HometownSource Blogs

Big day for pop culture today, with the official premiere of both Ratatouille and Sicko on the big screen. Must admit that I look forward to Pixar releases every bit as much as my kids do, and the early reviews on Ratatouille indicate this one won’t disappoint. Pixar has a perfect 7-0 record of producing animated features that are either very good or great. In an era when a number of other animation studios are cranking out recycled, mediocre material or outright crappy pictures, Pixar remains to animation what Apple is to personal computers - simply and consistently better.

Speaking of Apple, today’s biggest event has been the heralded launch of the iPhone. It remains to be seen whether iPhone can live up to the all this hype, but there’s little doubt that a new standard of convergence is being set in the world of handheld electronics. As a developer, I tend to believe this will be the device that seriously shoves Internet content into the mobile arena for a broader audience. The bar is being raised, regardless of which phone/multi-media player/camera the masses flock to from here.

So, will I run out and drop 500 bucks for an iPhone? Uh no. Not quite yet. But if anyone has like $480 that you are planning to burn up with a lighter, send it my way and I’ll gladly cover the remaining twenty and get myself one of those dogs. And for all I know, the thing might even BE a lighter, which would come in handy for all the fireworks next week.

Short of winning a gold medal at the winter Olympics, which, thanks to the inclusion of curling is still within the realm of possibility for me for at least another 20 years, holding a Stanley Cup over my head would be the sweetest thing ever. Oh well. There’s always Photoshop.

Then again, with my luck I would go to all the trouble of winning one and they would misspell my name.

Though most of us will never hold it aloft, smooch its silvery surface, or make Jello in it’s substantial bowl, we can at least get a look at it at Taste of Minnesota this year.

The last time I saw it was in ‘91 when the North Stars went to the finals. My wife and I packed up the kids and headed to the Hotel Sofitel to see the icon. I thought it was…well…sweet.

There is a new think tank in these parts, “Minnesota 2020,” calling itself “progressive, and non-partisan.”

As think tanks are rarely, if ever, non-partisan, I was a little skeptical. That skepticism wasn’t improved upon learning that the organization was founded by former DFLer and partisan, Matt Entenza, and is staffed by not one, or two, but three ex-DFL staffers.

It has also received the official seal of approval from The Center for American Progress, another infamous partisan outift, funded by everyone’s favorite leftist, George Soros.

Sure enough, a perusal of its site in search of someone, anyone, identified with conservative ideology (which would seem crucial to the “non-partisan” claim) came up empty, and this portion of its mission statement appears to be lifted right out of DFL talking points:

We are tired of a state that focuses on divisive side issues while our schools, healthcare, transportation, and economic development suffer.

My crystal ball shows a future of tax increase, mass transportation, and socialized health care advocacy, and support for more government intervention in the free market.

Blognetnews.com has blog roundups from all over the country, categorized by state. Now you can keep an eye on what is being said by Minnesota bloggers, and even by members of the Minnesota Organization of Blogs (MOB).

Today’s perusal led me to a post by former Star Tribune political writer Eric Black, who now writes for Minnesota Monitor. Black comments on the MSNBC study, commented on here, which showed a strong liberal bias in the mainstream media. It is Black’s contention that, just because the media is 80-20 liberal to conservative, that is no reason to suspect that personal politics shades news coverage.

Meanwhile, over at Power Line, a fine example of personal politics not shading news coverage.

Or not.

An article today on the donation habits of reporters:

The pattern of donations, with nearly nine out of 10 giving to Democratic candidates and causes, appears to confirm a leftward tilt in newsrooms — at least among the donors…

American Journalism Review has a nicely-executed article entitled What the Mainstream Media Can Learn from Jon Stewart. AJR’s Rachel Smolkin closes the piece with marching orders to her colleagues:

Don’t underestimate your audience. Be relevant. And be bold.

Along that same line of reason, maybe stop wearing the term “mainstream media” as a badge of honor. I’d bargain that a media outlet proudly calling itself mainstream these days is not very bold, not very relevant, and often focused toward the least sophisticated audience.

This ties into another item I ran across today, from the always relevant Jeffrey Zeldman. On the topic of Web-based form choices, Zeldman argues that ‘Maybe’ is one option too many, and also suggests that online rating systems should use four stars and not five. Why? Because given the opportunity, people will gravitate to the safety of middle ground.

I’d never given much thought to online rating systems, but his comment immediately struck a chord.  Netflix uses a five-star ratings system, and if I were to go back through the many dozens of movies I’ve rated upon return, no doubt I’ve chosen ‘three stars’ far more than the other options. This gives me a quick, mindless fix as the evaluator, and accounts for the many many movies these days that are somewhat entertaining, but nothing more. The central ground of that rating is essentially useless for others (even when packaged in the cumulative), and probably doesn’t help Netflix provide me with accurate recommendations, either.

So now I’ve got a plan. Movies are either good, or they are bad. They are not just okay.

Last month I had the honor of attending the Billy Joel concert at St. Paul’s Xcel Center.

I had seen him perform a number of years ago at the old Saint Paul Convention Center. Although, this time he was more mellow and didn’t leap from one piano to another arranged on different platform levels like he did in the olden days. But I’m happy to say Billy Joel still has it.

From the second his lighting crew climbed rope-like ladders to the ceiling’s center, the crowd was jazzed.The concert opened with the audience singing a surprise happy birthday to him. Joel turned to the band and gave them a playful gesture involving the third digit on his hand. Come on. You know what I mean.

Billy didn’t disappoint. Although, when he took his place at the piano, he introduced himself as Billy Joel’s dad. “Billy couldn’t make it tonight,” he said. Yes, he has gained some weight and his hair is scant, but he’s still Billy. And, by gosh, he sure can bang out a tune on the piano.

His fans were going crazy, dancing and singing along to his music that has transcended decades. “Italian Restaurant.” “Angry Young Man.” “Allentown.” Women of all ages stood and mobbed the front of the stage to get a piece of the action.

The show was low-tech. The only thing going on was that his piano rotated in a small circle. But he didn’t need all the flash. “That’s as high tech as we get,” he said. His music and his fabulous band was all that was needed. They exuded high energy. upbeat music. Running around the stage, playing a bunch of different instruments, flugelhorns, saxes, etc. Billy also did a hot imitation of Bob Dylan.

For one of his encores he played “Piano Man.” The lights went out and a plethora of cellphones luminated the arena. The lights waved in time to the music. So much for lighters.

A few days later, I watched a concert Billy Joel performed in Russia in about 1985. That’s when he was married to Christie Brinkley. (Yes, she was at the Russia concert with their daughter.) He played pretty much the same songs that he played last month. His songs have substance to have lasted for so long in an era where a stream of rappers and rockers come and go. This time he donned a pair of sunglasses and did a perfect imitation of Ray Charles. If you closed your eyes and listened, it sounded just like him.

Joel took off his shoes and surfed a mosh pit while singing. He didn’t miss a beat. The Russian audience couldn’t get enough of him.

I’m hoping some day he’ll return to the area. His music just keeps getting better. It’s like that song title, I believe by Peter Allen, “Everything Old is New Again.”

Oh yeh, he did end his last month’s concert with his signature statement “Don’t take any *** from anybody!”

More on Governor Tim Pawlenty’s well meaning but ultimately worthless planet cooling scheme can be found here.

And still, we have no idea what economic costs are associated with reducing Minnesota’s man-made emissions by 80 percent of less than one percent (Minnesota’s contribution) of the total of 25 percent (America) of the less than 5 percent total of overall man-made emissions.

We also have no idea that the reduction will have any effect on average temperature, or what that effect will be. If Kyoto was supposed to reduce global temperatures by .04 degrees in a century, than Pawlenty’s plan is sure to be just a miniscule fraction of that.

One wonders what the economic figures will look like next to the estimated cooling projections, and how much each thousandth (if that) of a degree will cost.

Not surprisingly, those numbers are all but impossible to find, and are sure to remain so.

UPDATE: Just noticed an extra “zero” in the Kyoto figure. It has been changed from “.004″ to “.04″ to reflect the accurate projections.

The Chisago County GOP has launched a blog. It has also unveiled Pachy. See Pachy’s debut in North Branch on June 17.

I enjoyed Don Heinzman’s latest column very much, but take issue with a couple of points.

“Property tax relief” is a bit of a misnomer in this case, because it’s not really tax relief, just redistribution. The bill would still be paid, but by people who would see no benefit. I’m not sure it’s fair for a taxpayer in Eagan to help fund a road project in Chisago County.

Furthermore, there is little evidence that local units of government exercised restraint when LGA was more readily available, or when those funds were reduced. Instead, many locals used the cut in LGA to raise taxes (often by more than was lost) and blamed the governor. As Don pointed out, the state already shells out $9.2 billion to various local governments. The offer to increase that amount in exchange for a local tax cap was rejected. That speaks volumes.

Local units of government, especially cities and counties, are not following the lead of the state and tightening budgets. Instead, they have turned the governor into a convenient scapegoat for raising taxes.

The thing about relying on outside funding is that it is prone to go away. In a perfect world, local units of government would have responded to Pawlenty’s reductions in aid by reducing their own budgets. Instead they performed a brilliant magic act of their own, creating the illusion that it was the governor raising taxes.

A sign that a candidate is having trouble competing in the arena of ideas is the call for publicly funded elections. It would certainly make Al Franken’s job easier:

…I often think about how badly we need public financing of elections in this country. We need it because I should be out talking to Minnesotans about the issues that matter to their families. We need it so that I can spend my days meeting with policy experts and reading up on legislation and working with progressives all over the state to build a movement that can take on Norm Coleman next fall.

The sense of entitlement Franken must feel, to believe taxpayers should finance his election campaign, trips the meter. I think it shows a serious lack of regard for hard-working citizens that he would advocate taking from their budget to pad those of politicians who have yet to represent a single one of them.

If there is such a thing as a well of forward-progress in the online newspaper business, it’s Adrian Holovaty. Holovaty’s career has been highlighted by an ability to take routine data and make it useful (example: ChicagoCrime.org). He now puts his considerable skills to work at WashingtonPost.com.

A recent project Holovaty and his team launched is Campaign Tracker, which combines campaign scheduling data and online mapping to track the daily schedules all of the major Presidential candidates.

At first, this might seem like tedious information, but the ability to see at a glance where all the candidates are, and what they’re doing, is illuminating. Compare this simple, elegantly-presented information to the scads of useless sound-bites and punditry that cable news outlets spew every day. At this stage of the game, you want to know where candidates are getting money and who they’re trying to impress. Campaign Tracker does this efficiently with a couple dozen lines of text and a simple Google map.

In recent days, candidates on both sides of the aisle seem to be shuttling between party functions in Iowa (that’s political party, mind you) and fundraising stops in California.

Here’s a map slash grid, plotting the Inglehart-Welzel Cultural Map of the World, based on two axis of interest. An often-heard refrain in immigration rhetoric is that everyone in the world wants to live in the U.S.  Seems to me this might generally be true for the whole area to the west and south of our position on this map, a majority of the world to be sure. Not so much, for those plotted due north and east. And, I suspect, for reasons roughly matching the variables on the axis. [ via kottke ]

While the state and the feds are trumpeting alternative energy plans with great reductions in emissions, no one really seems to have a clue how we are going to get there. Likewise, no one seems terribly interested in how much it is going to cost compared to the perceived benefit.

Pawlenty’s future calls for an 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gases by 2050. This seems like the kind of classic overreach that has Kyoto dead in the water. We’re certainly not going to get there with the governor’s emphasis on ethanol, which uses more energy to produce than it saves. Thus, increased production of ethanol means increased energy usage and increased emissions. Not to mention the stress on food stores and prices.

Making money requires energy. Has anyone calculated the amount of extra hours the average person will have to work to finance higher food, clothing, and energy prices, not to mention the massive subsidies they will pay to “reduce” energy bills?

Senator Klobuchar is calling for a national initiative that will produce 25 percent renewable energy by 2025, in part to “reduce carbon dioxide emissions, which cause global warming by trapping heat in the atmosphere.”

(Sigh.)

Let’s be clear. Mankind produces roughly four percent of atmospheric CO2. As a whole, CO2 is a tiny fraction of the overall greenhouse gas picture (.038 percent to be exact). The U.S. is credited with producing about 25 percent of man-made CO2 emissions. Were we to completely eliminate our contribution of atmospheric CO2, we would reduce greenhouses gases by about one percent.

Pawlenty and Klobuchar are putting us on a path to spend endless billions of tax dollars for a plan that is sure to raise the price of goods and services, energy costs (in the form of higher taxes), and puts our energy future in the hands of government. All based on the theory that our tiny contribution to CO2 is somehow causing a catastrophe that the other 96 percent is not.

You won’t believe your eyes. I promise.

TEASER UPDATE: Think fire from water.