Read this.

I am not proud to be an American today.

OK - so I started this post on Saturday. Then I got distracted.

Anyway, this week, the recently played list is dominated by the two albums I got today.

The new Sleater-Kinney was an interesting first listen at the gym. It's much more free-form than anything they've done. This path was predicted by 2002's One Beat, so I guess it's not really a surprise.

The new Spoon album - I'll be honest, I've only given a couple of tracks the most cursory of listens. But it's supposed to be fantastic.

Anyway, links to the tracks from each record below.

Ten Most Recently Played

1. Steep Air - Sleater-Kinney - The Woods (5.6 MB MP3)
   
2. Rollercoaster - Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
   
3. Entertain - Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
   
4. Modern Girl - Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
   
5. Jumpers - Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
   
6. What's Mine Is Yours - Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
   
7. Wilderness - Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
   
8. The Fox - Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
   
9. The Two Sides Of Monsieur Valentine - Spoon - Gimme Fiction (4.4 MB MP3)
   
10. The Beast And Dragon, Adored - Spoon - Gimme Fiction

I'll serve up the Zwan song because I actually thought that album was pretty good even though it really fell off the radar after it came out. Enjoy.

Random Ten

1. Heartsong - Zwan - Mary Star Of The Sea (2.9 MB AAC)
   
2. Stacy's Mom - Fountains Of Wayne - Welcome Interstate Managers
   
3. Black Dog On My Shoulder - Manic Street Preachers - This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours
   
4. Pink & Blue - Outkast - The Love Below
   
5. The Wrong Child - R.E.M. - Green
   
6. Inmates (December) - The Good Life - Album of the Year
   
7. Three Hopeful Thoughts - Rilo Kiley - The Execution Of All Things
   
8. Goddamn the Light - The Thermals - More Parts Per Million
   
9. Grey December - Chet Baker - The Best Of
   
10. In God's Country - U2 - Joshua Tree

I learned today that the Bush budget includes a small 2.7% increase in funding for the department of Veteran's Affairs. When you account for inflation, this amounts to a actual cut in spending on our veterans. Remember, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are minting new veterans at a pace not seen since Vietnam. Now is not the time to pinch the VA.

More specifically, the new budget doubles the cost of prescription drugs for vets and forces some to pay a $250 annual fee for medical service.

So, I guess the moral of the story is this: Blow 2 million bucks on a support-the-troops lovefest during the Super Bowl and everyone will praise you. Bury a true slap in the face to those risking their lives in the back pages of the budget and no one will notice.

First, let's review.

RSS: A simple way to push web content to all your readers, easily. Give them one URL and a program that knows how to read the format, and they can get real time notification as you add content. Particularly useful for - although by no means limited to - sites with frequent updates and bite-sized chunks of content (ie blogs). With a good RSS reader, you can track dozens of sites at a time very easily. More from Wikipedia.

IMAP: A method of storing email on a server that mirrors message deletion and filing on any email program you use to read your mail. If you delete a message at work, it will be deleted at home. If you file a message to a folder in your webmail, it will be filed to a folder on your PDA. Really, it's the only way to go if you use more than one box to read your email. Used only sparingly, much to my chagrin. More from Wikipedia.

So, do you see where I'm going with this?

I use RSS all the time and really like it. I really can keep tabs on dozens and dozens of websites with very little effort. It's gotten to the point where if you don't have an RSS feed, I'm not likely to read you. Daily Quickie is about the only thing I read regularly that isn't syndicated.

What has frustrated me in the last couple of days is that since starting my new job with the DSCC last week, I've been regularly using a second computer, this one running Windows XP. The system is pretty locked down, so I couldn't immediately install a good stand-alone XP RSS Reader. Plus, I didn't have a way to suck down my list of feeds from my iBook while I was at work. So I started exploring my options.

First, I learned that getting my feeds was pretty easy. Most of the major stand-alone software programs, browser plugins, and web-based services can read a format called OPML. I just exported the file from NetNewsWire at home and was able to use it with any new program I used.

I had heard about Bloglines, a web-based service that stored your feeds, notified you of new items, and displayed summaries of content as it came in. It worked OK, but had three drawbacks:

1. The OPML file didn't import correctly. For example, all of my friends blogs just disappeared. Strike one.

2. It doesn't support hierarchical folders. I don't go overboard with my organization, but seems to make sense to keep my favorite Apple sites separated from my favorite gadget blogs.

3. It's a web-based app. I essentially hate web-based apps because they are invariably slow and not very full-featured. This is no different.

Bloglines does a couple of things right. Most prominently, they have a robust set of developer tools that allows the current version of NNW subscribe to Bloglines feeds. Ideally, this would allow you to read blogs at work all day and then come home and have an updated list of read and unread items. Bloglines has a funny way of presenting only unread items that makes this not so easy to use. Essentially, as soon as you click to view the new items from a site, all of the new items are marked read. This is a pain if you're only able to read one or two new items at a time.

At about the same time I realized Bloglines wasn't for me, I had the IT guy at work install Firefox on my computer. One of the best features of the new open source browser is that it has a very robust developer platform that has allowed for an explosion of "extensions" that add functionality to Firefox.

I knew about Sage, the popular RSS Reader extension, and had even used it once or twice before, but I didn't really like it. In particular, I thought the way it displayed items in each feed was pretty screwy. The default settings used a two column view that went top-to-bottom then left-to-right, like this:

1	6
2	7
3	8
4	9
5	10

A two column view for content just doesn't quite work on the web. Browsers are made to scroll vertically through long lists of content. That's why virtually every blog is tall and narrow. Frankly, I think this was a pretty screwy decision for Sage to adopt.

Then I stumbled on the final piece (for now) of this puzzle. John Hicks is a designer who specializes in CSS stylesheets for websites and other applications. He's probably best known for designing the official Firefox logo. He also designed a much better custom stylesheet for Sage. His design is intended to make the extension look and feel more like OS X, but after using it on XP, I know it looks great no matter where it lives. In particular, the entries appear like they should, one on top of another vertically.

So, now I've got a pretty darn good RSS reader at work. It's an actual application (even if it's just a mini-app within Firefox), so it's snappy and full featured. It displays the entries gorgeously. It is built in to the browser, so reading full versions of entries is just a quick click away. It has the potential to reconnect design to content, addressing a major critique I have of RSS. It even imported my OPML file with nary a hiccup.

Here's where it gets fun.

Sage smartly stores the feeds you are subscribed as part of the Firefox bookmark structure. This means that you can use another plug in called FTP Bookmarks Sync to synchronize the feeds you subscribe to between multiple installations of Sage. Since Firefox is cross-platform, that means I can always be sure that I can read new items at home from feeds I subscribed to at work.

I haven't tried this yet, but that is pretty sick. There's no reason to expect it won't work.

This implementation is not, however, perfect. For starters, there's no way to synchronize the read/unread status of individual items. This means that as you move from machine to machine, feeds you've already read will show up instead as unread. That is not ideal.

Additionally, I don't really like Firefox for OS X. I just think Safari is snappier and feels more like a native OS X app. What we really need is a server-based (?) standard that will allow any program I want - Sage, NetNewsWire, Bloglines, or MyYahoo - to connect to a single RSS profile that synchronizes subscriptions and read/unread status. What we need is (Warning: Conversation coming full circle!) IMAP for RSS.

So, programmers of the world, get to work! I have confidence you can address this request in no time!

Actually, I think there is real hope for something like this from a familiar face. Apple has already announced that the next version of Safari will ship with Sage-like RSS capabilities. In fact, Hicks said that he pretty explicitly ripped off the Safari RSS design template for his Sage stylesheet. Safari RSS is set to ship with Tiger, the next version of OS X, in the first half of this year.

I doubt that the initial release of Safari RSS will include something like this, as it hasn't been discussed in the demonstrations Steve Jobs has presented so far. But Apple already allows users of their .Mac service to synchronize their bookmarks across multiple macs. Since Safari RSS will also leverage the bookmark architecture to keep track of RSS feeds, it seems only natural that someone at Apple will realize that it sure would be nice to synchronize more information about those feeds than just their existence.

And when that person invents "RMAP," I'm gonna be a happy camper. Sure, I'm gonna use it like a fiend. But I also figure I'm due some royalties.

Josh Marshall writes in today's Talking Points Memo that Democrats ought not be fooled into introducing their own comprehensive Social Security reform plan because it will only obscure the fact that the Republicans aren't talking about comprehensively reforming anything. What Bush and his cronies are really talking about is a plan to scrap Social Security entirely and replace it with something completely new that doesn't provide nearly as much "security."

I thought this was terrifically smart. Social Security is important because it provides a guaranteed benefit to American seniors that they can count on when planning their retirement. Without it, millions of seniors would be forced to live in poverty. We know that's true because that's the whole reason we started Social Security in the first place.

Republicans hate Social Security because it flies in the face of their "Strict Father" mentality that the only ones who deserve to live their old age free from want are those who made enough money while working to provide for themselves. Those without personal fortune simply don't deserve a comfortable life or adequate health care. Social Security makes no such distinction. It aims provides an adequate benefit to every American because no one deserves to live in poverty after a lifetime working to make America great.

To fix this perceived problem, Republicans have proposed something far more radical than a moderate reform of the system. They want to scrap it entirely and put it its place a souped up 401(k) program that would, again, greatly reward those with enough knowhow to game the stock market. If you are unlucky in the market, then you will be punished for it and your benefit will be reduced. It certainly won't be the reliable insurance it was intended to be.

It's not that Democrats don't have reform proposals to help shore up the long-term stability of the Social Security program. We do. First, we're even-handed enough to acknowledge that there is no crisis. Even the most dire forecasts predict that Social Security will be pretty much fine till about 2040. That's not to say there aren't things we can do now to make it last much longer. One of the simplest proposals is to do away with the cap on how much of your income is subject to FICA taxes. Currently, the FICA tax is particularly regressive because only the first $80,000 or so of income are taxed. If we simply fully taxed the salary earned by millionaires, the Social Security trust fund could afford benefits for another X years. (I don't have this statistic. If you do, please drop a comment and let me know.)

However, now is not the time to haggle over whether we should only raise the FICA cap or if it's time to eliminate it entirely, as sensible people might. Now is the time for Democrats to convince the American people that Social Security is a program worth having at all. It's a debate the Republicans would rather you didn't notice.

...the Battle for America has begun.

...the Netroots, that is.

Today, Howard Dean finally made the first step. He took our party back. He understands that we still have a long way to go and I'll report more on the future tomorrow.

But for now, I'd like to talk about the present. Be The Power is proud to join the internet-wide effort to show our strength and our support for Chairman Dean. Daily Kos has established an ActBlue page that will pool together the netroots' contributions to the DNC.

As of this writing, we're at 1500 contributors and $75,000 raised in about two hours. Yeah, two hours. I'd bet we'll be to a million by the end of the week.

So, dig deep and find that spare $25 bucks. Leave a comment and let me know you've done it. We may have succeeded in taking our party back. But I still want my country back, too.

You can use this simple form to make your contribution:

  Contribution amount:   $        

These contributions are important. The Republicans are ready to hijack this momentous event and paint our party as out-of-touch extremists. And the right-wing media will help them. I think kos said it best:

Remember, the GOP will unload on Dean. Everytime you hear the "Dean Scream" without context, consider donating. When you hear some empty head talk about the party "moving left" with Dean, consider donating. When you hear about unnamed big dollar Democratic donors whining about pulling their money out of the party, consider donating.

So, get out there and swing the bat.

Welcome to the very first Saturday Random Twenty!

Here's the deal, each week I'll post two top ten music lists. The first will be the last ten songs I've listened to. This list will usually, but not always skew very current. The second will be the ten random songs from my library (as determined by iTunes' Party Shuffle). I'll also post MP3's of the top song on each list. The idea here is to use what I consume as a stand in for who I am. It's all very High Fidelity of me, I think.

Let's be clear. This is all a shameless rip-off of my buddy Terrance's Friday Random Tunes. He claims he didn't actually create the idea, but Republic of T is where I first saw it. I liked it so much I bought the company decided to do it myself!

This week's lists:

Ten Most Recently Played

1. How We Know - The Thermals - Fuckin A (2.9 MB AAC)
   
2. Bam Thwok - The Pixies
   
3. Vertigo - U2 - How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb
   
4. Hey Girl - Delays - Faded Seaside Glamour
   
5. * - M83 - Before the Dawn Heals Us
   
6. Disconnected - Idlewild - Warnings / Promises
   
7. Blow It Out - Features - iTunes New Music Sampler (Universal Motown Edition)
   
8. BAD CARTRIDGE (E-Pro) [Remix] - Beck- Hell Yes EP
   
9. Bees - Caribou (formerly Manitoba) - The Milk Of Human Kindness
   
10. Bigtime- The Soundtrack of Our Lives - iTunes New Music Sampler (Universal Motown Edition)

1. Slow Bicycle - Múm - Yesterday Was Dramatic Today Is OK (8.2 MB AAC)
   
2. Paperback Writer - The Beatles - 1
   
3. I Looked All Over Town - The Magnetic Fields - i
   
4. Goodnight, Hollywood Blvd. - Ryan Adams - Gold
   
5. Drop a Line - Anna Coogan - Lonesome Cowboy Lullaby EP
   
6. The Death Of Ferdinand De Saussure - The Magnetic Fields - 69 Love Songs, Vol. 3
   
7. Be Here Now - Oasis - Be Here Now
   
8. At the Bottom of Everything - Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake It's Morning
   
9. Sexy Sadie - The Beatles - The Beatles [White Album] (Disc 2)
   
10. Strange Attraction - The Cure - Galore: The Singles 1987-1997
    

Use the comments to post a random ten of your very own!

Voting on the second round of revisions to The Principles Project ends Friday night at midnight. Don't forget to make your voice heard by voting today.

The Detroit Tiger Weblog and TigerBlog both are skittish about the news that the Tigers have signed Magglio Ordoñez. I am a bit more optimistic.

First, let's be clear, Ordoñez is a premier slugger. Before his injury-plagued 2004 season, the World Champion Boston Red Sox tried to get him to replace Manny Ramirez. Mags' career 162-game averages are an impressive .889 OPS, 30 HR, and 114 RBI. And that includes last year's lost season. He instantly adds the feared slugger the Tiger's needed and marks a vast improvement on the lineup that ranked in the top half in runs scored, despite playing half their games in Comerica. Now, Guillen-Mags-Pudge-Dimitri make up a heck of a middle of the lineup and there's not one real hole in the lineup.

There are two related pieces of bad news here. The first is that Ordoñez is coming off a year where he only played in 50 games due to a significant knee injury. But Tigers GM Dave Dombrowski negotiated a smart contract that can be voided if that specific knee injury comes back.

This gets at the other downside to this signing - the sheer size of the contract, $75 million over 5 years. If Ordoñez can maintain his production, the contract is clearly worth it. If his skills slip due to natural aging, it's probably an overpay, but not outrageous, I don't think. What really kills contracts like this is when the player gets hurt and their production plummets. Again, Dombrowski has protected the Tigers here. Major injury voids the contract. I don't mind paying a guy $2 million too much as a reward for past service. What drives me crazy is paying $17 million for a guy who's retired.

Anyway, welcome to the Tigers Magglio. If I were you, I'd start preparing now for your World Series MVP acceptance speech.

Ted Kennedy is on Meet the Press right now (check it! liveblogging!). I'm impressed by how smart and articulate he is. It's particularly impressive because I know from personal experience that he is an aged man with a very heavy heart.

But he's still out there fighting the good fight and doing it better than damn near anyone else in our party. The talking points aren't any different from what anyone else is using - "Iraq diverted attention from Al Qaeda." or "There is no social security crisis." - but his language is more forceful and his facts compelling that anything else I've seen.

I know it's impossible for him to run for President again, but this is what we need from our national leader. It's a big reason I'm happy Howard Dean will be the next chair of the DNC.

Update: Kennedy just took the Patriots by two touchdowns. Not only is he smart and articulate. But he's foolishly bold, too! I love it.

I mean, combine not one, but two robot voices (including a girl robot), funky beats that evoke the classic Odelay but still sounds brands spankin' new, lines like "Now I'm cleaning the floor. My beat is correct", and a late-80's Nintendo music video and you've got yourself the funkiest song in a long, long time. A classic.

Do yourself a favor and spend five bucks to download the iTunes exclusive EP:

Beck - GHETTOCHIP MALFUNCTION (Hell Yes)

I wrote the following email pitch for a friend of mine running for School Board in Woodbridge, NJ, his hometown. I wholeheartedly endorse his campaign and encourage all of you to throw a few dollars his way. The PayPal interface is really easy.

Friends,

Most of you know by now that our friend Jim Griffin is running for school board in his hometown of Woodbridge, NJ. He is committed to restoring his community’s schools to their rightful place of leadership in New Jersey. He knows that getting there will require reconnecting the local schools with the community they serve. He’s ready to do the hard work necessary to ensure a better future for the place he calls home. But he needs your help.

Jim faces a difficult, uphill battle. He's running against three longtime incumbents, each of whom will probably be better financed than our man. That’s why today, we’re launching an online fundraising effort aimed at closing that gap. Help Jim earn an A+ for Woodbridge’s kids by meeting our goal of $3,000 by Valentine’s Day. You can donate online at:

http://www.jimforwoodbridge.com/contribute.php

These incumbents are secretive, power-hungry bureaucrats who are merely resting on their laurels and aren't interested in proactively serving the Woodbridge community. Jim has outlined an innovative, forward-looking platform grounded in open communication and community input. And you can be certain that no candidate will outwork Jim and no campaign will have greater energy than ours.

But we can’t succeed without your help. If everyone who receives this message gives $100, we will blow past our goal and give our campaign a solid foundation built on the friends and family Jim values most. Your contributions are needed to pay for the advertisements that tell Woodbridge voters about the campaign. They're needed for the stamps and envelopes that will soon blanket the town. They will even pay for the thank you cards you'll receive after you donate. Please make a contribution today at:

http://www.jimforwoodbridge.com/contribute.php

This campaign is going to be a lot of hard work and a ton of fun. In the near future, we'll need your help in other ways to help win voters. But for now, we need your help to build the base that will get us there.

Thank you,

Todd

PS - If you have a friend you think would be interested in this campaign, please forward them this email. Be sure to tell them they can make a contribution to the campaign at:

http://www.jimforwoodbridge.com/contribute.php