October 2008 by The Yeti

Volume 5 ~ Issue 1 ~ October 2008 www.theyetionline.com

FSU’s Stephen MacNamara on Democracy in America Global Warming Myth Buster Your ISP Knows More than You Think Featuring the Artwork of FSU Grad Joseph Faura

The Yeti Says: VOTE! November 4th, 2008 We Don’t Care for Whom (HONEST!) Published with support from Campus Progress/Center for American Progress (online at CampusProgress.org)

Letter

Locations

While Florida may be said to have only two seasons – summer and December – the advent of fall nonetheless is a significant time of year. Summer heat has dissipated into cooler breezes, vacations have long since ended, and, in the city of Tallahassee, school has begun. The fall season means new books, new professors, new apartments... yes, unusual as it may seem, fall is the perfect time of year for new beginnings and your favorite grassroots publication is not immune to the theme. In keeping with our commitment to providing Tallahassee with true grit news articles and the latest lit by budding local authors, The Yeti is merging with The Buzz. Now, in addition to supporting progressive politics and expanding the reach of Tallahassee’s local color, you need only flip The Yeti to find information about your favorite local bands, a calendar of music events in and around Tallahassee, interviews with best and brightest Tallahassee talent, and recommendations for further listening. We are pleased to announce this merger with our sister magazine and happy to unite in our small-publication pledge to the hippest readership this side of the Mississippi. We hope you enjoy this issue as much as we enjoyed putting it together and encourage you to keep in the spirit of the season and submit your latest work to The Yeti. Ginny Kotzias, President

All Saints Café

Ginny Kotzias, President Ryan Jenkins, Treasurer

Contributors

Canopy Road

Brandon Cahela Rachel Dewitt Joseph Faura Ryan Huling Eliza Krigman Daniel Moussatche Nathan Thompson Erika Williams

Krank It Up Momo’s Pizza Paperback Rack Quarter Moon

Advisor: Paul Rutkovsky

Strozier Library

Front Cover: A piece from “Appeasing the Feminine” by Joseph Faura. For more of his work, see page 5. Special thanks to Flickr users Larsenphotography and jmtimages.

V89 Radio Station Velvet Vintage Vinyl Fever Word Traffic About the Yeti Founded in April 2005 by a small group of students from FSU, The Yeti was created as a truly independent alternative to the corporately owned FSView. Fueled by a hatred for the official FSU newspaper’s constant dribble, our publication is for interested and active people by an everincreasing collective of the same. The Yeti allows you to become the media at Florida State.

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2 | The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008

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Contents

4 14

Nation Your ISP Knows More Than You Think Nathan Thompson

he Unappetizing Politics of School T Lunches Eliza Krigman

On the Tyrant George

Daniel Moussatche

Artwork Appeasing the Feminine Joseph Faura

Energy 6 Hidden Costs of Biofuels Erika Williams

8 What Lies Beneath Rachel Dewitt

Feature

On Democracy Associate Professor of Communication Stephen MacNamara discusses voter responsibility, dialogue, sound bite culture, and America’s democracy in general.

Culture 18 Part of this Complete Breakfast Brandon Cahela

9 17

headlines

Progressivism Global Warming Myth Buster National Wildlife Federation

hy Animal Rights is a Progressive W Issue Ryan Huling

ALSO Enjoy our Political Crossword on 18 And two installments of the webcomic xkcd on 15 and 16

Study: CO2 Emissions Outpacing Worst Projections In environmental news, a new study says the rise in carbon dioxide emissions has outpaced even the most dire scientific projections. The Global Carbon Project says CO2 emissions rose nearly three percent last year. That’s at the high end of the projections from the world’s leading scientific panel on global warming, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Researchers say the rise could mean a global temperature increase of eleven degrees by the end of the century. Climate scientists have warned of massive environmental catastrophe if increases in carbon dioxide emissions top three percent. Gore Calls for Civil Disobedience Against Carbon-Emitting Coal Plants Meanwhile, former Vice President Al Gore has encouraged young people to engage in civil disobedience against coal plants unable to store carbon. In an address to the Clinton Global Initiative in New York, Gore said, “I believe we have reached the stage where it is time for civil disobedience to prevent the construction of new coal plants that do not have carbon capture and sequestration.” Psychologists Chide Pentagon on Interrogation Policy The nation’s top psychiatric organization is accusing the Pentagon of violating a pledge not to use psychiatrists in the interrogation of foreign prisoners. In a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, American Psychiatric Association president Dr. Nada Stotland writes, “The use of psychiatrists to aid in interrogations is a serious violation of medical ethics and should be discontinued.” Opposition to involvement in interrogations is on the rise within the ranks of the nation’s mental health specialists. Last week, members of the American Psychological Association approved a landmark vote barring members from taking part in the interrogations. For more headlines, visit www.democracynow.org.

The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008 | 3

nation

Your ISP Knows More Than You Think by

Nathan Thompson

f you’re the typical college student you spend 5% of your time studying, 65% of the time trashed out of your mind and the remaining 30% of your time illegally downloading music. And don’t kid yourself. You are the typical college student. Now I know you’re thinking to yourself, well even if all that’s true, you can’t prove it. Wrong. Grades don’t lie, Facebook pictures don’t hide and your Internet service provider knows more than you think. In fact, ISPs routinely get stacks of complaints from the likes of AT&T, Sony, and other major copyright owning corporations, demanding that ISPs take action against your dirty little Internet habits. And unfortunately for you, your ISPs know all your dark little secrets. They know you’ve downloaded every Britney Spears CD to date. They know you spent every hour between 2A.M. and 5 A.M. last week watching grandma porn (Yes, you need help). Dare I say ISPs actually know almost as much as Facebook? And you thought Facebook was the only way to stalk people… I’m sure you also think because the RIAA hasn’t come knocking on your door all 10,000 of those dance-pop hits you’ve accumulated over the years have gone unnoticed. They haven’t. It’s sort of like the Truman Show for the ISP, and you’re a more disturbing, less entertaining version of Jim Carrey. It’s tough to swallow, I know. Okay, so you’re shaken, but not completely convinced. After all, your online behavior logs are anonymous, right? Well, that depends on your definition of anonymous. If by anonymous you mean nobody is supposed to know who you are, then yes. But if by anonymous you mean nobody knows, then no. Tammy Snyder, Network Operations Center Supervisor at GRU, says she gets letters all the time demanding certain ports get shut down for illegal activity. “People have this sense they are anonymous. They’re not.” So what? You downloaded the the season finale of the Sopranos. What’s the worst that can happen? Well that’s going to depend on your particular ISP. Snyder says the the first step in the process is your ISP is contacted by the rights holder to the copyrighted material in question, which in the case of the Sopranos would be HBO. These letters list everything from filenames and file sizes to the network and protocol used. This of course is included with your very incriminating IP address, port and time of download. Snyder says the letters aren’t for the faint of heart. “Those letters are pretty scary.” Not only are the letters scary, but they can carry some serious consequences. Either your ISP kindly sends you a letter to lay off the illegal activities (and grandma porn), the ISP shuts off your Internet or worst case scenario, they simply hand your information over to the RIAA, MPAA etc. The letters could even get you evicted if you 4 | The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008

live in an apartment. Many apartment complexes include a clause in your lease that basically says you can be kicked out if you download illegal content over the Internet. Imagine explaining that one to your parents. “Sorry Mom and Dad, I downloaded “Grandmas Gone Wild” and got kicked out of my apartment. Think you could help me move?” GRU Marketing Specialist Dan Clark says most ports are traceable all the way to a person’s bedroom, but he’s seen cases where entire apartment complexes had to shut down their Internet as a result of illegal activity on a shared port. Clark sympathizes with most students. “We understand they’re our customers, and we want them to stay our customers.” But that doesn’t mean they are going to be able to save you everytime you get in caught. Moral of the story? Don’t download illegal music, don’t piss off your ISP and lose the grandma porn addiction. Your home, Internet and dignity depend on it.

artWORK

Appeasing the Feminine by

JOSEPH FAURA

Each issue, The Yeti features artwork from talented local artists. This issue, we are featuring the work of Joseph Faura, an FSU graduate. Send your artwork submissions for consideration to YetiSubmissions@hotmail.com. “The Feminine is a strong current that cannot be satisfied. Like a goddess, you can offer her sacrifices and prayers and chants, but her thirst will never be quenched. You can dress in a short skirt and high-heel boots, then parade yourself out on the boulevard; she will just laugh at your unskilled attempt to define her. “The Feminine lives inside all of us and takes many different forms. Learn to embrace her, and not project her outward into the image world that will never understand her.”

Joseph currently lives in Baltimore where he is working towards his MFA degree. You can see more on his website at Mavienrose.com.

The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008 | 5

energy

Hidden Costs of Biofuels: The Global Food Crisis by

Erika Williams, stanford university

he U.S. must not allow corn to be turned into ethanol anymore, much less subsidize it. It is immoral, as well as environmentally foolish, to deforest and diesel-distribute a product that would otherwise help the poorest of the world survive. Food riots have already broken out in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Egypt, Haiti, Mexico, Morocco, Niger, Pakistan, Senegal, Tanzania, and Yemen, and the World Bank estimates that a total of thirtythree developing countries are in danger of unrest because of rising food prices that are our fault. A World Bank study states: “corn prices rose by over 60 percent from 2005-07, largely because of the U.S. ethanol program.” At home, rising food prices are unfairly hurting the Americans who can least afford it and are contributing to the current recession. There is no environmental or humanitarian justification for our ethanol program. In 2007, Congress passed a bipartisan energy bill increasing support for ethanol, and mandated the production of 36 billion gallons of biofuel by 2022. The top 10% of recipients have received 75% of $177 billion of farm subsidies over the last 12 years. Poor people in developing countries spend 50%-85% of their income on food. Food prices have risen 83% over the last three years, and 40% since last year alone. “This steeply rising price of food — it has developed into a real global crisis,” U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said. Ban has urged leaders of the world to work together to improve economic distribution and encourage the production of crops for food, not fuel. Agriculture production has been increasing; U.S. agricultural exports are expected to rise to 23% this year, a record $101 billion industry. Of course, it is not only the Western desire for ethanol; part of the food shortage is caused by the global rising middle class: “Everyone 6 | The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008

wants to eat like an American on this globe,” said Daniel W. Basse of the AgResource Company, a Chicago consultancy. “But if they do, we’re going to need another two or three globes to grow it all.” The rising demand for meat is a particular problem for food supplies, because meat production involves an enormous amount of grain. The rising food prices have hurt the poorest the most deeply. The U.N. World Food Program sponsors free breakfasts for a small number of the poorest schools in the world. In Cambodia, 1,343 schools serve 450,000 children breakfast each morning, but the program will run out of money to cover the rising costs in just a few weeks. These children can only afford to go to school because they are fed; they are in the poorest villages in the most destitute provinces. The program was terminated for a month last year, and 10% of students had to drop out to help their families find sources of food, collecting crabs or bamboo shoots. While the children bike or walk to school through rows and rows of rice paddies, the price of rice has made it unaffordable for many who grow it. Cambodia’s government, along with several other rice producers, is threatening to stop exports in order to keep the food at home and feed its people. Worldwide, the World Food Program is trying to raise $500 million to cover the rise in food prices. Mr. Ban said covering the gap in funding is the U.N.’s top priority: “Without full funding of these emergency requirements, we risk again the specter of widespread hunger, malnutrition and social unrest on an unprecedented scale,” he told reporters. Ethanol production also makes the price of cooking oil skyrocket. In America,

the cost of cooking oil is trivial; in the developing world, cooking oil consumes a large percentage of a family’s earnings, especially of subsistence farmers who grow the rest of their food. Cooking oil is an

Since corn prices have almost tripled in the last three years, everything that uses corn has increased in price as well, from grain-fed beef to corn-syrup laden sodas to bread and disposable diapers. important source of calories, and necessary to cook meat, when families have a chance for protein. The U.S. produced 19% fewer soybeans, and therefore soybean oil, last year; at the same time, it also imported double its normal share of palm oil, because of the increasing move away from transfat oils. Biofuel production accounted for half the worldwide demand for oils, worsening developing countries’ suffering. Ethanol production is also causing hardship at home, with rising food prices making an economic downturn into a heady spiral towards recession. The number of ethanol plants in the U.S. has tripled since 1999, and even more are being built today, threatening to consume 25% of U.S. corn. Since corn prices have almost tripled in the last three years, everything that uses corn has increased in price as well, from grainfed beef to corn-syrup laden sodas to bread and disposable diapers. Chicken producers have closed factories and laid off workers. Tyson Food Inc., the world’s largest meat producer, expects to

spend $1 billion more this year than last because of rising grain costs, a price that will be passed on to consumers. Even Iowa, the home of the corn and ethanol industry, has shown a rising unemployment rate this last year: “People who are working families, just barely making it and already paying higher prices for gas and home heating oil, are going to be shot in the pocket by higher food prices,” said Carol Tucker-Foreman of the Consumer Federation of America. Food and fuel prices are rising faster than wages, decreasing the standard of living for many across the country. An increasing percentage of household income is spent solely on food and fuel, and buying fewer commodities increases the spin towards a recession. Tucker-Forman and Scott Faber of the Grocery Manufacturers Association both say rising food prices could be stemmed if Congress would pull back subsidies for the ethanol industry. The justification for ethanol production is environmental; however, it is less productive than gasoline, and its production has led to environmental degradation. In the U.S., large subsidies for ethanol have

encouraged farmers to remove their lands from less profitable conservation programs and has led to increased runoff into the already-large dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico; in the developing world, Western demand for biofuels has led to the destruction of rainforests, which destroys habitats, releases greenhouse gases, displaces indigenous peoples and subsistence farmers, and ruins carbon sinks. While the U.N. has not endorsed biofuels, the E.U. has proposed legislation to mandate their use. Chief science advisor to the British government, John Beddington, said: “The idea that you cut down rainforest to actually grow biofuels seems profoundly stupid.” However, there is one source of biofuel that has so far proven environmentally sound: waste vegetable oil (WVO). San Francisco has recently launched a city-wide program to collect restaurants’ used cooking oil for free and convert it into bio-diesel, which has a life-cycle emissions reduction of 78% compared to petro-diesel. WVO comes from vegetable oil that has

already been used, so it does not create a market that competes with food production. Besides helping climate change, picking up restaurants’ grease for free will save San Francisco an estimated $3.5 million, since grease illegally dumped down the drain clogs sewers like fat clogs arteries. Across the country, local governments waste an estimated $25 billion a year on fats, oils, and grease (FOG) cleanup. Restaurants create an enormous amount of WVO, with the estimate for San Francisco at 500,000 gallons, and the Bay Area with a total of 3 million. While San Francisco has to send the oil to Oakland, it hopes to have its own biofuel production plant soon, allowing all city vehicles, from buses to fire trucks, to run on WVO. Many MUNI buses already do. “This fuel is locally produced, better for the environment, better for engines -- this is what people in the city need to realize, this is what we need to educate the public about right now,” says Devon O’Keene, a biodiesel producer from Chico, CA. From Cambodia to San Francisco, ethanol production has made lives worse. In San Francisco, flour, no longer as profitable as subsidized corn for ethanol, is 48.9 cents, up 37%. Our signature sourdough baguettes are seeing the effect: Steve Sullivan, Acme Bread Co., says it costs him $140,000 more per month than last summer to make the same amount of bread, so he has raised prices by 8%. In Cambodia, children who could go to school because they were fed must work instead. Ethanol hurts people and the environment; please urge your representatives to stop this national folly. Encourage them to support WVO production as a truly environmental alternative to fossil fuels.

The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008 | 7

energy

What Lies Beneath by

Rachael DeWitt, campus progress

uring the long era of the Bush administration, environmental legislation has been repeatedly steamrolled and the Alaska Wildlife Refuge has been pegged as an entrepreneurial oil drilling opportunity. But during that same period, Colorado has established one of the largest refuges in the federal refuge system. In 2003, The Nature Conservancy, a nonprofit organiztion, purchased approximately 92,500 acres of private land in the San Luis Valley and established the Baca National Wildlife Refuge. The $33 million project was designed to “restore, enhance, and maintain wetland, upland, riparian, and other habitats for wildlife, plants, and fish species that are native to the San Luis Valley.” The refuge, managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), contains the largest and most diverse assemblage of wetlands in all of Colorado.

The refuge is next door to the town of Crestone and Colorado College’s Baca campus. But the Baca Refuge’s ability to provide protection for wildlife is being threatened by an antiquated nineteenth century mining law that is still on the books. The legislation separates land into “surface” and “subsurface” parcels, and oftentimes those who own the surface land do not own the rights to the minerals underneath. In the case of the Baca Refuge, the surface is federal land, while the minerals are owned by oil companies. When the refuge was formed, there was an attempt to buy out the mineral rights largely held by Lexam Energy Exploration, 25 percent of which is owned by oil giant Conoco. But the Nature Conservancy didn’t buy out Lexam, and, at the time, believed the energy company might leave the refuge alone. Today the area is under serious threat of exploratory drilling,

8 | The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008

toxic chemicals to fracture the which calls into question the earth. meaning of the land’s Wildlife Lexam received a state Refuge status. issued permit from the The National Wildlife Colorado Oil and Gas Refuge system does not Conservation Commission usually acquire land where the mineral rights are severed, that would allow drilling in according to Michael Blenden, the refuge. Although the company already has a manager of the Baca Refuge permit, it is not allowed to drill for the USFWS. “This was until the USFWS approves a large conservation effort the plan. In January, the having the primary goal of USFWS released an initial protecting ground water in environmental assessment. the San Luis Valley from Jay Slack, regional director of out of basin exportation,” the USFWS, is responsible Blenden said. “Protracting the for deciding whether a full acquisition negotiations over Environmental Impacts Report the mineral rights question (EIS) will be required before was likely to result in the drilling may be approved. whole deal falling through”— Numerous environmental and that would have represented a greater threat to and community organizations, both local and regional, have the Valley, Blenden argued. voiced their objection to the The split ownership of drilling and are pushing for the land is now creating a the EIS that would determine serious conflict of interest. the extent of the destruction Canadian-owned Lexam has 14,000-foot wells could cause. plans for two exploratory The organizations claim that wells, extending 14,000 feet such drilling would create into the ground. The goal of serious hydro-geological the project is to find out what damage and potentially is underneath the San Luis irrevocable disruption to the Valley, in the hopes that there plants and wildlife in the is a large amount of untapped refuge. oil waiting to be extracted. The USFWS, as a part This is a new kind of operation for Lexam, a wildcat of the department of interior, is caught between oil company. Lexam’s own environmental welfare and the consulting geologists report federal government’s push for that the company has never speedy domestic oil extraction. taken on a project like this, “This is a constitutional where the drilling would be issue that transcends extremely deep. Deeper administrations and is exactly drilling poses higher risks, as why there are a significant it requires breaking through number of national wildlife multiple layers of aquifer and

refuges and national parks that have oil and gas activity. This has been occurring for decades,” Blenden said. The proposed drilling will require stadium lights and noisy diesel engines that will seriously disturb wildlife and the appeal of Colorado College’s Baca campus. This has caused Colorado College professors and students to get involved in the debate. The college’s law firm submitted formal comments to the Fish and Wildlife Service during the initial scoping period last September, discouraging drilling and encouraging a full EIS. Oil is already drilled all over Colorado, but Baca is different. A wildlife refuge shouldn’t double as an oil drilling site. If Lexam continues speculating, then the land is effectively unprotected and its “refuge” status is meaningless. It is impossible to separate land from the rock beneath it. Rachel DeWitt is a senior at Colorado College. An earlier version of this article appeared in the Cipher, part of the Campus Publications Network. Full sourcing for this article can be found at http://campusprogress. org/fieldreport/2996/whatlies-beneath. This article was originally published by CampusProgress.org and is reprinted here with permission.

The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008 | 9

g n i m r a Global W r e t s u B Myth

progressivism

The National Wildlife Federation

Myth: The current warming cycle

Myth: The warming we have seen

is natural; the earth has been warming and cooling for millions of years. – No. What are experiencing today is not natural. It’s true the earth does go through long cycles of warm and cold periods due to small variations in the planets tilt and rotation. But science tells us the climate change we are seeing does not fit the planetary cycle. We are beyond anything the planetary cycle would account for.

is due mostly to the sun. - For the last thirty years, while the earth’s temperature has been rising fastest, the sun has shown no trend of increased solar radiation. There simply isn’t any reliable study showing the suns’ intensity has increased, causing the climate to warm.

Myth: We cannot even accurately

predict the weather a week from now, how can we believe we can predict what will happen 50 years from today? – Predictions of the terms “weather” and “climate” mean very different things. Prediction of the weather is a short term outlook at a day, hour, or perhaps week. Analysis of the climate, however, includes weather patterns over months, seasons, decades, or even centuries. Another way to think of it is climate is what determines what crops we plant for a given region and when we plant and harvest them. While predicting weather is often challenging, because weather indeed changes, climate predictions are based on historical averages to predict what is likely to occur into the future.

Myth: A temperature rise of 1

degree is inconsequential, and the predicted rise of 2-3 degrees is barely anything. – Actually one degree C (1.7 F) of average increase is already causing visable change on the earth and a degree or two more will increase the negative impacts. Its also important to understand the temperature is rising more in the polar regions.

Myth: Humans are only

responsible for a small amount of the carbon dioxide that goes into the atmosphere each year, so the warming must be natural. – The problem is human activity is releasing carbon that has been trapped in the ground for millions of years and is upsetting the balance of the Carbon Cycle. Unlike when the pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, today people annually release 7 gigatons of CO2, largely a result of the burning of fossil fuels, which has increased the CO2 in the atmosphere by 37 % in two hundred years.

Myth: Scientists only have 145 years of temperature data, this is not enough long enough to draw accurate conclusions. -– More information on past conditions exists than modern human measurements. There is 145 years of direct temperature measurements taken through tools such as thermometers and satellites. Scientists are also able to measure past temperatures with a high degree of accuracy from ice core and ocean floor

10 | The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008

samples. The current warming cycle is natural; the earth has been warming and cooling for millions of years. –No. What are experiencing today is not natural. It’s true the earth does go through long cycles of warm and cold periods due to small variations in the planets tilt and rotation. But science tells us the climate change we are seeing does not fit the planetary cycle. We are beyond anything the planetary cycle would account for.

Myth: A temperature rise of 1

Myth: Humans

are only responsible for a small amount of the carbon dioxide that goes into the atmosphere each year, so the warming must be natural. – The problem is human activity is releasing carbon that has been trapped in the ground

for millions of years and is upsetting the balance of the Carbon Cycle. Unlike when the pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, today people annually release 7 gigatons of C

Myth: Ice is building up in

central Antarctica, so global warming is not happening. – Ice is building up in central Antarctica, but being lost on the edge and being lost very dramatically in Greenland. The loss of ice from Greenland has doubled in the past 10 years, and Antarctic glaciers have been

retreating over the past half century. There are some reports of “Antarctic cooling,” but cooling in one region does not change the fact that global temperatures on the whole are rising.

Myth: In the 1970’s scientists

were predicting a coming ice age. Now they turn around and say the globe is warming. – Unfortunately, this myth is a product of the popular press in the 1970’s misinterpreting scientific findings. There was no widespread belief among scientists at the time that we were entering a period of cooling.

Myth: During the 1940’s and 1950’s

the earth’s temperature went down, even while CO2 rose. Therefore, CO2 is not connected to global warming. – Science now understands that air pollution (dust, smoke, chemicals) was masking the impact of increased greenhouse gases. Also the amount of increased CO2 was much less as recently as 3 or 4 decades ago.

Myth: The US is actually a net sink (or absorber) of CO2. – The US emits one-third of all CO2 today. A small amount is absorbed by soil annually, but it does not offset the release from burning fossil fuels. Myth: The “hockey stick” graph,

which is the basis for the claim of global warming, is proven to be flawed. – Scientists have used thousands of independent pieces of evidence gathered over decades to determine that global warming is primarily a result of human activities. So it is wholly false to argue that one graph is the basis for global warming. The “hockey stick” controversy is a complicated issue revolving around statistics and modeling techniques.

feature

On Democracy

Stephen MacNamara is an Associate Professor in the College of Communication at FSU. The Yeti sat down with him to discuss voter responsibility, dialogue, sound bite culture, and America’s democracy in general.

Winston Churchill said the best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter. Something that bothers me particularly is that there are a lot of people for which there’s just no way you could change their mind. Is this a real problem? A: It’s not only a problem, it’s becoming more and more of a problem. People are becoming polarized against each other. I’m a lifelong Republican. You’re probably a lifelong Democrat. We ought to be able to have a conversation on something we disagree on. Not only have a conversation, but if I honestly believe in my heart of hearts that life begins at conception, why should I be written off by someone who doesn’t? Can’t reasonable people disagree? It’s getting so in our society that they can’t. We’ve made every issue into right-wrong, up-down, black-white, and they’re not that simple. For example, the death penalty. Are you for the death penalty?

because it’s so inconsistent. You have the same people rallying against abortion that are the ones rallying in favor of war and in the favor of the death penalty. A: Exactly, and I have seen people chaining themselves to puppy dogs who would, as soon as the protest is over, go have an abortion. I think we have gotten to the point where we think everything is cut and dry. And that’s no way to conduct business when you’re in government. And a lot of it is not getting better. You’re the Sesame Street generation. It has to be very simple, it has to be entertaining. People don’t want to be bothered with getting into the details about how this crisis, for example, is really

Q: I am against the death penalty. A: Where do you think I stand on the death penalty? Q: I would imagine you are for the death penalty. A: I’m against it, because I am prolife: I don’t believe life should be taken. I think that that is the intellectually honest position to be taken by someone who believes life begins at conception. Q: There’s a critique that we on the left side of the fence hear a lot that the culture of life that the people in power are often clamoring for is hypocritical just 12 | The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008

You want your vote to make a difference and you find that, because a lot of uninformed people are participating, it really doesn’t. all about how we’ve extended too much credit in this country, and they want to keep extending credit because they’re in the business of extending credit. And now the credit they extended is no good, but what they’re saying is, “Americans are addicted to credit, but we need more heroin, we really do.” No one wants to get their arms wrapped around it. We don’t mine far enough into what’s going on in our country to attempt to understand it. We don’t allow dialogue to be conducted in a civil fashion, and we are less and less allowing for disagreement.

And that’s not what our founding fathers had in mind when they talked about the marketplace of ideas. They didn’t talk about the marketplace where the ideas were all stated in five words or less. They wanted a dialogue. Q: Americans don’t seem to have much respect for nuance. If you say something like, “There haven’t been any attacks since 9/11, George Bush’s strategy must be working,” a lot of people will agree. That might be true, but it’s really not that simple. What’s your opinion on the reliance on sound bites in today’s media culture? A: They did a study during the 2000 Presidential election – how long do you think the average sound bites of the presidential candidates were? Eight seconds. Say the Pledge of Allegiance real fast in eight seconds. You can’t. It’s ridiculous. So, if we’re going to get fed in sound bites, we’re going to learn to be comfortable with them, to live with them, deal them out ourselves as if we have some insight. Q: I heard some pundit making fun of the people who wanted to have a beer with Bush in 2004. He said, ‘We’ve lost half a million jobs this year alone, many of them people who voted for Bush, because they wanted to have a beer with him.’ Why does it matter to voters if a candidate is personable more than it matters if they’re, say, intelligent or experienced? A: If the voter has no responsibility, if the privilege of voting comes with no obligation whatsoever, then you’re going to be able to make decisions based on whether you want to have a beer with somebody, or want to go moose hunting

with someone else. We’ve so trivialized it, it’s gotten to that point where it’s a popularity contest. When we first elected the president of the United States, the people involved in the process were generally very well informed, and I believe that they had the good of the country at heart. We don’t have that any more. We don’t have the tolerance or the time to get in to meaningful discussions – not debates, but discussions – about issues. Q: In class you called bullshit on “wanting everyone to vote.” Instead, if you’re one campaign, there are people you want to keep away from the polls, because you know they’d vote against your guy. What do you think about this kind of “walking quietly” or tiptoe-ing around voters? Do you think it has negative implications for our democracy? A: If I gave the impression that you want to keep people from voting against your own guy, that’s not it. I want to keep voters from making uninformed decisions. Uninformed decisions about anything are bad. An uninformed decision about which way to turn on the expressway, or how fast to go, can be a very bad decision, and I think it’s the same with politics. Make uninformed life decisions – unless you’re very lucky – and you end up in a bad life. Uninformed political decisions and you end up with bad leaders. My only hope is that we would do a better job of educating the voters. No one is. It’s frustrating for McCain and Obama, because they know we’re deeper people than this. But even the reporters don’t have time. Ever watch FOX or CNN? It’s so annoying, they invite people on to interrupt them. I don’t know why people go on those shows. “You know, honey, I haven’t been interrupted enough today, I think I’ll go on O’Reilly.” Q: A lot of adults will become nostalgic when they see the energy and enthusiasm of young, politically active people. Why do you think so many people are cynical by the time they reach adulthood? A: You get burned. My father came back from World War II. But for the atomic bomb being dropped, he was part of the invasion of Japan. They said,

‘We’re going to send in 20 waves, and 15 of the waves are going to die, and that’s your job. Your job is to die until we get enough people on the island.’ They grew up and they saw friends and family die around them, they got pretty serious early on. When they came back, they, for the

A: Obviously, you’re positive about it because you do recreational drugs, I don’t. I have the occasional glass of wine, you’re obviously on narcotics since you think we’ve got a future. No – what makes me positive about the system, if anything right now, is the history of it working. I

We have in recent memory some rotten presidents, and we’ve made it, we’ve survived. And we haven’t just survived, we’ve become better in many ways: we’re more knowledgeable in many ways, safer in many ways. first time, got an education, and were demanding they got their money’s worth, because they had fought hard. They’re a very informed generation. I think the disenchantment came from when they went through the Depression and the War. They really gave up a lot for the right to vote and the privilege to vote, and they take it seriously. Then they see a whole generation who doesn’t take it seriously. Q: What I was really trying to get at is when my mom will kind of pat me on the head, and say, “Oh that’s so cute, when I was your age, I thought I was going to save the world, too.” It’s like a lot of adults have given up on that. A: The more you know, the more you know other people don’t know. As you get older, you’re thinking, “Oh my god, these people who don’t know so much have the same power that I do in the voting booth.” Imagine, I get the dumbest person I’ve met that says she’ll follow me into the voting booth just to cancel out my vote for Barack Obama. This person has no right to be there, they’re not informed, they’re an idiot. You see enough of that in your life – not that blatant – people that make you think, “I can’t believe they get to vote.” You want your vote to make a difference and you find that, because a lot of people are uninformed and are participating, it really doesn’t. Q: But in spite of all of this, I still have faith that our democracy is fundamentally strong – and that’s not supposed to be a jab at McCain’s infamous economy verdict.

think a lot of this history has to do with people being informed. It’s unique for someone your age to have a genuine interest in this. These are not the things that kids your age ought to be worrying about. You ought to be worrying about drinking beer, having fun, going to college, going to football games. I just have to be hopeful that as people mature, they become not only more involved but more informed. We have in recent memory - I don’t care if you’re a Democrat or a Republican – some rotten presidents, and we’ve made it, we’ve survived. And we haven’t just survived, we’ve become better in many ways: we’re more knowledgeable in many ways, safer in many ways. We’ve led the Western world in all areas: in commerce, in banking, in education, in technology, in finances. Even now look what’s happened to the European markets: when we hurt, they get squeezed. I think we’re in okay shape, as regards the rest of the world. We’ll see how the financial system shakes out, but I think that we’ll see that we’ve built a strong enough set of institutions to survive. The country is plodding along very well. It is an experiment, still, it’s a 200 year old experiment, but I don’t think we can discount the fact that it’s worked. I don’t care what you think of George Bush or what you thought of Bill Clinton. The system allows for a lot of input from a lot of people, informed and uninformed, and it seems to me that, on balance, it shakes itself out. The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008 | 13

nation

The Unappetizing Politics of School Lunches by

Eliza Krigman, campus progress

organ Spurlock drew attention to school lunch programs in his 2004 hit, Super Size Me, highlighting some of the questionable content of lunches served to students and the controversy surrounding the powerful grocery lobby today. In School Lunch Politics: The Surprising History of America’s Favorite Welfare Program, author Susan Levine provides a comprehensive examination of school lunches’ complex history from the birth of home economics and food as a nutritional science to the arrival of vending machines in cafeterias. The National School Lunch Program (NSLP) started out as a welfare program but instead became a boon to the agriculture and commercial food industries. Perhaps modeled after Marion Nestle’s seminal Food Politics, Levine’s book neither endorses nor attacks the program, but instead concerns herself with providing an accurate account of all the factors that created and sustained the school lunch program. She leaves out recommendations for how to improve the system, but today’s school lunch program suffers from many of the same problems Levine describes through the history of its creation: insufficient funds, poor nutrition content and a limited ability to provide lunches to those most in need. From its inception, The National School Lunch Program dealt with the competing interests of nutrition and child welfare advocates, U.S. agricultural priorities, and, later in its history, the commercial food industry. Levine’s book details how the school lunch program struggled to meet its stated goals, oftentimes reinforcing inequality and discrimination. The idea for school lunches grew from a nutritional reform movement. Until the beginning of the twentieth century, the science of food was largely aimed at livestock and agricultural productivity.

Democratic senators who designed But during the Progressive Era between the program, and the Department of 1880 and 1930, food nutrition for humans Agriculture that administered it, were developed as part of the optimistic effort staunch advocates of states’ rights and to bring efficiency, expertise, and rational expressly forbid federal management organization to industry, agriculture, and of the lunchroom. This left states and the domestic sphere. With a new value communities to determine how (and if at and understanding of human nutrition, the all) to create a school lunch program. economic depression of the 1930s gave The NSLP’s funding and administrative way to the idea, and public support, for a structure resulted in systematic national school lunch program. reinforcement of inequality and racism. Throughout the book, Levine shows Insufficient federal funds put poorer states how more often than not, concern for at a disadvantage to participate and these improved nutrition and children’s welfare states were primarily home to minorities. lost out to agricultural priorities and business. The first legislated incarnation of “The Department of Agriculture did nothing to ensure the participation of black schools the program—the 1946 National School in racially segregated Southern districts, nor Lunch Act—made lunchrooms an outlet did it establish any policies or guidelines to for surplus agricultural commodities. enforce the School Lunch Act’s mandate Consequently, the goal of providing a that poor children north or south, receive balanced meal was largely dependent on free meals,” Levine wrote. In 1963, the what kind of agricultural products were in surplus on a given year. Lunchrooms could NSLP in Alabama, Georgia, Virginia, and Mississippi only reached 26 percent of nonnot plan on the type of food the federal white children as compared to 62 percent government would send them and the of white children. In Maryland, only one out ability to provide a nutritious lunch was of eight students in the black high schools seriously strained. received school lunches versus one in two Although the NSLP intended to provide or one in three in white schools. lunch for all American children, the federal Had Congress fully funded the NSLP, government didn’t fully fund it. States were thereby providing lunches for all public [?] required to match federal funding, which school children, the deepening of inequality ultimately meant that costs ended up and racism could have been avoided. increasing children’s enrollment fees. “In Although the federal assistance program 1947…federal contributions accounted for needed national standards on eligibility 32 cents out of each school lunch dollar, criteria, none were established for the first while state and municipal contributions two and a half decades of the program’s made up about 12 cents,” Levine writes. existence. In 1971, the U.S. Department Throughout the 1950s and ‘60s, children’s of Agriculture (USDA) finally issued fees accounted for over 50 percent of guidelines which enumerated minimum funding for school lunches. The funding structure was a huge barrier to participation. income standards for free lunch eligibility. Unfortunately, flawed administration In 1960, for example, only about half of of subsidized lunches, such as creating the nation’s public and private schools separate lines for paying students and noncontracted with the department of paying students, created a negative social Agriculture for lunch programs. stigma for those receiving the benefit and Lack of funds and enforcement resulted discouraged participation. USDA Secretary in incomplete participation. The Southern

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Orville Freeman knew that poor children were almost entirely excluded from the schoolroom lunches but did not want to relinquish control of the program. In the 1960s, the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) pushed to take over the NSLP. HEW wanted to restructure the program to prioritize children’s’ needs over the demands of farmers. While the department successfully created some free lunch programs for poor children in urban areas and predominantly black rural counties, the USDA feared that a focus on welfare could lead to increased federal scrutiny over Jim Crow restrictions on benefits for blacks and refused to let HEW absorb the program. The USDA’s inability to achieve the lunch program’s goals opened the door to privatization. To accommodate the products of brand-name foods, federal nutrition standards were bent so far out of shape that ketchup was declared a vegetable (although this is no longer the case). Still, the nutrition of schoolroom lunches has not improved with private companies nor have

they improved the financial woes of the NSLP. Today, a meal consisting of chicken nuggets, tater tots, and canned fruit cocktail in heavy syrup meets all USDA nutrition requirements. With limited funds from the federal government, schools have no choice but to use commercial brands or pre-cooked commodities from the USDA. What’s more, the negative social stigma attached to receiving free or subsidized school lunches remains a prominent challenge. Just this past March, the New York Times reported that high school students in San Francisco opt to go hungry instead of be seen in the free or subsidized lunch line (yes, the two line system is still pervasive throughout the country.) Only 37 percent of eligible high school students in San Francisco take advantage of the subsidized meal program. With six decades of limited success and the inability to resolve recurring problems, the National School Lunch Program needs an overhaul. The federal government should prioritize finding ways to subsidize

lunches without marginalizing the poor over agriculture subsidies. Ultimately, School Lunch Politics shows how sound social policy can be compromised by politics. The home economists, nutritionists, and child welfare advocates that popularized the idea envisioned healthy lunches for all children. But once in the hands of Congress and the USDA, feeding the needy and ensuring proper nutrition took a second seat to benefitting U.S. agricultural commodities. The next time the School Lunch Program is up for re-authorization, Congress should look to restore the progressive values that inspired its creation. Eliza Krigman is a Staff and Research Assistant for the Brookings Institution’s economic studies program. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2005. Full sourcing for this article can be found at http://campusprogress.org/ books/3000/the-unappetizing-politics-ofschool-lunches. This article was originally published by CampusProgress.org and is reprinted here with permission.

XKCD

The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008 | 15

Nation

On the Tyrant George by

Daniel Moussatche

s the convention season approaches I am reminded of then Governor Bush’s acceptance of the Republican Party nomination for president. The one line that still resonates with me – I found it a great turn of phrase – is when he compares himself to President Washington; I paraphrase “his friends called him George W”. Eight years have passed and I have learned more about American history and President Bush, and I believe that President Bush is very much like an 18th century George. . . . but not Washington. The other George at that time was his majesty the king of England. In between the beautiful language of the declaration of independence there is a list of grievances of the American people that justified independence. Many of said complaints are as applicable to this George as to they were to George the III.

President Bush has: “. . .refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.’ -- Bush vetoed Embryonic stem cell research, children’s health insurance, Department of Health and Human Services Appropriations Act of 2008 and Water Resources Development Act of 2007. “. . .has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, - EPA vs. Massachusetts, attempting to prevent states’ regulation of CO2 emissions. “He has obstructed the Administration of Justice” – attorney general Gonzales and Muckasey have politicized the Justice department. “He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people.” – Department of Homeland Security “He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.” – Military tribunals and extraordinary rendition “For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent.” – Not direct taxes but taxes that will need to be raised to pay for the huge increase in the federal debt. “For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury.” – Military tribunals, resending habeas corpus “For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences.” – Guantanamo bay, extraordinary rendition. “For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments.” – The massive power grab of the executive and disempowering of the legislature and judiciary branches, therein destroying the balance of power created by the founders of the republic. 16 | The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008

“He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.” – Blackwater and other mercenaries being deployed at home and abroad. “In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.” For the first time since the foundation of this republic we have tyrant on par with George the III. Thankfully, he will be forced to leave office in January 2009 but we must set an example of him and his administration: not for retaliation but to protect the republic. We must make sure that all those that will follow him in the office of the president must never be tempted to repeat his abuses. The constitution was made to protect the people from the English tyrant George, now we must make sure that there are no future American tyrant Georges. Prosecution of the Bush administration is not an option but a necessity, not for the consolidation of Democratic power but to safe guard the republic.

XKCD

PROGRESSIVISM

Why Animal Rights is a Progressive Issue by

RYAN HULING

rogressive politics have allowed our society to overcome some of the most egregious abuses inflicted upon people of different races, genders, and ethnicities. They encourage us to open our minds and reevaluate how much compassion we extend to others. Unfortunately, we as a society have not yet challenged the way we view animals. Every year in the U.S., billions of cows, pigs, chickens, and other animals are raised and killed in some of the most violent and abusive industries on Earth. The fact of the matter is that animals value their lives just as much as we value ours, and the time has come for our society to reassess the

each other.” It’s all connected, and the clear companies to abuse workers and further contributing to the degradation of our solution to all three major issues is to leave society’s human rights record as a whole. meat off our plates—for good. Of course, this trend doesn’t just With campuses nationwide embracing extend to human rights violations. The a “green” lifestyle, it’s no wonder that final—and most prominent—argument for dining halls are packing their menus with vegetarianism is to protect the rights and vegetarian and vegan options. A recent welfare of animals. The routine abuse that groundbreaking study by the United animals face when raised and killed for food Nations concluded that raising animals for is a clear example of corporate greed gone food generates more greenhouse gases amok. Animals are systematically denied than all the cars, trucks, boats, and planes everything that is natural and important to in the world combined. As if that weren’t them and are instead forced to live a life full bad enough, recent studies indicate that humans can save more water by not eating of cement and steel, suffering burns, cuts, and beatings until they are slowly bled to 1 pound of beef than by not showering death for our meals. Chickens on factory for an entire year, since a meat-based diet farms have their sensitive beaks cut off requires more than 4,000 gallons with hot blades, and many pigs have their of water per day. This criminal throats slit while they are still conscious. squandering of our country’s How can we call ourselves a progressive resources continues to further society if we allow this kind of cruelty to fuel the threat of climate change, continue? We can do better, and indeed while simultaneously robbing we must. other nations of the muchThe fact of the matter is that in today’s needed relief that we could be society, we have a clear choice between offering. supporting companies that torture animals Even from a more individual and not supporting them. Every time we perspective, though, the meat go to the grocery store or dining hall, we industry is rife with abuse and can vote with our money by choosing one neglect. The U.S. Department of of the many new products available on Labor has concluded that nearly the market, such as vegetarian barbecue one in three slaughterhouse “riblets” or vegan pizza. These tasty and workers suffers from an illness or injury cruelty-free options have all the flavors we every year, many of whom will be fired love, without supporting companies that if they take time off or try to file a health destroy our ecosystem, abuse workers, insurance claim. It’s no surprise then that and torture animals. For more information, an eye-opening 175-page exposé by Human Rights Watch, titled “Blood, Sweat, visit peta2.com to request a free and Fear: Workers’ Rights in the U.S. Meat “Vegetarian Starter Kit” as well as stickers and a DVD. and Poultry Plants,” details that “[t]hese are not occasional lapses by employers Ryan Huling is the college campaign paying insufficient attention to modern coordinator for peta2, the world’s largest human resources management policies. youth animal rights organization. These are systematic human rights violations embedded in meat and poultry industry employment.” If we are giving our money to the meat industry, we are paying

Presidential hopeful Senator Barack Obama said outside a Las Vegas town hall meeting that “how we treat our animals reflects how we treat each other.” way we treat animals. We must move our country forward, dismantling the industries that profit from this injustice, like so many before them. It’s often said that there are as many reasons to go vegetarian as there are vegetarians. However, the three major issues that I would like to address here are the environmental, human rights, and ethical arguments. These three categories are not mutually exclusive, of course. It was none other than presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama who said outside a Las Vegas town hall meeting that “how we treat our animals reflects how we treat

The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008 | 17

culture

Part of this Complete Breakfast by

Brandon Cahela

he term cereal comes from the roman god Ceres, who was the goddess of the land. She was responsible for great famine as well as great abundance. I’m sure she never thought she’d be embodied as a compulsive white rabbit or a vampire who prefers chocolate to blood. Cereal starts off as wheat grown in the great farms of America there it is also packaged and boxed. A boring off color brownish grain is sealed into a brightly colored package with rainbows and swirls and activities on the back. The cereal is shipped across the country in the backs of trucks and eventually winds up in pantries, cabinets, and living room coffee tables being used as ottomans while red-blooded Americans watch TV. Perhaps it is this that appeals most to us. We feel when we open a box of cereal; a piece of our own country is being delivered straight to us for our enjoyment. It’s the same reason people bought American cars during the red scare or why people decide to become politicians. My favorite parts of any cereal, and certainly what helps me make my decision when strolling through that aisle, are the words “prize inside.” Since my days the prizes have gotten more

and more advanced, now prompting children to send away a proof of purchase to redeem a “free” DVD or T-shirt. The thing I think Kellogg is missing is the fact that children don’t want to send away for anything. They want instant gratification. When I was a kid I didn’t even like toys that involved me putting things together. The trick was to get the toy before my brother who I know wanted it just as badly as I did. The easiest prizes to find were the ones situated

on the outside of the plastic bags. Other times, I would have to dig with my hands through the actual cereal, struggling to keep the sticky pieces of sweet corn off of my palm. The prizes, though normally very small, provided a good 45 minutes of excitement. After that it was only a matter of time before they were lost, broken, or shoved under a car seat. The feeling of winning a prize however, is enough to make any kid feel as though he were a gladiator goring

8 9

11 12 13 14

18 | The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008

tiger. There is no better satisfaction than knowing something belongs to us fair and square because our hard labor. It is a micro chasm of the American dream, or perhaps Darwinism wherein the fittest or earliest to rise will claim that which allows them to go on living … In this case, a holographic card. But I am not exempt from the corporation that is cereal. In fact I could usually go through a box within a couple weekends, a majority being eaten on Saturday

mornings as I watched cartoons from 8 AM to 11. It wasn’t that difficult to form a routine of waiting for a commercial to re-fill my bowl. Commercial breaks for cartoons usually lasted 5 minutes. If two fifteen minute cartoons were taking up the allotted thirty minute time slot it would result in me trying to shovel in as much as I could before the next commercial break thirty minutes later. If I lost time or fell off track with my cereal eating I forced myself to wait

for the next available time to refill my bowl. Refilling was not a big deal either. I would normally just leave the milk out on the counter if I planned on coming back to it. The cereal box as well would stand on the counter, open flapped and waiting for my return. My Mom would get angry and usually tell me I’m spoiling the milk but the roar of my chewing on crispy corn normally blocked her shouts. Bowl selection was another variable done with

Crossword ACROSS

DOWN

4. H anging ____: 2000 electoral unrest 7. R epublican nominee for president 9. B ush administration’s first suspension of civil liberties 10. 2008 Green party candidate 11. Allegorical symbol of the Republican Party 12. O bama’s alma mater 14. 2 008 election buzzword 15. M ercenary company, no bid-contracts 16. Governor of Alaska 17. Redistribution of constituency boundaries for electoral advantage 18. “No law applies” here 19. “ What a nation does to invest in its future” -Alexander Hamilton

1. “ Not with a machete but a ____.” -Obama 2. Democratic nominee for vice president 3. Court famous for Brown v. Board of Education 5. Prisoner camp 6. Teddy Roosevelt’s foreign policy 8. 2008 Libertarian party candidate 11. N ot a university, but a college 13. “ I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just.” -____

the most intricate of care. My parents had a lot of bowls that were “off limits.” These were the ones bought at expensive bowl stores. My favorite was a very deep bowl with a dinosaur on the side. The reason I liked the bowl so much was because of the amount of cereal I could pile into the seemingly “normal sized” bowl. This statement varied from cereal to cereal though. While it was true that I could fit almost a quarter of a box of fruity pebbles into the bowl, I could only fit a handful of shredded wheat. I don’t even have the brainpower to estimate how much I could fit into the bowl when doing a suicide (several cereals mixed together.) The Kellogg’s company, started in Battle Creek Michigan with John Harvey Kellogg who was a lowly orderly at a sanitarium. He knew a lot of his patients were feeling weak and in order to make them feel better, he gathered a few ingredients together to make fiber biscuits in an attempt to end the fiber deficiency. Nice guy eh? The miracle of the story happened that night when he accidentally left the biscuits out in water. These soggy creations however were the first versions of shredded wheat and the next morning Kellogg knew he had an overnight sensation on his hands. However, the

tragedy of greed would take its toll as in most stories regarding business. John’s own brother William could see how much of an effect these new foods would have on American families who up to that point ate very little fiber. He stole his brother’s idea, and began the franchise that would change the lives of children everywhere. It is an interesting story and I pondered it as I walked through the aisles of Costco looking into the happy eyes of lucky the Leprechaun, and the colorful beak of Toucan Sam. I thought about the shrewd marketing techniques of purposely vibrant characters screaming with color and life, their energy and enthusiasm pouring into the aisle and leaping through the checkout counter past the ice machine. I realized at once how much my, as well as countless other parents around the world raised their kids with these clusters, snaps, puffs and bits. And without a second thought, I reached out for a particular box featuring a polar bear with a spoonful of marshmallows, and I couldn’t help but have a feeling of convenience when realizing that I had years of greed, backstabbing, desensitization, and small puffs of the American dream all wrapped up in a tiny, colorful, box.

The Yeti ~ Vol. 5 #1 ~ October, 2008 | 19

· · · · · ·

4 October: • Raizhome Film Series #2 @ Cafe Annapurna, free (9:30 pm) 6 October: • Virgins and Monikers at The Engine Room (8:00 pm) 7 October: • STATE RADIO @ CDU (9:30 pm) 8 October: • RA RA RIOT @ CDU (9:30 pm) • 6 PACK DEEP, Night Nurses From Jersey @ Engine Room (formerly The Beta Bar) 9 October: • THE RUMBLE STRIPS @ CDU (9:30 pm) • Will Goble Trio featuring Miguel Alvarado @ Paradigm 10 October: • Ancient Harmony @ The Warehouse

• DJ Z-trip @ The Engine Room (7:00 pm) • Lipona, Death In The Park @ The Shed • The Bluebird Suitcase w/ Damn Dirty Apes, Dynasty Music, Bing Bang Boom @ Big Daddy’s 11 October • Ancient Harmony @ The Warehouse 15 October • Gone til November Tour American Science, Junior Revolution, AutoVaughn, Monte Negro, Only Thieves @ Engine Room

· · ·

17 October: • DELTA SPIRIT @ CDU (9:30 pm) • A PLACE TO BURY STRANGERS @ CDU (9:30 pm) • ACME Rhythm and Blues and Harpoon Blues Band @ The Warehouse 18 October: • Bedhead Betty 19 October: • P.A. Benefit Show @ The Engine Room (2:00 pm) 23 October: • Japanther, Killer Dreamer, Words Defy the Plan @ The Charles Mansion (8:30 pm) 24 October:

• Have Heart, Blacklisted, Ceremony, more @ The Engine Room (6:00 pm) • Green Hit @ The Warehouse 25 October: • MAN MAN @ CDU (9:30 pm) 27 October: • Liquid Limbs, City Of Ships, SMATBKOTDA, Random Notes Of Decay @ Engine Room(8:00 pm) 29 October: • BEN KWELLER @ CDU (8:30 pm) ----==HALLOWEEN -------- • Halloween Spectacular With Trail by Stone and Even Money •

Hardcore Halloween @ The Shed!!!

2 November: • THE HOLD STEADY & DRIVE BY TRUCKERS @ THE MOON (8:00 pm)

Every night……. B Sharp’s Jazz Café hosts Jazz w/ Ryan Way Friday nights The Warehouse hosts Monday night Jazz, Wednesday night freestyle, and Thursday night Funk & Blues The Winery @ The Red Bar hosts Rick Lollar Trio Friday nights Down Below (underneath Barnacle Bill’s) hosts Mundazed Hip Hop and MC night Mondays

Independents Sink, Majors Swim Major labels have finally hit the iceberg. CEOs are scrambling for a seat on the lifeboat as they scrounge around for new business models that can keep them afloat. With onslaught of adsupported music websites, social music networks, streaming internet players, and direct artist downloads, the industry is yet again undergoing evolution. This is not the first time corporate dinosaurs have blamed technological advancements for unwanted shifts in music consumerism. In 1978, record sales dropped because of cassette tapes, and in 1983, an upstart cable channel called MTV revolutionized artist appearance. Musicians retaliated claiming “Cassette tapes [were] encouraging pirating and killing music,” and television coverage was depreciating artist authenticity. Regardless, major labels jumped on the bandwagon, and huge corporations, like Sony, put more money towards the trend selling their own cassette devices and making MTV the face of the music industry. Sony Music, along with Warner Music Group, EMI, and Universal, teamed up with CD distributors such as Caroline Distribution and other corporate giants like Ticketmaster and Best Buy to create an empire over new music marketing resources. It would be ideal to see a band use new media resources without being strung along the hierarchal ladder of corporate assholes. Radiohead may be the most talked about poster-children for possibility, but then how long they climbed up it before they took a leap of faith on their own. It’s a double sided debate when the musical universe is at our fingertips and it’s still hard to

find a way to beat the corporations. Consequently each make their moves accordingly; lil Joe Slayer sits at home spending hours perfecting his myspace, as record labels scramble for digital alternatives and major CEOs lay off artists reps for new digital programmers. Indie record labels are concerned with their resources, artists are concerned with their accessibility, and big corporations are concerned with their six figure losses. But major labels refuse to back down that easily as they look towards the big picture, in all sense of the phrase. Artist appearance, endorsements, paparazzi footage, gimmicks and outlandish performances are their staples of success. Artists like Lil Wayne and Fall Out Boy are guaranteed promos in Virgin Megastore as well as on the shelves of Mom and Pop record stores across the country But the importance is not so much on the CDs as it is the promo itself. 14 year old rockers are guaranteed to recognize Patrick Stump’s photo on a cardboard cutout. The more they see his face, the quicker they conclude that he’s the second hottest thing to Paris Hilton. It is obvious that CD sales will no longer indicate their success, so fudging a couple scandals and attending more photo shoots than band practices is basically the idea. With so many bands spanning across the genre spectrum, it’s harder now more than ever for the average Joe Slayer to get his metal songs out in the music world against these tactics of media imaging. From a report by the Forrester Research report, digital sales will grow at an annual rate of 23 percent over the next five years, and downloaded music will bury CD sales

in the year 2012. The music industry is media-driven rather than music-driven, and the more the artist is plastered over the internet, the more likely they are to sell their music. Torrent sites and other ad-supported downloads make it difficult for artists to stand out when a million other bands just like them are at the convenience of online connection. Majors still have the right of entry to many of the new resources that makes them still on top. So then the plight of the music industry rests in its accessibility. The easier it is for major labels to team up with mp3 providers and live concert promoters, the harder it will be to encourage unsigned artists to survive without them. Young musicians watch Live Nation cough up $120 million for a 10 year contract with Madonna, offering a one stop shop for concerts, records, merchandising, etc. and wonder how the hell they are going to make it on their own. Even though the corporations smashed hard and almost took a nosedive, they are patching themselves up nicely allowing for more monopolistic opportunities to take them into new directions. They’ve formulized their plan and despite losing big names like the Eagles, Radiohead, and Nine Inch Nails to their own independent distribution, the business is still grounded in networking and marketing. The only way to thwart the evolution into revolution is by completely cutting them off which is seemingly impossible. The only force that can safeguard us from these monster labels is the consumer, artists, and other investors that control necessary evils of consumerism.

The Buzz presents….

Calendar

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Contributors

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Independents Sink...

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Friends of the Fest

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Typical Food Adventure While Camping

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Recess

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Bear Creek

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Newest Scene Kid on the Block

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Real Big Deal

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This page

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Editor’s Note

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