Penny For My Thoughts On This Man

$70 To Be Exact

It's just my luck that in my worst financial crisis EVER par none, I should get approached to participate in a focus group for a price of $70 to discuss the man you see above: NSW Premier Morris Iemma.
Like, I'm going to turn that down.

Focus Groups are one of the worst inventions in marketing. They gather people in order to get qualitative feedback from a market but in most cases the feedback is coloured by a growing group-think that happens in the room. not that these companies tell their clients that fact. In my case I found out that the parallel session running was for 'Softly' a fabric softener. It's nice to know that NSW politics has about the same gravitas as laundry product, but that's what happens when you get marketing people to put together focus groups to discuss policy.

Most of the questions were context-less phrases where they tried to gauge people's emotional reaction to phrases. The moderator would trot out campaign catch-cries and try to figure out if we believed in those phrases. As if we would. The moderator would then go through the room asking people these dumb questions like, "what do you think of Morris Iemma if he were your friend?"

Occasionally, the questions would veer towards the surreal, like "what would you think if it was mandated that sheikhs and Imams had to pass a government test to qualify?"
or
"What do you think of mandatory sentencing for sex offenders and violent criminals"
Amazingly nobody agreed with the first but everybody apart from me agreed with the latter. In fact everybody thought we were in the midst off a crime-wave. I pointed out that mandatory sentencing would put insane people into prisons and that it would take away the power of judge's discretion. They didn't understand so I said, "look, we don't pay our judges to be stupid. By all means have better guidelines, but any kind of mandatory sentencing is asking the judges to be dumb bureaucrats ticking boxes."
There were some retired bureaucrats in the room. Heh. :)

The biggest policy mess was obviously the Cross-city Tunnel and the contract with the Private company. This was fun, because it was clearly a failure of policy, AND execution; and as such was open to a lot of interesting debate. The moderator asked:
"If there was one name you'd blame, who is it?"
Like blaming somebody is going to get them through the mess. My advice to them was to forget blaming somebody but instead to play hardball. Audit the private company and its board until they squeal with discomfort, and then throw out the contract on the basis that it's fraudulent. You should've seen the faces of the retired bureaucrats.
"You can't break contracts!" they said.
"Come on, a contract can only be truly binding if both parties want to be in it. Why is this one so sacrosanct and unbreakable? The Rolling Stones have broken lots of contracts in their time but they're still the Rolling Stones. Why can't the NSW Government just stiff them like they stiff other people?"

Indeed. Like they're stiffing me, the bums! :)
You should've seen their faces. They were apopleptic with rage, shaking their heads in disgust. Maybe I am too much of a Machiavellian, but hey, Morris Iemma is at least Italian! Come on Morris! :)

Predictably I went in there hyped, pumped and motivated to let loose and I did exactly that. I think I got in the most words of any participant because that was my target. I went in to swing hard for education and health, particularly mental health; hard against the anti-terror laws; totally slammed the Christian Right and their desire to obfuscate the line between Church and State and went in for better city-planning in Sydney and more trains and public transport.

At the end, everybody grabbed their cash and ran away. Nobody wanted to talk to me afterwards because I really went to town. I don't think I'll be asked back ever again.

Overall, if the questions were any indication, the powers that be are planning for a very anti-democratic time ahead. Oh, by the way, in the coming weeks, if you hear a politician say "we don't pay our judges to be stupid," you'll know where that phrase came from because it really shut the room up. :)

Forecast Is For Strong Protests Today

The protests over IR laws are predicted for today. I hope they RIOT.
I won't be going because I've already expended energy for political spleen-venting last night at the focus group where I finished as the most hated individual in the room for dominating discussions.
Also, public transport costs too much. :)

So I'm going to root them on at a distance. Go protesters. Where the hell were you when the put through the anti-terror laws?

And This Man? He's The AL MVP!

Alex Rodriguez, a.k.a. 'A-Rod' won the American League Most Valuable Player Award.

A-Rod's numbers were hard to argue with: a .321 average, 130 RBIs and an AL-leading 48 home runs. Considering Ortiz's final stats (.300-47-148), a case could have been made for either candidate, but Rodriguez's stellar play at third base likely pushed him over the top, as Ortiz's status as a DH hurt him with some voters.

"Defense -- for the most part, being a balanced player and saving a lot of runs on the defensive side -- was a major factor," Rodriguez said. "I've been in a lot of these races and come in second and third place, so I thought David had as good a chance as I did."

Votes were cast before the postseason, which was good news for both A-Rod and Big Papi, who may have watched Chicago's Paul Konerko vault himself to the top in that scenario. Rodriguez went 2-for-15 in the Yankees' ALDS loss to the Angels, while Ortiz had just one RBI as the Red Sox were swept out of the playoffs by the White Sox in the opening round.

"I was tough on myself because I always expect to play very good baseball," said A-Rod, who referred to himself as a "dog" after New York's Game 5 loss in Anaheim. "My one regret is that I thought I could have walked 10 or 12 times, passed the baton and been a little more patient."

The fact that the Yankees overtook the Red Sox to win their eighth consecutive AL East title probably didn't hurt Rodriguez, either. In the clincher, which came on the penultimate day of the regular season, A-Rod went 4-for-5 with a home run in the Yankees' 8-4 victory at Fenway Park.

A-Rod ranked in the top five in the AL in homers (first), RBIs (fourth), batting average (second), runs (first), slugging percentage (first), OPS (first), on-base percentage (second) and walks (third). He even added 21 stolen bases, which was ninth best in the league.

Rodriguez's award is the 19th in Yankees history, the most of any franchise. He is the first Yankee to win the MVP Award since Don Mattingly captured it in 1985. Joe DiMaggio, Yogi Berra and Mickey Mantle won three MVPs apiece, while Roger Maris won two. Other Yankees winners were Lou Gehrig, Joe Gordon, Spud Chandler, Phil Rizzuto, Elston Howard and Thurman Munson.

Rodriguez became the 24th multiple MVP winner and only the fourth to win at two positions and with two clubs. He was a shortstop with the Rangers when he was the AL MVP in 2003.

Rodriguez has also been the runner-up twice, in 2002 with Texas to Oakland's Miguel Tejada and in 1996 with Seattle to Texas' Juan Gonzalez.

Ortiz's supporters pointed to his numbers in "close and late" situations, which are defined by at-bats in the seventh inning or later with the team either ahead by one run, tied or with the potential tying run at least on deck.

Yeah, close and late stats are interesting and this discussion of 'clutchness' will never go away - but we all know Derek Jeter is the Clutch God so why even argue... only kidding. This is the AL MVP award that was so heavily debated so it deserves some amount of pondering.
Under more sober, statistical analysis, Win Shares has A-Rod (37WS) ahead of David Ortiz (31WS) by about 6 wins shares. Indeed, Ortiz' team-mate Manny Ramirez was more valuable than David Ortiz, clocking in at 34 win shares, about a win behind A-Rod.

And to be totally fair, I note that 'my favorite Clutch God' *only* had 26 WS. But he did win a Golden Glove Award to the amazement of many at the Baseball Think Factory. Everybody with any knowledge knows that Jeter (much as we may love him, adore him, cherish him) is only the second best shortstop playing for the Yankees. The grumbling ins and outs of that issue aside, gee it's good to have A-Rod at his career peak, manning Third base for the Yankees.

UPDATE: This is hilarious. ESPN columnist Jason Stark is ramping Ortiz' case on the basis that A-Rod wasn't 'clutch'. the best bit? He's citing Eric M. Van. LOL Bwahahahahahahahahahahahaha:

On the admittedly partisan, Red Sox-oriented Sons of Sam Horn site, frequent contributor Eric Van has laid out some truly startling evidence. He found that A-Rod was vastly more productive in the Yankees' blowout wins than he was in games where a hit either way was the difference between winning and losing.

In the 20 games each of their teams won by six or more runs, A-Rod hit .549, had an OPS of 1.793 and racked up 46 of his 130 RBI (35 percent). Ortiz, on the other hand, batted .277, had an OPS almost 800 points lower than A-Rod's (.999) and drove in only 33 runs (22 percent of his overall total).

But in close games (games that either went to extra innings or were decided by one or two runs in regulation), the numbers look a whole lot different.

In those games -- and each team played exactly 65 of them -- A-Rod batted only .243, had an OPS of .805 and drove in just 38 runs (29 percent). Ortiz, meanwhile, clearly tapped some mysterious force that made him even better in moments like that -- batting .321, running up an OPS of 1.116 and knocking in nearly a run a game (62 -- or 42 percent of his overall total).

Roll that info around your brain for a second. Think about what you make of it. All we know is that, when it came time to make our MVP pick at season's end, we had a tough time ignoring figures that staggering.

Oh crap, Jason Stark, crap. A-Rod's bat alone was better than Ortiz's at 33.3WS to 31.4WS. That's 2 WS, or 6 runs, or 2/3rds of a win, before we talk about defense. If you had to untangle numbers in an Eric M. Van way rather than say, a Bill James way, you know you're playing with partisans. Eric M. Van is infamous at the Baseball Think Factory/ Baseball Primer as the guy who was forever 'projecting' and fiercely predicting the Red Sox to win 125 games a year.
He was a laughingstock.

This Man Isn't Winning Friends In Kazakhstan

Sacha Baron Cohen's Borat the Kazakh is a pretty broad comic creation. He so broad even Americans understand him.
In case you thought attitudes about freedom of speech may directly affect what you get to say or see, try this article

KAZAKHSTAN'S Foreign Ministry has threatened legal action against a British comedian who wins laughs by portraying the central Asian state as a country populated by drunks who enjoy cow-punching as a sport.

Sacha Baron Cohen, who plays Kazakh television presenter Borat in his Da Ali G Show, has won fame ridiculing Kazakhstan on British and US channels.

Cohen appears to have drawn official Kazakh ire after he hosted the annual MTV Europe Music Awards in Lisbon this month as Borat, who arrived in an Air Kazakh propeller plane controlled by a one-eyed pilot clutching a vodka bottle.

"We do not rule out that Mr Cohen is serving someone's political order designed to present Kazakhstan and its people in a derogatory way," said Kazakh Foreign Ministry spokesman Yerzhan Ashykbayev.

"We reserve the right to any legal action to prevent new pranks of the kind." He declined to elaborate.

Cohen's jokes about the Central Asian state include claims that the people would shoot a dog and then have a party, and that local wine was made from fermented horse urine.

"We view Mr Cohen's behaviour at the MTV Europe Music Awards as utterly unacceptable, being a concoction of bad taste and ill manners which is completely incompatible with ethics and civilised behaviour," Mr Ashykbayev said.

Let''s be honest, nobody's nation likes being ridiculed on the International Stage by a *gasp* mere comedian! It must be that the comedian is on the payroll of some nation trying to bring about the downfall of that mighty, prosperous, beautiful nation, Kazakhstan. LOL. So presumably this Jewish schmuck who plays racial stereotypes from other parts of the world would be perceived to be a political pundit in Kazakhstan and probably jailed for his antics - and being Jewish.

More at the BBC
Talk about ugly attitudes. Kazakhstan isn't winning friends here.

Mr Ashykbayev described the comedian's MTV appearance as "utterly unacceptable, being a concoction of bad taste and ill manners which is completely incompatible with ethics and civilised behaviour".

Then again, it could be a publicity stunt by misinformation on Cohen's part.