Showing posts with label Facebook. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Facebook. Show all posts
July 16, 2012
Follow me to Tumblr!
You can still find me, cyberly speaking, at the venues listed here--Heroes and Heartbreakersm Goodreads, Amazon, Twitter, Pinterest, etc.--but I've taken to very short blog snippets on Tumblr. Please follow me there.
May 28, 2012
This blog is going on indefinite hiatus. Very few of you read it, and I'd rather reach a larger audience. If that mean spreading myself across multiple social media platforms, so be it. As a result I've provided handy-dandy buttons within two tables below for all the places you can follow me.
My tweets tend toward the political, and I'm progressive. Most of my library database is on Goodreads, and as it is becoming more and more the readers' social media outlet, I've just begun to post reviews there. Goodreads will more or less replace this blog, at least for now.
| Goodreads | Google+ | Huffington Post | My Jam | |||
My Facebook offers some personal nuggets and funny stuff. I try to keep my political stuff on a FB group I started earlier in the year. Google+ seems to be a more visual sort of social media outlet, so I try to post mostly photos, although when I post a review or a piece of writing somewhere, I'll link to it from g+. I pin at both Pinterest and Loveit, but since the latter is in beta, I didn't create a button. If you are a Loveit beta tester or would like to be, I'll be glad to share an invite and/or my home there. If you have a page on the Huffington Post, feel free to use the button below to link to mine. Finally, I post a weekly song to This Is My Jam. Nobody else uses it, but I try and curate my selections thoughtfully.
Though I've reviewed at Publishers Weekly since the late 1990s, other than a feature article I wrote last year, reviews remain without bylines. But it's a huge part of my work life, so feel free to link to PW, and if you are a subscriber, each week you can access upwards of 80 new reviews.
 Writer |  Blogger |  Member |  Reviewer |
After a substantial injury-related hiatus, I'm back on Heroes & Heartbreakers, with four posts in recent weeks. I've not written anything for some time at NBCC, but it's particularly interesting to those interested in literary fiction. Finally, the green leaf will [eventually] take you to my Amazon profile page, and the hundred plus reviews I've written.
And now I'm off to Goodreads to review Tiffany Reisz's The Siren.
July 14, 2011
Facebook, No...Google+, Yes Please
My dislike really began when Facebook removed the personalization aspect of my page, forcing me to go into my left gutter to access third party apps. Then they removed the tabs, so even if I wanted to share my FB friend web with people, I couldn't. Hell, at this point even I can't find it...or my world map of all the places I've been, or particular music I want to share, or anything that I'm guessing doesn't provide FB with a way to make money off of me.
Yes, I can go in and individually shut off the No Doubt updates, along with those from Mad Men, Big Bang Theory, Game of Thrones, James Taylor, and so on. But why should I have to do that, one by one, for each "like?" If FB is going to allow intrusion, shouldn't I be asked to allow it on the front end, not disallow it, individually, for each intrusion I never asked for?
Wow...I don't think I've ever ended so many sentences, let alone paragraphs, with prepositions!
I've been extending invitations to Google+ to all who ask...all I need is an email address...with the understanding that unless I actually know you in some substantive way, circle joining will not follow. I understand there are burps along the way; it took two invites to two addresses each for my husband and daughter to join, and a friend of mine is having problems having Google+ accept her. But I love the idea of having a place to post without limiting to 140 characters—if this goes as I hope, my Twitter feed will soon cease to have anything personal and solely be about politics and publishing because I doubt Author A or Publisher B is interested in where I checked in for dinner last night using Foursquare— and I'll actually be able to see updates from the people I care about.
My daughter joined, but has no intention of actually using Google+ "until it catches on." My response? "It won't catch on unless people actually use it." I'm making a conscious effort to do that, downloading the Google+ app to my phone yesterday (I used it last night to pull Kevin into my "family" circle on the way to dinner).
If I can convince all family members to join, and can find some way to import birthdays into my calendar, I plan to leave Facebook altogether. Yes, I know you all play games there, but I quit cold turkey about a year ago when I realized what a time suck it was, so if you are growing more and more dissatisfied with Facebook, please consider the Google+ alternative. And if you need an invite, let me know.
June 1, 2011
A Perfect Birthday
I mostly adhered to my daughter's "you shall not work on your birthday" edict yesterday, but after following one of Megan's tweets, I felt compelled to dash off a quick article that may go online today...and if so, may kick my article originally scheduled for today into some time next week. But I had fun writing it, it was quick and off-the-cuff, and I didn't edit myself to death.
My husband and I put ourselves on an austerity program a few years ago that precluded big celebrations and big expressions of affection, but this year we've been able to ease up. Because yesterday's birthday was a biggie, I actually looked forward to it. I knew this year would not be a repeat of last year's self-imposed pity party because...ta-da...a birthday card and check arrived from my mom last week, along with a birthday card and check for my husband, whose birthday was two weeks ago, and an anniversary card (our anniversary is in March) and check. Do I think my mom remembers just how big a birthday it was for me? Probably not, but to have had it remembered for the first time in three years is good enough for me at this point.
When I picked up Rachael after lunch yesterday, she couldn't wait to give me her gift. The card brought me to tears. After all our struggles, to be at this place in our relationship with one another is something neither of us takes for granted. As I told a close friend yesterday, in our immediate family we treat each other with respect and love, but don't allow anyone to either sit in their shit or be full of it.
Mostly, though, we laugh and talk, run errands, go to movies, and watch Bravo marathons. This morning talk was all about The Boy, who will be coming to visit late this month. Anyway, after the card came the gift, a lovely purple/blue glass bird made by a gifted glass artist who graduated from Hendrix College in 1998. Which means she bought it not over the weekend or last week...she bought it before coming home for the summer. It was thoughtful...obviously I adore purple, and I've transferred my love of glass to both Harold and Rachael...and lovely. After putting the card away, we put the bird on my bedside table. And then she took me to Starbucks for a drink. When we came home, she did my makeup, and noted that this fabulous new eye concealer from Mahya I've been using on my eyelids made a tremendous difference. 
(Truly, if you have discolored, dark, or red lids, this product is frigging amazing. Because my lids are so discolored, for a couple of years I've been unable to wear most of my beautiful BE shadows unless they are pretty light. This concealer makes it possible for me to pull out some of my favorite darker colors, and to wear them without looking like a raccoon.)
Later in the afternoon a beautiful display of hydrangeas and mini-calla lilies arrived from my family. More thoughtfulness as I am the Queen of the Hydrangea. When Harold got home, he gave me his gift. 
His card also brought me to tears. And the gift (depicted on the right)...extravagant and over-the-top on any other birthday than this one, but perfect—for me, and our lifestyle—for every day. 
Silly, silly man...I think he actually thought I was disappointed he didn't buy my dream bracelet (seen to the left), which would have been the perfect gift if I lived a different life. If I actually owned it, though, I think I'd probably gaze adoringly at it on a daily basis, but only wear it three or four times a year.
So ends the conspicuous consumption portion of my blog entry. <g>
Then it was time for dinner at Fearing's. Dean Fearing, along with Stephan Pyles and Robert Del Grande, invented Southwestern Cuisine, and for years Fearing ran the restaurant at The Mansion, a boutique hotel here in Dallas. A couple of years ago he opened his own restaurant in the Ritz Carleton, and though it isn't as highly acclaimed as Pyles' is, the food is more accessible, and more Texan in its exuberance and abundance. Dinner was spectacular, the birthday cake the best damn restaurant birthday cake you can fathom, and when I got home and checked my twitter feed, there was a response from @fearingsdallas about my foursquare tweet, sent in the car on the way to the restaurant.
To top it off, there was a birthday message from my mom, who called while we were at dinner, and though it's a very easy thing to post a Facebook birthday message, the number of family and friends who bothered to take the time really warmed my heart. And since I didn't know until this morning that the Mavs lost game one of the NBA Finals (our game is #3, on Sunday), the entire day went off without a sour note.
November 2, 2010
Fifteen Authors Meme
Donna Atkins just tagged me on Facebook for a Fifteen Authors Meme (list fifteen authors in no more than fifteen minutes who profoundly influenced you), and I thought I'd share my list. I actually read hers before going to bed, but my brain started to work on mine rather than letting me relax, so I decided to just do the damn thing and be done with it. It turned out to be a lot more fun than I'd thought, particularly because I remembered so many authors and works I loved long ago.
1. Virginia Woolf
2. William Shakespeare
3. Sydney Taylor
4. Marge Piercy
5. Jane Austen
6. Kathryn Lynn Davis
7. Dr. Seuss
8. John Irving
9. Emily Dickinson
10. Margaret Mitchell
11. Jefrrey Eugenides
12. Homer
13. Christopher Moore
14. Julie Garwood
15. Calvin Trillin
What's your list look like?
October 15, 2010
Goodreads & Kindle 3 Update
I spent much of the past several days doing three things: reading; moving my book database from Shelfari to Goodreads; and working on my Kindle 3 library. I read three books and the review for the first of the three is excerpted here on my blog...the full review is at Amazon. My book database now resides in full at Goodreads and I'm slowly deleting all but my DIK's from Shelfari, after having removed the Facebook apps for Visual Shelf and IRead. And as of this evening, using the same tags I set up on Goodreads, I've re-organized more than 110 titles in my library and now have close to 300 of my 1,200 book collection on my Kindle all catagorized, thereby fulfilling my librarian complex.
While going through my old blog to catch any stragglers to add to the Goodreads database, I came across my original entries deciding on Shelfari as opposed to Goodreads. Now I remember it had to do with the rating systems; on Goodreads the one star rating is for books I don't like, the two star rating is for okay books, and the three other ratings are for levels of like. At the time that bothered me. Now...not so much. Does it really matter how much I dislike a book if indeed I dislike it? I'll continue to maintain a personal book database on my computer and will grade books on my blog, but I'm satisfied with letting other Goodreads users know which books I found okay, liked, liked a lot, or loved, and using the "didn't like" option for books I grade C-, D, or F.
I plan to review the other two books before reading anything else, and will probably spend an hour or so a day working on my Kindle library using Calibre. It's pretty phenomenal and I hope it can withstand the size of my library. But right now I'm watching Bill Maher and deleting books from Shelfari.
October 6, 2010
Goodreads, Facebook, and Shelfari
I committed to Shelfari quite awhile ago, but to be honest, have always found it cumbersome and slow. The bigger my bookshelf, the more slow and cumbersome. Up at Facebook I shared my Shelfari shelf through their app, and also used LivingSocial's Visual Bookshelf for all my reading, and WeRead for my Desert Isle Keepers, mostly because other friends used those apps and I wanted to stay connected. But when Facebook eliminated third party boxes and rendered their Boxes page useless, those apps lost their potency because I could not nearly as readily see other peoples' bookshelves, and more importantly, that Facebook had basically turned into the old AOL. Neither appealed to me in the least.
So earlier this week I set up my Goodreads page and imported my Shelfari shelf, then went through my blog and Amazon to add more books, and my PW reviews as sent via email to my editors to add even more. I'm still not entirely up to date, but I'm closer. Yesterday I changed my two star ratings into one star ratings and my three star ratings into two star ratings, and tomorrow will work on the fours into threes. I'm still figuring things out over there, and very few of my friends from Twitter and Facebook have found me, but perhaps that will change in future days and weeks. If not, oh well.
This morning I changed my profile on Shelfari to provide my Goodreads link and plan to delete all but my DIK's when I have time. As for Visual Bookshelf and WeRead, I haven't decided whether or not to delete them entirely; it wouldn't be hard to maintain my DIKs on WeRead, after all.
Slowly but surely I'm deleting most of the apps I once had boxes for on Facebook. My decision after that, since at this point I plan to use it primarily for birthdays, email, and keeping up with friends and family, is to defriend most people so that it doesn't take me an hour a day to scroll through updates in order to find the people I really care about. I'll be missing news for authors and artists and friends I used to play games with, but it'll make Facebook usable for me in a way it hasn't been for some time, particularly since I use it via my phone so often.
So I've got three choices...cut my losses and eliminate Visual Bookshelf and WeRead entirely, pick one and delete the other, or maintain them both as I plan to maintain my Shelfari shelf, with DIK reads only. Let me know what you think.
September 26, 2010
Home
We just came home from Parents Weekend at Hendrix. It didn't go quite as planned, but I did have a great and intimate text conversation (apparently such a thing is possible) with Rachael while we were on the road back. Sometimes it's easier for her to talk to me via text than in person. So I take what I can get. She looks great, the young man she's dating is a nice guy - with some very gentlemanly attributes that only a parent of this particular child would notice - and she's making some (not all) smart choices when it comes to setting priorities. So I can't really complain.
I read three books on my Kindle while on the road and late at night and plan to review them within a few days. I have no PW reviews hanging on at the moment - I turned my last one in way early (the due date for it was to have been tomorrow) - so I can focus on reviewing the Anne Stuart, Tim Gunn, and Lucy Monroe books, and hopefully start on some other netgalley.com downloads before books from one or both of my PW editors arrive.
I tweeted today that I plan to "go underground" other than reviewing and blogging because the self-indulgence level has gone off the charts. There's another reason for it: I'm so frustrated right now about the state of our nation that I need to pull back. No more tweeting newspaper article links...or sharing Bill Maher quotes. While we were on the road on the way to Hendrix on Thursday, we vowed to stay away from talk of the news or politics and neither of us were able to do so. Then, on Friday night while we watched Bill Maher, I almost could not control myself whenever Amy Homes or that charlatan Andrew Breitbart opened their mouths. It was after Maher finished his New Rules segment that I realized I need to go on a news ban. Since much of my twitter feed is consumed with the news - and since the rest has gotten too "it's all about me" - it was pretty much a no-brainer.
Will I blog about anything other than books? Who knows? But since the average number of daily readers here on Toe in the Water is fewer than 25, I'm fairly certain those who tune in here are okay with whatever I share.
I'll leave with this small B&N tidbit: We visited the B&N-owned bookstore at Hendrix and learned that no more than 25% of the textbooks used by Hendrix students are available on Nook and that there are additional constraints to textbooks and e-book readers (laptops and printers and timing issues all play a part), leading me to conclude that while the eventual future of college reading will be electronically based, it's not quite ready for prime time just yet.
And, for those of you who haven't seen them on Twitter or Facebook, here are some photos I took with my phone at Hendrix. My DH took some excellent ones with a "real" camera, but for now these will do:
This chandelier in the student center was created by a glass artist who graduated Hendrix in 1988
Some on-campus apartments
I call this the "birthday fountain" because students are dumped there by their friends on their birthdays. They do the dumping based on the time each student came into this world; poor Rachael will be dumped in the middle of winter in the middle of the night
One of the main walkways on campus
Just one of many "thoughtful" spots on campus...this one particularly lovely
"The Pit," where the entire student body hangs out for college-sponsored events, like this month's Foam Party
The library (I didn't go close up on most shots because I wanted to include the surroundings, like the myriad of trees and shrubs that give this campus a very natural vibe
Student Life & Activity Center, which is where we started. In addition to the great art glass, the building is very tech-oriented, featuring many comfort-filled work/play stations utilizing large computer/TV screens with Internet hook-up and access to software programs. You can watch a football game, play Wii, or work on a presentation with classmates. I wish my den had a set up like this!
August 11, 2010
Meat
The following is a note I originally wrote and posted onto my Facebook page in February. Today for some reason I am waxing nostalgic on the experience; perhaps it remains close to the front of my memory after talking about it a couple of weeks ago with some of my mom's oldest friends, who are practically like parents to me, while we were in L.A. (pre-cruise).
I've lived in Texas since I was a college freshman, and being from California, had no clue what BBQ was all about. My mom always sauced her steaks prior to cooking, so the concept of eating plain meat never appealed. My husband, a Texan through and through, gave up in his efforts years ago of trying to convince me to partake of BBQ at his favorite joints whenever we drove through Central Texas, but when I took our daughter on a college road trip, I decided to give it a try. She loves the stuff, my husband loves the stuff, and as I've since come over to their side re: coffee (coffee flavored coffee) and chocolate (dark), perhaps it was time to give myself over to the meat.
While on our way from Austin to Georgetown late last month, we drove to Taylor and the wholly unprepossessing Mueller's Market, where I'd planned on simply ordering my usual sausage. That was my plan until the woman behind the counter put a morsel of glistening brisket on my tray...and I ate it. OMG, I had a foodgasm right then and there and changed my order. My daughter was so proud of me she announced to everyone that this was my first "real" bite of BBQ.
After calling my husband and yelling at him for simply not stuffing my mouth full of the stuff years ago, I went over the eating experience in my mind. For days. I love caramelized food...from onions and carrots and a nice crust on a medium rare steak to actual caramel. The brisket at Mueller's was simply sublime. Crusty, fatty, melt-in-your-mouth meat.
When I found out last week I wasn't working from Tuesday through Friday, I told my husband and he asked me to drive down to Austin with him for those days. He had some legal CLE and I could have the car during the day to do whatever I wanted. I jumped at the chance - and not only because I suspected we could work in some BBQ - and we had a nice drive down there, stopping, of course, in West at the Czech Stop.
Let me break in at this time to say that it's always baffled me that Texans are so jingoistic about their state. Part of it, I'm convinced, is almost Jungian, though instead of a collective unconscious there is a collective map. It's impossible to drive through West, for instance, without stopping at the Czech Stop...everyone I know who lives in Texas knows the place and can name their favorite kolache.
When Rachael and I drove home from Georgetown to Dallas, we, of course, stopped there, to surprise her dad with his favorite cottage cheese kolaches. We varied from our usual, which is his usual; I got blueberry cream cheese and they were unbelievable when warm. As for the collective mapism, here's mine: I far prefer the market to the bakery, even though the kitchen is shared. I dunno why.
But I digress. This collective map includes BBQ. Texans love their beef. My daughter has always loved both fruit and meat, and my husband first introduced her to BBQ prime rib years ago. Again, I'd demurred. Stoopid, stoopid me.
BBQ in Texas is a lunch-time affair. The best places sell out some time in the afternoon, so unless I drove to Lockhart while my husband was in his classes, we were probably going to have to settle for what some people believe is terrific stuff; BBQ at the Salt Lick, which my husband deems "commercial."
The first thing I noticed? That they ruined the meat, even the end piece in all its crusty glory by glopping sauce all over it. But, as my husband said, if I was going to truly try BBQ, I had to try a variety. Yes, this was better than the stuff you can buy in Dallas, but it was not foodgastic by a long shot.
By the time we'd finished our meal, our plans had changed; instead of his staying in class all day Friday, he'd omit the afternoon session and we'd drive 40 minutes out of our way to Lockhart, and two, or if necessary, three, of the BBQ markets he'd frequented for years that always seem to fall off the lips of Texans when they discuss, nay, argue, BBQ.
Meat-a-pooluza commenced at 12:30 when we hit the road. We drove up to Kreuz's Market shortly after one and ordered brisket - an end cut - and some sausage. Unlike Mueller's which supplies trays, this is totally old school; butcher paper only, and instead of the oven above-ground, a pit of fire that hits you in the face as you walk from the meat room to the "dining" room.
 Kreuz Market |  Kreuz firepit |
 Kreuz butchering order |  Kreuz brisket & sausage |
I took my first bite of brisket as soon as we sat down and immediately knew this was better than what we'd eaten at Salt Lick, but was disappointed that it didn't live up to Mueller's. Was this yet again a case of First as Favorites, applied to meat rather than authors? After all, Kreuz tends to rank higher up on most lists of BBQ than Mueller's, although, to be fair, it's the latter with a James Beard award.
Regardless, I enjoyed the brisket, but didn't love it. The sausage was very different than any other sausage I'd ever eaten in a BBQ joint; it wasn't smooth on the inside. It was very textured and you could see bits of spice and fat and much darker meat. It was yummy, but it was time to move on.
We then drove for the two minutes it takes to get to Smitty's, where another pit of fire hits you in the face...this time the moment you walk in the door. We order both brisket and prime rib, so much of it that I felt like a glutton. We sat down...I dug in. OMG, the mouthgasm was back with a vengeance.
 Smitty's |  Smitty's firepit |
 Smitty's butchering order |  Smitty's brisket & prime rib |
The brisket was thisclose in goodness to what I remembered at Mueller's, and far better than what we'd had at Kreuz's. It was all in the rub of spices. And then I took a bit of the prime rib, which I still can't quite figure out - how in hell can you smoke meat for hours and have it be medium rare in the middle?
If the brisket wasn't quite, quite, quite as good as Mueller's the fact that Mueller's doesn't serve prime rib put Smitty's over the top in my book. Both briskets were crispy, fatty pieces of deliciousness - but the prime rib was as buttery as prime rib, yet at the same time smokey. My mouth was confused but ultimately very, very happy.
As if that weren't enough, my husband decided we should walk across the street to the airstream trailer that had a revolving cupcake atop it and buy a couple of cupcakes for the road. I've never had a designer cupcake, but know that the Central Market vanilla/vanilla buttercreams are damned good, so that's what I went for. The DH chose a red velvet, and we left to come home. Of course, given the cupcakes, there was no reasonable reason to stop at West, but it did occur to me that I now have kind of have an inkling of why Texans are such Texanists.
When I told Rachael about the experience...in particular the prime rib...I got a big, fat, knowing "I told you so."
Earlier this year, but after Meat-a-pooluza (and my note on Facebook), the Travel Channel aired a show called Food Wars, and one of the battles was between Kreuz and Smitty's. They judged on brisket and sausage, and it was tied until the very last judge, who basically flipped a coin. Kreuz won...and I lost interest in Food Wars. Clearly, they got it wrong, and clearly, after an entire adult lifetime lived in Texas, I feel as though I'm (finally) one. Well, except for that whole Rick Perry thing.
May 25, 2010
Dallas Coffee Party...a Big, Fat Flop For Me
The Dallas Coffee Party kicked off with great fanfare, with local TV and print news coverage of the first meetings, and after the second meeting I volunteered to become an admin for the Facebook page. I was sick for the third meeting, and at the fourth, was one of six who bothered to attend...out of nearly a thousand Facebook members. Of course, that the meeting wasn't properly publicized or added to the national FB page where members looking for meetings could find it didn't help, but as a result of that meeting, I set up a Dallas Coffee Blog and an @dallascoffee twitter feed to gin up interest. I believed - and hoped - that if a local person wrote original content and tweeted other content of interest, more people might feel a connection and an inclination to actively participate.
In the interim, the originator of the DCP quit, and in-fighting broke out between two of the other three admins, leaving me stuck in the middle. Although the Coffee Party is thriving throughout the country, it's dead in the water in Dallas because of a lack of momentum and planning, and because too many of the few grown-ups involved actually decided to behave not as grown-ups but as petulant children. While I don't count myself as one of those pouting tots, it's obvious I've got some anger seeping through here, so I'll simply tell you what I did earlier today: Transferred all the DCP bloggings as a single note to the DCP page on Facebook, and after deleting the @dallascoffee twitter feed, I'll be deleting myself as a DCP admin.
It's true that not much time has lapsed between my first blog and tweet efforts and now, but with a thousand DCP members, and my RT'ing @dallascoffee tweets to the DCP page and linking to all the blog entries, I can't say that the word didn't get out. The word got out, but nobody cared. That's fine. I gave it a shot, and as I wrote on my DCP note, I'd rather write one blog nobody reads than two. Only one local person directly accessed the 28 tweets I've made...the other four are from CP's elsewhere. Almost 400 people subscribe to my @laurie_gold twitter feed and I'll concentrate on them rather than the five (again, including just one local person) who subscribed to @dallascoffee.
Because I'm proud of the blog entries I wrote for DCP, I'm going to insert them here onto my Toe in the Water blog...later today, after I've done so, I'll come back in here and provide links to any who are interested. And, as I wrote on the DCP page, I look forward to somebody with vision, patience, and a game-plan to reinvent the Dallas Coffee Party so that I can rejoin. In the interim, I'll look for another group to hook up with, possibly one in Ft. Worth. Sad that in one of the largest cities in the U.S. we were unable to sustain things here, but it's time to move on. My experiment failed.
BLOG ENTRIES ADDED TO TOE IN THE WATER FROM SHORT-LIVED DCP BLOG:
Financial Reform...It's Complicated
Stand Up...Or Stand Down
What If You Gave a Coffee Party and Nobody Came?
Corporate Fascism?
An Experiment
And, in case anyone's interested in links to articles from the @dallascoffee twitter feed...
Lost Decade Looming? (Paul Krugman NYT)
More on TX text book fight
New project of freepress.com invites us to keep media on its toes by submitting biased and or overblown reporting.
A nun is "automatically excommunicated" after sitting on hosp comm that agreed to perform abortion to save mom's life.
NYT: A generation gap on immigration
Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the...
Coffee Party USA is launching Coffee with Main Street campaign from now throughout the month of June.
Million-Dollar Ad Blitz to Kill Net Neutrality
The Senate approved a provision putting space between bond issuers & rating agencies
NYT: U.S. Said to Allow Drilling Without Needed Permits
NYT: Senate Beats Back Efforts to Ease Regulation Bill
Commentary on Findlaw about First Amendment
Newsweek article on Walt Whitman important for us to consider
Huffpost - Americans paid their lowest level of taxes last year since Harry Truman's presidency, USA TODAY found.
Rabbit hole of corporate spending on campaigns.
Tom Friedman in today's NYT
May 19, 2010
Financial Reform...It's Complicated (Transferred from short-lived DCP blog)
The national Coffee Party page on Facebook this morning reports on an amendment Senator Christopher Dodd is trying to attach to the Financial Regulation bill that would remove the derivatives spin-off portion requiring that the largest banks spin off their derivatives desks into regulated entities not guaranteed by taxpayers. He proposes to instead have the issue studied by a group of regulators whose members have "serious reservations about such a dramatic measure," and may try to kill it.
According to The Washington Post, it isn't just banks who are against the derivatives spin-off; regulators and officials in the Obama administration believe it "could drive the business into the shadows." Is this spin from Wallmerica or are those in agreement with Dodd's amendment correct in their assertion that the spin-off "would harm U.S. competitiveness or lead to less regulation of the derivatives market, valued at half a quadrillion dollars"?
The Coffee Party has taken a stand against the Dodd amendment and asks that you consider using a letter from Americans for Financial Reform (AFR) that you'll find below as a template for those interested in writing your senators. If instead of a letter or email you wish to call your senator, please consider using the bullet points contained in the following when contacting the U.S. Capital Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.
Given that we live in a global economy, I thought I'd share what the European Union is doing about derivatives. According to an AP article on Yahoo News, new rules will increase oversight and set fines for manipulating trades. The European market for "largely unregulated" derivatives is worth $600 trillion. Key to the new rules is the registration of "all products and trading" so that regulators can access the derivatives...and the investors behind them because, "These people don't like coming out in the light so we are going to flood them with light," said EU Financial Services Commissioner Michel Barnier.
But back to the American market for the moment, and the AFR letter...
Dear Senator,
The over 250 consumer, employee, investor, community and civil rights groups who are members of Americans for Financial Reform (AFR) write to express strong support for Section 716 (“Prohibition Against Federal Government Bailouts of Swaps Entities”) and our opposition to the new Amendment #4110 to replace the provision with a study. The study would put the final decision over implementing this important new structural reform in the hands of regulators who have already publicly expressed their opposition to it.The following are rebuttals to the primary arguments that have been advanced against Sec. 716:
Swaps Desks will Remain within the Bank Holding Company: Sen. Lincoln has clarified that the amendment would only separate derivatives desks from the core bank within the bank holding company – that is, the insured depository institution that has access to the Federal Reserve window. Moving these operations outside of the federally-protected core of the bank will only reduce the risk of future bailouts, still enabling the holding company to benefit from this lucrative business.
716 Will Not Lead to Weaker Regulation or Flight Overseas: Americans for Financial Reform is committed to bringing derivatives out of the shadows; we would not support a provision that weakened oversight of derivatives dealers. Under the derivatives title, any major swap participant will be subject to oversight and safeguards for capital adequacy, transparency, anti-fraud and anti-manipulation. In addition, the claim that the market will migrate overseas ignores the economic turmoil in Europe that was in large part exacerbated by unregulated derivatives activities.
Derivatives Dealing is Not the Usual Course of Banking: Some have argued that derivatives selling should remain within the core depository institutions because it is part of the “usual business of banking”. If that were the case, then why do only 5 out of America’s over 8,000 banks – the Wall Street banks JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley – account for over 90 percent of this market? The “usual” banking businesses in the U.S., represented by the Independent Community Bankers Association of America, support Sec. 716.
Banks Can Still Use Derivatives to Hedge Their Risk Under 716: Separating swap dealing operations from the business of banking does not mean that banks will be unable to hedge their banking risks. They will be customers and trade on open exchanges and clearinghouses.
Purely speculative financial derivatives now represent $78 for every $1 in true hedging by businesses and farmers. By quarantining highly risky swaps trading from banking altogether, federally insured deposits will not be put at risk by toxic swaps transactions. Moreover, banks will be forced to behave like banks, focusing on extending credit in a manner that builds economic strength as opposed to fostering worldwide economic instability. For these reasons, Americans for Financial Reform urges you to oppose Amendment #4110. Please contact Lisa Lindsley, Director, Capital Strategies, AFSCME, for more information.
Sincerely,
Americans for Financial Reform
~Laurie G
May 13, 2010
What if You Gave a Coffee Party and Nobody Came? (Transferred from Short-Lived DCP blog)
Yes...I'm impatient. And because there are multiple admins on the Join the Coffee Party Movement, Dallas page on Facebook, as well as members posting, it's difficult for members to find some of what I'd like them to find. Namely, this blog and the @dallascoffee twitter feed I set up earlier in the week. Because right now I feel like I'm giving a coffee party by myself.
This morning I decided to get pro-active about it...even more proactive than actually setting up the blog, twitter feed, writing up blog entries and finding articles of interest to forward via the twitter feed. So I searched twitter using @coffeeparty as my search item and clicked the "follow" button for other Coffee Party feeds, and, in addition, some feeds that look like they focus -on the Coffee Party.
Here's problem one: When you follow another feed, all their tweets show up on it, which is why although @laurie_gold follows @dallascoffee, @dallascoffee does not follow @laurie_gold. If, in fact, the feeds I selected focus almost exclusively on Coffee Party matters, everything will be copesetic. If not, though, if there are as many non-topic tweets that exist in my personal feed, I'll need to unfollow, putting me back at square one. Unless, of course, the feeds I've picked up pick me up in return, which has happened...just once...today. Meaning that I am no longer the sole follower of @dallascoffee.
Although I've used twitter for quite a while now, tagging is new to me. My @laurie_gold tweets are meant for family, friends, acquaintances, and those involved with books, publishing, and the like. Today I realized if I find a way to condense my tweets even more so that I can fit in "#coffeeparty" within the allotted 140 characters, my @dallascoffee tweets will get picked up and read by others searching for tweets on the Coffee Party, which is what happened earlier when I tweeted a link to the NYT on financial reform.
Now, back to the Facebook page for a moment...and the multiple admins. As it stands, there is no distinguishing which admin posted to the page - until now. In learning how to handle my new Droid phone, I've gone back and forth between using Facebook's "full site" in non-mobile mode and the mobile app because I'm still learning the ins and outs of copying and pasting on various apps. Today I discovered that when I post to the Dallas Facebook page for the Coffee Party using the full-site method, my icon is the generic cup of coffee. But, when I post using the Droid app, my personal icon is what appears after I hit the "share" button.
That still leaves one issue hanging out there - the ability to change the default on the Dallas Coffee Party Facebook page so that the "Info" page rather than "Wall" is where visitors land. It seems to me that if we want to actually use the twitter feed and this blog to their utmost, we need to direct people here.
For instance, I'd love to properly publicize the showing at the Angelika on the 28th of the documentary film release Captain Jack and the United States of Money, to direct readers to the Facebook RSVP page. I'd love to use this blog not only to publicize events and meetings, but to use it as a forum to talk about issues in a unique way to promote discussion.
I'd like to continue posting articles like the two I wrote earlier in the week. I believe that by making connections others may not necessarily leap to, I can educate and inform without being pedantic or partisan. But if nobody's here to read the content, what, really, is the point? It becomes nothing but mental masturbation.
Facebook is a terrific and easy way to introduce a concept, but as a way to motivate and mobilize, so far I've been unable to tap its potential. If you can help me figure it out, please do, either by commenting here, or through an email up at Facebook. In the interim, for those looking for something substantive and tangible, here is an urgent notice from the national Coffee Party page on Facebook, followed by local Event Listings, their links, and some detail:
URGENT: We have at least one more day to convince our senators to support the Merkley-Levin Amendment. Lobbying from the Big Banks are at a fever pitch in DC right now because this amendment spells real reform. It would ensure that American tax payers don't guarantee Wall St banks' risky bets and would stop banks from engaging in Goldman-Sachs-style bets against their own clients. Let's put (202) 224-3121 on speed dial and call: Klobuchar-MN, Nelson-NE, Brown-MA, Landrieu-LA, Lugar-IN, Corker-TN, Alexander-TN, Bayh-IN, Lugar-IN, Snowe-ME, Collins-ME, Hagan-NC, Warner-VA, Schumer-NY, Gillibrand-NY #coffeeparty
| Captain Jack & the United States of Money A documentary about Jack Abramoff | 5321 Mockingbird Ln. Dallas, TX 75206 Friday, May 28th from 6:00 pm to 10:00 pm |
| Leadership Training For those interesting in hosting a Coffee Party event | Fish City on Henderson, Dallas, TX Saturday, May 22nd from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm |
Help spread the word about these pertinent events and notices, make plans to participate somehow, and forward the link for this blog entry to other Dallas Coffee Party members.
~Laurie G
May 11, 2010
What Lies Beneath? (Posted on Toe in the Water & short-lived DCP blog)
Today I read on the Huffington Post that according to USA TODAY, "Americans paid their lowest level of taxes last year since Harry Truman's presidency." Further, the newspaper reports that while personal income fell 2%, paid taxes dropped 23%, excluding Social Security. While it's true that spending has increased in order to help the country climb out of the recession, it's also true that among those polled by Gallup last month, those who believe taxes are too high are the same taxpayers whose taxes remain "near a 50-year low."
What lies beneath that sort of disconnect? Yesterday a YouTube video posted last September enjoyed a resurgence. The video, which features two candidates for Texas governor who belong to the secessionist movement, seem to advocate the violent overthrow of the U.S. government. Indeed, what stuck in my mind as I watched it [again] was hearing Debra Medina announce, in response to shouts of "We hate the United States," that, "We are aware that the tree of freedom is occasionally watered with the blood of tyrants and patriots." Hearing Thomas Jefferson's words come out of this woman's mouth sickened me.
It was my daughter who actually alerted me to the video. She very much objected to the video's title at YouTube - Texas Filled With Insane Christian Republican Terrorists - particularly because the link was provided by one of the the other Dallas Coffee Party Movement admins on our Facebook page, and a core value of the Coffee Party Movement is to eliminate the name-calling that passes for political discourse these days.
I agree that the video's title was unnecessarily incendiary; its contents make the case without resorting to name-calling. That said, those heard on the video are actively shouting their hatred of the United States, bastardized the words of the man who wrote our Declaration of Independence, and by doing so advocated the violent overthrow of our government.
When George Bush took office, the projected 10-year budget surplus he inherited became a deficit that ballooned as a result of tax cuts combined with increased spending, as well as two unfunded wars, one of which was supposed to pay for itself. Interestingly, the same individuals now calling for the blood of tyrants and patriots to water the tree of freedom, were not doing so until Barack Obama was elected president.
It seems to me that the vehemence directed against Obama's "socialist" government grew out of proposed health care reform. In March on my personal blog, I wrote that in the rest of the developed world, citizens share health care while in the U.S. it's something we horde. They see it as a basic human right while we see it as a privilege, even though nearly 2/3 of personal bankruptcies, historically, are a result of medical bills. Could it be that all the money the health care industry spent lobbying Congress and with advertising aimed at the public against reform were successful in convincing the same people who believe their taxes are too high that, as reported in Salon, "healthcare reform helped 'other people' and not themselves"?
I can't help but wonder whether "other" is coded language that feeds into the worst impulses of a certain segment of Americans, perhaps those who preach that "others" don't have "small-town values." Is what lies beneath...black?
If you feel so inclined as to comment, please do so on the Coffee Party Blog...I'm hoping somebody will actually visit. It's very, very lonely!
May 10, 2010
Flip-Flop
I review for two different PW editors. One editor sends me mass market releases, the other hardcover or trade fiction, generally targeted for women. Some time ago I realized that as a general rule, I like more of the mass market release than not...and dislike more of the fiction releases than I like. That flipped during the past week. I liked the last book I reviewed for my fiction editor. Unfortunately, the review I turned in earlier today to my mass market editor was for a gruelingly bad read.
My mass market editor sent out the book with a blink-and-you'll-miss-it turnaround time (I volunteered); I'm still trying to decide whether the fact that I had to read and review it so quickly was akin to ripping off a Band-Aid in order to lessen the pain. The book arrived Friday morning and was due today, which would have been fine had I read it, as planned, on Saturday. Instead, because I'd already begun reading and knew it was bad from the get-go, I procrastinated and worked on setting up the Dallas Coffee Party blog and twitter feed, and wasted even more time by writing the first entry for the blog, instead. Which meant that I'd only read half the book by this morning.
And then, after I'd finished reading early today, I got caught up in a story I read on a Coffee Party friend's Facebook page, and decided it needed to form the basis of Corporate Fascism?, which I wrote and posted on the other blog around noon.
Which still left plenty of time to write my review, edit it, whittle it down to the requisite word count, and send it in so that by the time I left for work tonight, I could write this blog entry.
Even though my mass market editor keeps an extensive database so as to try and match books well to reviewers, everyone who reads realizes that it's impossible to succeed every time. 
And now, in a complete break from reviewing, I'm going to read a book I borrowed from James at the bookstore based on his recommendation: Jonathan Tropper's How to Talk to a Widower. It's going to be nice to read purely for enjoyment for a change.
Corporate Fascism? (Transferred from short-lived DCP blog)
Earlier today a headline caught my eye on Larry Hardy's Facebook page. The summary read: As a nation, we have officially ventured down the rabbit hole of big corporate spending in political campaigns, as a Texas company recently placed the first campaign ad paid for solely by corporate profits. I clicked the link and read the full article at The Wonk Room.
Because blogs often mix opinion with straight reporting, I did a Google search to find additional reporting from newspapers and news magazines. There wasn't any that I could find. The second page of results that included blogs large and small, The Daily Beast, Huffington Post, and Newser, among others, I found a link to a transcript from CNN dated April 26th; further investigation into the owner of the Texas company revealed a link to The Houston Chronicle.
Details from both cable network's transcripts and the Houston newspaper match what The Wonk Room blogger wrote about, which is that for the first time, a company's profits were used to pay for political ads - in this case, against incumbent Chuck Hopson, who holds the East Texas 11th seat in the State Legislature. The company, KDR, is a real estate business whose owner, Larry Durrett, also owns a franchise restaurant business. In 2006 Durrett ran, unsuccessfully, against Hopson.
Prior to the Supreme Court's January ruling in the Citizen's United v. Federal Election Commission case, which overthrew a 63-year-old precedent, this would not have been allowed under Texas law. After the Court's 5-4 ruling in favor of Citizen's United, the Texas Election Commission sanctioned unlimited political spending by corporations...and unions. A March 27th editorial in the Chronicle indicates that such spending can't be coordinated with candidate campaigns, although "joint efforts would be difficult to prove." Further, the editorial noted that "The content of Durrett's ads are notably similar to campaign pieces by Hopson's opponents."
Although in this instance Hopson defeated Durrett, many legal scholars and political scientists are convinced that corporate influence, most often felt these days through lobbyists (a substantial chunk of the $3.47 billion spent lobbying Congress last year was against health care), will grow even stronger. According to the editorial, "In the brave new world of post-Citizens United, multi-million-dollar corporate media blitzes directed against opponents for either personal or political reasons could become the norm." What the Court decided in January moves us one step closer to what I consider corporate fascism. Mussolini's definition of fascism, FWIW, is a merger of State and corporate power. What do you think?
In response to the January decision, Democratic Congressman Chris Van Hollen, joined by Republican Mike Castle, introduced a bill that would, among other things, require CEO's to appear in political ads, and to inform company shareholders about political spending. If I've read correctly, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce believes the Congressmen are over-reacting. What say you?
~Laurie G
May 9, 2010
Confusion Reigns
I joined the Coffee Party Movement in March, as did thousands of other people. It's easy, really...you press a button on Facebook and, voilà, you're a member. How to translate that membership into something substantial is a lot more difficult, for a variety of reasons: 1) The mission is amorphous (how does one translate "good government" into action?); 2) Grassroots organizations require more effort from the bottom; and 3) The original head of the movement for Dallas became overwhelmed by the enormity of her commitment, dropped out without asking for help, and left everyone floundering and trying to pick up the pieces. As a result, after ten or twelve local meetings in March and April, there was just one in May. Instead of fifteen to forty in attendance at each of those meetings, there were just six of us - including my now-adult daughter - at lunch yesterday.
While at the meeting I realized if I wanted the Coffee Party Movement in Dallas to succeed, I'd actually need to get off my ass and do something. The Coffee Party is thriving throughout all of Texas...but not in Dallas. So I decided to use my skill set as a writer and Internet guru by creating a new blog and setting up a[nother] Twitter account, specifically to communicate with the hundreds of people who have clicked that Dallas Coffee Party Facebook button.
After leaving lunch yesterday, I was supposed to have come home and read a rush book to review for PW by Monday (it arrived at my house on Friday). I didn't. Instead, I set up the bones of the new blog - Dallas Coffee Party - and wrote the first post. Then I left for work, and in the ten minutes before starting my shift, I set up the new Twitter account - @dallascoffee. It quickly became confusing. I'd thought if I input my @laurie_gold user name and password for one of my Droid's Twitter apps, and my info for the @dallascoffee using another, I could just click whichever app I needed depending on which account I was going to tweet from...so far I've not been able to get that to work. Equally confusing regards actual content for each blog - and what to tweet to each of the Twitter accounts as well. I'll be working with various Coffee Party members to suss out what to post on the other blog, but does that mean I should stop posting anything political here? The Coffee Party strives to be political but not partisan, and because most of my political tweets are simply links to newspaper articles, they can be tweeted from one and retweeted to the other, but other than that, I'm feeling more than a little Sybil right now.
As I wrote in my initial post to the Dallas Coffee Party blog yesterday, it's going to be an experiment, and the experiment will spill over onto Toe in the Water. Please be patient as I muddle through.
May 8, 2010
An Experiment (Transferred from short-lived DCP blog)
In March, I did something I'd not done since the late 1980s...got off my rear and decided to do more than give money to causes I believed in. As an individual with an advanced degree in public administration whose first career was in municipal management, I'm a strong believer that government is not evil. It's not the problem. It's part of the solution, and we are government - or should be. Tired of all the yelling that passes for political discourse these days, I decided to join the Coffee Party Movement. That was the easy part.
It's incredibly easy to press a Facebook button and join a cause, be part of a movement, or proclaim your allegiance to something or somebody. It's a lot more time-consuming - and frustrating - to accomplish something. And with a mandate as amorphous as cooperation and participation in government so that it expresses our collective will and addresses our challenges in a civil and positive manner, it's all the more difficult. How to translate a wish for "good government" into action?
I attended a planning meeting in March, then one of the hundreds of local meetings held throughout the country. The planning meeting made the local news and another of the local meetings did as well. Though attendance at the first meeting was high, and even higher for the second, for today's meeting there were a grand total of six of us in attendance...and as far as I know it was the only group to meet in Dallas county. While the movement remains strong and vital as near as Fort Worth, it's died in Dallas, and I'm one of those committed to reviving it. I decided my skill set would be best used in communicating with Dallas area members via this blog and through a Twitter account I've yet to set up.
This will be an experiment, for me, and for those of you who decide to participate by reading this blog, posting to the local or national Facebook page, or deciding to attend or even lead a local meeting in the future. I've included the movement's official mission statement, a link for those who'd like to sign the civility pledge (it's a jump link because the pledge is hosted on the national site...click it and a new browser window will open, allowing you to toggle back and forth), and activated sharing and subscribing abilities for those who are interested. Next will come links, and then the blog structure should be complete, and the real hard work of communicating will begin.
That's where you come in. As a grassroots organization, we are all responsible for determining our direction, but at the same time, many policy issues are time-sensitive, which means that among movement members locally and nation-wide, we need coordination. I'll be up front and share that the topic of most interest to me is campaign finance reform in light of the January's Supreme Court decision that under the First Amendment, Congress may not bar corporations and unions from using their own money to make independent expenditures to support or oppose candidates for office. 
Look forward to more from me on that in upcoming days, but please, please, please, share your interests as well. Comment at will. I've blogged, run discussion lists, forums, and websites since the mid-1990s and feel well able to keep my ego in check. I plan to be a two-way conduit of information more than anything else, and that won't work without your participation.
~Laurie G
Sunday, May 9: @dallascoffee set up and Twitter widget added to the right column of this page. Please spread the word about the blog and the Twitter feed...feel free to use the "share this" links following each entry and the right column. Look for some substance Tuesday.
~Laurie G
March 25, 2010
Writing Reviews
I just turned in a review to one of my two Publishers Weekly editors...what a difficult review to write! I spent more than three hours writing, revising, and honing 300 words for my hardcover/trade editor. It's a haunting book by a debuting author and I'll share more info as August closes in and the book nears release.
It's the third review I've written in a week. I sent the first one to my mass market editor a week ago, and a few days later finished the first book and review for an annual hush hush PW project requiring the reading and reviewing of five books in a two week period. I'm currently in the midst of book two and should have plenty of time to finish before the deadline.
As a result of all this reading and reviewing, it may "go dark" here on my blog that nobody knows about but me - and a couple of authors I contacted after my Tuesday entry. I'm debating when...even if...I should tweet or comment on Facebook about the blog. So far doing nothing save including links here from my Twitter and Facebook profiles is the extent I'm willing to go. While I'm excited, I also remember some of the reasons I stopped writing online to begin with. Hence my dilemma, and why I named this blog "Toe in the Water" (so far it's just one).
It's the third review I've written in a week. I sent the first one to my mass market editor a week ago, and a few days later finished the first book and review for an annual hush hush PW project requiring the reading and reviewing of five books in a two week period. I'm currently in the midst of book two and should have plenty of time to finish before the deadline.
As a result of all this reading and reviewing, it may "go dark" here on my blog that nobody knows about but me - and a couple of authors I contacted after my Tuesday entry. I'm debating when...even if...I should tweet or comment on Facebook about the blog. So far doing nothing save including links here from my Twitter and Facebook profiles is the extent I'm willing to go. While I'm excited, I also remember some of the reasons I stopped writing online to begin with. Hence my dilemma, and why I named this blog "Toe in the Water" (so far it's just one).
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