A Progressive on the Prairie

Search Warrants for Web-Based E-mail Accounts

Of all the constitutional guarantees, one most Americans are familiar with is the Fourth Amendment. In its entirety, it states, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." But that protection may not entirely apply to Web-based e-mail, a federal judge in Oregon has ruled.

The case involved a Gmail account and another web-based email account and whether the government can simply issue a search warrant to the internet service provider without notifying the e-mail account users. U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman said the Fourth Amendment provides protection "for homes and the items within them in the physical world." But when a person is using a web-based e-mail provider, "the user’s actions are no longer in his or her physical home; in fact he or she is not truly acting in private space at all," Mosman wrote. Instead, users voluntarily convey and expose their e-mail to a third party, which becomes the holder of the information. As the holder, it was enough for the government to serve it with the search warrant in the context of the particular case.

That wasn't the judge's entire rationale. Mosman pointed out that Gmail's privacy policy, like those of most internet service providers, says Google can share a user's personal information if it has a "good faith belief" that disclosure is "reasonably necessary" to satisfy legal process or an enforceable governmental request. That means, according to Mosmon, that Gmail users "are, or should be, aware that their personal information and the contents of their online communications ... can be shared with the government under the appropriate circumstances. ... Some people seem to think that they are as private as letters, phone calls, or journal entries. The blunt fact is, they are not."

The potential impact of the ruling could be vast. Look at Google alone. It allows you to store not only e-mail but documents and your personal calendar. Flickr, Facebook and the like all allow online storage of photos. Thus, once again, we confront the interplay of our lives in cyberspace and the real world and whether the former entitled to the same protections.

(Comments welcome at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Bloggers Back in Senate Shield law Proposal

You may recall I wrote last month about how a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee amendment to legislation creating a federal "reporters privilege" appeared to require that a person work for the mainstream media, thereby excluding most bloggers. Now it appears the committee will do a near complete reversal.

Sens. Charles Schumer (D.-N.Y.) and Arlen Specter (D.-Pa.) both announced yesterday an agreement with the White House over national security concerns the White Houses said the "Free Flow of Information Act" raised. The last paragraph of the Senators' press release noted that the new version of the bill "revisits the change made to the definition of journalist in the September 24 Manager’s Amendment by removing the requirement that the journalist be a salaried employee or independent contractor for a media organization. This should permit freelance authors to be covered, and it also provides the potential for journalists publishing on blogs to be covered as well."

Although I have been unable to locate a copy of the revisions online, reports indicate that the focus returns to the type of activity a person is engaged in, not who employs them. The WaPo reported the language of the new version applies to those with the "primary intent . . . to disseminate to the public news" if they had that intent from the "inception of the newsgathering process." That is a test at least three federal courts of appeals have used to determine who can invoke the privilege and was part of an amendment Sen. Specter offered on the Senate floor in late July 2008 to the version of the bill introduced in the last Congressional session.

The 2008 version of the bill with this language died in the Senate. Maybe the compromise with the White House bodes better for the bill with the reported changes. Still, even this version would differ from the one approved by the House and any version that becomes law would apply only to federal authorities, not state and local ones.

UPDATE: The Citizen Media Law Project blog has the new language.

(Comments welcome at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Why We Must Fix Our Immigration System

If you haven't noticed, we've got an immigration problem. It isn't illegal immigrants -- it's that our immigration system is broken.

Our immigration law labyrinth is not only a factor in illegal immigration, it adversely affects our ability to bring the world's "best and the brightest" to America. Just how big a problem the latter is requires a brief summary of some immigration basics.

What everyone calls a "green card" is the end result of the process to become a legal permanent resident (LPR) of the United States -- an immigrant. As the name suggests, LPRs can live and work permanently in the U.S., with or without eventually taking the steps to become a citizen. Green cards fall into two broad classes -- employment-based and family-based. Two frequently used employment-based routes are the EB-2 and the EB-3 visas. Not only do both normally require a U.S. employer offer the individual full-time, permanent employment, the employer must prove to the U.S. Department of Labor that U.S. workers have been recruited for the job and are unavailable. Roughly 90 percent of these visas have additional rather stringent requirements.

The EB-2 is limited to professionals with an advanced degree or persons of "exceptional ability" in the sciences, arts, or business. Thus, it is often used by doctors and scientists. Three-quarters of the EB-3 visas are reserved for professionals with bachelor's degrees and "skilled workers," those filling positions that require a minimum of two years of training and experience. This would include many computer professionals, software designers and health care occupations. Now it makes sense that we would want these types of workers in the U.S., particularly when the federal government says no American worker is adversely affected.

Here's the rub. Under our current system, less than 100,000 of these visas are available annually, allocated by country of birth (not citizenship). That means some extremely long waits. According to Charles Kuck, the 2008-09 president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, nearly 53,000 people born in India and China have been approved but are still waiting for EB-2 green cards. Another 140,000 people are waiting for EB-3 visas. Neither figure includes roughly 150,000 applications already somewhere in the application process.

What's that mean in real life? While admitting his calculations might be a bit rough, Kuck figures:

A person born in India who starts the process for an EB-3 visa today will wait 15.8 years before a green card will be available.

There will be a 4.1 year wait for a Chinese-born person who applies for an EB-2 visa today.

The worldwide wait for an EB-3 visa for a person filing today is 8.1 years.

Kuck points out the consequences of this morass:

Every single [person approved but waiting for a visa] has a job offer, an employer, and a certification that either there are no qualified, willing and able US workers for the job, or that the individual is so good, we do not even have to test the labor market. We need these people. We want these people. How many do you think will now just give up and go home?

So what?, critics ask, we don't need more of "them." Well, look at what some of "them" have done. My friend Joel Rosenthal points out that one of Google's co-founders is an immigrant. This year, the first six Nobel Prize winners were American citizens. Four were immigrants (winning the Medicine and Physics Prizes).

Our immigration system is broke. We need to fix it. If we don't, how many future Nobel Prize winners and genuises in technology, medicine and science will we have kept from bringing their expertise to this country?

(Comments welcome at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Book Price War: Skirmish or Armageddon?

War has broken out in the book retailing world. First, Wal-Mart last week said it would offer preorders of 10 top books to be released in November for $10 each online with free shipping. Amazon, of course, jumped in to match the price. That prompted a retaliatory strike by Wal-Mart, which lowered the price to $9. The battle erupted into a three front war when Target jumped in at $ $8.99 and Wal-Mart has since lowered its price to $8.98.

So what does this mean for the book industry? It depends on who you listen to. Some contend this is just an effort by Wal-Mart, and now by Target, to attempt to drive book purchase traffic to their web sites with the forthcoming holiday season. Others aren't so sure.

For example, MobyLives, the blog of Melville House Publishing, calls it "capitalism run amok, a race toward an Armageddon[.]" In addition to pointing out that this artificially dictates what a business can charge for its products, Moby makes the astute observation that this mere means a book is "reduced to a thing of no inherent actual quality, just a price."

That's a point also made in a NYT article on the subject when Wal-Mart announced the price cuts. "If you can buy Stephen King's new novel or John Grisham's [new novel] for $10, why would you buy a brilliant first novel for $25?," Grisham's agent told the paper. "I think we underestimate the effect to which extremely discounted best sellers take the consumer’s attention away from emerging writers."

We're all looking for a deal. I tend to buy as many books online as locally because the price is better. I also tend to buy more from the B&N chain store than local independents because of both the variety of selection and price. These actions unquestionably hurt independent and local bookstores. The impact on publishers may be a bit different because, at least to my understanding, these discounts probably come from the retailer's share, not what the publisher charges the retailer.

But, to use a cliche, maybe we're seeing some of the chickens coming home to roost. Like other consumers, readers have apparently shown that price is important. If behemoth big box retailers insist they will sell books at only a certain price point, does their market power allow tremendous influence on what publishers can charge? If so, where does that leave authors, particularly those who aren't household names?

The 10 books offered by Wal-Mart have "list" prices of $22 to $35 so it's a helluva discount. Actually, there's maybe one book out of the 10 I would consider reading and even that one I would most likely wait until it was out in paperback or get from the library. Still, there are plenty of people who are interested in them and best sellers account for a fair share of the market (hence, I suppose, the term "best seller"). But you aren't going to see the Wal-Marts of the world giving Melville House's Every Man Dies Alone -- one of my favorite books this year -- this type of discount. How, then, is quality literature to compete in the marketplace? If it can't, how can Melville House and other publishers continue to afford to publish these books?

There's no easy solution. You can't really blame consumers for looking for the best price, whether it's books or detergent. But there is far more interchangeability with the latter. If Wal-Mart and Target have a price war over detergent, the societal impact is negligible and there remains a relatively objective basis by which to judge the products. But to reduce the number of books (or movies) or which ones are distributed because of price rather than content runs counter to the core concept of creativity.

The book price wars probably don't mean the end of book publishing as we know it. Still, it never bodes well to treat a part of the humanities as just another fungible commodity.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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What About MJ?

My wife watches Entertainment Tonight so before or during dinner I occasionally hear snippets of what passes for news there. But I must admit that lately I feel adrift.

Seems like David Letterman did some things he maybe shouldn't have and some man did something to Letterman he really shouldn't have. Some people named Jon and Kate evidently don't like each other any more and it's affecting some TV show I've never seen. And evidently Marie Osmond has some connection I have yet to figure out with stars dancing on some other program I've never seen.

But that's why I'm lost and confused. Ever since Michael Jackson died in June I heard enough here and there to know he was still the most important thing going. But these other developments have left me stranded. Is Michael still dead? If so, was he really buried? Did his kids leave the Jackson compound today? Are his kids HIS kids?

Thankfully, although ET seems to have temporarily abandoned the MJ watch, I did catch a commercial this week. Seems Michael has a movie coming out that shows him not all that long before he died. Thank goodness. Now maybe he can regain his primacy in the entertainment news and I won't have to agonize over whether we quit hounding a dead man and his family too soon. After all, it's another three months before American Idol returns and becomes the most important thing in Americaa.

(For more commentary and plenty about books and other topics, visit A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Shield Law Amendment Impacts Most Bloggers

Both houses of Congress are still considering legislation to create a federal "reporter's privilege," legislation that took different approaches for bloggers. At bottom, the difference was whether someone had to earn an income from blogging to be protected by the law. Now, an amendment in the Senate Judiciary Committee would not only abandon the Senate's original position that deriving income from blogging didn't matter, it would essentially exclude from protection any bloggers who aren't working for the mainstream media.

A shield law basically protects reporters from having to disclose confidential or unpublished information in response to subpoenas or court orders unless certain conditions are met. The House version of the Free Flow of Information Act, which passed on a voice vote in March, requires that an individual's work in journalism must account "for a substantial portion of the person’s livelihood or for substantial financial gain[.]" The Senate version, however, required only that the activities be regularly engaged in. Once the bill reached the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY), a co-sponsor of the Senate bill, offered an amendment that radically changes the definition of a journalist. Under the amendment, a "journalist" is someone who:

(iii) obtains the information sought while working as a salaried employee of, or independent contractor for, an entity—

(I) that disseminates information by print, broadcast, cable, satellite, mechanical, photographic, electronic, or other means; and

(II) that—
(aa) publishes a newspaper, book, magazine, or other periodical; (bb) operates a radio or television broadcast station, network, cable system, or satellite carrier, or a channel or programming service for any such station, network, system, or carrier; (cc) operates a programming service; or (dd) operates a news agency or wire service . . .

Plainly, someone who blogs as an employee of the New York Times, Entertainment Tonight or a South Dakota media outlet would be protected. But the "and" at the end of paragraph (I) makes clear that someone like Cory at The Madville Times would not. Whether that is a legitimate distinction is something apparently reasonable persons can differ on and legitimately debate for hours.

If the amendment survives and the bill is approved by the Senate, that doesn't mean it will become law as it would differ from the House version. Moreover, this law would apply only to federal authorities. Cory and others may need to see what a South Dakota shield law would say -- that is if the news organizations in the state who support such a measure consider bloggers worthy of the same protection.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)

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PLEASE Let This Be Hype

Perhaps ironically apropos for Banned Books Week is the following: "When author J.K. Rowling was proposed as a recipient for the Presidential Medal of Freedom, [President George W.] Bush nixed the idea because Rowling's Harry Potter series 'encouraged witchcraft.'"

What?!?!

Now whether Bush himself canned the idea is open to debate. The book that is quoted actually says the objection came from "people in the White House." Still, the fact the executive branch of a 21st Century America is worried about witchcraft ought to frighten anyone.

Granted, one could debate whether Rowling should receive this country's highest civilian award. To earn the Presidential Medal of Freedom, an individual must have contributed to: (1) the country's security or national interests, 2) world peace, or 3) cultural or other significant public or private endeavors. I can see Rowling being honored because her series truly got children and even young adults reading. But to reject someone who introduced thousands of kids to the "magic of reading" for fear of witchcraft demonstrates who truly is living in a fantasy world.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Where Network News Budgets Go

No one can doubt America is a celebrity society. There seems to be more coverage of celebrities and what they're doing than objective analysis of pressing issues like the economy, healthcare, homelessness, etc.

And proof that even the American news media is far from immune from celebrity comes from a column this week on the Columbia Journalism Review web site. Michael Massing, the magazine's contributing editor, observed:

Katie Couric’s annual salary is more than the entire annual budgets of NPR’s Morning Edition and All Things Considered combined. Couric’s salary comes to an estimated $15 million a year; NPR spends $6 million a year on its morning show and $5 million on its afternoon one.

Now that can be easily explained by the fact CBS is a national television network that can sell commercial time throughout the day and during prime time and Sunday football games. And as we NPR listeners are aware from fundraising weeks, NPR is listener supported. Still, isn't it a bit appalling that society has no problem paying one woman more than it invests in public radio's premier news programs?

Perhaps the better question is one Massing notes in the column. What would happen to the quality of the news coverage if CBS invested some of that money on foreign and domestic news bureaus and more reporters?

I know -- another delusional idea.

(Go to A Progressive on the Prairie for more thoughts on books, culture, issues and other topics.)

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'Hollowing Out' Rural America

Two sociologists say the meltdown of rural America has reached a tipping point, one which is "transforming rural communities throughout the nation into impoverished ghost towns."

In an article in The Chronicle of Higher Education, husband and wife Patrick J. Carr and Maria J. Kefalas say a brain drain has led to a "hollowing out" of rural America -- losing the most talented young people at the same time changes in farming and industry have changed the landscape for those who stay. Although the couple moved to Ellis, Iowa, about 80 miles north of Des Moines, to do their research, pictures of Arlington, S.D., and Humboldt, S.D. accompany the article on the publication's web site.

The loss of jobs and family farms in rural areas has been caused by a variety of factors, they say, including such things as the rise of agribusiness and big-box retail stores and the decline of unions and blue-collar wages. "Civic and business leaders in the places most affected by hollowing out will tell anyone willing to listen how it is their young people, not hogs, steel, beef, corn, or soybeans, that have become their most valuable export commodity," they write.

They broke the youth into four categories: 40 percent were working-class "stayers;" 20 percent were collegebound "achievers" and they often left for good; 10 were "seekers" joining the military to see the world; and the rest were "returners," those who eventually came back home but only a small number of whom were "high fliers," i.e., professionals. The local high school guidance counselor put it more bluntly, saying "the best kids go while the ones with the biggest problems stay, and then we have to deal with their kids in the schools in the next generation."

Not only is the lack of job opportunities a problem, so is what is available in the workforce. Today's economy demands more than just a high school education for economic viability, meaning "the choices stayers make doom them to downward mobility and poverty." If the best and the brightest leave and the downwardly mobile stay, it's not hard to tell where a community will end up. While some have advocated abandoning the plains (the so-called "Buffalo Commons"), Carr and Kefalas say it would be a mistake to give up on rural America. They suggest a variety of approaches, several at the local level having to do with education and several at the national level dealing with economic stimulus and education.

But rural states like South Dakota do face a Catch-22. While South Dakota works hard to provide smaller schools with Advanced Placement courses and similar opportunities through such things as the South Dakota Virtual School, it probably increases the likelihood the best and the brightest become exports. Even if we do entice them to stay or come back, what are the odds they will return to rural communities as opposed to towns along the I-29 corridor? It's a difficult problem and one I fear may ultimately be insoluble.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)...

Media Sinks in Opinion Polls

We hear a lot lately about the struggles of traditional news media in the Internet age. But it seems a lot of people believe the damage may be self-inflicted.

A new study by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press indicates the fewest number of people in more than two decades believe the media accurately reports the news. The study shows that in July 2009 only 29% of Americans believe news organizations generally get the facts straight, while 63% say news stories are often inaccurate. That is a drastic change from when this was first surveyed in July 1985. Then, 55% said news stories were accurate while 34% said they were inaccurate.

What should be equally concerning to news organizations is that this attitude also seems to be reflected in views of its stature. Today, a full 70% say the press tries to cover up its mistakes, compared to 55% in 1985, while those saying the press is "highly professional" dropped from 72% in 1985 to 59% this year. The latter mirrors almost exactly the increase in those saying the press is "not professional," up to 27% this year from 11% in 1985. These results also appear to reflect some degree of partisanship in American politics. For example, while 11% of both Democrats and Republicans considered the press not professional in 1985, this year it was 39% of Republicans and 18% of Democrats. Yet there is one area where the decrease in believability was more bipartisan. In 1985 37% of Republicans and 32% of Democrats said the media was often inaccurate compared to 69% of Republicans and 59% of Democrats this year.

Polarization in American politics over the last two decades in seen in other areas. For example, nearly three-quarters of Republicans (72%) view Fox News favorably compared to 43% of Democrats. While I'm surprised the last number is that high, I am even more shocked that in 2007 61% of Democrats viewed Fox News favorably. For comparison, only 16% of Republicans view the New York Times favorably compared to 39% of Democrats. While Fox News was the media outlet viewed most favorably by Republicans, for Democrats it was CNN at 75% (compared to 44% for Republicans).

What perhaps isn't surprising is that, as a rule, local news outlets fare a bit better. A majority of people hold favorable opinions of local TV news (73%) and the daily newspaper they are most familiar with (65%). But there's also bad news for newspapers which most people won't find surprising. While television continues to be the main source of national and international news for most (715), the Internet is now second in that category. It increased from 24% in September 2007 to 42% now, while newspapers stayed roughly the same (34% and 33%, respectively). The only saving grace for newspapers appears to be local news, where 41% rely on newspapers and only 17% on the Internet. It isn't clear, though, whether the survey distinguished between how many of those relying on the newspaper for local news were getting the news from the dead tree version or off newspaper web sites.

As the survey was conducted in July, they don't reflect the impact of the coverage of the health care reform debate during the August Congressional recess. I speculate the media would fare even worse in the accuracy department across the board.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Beatles Bridge the Years

Today my wife and I officially became "empty nesters." And one of the things that came to mind as my youngest flew off to UMass this morning was The Beatles. That may strike some as a bit odd but, truly, it isn't.

My youngest daughter is the biggest Beatles fan I know. She got hooked on their music a few years ago and the band remains one of her favorites. She's got the Abbey Road poster and a variety of other Beatles memorabilia on her bedroom walls. The back window of her car is adorned with a Beatles decal. She was fascinated by the Beatles LPs I have, particularly their album covers. The Beatles helped create a common bond between us and, in fact, her musical tastes are much more in line with mine than either of her sisters. Not only have we seen Ben Folds and O.A.R. together, she bought the tickets to O.A.R. and invited me to go with her.

The shared appreciation of The Beatles may not be wholly unique. A recent Pew Research Center survey showed, not surprisingly, that The Beatles are the most popular musical performers for people in my age group. But it also showed the band was the second most popular performers among people ages 16-29. The group trailed Michael Jackson by just one percent, which is not statistically significant (especially considering the survey was conducted after Jackson's death). In addition, the Beatles were third in the 30-49 age group and fourth in the 65+ group.

Given that my daughter is 18, the breadth of the age groups might skew the figures for her group. Still, it is fascinating to see that parents and their kids today can and do share a common musical language, especially since my parents were appalled by The Beatles and their music. It also adds another flavor to my Beatles collection. Now, I'll be reminded of my daughter whenever I hear a Beatles tune.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)

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South Dakota's 'Hate Groups' Quartet

What do neo-Nazis, skinheads and fundamentalist Mormons have in common? In South Dakota, they comprise the "hate groups" identified by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The SPLC has created an online map of organizations and groups it considers to be "hate groups," which it defines as having "beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristics." The South Dakota map has four such groups: the National Socialist Order of America, a neo-Nazi group; Nordwave, another Neo-Nazi group; Retaliator Skinhead Nation, a "racist skinhead" group; and, the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints, a "general hate" group.

Perhaps the best known is the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints, which was headed by now-jailed Warren Jeffs. The group split from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when the LDS Church renunciation of polygamy and is now the largest polygamist Mormon group in the U.S. It is known in South Dakota because it bought about 100 acres of land it developed into a compound near Pringle (although the SPLC bases the group in Edgemont). The SPLC designated the sect a hate group in part because of Jeffs' comments on blacks, women and gays.

The only other group given a specific location by SPLC is the Retaliator Skinhead Nation, which it puts in Centerville. According to its web site, the group is "an elite organization created by and for the white race. ...our goal is to secure the streets and neighborhoods which we live [sic] no matter where that may be from the increasing crime and vandalism created by the savage gangs and the increasing number of mudd [sic] races that are infesting our land." According to the Anti-Defamation League, though, the group disbanded in 2006 and became part of an organization known as Volksfront.

No location is given for the National Socialist Order of America, a Neo-Nazi party created in 2007 following a rift in the National Socialist Movement. It was started by John Taylor Bowles, who was the NSM's presidential candidate until the split. Among his contentions during the campaign was that the Patriot Act gives the President the ability to remove nonwhites from the country.

Nordwave, meanwhile, bills itself as "the voice of National-Socialism." Its web site identifies one of its "units" as Nordwave South Dakota. Although no location is mentioned, a November 17, 2008, item on the South Dakota group's site says it is "beginning to build a community here in South Dakota. We now make up 1% of th [sic] population of a small town. It may not seem like much but its [sic] only the beginning. This is the first of many targeted towns and has alot [sic] of potential to become a strong white cultural community." There is little after that date, though.

Assuming the latter to be true, South Dakota's homesteading heritage appears to be reviving in a perverse sort of way, given that two of the four groups are trying to create their own communities.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Someone's Going to Pay for My Addicition

I guess I've been too lighthearted when I've said in the past that I ~~may be~~ am "addicted" to reading. Turns out there "arguably" is such a thing as a reading addiction.

When does reading become an addiction? Well, "reading is an addiction when it is used as a mechanism to avoid reality. A person can avoid facing life by reading all day. A person can also avoid facing themselves by reading all day. This is the only time that reading really becomes a problem." Great! My dream of actually being able to read all day means I'm deranged, mentally ill!!

But, then, maybe that response is just a phase of my addiction. You know, denial. Isn't there something about admitting you have a problem before you can deal with the problem? Damn! There is. The web site actually says that convincing yourself that heavy reading is not unhealthy is denial. (Emphasis from web site.)

So, maybe I'm being too flippant about this. I better see if there's any truth to this possibility of an addiction. Unfortunately, suggestions on coping with a reading addiction may confirm the worst.

"Have you tried unsuccessfully to cut back on your reading?" Maybe, I only cut back on my reading if real life demands it.

"Are you preoccupied with thoughts of the book when you are away from it?" Maybe, it depends on how good it is.

"Does reading help you escape from your problems?" Duh. After all, to quote a song, "You can't run away forever/But there's nothing wrong with getting a good head start." (Oh no!!! Should I worry about a music addiction too??? I better read up on that.)

But so I have the symptoms, does it really mean there's a problem? Things are looking bleak again as I itemize various problems believed to be associated with reading:

"How many book groups do you belong to?" None. That would require leaving the house and take time away from reading.

"Do you still recognize your family members when you pull yourself out of a book?" You mean my family is still alive?

"Have you gone into debt buying books?" First, I want to know if there are good and bad levels of debt for purposes of this question.

"Do you sneak out of work to visit a bookstore or library, just so you can be surrounded by books?" You don't?

Perhaps I should just admit it. After all, I had to read web sites to figure this out -- just more proof of the insidious nature of my disease. But if I'm addicted, someone is to blame. Let's see, I need to get a list of my elementary school teachers, then there's that favorite aunt of mine who always bought me books, the various libraries and bookstores I've frequented and, oooh, a real deep pocket, Amazon. I might even be able to convert this into a great class action!

But mentioning libraries, bookstores and Amazon reminds me -- maybe before filing suit I better see if I can find a book about reading addiction.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)...

Free Expression or Religious Disrespect?

When it comes to First Amendment concepts, I'm pretty close to an absolutist. But decisions like the one made this week by Yale University Press pose one of those conundrums that can arise if you believe strongly in free expression and freedom of religion.

Later this year, Yale University Press is publishing The Cartoons That Shook the World, an account of the uproar and riots that occurred in September 2005 when a Danish newspaper published 12 caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad. But the book will not include the cartoons themselves -- or any other illustrations of Muhammad that were originally to be included in the book.

According to the NYT, Yale University Press made the decision based on an "overwhelming and unanimous" recommendation from two dozen consultants, including diplomats and experts on Islam and counterterrorism. The fear, evidently, is that republishing the cartoons could lead to another round of violence and deaths. Author Jytte Klausen said she reluctantly agreed. The premise of her book is that the reaction to publication of the cartoons was "orchestrated, first by those with vested interests in elections in Denmark and Egypt, and later by Islamic extremists seeking to destabilize governments in Pakistan, Lebanon, Libya, and Nigeria." As a result, she says this was a political conflict, not a cultural misunderstanding.

Granted, the First Amendment doesn't preclude a publisher or author from making editorial decisions like this. Still, this highlights the struggle that can occur between between free expression and freedom of religion or, more accurately, respecting the right of someone to hold certain beliefs. What are the boundaries when one person's expression is offensive or, more accurately, contrary to another's faith or creed? And that core issue is even one step removed here. The book is not the complained of expression. Rather, it is an examination of that expression and its aftermath, an examination that presumably does not adopt the expression or reject the religion.

Yet Yale's decision may be the only middle ground between the two positions. As Yale believes the cartoons can be accurately described in words, it believes it is fostering expression on and exploration of the issue without treading upon Muslim beliefs. For me, though, the scales probably trip toward publishing all the images. First, the middle ground strikes me as undercutting not only free expression but the flip side of freedom of religion, i.e., freedom from religion. Second, I question whether words can adequately substitute for visual expression. Finally, what is being withheld is not just the source of the controversy but other, previous images. To some extent then, it ignores or seeks to rewrite reality.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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The Mirage of 'Best' Books Lists

I get a kick out of lists of books perceived to have been the "best" or "greatest" of a particular time period, genre or overall. Yet over the weekend, I was again struck by something I'd pondered a while ago. Specifically, a "best" list is a mirage to a certain extent. Any book and, thus, any list of books, are filtered not by individual tastes but how our perceptions change with time.

My idea isn't anything new. While it, of course, posits there is no objective measure of literary greatness, I don't think anyone can contend reading is not a wholly subjective experience. More important, that experience necessarily is directly influenced by our age -- and who we are -- when we read any particular book. The the impact or evaluation of a book necessarily depends on the psyche of the reader at the time they read the book.

I can think of several examples that support and illustrate the point from my perspective. One is The Catcher in the Rye, which makes many lists of great books. I didn't read it until I was in my mid-40s. Was I impressed? Not so much. I would be surprised, though, if my view of the book weren't dramatically different had I read it when I was in my teens.

The process works the other way, too. Two of my favorite books of the last several years are Out Stealing Horses and Gilead. Both narrators are older men looking back on their lives and contemplating such questions as how our lives got to where we are and how they made us who we are. These books would not speak to me near as much in my teens or even in my 30s. Rather, it is the "me" who existed when I read them, a person different in many ways from its earlier incarnations, that found them to be among the best I've read.

Thus, while best book lists may represent some sort of consensus of books that are widely praised, they necessarily are filtered by tastes that change along with the reader. Just as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, the shimmer of today's best book lists could well be a mirage tomorrow.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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'White-washed' Book Cover Replaced

You may recall last week's post about a so-called "white-washed" book cover. It stemmed from a forthcoming YA novel whose main character is "black with nappy hair which she wears natural and short" but whose cover pictured a Caucasian girl with long straight hair. Common sense has prevailed.

At left is the new cover. Author Justine Arbalestier reports that although her U.S. publisher thought about using the Australian cover (also pictured in the prior post), "given the paucity of black faces on YA covers, and the intensity of the debate around the original Liar cover, Bloomsbury felt really strongly that a more representative approach was needed."

What prompted the original cover was a belief that books with "black covers don't sell." Arbalestier now hopes "we can prove (again) that it’s simply not true that a YA cover with a black face on the cover won’t sell. But let’s also put it to the test with books written by people of color."

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Did Elijah Page Choose Lethal Injection Too Early?

A unanimous South Dakota Supreme Court has vacated the death sentence of Briley Piper on the basis he did not validly waive his right to have a jury determine if he should be sentenced to death. Piper's case will be sent back for another sentencing proceeding that will allow him an opportunity to have a jury decide whether the death penalty should be imposed. The ruling necessarily raises questions about a decision Piper's co-defendant, Elijah Page, made three years ago.

On July 11, 2007, Page was executed by lethal injection, the first execution in South Dakota in 60 years. Like Piper, Page pleaded guilty to the brutal murder of Chester Allen Poage in March 2000. Like Piper, Page waived his right to a jury, allowing the judge to determine if the case justified the death penalty. The South Dakota Supreme Court affirmed both death sentences in January 2006. Later that year, Page sent a handwritten letter to the judge, his attorneys and the news media requesting that further challenges to his sentence be waived and that he be executed. The initial execution date was delayed due to concern over South Dakota's method of legal injection but the sentence was carried out just more than two years to the day that Piper's sentence is vacated.

When Piper and Page initially appealed their death sentences, they both argued the state's capital punishment scheme was unconstitutional because it did not provide defendants who plead guilty to a capital crime an opportunity to have the jury determine if the aggravating circumstances necessary for a death penalty as opposed to a judge. The Supreme Court rejected those arguments in its January 2006 decision. In the new decision, though, the Court said "the issue of whether Piper constitutionally waived his right to have a jury decide the death penalty was not raised on appeal." The Court also said that the current habeas corpus proceeding brought the issue "squarely before us for the first time." It turned out to be the reason the Court vacated the death penalty.

This doesn't necessarily mean Page's sentence would have been vacated. The Piper decision hinges in large part on what the judge told Piper before he waived his right to a jury. I don't know what was said at Page's proceeding so it is unclear if the same issue existed even if so whether what transpired was sufficient to have caused the Court to throw out the sentence.

One thing is certain. Page's decision to relinquish any appeals and be executed means no one will ever know if that sentence would have been set aside.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Race and a 'White-washed' Book Cover

Undoubtedly, we've come a long way thanks to the Civil Rights Movement. Yet we can find in sometimes surprising places confirmation that underlying, institutionalized racial issues still exist. A case in point: the picture to the left, which is the cover of the forthcoming young adult novel Liar by Australian author Justine Larbalestier

Quite attractive, isn't it? Too bad that Micah, the novel's main character, is "black with nappy hair which she wears natural and short" and could pass for a boy. Now maybe she is a really, really, really excellent liar. Even then, I doubt she can lie her way into looking like the girl on the cover. Larbalestier "strongly objected" to various covers the U.S. publisher, Bloomsbury Books, suggested because "none showed girls who looked remotely like Micah." As is evident, she lost. And that loss raises a couple issues.

One concern is artistic. Larbalestier says she worked hard to make Micah a believable character. "One of the most upsetting impacts of the cover," she writes, "is that it’s led readers to question everything about Micah: If she doesn’t look anything like the girl on the cover maybe nothing she says is true. At which point the entire book, and all my hard work, crumbles." While that is certainly a concern to authors, it is to a great extent mainly an issue between the writer and her publisher.

More broadly disturbing is what the cover says about our continuing attitudes toward race. Liar is also being published in Australia and the cover of that edition appears at the right. That cover certainly doesn't create the same artistic concerns. And while I'll leave it to graphic designers and the like to assess the marketability of the book with the Australian cover, the contrast certainly is an indictment of American attitudes toward race. As Larbalestier wrote on her own blog:

Every year at every publishing house, intentionally and unintentionally, there are white-washed covers. ... Editors have told me that their sales departments say black covers don’t sell. Sales reps have told me that many of their accounts won’t take books with black covers. Booksellers have told me that they can’t give away YAs with black covers. Authors have told me that their books with black covers are frequently not shelved in the same part of the library as other YA—they’re exiled to the Urban Fiction section—and many bookshops simply don’t stock them at all. How welcome is a black teen going to feel in the YA section when all the covers are white? Why would she pick up Liar when it has a cover that so explicitly excludes her?

Now maybe what's really needed is to assess differences among the reading selection of young adults of various races, what might cause them and the extent to which cover art plays a role. And maybe the publisher is simply doing what the marketplace demands. Perhaps Liar would not sell as well in the U.S. without this cover. That's something we'll never know. What we do know is that the publishing industry's perception alone reflects a certain reality of American society. It's more than a bit depressing that in the 21st century, we still not only judge books by their cover, we judge them by the skin color of the persons on the cover.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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Thoroughly Modern Males?

Wondering what makes a modern man?' I can't say I was but this week I stumbled across a link to The 2009 Great Male Survey that AskMen.com conducted with about 50,000 of its readers. I'm not sure how definitive or valid the survey is but it asked a wide range of questions and had responses not only from from Americans but also the U.K., Canada and Australia.

So, here's just a few of its many insights into the state of manhood today:

81 percent of American males believe a couple should live together before marriage. But we're still evidently prudes. 86 percent of Canadian men, 90 percent of the Aussies and 92 percent of Brits supporting living together before marriage.

63 percent of American men said they've never paid for sex and "never would." Only just more than half of Australian men said that.

46 percent of American men "don't give a damn what people think of my car" while 23 percent want people to be impressed by their car.

77 percent of Americans say moral standards in business are in decline but of those 15 percent say "it's made business more efficient."

84 percent of the Americans say most accusations of sexual harassment in the workplace aren't justified.

If they could get away with it, only 26 percent of American men would punch their boss in the face -- but 48 percent would punch a co-worker in the face.

67 percent of all men are actively environmentally friendly -- "where it's convenient or painless for me to do so."

North Korea was ranked as the biggest threat to the U.S. by 37 percent of all men. Interestingly, the second biggest threat (23 percent) was the United States itself. That comes awfully close to correlating with the 78 percent figure for those who are proud to be an American.

87 percent of men don't use Twitter.

The highest ranking for best summer movie? "None," 39 percent.

Indicating either the split in men's attitudes or the validity of the survey, when asked how they would remember Sarah Palin, 39 percent said as "the woman who ruined John McCain" while 35 percent said "a hot babe."

But when it gets right down to brass tacks, 57 percent said "being " good father and/or husband who takes care of his family" is what "makes a man a manly man in 2009." At a distant second, 17 percent said it was "having manly skills, like the ability to fix things."

So there you have it. Proof once again that manliness is in the eye of the beholder -- and that the modern male is as well-balanced, schizophrenic, chauvinistic and chivalrous as ever.

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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A Nation of Televisions

We continue to be outnumbered -- and it's not getting better. Rather, the gap between the number of television sets in American households and the number of people in those households continues to grow.

At least that's what the latest Nielsen Television Audience sruvey says. The average American home has 2.86 TV sets, about 18% higher than in 2000 (2.43 sets) and 43% higher than in 1990 (2.0 sets). In comparison, the average U.S. home has only 2.53 people. But that's nothing new. Televisions have outnumbered people per household since at least 2005. And while the number of televisions per household continues to increase, the number of people per household has stayed roughly the same.

A few other interesting and occasionally frightening facts from the survey:

Only 72% of TV households have VCRs, the lowest number in more than a decade. VCR saturation peaked in 2005 when 90% percent of TV households had them
In contrast, 24% percent of TV households have DVRs, compared to 19% percent a year ago, while 88% of households have a DVD player.
Interestingly, 65 percent of households with TVs have no one under the age of 18 living in them.
In 2008, the average home received 130.1 channels.
Households tuned tuned into television a stunning 58 hours and 27 minutes per week, a 40 minute increase from the previous year, and equal to more than 8 hours per day.
The average person spent 33 hours and 13 minutes watching TV each week, an increase of about an hour from the year before. (I don't watch 8 hours of television in a week, even if you count what I've got on the DVR.)
More than $42 billion (with a "b") was invested in television advertising in 2008. Business and finance accounted for 29% of that, followed by drugs and toiletries (17%) and leisure (14%).

Personally, I don't see any choice but to cue (and edit) Bruce Springsteen: "There's ~~fifty-seven~~ 130 channels and nothin' on."

(Crossposted at A Progressive on the Prairie.)
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