Basically, I hate it. HATE. I hate that my Wisconsin Badgers were placed in a division without our two closest rivals and most popular road trips. Sure, we get a crack at Ohio State and Penn State every year, but we won't play Iowa or Nebraska annually either. In fact, after this year, Badger fans won't see the Hawkeyes again until 2013 (or never if the 2012 doomsday predictions come true).
The Big Ten claimed that geography was the number one factor in creating the divisions. I call shenanigans on this statement. The number one factor in creating these divisions was to give Ohio State and Michigan the opportunity to play each other in the conference championship. That's it.
Wisconsin is not in a division with either of the two teams located within 200 miles of Madison.
Nor is Wisconsin guaranteed a yearly game with either of these two teams
The "Wolverine" division teams are an average of 426 miles away from their opponents, while the "Buckeye" division is 351. If Wisconsin and Illinois were logically substituted for Michigan & Michigan State the divisions would be a far more manageable 303 and 330.
For Wisconsin, the change is more dramatic. In the current set up, Wisconsin is, on average, 426 miles from its division opponents. That's a flight. In an East/West setup, it's only 262 miles away - that's a four-hour car ride.
And it's not just about Wisconsin. In that east/west setup, the only teams on average more than 400 miles away from their division opponents are, logically, the two teams on the east/west extremes: Nebraska & Penn State. In the actual setup, 6 teams have to deal with distances at least that far.
To me, the Big Ten thought a lot about Ohio State and Michigan and a lot of current competitive football balance. They didn't think about geography. They didn't think about the fans. And I don't think they thought at all about Wisconsin.
With Bristol Palin joining such "celebrities" as the Hoff, Jennifer Grey, The Situation and Kurt Warner on the upcoming season of Dancing With The Stars, it occurs to me that Palin's performance could be an easy way to predict the November elections.
While I'm sure some people who watch DWTS base their votes on actual dancing talent, I suspect many more vote on simply which celebrities they like the most. Therefore, it's pretty easy to assume that the type of hardcore liberals who actually vote in mid-term elections won't be calling her number. Likewise, the Tea Party types who love Sarah Palin will probably vote for Bristol even if she has two left feet.
"Dancing With The Stars" is one of the biggest mainstream hits on television. I suspect its audience over indexes on voting, particularly in non-Presidential years. If Bristol stays longer than her dancing warrants or gets voted off more quickly than she should, I think we can attribute that to political reasons that will likely carry over to the real voting booth. This probably sounds a little ridiculous, but I do feel like the DWTS audience is more representative of what Americans think than the writers of the New York Times or Glenn Beck.
The only wrench in there is that it's possible that Bristol's personality will override the politics and people may vote for or against based on that. However, based on the 5 minutes she was on TV last night, it doesn't appear that she has a personality (or she was completely scared to death), so I think we're safe.
Bristol doesn't need to win - clearly this is The Hoff's show to lose - but I don't think it's crazy to think that a strong performance by her might mean more seats in the House and Senate for the GOP.
One of the biggest controversies in Wisconsin right now is the proposed high speed rail from Milwaukee to Madison. It's just a train, but people are very emotional about it and they project all kinds of nasty characteristics on people who disagree with them. For example, train supporters are clearly dirty hippies who hate America. Opponents of the train, on the other hand, are fat, racist SUV drivers who pollute the countryside with their McDonalds' wrappers. I'm really not exaggerating. Not even a little bit.
It occurred to me the other day, though, that the debate shouldn't be about the train. That's taking the debate too far down the line. Rather than starting with a solution, we should start with the problem. In this case, the problem is that our transportation system was designed for cars and that may not be sustainable in the future. The question, therefore, isn't "should we build the train?", it's "what should we do?"
See how that instantly opens up more possibilities? I read one article on the topic that talked about how unlikely it was that you could completely change America's car culture and that, instead of high speed rail, we should invest in things like electric cars. So, then maybe, future transportation projects could focus on building convenient charging stations on the interstate. I dunno. It's just a thought.
What I like about this is that you end the perception that disagreeing with one solution somehow means you're denying that there's a problem. I think it lets you discuss the problem without the burden of the emotional investment in the solution you like best.
One of the most irritating things about politics in America right now is that we're so partisan that we're convinced that the other side is committed to the downfall of our nation. There's no concept that each party genuinely wants what's best for America and that they just have different ways of getting there. I think if you start with the problem you are at least more likely to acknowledge that fact.
I think you can extend this idea into other policy areas. It would have been great, for example, if the health care debate didn't focus on the features and flaws of Obamacare, but rather than on what's wrong with health care in America and how we could fix it.
Sometimes digging deeper leads to some uncomfortable questions. I think if you go beyond the surface of the Ground Zero mosque debate, the problem is really something like "How can a country with values of religious & cultural tolerance coexist with religious fundamentalism?" That certainly covers more than the mosque (for example - I think the same question ultimately drives debate on things like abortion & gay marriage).
There are no easy answers and that's what I love about it. "You're racist!" or "You hate America!" isn't an answer, thank God.
While I may not get to watch every Packers game, I do have TVG, so I get to watch Zenyatta, among others. As a horse racing fan, August is one of the best times of the year. The Saratoga and Del Mar meets are in full swing, two-year olds are racing and you never know when you'll catch a future star.
Yesterday, I glanced up at the TV long enough to watch Uncle Mo, who looks to be a worthy challenger to the current hyped two-year olds Kantharos and Boys At Toscanova.
Wow. Although he's obviously quick, Uncle Mo may have some distance ability as his broodmare sire is the stamina influence Arch.
When you catch a horse at the beginning of his career, they're always a little special to you. It's that way with anything - it's always sweeter if you were in from the start. I found these two videos of Mumford & Sons - one from March 2009 and one from this summer. Don't you think the people that saw them on a patio in Austin love them just a little bit more seeing how far they've come?
Sometimes I make fun of those people that are always chasing the next cool band or the next trend or whatever, but seeing these videos now makes me think that maybe they're on to something.
As I was driving the other day, I heard a song that really reminded me of Brett Favre. I wondered if I could come up with a 20-song playlist that would reflect the Brett Favre Experience. Of course I could! You can see it below (interspersed with some football videos for context).
The Pre-Packer Years
As you can see from the picture on the right, Favre was pretty much a hayseed, hence my first track, "Cotton Eyed Joe" by rednex. For his short time with the Falcons, I picked "Zero" by Yeah Yeah Yeahs. I think these lyrics are perfect:
Your zero
What's your name?
No one's going to ask you
Better find out where they want you to go
Try and hit the spot
Get to know it in the dark
Get to know it whether you're
Crying, crying, crying, oh, oh
Can you climb, climb, climb higher?
Even Packer fans had no idea who this quarterback we traded for was.
The Early Packers Years
Of course, soon we'd never forget Favre. Now, it's easy to remember the bitter end, but I thought "Your Song" (I chose the Ewan McGregor version) was a nice way to remember the start:
And you can tell everybody this is your song
It may be quite simple but now that it's done
I hope you don't mind
I hope you don't mind that I put down in words
How wonderful life is while you're in the world
It's hard to believe it, but that's how we felt about the guy. I chose Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" specifically thinking of the 1995 NFC Championship Game loss the Cowboys. We lost that game, but we all just knew the magical was going to happen - hence the obvious choice of Queen's "We Are The Champions" to represent the Super Bowl.
The Middle Years
While Packers loved him, I think the rest of the country didn't get Favre shoved down their throat until after the Super Bowl. Then we heard all about what a "big kid just having fun out there" he was. Can you tell I'm rolling my eyes? Anyway, to represent this period of the Favre Experience, I've got "Build Me Up Buttercup" by The Foundations. It's perfect not only because the video from There's Something About Mary features Favre and his "awesome" dancing, but also because lyrically, Favre really did build us up and then let us down in a quest for a second Super Bowl title, didn't he?
After that, I've got Santigold's "Unstoppable" in reference to his consecutive games streak, followed by John Denver's "Thank God I'm A Country Boy" and Lazlo Bane's "Superman", which I think of as Favre's often fatal desire to win the game all on his own.
The End of the Packers Era
The chorus of the Old 97's "Indefinitely" neatly sums up what Favre put the Packers through every season:
I don't mean no.
I don't mean maybe.
I'm indefinitely.
I'm indefinitely.
Even though he was starting to be a pain in the ass, we loved him. It was hard to say goodbye. Jeff Buckley's "Last Goodbye" summed up those conflicting feelings well:
This is our last goodbye
I hate to feel the love between us die
But it's over
Just hear this and then I'll go
You gave me more to live for
More than you'll ever know
But, like The Eagles' sang, "There's A New Kid In Town" and while Packers fans loved Favre, we also looked forward to what Aaron Rodgers could do.
The Break Up
Rilo Kiley's "A Man/Me/Then Jim" was actually the inspiration for this post because of these lyrics:
She said, "You can sleep upon my doorstep
You can promise me indifference, Jim (editor's note: or Brett :)
But my mind's made up
And I'll never let you in again"
For the slow fade of love
It might hit you from below
It's your gradual descent into a life you never meant
It's the slow fade of love
I haven't heard a better way to describe my feelings about Favre in the summer of 2008 than as the "slow fade of love". That's exactly right.
As for Favre, like The Baby's sang, he was "Back On My Feet Again" in New York City.
The Betrayal
When Favre signed with the Vikings, that was it for Packer fans. We were over. Favre didn't get it. But I think our feelings were perfectly captured in Ben Folds Five's "Smoke":
You keep on saying the past is not dead
Stop and smell the smoke
You keep saying the past is not even past
You keep saying ...
We are smoke ... smoke ... smoke
I think of this song and then think about all of the Packer fans burning their Favre jerseys on giant bonfires. Smoke indeed.
The Heavy's "How Do You Like Me Now?" refers to both Packer fans who hate Favre and Vikings fans who've embraced him. Oh how the world turns.
But, the more things change, the more they stay the same as Britney Spears' "Ooops I Did It Again" neatly shows. Yep, we all say that interception in the NFC Championship Game coming. :)
The Future?
Favre claims this is his last year, but we'll see about that. It may be, but I'm sure he'll string the Vikings along a little bit, which is why Henry Rollins' "Liar" seems appropriate.
The final two songs on the Brett Favre Experience playlist reflect how I feel about the future relationship between Favre and the Packers will be like. First, I added Matthew Sweet's "You Don't Love Me". I think the fact that he's not immediately re-embraced by Packer fans will come as a shock to Favre:
What a beautiful moment, the truth comes out at last.
Once your heart would own me forever, then this passed.
And what a beautiful moment, as my head comes apart.
Drunk, and in a manner of saying, wasted.
'Cause you don't love me, you don't love me.
You can't see how I matter in this world,
even though I love you, you can't believe that.
If you find something you think might make you happy
then I guess it's OK, I think it's OK
if you go away.
Blown right out of my senses, I did not know know what to do.
Lost, and badly wanting someone to see me through.
That's why I needed you.
Finally, I ended with what may be Favre's future redemption song, The Avett Brother's "Shame":
Okay so I was wrong about
My reasons for us fallin' out
Of love I want to fall back in
My life is different now I swear
I know now what it means to care
About somebody other than myself
I know the things I said to you
They were untender and untrue
I'd like to see those things undo
So if you could find it in your heart
To give a man a second start
I promise things won't end the same
The Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission brought out a bunch of hand wringing about how this was the end of fair elections and from now on seats would be bought by the corporate monoliths.
One of the major criticisms of the decision was that it bestowed personhood on corporations. The counter argument is that corporations are already people - they're a group of people just like a newspaper or a union or a non-profit organization entitled to the same right to speech.
To me, the flap over Target's $150,000 donation to MN Forward shows not only that this latter view of corporations is correct, but also vividly demonstrates the pitfalls of corporate political contributions and why the Citizens United decision really isn't the death of democracy after all.
I think Target's executives decided to make the donation with a combination of thoughtlessness and arrogance. I think they made a personal decision that Emmer's social politics were either a) in line with their own and/or b) were dwarfed by MN Forward's general pro-business agenda. In doing so, they neglected to consider that many of the corporation's shareholders, employees and customers feel exactly the opposite - in fact, a corporation is actually made up on a large number of individuals with different opinions. Gasp. While shareholders empower executives to make business decisions, making political contributions on their behalf is taking that power too far. I expect that many corporations are going to have to write specific guidelines for corporate political contributions. It's not going to be as simple as writing a check to a charity.
So as a marketer, here are some of my suggestions for corporations considering political contributions:
Don't do it.
No really, don't do it. How much more than $150,000 has Target spent to deal with its donation? Couldn't those hours have been put to more productive use, especially in the middle of Back to School season?
Okay, if you're pretty much a "one issue" company, then go ahead and make political donations. But, I'm defining "one issue" pretty narrowly. One issue isn't "retail" or "food". One issue is something like the example I've gone back to with Churchill Downs. CHDN can probably get away with making political donations to pro-gambling PACs and candidates. But only probably. What if that same pro-gambling candidate opposes anti-horse slaughter legislation? Wouldn't that upset lots of their shareholders and employees and customers? See how messy this gets? Okay, so again, maybe the answer is simply - don't do it.
So, to sum it up, don't do it
Just because we can speak freely and donate freely doesn't always mean we should. That holds for individuals and certainly corporations too. I suspect that many corporations will still make political contributions and plenty of marketing and public relations people will spend much of their time cleaning up the ensuing mess.
A few weeks ago my nephew posted something on Facebook about how he was "liking" Ticketmaster there for the sole purpose of continually trashing them on their fan page. I giggled and appreciated his consistent desire to fight the power.
Today, however, I joined him in the fight. I went to purchase a $25 concert ticket and got hit with the following fees:
$7.30 convenience charge
additional taxes of $.57
$4.58 order processing fee
Add it up and that's $12.47. And that's not counting a $2.50 fee I could pay for the privilege of printing my tickets myself or a new $3.00 fee for will call. (As an aside, why will Ticketmaster mail tickets to me for free? Is there some law that doesn't allow them to tack on a $3.98 envelope fee and a $2.54 postage and handling charge? I can't believe they'd miss the boat that much)
So, needless to say, I'll go the box office and buy tickets. It might take a half hour and yeah, I value my time at more than $25/hour, but you know what I value even more? Making sure Ticketmaster doesn't get another dime out of my pocket.
So anyway, the point of this rant is that, clearly, some companies just shouldn't get involved in two-way social media. Ticketmaster has a Facebook fan page, but clearly, it's just another outlet for customer rage.
I understand that as long as enough people buy tickets, Ticketmaster doesn't really care about that rage. But what I don't understand is why they're bothering with social media in the first place. Bands and venues will promote their shows, so Ticketmaster has no need to be out there providing a forum for people to discuss how much they hate them. I mean, I appreciate the opportunity, but I don't understand it. They're wasting resources on social media that could be put to better use dreaming up more fees. What are they thinking?!?
As a serious question though, how can they get away with this? The government cracked down on bank fees, why the hell isn't Ticketmaster next in line?
In July we met Antoine Dodson, who saved his sister from a would be rapist and inspired another great song.
Then, just this week Steve Slater burst onto the scene and slid down the emergency chute (two beers in hand) and into our hearts.
Remember when summer used to be about big, expensive action movies and the stars were people like Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Will Smith? I think Internet celebrities have completely taken over for these guys. All that's missing is the popcorn!
But here's my question: why do we assume that Obama will even run in 2012? Would you want to be President now? I mean, when times are good, I'm sure it's tough, but fun. But in a long recession, a quagmire in Asia and a looming fiscal crisis, it's gotta suck.
So, Obama could put himself through another nasty campaign, this time grounded in dismal reality rather than lofty rhetoric, and if he "wins" he'll get to make a bunch of unpopular choices. Awesome.
On the other hand, he could quit, wrap things up in D.C. and ride the storm out from wherever he wants in comfort & style.
I wouldn't blame him if he chose the latter option. I think our leaders are in for a tough ride and if that's not your thing, then why not get off of the bus while you still can?
He could save face with some vague talk about "health reasons" and keep whatever legacy he has intact. Maybe he can even serve the country in some other capacity. But, he doesn't have to be the fall guy for everything.
My friend Steve is a thirtysomething father of two. He's also a huge music fan who was lucky enough to go to Lollapalooza in Chicago this past weekend. Inevitably, his friends gave him a hard time about being one of the "old guys" at the festival.
I think we have this idea that concerts and new music are just for the young. I don't think that's true. I think, rather, that the world is divided into people that actively seek out new music and those that don't. Age doesn't have that much to do with it. In my own family, my 20-year old nephew has no idea what music is new or cool, while his 50-something uncle will make you awesome CDs full of the latest and greatest songs (thanks again for introducing me to Okkervil River's "Lost Coastlines").
There's this perception that you stay in the pop culture bubble you came of age in. So Baby Boomers like the music of the 60s and 70s, while Generation X's music love should stop at grunge.
It's because of this that movie soundtracks are full of "classic" 60s songs, the Green Bay Packers play an old Todd Rundgren song when they score and American Idol forces its young contestants to sing songs that are nearly 50 years old. Producers are afraid of alienating their large older audience with scary "new" music.
To me, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Of course older generations aren't going to like new music if they never hear any of it. That's why I appreciate the Chicago Blackhawks for making The Fratellis' "Chelsea Dagger" their victory song. And yes, believe it or not, even Hawks fans in their 50s and 60s enjoyed it. Imagine that!
I've written before about the cultural death grip of the Baby Boomers, but I don't know that I had it right. I don't think the Boomers actually think that music peaked with them. I think, rather, that due to their demographic power, producers and marketers are just afraid to expose them (and by extension the rest of us) to anything too new or out there. It's easier to just have another "Stones night", you know?
In the meantime, there's a whole world of sounds out there to discover. And it's not just the realm of hipsters. Music is for everyone. We just have to be unafraid to take it, no matter our age.
So, Brett Favre is apparently retired again. But this can't be the end of it, can it? Doesn't he owe the Vikings a few more anguished weeks of hemming and hawwing? What do you think will happen next?
The weekend before last I volunteered at the Mississippi River Challenge. I paddled the event last year and remembered that often the most difficult part of the trip was maneuvering in and out of the rest stops. I was happy then to be put on the "boats" team at one of the stops where my job would be to help paddlers get in and out of the crowded beach. As I was wading out in the water, directing paddlers and pulling in and pushing boats off the beach, I kind of imagined myself as a beach master on D-Day - minus the whole people shooting at me thing.
I was brought back to that thought this past weekend when I was watching Mason Jennings in concert. Jennings has a song called The Field. It's the powerful lament of a father who's lost a son to a war:
If I was the president, if I was that brave
I would take a shovel then dig each child their graves
If I was the president, and my world turned black
I would want no victory, I'd just want you back
I don't want no victory, I just want you back
We always think of WWII and D-Day in particular as a good war and the that the sacrifices made were well worth it. I don't think that's necessarily wrong, but there's such truth in those lyrics. How many people would have traded that victory for the life of their loved one? All of them?
And that's with a "good" war. How does someone bear it for a cause they don't believe in?
I suppose it's a bit unfair to judge a war by that measure - no war would ever be worth fighting, right? But shouldn't that be part of the process you go through to decide whether or not to go to war or support a war?
At the start of the War on Terror, I think we collectively decided that it was worth risking the lives on soldiers in the Middle East to protect the lives of Americans flying in a plane or working in a skyscraper or hanging out at the mall. But nearly 10 years later, is that reason still valid? Or are we making up justifications as we go along?
So the same friend of a friend who posted the charming Press One for English video on Facebook, has a new one:
I'm no fan of Obama, but seriously? Do they really think they're fooling anyone? "The Great Reneger"? You're not being cute or clever, you're being racist.
It's funny, because I agree with a lot of the points in the video about Obama's broken promises, but it doesn't matter because every point you make is wiped out when you winkingly call a black President a "reneger".
Actually, it's not funny. It's sick and wrong and I am ashamed by it.
During his appearance on The View President Obama remarked that of course he doesn't do his own tweeting, but rather some "20-year old" does it. He's also made comments about how he doesn't know how to work his iPod. I get that he's trying to be glib and self-deprecating, but at what point does that attitude and those comments turn into the perception that he's hopelessly out of touch?
I remember when George H.W. Bush was roundly mocked for apparently not knowing how a grocery scanner worked. There are over 500 million Facebook users, about 15 million Twitter users and the iPod hit the 100 million sales mark back in 2007. These aren't "new" technologies anymore. Maybe our leaders should simply get with it.
And I'm not just talking about Obama or some other blowhard politician. I see the same thing in business. Some 50+ executive will make a comment about how he doesn't know anything about this internet stuff and he's never been on Facebook and blah blah blah. I want to yell at them and point out that they're in marketing or communications and how can they be in the field, much less a leader in the field, and be so ignorant. It's not cool. It's downright scary.
I was in a meeting the other day and saw some data about the gap between Americans' media usage and how advertiser's spend their budgets. Even though (at the time - the stats are a couple of years old) 37% of media consumption was online, only 14% of ad spend was. Likewise, newspapers accounted for just 4% of media consumption but 24% of media spend. The ignorance of out-of-touch marketing leaders leads to bad decisions like this.
The ignorance of political leaders will likewise lead to more poor decisions. Maybe if you're going to be President of the United States or President of a company, you should play a few less rounds of golf and spend a little more time learning about this "whole Internet thing". It's not going away.
So, I'm currently obsessed with Sporcle geography quizzes. Perhaps this obsession is what made me interested in How the States Got Their Shapes on History International last night. In any case, lucky me, because the show was a fascinating look behind the forces that made the states look the way they do today. For example:
Idaho and Colorado owe much of their shape due to the fact that the states around them gave up their land because they didn't want to be bothered with wild & rowdy gold prospectors
Missouri's boot exists because one guy held that land and decided that he wanted to be in Missouri rather than Arkansas.
Once the Erie Canal was opened, borders changed all over the place with states wanting "their" share of land on the Great Lakes
So that's why Chicago isn't in Wisconsin, huh? Those damn FIBs needed a coast. In light of the ongoing fight to keep Asian Carp out of the Great Lakes it's interesting that a single state with just a sliver of the lake can affect the entire region. Would things be different if all of that land was in Wisconsin? It's hard to imagine Chicago politics and the Progressive movement existing in the same state, so which would have held sway? Would we still have the Wisconsin Idea or would we be like more Illinois? And speaking of Illinois, what would it be like without Chicago? Would it basically just be the South? Would people still drive like crap?
These are the questions that keep me up at night (not really, but it's better than thinking about bats).
Yesterday I came upon the Driftless Rivers site, which highlights Bryan J. Stanley's book about trying to turn the Driftless Area of Wisconsin into a National Park. I was moderately intrigued by the idea as that part of the state really is beautiful. But on the other hand, the estimated cost was $900 million, the best parts of the area are already preserved as part of Wyalusing State Park and, while the land is lovely, it's no Yellowstone or Yosemite. But, the point is, I really did think about it. To the extent that I did a few more web searches on "Driftless Rivers" until I came to this article:
In the spring issue of the College of Natural Resources news for UW-Stevens Point, the alumni update included a note about 1977 soils graduate Bryan J. Stanley.
It announced the publication of "The Becoming of Driftless Rivers National Park," a "280-page hardcover book, which Stanley spent six years writing and researching."
The book, described as a cultural and natural history of southwestern Wisconsin, could be ordered from Stanley at 301 Troy Drive, Madison.
That is the site of the Mendota Mental Health Institute on the north side of Madison, where Stanley has resided since he murdered a priest and two others in an Onalaska Catholic church in February 1985.
Off his medication, he claimed to be the prophet Elijah and a "soldier of God" on a mission to save the church and the world from sin and communism. Judged mentally ill, a chronic paranoid schizophrenic, Stanley was eventually tried for the killings and found innocent by reason of mental defect. He has been at Mendota ever since.
I could practically hear the record screeching to a halt inside my head.
On one hand, it's kind of encouraging that with the help of medication this guy could produce a book like this. On the other hand, it's kind of hard to take a proposal seriously from someone who's up at Mendota. I mean, that's where Ed Gein was!
So, this whole incident made me think of a few questions:
Are there any areas of the United States that really should be made into National Parks?
Is a place "just" a state park to you? By that I mean do you think of state parks as less special and appealing than National Parks? Is the fact that something is a National Park by itself an incentive for you to visit?
Does the source of an idea influence your feelings about the idea beyond its own merits?
I was reading this article about the Afghanistan Wikileaks and this quote stuck out:
Labour leadership candidate David Miliband, said the "war logs" showed that the war could not be won by military means alone.
"We cannot kill our way out of an insurgency. Instead, the battle for power is fought in the minds of the local population, insurgents and western publics. The purpose of military effort and civilian improvement is to create the conditions for political settlement.
"There is now a race against time to persuade the Afghan people that the correct strategy is in place and show our own people it can succeed. Better Afghan security forces, better police, better schooling and economic opportunities are all vital but not enough. None of them are durable or possible without a political settlement."
Miliband, the former foreign secretary, said any peace settlement "must include the vanquished as well as the victors" and urged the government in Kabul to involve Afghans in "defining a political endgame".
I'm troubled by this quote. Not because I don't believe it, but because I think it shows why we're going to join the ranks of countries who've failed in Asian land wars: not only don't we know how we're going to win, we don't even actually know what "winning" entails. How in the world do you know if you've "created the conditions for political settlement"?
As is my custom, I'm going to fall back on marketing. Thinking about the war as if it were a marketing campaign helps to further highlight the mess we're in and see if there's anything we can do about it.
Understand your target market. If you're selling shoes, you need to understand the mysterious female psyche. While war is a little bit different, knowing your target is just as important. Typically the target market in a war would be something like: Germans and the goal would be to kill them. Simple enough. The problem with Afghanistan is that there are multiple target markets and we have different goals for each. For example, we want to get rid of the Taliban and al-Qaeda. We want moderate Afghanis to like us. These goals can conflict, so it's important that we determine what's the primary goal and what's the secondary goal. In the early days of the war I think it was clear that the primary goal was to get rid of the Taliban and al-Qaeda. But what is it now? If our goals are humanitarian and trying to win the hearts and minds of the people, is the best way to do that with the military? Couldn't we just open up Afghan Disney or literally employ a slick marketing campaign instead?
Have a measurable objective. What exactly are we trying to do? In Marketing, if you're trying to make sales by the end of the quarter, you don't measure your related advertising campaigns to see if you've raised your awareness. You measure sales. Sales sales sales. Likewise, if we're truly trying to create better schools and police in Afghanistan, we don't measure success by territory gained or al-Qaeda captured. If the war is just some giant P.R. campaign, then really couldn't we measure success via public opinion polls. Or maybe it's as simple as the using the ACSI("How likely are you to recommend America to your friends?").
Test & learn. Great marketing organizations always have a place for test & learn. You try new campaigns on a small scale and then roll them out if they work. Maybe going into Asia's graveyard of invaders wasn't the way to go. Perhaps we should have invaded a smaller, but equally hostile, country first and applied those lessons to Afghanistan. Alternatively, within Afghanistan itself, we could employ a test & learn atmosphere. Perhaps in one region we concentrate on humanitarian efforts, while in another it's all about military objectives. We don't have to just "go big" all of the time.
Give things time to work. American marketers are now a week or two into BTS (Back to School). Somewhere, some executive is freaking out about results already and forcing his or her team through fire drills to make changes. Elsewhere, there's another executive who trusts that his or her team's months of planning shouldn't be undermined by a single weekend in July. In the long run, the latter team is going to be more successful. Reactionary management kills morale and momentum and creates confusion. From a War on Terror perspective, imagine the poor soldier who doesn't know from day to day whether he should be fighting the enemy or kissing babies, because the orders change.
Cut & run. That's not to say that sometimes things aren't working and you've got to make a change. The best marketing example I can think of is New Coke. Sure, Coke spent a lot of time and money developing New Coke. They had the resources to spend even more money to continuing to market the product. However, to their credit, they saw the writing on the wall and didn't put more money into a sinking ship. Maybe Afghanistan is our New Coke. We can keep pouring money into it, but the people are never going to want to drink it.
I've been watching Versus' coverage of the Tour de France at times with my mouth agape. Their adoring coverage of Lance Armstrong is frankly shocking and offensive. It's as if they have no idea that he's likely going to be exposed as the biggest fraud in the history of sport. I understand that they say what the network and the sponsors want them to say, but I would expect a little bit of realism or at least a few mentions of the news swirling around Armstrong. But no.
With the risk of sounding like I love cancer, I should confess that I can't stand Lance Armstrong. Even if he really was clean as the driven snow, he's still a dick.
Dick.
Anyway, I've thought about what's the psyche behind the Armstrong myth. Here's my take.
1. In the mid-90s, Armstrong was a great one-day racer. The type of guy that'd be a favorite in classics and things like the Olympic road race. Then, all of sudden, guys on r-EPO started winning. r-EPO was undetectable, so Armstrong, like other cyclists were faced with a big moral dilemma. To dope or not to dope. I have some sympathy for Armstrong at this point. If he didn't dope, he'd likely lose his livelihood. It's easy to understand why so many riders chose to dope and just makes those who didn't all the more admirable.
2. Armstrong got cancer. The interesting thing is that his level of beta-hCG (the indicator of testicular cancer) should have been detected in routine doping tests months earlier. I'd imagine Armstrong felt two things: a) the cycling authorities weren't serious about catching dopers, so they were tacitly approving the practice and b) it was partially their fault that he almost died. If Armstrong had any moral doubts about doping, it's easy to see how they could have been erased. The UCI didn't care about doping and furthermore, they owed it to Armstrong.
3. So Armstrong went on to dominate the Tour de France rest assured that he wasn't a cheater because a) he had the moral high ground given his cancer and b) everyone else was cheating too. That attitude helps explain his issues with Christophe Bassons. Bassons' clean riding picked away at that moral high ground. Everyone wasn't cheating. Armstrong wasn't really an innocent victim of a dirty sport - he was part of the problem. Bassons mere existence must have irked him.
4. Armstrong kept winning the Tour. He got rich and famous and had a fabulous image that opened lots of doors with sponsors, celebrities and even politicians. That image had to be protected at all costs. Hence his attack of Filippo Simeoni, his feud with Greg Lemond, and his attempt to portray himself as a victim of the nefarious French.
5. At some point, I think Armstrong started to believe his own lies, kind of like O.J. Simpson. How could react with his typical level of indignation if he didn't? I think Armstrong thinks he's owed something because of Livestrong. It's a get-out-of-cheating-free card. If all else fails, he could fall back on cancer.
Eventually, I suspect Armstrong will have to deal with confession, contrition and rehabilitation. It's not pretty to imagine how a man like Armstrong is going to deal with his coming fall from grace. If he's running down innocent pedestrians now, just imagine who he could take down with him in the coming months.
I've been watching Bravo's new reality series, Work Of Art. It's billed as the "search for the next great artist" and as such it's pretty delightful. Like Project Runway, it gives you a glimpse into the creative mind, but unlike Project Runway, there are no limitations like making something actually wearable. The artists are relatively free to follow their whims.
It's fun to watch what they come up with, but the whole concept of judging art seems wrong to me. How can you objectively judge art? I know there are generally accepted masterpieces (although I'm not really sure how even that has happened), but isn't the greatness of art determined by the emotional reaction you have to it? Is the idea that a great artist has the power to draw out that reaction from anyone who sees their work?
I think that's probably the answer, but again, so much of the power of the work is derived from the viewer rather than the artist. I can't help but think of when I first saw Sarah Ruhl's play Eurydice. I saw it just a couple of months after my Dad died and basically sat through the play in tears. I loved it and it clearly touched something within me. My sister was sitting next to me and had no real reaction at all, despite our identical situation. One of us thought Ruhl's play was a masterpiece and the other just thought "meh". It doesn't make the play any less great to me because other people didn't share my reaction. I don't think greatness is consensus.
In general though, I find myself usually agreeing with the judges' decisions on Work Of Art. Why is that? Is it because of the general manipulations of reality television or is it because I'm wrong and that part of what makes a work of art great is a consistent reaction to it? Or maybe this show at its best is just producing middling art - so it's the equivalent of Top 40 radio - nothing truly great, but it's got a beat and you can dance to it. It's not challenging enough to produce anything but a consensus. So then really, it's more the equivalent of the politician who's for jobs, clean energy and against those fat cats in Washington. :)
Looking back at old immigration laws, it occurred to me that it might be handy to build a chart to show the evolution of American prejudice over time. Based on immigration laws and general sentiment, I came up with an arbitrary "hate index" of 0-10 and applied it to various groups over time.
While this is pretty tongue in cheek, it's also interesting to think about Latin American immigration in terms of the history of Asian immigration. Is the way Americans thought about the Chinese in the mid 1800s that different than how we feel about Mexicans now?
The Pre-Packer Years
The Early Packers Years
The End of the Packers Era
The Betrayal
