VP Debate: Those Pesky Facts
By Tommy ChristopherOct 3rd 2008 10:44AM
Filed Under:eBreaking News, Joe Biden, Debates, 2008 President, Sarah Palin
Ah, the morning after. You had a reckless blast last night, doing or saying whatever felt good in that moment. Now, it's time to wake up and face facts. You're not really a movie-producing fireman-cop, and she isn't really on the pill. FactCheck.org is the political equivalent of that buzzkill friend who cluelessly salts your game whenever you bring him or her out with you. They have already analyzed last night's Vice Presidential Debate, and although both candidates practiced elasticity of veracity, the winner of the FactCheck Derby was clearly Joe Biden. Just on volume, Biden had fewer miscues, but when you weight them for the seriousness of the error, the contrast is stark.
You can check out their full report, but here's my rundown.
Palin: Falsely claimed that we are now at pre-surge troop levels. Even with scheduled withdrawals through February, 2009, we will still be 6,000 troops north of the pre-surge force size.
Biden: Said McCain voted "the exact same way" as Obama on troop funding. In reality, although McCain opposed a funding bill that included timelines for withdrawal, and urged the eventual veto, he didn't actually show up to vote on it. I'd give Biden only half a point off, since what he said is true in spirit, if not to the letter.
Palin gets a full point off, even though you could argue for more based on the grossness of the error, and its greater political significance.
Palin: Repeated again a false claim that Obama voted to raise taxes on families making only $42,000 a year, one that FactCheck has debunked twice. The lie is willful, since the McCain had already been forced to change their lying estimate once by FactCheck.
Biden: Again, inaccurately claimed that McCain had voted the "exact same way," when he had, again, skipped the vote. In an abundance of fairness, I'll deduct a full point for each, even though Palin's lie is much more egregious, and the defense to Biden's mistake isn't really helpful to McCain.
Palin:-2 Biden:-1.5
Palin: Falsely claimed McCain's health care plan would be "budget neutral." Independent estimates put the plan's cost, including revenue offsets from taxing employer-based plans, at $14-163 billion for just the year 2013.
Palin:-3 Biden:-1.5
Palin: Falsely claimed that Obama's plan calls for healthcare to be "taken over by the feds," and that it would be "government run." This is a popular fallacy by the right, but it isn't true. Obama's plan calls for more choices in publicly funded health care.
Palin:-4 Biden:-1.5
Biden: Said that McCain said he wouldn't even sit down with the government of Spain. FactCheck's defense of McCain is that he didn't say he wouldn't, just that he wouldn't commit to doing it. They also said that McCain probably didn't understand the question. This should actually be a point in Biden's favor, but I will generously call it a push.
Palin:-4 Biden:-1.5
Palin: Said "But when you talk about Barack's plan to tax increase affecting only those making $250,000 a year or more, you're forgetting millions of small businesses that are going to fit into that category." However, independent estimates show that several hundred thousand small businesses, at most, would pay more under Obama's plan.
Palin:-5 Biden:-1.5
Palin: Disagreed with Biden's assertion that the current U.S. commander in Afghanistan said that "surge principles" would not work there. The general did say that, and she got his name wrong. This could easily be two points or more, but I will only knock off one.
Palin:-6 Biden:-1.5
Palin: Said that it is untrue that the U.S. is killing civilians in Afghanistan. According to an analysis by the AP, however, the US is killing more civilians than insurgents are.
Palin: –7 Biden: –1.5
Biden: Said his "clean coal" line was taken out of context. In fact, his statement just didn't make sense, and his record shows clear support for clean coal.
Palin: -7 Biden:- 2.5
Palin: Overstated the case that McCain "sounded the alarm" on Freddie Mac and Fanny Mae. I'd only take a half-point here.
Palin: -7.5 Biden: -2.5
Palin: Misstated oil imports at $700 million, instead of true estimate of $493 million.
Palin: -8.5 Biden:-2.5
Biden: Biden said McCain intends to deregulate health care. Fact Check got this wrong. I'll write a whole post about it later.
Palin: -8.5 Biden: -2.5
Biden: repeated several times the Obama campaign's fair, but technically unclear, assertion that McCain's plan gives $4 billion a year to oil companies. It does, but as part of more massive giveaways to all corporations. This is a push.
Palin: -8.5 Biden: -2.5
Palin: Criticized Obama for voting for the 2005 energy bill, saying "that's what gave those oil companies those big tax breaks." The bill did give breaks, but took away others, and the net effect was a tax increase for oil companies.
Palin: -9.5 Biden: -2.5
Biden: Misstated Iraqi surplus as $80 million instead of $79 million. Push, he was rounding up.
Palin: -9.5 Biden: -2.5
Biden: Misstated the number of times McCain voted against alternative energy. It was 11, not 20.
Palin: -9.5 Biden: -3.5
Eventually, there may develop a "FactCheck Effect" that causes candidates to toe the line of accuracy more closely, to avoid these information hangovers. Maybe not, though. Everybody loves to brag about that great night, and nobody ever remembers the morning after.
Tommy Christopher co-hosts "Unusable Signal" , on BlogTalkRadio Tues & Thur at 9pm, and Wed, Fri, & Sat at 11pm. Click here for the Unusable Signal homepage.
Friday, October 3, 2008
FD: I know that NO ONE is reading this Blogg... but just in case.
today's papers from Slate: A League of Their Own
By Daniel Politi Posted Friday, Oct. 3, 2008, at 6:44 AM ET
The vice presidential candidates faced off last night in an eagerly anticipated debate that ultimately failed to deliver any of the game-changing moments that partisans on both sides were hoping for.
The debate "included humor, emotion and sharp elbows," notes USA Today, as the candidates kept things relatively peaceful while they eagerly sparred on taxes, Iraq, and who can best bring change to Washington.
Coming a day after the Senate voted in favor of the $700 billion bailout plan, it was hardly surprising the economy quickly took center stage and Joe Biden and Sarah Palin tried to portray their ticketmates as the candidate most capable of understanding the struggles of the middle class.
Ultimately, each "escaped without a major mishap," says the Washington Post, "and Palin seemed to repair an image that had been damaged by recent media interviews and increasing public doubts about her readiness for the nation's No. 2 job." While many predicted Palin would be embarrassed on a national stage when faced off against the veteran senator, the governor of Alaska largely held her own.
Still, "Palin's novelty was on full display," says the Los Angeles Times. "She winked repeatedly, and often uttered remarks in a sing-song lilt more often heard in a children's classroom than on the national stage."
The New York Times agrees and says that Palin proved she "was unlike any other running mate in recent memory, using phrases like 'heck of a lot' and 'Main Streeters like me' to appeal to working-class and middle-class voters."
But even as she displayed more confidence on the important issues, "her citing of facts sometimes came across as rote, she twice misstated the name of the top American general in Afghanistan, and she was chided at times for not sticking to the subject at hand," says the Wall Street Journal.
While the "experience gap was evident throughout," as the LAT puts it,
the NYT probably describes it best by saying that Palin "succeeded by not failing in any obvious way." She often relied on talking points and repeatedly referred to John McCain as a "maverick."
A while into the debate it seemed Biden had had enough of the word and replied that McCain "has been no maverick on the things that matter to people's lives." And that was Biden's strategy throughout the encounter as he mostly ignored Palin and made McCain the focus of his toughest attacks.
At one point, when Biden attacked McCain for favoring deregulation and Palin answered by talking about taxes, the senator from Delaware did directly criticize Palin's failure to answer the questions she was being asked. The governor quickly turned it into a criticism of the media and Washington politicians. "I may not answer the questions the way that either the moderator or you want to hear, but I'm going to talk straight to the American people and let 'em know my track record also."
Biden repeatedly tried to link McCain with the Bush administration. In what the WP says may have been "the essence of the night," Palin replied in kind by saying that Americans would eventually grow tired of the Democratic ticket "constantly looking backwards, and pointing fingers, and doing the blame game." Biden was ready with a response: "Look, past is prologue." The LAT notes that in her eagerness "to portray Biden as typical of the Washington establishment so despised by voters, Palin at one point made an argument that echoed Obama's thrust against McCain" when she said that "Americans are craving something new and different."
Palin "delivered a livelier and more rhetorically compelling performance than Biden," says the LAT in an analysis that points out the governor winked at the audience, gave a "shout-out" to her brother's third-grade class, and talked of her connection to voters as a hockey and soccer mom. For his part, Biden seemed more comfortable when dealing with policy. Still, the debate's most emotional moment belonged to Biden when he briefly choked up when talking about the car accident that killed his wife and daughter. The NYT's Alessandra Stanley says that "while her showmanship may have exhilarated her fans, it also helped Mr. Biden, who is normally known as something of a know-it-all showoff; in contrast to her, he seemed reserved and sincere."
In the end, the encounter may have left voters wishing there were more vice-presidential debates.
"Palin and Biden were each appealing in their own way—and in ways that neither McCain nor Obama were in their first debate last Friday," says the Post in a front-page analysis. In its own analysis, USAT also compares the debate with last week's encounter and says the two running mates "delivered a fierce, fast-talking back-and-forth with tougher criticism than the presidential contenders traded in their first debate."
The NYT says that while Palin may have helped McCain by putting the focus back on the presidential candidates, it didn't "constitute the turning point the McCain campaign was looking for" at a time when Obama seems to be gaining ground with voters. "This is going to help stop the bleeding," a Republican consultant said. "But this alone won't change the trend line." There were new signs yesterday that McCain needs all the help he can get as his campaign announced that it was pulling its staff and advertising out of Michigan, a Democratic state where Republicans once thought McCain had a chance.
In a story that looks at the state of the presidential race, the WSJ points out that polls show Obama leading in almost enough states to win the election. The Democratic nominee is ahead or tied in a few states that voted Republican in 2004, including Ohio and Florida, and has a lead in Pennsylvania, which is the other Democratic state McCain's campaign has been targeting. Of course, a lot can change in a month, but right now McCain's campaign is "being forced to play defense in territory Republicans have long taken for granted."
In other news, the LAT fronts a look at how lawmakers who opposed the $700 billion bailout package have been on the receiving end of intense lobbying in advance of today's crucial vote in the House. Some of it has come from independent citizens, but the powerful blitz has also been the result of a concerted effort by the country's major business groups to rally support for the rescue plan. It's still unclear whether the House will have enough votes to pass the measure, but there are hints that several lawmakers will be changing their vote, even if they're not willing to say so publicly just yet.
The WSJ appears to want to send a message directly to lawmakers with a Page One piece that details how new economic data seem to suggest the crisis is rapidly getting worse in both the United States and Europe. Yesterday the Federal Reserve said that in the last week financial institutions grew even more reluctant to offer basic short-term loans to companies. The tightening up of so-called "commercial paper" is the "most worrying aspect of the crisis," says the WSJ.
While McCain was widely ridiculed for putting much of the blame for the financial crisis on Christopher Cox, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the NYT suggests today that the Republican candidate may have been on to something. The NYT says one of the root causes of the current crisis can be traced back to a brief meeting in 2004, where the big investment banks pushed the SEC to allow them to take on more debt. A few months later, "the net capital rule" was changed, and "the five big independent investment firms were unleashed." Although the new rules would allow the SEC to keep banks away from excessively risky activity, the agency essentially ended up "outsourcing the job of monitoring risk to the banks themselves." Cox came onboard a year later, but he made it clear from the outset that oversight of the banks was not an important priority, and regulators essentially ignored any problems that were discovered.
The NYT reports that after months of criticism from the United States, the Pakistani government has launched a full-scale assault against the Taliban in the country's tribal regions. "After years of relative passivity, the army is now engaged in heavy fighting with the militants on at least three fronts," says the Times. Even as many in Pakistan are convinced that something must be done to root out the Taliban, the government has done little to prepare the country for the fighting and risks losing the "hearts and minds" of civilians who are increasingly critical of its alliance with the United States.
The editorial pages of the LAT, NYT, and WP express disappointment in last night's debate. The WP says that the fact that "a rather surface-skimming discussion full of evasion and mischaracterization was viewed as good news" for both candidates is a reflection of just how low the expectations were. For its part, the NYT says the debate "did not change the essential truth" that McCain "made a wildly irresponsible choice" when he picked Palin. The LAT is the most decidedly unimpressed with the "Joe and Sarah show," saying that the "two candidates—aided and abetted by the singularly inarticulate work of moderator Gwen Ifill—combined to produce one of the worst debates in modern American presidential history."
By Daniel Politi Posted Friday, Oct. 3, 2008, at 6:44 AM ET
The vice presidential candidates faced off last night in an eagerly anticipated debate that ultimately failed to deliver any of the game-changing moments that partisans on both sides were hoping for.
The debate "included humor, emotion and sharp elbows," notes USA Today, as the candidates kept things relatively peaceful while they eagerly sparred on taxes, Iraq, and who can best bring change to Washington.
Coming a day after the Senate voted in favor of the $700 billion bailout plan, it was hardly surprising the economy quickly took center stage and Joe Biden and Sarah Palin tried to portray their ticketmates as the candidate most capable of understanding the struggles of the middle class.
Ultimately, each "escaped without a major mishap," says the Washington Post, "and Palin seemed to repair an image that had been damaged by recent media interviews and increasing public doubts about her readiness for the nation's No. 2 job." While many predicted Palin would be embarrassed on a national stage when faced off against the veteran senator, the governor of Alaska largely held her own.
Still, "Palin's novelty was on full display," says the Los Angeles Times. "She winked repeatedly, and often uttered remarks in a sing-song lilt more often heard in a children's classroom than on the national stage."
The New York Times agrees and says that Palin proved she "was unlike any other running mate in recent memory, using phrases like 'heck of a lot' and 'Main Streeters like me' to appeal to working-class and middle-class voters."
But even as she displayed more confidence on the important issues, "her citing of facts sometimes came across as rote, she twice misstated the name of the top American general in Afghanistan, and she was chided at times for not sticking to the subject at hand," says the Wall Street Journal.
While the "experience gap was evident throughout," as the LAT puts it,
the NYT probably describes it best by saying that Palin "succeeded by not failing in any obvious way." She often relied on talking points and repeatedly referred to John McCain as a "maverick."
A while into the debate it seemed Biden had had enough of the word and replied that McCain "has been no maverick on the things that matter to people's lives." And that was Biden's strategy throughout the encounter as he mostly ignored Palin and made McCain the focus of his toughest attacks.
At one point, when Biden attacked McCain for favoring deregulation and Palin answered by talking about taxes, the senator from Delaware did directly criticize Palin's failure to answer the questions she was being asked. The governor quickly turned it into a criticism of the media and Washington politicians. "I may not answer the questions the way that either the moderator or you want to hear, but I'm going to talk straight to the American people and let 'em know my track record also."
Biden repeatedly tried to link McCain with the Bush administration. In what the WP says may have been "the essence of the night," Palin replied in kind by saying that Americans would eventually grow tired of the Democratic ticket "constantly looking backwards, and pointing fingers, and doing the blame game." Biden was ready with a response: "Look, past is prologue." The LAT notes that in her eagerness "to portray Biden as typical of the Washington establishment so despised by voters, Palin at one point made an argument that echoed Obama's thrust against McCain" when she said that "Americans are craving something new and different."
Palin "delivered a livelier and more rhetorically compelling performance than Biden," says the LAT in an analysis that points out the governor winked at the audience, gave a "shout-out" to her brother's third-grade class, and talked of her connection to voters as a hockey and soccer mom. For his part, Biden seemed more comfortable when dealing with policy. Still, the debate's most emotional moment belonged to Biden when he briefly choked up when talking about the car accident that killed his wife and daughter. The NYT's Alessandra Stanley says that "while her showmanship may have exhilarated her fans, it also helped Mr. Biden, who is normally known as something of a know-it-all showoff; in contrast to her, he seemed reserved and sincere."
In the end, the encounter may have left voters wishing there were more vice-presidential debates.
"Palin and Biden were each appealing in their own way—and in ways that neither McCain nor Obama were in their first debate last Friday," says the Post in a front-page analysis. In its own analysis, USAT also compares the debate with last week's encounter and says the two running mates "delivered a fierce, fast-talking back-and-forth with tougher criticism than the presidential contenders traded in their first debate."
The NYT says that while Palin may have helped McCain by putting the focus back on the presidential candidates, it didn't "constitute the turning point the McCain campaign was looking for" at a time when Obama seems to be gaining ground with voters. "This is going to help stop the bleeding," a Republican consultant said. "But this alone won't change the trend line." There were new signs yesterday that McCain needs all the help he can get as his campaign announced that it was pulling its staff and advertising out of Michigan, a Democratic state where Republicans once thought McCain had a chance.
In a story that looks at the state of the presidential race, the WSJ points out that polls show Obama leading in almost enough states to win the election. The Democratic nominee is ahead or tied in a few states that voted Republican in 2004, including Ohio and Florida, and has a lead in Pennsylvania, which is the other Democratic state McCain's campaign has been targeting. Of course, a lot can change in a month, but right now McCain's campaign is "being forced to play defense in territory Republicans have long taken for granted."
In other news, the LAT fronts a look at how lawmakers who opposed the $700 billion bailout package have been on the receiving end of intense lobbying in advance of today's crucial vote in the House. Some of it has come from independent citizens, but the powerful blitz has also been the result of a concerted effort by the country's major business groups to rally support for the rescue plan. It's still unclear whether the House will have enough votes to pass the measure, but there are hints that several lawmakers will be changing their vote, even if they're not willing to say so publicly just yet.
The WSJ appears to want to send a message directly to lawmakers with a Page One piece that details how new economic data seem to suggest the crisis is rapidly getting worse in both the United States and Europe. Yesterday the Federal Reserve said that in the last week financial institutions grew even more reluctant to offer basic short-term loans to companies. The tightening up of so-called "commercial paper" is the "most worrying aspect of the crisis," says the WSJ.
While McCain was widely ridiculed for putting much of the blame for the financial crisis on Christopher Cox, the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the NYT suggests today that the Republican candidate may have been on to something. The NYT says one of the root causes of the current crisis can be traced back to a brief meeting in 2004, where the big investment banks pushed the SEC to allow them to take on more debt. A few months later, "the net capital rule" was changed, and "the five big independent investment firms were unleashed." Although the new rules would allow the SEC to keep banks away from excessively risky activity, the agency essentially ended up "outsourcing the job of monitoring risk to the banks themselves." Cox came onboard a year later, but he made it clear from the outset that oversight of the banks was not an important priority, and regulators essentially ignored any problems that were discovered.
The NYT reports that after months of criticism from the United States, the Pakistani government has launched a full-scale assault against the Taliban in the country's tribal regions. "After years of relative passivity, the army is now engaged in heavy fighting with the militants on at least three fronts," says the Times. Even as many in Pakistan are convinced that something must be done to root out the Taliban, the government has done little to prepare the country for the fighting and risks losing the "hearts and minds" of civilians who are increasingly critical of its alliance with the United States.
The editorial pages of the LAT, NYT, and WP express disappointment in last night's debate. The WP says that the fact that "a rather surface-skimming discussion full of evasion and mischaracterization was viewed as good news" for both candidates is a reflection of just how low the expectations were. For its part, the NYT says the debate "did not change the essential truth" that McCain "made a wildly irresponsible choice" when he picked Palin. The LAT is the most decidedly unimpressed with the "Joe and Sarah show," saying that the "two candidates—aided and abetted by the singularly inarticulate work of moderator Gwen Ifill—combined to produce one of the worst debates in modern American presidential history."
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Mars has real dirt, water, atmosphere, just no life (yet)....
Even as its mission winds down, NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has spotted snow falling from the Martian sky.
Phoenix's camera and meteorological equipment have shown clouds and fog forming during the night as the air gets colder.
"This is now occurring every night," said Jim Whiteway of York University in Toronto and lead scientist for Phoenix's Meteorological Station.
A laser instrument that is pointed directly up into Mars' atmosphere has also detected snow from clouds about 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) above the spacecraft's landing site. Data show the snow vaporizing before reaching the ground. There are no conventional photographs of the snowfall. Scientists knew from previous studies that it snows on Mars. But they've never seen it happening from the ground.
"Nothing like this view has ever been seen on Mars," Whiteway said. "We'll be looking for signs that the snow may even reach the ground."
The craft has also seen new hints of the planet's watery past. Meanwhile, mission scientists are trying to squeeze in all the science they can before the Martian sun sets for the winter, including a surprise attempt to switch on Phoenix's as-yet unused microphone.
Mission scientists announced the plans for Phoenix's remaining weeks of activity at a press conference Monday.
They also revealed information that will help them to "begin rewriting the book of Martian chemistry," said Michael Hecht, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., and lead scientist for Phoenix's Microscopy, Electrochemistry and Conductivity Analyzer (MECA).
Phoenix landed in the northern plains of Mars on May 25 and has been using its onboard instruments to analyze the Martian dirt and subsurface ice layer at its landing site above Mars' arctic circle. The mission, extended once by NASA through the end of September, was extended again earlier this month through the end of December.
But it's unlikely Phoenix will last that long.
What's next
As winter approaches in the Northern hemisphere of Mars, the sun dips lower in the horizon, providing Phoenix' solar arrays with less and less sunlight to convert into electricity to run its instruments. Eventually the sun will set above the arctic circle alltogether.
As this happens, the Phoenix team is "trying to get the most out of these science instruments in the last few days," said Barry Goldstein, Phoenix project manager, also of JPL.
Scientists working on Phoenix's Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer are planning to attempt to fill the instrument's four (of eight total) remaining ovens will Martian dirt and ice samples. The team particularly wants to get a pure-ice or ice-rich sample, said TEGA lead scientist William Boynton of the University of Arizona, Tucson.
The team has run into problems gathering ice samples, with the "ice almost welding itself to the inside of the scoop" on the end of Phoenix's robotic arm, Boynton said, though he added: "We're still optimistic that we can fill all four before we run out of power."
Phoenix will also look for signs of organics in the samples delivered to TEGA, by comparing them to a blank brought to rule out any contamination brought from Earth. While they would be a thrilling find, organics would not necessarily indicate life — they could be deposited by comets and preserved in the ice, said Phoenix principal investigator Peter Smith, also of the University of Arizona.
The lander will also look at the different isotopes (or types of an element with different numbers of neutrons) in the subsurface ice and the water vapor in the Martian air to see whether the two water sources interact, Smith said.
As a bonus, mission scientists are going to try to switch on the microphone that was originally installed on Phoenix to be used during the lander's descent. While that use was scrapped, the Phoenix scientists have to decided now to "try and listen to Mars for the first time," Smith said.
"We're not sure if it's going to work, but we're going to make a try," he added.
Phoenix will also try to sample the dirt underneath a rock, dubbed "Headless," that it successfully moved with its 7.7 foot-long (2.4 meter-long) robotic arm last week. Images have already shown some color differences in the dirt under the rock.
"We're hoping to find a different chemistry under the rock than next to the rock," Smith said.
New Martian chemistry
So far, the chemistry of the surface layers near Phoenix's landing site has been a bit different that anticipated.
TEGA has identified several minerals that suggest that the surface there has interacted with water sometime in the Martian past. These include silicates similar in structure to mica, only softer, and calcium carbonate. Examples of carbonates on Earth are chalk and antacid tablets.
The suite of MECA instruments have shown that the pH of the soil near Phoenix is approximate 8.3 — or slightly basic — "almost exactly the pH of ocean water on Earth," Hecht said.
MECA has also found evidence of perchlorates, which could act as an energy source for any potential past Martian microbes and could have a significant impact on Mars' water chemistry.
For one thing, they could help explain why Phoenix's fork-like probe has found that "the soil in our little corner of Mars is very, very dry," Hecht said. Perchlorate could be soaking up any water in the soil above the ice layer, he explained.
Based on models of Phoenix's energy decline, mission engineers don't expect Phoenix to last much past late November. Eventually, the sun will set on Phoenix completely, and carbon dioxide ice will likely deposit on it. That combined with the ever-decreasing temperatures of winter will likely destroy the spacecrafts components.
"Nobody anticipates that the vehicle will survive that harsh winter," Goldstein said.
Phoenix's camera and meteorological equipment have shown clouds and fog forming during the night as the air gets colder.
"This is now occurring every night," said Jim Whiteway of York University in Toronto and lead scientist for Phoenix's Meteorological Station.
A laser instrument that is pointed directly up into Mars' atmosphere has also detected snow from clouds about 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) above the spacecraft's landing site. Data show the snow vaporizing before reaching the ground. There are no conventional photographs of the snowfall. Scientists knew from previous studies that it snows on Mars. But they've never seen it happening from the ground.
"Nothing like this view has ever been seen on Mars," Whiteway said. "We'll be looking for signs that the snow may even reach the ground."
The craft has also seen new hints of the planet's watery past. Meanwhile, mission scientists are trying to squeeze in all the science they can before the Martian sun sets for the winter, including a surprise attempt to switch on Phoenix's as-yet unused microphone.
Mission scientists announced the plans for Phoenix's remaining weeks of activity at a press conference Monday.
They also revealed information that will help them to "begin rewriting the book of Martian chemistry," said Michael Hecht, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., and lead scientist for Phoenix's Microscopy, Electrochemistry and Conductivity Analyzer (MECA).
Phoenix landed in the northern plains of Mars on May 25 and has been using its onboard instruments to analyze the Martian dirt and subsurface ice layer at its landing site above Mars' arctic circle. The mission, extended once by NASA through the end of September, was extended again earlier this month through the end of December.
But it's unlikely Phoenix will last that long.
What's next
As winter approaches in the Northern hemisphere of Mars, the sun dips lower in the horizon, providing Phoenix' solar arrays with less and less sunlight to convert into electricity to run its instruments. Eventually the sun will set above the arctic circle alltogether.
As this happens, the Phoenix team is "trying to get the most out of these science instruments in the last few days," said Barry Goldstein, Phoenix project manager, also of JPL.
Scientists working on Phoenix's Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer are planning to attempt to fill the instrument's four (of eight total) remaining ovens will Martian dirt and ice samples. The team particularly wants to get a pure-ice or ice-rich sample, said TEGA lead scientist William Boynton of the University of Arizona, Tucson.
The team has run into problems gathering ice samples, with the "ice almost welding itself to the inside of the scoop" on the end of Phoenix's robotic arm, Boynton said, though he added: "We're still optimistic that we can fill all four before we run out of power."
Phoenix will also look for signs of organics in the samples delivered to TEGA, by comparing them to a blank brought to rule out any contamination brought from Earth. While they would be a thrilling find, organics would not necessarily indicate life — they could be deposited by comets and preserved in the ice, said Phoenix principal investigator Peter Smith, also of the University of Arizona.
The lander will also look at the different isotopes (or types of an element with different numbers of neutrons) in the subsurface ice and the water vapor in the Martian air to see whether the two water sources interact, Smith said.
As a bonus, mission scientists are going to try to switch on the microphone that was originally installed on Phoenix to be used during the lander's descent. While that use was scrapped, the Phoenix scientists have to decided now to "try and listen to Mars for the first time," Smith said.
"We're not sure if it's going to work, but we're going to make a try," he added.
Phoenix will also try to sample the dirt underneath a rock, dubbed "Headless," that it successfully moved with its 7.7 foot-long (2.4 meter-long) robotic arm last week. Images have already shown some color differences in the dirt under the rock.
"We're hoping to find a different chemistry under the rock than next to the rock," Smith said.
New Martian chemistry
So far, the chemistry of the surface layers near Phoenix's landing site has been a bit different that anticipated.
TEGA has identified several minerals that suggest that the surface there has interacted with water sometime in the Martian past. These include silicates similar in structure to mica, only softer, and calcium carbonate. Examples of carbonates on Earth are chalk and antacid tablets.
The suite of MECA instruments have shown that the pH of the soil near Phoenix is approximate 8.3 — or slightly basic — "almost exactly the pH of ocean water on Earth," Hecht said.
MECA has also found evidence of perchlorates, which could act as an energy source for any potential past Martian microbes and could have a significant impact on Mars' water chemistry.
For one thing, they could help explain why Phoenix's fork-like probe has found that "the soil in our little corner of Mars is very, very dry," Hecht said. Perchlorate could be soaking up any water in the soil above the ice layer, he explained.
Based on models of Phoenix's energy decline, mission engineers don't expect Phoenix to last much past late November. Eventually, the sun will set on Phoenix completely, and carbon dioxide ice will likely deposit on it. That combined with the ever-decreasing temperatures of winter will likely destroy the spacecrafts components.
"Nobody anticipates that the vehicle will survive that harsh winter," Goldstein said.
FD: The weather report from Mars is Snow flurries ... but clear by Mid Morning....
NASA Mars Lander Sees Falling Snow,
Soil Data Suggest Liquid Past
September 29, 2008 NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has detected snow falling from Martian clouds. Spacecraft soil experiments also have provided evidence of past interaction between minerals and liquid water, processes that occur on Earth. A laser instrument designed to gather knowledge of how the atmosphere and surface interact on Mars has detected snow from clouds about 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) above the spacecraft's landing site. Data show the snow vaporizing before reaching the ground.
"Nothing like this view has ever been seen on Mars," said Jim Whiteway, of York University, Toronto, lead scientist for the Canadian-supplied Meteorological Station on Phoenix. "We'll be looking for signs that the snow may even reach the ground." Phoenix experiments also yielded clues pointing to calcium carbonate, the main composition of chalk, and particles that could be clay. Most carbonates and clays on Earth form only in the presence of liquid water.
Soil Data Suggest Liquid Past
September 29, 2008 NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has detected snow falling from Martian clouds. Spacecraft soil experiments also have provided evidence of past interaction between minerals and liquid water, processes that occur on Earth. A laser instrument designed to gather knowledge of how the atmosphere and surface interact on Mars has detected snow from clouds about 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) above the spacecraft's landing site. Data show the snow vaporizing before reaching the ground.
"Nothing like this view has ever been seen on Mars," said Jim Whiteway, of York University, Toronto, lead scientist for the Canadian-supplied Meteorological Station on Phoenix. "We'll be looking for signs that the snow may even reach the ground." Phoenix experiments also yielded clues pointing to calcium carbonate, the main composition of chalk, and particles that could be clay. Most carbonates and clays on Earth form only in the presence of liquid water.
FD: How about a joke from a friend...
If you had purchased $1,000 of Delta Air Lines stock one year ago youwould have $49 left.
With Fannie Mae, you would have $2.50 left of the original $1,000.
With AIG, you would have less than $15 left.
But, if you had purchased $1,000 worth of beer one year ago, drank all
of the beer, then turned in the cans for the aluminum recycling REFUND,
you would have $214 cash.
Based on the above, the best current investment advice is to drink heavily and recycle.
It's called the 401-Keg
A recent study found the average American walks about 900 miles a year.
Another study found Americans drink, on the average, 22 gallons of
alcohol a year. That means, on average, Americans get about 41 miles to
the gallon.
Makes You Proud To Be An American!
It's called the 401-Keg
A recent study found the average American walks about 900 miles a year.
Another study found Americans drink, on the average, 22 gallons of
alcohol a year. That means, on average, Americans get about 41 miles to
the gallon.
Makes You Proud To Be An American!
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
A German View of the USa Financial Problem in Two Acts
America, Where It Pays to Fail
By Gabor Steingart in Washington
In the current financial crisis, the model of US capitalism has imploded with a big bang. But the Bush administration is trying to douse the flames with yet more fuel instead of water, and it wants to see Wall Street's gamblers rewarded for failure.
REUTERS
A contemplative trader on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.More than 100 years ago, German sociologist Georg Simmel criticized the banks for being even bigger and more powerful than the churches. His chief complaint -- that money is the new god of our times -- is still heard today. If Simmel was right, and there are some indications that he was, his statement would have to be modified to suit today's circumstances: Not all people pray to the same god.
Among the money worshippers, there are at least three faiths. First there are the Puritans, who patiently carry their money to the new churches, hoping that it will multiply. The average Chinese, for example, deposits 40 percent of his income in banks. What laudable discipline! Then there are the Pragmatists. They save and lend, but only in that order; their savings limit their boldness. This persuasion is especially prevalent in the Germanic countries, where the savings bank is the shrine.
REPRINTS
Find out how you can reprint this SPIEGEL ONLINE article in your publication. Finally, we have the religious community of the Uninhibited, which is especially popular in the United States. Its adherents readily admit to intentional recklessness, wanton waste and omnipresent greed.
They call it "the American way of life." Its members live in the here and now, without asking questions about tomorrow. One lends money to another, even though it's not his money. Instead, he has borrowed it from a third person, who has promised to procure it from a fourth person -- and so on.
Southampton : The Evidence Trail Begins
This religious community is the most devout of them all. Some time ago, it adopted the practice of treating anticipated money like real money and equating desire with reality. Whatever shred of inhibition they had was now shed.
Since everybody knew that desires outnumbered dollars, the inevitable result was a certain funding gap, or deficit. Capitalism without capital -- the audacious heart of the innovation -- could not function. There is no worldly salvation -- at least that was a conclusion that the old God, the one bearing the cross, and the new god, the one with the dollar signs in his eyes, could agree on.
And so the inevitable happened: the big bang.
Three of the five US investment banks lost their independence, while the other two are still floundering. Two mortgage banks and one insurance company are now under government administration.
The global financial system has been shaken, horrifying the members of the other two faiths. There may be three religions, but there is only one sky. If it falls down, everyone dies.
A search for evidence to pinpoint those responsible should most likely begin in Southampton, a seaside getaway for the moneyed elite. The town, on the eastern end of Long Island outside New York City, offers a glimpse of how attractive greed can be.
It is a place where stock options have been transformed by the hundreds into fairy-tale castles at water's edge. By taking advantage of tax loopholes, Wall Street's financial gurus managed to spirit their bonuses out of the city more or less intact. Under US tax law, compensation in the form of stocks and warrants is taxed at less than half of the highest tax rate. As a result, the incomes of many bankers are taxed at a lower rate than those of their secretaries.
How Minus Turned to Plus
The owners of these mansions by the sea are not there right now, so further investigation requires a train ride into New York. In the Midtown high-rise housing the offices of Lehman Brothers, which is in the process of bringing its own history to a close, there is more to be discovered about the sequence of events. Billions of dollars were lent to people who were not creditworthy for condominiums and houses that were not valuable. In the cheerfully cynical jargon of bankers, these types of loans were dubbed "NINA," short for "No Income, No Asset."
And yet things were going well in the world of the moneylenders. The miraculous increase in the money supply helped housing prices rise by more than 70 percent between 2000 and 2006. The industry had managed to turn a profit by increasing risk. On the balance sheets, at least, minus had turned to plus.
In better times, one would have called the bankers enterprising; today, they are being called irresponsible.
Even before the term investment banking was coined, Karl Marx knew how the two things were related: "Capital is as terrified of the absence of profit or a very small profit as nature is of a vacuum. With suitable profits, capital is awakened; with 10 percent, it can be used anywhere; with 20 percent, it becomes lively; with 50 percent, positively daring; with 100 percent, it will crush all human laws under its feet; and with 300 percent, there is no crime it is not willing to dare, even at the risk of the gallows."
Paulson's Faith
Now the trail leads from New York to Washington, where US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson has his office on Pennsylvania Avenue. His department is so important that a garden gate connects the grounds of the Treasury Department with those of the White House. Paulson took a hands-off approach to the banks, and he now plans to take on their losses. He has become something similar to reinsurance for high finance. His goal is to eliminate the gallows -- but not the greed.
Paulson was once a Wall Street banker himself. He is a man with good manners and firm principles. In normal times, he has faith in the market, God and George W. Bush. In times like these, he prefers to put his trust in the government, taxpayers and Bush.
Contrary to what has been widely reported, Paulson does not intend to use tax revenues to finance the bailout. Instead, he plans to take up billions in new loans on behalf of the US Treasury. "I hate the fact that we have to do it, but it’s better than the alternative," he said last week. The president has already nodded his approval.
That's what happens to religious communities when they come under pressure: They become even more devout. The same short-term way of thinking that triggered the disaster in the first place is now supposed to bring it to an end. The government is attempting to put out the fire with fuel, not water. In fact, it is precisely the same fuel that sparked the flames on Wall Street in the first place: borrowed money.
The only difference is that the new loans would not be coming from the sixth, seventh or eighth member of the religious community. Instead, they would be collected from all taxpayers put together. It would represent an elimination of the separation between church and state, with Wall Street becoming the national religion.
The common ground with the other two religious communities is already in the process of disappearing. Things that were considered inseparable in the days of the time-honored market economy -- such as value and consideration, wage and performance, risk and responsibility -- are now being torn asunder in the name of the government. The capitalism on display in America today is a beaten and degraded version of its former self.
The actions of politicians are amplifying rather than mitigating the effects of economic failure. American-style capitalism hasn't died yet, but it is merely preparing its own demise. The history of these days is the history of a death that has already been announced.
Which brings us to Miss Marple.
The amateur detective dreamed up by Agatha Christie, based on her grandmother, is equipped with more than just a sense of humor and an understanding of human nature. She also has experience with the obvious things that no one believes possible -- until they happen.
In the 1950 novel "A Murder is Announced," Christie looked into our future in comic fashion.
The story goes like this: One morning, citizens read the following message in the classified section of their local newspaper: "A murder is announced and will take place on Friday, October 29th, at Little Paddocks at 6:30 p.m. Friends please accept this, the only intimation." At the appointed time, half the village gathers at the house where the murder will supposedly take place. The warning is treated as a frivolous joke, one that no one would want to pass up. Sherry is served. The group contracts a collective case of the jitters. Promptly at 6:30 p.m., the lights go out.
"Isn't this wonderful?" breathed a female voice. "I am so thrilled."
When the lights come back on -- to everyone's surprise -- a murder had been committed. And now we, like the guests at Little Paddocks, are standing around, whispering, getting a case of the jitters, waiting to see what happens next. And no one seriously believes that an actual crime is about to take place.
"Everybody was silent and nobody moved. They all stared at the clock. … As the last note died away all the lights went out. Delighted gasps and feminine squeaks of appreciation were heard in the darkness. 'It's beginning,' cried Mrs. Harmon in an ecstasy."
A Future Sold
Anyone who hopes to get an early warning should simply expand his or her range of vision for as long as the lights are on. America's credit card companies are not in a significantly better position than the banks. They too have sold the future and even a piece of the period after that.
The American auto industry is also seriously stricken and is having trouble extending its credit lines on the open market. The industry has lost more than 300,000 jobs since 1999. But what good does that do if the managers -- and not the workers -- are to blame for the crisis?
America's enormous oil bill -- about $500 billion (€345 billion) -- is currently being paid for with money borrowed from China. Every business day, America's foreign debt grows by close to $1 billion (€690 million).
Probably the bitterest pill to swallow in America today is that private households are not managing their finances any better than corporate executives. They see their mirror images in Wall Street bankers rather than some distorted picture of themselves. "I know of no country, indeed, where the love of money has taken stronger hold on the affections of men," Alexis de Tocqueville noted 170 years ago.
The long-overdue conversation between the government and the governed has yet to materialize. It would have to be a conversation about the relationship between the economy and values, about regaining what has been lost instead of expanding. The word frugality -- which disappeared from the vocabulary of the Uninhibited -- should be reintroduced.
But there is no sign of any of this happening. Today's America is too American to survive in its current form. But today's America is also too proud to realize it. The faithful will hardly allow themselves to be converted.
And so our understanding of the events continues to get less and less clear. A dangerous game with time has begun.
"The ping of two bullets shattered the complacency of the room. Suddenly the game was no longer a game. Somebody screamed... 'Lights.' 'Can't you find the switch?' 'Who's got a lighter?'…'Oh, Archie, I want to get out of here.'"
Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan
By Gabor Steingart in Washington
In the current financial crisis, the model of US capitalism has imploded with a big bang. But the Bush administration is trying to douse the flames with yet more fuel instead of water, and it wants to see Wall Street's gamblers rewarded for failure.
REUTERS
A contemplative trader on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.More than 100 years ago, German sociologist Georg Simmel criticized the banks for being even bigger and more powerful than the churches. His chief complaint -- that money is the new god of our times -- is still heard today. If Simmel was right, and there are some indications that he was, his statement would have to be modified to suit today's circumstances: Not all people pray to the same god.
Among the money worshippers, there are at least three faiths. First there are the Puritans, who patiently carry their money to the new churches, hoping that it will multiply. The average Chinese, for example, deposits 40 percent of his income in banks. What laudable discipline! Then there are the Pragmatists. They save and lend, but only in that order; their savings limit their boldness. This persuasion is especially prevalent in the Germanic countries, where the savings bank is the shrine.
REPRINTS
Find out how you can reprint this SPIEGEL ONLINE article in your publication. Finally, we have the religious community of the Uninhibited, which is especially popular in the United States. Its adherents readily admit to intentional recklessness, wanton waste and omnipresent greed.
They call it "the American way of life." Its members live in the here and now, without asking questions about tomorrow. One lends money to another, even though it's not his money. Instead, he has borrowed it from a third person, who has promised to procure it from a fourth person -- and so on.
Southampton : The Evidence Trail Begins
This religious community is the most devout of them all. Some time ago, it adopted the practice of treating anticipated money like real money and equating desire with reality. Whatever shred of inhibition they had was now shed.
Since everybody knew that desires outnumbered dollars, the inevitable result was a certain funding gap, or deficit. Capitalism without capital -- the audacious heart of the innovation -- could not function. There is no worldly salvation -- at least that was a conclusion that the old God, the one bearing the cross, and the new god, the one with the dollar signs in his eyes, could agree on.
And so the inevitable happened: the big bang.
Three of the five US investment banks lost their independence, while the other two are still floundering. Two mortgage banks and one insurance company are now under government administration.
The global financial system has been shaken, horrifying the members of the other two faiths. There may be three religions, but there is only one sky. If it falls down, everyone dies.
A search for evidence to pinpoint those responsible should most likely begin in Southampton, a seaside getaway for the moneyed elite. The town, on the eastern end of Long Island outside New York City, offers a glimpse of how attractive greed can be.
It is a place where stock options have been transformed by the hundreds into fairy-tale castles at water's edge. By taking advantage of tax loopholes, Wall Street's financial gurus managed to spirit their bonuses out of the city more or less intact. Under US tax law, compensation in the form of stocks and warrants is taxed at less than half of the highest tax rate. As a result, the incomes of many bankers are taxed at a lower rate than those of their secretaries.
How Minus Turned to Plus
The owners of these mansions by the sea are not there right now, so further investigation requires a train ride into New York. In the Midtown high-rise housing the offices of Lehman Brothers, which is in the process of bringing its own history to a close, there is more to be discovered about the sequence of events. Billions of dollars were lent to people who were not creditworthy for condominiums and houses that were not valuable. In the cheerfully cynical jargon of bankers, these types of loans were dubbed "NINA," short for "No Income, No Asset."
And yet things were going well in the world of the moneylenders. The miraculous increase in the money supply helped housing prices rise by more than 70 percent between 2000 and 2006. The industry had managed to turn a profit by increasing risk. On the balance sheets, at least, minus had turned to plus.
In better times, one would have called the bankers enterprising; today, they are being called irresponsible.
Even before the term investment banking was coined, Karl Marx knew how the two things were related: "Capital is as terrified of the absence of profit or a very small profit as nature is of a vacuum. With suitable profits, capital is awakened; with 10 percent, it can be used anywhere; with 20 percent, it becomes lively; with 50 percent, positively daring; with 100 percent, it will crush all human laws under its feet; and with 300 percent, there is no crime it is not willing to dare, even at the risk of the gallows."
Paulson's Faith
Now the trail leads from New York to Washington, where US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson has his office on Pennsylvania Avenue. His department is so important that a garden gate connects the grounds of the Treasury Department with those of the White House. Paulson took a hands-off approach to the banks, and he now plans to take on their losses. He has become something similar to reinsurance for high finance. His goal is to eliminate the gallows -- but not the greed.
Paulson was once a Wall Street banker himself. He is a man with good manners and firm principles. In normal times, he has faith in the market, God and George W. Bush. In times like these, he prefers to put his trust in the government, taxpayers and Bush.
Contrary to what has been widely reported, Paulson does not intend to use tax revenues to finance the bailout. Instead, he plans to take up billions in new loans on behalf of the US Treasury. "I hate the fact that we have to do it, but it’s better than the alternative," he said last week. The president has already nodded his approval.
That's what happens to religious communities when they come under pressure: They become even more devout. The same short-term way of thinking that triggered the disaster in the first place is now supposed to bring it to an end. The government is attempting to put out the fire with fuel, not water. In fact, it is precisely the same fuel that sparked the flames on Wall Street in the first place: borrowed money.
The only difference is that the new loans would not be coming from the sixth, seventh or eighth member of the religious community. Instead, they would be collected from all taxpayers put together. It would represent an elimination of the separation between church and state, with Wall Street becoming the national religion.
The common ground with the other two religious communities is already in the process of disappearing. Things that were considered inseparable in the days of the time-honored market economy -- such as value and consideration, wage and performance, risk and responsibility -- are now being torn asunder in the name of the government. The capitalism on display in America today is a beaten and degraded version of its former self.
The actions of politicians are amplifying rather than mitigating the effects of economic failure. American-style capitalism hasn't died yet, but it is merely preparing its own demise. The history of these days is the history of a death that has already been announced.
Which brings us to Miss Marple.
The amateur detective dreamed up by Agatha Christie, based on her grandmother, is equipped with more than just a sense of humor and an understanding of human nature. She also has experience with the obvious things that no one believes possible -- until they happen.
In the 1950 novel "A Murder is Announced," Christie looked into our future in comic fashion.
The story goes like this: One morning, citizens read the following message in the classified section of their local newspaper: "A murder is announced and will take place on Friday, October 29th, at Little Paddocks at 6:30 p.m. Friends please accept this, the only intimation." At the appointed time, half the village gathers at the house where the murder will supposedly take place. The warning is treated as a frivolous joke, one that no one would want to pass up. Sherry is served. The group contracts a collective case of the jitters. Promptly at 6:30 p.m., the lights go out.
"Isn't this wonderful?" breathed a female voice. "I am so thrilled."
When the lights come back on -- to everyone's surprise -- a murder had been committed. And now we, like the guests at Little Paddocks, are standing around, whispering, getting a case of the jitters, waiting to see what happens next. And no one seriously believes that an actual crime is about to take place.
"Everybody was silent and nobody moved. They all stared at the clock. … As the last note died away all the lights went out. Delighted gasps and feminine squeaks of appreciation were heard in the darkness. 'It's beginning,' cried Mrs. Harmon in an ecstasy."
A Future Sold
Anyone who hopes to get an early warning should simply expand his or her range of vision for as long as the lights are on. America's credit card companies are not in a significantly better position than the banks. They too have sold the future and even a piece of the period after that.
The American auto industry is also seriously stricken and is having trouble extending its credit lines on the open market. The industry has lost more than 300,000 jobs since 1999. But what good does that do if the managers -- and not the workers -- are to blame for the crisis?
America's enormous oil bill -- about $500 billion (€345 billion) -- is currently being paid for with money borrowed from China. Every business day, America's foreign debt grows by close to $1 billion (€690 million).
Probably the bitterest pill to swallow in America today is that private households are not managing their finances any better than corporate executives. They see their mirror images in Wall Street bankers rather than some distorted picture of themselves. "I know of no country, indeed, where the love of money has taken stronger hold on the affections of men," Alexis de Tocqueville noted 170 years ago.
The long-overdue conversation between the government and the governed has yet to materialize. It would have to be a conversation about the relationship between the economy and values, about regaining what has been lost instead of expanding. The word frugality -- which disappeared from the vocabulary of the Uninhibited -- should be reintroduced.
But there is no sign of any of this happening. Today's America is too American to survive in its current form. But today's America is also too proud to realize it. The faithful will hardly allow themselves to be converted.
And so our understanding of the events continues to get less and less clear. A dangerous game with time has begun.
"The ping of two bullets shattered the complacency of the room. Suddenly the game was no longer a game. Somebody screamed... 'Lights.' 'Can't you find the switch?' 'Who's got a lighter?'…'Oh, Archie, I want to get out of here.'"
Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan
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