Blog Master G

Today it snowed many inches. The snow was soft and fluffy. It was fun to roll around in. Happy made yellow snow. Jen and Gabe made a snowman. His name is Mel. Meet Mel:

Mel will melt some day. Probably Wednesday. Until then, he will shovel snow for Jen and Gabe.

Happy snow day!

You know you live in the Northeast when you pull into a gas station and the car next to you is not quite a car…

Growing up in Sacramento, Robert Matsui was always my Congressman. I wasn’t always as politically aware or active, but my family always has been. Congressman Matsui passed away January 1, 2005. My Dad wrote the following on January 4, 2005, which Sacramento Bee Columnist Daniel Weintraub has also posted to his blog:

My name is Peter A_nderson. I was candidate Bob Matsui’s first press secretary when he ran for U.S. Congress in 1978 in an unlikely, ultimately victorious campaign that was the first of many successful efforts to come. Although I have been out of the Sacramento loop of journalism and politics for many years, I respectfully offer my condolences to your community that was well-served and effectively represented by this man, a textbook-perfect United States Congressman.
If I may be anecdotal and light-hearted, I want to offer three humorous and poignant glimpses into this wonderful individual. His political legacy and overall efficiency as a public leader has been well documented in your pages by able political commentators and editorial writers, but my take is a more personal one.
When I was hired to be a part of his campaign staff while he was still on the City Council, it was clearly an uphill battle against two better-known and formidable foes, Phil Isenberg and Gene Gualco. Nobody, not even Mr. Matsui, gave us a fighting chance. But what I learned from this gracious man was the power that comes from quiet persistence and richly self-effacing humor.
One time, we were touring the Auburn Dam, then under construction but then (and always) light years from completion. Bob and I were both decked out in pinstripe suits (with vests), which was the chosen dress of the day (one of my first assignments when I joined the campaign was to go to Irwin Clothing, where Bob had an account, and get fitted for three pinstripe suits). He was always elegantly garbed, even when lounging in his living room on Sunday mornings when I would arrive to give him briefing papers for the week ahead. Anyway, inside the bowels of Auburn Dam and surrounded by a pack of media types and reporters eager to hear Bob’s take on the controversial construction, Bob kept pushing me forward into the limelight of cameras. We were both donning those incredibly ugly yellow hard hats absolutely mandatory for such visits. After the third push, I turned to him in mock anger and said, scoldingly, “Hey Bob, you are the candidate, remember? It’s your face that we want to see in the papers and on TV, not mine.”
He gave me this very sly smile, and said in a whisper: “Maybe so, but I can see how idiotic you look in pinstripes and hard hat, and I want no part of it.”
Another time, poignantly, the two of us were attending a student political rally in the outside common area of Sacramento City College. It came to be Bob’s turn to speak at the podium, and during his speech, a student asked him his views on citizenship. Abandoning his prepared notes, Bob cleared his throat and embarked on what remains for me one of the most moving, intensely personal monologues I have ever heard a politician utter. In a few flash moments, he recounted his days as a young man shamefully held against his will in a World War II California prison camp. He talked lovingly of his family’s struggles and heartbreaks, and proclaimed in a voice quaking with emotion how proud he was, despite all that, to be an American. Suddenly, tears got the best of him, and, apologizing profusely, he broke away from the podium. After a slight pause of intense silence, the student body broke into uproarious applause. In that first race for Congress, I still believe that was Bob Matsui’s most shining and defining moment.
“I feel like a fool,” he said to me. I said: “Bob, look around you. These are jaded, cynical students treating you like a rock star. You have just become a serious candidate.”
My third vignette has to do with the hardboiled edge of bigtime politics, and how this gentle spirit named Matsui managed to defuse even this bit of rough-hewn reality.
Bob’s campaign manager in that first race was notorious San Francisco political consultant Clint Reilly. Reilly had hired me because we had gone to high school and college together, because I had secured for him his first official campaign, and because we both shared a passion for getting good people, particularly Democrats, elected to office. Reilly knew the odds against Matsui beating Isenberg and Gualco were enormous, and he was determined to turn this lovely man into a snarling street fighter. Frequently during the early stages of the campaign, Reilly would complain that Matsui was “too nice,” and that he was fair game ready to be mauled by more savvy political players in town. The campaign manager had come to a conclusion that the only way Matsui could win in Sacramento would be to appeal to the guilt of the voters. Reilly had already crafted a mailing campaign around the “citizen-statesman” profile of Matsui — an activist in pinstripes, so to speak — but he was hell-bent on upping the ante.
One Saturday afternoon, Reilly and Matsui and I met for a sit-down inside the Hofbrau, then a downtown Sacramento eatery. Reilly was acting annoyed and on edge. He took out a crumpled sheet of polling numbers scrawled on yellow legal paper, and thrust it under Bob’s nose. “We’re not gonna win,” barked Reilly, “and the only way we have even a narrow chance is for you to sign off on this brochure.”
Reilly then presented the candidate with a draft of a lavishly photographed brochure showing Japanese prisoners of war standing behind barbed-wire fencing. Laced between the pictures were words praising Matsui for his perseverance against the cruelest of odds. I glanced across the table and studied Matsui’s face. The life had been sucked out of it, and he looked ashen. He also didn’t say anything, so I did, a foolish act which cost me my job.
“Clint,” I said slowly and with my Irish temper rising, “maybe you don’t realize this, but this tactic would represent one of the most manipulative and disgraceful strategies imaginable. The Japanese people would be horrified to see these images used in a political campaign.”
Up to that point in my life, I had never been kicked under the table. Reilly gave me a swift kick and glared at me with a look that would freeze Horsetail Falls. “Let’s go outside and talk about this,” he snarled, excusing himself from Matsui.
Bob gave me a knowing wink, and said, “Kick him back, Peter. You’re wearing cowboy boots.”
The remark thawed the moment, and even Reilly had to chuckle, sort of. We had a face-to-face on the sidewalk, and he said if I ever made such an intrusive comment again, I would be out of the campaign. I made it easy for him, and quit. A few days later, I was writing a daily humor column for The Sacramento Union.
I don’t know how the brochure issue was ever resolved — my memory is that Matsui agreed to use it in a modified, tasteful version — but I do know that Matsui always remained the quietly graceful, dignified, classy and high-minded gentleman through this and through two ensuing decades of hard fought battles in Congress. We remained friends, and frequently traded notes and comments on child-raising — we were both young parents and shared many laughs together about our irrepressible offspring. After his first term in office, I wrote an effusive column about the man, floating the notion that one day he would make a superb Secretary of State. I know my enthusiasm embarrassed him, but I am now grief-stricken by the fact that his loss means that this once far-fetched notion is gone with the death of my friend, Bob Matsui.

December 2004 was a record-setting month for my site in terms of overall traffic: 21,051 unique visitors, 32,515 visits, 80,634 pages, 257,286 hits, and 4.15 GB of bandwidth. For the year, 2004 brought to my site 197,531 unique visitors. Not too shabby for a little personal site.

Of course, there are countless ways to look at stats, and as many services that measure “traffic,” so when comparing one site’s traffic to another, you should always use the same method of measurement. Site Meter tells me I have an average of 519 visits per day; Nedstat says I’ve tallied up 287,221 visits since September 18, 2002; Google AdSense tells me yet another stat.

Point being: It’s fun monitoring this stuff and pretty cool to see what a large audience I have (though I realize that much of my traffic is just happenstance and not representative of regular readers). One of these days, I’ll do a reader survey like Dan did once upon a time.

Last night I did what I honestly never expected to do: I bought a video game that I would never buy for my own future children or want them to play until they were old enough to understand that it’s just a game. But I just couldn’t help myself. I don’t really agree with the concept of the game and it still continues to shock me how terribly violent it is. But it’s just so much fun. And it cracks me up. I know it’s only a game.

I bought Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas ($39.99 at Best Buy).

A couple years ago I wrote this after playing the game’s predecessor, Vice City, for the first time. Pretty much everything I wrote then is still true — I feel OK playing this horribly violent and wrong game because I “understand the difference between make-believe and reality.” But it’s far from a game for the kids. It really does send the wrong message.

Of course, I think that Grand Theft Auto is far less insidious than “games” like Medal of Honor and JFK Reloaded that turn real, historic, and nightmarish events into entertainment. GTA is purely fiction.

I also didn’t expect to find myself so into video games once again. Growing up, I was all about gaming — Commodore 64, Nintendo, Sega Genesis, and Super Nintendo. But I stopped there and haven’t bought a new game system since. Even the PSII I now have I didn’t buy (it was bestowed upon me by Justin). Jen is really into Katamari Damacy and has already beaten the game but continues to play it. It seems that we’ll be fighting over who gets to play the game of choice. And I can say with the utmost confidence that I would never dream of busting out a gat to solve that — or any — dispute like the characters in GTA would.

Oh how sweet it is to be a United States Congress person. Earn a six-figure salary. Fly in a private jet. Go to the office only part of the year. Have those lobbying for your attention cover your and your family’s expenses (business and personal). Investigate yourself when you exhibit questionable ethics. Have a $1 million job lined up for you when you retire. The list goes on.

LA Times | Ethics: In the Eye of the Beholden?

One change would let special interests begin to pay some of a representative’s official operating expenses — in effect, making the member beholden for the daily activities of his or her congressional office. Another would increase the number of family members allowed to go on junkets paid for by private interests, a move seen as weakening the rules designed to keep members of Congress independent of outside groups.

The House proposals to loosen ethics restrictions parallel a lack of reform efforts on ethics issues in the Congress as a whole.

…

In a similar case, Rep. W.J. “Billy” Tauzin, (R-La.), who helped oversee the pharmaceutical industry, will become president of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America on Monday, when he retires from Congress.

The chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will earn more than $1 million a year in his new job.

More…

(Thanks, Jen, for the LA Times story.)

The Onion | Archaeological Dig Uncovers Ancient Race Of Skeleton People:

AL JIZAH, EGYPT—A team of British and Egyptian archaeologists made a stunning discovery Monday, unearthing several intact specimens of “skeleton people”—skinless, organless humans who populated the Nile delta region an estimated 6,000 years ago.

“This is an incredible find,” said Dr. Christian Hutchins, Oxford University archaeologist and head of the dig team. “Imagine: At one time, this entire area was filled with spooky, bony, walking skeletons.”

“The implications are staggering,” Hutchins continued. “We now know that the skeletons we see in horror films and on Halloween are not mere products of the imagination, but actually lived on Earth.”

More…

(Thanks, Shrey, for the link.)

Friday night was, of course, New Year’s Eve. We brought in the New Year with Jen’s cousin Courtney, in town from Colorado to visit this part of the family, Justin, Alex, and Cati. We started the evening with cava, creamsicle shots (Justin’s invention of vodka, triple sec, and Bailey’s), cheese, and crackers. Sometime around 10pm on the unusually warm winter night, we walked into the party town that is Saratoga Springs. As expected, the streets were packed bar to bar with the young and the young at heart. We hit one of our usual favorites, the Tin and Lint, where Don McClean penned American Pie. It was overflowing with fellow revelers; we managed to snag a table. We put back our share of pitchers of Foster’s and those red drinks. We spent most of the evening taking photos and laughing in the New Year. We walked home around 3:30am and were conked out by 4.

Saturday we chilled around the house on National Hangover Day, then hit the theaters to see The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and its all-star cast of Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Cate Blanchet, and others. Similar in quirkiness to Wes A_nderson’s other films such as The Royal Tenenbaums and Rushmore, this one was written by fellow Vassar alum Noah Baumbach. I thought the film was great. It had a very mellow pace, was entirely off-beat, and fun to watch. It’s probably not for everyone, especially the guy snoring in the next aisle, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

The plan Sunday was to take a day trip to the city, but freezing rain discouraged us from the trek. So we almost went ice skating, but open skating wasn’t until later in the afternoon, so instead we had a delicious Indian lunch at Haweli. Last night we played Scrabble (didn’t quite finish the game, but I’m finally beating Jen for the first time in ages) and watched Dawn of the Dead, which was pretty funny but (spoiler coming) made me mad because what’s up with everyone dying? What’s the point of that? Movies like that make me mad. I hear Shaun of the Dead is better anyway, but it wasn’t on iControl.

Happy 2005 to you and yours! May your new year be filled with health and prosperity.

When I wrote the other day about the early death count of those killed by the tsunami — 40,000 — I was having a hard time coming to grips with that number. The latest death toll, however, is mind-boggling and utterly staggering: 125,000 and rising.

The majority of the deaths are in Indonesia, where nearly 80,000 people have been killed.

A world away, it’s hard to imagine what it must be like. The pictures in the papers and on the TV certainly don’t do it justice. And since the damage is so widespread, who can even begin to imagine what 125,000 bodies must look like? What I do know is that this part of the world needs our help.

I was disgusted and abhorred earlier this week when I heard on CNN the emailed comments from some ignorant American who said that our country should do nothing to help — that we should focus on problems at home rather than help those in need. Any bets on whether this fool supported the war in Iraq and the “need” to invade? What of our problems at home then and now? We’ve spent $147 billion and counting there, while the U.S. funds to date for tsunami relief is a mere $35 million, 0.02% of the Iraq war cost.

The least we, the wealthiest nation on the planet, can do to help our world neighbors is to send a little dough their way. Then cross our fingers that we don’t soon face the same devestation here.