In doing research for my Linguistics paper on the metaphors used to talk about blogs (wee!), I came across this really interesting article that none other than Berkeley’s own Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, the Kos of Daily Kos, wrote for The American Prospect about a year and a half ago. Kos reflects on the time he spent in the army right after high school, and why he switched from being a presinct-captain Republican to a card-carrying Democrat. It struck me as incredibly poignant, especially with an election nearing, as people are evaluating their own beliefs in choosing a candidate to vote for. It’s a short article, so you should definitely check it out!

P.S. How meta is it that in the midst of writing a paper about blogs, I should be compelled to post one of my own? Oh, academia.

Did you know that last year Congress passed the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act (FFAT Act) of 2006? Once (if ever) this legislation is implemented there will be the creation of a free, searchable website that will list every recipient of every federal award. Did you know that this legislation was co-sponsored by Senator Obama and that he and two other republican presidential candidates are the only presidential hopefuls to sign an oath of presidential transparency? I’m in no way putting my word in for Obama (I personally have not decided yet) but it is interesting to think about the implications of this oath. From bad experience with the present administration, more presidential transparency can’t hurt. But the FFAT Act on the other hand seems positive in theory but will take an estimated $15 million to set-up the actual website. Playing the devil’s advocate, is there such a thing as too much information availability? Or is there a price we should set the cost at? A price we as a society are willing to pay (such as is in tax dollars) that could otherwise go towards say healthcare or reducing our deficit? It’s something worth thinking about.

A few days ago the President announced his intention to veto legislation which would expand health insurance coverage for children. By increasing federal funding for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), this bill—hailed before as “popular” and “bipartisan”—would cover an additional 4 million children who are currently uninsured.

Today we learned that, inexplicably, over 150 Republicans in the House of Representatives went on the record against protecting the health of poor kids. Poor American kids. more »

A great place to start is looking at the data:

Gallup Poll “Education” 9-5-07

If you read this Gallup Poll analysis and then come to the PVC meeting I will love you!

Next article: Europe’s bold moves toward parental choice show radical de-bureaucratizaiton (What? Since when am I not allowed to make up words?). What can Americans draw from this “blind man and an elephant” parable to the our education system?

Schools unchained: How to go about giving parents the schools they want

This week in PVC you’re gonna get schooled! …so to speak.

Danny Glover, who was slated to be the speaker for the Berkeley general commencement will no longer attend the ceremony, instead choosing to stand in solidarity with the unions picketing the school. UC Berkeley fails to pay its janitors a living wage.

I totally support Glover’s decision, but have to wonder why he accepted the invite in the first place. As a senior graduating next Wednesday, I can’t help but feel slightly punished when I know that my peers at other equal institutions get to have awesome speakers while we don’t because of a system-wide strike. The UC system should have dealt with its unfair practices long ago, like maybe after Fabian Núñez rejected last year on the day of the ceremony. Or ideally before that, like maybe never initiating the practice in the first place.

Do you agree?

Because we can all use a bit of laughter after this week…

• Colbert on the Pottery Barn Rule: “Do you know what happens if you break a lamp at Pottery Barn and leave? Genocide!”
• Colbert:
  

  According to the Washington Post, the President is seeking candidates for a brand-new position they’re calling the war czar. The czar would coordinate between State and Defense Departments; oversee operations in Iraq and Afghanistan; and, one assumes, keep an eye on Rasputin….If only the Constitution provided for some kind of—chief commander, or commanderish chief, who could command chiefly these wars!

• Glad our Attorney General was able to articulate a clear explanation of how his department operates.

• Abstinence-only education doesn’t work.
• Interracial marriages are on the rise. It’s been 40 years since the Supreme Court invalidated miscegenation laws in the landmark decision of Loving v. Virginia, calling the freedom to marry “one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.”
• DailyKos links to this interview:
  

  Q: You began in the Justice Department during the Watergate years. How would you rank Alberto Gonzales in terms of politicization of the department in comparison to the other AGs you have worked for?

  A: …[I worked in the Department for over 30 years under] more than a dozen attorneys general, including Ed Meese as well as John Mitchell, and I used to think that they had politicized the department more than anyone could or should. But nothing compares to the past two years under Alberto Gonzales.

So Karl Rove and other political appointees in the White House used their RNC email accounts (rather than their government accounts) to discuss the possibility of firing U.S. Attorneys, and now the administration tells us that these emails…wait for it…have mysteriously disappeared! What a shame, because the White House no doubt would have loved to be able to produce these emails to prove they weren’t attempting to interfere with the Justice Department for political reasons. But Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) isn’t buying it:

“They say they have not been preserved. I don’t believe that!” Leahy shouted from the Senate floor.

Is Leahy right to believe that the administration is lying, or did the RNC simply put IT wizard Sen. Ted “Series of Tubes” Stevens in charge of their servers? If so, Leahy has a solution for retrieving the messages:

“I’ve got a teenage kid in my neighborhood that can go get ’em for them,” he told reporters later.

Jon Stewart:

As…members of Gonzales’s own party are questioning his credibility, it’s once again left to the White House to defend Gonzales with a sentence that appears to actually be eating itself:

“He doesn’t recall having recollections about having deliberative discussions.” (Deputy White House Press Secretary Dana Perino)

That was a sentence so tortured, even the man who declared the Geneva Convention quaint wouldn’t allow it to be used on prisoners.

Also, you may recall jupi’s post about the New York City ban of the n-word. The recent Daily Show investigative report on this issue (by Larry Wilmore and John Oliver) is priceless.

This is soooo my favorite news story of the week:

Disney is now allowing gay couples to hold commitment ceremonies in the magic kingdom. In this article, a reverand attributes the decision to financial reasons, given that Disney can make an additional $1.5 million per year with a mere 1 commitment ceremony per week. (The average package goes for $28,000.) I don’t really buy that argument, because it would save Disney a lot of problems if it just left the issue alone. What do you think?

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