'TBH Politoons'
Thanks, again, Tim!
Baron Dave Romm
The Delphi Method
By Baron Dave Romm
Last week, I and the rest of the world laughed at John Poindexter when the Pentagon announced it would "abandon plans to create a futures trading market to help predict terrorist attacks and assassinations in the Middle East". Having dissed the convicted-felon-but-off-on-a-technicality, let me try to explain what he was trying to do. This is a guess, but I suspect he was concocting a Delphi Probe, and doing it in the most asinine way.
Conceived during the 1940s by the defense industry, using the Delphi Method is a way to predict technology development. Predicting the future is, at best, inexact. The method is named for the Oracle at Delphi , a shrine dedicated to Apollo (Delphi being the Greek word for dolphin, the form Apollo took when he brought back a Cretan ship so the sailors could build his shrine and be his priests). The term Delphi Probe doesn't get used much in the scientific literature, but that's how everyone I know refers to one. The findings were eventually published in an article in Management Science 9 (1963) called An Experimental Application of the Delphi Method to the User of Experts by NC Dalkey and O Helmer of the RAND Corporation. Numerous revisions, refinements and write-ups followed. Here's one list of articles relating to the Delphi method. Norman Dalkey summarizes the Delphi Methodology. The 1975 book The Delphi Method: Techniques and Applications, by Linstone and Turoff, is available as downloadable .pdf (Might be fun to compare their predictions of 1985 to what actually happened; I leave that as an exercise for the reader).
At its simplest level, a Delphi Probe is a multi-step brainstorming session. You take a bunch of people (preferably people who know a great deal about the subject) and ask them a question about the future. You then combine everybody's responses and send them to all participants, who then rate the various ideas. Experts in the field get to see what other experts thought, and make comments. No guarantee that any of their thoughts will be an accurate guideline for the future, but patterns develope over time and often generalized predictions about trends are very useful. You take your best guess, and act on it. A four-step Delphi Probe is analyzed here.
The refinements of the Delphi method include making your experts geographically separated and anonymous (that is, the people you ask don't know each other), making the question specific enough so everyone's on the same page, and making the exercise interesting enough that people don't lose interest over time. From here, we can see where Poindexter thought that "betting" on terrorism would hold people's attention. Poindexter was such an idiot that he wanted to make all the predictions public. The advantage is that there are more participants, the disadvantage is that some of the participants are likely to be terrorists. Some of the people criticizing the Future Map project were worried about "gaming the system"; if the prediction was that Houston would be attacked (and specifics laid out), they might attack in Dallas just to collect a larger bet. Frankly, I'd be more worried that terrorists would figure out how to attack Houston based on the analysis.
The issue of betting and money aside (naturally, the shallow Republicans can only think in terms of money), having an expert tell the world, "target x is most likely because its vulnerable in area y" is not merely bizarre but actively dangerous. Of course, "not merely bizarre but actively dangerous" describes much of the radical Bush administration. Poindexter must have felt right at home.
You can run a Delphi Probe yourself, though it will be less formal. Pick a question regarding the future. Pick a group of people knowledgeable about the subject matter. Don't have them all in the same room discussing the topic; let them go home and think about it. Make the question general enough for people to have differing opinions but specific enough that the answers are likely to be on target. "Who will win the World Series in 2013?" is too specific. "Why does baseball suck?" is too general. "What changes will baseball make in the next ten years to keep the fans' interest?" is more likely to produce valid answers. Take all the answers and collate them into one document. Show the document to everyone. Let them think about it (you can even do this with everyone present; might make a fun party). Rate the answers. Wait ten years.
I dislike Oscars and Grammies and such because they limit the nominees to five and there is only one winner. This makes no sense, especially in the arts. If you look over the Oscar winners, you'll see that the Academy has been a very poor predictor of which movies will still be highly thought of in the future. I propose a more Delphi Method approach to these kinds of awards, where there are no limits to the number of nominees, just consensus as to which ones are good. And there are no winners, just higher ratings for the consensus as to which are the best. Sure, you can still wear the sequined dresses and sling the gossip.
Baron Dave Romm is a conceptual artist and a noble of Ladonia with a radio show, a very weird CD collection and an ever growing list of political links. He reviews things at random for obscure web sites. You can read all his music recommendations from Bartcop-E here, and you can hear the last two Shockwave broadcasts in Real Audio here (scroll down to Shockwave). Thanks to everyone who has sent me music to play on the air, and I'm collecting extra-weird stuff for a possible CD compilation.
Reader Review
'The Awful Truth'
Last weekend we bought the DVD box set of Michael Moore's "The Awful Truth". Today I watched the episode where ex-convicts endorse Coca Cola, American Express, etc.
Last week we watched the episode where they confronted Humana about not paying for a guy's much-needed pancreas transplant. He would die without it, and Humana refused to pay, so they did a pre-need funeral at Humana ("Inhumana, as some call it) headquarters. The guy was still alive, but had tried out a casket, etc., and Moore decided to bring the funeral to them.
As the hearse drove away they played "Amazing Grace" which I normally am sick of, but they brought in a full orchestra with it as the hearse pulled away. It produced the normal effect a Michael Moore masterpiece does ... I laughed and cried at the same time.
They won the battle. Humana paid. The guy got a pancreas transplant and lived.
I highly recommend this episode to anyone who reacts like I do. I get the same reaction at the end of Roger and Me when he's got the Beachboys singing "Wouldn't It Be Nice" against families being evicted on Christmas Day, and in his last movie (Bowling for Columbine) when Louis Armstrong is singing "What a Wonderful World" against footage of American support of coups and wars around the world. I always laugh and cry at the same time, when they put goodie-goodie music against the harsh reality in video. One day I thought up putting the Zapruder film to "Climb Every Mountain" from "The Sound of Music". I have that video locked away somewhere. I had to do it. When the thought hit me, it sent chills down my spine. I think Kubrick was the first to do that with "We'll Meet Again" playing as Slim Pickins rides the bomb down in "Dr. Strangelove".
A Psych book says that when people "cry for joy" it is a reaction to some unfulfilled longing. I just wish I "had the balls" to do the things Michael Moore does. He confronts the Powers That Be without anybody getting killed like our generation experienced at Kent State, and in trying to register black voters in the south.
It seems like Moore has the guts to confront anybody. I wish I worked for him.
Ray McL
Great job! Thanks, Ray!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
The Wall Street Poet
'The Three B's Of Baghdad'
The Three B's Of Baghdad
Bush and Blair and Berlusconi
Marched in sync to fight Iraq,
Since then, though, their fortune's differed
From this war's complex blowback.
George is riding high and cocky,
Americans admire his sass,
The war, they know, was kind of wacky,
But they think: 'We sure kicked ass!'
Silvio must face Italians
Who opposed his warring views,
Add to that the stink of scandal,
Good thing he owns TV news.
Then there's Tony, poor, poor Tony,
Once thought Europe's brightest hope,
'Til his link up with the White House
Set him on the slip'ry slope.
As the tally slowly sinks in
Of this dumb adventure's cost,
Betting's started 'bout the Three B's:
Who'll be first from office tossed.
© 2003
**********
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Still too damn hot. Gonna get cranky, again.
Have extended the TCM listings to 2 days - today & tomorrow.
The NBC series 'West Wing' starts rerunning on Bravo with the very first episode tonight.
Tonight, Monday, CBS presents another '2-hour-block-of-grotesque-husbands-with-hot-wives-sitcoms,' starting with a RERUN 'Yes, Dear', followed by a RERUN 'Still Standing', then a RERUN
'Raymond', followed by a RERUN 'The King Of Queens', and then caps it with a RERUN 'CSI: Miami'.
On a RERUN Dave are Joaquin Phoenix, Blues Traveler, and a Top Ten List featuring members of the National Baseball Hall of Fame. (RERUNs all week)
Scheduled on a FRESH Craiggers are Jason Alexander and Lance Burton.
NBC opens the night with a RERUN 'Fear Factor', followed by a FRESH 'For Lu$t Or $', followed by the Series Finale of 'Who Wants To Marry My Dad?'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jay are Ben Affleck, K-1 Fighter Bob Sapp, and Nappy Roots.
On a RERUN Conan are Frankie Muniz, Geri Halliwell, and Veronica Vera.
On a RERUN Carson Daly are Regina King, Joshua Cooper Ramo, and Lynyrd Skynyrd.
ABC RERUNs 'That's Incredible: The Reunion, Part II', followed by the RERUN made-for-tv-movie 'Stephen King's 'Storm Of The Century' (part 2 of 3).
Scheduled on a FRESH Jimmy Kimmel are Mo Rocca and Linkin Park, with this week's guest co-host Super Dave Osborne.
The WB offers a RERUN '7th Heaven', followed by another RERUN '7th Heaven'.
Faux has a RERUN 'The O.C.', followed by a FRESH 'Parasite Hotel'.
UPN has a RERUN 'The Parkers', followed by another RERUN 'The Parkers', then a RERUN 'Girlfriends', followed by a RERUN 'Half & Half'.
A&E has 'Biography' (Carroll O'Connor), 'Cold Case File', and 'City Confidential'.
AMC offers the movie 'Usual Suspects', followed by the movie 'Saturday Night Fever'.
BBC -
[7pm] 'Ground Force' - Drumoak;
[7:30pm] 'Changing Rooms'- Fulham;
[8pm] 'Jonathan Creek' - The Wrestler's Tomb - Part 2;
[9pm] 'Red Cap' - Payback;
[10pm] 'Red Cap' - Cold War;
[11pm] 'So Graham Norton' - Naomi Campbell;
[11pm] 'So Graham Norton' - Johnny Knoxville;
[12am] 'Red Cap' - Payback;
[1am] 'Red Cap' - Cold War;
[2am] 'Jonathan Creek' - The Wrestler's Tomb - Part 2;
[3am] 'So Graham Norton' - Naomi Campbell; and
[3:30am] 'So Graham Norton' - Johnny Knoxville. (ALL TIMES EDT)
Bravo has the first 'West Wing', followed by a documentary on the making of 'West Wing', then the movie 'Absolute Power', followed by a repeat of the earlier 'West Wing'.
Scheduled on a FRESH Jon Stewart is Samuel L. Jackson.
History has 'Modern Marvels', 'Mail Call', 'Conquest', and 'Rumrunners, Moonshiners & Bootleggers'.
SciFi is all 'Stargate SG-1' all night.
TCM pays a 24-hour tribute to Frank Sinatra.
[6am] 'Higher And Higher' (1944);
[8am] 'The Tender Trap' (1955);
[10am] 'It Happened In Brooklyn' (1947);
[12pm] 'High Society' (1956);
[2pm] 'Suddenly' (1954);
[3:30pm] 'The Pride And The Passion' (1957);
[6pm] 'Kings Go Forth' (1958);
[8pm] 'From Here To Eternity' (1953);
[10pm] 'Some Came Running' (1958);
[12:30am] 'Guys And Dolls' (1955);
[3am] 'Step Lively' (1944); and
[4:30am] 'Double Dynamite' (1951). (ALL TIMES EDT)
A fisherman casts out a fishing line looking for rudderfish or chub locally known as 'nenue' with the sun setting behind him at Ala Moana Beach Park, August 9, 2003 in Honolulu. There are several varieties of chub in Hawaii but the most common nenue forms large schools in calm bays and nearshore waters. According to local fishermen the best hours to catch nenue are after sunset.
Photo by Lucy Pemoni
The Information One-Stop
Moose & Squirrel
Melbourne International Film Festival's Grand Prix for Best Short Film
'Destino'
A long-lost seven-minute animation by surrealist Spanish artist Salvador Dali and entertainment titan Walt Disney, which took 57 years to complete, has taken the top prize at an Australian film festival.
Fragments of the unfinished film "Destino" along with story boards, sketches and an original score were painstakingly put together by a team assembled by Disney's nephew Roy Disney after they were discovered in the studio's vaults.
Disney now hopes that "Destino," which fended off almost 90 entries to take the Melbourne International Film Festival's Grand Prix for Best Short Film late Friday, will be considered for an Academy Award nomination, and it is looking at ways of releasing the animation commercially. "If you saw it, you'd say this is what I'd imagine Dali paintings to look like if they came to life," said David Stainton, president of Walt Disney Feature Animation, a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company .
'Destino'
Another Candidate
Don Novello
In Marin County, Democrats Don Novello -- best known as his comic alter-ego Father Guido Sarducci (and, Lazlo Toth, American) -- and Paul Nave are in, as is Republican Rich Gosse. Nave, a boxer who spent time in state prison for selling drugs, lost a state Assembly bid in 2000.
Other candidates from the Redwood Empire include Libertarian Ned Roscoe of Napa and Darin Price, a Natural Law Party member from McKinleyville.
Election officials around the state will begin checking signatures on nominating papers to ensure that they belong to registered voters, and Secretary of State Kevin Shelley is scheduled to release the official list of certified candidates Wednesday.
Don Novello
5th Time's The Charm
Levy - Rivera
Yesterday Geraldo Rivera got married. Again. The fifth time. That makes him one up on Liza. However, he's still three away from Elizabeth Taylor Hilton Wilding Todd Fisher Burton Burton Warner Fortensky.
The wedding pictures go to People, same as Jamie-Lynn Sigler's did. The wedding orchestra he booked is the same as Michael and Catherine did. With mommyhood suddenly today's "in" thing, almost like parading the newest Prada bag, figures he'll become a daddy again. For the fifth time.
He's 60. The bride, Erica Levy, is 28. His last wife, C.C. Dyer, was his producer. His new wife was his producer. Geraldo is clearly into - pardon the expression - hands-on production people.
The guest list, including Cheech Marin, Al Sharpton, Don King, numbers 350. As one close to him put it, "It's his first 'big' wedding. The others were fast, or elopements." The 5:30 p.m. wedding was at Central Synagogue, 55th and Lex. Geraldo's half Jewish. Erica's all Jewish. The reception was at the Four Seasons restaurant. Large round tables of 20 apiece.
Levy - Rivera
Confederate solders lead Pickett's charge to the Union line, Sunday, Aug. 10, 2003, in Gettysburg, Pa., during the 140th anniversary re-enactment of the Battle of Gettysburg. Pickett's Charge is considered to have been the turning point of the Civil War.
Photo by Carolyn Kaster
Discusses Texas Senators
Willie Nelson
Singer Willie Nelson says he thinks 11 Democratic state senators from Texas who have been holed up in New Mexico to block a legislative quorum on congressional redistricting are heroes.
Nelson invited his fellow Texans to Saturday night's sold-out concert at the Isleta Casino and Resort in Albuquerque.
The Democrats left Austin two weeks ago after Republican Gov. Rick Perry called a second special session to address congressional redistricting.
"I think they're great," Nelson said. "I think they're heroes and we're all very proud of them."
Willie Nelson
Only On Cable
Democratic Debates
Fox News Channel said this week it will host two debates featuring the Democratic presidential candidates to air live in primetime.
Working with the Congressional Black Caucus, Fox said it has commitments from all nine Democrats for its Sept. 9 debate in Baltimore. A second debate, scheduled for Oct. 26, so far is missing Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., but Fox executives hope he will clear his schedule.
CNBC is hosting a debate on economic issues Sept. 25 in partnership with the Wall Street Journal. CNN has scheduled a Democratic presidential debate for Oct. 12 in Phoenix. None of the broadcast networks has announced plans to host a debate this year.
Democratic Debates
In The Kitchen With BartCop & Friends
Shows Fans the Finger
Jack White
White Stripes rocker Jack White, banged up in a car crash last month, makes this perfectly clear on the band's Website (www.whitestripes.com), posting actual footage from a surgery that inserted three screws into his broken left index finger.
"A bone in the index finger of my fretting hand was shattered...making it absolutely impossible to play guitar," White writes on the Website. "I've been instructed by doctors that there is no way I can move my wrist until it is completely healed."
For the non-squeamish, or the terribly curious, the video clip can be accessed at: www.whitestripes.com/finger.html.
White suffered his injury July 9--his 28th birthday--in Detroit. He was driving in a car with lady friend Renée Zellweger when another motorist made a "horrible left turn in front of me," he wrote on his Website last month. Zellweger was said to uninjured, White wasn't as fortunate.
For more, Jack White
Groom On Space Station, Bride On Earth
Space Wedding
Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko didn't let the fact that he's living aboard the international space station stop him from marrying his earthbound bride, Ekaterina Dmitriev, in the first wedding ever conducted from space.
The couple wed Sunday before family and friends in a private ceremony at Johnson Space Center in Houston, where Malenchenko took part via video. Texas law allows weddings in which one of the parties is not present.
A life-size cutout of the groom greeted guests at the wedding reception, at a restaurant decorated with silver stars and mannequins dressed as astronauts.
The honeymoon will have to wait until after Malenchenko, who wore a bow tie with his blue space suit, returns to Earth in late October. They plan a Russian Orthodox wedding sometime next year.
For the rest, Space Wedding
Sings at Naturalization Ceremony
Robert Goulet
At the federal courthouse in downtown Las Vegas, Robert Goulet sang an a cappella version of "God Bless America" during a naturalization ceremony for 53 new citizens — including his wife.
Vera Goulet, 56, who married the singer in 1982, was one of two new citizens who spoke during the ceremony.
"I am so proud, and I am so honored, as I know all of you are, to be an American," she said. Vera Goulet and her mother fled the communist regime in the former Yugoslavia in 1959.
Robert Goulet
'The D-List'
Kathy Griffin
Kathy Griffin is looking to glorify her status of D-list celebrity with "The D-List," a half-hour comedy for NBC.
Griffin has inked a deal with NBC Studios to develop the scripted project, which is based on her autobiographical stand-up.
"It's really the story of my life, but seen through the prism of being a D-list celebrity," Griffin said.
In summer 2002, the project would have been titled "C-List," but after "hovering on the C-list for a while ... I did 'Celebrity Mole' and jumped right to D," Griffin quipped.
Rejoining the C-celebrity echelon is the actress' goal with the new show.
Kathy Griffin
Formerly 'The Vidiot'
PSA For 'Friends of Cypress Gardens'
Delta Burke
Delta Burke has filmed a public service announcement urging others to help preserve Cypress Gardens, one of Florida's oldest theme parks, which closed in April after struggling financially.
Burke, a former Miss Florida, filmed the public service announcement for Friends of Cypress Gardens, a group trying to save the 67-year-old attraction. Burke, 47, is best known for her role on the "Designing Women" television show.
The goal of the announcement is to rally support for Cypress Gardens before a pair of meetings in Tallahassee that could determine the park's future.
Delta Burke
Alphorn trio 'Wahlen' wearing traditional clothes plays at the alp Nendaz, Switzerland, Saturday, Aug. 9, 2003. An international alphorn player meeting is taking place in Nendaz on Aug. 9 to 10, 2003.
Photo by Olivier Maire
Snatches Berlin's Party Crown
Zurich Street Parade
Nearly a million scantily-clad ravers thronged the streets of Switzerland's largest city on Saturday, dancing in sweltering heat to the heavy beat of the summer's biggest techno-music street party.
Despite crushing heat, organizers said the parade drew some 900,000 revellers, defying Switzerland's image as a conservative nation and snatching the party crown from Berlin's Love Parade which counted around half a million techno fans in July.
The sweet smell of marijuana hung in the air as scores of men and women in bright-colored clothes danced to electronic music on crammed "Love Mobiles," spraying water on the crowds.
The Street Parade, held in Zurich every year since 1991, draws around half its crowd from abroad and ends in hundreds of rave parties that continue until dawn.
Zurich Street Parade
She's Back
Beth Hart
Los Angeles based singer-songwriter Beth Hart will release her new album Leave The Light On on October 21. The album is the follow up to 1999's Screamin' For My Supper, which spawned her breakthrough ballad "L.A. Song."
Leave The Light On was produced by Oliver Leiber and it contains 11 tracks. The title track and first single from the album will hit radio on August 25.
Beth Hart
Finally Approved For Malaysia
'Bruce Almighty'
The Malaysian government has finally given the nod for cinemas to screen Hollywood comedy "Bruce Almighty" despite a minister's complaints that it was against Islamic beliefs.
The movie was set to debut Thursday but was postponed after minister for religious affairs, Abdul Hamid Zainal Abidin, said the movie, in which star Jim Carrey is given divine powers and challenged by God to do a better job of running the world, was "not appropriate".
But a home ministry official told Saturday's The Star newspaper that the government had given the go-ahead for the movie to be screened.
'Bruce Almighty'
North American Box Office
Top 10 Movies
Following are the top 10 movies at the North American box office for the Aug. 8-10 weekend, according to studio estimates collected on Sunday.
1 (*) S.W.A.T. ........................... $37.0 million
2 (*) Freaky Friday ...................... $22.3 million
3 (1) American Wedding ................... $15.1 million
4 (3) Pirates of the Caribbean ........... $13.1 million
5 (4) Seabiscuit.......................... $11.9 million
6 (2) Spy Kids 3D: Game Over.............. $10.1 million
7 (5) Bad Boys II......................... $ 6.0 million
8 (6) Lara Croft Tomb Raider.............. $ 5.2 million
9 (7) Finding Nemo ....................... $ 2.5 million
10(10) Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines . $ 1.6 million
NOTE: Last weekend's position in parenthesis.
"*" = new release.
Top 10 Movies
In Memory
Gregory Hines
Gregory Hines, the Tony Award-winning tap-dancing actor who starred on Broadway as well as in many films, including "The Cotton Club," has died at the age of 57, his publicist said on Sunday.
Hines, considered one of the top dancers of his generation, died Saturday night in Los Angeles of cancer, said Allen Eichhorn, a spokesman for Hines.
The native New Yorker, who won a 1992 Tony for the musical "Jelly's Last Jam," first found fame performing jazz tap with his brother Maurice, working together in the musical revue "Eubie!" in 1978 and in "Sophisticated Ladies."
Born on Feb. 14, 1946, in New York City, Hines had said his mother steered her sons toward tap dancing as a way to escape the ghetto.
By the time he was five, Hine was already performing, and the two brothers danced at the famed Apollo theater for two weeks when he was just six. In his teens, the brothers also performed with their father, Maurice Sr., who played drums.
Later he earned Tony nominations on Broadway in "Eubie!," "Comin' Uptown" and "Sophisticated Ladies."
Hines had a falling out with his older brother in the late 1960s when he wanted to perform to rock music and write his own songs. In 1973, the family act disbanded and Hines moved to Venice Beach, California.
But they reconciled a few years later and began performing in various Broadway shows together.
Hines landed his first film role in the 1981 Mel Brooks comedy "History of the World Part I," in which he played a Roman slave as a last-minute replacement for Richard Pryor.
Landing a leading role in Francis Ford Coppola's hit "The Cotton Club" in the mid-1980s cleared the way for more film work, including "White Nights," in which he starred with Mikhail Baryshnikov and with Billy Crystal in 1986's "Running Scared."
Hines nabbed several Emmy Award nominations, most recently in 2001 for his lead role in the mini-series "Bojangles."
His PBS special "Gregory Hines: Tap Dance in America" was nominated in 1989.
On television, he had his own sitcom in 1997 called "The Gregory Hines Show," and a recurring role on "Will and Grace."
Hines is survived by his fiance, Negrita Jayde, his daughter, Daria, his son, Zach, his stepdaughter, Jessica Koslow and his grandson, Lucian, Eichhorn said. Hines had been married twice. He is also survived by his older brother Maurice and father Maurice Sr., who he had performed with. A private funeral will be held in Los Angeles this week.
Gregory Hines
For more, Gregory Hines
A Diana monkey at London Zoo eats fruit frozen in ice Sunday Aug.10 2003, as the heatwave in Britain continues.
Photo by Kirsty Wigglesworth
'Ark of Darkness'
"The Ark of Darkness", a Political/Science-Fiction work, in tidy, weekly installments (and updated every Friday).
The Ark Group splits up. Steve returns to the bottom of hell, as the rest struggle through the storm raging at Kanda Feng.
'The Osbournes'
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 5
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 4
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 3
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 2
'The Osbournes' ~ Page 1
