None of Me

Poor Annette, she checked her name at How Many of Me and she doesn’t exist.

Here’s some background:

Q: How accurate is this program?

A: More accurate than a Magic 8-ball. Less accurate than distributing and collecting 300 million surveys.

Q: No, really. How accurate?

A: Well, it’s hard to say. In order to determine how accurate this program is, we would need a program that was completely accurate for comparison purposes. If we had a program that was completely accurate, we’d use that program instead of this one. At that point, discovering how accurate this program is would no longer be worth the effort. Therefore, we can fairly confidently say that it is impossible to determine how accurate this program is. (Confused? We’re just warming up.)

In our completely non-expert opinion, we say that the program gives a decent ballpark estimate, but it shouldn’t be used for anything more than that.

There’s more at Accuracy of HowManyofMe.com.

Some members of my family don’t exist either.

Mighta Shoulda Woulda

If you bought $10,000 worth of Apple stock when I suggested it here (January 2005), it would be worth over $25,000 today.

If you bought $10,000 worth of Google stock when it became available (August 2004), it would be worth over $55,000 today.

Just sayin’.

Best line for today from two years ago, so far

“I’ve been deeply disappointed. They’re fundamentally decent human beings, but you couldn’t tell it by their campaigns.”

Albuquerque Tribune editor Kate Nelson commenting on the negative campaigning for Congress in NewMexiKen’s district, as quoted by Joe Monahan.

That was 2004. It’s worse this time.

Runner-up, also first posted two years ago:

“These are not arguments. They are rhetorical drive-by shootings.”

— Harvard Law Professor Laurence H. Tribe writing in a review of The People Themselves.

October 24th is the birthday

… of Yelberton Abraham Tittle. Football hall-of-famer Y.A. Tittle is 80.

Career record: 2,427 completions, 33,070 yards, 242 TDs, 13 games over 300 yards passing…Paced 1961, 1962, 1963 Giants to division titles…Threw 33 TD passes in 1962, 36 in 1963…NFL’s Most Valuable Player, 1961, 1963.

… of Bill Wyman. The Rolling Stones’ bassist (1962-1992) is 70.

… of F. Murray Abraham. The Oscar-winning actor (best actor for Amadeus) is 67 today.

… of Kevin Kline. The Oscar-winning actor (best supporting actor for A Fish Called Wanda) is 59.

Got the Munchies Instead

“Pro-marijuana activists in Nevada gathered 6,000 signatures on petitions for a ballot initiative but then forgot to file the petitions.”

— Chicago Sun-Times via “The Edge” in The Oregonian

First posted here a year ago.

Never Been

This came up in conversation recently. Which NFL franchises have never been to the Super Bowl?

There are six. Here they are (with the number of seasons they could have made it — there have been 40 Super Bowls).

Cardinals (40)
Lions (40)
Saints (39)
Browns (37)
Jaguars (11)
Texans (4)

The Browns, Cardinals and Lions are original NFL teams.

The new Browns franchise, which began play in 1999, is considered a continuation of the old Cleveland Browns, despite the fact that the team left Cleveland after 1995 and became the Ravens. (The Ravens won Super Bowl 35.) The Browns last won the NFL championship in 1964.

The Lions last won the NFL championship in 1957; the Cardinals in 1947 (as the Chicago Cardinals).

World Series Winners

This is the 102nd World Series. 22 franchises have won at least one World Series (which means 8 teams have not won any):

  • Yankees 26 (in 39 appearances)
  • Cardinals 9 [Update: Now 10]
  • Athletics 9 (5 in Philadelphia, 4 in Oakland, none in Kansas City)
  • Dodgers 6 (1 in Brooklyn, 5 in Los Angeles)
  • Red Sox 6
  • 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 (once, last year)

Never been (and year began play):

  • Expos/Nationals (1969)
  • Devil Rays (1998)
  • Mariners (1977)
  • Rangers (1961)
  • Rockies (1993)

She Did It

Veronica, official daughter-in-law of NewMexiKen, finished the San Francisco Nike Women’s Marathon today. It’s her fifth marathon!

Here she is, with a smile in the twentieth mile — and getting support from Sofie.

20th MileGo Mommy!

Visit Veronica’s web page — you can still contribute to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society in her name to support research and patient services.

No One Pays Any Attention to Me

… but with all the issues, with all the polarization in this country, if you can’t run on the issues, incumbent or challenger, you are unfit for public office in the first place.

And the same for your supporters.

It’s as simple as this:

I support the President on the war in Iraq.
I don’t support the President on the war in Iraq.

I support the President on warrantless wire-tapping.
I am opposed to warrantless wire-tapping.

I believe the President needs the power to hold “enemy combatants” without legal recourse.
I believe every person is entitled to the constitutional rights of habeas corpus and due process.

I think we are over-taxed.
I think huge government deficits are a tax on our children and grandchildren.

I believe Social Security should be replaced with personal investment accounts.
I believe Social Security should be maintained and financially strengthened.

Like the rest of us, politicians have issues, take short-cuts, and sometimes lie, cheat and steal.

Who cares? Keep your eye on the ball. More than 70 fine young Americans have died in Iraq so far this month!

NewMexiKen will be back Tuesday.

October 20 is the birthday

… of William Christopher. Father Francis Mulcahy is 74.

… of Tom Petty; the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee is 56.

In a sense, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers are America’s band. Durable, resourceful, hard-working, likeable and unpretentious, they rank among the most capable and classic rock bands of the last quarter century. They’ve mastered the idiom’s fundamentals and digested its history while stretching themselves creatively and contributing to rock’s legacy. Moreover they are, like such compatriots as Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, a people’s band, writing of everyday struggles and frustrations while offering redemption through tough-minded, big-hearted, tuneful songs. (Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)

Mickey Mantle

… of Calvin Cordozar Broadus. Snoop Dogg is 35.

Actor Jerry Orbach was born on this date in 1935.

Hall-of-famer Mickey Mantle was born on this date in 1931 and died in 1995. Click on the plaque to learn more about The Mick (whom NewMexiKen saw play twice).

Bela Lugosi was born on this date in 1882. The Romanian-born actor (part of Austria-Hungary then) was best known for playing Count Dracula in the 1931 film. Lugosi died in 1956.

4 cents an acre

On this date in 1803, the United States Senate ratified the Louisiana Purchase Treaty by a vote of twenty-four to seven.

The First Consul of the French Republic desiring to give to the United States a strong proof of his friendship doth hereby cede to the United States in the name of the French Republic for ever and in full Sovereignty the said territory with all its rights and appurtenances as fully and in the Same manner as they have been acquired by the French Republic in virtue of the above mentioned Treaty concluded with his Catholic Majesty [Spain].

France had lost control of Louisiana to Spain at the end of the French and Indian War (1763). In the Treaty of San Ildefonso (1800), Spain ceded the territory back to France (along with six warships) in exchange for the creation of a kingdom in north-central Italy for the Queen of Spain’s brother. Napoleon promised never to sell or alienate the property. His promise was good for about 10 months.

The purchase included 828,000 square miles — all or parts of the modern states of Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Wyoming and Montana.

With interest the total cost was $23.5 million, or about 4 cents an acre.

Wal-Mart Expands $4 Generic Drug Program

Far be it from NewMexiKen to promote Wal-Mart, the evil empire, but this seems like a good beginning to doing something about the high cost of drugs in America. $4 is considerably less than my co-pay.

Wal-Mart’s program was extended Thursday to the following states: Alaska, Arkansas, Arizona, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Texas and Vermont.

— Los Angeles Times

The $4 progam began in Florida.

Another Reason I Remain Pessimistic about Change in Washington

[Bush] won 255 districts in 2004, or almost 59 percent, while winning around 51 percent of the vote (slightly higher if the calculation excludes Ralph Nader’s 1 percent). In other words, House districts are now drawn so that an evenly divided country can produce surprisingly lopsided GOP victories. …

The mismatch between popular votes and electoral outcomes is even more striking in the Senate. Combining the last three Senate elections, Democrats have actually won two-and-a-half million more votes than Republicans. Yet they now hold only 44 seats in that 100-person chamber because Republicans dominate the less populous states that are so heavily over-represented in the Senate. As the journalist Hendrik Hertzberg notes, if one treats each senator as representing half that state’s population, then the Senate’s 55 Republicans currently represent 131 million people, while the 44 Democrats represent 161 million.

— As excerpted at Daily Howler from Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson’s Off Center.

Feeling Good

Jerry Lee Lewis is an acquired taste, to be sure, one luckily most of us acquired at an early age.

But listening to Before the Night Is Over with Jerry Lee singing at age 71 and B.B. King playing at age 80 is a tribute to the human spirit.

Update:

All Music’s Stephen Thomas Erlewine:

This is the only guest-studded superstar album where all the guests bend to the will of the main act, who dominates the proceedings in every conceivable way. Jerry Lee doesn’t just run the guests ragged; he turns their songs inside out, too — and nowhere is that clearer than on the opening “Rock and Roll,” the Led Zeppelin classic that is now stripped of its signature riff and sounds as if it were a lost gem dug out of the Sun vaults. Far from struggling with this, Jimmy Page embraces it, following the Killer as he runs off on his own course — he turns into support, and the rest of other 20 guests follow suit (with the possible exception of Kid Rock, who sounds like the party guest who won’t go home on an otherwise strong version of “Honky Tonk Woman”).

[…]

[N]o, this is a record that celebrates life, both in its joys and sorrows, and it’s hard not to see it as nothing short of inspiring.

Last Man Standing

225 years ago today

… the British army surrendered to the Americans and French at Yorktown, Virginia, in essence ending the War for American Independence.

The siege of Yorktown was conducted according to the book, with redoubts, trenches, horn-works, saps, mines, and countermines. Cornwallis had about 8000 men in the little town on the York river, which French ships patrolled so that he could not break away. The armies of Rochambeau and Saint~Simon were almost as numerous as his, and in addition Washington had 5645 regulars and 3200 Virginia militia. The commander in chief, profiting by D’Estaing’s error at Savannah, wasted no men in premature assaults. There were gallant sorties and counterattacks, one led by Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Hamilton. Casualties were light on both sides, fewer than in the naval battle; but Cornwallis, a good professional soldier, knew when he was beaten. On 17 October he sent out a white flag, and on the 19th surrendered his entire force. Pleading illness, he sent his second in command, Brigadier Charles O’Hara, to make the formal surrender to General Lincoln, whom Washington appointed to receive him. One by one, the British regiments, alter laying down their arms, marched back to camp between two lines, one of American soldiers, the other of French, while the military bands played a series of melancholy tunes, including one which all recognized as “The World Turned Upside Down.”

Lafayette announced the surrender to Monsieur de Maurepas of the French government, in terms of the classic French drama: “The play is over; the fifth act has come to an end.” Lieutenant Colonel Tench Tilghman carried Washington’s dispatch to Congress at Philadelphia, announcing the great event. Arriving at 3:00 a.m. on 22 October, he tipped off an old German nighr watchman, who awoke the slumbering Philadelphians by stumping through the streets with his lantern, bellowing, “Basht dree o’gloek und Gornvallis ist gedaken!”

Windows flew open, candles were lighted, citizens poured into the streets and embraced each other; and after day broke, Congress assembled and attended a service of thanksgiving.

— Samuel Eliot Morison, The Oxford History of the American People, 1965.

October 19 is the birthday

America 2000 Peter Max

… of John LeCarre. The author is 75.

… of Peter Max. The artist is 69.

… of John Lithgow. He’s 61. He’s become somewhat a buffoon on TV in the sitcoms and commercials. Makes it hard to remember that he’s twice been nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar — Terms of Endearment and The World According to Garp.

… of Jeannie C. Riley, singer of the hit “Harper Valley P.T.A.” She, too, is 61.

… of Jennifer Holliday. The Tony Award winner is 46.

… of one-time first daughter Amy Carter. Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter’s little girl is 39.

Robert Reed was born on this date in 1932. A fine actor but one who will always be remembered best as the dad on The Brady Bunch. Reed’s best TV role was as Kenneth Preston, son in the excellent early 1960s father-son lawyer drama The Defenders. His father was played by E. G. Marshall. Reed died in 1992.

Winston Hubert McIntosh was born on this date in 1944. A founding member of The Wailers, Peter Tosh also was an international solo star and songwriter. He was shot and killed along with five others by a friend during an argument on September 11, 1987.

Fort Scott National Historic Site (Kansas)

… was authorized on this date in 1978. It is one of four national historic sites in Kansas; there’s also a national preserve in Kansas.

Fort Scott

Promises made and broken! A town attacked at dawn! Thousands made homeless by war! Soldiers fighting settlers! Each of these stories is a link in the chain of events that encircled Fort Scott from 1842-73. All of the site’s structures, its parade ground, and its tallgrass prairie bear witness to this era when the country was forged from a young republic into a united transcontinental nation.

— Fort Scott National Historic Site

Class, Class!, CLLAAASSSS!

This was funny two years ago when it first appeared here.

Now it could actually happen.

So George is doing yet another photo op at an elementary school, and this one’s been going pretty well, so he offers to take questions. A little boy raises his hand.

“Okay, you,” says George, smiling. “What’s your name?

“Billy.”

“Billy. And what’s your question?”

“I have three questions,” Billy says. “First, why did you go to war without UN approval? Second, why are you president when Gore got more votes? Third, where’s Osama bin Laden?”

George is taken aback. “Uh, those are really hard questions,” he says.

Just then the bell rings. “Whoops, time for recess!” George says. “Guess I’ll have to answer your questions when recess is over.”

After recess, when the kids have settled back down again, George says “Okay, who’s got a question?”

A little kid raises his hand, and George calls on him.

“What’s your name?” George asks.

“Steve.”

“Okay, Steve. What’s your question?”

“I have five questions,” Steve says. “First, why did you go to war without UN approval? Second, why are you president when Gore got more votes? Third, where’s Osama bin Laden? Fourth, why did the bell for recess ring twenty minutes early? And fifth, what happened to Billy?”