Erik Moe Art & Design

Senator Obama’s first act as top Democrat was to bring the clean fund raising policies of his campaign to the Democratic National Committee. Funds from Political Action Committees and registered lobbyists will no longer be accepted at the DNC. As a first move, it makes me very hopeful for things to come. Since moving from Minnesota’s squeaky-clean political atmosphere to the smoggy air of Philadelphia machine politics in 2001, I’ve realized that cleaning up democracy needs to be job one if real progress is to be made on most any other issue. Taking the high ground on campaign funding is a great place to start. It also signals that anyone who wants a job with Obama (particularly Vice President) will need to dedicate themselves to openness and financial disclosure as well.

I am truly moved by last night’s clinching of the Democratic nomination by Senator Obama. It is a good day to be an American after so many not-so-good ones. Might I suggest now is a good time to donate to the nominee’s campaign.

…And Historic Documentation in St. Paul

Some reports claim 50,000 turned up last night for the 18,000 seats in the Xcel Center. From TV coverage, it looked as though nearly everyone brought a camera. It is no surprise then that flickr is accumulating huge pools of images dated yesterday and tagged “obama minnesota,” “obama stpaul,” or “obama xcel.”

Someday will we re-assemble in virtual reality massively documented events such as this? Imagine if we had 10,000 small cameras at Lincoln’s inaugural.

Luigi Montanez at TechPresident and Matthew Yglesias both helpfully point out a nanosite that is attempting to simply and elegantly debunk the scurrilous (and often typo-filled) email chains that ask “Is Barack Obama Muslim?” The answer is of course “No,” and sites like this will hopefully make sure the truth is easy to Google.

I’ve noticed a similar and equally bizarre allegation being made in some of these emails. I’m hoping to put the matter to rest with my own nanosite: Is Barack Obama muslin? Link to it and help the typographically challenged. Thanks!

While reading Sunday’s New York Times Magazine feature on Gary Slutkin and the application of epidemiology to urban violence, I kept thinking of the implications for the media. As a longtime city-dweller, one of my biggest gripes with the media is the way urban violence is covered, in particular by local TV news. If the media were to treat an outbreak like Philadelphia’s upsurge in murders more like a disease or virus outbreak, what would it look like?

Coverage of traditional viral outbreaks certainly has its share of irrational fear-mongering for ratings – think about recent years’ SARS and avian flu coverage. At the same time, I feel like the media also spent quite a lot of time explaining ways to reduce exposure and prevent outbreaks from spreading. This despite the remote chances of exposure to most people.

Typical TV coverage of a violent crime shows a map of the incident (message: be afraid of that part of town) and maybe a sketch, mugshot, or security camera footage (message: be afraid of people who look like that). This limited coverage only amplifies the effects of the crime since virtually no one in the broadcast audience is at real risk of being the next victim. A very small minority of crime victims are strangers who are at the wrong place at the wrong time. Most crimes instead are responses to personal gripes. I’m not sure what kind of information might be more effective in avoiding fear and helping the public assist in containing an outbreak of violence. The Chicago program discussed in the Times article primarily uses specialists to intervene with persons directly associated with criminal incidents, but surely the media has a role in helping communities fight outbreaks of violence.

Somehow my consumer choices have made it possible for marketers to confidently address me as “Yankees Fan.” I’m not sure where it all went wrong. Was it the arugula?

P.S. Win Twins!

In the future will our children hear stories about how we had to eat generic Lucky Charms and stay at mid-priced hotels during the recession of ‘08?

The erosion of our civil liberties under this administration has been well documented and alarming, but did any of us ever foresee a day when we would lose our right to dance to our iPod at the Jefferson Memorial. What would old Thomas have to say?

At last night’s Oscars, Alex Gibney’s Taxi to the Dark Side won the Best Documentary prize. I finally had a chance to catch the film late last week at the National Archives* and think that (for once) the best – and most important – of the nominated films definitely won. Taxi is a well-researched and troubling look at the expanding use of torture in the U.S. military since 9/11. Gibney builds a strong argument that very specific methods of torture have come into use through a carefully orchestrated fog of conflicting demands, intentionally leaked documents, and purposefully vague orders from the Department of Defense and the White House. These indirect orders leave low-ranking troops vulnerable to court marshalls while shielding top level officials from war crimes trials. The film takes its title from the case of an innocent taxi driver named Dilawar who was captured along with his passengers at an Afghan army checkpoint and eventually died as a result of repeated beatings while in U.S. custody at Bagram Air Base. Taxi goes on to explore the suspension of habeas corpus rights – unprecedented in U.S. history – that make it impossible for detainees to find out why they are being held and tortured. The film can be tough to stomach for its use of footage of physical abuse and sexual humiliation at Bagram, Abu Ghraib, and Guantanamo, but since these crimes are being done in our name and in violation of our own Constitutional principles, the film is essential viewing.

UPDATE: *Yes, I appreciate the irony of watching a film about the Bush administration’s abuses of the Constitution in the very building that the executive branch displays the Constitution.

TechPresident sent a belated valentine card yesterday to our disbanded cohort of digital Dodd Squad-ers. Joshua Levy critiques Maverick McCain’s emails and thinks the Republican frontrunner should call us up for advice. Somehow I don’t think that would work out well for any of us, but the sentiment is appreciated.

The Sunday before an election is traditionally a time when newspapers make endorsements. In that spirit, here are a few notes in support of two candidates for this coming Tuesday’s primaries and caucuses: Illinois Senator Barack Obama for the Democratic Presidential nomination and Al Franken as Senate nominee for the Democratic-Farmer-Labor party in my home state of Minnesota.

On the cold weekend morning when Sen. Obama announced his candidacy last winter, I had been living in Chicago for about four months. The widespread enthusiasm for Obama in Chicagoland seemed genuine, honest, and – despite constant fawning from media sources I tend to distrust – unmanufactured. As I worked on Chris Dodd’s campaign over the intervening year, I watched cable news dig into and tear apart every minute detail of the “top tier” candidates’ personal and political lives to justify their omnipresent “BREAKING NEWS” graphic. Amid this caustic environment, Obama has continued to turn out huge crowds and energize groups that have historically had little voice in the nominating process. His campaign has raised absurd amounts of money through small online donations, making him much more of a true “people’s candidate” than a candidate of corporations and the wealthy. His early decision to pursue community organizing in crime and poverty-ravaged neighborhoods of Chicago rather than the easy money of corporate law shows the kind of commitment to common good that should be at the core of a progressive Presidency.

Al Franken’s netroots-savvy campaign has similarly energized Minnesota progressives. Over the past several years he has done serious legwork across the state to prove that he is not a novelty candidate merely coasting on his celebrity. In his years as a comedian (sorry, “satirist”), author and radio commentator he has been a leading voice in the effort to reject the very framing of American politics: we do not live in a blue and red nation, but in a have and have-not nation – with the disparity growing rapidly. As a Minnesotan, I will be honored to have Franken take on Norm Coleman in November and add his name to the proud list of prominent progressive Minnesotans that includes Humphrey, Mondale, and Wellstone.