Government

I’m speechless. I don’t think I even know how to process this anymore.

One of the big topics that came up on the panel I was on today at the DNC was the issue surrounding the labor supply in the US in computer science and IT. There is a growing shortage of software engineers in the US that is getting worse as every year passes. I’ve talked about this in the past as my main motivation for being involved in the National Center for Women & Information Technology as one of the ways to build the long term labor pipeline is to encourage more women and girls to get involved in careers in computer science and IT. ...

I’m having my half day DNC experience this morning. At 10am I’m on a panel creatively titled 2008 Technology Roundtable*.* It’s limited attendee (200 people at the Ricketson Theater) but appears to being broadcast live on the web . It’s an interesting experience. I really didn’t want to deal with the traffic and people around the DNC, especially after running a marathon this weekend (and still being in a recovery phase), so I took advantage of my early wake up time and drove to downtown Boulder around 6:30. I’m now sitting all alone in the breakfast room (green room equivalent) waiting for them to pull together the coffee service. It’s kind of tranquil in a weird way. ...

I have no idea where this joke came from, but I couldn’t resist posting it because it combined Alaska, Massachusetts, Democrats, Republicans, Guns, the Pope, and a Grizzly Bear. The Pope took a couple of days off to visit the rugged mountains of Alaska for some sightseeing. He was cruising along the campground in the PopeMobile when there was a frantic commotion just at the edge of the woods. A helpless Democrat, wearing sandals, shorts, a ‘Save the Whales’ hat and a ‘To Hell with Bush’ T-shirt, was screaming while struggling frantically and thrashing around trying to free himself from the grasp of a 10-foot grizzly. ...

My Sunday morning online scan of the New York Times turned up an awesome Op-Ed by Frank Rich titled It’s the Economic Stupidity, Stupid . It’s a scathing (er – “fucking brutal”) criticism of McCain and his total lack of understanding of “the economy”, how it actually works, and what he would do about it were he to be president. While Rich takes a few cheap shots (hey – it wouldn’t be a political Op-Ed without some gratuitous things) I think it’s right on the money. ...

I’m a huge believer in land conservation. I believe one of the best ways to protect our environment is to take wide swaths of land permanently out of circulation. I was delighted to read an article Amy forwarded me from the New York Times today titled Deal Is Struck in Montana to Preserve Forest Areas . The Nature Conservancy and the Trust for Public Land have put together a deal to pay $510 million to buy about 500 square miles of forest currently owned by Plum Creek Timber. Half of the money will come from private donations; the other half will come from a new tax-credit bond mechanism that was recently passed. I’m delighted our government is spending – via a tax-credit bond – $250 million on land conservation. I’d like to allocate 50% of my taxes next year to stuff like that. ...

I don’t write much about politics on this blog. Like father, like son – politicians (and politics) give me a headache. However, I love to pimp my father’s blog and he’s got a great post up today titled John McCain Describes His Health Plan; In Reality A Non Health Plan . For the past few months, my dad – a retired endocrinologist and now healthcare pundit – has been inspecting, dissecting, and commenting on what the various presidential candidates have been saying about healthcare. He’s got plenty of stuff on Obama, Clinton, and McCain. It’s a compendium of uniformly dismal, sad, and disappointing non-solutions. ...

From the WSJ : The Clintons had gross income of $109 million for 2000-2007, newly released tax documents show. President Clinton made $51.8 million speeches over eight years and $29.6 million in book income, while Hillary Clinton made $10.5 million in book income. The Clintons paid $33.8 million in taxes between 2000-2007, or 31% of adjusted gross income, and gave $10.26 million to charity over eight years. Nice tax bill.

I’ve never really understood the primary process – especially for superdelegates . That shouldn’t be surprising since there are a lot of things about politics that I don’t really understand – like why “one person, one vote” doesn’t actually equate to a democracy (or maybe it does, just not the way we run one around here.) I just got an email that a friend of mine – Rick Klau (FeedBurner – now at Google) has put up a great site called SuperDelegates.org which keeps track off all the Democratic superdelegate stuff. It’s very cool and based on MediaWiki so you can edit it. ...

Katherine McIntyre has a scathing post up describing her experience at the Colorado Democratic primary caucus . I think the caucus, primary process, and superdelegate thing is idiotic, a gigantic waste of economic resources, and about as far from a representative democracy as you can get and still be in a democracy. All that said, I’m still proud to be an American and love that we have a democratic political process. I just wish it started in August, finished in November, and was “whoever gets the most votes wins.” ...