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"Resist the urge to figure it all out in advance. Realize this is when you know the least."

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 07:53:20 -0600

“Resist the urge to figure it all out in advance. Realize this is when you know the least.”

- Derek Sivers

The Future of Books is Apps

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 17:58:00 -0600

Penguin’s CEO John Makinson on his company’s strategies for the iPad (via mrgan). It seems clear that those who take an aggressive approach, experiment, and try many things at once are going to be more likely to find success. And I see demos like this and I just get excited for the thing all over again.

On Finding an Alternative that Beats the Status Quo

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 13:48:03 -0600

On Finding an Alternative that Beats the Status Quo:

It’s a search problem:

As House Speaker Nancy Pelosi searches for votes and the WH hunts for compromises on health care reform, party strategists on both sides remain convinced that a legislative overhaul will pass.

Stephen Malkmus Interviewed by Chuck Klosterman

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 08:06:03 -0600

Stephen Malkmus Interviewed by Chuck Klosterman:

If you ever had a dream about what an afternoon (or at least reading about an afternoon) with SM would be like, you can rest assured that Klosterman delivers here. An article as perfect as anything on Terror Twilight.

I’ve seen Malkmus perform three times, but I’ve got near-Phish level enthusiasm to see Pavement this summer. Tickets arrived yesterday.

Mapmaking and Maps

Sat, 27 Feb 2010 12:08:00 -0600

Mapmaking and Maps:

There are a lot interesting bits in this New Yorker profile of Paul Krugman. But the part I found most appealing was the idea that economic formalization created holes – and opportunities – in our understanding of the world. The process of modeling is compared to mapmaking:

Sixteenth-century maps of Africa were misleading in all kinds of ways, but they contained quite a bit of information about the continent’s interior—the River Niger, Timbuktu. Two centuries later, mapmaking had become much more accurate, but the interior of Africa had become a blank. As standards for what counted as a mappable fact rose, knowledge that didn’t meet those standards—secondhand travellers’ reports, guesses hazarded without compasses or sextants—was discarded and lost. Eventually, the higher standards paid off—by the nineteenth century the maps were filled in again—but for a while the sharpening of technique caused loss as well as gain.

I’m very fond of the map analogy when teaching modeling to students; even 40 (or more) years into the formalization of political science, I wonder what old truths and ideas we have discarded, what opportunities exist. Some inspiration for reading old work to refine the new maps.

Is Indie Dead?

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 11:43:00 -0600

Is Indie Dead?:

How can a sound (or a movement?) be dead that was undefineable in the first place?

My sense is that it matters where you come from at least as much as where you are now. Also we need labels to talk about stuff, a small amount of noise is okay.

Posted with Instapaper (via Marco, I think).

The Popularity of Healthcare Reform

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 13:17:00 -0600

The Popularity of Healthcare Reform:

Ezra Klein asks if healthcare reform is popular – and it is if you ask people about their support for many of the components of the reform, but not so much if you ask people to stick their thumb up or down to the whole thing.

I think it’s easy to chalk up these sorts of survey results to the common variability and stupid human tricks we often see with polling. However, I think a good portion of the blame has to go to Obama and the Democrats for failing to market this bill with morality and as a series of regulatory changes (see Canes-Wrone and de Marchi 2002) and allowing the GOP to frame the discussion as a question over the size of government. It’s much too easy to maintain a status quo policy by maligning leviathan and the Democrats let their opponents do just that.

Link via Seth Masket who is quickly becoming one of my favorite bloggers.

More and better said on Ezra K. from frequent co-author and good friend of the log, Michael Ensley:

A big bill leaves too much room for doubt, attack. They took the wrong lesson away from 1993-94. The problem for Clinton was not getting Congress involved early. The problem was setting a modest, focused, and clear bill. We are going to make it better by doing X. Instead they were all over the map. By trying to do a comprehensive overhaul you open up to many avenues. Maybe he had to keep to campaign promises. But why not start by delivering something simple. A health insurance reform bill based on mandates and eliminating discrimination based on pre-existing health conditions.

I’ve frequently espoused the Congress-wasn’t-involved-early-enough story while explaining 1994. But I think Ensley is right, the tack taken in both instances was too sprawling to appeal to an inattentive electorate.

Liberal Magazines Suffer Under Obama

Wed, 24 Feb 2010 19:41:00 -0600

Liberal Magazines Suffer Under Obama:

Last week, Seth Masket posted about the disincentives toward winning majority power that some political actors might face. I thought it was a cute argument, but mostly bunk. However, some figures from Vanity Fair make me reconsider (via Political Wire). In the past year, liberal magazines are doing poorly but sales and subscriptions to conservative magazines are up – even in the down economy.

If (relative) political extremists are willing to purchase media as a way to compensate for their favored party’s minority status, doesn’t that potentially speak to the Tea Party movement? In this light, the Tea Party movement is just a group of vendors selling t-shirts and conventions, profiting off of angst like the magazine publishers. Maybe they’re just monetizing the hate. Real parties need elites, maybe the Tea Partiers are just angry consumers with political roots who need more than magazines.

"Democracy, we often forget, is a process, and thus is continually in the making. It is not, as we..."

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 12:53:41 -0600

“Democracy, we often forget, is a process, and thus is continually in the making. It is not, as we usually like to think of it, an outcome.”

- John H. Aldrich (1999), “Political Parties in a Critical Era,” American Politics Quarterly, 27(1):9-32.

Trey Anastasio: “Backwards Down the Number Line”...

Sun, 21 Feb 2010 19:47:00 -0600

Trey Anastasio: “Backwards Down the Number Line” from the mini acoustic set during the Classic TAB show at the Pabst Theater, Milwaukee, WI 2/18/2010.

Lincoln Chafee Doesn't Want to Eat Alone at Party

Sun, 21 Feb 2010 19:20:00 -0600

Lincoln Chafee Doesn't Want to Eat Alone at Party:

The Former Republican Rhode Island Senator Lincoln Chafee is now running as an independent for governor of Rhode Island and has his sights set on a John Zogby prediction of a centrist third party. He thinks that’s what is motivating Evan Bayh’s retirement.

Has anyone ever in history predicted the emergence of a third party that’s not wholly representative of their own personal ideology? Though Bayh’s proposal for a monthly lunch of all 100 senators eerily recalls Chafee’s own lonely lunch room account he described to John Stewart.

Lunch must be the real problem for the moderate senator.

Bayh’s proposed reforms are a really odd mix. Ideas like a scheduled lunch reveal naive and unrealistic assessments about the power of deliberation and sit next to pro-majoritarian calls to make it harder to filibuster. But maybe the weirdest comment was the anti-democratic lament about how incumbent members of Congress just don’t try and help rival partisans get reelected anymore.

Trey Anastasio & Classic TAB Pabst Theater,...

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 15:34:00 -0600

Trey Anastasio & Classic TAB
Pabst Theater, Milwaukee
2/18/2010

Not the best picture ever. I want to re-listen to the show before I type up my thoughts, but it’s not on etree yet.

As I remember them, the highlights were the first set “Push on ‘til the Day” and the always mesmerizing “First Tube” encore with many other nice points through out the show.

OkTrends

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 08:03:33 -0600

OkTrends:

A blog analyzing an internet dating market (via SVN).

Wisconsin is 9th in Internet Usage

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 15:55:11 -0600

Wisconsin is 9th in Internet Usage:

Beer, brats, cheese, AND the Internet. What’s not to like?

The Tea Party is Not a Party

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 11:09:44 -0600

The Tea Party is Not a Party:

So says Tea Party movement favorite Sarah Palin (via pwire).

The Politics of Violence against Animals

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 13:08:00 -0600

Anthony Weiner on not running for mayor of New York City (The Daily Show 2/4/2010):

I would have beaten Bloomberg like a rented mule.

Bill Clinton on the legacy of his impeachment (in The Death of American Virtue):

He stood up to them and beat them. And he beat them like a yard dog.

The Clinton quote is truly disturbing. And I don’t even like pets. But who is beating their own dog? Not good people. At least Weiner is half-joking, or at least winking with bluster.

It's Sorta like Getting Called up to the Mothership

Sun, 14 Feb 2010 22:00:26 -0600

It's Sorta like Getting Called up to the Mothership:

The GOP is trying to absorb the nascent Tea Party movement. Shocker, I know.

John Sides: “People trust government when times are...

Sun, 14 Feb 2010 21:52:19 -0600

John Sides: “People trust government when times are good.”

"There really is no difference between what Republicans believe in and what the tea party activists..."

Sun, 14 Feb 2010 10:08:42 -0600

“There really is no difference between what Republicans believe in and what the tea party activists believe in.”

- House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) (via Frank Rich)

"In November, Democratic fortunes will depend on how voters feel about President Obama, not how they..."

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 09:43:00 -0600

“In November, Democratic fortunes will depend on how voters feel about President Obama, not how they feel about Congress.”

- Alan I. Abramowitz on congressional popularity (via @BrendanNyhan)