Polls don't mean anything at this point and blah, blah, blah.

Everyone knows that polls showing results you don't like don't mean anything, while polls showing results you like are almost certainly accurate and a near-perfect gauge of evolving public sentiment.

This poll, then, is very accurate indeed (requires quick registration).

President Bush leads John Kerry by 6 percentage points in the battle for Ohio, a state that could decide who wins the White House, according to a statewide Plain Dealer poll.

Ohio voters surveyed say they favor Bush over Kerry, 47 percent to 41 percent. Consumer advocate Ralph Nader draws 3 percent, though he has yet to qualify for the Ohio ballot. Nine percent say they are undecided.

Though Bush is given low marks for his handling of the economy and the war in Iraq, those who say they favor him cite his moral character and his stewardship over the war on terrorism and homeland security as reasons.

...

The poll, conducted May 20-25 by Mason-Dixon Polling and Research, is based on interviews with 1,500 registered voters who plan to vote in November. The poll, which has a margin of error of 2.6 percentage points, is the largest presidential poll taken in Ohio this year.

47% is not 50.1%, though, which is what Bush will probably need to actually win Ohio. We are waiting for a more accurate poll that shows Bush above 50. That fact keeps this from being cowbell material.

Oh, what the hell. It's Saturday night, and the boss ("Mr. Tranh") isn't around snooping.

Little tiny cowbell for the media finally publishing a somewhat accurate poll:

Posted by: Ace at 06:14 PM | Comments (15)
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I don't know if anyone else shares this kink: I've got this crazy obsession about identifying minor players from movies and figuring out where I've seen them before.

I was set off on this because I just read a cool trivial question that feeds into this obsession. We'll call this question 1:

1) Name the one human being who has been assaulted and/or killed by an Alien (from Alien), a Predator, and a Terminator.

But that set me off on a binge, so here's more:

2) Apart from the person who is the answer to 1), name three other people who've been assaulted and/or killed by both an Alien and a Terminator.

3) Apart from the person who is the answer to 1), name one other person who's been assaulted and/or killed by both a Terminator and a Predator. (This is sort of a trick question.)

4) Name two people who've met both Robocop and Special Agent Dale Cooper from Twin Peaks.

5) Name the person who's met characters named Robocop, Hannibal Lecter, and "Arnold Schwarzenegger."

6) Name one person who's been killed by Axel Foley, James Bond, and Rambo. He also got his ass kicked by Prince.

7) Name one person who's met both Special Agent Dale Cooper and Cabin Boy.

And, just for fun, name one person who has been assaulted and/or killed by both a Predator and Craig T. Nelson.

Posted by: Ace at 11:35 PM | Comments (35)
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It's such absolutely must-read material that you've probably already read it.

But if you haven't, you have to.

Posted by: Ace at 02:22 PM | Comments (13)
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I'm deleting the various "free rape" spam comments as fast as I can. There are dozens of IP addresses sending them.

And, here's the thing: Maybe they're using spoof IP addresses to send them. Maybe I'm actually banning readers. If I banned you, let me know by email.

Posted by: Ace at 01:30 PM | Comments (34)
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Okay. For a month I've been saying, don't worry about the crappy comments interface, don't worry about the crappy archives. It will be fixed.

Well, I just learned that it's not going to be fixed, alas. The current site design by Maystar just doesn't integrate smoothly with all the Moveable Type templates. Someone could probably fix this, but I can't.

So, I can either stick with this current design and limp along with the crappy commenting and archives, or I can go with one of the default MT designs, which I don't like, but which will, hopefully, work properly.

I can either go with this design, white letters on black background.

Or this basic design.

Or I could even get crazy and go with this nutty design.

I'll do a little modification, to the extent I can, to make these designs look sorta like the current design. I can change fonts and colors and stuff, that's about the
extent of my mad skillz in this regard.

If anyone has a strong preference -- I know some hate the white-on-black thing -- I'd appreciate knowing about it, before I switch over.

Thanks.

Update: Don't bother commenting on possible redesigns. I'm told that I can't switch to a default as it stands, so that option isn't really open at this point.

Posted by: Ace at 10:54 AM | Comments (41)
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Nothing here you can't get off Yahoo Finance, but since I read this stuff, I might as well digest it and blog it.

OPEC considers quota suspension. Trouble is, most oil-producers, except Saudi Arabia, are already pumping at capacity. However:

Suspending output quotas temporarily would make little difference to actual output but could provide the psychological impact on prices that OPEC's President Purnomo Yusgiantoro spoke of in Jakarta on Thursday.

It would also give official cartel blessing for Saudi to pump more without blatantly ignoring any new, higher quota.

This might not have a major impact on oil prices, but it couldn't help but have a sanguine affect.

Once again, Midwest factory activity surprises. "Midwest factory activity surprises" = "a bad surprise for John Kerry," since he's counting on a lingering manufacturing recession to deliver him Ohio.

And Michigan. And Wisconsin. And Pennsylvania. And Minnesota. And etc.:

Strength in the Chicago Purchasing Management index of business activity backed up that argument. The index jumped to 68.0 in May, when economists had looked for a modest pullback to 61.0 after April's already robust 63.9. The employment index also firmed, pointing to some improvement in the labor market.

"This is a very stunning report. The Chicago PMI is a volatile series and I thought you'd get some retracement and you didn't," said an impressed Joseph LaVorgna, senior U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank Securities.

But complicating this is the public's anxiety over rising gas prices and the uncertain (they think) situation in Iraq, which has reduced confidence:

The University of Michigan's final survey of consumer confidence for May showed its index falling to 90.2 from April's final reading of 94.2.

"What's affecting consumer sentiment is the geopolitical news, which is quite negative coming out of Iraq. But also the rise in oil prices is of concern to consumers as it affects their pocketbooks directly and that surely had an impact," said Kevin Logan, senior economist at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein.

On the other hand, personal spending rose with expectations, personal incomes jumped, and yet inflation remained tame:

Personal spending rose 0.3 percent in April, the smallest gain in six months, the Commerce Department said. The figure was in line with forecasts.

More importantly for the economic outlook, incomes rose by a solid 0.6 percent, the biggest gain since last November as the job market improved. The rise showed households will have the wherewithal to keep on spending in the months ahead even if gasoline prices stay high.

A key indicator of inflation in the report -- and the Fed's favored measure of prices -- came in weaker than expected with a 0.1 percent increase, easing worries in the bond market that the Fed would need to make a series of aggressive rate hikes. The annual increase in the core personal consumption expenditures index was a moderate 1.4 percent.

"This eases fears that the Fed was behind the curve," said JP Morgan senior economist Jim Glassman.

"It allows the Fed to go at a measured pace without causing people to worry they are falling behind. The inflation scares are going to be dying down," he said.

Net effect? Well, the markets are slightly down.

Runaway inflation and interest rates, the liberals' latest economic bugaboos -- now that their unemployment bugaboo has been thoroughly rubbished by events -- would seem to be a phantasmal threat at this point.

Alas, no cowbell for mixed-to-hopeful economic news.

Posted by: Ace at 10:19 AM | Comments (10)
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Apparently we flipped two of his disciples -- two of the Portland-area Al Qaeda.

Alphabet City has some first-class reportage, digging through the indictment, linking together all the conspirators.

Ramzi Yousef, inevitably, makes a cameo. He's turning out to be as to Al Qaeda what Allen Dulles is to JFK conspiracy theories, or what the Knights Templar are to medieval/church conspiracies -- he's just always popping up somewhere along the way.

First I thought Alphabet City was cutting and pasting a professional dispatch, but no, it appears he's written this up himself.

This post is great for two reasons. For one, it's just a good backgrounder. It digests the indictment and reports all the most important facts, and then it hyperlinks the stuffings out of all the major players.

But it also demonstrates that there's no particular reason that a blogger, given sufficient discipline and craft, can't produce dispatches on par with anything from AP.

It's not that Alphabet City's backgrounder is so much better than what you'd read on AP (although it's better than what you might read most of the time).

It's rather that there's no discernable difference between a professional backgrounder and Alphabet City's.

And this kind of piece is an important part of the news. It's not talk-to-a-source original reportage (so far as I can tell; if I'm wrong, I trust I'll be corrected). But a lot of articles in the newspapers are digests of indictments and court opinions and the like. It's a big part of the function of reporters, if not their main function.

There are some genuine deep thinkers in the blogosphere. Den Beste, for one; the Volokhs; and even Mickey Kaus, when the mood strikes him, and when he can restrain himself from using exclamation points every second sentence.

So, as far as opinion and analysis, the blogosphere has produced some important players.

But it hasn't produced actual reporters, fact-finders, digesters, and backgrounders, at least not consistently. (And not to my knowledge; I'm not an expert on the blogosphere. I'm not really an expert on anything, to tell the truth.)

As the blogosphere begins producing pieces like this more consistently-- what, precisely, is left for the mainstream media?

Actual talk-to-a-source reportage will probably remain their turf alone; there's a steep entry barrier to that function. You need a lot of time and a lot of connections and a lot of time to work your connections.

Still: two out of three ain't bad. Once the blogosphere can compete in terms of both opinion/analysis essays and overview/context pieces, the reporters will be left with nothing much to do but report on actual breaking news...

...which is sort of the job they're actually supposed to be doing, anyway.

Note to self: Stop churning out slapdash buffoonery. There's a better way.

Note to self: Lean on "Deep Stoat" to tip me as to the upcoming jobs numbers.

Posted by: Ace at 11:10 PM | Comments (18)
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A friend sent me this email. I can't really vouch for its accuracy, but then, I'm a blogger. I don't sweat accuracy.

Sort of like the New York Times.

Anyway, here's a list of "facts" which may either be true or false. Decide which are the true ones, and which are the fake ones.
more...

Posted by: Ace at 02:25 PM | Comments (32)
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Interview Believed to Have Taken Place Before, During, or After Abu Ghraib Abuses

In the left-wing Salon magazine; requires you view a stupid ad.

But the hell with giving Salon traffic and ad revenue. Here's a fair-use excerpt of all the important stuff:

May 27, 2004 | Filmmaker Michael Moore filmed an interview with American Nicholas Berg in the course of producing his documentary film "Fahrenheit 9/11" before Berg left for Iraq, where he was taken hostage and killed, Moore confirmed to Salon in a statement Thursday. The 20 minutes of footage does not appear in the final version of "Fahrenheit 911," according to the statement.

Word of the footage reached Salon through a source unaffiliated with Moore or his film "Fahrenheit 9/11"...

In a statement released to Salon, Moore said, "We have an interview with Nick Berg. It was approximately 20 minutes long. We are not releasing it to the media. It is not in the film. We are dealing privately with the family." Moore's camp declined to comment further on any aspect of the interview. Because the footage is not in the film, a spokeswoman for Miramax Films, the production company behind "Fahrenheit 9/11," said the company had no comment.

Ahem.

First of all: subpoena the interview. This is a murder investigation, after all.

Second of all: I don't know what this means. Just because he was interviewed by the left-wing traitor Moore doesn't mean he was one himself; Moore interviews conservatives, too, in order to edit them into jackasses.

But the CIA theory would seem to be out the window.

Speculation: Sorry, Ilyka, I know you find this speculation about a murdered man distasteful, but I think we're moving past the point at which taste governs the inquiry.

I'd like to know who contacted who, here. My suspicion is that Berg contacted Moore, because I'm not sure anyone even heard of Berg before his death. If Moore managed to track him down because he learned of the FBI inquiry, he's a somewhat better Internet Detective than I gave him credit for.

If, on the other hand, Berg contacted Moore, I'd like to know for what purpose. The story has been that Berg was a big-time supporter of the War in Iraq. If it turns out he wasn't, well then, what we have here is a lie, and while some lies are innocent, most are not.

Nick Kronos makes the important point, which I overlooked, that the article doesn't say it's an interview with Michael Moore; it could just be an "interview" with his dad, which the dad then sent to Moore.

Who knows.

It does get curiouser and curiouser.

Posted by: Ace at 12:10 PM | Comments (14)
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According to a quick Lexis/Nexis search, here are the top ten words (including compound nouns) the media is currently using:

10. "were"

9. "Abu"

8. "Ghraib"

7. "is"

6. "abuse"

5. "and"

4. "George W. Bush's Abu Ghraib torture chambers"

3. "a" and/or "an"

2. "Fantasia 'Abu Ghraib' Barino"

... and the Number One Most-Used Words in the Media...

1. FOUR-WAY TIE:

1) "Abu Ghraib prison scandal"

1) "human pyramids"

1) "chem-light"

and

1) "the"

Posted by: Ace at 10:43 AM | Comments (8)
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