Further proof that people don't trust the Government

Wow. "In a new survey of 500 African-Americans released by the Rand Corp. and Oregon State University, nearly half of respondents said that HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, was created by scientists. Twelve percent attributed the creation and spread of AIDS to the CIA." Another study reported that 15% of respondents considered AIDS "a form of genocide against black people." These opinions sound distrustful enough to be patently nuts, but if the African genocide weren't enough to make the AIDS epidemic feel targeted towards Black people, consider this: Blacks account for 50 percent of new HIV infections in the United States, despite representing only 13 percent of the population.

What's going on!?

Caffeinated Beer

It's true. Budweiser is introducing a caffeinated beer. Prompting the Washington Post to appropriately ask: "Is adding America's favorite stimulant to America's favorite alcoholic beverage the greatest scientific breakthrough of the 21st century? Or the beginning of the end of civilization as we know it? Or what?"

Inspiration in Iraq

Even after endless speculation about this past weekend's Iraqi elections, it seems people were not prepared for what took place. Despite a determined resistance that included 9 suicide bombers, the elections were an overwhelming sucess--surprising most everyone. Beyond that, the elections managed to produce an outbreak of beautiful and inspiring scenes across the country as Iraqis braved the circumstances together to vote; bringing children, walking great distances (use of vehicles was banned for the day), waiting in lines, and finally displaying their ink-dyed fingers with great pride. Field reports described joyous impromptu gatherings that took place outside polling places after voting had taken place. Iraqis were first tense and brave, then giddy and social. Even with the loss of 35 precious lives, the general feeling was apparently one huge sigh of relief, and thousands of triumphant smiles.

As much as we love to undercut the lofty rhetoric of our President with our smart cynicism, his inaugural rang awfully true over the past few days in Iraq. Any person who has perused the pictoral slide shows at the Washington Post or New York Times cannot help but have their heart warmed by the glorious images of active democracy unfolding on new ground. It is not about anyone or anything being proven right or wrong. It is about the tentatively hopeful start of a process that surely will mean something better for these people than what once was. The Shi'ite majority in Iraq, once brutally oppressed by Saddam's regime, is now able to flourish, in spite of the ongoing rash of violence eminating from the Sunni region. None should be surprised that parts of the powerful Sunni minority have not taken well to being displaced from their stranglehold on the country's power. But neither, perhaps, should we have been surprised by the courageous trust and optimism displayed over the weekend by the Kurdish and Shi'ite majority. It is my prayer that their hope may be honored by what unfolds in the months and years ahead.

Their resolve and good spirit has allowed me to be hopeful again. Hopeful that as we finish building roads, schools, and hospitals we might leave the country in a better state than it was when we entered. Hopeful that we might successfully train an Iraqi police force sufficient to protect Democracy, by the people, on behalf of the people, in a dangerous and tenuous region. Hopeful that in 15 years we will have successfully and truly transferred the fate of Iraq from the whims of a corrupt tyrant to the common will of its people; and that we might then be able to survey the country of Iraq and know that all who have died in this terribly frustrating war on its behalf have contributed to an enterprise that accomplished something truly noble.

Suing Ronald

Viewers of "Super Size Me" may recall the class-action lawsuit against McDonald's that was featured in the film. Well, the suit is being revived, reinstating the complaints on behalf of the plaintiffs, two Ginormous teenage girls. Did they not layoff the fries over the past couple years?

Why Belichick Hates ESPN

Peter King of SI offers an interesting glimpse of the two Super Bowl teams.

Sports Columnists on TV

This rant on the recent spate of sports columnists-turned-bickering-tv analysts is on target, except where Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon--the originals--are concerned. Pardon the Interruption is pure delight, and makes 5:30 to 6:00 Eastern the best half hour of most weekdays. Around the Horn? Another story altogether. Simply painful...

Social Security and Black Americans

So does Social Security really shortchange African-Americans, since they pay the same dues but, on average, live shorter lives (receiving less cash back)? Well yeah, it makes perfect sense.

Not to contribute to the inevitable me-too-ism that would ensue if an adjustment is made, but can we get a little extra something for the Lefties (handedness, not ideology)? I think we have significantly shorter life span too. I just don't wanna hear smokers ask for more...

Green Hawks

A desire to stop pouring money into oil-producing countries hostile to America is apparently enough to make some conservatives become pro-war evironmentalists. A curious, but not entirely incoherent position.

Jesus the Philosopher, Natural Law, and the Second Inaugural

This is a great piece tracing the natural law philosophy that was ever-present in the language and argumentation of Bush's Second Inaugural. While many articles attempting to unearth Bush's religiosity say all the same things, this offers a glimpse at its philosophy in particular--a philosophy that the author feels has now become a core means of expression in current conservative thought. The Second Inaugural address:

signals the emergence of a single coherent philosophy within the conservative movement. Natural-law reasoning about the national moral character gradually disappeared from America in the generations after the Founding Fathers, squeezed out between a triumphant emotive liberalism, on the one side, and a defensive emotive Evangelicalism, on the other. Preserved mostly by the Catholics, natural law made its return to public discourse primarily through the effort to find a nontheological ground for opposition to abortion. And now, three decades after Roe v. Wade, it is simply the way conservatives talk--about everything.

More on Summers

Following up on Larry Summers and the women in science catfight, here is an interesting story in the Times on some of the natural differences in male/female brain processes.

Jonah Goldberg has a great column as well, outlining many of the same differences, and taking shrill complainer-in-chief Nancy Hopkins to task for her national outrage campaign:

In fact, the scientific consensus is that there are innate cognitive differences between men and women — as groups. Individual men and women can be geniuses or morons (though the data suggest that men tend to produce more of both than women).

Men tend to perform better at spatial tasks — rotating three-dimensional objects in their mind, for example — as well as some mathematical and navigational tests. Women, on the other hand, are better at word games of various kinds, and they beat men at identifying matching items rapidly and putting the right-shaped pegs in the right holes. This is all fairly uncontroversial stuff — you can find a nice summary on the web in a Scientific American article called "Sex Differences in the Brain" from May 13, 2002. But don't show it to Nancy Hopkins. She may lose her lunch.

The Non-Controversial Oscars

The culture war over Hollywood hardware will have trouble exploding or even igniting after today's batch of nominees for the 2005 Oscars. Fahrenheit 9/11 garnered no nominations whatsoever and The Passion of the Christ was shut out of the principle categories as well, thought it does have a chance to win for its musical score, cinematography, or make-up. Supporters of the Passion can't be too incensed, as the movie did get some appreciation. Detractors, meanwhile, will not have to wake up in a cold sweat after dreaming that The Passion won Best Picture, Gibson Best Director, or James Cavaziel Best Actor. (Being a huge fan of the movie, I would have voted for all of these honors, though I haven't seen many of the other movies nominated.)

Obviously Michael Moore's tactical move--withdrawing his movie from documentary consideration to go for Best Picture--backfired. I have to admit I'm surprised he wasn't even nominated for Film Editing--where he certainly possesses masterful talent, however it is used. The positive of his Best Documentary withdrawal: he left the door open for Morgan Spurlock's "Super Size Me."

Our Biases

Below is an excerpt from a fascinating article in Washington Post magazine, describing a bias test developed by team of Harvard sociologists that consistently reveals the innate biases that exist deep in our cognitive processes. Even minorities and women often find it easier to equate negative adjectives with members of their own groups than with whites or men. The article is a very thought provoking look at the attitudes that hide inside most of us, if even at a subcouncious level. This portion introduces the basic concept behind the test, and how the Harvard team leader--Mahzarin Benaji--was exposed to the idea.

In 1994, Anthony Greenwald, Banaji's PhD adviser and later her collaborator, came up with a breakthrough. Working out of the University of Washington, Greenwald drew up a list of 25 insect names such as wasp, cricket and cockroach, 25 flower names such as rose, tulip and daffodil, and a list of pleasant and unpleasant words. Given a random list of these words and told to sort them into the four groups, it was very easy to put each word in the right category. It was just as easy when insects were grouped with unpleasant words and flowers were grouped with pleasant words. But when insects were grouped with pleasant words, and flowers with unpleasant words, the task became unexpectedly difficult. It was harder to hold a mental association of insects with words such as "dream," "candy" and "heaven," and flowers with words such as "evil," "poison" and "devil." It took longer to complete the task.

Psychologists have long used time differences to measure the relative difficulty of tasks. The new test produced astonishing results. Greenwald took the next step: Instead of insects and flowers, he used stereotypically white-sounding names such as Adam and Chip and black-sounding names such as Alonzo and Jamel and grouped them with the pleasant and unpleasant words. He ran the test on himself.

"I don't know whether to tell you I was elated or depressed," he says. "It was as if African American names were insect names and European American names were flower names. I had as much trouble pairing African American names with pleasant words as I did insect names with pleasant words."

Greenwald sent Banaji the computer test. She quickly discovered that her results were similar to his. Incredulous, she reversed the order of the names in the test. She switched the left and right keys. The answer wouldn't budge. "I was deeply embarrassed," she recalls. "I was humbled in a way that few experiences in my life have humbled me."

Some may recall a U. Chicago study from a few years ago that sent out hundreds of resumes, identical in everything but their ethnic and non-ethnic names. Tom, Karen, and Susans got something like 30% more calls back than LaShondas and Jamels. Still a long way to go...

Those Crazy Exit Polls

I'm not at all surprised to see the findings of the investigation into the 2004 exit polls, which arrives at the same conclusion I did back on November 3--Kerry supporters over-participated. It makes perfect sense in a survey that's voluntary (53% of those asked participated in the 2004 exit polls). If one pool of voters are more passionate about their choice, they're likely to be overrepresented in the poll. Such was the case with the 2004 exits where the folks who were outraged about the state of the country were far more pumped on election day than those who felt that things were a bit lousy but that we were still more or less on the right course. One article notes that exit polls have inflated the numbers of the Democratic candidate in every election since 1988. You'd think they'd have tweaked the system by now...

...but also attempts at "fun"

Harvard's not entirely wrapped up in its women in science squabble. It's also trying to take aggressive steps to force their undergrads to have fun. To this end (in a clear sign of an over-sized endowment) they have hired their first ever "Fun Czar," a recent graduate who launched a website coordinating parties while attending the college.

The stepchildren at Brown U. are having a heyday making fun of the strivings of their more successful but not-quite-so-cool siblings up the highway in Cambridge.

Ivy League Starts Second Semester With Controversy

A quarrel between faculty and students at Columbia over Middle East politics has continued to grow and gain greater attention, as evidenced by today's 4 page spread in the New York Times. The dispute centers around allegations of intimidation by pro-Palestinian professors. It's a curious relationship at the nation's best universities, where the academy is usually solidy pro-Palestinaian, but much of the student body Jewish.

Meanwhile Harvard is all abuzz over comments made by President Larry Summers about the disparity between men and women in the sciences. President Summers' suggestion that biology may have some contributing role to play in the achievement gap between the genders has been met with a whirlwind of controversy. Articles about the flap over Summers' comments currently comprise 2 of the 5 most sent articles from the NY Times online. The intial article is linked above. See the follow up here.

Putting The Tools of Career Advancement (dancing pole!?) Into Kids' Hands

Children living in Palo Alto already have an uphill climb, living amidst rampant poverty and one of the nation's highest homicide rates. Fortunately, there are those who would help the kids. One of the more unorthodox is 64 year-old William Fried, president of Foster City's Precision Selling, a management consulting firm, who recently spawned an outcry by suggesting that stripping and exotic dancing could be wise career paths. Mr Fried has been an annual guest at Jane Lathrop Stanford Middle School, but this year caught some flak when he told students that "stripping and exotic dancing could be lucrative career moves for girls, offering as much as $250,000 or more per year, depending on their bust size. " There are many hidden laughter jewels in this USA Today article. A few highlights:

• Fried's presentation is called "The Secret of a Happy Life."
• One mother complained to the principal, outraged that "her son announced that he was forgoing college for a career in a field he truly loves — fishing."
• The best quote comes from school board member Mandy Lowell, on the defensive: "I don't think that your natural or implant-inflated bust size is what our schools aim to nurture"

Heil Harry?

The train wreck of Prince Harry's life just keeps piling up cars. In a sign that public opinion is clearly not what it should be, The Sun Newspaper of London today blared the headline "Harry the Nazi." This because the young prince managed to get himself photographed wearing a Nazi outfit to a party. I'm sure it was a hilarious hit among the revelers--actually, not sure at all--but many at home were unimpressed. Among them Conservative opposition leader Michael Howard, who is Jewish. Mr. Howard called for a personal apology from Harry after the royal press machine spit out a written statement. The Board of Deputies of British Jews had this to say: "It was clearly in bad taste, especially in the run-up to holocaust memorial day on the 27th of this month, which the Royal Family will be taking a leading role in commemorating." Yes Harry, sort of bad taste. Harry wore the nazi outfit to a friend's birthday party in Wiltshire, which had the fancy dress theme "colonial and native."

Sticks and Stones Can Break His Bones, but ESPN Documentaries Hurt Even More

To the casual news watcher Don King's hair probably made him seem like the treasure troll of the boxing world. He's not so cuddly as his 'do suggests. In fact he's killed two men with his own hands (one was ruled self defense), threatened to break the legs of heavyweight Larry Holmes and allegedly cheated boxer Meldrick Taylor out of $1 million and then threatened to have him killed. An ESPN SportsCentury documentary displayed facts such as these in a way that was apparently the last straw for Mr. King. He is now suing ESPN for $2.5 billion. That's no misprint, the figure starts with a b. This attempt to recoup losses is much more ambitious than previous attempts, but also more civilized. His 1967 beating of a man who owed him money ended in murder as the man died. A crime King spent four years in prison for. Hope it's not libel to bring that up...

Missing Free Throws via the Scientific Method

I love when people apply science to succeed in sports. This guy's nerdy approach to fan free throw distraction is absolutely fantastic. And I love that Mark Cuban followed his advice immediately on a whim. And that it (at least temporarily) worked. This is the kind of thing Duke undergrads must study...

The New Twilight Zone: TV Sitcom Couples

At last someone has pointed out the bizarre rule of thumb that says every television sitcom must pair an average to downright unattractive man with a blazing hot, classicly good-looking, 27-34 year old wife. This writer emphasizes the fat-white-guy-with-model-wife matches, but you can point to the quirky skinny comics too. I mean Ray Romano's charming but he certainly got the better end of that deal. Ditto for Jerry Seinfeld's slew of top-shelf ladies during that show. And just to return to the fat guys for a moment while we speak of comics---are we really to believe these are the chicks a non-famous Drew Carey finds knocking on his door?? Even George Lopez... Yeesh. And am I crazy, or do all of these sitcom wives essentially look the same? Average height, dark hair, sweet face with layered haircut...and far too hot for her age bracket. Never fails.

This trend, coupled with the unwritten secret code that requres all beer commercials to feature goofy/quirky men interacting with stunning, conventionally attractive women, creates a strange alternate perception of reality that probably leads men to treat not-great-looking women with even less care and respect than they already would. Inside their head, they're calculating that if the King of Queens gets Stacey Carosi...well then Kelly Kapowski must be waiting behind door #1 for them! Nonsense. You probably ain't Zach Morris, partner, so be nice to your waitress even if she doesn't look like a sitcom wife (i.e. an actress that read for the part of Rachel on Friends but could only get a gig playing eye-rolling homemaker opposite a moderately successful stand-up comic who's supposedly living in the suburbs and working a blue collar job).

When do we get the show where some infantile, weird-looking woman is married to a bland-yet-gorgeous male underwear model who patiently laughs at her foolishness and remains happily married to her in their suburban home?


--And just to quickly launch a side rant, how far is this proliferation of young hottie detective/investigator/prosecutors/doctors on TV gonna go? Why do casting agents think they can take the girl from the facial cleanser commercial and throw a lab coat on her and suddenly she's believable as the top forensics expert in Philadelphia? Ridiculous...

Judicial Birth Control

A judge in Rochester, NY ordered a woman to stop having children or risk being placed in jail for criminal contempt. The 31 year old woman is a drug addict with seven children ranging in ages from 8 months to 12 years. Six of the children are in foster homes, while one lives with an aunt. The children were removed from the mother's custody in separate neglect hearings dating back to 2000 on the grounds that 3 of the children tested positive for cocaine at birth.

The judge stated "Because every child born deserves a mother and a father, or at the very least a mother or a father, this court is once again taking this unusual step of ordering this biological mother to conceive no more children until she reclaims her children from foster care or other caretakers."

The New York Civil Liberties Union responded with this statement, "the opinion cannot be enforced because it 'tramples on a fundamental right -- the right to procreate'."

As someone who grew up in a home with several foster children born with cocaine in their system, I say right on to the judge. Children have the right to grow up in loving homes of their own, not being raised in the system. Children have the right to not grow up mentally, physically, and behaviorally delayed due to their parent's inability to stop abusing drugs. I don't know, but it seems to me that this "mother" has trampled all over her childrens' rights and the New York Civil Liberties Union does not seem all that concerned about that .

Vindication for the Big Ten

The College Football Bowl Season has been great thus far, my precious Wolverines losing a thriller to Texas in the Rose Bowl to cap a great day of intriguing matchups and competitive games on New Years (I'm pretending the pseudo-BCS bowl involving Utah and Pitt never happened later that night). The National Championship promises to be a doozy. As a perpetual proponent of the thesis that the middle of the country is far undervalued, however, I must point out one clear lesson of the College Football postseason--The Big Ten is far better than people think.

There is a tangible way to measure expectations--gambler's wallets. And Vegas didn't think much of the Big Ten. Every single team save Purdue entered its bowl game an underdog.

• Ohio State was a 7 point underdog against Oklahoma State
• Minnesota was a 2-3 point underdog against Alabama
• Wisconsin was a 7-8 point underdog against Georgia
• Iowa was a 7 point underdog against LSU
• Michigan was a 6-7 poing underdog against Texas

For those unfamiliar with spreads, 7 points is not small. It means the game has a decisive favorite. 5 of 6 Big Ten bowl teams were considered underdogs, 4 of those being significant underdogs. Let's revisit the matchups not that they've been played.

• Ohio State slaughtered OK State, 33-7
• Minnesota beat Alabama much more convincingly than the game's 20-16 score suggests
• Wisconsin narrowly lost to a Georgia team many picked to win the National title, 21-24
• Iowa stunned defending National Champ LSU 30-25
• Michigan lost to BCS #4 Texas 37-38 on a game-winning field goal

All 5 exceeded expectations. Only the lone favorite, Purdue, failed to play a great game. That would make the Big Ten 5-1 against the spread (or 5-1 ATS). When your conference percentage ATS is .833% you are UNDERRATED!