Dakota Today

*** Rory Hoffman Dakota Musician

SDPB-Radio had North/South Dakotan Rory Hoffman on with his music and his story.  Good music and an interesting story.  He and his siblings were apparently born blind, but with a lot of musical talent.  Check his story and his albums, etc at his website.  He ended the radio program on SDPB indicating he wanted to do concerts in South Dakota  and would do them as gospel, jazz or country.  Somebody somewhere in South Dakota should contact him and take him up on his offer and toss in a thank you to SDPB for the program..

Website of Rory Hoffman..His Story, His Sister's Book, His albums

His family still ranches near the South Dakota-North Dakota border north of Lemmon, SD. He said their phone prefix was in North Dakota, but mailing address in South Dakota and they went to school in Lemmon,SD.

.*** Stay tuned..you can do a lot worse --- Doug Wiken

 

** Site news ..Window on Winner

I slogging away on some interesting science news for SD Science Junction, and put a post yesterday at Window on Winner Blog  (WOW on menu above).  It is about a free lunch in Winner despite the conservativeness that runs rampant here.  Take a look.

Cold here this morning, but not quite so terrible now from around zero and up to 27 degrees Fahrenheit or so.

*** Stay tuned even if there is only a promise of something new --- Doug Wiken

*** Two new Dakota Today features..Site News

If you look at left and right columns you will see two new features for Dakota Today.  At right is a contact button which when clicked will take you to a Dakota Today Page with a Foxy Form contact form which will send your message to my e-mail address. At left is the Directorium Button which will take you to a Dakota Today page with sorted links.  The Directorium (fancy name for directory or more pejoratively "link farm") which when clicked will take you to a Dakota Today page with a list of websites in various categories which may be useful or interesting.  This will take some time to better populate with links however.

If you have suggestions for links, use the contact form to send them to me.. or as before, comment below on this message.  Hope you find these useful.  And, thanks to Cory Heidelberger for information on Foxy Forms.

** Stay tuned for bad jokes coming soon unfortunately --- Doug Wiken

 

*** Read about DRACO at SD Science Junction

South Dakota researchers and scientists may know all about this already, but others who want reasons to support science and engineering education and research may find the information useful.  It is about an apparently totally new approach to anti-virus research.

DRACO Links and abstract at South Dakota Science Junction

Other news in research recently has concerned a new way to attack Leukemia.

*** Stay tuned but search around the PLoS One site for other interesting info --- Doug Wiken

** Day 4 of the AT&T "service" in Winner, SD and another SD blog

On the minor local news front, last evening (Saturday April 23, 2011) for about 15 minutes or so  off and on between 8:30 and 10:00 PM, the signal strength indicator on the Rugby II AT&T phones showed a few bars.  For the first time I could stand inside the house and actually get my wife's phone to ring.  This useful level of service alas did not last.  Half way through a test call, the signal dropped off again to nothing and the call dropped.

Today, I am wondering if the system was actually working for a few minutes of if possibly the signal from a few miles south and west of Winner was being reflected off an airplane, charged cloud or some such.  No such bursts of service improvement today.

Anyway, I noticed some hits from a new blog site were coming to Dakota Today.  Bob Schwartz has started a new SD blog on Technology  Bob Schwartz at Great Plains Tech Blog  . 

Bob subtitles it "Geek Talk from the Technologically-Challenged Great Plains".  Take a look at his blog and if you haven't yet, take a look at my SD Science Junction blog which can always be reached from menu at top of Dakota Today.

*** Stay tuned even if science and religion are incompatible black boxes for you --- Doug Wiken

 

 

 

** One of these days, I might get around to writing a post like Sam Hurst's

What Sam Hurst wrote recently at link below is a better combination of information and observations than I could have slopped into a half dozen posts at Dakota Today.  Now all I have to do is link to it.

Too bad Herseth ignored her actual supporters when voting only to send out e-mail requests to them requesting money to meet her campaign expenses after she lost.  She wasn't believable as a Republican to Republicans and her waffling and pandering irritated real Democrats. Some around here were so aggravated they refused to vote for her or either of her opponents.

Sam Hurst at The Dakota Day Blog on Weiland or Herseth-Sandlin

After you check on that well-thought-out political commentary, you might want to check the links below for something completely different, but related to South Dakota.

A commercial link selling art by Dakotans.  If you want to buy art, why not buy it from South Dakotans and keep that money circulating here.  No sense sending your hard earned dollars to California or New York where it is gone forever.

Art of the Dakotas

And, if you like to eat and want to find out all about both wasteful food excess and also good nuitrition, take a look at a Sioux Falls link related to a TV show that runs (I think) on KELO second channel on Saturday afternoons.

Sioux Falls, Cooks, Restuarants, etc at Place and Plate

And, if I still feel wide awake for a few more hours, I will try to get some photos of the Christmas lights that make Winner, SD look a little brighter for a few weeks of the year.  The LED lighting from China, Taiwan, or wherever have helped make for some pleasant lighting. I will put the photos in WOW.. The Window on Winner Blog in top menu.

*** Stay tuned even if you are about as hungry as I am right now and also already very tired of cold weather, short days, and some snow --- Doug Wiken

 

 

 

** Just what the world needs-- another Blog -- Window on Winner, SD 57580

It is just starting of course, but you might want to click on the initial posts, the Winner Window Buildings Album, and the Winner-related LINKS.  Just a hint of what is coming.  You can get to the blog by clicking on the Window on Winner menu option above.  Might not be interesting to those outside of Winner, SD 57580, but I hope it will be a regular stop for residents and friends and former residents of Winner.

This new blog means less about Winner, SD here at Dakota Today.  Not sure if that will make Dakota Today more or less provincial.  South Dakota is a relatively big area however, so there won't be a lack of news here.

*** Stay tuned for news for Dakota Today -- Doug Wiken

Professional Journalist Code of Ethics

Recently, the Rapid City Journal blog "Mt. Blogmore" has been giving Shad Olson attention. Olson appears to me to be a wingnut right loon who warrants next to zero attention.  His bit of notoriety resulted because he left KOTA-TV after appearing at a "TEA Party" meeting.  Anyway, in the midst of the discussion, Bill Dithmer posted a journalistic code of ethics.

I won't pretend I meet those standards here at Dakota Today.  I do hope however that the facts and opinion here are reasonably separated and readers should not have much trouble determining my biases and weigh the opinions here in that light.  But, mostly I try to present information in something close to a journalistic style.

I have copied the Code of Ethics into the continuation of this post available at the bottom of this post.  Some Links:   Bill Dithmer"s Post at Mt. Blogmore ,  The Society of Professional Journalists ,  The S of P J printable single-page version of the Code .

Some blogs are all about good journalism, some are all about bad journalism, some are all opinion, and some are mixtures in varying degrees of the above.  In any case, bloggers and blog readers, and newspaper and magazine readers ought to look at the code of ethics.

*** Stay tuned even if journalistic ethics is the least of your concerns --- Doug Wiken

** Take Kristi Noem's "Fundamental Values" as a warning

By now, every voter should be very wary of supporting any candidate who emphasizes values over issues, logic, history, and reason.  Bob Schwartz has a couple of good posts on this peculiar SD Republican attitude of moral superiority.  Bob Schwartz Online

The “Family values”, “South Dakota values”, “Fundamental values”, etc are all camouflage for candidates who support the rich and powerful as they try to look like just good old boys (or good old girls). By definition “fundamental values” are values likely held by nearly everybody including ..gasp…Democrats.  Krazy Kristi’s “fundamental values” is more of the GOP manure spreading campaign machine talking points.

Other than as a warning to voters, “fundamental values” is claptrap that is otherwise meaningless. All Democrats and independents should remember that John Thune used "family values" as a way to indicate your non-Republicanism showed you had defective or perverted family values.  Why our Democratic candidates have never responded effectively to that insulting smear is beyond me.  Now we are getting another variation implying that if you don't agree with Krazi Kristi and her Kadre of supporters, you are somehow fundamentally off the values wagon that Republicans seem to think is their monopoly.

Of course, after Richard Nixon and his dirty tricks and Watergate, George Bush sub 2 and his Iraq war and budget busting tax favoritism of the rich coupled with off-budget squandering of resources, all the GOP morality, business-like management, virtue, etc seems grossly hypocritical and totally empty.  Republicans leadership almost never supports policies which help those of us who aren't wealthy enough to grease their palms.   The GOP is one big empty bag under a mighty small tent.

But, you won’t read anything like this at Mt. Blogmore. The new “tone” there won’t allow it. But by golly, the high tone there allows three posts all based on a single Rassmussen Poll showing Noem beating Herseth-Sandlin.

**Stay tuned even if you don't realize you view values through a GOP funhouse mirror-- Doug Wiken

** Warning to readers (both of you), you may find the wrong "tone" here

For several years, I have tossed comments into the Mt. Blogmore cloud of fog.  Bill Harlan started one of the best blogs in the country.  There was a good mix of conservatives, moderates, and liberals battling it out.

Bill Harlan is gone.  Denise Ross is gone.  What is left is primarily Kevin Woster and Randy Rasmussen and a lot of new conservative, wingnut right posters..or old conservative posters with newer misleading "names".   Responses to their lunacy are usually deleted.  But, here is a warning for readers here.  The RC Journal newsman and columnists Kevin Woster does not like my tone (among other things..more on that later).

Doug: Your attack on Bush was off the point of the discussion and outside of the playful nature of other digressions. Like most of your gratuitous attacks on the former president, it was also a tedious example of your inability to move on from things that angered you in the past or stick to the point in a discussion today. You are a relentless ax grinder. Nobody on this blog - including Art Oakes - has as many blog submissions rejected as you do. Maybe that’s just because I’m a narrow-minded, mean-spirited moderator who has it in for you. Or maybe it’s you and your tone - which is, quite regularly, contrary to the tone this blog is trying to maintain, and the one most commentators somehow manage to present. K.W.

So there you have a nice concise attack on posts that dare to be negative about one of the worst, most mediocre presidents in US history, George Bush sub2.   Rightwingers regularly post attacks on Carter, Clinton, Truman, LBJ, and FDR, but Mt. Blogmore posters better not comment negatively on the former Yale cheerleader president... even if his dreadful policies and administration are a source of many current problems which cannot be ignored if we do not want to repeat another election based on irrelevant "values" camouflaging corporatist policies benefiting primarily the very rich and very large while shifting costs of wars of dubious worth to the poor and middle classes.

In this particular discussion, the comments had drifted off to Kristi Noem's failure to obtain a college education.  I view that as generally a major flaw in a candidate for any party.  I noted there were exceptions..such as former Pres. Bush, who had a college education, and was still mediocre...assuming of course the junior Bush did not hire somebody to take all his tests...which one might assume in light of his intentional ignorance of many issues despite his college degree. And if the education for Bush did any good at all, how much more terrible could his administration have been?

Anyway, it is water under a bridge..maybe one of those curvy gracious wooden ones in the neighborhood of Mt. Rushmore.

But, be forwarned, my tone is now suspect and I would not want readers here to be misled into thinking I was non-partisan or unbiased.. or unable to use an axe..or grind one..

PS: Anybody who has figured out the new secret codes and handshakes for maintaining perfect pitch at Mt. Blogmore is welcome to let me know.  My ear for religious and Republican myths is a bit limited  in the higher frequencies.

** Stay tuned even if you are tone-deaf--- Doug Wiken