Gore Vidal and Robert Higgs on some Hoover Institute/KTEH show called Uncommon Knowledge: "I believe five years from now we will be much closer to living in a police state in which everybody is under constant surveillance by government agents and our liberties will have been diminished significantly."

GM wheat delayed [NYT] In a speech at a meeting on Monday of U.S. Wheat Associates, a trade organization that promotes exports, the head of a large Italian wheat miller said his company would "stop buying U.S. or Canadian wheat at once" if genetically modified wheat were introduced.

Another One [Washington Times] Didn't it seem like Tom Daschle might not be a douchebag?

Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle quietly slipped into a spending bill language exempting his home state of South Dakota from environmental regulations and lawsuits, in order to allow logging in an effort to prevent forest fires.

The area to be logged is called Beaver Park.

Pravda in (broken) English! Featuring headlines like: GENERALS WERE DRUNK AS COBBLERS AT THE LVOV AERODROME Witnesses say, the priests were jumping over dead bodies with their frocks up

Godless Americans march on Washington. yay!

Hero [Chron] I love Julia Child -- I would even call her a "hero" on the same scale as, say, E.B. White and Ted Williams -- but this kind of nostalgic fetishism only trivializes her real accomplishments.

She will have reunions of sorts with her famous kitchen in the next few weeks. One of its Peg-Board walls was dismantled and reinstalled at COPIA; the rest went to Washington, D.C., and the Behring Center of the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History. Hersh recalls the museum staff's approach to preserving the famous kitchen as awesome: They cataloged and photographed everything, from stove to windows, blinds to drawer contents. As reinstalled in Washington, the kitchen should be as we all remember it from countless TV shows, "right down to the toothpicks."

The article also mentions that she's writing a memoir of her and Paul's career in the "diplomatic service."

8/1: OK, I take it back. I must have been in a particularly vicious mood yesterday. The mere mention of COPIA darkened my vision with rage. And the element of self-congratulation that goes with the celebrification of Julia and, especially, Alice Waters, is irritating, at least if you have to live in Berkeley. Not to mention Mondavi's profound love of himself, in which, at least, he is alone. On reflection, however, it is actually a great idea to put that kitchen in the Smithsonian, which, when I visited last year, was surprisingly boring. There was a big display about nylon as I recall. But I would have to say that Julia Child is more important to me than synthetic fibers.

Douchebag Hall of Fame [Financial Times] Convenient table of the biggest bankruptcies, job losses, and who stole the money.

Further Pillaging [NYT] Last Thursday, semiconductors collapsed. Goldman Sachs bought 10,000 call options. Friday morning, the Goldman Sachs semiconductor analyst upgraded the semiconductor sector. A spokeswoman said: "There is absolutely no connection between any of Goldman Sachs' trading activities and its investment research. And given the current environment it's outrageous to suggest that there is."

I realize that this kind of news is becoming boring, so I'll refrain from rehashing the latest Qwest and E.D.S. violations. Just remember that you're still getting fucked, daily.

The Texas Observer has an article from '97 on Bush's deals with the Rangers, which included condemning private property by eminent domain to build a taxpayer-financed stadium, which the Rangers own outright. As the strike approaches, it's hard to avoid the conclusion that the racketeers who are ruining baseball are the same douchebags who raped our markets. The real problem is that they're our fucking government too.

So the Fucked Company guy wants to charge you $45/mo. to read corporate memos that people send him for free. This, not surprisingly, pisses me off. On the other hand, if they were all like the memo this PriceWaterhouseCoopers guy cc'd to the entire company after he was fired, it would be entertaining. Real smoking guns may be found here.

Stern had Leslie West on this morning. Thankfully, I had to go to work, but not before he called Mountain the best band ever.

There is a plague of locusts (ok, grasshoppers) in the American West, and they are insecticide resistant. After reading about the chemical regimen of Idaho potato fields in The Botany of Desire, it's not hard to figure out why. Meanwhile, agribusiness compares people who object to its practices to terrorists.

If you took 24 hours to play Beethoven's Ninth without altering the pitch, it would sound like this. Not unlike a certain EPMD 8-track. Ok, actually, very unlike it.

Internet Atlas:

32 MB, so don't click on it unless you mean it. Do not click on this under the influence of narcotics or other mood-altering drugs. Cf. mappa mundi, now defunct.

For typography geeks only [flash].

The Daily Douchebag -- last week's meme. Goes well with the groupie site.

Quote of the day, and yesterday Writing developed "to facilitate the enslavement of other human beings." So said Lévi-Strauss, as quoted (without reference) by Diamond in Guns, Germs and Steel, which I am finally reading. In related news, I finally tracked down the Latin* of Tacitus's (Tiberius's) condemnation of the Senate: O homines ad servitutum paratos! That should be our fucking national motto. I don't think it will violate the constitution. *Tacitus reports that Tiberius said this in Greek, as you'll recall, but the MSS only give the Latin trans.

Unfortunate headline of the day: "Bishops Select Lay Board on Sexual Abuse Review." Not as bad as "Roasted Nuts" for a mental hospital fire in NJ.

This is truly amazing [NYT]

Harvey L. Pitt, who barely goes a week without new calls for him to step down as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission because of his handling of the crisis in the markets, is asking Congress for a raise and more respect. Congressional aides and commission officials said today that in private discussions this week, Mr. Pitt had asked lawmakers to add a provision to the corporate and accounting bill moving swiftly through Congress that would elevate his office to the same rank as cabinet posts like secretary of state and attorney general.... Democrats and Republican critics of Mr. Pitt snickered at the proposal, which they said had no chance of passage and demonstrated Mr. Pitt's political tin ear.

But let's not forget the other self-righteous douchebag who started this.

The man wants you to turn informer. But this seems superfluous when the grocery store is already forking over everything they have on you. Uh-oh. Now I'm fucked.

I take that back about the real estate [Chron] "Last month, the median home price in the Bay Area rose to $416,000 and hit a record for the third month in a row..." What fucking recession? Bring it on.

The real estate is cheaper too [NYT]

Mr. Waxman sounded as if he had faced the frustration that Manhattan is not Berkeley, let alone Barcelona, with its dazzling Boqueria central market. And he was not dealing well with California withdrawal: life in this climate, with its short and unreliable growing season, would stymie even Alice Waters. "We do as much from the Greenmarket as we possibly can," he said, but it has not been easy. "I feel terrible for everybody," he said, "but the corn looks terrible, the gooseberries don't have any flavor." "I'm adamant about buying local," he continued, "but there are obviously some blanks that need to be filled in."

MOTO [Slate] Mark Lewis makes the stunningly obvious point that the crash is everyone's fault. I say, let's get the Dow back down to 2000! [GAAP=generally accepted accounting procedures, i.e., regular lies; pro forma=fantasy numbers.]

The GAAP numbers also were included in the press releases, although usually they were less prominently displayed. So why did everybody focus on the pro forma earnings? Because we wanted to. It was a mass delusion in which everybody willingly participated. That's why this issue is getting relatively little attention these days, despite all the focus on reform. With pro forma, there is no convenient villain to blame. The pro forma phenomenon is simply embarrassing for all concerned -- which is just about everybody. (Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan made the point Tuesday during his testimony before a Senate panel, when he was asked about the recent accounting scandals. "Remember, it's not as though everybody should be shocked by this," he said. "I mean, we had these pro forma statements for months and quarters back when the market was roaring away, and it was the most imaginative accounting I have ever seen.... Everybody knew that was going on.")

Update 7/24: Business 2.0 had a timely article explaining how this works back in February... 2002. Thanks for the tip. How can they still be in business?

Don't know how I missed this: Corporate Scandal Trading Cards from slate. Not just (slightly) clever, but a convenient summary.

Harrowing tale Ever wonder how much it would suck to be a nominally intelligent video store clerk? I only say nominally because the source is some kind of message board site for improv/stand up people. Nonetheless, you will not be able to stop reading. Found this on memepool too.

Disney is apparently making fake crop circles to promote the new Mel Gibson movie. [from memepool.]

Prairie Madness I saw this record lying on the street on the way to work today. I didn't pick it up because it was next to a pile of dog shit.

Corn clarified [NYT]

Under the 10-year program, taxpayers will pay farmers $4 billion a year to grow ever more corn, this despite the fact that we struggle to get rid of the surplus the plant already produces. The average bushel of corn (56 pounds) sells for about $2 today; it costs farmers more than $3 to grow it.

In case you didn't read the whole Farm Bill I mentioned the other day.

Speaking of Tools [NYT] "The most worrying reading is that perhaps we have come to the end of an era," said Rafael de la Fuente, chief Latin American economist for BNP Paribas in New York. "That we are closing the door on what was an unsuccessful attempt at orthodox economic reforms at the end of the 90's." DOUCHEBAGS.

Rapture [NYT] Isreali settlers steal ammo from the army and sell it to Palestinians. Shock and confsion is expressed. Isn't it obvious that they're trying to feul the intifada so that the army will eventually exterminate the Palestinians? Much to the delight of our own crazy fundamentalists.

Tool Me. I'm a corporate tool. I just bought this. Predictably, it kind of sucks. But I liked the single.... Of course, I also like that Offspring single back in '95. I guess I'll just sell it back and dig out my Bleach 8-track. At least it hasn't made this guy's list yet.

You are so glad you don't have cable So there's this show called Taildaters on Mtv: "We'll send two folks out on a blind date while their friends and family spy on the whole thing and provide running commentary about what's really going on." 1. they spy on it from a surveillance van or something that followers the limo; 2. they make dumb comments, then two-way the contestants/victims/daters during the date about how lame they are. I'm glad no one else feels the need to leave the house.

Jane sends word of furniture porn. Since no one else reads this, this entry creates a strange, cross-referential vortex. Nevertheless, she/you is quoting me out of context. Annoying popups, but so satisfying.

Eventually I will put up some links, but I just wanted to encourage my millions of readers to get really pissed off by visiting Equality Now. Give them money.

Plot thickens, or quadruples, or something [Salon]

Bush had made not just one but four Harken stock transactions worth more than $1 million between the time he joined the board of Harken and the beginning of the SEC probe. And each time he was at least three and a half months late filing the legal required report to the SEC.

Thanks to Kristina. Too bad Salon's going down. Not that I'd pay them, mind you.

The Al Qaeda suspects arrested in Spain had detailed videos of Disneyland and Universal Studios, as well as the Golden Gate bridge. Why didn't they start there instead of NY? Or better yet, the fucking Epcot Center. Even Disney would be happy to see that go.

Brain Candy So the JAMA just published a study that shows that HRT causes ovarian cancer too. Poor Pharmaceuticals. They must consolidate just to survive. Or they can just endlessly sue generic drug makers, instead of inventing new drugs that might help people, as opposed to, say, killing them.

A high-profile study released this May by the National Institute for Health Care Management, a group partially funded by Blue Cross Blue Shield, roundly accuses Big Pharma of failing to perform the innovation that would justify its massive profits. According to the study, from 1989 to 2000, the FDA approved 1,035 new drug applications, of which only 35 percent contained new active ingredients, and only 24 percent were given "priority review" status by the FDA, an indication that they constituted significant improvements over previously existing medications. Instead, the study concluded, the industry has focused on cranking out "me-too" drugs that offered only minor improvements on what was already available. The study also concluded that Americans were spending more than ever on new drugs, even on those that weren't terribly innovative.

Brain Candy is the most realistic movie of the past 20 years.

Kristina sends the latest bad writing, e.g.:

The professor looked down at his new young lover, who rested fitfully, lashed as she was with duct tape to the side of his stolen hovercraft, her head lolling gently in the breeze, and as they soared over the buildings of downtown St. Paul to his secret lair he mused that she was much like a sweet ripe juicy peach, except for her not being a fuzzy three-inch sphere produced by a tree with pink blossoms and that she had internal organs and could talk.

No, really, capitalism is working [NYT]

Since the start of the economic collapse in December, the Argentine economy has shrunk by more than 16 percent, and more than half the country's 37 million people are now living in poverty. In an effort to speed up an accord with the I.M.F., which would reopen other lines of credit, the government here recently agreed to work with a so-called "council of wise men" designated by the fund.

A little background, from LBO.

Think A-Rod registered Republican? [NYT]

The University of Texas, though a state institution, has a large endowment. As governor, Mr. Bush changed the rules governing that endowment, eliminating the requirements to disclose "all details concerning the investments made and income realized," and to have "a well-recognized performance measurement service" assess investment results. That is, government officials no longer had to tell the public what they were doing with public money, or allow an independent performance assessment. Then Mr. Bush "privatized" (his term) $9 billion in university assets, transferring them to a nonprofit corporation known as Utimco that could make investment decisions behind closed doors. In effect, the money was put under the control of Utimco's chairman: Tom Hicks. Under his direction, at least $450 million was invested in private funds managed by Mr. Hicks's business associates and major Republican Party donors.

The shit is starting to hit the fan.

Fit to be slaves To return to the abject servility of the legislative branch in our own day, I would like to point out that, in addition to the Senate's shameful unanimous vote to condemn the pledge of allegiance ruling, precisely three members of the House voiced any objection to the circus there: Scott [VA], Conyers[MI], and Blumenauer [OR], who said: "Mr. Speaker, at a time when meaningful debate is at a minimum in this Congress, it is embarrassing that this resolution has been brought to the floor in this manner.... I would hope we would allow this decision to work its way through the judicial process rather than engage in political grandstanding. I refuse to dignify this trivialization of the legislative process and I vote 'present'" [148 Cong. Rec. H4125-01, 2002 WL 1398890].

Sometimes, I miss my home [NYT] "I have been stopping for years at Bob's Clam Hut on Route 1..."

Does reading "this day in history" make you a geezer? The great E. B. White's obituary is reprinted in the Times today: Mr. White... said, ''I soon realized that I had made no mistake in my choice of a wife. I was helping her pack an overnight bag one afternoon when she said, 'Put in some tooth twine.' I knew then that a girl who called dental floss tooth twine was the girl for me.''

Krugman with more on Bush and Harken [NYT] "Mr. Bush claims that he was 'vetted' by the S.E.C. In fact, the agency's investigation was peculiarly perfunctory. It somehow decided that Mr. Bush's perfectly timed stock sale did not reflect inside information without interviewing him, or any other members of Harken's board. Maybe top officials at the S.E.C. felt they already knew enough about Mr. Bush: his father, the president, had appointed a good friend as S.E.C. chairman. And the general counsel, who would normally make decisions about legal action, had previously been George W. Bush's personal lawyer -- he negotiated the purchase of the Texas Rangers. I am not making this up."

The National Review attempts to explain it away.

I guess everything is going to have to be titled NO SHIT

A long-awaited federal report on trans fat, a processed fat pervasive in cookies, crackers and fast food, finds there is no safe level and recommends that people eat as little of it as possible.

I wonder what we are going to do with all that corn?

A generation ago, when cardiologists waved Americans off saturated fats such as butter and beef tallow, partially hydrogenated oils became a preferred alternative. But during the late 1990s, researchers started to discover that trans fat could clog arteries as readily as saturated fat.

Wednesday's study reported that since trans fat occurs in so many types of food, including dairy products and meats, an all-out ban would be impractical and could lead to other nutritional problems. Instead, the study says trans fat consumption should be "as low as possible while consuming a nutritionally adequate diet."

This is the best part. Don't eat food -- it might be bad for you.

Also see the Times Magazine on Atkins (which claims that our new understanding of diet comes from a superior knowledge of endocrinology. See yesteday's HRT story for details.) It's full of juicy details, like "low-fat diets will increase the risk of heart disease in a third of the population." And this gem: "Surely, everyone involved in drafting the various dietary guidelines wanted Americans simply to eat less junk food, however you define it, and eat more the way they do in Berkeley, Calif." At what point will people realize that these "nutritionists" are completely full of shit? Why would anyone listen to them at this point?

Kristina provides some tranny background:

Nutritionists are revisiting tropical palm and coconut oils, which may not be as bad as once thought and could actually have cancer-fighting properties. Healthier canola and sunflower oils that remain stable at high temperatures are coming onto the market. New seed oil crops are being bred to produce oils that don't need hydrogenation.

"Biotechnology holds great promise for us," Earl says.

Includes a discussion of "Syndrome X."

It's not as cool as the market map, but it's fun to watch California consume power before your very eyes.

"Syria, for instance, is usually prominent on America's list of outcast states. But right now its security services are engaged in questioning an alleged al-Qaeda leader under torture, with America's tacit approval and encouragement." [Economist]

See, not everything is enraging [NYT]
"As a small child he collected porcelain and was so obsessed that he used to go to bed with his cups and saucers, stroking them to determine by touch, in the dark, whether he could figure out which factories in France -- Sèvres, St. Cloud, Chantilly -- made what."

No shit Hey Ladies: HRT isn't good for you. In fact, it's likely to kill you. Sorry we didn't tell you earlier. Did I mention that we don't know shit about the endocrine system? So, it's a bad sign that I'm posting to this thing at midnight, but what am I supposed to do? I can't even flip channels during the Howard Stern commercials without getting pissed off. I have to stop watching TV entirely. Update 7/10 [NYT] [NIH] NWHN: "Pharmaceutical companies have used statistical smoke and mirrors to tout unproven benefits, minimize risks, and mislead physicians into being an unsuspecting marketing force for a regimen that harms healthy women. There was never one single clinical trial that showed that HRT prevented cardiovascular disease or stroke. This is not a story of science moving sedately forward, carefully adding pieces to a puzzle before making recommendations to patients. This is a story of the corruption of the medical and scientific community. The belief that hormones are good preventive medicine has been a triumph of marketing over science." Wyeth: "These are valuable new data with significant implications.��However, it is also important to recognize the critical role that combination HRT plays in treating the symptoms of menopause, the number one reason that women start therapy," says Victoria Kusiak, M.D., Vice President, Clinical Affairs and North American Medical Director.� Update 7/11 [NYT] "Moving quickly to try to prevent women from stopping their hormone replacement treatments because of fear of breast cancer, the Wyeth company has sent 500,000 letters to doctors and other health care providers urging them to consider when they talk to patients the "critical role" that one of its products, Prempro, has in relieving the symptoms of menopause."

Could they be bigger assholes? The "symptoms of menopause" = being an old woman. Check out the Times article from yesterday (above). Of course, the "relative risk" the NIH is talking about is tiny, but that's beside the point.

Thank you sir, may I have another? Paul O'Neil, the genius who went to Africa with Bono, said this today:

And you know one thing that occurred to me in listening to this and being part of this, there are so many wonderful decent human beings who are running small and medium-sized and even large corporations. They need to be celebrated, too. In our country, I think we tend to run from one side of the ship to the other. And it would be pretty good for people to stop and reflect and maybe say a word to the people that they work for that are helping create jobs and innovating new products -- thanks a lot, you know you're not guilty of this stuff and we appreciate it that you're helping our economy to be the envy of the world.

Incidentally, he talks like a fucking Muppet. He's the Secretary of the Treasury.

A little research for you Since I do work in a law library, I took it upon myself to look into the origins of "under God," in the pledge. This shit is not online, except for summaries in Westlaw (1954 WL 3058 = 1954 U.S.C.C.A.N. 22339), and presumably Lexis. The law passed by the 83rd Congress was H. J. Res. 243 (68 Stat 249), authored by L. C. Rabaut, D-Mich. -- but he himself says that sixteen other measures were introduced in the House alone (the relevent "debate" is in Congressional Record 100/6 (1954): 7757-7766). Rabaut introduced his resolution in April 1953, as he is eager to point out on the floor, but nothing came of it until Feb. 7, 1954. George M. Docherty, pastor of the New York Ave. Presbyterian church, which Eisenhower frequented (as had Lincoln), said this in his sermon:

I could sit down and brood upon it, going over each word slowly in my mind. and I came to a strange conclusion. there was something missing in the pledge, and that which was missing was the characteristic and definitive factor in the American way of life. Indeed, apart from the mention of the phrase, "the United States of America," it could be the pledge of any republic. In fact, I could hear little Moscovites repeat a similar pledge to their hammer-and-sickle flag in Moscow with equal solemnity. Russia is also a republic, that claims to have overthrown the tryranny of kingship. Russia also claims to be indivisible.

After this, the Protestants rushed to join Rabaut (a Catholic) and the competing resolutions flooded the House (and Senate). I will spare you the sordid details of our Congress's enthusiasm for God. The House soon returned to more pressing matters, like the Communist Control Act of 1954 (1954 U.S.C.C.A.N. 3145). How like the glorious Roman Republic is our own -- only, under God, of course:

So corrupted indeed and debased was that age by sycophancy that not only the foremost citizens who were forced to save their grandeur by servility, but every ex-consul, most of the ex-praetors and a host of inferior senators would rise in eager rivalry to propose shameful and preposterous motions. Tradition says that Tiberius as often as he left the Senate-House used to exclaim in Greek, "How ready these men are to be slaves." Clearly, even he, with his dislike of public freedom, was disgusted at the abject abasement of his creatures. [Tacitus, Ann. 3.65]

[As far as I can tell, the media has not bothered to look into this, with 2 exceptions: David Greenberg and David Morris. Hertzberg pointed it out in last week's New Yorker too, but the link is already gone.]

"The greatest hitter that ever lived" [Updike] I have to admit, though it was no surprise, I got a little teary when Ted Williams died. He really was larger than life. "I had a fishing date with Hemingway in Cuba," Williams told a friend. ��But I never got to keep it. Castro broke it up.�� Oh yeah, his son's having him cryogenically frozen. The New Yorker finally put up the Updike piece.

This would be funny if it wasn't killing people [NYT] "The inner workings of Myanmar's leadership have always been obscure, particularly given its reliance on soothsayers, numerology and black magic. "General Ne Win helped speed his own downfall, for example, by suddenly declaring much of the Burmese currency worthless and replacing it with bank notes in denominations divisible by his lucky number, nine. Riots followed." Upon further reflection, it would have been cooler if he switched the whole country to base 9.

WorldCom started laying off 17,000 people on Friday [NYT] Maybe they will finally stop fucking calling me.

Watch the bloodletting continue.

I thought I had a road rage problem [Chron] On Nov. 28, Angel Ann Coley, 28 was stopped at a red light behind Aram's 2000 Lincoln Town Car at the intersection. Aram works as a driver for Abco Limousine Service in San Jose. Although the light was red, she began honking at Aram to make a right turn. When he did not, she continued to honk and gestured at him with her middle finger. She then rammed her 1997 Toyota Avalon into the back of Aram's Town Car, propelling him into the intersection. When Aram came out of his limousine, Coley yelled, "Why don't you go back to your own country?" She spat at him, punched him repeatedly in the face and kicked his car before calling him a "foreigner" and a "towel head."

Shocked, shocked [NYT] In 1989 Mr. Bush was on the board of directors and audit committee of Harken. He acquired that position, along with a lot of company stock, when Harken paid $2 million for Spectrum 7, a tiny, money-losing energy company with large debts of which Mr. Bush was C.E.O. Explaining what it was buying, Harken's founder said, "His name was George Bush." Unfortunately, Harken was also losing money hand over fist. But in 1989 the company managed to hide most of those losses with the profits it reported from selling a subsidiary, Aloha Petroleum, at a high price. Who bought Aloha? A group of Harken insiders, who got most of the money for the purchase by borrowing from Harken itself. Eventually the Securities and Exchange Commission ruled that this was a phony transaction, and forced the company to restate its 1989 earnings. But long before that ruling -- though only a few weeks before bad news that could not be concealed caused Harken's shares to tumble -- Mr. Bush sold off two-thirds of his stake, for $848,000. Just for the record, that's about four times bigger than the sale that has Martha Stewart in hot water. Oddly, though the law requires prompt disclosure of insider sales, he neglected to inform the S.E.C. about this transaction until 34 weeks had passed. An internal S.E.C. memorandum concluded that he had broken the law, but no charges were filed. This, everyone insists, had nothing to do with the fact that his father was president. Shrub resembles that remark.

This might be a problem [NYT] "The authors also describe a 'severe shortage' of new writing and a dearth of translations of works from outside. 'The whole Arab world translates about 330 books annually, one-fifth the number that Greece translates,' the report said. In the 1,000 years since the reign of the Caliph Mamoun, it concludes, the Arabs have translated as many books as Spain translates in just one year."

IT'S ALL A LIE Thank you, Rupert.

Armchair anthropology I just read that Mongolians greet friends by inclining their head towards them, then gently sniffing them. I don't know if it's true or not, but I like it. No jokes about exotic customs or the scent of fermented mare's milk.

Got Meat? Have I mentioned that it takes 242 gallons of oil to feed genetically modified corn to a beef cow? Not to mention the hormones, antibiotics and chicken shit.

I know I'm a dork, but who can resist A Perfect Day for Barberafish?

As long as we're on the topic, this is a pretty good "blog."