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Marissa In Vogue
I thought her latest quarterly earnings call format was pushing the envelope a little too much . . . but she fascinates and inspires me every time I read a new article on her.
Yahoo's Marissa Mayer: Hail to the Chief
by Jacob Weisberg | photographed by Mikael Jansson
As she works to reverse the fortunes of a failing Silicon Valley giant, Yahoo's Marissa Mayer has fueled a national debate about the office life, motherhood, and what it takes to be the CEO of the moment.
"I really like even numbers, and I like heavily divisible numbers. Twelve is my lucky number—I just love how divisible it is. I don't like odd numbers, and I really don't like primes. When I turned 37, I put on a strong face, but I was not looking forward to 37. But 37 turned out to be a pretty amazing year. Especially considering that 36 is divisible by twelve!"
A few things may strike you while listening to Marissa Mayer deliver this riff, prompted by a question about how her life has changed since her son, Macallister, was born last fall. The first is that she's not kidding about being a geek. Mayer talks about numbers as if they were people, refers casually to x- and y-axes, and drops terms like stochastic factor (it means a random distribution) in conversation. On business issues, she speaks awkwardly, piling as many likes into a sentence as Alicia Silverstone in Clueless. But when she gets on to technology, she turns effortlessly articulate.
The next is that she is an unusually stylish geek. The day we had that conversation in her white, glossy, minimally appointed office in Sunnyvale, California, she was wearing a red Michael Kors dress with a gold belt and a brown Oscar de la Renta cardigan. This cashmere bolero is her work uniform—she has the same one in ivory, navy, black, hot pink, teal, red, and royal blue, and adds new colors every season. She was hoarse from a cold she picked up flying to New York and back, and it was eight-thirty in the evening, with hours' more work ahead. But she burbled with excitement as she talked about her job. "I'm having the time of my life," she told me.
It might also strike you that the paradox of being both glamorous and a geek explains Mayer's rapid progress in reviving what only a year ago looked like a moribund giant. Before her arrival in July of last year, Yahoo was being written off by the tech industry, investors, even its own staff. A series of failed CEOs—non-techies from Hollywood, advertising, and finance—had gotten little purchase on the fading technology brand. It was far from clear that a six-months-pregnant, 37-year-old Google engineer and first-time CEO could remove the air of irony that had attached itself to Yahoo's purple exclamation point.
A year later, the punctuation no longer looks so absurd. Adam Cahan, Yahoo's head of mobile and another ex-Googler, told me, "Yahoo has released more products in the last six months than probably in the last five years." But it is the products themselves that represent what he describes as "a dramatic cultural shift." These include a gorgeous new weather app for mobile phones, a relaunch of the photo-sharing site Flickr, and an update of Yahoo Mail, all of which are drawing the first positive reviews the company has seen in ages. By acquiring Tumblr, the hippest of the social-media sites, Mayer solved the problem of Yahoo's aging demographics and lack of cool with a single billion-dollar stroke.
If Yahoo's bottom-line growth is still modest, investors are optimistic: The stock price is up almost 60 percent since Mayer joined. But the most important aspect of the transformation she's leading may be the least tangible. Yahoo, a brand of early adopters before it became one for tech codgers, is returning to its role as a company that matters in Silicon Valley—able to compete for top engineering talent and acquire start-up companies without smothering them. "She is really talented. She is really aggressive," says Henry Blodget, whose Business Insider site is a partner with Yahoo Finance. "She is extremely driven, and that inspires people. Developers are excited about working for a leader like her, someone who says, 'I'm in; who's with me?' And they're excited about working for an underdog."
It's a midsummer evening in Mayer's backyard in Palo Alto. A green lawn large enough to accommodate a skating rink for holiday parties is framed by an irregularly shaped flower border and shaded by a spectacular live oak tree. To one side stands a work of sculpture: a three-foot-tall bronze frog. From the house comes a tinkle of Mozart, playing on a computer-driven baby-grand piano.
Mayer is hosting a cocktail party for entrepreneurs invited to Silicon Valley by the World Economic Forum's Technology Pioneers program. The guests are already sipping strawberry margaritas when she makes her entrance with a sleepy nine-month-old baby over her shoulder. As Macallister, who has inherited his mother's pale-blue eyes and flaxen hair, yawns and nuzzles her neck, Mayer calls him an "easy baby." At the end of a week of late-night preparations for a board-of-directors meeting and an annual shareholders' meeting, the 38-year-old Mayer might be the one ready to be tucked into bed.
Instead she finds a central spot on the patio and graciously fields comments on the company, about which everyone has an opinion. Esther Dyson, a well-known Internet pioneer and investor, comes over to praise Mayer's most controversial decision to date: a ban on the practice of employees' working at home. The ban prompted a national debate and some angry criticism that Mayer lacks empathy for women who can't afford the resources she herself enjoys: a private nursery in her office, a personal staff, and all the child care she needs.
Mayer elaborates, a little defensively, on her reasons for the change. She never meant it as any kind of larger statement about society, but simply as the right decision for Yahoo, where by various accounts working from home often meant hardly working. Teams are happier now that absent participants don't teleconference in for meetings. Messages on Yahoo's "devel-random" e-mail list, the company's informal forum, have lately turned positive. And in perhaps the clearest sign of support, employees have, she tells Dyson, "stopped leaking my e-mails" to the press.
As entrepreneurs from Japan, India, and upstate New York approach to introduce themselves, Mayer quietly inquires about their companies with the discerning focus of someone who might one day write a check to buy them. Usually, she finds some point of personal connection—an engineer they both worked with at Google, or a tech lab they both know overseas.
She suffers from shyness, she says, and has had to discipline herself to deal with it. For the first fifteen minutes she wants to leave any party, including one in her own home. "I will literally look at my watch and say, 'You can't leave until time x,' " she says. " 'And if you're still having a terrible time at time x, you can leave.' " She has learned that if she makes herself stay for a fixed period, she often gets over her social awkwardness and ends up having fun.
That seems to be the case tonight. Mayer turns more gregarious as she explains the presence at one edge of the garden of a two-story, miniaturized model of Palo Alto's Peninsula Creamery, a local diner where Stanford students go for milk shakes (the pineapple malts are Mayer's favorite). She and her husband, Zachary Bogue, a venture capitalist who invests in start-ups focused on "big data," bought the fifteen-foot, red-and-white playhouse at a benefit auction and had a forklift deposit it over their redwood fence the previous week.
Macallister won't be old enough to play in the structure for a while, but Mayer seems to have bought it just as much for herself. Her taste runs to the brightly colored and lighthearted—"happy art," she calls it—like the plate-mounted Jeff Koons balloon dogs in her airy kitchen and the Roy Lichtenstein print in the front hall of her cheerful, comfortable, but not especially grand Craftsman-style house. In the dining room, an entire wall is covered with purple-and-gold marquees that Mayer and Bogue had made for the tabletops at their wedding, printed with words representing their favorite things. These include on her side PEPPERMINT, COLORS, PARIS, and ETRO. Tonight she is wearing an Oscar de la Renta dress, with daubs of yellow, blue, and green on a white field, reminiscent of her most famous product: the Google home page. At some point, the guests notice that she's vanished. She calls this her "CEO exit," disappearing upstairs without good-byes while the party carries on.
Mayer's bright-color and bold-pattern aesthetic comes from her Finnish mother, an art teacher who surrounded her with Marimekko prints she can still cite by name. The love of science comes from her father, an environmental engineer who worked for water companies. "They're definitely in the camp of allies, not adorers," she says. "They'll tell me when they think I did something amazing, but they'll tell me when they think I could do better. I think like my dad, but I have a huge kinship with my mom."
Growing up with a younger brother in Wausau, Wisconsin, she never had fewer than one after-school activity per day: ballet, ice-skating, piano, swimming, debate team, Brownies. She still talks to her best friend from junior high every few weeks. "It was a very well-rounded childhood, with lots of different opportunities," she says. "My mom will say she set out to overstimulate me—surround me with way too many things and let me pick. As a result, I've always been a multitasker; I've always liked a lot of variety."
At Stanford, she majored in Symbolic Systems, which combines philosophy, cognitive psychology, linguistics, and computer science. Once, reading The Stanford Daily, she was laughing over a column about campus icons—the local man who abuses passersby, the guy in the sandwich shop who always gets your order wrong. "And there was literally a line in there that said 'the blonde woman in the upper-division computer-science classes.' And I was, like, I'm a woman in the upper-division computer-science classes—I should know this person! I really had just been very blind to gender. And I still am."
This insensitivity can sound retrograde, especially when paired with stereotypes of feminists as "militant," "negative," and having "the chip on the shoulder," which Mayer repeated in a PBS documentary about the women's movement that aired in February. Of course, in the male-dominated culture of Silicon Valley, gender blindness, willed or otherwise, is one way of fitting in. At Google, Mayer's approach was the opposite of her friend Sheryl Sandberg's. As employee number 20, she was often asked how it felt to be the only woman on engineering teams. She'd answer truthfully: She hadn't noticed.
Mayer describes herself as naive—which only fuels the fascination surrounding her fourteen-year rise. Did she pile up a reported $300 million in wealth and become a CEO of one of the world's top digital brands by accident? "I didn't set out to be at the top of technology companies," she insists. "I'm just geeky and shy and I like to code," she says. "Once, Eric Schmidt [then Google's CEO] pointed out to me that at Google, when you want to have an impact that's bigger than just you, you move from being an individual contributor to managing a team. . . . And I was like, Oh, right, it would be nice to have an impact that's bigger than just me. It's not like I had a grand plan where I weighed all the pros and cons of what I wanted to do—it just sort of happened."
That is subject to debate. At Google, Mayer drove the rigorous testing and analytics that perfected search and other offerings—and she helped invent the matching algorithm that has made Google AdWords arguably the most successful product in the history of advertising. Some at the company saw her as relentless in her ambition and publicity-seeking, and sniped that she'd been effectively demoted shortly before her exit to Yahoo. Other colleagues, who remain ardent supporters, point out that she's earned every success by working unbelievably hard. Among the roles that helped her develop her reach beyond Google was running the Associate Product Manager program, a two-year course that grooms future tech leaders. Its more than 300 graduates have gone on to lead some of the Valley's most closely watched start-ups and constitute an informal network of protégés.
One of the program's alumnae, Jess Lee, the CEO of the fashion site Polyvore, describes Mayer as a perfectionist. "She'll spot a lot of little details other people might not notice," she says. "But when you add them up in aggregate, it's the difference between a beautiful, polished product and one that feels more awkward." Lee notes that when Mayer recently hosted an APM reunion at her house, she took time to write a personal note in each of the 200 commemorative photo books.
Mayer has a taste for the comfortable and familiar as well as gloss and glamour. Most days she drives herself back and forth to work in an eighteen-year-old BMW, but she has also attracted attention for a high-profile social life, including glitzy parties she and Bogue threw at their penthouse apartment atop the Four Seasons Hotel in San Francisco. The couple met in 2007, via a mutual friend. A former football and rugby player at Harvard, Bogue, who has a chiseled jaw, tousled brown hair, and a big, athletic build, shares his wife's taste for physical challenges. They run half-marathons together and love hiking, skiing, travel, and good restaurants.
These days, though, she's lucky to squeeze in a round of her favorite Bejeweled Blitz or Candy Crush Saga on her smartphone. With less time, the couple is more focused on "walking to our local park and pushing Macallister in the swing," Bogue tells me, seated on a sofa in the living room as the party winds down. "It was clear sailing for both of us when the baby was conceived. Let's just say it's been a lot busier since."
How do people misunderstand his wife? I ask. "Marissa doesn't really like cupcakes," he says, referring to the legend that she once created a spreadsheet of different cupcake and frosting recipes. "She just called the trend early."
And what does Mayer misunderstand about herself? "I think she's not as shy as she thinks she is," he says.
I get a sense of Mayer's professional style in a product-review meeting where I am allowed to be a fly on the wall on the condition that I not talk about unreleased products. About 25 of Yahoo's top designers and engineers crowd into a darkened conference room on the Sunnyvale campus to present updates on a project code-named Grand Slam, an effort to bring a more coherent look and identity to Yahoo's pages. For an intense 80 minutes, Mayer does most of the talking, getting deep into the weeds about the size of navigation buttons, background colors, and spacing between columns. Working through a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich and a cup of pretzels from the cafeteria, she disarms confrontation with an easy, whinnying laugh.
When one of the project managers notes that a design change is likely to harm advertising revenue, Mayer makes it clear that the product comes first. "I just want to make sure it's user-experience positive," she says. "I'm worried that we're making trade-offs that are negative to users."
What might otherwise look like a crazed level of micromanagement serves a purpose. In the past, Yahoo's CEOs were routinely ignored by the engineering staff. But Mayer speaks with a decisive air of authority. "I'm not sold on this," she tells the team. "I'm not ready to green-light it."
After running through three CEOs in less than a year, Yahoo's revenue was shrinking, and it was being valued at little more than the sum of its key Asian assets: its stake in the Chinese Internet giant Alibaba and Yahoo Japan. Its user base was more than 700 million, but unlike Facebook, Google, and Apple, Yahoo had no fundamental function—e-mail, search, photo-sharing—that wasn't done better by others. In Silicon Valley, there was much residual loyalty to the company, where according to Mayer, half the industry's engineers have worked at some point in their careers. But it had turned into a place where no one wanted to go.
It was at that point that Daniel Loeb, an activist investor now battling Sony's Japanese management, got control of several board seats and pushed the idea of hiring Mayer. She was, somewhat inconveniently, newly pregnant, and much ink was spilled critiquing her plan to take a short maternity leave. Could she nurture a new baby and a corporate turnaround at the same time?
Thanks to Mayer's financial resources and physical capacity, this turned out not to be much of an issue. In fact, the combination of the pregnancy and the new job gave her even more energy than usual. "One night I looked up and was like, 'Oh, my God, it's midnight and I have a husband and I'm, like, eight months pregnant. I need to leave!' I was just here working, having the best possible time. When Zack and I were brushing our teeth in the morning, he was like, 'Where were you last night?' "
She set up a nursery next to her office, and for several months after Macallister was born, he and his nanny came to work with her. Business problems were much more serious. She was shocked to learn how little interaction Yahoo executives had with their employees. In her first weeks on the job, Mayer sought to change that, responding to questions on "devel-random" and taking her lunch in the cafeteria.
She also instituted a weekly all-hands meeting and added new perks with symbolic importance: free food in the cafeterias, on par with the standard at Google and elsewhere, iPhones instead of BlackBerrys, and the elimination of turnstiles that were costing employees an average of six minutes a day going in and out of buildings. While insisting that everyone show up for work, she also began removing cubicle barriers and office walls to foster a more collaborative work environment.
Mayer has applied this democratic thinking to her board presentations as well. Every quarter, she offers highlights and lowlights as voted by the employees. At the most recent board meeting, the top vote-getters included the weather app, the Tumblr acquisition, the Flickr relaunch, moving into the old New York Times building near Times Square, as well as Yahoo's new family-leave policy, which went a long way to assuage employees still stewing over the ban on working from home. All recent parents—male, female, adoptive, or biological—get eight weeks anytime during their first year with a new child. Biological mothers get an additional eight weeks.
Buying Tumblr represents Mayer's boldest step to position Yahoo for growth again. She first met David Karp, Tumblr's 27-year-old founder, in December. They met again in February to pursue partnership ideas. "That's when I really started to use the site a lot more and try to understand it," she says. "We started meeting more intensely in April. That's when we said, 'My gosh, if we're going to do all this, it makes sense to merge.' I loved David's perspective on the products, and I think he respected mine. We had a tremendous meeting of the minds in terms of what we wanted to build and what we wanted to do.
"I've done now between three and four dozen acquisitions in my career," she goes on, "and I've never seen this kind of lock-and-key fit between two companies. Our demographic is older. Theirs is the youngest on the Web. We pride ourselves on publishing at scale—they have some of the best publishing tools available. We're strong in news and sports and finance. They are strong in all the different complementary pieces—fashion, food, and architecture. They need monetization. We have monetization that can be turnkey for them and not very obtrusive."
For his part, Karp says he was won over not just by Mayer's commitment to keep running Tumblr as an independent company but by what a happy and optimistic person she is. "That's something I've always valued, and I think it's kind of a unique sensibility in the tech industry," he says. Karp points out that in a rapidly changing tech landscape, many of the biggest players are now playing defense, looking for acquisitions that help protect their empires. "Meanwhile, Yahoo, out of left field, is in attack mode. There was nothing defensive about Yahoo buying Tumblr."
Tumblr, of course, is far from profitable, and with a user base deeply resistant to commercial messages, there's no clear path to take it there. While Mayer and Karp figure out how to turn it into a business, it will be a burden on Yahoo's bottom line. The company can afford it—Yahoo is currently cash-rich—but growth has so far been slow: a mere 2 percent in 2012. As advertising revenues continue to show declines, Mayer has tried to set expectations appropriately, telling investors that exceeding industry growth levels is going to be the work of years.
In reviving Yahoo, Mayer faces the challenge of a diffuse set of products and a business model based on advertising. Audiences are moving quickly from desktops to small-screen mobile devices, where marketers struggle to capture attention, and revenue per user is much less. Mayer's bet is that Yahoo will thrive amid this transition by going back to its roots as the "daily habits" company, providing the best tools for what people do digitally every day.
"Close your eyes and listen to this list," she says. I close my eyes and hear her recite: "E-mail, maps, weather, news, stock quotes, share photos, group communication, sports scores, games.
"You're listening to what people do on their mobile phones," she says. "And it sounds like a list of what Yahoo does."


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subset: commoncrawl


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>>>full ranks
SKILLMAN, N.J. – The Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) released its latest national and regional rankings for Division II men's tennis, with Georgia College (14-9) taking No. 19 in the country.
The Bobcats are ranked seventh among Peach Belt Conference (PBC) schools, behind No. 1 Armstrong Atlantic, No. 10 Columbus State University and No. 11 Lander University among others.
In the region, GC is positioned seventh, again with the same schools ahead of the Bobcats.
The Bobcat doubles team of Jerome Leborgne (Coordimanche, France) and Johan Wadstein (Helsingborg, Sweden) earned the No. 14 spot in the national rankings, taking No. 5 in the region. The Bobcat pair finished the 2011 season 14-8.
Leborgne took the No. 45 slot in the national rankings in singles action, adding the No. 18 position in the region. Wadstein came in a slot behind in the region for No. 19. Both were named All-PBC second team this season. Leborgne was 12-10 and Wadstein posted a 12-7 mark.
The Bobcats advanced to the NCAA Tournament this season, making five-straight appearances in that regional tourney.
The Georgia College Department of Athletics, back-to-back winners of the PBC Commissioner's Cup, sponsors 10 varsity athletic programs at the NCAA Division II level. As a Division II program, Bobcat Athletics prides itself on balancing the life of the student-athlete, evidenced by the teams' multiple appearances in post-season competition as well as documented academic success and community-service involvement. Sign up at www.twitter.com/BobcatSports and www.facebook.com/gcbobcats for up-to-the-minute reports, and visit www.GCBobcats.com for more information, and to nominate your favorite former Bobcats and Colonials to the GC Athletics Hall of Fame.


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Good afternoon. A member of my forum that I host referred us to you lovely site. We are looking for formulas that help generate and extracts roots of figurate numbers. It is an interesting but often neglected field of study. You could be the ones who help us make great discoveries.:D You are welcomed to share info with us: http://forums.delphiforums.com/figurate/start
Have a great week.:)
Please consider visiting our forum. Please let me know if their is any way I can contribute to yours. Say, as you may well be aware, just as one can generate square numbers (n x n), one can also generate triangle numbers. Where any of you aware that just as there is a square root, there is also a triangle root? I'm not kidding.
If you meant cube root, most of us are aware that there exist cube roots. Regarding extracting cube roots, I think of prime factorization as the only possible method. Logarithms help, but they are an approximation. For higher roots also, prime fasctorization is the ideal method.
PS:- The forum you host is quite interesting.
It is no good to try to stop knowledge from going forward. Ignorance is never better than knowledge - Enrico Fermi.
Nothing is better than reading and gaining more and more knowledge - Stephen William Hawking.
Yes, we know about the cube root. How about the tetrahedron root, octahedron root, etc;? The extracting of 3D figurate numbers is what has me stumped. I'm glad you like my forum.
Roots aren't given in shapes with different number of sides. They are all cubes of different dimensions. A 2-dimensional cube is called a square, and so we say a number is squared. A 3-dimensional cube is simply called a cube, so we say the number is cubed.
Why? Because if you take some length x, x*x is the area of a square and x*x*x is the area of a cube.
"In the real world, this would be a problem. But in mathematics, we can just define a place where this problem doesn't exist. So we'll go ahead and do that now..."
Actually, they can! Soon, I will be posting a chart at my forum that shows the triangle root, pentagonal root, etc; we simply have the square and cube in their simplest form. After all, Pascal's triangle does not have squares and cubes. It has triangle and tetrahedron numbers.
I just posted charts that give proof that you CAN INDEED have roots of other polygonal numbers besides squares. Just look under "Triangle Root" and "Pascal Genesis" for the most recent postings and you see that the door to yet another world is opened to you. Enjoy!
Perhaps you can define things such as "triangle" roots, and the like, because I (nor Google) haven't the slightest idea what you mean by such.
"In the real world, this would be a problem. But in mathematics, we can just define a place where this problem doesn't exist. So we'll go ahead and do that now..."
OK. Let us take a trip to the bowling alley, shall we? Now how many pins are set up? Usually 10! That's right. How many rows are there? Four. We know that 1+2+3+4=10. Ten is a triangle number. What is its triangle root? 4! Did you know that 666 is a triangle number? Yikes! Its triangle root is 36. Why? Because if you add the numbers from 1 to 36, you will get the sum of 666.
Wikipedia has an article on triangle numbers. At the very bottom, they give a formula for testing if a number is a triangle number. If it comes out as a whole integer, it is a triangle. If it comes out with numbers right of the decimal, it is NOT. The same idea would apply for a square root. If I placed a number in the square root sign, and it came out a whole integer, it's a square number. If it has numbers right of that decimal point, it ain't.
My forum http://forums.delphiforums.com/figurate/start also goes into more details.
Last edited by R3hall (2007-07-04 15:02:22)
I hope the last entry answered your question. At my Figurometry forum, I just posted an application to the Twelve days of Christmas that should also clear the waters for you.:cool:
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First put forward by Italian vascular surgeon, Palo Zamboni, in 2009 CCSVI's connection to MS has been a controversial – to say the least. The general theory of CCSVI is that blocked veins in the neck cause blood to back-up into the brain and cause MS symptoms. If these blockages are removed, MS symptoms reverse.
Studies continue around the globe into the possible validity of the theory and the restorative procedure dubbed the "liberation therapy". Two Italian researchers have, however, closed their books on research and their findings have prompted the Italian MS Society to recommend against further tests to diagnosis and procedures to correct the condition.
"CCSVI is not a disease connected to multiple sclerosis." Read their statement, and it continued, "there is no need [in clinical practice] to carry out additional tests to diagnose CCSVI, nor is vein surgery required."
The impetus for such strong wording came from a study that looked at over 450 MS patients - from 33 MS centers in Italy - who have had treatment for CCSVI.
While over half (53%) of patients reported subjective improvements in MS symptoms, only thirty (that's 30 people, not 30%) showed improvement in their EDSS scores and just over half of the people had stable scores after 6 months. The remaining people had scores that worsened (by at least 0.5points) during the same follow-up period.
Looking at 171 patients with pre- and postsurgical MRI scans, new lesion activity was seen in 36% (with new gadolinium-enhancing lesions were seen in 26%). About 20% of patients with relapsing MS developed relapses during a median 29 weeks of follow-up.
Comparing objective EDSS scores with reported improvements presented researchers with stark contrast. Even though only 6.4% of people showed clinical improvements, over half of the total cohort reported some improvement and 47% reported definite improvements in their condition. And, while 20% of the patients had clinical relapses in the follow-up period, only 13% reported that their MS had worsened.
Now, we all know that EDSS scores are not the be-all and end-all of MS presentation. Symptoms such as cognitive impairment (cog-fog) and fatigue are not measured by this scale and are often reported as responding well to the liberation therapy.
In addition to the limited benefits, 15 serious adverse medical events occurred in patients who underwent treatment.
You can read more detail about this report from MedPage Today for further details. One such, which will undoubtedly be sited by those who support CCSVI treatment, is the fact that the researcher who compiled the data from across Italy has – in the past – received funding from pharma companies.
I look forward to more information due out in the next few months on studies here in North America.
Does this change your thoughts about CCSVI? Is the slight risk of serious damage worth the possible improvement in subjective symptoms? If you've had the liberation treatments, what are your thoughts of this research (please, not the guy reporting on the research… I'm kinda done being a whipping boy on that front)?
Wishing you and your family the best of health.
Don't forget that you can also follow me via our Life With MS Facebook page, on Twitter, and our new group on MS Connection.org. Check out our bi-monthly blog for the UK .


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Publish Classroom iPad Podcasts on SoundCloud
Creating educational podcasts is a great way to blend technology and learning in an iPad classroom. Share student podcasts through SoundCloud, an Internet social audio sharing site. Assignments that incorporate podcasts improve student's communication and collaboration skills, and sharing those podcasts is an important part of the process.
SoundCloud allows registered users to share original music, spoken word, comedy, radio shows, and any other audio recordings. Use SoundCloud directly over the web at the website or from the SoundCloud iPad app.
The recording process is simple. Just open an account, start recording (by tapping the Rec button), and decide how you want to share the audio. You can upload it to your account and share it with the world, or keep it completely private.
Every account has a public page, but you can elect to keep recordings private. Your options include the following:
Complete privacy: It's secure and will not be listed or appear in search listings.
Selected access: You can give people access to a recording in four ways:
Add their e-mails addresses or SoundCloud usernames.
Add a previously created Contact List.
Create a secret link (requires a premium account). When you set a recording to private, only users with the URL of the recording can hear it. You can send and share that URL with anyone you please.
Create a group. Groups have moderators that determine access rights and contributors that upload and share recordings with the group.


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Marion Cunningham, the home-cooking champion whose legacy can be found in the food-spattered pages of "Fannie Farmer" cookbooks in kitchens across America, has died at age 90.
Cunningham, who had been ill for some years, died of complications from Alzheimer's disease, a family friend told the San Francisco Chronicle.
Best known for her revisions of the classic "The Fannie Farmer Cookbook," in 1979 and again in 1990, Cunningham wrote several other books, including "Lost Recipes." She also hosted a television series, "Cunningham & Company," that aired on the Food Network.
Though she moved in rarefied circles, Cunningham resisted trendiness. She was an ardent supporter of the humble iceberg lettuce and specialized in simple, straightforward recipes.


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Dazzling new filmmaking tools were the stars of a two-day conference at the Marriott Burbank Airport conference center.
Hundreds of film crew members and gear heads walked among the booths at the Createasphere digital technology exposition, where companies from across the globe — as well as Burbank's own EVS and FilmTools — hawked software, digital cameras, stage lights and more.
"It's nice to see the local companies as well as the larger companies," said Nick Lampke, who works for FilmTools, a Burbank firm that sells everything from gaffer tape to cameras.
The expo is a smaller cousin to major events such as the annual National Assn. of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas or Cine Gear Expo at Paramount Studios. Many people said they appreciated the more manageable atmosphere.
"We have a really good mix of folks here, from the education sector to video production," Ian Yeh of Ross Video Ltd., said.
He was showing off his company's production switchers — control panels that facilitate real-time shifts from one camera or data feed to another. His target market ranges from sports facilities that use Jumbotron screens to TV newsrooms, and even large religious congregations.
"Mega-churches have sizeable production capabilities," Yeh said.
Pamela Rosenberg and Moana Sherill of Hemisphere Productions, an independent TV production company in L.A., came to check out the new gear, with an eye on digital-storage systems.
Rosenberg said her company may need a storage upgrade as it starts work on a new TV show. When asked what the show was, Hollywood's curtain of silence came down.
"Can't say," she smiled.
Vendors said attendees were serious about their gear, making the show rewarding.
"Yesterday was pretty good," Blair Paulsen said Thursday.
Paulsen runs 4K Ninjas, which provides gear and onsite post-production expertise to commercial makers and other clients.
"I met with some real players, people I'll have meetings with," he said.
Mark Blaker of Manfrotto, which makes cameras and accessories, came from Hong Kong for the show and said he was pleasantly surprised at the attendees' know-how.
"The traffic coming through here has been really high-quality," he said.
Off the floor, the thousand-plus attendees went to mixers designed for aficionados of digital single-lens reflex, or DSLR, cameras, as well as sessions on creative camera shots and cutting-edge 3-D products.
The gear is the fastest-changing part of the business, giving amateurs and independent producers capabilities they only dreamed about a few years ago.
"What used to cost you a couple hundred thousand dollars, now you can get it with $800 software and a $5,000 camera," said Richard Threadgill of Grass Valley, a Northern California maker of video equipment and software. "It's pretty crazy."


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Hi Kevin, i am in fairfax too and have lots of free time. would you like to play tomorrow morning at the Plummer Park? let me know here is my number 760 514 3611. i m level 3.0. been looking for someone likes to play often can't find anyone yet. i m new in here so.
Hey Kevin,
Do you want to play at Poinsettia anytime after Jan 8? I'm also looking for some regular hitting.
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Heritage meets style savvy in this Mexican cultural hot spot
Photography Daniel Robles
WHAT SHE'S WEARING: Cotton dress and shawl by Dosa; jewelry by Mexican designer Natalia Toledo
ON THE LOCAL STYLE: "Oaxaca is all about inclusion, integration and collaboration. There is a love affair with locality and the poetics of the handmade, in everything from art and architecture to food and fashion."
WHERE TO SHOP IN OAXACA: "Go to Los Baúles de Juana Cata for exquisite local textiles, and La Bonetera for contemporary fashion with a strong Mexican flavor. And at Tienda Q, where I bought this outfit, I always find unique and tasteful items by artists and designers working locally but thinking globally."
PERSONAL AESTHETIC: "I tend toward subtle reminders of the cultural richness that Oaxaca is famous for. My jewelry, for instance, is an important part of my wardrobe because most of it was made by fine local artisans that I'm very proud of."
– – – – – – – –
"My typical look: casual, with a touch of local handmade textiles, and always a good pair of jeans because I ride a bike."
I would like to purchase the outfit worn by Claudina Lopez in the article … cannot find out how to get in touch with Tienda Q?
can you please help with contact information?
thanks –
Hi, Judith—See if you have any luck with these. The designer is Dosa, and if you go to the contact section of http://dosainc.com, you might find a boutique in the US that can assist you. To contact Tienda Q, try emailing firstname.lastname@example.com. Best, Jenn


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I liked a video tutorial (see photo above and click link here for the tut ) https://www.instagram.com/p/BC0lfAPvcZC/
which resulted in a dialogue with another Instagram user. It ended by her calling me a racist if I adopted this look. You can see it all in the comments if you go to the post (if they are not deleted by now).
I have always loved and admired super curly hair ever since I laid eyes on Diana Ross as a kid. (I actually have been collecting some pics of Diana Ross and there's a post coming soon about her.)
I am white and my hair is naturally straight. I mean SUPER straight. I don't have to flat iron it to achieve that look. It doesn't even have the slightest hint of a wave. No body to it, flat-against-my-head straight. Not even a cowlick. I don't hate it. It has its advantages too. I love that is is super soft and silky. I love that it rarely frizzes. I love that, when I have the right cut, I barely have to do anything to it at all besides wash and towel dry. But what is the fun of having hair that we can't experiment or play with? :)
So I love curly hair. The bigger the better! I have never in my life made fun of someone with curly hair. I have never in my life thought that people of color should straighten their hair to look white. I am not prejudiced. However, it was posed to me that, even if I don't know what I am contributing to, I would be oppressing people of color if I gave myself tight curls. Also, that I simply can't understand the issue because I have white privilege and it doesn't affect me. Honestly, I felt like I was the one being judged and stereotyped. It was also just sad to me. It deeply saddens me that someone is so one sided that she would assume all white people are out to disrespect her black heritage. I understand that there was a time when people of color were ridiculed for their looks. I also understand how people of color may think it is hypocritical then for white people to adopt those same looks. However, keep in mind these are NOT the same people. Times have changed and I am not the one mocking the looks of anyone. No one likes to be lumped into a category. It is still called stereotyping, "whether you realize you're doing it or not. "
It has been my understanding that cultural appropriation means to take something (dress, religious symbol, etc) from a person belonging to a minority culture that is of value or has significance to that culture and exploit it or claim it as one's own or mock it.
When it comes to something such as black face, I get it. Clearly there is something to be offended about there. But when it comes to curled hair? Come on. Every culture gets inspired from other cultures when it comes to art, food and fashion. What would life be without it?
I wouldn't wear a bindi because I understand it has a specific meaning in Hindu cultures. I wouldn't wear an Indian headdress because I understand there is significance in Native American culture. For them it is not a fashion statement. But curly hair? I still don't get it. Curly hair spans across too many cultures.
Does this mean I cannot wear my hair curly anymore without being referred to as a racist? THAT, to me, is offensive. That person doesn't even know me but would judge me by my hairstyle? How would she even know those aren't natural curls if she saw me on the street? I have seen white people with naturally tight curly hair. How would she know who I am as a person or what my thoughts are regarding other cultures or races? I do understand that part of the oppression was being made fun of for having hair that was different than the traditional "white" hair. But maybe this means times are changing. Why is there a negative connotation to it still? I feel confident in saying that I seriously doubt anyone going through this much trouble to give themselves hair like this will be making fun of people of color who have that same type of hair.
I curled my hair yesterday. Well, I also drank French Roast coffee, and ate a Jewish bagel. So what?
What if I really like an armful of bangles and heavy black liner? Does that mean I am disrespecting Indian culture? I am not referring to the whole dress and look (though it is drop dead gorgeous in my opinion and I have a whole post just on beautiful Indian brides). I do happen to have quite a few dangling Indian inspired earrings that I adore, wear layered bangles and rock heavy black liner at times. I am not ashamed of it either. I've received some nice compliments from some of the female Indian physicians and nurses with whom I've worked. They didn't seem offended at all.
I think the term cultural assimilation has been taken way out of context.
This person said to me that even though I may not be blatantly racist, I am STILL a racist. She also said "when will white people f-ing stop? "
Aren't comments like those contributing to the division of races?
I know it is a touchy subject. I realize that there are many years of deep hurt for the oppression that people of color had to endure. I know there is still racism today. I am in no way condoning or making light of racism in any form. However, sometimes fashion is just fashion.
I love fashion from many different cultures.
Would it be racist if I wore this? (Holy crap, if my butt looked this good in it I would never take it off!)
(Aztec printed maxi)
Or what about this?
(Mexican style dress)
Seriously, where is the line drawn?
A suggestion was posed on a different blog that one should ask oneself, "Would anyone be offended if I wear this?" before putting something on. Well, I suppose every day the answer would have to be yes, if people are offended this easily.
Are people who collect items from other cultures on their travels racist?
I have a bunch of Native American jewelry from when I lived in Arizona. The Native American Indians were selling it themselves. (I, personally, love Hopi jewlery in particular) There are also roadside stands that sell mocassins and a lot of other traditional Native American apparel. I loved the road side stands where I could speak to the artists themselves and get a bit of history and learn about their culture. To me, that is where the barriers are broken. It was truly beautiful to see some of the Indians working at their art and upholding part of their tradition and culture right there while selling it. They were proud of their workmanship and culture and readily wanted to share it. No one called me any names for enjoying it either. I do not condone anyone taking away the rights and privileges of another. I do not agree with what happened to Native Americans but I didn't do it. I respect and admire the Native American culture and want to support it.
In writing this I am also remembering a time when there was an African American man, in traditional African attire, selling these necklaces made out of leather that had a large leather pendant which was a painted cut out of the Africa continent. Our son was young at the time and had no idea it was Africa but he wanted one (probably because it was brightly colored) so we got it for him and took the opportunity to educate him on Africa. He wore that necklace all over the place for the longest time.
I also love the bold and beautiful colors of African dress. The patterns are beautiful.
Loving the color, pattern and cut of these dresses.
Traditional dashiki print kaftkan
I think we should not assume someone is a racist by the fashions they wear unless it clearly mocks a part of one's heritage that has a specific and deep meaning (such as the bindi or headdress example).
Perhaps the question posed should be "Why am I offended so easily by another person's choice of hairstyle? "
I personally don't care what you wear, what your hair looks like or if you straighten or curl it. It matters more to me how you treat people and what your intentions are. And, for the record, I haven't done the chopstick curling method because, quite frankly, I am afraid my arm would fall off after holding it up to curl my hair for like 12 hours! When I was 14 I did get a short haircut and a perm that resulted in a very unfortunate Shirley Temple look though. I blame that on my mom who wanted to save money so took me to the one and only beauty school in our small town. Ah memories.
Feel free to comment for the purposes of educaction and enlightenment. Hate will not be tolerated here. However, I am very open to learning something new about cultural assimilation that I may be overlooking. I am open to learning more about black hair and it's cultural significance as well. The person I engaged with clearly did not have the capacity to get past name calling so I did not continue the conversation.
As always, thanks for reading my blog!
Love and Light,
PS I am revamping my blog so please forgive the blank pages. I will be blogging more and updating lots of things so stay tuned! :)


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The Information Technology Services department will determine if the equipment should be redeployed, donated, sold or discarded. If any equipment is determined to have cash value, it will be sold to vendors of used equipment, non-profit agencies, non-profit institutions, or other third party vendors who may offer it for public sale. Obsolete equipment may be donated to non-profit agencies and non-profit institutions based on a written request from the agency or institution. Any monies received through these sales will go to general University funds.
Computer disposal requirements are more restrictive for businesses than for households. For example, under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), computers disposed of by a household are excluded from the definition of a hazardous waste while computers disposed of by a business may be regulated as a hazardous waste. Some computers contain small amounts of toxic compounds including lead, mercury, cadmium and arsenic. Although individual computers from households may be placed in solid waste landfills, EPA requires commercial establishments disposing of computers to determine whether they qualify as hazardous waste, and if so, to have the computers sent to an approved hazardous waste disposal facility or to a recycler.
In order to comply with governmental regulations, state and federal, and Baylor policies, including FERPA, HIPAA and GLB guidelines, ITS will erase all data from the computer drives to ensure that no data can be recovered. Baylor complies with the DOD (Department of Defense) specifications for erasing data on storage media prior to the disposition of computer equipment. If the hard drive cannot be erased according to the DOD specifications, the hard drive will be destroyed.
Reviewed February 28, 2014


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The growing silence of 'union radio'
The golden age of unions is long gone — and for the radio shows that focus on labor and workers rights, every day is a struggle just to stay on the airwaves.
There are a number of talk radio shows around the country covering — and funded by — organized labor that are still up and running, but like the labor movement as a whole, what remains is a far cry from the time when unions and the concerns of workers were a dominant part of the media landscape.
Story Continued Below
"It's literally dying on the vine," said former radio host-turned-Democratic candidate for the Michigan House of Representatives Tony Trupiano. "The future does not look good for labor radio or progressive radio in any way, shape or form."
( Also on POLITICO: Volkswagen workers reject UAW)
People behind the shows with whom POLITICO spoke recently said their programs were in part sponsored or financially supported by advertising with union money. Individual donors also contribute to keep the shows — which broadcast from Pittsburgh, Madison, Wis., and Washington, among other cities — on air.
The niche has suffered some hard hits lately, with local programs in Michigan and Wisconsin going dark at the end of 2013. The dozen or so shows that still offer up labor and union concerns to radio listeners are mostly local, based in the country's traditional union strongholds of Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. There's just one nationally syndicated labor program in the country — "The Union Edge" — and it counts about 15 stations to its name.
The hosts and several radio observers say the programs are a bulwark against what they call the corporatization of the airwaves, and they argue that without the shows, labor issues such as raising the federal minimum wage and fighting right-to-work legislation would disappear altogether from radio.
"The issues of working Americans, whether they're union members or not, are barely covered by the media in this country today," said radio consultant Peter B. Collins, who hosts a liberal podcast. "And I don't think that it's an accident."
At least 100 locally produced programs were on the air in the 1950s, during the heyday of unions, according to Elizabeth Fones-Wolf, a history professor at West Virginia University. In 1950, the AFL went live five nights a week over 176 radio stations, and, starting in 1953, the CIO show was broadcast on more than 150 network stations, she noted.
( Also on POLITICO: Teachers unions face moment of truth)
There were 16 labor radio programs during that era in Michigan alone, compared with about the same number across the whole country today.
"Labor's voice was heard by the American public in ways that it's absolutely not today," said Fones-Wolf, who wrote about the labor movement's history with radio in her book, "Waves of Opposition: Labor and the Struggle for Democratic Radio, 1933-58."
For an explanation, look at what's happened to the audience: In 1953, unions boasted 17.7 million members, or 32 percent of the workforce, while in 2012, union membership had dwindled to 14.5 million, or just 11.3 percent of the workforce.
Today, most shows are helmed by people with union connections but are not run by the unions themselves. The American Federation of Government Employees is an exception, with a weekly program, "Inside Government," airing every Friday on D.C.'s Federal News Radio.
"We feel like it's almost one of a kind because we have access to all of these great workers who are our members and they're able to tell their stories every week," host and producer Jason Forincola said.
At the end of 2013, two talk shows in the genre — the Detroit-based "Night Shift with Tony Trupiano" and Madison's "The People's Mic with Doug Cunningham" — went off the air. Trupiano ended his show to run for the Michigan State House, while Cunningham's program bit the dust after two years due to financial problems.
Cunningham, who still hosts WIN, a daily, three-minute newscast out of Madison focused on labor news, noted that the small organization also had to lay off a news producer at the end of last year due to the financial crunch. "We had a crisis at the end of last year, a cash flow crisis where we were in danger of having to pull the plug on the news service entirely," Cunningham said, adding that WIN was able to raise close to $90,000 to keep the labor newscast on the air.


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Abandon your preconceptions of the architect as a quiet, bespeckled intellectual who cares more about sharp Italian suits and clean concrete lines than about saving trees. Here comes a new breed of architectural environmental activism in rising star Andrew Maynard, who has designed these awesome treehouses in order to protest logging.
The vigilant protection of endangered forests represents an enduring legacy of environmental activism, from the Chipko movement in India in the early 70s to Julia Butterfly Hill's long sit in the redwoods. Few things deter a logger from felling a tree more effectively than a protester clinging fiercely to its trunk. Except maybe a protest structure that clings to three trunks at once.
On top of being a wildly inventive architect, Andrew Maynard – whose prefabs have been widely lauded for their astounding multiplicity and brilliant design – turns out to be a cleverly scheming activist. Maynard's Global Rescue Station fastens semi-permanently to the body of three trees, promising not only to shelter and protect protestors during their demonstrations, but to take out anything beneath or around it if a logger dares to cut down its supports.
Maynard's Global Rescue Station initially emerged in the midst of opposition to clearcutting in Tasmania's Styx Valley Forest. The first iteration consisted of two platforms roped into the canopy of a single gum tree (affectionately named Gandalf). Maynard has since advanced his protest design strategy to create the concept for GRS Generation 2, which uses far more refined methods and materials to create a bi-level shelter replete with solar panels and sleeping quarters. Those Earth Firsters might be wishing they'd had Mr. Maynard in their posse a few years back…
Check back tomorrow for more on Maynard's prefab work, a follow-up to our Australian prefab post.


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Donald Trump forcefully defended his hair and attacked the New York Times for a front-page report on his adversarial relationship with Spanish-language media during a rally in South Carolina on Thursday.
The GOP presidential frontrunner took umbrage to the opening paragraph of the Times story that details how Hispanic radio host Ricardo Sánchez has nicknamed Trump "El hombre del peluquín," or "the man of the toupee."
"I don't wear a toupee. It's my hair. I swear," he said before inviting a woman in attendance to inspect his head.


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Chris Mooney | September 7, 2011
By Chris Mooney • Wednesday, September 7, 2011 - 09:49
There's a fascinating new public opinion analysis out today from Anthony Leiserowitz and the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication. It looks at political divides and how they impact one's views of the science, but with this new twist—Tea Partiers and Republicans are treated differently.
And look what results:
- 53 percent of Republicans believe global warming is happening, but just 34 % of Tea Partiers.
- 56 percent of Republicans, but 69 % of Tea Party members, say there is "a lot of disagreement" among scientists about whether global warming is happening.
- Tea Party members are much more likely than Republicans (45 % to 20 %) to have heard of "ClimateGate."
- Staggering, but not surprising if you've been following my posts: "Tea Party members are much more likely to say that they are 'very well informed' about global warming than the other groups," according to the Yale study. "Likewise, they are also much more likely to say they 'do not need any more information' about global warming to make up their mind."
In other words, Tea Party members are more extreme than Republicans in their rejection of the scientific consensus on global warming—simultaneously more wrong, and also more sure of themselves.
What's up with that?
Well, the study also shows that Tea Partiers are more likely than other Republicans to be "born again" Christians and to doubt evolution, and highly individualistic and anti-egalitarian in their moral values.
In short, what we appear to be seeing in them is a kind of merger of right wing free market views on the one hand, and the unwavering certainty associated with certain forms of fundamentalist religion on the other.
They know they're right, they know that liberals and scientists—and most of all, President Obama—are wrong, and there is no swaying them in that. (There is also some reason to think that Tea Party members are authoritarian in their outlook, wanting to impose various types of Christian views in government.)
When you merge this with previous data on white male conservatives and climate change, it becomes apparent that the person least likely to change his mind on this issue and accept the science is a 1) white 2) male 3) conservative 4) Tea Party American.
So what should we do? This gets back to the whole debate with Dave Roberts about whether to "beat" them by being better at politics. That's a tactical discussion where folks will differ, but one thing is clear–we're all better off in knowing precisely who the opposition is.
PeterS.Mizla replied on Permalink
Tea Party?
The Tea Party and most Libertarians by a large margin feel that global warming is a manufactured hoax to deny them 'freedom'- and to destroy the free enterprise system.
You can go over and over the data, the observations, the paleo climates of the past- and how CO2 throughout earths long geologic history has been responsible for massive climate change- but they still deny it all.
reasoning with these people is impossible- the truth will come however has climate change and its nasty and costly side effects kick in-
when their greedy bottom lines begin to suffer- they may begin to changer their minds.
The Tea Party is worried about 'Red's & 'Socialists' et al destroying the free enterprise system– the only thing going to bring down the free enterprise system is global warming- with a huge thud by around 2030-
as Bette Davis said in 'All About Eve' 'Fasten your Seat Belt- its Going to Be a Bumpy Night'
RickJames replied on Permalink
As long as we are making
As long as we are making predictions - here's mine:
Western industrial co2 emissions wil plunge precipitously in the next few years, thanks to massive unavoidable system wide economic crashes. People will riot. Living standards will plunge and organized crime will win the day.
So really nothing to worry about.
"People will riot. Living
"People will riot. Living standards will plunge and organized crime will win the day."
Isn't that in reality, what the Libertarians are actually voting for? In their minds, they are after Liberty!!! It's all about the liberty!! Let us have freedom!! In reality, they are parroting the dogma they have ingested from manipulators much smarter than themselves.
Libertarian fallacies:
1) Let us have freedom to carry weapons anywhere!!…until one of my family gets killed…then I'd like you to regulate.
2) Let us have less red tape on building practices!! It slows down growth!….Until someones husband is killed on a jobsite…..& in the end, when no one listens to their plea for action & investigation, they turn to the unions.
3) Let us have have no minimum wage!! It destroys our manufacturing sector these high wages!……Until your own wages are cut…then it's unfair & you can't survive on so little when everything is so expensive. Plus lets conveniently forget that Germany has a high wage system & still has a thriving manufacturing sector.
4) Let us have less bureaucrats , regulations & red tape on our industries & corporations!! It stifles growth & prevents job creation!! …….Hey! They got a machine to do my job, I thought they cared about people & jobs!? Hey, they just dumped a whole heap of waste on my property & when I complained, no one listened or came to my aid!! Useless government!!
Why stupid people are the most confident
A study was done on this. The termed coined is called the Dunning-Kruger Effect. Basically, some people are so dumb that they lack the cognitive ability to recognize that they are dumb.
I have long argued that trying to use logic and facts is a useless tactic with these people. Think of them like junior high schoolyard bullies. Their weakness is their egos. The best solution is to make them look and feel stupid. Better yet, embarrass them in front of a group of others (or on a message board). Get them laughed at. They will squirm away.
I know that many on the left shy away from these tactics because they "are too good for it".
I'm sorry, but denigration works against those with a mentality that doesn't know any better. Our desire to play fair only succeeds in getting our butts kicked.
I highly recommend watching the movie Thank You for Smoking. It gives useful insight into how this game is played.
RickJames replied on Permalink
"A study was done on this.
"A study was done on this. The termed coined is called the Dunning-Kruger Effect. Basically, some people are so dumb that they lack the cognitive ability to recognize that they are dumb."
It's not about ability - it's about assumptions being made about some specific field where a person has a less than complete education. Everyone is prone to this effect in areas in which they do not specialize.
"I have long argued that trying to use logic and facts is a useless tactic with these people. Think of them like junior high schoolyard bullies. Their weakness is their egos. The best solution is to make them look and feel stupid. Better yet, embarrass them in front of a group of others (or on a message board). Get them laughed at. They will squirm away."
If you enjoy advanced education in some particular field, why lower yourself to ridicule of others? Why don't you use some superior explanation and art of persuasion to make your logic and facts more palatable? Are you not smart enough to do that?
"I know that many on the left shy away from these tactics because they "are too good for it"."
Charitable. There is plenty of bitter anger and mean spirited contempt on the left. Of course there are exceptions but do you really think the left is particularly known for playing nice? I hadn't noticed.
"I'm sorry, but denigration works against those with a mentality that doesn't know any better. Our desire to play fair only succeeds in getting our butts kicked."
Maybe you should teach high school. tell those slackers how stupid they are. that'll fix em good
RickJames replied on Permalink
Libertarianism isn't a
Libertarianism isn't a perfect solution.
Just pointing out there are other unavoidable realities we are being faced with.
Having a laser focus on co2 is great and all that but if you stand back and take a look at the world, co2 is not the only game in town.
@ Rick James I hear what
@ Rick James
I hear what you are saying about the potential for worse economic collapse. And we need a functioning economy to tackle the issue of global warming.
However, I think the best path to improving the economic outlook includes development of clean energy and energy efficiency
GetEnergySmartNow has an interesting article today on jobs, that covers some of this, and more.
CO2 may not be the only issue, but it is the one that, if not dealt with, will likely ensure complete economic collapse, along with political collapse, societal collapse and maybe mass extinction in a human life time or two.
We can probably expect 4 C warming(from pre-industrial temps) by the end of the century, on a business as usual trajectory, something humans have never experienced. The most probable result would be complete collapse of civilization and collapse of ecosystems about 100 years hence. Food shortages from climate change would start many decades before then, and in fact may have already begun.
Above based on my guestimate of doubling of CO2 to about 560ppm by about 2080, for 3 C warming from pre-industrial time.
thegreenchick replied on Permalink
Tea Party worse than GOP
What I often say to deniers is that Americans support action against countries that demonstrate a less than one percent chance of having nuclear weapon capabilities. We protect ourselves against a less than five percent statistical chance our house will burn. We insure ourselves for the less than twenty percent chance we may get sick. The question they need to deal with is, "what if the science is right?"
Tea Partiers dismiss this logic because they have experts who inform them about such topics, like Sarah Palin. The public gets their education from subsidized coal and oil industry ads, overwhelmingly prolific on the airwaves, indoctrinating the under-informed with half-truths and twisted perspectives. The environmentally concerned would do better if they pooled resources to combat this media blast. Unfortunately, as long as the airwaves belong to wealthy industries and the news media remain only quasi-independent info-sources, the public will remain under or misinformed and pliable by those who perceive wealth in denial.
RickJames replied on Permalink
I will challenge that by
I will challenge that by pointing out that the very people who ridicule Palin and the Tea Party the most are pretty much all on board with Palin about what should be done about global warming.
The answer across a vast political spectrum is …. Do Nothing.
That's why Obama was all about health care and now is all about jobs.
No one with actual power has climate on their agenda. You can blame Palin and the Tea Party if you want but that's too easy.
Palin is hardly even a politician anymore. She just an occasional contributor on Fox and she gives some rah rah speeches and posts stuff on Facebook. She's not your problem.
"The answer across a vast
"The answer across a vast political spectrum is …. Do Nothing."
So Obama has almost mirrored people like Rick Perry & Michelle Bachman & said climate change is all a hoax & we should do nothing? Despite capitulating to the fossil fuel industry, I haven't heard Obama use any such language.
"That's why Obama was all about health care and now is all about jobs."
If it was all about the jobs he would remove fossil fuel subsidies & allow renewables to compete with fossil fuels on the free market. Thus creating millions of clean tech jobs. At least he wasn't busted like denier & liar for hire Chris Christie, who after a call from the Koch, dropped his green initiatives. Well not yet anyway.
If fossil fuels were the savior for the country, they would have saved it a long while ago. The fact is, the fossil fuel industry uses less & less labour to extract & process minerals. It's mostly a mechanized process now. The fossil fuel industry will make billionaires even richer, provide some government revenue, but provide relatively few jobs. It's the definition of insanity. Doing the same thing over & over & expecting a different result.
"Palin is hardly even a politician anymore."
Was hardly one in the first place.
"She just an occasional contributor on Fox and she gives some rah rah speeches and posts stuff on Facebook. She's not your problem."
She can nominate & run tomorrow if she decided to.
RickJames replied on Permalink
"Despite capitulating to the
"Despite capitulating to the fossil fuel industry, I haven't heard Obama use any such language."
well that's the point - words don't matter - actions do.
A good politician is going to say all the right things but that doesn't mean he fully believes it.
for example I live in Vancouver. I can go around telling people that it's an earthquake zone and we better get ready for the big one. But if I don't take the time and money to put together some survival supplies then I probably don't really believe it's coming or that it's anything to really be concerned about.
Unlike most people I actually have a good survival pack.
"well that's the point -
well that's the point - words don't matter - actions do.
A good politician is going to say all the right things but that doesn't mean he fully believes it."
It's a bit hard when the Republicans only objective is their own interests & not the interests of the country. They are now there only to oppose. As a GOP insider who left has now exposed.
"It should have been evident to clear-eyed observers that the Republican Party is becoming less and less like a traditional political party in a representative democracy and becoming more like an apocalyptic cult, or one of the intensely ideological authoritarian parties of 20th century Europe. This trend has several implications, none of them pleasant."
"Far from being a rarity, virtually every bill, every nominee for Senate confirmation and every routine procedural motion is now subject to a Republican filibuster. Under the circumstances, it is no wonder that Washington is gridlocked: legislating has now become war minus the shooting, something one could have observed 80 years ago in the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic. As Hannah Arendt observed, a disciplined minority of totalitarians can use the instruments of democratic government to undermine democracy itself."
"A couple of years ago, a Republican committee staff director told me candidly (and proudly) what the method was to all this obstruction and disruption. Should Republicans succeed in obstructing the Senate from doing its job, it would further lower Congress's generic favorability rating among the American people. By sabotaging the reputation of an institution of government, the party that is programmatically against government would come out the relative winner."


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Photos: Pride, passion, music and fireworks at Paralympic...
The Games are over and the athletes and ...
Monday set to be busiest day for airport and Canada Line
The exodus of people through Vancouver's airport Monday after the Olympics end is expected to set records.
Photograph by: Ian Smith , Canwest News Service
The Canada Line from downtown Vancouver to Vancouver International Airport will run all night tonight, TransLink has announced.
Normally the service is shut down for a period overnight to allow for maintenance but with a record number of persons flying out from the airport once the Olympic Games end today the system will be kept running, said TransLink CEO Ian Jarvis.
"All rail rapid transit services are normally shut down for daily maintenance, which is why they do not run 24/7. This is a very special circumstance with so many people planning to fly out of Vancouver immediately after the games," Jarvis said.
Monday is expected to be the busiest day in the history of the airport with 39,000 travellers and 77,000 pieces of luggage passing through the terminal.
The Vancouver International Airport Authority has implemented a number of measures to ease passengers through the airport including increasing staff levels, off-site check-in facilities at the Athletes Village and has set up an auxiliary terminal on Sea Island.
However, air travellers are advised to check ww.yvr.ca for the latest flight information before leaving for the airport.
While the Canada Line to the airport will be kept open the Canada Line to Richmond will be closed at its usual time.
The service to the airport will involve ten trains running at six minute intervals.
The trains will be able to move 3,300 passengers an hour.