Slouching Towards Bethlehem

Nothing beats the spectacle of modern-day human trafficking and enslavement for a family night out.

What’s this weird sense of entitlement Clinton’s campaign exudes? Clinton is acting like it wouldn’t be fair if she didn’t get the nomination. What’s up with that? The rules are the rules. She’s playing dirty, it’s not sticking. She’s failing to get a rise out of Obama, and it’s making her look bad.

None of this is unfair, and her air of unjust injury is off-putting. It’s certainly not befitting a presidential bearing.

The other thing: if, as she claims, her years in the White House - all eight of them - count towards her political experience, then hasn’t she had her turn?

Insider trading, the Rolls Royce of investment policies, is legal, courtesy the SEC.

That’s deplorable, of course, but thank god for Wikileaks, huh? This wrong might actually get righted.

PR responds to churnalism charges.

The power of PR. The PR response somehow wiggled its way up the charts to be the first Google hit, ahead of the LRB article that is causing all the fuss. That’s good.

Next, watch as PR works its magic powers on your perception of reality…

Yes, there has been an increase in PR people over the last ten years and yes, companies and organisations are now realising the importance of PR at the board room level, how they need to manage their reputations and present themselves to their stakeholders. I believe that much of this actually comes from the public. We want to know the story, we want to be communicated to, we want transparency and we’re all too ready to cry ‘watch dog’ if something goes wrong.

Okay, maybe not so magic. I mean, come on. “We”? It’s almost like a new version of the “weasel we” - ingratiating, chummy, overly familiar, with the intention of creating a false cameraderie. The ploy is so transparent, however, that I can’t imagine this woman is actually very good at what she does.

Maybe that’s why she got stuck writing the blog?

Nice watch, honey.

Would someone please tell Clinton she isn’t winning?

“It’s really a rare occurrence, maybe the first time in history, that the person who’s running No. 2 would offer the person who’s running No. 1 the No. 2 position,” Daschle said.

Thank you, Tom Daschle.

This is the kind of thing that makes capitalism better than communism.

From the Slashdot story:

The early adopter premium is the difference between the
cost of buying the latest greatest techno-toy today and the cost of
buying an equal or better unit a couple of years later for much less.
That Blu-ray unit you buy today for $300 will cost $80 two years from
now. The premium is the $220 you pay to get the starter Blu-ray unit now
as opposed to waiting. The same applied for HD-DVD until the axe finally
fell and this is where it gets interesting. MP3 Newswire has been
tracking post-mortem HD-DVD sales on eBay and surprisingly found that
there are many takers. And why are people flocking to buy this
decade’s Betamax? Simple, they did the math. The demise of HD-DVD format
creates “an option where the consumer can get his high-def player NOW
without paying the $220 early adopter premium. That savings pays for the
player and more. New sealed boxes of the Toshiba HD-A3, which shipped
last fall for $300, are now drawing on average about $75 on eBay, where
plummeting HD-DVD movie prices are averaging between $6 and $10. “Take a
consumer with a 42″ plasma set who needs to replace a broken standard
definition DVD player. He can a) replace it with another standard
definition DVD for about $60. b) He can buy a Blu-Ray player for between
$300-$1000. c) He can buy an HD-DVD unit for under $80 and then buy ten
$10 or sixteen $6 HD-DVD videos for a total of $180″. What really drives
this is Blu-ray’s skimpy catalog, which will take a couple of years to
pump up. Rather than blow the $220 on the early adopter premium just to
have access to a limited number of movies the post mortem HD-DVD buyers
can enjoy cheap Hi-Def players, cheap Hi-Def videos, and pay less. These
users can shift to Blu-ray when players are less expensive and the
catalog is robust. Actually, the early adopter premium is more like $320.
With the win, Blu-ray manufacturers have raised prices.

Bernardo Atxaga, the best-known Basque writer, has written up his observations of a rally for Obama he attended in Nevada. I’ll post a translation when I get around to it.

Here’s some gruesome news from Interfax. Russia’s suicide rate is already high, but apparently the number of suicides on New Year’s Day in Moscow this year spiked. One of the people mentioned in the article was born in 1976… It gives you pause.

Interestingly, psychologist quoted in the article hazards that the cause might be the expectation by many people (in Russia, presumably) of a miracle on New Year’s. Under stress, a person might take the final step in the absence of some kind of sign.

Here’s the text of a letter written by Arkhangelsk’s mayor Aleksandr Donskoy to Russian President Vladimir Putin … from Donskoy’s prison cell.

Mr. President,

Although I was not given the opportunity to be a candidate for the post you currently occupy, I intend to participate as a candidate in the 2012 presidential elections. I am certain that the opposition forces will support me, and that Aleksandr Donskoy’s “Novaya Partiya” [trans.: "New Party"] will become a real political force in the country.

In connection with which I would like to point out that even in Myanmar, the military junta which is friendly to us places presidential candidates from the opposition under house arrest, and not in prison. We are not in a state of emergency yet, so it would be appropriate if the following articles could be included in the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation:

• Making negative assessments of the activity of the President of the Russian Federation and his successor.

• Criticism of Putin’s Plan.

• Desire to be on the ballot for the post of President of the Russian Federation without an agreement with federal officials.

All of these articles can be applied to me, on the basis of which I can then be prosecuted. It would be more honest that way.

Happy New Year!

Aleksandr Donskoy, Mayor of Arkhangelsk
December 27, 2007