At least I'll be able to watch a new Fringe tonight

Okay, well, the Phillies were clearly out-gunned as some key players failed to perform in the World Series, and they needed at least a couple other players to peak to have a chance against as well-funded and talent-packed a team as the Yankees. It became increasingly clear that the Yankees were getting the Phillies players' numbers enough to connect hard with more than enough of the pitches and to neutralize some of their hitters enough of the time to make them fairly irrelevant.

Once we hit game three, the first of the ones to be played back at home, I could see it wasn't going to go well. The loss in game four was for me the critical nail in the coffin as they came back to a point where they could have taken it... only to lose as another set of runs was scored against them. Lidge certainly didn't lose it all by himself, but he was a big part of it.

While it was good to see them win game five, keeping their chances alive and not losing it while in their own stadium, it was clear that unless the Phillies offense in particular got back on track very quickly there was no way they were going to pull it off. Even with ace pitcher Cliff Lee out there game five was tighter than it should have been, none of the other starters were performing as well as Lee and, plainly, it wasn't as if he could be the starter for every game.

In the end I feel bad for the team, especially since most baseball fans apparently looked at last year's World Series as if it was a freak event where two booby prize winners happened to be the last teams standing, and I get the feeling the Phillies still didn't get the attention they deserved despite making it to the top of the National League again and making it six games into the series.

Still, there can only be one, and it won't be a huge victory parade on Broad Street this year... which may be just as well, as there's a transit strike underway in Philly.

As I was saying to people after Monday's win, if they were to somehow win game six I'd look forward to a spirited, desperate game seven, but if they didn't... I'd have a new episode of Fringe Thursday night, as Fox wouldn't have a baseball game to pre-empt it for.

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Healthcare (Again)

Another excellent journal entry by Roger Ebert.

I keep hoping enough people will wake up and join us in demanding a national healthcare system.

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Phillies Headed To World Series Again!

They managed to pull it off in five play-off games.

Tomorrow night the Dodgers may seal it for the American League, though I won't mind if the Angels take the night and force them to fight for it in one or two more games. (Not that I'm going to be watching those games, but anything to stress them and maybe get someone else on the D.L.)

Now to see how out of control things get in Philly overnight. Wednesday morning they were pushing out the info that they'd greased the sign/light poles to prevent people from climbing them, and have remote-controlled cameras on each street corner.

Then tomorrow we'll see what condition some of my co-workers are in. My lab assistant's down in there somewhere...

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It Could Happen To Anyone

The title is a link to her site. I should have posted this long ago.

It's one woman's battle and journey, and the many, many similar stories from people she's met. People living and dying on the edge because our "healthcare" system is run by for-profit health insurance companies; highwaymen on the road to recovery.

People who should be able to concentrate on recovery are instead left to make accounting decisions in which many will decide to avoid treatment and simply die rather than court almost certain financial ruin for their families.

Never forget that the health insurance companies' mission is not to provide the best medical care, but to maximize profits. To become ill is to become a less effective profit center and then a source of loss for the company. The quarterly profits and interests of the shareholders will trump all else.

What may be more frightening is that this is someone who has medical insurance. Those who don't are truly lost.

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Rockies To Rubble

The Phillies take game 4 of the current series, so they'll be going up against the Dodgers for the right to be the NL team in the World Series.

Yeah, it was a little cruel, but I must admit I was at least somewhat happy to see the Rockies fans go from being ecstatic with their gaining the lead in the eighth to watching it fall apart in the ninth.

So, a couple days off and then it's out to Los Angeles for game one of a possible seven. Two there, three back here in Philly, then, if need be, back out West for up to two more.

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Insurance Company-Driven Propaganda Storm

It's almost heartening to see them go to these lengths - they're getting a little scared - though I worry how many wingnut media outlets will reference the report as if it's substantive..?

(From the Washington Post)
The Insurance Industry's Deceptive Report
by Ezra Klein

In the hallowed tradition of the tobacco and energy industries, the health insurance industry has commissioned a report (pdf) projecting doom and despair for those who seek to reform its business practices. The report was farmed out to the consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers, which has something of a history with this sort of thing: In the early-'90s, the tobacco industry commissioned PWC to estimate the economic devastation that would result from a tax on tobacco. The report was later analyzed by the Arthur Andersen Economic Consulting group, which concluded that "the cumulative effect of PW’s methods … is to produce patently unreliable results." It's perhaps no surprise that the patently unreliable results were all in the tobacco industry's favor. He who pays the piper names the tune, and all that.

All that makes it a bit hard to respond to this analysis. Seriously engaging with its methodology probably gives it more credit than it deserves, making this seem like an argument between two opposing sides as opposed to a predictable industry hit job. But totally ignoring its claims means some of them might live unchallenged. So rather than a full tour through the "analysis," here are a couple of its more representative moments.

A footnote -- how come the good stuff is always in the footnotes? -- on page E-2 of the report sort of gives away the game. It reads: "Impact assumes payment of tax on high- value plans, full cost-shifting of cuts to public programs, and full passthrough of new industry taxes." That's written to obscure, but what it means is that the report assumes no behavioral changes in response to new policies.

To illustrate how this works, let's go back to another PWC favorite: tobacco taxes. Imagine Congress slaps a $10 tax on each cigarette purchased in the continental United States. The impact is obvious: People will virtually cease purchasing cigarettes, or the trade will move onto the black market. But a PWC report that "assumes payment of tax" would assume that cigarette purchasing remains unchanged, and smokers fork over $30 bazillion (approximately) in taxes. This would mark the beginning of a heretofore unknown phenomenon: nicotine bankruptcy.

At least, it would in the world of PWC's report. But it wouldn't do so in the real world. So too with these assumptions. Economists think that the tax on high-cost health-care plans will lead employers and consumers to demand cheaper plans that do more to control costs. In fact, PWC expects that, too. They just don't build it into their estimate. On Page 6, they say, "Although we expect employers to respond to the tax by restructuring their benefits to avoid it, we demonstrate the impact assuming it is employed." That's a bit like saying although I expect to eat doughnuts this morning, I will instruct my scale to act as if I had abstained.

Or take the assumption of "full cost-shifting of cuts to public programs." What that means, essentially, is that health-care spending is considered a constant, and every dollar that a public program cuts from its payments to hospitals is a dollar the private health-care industry has to add to its reimbursements to hospitals. Have you ever heard of that before, in any industry? If Blockbuster decides to cut costs to consumers by negotiating lower payments to movie studios, does Netflix send out a sorrowful e-mail explaining that it will have to increase its membership fee because it now needs to make higher payments to movie studios?

Another interesting bit comes on Page 2, which identifies "new minimum benefit requirements that may require people to buy coverage that is more expensive than options to which they currently have access" as one of the "root causes" of coming premium increases. In the footnote, the report complains that the Senate Finance plan requires a minimum 65 percent actuarial value (that is to say, 65 percent of what an individual is expected to need), while the Massachusetts plan only requires a 56 percent actuarial value. Other states have no minimum value. Insurers will also be forced to cover preexisting conditions, have an out-of-pocket limit, and end rescissions.

It's true, as the report says, that buying better insurance will cost somewhat more than buying insurance that doesn't cover anything. The vast majority of the people affected by this will be using subsidies, of course, but put that aside for a moment. This is part of the point of health-care reform: Insurers will no longer have the freedom to offer products that let an individual think his family his protected when the policy will do nothing of the sort. That may raise prices, in much the way that antibiotics cost more than herbal supplements, but it raises prices because it reduces the insurance industry's ability to sell a deceptive and insufficient product.

But if the PWC's report doesn't offer much in the way of trustworthy policy analysis, it is an interesting looking at the changing politics of the issue. In short, the insurance industry is getting scared. After many months of quiet constructiveness, they're launching a broadside on the week of the Senate Finance Committee's vote. The White House, which had a pleasant meeting with the industry's leadership last week, was shocked by the report, and so too was the Senate Finance Committee. The era of cooperation seems to be over, and they weren't given much advance warning. But the report might have another impact, too: The evident anger and fear of the insurance industry might do a bit to reassure liberals that this plan is worth supporting, after all.

Photo credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images.

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Something not likely to be clearly stated on FOX

Full text below.

Fox Admits on CNN That It Traffics in Opinion Not News
Jon Ponder | October 12, 2009
After a brief but concerted challenge by the White House to the credibility of Fox News Channel as a legitimate news organization — including a detailed takedown by Communications Director Anita Dunn on CNN’s “Reliable Sources” on Sunday — a spokesman for Fox made a de facto admission that the channel is nothing more than a propaganda arm of the Republican Party and the conservative movement:

In a written statement given to CNN, Fox News said its programming was comparable to the editorial page of a newspaper.

“An increasing number of viewers are relying on Fox News for both news and opinion,” Fox News Senior VP Michael Clemente said in the statement, “and the average news consumer can certainly distinguish between the A-section of the newspaper and the editorial page, which is what our programming represents.

“So with all due respect to anyone who might still be confused about the difference between news reporting and vibrant opinion, my suggestion would be to talk about the stories and the facts rather than the [sic] attack the messenger . . . which over time has never worked.”

Not surprisingly, even this statement from Fox was carefully crafted to obfuscate the truth from hapless readers. Like the classic non-denial denial, it is a non-admission admission.

For example, while it is true that “an increasing number of viewers are relying on Fox News for both news and opinion,” the fact is a majority of those viewers are not media savvy, and would be shocked to lear that even Fox admits that what it is pushing at them as “news” is in fact Republican talking points and propaganda.

Fortunately, few Americans are fooled by the Fox channel. A poll in August found that among all Americans, Fox was considered trustworthy by just 35 percent, while 41 percent felt it was untrustworthy. Among Southerners, however, the poll found that 46 percent thought Fox was trustworthy, compared with 27 percent in the Northeast and 33 percent in the Midwest and the West.

It is also true, as the Fox VP says, that “the average news consumer can certainly distinguish between the A-section of the newspaper and the editorial page.” What he doesn’t say but surely knows is that Fox viewers are below-average news consumers.

A recent study by Magna Global that was reported in Variety found that “[among] ad-supported cable nets, the news nets (along with older-skewing Hallmark Channel, Golf Channel and GSN’s daytime sked) sport the most gray, with Fox News Channel’s daytime and primetime skeds the absolute oldest, clocking in with a median age above 65.” (Emphasis added.)

While there are certainly millions of elderly people who are average and above-average news consumers, they are, by definition, more likely to agree with the majority of Americans that Fox is not trustworthy. Media savvy people, no matter how old they are or where they live, know better than to depend on Fox for fact-based information about newsworthy events.

The Fox exec’s final assertion is rich. He suggests that the White House should “talk about the stories and the facts” rather than attacking Fox — meaning: Fox would prefer it if the White House would get off the offensive and return to defending itself against Fox’s lies, spin and propaganda.

This does not seem likely. Fox’s statement admitting that it is propaganda outlet came just hours after Anita Dunn from the White House made “>these assertions on CNN:

* “If we went back a year ago to the fall of 2008, to the campaign, that was a time this country was in two wars that we had a financial collapse probably more significant than any financial collapse since the Great Depression. If you were a Fox News viewer in the fall election what you would have seen were that the biggest stories and the biggest threats facing America were a guy named Bill Ayers and a something called ACORN.”
* “The reality of it is that Fox News often operates almost as either the research arm or the communications arm of the Republican Party. And it is not ideological… what I think is fair to say about Fox, and the way we view it, is that it is more of a wing of the Republican Party.”
* “Obviously [the President] will go on Fox because he engages with ideological opponents. He has done that before and he will do it again… when he goes on Fox he understands he is not going on it as a news network at this point. He is going on it to debate the opposition.”
* “[Fox is] widely viewed as a part of the Republican Party: take their talking points and put them on the air, take their opposition research and put it on the air. And that’s fine. But let’s not pretend they’re a news organization like CNN is.”

And Dunn’s smackdown of Fox is a follow-up of the White House’s slap at Fox three weeks ago when the president chose to do all the Sunday political shows except Fox’s. When Fox complained, the White House responded:

“We figured Fox would rather show ‘So You Think You Can Dance’ than broadcast an honest discussion about health insurance reform,” a White House deputy press secretary told ABC News on Saturday. “Fox is an ideological outlet where the president has been interviewed before and will likely be interviewed again; not that the whining particularly strengthens their case for participation any time soon.”

The White House is winning this battle. Let’s just hope they don’t back down.

On the other hand, don’t be surprised if Fox’s admission that it is a broadcast version of a newspaper’s opinion page to be the most un-reported story of the year.

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A few of the oh so many examples of why I have my DVR set to catch The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson five nights a week.

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Swined!

Ah, yes. The H1N1 has had carnal knowledge of yours truly.

It went from mild symptoms Tuesday mid to late morning in through a desperate, truly feverish push to clear out some projects before leaving work after 7 that night. I made a quick stop for something in the Flu Buddy strain on the way home (living in the brutality of the Land of the Free, I knew it wasn't as if I was going to go to a doctor and get a prescription I couldn't afford to fill, after all) and arrived home, somehow, hot enough that I was reportedly almost painful to touch.

Two nights later and I appear to be past most of it, though I'm still a bit sore, and will be dosing up with anti-diarrhea pills before settling in for the night. I'm wrung out.

Tomorrow I go back into work for the first time since Tuesday. I'm going to attempt to take it sanely, deal with what needs to be dealt with and not let the other matters stress me. Easier said than done, but that's the plan.

Hopefully my recovery trajectory at least stays consistent, and I'll awake feeling at least somewhat rested. That would be pleasantly novel.

This is the first time I've been online in a couple days, understandably, so those who were waiting for me to approve Friend status on my Facebook account, well, that's likely why it's taken so long. The whole Facebook thing is a different subject, though, and best handled in a separate post... sometime later.

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NomNomNom!

Jack Kirby's heirs have served Marvel Entertainment, the Walt Disney Co. and related studios with 45 copyright termination notices concerning characters created or co-created by Jack Kirby.

The list of characters includes Captain America, the Fantastic Four, X-Men, Thor, Iron Man, Hulk, Silver Surfer, Black Panther, Galactus, Magneto and Dr. Doom.

I'm sure I'll raise some ire from some and perhaps confusion from others over this, but my tone's one of initial reaction.

On the one hand I believe that copyright laws have long since been corrupted into a hideous, eternal monstrosity they were never intended to be. Current law, and trends that we've seen in it, threaten to choke our society by locking everything up so that it becomes less and less likely that anyone who succeeds in some creative venture will be free of people claiming to pre-own a piece of it.

On the other hand, while I will side with the individual over a corporate entity almost any day, it's difficult for me to see this as something other than a people looking to get paid for concepts they themselves never created by looking to overturn work for hire agreements from 40 years and more ago. It isn't as if the heirs are going after this for proper credit for their dear, departed Jack - official creator credits are fairly standard and fashionable these days. These characters are no more cherished by them than they are by Marvel -- they're just properties to both of them and I honestly don't see the family having truly strong claims to them... though that will theoretically be for courts to decide, then reaffirm or overturn, and then go back for appeals. It may easily end in an out of court, Do Not Discuss agreement and pay-off, though it could go the distance so long as the plaintiffs believe they see a large enough pay-off.

Ultimately, as with cockroaches and rats prospering in almost any prolonged battle, I know that the legal teams on both sides are going to make out handsomely.

This is as reported in the Wall Street Journal, which seems to be where the story broke.

Here's the text to the WSJ article, in case the original is changed or otherwise made unavailable:

Heirs of Comic Book Creator Seek to Recapture Copyrights

By LAUREN A.E. SCHUKER

The heirs of late comic-book creator Jack Kirby served 45 copyright-termination notices to Marvel Entertainment Inc., Walt Disney Co. and other Hollywood studios relating to comic-book characters and stories created by Mr. Kirby, including "X-Men" and "The Fantastic Four."

Mr. Kirby's four children are seeking to recapture as early as 2014 copyrights to characters he created. Those creations and co-creations are currently owned by Marvel. But if the heirs gain control of the copyrights, they could license them without Marvel's permission, or at least secure a share of the profits generated by those characters.

The heirs served the notices under the auspices of the U.S. Copyright Act, which permits authors and their heirs to terminate old copyright grants after a long waiting period, allowing them to recapture the rights for their own use.

A spokeswoman for Disney said: "The notices involved are an attempt to terminate rights seven to 10 years from now and involve claims fully considered in the acquisition."

Disney last month agreed to acquire Marvel for $4 billion.

In a federal court lawsuit that hasn't been fully resolved, the heirs of "Superman" co-creator Jerry Siegel recently recaptured limited rights relating to the original "Superman" from Time Warner Inc.'s Warner Bros. and DC Comics.
—Ethan Smith contributed to this article.

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It speaks eloquently for itself.
(Thanks to Grant for the link.)

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2009: Day 240

The first issue of Scientific American is published today back in 1845.

Hail to the King! Jack Kirby (born Jacob Kurtzberg) - without whose creations modern comic books would be a very different place - was born today back in 1917.

Nancy Kulp -- known primarily as Miss Jane of The Beverly Hillbillies - was born this day in 1921.

Hutch! Actor/musician David Soul hits 66 today. (I had no idea he'd become a British citzen in 2004.)

Director, producer and political activist Robert Greenwald (1946) is 64 today.

Puerto Rican character actor Luis Guzmán (1956) celebrates his 53rd birthday today.

Fillmaker David Fincher (Seven, Fight Club) turns 47 today.

Stiffler's Mom - Jennifer Coolidge - turns 46 today. The same day, the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom occurs, and Martin Luter King Jr. delivers his "I Have a Dream" speech.

In 1964 the Philadelphia race riot of '64 began in a Northern section of the city today, continuing for three days of looting and destruction.

Stargate SG-1/Atlantis and Sanctuary actress Amanda Tapping turns 44 today.

Peregrin Took - Scottish actor Billy Boyd - turns 41 today. Meanwhile, riots in Chicago accompany the tumultuous 1968 Democratic National Convention.

It's the big 4 O for Jack Black today.

Today in 1991 the ripples from the ongoing collapse of the Soviet Union included Ukraine declaring its independence and Mikhail Gorbachev resigning as Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party.

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