And then there was one...

This entry is written early Wednesday afternoon, just following Bush’s speech.

What a day for politics. For all those in favor of change, we could not have asked for much more. The House of Representative is secure and great strides have been made in the Senate. The only Senate races left uncertain are those of Montana and Virginia. Montana’s winner has been called by CNN in favor of Jon Testor, a Democrat. Virginia’s race is far to close to call, though the current count places Jim Webb (D) ahead by only 7,000 votes from a pool of 2.5 million votes. (The independent candidate has received 26,000 votes- enough to cover the spread between the main party candidates 3.5 times over.)

If the Dems can take that last Virginia Senate seat, they will total 51 in the upper house, which is enough to gain “control.” If that seat goes to the GOP, the 50/50 split will be broken by none other than Dick “Bulls-eye” Cheney, everyone’s second favorite oil man cowboy.

I’ve been glued to CNN.com today, checking up on the close races and witnessing another tidbit of outstanding news- Rumsfeld is stepping down from his post as Secretary of Defense. This may be an act that should have taken place ages ago. With the debacle in Iraq and all its detail, Rummy should have left the Pentagon years ago. If I recall correctly, he did try to resign but Bush would not accept his resignation. More recently, military generals and other political elites have been making efforts to encourage his removal.

Thus far I have only one major theory as to why he selected today to leave. It was clearly a reaction to the election (obviously). The GOP clearly did not expect to lose as much as it did in Congress, and Rumsfeld may have been waiting it out. If the Democrats were to take control of Congress with Rummy still in the war room, chances are good that he could be investigated, prosecuted, or otherwise for Iraq, Abu-Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay prisoners, use of torture, use of illegal wire-tapping, an unsuccessful search for Bin Laden, and other military leadership failures. By getting out now, Rumsfeld may escape any such investigation- and exposé I would love to see.

Anyway you cut it, today was a solid victory for the Democrats, as well as those who are just plain fed up with the right-wing leadership of our country. I voted for change, and I hope we get it. While no candidate promised to fix Iraq, I think the odds are better than they were yesterday.

So now we wait. If a Virginia election is close within a certain percentage of votes, there is an automatic recount. With it being such a close finish, neither candidate would be willing to concede their candidacy and finalize the election.

Web 2.0? More like Web You.0

For a long while I didn’t know it had a name, but I noticed the evolution. Web 2.0 is upon us, or rather, it is us.

If you’re reading The Soap Box, there’s a good chance that you’re old enough to remember the early days of the internet. Those days when you had about three options for an ISP using your 14.4 kb modem and had to pay-per-email. We’ve certainly come a long way in a short time.

The internet has evolved into countless ISPs, millions of websites, free email, and connection speeds that put any type of phone modem to shame. While the internet used to be corporate or organizationally driven, it has turned into an outlet for individuals.

From blogging to personal pages on Facebook, MySpace, Xanga, Flixster, to Wikipedia, Wikihow and so many others have empowered individuals to access, use, and share their slice of the internet. What’s more, the number of slices of the internet is pretty much infinite. Anyone with access to a computer, or even a Smartphone or PDA can do it effectively for free. Even the previously standardized web pages like Yahoo, Google, and many others are fully customizable. The web is now all about the user, and scarcely about the provider. Compare this to a Henry Ford quote from the 1910’s “Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black" versus today’s age where you have dozens of car styles, colors and options to tailor your ride to your personal preference.

With all this personal empowerment, we have achieved the ability to share human knowledge and experiences with the entire world at any time, instantly. Readers of Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat will recognize everything I’m talking about as part of Globalization 3.0. (If you haven’t read this book, it is highly recommended.) Look at Wikipedia. Its creators designed it as a resource to contain the world’s combined knowledge. And with personal pages on the social networking sites, we can learn more and more about each other as human beings.

Other features of Web 2.0 include the new dynamic of software. When was the last time you purchased software and used your CD-ROM drive to install it? It is far more common now to acquire applications and games from the web. Even the programs you already have utilize the internet to update or sync with a distant source. Or examine the Open Source movement- millions of individuals whom have never met in person are now collaborating to develop software for all sorts of uses, all for free.

When considering at what point this new era began, I don’t think there is a solid answer. The internet has been going through an evolution. Because the web is neither centrally located nor centrally controlled, there was no single force that guided it to where it is now. Certainly the most palpable answer is simply that the individual empowerment started when it became economically feasible to extend this sort of technology to the masses. Like any other major technological innovation, it is generally prohibitively expensive to most in the early stages, but cost goes down steadily and availability increases.

Most of us are only beginning to embrace the possibilities of this new era of the internet. Like all evolutions, it will take time. For now, I’m taking every opportunity to explore new facets of the internet and my stake in it.

I found this picture on Google Images, and it does a bang up job of summing up Web 2.0. It’s eerily reminiscent of the socialist movement.

A Little of Each, All of Neither

I mentioned in my post regarding Iraq that I was not a democrat or a republican, and I thought I best explain that before the election. Not to say that it would become completely irrelevant after tomorrow, but politics certainly takes a back burner in most people’s minds after Election Day.

Most people in this country identify themselves politically by siding with a political party of choice. Unfortunately in this country, there’s effectively only two from which to choose, so it becomes a very polarized electorate. However, I seek out some sort of middle ground. I’m not a Democrat or a Republican. My voter registration information does not declare me as either, nor do I belong to any formal organization. I don’t attend meetings, I don’t donate money to any candidate, and I don’t volunteer for any campaigns. To call myself a member of either party without any level of participation above the ballot box would be a flagrant overstatement.

Beyond campaign participation and general support, I do not necessarily agree with either party on enough issues to substantiate supporting them in all cases. For a broad example, I am generally left leaning on social issues and more right leaning on economic ones. (i.e. support stem cell research and free trade) Few candidates stand on this kind of platform, and seldom is it regular in any one party.

Additionally, I can’t possibly agree with the Republican Party as a whole as they sit right now. Even though one of this party’s charter members was the much respected Abraham Lincoln, today they seem tied up with cronyism, sex scandal and a blunder of foreign policy. So many GOP politicians seem so much more focused on their own wallet than the direction of this country. Tom DeLay and Dick Cheney are great examples.

The Democratic Party isn’t much better. While they may not be locked in scandal, they frequently seem completely unable to organize themselves. So much of their political base has been fragmented by groups that do or do not support the Iraq war, and those that may or may not believe in “the defense of marriage.” What’s more, as the Republican Party has sabotaged itself so many times in the last five or so years, the Democrats have routinely failed to take advantage. Lacking organization and a spine, they don’t seem able to stand up for anything. They have sat silent through so many prime opportunities. That kind of political apathy makes them no better than their opposition.

I’ve never been a fan of the polarizing effects of a two party system. I much prefer the multi-party structure that is commonly found in the parliamentary systems of Europe. Germany, for example, has a solid government that allows for more than two political views to be expressed. Unfortunately, that is not an option in America.

In the mean time, I’m just going to stick to the issues and vote for candidates that agree with my line of thinking. I don’t go out of my way for red or blue. Colorblind voting, I’ll call it.

The Chipotle Blend

I love Chipotle. Who doesn't? Since moving to Columbus I've had thier delicious burritos on a number of occasions. Nevertheless, I've developed a solid idea that could maximize my tex-mex burrito experience.

The Chipotle burrito is pretty wide. (I'd say 4 or so inches across maybe, by two inches? That's 8 square inches!) Which is too wide to get a bite that encompasses the entire girth of the tortilla. Because of the way the burrito is made, the distribution of ingredients is uneven, and a bite of any one section of the burrito yields only one or two flavors. Often the rice is on one side, the cheese in the middle and your meat on the other end. Usually the salsa of your choice only spices up a third of the burrito to boot.

What I propose is an extra step in the burrito creation process. After you pick out your ingredients, everything should be dumped into a bowl and stirred gently to create an even burrito distribution. The burrito ingredients can then be re-integrated with the tortilla for your eating pleasure. I propose the name "Chipotle Blend" for the new product.

Think of it- spice mixed with meat, rice mixed with cheese, and all of this blended together for a cornucopia (horn of plenty) of flavors and deliciousness. Chipotle, I'm waiting by the phone for you to call and ask me to go on a national tour demonstrating my new product.

Make the check out to: Taste Wizard Tyler

Stem Sold

Stem cell research is becoming one of those "hot-button" issues this election season. It seems that more liberal candidates support the study, while conservatives have made an effort to block research. President Bush himself used his first ever veto to block a congressional act allowing research. (Finally he uses a veto... I guess it shows how aligned Bush and the Republican congress are!)

Why is this such a big deal? It seems like any medical effort that could be made to save lives and fight diseases such as cancer, Parkinson's and heart disease would be a shoe-in. Well, it's complicated. But here's the short of it:

Your entire body is made up of cells, but there's lots of different kinds. Skin cells, heart cells, nerve cells, bone cells, etc, are all a little bit different, because they have different functions. They can't be interchanged to help heal other body parts not of their same type. (i.e. a skin cell put in your brain won't regenerate neurons lost from a stroke) Stem cells aren't any specific type of cell. Or rather, they're any type of cell you want. Follow me on this.

A stem cell is like a blank piece of paper that can be written on with a pencil. However, the pencil has no eraser. Stem cells can be conformed to be nerve cells, heart cells, or whatever else is needed, but it can't work backwards. So theoretically, we could use stem cells to create heart cells and help someone with heart disease. Easy enough, right? Sort of. Adult humans do have a limited number of stem cells in their bodies which can be used, but the process isn't as effective or promising as the alternative.

Embryonic Stem cells (or ES) is the same concept, but the cells are obtained from an embryo, where all the cells are dividing to become different body parts. Cultures of human embryonic cells can be used for this research, and this is the most controversial idea surrounding stem cells. The political problem arises when people believe that stem cell research requires the "murder" of a baby to access these cells. This really isn't the case. Most stem cell research is done using embryonic cell lines that were already created for the purpose of in-vitro fertilization. After a successful fertilization, the remaining embryonic cells are set to be destroyed anyway, so using them for research is a lot better than nothing. Furthermore, the embryo that is used is at its very earliest stages of development. We're talking 32-64 total cells. A far cry from the 50-75 trillion cells it takes to make a living, breathing human.

I'm all-for stem cell research. I think the possibilities that lie within a handful of cells vastly outweighs the claim by a few that we're murdering babies for the benefit of a few. Much of the opposition (frequently the religious right) claim that "life begins at conception". I disagree with that statement, especially when there are fewer than 100 cells in question.

Even if not everyone agrees that we should allow embryonic generation for the purpose of research, it cannot be denied that the medical possibilities that could be unlocked are powerful and numerous. At the very least, researchers should be given full access and permission to utilize embryonic cell lines that already exist to further understand what possibilities may await. Perhaps then we can more fully understand their potential and develop a strong case for additional embryonic research development.

Most Saints Day

Today is November 1st, what the Catholics call "All Saints Day". Something about this fascinates me. Saints are supposedly among the most important people who ever lived. Being Sanctified is more elite than being called "Sir", "Dr.", "Your Honor", "Mr. President", or probably even "Pope".

I thought it was odd that all the saints would have to share one day until i realized how many of them there are. This list on Wikipedia clearly shows that there are many, many saints. The article also states that in Roman Catholicism there are "10,000 saints and beatified people." So even if they were divided up equally each day (and not exempting time for Jesus' Christmas and Easter) 27 saints would have to share each day. So i guess it only makes sense that they should all combine for one Saint-tastic hollapalooza on November 1st.

I figured the most stand-out saints would get their very own day, but I'm curious as to why the ones that do were selected as such:

St. Patrick: Patron saint of excuses for drinking.
St. Valentine: Patron saint of chalk flavored candy hearts with out-dated messages written on them. (Fax Me!)