Month: September 2003

Indian Gaming: Special Interest, or Just Like Every Other?

Calpundit up on a point made by Atrios on “Indian Gaming Interests”:
INDIAN GAMING….Atrios makes a good point today:
I’m really getting tired of the phrase “Indian Gaming Interests” being thrown around by the media as if it is some sort of insidious thing. They’re just another business interest, like the numerous “old white man business interests” that spend a lot of money financing campaigns.
As it happens, I’m not especially happy about Indian gaming, and I’m not especially happy about the lobbying they do. However, there are plenty of businesses that get unique concessions from the government

Blogwar Meets Blog Showcase

Next week’s should be an interesting one, as it looks like we will have some guest judges. I’ve just sent the following message to the leadership of the warring factions in the Great Blogwar:

To: The Blogger Alliance; The Axis of Naughty
From: N.Z. Bear of The Truth Laid Bear
Re: Proposal to Sponsor the New Weblog Showcase
Greetings, honored combatants, from the neutral zone of the Blogwar!
As I believe you know, one of the projects which I maintain at The Truth Laid Bear is the New Weblog Showcase.
Each week, the Showcase is open for new bloggers (currently defined as those blogging for less than three months) to submit a sample post of their best work. Other bloggers then cast their votes simply by linking to the entered posts they deem most worthy — and each Monday morning, whichever weblog has received the most votes is declared the winner for the week. (More detailed information can be found here).
I would like to propose, therefore, an offer to each of your alliances. I would be willing to declare an alliance the “sponsor” of the Showcase — complete with a declaration as such and your logo prominently placed on the Showcase pages — in exchange for a pledge that your alliance members would actively participate in each week’s Showcase: reviewing the work of the new bloggers, and voting for those that they feel are most worthy.
I believe such an arrangement would have mutual benefits: the Showcase would gain greater visibility and new bloggers would have wider exposure in the Blogosphere. And the alliance sponsoring the contest would both gain a valuable opportunity to recruit new members from the Showcase contestants — and have a practical focus for the energies of its membership.
There is, however, one catch: it seems reasonable that only one alliance should have the sponsorship. Therefore:
– If one of your noble alliances is interested in this sponsorship, but not the other, then I will accept the sponsorship from the interested group effective immediately.
– If neither alliance finds this arrangement of interest, I shall leave you all to your own devices, and return sheepishly to my own.

– If BOTH alliances are interested in the arrangement, I propose to make the next week a challenge between the two alliances. Whichever alliance can succeed in delivering the highest participation (linking to entered Showcase posts and to the winner’s announcement Monday) from their membership — measured by percentage of your total membership — will win sponsorship of the Showcase.
I propose to make the initial sponsorship arrangement a temporary one — perhaps a month — after which we can re-evaluate the arrangement to ensure it remains mutually beneficial to all involved.
Please feel free to distribute this message to your respective memberships, or repost it on your weblogs. Regardless of your decisions, I wish you all the best, and await your replies.
-N.Z. Bear
The Truth Laid Bear

Kevin at Wizbang has already replied: “The Axis of Naughty is in.”
Will the Blogger Alliance take up the challenge? Stay tuned!

A final, first Heinlein novel

Well, is astounding news:
As of this writing, August 31, 2003, there are only about half a dozen people in the entire known universe who can accurately claim that they have read every novel Heinlein has written.
For those of us who thought there would never again be another new Heinlein novel, the impossible has become reality . “For Us, the Living,” is a brand new, never before published novel by Robert A. Heinlein. It is going into print now for the first time and will be in bookstores by the end of November, 2003.
“For Us, the Living” was written by Heinlein about 1938-9, before he wrote his first sf short, “Lifeline.” The novel, “For Us, the Living,” was deemed unpublishable, mainly for the racy content.
I find it difficult to discuss Heinlein without falling into superlatives; suffice it to say that yes, I’ve read just about everything he’s ever written (or so I had thought!), and yes, I borrowed many of my core moral and political beliefs from what I found in his work. To find that after so many years we have a fresh opportunity to hear one last tale from the old man is simply extraordinary.
Hat tip: Ambient Irony

Do-overs for Showcase

OK, by popular demand — or at least, request — if you entered the Weblog Showcase over the past few weeks and feel you got hosed due to the Ecosystem problems, feel free to enter again this week. If you need to, fudge your blog-started date so that you qualify for this week’s contest, we’ll consider the date extended backwards a few weeks.