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September 13, 2012
Guests: Joe Klein, Nia-Malika Henderson, Robin Wright, David Ignatius, Dana Milbank, Bob Woodward, Major Garrett
CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Obama commands, Romney complains.
Let`s play HARDBALL.
Good evening. I`m Chris Matthews in Washington.
"Let Me Start" with this. Tonight, President Obama leads the search
for the killers in Libya, for justice for the murders of four Americans in
the line of duty. His political rival, Mitt Romney, meanwhile continues
his desperate attempt to justify his craven effort to exploit the death of
the Ambassador Chris Stevens and the others.
For the critics of Romney`s conduct, the one question is, What made
him do it? Was it the trigger-happy politics of a candidate suffering in
the polls, or more dangerous still, the hawkish urge to attack of Romney`s
ever-ready circle of neocon handlers? Or could it be both?
President Obama benefits from the shared experience and wisdom of top
national security and foreign policy advisers, many of them career
professionals. His rival, on the other hand, is surrounded by a corporals
guard of campaign hotshots and right-wing ideologues randy for the next
Mideast war front. Imagine trying to repeat -- or rather, to reap on-the-
spot wisdom from that posse.
Joining me now to sketch out both war fronts is Joe Klein of "Time"
and Nia-Malika Henderson of "The Washington Post."
Today again President Obama was resolute and clearly in command of a
chaotic Middle East situation as he campaigned in Colorado. Let`s listen
to the president.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: What I want all of you
to know is that we are going to bring those who killed our fellow Americans
to justice.
OBAMA: I want people around the world to hear me. To all those who
would do us harm, no act of terror will go unpunished. It will not dim the
light of the values that we proudly present to the rest of the world. No
act of violence shakes the resolve of the United States of America.
MATTHEWS: And the president`s on the case. He sent two U.S. warships
to the Libyan coast. He sent Marines into Tripoli. And the attorney
general, Eric Holder, said today the FBI has opened up an investigation
into the attack that killed those four Americans.
Contrast that with what Mitt Romney did today campaigning in Virginia.
Let`s listen to him.
MITT ROMNEY (R-MA), FMR. GOV., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: As we watch
the world today, sometimes it seems that we`re at the mercy of events
instead of shaping events. And a strong America`s essential to shape
events, and a strong America, by the way, depends on a strong military.
This president has done something I find very hard to understand. Ever
since FDR, we`ve had the capacity to be engaged in two conflicts at once,
and he`s saying, No, we`re going to cut that back to only one conflict.
MATTHEWS: Joe Klein, thank you because you`ve got a big-picture look
at this. What is Romney talking about that`s relevant to our ability to
deal up front with these local situations where a group of militants in
some place like Benghazi decide to go after the American embassy, or the
same or at both times going after one an embassy and our ambassador --
ambassador`s -- the embassy itself in Cairo, in Egypt?
What does being able to fight two big land wars have to do with that?
That`s what I don`t get.
JOE KLEIN, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Well, you know, once again, the guy
doesn`t know what he`s talking about, or he`s 25 years out of date. The
two-war strategy was a product of the cold war, when we had to have the
ability to fight the Russians on the plains of Europe and fight the Chinese
on the Korean peninsula at the same time. That costs an awful lot of
But we`re facing a very different sort of threat now, a more amorphous
threat -- you know, al Qaeda, terrorism, and so on. And so the military
has abandoned the two-war strategy. And obviously, Romney wants -- he
still thinks that the Soviet Union exists and is the greatest threat we
have out there.
I mean, it`s really remarkable that a guy who is as smart as he is is
so ill-informed on these essential issues of military doctrine.
MATTHEWS: Nia-Malika Henderson, could it be that he`s surrounded,
Mitt Romney, by neocons, who really do have a strong intellectual footing
in the cold war scenarios, where they really do have a more -- I hate to
say this, but an intellectual comfort in that kind of manichean struggle
between East and West, between us and the Russians, and they`ve never
really adapted to the situation where no matter how many troops we had in
Benghazi, you can`t fire on a crowd and start mowing people down who are
coming across the wall in a host country. You can`t do that.
And yet they think -- he`s talking about all we need are higher force
levels to deal with these very tricky ethnic and religious situations
stirred up by some crazies out in California.
NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, "WASHINGTON POST": That`s right. He is
surrounded by neocons from the Bush administration, people that Colin
Powell too far to the right in terms of what he believed was the right
course for American foreign policy.
Part of Mitt Romney`s foreign policy is that he wants to expand the
military by 100,000 troops, bring up the level of support to 4 percent of
the GDP, and that plays really well in a state like Virginia, where there
is a big military population.
But I think it does go up against the fact that Americans are weary of
war at this point. We already experienced a time where we did have two
large land wars going on at the same time and we saw what that did to the
So he`s very much going up against a different reality in terms of
what Americans want. But then again, he has these neocons who are
surrounding him that were part of the push to war with Iraq that, of
course, Americans have since turned against and judged to be a war that was
not worth fighting.
MATTHEWS: You know, one of the questions everybody in this business
seems to have in journalism is, What`s going on with Romney in the day that
things (ph) happened? That moment when something happens, like we had this
situation in Libya, simultaneously in Cairo, and he puts out a statement
attacking what he calls the disgraceful behavior of President Obama before
he knows what`s going on.
Who`s pushing that button saying, Release this statement, attack,
attack, attack? Who`s doing that "Tora tora" thing in his campaign, Joe?
KLEIN: Well, I don`t know who`s doing it, but it seems to be his own
impulse, and it has been consistently in this campaign on matters not only
foreign but also domestic. But it really is unseemly when you have
American embassies under assault for a presidential candidate to start
playing politics with it.
And as you said before, there are people on his foreign policy
advisory staff who are neoconservatives who just don`t reflect, you know,
the views of a majority of the foreign policy establishment or of the
American people.
MATTHEWS: Any chance of a shake-up, Nia, before we go on here? Any
chance Romney`s going to say, I`m surrounded by idiots, nobody around me`s
giving good advice, I have the wrong impulses, save me with somebody new?
Any talk of that?
HENDERSON: Well, I don`t think there`s any talk of that, but what I
have heard from people who are close to Boston is that it`s sort of a
chaotic situation in Boston headquarters, somebody who just started, sort
of arrived and said that things in terms of the communication and strategy
of the place, that maybe it does need a shake-up.
I think the problem with that would be what sort of message would that
send? Republicans are already doing lots of hand-wringing about this
campaign, about this candidate. And one of the problems -- obviously, when
you have a presidential campaign, it in and of itself -- it can be an
argument for the White House, an argument for what sort of White House you
would run.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
HENDERSON: So I think to have this sort of shake-up at this late
date, it certainly wouldn`t send a lot of confidence to voters or
Republican donors who at one point had a lot of confidence in Mitt Romney,
but now they seem to think that he is still fighting, I mean, not only the
cold war but fighting the primary and that he`s still tugging to the right
and hasn`t moved to the center quickly enough.
MATTHEWS: Well said. "The Wall Street Journal" columnist Peggy
Noonan, who I read every week, gave a withering assessment of the way
Romney handled his comments on that Benghazi murders that killed Chris
Stevens over there and the whole question of the Middle East violence.
Here`s what Peggy Noonan had to say. Let`s listen.
PEGGY NOONAN, "WALL STREET JOURNAL" COLUMNIST: Romney looked weak
today, I feel. I mean, I`m still kind of absorbing it myself. But at one
point, he had a certain slight grimace on his face when he was taking tough
questions from the reporters, and I thought, He looks like Richard Nixon.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Wow.
NOONAN: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Wow.
MATTHEWS: Well, he does, actually, there. And she wasn`t alone.
Later in a "Wall Street Journal" interview, Ms. Noonan delivered the velvet
hammer. Let`s listen to this.
NOONAN: Of course, he`s trying to focus on the economy. It is the
great immediate issue in all of our lives. But foreign policy is always
there. I think Romney`s (INAUDIBLE) is that this is what there`s an
opening for in America`s thinking about foreign policy now, the statement
of and the holding high of a grand strategy that says, This is America`s
role in the world now, this is what we intend to do, these are what our
challenges are, this is how we mean to meet them.
Do (ph) you (ph) have (ph) any (ph) (INAUDIBLE) vague ad hoc
unconnected statements about whatever foreign policy issue comes up. What
is your grand strategy, which means what is your thinking as you look at
the world?
MATTHEWS: That`s a powerful question by her. And anyway, my
colleague, Joe Scarborough, in a Politico column today, got to the core of
Romney`s problem, as he sees it. He writes, quote, "If we want to win the
battle of ideas in the long term" -- he`s talking about the Republican side
-- "we should be willing to face the fact that Mitt Romney`s likely to
lose, and should, given that he`s neither a true conservative nor a
courageous moderate. He`s just an ambitious man. Nothing wrong with that
except when you`re going to (ph) be president, you should be more than
Let me go back to that whole question. Joe, I keep thinking, What`s
Romney`s mission in life? Why does he want to be president? It`s a fair
question. What do you want to do in the world? What`s your view of the
United States` role in the world, besides this truculence that, I`m going
to be tougher and all this BS, basically -- basically, a guy who`s had no
military experience in his family, he keeps talking about how tough he`s
going to be. That`s a metaphor.
But what does it mean translated into U.S. policy? What does he want
to do, Joe?
KLEIN: Well, the scary thing about this campaign is that -- is that
we don`t have any idea what he wants to do or which policies he`s going to
support. I mean, you know, this has been, I think, an insult to the
intelligence of the American people because of the lack of details, the
lack of -- of -- you know, of content here.
And you know, you watch -- you know, we saw the stock market go up 200
points today. And when people -- you know, Romney is allegedly running on
the economy. Well, for most people, the economy isn`t the unemployment
figures, the economy is two things, your house value and your 401(k).
Housing values are going back up, and the market is almost back to where it
was almost four years ago. So the one thing that he had, he doesn`t really
MATTHEWS: And consumer confidence is also going up, Joe. I want to
talk about something here -- first of all, Nia, respond to that -- this
question I have about Romney. Do you, following the campaign, expect that
someday he`ll go to Georgetown or George Washington University, somewhere,
or up at BU or somewhere, and give us a grand look at the world that Mitt
Romney would like to lead America into?
Is he going to do that to respond to this sort of tit for tat game
he`s been playing and losing here?
HENDERSON: I don`t think so. I think we`ve had these expectations
all along the way that he would do that. Remember when we went down to
Florida and he was supposed to lay out an immigration strategy? Turned out
that it wasn`t very much different than what he`d already laid out. Same
thing happened this week. When he went to Reno, Nevada, people had thought
that he was going to roll out a more robust foreign policy plan. John
McCain was asking him to get really tough on President Obama. He didn`t do
This is a candidate that believes the more details that he lays out
there, the tougher road it`s going to be. He also believes that Americans
will wake up on that first Tuesday in November and realize that the economy
is horrible and that they will lay the blame solely at the feet of Barack
MATTHEWS: And if it isn`t? And if it isn`t?
HENDERSON: And that`s the problem. And I think, in some ways, that`s
why you see them trying to widen this conversation in some ways. They did
that with Welfare. They`ve done that here with foreign policy.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
HENDERSON: They in some ways did that with Medicare. But -- but I
think, ultimately, their bet is that in November, they`ll get some -- we`ll
get some bad news in terms of the economy. But I do agree with Joe, things
are looking up in terms of the economy.
MATTHEWS: Yes. OK.
HENDERSON: And people also blame Bush, as well.
KLEIN: Chris, could I...
MATTHEWS: My -- very quickly, Joe. Very quickly.
KLEIN: No, that -- well, that -- that`s OK, then.
MATTHEWS: OK, good. My quick thought is that presidents -- we always
ignore the fact -- there`s a lag effect. When George Herbert Walker Bush
did some good work on the economy, it helped Bill Clinton when he came into
office. Ronald Reagan`s real economic successes came in his second term.
Common sense tells you when you change U.S. economic policy, it`s like
turning around a big battleship. It takes a while to have an influence.
If Obama starts to get successes now, they`re a result of what he did a
couple of years ago. And that`s common sense.
Thank you, Joe Klein, and thank you, Nia-Malika Henderson.
HENDERSON: Thank you, Chris.
MATTHEWS: Coming up: While Mitt Romney embarrassed himself, most
believe, trying to paint Obama as a terrorist sympathizer, here`s a
question. Where are the Republicans criticizing that film that started
some of this mess over there, that crazy anti-Islamic film out of LA?
Where`s Romney on this? In fact, Mitt Romney doesn`t like criticizing the
fringe right on just about anything.
Also, could this be just the latest incident in which Romney has shown
a tin ear for politics? It was Romney, by the way, who managed to insult
Britain on the eve of their own Olympics. Maybe the guy should have stuck
to business.
And Bob Woodward tonight -- he`s coming here -- on last year`s debt
crisis and who was to blame for the failure to reach an agreement between
Boehner and Obama.
Finally, "Let Me Finish" tonight with a man who hopes to become
president by saying -- nothing. Ask President Dewey. Remember him,
President Dewey, how that worked out for him?
And please come back at 7:00 o`clock Eastern time tonight. We`re
going to have the brand-new NBC News/"Wall Street Journal" Marist poll
numbers on the three most important states in the union politically --
Florida, Ohio and Virginia. Wait`ll you catch these numbers in the 7:00
o`clock show.
And this is HARDBALL, the place for politics.
MATTHEWS: Well, the supreme court in Pennsylvania heard arguments
today about the state`s strict new voter photo ID law. Well, that`s the
law Republicans pushed through so that, in the words of their top leader
there, Mitt Romney can win the election in November.
Well, the state estimates as many as three quarters of a million
voters may -- many of them elderly or African-American or both -- doesn`t
have the requisite photo ID to vote. And the state conceded there have
been no recent investigations or prosecutions against anyone in the state
for voter fraud.
Well, the court`s ruling could come tomorrow or sometime next week.
What a big ruling that`s going to be.
We`ll be right back.
MATTHEWS: Back to HARDBALL. For two days now, Mitt Romney`s response
to the violence in Libya and Egypt and his decision to try to score
political points on it has earned him criticism, even from some in his own
party. But how about the things Romney didn`t say? Namely, why hasn`t he
condemned the brutally offensive film that was at least partly responsible
for this violence in the Middle East? Well, "The Washington Post"
editorial board wrote, quote, today, "The movie is a despicable piece of
bigotry. It was striking that Mr. Romney had nothing to say about such
hatred directed at a major religious faith."
With me now is "The Washington Post" columnist and associate editor
David Ignatius and Robin Wright from the Woodrow Wilson Center.
I like both of you because you`re great people, but also you know the
Middle East. And you`ve been over there and you know a good part of this
world is Islamic. Now, the United States isn`t largely Islamic, we`re
largely Christian. But the fact is, there`s a big part of the world that
just is Islamic.
Wanting to pick a fight wit Islam is insane. There`s a billion
Islamic people who are born that way. There`s 350,000 Arabs born that way.
Why would you want to make them hate you?
My question is, why didn`t Mitt Romney at some point in the last 48
hours say, I hate people that want to stir up trouble between the two
largest religions? Your thought.
ROBIN WRIGHT, WOODROW WILSON CENTER: Well, I think...
MATTHEWS: Why doesn`t he say something?
WRIGHT: I think there are a couple of things. First of all, you have
this attack on the American embassy that some -- in some ways is eerily
reminiscent of 1979 and the takeover of the American embassy in Tehran.
And this was an election that hinged in large part, Ronald Reagan`s defeat
of Jimmy Carter, on how that crisis was handled, how it dragged out.
And the Republican Party may be calculating that they`re waiting to
see how this plays out, if it escalates particularly Friday, the Muslim day
of prayer.
But there`s that other domestic component of his own religious right
within the party, and there may be many who are sympathetic to anti-Muslim
sentiment or who are skeptical that the cultural gap can be bridged. And
so I think there are a number of -- of factors, but I think...
MATTHEWS: You mean the right wants to go to war with Islam? That`s
what you`re saying.
WRIGHT: Well, not necessarily, but I think there is a religious right
that is very suspicious of other religions and...
MATTHEWS: And therefore, what do they want to do about it? What do
they want our policy to be in regard to Islamic reality in the world?
What`s their goal, to get rid of it?
WRIGHT: No, but I think there are those who are still deeply
suspicious 30 years after the takeover of the American embassy about
whether the bridge can be crossed between the Islamic world and the West.
And there are some who fundamentally just believe that the cultural divide
is too deep ever to be healed.
MATTHEWS: You know, David, you watch politics here, you watch it around
the world, the endless drumbeat in this country of dog whistles and
everything else about Barack Obama may be a Muslim himself. The other day
they were calling him sympathizing. You heard it from -- what is his name?
I can never get the name right. Priebus, the Republican chair, Reince
Priebus, he went out there saying the president sympathizes with the
attackers against our embassy, the same -- he was echoing basically what
Mitt Romney had said a few minutes before when he put out the word.
This idea that somehow Obama is sympathizing with our enemies has been
a relentless little thing out there using the argument, well, he`s not
really one of us, he`s one of them.
But now you have the problem of an active front now, a heated front in
Benghazi and in Cairo. What is the argument between the two parties on how
to address those situations?
DAVID IGNATIUS, COLUMNIST, "THE WASHINGTON POST": Well, the serious
argument that Mitt Romney should be having and that I hope we will have
down the road in the debates is, what is a strong America all about in the
21st century and especially now in the midst of these Arab revolutions?
What is the right policy for the United States to adopt? And Mitt
Romney has an argument. He did make it today in a more temperate set of
remarks, where he basically said to the country that Barack Obama is Jimmy
Carter, that American weakness has brought on this level of disorder in the
world and that, as Robin said a moment ago, this is 1979 all over again.
I think Barack Obama can rebut that. I think that he can say that to
the extent that we`re going to war with the Muslim world, we`re just
digging ourselves in deeper.
I will cite one thing for you, Chris. When I read Osama bin Laden`s
private communications that were taken out of his compound when he was
killed, one of the things that was most striking was how upset he was that
-- that Barack Obama had stopped talking about a war on Muslims, and had
started talking about a war on al Qaeda.
It drove bin Laden crazy, to the point that he wanted to change al
Qaeda`s name. He wanted to rebrand it. Now, that`s the clearest testimony
you could possibly get from Osama bin Laden that trying to do this divisive
thing, war on Muslims, just plays into the extremists` hands.
You have it from the man himself, so what more can you say?
MATTHEWS: Robin, I think that was great reporting there. I didn`t
know that before, that the bad guy of all bad guys said this is the smart
strategy from America, don`t focus on Islam, which will just stir up an
East-West war you will lose or will never end. Focus on the bad guys
themselves, and then Obama not only talks that way, he`s out killing these
guys, including the guy who rendered that opinion, bin Laden.
WRIGHT: Yes.
And the Obama administration has tried to make that point in the
campaign. General Motors is still alive and...
MATTHEWS: How can you say he`s weak? He had Robert Gates there, Leon
Panetta in there. He`s been hawkish. He`s been using drones, killing one
after another. He knocks off the -- I don`t see anything to justify the
word weak. You could argue after Desert One, Jimmy Carter looked weak
because the mission failed. It was a horrendous failure. But what`s the
point now?
WRIGHT: Well, look, this is also a particularly delicate moment.
Everyone is very concerned within the State Department and
intelligence community about what happens elsewhere in the Islamic world.
You have already seen the protests in Libya and Egypt expand to whether
it`s Kashmir or Pakistan, to -- and the danger that this becomes much
bigger and that the kind of conciliatory position that the Obama
administration has taken might make it look weak down the road, when in
fact it has been...
MATTHEWS: Certainly, you have to attack anti-Islamic stupidity. It`s
coming out of Los Angeles or the Reverend, what`s his name, Terry Jones or
any of these characters.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton did that today. She took the
opportunity to denounce the offensive video coming out of L.A. and to say
that Romney hadn`t done so. Let`s watch the secretary.
HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: Let me state very
clearly -- and I hope is it obvious -- that the United States government
had absolutely nothing to do with this video. We absolutely reject its
content and message.
MATTHEWS: Why doesn`t Romney say that? Would that offend one of his
Who would be offended if Mitt Romney were to come out and say, I may
disagree with the president on foreign policy, but these people that keep
stirring up wars by burning Korans, flush them down the toilet, peeing on
them, whatever they`re doing lately, is nothing but killing American
soldiers, David?
IGNATIUS: Chris, Romney has painted himself into a corner as the no
apology guy, Mr. Never Back Down.
There are a lot of people on the Republican right who are -- have
bought into this idea that there`s a clash of civilizations going on. You
see this every day on the Internet. And I guess Romney, in a kind of a
political opportunist`s way, doesn`t want to offend people who are going to
be supporters of his.
But I do think he`s got to break out of that. He just -- every time a
foreign policy issue comes up, he hits a clinker. And he just comes across
as a guy who doesn`t have a feel for the way the world works, who talks in
sound bites and epithets. And I think it`s going to hurt him.
We will see in the debates whether he can form a coherent argument
about American power and how the world works. But he ain`t done it so far.
WRIGHT: Yes. He looks clumsy and slow when it comes to any of these
crises. And he keeps putting his foot in his mouth when he`s gone abroad.
And I think that`s a problem for him. Wait and see is not going to
work in his favor on this very volatile issue.
MATTHEWS: Yes. Well, it`s one thing to be a robot. It`s another
thing to be a robot rigged for the right.
MATTHEWS: Anyway, thank you, David Ignatius. Thank you, Robin
I don`t know if I like his networking in that brain of his.
Up next, as everyone knows, Chris Christie is a Bruce Springsteen fan,
but so far Springsteen hasn`t returned the love. So, what is about that?
Anyway, the "Sideshow" is coming up next with some Jersey news.
This is HARDBALL, the place for politics.
MATTHEWS: First, some technology buzz.
Jimmy Kimmel took to the streets to get some pedestrian input on a new
device, or what they thought was a new device. Mitt Romney gets a nod here
in the tech talk.
JIMMY KIMMEL, HOST, "JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE": We told people outside to
check out the new iPhone 5, which is unavailable so far. In reality, what
they were looking at is the current iPhone 4S that everyone has.
KIMMEL: And, well, here`s how that experiment played out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, it`s way better.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That`s nice. It looks like the screen is a little
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Faster, lighter.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Feels heavier.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lot lighter than the last one. It`s a lot
faster as well.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you drop it, it looks like it`s not going to
break, like this one has a million times.
KIMMEL: The company Fujitsu and Japan`s National Institute of
Informatics have teamed up to create a robot that they hope will be able to
pass the entrance exam at Tokyo University.
We`re already way ahead of Japan on this one. American researchers
have already created a robot that`s smart enough to be president of the
United States.
KIMMEL: And that`s him.
MATTHEWS: I don`t think Romney`s ever going to escape the robot
Romney zingers.
Also, over the weekend, Florida pizzeria owner Scott Van Duzer grabbed
headlines for giving President Obama a bear hug -- there he is -- and
hoisting him up off the ground. Well, Van Duzer has dubbed his embrace the
Which politician, by the way, swung by the restaurant yesterday
looking for the same action? The clue? He`s already been the subject of a
high-profile hug. It`s former Florida Governor Charlie Crist. He`s got
something in common with Van Duzer when it comes to not toeing the line of
political parties. Crist used to be a Republican, is now a -- I guess you
would call him a Democrat-leaning independent backing President Obama.
Van Duzer is a Republican, but says he`s voting for President Obama in
November, just as he did in 2008. As for that other high-profile hug I
mentioned, you know the one, Crist with Obama back in 2009, the former
governor said Obama`s hug with Van Duzer puts that one -- quote -- "to
Next, all it takes is a look at Chris Christie`s recent interview with
Jimmy Fallon to recall that he`s a big Bruce Springsteen fan.
JIMMY FALLON, HOST, "LATE NIGHT WITH JIMMY FALLON": I have been to
Springsteen shows where the guy that screams all the words louder than
Bruce Springsteen me, pumping his fists.
Could you do a little "Thunder Road" or something?
GOV. CHRIS CHRISTIE (R), NEW JERSEY: Me and you?
FALLON: Yes, I will do it with you.
MATTHEWS: Unfortunately for Christie, Springsteen hasn`t shown any
sign of returning the love.
So imagine the shock when a later from Springsteen recently arrived at
the governor`s office. A truce? Far from it. The letter was from
Springsteen`s 20-year-old daughter, Jessica, an accomplished equestrian.
She was pressing the governor to sign a bill banning the slaughter of
horses in New Jersey.
Well, the bill was passed by the legislature in Jersey. It is still
sitting on the governor`s desk.
By the way, Springsteen`s song "We Take Care of Our Own" was played
after President Obama`s DNC speech last week. There was a whopping
increase in sales, we`re talking over 400 percent, in the days following
the event. Wow. That`s marketing power.
Up next, brand new poll numbers from the three states that could
decide this election: Florida, Ohio and Virginia. And we now have a clear
leader in all three.
And that`s ahead. And you`re watching it, HARDBALL, the place for
MATTHEWS: Welcome back to HARDBALL.
Both Mitt Romney and Barack Obama are focusing a lot of their
attention on three key states this November, obviously -- Ohio, Florida,
and Virginia. And according to new poll numbers, today, Romney is at a big
disadvantage in all three states.
Here`s the latest NBC News/"Wall Street Journal"/Marist poll:
In Florida, Obama now has a five-point lead over Romney over likely
voters. That`s key.
In Virginia, the president also has a five-point lead here, 49-44,
among likely voters.
In Ohio, the president has a seven-point lead. Romney gets 43 percent
of the likely voters, to the president`s 50 percent.
All told, that`s bad news for Romney, and leads to the question: what
can Romney do to turn things around?
Chuck Todd is NBC News political director and chief White House
correspondent, and Major Garrett is White House correspondent for "The
National Journal."
Gentlemen, starting with you, Chuck.
CHUCK TODD, NBC NEWS: Yes.
MATTHEWS: I don`t know what all of this means because I still see the
debates coming, four and a half hours of razzmatazz, who knows what`s going
to happen?
TODD: And I think you can say it`s so far of the bounce. Our polls
are conducted Sunday through Tuesday. And that`s still in the -- as a
Republican reminded me when they heard about these numbers, hey, don`t
forget, it`s part of the bounce.
MATTHEWS: The sugar high, as they call it.
TODD: Which also tells me, they know the numbers are pretty right,
where the race is right now.
MATTHEWS: OK, what`s interesting --
MAJOR GARRETT, NATIONAL JOURNAL: It`s still a high.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
TODD: Yes.
MATTHEWS: This is a very rigid electorate. People basically have
decided who they like of these two candidates. This is a big -- is this
real? Is this any less real, this five-point lead, that we`ve seen before?
GARRETT: Well, the fundamentals remain the fundamentals. But one
thing that is interesting, in addition to this polling data, that the three
polls taken after the two conventions, right track, wrong track, the 10
polls in August taken before the conventions had the right track number on
average of 31 percent. The three taken after the party conventions had the
right track at 38 percent.
People felt better about the country after watching the convention.
TODD: Same thing you saw here.
GARRETT: Was the Democratic convention.
MATTHEWS: By the way, economic optimism is also going up and studies
of consumer optimism.
TODD: I think this is a Bill Clinton --
MATTHEWS: People really feel better about the country because of
TODD: Honestly --
TODD: No, no, I think it`s the Bill Clinton and I say this because he
sat there and his job was to explain, OK, you think the country is off the
wrong track but I`m here to tell you it`s on the right track.
MATTHEWS: He took away the fear.
TODD: Who was in charge of the right track speech? Not the
president, it was Bill Clinton. So I`m glad that Major brought this up on
TODD: The most important thing and the people --
MATTHEWS: As David Gregory would say, unpack that (ph).
TODD: Right.
MATTHEWS: Why was the president able to sort of take away some of the
fear of the economic future.
TODD: Well, he was trying to explain why is the economy not getting
better, is it going to get better? And so, the president`s job was to
explain, look, I couldn`t make it any better than it is today but trust me,
it`s on the way back. And I have credibility, you remember me, I`m the guy
who did it, who created --
MATTHEWS: Well, I`m amazed that the objective sense of things getting
better because of a political event. That`s pretty amazing.
GARRETT: Not only that. But if you look at the underlying numbers in
Ohio, Florida and Virginia, Mitt Romney does not have the lead among white
voters he needs to carry those states. The president is running more
competitively than they would like to see, and he`s not winning with upper
income voters nearly by as much as he would need to. He`s not putting a
distance between himself and the president.
MATTHEWS: Let`s take a look at the president`s job approval numbers,
which are the key in all three states. In Ohio, 53 percent think he`s
doing a good job. In Florida and Virginia, his approval is 49, it`s a very
close to where it has to be.
TODD: It`s a ballot test. Look, his job approval and the ballot test
will be the same number on Election Day.
MATTHEWS: Ballot test --
TODD: Meaning, the ballot test right now with Romney is what, 49 in
Florida, 49 in Virginia. What`s the approval rating -- 49-49.
Another way to watch these polls, by the way, and I`ve talked with
both campaigns and they agree with this, if the president is sitting at 47,
(INAUDIBLE) in the election, he loses. If he`s at 48, we`re at the coin
toss. Forty-nine or obviously 50 -- but at 49, he`ll find the one point he
gets to 50 and he`s going to win re-election. So that 49 number is a big
deal to beat.
MATTHEWS: So, is it a referendum or is it a choice?
TODD: Yes, it`s both.
MATTHEWS: Yes, thanks for --
TODD: Of course it is.
GARRETT: Of course it`s both. But it has become more of a choice and
a more clearly defined choice aspect of that decision than it was before
the convention before Paul Ryan was put on --
MATTHEWS: I`ve got you two heavyweights here, I`ve got a question for
you. It`s about what we`ve been talking about the whole show. Who`s in
the room when Romney when he has to make a quick call, to say something
about what just happened to Libya, to say something (INAUDIBLE) Obama, for
that quick opportunity in that news cycle? Who is in that room and tell
him what to do, help him with that quick decision because there`s been a
real question if he`s doing it right?
TODD: My understanding is he trusts a couple of people in that room.
One I think is Stuart Stevens. I think the other is Bob White, somebody
who`s been with him since the Bain days.
But a lot of that is him. I mean, that`s what people need to
understand about Mitt Romney, is that he`s more in charge of his campaign
than I think people in the political class appreciate.
You know, we in the political class -- there`s too many people --
who`s really running things in who`s the Karl Rove?
MATTHEWS: Let`s take a shot at the president, who says this?
TODD: I think there was -- the guys traveling with him were pushing
him to do it.
MATTHEWS: Was it neocon ideology or political opportunism?
TODD: Don`t forget --
MATTHEWS: Which one --
TODD: Mitt Romney -- oh, I think this is part of a fight he`s been
trying to pick for a while. Remember the title of his book, "No Apology."
So, he`s been wanting, this is a fight he`s been wanting. He wants to
prove -- everybody says, no, no, he can`t win on foreign policy. He`s sort
of -- it`s almost like a chip on his shoulder, he wants to prove --
GARRETT: And it will be incumbent upon him, if he`s going to make an
argument, about the president`s policies, post-Arab Spring. He`s going to
have to define what`s wrong with it and what he would do differently. And
if he doesn`t, then this will look more and more overtime like opportunism.
MATTHEWS: Who he`s apologizing --
TODD: No, no, no, I think he`s with more aggressive, the John Bolton
wing of the Republican Party.
MATTHEWS: Yes, they want to fight it generally.
TODD: But you know what? He doesn`t have an answer to the question -
- would you have pushed Mubarak out?
MATTHEWS: Yes.
TODD: He didn`t have it. I asked him that direct question. He
wouldn`t say.
GARRETT: And he fell all over the map in Libya when he was asked to -
MATTHEWS: Would you fire on a crowd if they were approaching the
embassy? There`s the question that comes down. You can`t fire on a crowd
and start killing people.
TODD: Not, in foreign country.
MATTHEWS: No, you can`t.
Anyway, more in the polls. There are also some new numbers in the
Senate races in the big three states.
In Ohio, Senator Sherrod Brown was on the show yesterday, he`s got a
seven-point lead among likely voters. That`s a good number to be against
Josh Mandel.
In Florida, Democrat Bill Nelson has a 14-point over Connie Mack.
And look at Virginia, this one is too close to call. Tim Kaine and
George Allen, dead even at 46.
My thought about Virginia is really a problem. That`s a challenge.
For some reason, Allen is doing well.
TODD: And Allen is doing better than Romney. Allen is doing two
points better than Romney and the difference is with independent voters.
Independent voters, Allen is doing better with independent voters than
MATTHEWS: You can see it`s more conservative and a --
TODD: Well, they have been pounding Kaine and trying to tie him to a
more liberal wing of the Democratic Party. We`ll see, Kaine -- I still
can`t figure out how Kaine loses if the president carries the state.
MATTHEWS: Well, who`s the last liberal senator from Virginia?
TODD: No.
MATTHEWS: Is there ever been a liberal senator from Virginia?
GARRETT: Not classically defined.
TODD: Some Republicans might say it`s John Warner, you know?
MATTHEWS: He`s a moderate conservative. But really --
GARRETT: Chris, can I lay down something to the table? It`s
something to watch as this race develops.
If Romney cannot spring back and get closer to Obama and put more of
these states credibly in play, what you may begin to see in these Senate
races is Republicans adopting a message they would not do it now, check on
power. Obama might win, elect a Republican to restrain what Obama --
TODD: What Haley Barbour did in `96, remember he`s running the RNC?
GARRETT: It hasn`t happened yet.
TODD: They threw Dole under the bus.
MATTHEWS: -- is that Paul Ryan is running for reelection as a
congressman in Wisconsin.
TODD: However, to his -- wait a minute, his TV ads, though, are on
national message.
MATTHEWS: OK. What he`s running for reelection.
Anyway, thank you, Chuck Todd -- Plan B, stay where you are.
Major Garrett, thank you.
Ever wonder what a candidate who knows he has a problem with women
voters looks like? Check this out.
That`s Mitt Romney campaigning today in Fairfax surrounded by -- well,
look, who`s behind him? Nothing but women -- everyone on that stage is
obviously a woman. I don`t have to tell you that. In fact, all for the
introductions at that Fairfax, Virginia, rally today were made by woman.
Up next, investigative journalist Bob Woodward joins us to talk about
who is to blame in last year`s debt crisis?
This is HARDBALL, the place for politics.
MATTHEWS: We`ve got new polling from Michigan and Montana, two states
with critical Senate races. Let`s check the HARDBALL scoreboard.
First to Michigan where Senator Debbie Stabenow has 11-point lead over
Republican Pete Hoekstra. That`s according to a new Epic-MRA poll.
In Montana, a much closer race, Senator Jon Tester, the Democrat, is
leading Republican Denny Rehberg by just two. Tester is ahead, 45-43.
Now, the presidential race on those two races. In Michigan, President
Obama has a 10-point lead, 47-37. That was supposed to be close. It
In Montana, Mitt Romney is up by five, no surprise, 50-45. But fairly
close for that state.
We`ll be right back.
MATTHEWS: We`re back.
What happened to that grand bargain President Obama and Speaker of the
House John Boehner tried to reach last summer. Well, it`s an old he
said/he said Washington story. The president says the speaker walked away
from talks because he couldn`t or wouldn`t stand up to the right wing in
his party, the Tea Partiers. Boehner says the president is at fault
because he insisted on additional tax revenue at the last minute.
By the end of July, the talks had broken down.
In his new book, "The Price of Politics," Bob Woodward deconstructs
the tumultuous events of last summer and concludes, quote, "Neither Obama
nor Boehner was able to transcend their fixed partisan convictions and
dogmas. Rather than fixing the problem, they postponed it. When they met
resistance from other leaders in their parties, they did not stand their
Well, Bob Woodward joins me right now.
Bob, I want to ask you, because you`re obviously the great reporter
and you deal with the facts as you find them. What were the fixed partisan
convictions and dogma that stopped Boehner? I thought he`s practical guy.
He didn`t have fixed dogma. And now, the president, we can argue about
that. I thought they were both willing to deal, it was the people on the
right that kept them from dealing.
BOB WOODWARD, THE WASHINGTON POST: Yes, there`s a war going on in the
Republican Party, as you know, and Eric Cantor, the number two in the House
majority -- Republican majority is much more connected to the Tea Party.
But don`t kid yourself, Boehner is a conservative Republican, a much
more moderate one and he was laying down the law with Obama, said no tax
increases. We can`t increase --
MATTHEWS: But he agreed to 800 billion --
WOODWARD: Through tax reform which is tricky. I mean, it`s possible.
But I call it the great white whale. You chase it in the ocean and it
might kill you.
MATTHEWS: Let`s talk about the Republican Party in the House. We
know there are x number of Tea Partiers, who were just against any
revenues, just cut everything, cut spending cut spending. I heard that
every time Boehner come back from the White House with the deal he thought
he could meet with the president, make with the president, he would get a
call from his staff, Barry Jackson, Eric Cantor is talking to the crazies
out there. We`re not going to be able to hold this deal.
WOODWARD: Yes. There`s a scene at one of the key moments where the
president is asked for that $400 billion additional revenue.
MATTHEWS: Eight hundred billion up to 1.2, yes.
WOODWARD: And so Boehner calls Eric Cantor and his chief of staff
down and says, what do you think of this? And Eric Cantor`s chief of
staff, Steve Stombres, classic former Army intelligence officer, bald head,
very aggressive, asked Speaker Boehner and said, well, how many votes do
you think you can get for that? Boehner says, 170. And Stombres, you`re
crazy, not very polite. Very much in the face of the speaker. And Cantor
backed him up and Cantor they thought they`d only get 50 votes for that.
So, there`s a war there. But as you know, there`s also a war in the
Democratic Party. The president could not control Pelosi and Reid on some
of these --
MATTHEWS: Look, we don`t have a British-style parliament. We have a
congressional party. We have Congress and we have the president. If the
Congress begins to behave like a parliamentary party and votes down the
line discipline and says no to the president of another party, has anything
get done? Does the system work?
WOODWARD: That`s exactly the problem. We have got a situation now --
let`s not kid ourselves -- where the financial house is not in order. And
that is -- we`ve got $16 trillion of IOUs out in the world with Europeans,
people in this country, the Chinese and so forth.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
WOODWARD: We have to make good on the principal payments and the
interest payments and the president and the Republicans in all of their
talks and it`s not just what happened last summer. I cover 3 1/2 years.
They postponed everything. They said, oh, yes, we`ll do it in 2013.
MATTHEWS: Let`s look for bad guys, Bob. Let`s look for bad. Does
Grover Norquist is responsible? He has every member of the Republican
Party basically sign a thing that they won`t raise taxes.
If you don`t raise taxes, the Democrats won`t go along with it. There
won`t be a deal. So is that a deal breaker?
WOODWARD: Well, don`t blame Grover Norquist. He believes he has
strong convictions on it. Believe the people who signed up.
Look, you`ve got to have compromise. In the book, I described at
crucial moments where it`s Joe Biden who comes in with the old approach.
He is the -- he`s called the McConnell whisperer, the guy --
MATTHEWS: The horse whisperer?
WOODWARD: Yes, the guy that can deal with Mitch McConnell, the Senate
leader, who`s a real hard ass, as you know. But Biden can sit down with
him and say, one for you, one for me, we`re going to cut a deal.
MATTHEWS: And what does McConnell say?
WOODWARD: As long as you don`t raise taxes, I`ll go along with it.
And --
MATTHEWS: But you can never sell that, as you point out, to the
Pelosi party. The hardcore of 150, 180 Democrats are not going to sign any
deal that doesn`t have some kind of balance with revenue and spending cuts.
WOODWARD: But if you dig into this, as I spent 18 months doing,
talked to the president, talked to the Republicans, talked to Speaker
Boehner --
WOODWARD: -- they all feel that they can get -- you know, if they
agree on something, and they stand before the microphones and the cameras
and say, this is the deal, this is in the interest of the country in the
long run that people will swallow some of that dogma. But they never got
to that point. And so now we`re dancing on the edge of the razor blade.
MATTHEWS: Well, as always, you`re right at the front edge of reality.
I`ll see you on Sunday show for more time with Bob Woodward, "The Price of
Politics." Once again, the frontlines, the great Bob Woodward.
When we return, let me finish with who is who? The man who is running
for president without ever saying anything. We`ll ask Tom Dewey. He
didn`t quite make it to the White House, did he? He didn`t say anything
You`re watching HARDBALL, the place for politics.
MATTHEWS: So let me finish tonight with this. Mitt Romney is
fretting his hour upon the state. He served his time getting there running
and losing, running and saying what he had to say. Signing the documents
of admission that right in place before him. He was when asked to cite his
stronger character trait: resolute.
Resolute? Yes, but towards what?
Some troublemakers in Los Angeles put a preview of an anti-Islamic
movie. It goes viral. It translated into Arabic, hits the Cairo streets
and cafes. Suddenly there are militants climbing the walls of our embassy.
What does Romney do? Does he decry the anti-Islamic movie? Actually,
no. He had nothing to say about that. Nothing at all. All he did was put
out a statement attacking a statement from some official in the Cairo
embassy put out decrying the anti-Islamic movie.
Mr. Romney had nothing to say about the movie that stirred things up
because -- let`s agree on this -- except for the snippets to the issues
attacking his rival, he doesn`t have much at all to say about anything, and
that`s the huge emptiness people starting to notice in this person.
Except for his faith, family, and business, he doesn`t have a whole
lot in his mind. He`s been in public life a long time, perhaps a
generation now. If he thought anything was curious about anything, had
discovered anything in life, he`s yet to let it out. And yes, this is why
his tent is starting to flap.
The great writer William Manchester described the 1948 presidential
campaign of New York Governor Tom Dewey, superbly organized, rigorously on
schedule, providing the very latest thing in media equipment, design to
carry spread and disseminate whatever he wished to say. He wished to say
And that could end up being the epithet for Romney in 2012. He didn`t
want to say anything.
And that`s HARDBALL for now. Thanks for being with us.
"POLITICS NATION" with Al Sharpton starts right now.
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text:
Traction equals performance and for traction you need rubber. The wider the better, but how wide is too wide? Since we don't all own tire and wheel shops, we can't randomly test-fit tire and wheel packages all day just to mount wide rubber. So we need a way to test-fit tires without mounting them on wheels. Lucky for us there's already a company making a tool that allows just that.
The tool is called the Tire Mount Mate from Wheel Works, and it allows test-fitting tires on just about any size wheel and on any car or truck. The tool can simulate wheels from 7 to 16.5 inches wide and can create up to about 12 inches of backspacing. The tool is cast from 1/2-inch-thick aluminum, so it's strong enough to bolt the tire on the car with the suspension, creating just enough down force to simulate the bulge in the sidewall when it's inflated and sitting on the ground. The Mount Mate IS NOT designed to support the weight of the vehicle, so don't lower your car down on it.
Where the Mount Mate really comes in handy is for test-fitting large tires on a car to figure out what backspacing (also referred to as offset) will be needed when you order your wheels. If you want to go drag racing and have a traction problem, this tool allows you to mount the biggest tire you can fit and check clearance even under full suspension compression with the help of a few friends' pushing down on your bumper while the axle is supported on jack stands. The only thing the Mount Mate cannot simulate is how wide the inflation pressure will make the sidewalls grow.
The best way we've found to determine this is to measure a mounted tire's inflated width on the same size wheel you plan to run and compare that to the uninflated tire size as it hangs on the Mount Mate so you'll have a good idea of how much it'll grow. That's important because drag tires have very soft sidewalls that will grow quite a bit when inflated. You'll need to know if the sidewalls will clear your car's wheelwells, frame, and leaf springs or lower control arms. The Mount Mate will let you hang the tire you want under your car and play with wheel backspacing until you get it right.
Up front, the Mount Mate can really help out if you're building a g-Machine and want the widest rubber for grip. Turning the wheels introduces a whole new area of problems with wide front rubber, and braking can compress the suspension enough to make wide tires rub. Again, the Mount Mate can help out here, along with a few friends' pushing down on the front end. With jack stands under both control arms, mounted as close to the tires as possible for leverage, hang a tire on the Mount Mate and bolt it to your car.
Then have your buddies push down on the bumper or frame (don't push on the fenders because they may dent) while you turn the steering wheel lock to lock. You'll need one more sharp-eyed friend to look underneath and see if the tire is hitting anything. Be especially careful to check interference at the tie rod ends and control arms: Remember a wheel will go in there, so leave extra room, because deep wheels with lots of backspacing will hit these spots.
In addition to trying out a few tires with the Mount Mate we've included a bunch of tire and wheel tips for you to check out. If you want to learn more about fitting big tires and wheels on your car and what proper sizing can mean for you, check out the Tire and Wheel Tech Sections on The Tire Rack's Web site at www.tirerack.com. The Mount Mate isn't inexpensive (roughly $300), but get a few friends to go in on it with you (or charge them to use it) and it won't be long before it's paid for. Anyway you slice it, the need for big rubber will always be there, and this is one of the best ways to satisfy it.
Tire Sizing ExplainedTires used to be sized in inches and were pretty easy to figure out. Drag racing tires and most large truck tires are still referred to by height and width, like 28x10.5, or 35x12.5, etc. Most passenger car tires use the metric sizing system, which lists the overall tire width from sidewall to sidewall, aspect ratio, and wheel diameter, in that order. It may also have the letter "R" for "radial" or "ZR" for "high-speed radial" in there (see sidebar "Sidewall Definitions" for more info).
Comparing tire sizes today is difficult due mostly to the aspect ratio, which is simply the ratio of sidewall height to width. The aspect ratio is actually a percentage of the tire's overall width and determines the sidewall height. For example: a 225/60R16 tire has a 225mm width and its sidewall is 60 percent of that (225 x 0.6 = 135mm). To determine the tire's overall height there is a little more math involved. The folks at Falken Tire were kind enough to give us some formulas to help out. Remember: To find inches you must first convert from millimeters. The conversion factor is 25.4 mm per inch.
225/60R16 Tire Example1. Calculating Width Width / 25.4 = Actual width in inchesEx. 225 / 25.4 = 8.86 inches wide
2. Calculating Overall HeightCalculate sidewall height by multiplying the aspect ratio times the width.Ex. 0.6 x 8.86 = 5.32 inches
3. Calculate total sidewall height; there is sidewall both above and below the rim.Ex. 5.32 x 2 = 10.64 inches
4. Calculate total overall height by adding the rim diameter in inches to the total sidewall height. Ex. 10.64 + 16 = 26.64 inches

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Heartbroken mother of slain teen tries to grab killer in Schenectady court
"You're lucky I can't get to you," Tyesha Murray screamed at Raekwon Stover as he was escorted out of the Schenectady County courtroom. Relatives and guards held Murray back.
Stover was sentenced to 25 years to life in state prison for killing Medina Knowles, 17.
Relatives of the girl assailed Stover for killing her after she told him she wanted out of the "shameful lifestyle" of sex work.
Stover "met her demands with death," Murray told visiting state Supreme Court Justice Louise Sira on Tuesday.
"I'm never going to be the same. I'm not going to be able to live like this," Murray said, urging the judge to impose the maximum sentence.
Sira followed through on the request for the maximum, sentencing Stover to 25 years to life for second-degree murder and an additional 1 1/3 to 4 years for tampering with evidence in the case.
After killing Knowles, Stover deleted incriminating emails and got rid of the murder weapon. That illegally owned handgun is "still out on the street now," prosecutors said Tuesday.
In mid-June, a Schenectady County jury found Stover guilty of firing a bullet into Knowles' head on Sept. 15 inside 524 Schenectady St.
"This wasn't a case of a momentary loss of control or a lapse in judgement," Assistant District Attorney Christina Tremante-Pelham said Tuesday. "Raekwon Stover made a series of choices and deliberate acts."
Stover learned Knowles had not gone to a prearranged meeting with a john that afternoon, argued with her about why and left to get bullets before he killed her that evening, Tremante-Pelham said.
Stover, who was romantically involved with the victim, shot Knowles as she yelled for her mother. At trial, a neighbor testified about hearing the shot.
On Tuesday, Murray looked directly at Stover and said that, while she was startled awake by gunfire, she had not heard her child's pleas for help.
"I could have been there," Murray sobbed, as Stover silently brushed away his own tears.
Prosecutors said Stover shot Knowles because, among other reasons, she decided to stop being a sex worker for him.
"She was a 17-year-old girl who found herself in her final months under the control of a man who used her," Tremante-Pelham said. "Her final moments were spent terrorized by him."
The jury convicted Stover of all charges, which included second-degree murder, two counts of criminal possession of a weapon and tampering with evidence.
Knowles left behind a 3-year-old son, Jahsiy, who family said has struggled to understand the finality of his mother's death.
"He's such a smart 3-year-old: full of life and energy, so pure, so innocent," Knowles' uncle Marcus Goodman told the judge. "We, as a family, have to sit him down and explain this all over again: how he was in the house when his mother's murder took place. Can you imagine that conversation?"
Knowles, who family members described as selfless and kind, was the second oldest of five children. Her mother told the judge that the three youngest kids missed a significant amount of school in their grief and were forced to attend summer school.
The family also lost their apartment and most of their possessions, Murray said, because she was emotionally unable to return to the place where her daughter died. Murray said she's been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and is haunted by vivid recollections of the night her daughter was slain.
In her final hours, the teen had posted on Facebook over a dozen times about relationships, spurned exes and conflict with other women, including a re-posted photo that said, "Don't waste your time on revenge. Those who hurt you will face their own karma."


text: Friday, October 25, 2013 Let Everyone See How You Celebrated National Physical Therapy Month How did you celebrate National Physical Therapy Month (NPTM)? Tell APTA—and the rest of the world. APTA is calling on physical therapists (PTs), physical therapist assistants (PTAs), students, and faculty to share stories and photos of their October activities to bring attention to the value of physical therapy. An ever-growing collection of photos and statements has been posted to a special APTA NPTM celebration page, and now's your chance to add your highlights to the chronicle of celebrations across the country. Help APTA and your fellow PTs and PTAs show how physical therapy can help restore and improve motion in people's lives. E-mail a brief description and at least 1 photo (300 dpi) to the APTA public relations staff, then sit back and watch as you become the next worldwide internet sensation. Okay, maybe not, but you'll at least get the thrill of seeing your own post on APTA's website, and the satisfaction of knowing you've helped to promote physical therapy. And then, who knows? Comments I spent my National Physical Therapy months studying for the boards! Posted by Brittany on 10/25/2013 3:48 PM We did a drawing for a free pair of ascis to celebrate national PT month. We used our Apta ascis discount to purchase the shoes of the winner! Happy PT month! The employees at our hospital loved it. Posted by Meagan weber on 10/25/2013 5:41 PM 80% of our Rehab Team got laid off, I don't know where this profession is taking us.. Posted by Kay on 10/25/2013 7:15 PM I have spent countless hours advocating for my geriatric patients to my Congressperson, CBIC, Noridian, and various organizations and groups. Some medical healthcare professionals and families have written letters along with me, some have called their Congressperson. Since July I am still unable to get platform walkers for my patients so they can walk and be less of a burden to those caring for them at home. My wish is that more members take an active role in helping their profession combat the deluge of congressional policy-making that is hurting our patients and disabling our ability to help them. Posted by Lise McCarthy on 10/26/2013 6:41 AM We held FREE SCREENS for anyone to come in to screen for any muscle or joint injury during the month of OCT for PT Month! We also gave out a free gift including backpacks, water bottles and ice packs for those who took advantage of this offer. Posted by Back-n-Action PT, WI on 10/26/2013 8:28 AM We combined National P.T. Month with Breast Cancer Awareness month in Oct. We performed 4 short lectures of How Exercse can Defeat Breast Cancer. We also held a Poker Walk for all employees of the Doctors clinic to promote walking. We had an open house to feature our new Alter G Antigravity Treadmill. Posted by Linda Pillow on 10/27/2013 4:45 PM I spent 3 days kayaking at Cedar Key , Fla. with 88 fellow kayakers, 75% were geriatrics.We had a great time, beautiful weather and lots of migrating water fowl.www.hiddencoastpaddlingfestival.No age requirement, maybe we'll see you next year.k.power Posted by Kathleen Power -> =IYZ@N on 10/28/2013 9:36 PM Des Moines University goes all out on Physical Therapy Month! We kicked off the Month with two very inspirational and knowledgeable speakers, Jim Meadows (BScPT, MCPA, FCAMT)and Mark Block (SCI inspirational speaker). We also celebrated with some friendly competition between on campus students and faculty with a physical therapy picture scavenger hunt and relay races. This was sponsored by the physical therapy club here on campus but celebrated by everyone! Posted by Kelsey Kolb on 10/31/2013 10:18 AM We celebrated National PT Month by asking our followers to nominate their PT and share a story about how their PT helped change their lives! Our nominees and winner received AlterG gear for participating! Check out some of the awesome submissions here: http://bit.ly/1heirMD Posted by Megan Chen on 11/4/2013 4:25 PM Nova Medical Center is a growing occupational healthcare services provider that began as a single facility formed 20 years ago in Conroe, Texas, to provide the highest level of healthcare to patients suffering from musculoskeletal injuries. Nova now treats over 40,000 injuries each year and operates over 30 occupational medicine facilities across Texas and are expanding to Georgia & Tennessee. We want to let APTA know how Nova Medical Centers celebrated National Physical Therapy Month! Dr. Trisha Perry, PT, DPT, our Vice President of Therapy Services and National Therapy Director, hand-wrote notes to the EVERY PT/PTA within our company. Each weekend in October she also coordinated an appreciation lunch for the entire PT staff in each section of Texas. (One for all the Houston-area locations, one for the DFW-area locations, one for the Central Texas locations and one for the South Texas locations.) At each appreciation lunch there were gift card giveaways and assortments Nova swag (Nova cups, bags, pens, etc) for each member of the Nova PT team. We are so proud to have all of our PT team members and we're excited to do something special for them! Posted by Nova Medical Centers on 11/15/2013 12:03 PM


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Associated Press
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) -- Beneath the cold ocean waters off the coast of Maine, the nation's lobster breadbasket, lie hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of old wire lobster "ghost traps." Lost over the years to storms, boats -- even the knives of fishermen who've cut them from their buoys to settle scores -- many of the traps continue catching lobsters.
Marine biologists say lost and abandoned lobster, crab and other fish traps plague coastal waters around the globe, putting pressure on a number of already-stressed fish populations. In U.S. waters alone, millions of dollars' worth of marketable seafood is lost each year.
Lobstermen this winter will grapple up gear from selected spots in the first large-scale study of ghost traps along the Maine coast. Nationwide, other studies are focusing on lost traps off the Pacific, Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coasts.
"It would be very interesting if we could drain the ocean and look at what's down there," said Holly Bamford, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Marine Debris Program. "We might be surprised."
The extent of Maine's ghost-trap problem isn't fully known, but lobstermen say they sometimes recover traps that contain skinny lobsters -- ones that appear to have not eaten -- or shells from lobsters that have starved and withered away to nothing or been eaten by other lobsters.
Most lobstermen feel it'll get worse with a new federal regulation requiring them to use a certain type of rope on their gear. The rope, they say, is prone to breaking and will result in even more lost traps.
Fishermen have been losing and discarding equipment for as long as they've plied the world's seas. But the range and impact of that refuse has grown in the past 50 years as fishing has increased, especially with more durable, non-biodegradable equipment.
The ability of lost lobster traps to continue fishing diminishes as the bait -- herring or some other oily fish -- dissipates. Still, scientists believe the traps continue catching lobsters, attracting creatures in search of shelter. And while the traps are required to have escape vents that break free over time, not all vents break free as intended.
"Ghost fishing" studies are under way or recently completed along all U.S. coasts. They include looks at Dungeness crab traps in Alaska, Washington, Oregon and California; blue crab and sea bass traps off North Carolina; blue crab traps in the Chesapeake Bay and the Gulf of Mexico; spiny lobster traps in Florida; and fish traps in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Other studies have looked at the impact of lost fishing nets found in Puget Sound in Washington and off the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, where more than 600 tons of nets were collected.
In Maine, the Gulf of Maine Lobster Foundation has received a $200,000 grant to look at the issue. The foundation plans to recruit 10 lobstermen in each of seven Maine harbors to grapple for lost traps late this winter or early spring, said Laura Ludwig, who is heading the project.
The findings will be recorded and assessed in hopes of determining how effective the traps are at fishing after they've been lost in the deep. Depending on their condition, the recovered traps will be returned to their rightful owners, recycled or disposed of.
In Maine, where lobstermen actively fish more than 2 million traps, it's estimated that 5 to 10 percent -- 100,000 to 200,000 -- are lost in any given year. In a decade, that could be 1 or 2 million lost traps; if that's the case, there could be as many abandoned and lost traps off the Maine coast as ones currently in use.
Ben Crocker Jr., a lobsterman from Roque Bluffs in eastern Maine, says most lobstermen feel the lost traps aren't actively catching lobsters because they're so mangled and don't have bait in them.
"It's mostly just garbage on the bottom," he said.
Two winters ago, Ian Lussier of Owls Head grappled for lost traps with another lobsterman in Penobscot Bay and recovered several hundred traps in depths of 100 to 400 feet, he said. Some had tags showing they were owned by lobstermen who hadn't fished in more than a decade. Some traps were wooden, which haven't been used for the most part for 25 years.
How much lobster the traps are catching is almost a "non-issue" for Lussier because he believes so few are caught.
The bigger issue, he says, is a new federal regulation that aims to protect endangered North Atlantic right whales by outlawing use of floating rope that connects lobster traps on the ocean bottom and sometimes entangles the whales.
Lobstermen say the sinking rope sits on the rocky bottom, where it easily abrades and breaks free, resulting in more lost gear. Lussier said he lost 87 traps out of his 800 between April 5, when the rope law went into effect, and the middle of June, because the rope deteriorated on the rocky bottom.
"What's going to happen is more traps are going to build up on the bottom in areas where we have to use sinking line," Lussier said.
Worldwide, concerns about lost gear are growing.
Besides continuing to catch fish and shellfish, lost nets and traps have been known to snag whales, seabirds, turtles and other animals, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations reported this year. They can also hurt the benthic, or ocean-bottom, environment and create navigational hazards.
Frank Chopin, a senior fisheries officer with FAO in Rome, said more people are taking part in programs and campaigns to recover the gear. But there hasn't been a systematic approach to removing it.
"It's a complicated issue," he said. "And it's not going to go away."
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.


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President Barack Obama signed the latest National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) into law on January 2, renewing the power to apprehend and detain Americans indefinitely granted in the previous year's version.
In order to protect their citizens from being grabbed and imprisoned under the provisions of the NDAA, many state lawmakers are standing up to the federal government, proposing resolutions nullifying this unconstitutional power at the state borders.
Nullification is a concept of constitutional law recognizing the right of each state to nullify, or invalidate, any federal measure that exceeds the few and defined powers allowed the federal government as enumerated in the U.S. Constitution.
Nullification exists as a right of the states because the sovereign states formed the union, and as creators of the compact, they hold ultimate authority as to the limits of the power of the central government to enact laws that are applicable to the states and the citizens thereof.
As President Obama continues accumulating all legislative, executive, and judicial power, the need for nullification is urgent, and liberty-minded citizens are encouraged to see state legislators boldly asserting their right to restrain the federal government through application of that very powerful and very constitutional principle.
The House of Representatives of Washington, for example, is considering the "Washington State Preservation of Liberty Act." Introduced earlier this month, this bill "condemns and criminalizes" the use of the indefinite detention provision of the NDAA.
H.B. 1581 enjoys bipartisan support. The bill's primary sponsor is state Representative Sharon Tomiko Santos (D), who is joined by at least eight other Democrats and 12 Republicans.
The state senate in the the Evergreeen State is considering a companion bill, co-sponsored by Democrats Bob Hosegawa and Maralyn Chase.
Both measures intend to prevent the president from sending the military to arrest and detain Washingtonians, under the authority of Section 1021 of the Fiscal Year 2012 NDAA.
Section 4 of H.B. 1581 prohibits:
state or local official or employee, or agent of the state of Washington, or employee of a corporation providing services to the state of Washington, or member of the national guard or state defense forces acting in his or her capacity as a state or local official or employee, or agent of the state of Washington, or employee of a corporation providing services to the state of Washington, or member of the national guard or state defense forces...
from knowingly participating in the "investigation or detainment of a United States citizen or lawful resident alien located within the United States of America by the armed forces of the United States of America."
Another section makes a violation of this prohibition a felony.
As of press time, The Preservation of Liberty Act sits in the House's Committee on Public Safety.
Sponsors await the scheduling by committee chairmen of a hearing on the bill.
As reported by the Examiner, "last year's version of the bill died in committee, so supporters are urged by activists to pressure the chairmen of the committees to act while the tide is high."
In the nation's heartland, as well, state representatives are standing up for the constitutional rights of their constituents.
Kansas state Representative Brett Hildabrand has introduced HB 2161, a bill protecting Kansans from being nabbed and detained by the military operating under orders from the president as authorized by the NDAA.
One notable and noteworthy aspect of the Kansas legislation is described by a report published buy the Tenth Amendment Center.
This bill is different from and quite a bit stronger than previous bills introduced around the country to nullify NDAA indefinite detention. It includes kidnapping charges for federal agents attempting to arrest people in Kansas without due process.
Legally speaking, when a suspect is denied of his constitutionally protected rights of due process, any detention — regardless of the detaining authority — is nothing less than government-sanctioned kidnapping. The Kansas bill appreciates this legal reality.
Hildabrand's bill states, in part: "A person who violates the provisions of this section may also be prosecuted for, convicted of, and punished for kidnapping or aggravated kidnapping, K.S.A. 2012 Supp. 21-5408, and amendments thereto."
Anyone convicted of kidnapping as a result of his participation with the indefinite detention is subject to the following criminal penalties provided in the bill:
Kidnapping is a severity level 3 felony with a potential of 8 years in prison. Aggravated kidnapping is a severity level l felony with a prison sentence of over 20 years being possible. Both of these felonies are subject to a fine "to not exceed $300,000.
"Indefinite detainers" are also subject to being charged with a misdemeanor for the "denial of due process" of anyone apprehended under the terms of the NDAA. Punishment for conviction of violating this section could include "a definite term of confinement in the county jail which shall be fixed by the court and shall not exceed one year" and "a sum not exceeding $2,500."
"When I first heard that the federal government was considering indefinite detention, I was horrified, but I was unaware of how to fight it at the state level. After reading about anti-NDAA legislation introduced in Texas, I knew we needed to attempt the same thing in Kansas," said Representative Hildabrand, as quoted by the Tenth Amendment Center.
He continued, "The kidnapping portion was added to convey the seriousness of the offense. If a non-government official were to take someone against their will and hold them without access to the outside world, we would consider that a kidnapping. If a government official does the same thing, without granting access to a lawyer or the courts, I see no difference."
In a final denial of federal usurpation of police power, Representative Hildabrand's bill protects citizens in the Sunflower State from being placed under the jurisdiction of the U.S. military.
"I believe that a person either supports the whole Constitution, in every circumstance or they do not support it at all. Therefore, when any one is denied due process, I consider it an assault on the Constitution," Hildabrand explained.
Finally, there is news out of Texas that on February 6, a bill blocking the indefinite detention provision of the NDAA was placed before the Federalism and Fiscal Responsibility Committee of the state House of Representatives.
The Texas bill (HB 149), like those in Washington and Kansas, aims at denying the president the power to apprehend and indefinitely detain citizens without affording them their constitutionally protected due process rights.
Criminal penalties are provided in the bill for federal agents attempting to execute the indefinite detention provisions of the NDAA within the state of Texas. Penalties for conviction are set at "one year, a fine of not more than $10,000, or both the confinement and the fine."
These state legislators stand on very sound constitutional ground in their battle against federal overreaching. Acts of the federal government that exceed the constitutional boundaries on its power are null, void, and of no legal effect. In fact, they are not laws at all. As Alexander Hamilton explained in The Federalist, No. 33:
If a number of political societies enter into a larger political society, the laws which the latter may enact, pursuant to the powers intrusted [sic] to it by its constitution, must necessarily be supreme over those societies and the individuals of whom they are composed.... But it will not follow from this doctrine that acts of the larger society which are not pursuant to its constitutional powers, but which are invasions of the residuary authorities of the smaller societies, will become the supreme law of the land. These will be merely acts of usurpation, and will deserve to be treated as such. [Emphasis in original.]


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Of COURSE It's Right-Side Up...
"The balloons just had a really strong tailwind, that's all. Oh, and the inscription? Uh, yeah, that was the tailwind...too..."
I don't think I buy it, Garret A. - but then, I guess I don't have to; you already did! [cymbal crash!]
(Why yes, sometimes I DO have an old-style Vaudeville soundtrack in my head - why do you ask?)


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Living with Uncertainty in Washing Machines and LifePosted in Grief and Grieving, Self Care on September 22nd, 2010 by Jim Hughes – Comments Off
We live in a world where washing machines overflow and flood houses. According to my repair man, they all work the same way and are all prone to the same problem, the one that causes them to overflow.
He blames it on the detergents. And the fabric softeners. Over time, he says, they plug the Tygon tubing that connects to the switch that senses when to shut off the water. And when that happens, the floor gets flooded.
His recommendation? Use less detergent, and use a different type. And NEVER run the washing machine when you are not there to watch it and make sure it doesn't overflow and flood your house.
The washing machines of our world are imperfect. We think they should be better. In fact, they could be better. One could easily design them with an additional sensor that would shut them off it they started to overflow. Or maybe the detergent makers could make better detergent products. But the extra protection from an infrequent overflow would cost more, and because our washers don't overflow every day, we wouldn't want to pay the difference. Unless maybe our house had just been flooded.
So because no one makes that washer that will never overflow, we live with ones that might. And because our easy chairs or our desks aren't in the laundry room, we don't sit and watch washers to make sure they're not going to overflow. We just live with the uncertainty, learning to allow it to be pushed from the fronts of our minds by other things.
More importantly, we want a life that we can control, a life that is surprise-free, a life that isn't disrupted by unexpected incidents. No one makes that life, just like no one makes the washing machine that could never overflow. Things happen, some of them tragic, some of them painful, some of them even fatal. That's the way life works.
So we learn to live with uncertainty, and the prospect of not only flooded floors, but disrupted lives. Because we have no other choice.


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F-117 Nighthawk
Kelly Johnson had seen enough. The brilliant but irascible pioneer of Lockheed's famed Skunk Works division grabbed the blueprint he'd been studying—specs for an alien-looking, diamond-shaped aircraft—walked over to his successor, Ben Rich, and promptly booted him in his rear end.
"Have you lost your mind?" Johnson barked, throwing the crumpled blueprint at Rich's feet and fuming that the design would "never get off the ground." Johnson valued sleek designs—highly aerodynamic aircraft. The blueprint offered neither.
Although a bit sore, Rich was unfazed. Aerodynamics was not the priority. Two years earlier, in 1973, defense officials had called for a competition to build a stealth bomber undetectable by enemy radar.
Rich had embraced the challenge with gusto. He turned to a pair of young Lockheed engineers, Denys Overholser and Dick Sherrer, who developed a computer program based on obscure German and Russian theories, which postulated that radar beams could be reflected by a series of carefully angled triangular panels.
The pair's computer program had revealed that a diamond-shaped aircraft—what looked on paper like a flying engagement ring—would be 1,000 times less visible than any other aircraft ever created at Lockheed.
The plans Johnson had crumpled up? They were specs for the world's first aircraft invisible to radar.
Diamond in the Sky
The blueprints—dubbed the Hopeless Diamond by naysayers—were converted into a 38-foot-span wooden model, mounted on a pole, and exposed to radar from every angle to see just how invisible it was.
Early tests showed the model registered no bigger than an ordinary marble, and was thus nearly impossible to detect. In response, Ben Rich, ever the savvy salesman, brought a bag of ball bearings to the Pentagon and rolled a few across a general's desk, saying, "Here's the observability of your airplane on radar."
A contract was immediately awarded in 1976 to begin work on Have Blue, the stealth demonstrator that would lead to the F-117A Nighthawk. Constructed almost entirely of aluminum, its external surfaces sheathed with radar-absorbent material bound with putty, the Nighthawk had to be immaculately flush. Even the slightest crack or unfastened screw would make it visible to enemy radar. And the unconventional shape required a quadruple-redundant fly-by-wire system to correct its natural instability.
On June 8, 1981, the F-117A had its inaugural flight, showing off its unprecedented stealth capabilities. In the ensuing years, the project would be kept under the strictest of secrecy, with all training conducted at night, prepping the Nighthawk for its stunning debut over the skies of Iraq.
A Storm in the Desert
During the early-morning hours of January 17, 1991, in response to the invasion of Kuwait by Saddam Hussein, a fleet of Nighthawks slipped in unseen by Iraqi radar and neutralized 37 targets across Baghdad. Over the ensuring weeks, Nighthawks would strike with remarkable accuracy, helping bring the campaign to a successful end in just 43 days.
Although retired in 2008, the F-117 would be the basis upon which subsequent stealth fighters, including the F-22 Raptor and F-35 Lightning II, would be designed. As remarked during a banquet celebrating the plane's achievements in 2008, before the F-117, the question to ask was how many aircraft were needed to take out a target. After the Nighthawk, the question was how many targets could be taken out with a single aircraft.
Sources and Additional Reading
- Boyne, Walter. Beyond the Horizons: The Lockheed Story. New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 1999.
- Jacobsen, Annie. Area 51: An Uncensored History of America's Top Secret Military Bases. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2011.
- Rich, Ben E. and Leo Janos. Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed. London: Time Warner, 2003.
- Sweetman, Bill. "Unconventional Weapon." Air & Space. January 2008. https://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/unconventional-weapon-23371597/, accessed July 16, 2012.


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International Monetary Fund Lowers Global Growth Forecast for 2012
(NEW YORK) -- More than ever the U.S. is part of the global economy, with millions of American workers depending on jobs linked to imports and exports.
But a new warning that the world's economy has weakened further could mean a slowdown for global trade and the biggest threat out there to American jobs.
In its latest update, the International Monetary Fund forecasts global growth of 3.3 percent this year -- down from an estimate of nearly 4 percent just three months ago. Slower growth is also forecast for 2013.
"Risks for a serious global slowdown are alarmingly high," says the IMF's World Economic Outlook.
The report comes one day after a forecast of a deepening slowdown in China, the world's second largest economy. India -- another engine of growth -- is also facing a serious slowdown.
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio


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Many feel that memetics is too abstract to assist deconversion. Here's an outline for a ritual designed to integrate it with three other ideas for a more tangible social emotional impact.
Give me you feedback, please.
MemeOut Outline: Directions for ritual actions in color
We're gathered here to remember how we've been infected by Dominator religious mind viruses and to celebrate our escape.
(1) Let us be grateful to Richard Dawkins for opening our eyes to memes.
Hold up The Selfish Gene
Passing the book around
Dominator Culture Religious Mind Viruses infect human hosts. They evolved to exploit exploiting our misperceptions, our longings, our pain and loss to drive their reproduction.
(2) Let us be grateful to Riane Eisler for opening our hands from fists.
Hold up The Chalice & The Blade
Passing the book around
Cultural Transformation Theory shows how violent Dominator hierarchies justify adults abusing children, men abusing women, and a few powerful men abusing all others.
(3) Let us be grateful to Eric Berne for opening our minds to the Victim/Rescuer/Persecutor mind games built into Religious Dominator Memeplexes.
Hold up Games People Play
Passing the book around
People seduced by these mind games settle for self worth based on invidious comparison instead of authentic self worth, "I'm OK, You're Not OK" instead of "I'm OK, You're OK". In Group/Out Group self righteousness passes for self affirmation.
Reality's rich tapestry is twisted to reduce every action into one of these:
Victims who feel moral superiority to their persecutors.
Hold up a bitter food
Bitter food represents the self pity stamps victims save up.
Taste and pass around the bitter food
The bitter taste hides lies of omission, responsibility for provocation.
Hold up a "hot" food
Spicy food represents the anger stamps victims save up.
Taste and pass around the "hot" food
The heat makes blaming and shaming easier, anger and rage help us to demonize outsiders.
Rescuers who feel moral superiority to victims and persecutors.
Persecutors who feel moral superiority to those they persecute by the trick of "cashing in" self pity and anger stamps. They get a guilt free pass for cruelty and destruction, because the demonized "deserve it".
Religious Dominator Memeplexes infecting competing groups perpetrate cycles of mutual hatred and destruction in symbiosis with each other, dividing and conquering the host species.
(4) Let us be grateful to Chris Hedges...
Hold up War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning
...for opening our hearts to the terrifying human depravity of war, the secret dungeon in Dominator Culture's foundation.
Passing the book around
Affirmation (to music)
Cast off!! Religious Dominator Memeplex lies of omission. Cast away motion
Cast off!! their impossible promises. Cast away motion
Cast off!! their imaginary fears. Cast away motion
Cast off!! primitive (pause) Cast away motion
past-obsessed (pause) Cast away motion
magical (pause) Cast away motion
thinking which impairs us. (hitting forehead)
Impairs us from comprehending today's complex real world.
Embrace all humans!! Holding hands around the circle
Our small fragile Earth will either become a wasteland
wasteland (echoing)
for us all to perish,
or (raise arms together) it will be sustainable for people all races and ethnicities.
Views: 725
A few reasons I don't use a play format:
I'm not supporting everything de Botton says. I don't even know everything he says. I agree with the main ideas in his TED lecture Atheism 2.0, that should also incorporate our human need for connection, ritual and transcendence. His restaurant idea seems silly and technologically naive to me.
I read your outline and I noticed the circle that you form. It reminds me of Wiccan and Pagan rituals in which you create a circle; as in a Wiccan Coven when you join hands. I think that idea is quite nice. Were you thinking about that Coven circle when you made your ritual?
The circle is from my group process training. Chairs lined up facing the leader places him or her in a relative position of power. It's hierarchical. It makes other members relatively invisible and robs them of their voice, in that everybody has to twist around uncomfortably to listen to one of them. Facing one another in a circle is a physical representation of egalitarian relationship. People's gaze is naturally directed toward the whole group instead of being monopolized by the leader, so they pay attention to one another. A circle invisibly facilitates egalitarian interaction.
"It reminds me of Wiccan and Pagan rituals…" ~ Steph S.
Yup, ...and Christian "prayer circles". I'm not denying that they can be effective...
"It makes other members relatively invisible and robs them of their voice, in that everybody has to twist around uncomfortably to listen to one of them. Facing one another in a circle is a physical representation of egalitarian relationship." ~ Ruth
How do they now, not have to "twist around uncomfortably", it's still a circle, albeit one that may or may not have lost focus.
"A circle invisibly facilitates egalitarian interaction."
"Invisibly"? …I would suggest that the only way to discern whether or not it does anything positive is entirely dependent on the group itself. Group coherence isn't always a "good thing" either.
"group process training"
Yes, I'm quite familiar with "group dynamics" as well as "group facilitation", and also "social engineering" and "consensus models".
My wife, as part of her job, had to take a course in "group dynamics", we've had occasion to debate the effectiveness of the use of such strategies in facilitating online communities (something I've had extensive prior experience in, especially in how to make them thrive, and why they sometimes implode).
Because of my experience, she would often ask for my advice on certain things, as she has been asked by admins at several sites to moderate forums (one general topic and two skeptic/reason groups).
More often than not, she would argue against certain suggestions from the standpoint of her training, and take her strategies from there.
…She now understands my advice, "group dynamics" training is not a panacea for all groups, especially online ones. The results can be disastrous.
(and I've not ever uttered an "I told you so", …just to preempt any implication that I have, or even would).
How online groups function differently than real world groups is an interesting topic. However, even if your expertise in online groups is outstanding, in the case of critiquing a real world ritual it would not apply.
How do they now, not have to "twist around uncomfortably", it's still a circle, albeit one that may or may not have lost focus.
I was comparing rows of seats facing a leader in front to members seated in a circle with the leader among them. If you're in the second row of a meeting hall or lecture hall or church pews and someone in the back wants to address the group, everyone forward of the speaker has to twist around uncomfortably to properly attend to the speaker. If everyone is in a circle, it's much easier to just turn your head to properly attend to a speaker anywhere in the circle. The leader has no positional advantage for group attention.
"A circle invisibly facilitates egalitarian interaction."
"Invisibly"? …I would suggest that the only way to discern whether or not it does anything positive is entirely dependent on the group itself. Group coherence isn't always a "good thing" either.
"Invisibly", here, is metaphorical. I was trying to say that people are not usually consciously aware of the way setting structure influences their attention and behavior. For example, the leader standing on an elevated platform with a lectern between him and the audience sends a message of hierarchical power and authority. Seating in a circle influences "audience" attention and perception of leader power, but most people don't notice how they are being manipulated to feel small or helped to feel empowered by the way chairs are arranged.
...the only way to discern whether or not it does anything positive is entirely dependent on the group itself.
I disagree, but then I assume that egalitarian relations are positive in a group, for most purposes, compared to hierarchical relations. That's my value. You may not share it.
Group coherence isn't always a good thing? If the group's purpose is worthy, how is it's coherence anything but good? The only circumstances I can imagine in which group coherence is dysfunctional is when rebellion and breaking up of the group is morally correct. This isn't because group cohesion, per se, is a bad thing but because that group doesn't deserve to continue. But then your rebellious sub-group needs cohesion to be effective.
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The HATS flask GC-MSD program measures several HFCs. Below are links to data files and figures for HFC-152a.
Atmospheric dry mole fractions (parts-per-trillion or ppt) of HFC-152a measured by GC-MSD in the HATS flask program. Each point represents a monthly mean at one of 8-12 stations: Alert, Canada (ALT), Summit Greenland (SUM), Barrow, Alaska (BRW), Mace Head, Ireland (MHD), Trinidad Head, California (THD), Niwot Ridge, Colorado (NWR), Cape Kumukahi, Hawaii (KUM), Manua Loa, Hawaii (MLO), American Samoa (SMO), Cape Grim, Australia (CGO), Palmer Station, Antarctica (PSA), South Pole, Antarctica (SPO).
Zonal mean dry mole fractions (ppt) are estimated by equally weighting monthly mean measurements in each latitude band. Small gaps (less than 6 months) are interpolated prior to averaging. Solid lines are used for Northern hemispheric measurements and dashed for the Southern hemisphere.
Selected Publications
- Montzka, S. A. and G. Dutton, 2012: [Global climate] Ozone-depleting gases and their replacements [in "State of the Climate in 2011"]. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 93 (7), S68–S69.
- Montzka, S.A., M. McFarland, S.O. Andersen, B.R. Miller, D.W. Fahey, B.D. Hall, L. Hu, C. Siso, J.W. Elkins, Recent trends in global emissions of hydrochlorofluorocarbons and hydrofluorocarbons—Reflecting on the 2007 Adjustments to the Montreal Protocol, J. Phys. Chem. A, 119, 4439-4449, doi:10.1021/jp5097376, 2015.