issues

news/blogs

organizations

amusement

etc

music

issues of pressing concern:  (about which you might want to CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES)

a note about trying to make a difference:  don't be intimidated.  the citizens of the united states especially have extraordinary power to enact change.  but it DEPENDS on people SPEAKING UP.  don't be a part of the apathetic majority.  the vocal minority has changed history countless times, but the instant it becomes a vocal majority, nothing will stop us from building a better world.  the best thing you can do to get started is read the news from as unbiased a source as possible (i.e. not fox--try google news and the bbc), write letters to the editor in your local papers, and write to your senators and representative on the federal level and to your state legislators.

advice on writing to your federal legislators.

advice on talking to your state legislators.

advice on writing a letter to the editor in your paper, and an easy way to do it.

consider running for local office, like a position on your local school board.

don't dismiss the idea of reprioritizing your spending by donating a certain percentage of your income to worthwhile organizations or charities.

 

• here's a list of the stellar GOP congressional candidates this election season.

 

• IMPEACH.  this has gone far enough.  more here.

• Bush administration's cover-up tool:  censorship.  "NEW ORLEANS, Sept 6 (Reuters) - The U.S. government agency leading the rescue efforts after Hurricane Katrina said on Tuesday it does not want the news media to take photographs of the dead as they are recovered from the flooded New Orleans area."

• white house tries to block torture ban.  this washington post article provides further evidence that this administration's claim to "moral values" is an insulting lie:  the white house is pressuring law-makers not to pass legislation prohibiting military personnel from "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment" of prisoners.

• the search for iraq's weapons of mass destruction is over. compare this information, if you will, against what Bush told us was the reason for going to war.  if i were you, i'd demand an explanation.

• iraq body count
• iraq dollar count

• guantanamo bay detainees
  • indefinite, anonymous detention without charges, without due process, without counsel…  and our attorney general thinks the geneva conventions are too "quaint" to apply.

 

• the right is fighting hard to push the federal marriage amendment.  Evan Wolfson of Freedom to Marry came to stanford to participate in a debate with the Reverand Lou Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition on the proposed amendment.  It was sadly not too informative a debate.  Wolfson spoke with eloquence and logic, while Sheldon relied on rhetoric and prejudice.  i felt like if i talked one-on-one with Sheldon, i should be able to expose the absense of logic in his initiative and get him to change his mind, but that's a fundamental problem dealing with people who base their decisions on faith rather than reason:  they cannot be made to see reason.   ...more...

• ELECTION FRAUD
• our voting system is not secure.  especially the Diebold voting machines that are very prevalent, including in florida.

   

• "the Bush doctrine" of preemptive war (written by former presidential hopeful Howard Dean)

• i haven't fact-checked this "history of the cia", and it is clearly biased, but worth taking a look at.  the more balanced wikipedia entry is only slightly less chilling--it's important to look at the results of our previous nation-building exercises.

 

• death penalty

• "Since 1973, [at least] 121 people in 25 states have been released from death row with evidence of their innocence." --Death Penalty Information Center
• here's a great piece from the nytimes, on one judge's clever constitutional reasoning:  killing prisoners denies them the ability to seek evidence supporting their innocence, a violation of due process.
• take a look at where else in the world the death penalty is legal.  we're not in good company.

 

• 45 million U.S. citizens don't have medical insurance.

• the institute of medicine estimates that approximately 18,000 U.S. citizens die every year because they are not medically insured. our government, which has sworn to protect these citizens (and to which they pay taxes), has failed them inexcusably.

 

• vegetarianism
• the environmental arguments are quite powerful:  producing meat amounts to a huge waste of water, land and energy, and production of greenhouse gases.  in what i would call a conservative estimate, an article in the american journal of clinical nutrition calculates that the damaging environmental impact of a meat-eater is 50 to 100% greater than a vegetarian's.  a vegan's impact would probably be even less than a vegetarian's.  you might be surprised to discover how much water is used by factory farms in the US, and how much methane they produce, a huge contributor to global warming.
• a more propagandist perspective is the GoVeg site run by PETA.  i would in fact encourage anyone who eats factory-farmed meat to check out meatyourmeat.com, since the video doesn't lie.  sanitation concerns aside (and the health concerns stemming from ingesting toxins which flood the bodies of stressed animals), it seems pretty clear to me:  if you have any doubt at all about whether it's ethical to eat meat, stop.  in this day and age in almost every developed part of the world, it's very easy to eat a meat-free diet, so why not err on the side of ethics, health, and ecological sustainability?
• you might wonder, what difference does it make what i do as an individual?  well, think about the amount of food you eat in a lifetime.  every time you make a vegetarian choice instead of a meat choice, you are reducing the demand for meat products, and reduction in demand will naturally lead to less production.  but just as importantly, you are increasing the demand for vegetarian alternatives, which will lead to greater availability, visibility, and ultimately more marketing for those alternatives.  others who see your example, and who see the increased supply of vegetarian options, will be more likely to reduce their own meat consumption.

 

• alternative transportation
• miscellaneous stats comparing travel by car and by bicycle.  i know in many parts of the country, and for many occasions, driving is the only practical means of transportation.  but keep in mind that using your car is probably the most destructive thing you do.  in addition to particulate pollution that directly contributes to cardiovascular disease, driving contributes to global warming.  every gallon of gasoline you burn in your car puts about 20 pounds of carbon dioxide into the air.  how many gallons do you burn in a year?
  consider biking, walking, and public transportation.  try working them into your routine even if you can't give up your car--every gallon of gas you don't burn means cleaner air.  carpooling helps a lot also.  fun example:  a boeing 747 gets about 0.15 miles to the gallon of fuel, but if you multiply that by 400 passengers or so, it's even more fuel efficient than a hybrid car.
• if driving is an absolute necessity, consider www.carbonfund.org, a fund you can donate to that can offset your environmental impact.  it's worth checking out.

 

• stop walmart.  sign up.  don't shop there, and tell your friends not to either.  here's why.

 

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• individual power:  living a low impact life
  • drive as little as possible.
  • eat as little meat as possible, reduce dairy consumption (contrary to what the dairy industry would have you believe, there is no connection between dairy consumption and prevention of osteoperosis!), and if possible buy organic.
  • reduce waste:
    • bring cloth, plastic or paper bags with you to the store.  double-bagged, typical paper or plastic bags can last for months of repeated trips.
    • for meals not at home, bring your own reusable plate and utensils instead of using disposable plastic.  plan ahead, or else just keep a small plate and fork in your bag or at your desk.
    • only take a napkin if you really need to use it.  try a reusable sponge instead of a paper towel.
    • use both sides of paper.  use double-sided printing, or use the back of one-sided documents as scratch paper.
  • buy local produce and products.
  • turn off lights and computer equipment when not in use.  use a mechanical mower instead of a gasoline or electric one (or better yet, go with a lawn alternative). set your thermostat a couple degrees warmer than you usually do in summer and a couple degrees cooler than you usually do in winter.
  • use cleaning products and detergents that are free of chlorine and phosphates.
  • consider spending a bit more to get your electricity from clean, renewable sources:  Buy Clean Electricity.
  • some good tips:  eartheasy.com.

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news/blogs:

google news:  i think it's a pretty good source for relatively unbiased news.

FAIR.org:  fairness & accuracy in reporting, a media watchdog group, plus its weekly radio show/podcast, counterspin.

on the media (podcast):  another weekly edition of news and media criticism.

democracy now (podcast):  a great daily rundown of the news, from a perspective wholly missing from the mainstream press.

crooksandliars.com:  wonderful blog about—you'll never guess—crooks and liars.

commondreams.org:  source for progressive opinion.

overspun.com:  fun blog about the media.

the daily show:  Jon Stewart is, without a doubt, my hero.

grahamazon.com:  often interesting blog/meta-blog about healthcare, med school, and random stuff.

cynical-c blog:  completely random as far as i can tell, but great.

 

organizations i support:

progressive secretary:   point and click activism—easy letters to congress

amnesty international:  human rights watch

MoveOn.org:  attempting to preserve our democracy in the united states

doctors without borders:  providing international emergency medical relief

heifer project international:  fighting hunger and poverty through sustainable means

american civil liberties union:  defending the US constitution and our supposedly inalienable rights and freedoms

human rights campaign:  (with some reservations…) gay rights lobbying advocacy

GLAD:  gay rights legal advocacy

wikipedia:  online user-edited encyclopedia.  not definitive, but definitely informative.

amusement:

Ted Rall:  political columnist and cartoonist

Bruce Eric Kaplan:  brilliant cartoonist for the new yorker

tom tomorrow:   leftist political cartoon

out of the mouths of presidents:  W on parade

theonion:  enough said.

word freak:  most enjoyable non-fiction i've read in a long time. Stefan Fatsis covers the extraordinary underworld of competitive scrabble.

wvs.topleftpixel.com:  cool photoblog by Sam Javanrouh.

etc:

my friend Carl Sciortino won in his 2004 race for massachusetts state rep in the somerville/medford district (34th middlesex).  he is awesome.

eat, drink, and be healthy:  fantastic book by Walter Willett, chair of the nutrition dept at the harvard school of public health.

minnesota river school of fine art:  the school my parents run

brown:  where i came from

stanford neuro:  where i am now

groupbrain project:  what i worked on in between

i use the Dvorak keyboard layout, in which the fingers travel less distance overall because the most common letters are in the home row of the keyboard, followed by the upper row.  here's a comic singing its praises, and an online analysis of typing patterns comparing dvorak and qwerty.  here are the free lessons i used to learn dvorak (takes some getting used to, but it's not necessary to relabel your keyboard or anything).  i used to have pain in my forearms from using the computer, and i don't anymore.

speaking of free lessons, you can teach yourself ASL at home.  and here's a cool way to practice that fingerspelling.

bicycle repair how-tos:  from wikibooks.  so much cheaper to do it yourself.

all in the mind:  usually wonderful show on australia's abc radio national exploring issues of cognitive neuroscience and philosophy of mind.  the free podcast can be found here.

some more links can be found on my music page.

GOP candidates in 2006 midterm elections

--AZ-Sen: Jon Kyl
--AZ-01: Rick Renzi
--AZ-05: J.D. Hayworth
--CA-04: John Doolittle
--CA-11: Richard Pombo
--CA-50: Brian Bilbray
--CO-04: Marilyn Musgrave
--CO-05: Doug Lamborn
--CO-07: Rick O'Donnell
--CT-04: Christopher Shays
--FL-13: Vernon Buchanan
--FL-16: Joe Negron
--FL-22: Clay Shaw
--ID-01: Bill Sali
--IL-06: Peter Roskam
--IL-10: Mark Kirk
--IL-14: Dennis Hastert
--IN-02: Chris Chocola
--IN-08: John Hostettler
--IA-01: Mike Whalen
--KS-02: Jim Ryun
--KY-03: Anne Northup
--KY-04: Geoff Davis
--MD-Sen: Michael Steele
--MN-01: Gil Gutknecht
--MN-06: Michele Bachmann
--MO-Sen: Jim Talent
--MT-Sen: Conrad Burns
--NV-03: Jon Porter
--NH-02: Charlie Bass
--NJ-07: Mike Ferguson
--NM-01: Heather Wilson
--NY-03: Peter King
--NY-20: John Sweeney
--NY-26: Tom Reynolds
--NY-29: Randy Kuhl
--NC-08: Robin Hayes
--NC-11: Charles Taylor
--OH-01: Steve Chabot
--OH-02: Jean Schmidt
--OH-15: Deborah Pryce
--OH-18: Joy Padgett
--PA-04: Melissa Hart
--PA-07: Curt Weldon
--PA-08: Mike Fitzpatrick
--PA-10: Don Sherwood
--RI-Sen: Lincoln Chafee
--TN-Sen: Bob Corker
--VA-Sen: George Allen
--VA-10: Frank Wolf
--WA-Sen: Mike McGavick
--WA-08: Dave Reichert