October 2004 Archives
I've been feeling a final push for Kerry (or against Bush) in the last few days that has left me feeling good for Tuesday. First it was
Andrew Sullivan's peice in
The New Republic titled
"Risk Management," where he makes public his support for John Kerry. Then yesterday it was
The Economist coming out with
their support of Kerry. Today it was
Eminem's new video for his anti-Bush anthem "Mosh," which I finally watched today. None of the three is terribly supportive of Kerry, but they're all important. To have conservatives like Sullivan and the Economist coming out with their support of John Kerry for prisdent is a huge step. Then for Eminem to come out with this stirring call to arms for the MTV generation to get up and vote takes it a step further. I understand it's quite late in the game, but these kinds of things are big steps towards taking back the White House on the second of Novemember.
Sullivan looks at both candidates and while he doesn't particularly like Kerry, he is incredibly unhappy with the job that Bush has done in nearly every realm of politics. He concludes with this:
Kerry? I cannot know for sure. But in a democracy, you sometimes have to have faith that a new leader will be able to absorb the achievements of his predecessor and help mend his failures. Kerry has actually been much more impressive in the latter stages of this campaign than I expected. He has exuded a calm and a steadiness that reassures. He is right about our need for more allies, more prudence, and more tactical discrimination in the war we are waging. I cannot say I have perfect confidence in him, or that I support him without reservations. But not to support anyone in this dangerous time is a cop-out. So give him a chance. In picking the lesser of two risks, we can also do something less dispiriting. We can decide to pick the greater of two hopes. And even in these dour days, it is only American to hope.
Kerry offers us a hope for future of this country. A hope that we can regain some sense of dignity in the eyes of the world. Both pieces believe that we're better off changing horses midstream because it's quite clear that the horse we're riding now has taken us off course. The Economist concludes:
John Kerry says the war was a mistake, which is unfortunate if he is to be commander-in-chief of the soldiers charged with fighting it. But his plan for the next phase in Iraq is identical to Mr Bush's, which speaks well of his judgment. He has been forthright about the need to win in Iraq, rather than simply to get out, and will stand a chance of making a fresh start in the Israel-Palestine conflict and (though with even greater difficulty) with Iran. After three necessarily tumultuous and transformative years, this is a time for consolidation, for discipline and for repairing America's moral and practical authority. Furthermore, as Mr Bush has often said, there is a need in life for accountability. He has refused to impose it himself, and so voters should, in our view, impose it on him, given a viable alternative. John Kerry, for all the doubts about him, would be in a better position to carry on with America's great tasks.
As I stated earlier, neither is a particularly strong support of Kerry, however, these are both conservative publications and to see them leave Bush's side encourages me. If the democrats can win them, I feel good about the chances they can win this election.
Finally, Eminem's new video is something different. This is the first protest song by a mainstream artist with lots to say and a video that is equally impressive. Read these lyrics to get an idea of Eminem's rage and message [lyrics via: Sing365]:
Imagine it pouring, it's raining down on us
Mosh pits outside the oval office
Someone's tryina tell us something,
Maybe this is god just sayin' we're responsible
For this monster, this coward,
That we have empowered
This is Bin Laden, look at his head noddin'
How could we allow something like this without pumping our fists
Now this is our final hour
Let me be the voice in your strength and your choice
Let me simplify the rhyme just to amplify the noise
Try to amplify the times it, and multiply by six...
Teen million people, Are equal at this high pitch
Maybe we can reach alqueda through my speech
Let the president answer a higher anarchy
Strap him with an Ak-47, let him go, fight his own war
Let him impress daddy that way
No more blood for oil, we got our own battles to fight on our own soil
No more psychological warfare, to trick us to thinking that we ain't loyal
If we don't serve our own country, we're patronizing a hero
Look in his eyes its all lies
The stars and stripes, they've been swiped, washed out and wiped
And replaced with his own face, Mosh now or die
If I get sniped tonight you know why,
Cause I told you to fight.
I feel energized . . . hopefully it follows over to Tuesday.
UPDATE: MoveOn raised $173,000 in less than two hours today to run ads in Colorado, a state that's looking closer than anyone imagined.
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According to an email posted on
daily KOS it appears as though a school in Wisconsin that George W. Bush recently visited refused to allow students to wear any pro-Kerry clothing or risk expulsion. Here's the
email from the daily KOS.
A friend with a child in the Richland County,WI high school where George Bush appears today reports the following. Students were told they could not wear any pro-Kerry clothing or buttons or protest in any manner, at the risk of expulsion. After a parent inquired, an alternative activity will be provided, probably a movie being shown in an auditorium. (The school secretary reportedly said that students had the choice of just staying home if they didn't want to attend the Bush rally, but the principal subsequently offered an alternative.)
They are not just talking about suspension, but expulsion. I have to imagine this would fall under first amendment right for free speech. Many have heard about this were outraged and consequently posted all the contact information for the school and district. Both
Electrolite and
Boing Boing have posted this information and here it is for anyone who may be interested:
Richland Center High School
23200 Hornet High Rd
Richland Center, WI 53581
Phone: (608) 647-6131
Here’s the principal:
John Cler
608-647-6131 x1590
Here’s the local superintendant of schools:
Rachel Schultz
608-647-6106
Here’s the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction:
1-800-441-4563
Here’s the state superintendent:
Elizabeth Burmaster
state.superintendent@dpi.state.wi.us
Write them, call them or just pass this information on. What kind of message is it to send children that they do not have a right to show their support of a political candidate because the opposition is there to visit. I thought schools existed to encourage involvement in democracy. This certainly seems counterproductive.
Update 1: I just sent this letter to the state superintendent (if anyone else sends a letter please let me know and I will post it here):
Dear Ms. Burmaster,
I am writing to express my disappointment in the recent decision at Richland Center High School to not allow students to wear any pro-Kerry items while George Bush was visiting the school. Apparently these students were told they risked expulsion if they were to show protest of any kind. What kind of message is that to send to children? I always believed that part of the goal of education was to teach students the skills necessary to fulfill their civic duties. Voting, for most of these students, will be one of those duties in the next four years. While I have no information on the curriculum of the school, this incident seems to be counterproductive to that goal of civic participation. What this school has done is send a message that being actively involved and interested in politics is not in the students' best interests. I doubt you will answer this email, but I would like to understand the reasoning behind this decision. I understand that a child with a pro-Kerry button may seem like a sign of disrespect for George Bush, who had come all the way to Wisconsin to visit the school. However, your choice to squash the students' right of free speech is far more disrespectful to the constitution. These students have a right to have their voices heard, no matter who the audience may be. I can only hope that the students of Richland Center High School are apologized to by their administrators with an explanation that encourages the type of free speech and activism that the school decided to hold back.
Sincerely,
Noah Brier
Update 2: I received this reply:
The rental and use of school facilities is an issue that is governed by
local school districts, as is the scheduling and assignment of pupil
activities during the school day.
Joe Donovan
Communications Officer
Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction
My next step is to mail the letter to the principal of the school, I'll let you know how it turns out.
Update 3: Here is the comment that Dustin Ragans posted this afternoon for those who are seeing this on the front page or via RSS:
My gf called the principle, and this is what she got:
I just spoke to the principal. btw, the area code for the principal is wrong, it's 608 like the rest, not 508.
Basically, the town is a small town (about 5,000 people), but it's in a fairly rural part of Wisconsin. The school auditorium was the only place big enough to hold the rally, so that's where it was held. It was a ticketed event, but students were allowed to go without a ticket, because the principal wanted to give everyone the opportunity to see the president of the U.S. He said that there was a rule that students who were wearing pro-Kerry stuff would not be allowed in the rally, but there was nothing that stated they would be expelled from the school. He said they didn't want protestors or picketing. He also said students were allowed to wear whatever they wanted before and after the event, but if they wanted to go into the audotorium during President Bushie's speech, they'd have to take off pro-Kerry stuff.
I asked, "So, there was nothing stating that they would be expelled if they wore pro-Kerry paraphenilia?", and he said "No, there was not. That would be illegal, and we wouldn't stand for that."
Thanks a lot to Dustin for posting and his girlfriend for making the phone call. I'm not sure exactly what to think now, I still think it's wrong to not allow students in who are wearing pro-Kerry gear, because no matter what they have on they have a right to hear what Bush has to say. However, hearing that the expulsion part may have been overplayed makes the whole situation a little less serious. I still believe these students are being sent the wrong message, but certainly not to the level I originally believed. Did anyone else get the same response from administration? What's the opinion on their position sans expulsion?
Update 4: Cory Doctorow has updated his original post and added these comments:
Many of you wrote to say that you communicated with the the principal listed above that that he says:
1. The Bush people rented the gymnasium, and the school was just enforcing their requirement that students not wear Kerry-supporting materials
2. The principal didn't threaten expulsion
I don't buy it: signing up to do #1, enforcing a ban on political expression, at a political event, in a political season, is a betrayal of an educator's duty. And anything a school administrator bans carries with it the implicit threat of discipline. One student reports being threatened with expulsion, the principal denies it. It may be that the principal didn't make the threat of expulsion, but telling students that it is forbidden to do foo implies that students who undertake foo will be punished somehow.
I'm still not quite sure what to think on this. I agree with Doctorow, it's hard to say what the truth is at this point and the whole situation sounds quite fishy. I'd really like to hear a firsthand account from some students, anyone know if that's out there yet?
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For all the New York City Readers (for those not in New York, tell your NYC friends):
Dear prospective party-goers,
Well folks, with the election, Halloween and the world series on your
minds it's possible (though doubtful) that you may have forgotten
about the other important event of the week. That's right, it's almost
time to get down with your costumed self to the rump-shaking sounds of
yours truly on the decks. So without any further ado, here's the info:
What: Party, Halloween, costumes, word.
When: Friday, October 29, 2004 (That's right, two days before Halloween)
Time: 8pm - ?am (Get there early for drink specials, $4 Yeungling
drafts and $4 vodka drinks until 10, don't miss it!)
Where: OpenAir (http://www.openairbar.com)
Address: 121 Saint Mark's Place (Near Ave. A)
Who: Me, as usual. I'm DJ'ing every record you want to hear from 8-11
(some extra time behind the decks this time means more 'Land Down
Under' for everyone to shake their asses to)
Alright, so now that I've jogged your memory, here's the deal. It's a
Halloween party so wear some costumes. I'll be in one, so please don't
leave me out to dry on this one. Get there early for drink specials
and so you catch my set (which you won't want to miss). If you have
specials songs you want to hear, bring me a CD burned with them and
I'll try to play them (I make absolutely no promises on this one). As
usual, everyone is invited to this one so forward, print, plaster this
email to anyone/anywhere. More people = more fun, it's a simple
equation. So come on down with your friends and anyone else you pick
up on the street and drink/dance your cares away. If you have any
questions at all, please email me. Help me make this party go off
without a hitch! Thanks.
Peace,
Noah
PS - San Loco. San Loco. San Loco. San Loco. San Loco. (Lou, just let
me know when this gets old.) San Loco. San Loco. Happy Birthday.
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As everyone in the country knows, the election is only a week away, yet pollsters and pundits are still relatively clueless on the eventual outcome. There's a strong push from both sides and everyone seems to be making their choice for 44th president of the United States public. Those who know me (or have read my political-oriented postings) understand that I have liberal convictions and I support John Kerry. This is bigger than just who I believe should be our next president, though. I believe we are at a crossroads as a nation and we can't afford to take the nosedive that four more years of George W. Bush could put us into. It's scary to imagine what a man with a real mandate from the people will do with four more years in office after the damage he caused in his first term. I understand that I'm most likely preaching to the choir, but I just wanted to point to an article from the The Nation titled 100 Facts and 1 Opinion: The Non-Arguable Case Against Bush" by Judd Legum. I have pulled some of the facts I found most damning out, but I urge you to go to the site, read them for yourself and pass on the url (http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20041108&s=facts) or print out the PDF and distribute it.
16. The Bush Administration has assigned five times as many agents to investigate Cuban embargo violations as it has to track Osama bin Laden's and Saddam Hussein's money.
Source: Associated Press
20. Even though an Al Qaeda training manual suggests terrorists come to the United States and buy assault weapons, the Bush Administration did nothing to prevent the expiration of the ban.
Source: sfgate.com
24. The Bush Administration granted the 9/11 Commission $3 million to investigate the September 11 attacks and $50 million to the commission that investigated the Columbia space shuttle crash.
Source: commondreams.org
70. The Bush Administration has spent $270 million on abstinence-only education programs even though there is no scientific evidence demonstrating that they are effective in dissuading teenagers from having sex or reducing the transmission of sexually transmitted diseases.
Source: salon.com
71. The Bush Administration slashed funding for programs that suggested ways, other than abstinence, to avoid sexually transmitted diseases.
Source: LA Weekly
75. Days after 9/11, the Bush Administration told people living near Ground Zero that the air was safe--even though they knew it wasn't--subjecting hundreds of people to unnecessary, debilitating ailments.
Source: Sierra Club, EPA
After the hundred facts, the article ends with one opinion:
If the past informs the future, four more years of the Bush Administration will be a tragic period in the history of the United States and the world.
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By Jeff Hughes
I was watching CNN today and heard a clip of Dubya saying the following about John Kerry (and I'm paraphrasing): "He has called the war in Iraq a colossal failure.  He has called it the wrong war.  How can we expect someone to win a war he doesn't believe we should be fighting?"
Let me draw a parallel for you on this one.  Say I'm Student Council President at Flemington High School in New Jersey.  I decide - without the permission of my classmates, the administration, or any of the other school in my county - to use the entirety of budget to buy dump trucks which will pour five tons of rat poop on North Arlington High's football field.  We send many of our own students to run the operation, drive the trucks...etc.  Unfortunately, NAHS doesn't want the rat poop so they fight back and a battle ensues.  Those who voted for me because I'm a jerkoff and they thougt it'd be "funny" still support me.  Everyone else is apalled.
Now here comes Bob Tawilliger and he wants my job.  And what's my argument against his being able to do the job: he can not finish the unbelievably asinine rat poop job. Why?  Because he thought it was inappropriate. [Editors Note: I had no idea what Jeff was talking about to this point either, but just stick with it.]
When Dick Cheney says every Iraqi he's talked to - "to a man" - has thanked him for the liberation, you have to go with Jon Stewart and wonder if he talked to any of the ones holding large missiles over their shoulders.  I don't make the Iraq war the center of my voting decision but can these guys please stop with the "everything is peachy" attitude.  It's condescending, patronizing and just downright delusional.
They call John Kerry a coward.  They say John Kerry does not stand with his convictions.  Ask the John Kerry who went and fought the Vietnam war how cowardly he is.  Ask the John Kerry who stood ALONE in front of the government to protest that way about convictions.  I am not a John Kerry lover.  I don't think he's going to win and POOF everything will be better.  But sometimes you reach a breaking point.
At the rish of sounding like a political ad, here's what a John Kerry vote means to me.  It means electing a smart, capable leader.  It means not having to be embarrassed every time your president decides to appear in public.  It means we can again be a country among the world and not a country "above" the world.
It means Dick Cheney goes back to Halliburton where he belongs.  It means Don Rumsfeld can continue decaying and John Ashcroft can resume his throne in Hades.
It means the era of the scary binary: right/wrong, good/evil...is over.  The discussion can begin.  Conversation, debates, ideologies...the hallmark of being a liberal.  The reason we do what we do.  The right to think and speak our minds.  I hate to sound like an ACLU hack-in-training, but this election has become more than the choosing of a leader.  A couple of supreme court justices from now, "liberal" may mean nothing more than "anarchist."
John Kerry does this crazy thing called flip-flopping.  Some people in the real world call this "humility" or "admitting your mistakes."  Republicans have used this as their #1 attack of the man.  Aren't you shocked they're so steadfast on the Iraq war?
I'm voting for Kerry so I can be proud of America again.  The way I was every time I heard Bill Clinton speak.  I don't get the same rush from Johnny, but who knows, after Tuesday night I just might.
Jeff Hughes is a guest writer for NoahBrier.com because no matter how much he hates the site, occasionally he has to make his thoughts public.
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It's been a couple hours now since we all witnessed the end of the Dynasty: A team that won 4 World Series between 1996 and 2000 and played in two others in
2001 and 2003. Paul O'Neill stands out in my mind as 'the guy' from that
era. He played hard every day, practiced his swing non-stop in the outfield
and threw his helmet after every at-bat, even if he hit a home run. He was
pure heart and he is responsible for the single most incredible sports
moment I have ever been a live witness to. In game 5 of the 2001 World
Series, the Yankees were down 2-0 to the Diamondbacks in the top of the 9th
inning. Yankee fans, rather than sulking in their seats got up and starting
chanting Paul O'Neill, eliciting what my friends who were watching on
television claim was tears from number 21. Of course, the Yankees ended up scoring two
runs in the bottom of the 9th with what must have been the longest home run
Scott Brosius ever hit (he was another heart guy). The Yankees ended up winning
the game in the bottom of the 12th as homegrown talent, Alfonso Soriano,
singled in the winning run.
Soriano is now a Ranger, gone in the trade for the 'best player in
baseball,' Alex Rodriguez. The same guy who tried to slap the ball out of
Bronson Arroyo's glove on the way to first base in game 6 of the ALCS after he couldn't hit the ball out of the infield.
Rodriguez is one of many new members of the 2004 Yankees without half the
heart that those guys like O'Neill, Brosius and Tino Martinez had. Today's
Yankees have 4 homegrown guys left from that Dynasty run, Jorge Posada and
Bernie Williams along with Jeter (the heart) and Mariano (the soul). Those
guys know what it's like to win, and more importantly to win right. They
were a classy bunch of hard-working guys. They were a group from whom Jeter
learned everything he knows about being a leader.
For all his faults, both at shortstop and at the plate, Derek Jeter
represents everything that a baseball player should be. Although he often appears to
have a non-chalant attitude, he is always the first guy at the top of the
steps to congratulate someone on a home run. He always runs hard, plays hard
and cheers on his team. He was a kid in 1996 and through that run we got to
see him become a man. Now, unfortunately, he's surrounded by a bunch of guys
who, while great players, hardly have that workhorse swagger that went along
with those Dynasty players.
Call it nostalgia, but I miss those guys. I realized just how much this afternoon when it dawned on me that I wouldn't give the following trade a second thought: Sheffield and Rodriguez for O'Neill and Brosius. I asked some friends and everyone agreed, they all said they'd much rather see those guys on the team. What does it say when you're willing to trade two guys who hit 36 home runs each for two guys who in 2001 combined for 34 (21 by O'Neill and 13 for Brosius). Those guys knew what it was all about to wear the pinstripes. So much so that one person I asked responded, "I'd trade Sheff and A-Rod for just O'Neill." Of course, with the size of contracts today, these guys aren't going anywhere, but neither are the Yankees anytime soon.
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Yesterday I was talking to a friend of mine who said, jokingly I think, that he was going to bring back Friendster. To think that just a year ago everyone who was anyone had a Friendster account, it's fairly amazing how quickly the site has fallen from grace. Social networking was all the buzz in September/October of 2003. Now, however, outside college where sites like thefacebook are picking up some slack, there doesn't seem to be any excitement left. So what happened? To put it simply, people realized that Friendster had no real relevance for them in their lives. It was fun for a little while to write/receive testimonials and collect friends, but people quickly began to realize that the benefits of Friendster pretty much ended there.
I'll be the first to admit that I was pretty impressed with social networking sites when they first came out. It simply amazed me that it had taken so long for us to recreate our real social networks using the networked architecture of the internet. For the first time we had a way to visualize and understand our social circle (maybe web would be a more appropriate term). All of a sudden we could see how we were connected to different people. However, after I, got past that initial fun of these sites I really began to realize that there was very little usefulness built in. Other than the ability to post events or messages to a large group (which is easy enough through any number of other ways), sites like Friendster are just not overly useful. They're a good way to show off how many people you know, but other than that I can't think of why I should use them.
So my question, to anyone who doesn't mind taking the time to answer it, is what is worthwhile about social networking sites? I'm really interested in understanding why they are relevant to my life (if they are at all). Certainly there are pieces of social networking that could be kept. In a way sites like del.icio.us and Audioscrobbler use some social networking architecture in the way they work. I guess my question is just, am I missing the point or is Friendster useless?
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I check my usage statistics on the site fairly obsessively. I like to keep on top of how many visitors I'm getting and more importantly where I'm getting referrals. It's a good way for me to get some idea of how many people the site is reaching (and just part of a certain general obsessive nature of mine). One of the things that shows up on the usage statistics is the popularity of different search terms on the site (this is using my search box, not Google's). This gives me an interesting picture of what people are looking for on the site when they get here and what's been jumping out is just how many people are looking for information on Zubaz (the tiger print football pants I wrote about in a post aptly titled "Tiger Print Football Pants"). Although they are really called Zubaz, the most popular search on NoahBrier.com is for 'zoomba pants,' the name I thought they had when I was searching for the real name (this term accounts for over 22 percent of total searches on the site). On top of this, the "Tiger Print Football Pants" entry is the most popular entry page, which leads me to believe that a majority of my Google referrals are for people looking for information on the pants whose name I could remember and the answer I couldn't find on Google. For those who don't remember the post, or don't care to click through, here's what I wrote:
Today I was trying to remember the name of the bad 80's fashion that put tiger print stripes in the color of your favorite football team onto a pair of parachute-like pants. When I did a Google search for the terms 'tiger,' 'print,' 'football' and 'pants' I didn't come up with any relevant results. In order to remedy this for the next person that might be interested in the topic I have decided to put all those words into one entry so hopefully they'll be able to get right to the answer. (I'll throw in 'bad 80s fashion,' just in case that's in the search. While I'm at it let me add 'zoomba,' which one person told me they were called and 'ugly,' which they were.)
What I've also noticed is a number of people who have searched the site for 'bears zubaz,' because I mentioned an eBay interview. All of this made me decide to do a little experiment in search engine optimization (SEO). I'm curious what will happen if I include all the terms from the original post but include this time the names of all 32 teams in the NFL (which I'm writing from memory, if that earns me extra points).
New England Patriots, Buffalo Bills, New York Jets, Miami Dolphins, Cincinnati Bengals, Cleveland Browns, Pittsburgh Steelers, Baltimore Ravens, Indianapolis Colts, Jacksonville Jaguars, Tennessee Titans, Houston Texans, Kansas City Chiefs, Oakland Raiders, Denver Broncos, San Diego Chargers, New York Giants, Washington Redskins, Philadelphia Eagles, Dallas Cowboys, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Atlanta Falcons, New Orleans Saints, Carolina Panthers, St. Louis Rams, Arizona Cardinals, San Francisco 49ers, Seattle Seahawks, Minnesota Vikings, Detroit Lions and everyone's favorite Chicago Bears. (I purposely left one team off the list because I'd prefer if fans from a certain cheese nation stayed out of here.)
Anyway, thanks for bearing with me and I'll let you know what comes of all this. If you did come from Google and you're reading this message, do me a favor and leave me a comment and let me know what you searched for or email me at nb@noahbrier.com. (Let me also add the terms zoombas, zoombaz and zubas to this post.)
For those actually looking for Zubaz, let me redirect your search to eBay. Sorry for inconvenience and I hope you have a nice day.
For those regular readers (or just those interested) who have made it all the way to the bottom of this entry, can I recommend checking out the comments on my “Youth Evolving Online� post, an interesting dialogue developed that even my mother jumped in on.
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On October 15th The Daily Show's Jon Stewart went on CNN's Crossfire. (For those interested in watching the video you can find it here -- the 56k and the 200k versions are both free and the have Real, Windows Media and Quicktime versions.) Rather than sit there and promote his new book, A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction, Stewart decided to Crossfire's Carlson and Begala how he really felt [via the CNN transcript of the show]:
STEWART: And I made a special effort to come on the show today, because I have privately, amongst my friends and also in occasional newspapers and television shows, mentioned this show as being bad.
(LAUGHTER)
BEGALA: We have noticed.
STEWART: And I wanted to -- I felt that that wasn't fair and I should come here and tell you that I don't -- it's not so much that it's bad, as it's hurting America.
Stewart took the chance on the show to tell Carlson and Begala that shows like theirs were the problem with American politics.
STEWART: See, the thing is, we need your help. Right now, you're helping the politicians and the corporations. And we're left out there to mow our lawns.
BEGALA: By beating up on them? You just said we're too rough on them when they make mistakes.
STEWART: No, no, no, you're not too rough on them. You're part of their strategies. You are partisan, what do you call it, hacks.
Stewart brings up a good point, if shows like Crossfire didn't go into 'Spin Alley' after a debate, 'Spin Alley' wouldn't exist. "STEWART: Yes. You go to spin alley, the place called spin alley. Now, don't you think that, for people watching at home, that's kind of a drag, that you're literally walking to a place called deception lane?"
While Carlson brings up a fair point that Stewart did pitch Kerry some softballs in his interview, Stewarts comeback (or copout?) is that he is a comedy show, not a news show. I think the point here is that The Daily Show doesn't pretend to be influential and meaningful, while Crossfire does. By claiming it's a debate show it gains a certain amount of credibility and influence over people's opinions. What it does with that credibility is what Stewart is indicting the show about.
STEWART: But the thing is that this -- you're doing theater, when you should be doing debate, which would be great.
. . .
STEWART: You know, the interesting thing I have is, you have a responsibility to the public discourse, and you fail miserably.
Stewart doesn't have this same responsibility; he after all (as he often notes) is on a show that follows a bunch of puppets making prank calls. However, Stewart takes his responsibility very seriously. Findings have shown that young Daily Show viewers are actually more politically informed than those who consume other media. This comes from a study by the National Annenberg Election Survey (NAES) which I wrote about for the October 5th edition of Demographics Alert in a story titled "Politics Served Fresh Daily."
The Daily Show viewers did more than just score higher than other viewers of late-night television. According to the NAES survey, only people who consume four or more days of cable news scored as highly as late-night viewers who prefer Stewart's Daily Show. In fact, those 18- to 29-year-olds who claimed to read newspapers four or more days a week scored two percentage points lower, with 46 percent correct. The six knowledge questions ranged from "Who favors allowing workers to invest some of their Social Security contributions in the stock market?" to "Who was a former prosecutor?" Daily Show viewers are clearly a well-informed bunch, not the 'stoned slackers' Bill O'Reilly recently called them during an interview with Jon Stewart on his Fox News Channel show The O'Reilly Factor.
Dannagal Goldthwaite Young who conducted the study did make this caveat: "That being said, the association we found between political knowledge and watching The Daily Show we can't necessarily attribute it to 'they watch the show, therefore they're smart.' There's a very strong case to be made that they're very politically knowledgeable coming into the show. You'd have to be to understand the parody and satire." These young people are turning to The Daily Show because they're increasingly fed up with what's going on in the mainstream media. Stewart is right, shows like Crossfire are the problem. They claim to ask tough questions but then they allow politicians to slither their way around them and say whatever they want. Unfortunately, the mainstream media too often miss this point while they're trying to get in the good graces of politicians so that they will make more appearances. They also seem to miss the point of Stewart's show:
BEGALA: But who would you provide you better material, do you suppose?
STEWART: I don't really know. That's kind of not how we look at it. We look at, the absurdity of the system provides us the most material. And that is best served by sort of the theater of it all, you know, which, by the way, thank you both, because it's been helpful.
(LAUGHTER)
CARLSON: But, if Kerry gets elected, is it going to -- you have said you're voting for him. You obviously support him. It's clear. Will it be harder for you to mock his administration if he becomes president?
STEWART: No. Why would it be harder?
CARLSON: Because you support...
(CROSSTALK)
STEWART: The only way it would be harder is if his administration is less absurd than this one. So, in that case, if it's less absurd, then, yes, I think it would be harder.
But, I mean, it would be hard to top this group, quite frankly.
(LAUGHTER)
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
STEWART: In terms of absurdity and their world matching up to the one that -- you know, it was interesting. President Bush was saying, John Kerry's rhetoric doesn't match his record.
But I've heard President Bush describe his record. His record doesn't match his record.
Stewart is mocking a political system that deserves to be mocked. He is absolutely right and he is hoping that through laughter this country will begin to open its eyes to the serious problems it faces. I think Stewart has transcended his position as The Daily Show anchor and become a figure that we haven't seen in a long time. I'm not quite sure what that figure is or how to describe him, but I am impressed with his honesty and forthrightness.
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Ben asked the question on everyone's mind (definitely not true, but still): what the hell is RSS? I'm going to do my best to answer it. First, here's the description I used in my September article for American Demographics titled "This Way App."
The power of RSS makes it difficult to compare it to traditional media. Calling it syndication evokes visions of I Love Lucy reruns or Oprah's talk show being broadcast across the country. But that isn't RSS. Many people describe RSS as TiVo for the Web. Part of what makes TiVo so appealing is the ability to pick and choose from across the network spectrum and record those shows you're interested in. RSS, however, records an entire opt-in spectrum of feeds, rather than one show at a time. It's like being able to choose your cable package with On Demand channels only. That way, when you get home from work, rather than watching what's on at that time, you are provided with a list of every show that has appeared on your chosen channel lineup since the last time you watched. This way, if you only watch ESPN, HBO and NBC, you only need to subscribe to those 3 stations. And for those who watch 100 different channels, RSS can handle that too by spidering across all the sites you've chosen and posting update signs and signals for each of them.
Quite simply, RSS is a syndication technology that allows you to receive updates thanks to a handy-dandy aggregator (like Bloglines).
The best tutorial I've read is titled What is RSS: A basic tutorial introduction to RSS feeds and aggregators for non-technical people from Software Garden, Inc.. They answer the 'what is RSS?' question with this: "RSS stands for "Really Simple Syndication". It is a way to easily distribute a list of headlines, update notices, and sometimes content to a wide number of people. It is used by computer programs that organize those headlines and notices for easy reading." They then continue to explain the technology in reasonably easy to understand language, it's definitely worth reading if you're interested.
For me, RSS has changed the way I surf the web. I no longer go to a bunch of different websites, instead I just visit Bloglines and those websites come to me. You can get RSS feeds for the New York Times, Washington Post and, of course, NoahBrier.com (unfortunately at this time, I don't believe either CNN.com or Drudge uses RSS). [Also, those links are to the RSS feed pages if you're interested.]
If you're interested in getting started, put your mouse over the XML button on the right side of my website and click on Bloglines. That should bring you to a page to sign up and get you set up with my feed to begin with. From there you can explore Bloglines for more feeds or go somewhere like Feedster's Feedfinder, where you can type in the address of a website to see if they have a feed. Anyhow, hope that get's you started and if you have any more questions I'd be happy to answer. Enjoy!
UPDATE: Scott Rafer at Feedster has pointed me to RSS feeds for CNN.com and Drudge. Both have bootleg feeds (not sanctioned by the respective websites), but they should get the job done nonetheless.
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A while back I asked people to make a list of sites they visit everyday. I was finding that there was an increasingly long list of places I visited daily and I was curious if others behaved similarly. What I found ended up changing much of my thinking and consumption of the web. Not only was this stupid little activity the reason that I got into RSS (one of the people I polled listed Bloglines as one of their daily visits), but I also discovered an interesting divide in the way different sexes used the internet. (For anyone interested, the list is available at TimeAtWork.)
Nearly every male I talked to had a list of sites they checked daily, which for most began with ESPN.com. However, when I asked females I know for their lists I got answers like, "I don't know, I don't really have any sites I check that often," or, "I just don't use the internet that way." This way of using the web, checking sites every day, seemed like such a natural thing for me and I couldn't understand how it could be used differently. I mean, visiting my regular sites was always the first thing I did online and consumed a majority of my time. Why would men and women use the technology in such different ways? For the men, this was an information medium and for women it seemed to be much more of a tool. (This is not to say that women aren't consuming information online, but the women I spoke with seemed much less inclined than the men. Most women I spoke to seem to prefer consuming their news as hard copy rather than digital form.)
When I read Danah Boyd's entry titled "a culture of feeds: syndication and youth culture," I immediately thought back to my TimeAtWork survey. Boyd's essay is about the way youth use the internet and specifically whether RSS will be a useful technology for them.
Youth use email to talk with parents and authorities (including corporate emails like from Xanga); it's where they get the functional stuff. They check email once a day. They get notices there, but they're mostly disregarded. IM is where the action is. Youth see this as their digital centerpiece, where they communicate with their friends, thereby maintaining their intimate community. They use the Profiles in IM to find out if their friends updated their LJs [Live Journals] or Xangas, even though they are subscribed by email as well. The only feed they use is the LJ friends list and hyper LJ users have figured out how to syndicate Xangas into LJ. [Remember: blog is not a meaningful term to youth culture.]
In a lot of ways, the differences in the way youth use the internet seem similar to the difference I found between males and females. For youth it is less of an informative medium than a social one. However, this raised two questions in my mind. First, what's the difference between teenage male and female internet use, and second, what will happen when these youth reach college and the work world? Will their online consumption habits change?
The fact is that most teenagers are not overly interested in what's going on in their world. How could they with dating, drinking and sex taking up 90 percent of their mindshare? They are at a time of their lives when they're trying to develop their identity and these activities are far more important than knowing what's going on in the world around them. (I'm not being sarcastic here, at this point in their lives, identity creation really is, and probably should be, higher on their list of priorities. I know it was for me when I was 15.)
However, most will reach a point later in the lives when they feel a responsibility to better understand their world. [Just to clear up one point, I am speaking strictly of youth at this point, while I compared the consumption habits of women to that of youth towards the beginning of the essay it was purely a jumping off point and I apologize for any misunderstanding this may have caused.] Boyd suggests that, "there is a huge cultural divide occurring between generations, even as they use the same tools." I'm not sure that I agree, though, I think that we may be getting our first look at how a generation that grows up with the internet evolves with it. As I grew older my internet habits changed based on my interests. I would imagine that while LJ may be amongst the most popular location for youth in general, that specifically within the male youth demographic there are sites, like ESPN.com, that get visited regularly. It is that kind of surfing pattern that lends itself to RSS so well. Rather than having to visit the sites, these youth will be able to be informed of the updates in real time. While I'm not expecting them to subscribe to the technology now, by the time they reach their college/post-college years it will most certainly be integrated into their browser/OS in an undetectable way.
I also don't think that Boyd is putting enough stock in the content creation side of this trend. She explains that, "Their participation in "blogging" is not in the form of alternative journalism and so they, like most people, seek news from mainstream (even if digital) forms." I would argue that online journaling in this way may be the pre-cursor to 'blogging' in the alternative journalism sense that the word is often used. Whether they understand it or not, they are creating internet content, albeit in a different way and with a different goal than your average 'blogger' does. What will this openness lead to, though? The lesson we learn from sites like LJ and Xanga is that our life should be open to people and that the world is interested. With that said, when it comes time later in life that they are coming up with their own ideas and theories who is to say that they will not publish those as well (as opposed to just their experiences)?
I'm not completely sure where I've gone with this post and feel free to throw in your own two-cents in the comments. Clearly there are divides between the way different groups use the internet, but the overall lessons can not be ignored. Watching Generation Y and the Millenials grow up with the digital world at their fingertips will be a fascinating experience with much opportunity to understand the technology in completely new ways.
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In response to "Content Creation and Organizing", David asked this question which I felt as though deserved a much longer response that I felt like writing in the little comments box: What do you think will be the next round of software applications that will emerge around RSS to enable its widespread adoption? Plugins to browsers that enable aggregation links to be always visible? Aggregation tools/agents that search for favorite sites among like-minded users? Billboard-like listings by topic that identify sites that are, within the recent past, the targets of the highest rates of linking? What topics/events do you think will drive significant waves of RSS adoption?
I know that we're going to see the major browsers add RSS functionality within the next year or so (Safari already has some functionality to my knowledge and Longhorn is going to be RSS enabled). I think that for RSS to really reach the mainstream it's going to have to run more in the background, people are not interested in learning something new, whether or not that something is really not all that confusing when it all comes down to it. When I did interviews for my RSS article "This Way App," [American Demographics, September, 2004] I had experts tell me they expected people to be using RSS in one way or another in the next six months. I also expect that we will see one of the major players (Yahoo!, Google) really begin to push RSS and help people understand (I understand that My Yahoo! already has RSS capability, but it's not really something they've been actively promoting up to this point). What we're seeing now, though Yahoo! beginning to add RSS feeds to news searches with both a link to the feed or a button to add it straight to My Yahoo. It's this kind of embedding that will push RSS out of early adoption and into the mainstream (Google has also added Atom functionality to Gmail, a step in the right direction). At the end of the Scoble entry "My Message in a bottle to Bill Gates," he asks this question: "It's interesting, at Gnomedex (a geek-centric conference) about 90% of the audience uses a news aggregator already. Do you see the trend? Is this a trend that gets Microsoft's attention?" This trend has gone well past critical mass amongst early adopters.
Another possibility is that it takes the business route to reach the mainstream consumer. One of the ideas I discussed in "This Way App," is the business potential the technology has.
For businesses, RSS provides an interesting new approach to inter-office communication. Combined with company blogs, RSS can offer a powerful way for managers to communicate with employees and for employees to communicate with each other. 'We see a lot of companies having employees create internal Weblogs so that they can talk about what they're working on,' says Greg Reinacker, CEO of NewsGator Technologies, creator of RSS aggregation software. 'We also see a lot of companies replacing internal mailing lists with RSS.'
This business adoption would certainly push mainstream adoption because if it were part of someone's job they would be forced to learn the technology. Once people understand how to use RSS and see how powerful a tool it is, I have little doubt they will appreciate what it does for them.
As for the second question about actually aggregator features, I don't believe that there are many features at this point that will drive adoption. Unfortunately we are still at a point where the entire process is too confusing. There's no easy way to add feeds to your aggregator (although that's what the point of the script I run that allows for the pull down menus on the XML buttons). With that said, though, I have no question that we will see aggregators that search for favorite sites amongst like-minded users. In fact, Bloglines already has that feature with a 'related feeds' button at the top of every feed. Other features that we are looking at in the future are things like ranking of entries based on past viewing. Another feature is aggregation of like entries and linked entries to allow for easy reading of a single topic across multiple pages, allowing users to get multiple views on a topic at the same time. Ability to filter out entries on topics that don't interest you is another one that I would appreciate. There are lots of feeds I have for very specific reasons and if I could put in a term that I wanted to appear in every entry for that site it would save me some time and energy.
I don't completely understand the question about the "billboard-like listings by topic." To my understanding, this already exists with Technorati. Beyond just their politics page you can do a search for any term and get back a listing of entries with that term ranked in order of incoming links (although that is incoming links to the entire site, not just the single entry). I think this is the idea you're asking about, although I may be mistaken and please correct me if I am.
Finally, when I think about events/topics that will push RSS to the mainstream I think about the major players getting into the field and Microsoft adding RSS functionality. With something like 95 percent of the web using Internet Explorer, RSS adoption by Microsoft would bring the technology to the world. With that said, though, little things like RSS feeds on Craig's List is something that will help push adoption (I discussed this briefly in an entry titled "Craigslist: An Effective Use of RSS). This is exactly the kind of thing that RSS is perfect for. When you're interested in tracking oft-changing information without having to constantly go back and check the page. On Craig's List you can do a search for anything and just watch new results come up in real time via RSS. There's no question in my mind that we are looking at something that will change the way many people use the internet (I know it's revolutionized my browsing), but we are still a few steps away from the tipping point.
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Dear Readers,
I just wanted to thank everyone who reads this, I really appreciate you taking your time to read what I have to say. I also have one small request to make of you, can you please post comments on anything you find interesting? (The old high school rule applies where no comment or question is too stupid, part of it is to just know you're all alive.) I would much rather this were a dialogue than a monologue. (For anyone who isn't aware, if you click on the comments link at the bottom of any entry you are redirected to the 'Permalink' of the page where you can post comments.) I am really interested in what you all have to say about my thoughts and I can't encourage you enough to post them. I promise to read them and reply in a most thoughtful manner possible. Think about people, it might even be fun. Also on that note, if anyone has any comments, suggestions or complaints you can go ahead and post those in the comments as well or you can just email me at nb@noahbrier.com. On that note, if I don't know you, or if I do for that matter, you can always just email me and say "hi, I've been reading your page and it's interesting/boring/long-winded/thought-provoking/really dumb."
I think that's all. I hope everyone has a great weekend and here's some virtual bubble wrap to play with if you get bored.
Sincerely,
Noah
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I've been thinking a lot over the last few months about the impact of all the internet content creation going on right now. I, personally, have had this webpage for about 3 months now and I have found that it's a great outlet for ideas, whether they're just for fun or more in-depth and thoughtful. While I'm not getting a ton of hits, each month has seen more than the one before and I feel good about the feedback I've received. It's certainly been a fun experience and while I don't post as much as I might want to or think I should, I think/hope that the content that has made it up has been interesting.
This entry came about because I ran across one of Scoble's latest entries titled "My message in a bottle to Bill Gates." (For those that don't know, Robert Scoble works for Microsoft as a technical evangelist and his blog is incredibly widely read. He has effectively given Microsoft a human face within the giant machine and has done tons for their PR. It's a very interesting page and worth reading often if you're interested in almost any facet of computing.) In this new entry, Scoble writes of what he'd like Gates to know to prepare Microsoft for the future:
This is a major trend. Microsoft should get behind it. Bigtime. Humans want to create things. We want to send them to our friends and family. We want to be famous to 15 people. We want to share our lives with our video camcorders and our digital cameras. Get into Flickr, for instance . . . It's the urge to create content. To tell our coworkers our ideas. To tell Bill Gates how to run his company! Isn't this all wild?
This is a new trend. While people have been creating content forever, it's never been this easy and open. Thanks to the internet we can all be content creators, even if we're only writing for those 15 people. What is more, when you're creating content, you're also consuming content differently. I know as a journalist that when I read certain things I am thinking of them in terms of how they fit into my 'beat.' When you're creating any kind of content, even something like link blogging on del.icio.us, you're constantly thinking about what's good/funny/interesting enough to post. There's a certain amount of critical thinking that is absent in the consumption when the creation side is divorced from it. Thinking back to college, it's easy to see that when I was reading something that I would need to talk or write about I took more care in understanding what was being said.
What is more, when you're creating content you have new needs and desires for how you receive and organize the content you're commenting on. Scoble puts it like this:
Now that everyone is creating content, we want to consume it. That's where news aggregators come in. NewsGator. FeedDemon. NetNewsWire. Bloglines. Radio UserLand. RSS Bandit. SharpReader.
And services that help us find content. Feedster. Technorati. Pubsub. Google. My Yahoo. MSN.
And services that help us organize our content. Deli.cio.us. My Yahoo. Outlook. And MSN? Google?
And systems that help us deliver our content. Bittorrent. iPodder.
My RSS aggregator has become a tool that has made my work much easier. Rather than visiting hundreds of sites a day to get the latest information on my interests (both personal and professional), I can now go to one place and have that content delivered to me, saving myself valuable content creation time. In my latest American Demographics article titled "This Way App," I discussed the impact of RSS with Clay Shirky:
RSS changes the way people access information on the Internet. “It puts the onus of matching readers to content where it belongs: on the publisher,� explains Clay Shirky, a highly respected voice in the world of social software and a professor in the Interactive Telecommunications Program at New York University. “The old expectation was that the user would do all the work. Most sites are not updated that frequently. What RSS does is it lets people off the hook for searching. Everyone's pattern before RSS was, ‘I'm not going to pay attention to a little Web site, I'm going to go to the big guys and trust them to look at everything else.’� Now, anyone with an aggregator has the power to pull information from any number of sources as it is published. You don't need the big guys and you don't need to visit 10 different Web sites for information in 10 different areas. You can plug the feeds for those sites into your aggregator and be informed of their updates as they happen.
In the past it was the big news organization who had real-time feeds coming in with breaking news. Today, we all have an incredible amount of access and that advantage of old media has been destroyed (if not completely, it's almost there.) I'm not saying that blogs are on the same level as traditional media, just that the advantage the media used to have is gone. In a new Many-to-Many entry titled "The new IN list," Kevin Marks is working on a 'in/out,' 'tired/wired' list "based on hierarchic vs emergent thinking." He's calling it the Tiered/Weird list. While it's really just a fun idea, the list is really interesting. On Marks' list, Britannica is 'Tiered' while Wikipedia is 'Weird.' More appropriate to my bigger point here, though, is Dan Rather in the 'Tiered' column versus the 'Weird' equivalent of Technorati's Politics Attention Index. We don't really need that one guy anymore telling us the news.
Technorati is not creating content, but they exist because of the need for new ways to organize information in our digital world. We are no longer comfortable having someone speaking at us, like Rather, instead a list like Technorati's gives us immediate access to what people are interested in at the moment by ranking based on incoming links. While there are undoubtedly flaws with this system, it doesn't exist in a world where all these people aren't creating content. We are changing the way information is being processed and reported and it's exciting to feel involved in some small way. We are taking back some of the power the mass media has held so long. Scoble's point to Bill is that Microsoft needs to understand this and help feed the hunger.
Hint: Microsoft should be the fertilizer for this new garden. We should offer new platforms. New ways of building applications. New ways for developers to participate in this new garden.
The impulse to create is strong. The impulse to share is strong. The impulse to consume is strong.
It's not just Microsoft, companies are going to need to understand the effects of this hunger to create that hasn't really existed any time before this. Yes, it's starting online, but this is sure to be something that spreads well beyond the digital world as consumers take what they're learning and feeling online and move those lessons into the real world. How do we help to make our analog world feel more digital so that it's properly programmed for this big change? Companies need to be asking these kinds of questions.
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While most websites have been analyzing the performances of the two candidates in Thursday's debate, Jay Rosen, head of the NYU Journalism Department, has decided to analyze Lehrer's performance as moderator on his website PressThink. He has asked his readers to comment on what they saw and it's created quite a lively discussion with some very insightful, and generally postitive, thoughts about Lehrer's performance. Here are a few that jumped out at me:
In response to: "Your favorite Jim Lehrer moment from tonight?"
Rebecca Blood: "I liked it very much when he stopped the debate twice to clearly restate the candidates' positions on an issue and to ask if that accurately relected their position. I felt as if he was making an honest attempt to help the viewer make sense of a point that might otherwise have been muddied."
In response to: "Does Jim Lehrer of PBS have a style and what are the consequences of that style in a presidential debate?"
Jay Rosen: It's harder than it looks to do what Lehrer does. Just to be cool and alert in the situation is a feat of professional discipline. Lehrer was that: he was disciplined. I think Andrew is right that his great skill is his ear. But you have to be calm and confident enough to relax in a very tense situation and just... listen. Kerry says Bush made a colossal mistake. "Colossal misjudgments," says Lehrer, "what colossal misjudgments, in your opinion, has President Bush made in these areas?"
This invites Kerry to swing away at Bush and in that sense is not a "tough" question. On the other hand, it increases the pressure on Kerry: now he has to convince us that "colossal" is the right word, or he loses some of what tried to gain. Lehrer would never say, "it my job to increase the pressure on the candidates," because that wouldn't fly, politically. Still, it's what a moderator in that situation does.
I personally thought Lehrer performed quite well in what must be an incredibly difficult job. I know personally that as hard as I tried to stay focused on everything each candidate was saying on more than one occaision I found myself tuning one or the other out. 90 minutes is a long time to be at your peak of concentration and Lehrer never seemed to waver from that. I, as the comment from PressThink, think that he was at his best when he actually stopped the debate those two times and attempted to clear up what the candidates' positions were on specific topics. I'm excited to see the debates to come.
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For all you New Yorkers (or people that know New Yorkers) here's the invite for my next shindig:
Hi Everyone,
First off, thanks to everyone who made it out last time, it was a
blast. After the success of the last party I've decided to give it
another go. This time it's a new location, new theme, more music and
hopefully a lot more drinking.
What: Party, Halloween, costumes, word.
When: Friday, October 29, 2004 (That's right, two days before Halloween)
Time: 8pm - ?am (Get there early for drink specials, $4 Yeungling
drafts and $4 vodka drinks until 10, don't miss it!)
Where: OpenAir (http://www.openairbar.com)
Address: 121 Saint Mark's Place (Near Ave. A)
Who: Me, as usual. I'm DJ'ing every record you want to hear from 8-11
(some extra time behind the decks this time means more 'Land Down
Under' for everyone to shake their asses to)
So here's the rundown. It's two days before Halloween and that means costumes. So wear one. I will be. They won't be required for entry, but they're highly recommended (you know you want to). Also, wear a
good costume and maybe I'll buy you a drink (how's that for a deal?). Once
again, tell everyone you know, a lot of people came out last time and
I want to see more this time, let's make it like a real party, people.
Make sure you get there early so that you get to hear some good tunes
and get to drink as much as possible on the cheap. This is in the East
Village so I expect no excuses from anyone, get yourself there and get
your friends there. We're doing this one right. So come down in a
costume, dance, drink and be generally merry (just make sure before
you go you call up all your friends and tell them how much fun it's
going to be). Please forward this along no anyone and everyone.
See you all there.
Oh yeah,
Noah
PS - As usual I have positioned this party within close proximity of
San Loco and I will do my damndest to make it there after the party
and watch my Cuban friend consume more tacos than once thought humanly
possible. You're all invited to join. If he gets a big enough audience
he may even cover them in cheese.
PPS (Web Only Edition) - I'm well aware I've never actually made it San Loco after a party of mine but I'm steadfast and resolute in my commitment to make it there one day. I will not waver on this issue.
PPPS (Another Web Only Edition) - As an experiment I've decided to post a Craig's List ad for the party, go check it out.
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Take a wild guess what newspaper this excerpt comes from:
Kerry seemed far better prepared than Bush, ready to counter the president's points while Bush often repeated himself and at times seemed at a loss for words or defensive. The president even audibly sighed at times.
By the time the debate was over, it seemed clear that Kerry had given himself a new lease on life and guaranteed that the campaign has a long way to run.
Kerry was rated the clear winner in a CNN/Gallup poll immediately after the debate. It found that 53 percent said Kerry won the debate, compared with 37 percent who gave the nod to Bush.
. . . . Ready? The New York Post. I would venture to say if the Post is announcing that a Democratic candidate clearly won a debate that it's a fairly substantial victory.
Although the story follows those paragraphs with this: "But the victory didn't help Kerry in the overall race  an ABC News poll last night before the debate showed Bush with a 4-point edge, and a survey of the same group of voters after the debate found the president's margin hadn't changed." I'm not sure why a survey of the same people before and after the election should mean anything. Unless these were undecided voters there's very little chance that even a great debate would change their opinion on two candidates that stand at such opposite ends of the spectrum. As has been reported online fairly often lately, generally the polls are hard to believe. To begin with many poll less than 1,000 people, the minimum for a survey to be considered scientific. You can read more at The Left Coaster and Zogby International.
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Hi, I'm 