Hunting The Muse

Maximize Affirmed Majorities

The MAXIMIZE AFFIRMED MAJORITIES voting procedure

Here's a voting method that seems to be superior even to Condorcet and Ranked Pairs.

I don't understand the definition, but it's similar to both and seems right in line with what Marquis Condorcet intended from the beginning.

Dean's Fundraising

It seems likely that Dean won't get all the way to $15 million by end of day tomorrow (although the results are already stunning), but it will be fun to watch. I think I have the right code here that will show the image auto-updating every half hour as the money comes in. As I write this, we're at about 12.8 million.

Update: Yowsers. They reached 13 million by 11pm from online-only contributions, and 13.45 by midnight with offline contributions added in. This is going wild. Maybe I spoke too soon. Tuesday should be fun to watch.

H.R. 2239

A while ago I posted this on Slashdot when people were bitching about all the electronic voting machines that work in mysterious ways:

Don't just complain, act: There is a bill in Congress introduced by Rush Holt, D-NJ. It is called "The Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2003". It is H.R. 2239. It currently has 29 cosponsors and needs more support. The Summary page is here [loc.gov]. The press page is here [house.gov]. Congress is in session again now. Contact your Congressperson and demand they support this bill. It would require a voter-verifiable paper trail.

Well, I wrote my rep (Wu) and I got a letter back today saying he would support H.R. 2239. Hooray.

Canada

Well, I'm off to Canada for four days, to see a friend of mine get married.

I have this group of friends that I used to sing with in college. They are all slowly getting married. Of the guys I sang with, this will be the third wedding. I always wondered if it would bother me, seeing as how I haven't seen fit to hitch up yet, but it hasn't.

Then when I come back, I have another long stretch of time where I'll have no traveling. With autumn starting, it's the time to start some new projects or new life phases. I'll be starting a couple of new classes, which will fill up some time, even though I don't feel that either are completely aligned with my intent. And maybe I'll finally find a house I want to live in. We shall see. Once I get that piano, there's a lot of things I could do.

For all the talk I've done on politics, there isn't a candidate that I am really dead set on. I think Dean is probably the best guy (and actually a hell of a lot better than in past years), but still, ho hum. Even with a candidate as strong as him, there are so many false premises that you have to accept in order to be a legitimate candidate. And of course I'm always wondering if it's all a sham and that once Dean or whoever gets elected, they'll start supporting some of the same crappy programs that they profess to oppose.

I'm not as intrigued about Clark as I was. It'll be interesting to review the coverage of their performance at the debate tomorrow - I won't really be able to, however, until I get back on Sunday. Sunday, by the way, is also important because it's the season premiere of Alias and The Lyon's Den!

I caught The West Wing tonight and it felt off. I missed Sorkin. Not that I ever watched that show regularly, though.

Well, off to finish packing... I'm taking off in four hours, and I hope to grab about three hours of sleep.

Israel Pilots Boycott Bombings

27 Israeli pilots boycott territories

That whole Israel thing is really complicated. I read another article the other day (can't find it now) that made that point that what is considered "center" politically is actually right-of-center when you consider what the citizens want - even if you only consider just what the Jewish citizens want. I'd like to see that whole bubble popped...

Krugman strikes again

Buchanan and Press for Sept. 22

Paul Krugman is rapidly becoming a hero of mine. Check out this transcript of an interview he has with Pat Buchanan. Now, his responses are the sort that would probably get Howard Dean in a bit of trouble ("he's mean! he's mean!"), but it's exactly the kind of response that is needed. "Is this really the best you can do, Pat?" Go, Paul.

Bev Harris Interview

Salon.com Technology | An open invitation to election fraud

An interview with the author of the upcoming book, "Black Box Voting". When is the book going to come out, already??

Clark Leads...

Daily Kos: Gallup has Bush at *50*

Well. It looks like Clark is in the lead - both ahead of other Democrats, and ahead of Bush.

So this is one of the good days, politically. There's a lot that could happen, but it's nice to have the momentum for a change. Right now, without knowing much, I'd be happy with Clark, Dean, or possibly Edwards. I'd be able to vote for any of them, although I'd be in a really bad mood voting for Lieberman.

Clark Interview

yin.blog-city.com Notes on Gen. Wesley Clark's appearance in Iowa

A first-hand description of an appearance by Clark. I like these better than re-interpreted articles.

Powerbook! Woo-Hoo!

So I bought it!

It has a mini-DVI (yay!), 256M Ram (I'll buy more when I receive it), 80 GB hard drive (!), and I got the superdrive. I also bought the $99 final cut express, which arrived today, so I'll be able to do movie stuff. The laptop should be here within two weeks. Whoopeee!

Disassembling A 12 inch Powerbook

Disassembled 12 inch PowerBook G4 by KODAWARISAN

There's something about this series of pictures that is like watching a snuff film or something.

Politics Matters

Hunting The Muse: Tax Cutting

Dogan asks me about why I am so political, and brings up the point that he rarely feels affected by all the political goings-on personally. First, I don't actually see myself as extremely political - I don't participate in campaigns (yet) or anything, for one thing. But I guess it's a matter of degree.

Well, there are a variety of generic responses to give to a question like this. Most of these responses are stupid. Here are some examples.

Evangelistic Altruisim:

But you SHOULD care! People are hurting out there! Just because you aren't doesn't mean other people aren't! Look at the poor people! Look at Evelyn McWilliams! Look at George Bush punch her in the mouth! Doesn't that make you feel sorry for Evelyn? Doesn't that make you dislike George Bush? Poor Evelyn! Evil evil Bush!

Usually when I get that response, I just want to punch the mouth of the person giving it to me. :-) I think it's simplistic and I don't think it inspires the recipient to actually care. In other words, if the intent is evangelism, the technique works against the intent.

Dark Foreboding Foreshadowing:

It doesn't affect you personally? Just wait.

Well, that may have a grain of truth in it, but it isn't exactly helpful. It scores points for dramatic effect, though! Usually the person saying it is trying to break into show business.

The Canned "You're A Nazi If You Don't Care" Response:

First they came for the Jews and I did not speak out — because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for the communists and I did not speak out — because I was not a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out — because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for me — and by then there was no one left to speak out for me.

—  Pastor Martin Niemöller

Let me be clear I don't have a quarrel with the Pastor. I think it's a very powerful quote. Especially considering that when he said it, he probably said it in the context of the Holocaust. But when people start using it to guilt people into thinking the way they want them to think, it's a cheap trick. I've seen this quote used a few times to shock someone else to "come to their senses".

Now, I'm not intending to set up straw men here; just examples. I'm saying that I don't like when someone tries to strong-arm someone else into having an opinion. The strong-arming really just skips whatever personal reality the person might have for not having that opinion. It ultimately discounts the person it is trying to maniuplate, and again, isn't helpful.

So, where does that leave me, and why do I care?

I guess it's because I believe in ripples. I don't believe that every person can change the world. I don't believe that I can change everything in the world. But, I do believe in the power of ripples. I do believe that my little ripples combined with everyone else's ripples can result in a change. And, I even believe that in some cases, if my ripple weren't there, the resulting change from all rest of the ripples might be a little different than if my little ripple had been there.

The thing that is important to see is how big and massive these systems are. I'm not able to stop Bush from going to war against Iraq. But Bush is elected by elections that sometimes rely on voting machines that don't have their counting procedures audited, in precincts which have results that don't match up to the exit polling, and there are fifty states, and maybe I can participate in the public comment period of one of these states, as I did in Washington, and help convince them to not use electronic voting machines from a particular vendor.

I guess the other thing is that I believe that even huge massive systems and realities have a balance point, where it can rapidly tip to one side or the other, and I believe we're on a balance point now. A little nudge one way or another, even by a very small group of people, can create huge change.

The other reason I care about politics is because the struggles and battles that happen strike me as being very archetypal. The fight of someone who tries to corrupt another, or tries to encourage someone to corrupt himself, in an effort to accumulate more power. The fight to discredit an idea or a person, in order to inflate an opposing idea or person. These are all battles we fight inside ourselves as well, and witnessing the resolution of these battles can give us clues on how to relate to our own senses of power. And as these archetypal battles are fought over and over again, always leading to something that feels like a net loss, once in a while there's reason to believe that we can stumble on to approaches that lead to real healing instead.

P.S.: In another note, there was a mentioning of compromise and how it was discouraging. I think that the belief that opposing realities has to lead to compromise is a big misunderstanding. If you have two opposing realities, one way to handle it is to discredit one side, or discredit both sides equally, and come to a resolution that neither side is extremely happy with. But another way to handle it is to actually work with the two realities enough that they come to a transformative understanding. This isn't anything new-age or revolutionary, it happens in the business world all the time - they call it synergy, or negotiation, or win-win scenarios. I believe they are always there, if both parties want to find them. I think that true politics - policy - is the art of finding them.

I also do feel personally affected by politics. I could give a big list of how, but I'm not sure that's what was being asked for.

Krugman Interview

CalPundit: An Interview With Paul Krugman

To follow up on my previous entry about Krugman, here's an interview where he expands on some of the Bush lies. The first few comments afterward are pretty thought-provoking as well.

Tax Cutting

The Tax-Cut Con

This is a great article that pulls together everything that is exactly happening regarding tax cuts. Some people would say it's a conspiracy theory, but it's been obvious to me.

What mystifies me is that some people openly admit they want to cut taxes so that we have to cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. I want to know their reasons for wanting to cut those programs. I know what we would say - because they're cruel heartless people, etc. But what are their reasons? Every once in a while you hear them give an honest reason that isn't a lie or spin. Doesn't mean it's respectable or not cruel, but still. I want to know why. Why does Grover Norquist want to get rid of these programs?

New Powerbooks

New 12" powerbook! Yay!!

1 ghz with 512k cache, around $1599, geforce fx go, usb 2.0, available today. $1799 with superdrive. With the 7457 chip.

Well I think I'm just about to place my order! I hope it has room for more RAM, and the DVI out...

Republican Quote

Here's a quote from a republican giving his honest opinion (rather than a gamey gotcha stance):

Seriously, though, for some reason, I really think that Clinton's lie about a blow job is far more serious than Bush's alleged "lies" about WMD. Clinton was lying for his own selfish reasons. At least Bush was trying to make our nation safer and the world a better place. It doesn't necessarily excuse Bush, but it's a mitigating factor.

So how would you counter that? It's easy to counter from the democrat perspective (Clinton's lie was harmless in terms of foreign and domestic policy, while Bush's lies hurt America), but how do you translate that to a perspective that this generic republican would understand?

I think the problem is that many of these republicans hawks just have no belief in the intelligence of Americans. These lies are by definition defensible since they belive that a) the ends are defensible and required and b) it would be impossible to attain these ends without lying, since most Americans would oppose it for stupid reasons.

So, they think, why even try?

From their perspective, Clinton's lie was worse because there was no reason for him to need that (no ends justifying the lie), and while many of us just consider it irrelevant, it gets them all lathered up with their anti-sex hysteria.

So, you've got someone who associates Clinton's sexual behavior as being the root of all that is wrong with the world, who believes unquestioningly that we had to do what we've done these past couple of years, and that it's irrelevant to him that Bush lied to do it.

You have to figure out how to reach at least some of those people.

Q: Why get rid of Saddam?
A: He's a threat to us!
Q: But actually, he wasn't.
A: Look, it's still good that he is GONE.
Q: But it wasn't our job.
A: Well, who else was going to do it?
Q: But he LIED to us.
A: Who cares? Saddam's gone.

This stumps me sometimes. I mean we obviously don't want to get caught in an argument where we're trying to say that we'd rather Saddam was in power.

Alabama Says No Tax Increase

Alabama votes down huge tax hike

This was a Republican governor asking for a tax increase that was actually a tax cut for lower and middle class voters. He went against his own party. His Republican opponents tapped into the distrust that the voters feel for politicians and tax hikes, by convincing people to vote against the tax cut. So poor voters basically voted to pay higher taxes, because they didn't want to pay higher taxes.

I admit that there's a first reaction of just complete impatience against all the reflexive voters out there that do what seems to be an extraordinarily stupid thing. They think they're being smart, and they end up hurting themselves.

But you have to look past that. There's got to be something deeper. I just can't imagine that such a huge percentage of the voting population was smart enough to know about the issue, smart enough to vote, and then stupid enough to vote the wrong way. It has to be something else. I'm just not sure where to look.

Allowing Attacks To Happen

I just read that Roosevelt had advance knowledge of Pearl Harbor and allowed it to happen to create a pretext for entering the war. I had never heard this before. In this article they make a connection to the PNAC (neocon) document from 2000 that

...the process of transforming the U.S. into "tomorrow's dominant force" is likely to be a long one in the absence of "some catastrophic and catalyzing event -- like a new Pearl Harbor".

I think that's pretty scary.

Terrorism

Linguistically and emotionally speaking, I think one of the most shameful parts of this whole war is that they are using "Terror" to mean "Terrorism".

It's not a war on Terror. It's a war on Terrorism. Terrorism is bad and should be wiped out. Terror is different, it's a human emotion that sometimes needs to be embraced to find out what is behind it. It's important, because the demonizing of Terror is yet another step towards invalidating human emotions.

What's so stupid about the reaction is that it is exactly an illustration of what happens when you do invalidate real terror. You've got a whole set of people that are petrified of terrorism and what it means, so much so that as soon as the concept is introduced to them as anything other than a vague hazy term, they immediately and reflexively react with an instinct: "Aaagh! Smash smash! get it offa me! kill! kill!" They don't even try to come to any wisdom about it. It's worse than animal, because it's not actually expressing fear, it's acting from a hatred of fear. And in the long run, it just makes the situation worse. This administration is not strong, it is lethal and stupid.

Random Dreams

Had a dream last night that a girl named Opal (Opie for short), who was hanging out at a cheese display in a ritzy grocery store with some friends, had a crush on me. The cheese was also named Opal something, although sometimes Opaque was mentioned. She was introduced to me by a friend of a friend by someone who was trying to decide between some bean with bacon soup, and a cream of aloe soup. The aloe soup was actually quite good. I didn't try the bean soup because I'm vegetarian. Opal ended up inviting me to her birthday party on September 10th.

Richardson Not VP

ABQjournal: Governor Denies VP Aspirations

One of the electoral strategies was to avoid the south and focus on the southwest, and NM Governor Bill Richardson has consistently been mentioned as a VP for that strategy. But he's saying he would not accept it.

If Dean is running for Pres, then that would leave Graham, Gephardt, or Clark for VP choices. Assuming Clark doesn't win the nomination.

Diebold Vote Tracking

Slashdot | Electronic Voting: Your Worst Nightmares are True

Hot damn. They uncovered evidence that Diebold machines were reporting election results wirelessly, over a network, while people were voting. This could mean that the votes can be manipulated in real time.

Any district considering Diebold machines should stop now. Any district should only consider voting machines with a voter-verifiable paper-trail. And any voter should check status on the paper-trail voting bill in Congress, sponsored by the democrat from New Jersey. Holst or something?

Definition Of Bling Bling

UrbanDictionary.com/bling bling

So I saw an MSNBC headline that said, "Don't be dissing the bling bling! Teach!" And, you know, what the hell is bling bling? I mean, I know it's some rap thingyadayadayada. That's what my head does right after I hear or think the word "rap"yadayadayada. So I look it up: Google: "bling-bling" definition. And I came to this page. It is hilarious. Excerpt:

n. synonym for expensive, often flashy jewelry sported mostly by African American hip-hop artists and middle class Caucasian adolescents.

the sound light makes reflecting off of chrome

Me! Me Me Me!

Happy Birthday To Me!!!!!

Woo-hoo!

APY

Here's another nice little tip I learned. I was knee-deep in formulas about IRR and APY and no one ever explained this simple thing to me:

APY is just the interest rate for an investment if it were only compounded yearly.

It's basically an equalizer. So whether you have a credit card compounded continuously, a money market, compounded daily, or a bank account compounded quarterly, they are all required to report their effective interest rates in terms of APY instead. What it would be if it were compounded annually.

The credit card companies are good at abusing this. They can say that they charge some percentage interest rate. But converted into APY it would be much higher. The reason is that if the money is working for you, then a continual interest rate can be much lower than its APY to generate the same amount of interest. But they can try and tell you that they're "only" charging you x% continually compounded, when the APY would be much higher.

Update: Argh, even this isn't technically right. For partial periods they do simple interest, which means that an APY can actually be just a tiny bit higher than yearly-compound for a period that includes a partial year. Oh well.

IRR Details

It took me a lot of googling to find what I needed, so I'm summarizing here in case it helps someone later.

IRR guesses the interest rates by applying them to a series of time-based contributions and withdrawals, and hoping they sum up to zero.

To figure the interest generated by yearly rates:

Compounded n times per year: (1 + R/n)n - 1	Compounded continually: eR - 1
You can figure the rates if you know the full value, the starting value, and the length of time of an investment (e.g. 1.75 years):
FV = P(1 + R/n)Yn	FV = PeYr

What this program is doing is figuring the rate for continual compounding. (It also figures yearly compound, but not daily.) For each value, it figures:

Pe^Yr

by plugging in everything except r, which it interpolates. The time periods are in terms of years, so the rate it is figuring is therefore the continual rate per year.

It then has to convert this continuous rate to a discrete rate. Since you can arrive at the same full value using either a discrete rate compounded periodically, or the continual rate compounded continually, set them to be equal. We'll say d is the periodic rate, and u is the continual rate.

P(1 + d/n)^Y*n = Pe^Y*u

This leads to two conversion formulas.

u = n ln(1 + d/n)
d = n(e^u/n - 1)

So, plugging in numbers:

Yearly compound: d = e^u - 1
Daily compound: d = 365 * (e^u/365 - 1)

IRR for Perl

:: Quantnotes.com :: Fundamentals ::

I've been struggling with trying to figure out IRR for a while. I'm glad I found this page because it was something of a breakthrough. The question is how to convert rates between continual, yearly, and daily compounding (as well as any other arbitrary period). What is confusing is that I've been using an excel irr plugin that I believe is actually calculating things wrong. It says it is compounding daily, when I think it is actually compounding yearly.