The Bull in Full

Just because my head hurts at work...

Some time in the next week, Barack Obama is going to announce his running mate.  My main observation is that very rarely in my lifetime has the actual veep pick been anyone who was on the "short list."  Aside from John Edwards in 2004 and Joe Lieberman in 2000, the picks have hardly ever been who people were buzzing about.  Dan Quayle had been mentioned, but wasn't seen as a leading candidate in 1988.  Al Gore sort of came out of nowhere in 1992.  Jack Kemp was seen as out to pasture in 1996.  Dick Cheney was the one supposedly finding someone to pick in 2000, when he decided to pick himself.

With that, let's just assume that Bayh, Kaine, Sebelius, Biden, and the rest are right out, simply because the chattering classes think they're likely picks. Your best VP pick comes out of nowhere, makes people go, "whoa!" and scramble about for information, and ultimately reinforces the logic of your campaign. Here's my list of dark horses for the nomination:

• Bob Graham -- Whom I thought it would be for a while, although I'm cooler on him these days.  Shores up Florida votes, impeccable national security credentials, and has that "old hand, gravitas" thing to reassure people about Obama.
• John Kitzhaber -- Former governor of Oregon.  Governors just make better Presidential candidates in general.  Kitzhaber is charismatic, popular with rural westerners, but is largely unknown to the country at large, which in my book is a big plus when it comes to a VP pick.  He's spent his time since being governor working on grassroots organizing to reform health care.
• Bill Bradley -- Campaigned for the nomination in 2000 on a "new kind of politics."  Sound familiar?  When I mentioned this to my parents, one of them pointed out that one of the prime benefits would be watching him and Obama go one-on-one in basketball.  Sure, Obama's 20 years younger, but that's the only thing that would keep it close.  Back in the day, Bradley knew a thing or two about roundball.
• Tom Daschle -- The dark horse pick of a couple of notable liberal bloggers.  Big Obama supporter, and he'd know how to work the Senate.  I'm still simmering at the complete capitulation of him and Gephardt between 2000 and 2002, but in the VP role he wouldn't need spine.  (Might be better not to have it.)
• Brian Schweitzer -- Enormously popular Democratic governor of Montana.  People say, "but he's got no name recognition!" but I happen to think that's a bit of a good thing.  Only thing is, he's cruising to re-election this year, but he might help the top of the ticket enough to make that expendable. 

Not that anyone asked, but hey, it's a blog entry.  It's what they're for.

One penny, two penny, one dollar, two dollar

Hey!  Here's a fun way you can improve the efficiency of US government services as well as other firms and services that require small cash transactions, and make the maintenance of your own pocket cash more manageable!

(How's that for a Bulwer-Lytton-esque blog opening to put everyone to sleep?)

Seriously, though, it seems a lot of people don't realize that one can walk into most banks at the moment and ask for a full roll of dollar coins, or frankly however many you want.  The U.S. Mint is currently starting a series of dollar coins similar to the state quarters, but with the Presidents coming out sequentially.  (we're on Madison at the moment, it seems.)

It may seem kind of funny for a blogger to be telling you to go use a certain kind of currency, but that's exactly what I'm doing here.  There are a number of reasons for doing this:

Digital entertainment and Northgate Cinema

Back in town, and catching up on some blog reading, it's hard to read this from Kevin:

On the plus side, McCall apparently has an interest in bringing digital entertainment like concert and sporting events to the theater, along with revitalized concessions.

and not think of this:

The most immediate of these   changes–the replacement of film in movie theaters–is due to get a   lot of media attention in the near future, and you can count on much of that   to be of the gee-whiz, isn’t-technology-amazing variety so beloved of entertainment   writers, scoop-hungry editors and, presumably, gadget-loving Americans. I doubt   that many negative notes or calls for resistance will be heard, or that the   overthrow of film by television–which is what this amounts to–will   be related to a dissolution of cinema esthetics and the enforced close of cinema’s   era in the history of technological arts.

The latter is movie critic and erstwhile Triangle resident "Gilbert" Godfrey Cheshire's (his articles are much funnier if you imagine them with Gilbert Godfrey's voice) article, The Death of Film/The Decay of Cinema.