Sports columnist Wilbon is well

This is month-old news, but sometimes you get so wrapped in your own things you miss the others.

Michael Wilbon, the beloved Washington Post sports columnist and co-host of ESPN's Pardon the Interruption, had a minor heart attack early Monday morning. Absent from Monday's PTI, Tony Kornheiser announced Wilbon wasn't feeling well and had been experiencing some minor chest pains (he was replaced by ESPN analyst J.A. Adande).

DCist, 30 January 2008

Wilbon is a fantastic sports columnist. He writes about life as well, and has never been afraid to take risks with his well-researched and expressed opinions. He returns to the airwaves this weekend on George Michael's (not the singer) sports program, Full Court Press.

Welcome back!

2009.01.20

President Bush reacts to a reporter's question during a news conference
at the White House in Washington, Thursday, Feb. 28, 2008.
AP Photo/Charles Dharapak

US Presidents' terms originally did not conclude until the 4th of March following the November election. The 20th Amendment moved this forward to the 20th of January.

FDR was the first President inaugurated on this new date, in 1937.

The next Inauguration Day will occur on January 20, 2009.

Trumpets will sound!

Whose presidential platform is this?

• Adopt single payer national health insurance
• Cut the huge, bloated, wasteful military budget
• No to nuclear power, solar energy first
• Aggressive crackdown on corporate crime
• and corporate welfare
• Open up the Presidential debates
• Adopt a carbon pollution tax
• Reverse U.S. policy in the Middle East
• Impeach Bush/Cheney
• Repeal the Taft-Hartley anti-union law
• Adopt a Wall Street securities speculation tax
• Put an end to ballot access obstructionism
• Work to end corporate personhood

McCain? Of course not!

Clinton? No.

Obama? Not close.

It's Ralph Nader's.

Hillary's snowfight tonight

To frankly remain viable in the Democratic presidential delegate race, Hillary Clinton—like a challenger in a prizefight—must score a knockout or—at the least—win on all scorecards in tonight's Cleveland Ohio debate, in a snowstorm. A draw would go to the leader—and isn't that a remarkable thing in this Democratic primary season!—Barack Obama.

Dancing with McCain

We're about to spend a trillion in our occupation of Iraq. Osama bin Laden is at large. The country is in a recession. We're dependent on other nations for our cash reserves and oil.

But what's important this week?

John McCain had lunch ... with a woman ... nine years ago.

Frank Sinatra once saw a man dance with his wife in Chicago.

Egads! Enough already.

Barack Obama is Your New Bicycle

This is hilarious:
http://barackobamaisyournewbicycle.com/

One could daydream for a second or two, hoping that that link might be the snarkiest political attack of this election cycle. Of course, it has already not been so; Pandora opened her box long ago.

Do I care if Hillary Clinton served on the board of WalMart? Do I care that past POW John McCain talked to lobbyists? Yes.

But do those, and other things, comprise the greater portion of my calculus on who should lead this nation? No, and it's not even close.

We elect humans, not saints. Religion is the venue for absolutes; politics is the venue for actually getting things done.

With McCain, whatever the truth may be, it is his very legislative actions against the pernicious influence of big money and power that are protecting our electoral process.

With Clinton, we have a tough as nails leader, whose health care plan is vital for the health (pun intended) and the economic welfare of our nation.

Although this unreconstructed liberal (me) is for Clinton, Obama could indeed be an amazing option for president, both for the symbolism -- as with Hillary -- and for what he might be able to accomplish.

And anyone who thinks that Obama is all speechifying and no thinkifying: read his single-spaced position papers.

I am concerned, however, that an emotional fatigue may develop toward him, as it did with Bill Clinton. It's like the emotional high of a love affair, until that first day you realize that, hey, she/he has morning breath.

Those who have become so recently politically engaged, do not, just as precipitously, become disenchanted again.

For leadership, yes, moral fiber counts. As does strength under adversity, and crisis management, and intelligence, and experience, and "the vision thing".

So, be inspired, but care more for the plan than the (wo)man.

Facebook: privacy

Facebook was in the news for privacy issues last year and again just recently.

In November [2007], Facebook introduced an advertising program called Beacon that tracked its users’ activities on other Web sites and sent reports to their friends. Users complained that it was intrusive, leading Facebook to scale back the program.

And, last week's imbroglio:

Magnus Wallin, the founder of a Facebook group called “How to permanently delete your Facebook account,” posted a warning on Friday.

“Users who have requested to be deleted via the recently introduced form are only partly deleted, even though the deletion is confirmed by Facebook staff,” Mr. Wallin wrote.

On Saturday, after the partially deleted profiles disappeared, Mr. Wallin said in an e-mail message, “Now there seems to be a way to completely remove yourself from Facebook, without having to delete items individually.” But he does not plan to retire from his group.

“It’s pretty obvious that Facebook are scared of losing loads of members if they made the delete option easily available,” Mr. Wallin said.

Approaching my half-full/half-empty life year, I'm not in a demographic that extensively participates in Web 2.0. And, as a much-younger 20-something friend said to me—surprising me: "Why should I let everyone, everywhere, know my personal business, forever?"

In other words, you don't have to sign up. But, that being said, Facebook and others of its ilk can serve as useful networking tools.

On Feb. 8, a British newspaper, The Sun, reported that Bill Gates, the chairman of Microsoft, had deleted his Facebook account ­ not out of privacy concerns, but because he got “more than 8,000 friend requests a day and spotted weird fan sites about him.”

Bill never listed me as a friend.

More from The New York Times, 18 February:
After Stumbling, Facebook Finds a Working Eraser.

Are you now, or have you ever been, a vegan?

Being a vegetarian, I was quite amused by this post on Mike Walter's blog. He's the morning co-anchor on WUSA-TV, the DC area CBS affiliate:

I don't know about you, but I slept a lot better last night. I went to bed knowing deep down that the government is in good hands. Maybe it's just me, but last time I checked our country was at war in Iraq and Afghanistan. So many people in this country are suffering and losing their homes to foreclosure. Oh and did I mention it appears our country is thundering towards a recession. Maybe I forgot to mention that we are leaving an enormous debt for our children and grandchildren to pay off. New Orleans is still suffering and in need of help. If you are in Congress you might need to think about these issues. Nah what am I thinking!

Forget about Waterboarding and whether our country should be spying on us, no America and Congress needs to know, in fact we must know, is Roger Clemens a Vegan! I was listening on C-Span radio yesterday to the Congressional hearing. I know one thing Clemens is smart and crafty. One Congressman moved in and tried to pin him down on the Vegan issue.

Congressman: 'Are you a Vegan?"

Clemens is trapped! Even though I'm listening to it on the radio, I can tell he's squirming, and uncomfortable. How is he going to get out of this jam? He certainly can't throw a fastball or a curveball this time can he? In a stroke of genius he decides not to answer the question. Does he plead the fifth? No he's too tricky for that.

Clemens: "Um, uh, um, uh, um I uh, I don't know what that is!"

It's incredible, but this exchange between Congressman Bruce Braley and steroid-use-denying baseball pitcher Roger Clemens actually did occur.

The Constitution obviously doesn't include intelligence as a prerequisite for Congressional service.

More

Digital television update

In February of 2009, TV rabbit ears will be going the way of the dodo bird. Standard television sets will no longer be able to receive a signal. If you subscribe to cable or satellite services, you should be ok and won't need to do anything

Otherwise, here's what to do.

Absence of Grace

People often speak of an absence of civility in Washington, but that's not quite the problem. Faking civility is a primary operating style: "My esteemed colleague."

What is needed is grace — sensitivity, mercy, generosity of spirit, a courtesy so deep it amounts to beauty. We will have to summon it. And the dreadful thing is you can't really fake it.

A very small theory, but my latest, is that many politicians and journalists lack a certain public grace because they spent their formative years in the American institution most likely to encourage base assumptions and coldness toward the foe. Yes, boarding school, and tony private schools in general. The last people with grace in America are poor Christians and religiously educated people of the middle class. The rich gave it up as an affectation long ago. Too bad, since they stayed in power.

The latest example of a lack of grace in Washington is the exchange between Jim Webb and President Bush at a White House Christmas party. Mr. Webb did not want to pose with the president and so didn't join the picture line. Fair enough, everyone feels silly on a picture line. Mr. Bush approached him later and asked after his son, a Marine. Mr. Webb said he'd like his son back from Iraq. Mr. Bush then, according to the Washington Post, said: "That's not what I asked you. How's your son?" Mr. Webb replied that's between him and his son.

For this Mr. Webb has been roundly criticized. And on reading the exchange I thought it had the sound of the rattling little aggressions of our day, but not on Mr. Webb's side. Imagine Lincoln saying, in such circumstances, "That's not what I asked you." Or JFK. Or Gerald Ford!

"That's not what I asked you" is a sentence straight from cable TV, from which many Americans are acquiring an attitude toward public and even private presentation.

Our interviewers and anchors have been taught, or learned, that they must show who's in charge, who's demanding answers, who's uncompromising in his search for truth. But of course they're not in search of truth; they're on a search for dominance.

Interviewers now always, as you have noticed, interrupt the person they're interviewing. Yes, they are trying to show who's in control of this conversation, and yes, they're trying to catch the interviewee off guard in hope of making news. They are attempting to keep trained and practiced politicians from launching unfruitful filibusters and boring everyone.

But interviewers also interrupt their subjects because they don't want the camera on the subject. They want the camera on themselves. <...>

The Dominance of the Face leads to the inevitability of the interruption:

"Why did you vote 'no'?"

"I felt--"

"But why'd you do it?"

"Well, the implications of the question, and the merits of the arguments seemed--"

"That's not what I asked you!"

Because of this style, no one in America has been allowed to finish a sentence in the past 10 years. And it is not confined to cable but has spread to the networks, to government, and is starting to affect regular people, encouraging in them a conversational style that is not friendly or graceful, but depositional.

This has not contributed to the presence of grace in our public life.

Peggy Noonan — past speechwriter to Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush — wrote this in 2006. (Its political content is timely: Senator Jim Webb of Virginia has recently been mentioned as a potential Vice-Presidential Democratic nominee.)

But risking castigation as lacking grace myself, I might differ with Ms. Noonan as to the holders of grace in today's society. No religion — or non-religion — has a lock on that sacramental civility.

As often as one may encounter incivility, one can occasionally encounter anonymous politeness, pleasantry, collegiality, gentle discourse, and — okay, I'll say it — random acts of kindness.

Whether these are religiously spurred, I cannot — and should not be able to — tell. The very implication of grace is that it demands no recognition. It is not even its own reward. It is, simply put, the right thing to do.

And that is why I believe grace rare to find ... and personally difficult to practice.

Lithuania 1, Tsar 0

As late as the 1300s, Lithuania was the largest nation in Europe. It also had been the final European nation to accept Christianity.

But politics, geography, and cruel chance conspired to reduce Lithuania to a mere sliver — an annex of Tsarist Russia and Imperial Germany.

Today marks the 90th anniversary of its return to sovereignty — the 1918 Act of Independence of Lithuania. (The title to this post does actually miss the mark by a year. Tsar Nicholas II had abdicated in 1917. Snappy sound to it though!)

Of course, then came Stalin, then came Hitler, and then again Communist Russia. So we'll fly the flag again on 11 March — which in 1990 marked the reestablishment of the independence of Lithuania.

My forebears emigrated from Lithuania in the early 20th century. My mother's father — Josef Ambraziejus, born in 1877 — remembered burying Lithuanian-language books in the dirt floors of houses to save them from the Tsarist Cossacks who would raid villages, looking to eradicate any resurgence of of Lithuanian culture or resistance.

So, today, I proudly display the flag.

Prior related posts from my beer blog(!) on Lithuania.

Political mechan-ics

If the Republicans wish to persist in shorting the Democratic Party a syllable by referring to it as the "Democrat" Party, those Democrats should return the favor, and give the Republicans that missing syllable.

Say hello to the ... 'Republicanics'.

Differences Do Not Define Us

From the Washington Post, Letters to the Editor, today, 14 February:

As I was leaving a Barack Obama rally, a young white woman caught up with me and said: "It's so nice to see someone your age [emphasis mine]. I thought it would be all young people."

I'm 72 years old and fit into several of the demographic groups (white, educated, female, retired, urban, middle-income) that are constantly polled, second-guessed and analyzed in the election campaign coverage. But these labels are not particularly relevant to my vote.

I wish people would understand that older people care about the same things as everyone else. I have an adequate income, health care, and a home, but I worry about those who don't. I worry about education. civil rights, economic disparities and the endless, unconscionable war in Iraq. I've lived most of my life, but I care about the future. I long for a country where people place the common good above their own needs.

Sophisticated polling based on ever-smaller slices of the population exaggerates our differences and mistakenly assumes that our differences define us. We have much more in common than the polls suggest. I will be glad that an old, white woman goes to a rally for the person who someone else has decided is the candidate of the young, black, and male population.

Our Differences Do Not Define Us
GEORGIA LEWIS

My mother agrees (as do many of us). But, Georgia, you are yet young!

Past Valentine

And now the purple dusk of twilight time
Steals across the meadows of my heart.
High up in the sky the little stars climb
Always reminding me that we're apart.

You wander down the lane and far away
Leaving me a song that will not die.
Love is now the stardust of yesterday
The music of the years gone by.

Sometimes I wonder why I spend
The lonely night dreaming of a song.

The melody haunts my reverie
And I am once again with you
When our love was new
And each kiss an inspiration.

But that was long ago.

Now my consolation
Is in the stardust of a song.

Beside a garden wall
When stars are bright
You are in my arms
The nightingale tells his fairy tale
A paradise where roses bloom.

Though I dream in vain
In my heart it will remain
My stardust melody ...

The memory of love's refrain.

With thanks to Hoagy Carmichael who wrote Stardust, and, of course, to Nat King Cole who sang Stardust better than anyone else ever could.

Beagle wins!

Ethel Mae is a very proud beagle this morning.

Uno — her breed kin — has won best of show at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show. In fact it's the only time that a beagle has won there ... ever!

Barking and baying up a storm, Uno lived up to his name Tuesday night by becoming the first beagle to win best in show at the Westminster Kennel Club.

The nation's new top dog was clearly the fan favorite and drew a standing ovation from the sold-out crowd at Madison Square Garden when he was picked.

Uno got right into the act, jumping up on handler Aaron Wilkerson and confirming his other title: noisiest in show. Years from now, he'll be known for the "ah-roo" heard 'round the ring.

The only dog consistently listed among America's most popular breeds for nearly 100 years, a beagle had never won in the 100 times Westminster picked a winner.

More...

Ethel Mae let go with several good "ah-roos" of her own this morning chasing a squirrel in the snow.

BREW is a beagle rescue and adoption agency with a chapter located in the greater Washington, D.C. area. Its acronym (appealing to the beer guy in me) stands for Beagle Rescue, Education, and Welfare. Go to http://brewbeagles.org for more information.

Bye, Bye WYPR

Listening yesterday to the Diane Rehm Show on WAMU-FM — a Washington DC National Public Radio (NPR) outlet — I heard a caller refer to himself as a disgruntled and former WYPR listener.

The reference was to the firing last week of long-time Baltimore NPR station WYPR-FM talk show host Marc Steiner.

In fact much more than just a host, Steiner had been the public face, if you will, of that station for many years, and had recently guided it into its current independence and format.

As Dan Rodricks of the Baltimore Sun put it:

The dumping of Marc Steiner as host of the midday show at WYPR-FM -- a public-radio station that very likely would not exist were it not for him -- is sad and infuriating. Steiner was blessed with the brains, heart, pipes and civic interest for a great talk-show host, and he had a long run of good work.

[By the way, it's interesting to note that Rodricks may be invited to host Steiner's former noon to 2pm time-slot.]

Although I don't live in Baltimore, I am able to access the station while driving through some areas in which I work. But now, I won't. WYPR has lost this customer.

Steiner's website — The Center for Emerging Media — lists some of his other endeavors.

[UPDATE 2008.06.11: Steiner returns to airwaves, but NOT at WYPR.]

Separation of Huckabee and state

Considering tonight's close choice between Senator McCain and Minister Huckabee in Virginia, here's this from a blogger who once posted a Flickr photo of my front window and who recently wrote about my First Amendment rights:

On January 14 in Warren, Michigan, Huckabee was speaking to a large crowd about proposals for a constitutional human life amendment and an amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman. I knew his position on those issues, but nothing had prepared me to hear him say this:

I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution. But I believe it’s a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living God. And that’s what we need to do is amend the Constitution so it’s in God’s standards rather than trying to change God’s standards so it lines up with some contemporary view of how we treat each other and how we treat the family.

I have no idea what Huckabee truly meant by this ominous assault on the "wall of separation" between church and state. Even the evangelical magazine Christianity Today seemed troubled by his statement, noting that it may cost him more votes among evangelicals than help him. One can only hope.

The constitutional doctrine pertaining to the separation of church and state is certainly a complex topic and, like all constitutional issues, is part of a living document. We are fortunate that Americans have recognized that amending the constitution is a grave matter and should not be a way of resolving parochial differences on cultural or religious concerns.

I know that many so-called mainstream people of faith are appalled at this dangerous statement from a presidential candidate. We must now hope that evangelicals will see beyond the rhetoric and recognize that Huckabee's position puts their own freedom of religion at risk, and not just that of people whose theology differs from theirs.

More.

Ways out of the recession

From smarter minds than mine:

No Quick Fix to Downturn

Peter S. Goodman and Floyd Norris

The question is not whether we will have a recession, but how deep and prolonged it will be,” said David Rosenberg, the chief North American economist at Merrill Lynch. “Even if the Fed’s moves are going to work, it will not show up until the later part of 2008 or 2009.

Stimulate the Economy, Don't Play Politics With It

Steven Pearlstein

Look, folks, this ought to be an easy one. Almost everyone agrees that recession is likely and a modest amount of fiscal stimulus could provide an economic cushion. It won't prevent a recession, but fiscal stimulus could be an insurance policy against the economy spiraling out of control. And it could take some of the pressure off the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates, which could stoke inflation, prompt a run on the dollar and reinflate the credit bubble that got us into this mess.

And, of course, vote the bums out!

Potomac Primary: a split decision

Enjoying their cups of victory joe at Stacy's Coffee Parlor, Gene Cizauskas (on the left) — the matriarch of the Cizauskas clan — and Y.F.G.F. (on the right, and that's not metaphorically) had split their votes earlier on primary day in Virginia.

When reminded that the pollsters were saying that it's the young that were voting for Senator Obama, Gene agreed. She had!

• Today is Lincoln's Birthday
  
• Respect for Democracy
• A toothy smile for Prez
• Barack Obama
  
• Shakepeare and beer, wine, and victory

Lincoln's birthday

Tuesday is the 199th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln's birth.

And, Tuesday, three options at the Virginia presidential primary polls will include an African-American man, a Caucasian woman, and an American war hero.

This will be an historic day on which I will feel very proud and fortunate to be an American.

Is fascism an impeachable offense?

The spelling isn't quite right, but the rant is ... and it is frightening in its implication: degradation of the Constitution has been so blithely accepted or shrugged as off as 'whatever' during the last 7 years.