Why News Corp’s Stupid Idea Won’t Work

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This afternoon presented me with a perfect example of why Rupert Murdoch's dumb idea of charging for access to his media empire's "knowledge" is such a loser.

There was a fake hijacking or bomb threat called in to San Francisco International Airport today.  I saw the item on my Google News page. I clicked the headline without paying attention to the source of that particular story (I've often done that) and was taken to the story on Murdoch's once-respectable, now-trashy Wall Street Journal. The generous folks there allowed me to read a two-sentence teaser of the story and then suggested that if I'd just log in they'd let me read the rest of it.
The story they reported on the WSJ wasn't even their original reporting. It was from Fox. I closed the WSJ page, went back to Google News, picked the same story from one of more than 100 additional sources, and read the entire account. For free. Imagine that.
As if that weren't ample evidence of Murdoch's faulty (you should pardon my loose use of the word) "thinking," all I had to do was go to the Fox site and read the piece in its entirety…again, for free.
I can see charging for access to unique reporting or commentary, though I'm not sure that model's sustainable. But when you tell me i have to pay — or even subscribe so you can bury me with spam and claim we have a business relationship — to read someone else's story or general reporting on a topic of broad news interest, I say, "Thanks, but no thanks."

Posted via email from danshafer's posterous

August 19, 2010 · Posted in Media  
　　　　

GOP Gubernatorial Candidate Calls Islam a Cult

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Republican Ron Ramsey, a candidate for the governorship of Tennessee, is under fire for a comment he made earlier this month that characterized Islam as a cult. I don't know which is worse: the bigotry or the ignorance. Perhaps they're related. In any case, anyone aspiring to a chief executive position in the public sector of the 21st Century United States who doesn't recognize Islam as one of the world's major religions (and, by the way, the fastest-growing of those) ought by that fact alone be disqualified from holding high office.

It really is astounding how much ignorance abounds in our nation about the world and its peoples. Poll after poll reveals our woeful ignorance of global politics and geography. We are in fact and sadly only slightly better informed about our own country's geography, history and politics. As the nation nominally leading the free world today, that kind of electoral ignorance is not only appalling, it's frightening. But when that ignorance extends to those who are elected to lead the nation in a more official way, it is downright unacceptable.
While I am unalterably opposed to literacy tests for voters despite the above observations, I think I'd be ready to back a move to require candidates for at least some public offices to pass a basic test of knowledge and awareness of politics, economics and geography as a pre-requiaite to running for one of those positions.

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July 28, 2010 · Posted in Politics  
　　　　

Obama Breaks Another Promise, Presents War Supplemental

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Candidate Barack Obama criticized the former administration for using "supplementals" to fund the war in Iraq and thus effectively hide the full cost of that war from the American voter. He promised that his administration would be open and honest and specifically that it would not ask for any supplementals.

So today Congress is voting on only his latest supplemental to fund the ongoing futile war in Afghanistan. Just as with the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell by the military and many others (see this site for a detailed listing and analysis), President Obama, faced with the reality of governance as opposed to the fantasy world of campaigning, is finding that it is often far more difficult to do what is promised than it is to promise it in the first place.
This problem is endemic to our political system. No politician I can recall in my lifetime has kept every promise made during the campaign for office. But it is disconcerting — in large part thanks to the very high expectations he set to change politics as usual — to see this particular President renege on so many important promises in the first half of his first term. I supported him reluctantly and voted for him with some enthusiasm. I allowed myself to become very hopeful about his presidency. The bloom is definitely off the rose, though, and I find myself increasingly critical and skeptical of how he's handling his job. I mean, if he found it difficult to keep some promises, why didn't he renege on his completely indefensible promise to up the ante in an unwinnable war on Afghanistan? Now that's a broken promise I'd have applauded.
Alas, he is not a Liberal. He never was, of course. Only by comparison was he able to give the Left any hope at all. And he has dashed most of that hope on the rocks of compromise with an opposition party which is not interested in compromise or governance.

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July 27, 2010 · Posted in Politics  
　　　　

Believe in the Future, Believe the Future In

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My dear late friend Rev. Rory Elder was famous for finding ways to turn words and phrases into memorable sayings that contained great truths.

Earlier today, I spent some time responding to a colleague who sent me an email consisting only of more than 20 dire predictions of worldwide economic doom and collapse the second half of this year. As you can imagine, despite my normally positive and affirmative approach to such topics, I was feeling a bit low. As I sought spiritual guidance, an email crossed by desk with this quotation from one of Rory's radio spots, "Give 'em Heaven."

We are exposed every day, through a variety of different sources, to the message of doomination in the world.

Today I invite you to suspend such thoughts–and be a messenger of illumination.  Share your passion and vision for a better world–and share the gift and light you have been given–if it’s a song, sing it; if it’s a vision live it; if it’s hope, share it.  

Remember: It’s not enough just to believe in our future, we must believe our future in.  Never doubt that a thoughtful, committed consciousness can change the world–it is unquestionably the only thing that ever has.

I am reminded in reading that quotation that miracles happen every day, that nothing is finally fatal (even physical death, by my own experience) and that it takes only a tipping point of properly intentioned minds to bring about stunning and sudden change. 
Therefore i hold a clear vision and intention that wisdom and prudence and compassion will ultimately prevail in all this turmoil and that we will be able to look back on it one day and recognize it for the catalyst to badly needed major policy change that was necessary for us to yank ourselves out of the stupor of greed and avarice that have long dominated our culture on far too many levels to be sustainable.

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July 16, 2010 · Posted in Spirituality  
　　　　

BP = Be Positive? An Intention Experiment Worth Trying

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I haven't written much about the Oil Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. In part, I've been silent because I didn't know what to add to the conversation that a thousand others weren't already saying. In part, I was at a loss; how could I describe my sick feelings of sadness that this planetary disaster had happened in the first place and my deep-seated fear that the damage done would be so great as to defy comprehension for decades to come? 

But a big part of my reluctance to speak was driven by my newfound desire to try hard to be positive in these posts, to move away from the harping and blaming that fills and characterizes the media on all sides these days. I really do want to try to turn over a new leaf in my writing, not just here but everywhere, and offer constructive thoughts where I can. But what positive notions could I conjure up in the face of this crisis?

Then along came one of my heroines, Lynn McTaggart. In her newsletter today, she offered the brilliant idea of all of us holding a positive intention for BP engineers to resolve this issue soon and with no further damage to the Gulf and its shores. If you don't know Ms. McTsggart's work, her latest work is a book called The Intention Experiment which she has parlayed into a mini-enterprise of its own, one of which I am proud to be a part. She suggests that from now until the solution appears, everyone who wishes to see a positive outcome in the Gulf pause at 1 p.m. Eastern time daily and go to her Web site to join millions of others in clearly stating this positive intention: 

'My intention is for BP's engineers to immediately and successfully divert the Deepwater Horizon oil leak with no long-term damage to the environment.' 

Whether you believe, as I do, that a tipping point of folks holding a positive intention can actually effect change, just think how much better doing this will make you feel about yourself and the world around you! It is unarguably true that, regardless of the intention of BP executives (and I'm not so much doubting them as setting them aside), you know that there are many engineers inside BP who are moral, intelligent and creative people who are thinking and brainstorming hard about how to solve this problem their employer has triggered. It can certainly do no harm to hold them in a positive intentional force field and envision them coming up with something heretofore unheard of that may help prevent another such accident or provide a new way of cleaning up after such an incident if one does recur.

What say you?

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July 2, 2010 · Posted in Environment  
　　　　

Fearmongers Trying to Undo the Only Growing Job Sector in California

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In 2006, the California legislature, which hardly ever does anything, passed AB32, the Global Warming Solutions Act. It was a strongly bipartisan effort which when the Republican governor signed it into law, he characterized as a “landmark” piece of legislation. As a direct result, more than 500,000 new jobs have been created in California, which has seen more than $2 billion in venture capital invested in a clean-energy future.

Now there’s a movement afoot in the state to “suspend” the law until California experiences at least four consecutive quarters of unemployment of 5.5 per cent or less. This effort is being largely funded by two Texas oil companies (Valero and Tessoro, per this article from the Natural Resources Defense Council), and its backers throughout the state are science-ignorant people like Republican State Senator Bob Dutton.
In an article that appeared in the Fontana Herald News, Dutton dragged out the long-dead argument about global warming that first sets up the straw man that it’s primarily about carbon dioxide (which is a big but not sole factor) and then knocks down the argument with the soporific statement that since CO2 is exhaled by humans and other animals, it’s obviously not unhealthy. I think we should sentence morons like that to spend a few minutes in a room where there is only CO2 and see how they feel about it then. Feces and urine are emitted by humans and other animals but we don’t suggest that we don’t need to clean them up because they are healthy. Geesh. Where do these guys to school? Orange County?
The dumbest thing Californians could do is to back the suspension of AB32. It would be bad for the economy, bad for unemployment, damaging to California’s bright future in clean energy, and ultimately harmful to the environment.
I urge you to join the NRDC’s campaign to stop this assault on forward-thinking legislation for the benefit of two Texas oil companies who want to continue to destroy the planet for the sake of private profit.

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June 18, 2010 · Posted in Environment, Politics  
　　　　

So “Corporate Greed” Turns Out to Be a Tautology

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Tonight, I finally brought myself to say goodbye to one of the last
true journalists in America as I watched the final episode of Bill
Moyers’ “journal”, which was broadcast a few weeks ago.One of his final guests was Jim Hightower, nationally syndicated radio
commentator, author and ultimate champion of true American populists.
I was surprised not only by how much I liked the guy, but by how much
I found myself agreeing with him.

Hw makes a ton of great points in the interview, but perhaps the most
salient is his core position that politics today is not about
right-left but about top-bottom. The elite at the top have ALL the
power, ALL the influence, ALL the control, regardless of whether they
label themselves liberal or conservative. They are all, at bottom,
what he calls “corporatists.”

He is so right. Just before I sat down to watch the closing episode, I
wrote this note to myself for further reflection:

“What’s really wrong with America today is that corporations are in
charge of EVERYTHING. And it is the very nature and essence and
character and definition of corporations in a capitalist state to be
greedy. We can’t talk about ‘corporate greed’ because the very phrase
is a tautology.”

It is not time to reduce government nor to enlarge it as it has
become, but to take the helm from, as Hightower famousy puts it, “the
Powers That Be to the Powers That OUGHT To Be.”

Posted via email from danshafer’s posterous

June 12, 2010 · Posted in Politics  
　　　　

SC’s Alvin Green is the Future of Politics in CA

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An unemployed, semi-literate veteran won the Democratic Party’s nomination for the U.S. Senate in South Carolina Tuesday night in a harbinger of all future primary elections in the State of California.

Thanks to easily propagandized voters in my state, we just passed a ballot initiative creating open primaries. That means each party’s nominees for office are chosen not by party loyalists but by anyone who wants to cast a vote for whatever reason. In the case of Alvin Greene of South Carolina, his party chair had never met him, had no encounter at all with him during the primary campaign. He spent no money, ran no ads, and apparently pretty much stayed home during the primary. He won because in SC — as now in CA — tens of thousands of Republicans whose incumbent candidate Jim DeMint faced no opposition got together and decided to vote for the worst possible Democratic opponent to ensure their guy’s November victory. This effectively kills two-party politics in SC as it surely will here.
DeMint is one of the worst demagogues in the Senate. The Democratic Party in SC probably couldn’t defeat the guy anyway. But the malicious vandalism of the open primary guarantees the people of SC won’t even have a viable option in November.
What crap.

Posted via email from danshafer’s posterous

June 10, 2010 · Posted in Politics  
　　　　

Your Disappointment With Obama Seems Misplaced, Tony

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My good friend Tony Seton launched yet another narrowside (it wasn’t quite vitriolic enough to qualify as a broadside) at President Obama on his SetonNoteS audio blog today. Tony, like a lot of my friends (and, to a significant lesser degree, myself) is frustrated with Obama’s failure to get furious over the Gulf Oil Explosion and Volcano incident. While he’s at it, Tony takes the President to task for being “a president who is spending much time and energy perpetuating politics as usual, attending lavish fund-raisers and offering candidates federal jobs to quit races. He’s expanded our covert military operations to 65 foreign countries and failed to close Guantanamo. He’s held only a couple of press conferences. He is losing the faith of almost everyone, at home and abroad.”

Let’s look at these charges. The first is too broad to address. The second seems hardly like a criticism, though offering a candidate (not plural) a federal job to quit a political race is a tad on the ugly side). As to the third and fourth charges (expansion of covert ops and failure to close Guantanamo), he’s guilty but perhaps not solely or primarily responsible for the second. I’m as disappointed and surprised as Tony about the dearth of press conferences, though in fairness he’s made himself available for far more individual press interviews already than his predecessor did in eight years. He’s losing the faith of a lot of folks — most notably those who, like me, hoped for more progressiveness than we’ve gotten.
But to be honest and fair, Obama never promised to be a progressive. He is and always has been a corporate Democrat, a centrist with a very small handful of semi-progressive or at least populist ideas. If we wanted a liberal in the White House, we blew our chance very early in the last election cycle by not getting enough energy behind Dennis Kucinich.
And even if we allow for the possibility that all of Tony’s charges are valid, how in the world can one be disappointed with a President whose successes in a little more than a year into a term that began with the worst economic and world conditions of any modern President are numerous and impressive. These include:
  • preventing us from falling into another Great Depression that would certainly have been worse than the Great one
  • passing the first comprehensive health-care reform in a half-century
  • significantly increasing government transparency (though certainly not completely)
  • extending medical coverage to millions of previously unprotected children
  • shepherding a modern-thinking judge onto the Supreme Court bench
  • making reductions estimated at several billion dollars in wasteful spending in his first budget
I submit that if any of his predecessors, even if they had taken office during such difficult times, had accomplished half of that list (and it’s a very partial list), we’d be talking about him in the same breath with Abraham Lincoln or whoever your favorite President was. But because he has in fact continued some policies of the previous administration that many of us find reprehensible, because he has failed to deliver on don’t-ask-don’t-tell and on the closure of Guantanamo, because he has greatly escalated the war in Afghanistan (which he promised to do as a candidate), we judge him a failure. That is true only by comparison against our impossibly high standards and expectations. If he’s guilty of anything it may be of not managing expectations better.
Come on, Tony, get off the guy’s back, will ya? :-D

Posted via email from danshafer’s posterous

June 9, 2010 · Posted in Politics  
　　　　

Ending War is the Only Fitting Tribute to the Fallen

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For the benefit of you who don't know me, I'm a military veteran. I served two tours in Vietnam. I have had comrades die in my presence, one in my arms. Like many of my fellow vets, I became unalterably opposed to war by the very act of helping prosecute it. Not all veterans draw that conclusion. That is their right. As it is my right to voice opposition to state-sponsored violence.

With that background and caveat, let me commend to you the audio posted by my friend Tony Seton yesterday on his SetonNotes audio blog. Responding to the hue and cry of the Right Wing that President Obama was unpatriotic in his decision to spend Memorial Day in Chicago with his family rather than pontificating at Arlington National Cemetery, Tony recorded a sad and insightful commentary on the matter. His own summary reads, "There seems to be some confusion between the idea of showing our profound respect and gratitude and the equally powerful tearful courage that calls on our better selves to rise up against the carnage of strangers killing strangers."

I don't know if Tony's a vet. I don't really care if he is. His views on this topic are sound and wise. Humanity is on the verge of extinction. If we don't kill ourselves off with bullets, we'll do it with poison through global warming. The time for nationalism and parochialism is long since past. As a race, we must unite against a deadly common foe: our own ignorance and fear that keep us killing each other off while the larger invading army of climate crisis marches us inexorably to our death.

We can do this. But we first must want to do this. That we become so willing is my Memorial Day prayer.

Posted via email from danshafer’s posterous

June 1, 2010 · Posted in Peace  
　　　　

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