Author: N.Z. Bear

Douglas Turnbull over at Beauty of Gray us of the fifth plane to be lost last fall — American Flight 583. He’s got a wrap-up of the latest from the NTSB investigation — which has not released conclusions as yet, but has provided some info on their web site.

Jay Manifold thinks small is beautiful. Or at least, short is.

The topic du jour is about rebuilding the WTC, which from a safe distance of 1200 miles, I … still oppose. The density of central cities is an artifact of an earlier time, where the value of information combined with limited bandwidth and personal transportation to require close physical proximity … I have seen the future, and it’s about 50 feet high.

Well, sure, out there in the cornfields of Kansas City it’s easy to say that. But I would point out that Manhattan is an island. There ain’t no more space to build any direction but up there… and hasn’t been for some time. And so for some patches of civilization, I think you’re going to have those big buildings… not necessarily out of architectural hubris, but out of simple geometry…

Thanks to those who some votes over at The Weblog Review. I’m #4 on the “Readers’ Top 5” list, and am now up to a reader rating of 3.1428571428571.
Approximately.

New goal: Kick that punk Wil Wheaton‘s ass. He’s got a reader rating of 4.0434056761269. Approximately.

And he’s all that stands between me and that #3 slot.

C’mere, Wil. I’ve got this nice red shirt I’d like to lend you…

A new look for The Truth Laid Bear

Finally — A logo submission !

To the left, you will behold the new TTLB logo, submitted by a self-described “huge fan of my stuff”. Cower in fear of its aesthetic beauty, foolish mortals ! You are not worthy !

I’m late to acknowledge this, but better late than and all that:

Mr. Patio has replied to my (well, whines, actually) to declassify me from Comedies on his blogroll.

His new category for this humble bear is, I suppose, appropriate, given how “smokin” this site has been lately. Ahem.

Heather Havrilesky a strange lady. She’s also very tired.

Heather on manic episodes: “The Manic Episode is our friend. We need it to function. Without it, how would we alienate our friends and relatives, or do the laundry in a timely fashion?”

Heather on the Good Things In Life: “Well, there’s pizza with extra garlic. There’s great sex and even better sex. There are places in Palm Springs where they bring you cold beers to reward you for tanning so evenly.”

Heather on her plans for children: “I’d prefer to have kids who grow up wretchedly poor in some foul, twisted city.”

Go ahead. Click it. You know you’re curious. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.

I don’t think Jason Rylander Ralph Nader much.

Shameless plea for validation

Okay, I’ll admit it. I paid $5 to Weblog Review for them to get off their butts and get around to reviewing my site. I’m a narcissist, and I was curious what they’d have to say.

Well, turns out they said nice things, rating TTLB at 4.5 out of 5. Which is great.

But then, some meanies decided to cast their own votes on the site, and they don’t seem to like this bear much at all. My average “user” vote is 2.5, with only two votes cast. And that… well, that just hurts my feelings. Sniff.

So if only to stroke my pathetic ego: go vote! Unless of course you think I suck, in which case: don’t !

I think you have to register, but it’s free and relatively painless, so it’s a small price for you to pay for… well, for me.

Brian Finch has column today over at TechCentralStation which InstaGuy advises us to read, so never to be one to turn down He From Whom All Traffic Flows, I did.

It’s a good piece, and reminds us of the paradigm shift the September 11th attacks forced on our ideas about aircraft hijackings and how they obliterated the “old” approach to dealing with terrorists in flight. Finch calls this “The Delta Force Paradigm”, and describes it as “stay calm, listen to what the hijackers say and wait until the plane gets on the ground so the military or police can come and rescue everyone.”

On September 11th that, of course, didn’t happen, and now we know that there is something worse than the terrorists destroying the plane and killing everyone on board. And we’re adjusting our approaches to countering them accordingly.

But I wanted to take this opportunity to remind everyone — as Finch does — of exactly how long it took American society to analyze this new threat and change our policies to deal with it appropriately.

The change didn’t come from Congress, or from a new Cabinet office. It came through the reactions of civilian passengers on Flight 93, and their loved ones on the ground. And it took one hundred and nine minutes.

This has been commented on before, but it’s worth revisiting, especially in any moments of doubt we may be having about our ability to prevail in this struggle. One hundred and nine minutes after the first plane hit the World Trade Center, our society was able to recognize the new threat, determine how to counter it, and act.

As an occasional Star Trek geek, I find myself compelled to bring up a comparison to the Borg; the race of humanoids who function as a collective mind, completely integrated with their technology. One of their greatest strengths is that no weapon works on them more than a few times — they use their combined abilities to analyze, assess, and adapt to the attack, nearly instantly.

Welcome to the benevolent Borg collective, folks.

Wanted: Soccer Mom Bloggers

The recent York Times piece on bloggers has stirred up yet another round of metacommentary on blogging (“another round” is probably generous — it’s more accurate to say the metacommentary never really stops), and many bright folks have weighed in with their two cents on the future o’ blogging.

Personally, I was unimpressed with the Times piece; despite Glenn’s comments that he was satisfied, it certainly seemed to me to be trying to create a story where there really wasn’t one — i.e., the “rift” between techblogs and warblogs. Am I just dense — is there a war going on and I just didn’t notice it?

But the substance of the piece aside, it has certainly had the salutory effect of driving out some interesting self-reflection in the community, such as Jeff Jarvis’s comments (via Eric Olsen ):

To survive and succeed, weblogs must be embraced by many, many interests and their communities. I’ve seen some good food blogs. We need more entertainment blogs. I can’t believe there aren’t many more sports blogs, from pro all the way down to Little League. I hope to see local blogs and ethnic blogs and, of course, biz blogs.

This is exactly right, but I’ll take Jeff’s points a few steps further.

Once-A-Week Bloggers

In the heart of the warblogger community, a normal rate-of-posting is at least once a day. Many (not just Glenn) are updating many times throughout the day, every day. This is great. But what we really need is not 100 more blogs being updated six times a day — what we need is 100,000 more blogs that are all being updated once a week.

Right now, the political blogs are dominated by — well, political junkies. People who love to think about politics, news, events, and have an opinion on everything. This is, as I said, great. But what would truly be interesting would be to encourage a far, far wider group of people to become involved in blogging — those who don’t want to spend many hours a day on a blog, but who are willing to devote one hour a week.

To keep to what I know best — the political end of the blogosphere — I know what Stephen and Glenn and Mickey and Andrew have to say about homeland security. What I want to know is what the legendary soccer moms have to say about it. We do have a diversity of political opinion in the blogosphere (despite whining complaints of it being conservative-dominated). But what we don’t have enough of is diversity of “time commitment”. The people who are blogging are, by and large, those who are willing to devote a large chunk of time to blogging. And that skews the equation, and limits the spectrum of thought and opinion that we find.

Tools & Talent

What needs to happen for the soccer moms to start blogging? A few things.

First, nobody blogs if they don’t think anybody is reading them. (Or at least, nobody I know). And right now, the tools available to us as blog readers are skewed to favor blogs that are updated very frequently — and readers who are monitoring blogs continuously. Webogs.com’s main list is the worst example. It’s great if you’re monitoring it every few hours and looking to see when Glenn updates. But if you check it once every two days (let’s not even think about only once a week) and are looking for three blogs that update about once a week, then good luck. You’ll never find them; the tool isn’t geared to that kind of usage.

(This is not, by the way, meant as criticism of Weblogs.com — it is a great service and I thank those who run it. But it fills a need — not all needs).

Some add-ons to Weblogs’ main data stream help; BlogTracker lets you select your list of blogs and shows you when they were last updated, and can be used to track blogs over long periods of time. But we need more — more tools, more features on those tools, more flexibility in how to use them, and more independent tools that don’t rely on the Weblogs,com data stream (because after all, the fatal annoyance of Weblogs.com is that it requires the blogger to ping them. We need active monitoring tools to handle sites run by people who’ve never heard of Weblogs.com).

The point being, if there are no tools available to ‘automate’ blog tracking, a normal person is going to reduce down to the five or ten blogs they either remember the URL for, or bother to put in their bookmarks (or, is going to just rely on a major bloggers list like Glenn’s). But with easy-to-use tools, there’s no reason why that list can’t expand to fifty or a hundred weblogs, many of which don’t update frequently. And that sets the stage for the once-a-week bloggers to be able to actually publish with a reasonable belief that just even though they don’t update six times a day, they will still get read.

And the tools need to get better on the authoring side, as well. Surely it is obvious when the blogging revolution will truly have arrived? That’s right: when Microsoft starts bundling Blogger into a version of Windows. Or Internet Explorer (they’re the same thing, right?).

And there’s no reason why they shouldn’t. Using Blogger is a bit harder than using Microsoft Word — but only a bit, and it’s not harder for any really good reason that couldn’t be fixed. So why shouldn’t we see Microsoft bundling a blogging tool and free (limited) hosting on MSN with the next version of Windows?

(I use Microsoft as the obvious example here, but I don’t intend to get into the question of whether they, as the Evil Empire, are the best to do this. AOL could do it, as could any ISP. The ideal situation, of course, would be if they all did it…)

Spread the Gospel

Lastly, the obvious point. We need to spread the gospel o’ blogging. This means reaching out to those who are not yet bloggers but should be — and it also means encouraging those newcomers who are just getting started (and there ain’t no lovin’ quite like linkin’ lovin’ — so that’s the best way to encourage!).

The realization I’ve come to recently is that anybody who enjoys writing — even a little bit — should be blogging. It’s not just to share your wisdom with the world. It’s to clarify for yourself just what your wisdom is. The discipline required to sit down and state your case, to declare an opinion and back it up, forces a person to think critically about the issue at hand. By documenting your thoughts, you actually improve the quality of your thinking.

And that is the true promise of blogging. Not only to create a space where — perhaps — the embryo of a virtual democracy can form, but also to drag people out of their spoon-fed adherence on the Conventional Wisdom of the day. If nobody is listening to you, it feels like it doesn’t really matter if you form your own opinion or just parrot back what you heard on Crossfire. But once you’ve got a platform — the feeling that people are actually listening to what you have to say — well, that makes you think.

And that’s the whole idea.

refers us to a Michael Kelly piece in today’s WaPo online, in which Kelly stakes out the pragmatic high ground of the civil liberties vs. increased security debate.

First, Kelly:

The proper response to [complaints about security measures violating civil liberties] is: Yes, it is true, this action will indeed hurt or at least insult some innocent people, and we are sorry about that. And this action does represent an infringement of the rights and liberties enjoyed not just by Americans but by visitors to America, and we are sorry about that, too. But we must do everything we can to curtail the ability of the enemy to attack us. This is necessary.

And VP:

Readers here know that VP is as hawkish as they come. But Kelly frightens me a bit. Read him and report back.

Read and reporting as ordered, sir.

I think I know what the problem is here, and why VP is troubled by Kelly, despite being a rather pragmatic fellow himself. Kelly’s central point is that in wartime, we may not, as citizens (or even simple residents) of the United States retain the exact same rights and privleges as we have in peacetime, and that this is a rational and necessary response to realize the greater good of defending the safety and survival of our country. To which most normal folks would reply: “Well, duh!.”

But that’s not the troubling part of Kelly’s piece. The troubling part is that he takes aim at those who are raising concerns about the impact new security measures will have on civil liberties; in effect, the tone of his piece suggests that he thinks they should sit down and shut up.

And this is exactly, 100% wrong. It is precisely because we have people such as those Kelly bashes to raise objections to new policies — and have a society and legal framework that ensures the right to such debate — that we can safely consider rational tradeoffs between liberty and security.

Reader MarkD on VP’s comment board points out that “Fingerprinting aliens is not the first step on a slippery slope to the American Secret Police knocking on your door just because you said mean things about the government. There’s a million breaking points where lines can and will be drawn. This is a democracy and the people will never stand for intrusions on that level.” And MarkD is correct. But Kelly doesn’t seem to want any review of these policies; in describing the dialogue (he calls it “ritual”) between civil liberties activists and government officials pressing for further security measures, he asks alound, “Would it be too much to ask that we cut this out?”

Yes, Mr. Kelly, it would. For while I’ll support your position that some restrictions on liberty may — may be necessary, I will absolutely not support the idea that such restrictions should be put in place without any public feedback or review. Many of the concerns raised may not be valid — they may be stupid, foolish, and irrational. But some won’t be. And in the dialogue between cop and civil liberties lawyer; between spy and protester; in that heat of discussion and opinion flowing back and forth, we will find the truth. The policies that are truly necessary and just will stand — and those that aren’t will get shouted down.

That is why we call this a democracy, and why it is worth defending, remember?

PS – Stephen has now exceeded his quota of interesting pieces for the next day or so. No more links for you, VP!

If you haven’t figured it out, I’ve backed off from the Hayman coverage. Not because it’s any less important, but because there are folks who are doing a much better job of it that I could. If you are looking for information, please start with the official county sources which I have listed in the top-left of the page. If you can’t find what you’re looking for, then try the media resources. And good luck to all affected.

More Nonflamable Posting: The N.Z. Bear Name FAQ

To my surprise, I received far fewer questions about my nom de plume than I had expected when I started TTLB. However, they are starting to pile up. And so, while I’ve answered some queries privately, it is time, I think, to publicly address some of the common questions. So here goes.

Is N.Z. Bear your real name?

No. It is indeed an alias.

Why the alias, coward? Are you chicken ?

Well, yes and no. I don’t particularly care if I potentially endanger myself by pissing off wackos. (And if I am not pissing off any wackos, I’m not accomplishing my goals for the site). However, I do have family, and they have the same name as I do. And so I’m uncomfortable with the possibility that, remote as it may be, some wacko might decide to show up on my doorstep and harass anyone I hold dear. And so, an alias.

Will you ever consider dropping the alias?

Yes, almost certainly. I think about it pretty frequently. (When I got the Salon piece published was certainly a big moment of decision… there was a heavy temptation to have it be my “true name” up in lights there). My conclusion, however, is that I can always “come out” later… but once “out”, there ain’t no going back. And so, for now, I remain a coward.

Does the N.Z. stand for New Zealand?

Probably the most common question. No, it does not. I’ve don’t live there, and in fact have never been there, although I hear it is lovely. (I live in California, which those of you who have been paying close attention already knew).

So what does it stand for?

It’s a private joke. And no, I’m not telling.

About the “Bear” part. Are you a large, hairy gay man?

Er, no. But thanks for asking. (I actually did receive this question — asked very politely, I might add — from a reader). Although I have now learned (also from said reader) that “bear” is a term some homosexual men of generally large build use to describe themselves, that would not be me.

If you have a N.Z. Bear name question that wasn’t answered here, by all means, it my way! I’ll try to answer it — or at least evade it in an entertaining fashion.

A Post About Something That Isn’t On Fire — With Special Bonus Nomenclature !

VodkaGuy, clearly befuddled by the unending dilemma of whether he wants to be or Paul Wolfowitz when he grows up, misses the lead in his takedown this morning of accused “dirty-bomber” Jose Padilla.

VP cites Padilla’s impressive rap sheet (Chicago gang member, assault, etc.) as evidence that al Qaeda will take anybody — as opposed to our fine U.S. Marine Corps, who are of course looking simply for a few good men.

What VP forgets, however, is that to the Islamofascists, a disregard for human life, violent behavior, and a general lack of morality are assets. Viewed through that lens, Perdillo is imminently qualified.

By the way: let’s drop the tag “dirty-bomber”. There’s a much better moniker to stick on Padilla and his ilk : wannabomber.

I think it summarizes both the facts of his (alleged) intentions, and also nicely captures the pathetic, cowardly loserdom inherent in a man — or at least, a male human, not a man — who would seek to kill innocents in such a manner.

It’s a nice generic term, too, and can be applied with equal validity to the Palestinian murderers-to-be who are caught before they can carry out their attacks, and (with even greater enjoyment) to those who accidentally blow themselves up before they can harm any women and children…

Update: I goofed and got the wannabomber’s name wrong. The error has now been corrected; thanks to Kevin at Flyover for pointing it out.

If you are truly desperate for the latest rumours about the Hayman fire, you can monitor the IRC channel that Pinecam.com has set up. Keep in mind that anybody and everybody is chatting in there, so information you read may be inaccurate, completely wrong, or malicious lies. Or all three. This is not an official government source — see the list of phone numbers at the top-left of the page for the appropriate local resources near you.

You can access the channel via your browser or via your own IRC client at chat.planetz.net, port 6667, channel #pinechat .

Update 2/21/03: The folks at Pinecam are continuing their efforts to provide useful and accurate information; see this thread on their discussion board for additional info:
We are working with local fire authorities now to make sure information given out on Pinecam this season is more responsible and sensitive to the needs of firefighters and possible fire victims. You may find less direct scanner posts on Pinecam this year, but rest assured the important information will still be here. We’re just not going to be posting — willy-nilly — everything that we hear on the scanner.

Folks –

I’ve taken down my handmade fire maps. I know this may disappoint some, but I am concerned that folks may start to rely on my information as “definitive” — which it is not. In addition, I am fearful that even the official info coming out (which I based my maps on) is significantly behind the real fire, and I am worried about posting a map that is actually half-a-day out of date.

So: No more pretty pictures, sorry. But I will continue to post official info as I find it, as well as links to resources. Hope y’all understand.

I just updated the map to more accurately reflect the most current information on expected / “encouraged” evacuation areas. In addition, there is now a high-quality version of the map available; click on the map for the larger version.

The Douglas County Sheriff has a news release out this morning regarding evacuations. In a nutshell, it sounds like the areas to the northeast of the fire will be under mandatory evacuation orders sometime today, and the sheriff is encouraging residents of those areas to leave now. (Phone number for Douglas County sherriff’s office can be found in the left navigation bar).

Release Date: 06/11/02 Release Time 8:00 a.m.

DOUGLAS CONTY, CO — Although the Hayman fire did not advance much overnight, conditions today are right for the fire to once again advance rapidly and unpredictably.

The Sheriff’s Office is contacting Neighborhood Watch block captains to augment its emergency notification capability. Evacuation notices for affected neighborhoods have been loaded into the EPN emergency telephone notification system to allow for immediate notification of citizens in the event of an evacuation order.

While NO NEW EVACUATION ORDERS HAVE BEEN ISSUED, the sheriff’s office is highly encouraging residents of all urban-wildland interface areas between Perry Park (on the south) and Roxborough Village (on the north) – to include Sedalia, Indian Creek Ranch, Oak Valley and surrounding areas — to give serious consideration to the idea of leaving now. If the fire advances quickly toward a residential area, an emergency evacuation order may not allow enough time for people to leave in an orderly manner, especially given inevitable traffic congestion.

Residents are STRONGLY ENCOURAGED to pack up medications in their original containers, insurance and other important papers, a change of clothing, and any other items they need at this time.

The sheriff’s office is establishing and will maintain checkpoints in the area to discourage non-residents from trying to get into the area. Consequently, residents should make sure they have identification with their current address with them at all times.

Residents should also be aware that if an evacuation is ordered, residents WILL NOT be allowed back into the affected areas until it is safe to do so. Please DO NOT WAIT for an evacuation order to be issued to make these critical preparations.

If you’re looking for even more Hayman fire information, check out In addititon to a blog, they’ve also got folks who are monitoring scanner frequencies and posting updates to a message board on what they hear.

In particular, you’ll find information in the blog about resources that fire fighters are in need of — snack foods, water, minor first aid supplies, things like that. Check it out, and if you are in the area and can spare anything, help them out!

PS – And no, my father’s not on the Hayman fire today (I think), so I’m not plugging this to get my Dad some chips!

Okay, as I’ve been focusing my efforts almost exclusively on the Hayman fire, I’ve implemented a temporary site redesign. I’ll be updating the map above with additional information as it comes in, as well as the statistics to the right.

As always: I’m doing what I can, but please, please, contact your local authorities for official information.

With the redesign, I may even be able to cover some non-fire stuff today without reducing the prominence of the Hayman info, so we’ll see how that goes.