BuzzMachine... by Jeff Jarvis

August 26, 2004

Can't wait

: Engadget has the first pix of the new Treo 650 with features I've been waiting for. Where/when can I get one?

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Whereabouts

: I'm headed to Baltimore Friday to talk to staffers at the Afro newspaper about citizens' media and all that. Blogging when possible.

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Couldn't stay away

: Colleague/blogger/former-blogger/blogger Joe Territo found the blog taking over his life -- well, yeah -- and rashly killed it. Then his fans mourned. Seen it before. Once a blogger, always a blogger.

Joe tweaks me here. I was one of the folks who wanted him to return. So make it worth his while. Link love, people. Link love!

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If you thought the campaign was dirty...

: As I passed through Chicago yesterday, a truly disgusting story I hadn't seen much elsewhere was all over the papers: The bus driver for the Dave Matthews Band dumped sewage from the bus into the river, hitting a tourist boat and a boatload of tourists to boot.

Anarchists: Don't you get an ideas in New York. Delegates: Stay on land.

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Well, four out of five ain't bad

: Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, who supposedly taught the world how to die, died.

She argued that there are five stages to dying (unless hit by a bus): denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.

Two days ago, surrounded by children, grandchildren and two close friends, the woman who made it acceptable and imperative to talk openly about death and dying was asked whether she was ready to "transition."

"Not yet," said Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, 78, who started the discussions on the death process more than 35 years ago.

Since 1995, she had suffered a series of strokes that left her partially paralyzed and found herself working through the very stages of dying she outlined in the 1969 book, "On Death and Dying." She told friends and family she experienced them all: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.

"When will you know that you are ready?" her close friend, Brookes Cohen, asked at her bedside at an assisted-living facility in Scottsdale, Ariz.

"I will know it from my head to toe," she answered.

As hours passed, she lost the ability to talk, so her readiness went unacknowledged. She died Tuesday evening as her grandchildren played and the television blared in her room.

Sounds to me like she hadn't quite embraced No. 5. Can't blame her.

But this is a bit like Jim Fixx dying while running and Dr. Atkins dying while tubby.

That grim reaper does have a fine sense of irony.

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Take the pledge

: In every campaign, we get to the debates and we come to that moment when one candidate -- the most recently slimed -- turns to his opponent -- the most recent slimer -- and challenges him to take a pledge to run a clean campaign.

It's time to take the pledge now, boys.

But this time, it's the voters who will turn to you and tell you to put down the rocks.

We have just 11 weeks left until we pick a President. We have huge issues to debate. We have unprecedented threats facing us. We have new opportunities as well. The last thing we need right now is more mud.

I was going to wonder this morning whether this was the dirtiest campaign in modern history. But then Layne reminded me of a few others (see below). Yes, there have been dirtier dirty tricks. But the tenor of this campaign and its coverage is turning unrelievedly slimy. Enough.

Put down the rocks. Tell your bullies to put down their rocks.

Take the pledge, boys.

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Memories...

: Ken Layne says the Bush campaign is just making dumb campaign moves reminding voters of both the fact that their guy ducked Vietnam while their opponent fought there and that their party has a history of a few, uh, less-than-stellar campaign techniques.

Doesn't anybody remember the backlash of the BlowJob Impeachment, or what happened to another incumbent Republican president with "overzealous" campaign advisors? As I've said about a dozen times on this site, when you work for the Bush / Cheney ticket, the last thing you want to do is remind people every day that John Kerry fought in Vietnam.

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