Two important voting stories

One that should piss you off.

And one that beautifully conveys the historical moment.

And an ad. Who knew?

23

Barack Obama, Michelle Obama and Joe Biden keep sending me emails. (It’s Jill Biden I’m waiting for.)

And they keep asking for another $100.

Since they’re my new best friends forever, I have to do it, don’t I?

So 23 is the limit, right? I sure hope someone is keeping count.

https://donate.barackobama.com/finalfight

Watershed II

Every day NewMexiKen gets snail mail from Republican U.S. Senate candidate Steve Pearce (the fun of registering Independent).

And every day I laugh and think, “Pearce, I sure hope you’re spending your own money on this trash.”

And every day I rip it half and toss it in the waste can.

As Kos says, if you know a pro-Bush Republican in danger of going under this election cycle, throw ‘em an anvil.

What historians call a watershed

Helen (Babe) Walker, seventy-three years old, who lives in the Appalachian mining town of Glouster, Ohio …, writes:

“I think that the residents here in Glouster are getting accustomed to the fact that we will be having a black president. They think it is not a bad idea.”

And Roger Catt, the retired Wisconsin farmer who told me that “McCain is more of the same, and Obama is the end of life as we know it,” will be voting for the end of life as we know it.

George Packer

Social Security: we have always been at war with Eastasia

“But even in the middle of all that, it never occurred to me that a future presidential candidate would invent out of thin air a completely false story about how the privatization push failed.”

Paul Krugman amazed at John McCain’s bizarre fabrications.

Does McCain just not know what he’s talking about, or is he purposefully lying?

And again I say, there’s no difference between this McCain and old McCain. Being a maverick always meant he just did his own thing without regard to consistency, party or fair play. He is and always has been an “it’s all about me” ass.

That’s a lot

Obama has 160,000 volunteers.

In Florida.

Missing Person

Anybody seen Ephraim F. Moya?

Says it all

Julie Nixon Eisenhower supports Obama.

Well, if nothing else can make up your mind, how about this?

Now he figures it out line of the day

News item: “Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman, told a House panel [today] that the crisis had uncovered a flaw in how the free market system works that had shocked him.”

A flaw? In the free market system? Really?

The Crash

Though forever entwined, the stock market crash of 1929 and the Depression were distinct. Neither caused the other.

The stock market that crashed in the fall of 1929 was overheated by speculation. The bubble simply burst, as speculative bubbles always do. (What’s amazing is that this lesson of history never seems to keep the next bubble from forming.)

The market stood at 452 on September 3, 1929. On November 13 it bottomed at 224, the end of the Crash. That’s a loss of just about 50% in ten weeks. (I’m relying on the numbers in Galbraith’s The Great Crash and he relied upon The New York Times Industrial index.)

The market was steady after that, rising some in early 1930, then dropping notably in June. From June on the market just kept dropping until the index reached 58 in July 1932. These losses were related to the Depression, a symptom of it, not a cause.

Fantasy football partner: Barack Obama

“I needed to know: can Obama pick a fantasy team? So I asked him.”

Rick Reilly tells the story.

Thanks to Jill for the link.

World Serious

The 104th World Series began last night. The Phillies have the fewest world championships (1) of any of the 16 franchises that have been around since the first World Series in 1903. The Rays have none.

In all, 22 franchises have won at least one World Series (which means 8 teams have not won any):

• Yankees 26 (in 39 appearances)
• Cardinals 10
• Athletics 9 (5 in Philadelphia, 4 in Oakland, none in Kansas City)
• Red Sox 7
• Dodgers 6 (1 in Brooklyn, 5 in Los Angeles)
• Giants 5 (all in New York)
• Pirates 5
• Reds 5
• Tigers 4
• Braves 3 (one each in Boston, Milwaukee and Atlanta)
• Orioles 3 (none as the St. Louis Browns)
• Twins 3 (two in Minnesota, one as the Washington Senators)
• White Sox 3
• Blue Jays, Cubs, Indians, Marlins, Mets 2 each
• Angels, Diamondbacks, Phillies, Royals 1 each

Appeared in a Series, but haven’t won:

• Padres (twice)
• Brewers (once, while in American League)
• Astros
• Rockies
• Rays

Never been (and year began play):

• Mariners (1977)
• Expos/Nationals (1969)
• Senators/Rangers (1961)

Which will move up the list this year, the Phillies (their second) or the Rays (their first)?

The World Series began in 1903, but there was no Series in 1904 or 1994.

October 23rd

The iPod is 7-years-old today. It was introduced by Steve Jobs on October 23, 2001.

The name iPod was proposed by Vinnie Chieco, a freelance copywriter, who (with others) was called by Apple to figure out how to introduce the new player to the public. After Chieco saw a prototype, he thought of the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey and the phrase “Open the pod bay door, Hal!”, which refers to the white EVA Pods of the Discovery One spaceship. Joseph N. Grasso of New Jersey had originally listed an “ipod” trademark with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in July 2000 for Internet kiosks. The first ipod kiosks had been demonstrated to the public in New Jersey in March 1998, and commercial use began in January 2000. The trademark was registered by the USPTO in November 2003, and Grasso assigned it to Apple Computer, Inc. in 2005.

Wikipedia

Pele is 68 today.

Michael Crichton is 66.

Oscar-winning director Ang Lee is 54.

Dwight Yoakam is 52. Yoakam has been in a number of films — he was the nasty boyfriend in Sling Blade — but it’s country music that earned his fame.

With his stripped-down approach to traditional honky tonk and Bakersfield country, Dwight Yoakam helped return country music to its roots in the late ’80s. Like his idols Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, and Hank Williams, Yoakam never played by Nashville’s rules; consequently, he never dominated the charts like his contemporary Randy Travis. Then again, Travis never played around with the sound and style of country music like Yoakam. On each of his records, he twists around the form enough to make it seem like he doesn’t respect all of country’s traditions. Appropriately, his core audience was composed mainly of roots rock and rock & roll fans, not the mainstream country audience. Nevertheless, he was frequently able to chart in the country Top Ten, and he remained one of the most respected and adventurous recording country artists well into the ’90s.

allmusic

Weird Al Yankovic is 49.

Johnny Carson was born 83 years ago today. A little luck and many fewer cigarettes and he might be alive today. While he was alive, Carson would have been NewMexiKen’s choice for the person I’d most like to have dinner with.

John William Heisman was born on this date in 1869. He’s the guy the trophy is named after. The following milestones in Heisman’s career are excerpted from his 1936 obituary in The New York Times and put here in chronological order.

In 1888 he was a member of the Brown football team, and in 1889 of the Pennsylvania varsity football eleven.

He began his coaching career in 1892 at Oberlin College. In 1893 he coached all sports at the University of Akron. From 1895 to 1900 he coached football and baseball at Alabama Polytechnic Institute, and from 1900 to 1904 was coach at Clemson College.

From 1904 to 1920 he coached football, baseball and basketball at the Georgia Institute of Technology, where he developed the famous “Golden Tornado” teams.

In 1908 he was director of athletics at the Atlanta Athletic Club. From 1910 to 1914 he was president of the Atlanta Baseball Association. In 1920 he coached football at the University of Pennsylvania and in 1923 filled the same position at Washington and Jefferson College. From 1924 to 1927 he was head football coach and director of athletics at Rice Institute, Houston, Texas.

In 1923 and 1924 he was president of the American Football Coaches Association.

For the last six years [before 1936] he had been physical director of the Downtown Athletic Club.

The Recession Is Not Caused by the Credit Crunch

The economy is not in a recession because of the credit crunch. The economy is going into a recession because of the crash of the housing bubble. Homeowners are losing on the order of $8 trillion in housing bubble wealth, $110,000 per homeowner. For most families, this is most of their wealth.

It was this housing bubble wealth that drive consumption and pushed the savings rate to near zero over the last four years. Now this wealth is disappearing and people are cutting back their consumption.

Dean Baker