Darkstar

Bush Economics

ROLLING BACK THE 20TH CENTURY
William Greider, The Nation
Hard-right conservatives like George W. Bush have been advancing their ideological agenda step by step, laying the foundations for their grand transformation of American life. This 'McKinley vision' requires vast sectors of society to pay dearly, and from their own pockets. What does it look like? To begin with, slash hundreds of billions in domestic programs, especially spending for the poor, even as the Bush tax cuts kick in for the well-to-do; and hand housing aid, food stamps and other social welfare programs over to state governments.

PP Take Action

Last year President Bush, ignoring the advice of his own State Department investigation team, decided to withhold all U.S. funding to the United Nations Populations Fund (UNFPA). UNFPA is the single largest global source of multilateral funding for maternal health and family planning programs, providing desperately needed health care services to poor women and their families in 150 countries. On Tuesday, July 15th, the U.S. House of Representatives is expected to take up the issue of re-funding UNFPA in the State Department Authorization bill (H.R. 1150). Urge your representative to support re-funding UNFPA

Paxton's B-day

Celebrated Paxton's 33 b-day last night at Todai. What an experience. Japanese all you can eat seafood buffet for $30. It was Las Vegas in Waikiki. The place is huge and brightly lit with multiple buffet lines. We arrived just after 6 pm to beat the rush. There were folks almost falling out of moving cars to rush up the stairs to get in line. I saw a middle aged japanese woman basically drag her elderly mom up the stairs to get in line (and it wasn't even full yet). Gluttony at its best... Food coma gripped all of us after dinner, but we did manage to get in one good game of settlers (with a bottle of Scotch) before retiring.

HTML vs. Text emails

Beth Kanter sent me a couple of article talking about the pros/cons of text vs. html emails.
HTML Always Outperforms Text? Don't Stake Your Career on It by Heidi Anderson http://www.clickz.com/article.php/977571
Describes case study of Wall Street Journal testing text/HTML. Key Point: If you're considering an email marketing campaign of your own, don't believe what everyone will tell you: that HTML always outperforms text. Consider your options. And your audience.
CRM and Switching To HTML Format By Janet Roberts http://ezine-tips.com/articles/format/20021227.shtml There are some advantages to switching to HTML format, but it is customer relationship issue that needs to be thought through.
The Dirty Secret of HTML vs. Text E-newsletters... Two sides to the publishing equation By Debbie Weil [May 14, 2003 issue] http://www.wordbiz.com/archive/htmlvstext.shtml

Weapons of Mass Destruction Message

From TP... check this out .... Go to google.com then type: weapons of mass destruction Don't press Search!! Next click the "I'm feeling lucky" button - read the error message carefully

Bush is a Liar

Paul Krugman wrote an interesting column in the New York Times about the lack of reaction to Bush's deceptive tactics bringing the country into war. Politics over integrity again. Continue reading for an Iraq War Intelligence report written by the great folks at moveon.org

Summer Reading

Just got this list of summer reading from the One/NW newsletter. Looks like a great list
---> Edward Tufte, Visual Explanations
This is *the* essential book on how to create charts and images that tell powerful stories. Tufte is the undisputed high priest of visual information design, and his books are works of art in themselves. Buy it at Powells.com: http://tinyurl.com/g9og
---> Bill Moyer et al., Doing Democracy
Doing Democracy provides a practical theory about how social change movements work and how they evolve over time. We've found it very helpful as we ponder our role in helping the environmental movement rise to the next level. Buy it at Powells.com: http://tinyurl.com/g9os
---> Paul Ray, The Cultural Creatives
In this influential book, Paul Ray and Sherry Ruth Anderson argue that a powerful new cultural group is emerging, characterized by a set of values that emphasizes ecology, less-consumptive lifestyles, and a holistic approach to social and political issues. A must-read for folks thinking about how to frame environmental issues so that they resonate with broader themes in American life. Buy it at Powells.com: <http://tinyurl.com/g9oy>
---> Deborah Lynn Guber, The Grassroots of the Green Revolution
This book uses the past several decades worth of environmental polling data to provide an in-depth analysis of Americans' attitudes towards the environment and environmental issues. It offers some important insights into the paradox of "broad but shallow" support for environmental issues, why green consumer choices may be easier to sell than green politics, and how environmental attitudes are shifting over time. Buy it at Powells.com: <http://tinyurl.com/g9p2>
---> Seth Godin, Permission Marketing
Permission marketing is nothing more than the idea -- implemented with spectacular success by Amazon.com among others -- that the best way to market something is to build a relationship by offering people a service that they value. This seemingly simple insight has enormous implications for how environmental organizations structure not only their fundraising and marketing efforts, but also their programs. This book is written in a somewhat breathless style that belies its challenging message. Buy it at Powells.com: <http://tinyurl.com/g9pg>

Bush Sucks

That's a fact, but what is this world coming to when people will give money to an anonymous woman for breast implants. Some days I just put my hands up and scream!

Riders Blogs

John Stahl's site has a list of Riders blogs online. I am testing out the trackback ping function of MT with this post also.

Recent Entries by Categories

I recently received this great MT code snippet from Jon Stahl's blog to list recent entries by category with links to the articles.