verisimilitude

Leon Panetta

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 15:38:11 -0800

Today the New York Times is reporting that President-elect Obama has selected Leon Panetta as his nominee for Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. This reminded me that I had taken a course in college from Mr. Panetta on public policy. It was a fascinating class, the highlight of which was Mr. Panetta telling stories from when he managed the federal budget and served as White House Chief of Staff. I recall one class where he had to step out of the classroom briefly to be interviewed by CNN, which had parked a massive satellite truck on the street outside.

I dug through some old boxes and found my final paper from that class. The title was American Intelligence Community: (not an oxymoron) Combating terror. In the paper I describe in detail the organization of the US intelligence community as well as the role the then position of DCI entailed. If you are using that paper for reference Mr. Panetta, I do wish to make a correction which is that you now report to the Director of National Intelligence and not the President. Sorry about the demotion.

I go on in the paper to list changes in CIA policy since 9/11 and to raise concerns about those changes, such as an apparent repeal of the Presidential directive prohibiting assassination. Of course the interesting question is, what did Leon Panetta think about my paper?

Much like this post, it seems I tend to ramble a bit and could use better organization. B+.

Here he seems to be agreeing with my stance that having a President with a “hands off” approach to targeted assassination is disturbing. Though, his hand writing is cryptic and difficult to read, so he could just as easily be disagreeing with my position.

His only other mark on my paper is to underline my concluding sentence about order versus freedom. Certainly the kind of question he will be weighing if he gets the job.

After spending a few months listening to the man discuss public policy, the political process, and managing governments, I was left with the impression he was honorable and decent, with a studied and diligent approach to problem solving. Exactly the kind of person I would want for the job he has been nominated for.

tags: politics

Despots and child birth

Sun, 04 Jan 2009 15:00:50 -0800

Last week’s episode 57 of The Bugle was particularly funny. The highlight must be Andy describing, in often times graphic detail, his reluctant and unexpected midwifing of his new son on the floor of his bathroom. Many memorable lines, not the least of which is:

So nature and gravity combined, and I caught my child falling out of my wife.

Enjoy this three and a half minute excerpt, though the entire first part of the episode is more of the same hilarity.

Listen to the file.

Finally, a shorter excerpt from the same episode that I wish I’d heard before Christmas, in which Andy lists some globally conscious gift ideas. Note that shockingly takeoutatyrant.com is still available for registration.

Listen to the file.

tags: humor

Step away from the Robot

Fri, 02 Jan 2009 23:30:00 -0800

To commemorate Denote shipping, I made this short video featuring my two favorite Christmas presents: Little Itch’s logo on a sweatshirt and “My First Skynet Buddy”. The voice capture makes it all the more creepy.

Step away from the Robot.

tags: robot, skynet, littleitch

Socratic mentor

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 11:41:39 -0800

A great man reveals his mentor.

Listen to the file.

tags: thacher

Opiate of the masses, once again

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 11:48:25 -0700

Thanks to The Bugle for reminding us once again, that Karl Marx was the greatest opiate referee of all.

From episode 16 of The Bugle

Listen to the file.

tags: humor

Beats and Pieces Volume 2

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:36:31 -0700

Beats and Pieces Volume 2

In this second volume, I’ve gone with a pure electronic music list. The theme might be: repetitive fun. All of these tracks I have listened to many times, and all live in my coding playlists. I own the Digitalism, Moby, and Fluke albums, all of which are hit or miss in terms of individual track enjoyment.

For the next installment, I will focus on albums which are great from start to finish.

Update: Added last.fm links where they have a longer sample.

tags: music

Palette upgrades

Mon, 01 Sep 2008 15:15:31 -0700

The clog and the root site have new and improved look and feels. Please to be enjoying. Thanks be to Sara for most of the chromatic heavy lifting.

tags: site

Irresponsible goldfish

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 20:39:14 -0700

John is truly a master of international relations and foreign policy. I’m referring to John Oliver of course. From episode 41 of The Bugle

Listen to the file.

tags: humor

My morning

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 16:21:42 -0700

When I saw what they had to do to clear the bathroom sink, I felt less bad about my inability. I had taken the drain apart and, using a bent coat hanger, had fished out what was clearly years of backed up hair and filth the likes of which I hope to never see again. But this was merely the tip of the revolting iceberg, as the two handymen had to cut the drain pipe in half with a hacksaw and extract even more disgustingness. The hair was clearly not ours. It was very, very long. Like haunt my nightmares long. So that threw off my whole morning.

Rapunzel must have grown old in my apartment.

tags: disgusting

The Bugle

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 11:39:36 -0700

The last week I have been catching up on The Bugle, a rather enjoyable weekly “audio newspaper for a visual world”. You might recognize the voice of John Oliver from The Daily Show but who really cares about that. It’s hilarious. I’ve excerpted a short bit from Episode 34 that I was compelled to replay a few times my first listen. Also gives me a chance to try out the embedded Flash player I just wired up. Have no fear, those of you on the iPhone without Flash can still hear the clip.

Also, another geeky technical point, I stumbled upon a useful way of making clips from iTunes files. Right click and Get Info on the track, select Options, and set the Start Time and Stop Time. Then right click on the track and select Convert Selection to MP3. Done.

Listen to the file.

Update: Had to add one more excerpt as some people didn’t quite think the first one was funny enough. What’s not funny about a nuclear submarine and some bleeped swearing? Did they bleep shipmates, or did the XO say shitmates? Funny either way really.

Listen to the file.

tags: humor