Sunday, August 19, 2007

Hillary's Christianity: more than right-wing pandering?

I just read quite an interesting article by K. Joyce and J. Sharlet in the Sept/Oct issue of Mother Jones about Hillary Clinton's faith. For some reason, even the (Christian) faith of the Democratic Presidential candidates has already garnered lots of attention this time around, Obama's and Clinton's in particular. Perhaps this is a result of their openness on the matter, which is at a level somewhat unusual for "liberals."

After all, the trend among liberals has been towards something like public agnosticism, a fierce adherence to the "separation of church and state" principal (Constitutional mandate, technically) from the campaign podium. This, of course, has also served nicely as another stark contrast with the increasingly fundamentalist bent of the Christian Right. Liberals certainly have worked hard to equate conservative Christianity with uncompromising self-righteousness that stands firm in the face of scientific and social realities.

Which makes this report about Hillary's involvement in a "secret" prayer cell -- "cellmates" include embarrassingly unabashed Creationist Sam Brownback (who is also one of the hangers-on among the Republican Presidential candidates) -- all the more intriguing. It turns out that Clinton has been a moral conservative all her life, even putting the "revised social gospel" of individual salvation before Christian social activism during the turbulent 1960s. She is publically a champion of women's and gay rights, but apparently these stances are two of only a handful on which she and her Republican prayer-group fellows truly differ. To be sure, the faith-based initiatives put forth by her husband and herself during the 90s Clinton tenure opened the door for Bush's more vigorous faith campaigns.

And "morality" and "values" have been the driving force behind certain of her political moves; the MJ article cites her support of the Defense of Marriage act, a Constitutional amendment banning flag-burning, and her Bush-esque "strings attached" support of an anti-human-trafficking law that did not give funding to anti-trafficking groups if they didn't define prostitution "in the proper terms." (The Bush Administration has notoriously denied funding to certain programs that don't fall in line with the Christian Right's idea of a virtuous Utopia, despite their potential to have dramatic positive effects in the real world; these include cutting off support for condom distribution in urban Brazilian red-light districts -- hey, if it ain't abstinence-only education, it ain't gettin' no American money.)

Another morality-fueled move has been Clinton's support of the Workplace Religious Freedom Act, even after concerns were raised about, for example, high-minded pharmacists becoming consientious objectors to filling birth control prescriptions. (I know pharmacists who would do this if they could, which kills me -- these same people never stop complaining about the overabundance of public-aid recipients; just what do these guys think would happen if no one could get birth control??)

Anyway, check out the article, if you can pick up a print copy. Unfortunately the Sept-Oct issue isn't online yet, but I'll keep an eye out and provide a link here once they put it up. I'll also go back and insert appropriate links in short order...

Saturday, August 18, 2007

Quick! Decide!

Okay. It's getting down to the wire -- my thesis adviser informally gave me til mid-August to wind up my research and start narrowing my focus. Yeah, it's past mid-August. But I still don't feel anywhere near ready to begin a proposal.

By now I have read quite a few articles, have been "introduced" to the world of blogs several times over. I've run across idea after idea that could feasibly lead me down a particular path, but at the moment everything is pretty jumbled. One article by Barbara Ganley, a professor in the writing program at Middlebury College, was fairly intriguing; she proposes that blogging could be a "dynamic, transformative medium" in the liberal arts classroom, one that allows "students [to] become the course." I've also grown more interested in the use of blogs for research and project management, thanks to certain other studies. While these "knowledge management" studies tend to focus on applications in the corporate world, my experience this summer as an intern at a local nonprofit agency has revealed the similarities between for-profit and grants-funded companies. So I can appreciate that knowledge management is a key component of nonprofit operations as well, and therefore blog communities and "k-logs" (knowledge blogs) could contribute just as much to nonprofits.

I need to meet with my adviser ASAP to find out just how narrow my proposal should be, though I can't imagine narrowing it very much and still expecting to fill 60 pages. I suppose it would help if I dug up the thesis guidelines that the graduate coordinator handed out at our orientation last fall.

For my future reference, here are some possible thesis issues I jotted down a couple of days ago:
- learning communities
- learning dynamics, potential (see Ganley)
- increasing global awareness
- apprenticeship and expertise
- record of learning/ knowledge management
- linking, parallel analysis
- reading and writing
- development of voice

I doubt things are really quite as urgent as I'm making them out to be right now, but if I slip back into my procrastinatory ways, I could be shooting myself in both feet! Best to hit the ground running instead...

Friday, August 10, 2007

CounterConsumption

It's been only a couple weeks since I started this blog, and I'm already thinking of starting another one. But I wouldn't be thinking this if I hadn't come up with a good idea (in my opinion!).

I'm still quite new to the blogosphere, and so far my posts have only been pinged(?) by one other blog: "Biofuel Worldwide." Someone liked my post on Obama and coal. Either that or the blog automatically picked up on one of the zillion tags I had attached. Probably the latter. (I'm in the process of learning how tracking programs and trackbacks and pings and RSS and such work -- at the moment I'm very early in the process; my plan to maximize my connectivity is to attach every remotely relevant tag I can think of, which probably is inefficient and looks rather desperate besides.)

Anyway, back to my idea -- I think that it would be good to start a blog about consumption. Not tuberculosis, or even overeating, per se -- but overconsuming in the modern materialistic sense. I would like to not only gather and link to stuff having to do with the media's influence on people's spending habits (the "desire market"), but also to info about positively modifying consumer habits on the levels of the individual and society. People don't need all that they think they need! And if they realized this, and acted on this awareness, it would make sense that their life changes would have a lesser negative impact on the world around them. There's all kinds of stuff out there about "living well on less," and being truly happy without heaps of material possessions -- even as a result of not having heaps.

Why start a new blog? Well, for one thing I think I'd rather keep this blog's focus on my thesis ideas and info-gathering, with the occasional (perhaps not-so-occasional, let's be fair) "vent" on topics that gnaw at me (healthcare, justice, etc.). For another thing, like I said, there's all kinds of stuff out there on consuption and "counter-consumption," and I want to give myself plenty of room to explore. Plus having a blog dedicated to a topic this important to me will probably keep me more active -- learning, commenting, linking -- than if I just threw in the odd consumption post on this blog now and again, though I doubt it would be only the "odd" consumption post, which is another reason to give it its own space.

So, off I go to explore, and I'm thinking about trying a different blog software -- maybe Typepad? Or do you need a subscription? Anyway, I figure it's good to broaden my blog experience every chance I get, may help me with my thesis, too.

Tuesday, August 7, 2007

With regard to the Tim Griffin videos in the sidebar...

Who is Timothy Griffin? In short, he recently resigned from his Bush-appointed post as Arkansas US attorney, which he got right after it was vacated during recent "selective" firings (you know, all that stuff that's currently got Atty Gen Gonzales' back to the wall). Griffin had been a wing commander during the Bush 2000 Campaign's assault on foe Al Gore, conducting "opposition research" in an effort to trip up the Democratic Party (see top video at right). But crusty left-leaning journalist Greg Palast caused a blogospheric stir in March by alleging that Griffin had "caged" votes, i.e., had disenfranchised certain absentee voters (namely, black and Hispanic soldiers serving overseas) by illegally manipulating forwarding-address info. Not only is "caging" illegal, it's felonious -- making this one hefty allegation.

So, which truth is truthiest? There's a lot of Griffin stuff out there now, and it seems to be ever-accumulating. One of the more recent developments has been Fred Thompson's public approval of Griffin, giving rise to speculation that there may be a place for Griffin in Thompson's presidential "campaign" (I'm betting those quote marks will be out of date by the end of the month) -- and don't forget that Thompson couldn't be happier about Bush's pardoning of Scooter Libby, whom ol' Fred had stoutly defended from the earliest Plamegate allegations.

If you believe the bottom video at right, Griffin doesn't cage animals, let alone votes. But even without the caging, the guy is just another lightly-credentialed Bush loyalist who was slid into a high-level position under dubious circumstances. At least he's gone now, right? Oh, wait ...





The Pharma Philes: Part One

Note: "Philes" here is a play on "files" and is not meant to indicate any affinity I have for Big Pharma -- believe me, there is no love lost there (as those of you who've read my "Sicko" post know all too well)!

Grr... I just got back from a trip to the local [Corporate Pharmacy] after lingering for ten minutes in their "parked call" netherworld -- I'd tried phoning and was on hold for a ridiculously long time, with only the pseudo-apologetic automated voice periodically piping up to reassure me that my call would be "the next answered"; the staff were busy with other customers, etc.

Fortunately, I live just a few blocks away, so I tumbled into my a/c-free car and huffed through the 88-degree dusk down to [Corporate Pharmacy] (I'd have walked, but I had about 8 minutes before they closed). Upon arriving at the pick-up window, I asked the lone pharmacist if my doctor had phoned in refills on my blood pressure med; I'd called it in over the weekend, knowing this would give the doc's office all of Monday to fax over their permission. Well, I didn't know -- it wasn't there yet last night, hence my phone check-in tonight. Last night's dose was my last, so I was hoping for at least an "emergency" coupla-pills to tide me over til tomorrow.

Now, the problem wasn't that the pharmacist wouldn't give me two pills. He gave me three, and with minimal grumbling. The problem was that I'd been on hold for ten minutes, and the place was quiet as a tomb. If that place was overrun with customers a moment earlier (while I was on hold), damned if they hadn't vanished without a trace at the first whiff of my arrival.

Had he parked me, and then reparked me, and then reparked me, out of laziness?

This guy, an old coot, a relic who started out in the days when pharmacy graduates could only dream of making in ten years what today's fresh-faced grads can count on as soon as they toss their caps and gowns -- I'm talking about starting six-figure salaries inflated by massive demand -- this guy has given me trouble in the past. The only reason I was able to see through his lazy facts-fuzzing is because I'm a pharmacy tech myself; I knew full well that my particular insurance gave vacation overrides for maintenance meds -- he was trying to tell me it didn't, stone-faced and cranky to boot. I wasn't about to go off to England without my birth control, so I revealed my pharm-tech identity and blew his cover.

It's never pleasant or easy, speaking truth to "power." But I walked out of there with my BC.

My point is ... well, that this haggling-for-meds is just a tiny evil in light of our crumbling healthcare system. "Crumbling," of course, only when you consider patients' rights. (The whole deal just keeps getting better and better for Big Pharma and Big Insurance, it goes without saying, though it seems we really can't say it enough.) My "sub"-point is that cranky, bitter pharmacists are salt in the wound. Well, maybe not salt, but at the very least a hovering gnat.

Sigh. I don't blame the guy entirely. I wouldn't want his job for all the tea in China. Or all the whizz-bangs on a brand new Lexus SUV (with maybe two exceptions, all the pharmacists I've worked with have had whizz-bang SUVs). This is simply because I'd never have the time or energy to sit down and enjoy all the expensive doodads I could buy with my wads of cash. As far as I can tell, and especially during this nightmarish era of Medicare Part D, being a pharmacist sucks.

So, Gary-or-whatever-your-name-is at my local [Corporate Pharmacy], I'm not holding a grudge. Just don't try pulling any more fast ones, ok?



Obama: Liquefying coal? ...Oh, momma...

Barack Obama's energy/environment plans are by and large respectable -- he would establish a National Low Carbon Fuel Standard, invest in renewable fuels such as corn and cellulose ethanol, reduce annual greenhouse gas emissions by about 180 million metric tons by 2020, and has led a bipartisan effort to raise CAFE standards.

All this would be well and good if it weren't for one dirty little component of his energy plan: his support for implementation of coal-to-liquid technology in Southern Illinois. Understandably, Obama is concerned about high rates of unemployment in this mining region. But his stance on coal-liquefication has alternately baffled the local industry and environmentalists. His votes on coal-related legislation seem to back industry interests one day, "green" causes the next. It would seem the Presidential hopeful is caught between a rock and a hard place.

So what's the bottom line for Mr Obama? As noted above, virtually all his other energy proposals have the health of the planet at heart, though energy independence for its own sake is right alongside (not that this is a bad thing). His enthusiasm for corn ethanol may be a point of concern if you worry about the effect the biofuel industry may soon have on the global food market (more corn for fuel means less to eat, and at higher prices), but he claims to also support investment in cellulose-based fuel technologies, something that is already huge in South America (namely Brazil).

And, as coal-to-liquid proponents point out, coal-to-liquid would produce hardly more greenhouse gases than oil -- BUT that is only if the emissions produced during the process were trapped and contained underground, which at this stage is much easier said than done. And besides -- don't people concerned about global warming want less greenhouse gas, not "hardly more"?

This is surely a quandary for Mr Obama -- I for one will be interested to see where he goes from here.

What is Knowledge Management??

My thesis adviser has given me til mid-August (it's an informal deadline, but still) to narrow my thesis ideas... So far, I'm certain that I'd like my research to focus on blogs, but I'm not sure just how. For a brief report I wrote recently as part of my summer professional writing internship, I tried to organize the overwhelming results of my blog-studies research -- yes! there is such a thing as blog studies! -- into more digestible categories: weblog communities, corporate blogging, journalism, and blogs in the writing classroom. I didn't expect to find much info on corporate blogging that I might be able to tie into a thesis research project; I don't know, the idea of sharing production-boosting strategies for the purpose of maximizing profits turns me off, I guess. But it was my investigation of the corporate-blogging realm that brought me to a field hitherto unbeknownst to me: "knowledge management."

One knowledge-management guru, Jack Vinson, referenced and linked to work by Lilia Efimova, a doctoral candidate who is writing her dissertation on blogging and knowledge management. I read parts of one of her papers and also have been checking out her blog, what she calls her "learning diary." She says it is "on personal productivity in knowledge-intensive environments, weblog research, knowledge management, PhD, serendipity and lack of work-life balance..." Long story short, this blog is dense! There is a buttload of info and I'm almost afraid to delve too deeply for fear I'll never again see the light of day... Not really -- her writing is very engaging and I'd even say she's someone I'd like to hang out with. :)

Well, I'll leave this for the moment, but there is more to come -- I really like the "learning diary" concept; if I had one, it would help keep me organized as I research and write, I think...