Duane Gran’s log of thoughts

I’ll be doing some travel for a little while, so I’ll have to write my thoughts on pieces of paper, but rest assured when I’m back I’ll share them. I’m sending all comments into the moderation queue to avoid hundreds of comment spams. See you back a little later…

Indiana House passes daylight-saving time bill

Daylight-saving time is coming to all of Indiana for the first time in more than 30 years.

In a history-making drama, the Indiana House voted 51-46 late Thursday to pass the controversial issue, which has dominated the legislature, coffee shops and kitchen tables for four months.

Indiana is both out of touch and boring if this is the talk of the town. As much as I chide about Indiana, as it was the place where I grew up, I do think daylight savings is a non issue. On a deeper level, I think it says something out society when it is easier to make everyone change their clocks than to just shift our life schedules a little. It seems to me the equivalent of an adult asking for a hall pass to use the restroom. Are we so regimented that we need to change our clocks to realize that daylight is coming sooner or later?

We Are the Majority | Bernie Sanders | February 2004 Issue

Go out on Main Street, stand at the corner, and ask people a simple question. Tell them you’re doing an informal poll, and ask them if they want 40 percent of the tax breaks, hundreds of billions of dollars, to go to the top 1 percent, or whether those breaks should be spread around more fairly and be used for education or lowering the deficit. Then tell me who is “fringe.” Ask them if we should maintain our disintegrating health care nonsystem or establish a universal health care system that guarantees health care for all. Then tell me who is “fringe.” Ask them if we should continue to let polluters destroy our environment, or move to safe, sustainable energy. Then tell me who is “fringe.”

Bernie Sanders, and Independent congressman from Vermont, wrote the above missive and I couldn’t agree more. It is a good reminder that progressives represent the majority opinion but that we have been losing the battle over how issues are framed.

From The Shadow of Globalization:

Poverty in the Third World is a story as old as colonial plantations and clipper ships, with generations of laborers having earned pennies to sate appetites in the First World. But at the dawn of the 21st century, a simmering protest movement has been drawing attention to the inequities in international trade, which critics say provides cheap goods for wealthy consumers but little improvement in the lives of those who produce them.

While Capitalists and Socialists (and all those murky moderates) may disagree, at least they can do so over a cup of coffee. The desire to support fair trade products, such as coffee, can also be a united theme among even diverse political groups. Transfair USA attempts to negotiate fair terms between farmers and coffee growers to preserve the mature crops in Latin America and avoid calamity for the farmers.

Much of the problem emerged about 15 years ago when Vietnam entered the coffee market. A coffee geek article gives a fantastic summary of its impact on the market. After reading it you may never want to touch flavored coffee again. At the very least, I think it isn’t asking too much for people to seek out fair trade coffee and to put pressure on companies to offer it as a choice.

Lately I’ve been reading a book titled “A Short History of Italy” by Henry Dwight Sedgwick, published in 1905 (link). I’m reading it in advance of a vacation, but also as a primer on Papal history — while not synonymous, it is tightly related with the history of Italy. I chose this book as an experiment and found a few interesting things:

1. Because it predates the Second Vatican Council of 1962, many views of the role of The Church are inherently different. I don’t have empathy for Christians who reject these reforms, but I think the book gives a perspective unavailable to the modern historian.
2. The phrase “dark age” is nearly absent in the book. I’ve suspected for a while that this was a recent terminology for the period spanning from the 5th century to the 14th century Renaissance. The author denotes many efforts to revive the memory of the Roman Empire during this period.
3. We often hear of the barbarian invasions after the fall of the Roman Empire (476 AD), but the author is more generous and points out that the Lombards, Visigoths and various others were in fact not barbaric. They often tried to embrace the Roman law but they seemed preoccupied with civil unrest and feuding city states. There may be better modern explanations, but most of them over simplify the fall of the Roman Empire in my opinion. This book offered a refreshing alternative. To me, this explains the previous point about the dark ages.

So far the experiment has been most interesting, but I confess that I need more solid grounding in history to avoid trading modern for antiquated bias. Neither is worthwhile, but I think reading old history books, along with current ones, may be helpful to get a better picture of the past.

Walmart Watch placed advertisements in major newspapers this week to highlight various unsettling facts about walmart. I emphatically join them in their criticism of the chain and encourage people to avoid shopping there, provided that their local shops have not been already destroyed. In the past few months walmart has responded to grassroots resistance with advertisements extolling their brand and value as an employer. They believe that they can purchase consent from the public, but I’m optimistic that we can break their back via unions and/or decreased patronage. See another good site for more background information on the resistance in progress.

Beyond all the main issues I have with walmart, I’m mostly upset that they have misappropriated the Communist star in their logo. ;)

I’ve been anti-television ever since college, but I try not to be the guy who brags about not watching television, as if this elevates me to some higher plane of understanding. This week marks TV turn off week, so maybe I should turn it on for some balance. After all, a NY Times article proclaims that watching TV makes you smarter. I still think watching TV is mind-rot, but I concede that some shows are thought provoking.

If I follow the script correctly I should begin to extoll the virtues of reading books, but according to Steven Johnson (the author of the NY Times article) that isn’t such a safe bet:

Reading books chronically under-stimulates the senses. Unlike the longstanding tradition of gameplaying—which engages the child in a vivid, three-dimensional world filled with moving images and musical soundscapes, navigated and controlled with complex muscular movements—books are simply a barren string of words on the page. Only a small portion of the brain devoted to processing written language is activated during reading, while games engage the full range of the sensory and motor cortices.

Yes, it is satire, but it made me think about how we mistrust new media and hold onto familiar experience. If the television networks succeed in creating an interactive experience via the Internet, or some such technology, I’m sure people will wax poetically about the good old days when you just sat there. Some people already talk about the golden age of television.

I can’t resist it though. I like books and reading more than television. Probably the main reason is the reading inspires me to write, but watching rarely motives me to do anything. Readers who stumble upon these thoughts-in-motion may indeed regret that I don’t own a television.

From Computing Research News:

Survey results from the Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California at Los Angeles (HERI/UCLA) show that the popularity of computer science (CS) as a major among incoming freshmen has dropped significantly in the past four years. Alarmingly, the proportion of women who thought that they might major in CS has fallen to levels unseen since the early 1970s.

I’m not nearly as concerned as the authors of the article, but I also think that CS is about science and it has little to do with filling jobs in Information Technology. I think it dilutes the meaning of Computer Science to treat on par with getting an MSCE certificate.

From GhanaMusic.Com

The International Folklore Expert said the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) recommended in the 1980’s that, in the light of the extreme economic imbalance in the world, developing nations should nationalize their folklore in respect to its commercial exploitation by Industrial ‘First World’ nations. “Folklore from any country had been considered a common heritage for anyone to use freely,” he explained.

The developing world realizes that industrialized nations are plundering their music heritage for inspiration and giving nothing back. The solution, advocated by WIPO, is to nationalize the “property” of their culture so that they can monetize it. Supposedly this protects someone.

Economic imperialism is nothing new, but this raises new concerns because Western notions of intellectual property is poisoning the legal system of other nations. Why shouldn’t Ghana keep its folklore in the public domain? The emerging international marketplace is forcing their hand, but this is really a step backwards. For some clarity on why IP laws are backward, consider a Financial Times article:

Since only about 4 per cent of copyrighted works more than 20 years old are commercially available, this locks up 96 per cent of 20th century culture to benefit 4 per cent. The harm to the public is huge, the benefit to authors, tiny. In any other field, the officials responsible would be fired. Not here.

Not that Java is badly broken, but like any complex system, there are bugs. Andy Trip writes about his experience committing some changes back to Sun for the next generation version of Java. I’m impressed that Sun has come around to making use of the good will of software developers.

The Submarine

“Suits make a corporate comeback,” says the New York Times. Why does this sound familiar? Maybe because the suit was also back in September 2004, June 2004, September 2003, November 2002, and February 2002.

Why do the media keep running stories saying suits are back? Because PR firms tell them to. One of the most surprising things I discovered during my brief business career was the existence of the PR industry, lurking like a huge, quiet submarine beneath the news. Of the stories you read in traditional media that aren’t about politics, crimes, or disasters, more than half probably come from PR firms.

As much as I would like to believe that the suit is making a comeback, Paul Graham is probably right. His essay is a good read whether or not you have developed a healthy skepticism for mainstream media yet. The article goes on to describe why Graham finds himself reading outside of the mainstream:

Whatever its flaws, the writing you find online is authentic. It’s not mystery meat cooked up out of scraps of pitch letters and press releases, and pressed into molds of zippy journalese. It’s people writing what they think.

It is a sad commentary how little we can trust the media these days. Everyone harbors a certain amount of bias, but the straight talk of blogs is a refreshing alternative to the standard media formula. Graham warns that the PR machine will seek ways to manipulate blogs into their mouthpieces. I think we already seeing it to some degree with viral marketing.

(this post was not sponsored in any such way by any for-profit entity; however, I did come by way of slashdot)

Update: After posting this I became aware of SourceWatch as a resource to monitor the effects of the PR machinery.

Who Pays $600 for Jeans?

As jeans have become an increasingly acceptable component of business and evening wear, a wardrobe staple suitable for any occasion (including board meetings, if one happens to be Steve Jobs), out of place nowhere except, possibly, funerals, the appetite for premium jeans has grown beyond a cowboy’s wildest imaginings.

God help us all. What is next? Designer sweat pants? I don’t expect the world to swagger around in Armani suits, but since when did denim become expensive and fashionable?

I don’t mean to sound like a total snob (although I concede a little bit of snobbery), but jeans are for doing yard work or riding a horse, neither of which I think many urbanites in NYC are doing.

They’re In — but Not Home Free

In 2001, as the current housing boom got underway, fewer than 2% of California homes were bought with interest-only loans, according to an analysis done for The Times by LoanPerformance, a San Francisco mortgage research firm.

By last year, the level had risen to 48%. Nationally, LoanPerformance says, interest-only loans were used in about a third of all purchases.

Why is this a problem? Namely, people are over exposed to risk when they have little equity in their homes. Given the high transaction costs to sell, currently around 6%, it means that half of all homes bought in California are at a loss. They are hedging on fast appreciation. The article cites an example that puts the risk in perspective:

Thanks to her “interest-only” loan, the 911 police dispatcher was able to afford, barely, her first home. She now has a stake in California’s sizzling real estate market. As her home increases in value, she plans to use some of that equity to pay down her credit cards.

But Herron is also setting herself up for a day of reckoning: Nov. 1, 2007.

That’s when she has to start paying off her loan principal. If interest rates are higher than when she bought her home last fall — something many economists consider probable if not inevitable — her monthly payment will increase by as much as a third. (emphasis mine)

Almost certainly we will see a rise in foreclosures among the least wealthy of homeowners. As they shift back into renting they will get hit a second time, as rents tend to rise along with interest rates. What should we do?

1. Keep renting if you can’t put down close to 20%.
2. If you added an interest only loan (second mortgage) to your primary home, spend it wisely. Paying down other debts with higher interest rates is smart, but buying doodads isn’t.
3. As a society, now is the time to address affordable housing before the problem gets any worse.

Benedict XVI Homily at the Mass for the Election of the Roman Pontiff

How many winds of doctrine we have known in recent decades, how many ideological currents, how many ways of thinking… The small boat of thought of many Christians has often been tossed about by these waves — thrown from one extreme to the other: from Marxism to liberalism, even to libertinism; from collectivism to radical individualism; from atheism to a vague religious mysticism; from agnosticism to syncretism, and so forth. Every day new sects are created and what Saint Paul says about human trickery comes true, with cunning which tries to draw those into error (cf Eph 4, 14). Having a clear faith, based on the Creed of the Church, is often labeled today as a fundamentalism. Whereas, relativism, which is letting oneself be tossed and “swept along by every wind of teaching,” looks like the only attitude (acceptable) to today’s standards. We are moving towards a dictatorship of relativism which does not recognize anything as for certain and which has as its highest goal one’s own ego and one’s own desires.

While secular media worldwide call for the church to modernize, it is refreshing (to me, at least) to see an affirmation of the whimsical state of relativist thinking. Dogma is no paradise either, but there is a reason that the message of absolute truths has endured in the church. While some will cast this as fundamentalism, those of us who believe know the difference aren’t so easily fooled.

Unsolicited, we often give advice to others. Along the way I’ve picked up a few nuggets about giving advice:

1. Sometimes it is best not to give advice. Men have an inclination toward interrupting the listening process with advice, thinking that it gets straight to the point, when in fact empathy is often the wiser choice. Don’t ask me to explain it though, because I can’t imagine telling another guy how I feel about something unless I expected to be advised.
2. Don’t mandate advice. As Hannah Whitall Smith said, “The true secret of giving advice is, after you have honestly given it, to be perfectly indifferent whether it is taken or not, and never persist in trying to set people right.” The only thing worse than someone who gives advice instead of empathy is the person who becomes upset when you decline their preferred course of action.
3. Advice often comes at the wrong time. For some odd reason, most people (myself included) can attest to the value of advice only after it is too late to accept it. A truly wise person knows not only the right advice to give, but the right time for its delivery.

My rants about walmart are often in this space, but I think it isn’t enough just to be upset. On that note, I encourage readers who also share my concern to take action. For those who don’t share my concern, you can always taunt me in the comments section. ;)

Unions established the “Made in America” movement in the 70s as a response to foreign imports. It resulted in some patriotic buying habits that continue to this day and the ever present “made in x country” labels that we see on nearly every product we buy. It was generally a good idea, as it made people aware of a new dimension to their purchasing habits.

However, times have changed and globalization, for good or bad, is so pervasive that this strategy holds little sway over purchasing decisions. Between diluting the idea with lies from walmart and inherent complexity of identifying a country of origin, the label is no longer worthwhile. I suggest we move to version 2.0 of the info-label.

I propose that the label should indicate a simple ratio that denotes the wage differential of the typical executive to the typical worker. In case anyone thinks that this is a non-issue, I draw this from a summary of BLS data:

The United States long has had the industrialized world’s largest gap in pay between chief executives and blue-collar workers. CEO compensation swelled from 85 times what workers earned in 1990, to 209 times in 1996, and 326 times the following year. In 1999, CEO pay surged to a record 419 times the average worker’s wage, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Although I have some doubts about consumer social consciousness, I think providing the facts is a good start. We provide FDA information for consumers to make healthy choices about food. I think we should provide them a way to support companies that operate with a more fair compensation differential. It should be a part of our purchasing decision.

Update: I cross posted this to the Road Bike Review politics forum. A lively discussion has ensued.

Project Syndicate

Over 50% of Russia’s population, including teachers, scientists, doctors, and military personnel, have seen their quality of life fall since communism’s demise. No surprise, then, that they are nostalgic for the past, including Stalin.

It shouldn’t surprise us. I’ve heard it from Russians myself. While Communism wasn’t perfect and people were generally poor, at least they felt powerful. Now they are more poor and they are mocked by the West.

The Rise of Disaster Capitalism

As in other reconstruction sites, from Haiti to Iraq, tsunami relief has little to do with recovering what was lost. Although hotels and industry have already started reconstructing on the coast, in Sri Lanka, Thailand, Indonesia and India, governments have passed laws preventing families from rebuilding their oceanfront homes. Hundreds of thousands of people are being forcibly relocated inland, to military style barracks in Aceh and prefab concrete boxes in Thailand. The coast is not being rebuilt as it was–dotted with fishing villages and beaches strewn with handmade nets. Instead, governments, corporations and foreign donors are teaming up to rebuild it as they would like it to be: the beaches as playgrounds for tourists, the oceans as watery mines for corporate fishing fleets, both serviced by privatized airports and highways built on borrowed money.

We should be very concerned when our charitable efforts are turned into an opportunity for globalization. I certainly hope my support to the Red Cross is being used in more humanitarian ways. It is simply outrageous to use a disaster as an excuse to monetize a shoreline.

Now on DVD: The Sanitizer’s Cut

[Ray] Lines is a film “sanitizer,” one of a new kind of independent and self-proclaimed “family-friendly” editors who delete scenes containing sexuality, violence or crude language — and sometimes more — from the DVD releases of Hollywood movies. The edited DVDs are resold or rented to parents and others who want a “clean” version of the movie.

This is creating a bit of controversy because it naturally alters the film in some way. Opponents of the process have likened it to propaganda and insinuate that the patrons of sanitized film are prudes. the issue isn’t about revenue, since the sanitizer purchases a copy of the media before reselling an edited version. The net result may actually be an increase in sales. So what is the big deal? I quote:

The dispute is, in some ways, less about money than a clash over social values and control of a creative product. “A lot of people are just really tired of what’s out there,” says Sandra Teraci, who runs Family Flix with her husband, Richard. “They’re tired of turning on the TV or renting a movie and constantly being hit by violence, profanity and nudity. A lot of people want to go back to the 1950s, before this sort of thing was routine.”

The content creator wants to publish smut and the content consumer sees a glimmer of redeeming value. This is not much different from fan fiction or a variety of other good-faith efforts to put media in the hands of the public interest. I’m rather a fan of Lessig’s view on Creative Commons, where copyright shouldn’t be a lever to ensure perpetual profit at the expense of the common good.

In other words, I say let a thousand flowers bloom. The content creators have longed endured a variety of interpretation of art (and that which purports to be art). Direct manipulation and derivation of work is a natural form of expression. We would be wise to encourage it, lest the exercise of creativity become the sole province of the RIAA and MPAA.