OPINION

I went to see my wife at the school she teaches at this afternoon before reporting to work. Her school is a polling place. As I pulled up it looked like the property had been flooded by a see of red Cindy Burkett signs. That was before I saw Cindy smiling from the big sign at the parking lot entrance or the two Cindy supporters holding signs in the parking lot waving at me.

Looks like all of that signage is paying off. Burkett has a commanding lead in the race for state representative in District 101. She may even avoid a runoff.

I don't know the last time I watched the Oscars all the way through, and I've never really cared about the nomination announcements. But with this year's increased number of best picture nominees I was curious. I was hoping that we'd see more popular movies get nods. (Chris Vognar says something similar and has other thoughts on the Oscar nominations here.)

At the very least I was hoping that increasing the number of best picture nominees would increase my chances of seeing some of them. It's been a slow movie year for me, but I'd only seen two of the 10. When there were five nominees I'd typically only seen one, so, talking percentages, we are right on track.

My wife drives a 4Runner. It's older and a model that's not being recalled by Toyota, but I can't help but feel for those drivers who are dealing with the massive number of cars that are being called unsafe. I honestly don't know what we'd do if we were having to think about the recall.

Toyota is sending mixed messages, to me. It is telling the world with it's stop in production and sales of these cars that it doesn't know what's wrong, but the problem is so serious that it no longer wants new models on the the road or in the showroom.

But Toyota's telling those who have already purchased one of these cars to keep driving them. How can you be comfortable behind the wheel if you are driving a car that you know is unsafe and the manufacturer can't tell you why.

So, I'm curious. If you drive a Toyota that is part of the recall how are you dealing with it?

What do you do when you have used space shuttles with a few million space miles on them? Stick a 'for sale' sign on the front and ark it on the corner for all passersby to see, of course.

And what do you do when no one seems interested in paying the price you've shoe-polished on the windshield? You reassess, maybe dropping the price by a few million bucks.

That's what NASA has done. The agency has been looking to sell its fleet of shuttles that will be retired later this year. Original asking price:$42 million each. New price: $28.8 million. And to sweeten the deal you get a free shuttle engine with purchase. All in the name of making sure these shuttles find a good home. Good job.

Conan O'Brien has issued a statement saying the he won't do The Tonight Show if NBC moves it back half an hour to 11:05 p.m. Dallas time.

I have been watching this with some interest. I don't watch either the Leno or Conan show, but was curious how Leno's primetime show would do once it was announced. I didn't think it would succeed and agreed with our editorial calling its launch a bad idea.

Seeing NBC go through so many hoops to get rid of a show that, despite what the network has claimed, didn't work has been interesting. What I haven't understood, though, is the lengths NBC is going to to make sure that Jay Leno stays on its air. Can someone explain why the network is treating him as its golden boy? I don't get it.

Watching the UT-Alabama game last night and seeing Colt McCoy get hurt and freshman Garret Gilbert come in I wondered to my wife what it must be like to be those two guys.

McCoy had worked for four years to get to this point, to this game. And with one seemingly harmless hit it's all over.

Then there is the true freshman who was forced into a situation that I don't think he or the coaches expected in their wildest dreams. When it looked like the Longhorns could come back, Gina said to me that this kid was about to become an instant legend. I was thinking we already had our Texan of the Year for 2010.

We all know the game ended in heartbreak for both players, and this column from Dan Wetzel with Yahoo! comes the closest to getting us in the heads of McCoy and Gilbert that I have found. It's worth the couple of minutes it takes to read.

If losing weight and finding that special someone both made it on your list of resolutions this year, take note. Going to the web site beautifulpeople.com may not be the best idea.

Roughly 5,000 members of the site soon became former members after posting pictures that seemed to indicate that they may have put on a few pounds over the holidays.

If the site's name wasn't indication enough, being a member is all based on looks. You can't join unless other members give the OK that you are good looking enough to mix with them. That must be very exclusive company since the site bills itself as "the sexiest website in the world today."

The site's founder, Robert Hintze, said he was sad to lose members but that "letting fatties roam the site is a direct threat to our business model and the very concept for which BeautifulPeople.com was founded."

Stay classy guys.

Kay Bailey Hutchison said on the radio today that a point of order will be made on the floor of the Senate questioning the constitutionality of requiring every American to buy health insurance. She said a vote on it is expected tomorrow.

It's something I've heard brought up by a few as both houses of Congress worked to shape their reform bills, and it's an assertion that I have never heard anyone rebut. Can someone do it here? Because to me, and I am no Constitutional scholar -- shocking as that might seem, I can't see how it would be OK for the government to require every American citizen to purchase something.

If you're still looking for one more thing to get a special someone, or a new dog is on your list of things to get for Christmas, you might want to see about getting a chihuahua from California.

Apparently, in a rush to copy their favorite celebutante, people in California went out an bought chihuahuas. Now those people have decided they don't really want their newish pets and, according to this story, have created a Chihuahua crisis in California animal shelters. It's gotten so bad that some facilities have had to remodel just to handle the glut of smaller dogs.

In a decision that I am sure is going to draw fire from some, the Associated Press has named Tiger Woods its athlete of the decade.

No matter what you think of the headlines this last three weeks -- and they just keep getting worse -- you can't argue that the man is a tremendous talent on the golf course.

Here is a paragraph on his accomplishments from the story on our site right now.

He won 64 times around the world, including 12 majors, and hoisted a trophy on every continent golf is played. He lost only one time with the lead going into the final round. His 56 PGA Tour victories in one incomparable decade were more than anyone except four of golf's greatest players won in their careers.

By the way, Texan Lance Armstrong was a distant second in the voting. He received 33 first place votes to Woods' 56.

When President Obama makes his LONG-awaited announcement tonight that he will be sending 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan on an accelerated timetable he will be doing it from West Point with, no doubt, troops as the backdrop. Does that bother anyone else, because it doesn't sit right with me.

The idea has felt weird since I heard about it, but I didn't want to knee-jerk and criticize the president just because he and I don't see eye to eye on much. But after considering it more, a policy decision like this needs to be announced from the White House with just the president. He's sending thousands of troops into harms way and using them as props on a stage is bad form.

Watching the coverage of the committee vote on Senate Finance's health care bill, the people on TV keep talking about how Olympia Snowe's vote of support allows the bill to be called bipartisan.

Well, I suppose in a technical sense that's true. It does have the support of people in both parties. But can we please come up with a better definition of the word bipartisan? Support of one Republican does not a bipartisan bill make. True bipartisanship requires a give and take by both parties and several members of each party coming together to support something, not whatever it was that we saw today. That was not bipartisanship.

Someone needs to call Glenn Beck and have him look into this disturbing compilation of photos of the president. They come from the state department's flickr account and were taken at a recent reception the president and first lady hosted in New York.

Watch his never-changing smile. The birthers may have more of a point than even they knew. No human could replicate his or her smile like that 130 times. Spooky.

As we each spend today celebrating the Internet's birthday in our own way, there are, no doubt, some who are cursing its birth. That bunch is lamenting what the Internet and technology has done to writing in our society. Well to that group, worry no more.

Stanford University professor Andrea Lunsford has organized the Stanford Study of Writing. Between 2001 and 2006 she collected almost 15,000 writing samples. That included everything from class assignments to chat sessions.

What she found was that technology is doing anything but killing our ability to write. Young people are doing more of it than ever and they are doing a good job of it too.

Lunsford's team found that the students were remarkably adept at what rhetoricians call kairos--assessing their audience and adapting their tone and technique to best get their point across. The modern world of online writing, particularly in chat and on discussion threads, is conversational and public, which makes it closer to the Greek tradition of argument than the asynchronous letter and essay writing of 50 years ago.

The folks at Wired did a good job of summarizing the findings here.

Happy birthday, Internet. You don't look a day over 20.

According to internet security company McAfee, Brad Pitt has had to give up his crown as the Internet's most dangerous celebrity. Actress Jessica Biel tops this year's list as the riskiest celebrity to search. If you search her name you have a 1 in 5 shot of landing at a web site that tested positive for spyware, adware, spam, phishing, viruses and other malware.

Richardson's own Jessica Simpson was No. 5 on the list.

Apparently, Pitt didn't just fall one or two places on this year's list. He fell completely out of the Top 15. That entire list is here if you want to see it.

I don't have the numbers in front of me and I could be wrong about this, but I am pretty sure that I remember hearing once that a big portion of the military's budget goes to fuel costs.

Well, how much could be saved if our air craft carriers could take in seawater and turn it into jet fuel?

Scientists are working on it and we could be close to finding out.

Navy chemists have processed seawater into unsaturated short-chain hydrocarbons that with further refining could be made into kerosene-based jet fuel. But they will have to find a clean energy source to power the reactions if the end product is to be carbon neutral.

That link is full of science words that I don't understand, but if that quote above doesn't tell you enough follow the link and read more.

The Southeastern Conference had been considering a new media policy that banned ticket-holding fans at sporting events from posting pictures and game updates to social media sites like Twitter and Facebook.

Looks like the powers that be have changed their minds. While they are still ruling video posts out of bounds, they say pictures and updates are fine as long as they aren't done with a commercial purpose. The link above speculates that the concern from the SEC is more aimed at someone streaming video from one of the games, competing with broadcast rights that have already been sold.

Smart move by the SEC. The all-out ban on something that you don't necessarily understand typically does more harm than good. And, it seems to me, there is an opportunity here. The conference should Tweet near-continuous updates on the game for those who want it. For football update after each play. For basketball, same thing. Beat someone to the punch.

I have never been a fan of the Cash for Clunkers program. It's been sold as an air quality program when its real purpose was to serve as a stimulus for the auto industry. Well, Shikha Dalmia, crunched some numbers and it turns out that the program doesn't do much for air quality and isn't much of a stimulus for the auto industry either.

We complain about reality television in the US, but so far nobody here has gone as far as a Brazilian TV host.

Police say the host of a show focused on crime in western Brazil ordered five murders. Police say that show host, Wallace Souza, a lawmaker who denounced crime during the program, was dealing drugs and using the show to eliminate his rivals. Authorities became suspicious when reporters for the show were repeatedly the first to the scene of killings.

As much as it pains me, I am going to put up a link to a story on a site called treehugger.com.

Here it is.

Germany's Cash for Clunkers program has been just as popular as the US program. The big difference is that the cars deemed clunkers in Germany aren't actually being taken off the road. Instead, thieves are stealing them and taking them overseas and putting them back on the streets, negating whatever environmental benefit trading the car in might have had.

The big problem is the German legislation didn't require the so-called clunkers be destroyed like we do here. Instead, the Germans just had them taken to a junkyard and that's where 50,000 clunkers have gone missing. And not all of them are going overseas. Some are even being put back on German roads.

The Marines have banned the use of Facebook, Twitter and MySpace on its networks. The ban begins immediately and this is a move being considered by other branches of service.

Officials are citing security concerns with social networking sites for the ban. It's a move that I understand and is only supposed to last for a year. It will also be lifted if it's use is considered "mission critical." But as the people at Wired's Danger Room point out, the ban comes at an odd time.

Yet many within the Pentagon's highest ranks find value in the Web 2.0 tools. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has 4,000 followers on Twitter. The Department of Defense is getting ready to unveil a new home page, packed with social media tools. The Army recently ordered all U.S. bases to provide access to Facebook. Top generals now blog from the battlefield.

The folks over in Fort Worth who run Radio Shack announced yesterday that they would launch a rebranding of their company that they hope will update their image. They are going to be calling themselves The Shack from here on out.

My family has a history of buying Radio Shack products. My first computer was an old TRS-80 and we subscribed to Rainbow magazine, the official magazine of the TRS-80.

I am saying that to establish that I do like the company. I like the stores. But do you really want to call something "The Shack" and then tout it as the place to come get electronics and accessories. I don't know that as a consumer I would want to shop at someplace that associates itself with a thrown together shelter.

So far I've seen the media go with the labels "Beerplomacy," "The Audacity of Hops," and "Ale to the chief." Are there other labels that I am missing?

The New York Times is reporting that Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz are on the list of baseball players who tested positive in 2003 for using performance enhancing drugs.

That was the first year that baseball tested for PEDs. The tests were only of 100 players and the results were supposed to remain anonymous, but so far the names of fivestars have been leaked by "lawyers familiar with the list." Alex Rodriguez's and Barry Bond's names came out in February. Sammy Sosa's name in June.

These are five big names that have been tied to this list. Isn't it time for baseball and the players' union to agree to release the list? Wouldn't they both be better off if everyone whose name in on the list as testing positive is revealed all at once instead of dragging this out?

This is an interesting question raised by the folks over at BoingBoing, and prompted by a letter from four senators to the head of the FCC. They ask whether it's fair to consumers that phone manufacturers can enter into exclusive contracts with certain cellular providers.

I am as torn as the BoingBoing poster. I can see why it would be cost prohibitive for someone like Apple to make an iPhone that will work with the different infrastructures of the different carriers. But it's also a bit unfair for the smaller providers in rural areas to not be able to offer the iPhone.

I am curious what others think. Also, I am sure that the answer is findable on the web, but why don't we have a standard cellular infrastructure in this country? Seems like that would solve this problem, at least on one level. Or eliminate one argument.

Reason No. 4,385,965 for Michael to hate baseball, the New York Times is reporting that Sammy Sosa may hae tested positive for steroids in 2003.

I have MSNBC on in the office and just now one of the hosts asked a Democrat talking head if Obama should do what some on the left are calling for and shove some policies down the Republican's throats since, well, he has the votes to do it.

The talking head's response was, "Of course. This president has a chance to build a coalition ...."

Because, you know, what better way to build a coalition than by forcing policies down the throats of the party not in power.

Not to mimic my headline, but the House is expected to pass a tobacco bill today that would allow the Food and Drug Administration to ban tobacco ingredients deemed dangerous to health, prohibit use of candied and flavored cigarettes and prohibit use of words such as "mild" or "light" that may give someone the impression that the product is somehow safer.

Democrats, including the president, are happy, saying that the bill will finally allow the FDA to start taking steps to regulate tobacco.

Considering this and the recent moves to ban smoking in public places, what is the future of tobacco and smoking in this country? Where will the industry and the habit be in, say, 10 years? 20 years?

On this day in 1949 George Orwell's novel 1984 was published, putting the phrases "Thought police" and, obviously, "Big Brother" into the common vernacular.

It was confirmed yesterday that Dirk Nowitzki's girlfriend is, indeed, pregnant.

Following all the stories, I find myself feeling sorry for the Mavs' big man. Everything we have found out about this woman points to Dirk being taken by a grifter. She went out to land her big fish and hooked one with Dirk. But I wonder, how much more do we need to know? Is it time for this story to go away? I would guess Dirk's answer is yes.

Major League Baseball and Dodger's outfielder Manny Ramirez have made one final push to force Michael Landauer away from the game altogether.

The Dodger's outfielder has been suspended for 50 games after he tested positive for a substance banned by baseball. According to ESPN the drug in question in hCG, a substance I've never heard of.

However, two sources told ESPN's T.J. Quinn and Mark Fainaru-Wada that the drug used by Ramirez is hCG -- human chorionic gonadotropin. HCG is a women's fertility drug typically used by steroid users to restart their body's natural testosterone production as they come off a steroid cycle.

So, it's not steroids but its use looks awful suspicious. Manny claims that the drug was given to him by a doctor for a personal medical issue. If it's really about fertility, here's wishing him luck in conceiving.

I read an interesting blog post about some remarks regarding privacy by Justice Scalia. It's not long but complicated and I am assuredly going to do a lousy job of summarizing it here. Read it if this sort of thing interests you.

Essentially, Scalia was arguing that it is unreasonable to expect every single bit of our lives to be private.

A professor took what Scalia said and used it as a challenge for his students -- find any public information about Justice Scalia and compile it into a dossier. At the end of the semester the students had a dossier that includes the justice's home address, his home phone number, the movies he likes, his food preferences, his wife's personal e-mail address, and photos of his lovely grandchildren.

Responding to the student's work, Scalia said that he stood by his original statement.

That raises the question of data aggregation. Sure, none of the information gathered on Scalia -- or that same info gathered on us with grocery store savings cards Internet cookies -- by itself needs to be private. But when you put it all together in one place you get an awfully intimate picture about someone and his or her life.

So, all of that to ask today's question, what about us should remain private? Where do we draw the line on public information and private information?

See that @ symbol in the headline above you? See the one in Sharon's headline below this post? Well, if not for an Italian businessman almost 500 years ago that little bit of shorthand may still be locked away in a monastery somewhere.

UPDATE: That link actually leads somewhere now. Sorry about that.

We had a nice little discussion yesterday on the effectiveness of medical masks fighting things like the swine flu. Well, if you were inclined to be safe rather than sorry and get yourself a nice little stockpile of them, you better make it quick. CNBC is reporting that allegromedical.com sold more than $40,000 of them yesterday alone.

I am just wondering if anyone else is a little tired of seeing the president in prime time.
Today my wife asked me why Obama was going to be on TV again and I couldn't give her a good reason. The only thing I have heard is that he is speaking to mark his first 100 days in office, a made up marker that our own Carl Leubsdorf says tells us more about a president's style than ultimate record.
I haven't been keeping a running tally, but this is at least his third prime-time interruption. Combine that with the daily briefings after he was elected but before he was sworn in, and I think Obama could be running the risk of over exposure.
After all, people will only allow you to delay America Idol so many times before they start holding it against you. I don't know, could just be me.

The Pacific Gas and Electric company in California is exploring a satellite that would generate solar energy in space, beam the energy back to a receiver in Fresno, then convert that to electricity its customers can use.
The company acknowledges that going into space will present some challenges, but says its worth it.

Why would anyone choose so challenging a locale to generate electricity? For one, the solar energy available in space is eight-to-ten times greater than on earth. There's no atmospheric or cloud interference, no loss of sun at night, and no seasons. That means space solar can be a baseload resource, not an intermittent source of power.

PG&E is working with Solaren to make this happen. Solaren is a company made up of satellite engineers and scientists, primarily from the U.S. Air Force and Hughes Aircraft Company. So, they've got the smarts to make this work.

You can read more on PG&E's blog.

Philadelphia Phillies broadcaster Harry Kalas has died. He collapsed before the Phillies' game today. His voice was memorable, but not necessarily for broadcasting the Phillies' games. He was also the voice of NFL Films. As big a baseball fan as I am, it's from the NFL Films that I know Kalas.

Click this link to hear him call the final strike of the 2008 World Series. I am sure you'll recognize the voice.

There was an interesting story in The New York Times on breakthroughs by neuroscientists in eliminating memories. The simplified process is this: add a chemical called ZIP to a specific part of your brain and the connectors needed to retain a certain memory are eliminated. The doctors and scientists working on this say that it could do wonders for people with post-traumatic stress, addictions, phobias and memory loss. The story really is fascinating and worth a read.
A Wired magazine reporter talked to an ethicist about all of the potential unforeseen consequences, one being small, false memories could be created. This is worth a few minutes to read too.
So the question is, if our ability to erase memories gets so precise that we can target specific memories, would you want to have any memories erased? I am not looking for details of the memories, just whether or not you'd want to have the procedure done.

We had a miss in last week's print product to the Rangers for getting rid of the manual scoreboard in left field. I didn't mind seeing it go and after seeing the new scoreboard live I have to say Rangers 1, Editorial Board 0. The new board is so much better than the old one.
It doesn't look like I was expecting it to, but it gives more information than the old board. You get not just the score and inning but who is pitching, number of outs, and whether any men are on base.
Good job, Chuck Morgan and the Rangers in-stadium entertainment team. It's a hit from me.

The Exxon Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of crude oil along Alaska's coastline 20 years ago today. This short history ranks this among the worst man-made disasters ever. I'll leave it to them to throw around those kinds of claims, but it would be hard to argue.
What I didn't realize is that there is an estimated 26,000 gallons of crude still contaminating the coast.

Saw something on one of the morning news shows, Good Morning America I think, that was showing foreign investors coming to America and buying our foreclosed homes at auctions. Some weren't even coming here and doing it. They were just looking at listings online and deciding to buy.
The bargain-hunters weren't just foreigners either. The reporter spoke to a man who was hoping to purchase 100 homes by the end of the year. I think he was in California. He was buying $350,000 homes for $55,000. The host of the show was amazed at that number and said that one expert she'd read said that it was a sign that the housing market was on its way back up when the investors were buying again.
All of that is a long-winded way for me to get at a question that the story sparked in me.
If the market is significantly better in the next couple of months, who gets the credit? Is it Obama or Bush? Or will they share it?

Here's an interesting story from the BBC on a community of people in Japan who are one step away from being homeless. They spend $500 a month for what is essentially a closet in the back of a cyber cafe. That's what they call home. They are called cyber drifters and I can't even imagine living like that.

Over on our opinion home page we have a link to a list from The Daily Beast on the top 5 economic scapegoats.

It's human nature to want to lay the blame at someone's feet. David Rushkoff says that we should be looking to the feudal lords of 14th century England

So, who do you blame?

Lots of hubbub over Limbaugh speaking at CPAC. There are several stories linked on our opinion front. Our topic of the day is even on the subject. There is an interesting piece over at Newsweek about why we the media continues to turn to the same self-confident, loud mouths over and over when trying to get predictions, and why those pundits are so often wrong.

It has something to do with foxes and hedgehogs and cognitive abilities. I kept trying to find the best bits to cut and paste here but the piece is so short that I found myself pasting nearly the entire thing. So instead of doing that, here's the link. Go read it for yourself. It's worth the couple of minutes it will take.

This Yahoo story lists 15 companies that could either fold or be significantly smaller by the end of 2009. Two companies with local entertainment ties are listed: Six Flags and Blockbuster. And don't try to bury your sorrows in a Krispy Kremes. They made the list too.

We had an interesting story in this weekend's Points section about the popularity of Facebook. The argument made is that if you aren't on Facebook now, you should be. I talked about the story at lunch with my in-laws yesterday and my wife says that her father now wants an account.
So, the question today is an easy one. Are you on Facebook? If yes, then why did you join? If no, then what's keeping you form signing up?

It's two weeks until the inauguration so let's have a hypothetical. You are on a rope line waiting for the chance to shake hands with the president-elect. Obama is working his way through the crowd and stops when he gets to you. He looks you dead in the eye and asks, "Any advice?" You've only got time to get out a sentence or two before Secret Service moves him along. So, what do you say? What advice do you have for Obama as he starts his first term?
My advice: Don't try to be everything to everyone.

Maybe it's only because (to the best of my knowlege) Laura and George Bush never scoped out Rockwall County for their post-presidential home, but I haven't been able to work up a huge interest in this story. Judging by the hubbub that ensues when the First Family dines in Dallas, much less lives here, I'm glad that my hangouts and theirs don't mix .

None of the crowd that I run with lives in Preston Hollow, so I'm unlikely to get any first-hand reports either. But here's one from dallasnews.com.

Word comes today of another giant corporation getting government money to stay afloat -- $300 billion to Citigroup. The argument is that Citi is just too big to fail, the same ambiguous reason we have heard before.
But what does that mean? That's the question for today. Is something too big to fail because has tentacles that reach into all areas of the economy? That seems to be the reasoning with giving money to Citigroup. If it fails it's the first domino in a chain. But can't the same argument be made for the auto industry? If they fail then suppliers could fail. Dominoes.
So what does it mean to say something is too big to fail?
For me, I am at the point where there is no such thing. I think that the economic collapse would be better for us in the long run than trying to prop up something that seems so screwed up.

ABC has been showing shots of the crowd in Times Square and there are some people holding up a huge sign that, I am almost certain, says cassoulet. Wikipedia says a cassoulet is a rich, slow-cooked bean stew or casserole originating in the southwest of France. That may well be the most confusing sign I have ever seen anywhere. Or it's just a final example of the elitism of the Obama campaign. I haven't decided.

... if anyone's counting.

I've been waiting to tally the last big newspaper endorsement, and the El Paso Times finally weighed in over the weekend with a nod for John McCain. It was a notable edit for its relative tardiness (early voting was over with) and for this characterization of Barack Obama:

He often sounds more like Venezuelan despot Hugo Chavez than a U.S. presidential candidate. What's down the road, nationalization of oil companies, health -care providers and more?

Whew! At least our newspaper gave Mr. O respect in our recommendation editorial of John McCain.

The El Paso endorsement rounds out the list of Texas' biggest papers. Here is the list as updated Friday by Editor and Publisher (The "B" and "K" designations reflect whether the paper went Bush or Kerry in 2004):

Texas papers for McCain

Amarillo Globe-News (B): 44,764
The Beaumont Enterprise (B): 45,684
Corpus Christi Caller-Times (K): 53,368
The Dallas Morning News (B): 368,313
The Galveston County Daily News: 26,933
Kerrville Daily Times: 8,971
Lubbock Avalanche-Journal (B): 49,094
New Braunfels Herald-Zeitung: 8,599
San Antonio Express-News (B): 225,447
Tyler Morning Telegraph: 35,598
Wichita Falls Times Record News (N): 28,888

Texas paper for Obama

Austin American-Statesman (B): 170,309
The Eagle (Bryan-College Station): 21,654
Fort Worth Star-Telegram (B): 207,045
Houston Chronicle (B): 494,131
Longview News-Journal (K): 27,590
The Lufkin Daily News (K): 12,225
San Angelo Standard-Times: 24,919

Make of it what you wish, but McCain was stronger close to the border, with El Paso, Corpus and San Antonio. (The Valley newspapers don't endorse). He also got Midland (Odessa doesn't endorse) but not San Angelo.

This just in: I had the feeling of a gaping hole in the above lists, then found it -- Waco. So I went to the Tribune Herald's website and found that paper's endorsement editorial. This, sadly, is an excerpt from what I found:

So, after long, even painful, deliberation, we have decided to side with neither Barack Obama nor John McCain. But we do have something important to recommend. We recommend believing that our democratic process -- however turbulent, however flawed -- will reflect a collective wisdom of the electorate.

Could there be a worse sin on the opinion page than providing no opinion?

Nothing drives me more crazy than to hear a politician refer to whatever the current election is as "the most important election in our history." We heard it in 2004 and in 2000 and we'll hear it again in 2012. Most of the time, however, it's not the most important election. That's a label that can only go to one election, so help me out history buffs. What eelction shoudl get that label? What truly was " the most important election in our history?"

I spent about 10 minutes last night watching Obama's paid ad before I gave up. It was just a prettied-up version of his stump speech and debate talking points. I was hoping for specifics. For something like Ross Perot in 1992 -- bar graphs and explanations on why we needed to do things Obama's way.
But I wonder if last night changed anything? Did it help? Did it hurt, like some were speculating? Should I have stuck around until the end?

I am going to admit here something I admitted to Sharon walking in today. The debates bore me. I learn very little new. Neither cnadidate leaves his stump speech in the car. Obama is playing it safe, as he should. He's the one with something to lose. He's ahead in the polls and only needs to be safe with his answers. He'll keep his support.
The problem for McCain is that he's also playing it safe, and that's the last thing he needs to do. McCain needs a game changer, something that is going to shake this thing up and make people take a second look. He had one with Palin. He needs another. Whether it comes in the debates or on the trail, he has to do something to move the very small number fo undecided voters into his camp. But what is it that he does? What is his game changer?

Is it unAmerican for me to say that I may be reaching a saturation point with the coverage on NBC (and its family of networks) of US swimmer Michael Phelps? Don't get me wrong. I am rooting for him to win every gold medal he can, and I know my wife and I will be cheering him on in every race. But last night during the medal presentation for the relay team that had just come from behind to win gold, the focus was constnatly on Phelps. That's great, but it's the other three guys I wanted to see. I wanted to get their reactions to winning gold. So, is it just me that's tiring of the Micahel Phelps coverage? Or, to broaden it, are you already tired of the Olympics in general?

Today's topic of the day is easy. What'd you think of what Obama said in Berlin?

This story is up on our site now. A Rhode Island man had a blood alcohol level of.491. That's more than six times the legal limit. I wanted to post some comment about prohibition just to get the folks commenting on my drug posting yesterday all riled up. Sadly, I can think of nothing. I am just amazed that someone can have a blood-alcohol level that's that high.
The headline says that this is a new state record in Rhode Island so maybe I should just offer my congratulations.

We had an interesting column on our Viewpoints page today by Dallas DEA agent James Capra. He argued that legalizing marijuana doesn't make us safer. He was responding to a column by Joy Strickland that you can read here.
I found myself on the wrong side of several readers a few months ago when I took a position similar to Mr. Capra's. I am curious what others thought of his arguments. I found them pretty convincing myself.

Sorry for the belated posting of the Topic of the Day.
In yesterday's staff meeting we were discussing the fundamental changes people would be making because of higher oil prices and we decided to write something that encourgaed the city of Dallas to start making plans through zoning and other ways for people to move closer to the city's core. The idea being that higher gas prices and more costly commutes are going to force people to move from their suburbs and farther out neighborhoods back toward downtown and their jobs. That means there would be a need for not only improved city services but also businesses to cater to those new residents.
I have no problem encourgaing the city of Dallas to start planning for this possibility, but I really belive it's farther off than some in the meeting seemed to think. Seems to me there are a lot of steps that people will take to save money before they go to the trouble and expense of moving their families from their homes to save a couple of dollars a gallon on gas.
So, the question for today is what is the first fundamental change you plan on making to your life, or see the possibility of making, because of gas prices? And I am not talking about taking the train or deciding to get in on the park and ride. I am talkng about changing jobs, moving, that kind of thing.

John Edwards has taken quite the stand and decided to give his support to Barack Obama. Hope Sen. Edwards isn't lonesome out there all by himself.

If things go like everyone expects Hillary Clinton will be thanking the people of West Virginia tonight for a convincing win in their primary. This is even though all of the talking heads on TV say that she is in the middle of her swan song. This is even though Time magazine has a cover with Obama's picture and the headline "And the winner is ..." So, let's pretend for a moment that you are a Hillary Clinton staffer and I am the candidate. Tell me why, after a big win in West Virginia, it's still time for me to drop out. I want to hear your most convincing argument.

I don't know that I can do anyhting but scratch my head at this video linked to on our home page. Why anyone would think this dress is appropriate to wear to a prom, or really in public, is beyond me.

The only news flash here is that I actually turned on our television last night, a first (not counting college basketball) in probably a year. I had a rare night home alone and noted that KERA was rerunning an American Experience segment on my hero, Eleanor Roosevelt. So I tuned in (no small feat for this remote-moron). And sat there spellbound for more than two hours.

Perhaps this biography was even more moving to me in this particular week, a week I believe was historic in terms of Barack Obama's attempt to move the racial discussion to a meaningful, honest place.

But I'm never ceased to be dumbfounded by Mrs. Roosevelt's courage and totally-out-of-bounds-for-the-times efforts to make this country one where all people were treated equally.

The relentless drum she pounded about all our country's outrage over Hitler's atrocities while at the same time turning a blind eye to our own atrocities toward blacks is a message too often forgotten as we look back smugly at our WWII victory. And her work after she was no longer First Lady -- and after Eisenhower took over and she no longer even held her UN position (a Truman appointment) -- was equally courageous.

This Easter Sunday, as we roil about in racial discord, I'd encourage everyone to include this in your day. It is the story of how in 1939, after Marian Anderson was denied the right to sing in Constitution Hall by the Daughters of the American Revolution, Mrs. Roosevelt personally arranged for her to sing at the Lincoln Memorial. If the footage from that concert doesn't bring tears to your eyes, you need a new heart.

A lesser-known story is how, at age 74, Eleanor defied death threats from the Ku Klux Klan and drove without security to a civil rights workshop at Highlander Folk School in Tennessee.

The FBI files on Mrs.Roosevelt alone make me glad to count her as my hero.

Getting ready for work this morning the folks on TV kept telling me that today was the next Black Monday. Overseas markets were down. Banks were being bailed out. It was going to be a dark day on Wall Street. And, for at least an hour or so the experts were right. Looking at the markets now the dow is almost 15 points in the black.

We seemed to be a pretty split board in our meeting today when talking about what the Democrats should do about the Florida and Michigan delegates. A few thought the states should pay for new elections. A few thought it should be the parties. A couple even thought nothing should happen since the states knew going in their delegates wouldn't count.
The only thing we all seemed to agree on was that the delegates Hillary won in the initial contests shouldn't be seated.
I was in the camp that new elections shouldn't be held. The states gambled and lost. You don't get a do-over.
So, this really isn't so much of a question, just a chance to continue the discussion we were having in the meeting. It seemed, to me, to get cut short because of time.

Ralph Nader wastes no time in naming his running mate, a man named Matt Gonzalez. He just listed this man's accomplishments and politically the most he's done is serve at the city board in San Francisco.

Yes, it's Valentine's Day.
Yes, it's Rod's birthday.
But today is also the day that pitchers and catchers report to Spring Trainging.

Not sure how many folks are interested, but the Houston Chronicle's baseball guru Richard Justice is live-blogging the Roger Clemens hearing.

MSNBC/ Associated Press/Reuters are reporting that Mitt Romney is suspending his campaign or dropping out of the presidential race. That surprises me a bit, especially after his speech the other night.
I asked this the other night, but where do his supporters go? I would have to think this means good things for Huckabee.

MSNBC just called California for Hillary. Big win for her. Right now she has a more than 20 point lead on Obabma. That could narrow later. If it does that would be better news for Obama since they get to split the delegates. Won't know who gets what until all of the votes are in and they work the formulas to figure out what goes where.
McCain just got the call also. Big score for him since he gets all of those delegates. Romney now becomes an afterthought.

And then you have Obama who just has an ease at the podiium. He looks natural up there.

He is reminding me of a non-actor delivering a monologue on Saturday Night Live.

I may be the only person left blogging, but Romney just grabbed another win tonight -- the Minnesota caucus. Chin up, Mitt! All is not lost. Now start praying for a winin California.

So, like Michael said, Romney is tonight's big loser. Mitt says he won't quit. Assuming that some of his supporters want to get off what appears to be a sinking ship, where do they go?
The folks rallying around him seem to be the "true" conservatives. The voters who liked Reagan and Thompson. Those folks seem to dislike Huckabee and McCain equally, but which one would get their support?

Huckabee just made a David/Goliath reference and decalred that he was one of the two men left in the GOP's two-man race. That's some confidence. I will echo Rod. I don't think that he ends up the nominee or stays in the race to the end. Still, I like to see him hanging tough tonight, even if he is winning where he should.

If I don't hear John McCain say "I enlisted as a foot soldier in the Reagan Revolution" one more time I'll be a happy guy.

I am stealing Tucker Carlson's point. Mike Huckabee can conceivably win five states tonight, meaning that he may come out of Super Tuesday with more delegates than Mitt Romney. What would that do to his buddy-buddy relationship that he's had the last week with John McCain? Seems that it was accetped that he was now campaigning to be McCain's running mate. What happens if he comes out of Super Tuesday with more delegates that he had expected to? Does that mean he gets a little tougher on McCain?

MSNBC just called Alabama for Huckabee even though he's 5% behind McCain right now with 10 percent of the actual vote in.

Just flipped over to ABC from MSNBC and am greeted by Diane Sawyer. Why is she in one of the anchor chairs? She lost serious news cred, at least with me, when she started doing Good Morning America. I've seen her do too many fluff celeb interviews and feel-good pieces to take her seriously. Oddly, that's where Charlie Gibson used to be and I don't feel the same about him. Is that some sort of sexism on my part?

With Obama's Georgia win and Huckabee getting the vote in West Virginia, the guys we recommended are 2 for 2 tonight. Good way to start.

Just a quick note for the silent masses who may be checking in with us before leaving work. We will be live blogging tonight as results come in from Super Tuesday primaries. Don't forget to check in with us when you get home. Should be fun. And if it's not, don't blame me. I'm one of a small crew that has to work the night shift so we can opine on the results for tomorrow's newspaper.

Not sure where I've been, but Texas is getting new license plates. We get a chance to vote on what the new ones will look like. You can do that here. My choice is very far behind. It's the New Texas plate. I like it for the composite skyline across the bottom. Looks to me like it includes the downtowns from Texas' largest cities.

Nancy Cartwright, the woman who is the voice of Bart Simpson, donated $10 million to Scientlology last year. That earned her some big award. The report I saw on this said that the $10 million was close to two times her annual salary. The woman who voices Bart Simpson makes roughly $5 million a year? Really?

Nicole and I were talking last night and I asked for ehr opinion on why some candidates refuse to drop out of the race. Watching Florida returns Tuesday I noticed that Duncan Hunter recevied 0 percent of the vote. That was 1 percent less than Fred Thompson who had dropped out after South Carolina. Granted, Thompsons votes could have come through early voting. Still, why hasn't Hunter dropped out yet? I understand that some candidates stick around so they can have a national platform for their issues. You can argue tha that is why Ron Paul is still around, even though he's getting zero press coverage. But why do candidates like Duncan Hunter not drop out? He has no issue that he's pushing. At least not that I know of. He's just a Republican.

Sharon and I went to lunch yesterday and were discussing what motivates people to back a presidential candidate. We both decided that it was a gut thing more than any other factor. People don't necessarily make their decision based on proposed policies, but who makes them feel the best. It's emotional.
For me, it's someone who can speak well. I am willing to overlook a few political differences if someone can put a sentence together and inspire me. Ronald Reagan did that. I never supported Bill Clinton, too many political differences, but he could do it too.
This time around it's Mike Huckabee and Barack Obama. I don't agree with Huckabee on everything but I like to hear him give a speech. I agree with Obama on even less, but the same thing is true. And I think it's why you are starting to see moderate Republicans cast their lot with him.
So, my question for today is: What makes you choose a candidate? Is it your heart or your head?

Just saw this story online. Time Warner is going to test a pay-for-usage plan for its high-speed Internet subscribers. Reminds me of the days of the early 1990s and paying by the hour for AOL.
Company officials say that most users won't see much change in their bill. It's only the heavy users who will see higher prices. This stat surprised me.

The company believes the billing system will impact only heavy users, who account for around 5 percent of all customers but typically use more than half of the total network bandwidth, according to a company spokesman.

Going over cartoons for tomorrow's editorial page, Sharon and I ran across one that compared McCain to Bob Dole and I commented to Sharon that was the thing I most think about when I consider a McCain candidacy.
I was in college in 1996 when Bob Dole was the Republican nominee. Comparing him to a younger Bill Clinton, Dole seemed too old and too tired and cranky to be president.
What are the chances that if McCain is the nominee against a younger and fresher Obama, or even a Hillary, he gives off and suffers from the same impression?

This story in today's newspaper interested me. I have had opportunity recently to spend a little time in the central library downtown and was shocked when my fiancee told me that there was a man looking at some very graphic stuff on one of the computers in the middle of the room.
The story says that the library is hesitant to put filters on the computers to keep the dirty stuff out. Apparently filters can restrict access to porn but also to web site with information on breast cancer and classical works of art. Really? We are in 2008 and we can't fine tune the Internet filters enough that they would recognize the beneficial sites from the others?

NBC News just called it for Hillary. I think it's safe to say that none of the crew still at the office thought that the Democrats was the race we'd be waiting on tonight.

McCain is giving what may be the most uninspiring victory speech I have ever heard. He's reading it and doing it in a near monotone. Stumbling over words. Here at the end when his voice should be swelling it's unchanged from what it was at the beginning. Terribly uninspiring. If I were a supporter I'd have to ask myself why.

The New Republic has an interesting story on Ron Paul's background and his history of publishing newsletters filled with some very inappropriate racial comments.

The article does say it's unclear whether or not the candidate wrote the pieces, but that they were all published in newsletters either bearing Ron Paul's name or by companies he was a part of.

Since Paul and I subscribe to different brands of conservatism I have never taken the time to look into his background, but the stuff in this article was shocking to me. Worth a read.

Last week Colleen asked for everyone's opinion on who is going to win in Iowa. I won't ask that again. I will, however, ask when everyone thinks we will know the nominees for each party.

On our front page today Wayne Slater says that the accelerated primary schedule makes the March 4 Texas primary meaningless. So, what say you? Agree? Disagree? Will each party have its nominee decided two months from now? If so, by what point will the nominees be known?

Comes out today that Six Flags' parent company is applying for a permit to sell beer at both Six Flags and Hurricane Harbor. I remember this idea coming up years ago. Seems like a bad idea to me, but only because it's probably not the smartest thing to fill folks with a gut full of suds then spin them round and round on some of those rides.

Just listened to Mitt Romney down in College Station. What he said seemed very generic. I was hoping he would do what he promised at the beginning of the speech and tell us how his religion would influence a Romney presidency. I never heard him do that.

Another thing I never heard him say was Mormon. I don't think he ever used the word. Interesting.

The preisdent is about to start his end-of-term Middle East summit. The question for today is pretty simple. Is this whole effort a waste of time? Presidents have tried for years to bring peace to the Middle East. Is it something that is even possible?

The National Right to Life Council is backing Fred Thompson for president. Judging by the headline they put on their own press release (National Right to Life shakes up race for Republican presidential nomination) this is a big deal. I'd be curious what others thought. Poll numbers on some of the morning shows this Sunday had Thompson in the single digits in Iowa and New Hampshire. Will this endorsement make a difference? Will it start uniting evangelicals around Thompson?

They just reported on CNN that Ron Paul is going to have to return a small protion of the record-breaking money he raised recently since the donations came from overseas thieves who used stolen credit cards to make the donations. They were just wanting to verify that the numbers would work.

I don't think Robertson's endorsement will matter much to Rudy one way or the other.

I am one of the folks Bill described. I find Robertson loopy. He's an attention hound, and the attention he's been receiving lately has been very weird. The last thing I remember about him in the media was when he came out claiming to be able to lift hundreds and hundreds of pounds with his legs because fo some energy drink he had developed. Weird.

I'd argue that Robertson is irrelevant to most evangelicals. I agree that Rudy would be better served to get endorsements from the Rick Warrens or Bill Hybels of the world, but, from what little I know of those men, they aren't political like the old-guard evangelical leaders are. Or, they aren't as openly political. Honestly, it's one of the more refreshing things about the up and coming evangelical leaders. Their lack of politicalness gives them more relevance.They won't be as easily written off by the opposing side as right-wing Christian nuts.

I think it's safe to say, judging from yesterday's predicitons, that the results in the Trinity vote were a surprise to most of us.
Angela Hunt and her team forced the mayor to put his focus on the Trinity. So, the question for today, is where should that focus go now? What should be the next initiative or project the mayor focuses on?