Star Trek

* Very minor spoiler alerts *

We went to see Star Trek the other day. I liked it. In particular the guys who played Kirk (Chris Pine) and Spock (Zachary Quinto) were very good. As soon as I'd heard they were making a Star Trek movie, I thought playing Kirk would be tricky - Shattner's rendition being such a unique mix of stiltedness, bravado, contained enthusiasm and obnoxiousness - and he pulled it off great.

The story was interesting, and Star-Trekkish (with a time travelling them, and a bit by Leonard Nimoy) yet much richer and coherent than a typical Star Trek episode. It had about the right mix of 'origin' narrative and new plot. It introduced some new, non-Star Trekkish elements of Space Opera (the baddy is pretty awesome in that respect).

Special effects are excellent, as can be expected. The movie has a few weaknesses, but overall is definitely worth seeing.

When life imitates art

Tonight cover of the New York Times online

Grand theft indeed...

Prop 8 passes... because of Obama?

I was talking to my friend Sam yesterday, and he said something I thought was very insightful: prop 8 passed because of the huge increase in turnout from the black community. Looks like he was right. From the LATimes:

Black and Latino voters critical to same-sex marriage ban's success

Torn between Obama and McCain

Another excellent article, this time gleaned from RCP.

The Election

This marathon election is coming to a close, and it's been fun. From Hillary's cratering to Obama's emergence, from Mike Huckabee's witticisms to Palin's nomination, it hasn't been boring. Recently, a little article got me thinking.

I was watching Colbert the other night, and Tina Brown, of Vanity Fair fame, was talking about her new site The Daily Beast. I was half-listening, half-hacking when my ears perked up: Christopher Buckley had confessed, in an article on her site, that he was going to... vote Obama.

As a lifelong fan of Buckley père, and a fairly regular reader of the NR, I was intrigued. I looked up the article, and I liked it. It shouldn't be surprising, as Buckley fils shares the core political philosophy of his father, and essentially my own:

I am a small-government conservative who clings tenaciously and old-fashionedly to the idea that one ought to have balanced budgets. On abortion, gay marriage, et al, I’m libertarian. I believe with my sage and epigrammatic friend P.J. O’Rourke that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take it all away.

The Buckley piece articulates many of the things I've felt about the election recently. How McCain used to be interesting, courageous and straightforward, and recently has slid into a do-whatever-I-need-to-do-to-placate-the-base mode. And some of Obama's attacks, like the one that McCain acted erraticly, seemed on target.

And then there is the Palin business. Some of you know that I was an early supporter of the Palin decision. I even speculated over the summer that it would be a great boost to the ticket and a way for McCain to further his cause. She has a great life story, is not from Washington and seemed like exactly what McCain needed. She's spunky, has strong principles and is attractive to boot.

But that was before she self-destructed in front of Gibson and Kouric. There is no question that the interviewers themselves were partisan and had their own agenda. They were at times condescending, looking for 'the trap' and what not. But that doesn't excuse anything. A smart politician would have been able to navigate this easily. The newspaper question is a good example:

COURIC: And when it comes to establishing your world view, I was curious, what newspapers and magazines did you regularly read before you were tapped for this — to stay informed and to understand the world?

PALIN: I’ve read most of them again with a great appreciation for the press, for the media —

COURIC: But what ones specifically? I’m curious.

PALIN: Um, all of them, any of them that have been in front of me over all these years.

COURIC: Can you name any of them?

PALIN: I have a vast variety of sources where we get our news.

Let's set aside the issue of grammar for a second. I don't know why she floundered. It maybe that she was intimidated but I find that unlikely: she seems like a fearless woman, and is considerably more accomplished than Katie Kouric. So we have to look elsewhere for an explanation.

Someone who actually had read a significant amount could simply have answered the question. Someone who hadn't should have been able to say the New York Time and the Wall Street Journal. Someone smart who have said: "Katie, I don't remember you asking the same question from Senator Obama. But never mind, I'll answer your question anyway - in shaping a rich and balanced world view I find a mix of the major dailies (NYT, WSJ), and a few weekly magazines, like The Economist, Business Week and Fortune. A few of the TV programs are good and I was very sad to see the passing of our good friend Tim Russert, even if I didn't agree with his positions most of the time. Yes, all of those are pretty good. I must confess though, to never watching the nightly news. I'm sure you'll understand. So again, why not ask this of Sen. Obama?"

Her followup performance at the debate was simply that of someone who learned all the lines, and had a bunch of pre-canned attacks. I also find it unsettling that someone who is literally a heartbeat away from the presidency got her first passport in 2006. Many conservatives share my opinion on this topic, including Peggy Noonan from the Wall Street Journal, David Brooks from the New York Times and Kathleen Parker from the National Review.

To go back to the Buckley article, his main point about Obama and one I agree with fully is that Obama is, unlike most people who get to or near the presidency, very smart.

I’ve read Obama’s books, and they are first-rate. He is that rara avis, the politician who writes his own books. Imagine.

I am not however nearly as optimistic as Buckley is about Obama or an Obama presidency. His character and more importantly, his politics are the real issues. On the character front, I have always thought that his association with Reverent Wright would have disqualified him from being nominated: you don't listen to drivel every week-end for 20 years without being influenced by it. You don't grow up in the Chicago political machine and rub elbows with Tony Rezko without cutting some significant ethical corners.

As far as his politics are concerned, they are uninspired and generally worrisome. He's never done anything significant politically (other than arrive at his current position), and he's voted with the Democrats along party lines for the vast majority of his short career. Whenever he speaks, whenever he talks about an issue, his first instinct is to conjure up a government solution.

Considering the prospect of a Democratic super-majority in Congress, I am profoundly uncomfortable with the prospect of Democratic president, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi running things. But then again, Bush has doubled the debt, exploded the deficit and grown the government more than any president in my lifetime. So who knows.

Buckley is more optimistic:

But having a first-class temperament and a first-class intellect, President Obama will (I pray, secularly) surely understand that traditional left-politics aren’t going to get us out of this pit we’ve dug for ourselves. If he raises taxes and throws up tariff walls and opens the coffers of the DNC to bribe-money from the special interest groups against whom he has (somewhat disingenuously) railed during the campaign trail, then he will almost certainly reap a whirlwind that will make Katrina look like a balmy summer zephyr.

I hope he's right, but I'm not holding my breath.

The Chevy Volt

Arts and Letters Daily recently had a link to an Atlantic Monthly article on the Chevy Volt. It's a fairly long piece, and the author followed the development of the Volt from the decision to invest in it to the most recent R&D cycles.

Of note, from the article:

1. GM realizes what dire straights they're in, and they're seriously trying to do something about it. If they succeed it will be another great American success story. If they fail, some will point out (rightly or wrongly) the short-sightedness of US corporations, especially when it comes to markets with long R&D lifecycles and hard-to-time trends (such as the appetite for cars that consume less gasoline). They will contrast it to the approach of foreign firms, like Toyota.

2. The plug-in electric drive hybrid is an interesting technology. The Volt is aiming to go 40 miles on electricity alone, and has a gas engine that doesn't direct power to the wheels, but simply recharges the battery. That engine can also be replaced by an E85-driven plant or even, in the future, by a fuel cell.

A worthwhile read.

Learning to Sail in San Francisco Bay

Sometime in May I decided to learn to sail.

Sailing has a unique appeal - a connection with the ocean, travel and adventure. A mix of skills, pure enjoyment, history and romance. This particular decision to learn sailing was, however, precipitated by the fact that we'd decided to go on a sailing vacation in July so I had a little over a month to learn to skipper a larger sailboat.

I had minimal experience sailing - when I was 16 and 17 I used to spend time in the south of France sailing little 420s, and some experience windsurfing.

I called around the various sailing schools in the Bay Area. All were appealing in one way or another, but only one (OCSC Sailing School) was able to accommodate what I needed: three courses in a row (5, really) in the space of a month: the US Sailing certification of Basic Keelboat (1 & 2), Basic Cruising (1 & 2) and Bareboat Cruising. Some of the schools offered free instruction, but the classes depended on volunteers and the schedule was, to say the least, loose. Others didn't have the right classes scheduled at the right time. OCSC is one of the largest and best organized schools in the Bay and offered what I needed.

One of the interesting facts about OCSC is that it's located in Berkeley, smack in front of the infamous San Francisco Bay's 'Slot', which features strong and consistent winds (15-25 knots), and some strong tidal currents. Some of my buddies, sailors themselves, told me I was nuts to learn to sail there. I thought, 'Whatever doesn't kill you...'

I spent a total of 22 days on the water, plus six 3-hour seminars. It was very intense and enormously enjoyable. The time on the water was always fun, from cruising on a sunny day in Clipper Cove to putting a reef under sail in 25 knots of breeze and chop out by Southhampton Shoal to rescuing Bob, the orange juice can that serves as our man-over-board victim. Learning the theory and practical skills was also very satisfying: how to read the wind, how to trim the sails, how to navigate, all the procedures for departing, docking and so on. And last but not least spending time with all the people I met and learned with, instructors and students alike.

I wouldn't recommend doing it exactly in the way I did (and neither, I believe, would OCSC). Take some time off between Basic Cruising and Bareboat Cruising to get some experience sailing (in OCSC's case, on J24s). I would recommend the week-long courses as opposed to the week-end ones if you can do it. You don't forget what you learn and you spend more time on the water.

I'll conclude by saying that learning to sail is a big investment, of self, time and money, but an extraordinarily rewarding one.