The forgotten people

From The New York Times:

Florida election officials used a flawed method to come up with a listing of people believed to be convicted felons, a list that they are recommending be used to purge voter registration rolls, state officials acknowledged yesterday. As a result, voters identifying themselves as Hispanic are almost completely absent from that list.

Of nearly 48,000 Florida residents on the felon list, only 61 are Hispanic. By contrast, more than 22,000 are African-American.

About 8 percent of Florida voters describe themselves as Hispanic, and about 11 percent as black.

*****

But the database of felons has only five variables for race: white, black, Asian, Indian and unknown. And a voter registered as Hispanic whose name and birth date matched a felon’s would be left off the purge list unless his race was listed as unknown.

*****

The exclusion of Hispanics from the purge list explains some of the wide discrepancy in party affiliation of voters on the felon list, which bears the names of 28,025 Democrats and just 9,521 Republicans, with most of the rest unaffiliated.

Update:

Florida elections officials said Saturday they will not use a disputed list that was designed to keep felons from voting, acknowledging a flaw that could have allowed convicted Hispanic felons to cast ballots in November.

Here she is, Mrs. Washington D.C.

Writing for Slate’s Human Guinea Pig, Emily Yoffe enters the Mrs. America contest. The two-part article is a real delight, and laugh-out-loud funny at times.

I said that maybe when the judges saw me in my suit, they would decide not to crown a Mrs. D.C. this year, the way the Nobel Peace Prize usually doesn’t get awarded during world wars.

Hollywood babes

NewMexiKen knows that my readers are not interested in this sort of thing, but in the interest of providing “a little bit about a lot of things” here’s a Los Angeles Times article on “Several high-profile pregnancies have made motherhood a hot trend in Hollywood. And what the tabloids wouldn’t do for a baby picture.”

Lee P. Cook

GpaCook.jpgMy mother’s uncle, and her guardian, was born in Conlogue, Illinois, on this date in 1888. I knew him as Grandpa, usually written as G’pa. A salesman through most of his career, after tough times during the Depression he established a successful insurance agency in Detroit in the 1940s and 1950s. Despite his success, his office was in the dining room, then in the second bedroom of a small apartment — a great place for a little boy to play “office”.

G’pa was a conservative, staid almost austere man. His favorite activity — other than work — was telling “stories” (jokes we would call them), none of which were ever off color and a few I can still remember hearing. He was good at the telling and no doubt that was part of his success in sales. Ironically though, it didn’t seem to serve him well in the Army, a time of his life he particularly disliked — but then he was a 29-year-old draftee.

Lee Cook sold the insurance agency when he was in his early 70s, but couldn’t retire. He continued trying to sell this or that, without much success. It was sad to see him so frustrated. (I learned then that I should have a blog when I retired to keep me busy.)

Grandpa’s been gone more than 30 years now, but I still miss him.

Wyoming…

joined the Union as the 44th state on this date in 1890.

The horse on the Wyoming license plate is a depiction of Steamboat, an early twentieth century bronc that could not be ridden.

Kerry and Edwards in ‘Burque

From AP via The Albuquerque Journal:

But at one point, a group of young men in the crowd took off their flip-flops, waved them over their heads and chanted “Viva Bush!” The young men contend that Kerry’s support of the war has flip-flopped.

Kerry urged the crowd to tolerate the young men and said he and Edwards would teach them a “lesson in values” during the campaign.

“We have 115 days to change the world, not just America,” Kerry said.

Good thing the young men didn’t accuse Kerry of jockeying for position.

Close call

English and American troops under British Major General Edward Braddock were routed by French and Indian forces near Fort Duquesne (modern Pittsburgh) on this date in 1755. The leading colonial officer, George Washington, had two horses shot out from under him, his coat torn by bullets and his hat shot off, but he survived.

Tom Hanks…

is 48 today. Hanks has been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role five times, winning for Philadelphia (1993) and Forrest Gump (1994).

Orenthal James Simpson…

is 57 today.

(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)

Yeah, I’ve been searchin’
A-a searchin’
Oh, yeah, searchin’ every which a-way
Yeah, yeah
Oh, yeah, searchin’
I’m searchin’
Searchin’ every which a-way
Yeah, yeah
But I’m like the Northwest Mounties
You know I’ll bring ’em in someday

(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)

Well, now, if I have to swim a river
You know I will
And a if I have to climb a mountain
You know I will
And a if he’s a hiding up
On a blueberry hill
Am I gonna find ’em, child
You know I will
‘Cause I’ve been searchin’
Oh, yeah, searchin’
My goodness, searchin’ every which a-way
Yeah, yeah
But I’m like the Northwest Mounties
You know I’ll bring ’em in some day
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)

Well, Sherlock Holmes
Sam Spade got nothin’, child, on me
Sergeant Friday, Charlie Chan
And Boston Blackie
No matter where he’s a hiding
He’s gonna hear me a comin’
Gonna walk right down that street
Like Bulldog Drummond
‘Cause I’ve been searchin’
Oooh, Lord, searchin’, mm child
Searchin’ every which a-way
Yeah, yeah
But I’m like the Northwest Mounties
You know I’ll bring ’em in some day
(Gonna find ’em)
(Gonna find ’em)

Those lovable education secretaries

NewMexiKen is all for cutting Riordan some slack, but the whole incident reminds me of when right-wing California Superintendent of Schools Max Rafferty lost to Alan Cranston for the U.S. Senate. Rafferty eventually left California for the education job in Alabama. Word was his move from California to Alabama raised the average IQ of both states 10 points.

Hmmm

It’s interesting that civil rights groups such as the NAACP, as well as African-American state Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally, spoke out against California Education Secretary Riordan when they assumed (why?) the little girl was not white, but withdrew their demands for Riordan’s removal once they learned Isis was white.

Democratic state Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally, who had scheduled a protest by civil rights organizations, canceled the demonstration after an apparent mix-up over the girl’s racial background.

Isis

Isis.jpg
Photo of Isis and her mother taken last month. The video of California Secretary of Education Richard Riordan telling the little girl her name meant “stupid dirty girl” is at CNN, but requires a subscription.

Summing it up nicely

Dan Froomkin at The Washington Post sharpens the focus:

A theme increasingly running through President Bush’s public messages these days (even more than his constant insistence that he is optimistic) is that his values are America’s values.

Bush is hoping to persuade American voters that his own morality, faith and patriotism stand in contrast to Senator John F. Kerry’s and more closely mirror their own. It’s a powerful assertion.

But it’s an assertion that is vehemently challenged by Democrats — and it may have some risks.

Imagine what would happen if, for instance, it were to turn out that Bush was using terror warnings for political purposes; or if he shirked his National Guard duty in Vietnam; or if one of his top aides were charged with outing a CIA operative as an act of political retaliation; or if he is perceived as being part and parcel with the likes of indicted former Enron Corp. Chairman Kenneth L. Lay.

Imagine.

This or that

Don’t forget to check out TCCI, mentioned here Tuesday. It’s a list of 100 pairs. You chose one of the two. It doesn’t reveal any particular personality traits or anything (I don’t think), but it’s still kind of fun.

From the first three, NewMexiKen picks Kelly, The Sun Also Rises and Duke Ellington.

Furor grows over Riordan’s remark to girl

From The Sacramento Bee:

“I let my daughter go to story hour and figured she’d be safe in a room full of librarians and parents and other children and the secretary of education,” Lila said.

“If I was in the room, I would have defended her. But she did OK without me. I’m really proud of her for standing up for herself. She’s OK. She’s moved on. It’s not like I’m going to sue to pay her therapy bills.”

The controversy began July 1 when Riordan, a wealthy venture capitalist whose foundation has spent millions of dollars promoting literacy and computer programs for minority and other children, attended a summer reading program at the Santa Barbara Central Library.

With a few dozen children seated on the floor next to Riordan, Isis D’Luciano, a blond-haired, blue-eyed little girl, asked him a question.

“Did you know that my name actually means an Egyptian goddess?” she said with noticeable pride in her voice.

Riordan looked somewhat confused for a moment or two before answering: “It means stupid, dirty girl.”

The kids groaned and giggled, before Isis again said her name was that of a goddess.

“Hey, that’s nifty,” said Riordan, who issued a statement a short time later saying he “teased” her and “immediately apologized … for misunderstanding.”

Lila said her daughter didn’t correct Riordan because “she told me she didn’t want to hurt his feelings. I got the impression she just didn’t think he was very bright.”

“I really didn’t know much about the man, so I wasn’t aware of how socially inept he is,” she said. “He’s a bureaucrat and I guess he’s a grandfather. But it doesn’t seem like he’s had a lot of exposure to kids. It was really a stupid thing to say.”

Yes, stupid. Let it go.

Link via Eschaton.

Santa Fe

NewMexiKen spent late afternoon and early evening Thursday on the Plaza in Santa Fe, the nation’s oldest capital city (1608). It had been a year or possibly two since I’d been there (though it is one of America’s premier tourist attractions and I live just an hour away). I am always ready to dislike Santa Fe — and it’s always like a new love when I get there. Yes, it has the so-so affected galleries and their so-so affected clientele; and yes it has too many places to buy T-shirts (I got two) and laser art. Still, the setting itself is authentic — like me, people have been drinking tequila on the plaza for nearly 400 years. And weather! Yesterday evening was stunning. Low 80s, clear, with a few white clouds, slight breeze. Blue sky that North Carolinians can’t even imagine.

Two years ago NewMexiKen saw Bonnie Raitt in Santa Fe at the Paolo Soleri Amphitheater (four days after seeing the Eagles in Albuquerque). Here’s the review I wrote then:

Saturday was entirely different. The Paolo Soleri is an outdoor amphitheater behind the Santa Fe Indian School. It seats maybe 2,500 and most of the seating is unreserved. We had reserved ninth row center seats for just $45 each, close enough to see the welt on the performer’s forehead after she whacked herself with a guitar.

Bonnie Raitt, 52, has also been recording and performing since 1971. She came into her own in 1989 when she won the Grammies for Album of the Year (Nick of Time); Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female; Best Rock Vocal Performance, Female, and Best Traditional Blues Recording (for a duet with John Hooker on I’m in the Mood). She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame two years ago.

Unlike the Eagles (excepting Joe Walsh) Bonnie Raitt was an entertainer, not just a musician. She had a lot of banter with the crowd, giving every impression she was having a great time. “You can leave if you have too, I’ll understand, but I’m staying a little longer.” It actually appeared as if her third encore was genuine; that is, a salute to a particularly appreciative audience. She had a guitar player and bassist behind her that have been with her for more than 20 years, plus a great new keyboard player and a fine drummer. She included all the essential hits, except sadly not Runaway, but a fair number of new songs as well from her new album, Silver Lining.

Bonnie Raitt is a great guitarist. I think I wasn’t as aware of that as I should have been before last night. She’s got the blues down when she needs to, and she can rock. It was wonderful to be close enough to see the playing; close enough to count the picks on her fingers (and not on a big screen – there are no screens at Paolo Soleri). Her voice was great, though she complained a little about some smoke from a concession early in the performance – it was like being at someone’s backyard charcoal barbeque for a while. She commented she preferred the “smoke” at Red Rocks (near Denver), which she claimed had been thick enough to make her high by the third song. She may have been particularly chatty Saturday night, as she needed to catch her breath between numbers at Santa Fe’s 7000 feet. Whatever, it was welcome and fun.

The Santa Fe Birkenstock crowd was interesting on its own. Seldom have I seen so many Earth people this side of Fourth Avenue, Tucson. I was expecting the glitterati of Santa Fe I suppose, and they are probably waiting for the Santa Fe Opera to begin its season.

Nevertheless, we did have one celebrity in the audience, two rows down, and five seats over. Jane Fonda, an apparent friend of Ms. Raitt. She looked good, but not unlike any other 64-year-old, exceptionally rich woman might. No Birkenstocks on Jane.

The Man Who Knew Too Much

From Dana Stevens at Slate:

But the real TV story this week has to be the undisputed 25-game reign of Jeopardy! supercontestant Ken Jennings. As of yesterday, the 30-year-old software engineer from Salt Lake City had won a total of $788,960, beating the previous record-holder, Tom Walsh, by a margin of over $600,000. Granted, this unprecedented victory streak was also made possible by this season’s change in Jeopardy! rules—the term limits have been lifted, as it were, so that the run of a winning contestants may continue indefinitely, instead of being stopped after five consecutive games. But Ken is no mere beneficiary of this loophole in Jeopardy! bylaws; self-deprecating and sweet, the blond, elfin Jennings has host Alex Trebek wrapped around his fast-on-the-buzzer finger. (One evening, the bemused host opened with, “Welcome to the Alex and Ken show,” and David Letterman has an ongoing gag in which he speculates that a lovestruck Trebek is helping Jennings cheat.) KenJen has turned the Culver City set into his own private fiefdom.

Watching Ken Jennings play is like witnessing any great athlete in top form: He’s the Michael Jordan of trivia, the Seabiscuit of geekdom. Note his systematic habit of moving down the categories vertically, one by one, rather than skipping around the board. His nearly preternatural ability to land on the hidden Daily Doubles. His obscure betting tactics, which, as near as I can divine, are inspired by an obsessive-compulsive need to end each day’s winnings with a round figure. His habit of adding some thematic je ne sais quoi to his answers (which, this being Jeopardy!, are of course phrased as questions.) If the topic is a foreign country, he’ll answer in that country’s accent, and in answer to one clue about hip-hop music, the ultra-white Ken memorably responded, “What is rap, yo?”

Jeopardy ratings are up 20 percent.

Bloggers Suffer Burnout

From Wired News:

[J]ust one manifestation of a problem increasingly faced by popular daily bloggers: burnout. While they enjoy what they’re doing, many find that keeping up with the pressures to post regularly and to be sharp, witty and incisive is often too much.

NewMexiKen is rarely sharp, witty or incisive, but I know what they mean.

Several bloggers contacted for this story noted that their readers seem to look at their regular, consistent posting patterns as somewhat akin to a sign of physical health. And any break in that pattern is sometimes seen as a cause for alarm.

“I know that if I go more than about five or six hours without posting, or telling people that I’m not going to be blogging for the rest of the day,” said Reynolds, readers e-mail him and say, “You haven’t posted anything in five or six hours. Are you OK?”

Oliver Sacks…

is 71 today. The Writer’s Almanac has a nice essay (which you can hear Garrison Keillor recite):

It’s the birthday of science writer Oliver Sacks, born in London (1933). He’s known for writing about the experiences of people suffering from neurological disorders in books of essays such as The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (1985). Both his parents were doctors, and he grew up wanting to follow in their footsteps. After graduating from Oxford, he went to California as a doctor of neurology, and he studied people with strange disorders of the mind, such as the inability to form new memories, or the inability to recognize faces.

In the 1960s, he began to treat a group of people suffering from a rare sleeping sickness, and he tried treating them with a drug called L-dopa. He said, “Suddenly … in the lugubrious and vaulted silence … there burst forth the wonder, the laughter, the resurrection of awakenings. Patients motionless and frozen, in some cases for almost five decades, were suddenly able, once again, to walk and talk, to feel and think, with perfect freedom.” Sacks had to help them come to terms with the fact that decades had passed since they’d last been conscious. Then he watched as most of them relapsed back into their catatonic states.

He found the experience profoundly moving, and when he wrote an article about it for a scientific journal, he included his emotional responses as well as his scientific ideas. His colleagues criticized him for getting too personally involved with his subject, so he decided that they were the wrong audience for his work. He began writing a book about his observations that told the story of his experience, and included his personal and philosophical speculations. The result was Awakenings (1973), which was a great success and was eventually made into a movie with Robin Williams.

Oliver Sacks has since gone on to write many books and essays about his patients, and he says that he is trying to revive the practice of storytelling in medicine, because he believes that few things illuminate the human condition better than disease. His most recent book is Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood (2001).

Awakenings is a truly fine film, all the more for being based on actual patients. Robert De Niro is excellent in it, as is Robin Williams.