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With the mid-term elections less than a month away, I figured now would be an excellent time to give an update as to where I see things going on November 7th. Lets start with:

Lamont vs. Lieberman
It’s the fights of the two L’s (not that kind of “L”!). Lately, Lieberman has been sticking to his guns, and trying to defend his support for the war. He’s unwavering in his support for the war in purpose, but points out that he’s been opposed to Bush’s handling of it. I think it’s something to say that he is consistent in his views. At least he’s not playing down his support of it since he lost the primary.

What he’s not being consistent in is his continued support of the Democratic party. Before the primary, his party-related message was how good of a Democrat he is. After losing the primary, he’s been telling people how good of a Democrat he’s not. That is, how well he’s worked to cross party lines and get things done. It’s a interesting strategy, since he needs that Independent and Republican support to ensure he wins.

In the latest Quinnipiac poll, Lieberman leads over Lamont by 10 points, so at the moment, he’s in a comfortable position. However, who knows what could happen between now and election day, especially after the Foley scandal. Yes, Lieberman is a Democrat, but to some voters, if you’re perceived as supporting Republican policies or defending Republican scandals, you’re as good as a Republican. Lieberman is close to Bush, and remains as such, so it could hurt him. Lieberman has said some things to infuriate Democrats, especially those who’s traditionally supported him. However, those things were before this poll, and I’ve just shown how well that’s worked.

While Lieberman has lost some ground (49-39 compared to August’s 53-41), Lamont hasn’t gained much. I still think Lamont is focusing too much on how different to Lieberman he is, and on the Iraq war issue. Lamont has all this money, he should be using it to better explain his position on some of the other major issues. One of his other big issues is healthcare, yet he isn’t doing much to talk about it. Lamont has some real work to do before November, or Joe Lieberman will win. There are 7 percent undecided, but unless the Foley thing hurts Lieberman, or unless Lieberman screws up, that’s not going to help Lamont, even if he were to get all of those undecided voters.

I’m still rather undecided. A month ago, I might have been leaning more toward Lieberman, but now I’m stuck just about right in the middle. Some of the things I’ve learned about Lieberman have made me uneasy, but I’m trying to look past the war issue and see what else he’s about as well.

Rell vs. DeStefano
What can I say here? I think this race is already decided. Despite the justice department turmoil and a couple small scandals, Rell still enjoys pretty popular bi-partisan support. According to the poll, she’s leading 63-30, a shocking amount, which tell a lot about what is going to happen. I haven’t seen much from DeStefano since the primary, which doesn’t bode well for him. DeStefano beats Rell 53-42 among Democratic voters, but I’m guessing most of the people who are part of the lead would never vote for Rell, just on principle.

I’m pretty pro-Rell right now. Despite the couple small scandals in her administration (the justice department one she had no control over, but handled well all the same), I like the efforts she has made at trying to clean house. Yea, there are some questions lingering, even in my mind, over how much she might have known about Rowland’s activities, but unless we get some concrete proof she was involved, I’m willing to look past it. She was a supporter of the civil unions legislation, which I think was a good thing for her to support, given that she seems pretty religious, as far as I can tell. Even though I do support gay marriage, I feel we have to take baby steps on this issue. There are some who want all or nothing, but if we go that attitude, it’ll never happen. We’re a blue state, we’ll get there.

Simmons vs. Courtney
Another pretty close race. However, I think that unless Simmons commits some kind of major screwup, he may win. Will “Foleygate” affect him? I don’t know, but I’m better to guess it won’t. I will have to keep a closer eye on this race for my next update. I just don’t have much to say about it right now.

and, because I’d be voting here if not for college:

Larson vs. Who (?)
I don’t even know who he’s running against off the top of my head. That says a lot, I think. Yea, Larson’s keeping it.

That’s it for now. I’ll keep an eye on Lamont vs. Lieberman, and Simmons vs. Courtney.

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I have just had an epiphany: it is time for a new template. Probably at best, anything I do will be a medium to major reworking of what I already have. I like simple layout, hence this one. However, I think it could do with a freshening up, and maybe some more graphics. Not a lot, but some more. If you have any ideas, let me know.

By the way, my last entry made number 100. I’m so proud of myself because I never though I’d get there. And what an entry to do for number 100. Nice and content-filled.

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This is an article I wrote to my campus newspaper, The Campus Lantern, in response to a current situation going on between them and the Student Government Association. In brief, the newspaper, which has been in print for about 45 years, recently made the decision to switch from a traditional print paper to an entirely online version. This article tries not to take a political position in the matter, but instead explains my views on the future of print news.

Ever since I became aware of the ongoing battle between The Campus Lantern and SGA, I’ve been trying to figure out how I wanted to respond to the matter, because I knew I had to write something about it. Had I responded right after the first articles appeared in the Lantern, it probably would have ended up being something about my political views over who has the right to decide the Lantern’s direction. However, since I now have the whole story from both sides (I think), I have decided not to take a particular position on who is right and who is wrong in that matter. I’ll leave that up to those who know best about what’s going on, The Lantern and SGA. Rather, I want to explain where I feel the genre of print news is headed, and how my feelings apply to the Lantern. I will take a position on this subject, so feel free to agree or disagree.

It is hard to deny that the Internet age has arrived. Whether the activity is research for a paper, or simply checking Facebook, if you’re reading this article, you probably use the Internet to some extent everyday. With the rise in Internet usage over the past few years, it’s hardly surprising that more and more people would use it as their primary source of news. Don’t take my word for it, just look at the numbers. According to a study by the Newspaper Association of America (via Reuters), the number of unique visitors to newspaper websites for the first half of 2006 was 55.5 million, compared to 42.2 million a year earlier, about 52%. In the same period, some of the top newspapers have seen some pretty impressive drops in readership. The New York Times went down 5.8% to 4.7 million readers and USA Today is now down 3% to about 6.9 million readers. You can check the figures out at the Reuters website. While there is still a significant number of newspaper readers, it would seem that more and more people are using the abundantly available websites on the Internet to get their daily news, rather than the newspapers. I think the continuing rise of visitors to these websites represents a trend that will continue as more people gain access to the Internet.

In my own personal experience, I know my day isn’t complete without my usual rounds to the news websites: CNN, BBC News, and occasionally Fox News and some of the others as well. That isn’t to say that I don’t read printed newspapers anymore, quite the contrary. The thing I do most in Hurley Hall, besides eating, is read the Hartford Courant. I feel that the printed media, among others mediums like television, it still the best way to catch up on local news. On the other hand, I can’t deny that most of my news no longer comes from the traditional printed newspaper. I’m more likely to get it from one of the sources mentioned earlier. Hey, what can I say? I like my news when it first becomes news. I like to know what’s going on in the world when it happens, and not the next day. Sure, there are some issues with such instantaneous news, but that’s another topic.

The fact is that getting your news from the Internet can provide more interactivity with that news, so to speak. With a printed newspaper, you get text and some pictures, and that’s about it. On the other hand, a website can give you both of those, and in addition, can provide video and/or audio from just about anywhere. Also, commentary has been made easier as a reader no longer has to submit a letter to the editor to say something about an article. Instead, they can leave a short blurb of one or two sentences to express their feelings. With some systems, you can discuss an article or issue in a forum-like setting. Finally, all of this can be updated twenty-four hours a day, so there is no delay, no waiting to see what has developed since the last time you’ve read the paper. I think I’m right in saying that most people like seeing so many ways they can interact with the news, which is probably one of the reasons newspaper websites have risen so quickly.

So, what does any of this have to do with The Campus Lantern? Well, by going online, the Lantern is able to reach a wider audience than they ever have. Not only will Eastern students and staff be able to get the news and other content, but anybody who knows the web address, say, Willimantic or Windham residents, will also be able to see what is happening at Eastern. This means that people who may not usually read the Lantern will now have access to do so. Earlier, I provided some figures on the changing landscape of news reading for some of the national papers. While thecampuslantern.com has only been up for a few weeks, it will be interesting to see what happens to readership once the word has spread a bit more. Therefore, I hope they’ll continue to provide periodical updates on how many people are visiting the website. So, this is one reason I like the change, since I’m all for more people able to gain access to the paper. After all, I know I’m more likely to read the Lantern if it’s on the Internet, something I already use a lot, anyway.
Continue reading →

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This blog post is different than others I’ve done. Unlike the Clash of Civilizations, which started off as a blog post and then became a class paper, this started off as a class paper, and I’m just now posting it to the blog. I think CoC is better work, but I want to post this anyway.

The role of “national identity” has an important part in shaping American security policy since World War II. The norms and values of this nation have defined how we want to see the rest of the world. Therefore, anything that has been perceived as vastly different from the identity of the nation has been deemed first as foreign to the people of the nation, and at the level of government, a possible threat. Since the end of the war, there have two major areas of security policies: dealing with communist and middle eastern states.

The first major threat after the war was the rise of communism. Here we have several new regimes popping up that are just about as different from the U.S. as possible. No more capitalist system, state-run industry on everything, a promised sharing of wealth, and to top it off, totalitarian leaders. Everything that is just about direct opposite of what Americans identify themselves as, capitalist and democratic. So, a national security policy is adopted that generally opposes these states, and one that works to eventually see a change in the regime that runs them. However, the policy was more confrontational than hands-on, because of the problem of nuclear weapons. They wanted to change the system, but not incite violence, or the problem would just increase. Hence why it never turned into a “hot war.” In the end, through persistence, among other factors, communism fell, and that problem ended.

The threat of the current day is Islamic terrorism, and those states that support it, or would work to cause violence in the world. Again, the problem boils down to those states that go against American values, particularly democracy. In this case, the government saw a need to directly intervene and act in a very hands-on way to solve the problem. The first case was in response to direct attack by terrorists who were supported by Afghanistan, and the next case because of the allegation of weapons of mass destruction. They were invaded, and new regimes are currently undergoing development.

This seems to represent another aspect of American identity, wanting to directly change things that also affect us. In World War II, we were relatively neutral until we were attacked. We may never have gotten involved if we were not affected. Then, in the Cold War, we were constantly under a perceived threat, but never directly affected, so no direct action against communist states was really ever taken (yes, I know of the exceptions, like the Bay of Pigs). Yet, here we were attacked, and the government decided that it needed to go on a mission of spreading democracy, to prevent weapons of mass destruction from being used. There have been exceptions, of course, like Vietnam, Korea, and the first Gulf War, but generally, but in terms of threats that affect us, we tend not to get involved unless we have to. So, our strong national identity of wanting to see democratic values throughout the world has shaped the U.S.’s security policies, which have been implemented in different ways depending on the situation.

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Time for one of those rare, boring, “why are you doing this to me” updates. Haven’t done one in some time, so I’m overdue.

Since the last one of these entries, I have began college again, and am, for the most part, enjoying my classes. I have two of them with the same guy (State & Local Politics and The Presidency…interesting how much both of them overlap), and he’s a bit crazy, but in a good way. I think he has a bit of cynical view of life, but maybe that’s just me. It doesn’t impede his teaching, and that’s the important thing. He can go off on tangents, but not as wildly as my old polysci professor from last semester. I particularly enjoy the night class I have with him. In all, classes with him go pretty quickly. He’s a flaming liberal, but at least he educates himself with everything. I have to let him know his antics have got me reading the 9/11 Commission Report.

I’m also taking a course called Culture and National Security. It’s apparently one of the few that exist in the country, apparently (for one reason) because Americans tend to be awful at integrating cultural understanding whilst doing international relations. I guess the goal of the course is to improve on this problem. The book we use is from 1996, so the professor says someone could make a lot of money at making an updated version. I don’t think I’m up for the task, though. My other two courses are Western Civilization after 1500, which not much can be said about, except…history…and Scriptwriting, which allows me to be a little creative in something that isn’t getting awesome video footage. Hopefully it’ll prompt me to update Creative a bit more.

On a slightly less academic topic, the clubs I’m in are going pretty strong. As I think I’ve said, I was elected Treasurer at the end of last semester. Haven’t done much yet, but I will soon, since I’ll have to work to get prizes for previous contestants. Then in January, I’ll be working a lot for the Vegas trip. I have yet to do much for that position, but I think I will soon to get some prizes for the Expedition game show. Aside from Treasurer, on Thursday I tried out for and got the position of Director for the B-team of the newscast. I’m very excited and a little nervous about this, as being a director can be both fun, intense, and terrifying at the same time. You have to be alert to everything, since you’re the one to which everybody else is listening. The newscast has two teams, one that goes live, the A-team, and one that goes live-to-tape, the B-team, so I’m sorta anxiously anticipating next semester, when I’ll be in the A-team position. Being one of the directors, I’m fairly certain I’ll be asked to also direct at least one of the Expedition episodes, so I may have that to look forward to. At least I can be a little more creative there, as that’s all in-studio. No switching to and from tapes, and a game show is not as formulatic as a newscast setting.

Other than the TV club, I’m still participating in my hall’s resident council, now known as Nutmeg Residence Hall Association, which is a more informal version of Hall Council. So, after finally gaining President last semester, I lost it…heh. But, that’s ok. I’m more in the business of getting some fun stuff planned for the hall. So, if I can help do that, I’ve done my job.

Well, that’s the short of what’s been going on. Time to watch one or two episodes of Stargate, then off to bed.

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If there’s anything I hate just as much as people trying to shove religion down someone’s throat, or people who are closed-minded to other ways of living one’s life, it’s people who are closed-minded to the fact that people may have a faith…which I suppose is a subset of the second thing I hate.

On one of the forums I help run, there was recently a debate over whether God exists. As always, these things never come to a conclusion, usually go in circles forty times over, and end up going rotten with the one or two people who get into a fight, although this one did not. Now, this entry isn’t about what I think about the issue (if you’re that curious, I’m somewhere between agnostic and athiest), but about the way people respond to the issue.

Usually, on one extreme, you have the full-fledged bible-thumping believers who make it their mission to preach everywhere they can. Then you have the people who don’t believe, never have believed, never will believe, and scorn those who do believe. Finally, you have everyone else somewhere in the middle. The person in question was somewhere closer to the latter extreme. He called those who believed “fools.” Now, I understand it’s his opinion, but I don’t think anyone who believes in God or attends church should be scorned as such. Doing so is just as bad as a bible-thumper telling someone they’ll rot in hell unless they accept Jesus Christ as their savior.

Luckily, most people are not like either extreme. They’ll respect someone’s choice to follow or not follow a faith. However, people who preach and/or scorn people for their beliefs bugs the living daylights out of me. Debate is good. Scorn is not, and only leads to problems further down the road. I was happy to see that the topic in question lasted without many problems, a first for that type of discussion on that forum.

Remember, tolerance and healthy debate. Not scorn.

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I’m listening to the DJ Dan Live Podcast tonight. I’ll attempt to provide as much of an up-to-date summary of what’s going on, for those who can’t get a spot in the audience on iTunes or WMP.

12:53AM – Hanso is under house arrest, Mittlewerk is responsible for everything, and Rachel is Hanso’s daughter. The end? Only time will tell. But, one thing it is the end of…the end of the night for me. Time for bed.

12:32AM – Holy crap. Thomas Mittlewerk just blew up The Hanso Foundation building! Rachel gave us instructions to go to abc.com and view her final video, and with that, Dan signed off.

12:18AM – OMG!!!!!! Rachel!

12:10AM – Dan has been having some problems getting calls to air. He’s suggested everything from technical difficulties to The Hanso Foundations for reasons the calls are failing.

11:59PM – Dan feels that the Valenzetti Equation should be shared with the whole world, and that The Hanso Foundation should let the public see Gary Troup’s book.

11:44PM – The announcer, Johnny, just summarized TLE in about two minutes. 183 licks to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie pop. Dan will clearly have a mental breakdown if Rachel was The Man.

11:41PM – CONSPIRASPIES UNITE!

11:33PM – Top five mind-control substances in Apollo bars: 5)Lymon 4)Zantham Gum 3)Parsley 2)Donut Extract 1)Season 1 of MASH

11:29PM – Never knew how much of a jerk he is. 😛 Shut down three people so far.

11:24PM – Marvin the Martian? He claims he knows about TLE. And now Dan is about to take calls.

11:18PM – After discussing the virtues of roaches, Dan is going on a philosophical rant about whether or not Lost, Hanso, and himself are real.

11:07PM – Nothing we didn’t know, but Dan just confirmed Rachel Blake’s participation in the show.

11:05PM – He’s on!

11:02PM – Nothing Yet. A few minutes ago, some guy said they’re working out technical problems. Will update again when he gets on.

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I have again taken the Political Compas survey. From the last time I took it, I’ve apparently moved slightly further left economically, and have gotten slightly more authoritarian. Here are the two graphs:

My Political Compass - First Time

My Political Compass - Second Time

Funny how these things can change. If you want to find out where you stand, and because franky, the whole Liberal-Conservative line kind of sucks to study a person, take the survey at the Political Compass website.

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Well, in order to try and combat the spam problem. I’ve signed up for Akismet, the anti-spam service from the same guys who gave us WordPress. I’m hoping it’ll work better than MT’s system. So far, so good, but only time will tell. So, if you submit a comment, and it doesn’t get approved after a day or two, shoot me an email.

Also, time for the stats update! Not much change since last time, it’d appear. But, I was baffled at this search term: “statute of limitations on statutory rape – IL” What exactly on my blog has anything to do with that? If you know, please, let me know. The oddest network location of this week is, “Crest Foods Co.” More people surfing on the job? Tsk tsk. Ok, I’m no angel.

Anyway, time for bed.

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Sorry, I’m watching/laughing/partially agreeing with O’Reilly right now.

Today’s Dymersion is about a small piece of old news, that of the controversy over the Facebook mini-feeds. Now, while I agree that the feeds just make finding information all that easier, and Facebook has some responsibility to let people opt-out or remove themselves from the information, some of the things I saw during the period were just disgraceful. Campaigns taking what should be a good cause, and using it to complain about things that just don’t make sense.

Look, the fact is that most information on Facebook is opt-out. You don’t HAVE to provide almost any of the information on there. Likewise, you don’t HAVE to accept anybody as a friend. Heck, you can even set what’s called a “Limited Profile,” and let certain people see less information than your closest friends. Trying to blame Facebook for the information you can control is ignorant. They have two responsibilities in my eyes: 1) Not sharing your information without permission (see below) and 2) Not making that information easier to find than had been already possible.

Like I just said, Facebook has a responsibility not to share information with third parties without permission. So, I was a little angry when I learned of this “developers” program have me opted-in with even asking me. I never got any notice of it, or any screen asking me to opt-out if I didn’t want it. Now, while I understand these are not advertisers, once they have this information, they can do pretty much whatever they want with it. That is ridiculous.

However, other than that, only you can control what people see. Facebook can’t do that for you. What they can do is make sure the information is as difficult as possible to get, without making it too inconvenient. I considered the mini-feed too convenient. Otherwise, it’s up to you.