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May 26, 2004

A City on the Brink

What do you do when your city government mismanages its finances? Put the burden of recovery on the taxpayer. Pittsburgh has been in financial trouble for a long time. And now, a state task force has presented its solution. The worst of it:

* A $120 occupation tax (up from $10).
* An increase in the income tax.
* An increase in the property tax.

Fantastic. I'd gripe about the commuter tax, but hey, we live in the city, so that wouldn't apply to me.

Rally Cyprus Update

The FIA decided today to exclude both Peugeots from the Rally Cyprus after concluding that the 307s were using non-standard water pumps. The rally was awarded to second place driver Sebastien Loeb, and everyone else in the standings moved up one place. The "win" moves Loeb into first place in the driver's championship (giving him the unenviable task of running first on the road in Greece), and drops Gronholm to fourth, four points behind Petter Solberg. Ford's Markko Martin currently holds third.

May 19, 2004

The Death of Marriage is Greatly Exaggerated

I came across this today on Salon:

James Dobson, chairman of the Colorado Springs-based Christian group Focus on the Family, offered a grave assessment of the jubilant same-sex couples flocking to court houses in New England.

"We will look back 20, 30, 50 years from now and recall this as the day marriage ceased to have any real meaning in our country. The documents being issued all across Massachusetts may say 'marriage license' at the top but they are really death certificates for the institution of marriage as it has served society for thousands of years."

Do Christian leaders not realize that the divorce rate is roughly 50%? Seems to me that the death knell for marriage has already been heard. Some Christians have to realize that we can't legislate faith. The institution of marriage won't be saved by fighting for an amendment defining marriage. Marriage will be saved by Christians not getting divorced. The divorce rate among Christians is roughly the same as the national rate -- 50%. Here we are, loudly proclaiming that homosexuality marriage will destroy the moral fabric of this country (assuming of course that the country has a moral fabric to be destroyed) while silently slinking into divorce court.

Rally Cyprus Review

It's been a few days coming, but here's the wrapup of the WRC action from last weekend...

As expected, it was a rough rally for all the factory teams. The biggest victim was Subaru's Petter Solberg. Solberg started the rally well, and held the lead through the opening stages. Then, a minor incident that bent his Impreza's front bumper caused dirt to be pushed into the engine's intake, thus seriously limiting the car's power. Solberg lost over nine minutes by the end of the first leg, destroying his chances of winning the rally. Despite the setback, Solberg was the most consistent driver, setting the highest number of scratch times and fighting back into points, eventually finishing sixth.

So, who won? Marcus Gronholm. The new Peugeot 307 won its first rally, but it wasn't without incident either. Gronholm struggled with gearbox problems on days one and two, but managed to get enough of a gap on the field to hold his lead. The win also puts Gronholm on top of the championship bracket heading into the Acropolis rally (more on that in a bit).

Sebastien Loeb had a quiet, measured drive to take second place. He drove consistenly, and the Xsara was reliable enough. Ford's Markko Martin finished third, after battling for the lead on day two. Martin's teammate Francois Duval didn't have a good time, however, retiring on leg two. Citroen's Carlos Sainz ended up in fourth. Peugeot looked like it could take the top two spots on Saturday, with Harri Rovanpera holding second place. But reliability issues with Rovanpera's 307 dropped him to fifth overall.

Subaru's Mikko Hirvonen finished behind teammate Solberg in seventh. Hirvonen has performed quite well for Subaru this season, with only a couple of years of experience under his belt. The Finn will stand on the podium before the end of the season. Ford's Janne Tuohino took the last of the driver's points in eighth place. Mitsubishi had another disappointing rally, with both cars retiring. Gilles Panizzi did managed to fight his way into the top eight on Saturday.

The results of the rally have no yet been finalized by the FIA yet, however, as they are examining both the Citroens and Peugeots for possible technical violations with the cars' water pumps. Should the FIA exclude both teams, Markko Martin would take the win, with Solberg and Hirvonen taking second and third.

So, here's what the championship looks like:

1. Marcus Gronhom - 34 pts
2. Sebastien Loeb - 33 pts
3. Markko Martin - 32 pts
4. Petter Solberg - 28 pts
5. Carlos Sainz - 18 pts

Quite a close race. Each of the top four drivers have won a rally this season, with Loeb taking the double on Monte Carlo and Sweden. Loeb, Martin, and Solberg actually expressed delight with the positions heading into Greece. Gronholm, thanks to his lead, will be running first on the roads on day one, acting as a sweeper for the rest of the field.

May 14, 2004

Cake

The boy discovers the joy of cake.

May 13, 2004

Rally Cyprus Preview

The championship picks up again tomorrow morning on the rough and twisty roads around the island of Cyprus. This is the first of three very tough events to start the summer, with this rally quickly followed by Turkey and the Acropolis. This means a lot of damaged cars and many retirements. All of the teams are sporting relatively new cars, and none of them have cut their teeth on rough terrain, so this weekend will be good indication of how the teams have done developing the latest WRC iterations.

So, who are the favorites? At this point, it's Petter Solberg and Marcus Gronholm. The Peugeot 307, while suffering some reliability issues on the opening legs of the championships, has the most kilometers under its tyres than the other cars. Gronholm, however, has a less than stellar record on these rough and twisty events. Solberg, while driving a newer Impreza, won here last year, and always does well on the rough stuff. Solberg has already said he plans to run a consistent race, just to see what happens to his rivals. If he can post decent times and stay out of trouble, he should be able to stand atop the podium on Sunday.

Keep on eye on the youngsters this weekend as well. Despite the fact that neither Ford's Francois Duval or Subaru's Mikko Hirvonen have much experience in this event, they may fair well if they play it safe. Both could finish in the top five if they take care of their cars and the rest of the field runs into trouble.

Markko Martin should also be a factor, but the reliability of the newer Ford Focus could be an issue, with Martin already damaging the turbo during the shakedown. Citroen isn't expecting much, either, with the newer Xsara, though both Carlos Sainz and Sebastien Loeb need a decent result to get their championship aspirations back on track. Mitsubishi also isn't expecting much after a horrible race in New Zealand, though it would mean a lot for the team just to get both Lancers to finish ramp on Sunday.

My Top 8
1. Petter Solberg
2. Marcus Gronholm
3. Markko Martin
4. Carlos Sainz
5. Mikko Hirvonen
6. Harri Rovanpera
7. Francois Duval
8. Sebastien Loeb

Who's To Blame

Slate has an interesting Chatterbox article about who (or what) is to blame for the military debacle at Abu Ghrarib. I'd like to respond to a couple of the people who were quoted in the article:

Richard Land, head of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission: Can I ask that you take another good look at your Bible? There was this minor event we Christians like to call "The Fall" that occurred, which screwed things up for a very, very long time. Moral pundits always like to point out that society in their day and age is going downhill. NEWSFLASH: it's been going downhill since the dawn of humanity, and it's not getting better without divine intervention. Torture, rape, and humiliation are not 21st century inventions. Society, Mr Land, has been broken for a long time.

Diana West: Blame the media? This is same sort of thing Donald Rumsfeld hinted at during his testimony before the Senate -- "things wouldn't be so bad if those photos didn't get out to the public." Ahhh, yes, the "if a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it" argument.

May 12, 2004

One Year Older

Sebastien turned one year old today. Wow. One year. Jen put together a nice collage of month-by-month photos. A couple of things we noticed when looking at the pics lined up like that:

1) We thought he was a cute baby. Not a chance. He's much cuter now.
2) We thought he had a lot of hair as a newborn. Um, yeah. He looks bald in those early shots.

It has been quite a year, and it's safe to say that we've learned a lot -- who would have thought that an infant would be such a wise sage? Life has changed quite a bit for us. I was just thinking last night that just a year or two ago we were fixtures at the New River Gorge (and Roger's campground). Now, we probably wouldn't know a soul down there. We both miss those days at least a little bit, but these days are much better.

Anyway, we're having a little family party for him this evening (including his first taste of birthday cake), which should include many, many presents from our families. Expect some pictures as soon as we get DSL (don't get me started about how much of a pain it was for us to put those new images on the homepage over a dialup)....

May 11, 2004

Windbags

While I like talking about politics as much as the next arm chair pundit, I am very tired of hearing about the (insert the political idealogy)'s control of the national media. According to the Right, the Left has hopelessly brainwashed the national media, skewing everything to the Left. And according to the Left (see the link above), the Right has controlled the national media for 30 years, suppressing the truth from the country.

The problem is, each side (who only view things through their own set of red or blue tinted glasses) believe that somehow, the national media must be completely unbiased in their reporting. These people live, eat, and breath politics, and expect other people to do the same, but they also expect the national media to be completely unbiased (or at least on their team). Of course some media outlets are going to be biased. Isn't that the point of a free press? If you don't like Rush Limbaugh, then don't listen to him. Nothing you say will convince a ditto-head to stop listening to him. Save your breath. And don't forget, there are plenty of left-leaning media outlets. Maybe they aren't as loud or as well listened to, but they exist (as a side note -- and I'm too lazy to find links -- I thought it was interesting when it was announced that Al Franken would do a radio, it was pointed out that he only had a one year contract. Not the best way to build a loyal fan base -- how long has Rush been on the air?).

It seems to me that this sort of finger pointing is simply a way to shift the blame. The Democrats can say "it's Rush Limbaugh's fault Al Gore lost! He gave his listeners bad information!" If Bush loses come November, the Republicans can claim "those Lefty newspapers were spreading lies!" Why shoulder the blame when you can point it at someone else?

May 08, 2004

Sick Fascination

Perhaps it's my previous life as an endurance athlete, or my love of bicycles, but I find this event (the Raid Calfornie-Oregon) to be incredibly interesting. It's described (quite fittingly) by its creator as the crash between a traditional brevet and an alleycat. Basically, the event was a race from San Francisco to Portland, with a relatively minimal set of rules: you've got five days, you've got have a cyclometer and lights, and you've got to have "checkpoints" from along the way. That's it. Take whichever route you choose, just be sure you cover every kilometer on your bike.

The ride reports from some of the racers are good views into the souls of the suffering. Most of us would be quite happy to ride 150 in a day, let alone do it for five days straight with no real company through the hills of northern California. I assume it's a bit like riding part of the Tour de France, except without the benefit of a team of mechanics, masseurs, and chefs following you around.....

May 07, 2004

Why?

Why are some libertarians so overzealous in their defence of the fast food industry? I understand their love of personal responsibility, but let it go! It's interesting -- at either end of the political spectrum exists a land of moral fuzziness. Here's a libertarian saying that everything is good, even if it makes you fat and causes you to die young. You have a right to do that! This is America, after all. Libertarians are afraid of passing judgement, lest that be construed as pining for government action. The only judge in their world is the market -- if the market allows for it, then it must be ok.

May 06, 2004

Good People

Nick Sande (of Surly fame) has a really nice post about nice people (or the lack thereof).

May 04, 2004

Welcome to Middle America

Well, we moved into the new abode on Saturday, and we got a fair amount of unpacking done -- at least enough to feel comfy. The move went very well, with plenty of friends to help out (and Jen's dad organizing the truck for us), and we managed not to break anything either. Pics will be coming as soon as the DSL gets switched on.