore, named after the world’s largest <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_River"target="_blank">river</a>. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia" target="_blank">Wikipedia</a> was named after a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki_Wiki_Shuttle" target="_blank">bus</a> in Hawaii, which was named after a Hawaiian word for “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki" target="_blank">quick</a>”. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EBay" target="_blank">eBay</a> was named after the consulting company of its <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Omidyar" target="_blank">founder</a>. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc." target="_blank">Apple</a> was named after a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple" target="_blank">fruit</a> as an <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc.#Corporate_identity" target="_blank">afterthought</a>, and was allowed to keep that name only after they promised <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Corps" target="_blank">Apple Records</a> that they would <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Corps_v_Apple_Computer" target="_blank">never, ever</a> enter the business of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITunes_Store" target="_blank">selling music</a>.<br>
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I could go on. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zappos" target="_blank">Zappos</a>. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter" target="_blank">Twitter</a>. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinterest" target="_blank">Pinterest</a>. All big names on the Internet. And just saying their name makes you want to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smile" target="_blank">smile</a>.<br>
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Industrial giants of old tended to have industrial-sounding names: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodak" target="_blank">Kodak</a>. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Oil" target="_blank">Standard Oil</a>. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Electric" target="_blank">General Electric</a>. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Technologies" target="_blank">United Technologies</a>. Hrummppph!<br>
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It’s nice to see that digital companies of today recognize the importance of a good brand. But they also see that a whimsical brand name doesn’t cheapen the value of their stock. It only makes it more memorable. And more fun to say.<br>
<br>
Think about that next time you giggle about Google.<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-10869488419625673982017-01-12T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-13T09:17:54.481-05:00The Transition of Power<!--
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Kings die. That’s just what they do.<br>
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Some die slow, peaceful, gradual deaths, eventually succumbing in their old age to their Creator.<br>
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Others die grand and glorious deaths in battle; sometimes as martyrs, sometimes as disgraced and defeated failures.<br>
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And others die suddenly and unexpectedly in the prime of their life, cut down by an assassin’s bullet or sword.<br>
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But they die. And die they must. How else can succession of power proceed? For thousands of years, there was only one way the next prince, political foe, or conquering hero could take charge: the reigning king must get out of the way.<br>
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All that changed on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inauguration_of_John_Adams" target="_blank">March 4, 1797</a>. The people wanted a king. But <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Washington" target="_blank">George</a> (and the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Constitution" target="_blank">Constitution</a>) thought otherwise. Although he was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1788%E2%80%9389" target="_blank">unanimously elected</a> to the office <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1792" target="_blank">twice</a>, he felt it was important that the office be shared, and that the transition must be smooth, orderly, and lawful.<br>
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So the surveyor-turned-farmer-turned-general-turned-president handed the seat of power to his Number Two, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Adams" target="_blank">John</a> and returned to his <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Vernon" target="_blank">farm</a>. In doing so, he set a precedent of peaceful transition that has endured for almost two and a half centuries.<br>
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There have been times that bad actors have sought to take advantage of the transition for their own good. In 1861, seven states used the transition period between <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Buchanan" target="_blank">President Buchannan</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln" target="_blank">President Lincoln</a> to secede and form the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederate_States_of_America" target="_blank">Confederate States of America</a>. The American economy nosedived during the transition in 1933 as both departing <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Hoover" target="_blank">President Hoover</a> and President-elect <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt" target="_blank">Roosevelt</a> sat powerless and watched the banking system implode.<br>
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And in 1981, 52 American <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_hostage_crisis" target="_blank">hostages</a> were forced to sit for hours at the edge of a Tehran airport runway until just after noon Washington time, denying President <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Carter" target="_blank">Jimmy Carter</a> the satisfaction of having them released on his watch.<br>
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Although the transition is always lawful, that doesn’t mean it’s without drama. The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1800" target="_blank">presidential election of 1800</a> ended in an electoral tie, which wasn’t resolved until a scant 15 days before the planned inauguration.<br>
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And <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2000" target="_blank">200 years later</a>, America held its collective breath for 35 days while Florida’s hanging chads determined the election results. It was ultimately settled when the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Court_of_the_United_States" target="_blank">Supreme Court</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_v._Gore" target="_blank">ruled </a> that the margin of 537 votes should give <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush" target="_blank">George W. Bush</a> the victory.<br>
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In a few days, a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama" target="_blank">lawyer-turned-organizer-turned-senator-turned-president</a> will hand over the keys to the front door of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_House" target="_blank">White House</a> to a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump" target="_blank">magnate-turned-billionaire-turned-politician</a>. And this one should be an interesting one to watch. Eight years ago, Obama promised to “<a href="http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/11/16/obamas-fundamental-transformation-began-at-mizzou/" target="_blank">fundamentally transform</a>” America. Apparently, Americans didn’t like the way they were fundamentally transformed. Seeing the possibility of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillary_Clinton" target="_blank">Hillary’s</a> four-more-years of Barack, they chose Donald’s promise to “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Make_America_Great_Again" target="_blank">make America great again</a>".<br>
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By design, Trump’s presidency will be the polar opposite of Obama’s. But the transition itself will be a model of democracy. After thousands of years of monarchal transitions, the concept of a democratic transition had its roots in the American Constitution and is now the accepted standard in the civilized world.<br>
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The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Founding_Fathers_of_the_United_States" target="_blank">Founding Fathers</a> should be proud.<br>
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<i>My thanks to the History Channel’s “<a href="http://www.history.com/specials/transition-of-power-the-presidency" target="_blank">Transition of Power</a>” for the inspiration for today’s post.</i><br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-19880256327648381902017-01-11T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-13T09:18:19.213-05:00Technology in Perspective<!--
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smartphone" target="_blank">Smart phones</a> are truly one of the most amazing feats of technology ever invented.<br>
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It is now possible to use <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_recognition" target="_blank">speech recognition</a> apps to speak a text message into your phone without having to actually write it. When the person on the other end receives the message, he can use a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_synthesis" target="_blank">text-to-speech</a> app to read the text back to him in a human voice.<br>
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When I was growing up, we had an app that would do all that.<br>
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We called it the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone" target="_blank">telephone</a>.<br>
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A <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_Z" target="_blank">generation</a> is growing up that doesn’t understand the concept of a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dial_tone" target="_blank">dial tone</a>. They don’t know why we “hang up” to end a call. They don’t know what it means to “dial” a number. They have never heard a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ringtone" target="_blank">ringtone</a> actually “ring”.<br>
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And they wonder why refer to something as “wireless”. What? As opposed to being “wired”?!<br>
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<em>(Well, yeah. But, never mind...)</em><br>
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Eons ago, a phone was something that was screwed to the kitchen wall. The sphere of your conversation was limited to the length of a spiral cord (thus, the wire).<br>
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People would run extra fast when they heard that the call was “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-distance_calling" target="_blank">long distance</a>”. You never called a “person”; you called that person’s “house” and hoped they were home. The person answering didn’t have <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caller_ID" target="_blank">Caller ID</a> or a customize ringtone to know who was calling; they just had a “ring”.<br>
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It’s all perspective.<br>
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A century and a half ago, it took 24 days to get a message from Missouri to California. The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pony_Express" target="_blank">Pony Express</a> shortened that time to 10 days. Only two years later, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_transcontinental_telegraph" target="_blank">telegraph</a> changed that time to a matter of hours. The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcontinental_railroad" target="_blank">transcontinental railroad</a> could deliver the message <em>and the messenger</em> in three days. Airliners reduced that time to dozens of hours, and then four hours.<br>
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An <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email" target="_blank">email</a> travels the distance in milliseconds.<br>
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltimore-Washington_telegraph_line" target="_blank"><em>What hath God wrought?</em></a><br>
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We used to have a phone. Then we had a <em>mobile</em> phone.<br>
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Now we have a portal to the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia" target="_blank">sum of all human knowledge</a>, slimmer than a deck of cards that we can carry in our pocket and call upon to solve the mysteries of the universe. Coincidentally, it contains an app that lets it emulate an old-fashion voice telephone.<br>
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And we use it to share kitten videos.<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-54018429369824878262017-01-10T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-13T09:18:45.895-05:00The Continuum of Altruism<!--
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The concept of “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pay_it_forward" target="_blank">Paying it forward</a>” has always intrigued me. There are times where a debt cannot be “paid back”, but should be “paid forward”.<br>
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Although it was popularized in the <a href="https://www.blogger.com/www.imdb.com/title/tt0223897/" target="_blank">2000 movie</a>, it was around well before that. The actual term “pay it forward” may have originated in the <a href="https://archive.org/details/InTheGardenOfDelight" target="_blank">1916 book</a> by Lily Hardy Hammond where she wrote “You don't pay love back; you pay it forward.”<br>
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But the concept has many mentions in even older literature, including a <a href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Franklin_to_Benjamin_Webb" target="_blank">letter</a> from <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin" target="_blank">Benjamin Franklin</a>:<br>
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I do not pretend to give such a deed; I only lend it to you. When you [...] meet with another honest Man in similar Distress, you must pay me by lending this Sum to him; enjoining him to discharge the Debt by a like operation, when he shall be able, and shall meet with another opportunity. I hope it may thus go thro' many hands, before it meets with a Knave that will stop its Progress. This is a trick of mine for doing a deal of good with a little money.
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Franklin and others were concerned with: “Here is a debt. How shall it be repaid?”<br>
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I’ll take it a step further: “How can I pay a debt that doesn’t even yet exist?”<br>
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In other words, can I be both the <em>originator</em> and <em>payer</em> of the debt, but never the <em>recipient?</em><br>
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Such is the concept of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altruism" target="_blank">altruism</a>. It’s defined by the <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/altruism" target="_blank">dictionary</a> as “behavior that is not beneficial to or may be harmful to oneself but that benefits others”.<br>
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The debt can be trivial. I work on the top floor of a four story building. You must enter the building from the parking lot through the first floor. Most people ride the elevator. I’m usually one of the first people at work.<br>
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When I get to the top floor, before getting off the elevator, I press the “first floor” button. Why? I know that at that time of the day, the heaviest use of the elevator would be by people starting on the first floor. The elevator isn’t smart enough to wait for them on the first floor. By my altruistic act of pushing that button, I’m making the ride for the next person a little shorter, because the elevator will already be on the first floor waiting for them.<br>
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I would expect that person to pay the debt forward and send the elevator back to the first floor for the next in line.<br>
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Why would I do that? What is my benefit? After all, I always have to wait for the elevator, because the last person probably didn’t return the elevator for me. What do I benefit by being kind to the next anonymous person in line? Especially when they just think they’re lucky that the elevator was already there.<br>
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Do I get a warm fuzzy feeling in my heart? Well, yeah. Is that my motivation? Kinda. It feels good knowing that I have helped a stranger.<br>
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Taken to an extreme, that can be dangerous. What if the only reason I do good for others is because I actually feel good about myself? Does that defeat the purpose? Can it get to a point that I feel so good about <em>doing good</em> for others that the only benefit is that, in fact, <em>I benefit?</em><br>
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In other words, maybe the relationship between altruism and selfishness isn’t a <em>continuum</em>. Maybe it’s a <em>circle</em> that actually loops back around on itself?<br>
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Wrap the duct tape around my forehead. Mind. Blown.<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-58498708196290240942017-01-09T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-09T07:00:17.985-05:00From Dust To DustDust is a very interesting phenomenon of physics.<br>
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On the one hand, dust is the leftovers of destruction. Saw a board or drill a hole and you will produce dust equal to the width of your saw blade or drill bit. Common house dust results primarily from the destruction of skin cells shed by your body. Other dust on the floor may be what was scraped from the topsoil and transferred to your shoes.<br>
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On the other hand, dust is the beginning of a remarkable reconstruction process. Just about everything in the universe was at one time mere dust floating about.<br>
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The universe is full of dust particles in the process of accreting themselves back together. Over millions of years, dust particles attract each other to create planets, stars, and all celestial bodies in between.<br>
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That’s why it was so important to study the surface of the moon. The gravity of our moon is a virtual vacuum, sucking to its surface trillions of tons of celestial dust — the virgin building blocks of the solar system of the future.<br>
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Eons from now, the dust on your front lawn will be compacted into layers of solid rock, pressed down from the accumulation of centuries of dust piling on top of it. Evidence of that can be seen in the layers of the Grand Canyon — even in outcroppings along a highway ramp construction.<br>
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And the dust bunnies under your bed? That’s just the first attempt of your dead skin cells trying to clump together to form something even more grandiose.<br>
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It’s no wonder that “dust to dust” has become a metaphor for the cycle of life. Not only was Man created from the dust of the Earth, the Earth itself was created from the dust of the cosmos. Pretty impressive.<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-41293180960806831112017-01-06T07:00:00.000-05:002017-01-06T08:48:14.936-05:002016 Sucked. Or Did It?By many measures, 2016 was a pretty sucky year. The problem is that many people measure suckiness by how many of their favorite celebrities died during the year.<br>
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Unfortunately, there’s a flaw in that ointment. Let me explain.<br>
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There’s no doubt that we lost some brilliant and beloved celebrities in 2016. It started in January with the loss of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Bowie" target="_blank">David Bowie</a> and ended with the deaths of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Fisher" target="_blank">Princess Leia</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debbie_Reynolds" target="_blank">Kathy Selden</a>, and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Christopher" target="_blank">Father Francis John Patrick Mulcahy</a>.<br>
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In between, we lost athletes, authors, astronauts, and politicians. And one <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Glenn" target="_blank">astronaut/politician</a>.<br>
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Not to minimize those loses, but were they really greater in 2016 than an average year? Statistics say nay, and I can prove it.<br>
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First, we need to provide a measurable definition of “celebrity”. Somebody isn’t famous just because I’m a fan of theirs; they are famous because, well, they are famous.<br>
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Fortunately, there is an accepted definition of “celebrity”, accepted by dead pools everywhere, and absolutely measurable.<br>
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A person is a celebrity if there is a unique Wikipedia article written about that person. No wiki, no celeb. It’s that simple.<br>
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Using that definition, it’s very easy to count the number of celebrities that have perished in each year in this and the previous century:<br>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhYcUUTEegmu1MfO6L6IjTUw7yx_WyZjyWyTTzgNP3dBlyDl3c6GIYjw4KXVoQyJbvqYCMKkTz7OA-kMr74aZWeV9CGxY-BG_7so9eutopB1yJnQJetZ42H_EglobLgSortk5xJQ/s1600/wikipedia_deaths_by_year.png" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhYcUUTEegmu1MfO6L6IjTUw7yx_WyZjyWyTTzgNP3dBlyDl3c6GIYjw4KXVoQyJbvqYCMKkTz7OA-kMr74aZWeV9CGxY-BG_7so9eutopB1yJnQJetZ42H_EglobLgSortk5xJQ/s400/wikipedia_deaths_by_year.png" width="400" height="261" /></a><br>
According to these statistics, the number of celebrity deaths has been exponentially increasing every year. It seems like there’s a whole lot of dyin’ goin’ on.<br>
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Actually, the celebrity deaths for 2016 are pretty much on average with the other years. The difference is that “death” has a much larger pool of celebrities to pick from.<br>
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A hundred years ago, there really weren’t many celebrities. Politicians and war heroes were about all we had. Actors and athletes and weren’t famous in their own right until around the time of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudolph_Valentino" target="_blank">Rudolph Valentino</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babe_Ruth" target="_blank">Babe Ruth</a>. It took a long time for pop musicians to attain celebrity status. Even longer for rappers.<br>
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So yeah, 2016 sucked. We lost <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zsa_Zsa_Gabor" target="_blank">Zsa Zsa</a>, who was famous for being famous; and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fidel_Castro" target="_blank">Fidel</a>, who was famous for being mean; and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_(musician)" target="_blank">Prince</a>, who was famous for having one name.<br>
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But we also continued the tradition of lowering the bar for what qualifies to be famous by making more people famous than ever before. And the more people we choose to love, the more there are to lose.<br>
Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-57560932805504614872010-04-12T08:00:00.001-04:002010-04-12T22:51:28.964-04:00Doris Has a Point, and Obama doesn't get it<span id = "initcap">W</span>hen President Obama gets something right, I’ll be the first to admit it.<br /><br />The problem is he’s got such a lousy track record for ever getting anything right.<br /><br />Most politicians have a hard time answering a question directly, especially if the question doesn’t exactly fit in with the talking points that they have chosen to cover at the time.<br /><br />But Obama set a new standard for exhibiting the symptoms of diarrhea-of-the-mouth with his answer to Doris’ question last week.<br /><br />You can read the entire exchange <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2010/04/02/obamas_remarks_on_jobs_in_charlotte_105031.html">here</a>, and you can see the first part of it <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Jz6y_16NI8">here</a>.<br /><br />At a recent event in Charlotte, North Carolina, a lady who identified herself as Doris asked a very simple question: Is it wise to add more taxes with the health care reforms that have recently been passed, since we are over-taxed as it is?<br /><br />A simple question. It deserved a simple answer. If I had been asked that question, I would have no problem coming up with a concise response: No, it is not, and that is the primary reason I was against health care reform as it was passed by Congress.<br /><br />The President never sees things as simple as that. Maintaining his campaign mode in spite of his recent victory, he rambled incoherently for 17 minutes and 2500 words.<br /><br />He talked about <span style = 'font-variant:small-caps'>cobra</span>. He referred to people with insurance as being “lucky”. He said that lifetime limits are “fine print”. He made a “final point” at the four-minute mark and kept talking for 13 more.<br /><br />He talked about federal health care systems already being out of control and suggested that they be replaced by — wait for it — another federal health care system.<br /><br />He talked about the deficit — which Doris never asked about — and then cited programs that will by their very existence, blow the deficit out of the water.<br /><br />He talked about the “quality” of medical tests and suggested that doctors send emails to each other, even thought the health care bill doesn’t address those issues and Doris never asked about them.<br /><br />Somebody must have told him that an analogy of fixing the roof on a house resonates well, because he told some sort of awkward story that claimed if I fix the leaky roof in my house, the people who are shivering outside in the cold are somehow going to benefit.<br /><br />He complained about President Bush’s war in Iraq — supported by virtually every Democrat in Congress. He complained about the Medicare prescription plan — passed by Democrats in Congress. He complained about Medicare Advantage — passed by Democrats in Congress.<br /><br />He threw one of his biggest supporters — Warren Buffet — under the bus, calling him out by name and bragging that he was going to raise Mr. Buffet’s taxes on dividends and capital gains, not to raise more revenue, but because it was an issue of “fairness”.<br /><br />Finally, he interrupted himself as he was explaining the Congressional Budget Office’s accounting gymnastics to make sure he was answering the question — which he never did.<br /><br />If the President had been philosophically honest, he could have given Doris a very succinct answer: “Frankly, Doris, I don’t believe you are taxed enough already”. It could have been that simple.<br /><br />If he had answered the question honestly, he would have to reveal the fundamental difference that he has with the Tea Party movement, which received its name by blending the name of the famous 1773 Boston tax revolution with the acronym “Taxed Enough Already”.<br /><br />Unwittingly, perhaps, Doris expressed her sympathy with the primary purpose of the revolutionary movement.<br /><br />I’m not sure what a “fair” amount would be for a federal government to involuntarily extract from its citizens to promote the common welfare. Five percent? Ten percent? Ninty percent (as suggested by some members in Congress)?<br /><br />I just know that we passed that threshold a long time ago. Enough is enough.Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-19242897628234950722009-11-03T07:00:00.000-05:002009-11-03T12:27:19.840-05:00Britain’s Health Care Began With Propaganda<span id = "initcap">A</span>s America debates the merits and follies of nationalized health care, many people hold up “the rest of the world” as an example of a system that should be emulated.<br /><br />After all, the argument goes, America is the only industrialized country on the planet that does not provide “free” (or at least, heavily subsidized) health care for its citizens.<br /><br />It’s true. We’re the last hold-out. For a very good reason. Our health care system mirrors the principles that our founding fathers laid, which in turn created the greatest civilization on earth. There’s no reason to mess up a good thing.<br /><br />The rest of the world believes that government exists for the benefit of the people. Taken to an extreme, they believe that the role of government is to “take care” of the people. That’s what Annie Leonard declares in “<a href = "http://www.thestoryofstuff.com" target = _blank>The Story Of Stuff</a>”. She pooh-poohs the government’s true role of national defense, the foundations of capitalism, and the free market. Then she declares that the government should intervene to make sure that we, the consumers, don’t consume too much.<br /><br />This notion that the government should have an active role in defining our quality of life has deep roots in European culture. We’re reminded of this by watching a charming piece of British propaganda: “<a href = "http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLhxHiGmYJ8" target = _blank>Charlie’s March Of Time</a>”. Created by the British government to introduce socialized health care to the Brits, the film traces British government back hundreds of years. In feudal times, the king took care of the people. In more modern times, the House of Commons took care of the common people.<br /><br />The theme is consistent. People are not able to deal with the standard trials of life — unemployment, hunger, illness, retirement — without the government’s interference.<br /><br />In a classic case of socialistic incrementalism, the film chronicles one act of Parliament after another, each removing one more area of personal responsibility from the citizenry while claiming to cure all social ills. The culmination of all this effort was 1946’s Health Service Act. The film reminds us that the utopian state costs only a few pounds and tuppence each week.<br /><br />That’s fine for “the rest of the world”. But there is a very good reason why it won’t work in America. That’s because our country was founded on the principle of freedom FROM government. Americans believe the responsibility for care of the population rests in the population itself, not in the government. The constitution is concerned with what the government CANNOT do, rather than what it MUST do.<br /><br />America is a collection of individuals. We were founded by a group of men who believed that the rights of the individual superseded the responsibility of the government to care for their needs. Most of our wars have been fought for the purpose of freeing citizens from a repressive government.<br /><br />That’s what makes America unique from the rest of the world. We realize that rugged individualism and free-market capitalism always succeeds in the long run. And we have seen that socialism always eventually collapse under its own weight.<br /><br />Let the rest of the world keep their nationalized health care. If it suits them well, so be it. But America has produced the greatest society in the history of the world by believing in the individual’s responsibility to take care of himself. There’s no reason to abandon a system that works.Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23078932.post-12645824535522492142009-06-19T16:47:00.002-04:002009-06-19T17:01:25.491-04:00This Is Why I Need to Go to Washington<span id = "initcap">O</span>h, I wish I could have been there. I wish I could have been a Senator in that room.<br /><br />Actually, I wish I could have been the Junior Senator from the Great State of Missouri in that hearing room, scheduled to ask the next question after the Junior Senator from California completed her round of questions.<br /><br />Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) was questioning Brigadier General Michael Walsh about something — it doesn’t matter what — during a hearing of the Environment and Public Works Committee. Senator Boxer received her seventeen seconds of fame on the Internet with a terse and extremely irreverent tirade against the General.<br /><br />If you missed the video, <a href = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHFPsiPYDA8 target = _blank>here it is</a>.<br /><br />The exchange went like this:<br /><br />==============<br /><br /><strong>Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA):</strong> Well, why has it been delayed?<br /><br /><strong>Brigadier General Michael Walsh:</strong> Uh, Ma’am, at the uh, LACPR is a …<br /><br /><strong>Senator Boxer:</strong> I don’t… You know, do me a favor. Could you say “Senator” instead of “Ma’am”?<br /><br /><strong>General Walsh:</strong> Yes…<br /><br /><strong>Senator Boxer:</strong> It’s just a thing. I worked so hard to get that title. So I’d appreciate it. Yes, thank you.<br /><br /><strong>General Walsh:</strong> Yes, Senator.<br /><br />==============<br /><br /><em>(If you listen closely, you can actually hear a little giggle from somebody in the background right after Senator Boxer’s declaration of working “so hard to get that title”.)</em><br /><br />In my wildest of dreams, I am the Senator from Missouri. Immediately after Senator Boxer, it is my turn – according to the rules of the Senate Committee – to ask my questions of the General.<br /><br />The exchange would go something like this.<br /><br />==============<br /><br /><strong>Senator Joe DeShon (R-MO):</strong> <em>(To Senator Boxer)</em> Thank you, Senator, for yielding your time. <em>(Turning to the General)</em> General Walsh, before I start my questioning, I want to inform you that you are welcome to call me “Sir”, or “Senator”, or “Mr. DeShon” – maybe even “Joe” – as you see fit. You have certainly earned that right in return for your service to our country, for which I am eternally grateful.<br /><br /><strong>General Walsh:</strong> Thank you, sir.<br /><br />==============<br /><br />And, with that formal exchange, the questioning would continue.<br /><br />Senator Boxer has forgotten that being a Brigadier General is a service to the country. General Walsh certainly has a right to show his pride by wearing his uniform and displaying his stars in public.<br /><br />A Senator, on the other hand, is a job for which someone is <em>hired</em> by the voters of their respective state. They are <em>to serve</em> on behalf of those citizens by making laws as mandated by the Constitution of the United States.<br /><br />The Senator further needs to realize that the first thing that members of the military are taught is to show respect for authority. That respect is usually demonstrated in public by referring to everybody as “Sir” or “Ma’am”. At worst, the general was demonstrating that he is a creature of habit. At best, he is <em>showing respect</em> to the Senator by calling her “Ma’am”, much more respect for her than she showed for him.<br /><br />If somebody feels that they had to “work hard” for the title of Senator, that person should be shamed into retirement. That is especially true if that person is so insecure in her title that she feels the need to proclaim such a fact on the public record by humiliating a member of the Armed Forces of the greatest country on Earth.<br /><br />I’m sure after my little display of arrogance in the hearing room that I would be chastised in the hallways of the Senate — perhaps in public — by Senator Boxer or her representatives for the disrespect that I displayed to my colleague. That’s okay; I have tough skin. I can take it.<br /><br />I am also sure that I would be privately taken to the woodshed by the Republican leadership of the Senate for failing to respect the esteemed opposition and the majority party. I would probably be relieved of any leadership in the Senate. That’s okay; <em>they didn’t hire me</em> for the job.<br /><br />I am also sure that my mailbox would be full of congratulatory words of encouragement from my constituents at home and that my chances for re-election by those voters would go up by several percentage points for standing my ground on principle.<br /><br />It would be worth it.<br /><br />Yep, I definitely need to get serious about this run for Congress…Joe DeShonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06903141672620986840noreply@blogger.com1