Saturday Night Live - Couric / Palin Open - Video - NBC.com

In case you haven't seen it. It's really good but I didn't laugh that much. Perhaps because it seemed so real.

must see chart

More than a dime's worth of difference this time around.

done!

6/7 of the way done with exams!

Last year my major comprehensive exam (comparative politics) was two full days. The minor one (methodology) is a day and a half. Today I took day one and I think it went reasonably well. Not awesome but good enough. Tomorrow I'll get the questions at 8 am and have to turn them in by 12:30 pm. If I pass I'll have demonstrated Ph.D. level knowledge of two fields. Scary.

Driving home from Allison's the country station played "In Color" by Jamey Johnson. It's about a grandfather talking about the Great Depression, WWII, getting married etc. and saying you should have seen it in color. Just as when I started grad school and the night before my MA defense, I got to thinking about my grandparents and parents and how hard they worked so I can be here. This time with Carson about to turn 8 months I'm also thinking about the next generation. I like to think I'll be taking the exam for all of them.

a few (unoriginal) thoughts on Palin

Since I grew up in Alaska (Seward from infancy to age 6, Chugiak until age 12, visiting my dad in Eagle River twice a year up to age 18, irregular visits since then) people have been asking me about the nomination. I don't know much, since I mostly follow AK politics via my dad's news of the latest corruption scandals. Prior to the nomination I didn't even know her name, though her primary victory in the governor's race made me happy because Young, Stevens and Murkowski had been in power as long as I could remember.

Firstly, I find it odd to hear Wasilla reffered to as "a suburb of Anchorage." Here is a map of where the two are in relation to each other:


View Larger Map

Following the map from Anchorage to Wasilla you pass through Eagle River and Chugiak. If you follow what it calls highway 1 to Palmer and Sutton you see there area where my dad has a "cabin" (12'x24'structure). Anyhow, back to my point.

It's a 42 mile drive according to Google Maps. The argument in favor of calling it a suburb is that many people do commute from Wasilla to work in Anchorage. The community has changed greatly from how I knew it as a kid, with massive growth. What feels wrong to me about calling it a suburb is that there is so much undeveloped space between Anchorage and it. I picture suburbs as being congruous with the city with which they're associated. As you can see from the map, that is far from the case. Many of the definitions in dictionaries agree with me.

Yesterday on NPR one of the news casters or commentators referred to it as "that small town." I was annoyed that he couldn't remember the name (or have it written in front of him).

In that news segment he also said that many Republicans feel the negative press will help them because people will think it's unfair. We shall see.

My main response to much of what I'm seeing about her (which tends to come from people to the left) is this: they didn't pick her to try to make you happy. It doesn't matter to them what the New York Times thinks about the choice. The people who decide elections don't read the New York Times. What matters is two things (1) how this helps them turn out the base and (2) how it plays to swing voters. It clearly helps the first and we'll see about the second. Their concerns and sources of information are quite different than the people going off about McCain's poor choice of running mate.

Democracy Now!’s Amy Goodman, Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar Released After Illegal Arrest at RNC | CommonDreams.org

Scary stuff. Kouddous and Salazar are being charged with rioting, Goodman with obstruction. They were covering the demonstrations.

ST. PAUL--Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman and producers Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar have all been released from police custody in St. Paul following their illegal arrest by Minneapolis Police on Monday afternoon.

All three were violently manhandled by law enforcement officers. Abdel Kouddous was slammed against a wall and the ground, leaving his arms scraped and bloodied. He sustained other injuries to his chest and back. Salazar's violent arrest by baton-wielding officers, during which she was slammed to the ground while yelling, 'I'm Press! Press!,' resulted in her nose bleeding, as well as causing facial pain. Goodman's arm was violently yanked by police as she was arrested.