Obama in Kansas: "It's great to be back in the state of Texas."

He was there to give his big speech, doubling down on class politics. (Growing — "gaping" — disparity in income "gives lie to the promise at the very heart of America: that this is the place where you can make it if you try.")

EcoKat backlash.

What's the matter with Kansas?  (Via Instapundit.)

Kansas State University recently introduced EcoKat, a special mascot to promote environmental causes -- and the fans are not thrilled. The Kansas City Star reported that, on Twitter, the #ecokat hashtag suggests considerable dislike, and that a #fakeecokat has also emerged on Twitter. Among recent tweets: "#EcoKat makes me want to leave my porch light on 24hours and drive two blocks to the gas station for a pack of gum," "EcoKat: The worst idea since the Power Towel" and from a University of Kansas fan "MY GOD. What is #kstate thinking? And you ask why you get made fun of ... #EcoKat. Please never change."

Oh, how bad can it be? Aaaah!

Sorry, I was totally distracted by the cat head. But that's Willie the Wildcat, which is apparently the school's regular sports mascot, their Bucky Badger, if you will. EcoKat is the lady: "played by a K-State student who auditioned for the role... outfitted in a costume made of 90 percent repurposed materials." They say her outfit is "sustainable." But it is not sustainable! Because people will not stand for it.... or wait. Is this a trick? So bad it's good? So bad it gets people to tweet and blog about how bad it is? Kind of like the Burger King king? But the Burger King king is passé. He's ousted. Dethroned. Get with it Kansas! Creepily bad is not somehow cool. Not anymore.

Bob Dylan on Barack Obama: "He’s like a fictional character, but he’s real."

From an interview with The Times Online's Bill Flanagan:

First off, his mother was a Kansas girl. Never lived in Kansas though, but with deep roots. You know, like Kansas bloody Kansas. John Brown the insurrectionist. Jesse James and Quantrill. Bushwhackers, Guerillas. Wizard of Oz Kansas. I think Barack has Jefferson Davis back there in his ancestry someplace. And then his father. An African intellectual. Bantu, Masai, Griot type heritage - cattle raiders, lion killers. I mean it’s just so incongruous that these two people would meet and fall in love. You kind of get past that though. And then you’re into his story. Like an odyssey except in reverse.

BF: In what way?

BD: First of all, Barack is born in Hawaii. Most of us think of Hawaii as paradise – so I guess you could say that he was born in paradise....

BF: What in his book would make you think he’d be a good politician?

BD: Well nothing really....

BF: Do you think he’ll make a good president?

BD: I have no idea. He’ll be the best president he can be. Most of those guys come into office with the best of intentions and leave as beaten men. Johnson would be a good example of that … Nixon, Clinton in a way, Truman, all the rest of them going back. You know, it’s like they all fly too close to the sun and get burned.

"European man... putting security on red alert... stripping down to tight shorts and dancing in the lobby of Wichita Airport."

What's the matter with Kansas? Don't they get HBO?

What's the matter with Kansas?

Get with the program, people!

"There's an edgy attitude. Not toughness. Not meanness."

It's Betsey Johnson, talking about fashion.



Several points:

1. I used to buy Betsey Johnson clothes when they were at Paraphernalia (which she left in 1969). Does anyone else remember shopping for clothes at Paraphernalia in the Betsey Johnson days? I loved that stuff.

2. I love the version of "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic" that plays at the end of the video.

3. Betsey has worked out a really nice image for herself as an aging woman. It's almost clownish, but it suits her. I could get my hair cut like that. What stops me?

4. "She lived in the Chelsea Hotel in the late '60s. Edie Sedgwick was her house model. She became a friend-of-Andy. She designed the costumes for 'Ciao, Manhattan.' She made velvet suits for the Velvet Underground. She made Lou Reed's pants too big in the crotch, provoking his anger. She married John Cale, making matters worse. She shocked the fashion establishment. She hung out at Max's Kansas City. She shocked the fashion establishment at Max's Kansas City. She played Yoko Ono to Lou Reed's Paul. She broke up the Velvet Underground."

5. She reminds me a little of Susan Estrich.

The White House belongs in Smith Center, Kansas.

So thought the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi:

He called for the demolition of all toxic buildings and unhealthy urban environments, even the demolition of historic landmarks if they were not built according to “Vedic architecture in harmony with Natural Law.”

There are so many interesting things you can think up and purvey when you're a self-styled spiritual leader. A guru. There was a time when we Americans didn't use — hadn't heard — the word "guru." That was before the Maharishi, who had to be some kind of genius to have figured out how to use that most sensational vehicle for reaching the minds of everyone in the world: The Beatles:

Maharishi, what have you done?
You made a fool of everyone.
Maharishi, ooh, what have you done?...

Maharishi, how did you know?
The world was waiting just for you...
Maharish, oooh, how did you know?

Maharishi, you'll get yours yet
However big you think you are...
Maharishi, ooh, you'll get yours yet.

And so, Maharishi finally has got his. Dead in Vlodrop, Netherlands, at an age somewhere beyond 90.

When laws meant to help really hurt — and what would it take for the NYT to quote Ronald Reagan on the subject?

Stephen J. Dubner and Steven D. Levitt give some vivid illustrations of the way well-intended laws can backfire: The Americans With Disabilities Act motivates doctors to reject deaf patients, and the Endangered Species Act incentivizes the destruction of anything that might come to be regarded as a habitat for something rare.

[W]ith a government that is regularly begged for relief — these days, from mortgage woes, health-care costs and tax burdens — and with every presidential hopeful making daily promises to address these woes, it might be worth encouraging the winning candidate to think twice (or even 8 or 10 times) before rushing off to do good.

Reading this terrific essay, I thought it should be necessary to acknowledge the famous Ronald Reagan line: "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'"

At first, I thought, well, maybe you can't do that in an issue of The New York Times that features a big Frank Rich essay called "Ronald Reagan Is Still Dead." ("[T]he G.O.P. is running on empty, with no ideas beyond the incessant repetition of Reagan’s name.")

But then I searched the NYT archive. I found the transcript of Reagan's August 13, 1986 news conference that contained the line. [Restricted access link.] Since then, however, the New York Times has never printed the entire Reagan quote and has only used the final 9-word quip on 3 occasions.

1. August 22, 2006:

In the lexicon of American business, “cynicism” means doubt about the benevolence of market forces, and it is a vice of special destructiveness. Those who live or work in Washington, however, know another variant of cynicism, a fruitful one, a munificent one, a cynicism that is, in fact, the health of the conservative state. The object of this form of cynicism is “government,” whose helpful or liberating possibilities are to be derided whenever the opportunity presents.

Remember how President Reagan claimed to find terror in the phrase, “I’m from the government and I’m here to help”?

This was from Thomas Frank. Of course, the author of "What’s the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America" thinks this cynicism is wrong.

2. October 21, 2001:

Since Sept. 11, Washington's sense of itself has changed utterly. ''Washington solutions'' have gone from inherently suspect to indubitably essential. The federal government is now seen not just as capable but also as uniquely capable of performing a great variety of urgent tasks: fighting our enemies abroad, stimulating our flagging economy, rescuing bankrupt airlines, rebuilding the ruins in New York City, protecting us from bioterror and making the skies feel safe again. Reagan's old joke about the 10 scariest words in the English language -- Hello, I'm from the government, and I'm here to help'' -- isn't a joke anymore. It's the literal attitude of Reagan-revering Republicans who toured the devastation at ground zero.

With this can-do attitude has arrived a renewed feeling of self-esteem....

This is from Slate's Jacob Weisberg, who also, obviously, disagrees with Reagan.

3. August 1, 1993:

Unlike the Reagan and Bush Administrations, which opposed most Federal efforts to assist American industry, the Clinton Administration enthusiastically supports technology policy and has selected the National Institute of Standards and Technology as the civilian agency to help manufacturers.

The institute is one of the few Federal agencies where the statement "I'm from the Government and I'm here to help you" would not be greeted with derision among most business people....

This is a profile of Arati Prabhakar, the woman President Bill Clinton named director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Again, the context is that the quote is wrong and the government can help.

So, you see, The New York Times has never once invoked that famous Reagan quote for the proposition that the well-meaning government efforts can prove harmful.

"When you say Wisconsin, people most often think of the Green Bay Packers, cheeseheads, beer and cold weather."

Does Wisconsin need rebranding? Apparently, the Wisconsin "brand" ranks 37th among states. States that rank higher: Kansas, Rhode Island, Minnesota, New Hampshire, West Virginia, and Utah. New Jersey is 50th. (Even after "The Sopranos"?) California ranked first, of course.

How would you bolster the Wisconsin brand? And are all the states supposed to get into a big competition to have the most lustrous brand? I guess it's good federalism for the states to compete this way, by making you think well of them. Federalism and advertising — they go together under the heading "American" (even as Packers and beer go together under the heading "Wisconsin").

When does a song "demobilize" a word, so that no serious lyricist can use it again?

Laurence Maslon writes a long, interesting article about the song "Over the Rainbow." (Via A&L Daily.) Read the whole thing, but let's discuss this:

In turning to the rainbow as a metaphor for happiness, [lyricist Yip] Harburg also drew on decades of American songs. In 1918, a minor Broadway show, Oh, Look!, gave the world a major tune, “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows”, one of the most popular of its day. (Its closing lyric runs, “I’m always chasing rainbows./ Waiting to find a little bluebird in vain.”) Ten years later, Billy Rose and David Dreyer contrived a popular hit, “There’s a Rainbow Around My Shoulder”....

Why would Yip Harburg, a man of considerable imagination, take yet another drink from such an oft-dipped well? Part of it was his conviction that the rainbow image would be useful for the rest of the picture.... Also, Harburg must have intuited that such an image would have seemed ridiculous and corny if were sung by, say, a Manhattan cigarette girl singing on a penthouse balcony. But for an untutored farm girl from Kansas, living in some indeterminate point early in the 20th century, the very predictability of the rainbow image speaks to her old-fashioned values and lack of pretense....

[The song] is a seminal influence on the imagination of impressionable youths to this day, truly a brilliantly crafted song, with Arlen’s achingly adult melody set off by Harburg’s sophisticated use of childlike simplicity. Rarely has such a juxtaposition yielded such a felicitous result. Harburg’s lyrics are so successful, in fact, that they essentially demobilized the words “rainbow” and “bluebird” from serious use in popular song forever after. (The two exceptions, ironically, are Harburg’s own “Look to the Rainbow” from Finian’s Rainbow and Arlen’s collaborator, Johnny Mercer’s, use of “rainbow’s end” in “Moon River.”)

But now aren't you thinking of exceptions? I immediately thought of Lesley Gore singing "Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows" ("Everything that's wonderful is what I feel when we're together"). And for "bluebird"... come on, I feel sorry for Stephen Stills that Maslon threw in the part about "bluebird":

Listen to my bluebird laugh.
She can't tell you why.
Deep within her heart, you see,
She knows only crying.

Somehow I don't feel sorry for Paul McCartney ("I'm a bluebird, I'm a bluebird, I'm a bluebird, I'm a bluebird, Yeah, yeah, yeah"). I don't think he was really even trying there, and besides, he's demobilized "blackbird."

Yet copying the Stills' lyrics, I see that it is obvious that the lyrics without the music don't make much of an impression at all. Perhaps it's not -- after all -- a "serious use" of the word.

So, what songs have used a particular word in such a way as to take it off the list of words a serious lyricist can use? (Do we still have such people?) What does it take to demobilize a word?

Perhaps sometimes this happens only within a particular type of music. Can I think of a good example of that? Betraying my age once again, I think of the mid-60s word "groovy," which spiked in popularity and then became unusable. In 1966, there was "A Groovy Kind of Love" (which was 34 on the Billboard 100 that year -- that great year). When that song came out "groovy" was nearly unknown slang (at least in the U.S.). The following year there was "The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin' Groovy)," the Paul Simon song that was a hit by Harper's Bizarre. It's 98 on the Billboard 100 for that year. And, the same year, there's also "Groovin'" by the Young Rascals (11th). When these songs were hits, "groovy" had become a word that no one would actually use in conversation. You might hear it on a TV show, but it would be embarrassing to say it unless you clearly conveyed that you were making fun of the word. But this is a big digression, because no song lyric killed "groovy." "Groovy" was killed by its own sudden, extreme popularity.

So back to the real question. Can you think of a word that is used so decisively well in a song as to remove if from a good lyricist's vocabulary?

The article about "Over the Rainbow" raises a second issue: "it’s the only adult song in the popular canon to be sung by a child." Is it?

(Here's the recent example of a 6-year-old singing the song -- with the audience melting like lemon drops. And here's Katharine McPhee singing the song to great acclaim on "American Idol." I'm on record hating it, by the way.)

Obama's getting tired.

He weirdly told a crowd that 10,000 people died in the Kansas tornado, then explained his lapse by saying he was tired. Eugene Volokh says: "Campaigning for President is... an immensely tiring task... Seems to me we ought to cut the man... some slack...." Glenn Reynolds retorts: "Of course, being president is tiring too, and one of the arguments for a grueling campaign season is that it weeds out people who don't function well when tired."

Back in 2000, there were a lot of stories about how George Bush was always getting tired and complaining about the overtaxing schedule. For example, Anne E. Kornblut had an article in the Boston Globe on August 2, 2000, titled "Nomination will keep George up past bedtime; Aides schedule afternoon nap to keep him fresh" (which I can't find on line):

When George W. Bush gives his acceptance speech at the Republican convention tomorrow, it will mark the most important moment in his political life.

It will also be past his bedtime.

That seemingly trivial coincidence has become a source of concern for the Bush entourage, who know well that the candidate's sometimes awkward speech can become even more tangled when he has not had enough sleep. In fact, Bush aides, well aware of the importance of the moment and the needs of the candidate, are scheduling him for an afternoon nap.

Aides deny they have been purposely keeping the Texas governor on a lighter schedule in recent days to give him rest. Although Bush held only one public event on Sunday and two Monday, communications director Karen Hughes said that, outside of public view, he had "a pretty busy schedule."

But the intensity surrounding the campaign has lessened significantly since Bush named Dick Cheney his running mate last week, and it appeared from the public schedule during the past few days that he was pacing himself, much as he did in the early days of the Republican primaries.

On Sunday, after staging one rally and rehearsing his 38-minute speech in a friend's living room, Bush was the first to excuse himself from dinner in order to retire around 9 p.m. Under normal circumstances, Bush is asleep around 9:30 p.m., Hughes said. His convention speech begins after 10 p.m....

Bush has long treasured his private time, reserving time to go running and avoiding events that run late at night.

He faced criticism during the New Hampshire primary from voters who felt he was too laid-back; yet when he did campaign for more than 14 hours on one day, Bush made one of his most memorable verbal missteps.

At an appearance in Iowa on Jan. 21, he told the audience: "When I was coming up, it was a dangerous world, and we knew exactly who the 'they' were.

It was us versus them. And it was clear who 'them' was. Today, we're not so sure who the 'they' are. But we know they're there."

Hughes's explanation was one she does not seem eager to repeat: "That's how we talk in Texas when we're tired."

Man, I remember reading stuff like this at the time and thinking, great, Gore will win!

Simulblogging the Republican Debate.

1. Yes, I'll do it. And I'll do it without TiVo assistance. Going TiVo-less is not just to make me completely spontaneous. I don't want to get bogged down in it. Once I start pausing, I start feeling responsible for everything. But there will be a transcript later for that. And, dammit, I want the TiVo for "Survivor"!

2. I didn't realize there was a debate today until someone asked me this morning if I was going to watch it. Oh, no. I guess I am. But how many candidates? 8 for the Democrats was pretty annoying, though the 8th guy -- Gravel -- did provide some comic relief. I have to listen to 10 Republicans? 10! Who the hell are they? 10? Let's see there's Giuliani and McCain... uh.... and Tommy Thompson but not Fred Thompson... conversation about whether Tommy gets any boost in popularity by having the same name as the strangely longed-for non-candidate Fred... so, come on, you only got 3. There's 10! Where's my coffee? I can't believe you don't even remember Romney. Oh, yeah, Romney. How could I forget? Who else? A Senator from Kansas? A Senator from Kansas, really? Not Dole... Brownback! Oh, he's from Kansas. How perfectly boring. Huckabee. Oh, yeah, Huckabee. He used to be fat. Yikes, that's still only 6! Who are the other 4? And I'm committing to listening to them? Ron Paul. He might be amusing. Who else? I look it up: Jim Gilmore, Duncan Hunter, Tom Tancredo. Oh, the pain.

3. The Reagan Library set is glossy, what with the reflection on the underside of Air Force One, suspended over the heads of the audience. So are you pouring a big glass of wine and planning to take a sip whenever anyone says "Reagan" and drain the glass if anyone says "I knew Ronald Reagan, and you're no blah blah blah"? Nancy Reagan is there, sitting with Arnold Schwarzenegger. The voiceover guys are gushing about how "regal" the setting is. Chris Matthews gives a snazzy introduction, brimming with enthusiasm for Reagan. Reagan Reagan Reagan. Agghh. Where's my wine glass?

4. Ooh, it's closed book. No notes allowed. The first question is about optimism (like Reagan's) and pessimism (shown in the current polls). Giuliani has one minute, and he leverages in statements about immigration, health care, and the war on terror. McCain is next. He stammers a bit but sounds very strong -- and angry at the congressional Democrats for cheering surrender in Iraq. Tommy Thompson looks awful, but he lays out a point-by-point political solution for Iraq. Mitt Romney looks great.

5. They're all asked if they'd amend the Constitution to let Arnold Schwarzenegger run for President. Nearly all of them say no. Right to his face. Take that. Now, we're getting some questions submitted and voted on through Politico.com. That's a nice touch. What does Romney dislike most about America? He just acts like the question is: What do you love about America?

6. Values! In other words: abortion. Okay to "repeal" Roe v. Wade? All must answer. All say yes, with different levels of passion. Giuliani says it's okay to "repeal" it, but it would also be okay for a "strict constructionist" judge to uphold it based on stare decisis. Romney is confronted about his change of mind on abortion rights, and he clearly says he changed his mind. Wasn't that purely political? He denies it and ties his change of mind to thinking about cloning. I don't believe that.

7. McCain: "I know there's good and evil in the world. I've seen it."

8. Can a business fire an employee because he's gay? Tommy: yes.

9. Romney is asked about religion, and he is speaking very well about it. Matthews keeps asking the question about whether religious faith has any relevance to the presidential race. The right answer here is rather obvious, and I think everyone on the stage knows what it is. A person's religious faith gives rise to values that matter in public life, but which religion it is doesn't matter and we shouldn't argue about that. It's really just a matter of saying that in a clear and inspiring way: America is great because of our religious tolerance, etc.

10. Halfway into this, I'd say the person making the most headway is Romney.

11. Romney takes a shot at the McCain-Feingold Act in the middle of an answer about abortion. He's referring to the effect of the Act on issues ads close to the election (something that is before the Court in the Wisconsin Right to Life case argued last week).

12. Stem cells. Tommy Thompson talks about the research going on at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Wisconsin. That appealed to me.

13. Wow! Romney on health care! I have no idea if his policy is good. I'll have to read about it. But his form of expression was great here.

14. Tax. It's very hard to compare tax policies on the fly. Thompson struck me with his idea of dealing with the AMT by giving people the option of a flat tax: you get whichever is lower. He brags about all the vetoing he did as governor of Wisconsin and acts like he could bring that vetoing style to the White House. But Wisconsin has an extremely strong veto power. You can't do that in the White House.

15. A yes-or-no question: Do you believe in evolution? It looks like 3 of them raised their hands on no, but I didn't quite catch who.

16. Gilmore is asked a question and I realize he's made no impression on me so far.

17. Brownback is too conservative for me, but I give him credit for speaking well. He's a good voice for his position, not that I want it to succeed. "This is a set of quality candidates" he says, when asked what he doesn't like about Giuliani. I like that he doesn't take a shot at Rudy. Clearly, the two men have very different positions. People can see that, and it's cool of Brownback to be magnanimous about it.

18. Giuliani seems natural and good-humored. I think he's showing what he is in an attractive way. A moment ago he was asked the sort of pop-quiz question that isn't at all about trying to find out what his policies are: explain the difference between Shiites and Sunnis. He does it exactly right. Later, Thompson gets a question like that: How many Americans have died in the Iraq war? I don't like this sort of smart-ass question, especially when only some of them get hit with one. The idea is to see if they'll screw up. There's nothing to be learned in a positive way. Let's just see if this guy is clueless.

19. Guy! They're all guys! It just hit me. They're all white too. Should be a question on that.

20. National ID card. McCain's all for it. Ron Paul lights on fire: ID cards are eeevvviiilllll.

21. Romney lights into Patrick Fitzgerald and the way he went after Scooter Libby. I like the way Romney is cool and controlled but gets passionate -- in a controlled way -- when it goes with his issue. Or do you think he's too slick? I think he's doing well. He's seems ready to play the role of candidate. Republicans ought to want to take advantage of that.

22. I confess to being moved to tears by Brownback talking about the sacredness of Terri Schiavo's life (even though I disagreed with what the Congress did). I'm impressed by the way this man believes what he believes and expresses this. But, of course, it would be a terrible mistake to make him the candidate.

23. Hey, Chris Matthews is doing a great job. He's keeping it lively, without seeming like he's lording his power over them. He's making it seem like fun, when it can't be fun. Nice going.

24. Closing statements. Jabbery details. Moving too fast. Okay. Time up. Stop already.

25. Giuliani uses his time to compliment the President, giving him credit for the lack of additional terrorist attacks after 9/11. He distinguishes himself in the group by going positive here.

26. In the after show hubbub, we see Romney getting into a photogenic encounter with Nancy Reagan.

27. The commentators. They're going to go on for another 90 minutes. Wow. Who will listen?

28. Glenn Reynolds has a good collection of links to other "live-blogging." I can't bring myself to use that term when I'm not there in the room. He includes a link to me, which is nice, and characterizes me as blogging "from her very own perspective." Well, yeah. What are other people doing?

Time to turn my back on Austin.

I need to get on I-35 and head north, out of Texas, back through Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri... Who knows? Starting out at 6 a.m., who says I can't drive the whole way home? It's only 1200 miles or so...

UPDATE, 1 a.m.: Home!

The Wichita Eagle.

Don't you love when your hotel delivers a newspaper, and it's not USA Today, it's the local paper? For me, today, that means The Wichita Eagle.

Front page article: "What do you love about the Sunflower State?"

Some of Kansas' top draws are casinos, the Kansas Speedway, theme parks, lakes and state parks. But officials hope this contest also will expose Kansans to the state's quirkiness -- Big Brutus in Cherokee County, the giant ball of twine in Cawker City or the Garden of Eden in Lucas.

"The best places you can find are in those small towns, in some of those family-owned restaurants that fix fried chicken and fresh-baked pies," Asher said. "Those hidden treasures are something we are lucky to have."

May I recommend the website Roadside America if you like those quirky things. Here's the list for Kansas, which has Big Brutus, the giant ball of twine, and the Garden of Eden.

The Twine Ball story began in 1953, when farmer Frank Stoeber, like thousands of his rural brethren, found it tidy and efficient to roll spare bits of sisal twine into a small ball in his barn. But over the years, instead of re-using or disposing of the twine, Frank kept rolling. By 1957, his twine ball weighed 2 1/2 tons and stood 8-ft. tall. By 1961, when he turned it over to the town, Stoeber had over 1,600,000 feet of twine rolled into a sphere 11 feet in diameter.

A few states away in Darwin, Minnesota, Francis A. Johnson had been rolling his own twine since 1950. He kept it up, four hours a day, until he died in 1989. Though twine ball battle statistics from the critical early years are hard to come by, we believe Stoeber, starting later than Johnson, matched and surpassed his achievement in the late 1950s. But when Stoeber stopped rolling and eventually died in 1974, Johnson surged back, broke the 11-ft. diameter "Twine Barrier" and continued until his own death in 1989. Darwin's 12-ft. diameter ball continues as a celebrated town shrine, and not an inch of twine has been added that wasn't wrapped by Johnson's own hands.

Cawker City faced a dilemma. They wanted to preserve Stoeber's accomplishment as a single-minded Dreamer. But his twine ball would remain for all time an also-ran, a fading and forlorn claim to fame; if more contenders came along it might drop entirely from the Great List of Obsessions.

Did they preserve Stoeber's accomplishment, or did they intrude on its purity for the sake of competition? They went for the competition. They have Twine-a-Thons to add to the ball, and they have to worry that people will using string or yarn and not just twine, and the ball's gotten un-ball-shaped. Please visit them. They're twining for you to visit.

The Garden of Eden is more my kind of thing. I don't have time to go that far out of my way today, but maybe I will schedule the ride home so I can see it.

A concrete Adam and Eve greet you; Eve offers an Apple of Friendship. Above them on tall concrete pillars are the Devil, frolicking concrete children, and two love storks. To the left, high in the air, an all-seeing concrete eye watches over the Garden.

Biblical scenes mingle with political messages. In the back yard, Labor is crucified while a banker, lawyer, preacher and doctor nod approvingly. On one pillar, an octopus representing monopolies and trusts grabs at the world. A soldier and a child are trapped in two of its tentacles. Fear not. On the "Goddess of Liberty" tree, Ms. Liberty drives a spear through the head of another trust octopus, as free citizens cut off the limb that it rests upon.

This is the work of one Samuel Dinsmoor, who was "[g]ripped by severe dementia concretia at age 64."

So for me, Dinsmoor over Stoeber. I prefer the religious, artistic obsessive vision over the practical one. Still, I appreciate the charm of the practical endeavor that becomes absurdly impractical. And maybe that makes it the greater art.

And what of Big Brutus? He's not a man at all, but a big machine. Who knows what his obsessions are?

"I know I need a small vacation but it don't look like rain..."

Oh, but it do look like rain here in Wichita, where I'm finally on line. It's almost 700 miles from Madison to Wichita, the obvious place to stop on this drive to Austin. And as I reached the final 100 miles, just past Kansas City, crazy rain started, the kind that's such solid water that the windshield wipers make no difference and you struggle just to see the painted lines.

Some cars are pulled over on the shoulder, but I keep going, creeping along at 30 miles an hour, listening to a BBC radio program about lungfish. I start thinking: Kansas!

I have a feeling I am in Kansas. Tornados! How will I know where they are in the dark? If one hits and I'm thrown around in the car, will the airbags save me? I've heard you're supposed to get out of your car and cower somewhere. Where? What's to stop the tornado from picking up the car and slamming it down right on top of me? I'll take my chances driving, slowly, following the red lights on the truck in front of me, keeping my distance, thinking about ten car pile ups, hoping to drive to the end of this crazy rain.

And I'm here now, at a hotel nice enough to have room service until midnight. Ah, there's the knock on the door. A Caesar salad. A glass of wine....

UPDATE: Wine drunk, I Googled for some advice about how to survive a tornado while driving and hit upon this amusing information: "If a tornado seems to be standing still then it is either travelling away from you or heading right for you." All right, then!

Is Barack Obama's first memoir "a blueprint for negative attacks"?

"Dreams From My Father" was written 11 years ago, after Obama was approached by a publisher interested in his success at Harvard Law School. It's "not the kind of book you would ever expect a politician to write,"one GOP consultant says. I think it's a good thing if he revealed himself as a real person back before everything had to become a political calculation. (Or was it a political calculation, even then, just an unusual and sophisticated one?)

Obama writes extensively about his struggle to come to terms with being a black man whose African father returned to Kenya when he was 2, leaving him to be raised by his white Kansas-born mother and grandparents in Hawaii. He describes an identity crisis arising from his realization that his life was shaped by both a loving white family and a world that saw in him the negative stereotypes frequently ascribed to young black men. He recounts a search of self that took him from high school in Hawaii to Columbia University, and then to the streets of Chicago as a community organizer.

"We were always playing on the white man's court . . . by the white man's rules," he writes. "If the principal, or the coach, or a teacher . . . wanted to spit in your face, he could, because he had the power and you didn't. . . . The only thing you could choose was withdrawal into a smaller and smaller coil of rage.

"And the final irony: should you refuse this defeat and lash out at your captors . . . they would have a name for that too. Paranoid. Militant."

Most of the talk thus far has been about the confessions of drug use -- not just marijuana, but cocaine. I don't see him losing a lot of votes because of that. But presumably, people will now pick over the book looking for other sorts of character flaws. Is he paranoid? Militant? Anyone making such insinuations -- not Hillary, surely! -- will have to worry about what they say about the one doing the insinuating.

Now we know it's a publicity stunt.

Oprah's suing him for running an Oprah for President website, and Patrick Crowe continues to push for Oprah for President. And don't give me that oh, he's a retired math teacher crap. He's selling a book.

Patrick Crowe says he is having a blast promoting talk-show icon Oprah Winfrey for president. Winfrey's lawyers are not.

Crowe has been unofficially campaigning for the first lady of daytime TV for years. The Kansas City man's Web site comes complete with a campaign song and volunteer sign-up. He also sells "Oprah for President" T-shirts.

Please note. I'm not saying Oprah should win. (Her claims are based on copyright and trademark law.) I think there should be plenty of room for people to make websites and write books about public figures. I'm just saying that the guy is obviously not just some character who wants Oprah Winfrey to be President:

"It has become increasingly serious to me," Crowe, who opposes the Bush administration and its foreign policy, told The Kansas City Star for a story Friday. "I know Oprah can do better than that."

Mmm-hmmm. You figured out a way to get attention for your anti-Bush opinions in this noisy world of opinion.

Anyway, would Oprah be a good President? I think she's too litigious.

"Why is [Scalia] blogging his concurrence....?"

Read Dahlia Lithwick's write-up of yesterday's death penalty case, Kansas v. Marsh, in which the court upholds a state law that requires the death penalty when the jury weighs the aggravating and mitigating factors and finds them in equipoise. In Lithwick's words "the tie goes to the hangman."

Let's concentrate on what she has to say about Scalia:

[T]he real wackiness today comes with Justice Antonin Scalia's concurrence, which is nominally about the case but is actually a full-bore global assault on any claim ever made anywhere about the execution or exoneration of an innocent defendant. Nobody is immune to Scalia's nail-spitting this morning: He attacks the 1987 study cited by Souter whose "obsolescence began at the moment of publication"; the "exonerees" who are "paraded by various professors" (from whom else could the word professors be a slur?); and the dissent, which merely "parrots articles or reports that support its attack on the American criminal justice system."...

Why is he blogging his concurrence, rather than taking a step back and actually writing it with some reasoned regard for the arguments on the other side?...

[Scalia] ... paint[s] the law as this dispassionate machine, into which you enter the legal facts and then download the correct answers. This is not a "moral" process, they say. This is a coolly rational process that works best when meddlesome supreme court judges leave it alone. But then the force of his argument rests wholly on his increasingly hysterical cataloging of the crimes of the so-called "innocent" exonerees. He isn't dispassionate here; he's hardly even rational at points. How can he assert that death isn't different, when it clearly drives him to the brink of insanity?

I don't agree that the originalist approach to interpretation is inconsistent with forceful, vivid writing. Lithwick disapproves of the interpretive methodology and that motivates her to portray it as mechanical and inhuman -- the judge as a big computer. Then, she demands consistency within her image and criticizes Scalia for inconsistency. He's not allowed to seem human, because he claimed to be a machine!

But I must say that I do love the notion that to show one's human feeling is to sound like a blogger.

Anyway, what's this about "various professors" with their "parade" of "exonorees"? Let's go to the Scaliatext. He's responding to the dissent, which relies at one point on "a handful of studies that bemoan the alleged prevalence of wrongful death sentences."

One study (by Lanier and Acker) is quoted by the dissent as claiming that “ ‘more than 110’ death row prisoners have been released since 1973 upon findings that they were innocent of the crimes charged, and ‘hundreds of additional wrongful convictions in potentially capital cases have been documented over the past century.’ ” Post, at 8 (opinion of Souter, J.). For the first point, Lanier and Acker cite the work of the Death Penalty Information Center (more about that below) and an article in a law review jointly authored by Radelet, Lofquist, and Bedau (two professors of sociology and a professor of philosophy). For the second point, they cite only a 1987 article by Bedau and Radelet. See Miscarriages of Justice in Potentially Capital Cases, 40 Stan. L. Rev. 21. In the very same paragraph which the dissent quotes, Lanier and Acker also refer to that 1987 article as “hav[ing] identified 23 individuals who, in their judgment, were convicted and executed in this country during the 20th century notwithstanding their innocence.” Lanier & Acker, Capital Punishment, the Moratorium Movement, and Empirical Questions, 10 Psychology, Public Policy & Law 577, 593 (2004). This 1987 article has been highly influential in the abolitionist world. Hundreds of academic articles, including those relied on by today’s dissent, have cited it. It also makes its appearance in judicial decisions—cited recently in a six-judge dissent in House v. Bell, 386 F. 3d 668, 708 (CA6 2004) (en banc) (Merritt, J., dissenting), for the proposition that “the system is allowing some innocent defendants to be executed.” The article therefore warrants some further observations.

The 1987 article’s obsolescence began at the moment of publication. The most recent executions it considered were in 1984, 1964, and 1951; the rest predate the Allied victory in World War II. (Two of the supposed innocents are Sacco and Vanzetti.) Bedau & Radelet, supra, at 73. Even if the innocence claims made in this study were true, all except (perhaps) the 1984 example would cast no light upon the functioning of our current system of capital adjudication. The legal community’s general attitude toward criminal defendants, the legal protections States afford, the constitutional guarantees this Court enforces, and the scope of federal habeas review, are all vastly different from what they were in 1961. So are the scientific means of establishing guilt, and hence innocence—which are now so striking in their operation and effect that they are the subject of more than one popular TV series. (One of these new means, of course, is DNA testing—which the dissent seems to think is primarily a way to identify defendants erroneously convicted, rather than a highly effective way to avoid conviction of the innocent.)

But their current relevance aside, this study’s conclusions are unverified. And if the support for its most significant conclusion—the execution of 23 innocents in the 20th century—is any indication of its accuracy, neither it, nor any study so careless as to rely upon it, is worthy of credence. The only execution of an innocent man it alleges to have occurred after the restoration of the death penalty in 1976—the Florida execution of James Adams in 1984—is the easiest case to verify. As evidence of Adams’ innocence, it describes a hair that could not have been his as being “clutched in the victim’s hand,” Bedau & Radelet, supra, at 91. The hair was not in the victim’s hand; “[i]t was a remnant of a sweeping of the ambulance and so could have come from another source.” Markman & Cassell, Protecting the Innocent: A Response to the Bedau-Radelet Study, 41 Stan. L. Rev. 121, 131 (1988). The study also claims that a witness who “heard a voice inside the victim’s home at the time of the crime” testified that the “voice was a woman’s,” Bedau & Radelet, supra, at 91. The witness’s actual testimony was that the voice, which said “ ‘ “In the name of God, don’t do it” ’ ” (and was hence unlikely to have been the voice of anyone but the male victim), “ ‘sounded “kind of like a woman’s voice, kind of like strangling or something U .” ’ ” Markman & Cassell, Protecting the Innocent, at 130. Bedau and Radelet failed to mention that upon arrest on the afternoon of the murder Adams was found with some $200 in his pocket—one bill of which “was stained with type O blood. When Adams was asked about the blood on the money, he said that it came from a cut on his finger. His blood was type AB, however, while the victim’s was type O.” Id., at 132. Among the other unmentioned, incriminating details: that the victim’s eyeglasses were found in Adams’ car, along with jewelry belonging to the victim, and clothing of Adams’ stained with type O blood. Ibid. This is just a sample of the evidence arrayed against this “innocent.” See id., at 128–133, 148–150.

Critics have questioned the study’s findings with regard to all its other cases of execution of alleged innocents for which “appellate opinions U set forth the facts proved at trial in detail sufficient to permit a neutral observer to assess the validity of the authors’ conclusions.” Id., at 134. (For the rest, there was not “a reasonably complete account of the facts U [sic] readily available,” id., at 145.) As to those cases, the only readily verifiable ones, the authors of the 1987 study later acknowledged, “We agree with our critics that we have not ‘proved’ these executed defendants to be innocent; we never claimed that we had.” Bedau & Radelet, The Myth of Infallibility: A Reply to Markman and Cassell, 41 Stan. L. Rev. 161, 164 (1988). One would have hoped that this disclaimer of the study’s most striking conclusion, if not the study’s dubious methodology, would have prevented it from being cited as authority in the pages of the United States Reports. But alas, it is too late for that. Although today’s dissent relies on the study only indirectly, the two dissenters who were on the Court in January 1993 have already embraced it. “One impressive study,” they noted (referring to the 1987 study), “has concluded that 23 innocent people have been executed in the United States in this century, including one as recently as 1984.” Herrera v. Collins, 506 U. S. 390, 430, n. 1 (1993) (Blackmun, J., joined by Stevens and Souter, JJ., dissenting).

Remarkably avoiding any claim of erroneous executions, the dissent focuses on the large numbers of non-executed “exonerees” paraded by various professors. It speaks as though exoneration came about through the operation of some outside force to correct the mistakes of our legal system, rather than as a consequence of the functioning of our legal system. Reversal of an erroneous conviction on appeal or on habeas, or the pardoning of an innocent condemnee through executive clemency, demonstrates not the failure of the system but its success. Those devices are part and parcel of the multiple assurances that are applied before a death sentence is carried out.

Sorry to print such a long passage, but this is what Lithwick decried as his "increasingly hysterical cataloging of the crimes of the so-called 'innocent' exonerees." Remember, she said "He isn't dispassionate here; he's hardly even rational at points" and that the death penalty "clearly drives him to the brink of insanity." Does Scalia deserve that?

I could ask why is Lithwick blogging her criticism, but the question answers itself: She's writing for Slate, and Slate readers are sure to love a "Scalia's ca-ray-zee" rant. Are they going to check the Scaliatext or go about their busy lives feeling one notch more certain that Scalia's a wacko?

Rudy Giuliani picks the top 5 biographies of leaders.

How can you read this list and not think that he first decided which 5 leaders should be on his list and in what order and then came up with the names of books for the 5 slots?

I'm not blaming him. He's a politician. It's like all those politicians who let us know what is in their iPods. The demonstration of balance is too obvious, the need to show the right frame of mind, so we'll trust them with what they want us to let them do.

Giuliani briefly explains why he picked each book, and each explanation is perfectly honed as a campaign pitch -- deniable, yet unmistakable.

For book #1:

On the night after the attacks of Sept. 11, I remember getting home at about 2:30 a.m. and seeing on my nightstand a book I had been reading, a prepublication copy of Roy Jenkins's forthcoming "Churchill."...

Mmmm... yeah... who's to say it didn't happen?

Book 2 is about Jefferson. Book 3 is about... guess!... Lincoln:

My mother was a great storyteller and a natural teacher. She introduced me as a child to the life of Abraham Lincoln....

Don't you tell me she didn't! You don't appreciate Mom?

Book 4 is... love me Democrats... President Kennedy's "Profiles in Courtage"!

One profile in particular that stuck with me was that of Edmund Ross, the Kansas Republican who cast the deciding vote for acquittal in the impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson in 1868. Ross was no fan of Johnson's but sensed that the trial was more about rounding up votes than weighing the evidence. His decision to break ranks with his party ended Ross's political career, but his principled stand has been vindicated by history....

Yay, Republican!

Book 5 is... note, Democrats, I put him after Kennedy... Ronald Reagan!

My wife, Judith, recently bought me Richard Reeves's book (subtitled "The Triumph of Imagination"), which excels in depicting Ronald Reagan's management style and unrelenting pursuit of his core principles: the restoration of the American spirit, limited government, a strong defense and the defeat of communism.

First, Kennedy, then, Reagan. First, Mom, then, Wife. Do you love me yet? Did I present my admiration for Reagan in a way that makes both Democrats and Republicans feel good? Management style! Principles! Like the principles I extracted? Come on, they're really good ones! What? You're for unlimited government?

Hey, I love the guy. I'm just saying I can read.

"People with Down syndrome are pure in heart and spirit."

Did you know that there is an especially high demand to adopt children with Down syndrome? There are long waiting lists to get such a child. When I first saw this surprising fact, I thought it was part of the pro-life movement, an expression of opposition to the practice of aborting fetuses found to have Down syndrome, but that's not it:

Most who seek to adopt Down syndrome children have had a family member, friend or acquaintance with the disorder, or work with them in medical or school professions.

"People think they are just great kids, people feel like they are very lovable," said Rachel Crews, a social worker with the Special Additions adoption agency in Stillwell, Kansas.

Changing attitudes toward people with all disabilities and improved medical treatments also are helping unite these children with families, advocates say.

"Society as a whole is much more accepting," said David Tolleson, executive director of the National Down Syndrome Congress in Atlanta, Georgia. "You are much more likely today to see people with disabilities in the media, places of worship, schools.

"Whereas in a prior generation, mothers were told when they had a baby with Down syndrome or another disability, put the child in an institution and forget about them."

That's what happened 34 years ago to a little girl named Martha, whose single mother gave her up for adoption. She was diagnosed with Down syndrome and placed in a group home in Cincinnati, Ohio.

But when Martha turned 4, Robin Steele and her husband met her and fell in love immediately. With one son already, they adopted Martha and have gone on to adopt nine other children -- three of them with Down syndrome.

"We just knew we wanted to make Martha part of our family," Steele said.

Martha's adoption also spurred the Steeles to help connect other families like theirs with families who felt they could not raise children with Down syndrome.

So, 23 years ago, they started the Adoption Awareness Program in conjunction with the Down Syndrome Association of Cincinnati. Steele connects people who want a child with Down syndrome with birth mothers or adoption agencies.

In the first year, she helped find homes for three children with Down syndrome. Now, Steele works with three to five situations a week, she said, and has a waiting list of 150. Waits average six months to a year.

"People with Down syndrome are pure in heart and spirit," said Amy Allison, executive director of the Down Syndrome Guild of Greater Kansas City. "They keep you grounded."

Allison said the organization does not monitor trends, but "there are easily more people contacting us interested in adoption than we have ever seen before."

Would you get amniocentesis for the purpose of learning whether your child would have Down syndrome, so you could abort that child? Do you think ill of those who do? What would you do if you had tried to get pregnant and believed in the importance of loving whatever child you were blessed to bear and your husband revealed to you that he would reject a child with Down syndrome? Would you have amniocentesis and abort a child with Down syndrome so you could go forward with another pregnancy that, you hoped, would produce a less flawed child? Would knowing that there are long lists of would-be parents who especially hope to adopt a child with Down syndrome affect your decision? Would it make a difference if those waiting to become adoptive parents had put their names on the list to discourage abortion or if, on the other hand, they simply had a special love for persons with Down syndrome?