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Wednesday, April 7, 2010
A Bibulous Bibliography: Beachbum Berry Remixed
A while ago I wrote about a book that has a permanent place next to all my shakers, stirrers, bottles and glasses: Vintage Spirits & Forgotten Cocktails. Occupying an adjacent piece of real estate are the various books authored by Jeff "Beachbum" Berry. (If my bookshelf was an actual neighborhood, these would be the guys who are always out the front lawn, drink in hand, starting impromptu block parties).
The books in question, Sippin' Safari, Grog Log and Intoxica! are the definitive bibles of tiki/faux-tropical drink-making and history, and any half-aware cocktailian owns 'em. As for the author himself, there's not much I can add that hasn't already been documented elsewhere. Suffice it to say that Berry's impact on the tiki drink landscape can't underestimated- if it weren't for him, we'd all be buying powdered Mai Tai mix and drinking the equivalent of rum Slurpees.
So yeah, the guy pretty much single-handedly saved classic tiki drinks from being lost forever. No small feat, which is why you should have at least one of his books behind your bar at all times. And if you had to limit yourself to only one, the book I'd recommend conveniently just came out last week: Beachbum Berry Remixed.
Don't worry- I'm not going to do a full-on book review here. This is because:
1) There are going to be a ton of better-written ones appearing in the coming weeks.
2) When I write big, long posts it really cuts into my drinking time.
So the here's the scoop: Beachbum Berry Remixed combines the info from Grog Log and Intoxica! and wraps it all up with a boatload of full-color photos and illustrations. You get recipes, you get history, you get anecdotes, and you get useful facts on ingredients, including brand recommendations and how to make some things at home (if you're so inclined).
More importantly, there's new stuff. BBR isn't a barely-disguised attempt to re-package existing material like some lame greatest hits collection. The Bum has provided a bunch of new recipes (both his own and newly-unearthed ones), and there's also fresh background material on people, places and potions sprinkled throughout.
I'd also be remiss if I didn't mention there's an entire section containing new original recipes by drink writers, cocktail experts, bartenders, and people who play with booze and then blab about it online (a.k.a. bloggers). If you're the kind of person who travels the boozeblog circuit, you'll notice some familiar names, as there are contributions by this guy, this guy, this guy, this guy (who, by the way, is attempting to make every single drink in the book), and yours truly (As with my appearance in Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, I've yet again found myself among people far more knowledgeable and experienced than myself. Nonetheless, I'm extremely flattered).
Anyway, if you're still reading this, stop now and go buy a copy of Beachbum Berry Remixed from your favorite purveyor of mashed-up trees and ink. Then make yourself a drink from it. One of my favorites is...
Zombie (midcentury version)*
1 oz. fresh lime juice
1 oz. fresh lemon juice
1 oz. unsweetened pineapple juice
1 oz. passion fruit syrup
1 oz. light Puerto Rican rum
1 oz. gold Puerto Rican rum
1 oz. lemon Hart 151-proof Demerara rum
1 tsp. Demerara sugar syrup
1 dash Angostura bitters
Shake well with lots of crushed ice and pour into a tall glass.** Garnish with a mint sprig.
* people who like this incarnation of the Zombie (like me) take considerable guff from those who prefer the other versions. Whether this is due to its hazy provenance, less-intensive rum profile or inclusion of passion fruit syrup remains to be conclusively determined. Regardless, I'm sticking to my guns.
** Because I'm a colossal nerd and take this stuff way too seriously, I like to shake with a few large ice cubes and strain into a glass filled with crushed ice. Tomato, tomahto.
UPDATE: I forgot to mention that the Grogalizer has been updated and is fully operational! If you want to know what recipes from any of Jeff Berry's books you can make based on what currently resides on your liquor shelf, then the Grogalizer is what you need. Get over there and start mixing!
8 comments:
- Blair, aka Trader Tiki said...
Hooray for your inclusion in yet another tippler's tome!
Seriously, this book is great. Also, I'm totally going to try and beat rick to the "punch", so to speak.
- April 7, 2010 at 7:15 PM
- Unknown said...
To date I've tried four versions of the Zombie, and I, too, like the passion-fruit syrup version best. (No surprise, given our like-mindedness on most things!) Although I am tired of buying passion fruit syrup and throwing most of it out. Tried freezing it, but that didn't work well either. Guess it's time to scrounge up a recipe and try it myself!
I shall add the new book to my library asap!
- April 7, 2010 at 7:50 PM
- Sunny&Rummy said...
Nothing at all wrong with the Spievak Zombie. I go back and forth between it and the 1934 Donn Beach version. I have to cheat in both versions and sub Gosling's 151 and a bit of ED dark for the rapidly disappearing LH 151.
In the Spievak, I've used Ron del Barrilito 3 star as well as Bacardi 8 as the PR gold and definitely prefer the Bacardi 8 here, though the Barrilito
- April 7, 2010 at 9:02 PM
- Chris said...
Mr. Berry is on the hot seat with my wife, I've paid more attention to him in the last week than her!
- April 8, 2010 at 6:18 AM
- RumDood said...
The best version of the Zombie is the '34. Jeff said it was his favorite. So there.
Sure, he might have just said that to get the stalking to stop, but that's beside the point.
- April 8, 2010 at 10:55 AM
- Rowen said...
The Grogalizer?! The web app my life has been waiting for!
- April 8, 2010 at 9:51 PM
- Sunny&Rummy said...
I have to confess I jumped right into some of the "new classics" Mr. Berry included in Remixed. At the top of the list of fabulous must-try drinks are Stephen Remsberg's Planter (wow!) and the Death and Co. Plunky Monkey — just in time to put a serious dent in the Bottle of Scarlet Ibis I finally tracked down. Cardamom spice and high proof bourbon in this one make for a really interesting cocktail.
Also really liking Ron Mosessco's Reverb Crash with fresh squeezed grapefruit juice, but this one's more of an old favorite from its long standing as a favorite at Tiki Central.
- April 9, 2010 at 7:56 PM
- Tiare said...
Great post Doc! i wouldn´t be able to say it better! but of course i`ll say something on my blog and mix up something too..There`s a lot of interesting new stuff in the book! I just got it so i haven`t yet had the time to more than browse through it - drooling of course.
Blair..good luck..;-)
- April 10, 2010 at 8:55 AM


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A College Football Site for Winners
not google earth, its virtual earth
this is old, stanford has a new stadium
It looked so real, especially the shot of Willingham on the golf course. If anyone is keeping score at home, Washington has zero commits. USC has 15...Stanford has 10.
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The Artist
Academy Award® Winner
Hollywood 1927. George Valentin (Jean Dujardin) is a silent movie superstar. The advent of the talkies will sound the death knell for his career and see him fall into oblivion. For young extra Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo), it seems the sky's the limit - major movie stardom awaits. THE ARTIST tells the story of their interlinked destinies.
Starring Jean Dujardin, Berenice Bejo, James Cromwell, John Goodman, Malcolm McDowell, Penelope Ann Miller
Directed by Michel Hazanavicius
Running Time - 1:40
Genre - Romance
Opened in Theaters - Wednesday, November 23rd, 2011 (8 years ago)
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©Bridgette WTPOTUS 2012
The Results of Obamacare?
Is he breathing steam?
The better to hear you, my dear…
How Many Barack Obamas are There?
Note the differences in the shape of the ear, the size of the ear lobe and the ear canal. These are two photos of BHO. The scar is also missing on BHO #1, but it is on BHO #2.
Why Does He Have Two Sets of Ears?
Pretty Earrings for Those Fabulous Ears!


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Will Solange Open for Jay Z and Beyonce's On the Run Tour?
It looks like that elevator fight with Jay Z may have made Solange about $8 million richer.
Why? The 27-year-old singer will reportedly be the opening act on Jay Z and Beyonce's On the Run tour, which starts in Miami on June 25. That large sum will apparently be the amount of money she'll earn from the performance trek.
According to reports, the deal was made earlier this week. Considering the three have made countless headlines since the elevator footage emerged and ticket sales have dropped as a result, this is a great PR move.
There's been much speculation about the Knowles sisters being at odds after the fight between Hov and Solange became public news. However, they've since issued a statement about the incident with hopes to "put this behind us and hope everyone else will do the same."
Fans who are fortunate enough to secure a ticket to one of the 16 shows will be treated to a full band, a mini-film, a DJ and all of the bells and whistles that you would expect from two mega stars like Hov and Queen B. Add Solange's pop-inspired soul music into the mix and each show should be more than memorable.
Beyonce & Jay Z's On the Run Tour Dates
June 25: Miami — Sun Life Stadium
June 28: Cincinnatti, OH — Great American Ball Park
July 1: Foxborough, Mass. — Gillette Stadium
July 5: Philadelphia — Citizens Bank Park
July 7: Baltimore — M&T Bank Stadium
July 9: Toronto — Rogers Centre
July 11: East Rutherford, N.J. — Metlife Stadium
July 15: Atlanta — Georgia Dome
July 18: Houston — Minute Maid Park
July 20: New Orleans — Mercedes-Benz Superdome
July 22: Dallas — AT&T Stadium
July 24: Chicago — Soldier Field
July 27: Winnipeg, Canada — Investors Group Field
July 30: Seattle — Safeco Field
Aug. 2: Los Angeles — Rose Bowl
Aug. 5: San Francisco — AT&T Park


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Over his lifetime, the academic scholar and Nobel price winner, Herbert Simon, explored the boundaries of human decision making in dynamic environments and contributed significantly to management literature, economics, cognitive psychology and artificial intelligence.
He questioned the assumptions behind the rational decision making process in which individuals clearly define the problem, generate and evaluate all alternative solutions and select the best approach before implementing it.
He pointed out that people decide rationally only in a limited number of situations. They make choices according to their interpretation of the situation which is often a simplification. Rationality is "bounded", e.g. managers seldom have access to all relevant information and must rely on a 'strategy of satisfying', that is to make the best decision on limited information. They choose the first opportunity that seems satisfactory rather than seek the best solution.
Human rationality is limited:
In addition, organisations, themselves, act as "boundaries". Organisational boundaries allow organisation members to focus and act without the need to (re)think through each action. Information in an organisation is of two kinds:
Simon saw humans as information processing entities wherein uncertainty comes from a lack of information. A fast changing and complex environment creates more complex problems that, in turn, require organisations and its members to expend greater search efforts.
Depending on the circumstances, i.e. the complexity of the problem, the ambiguity of the decision making process and the number of decision makers, decision makers need to adopt a more behavioural decision making process versus the more rational.
Simon's bounded rationality concept debunked the organisation as a rational construct and introduced behavioural thinking as a central part of organisational decision making. Rationality had been the dominant organisational doctrine after the second war. Centralised bureaucracies proved successful in efficiently training and equipping large numbers of soldiers during the war effort. Bounded rationality emphasised generating reasonable alternatives through a fast and creative process rather than selecting one best alternative.
Simon included internal politics of organisations into the decision making equation. Decision makers often have opposing views on how to achieve goals or even how to define them. The less consensus on organisational goals and values, the more ambiguous the process. In an ambiguous process, more information often lead to even more ambiguity by providing additional points of disagreement.
The model moved from the notion of universally applicable management principles since decision makers with access to the same information often reach different conclusions. They choose the first opportunity that seems satisfactory rather than seek the best solution.


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Empty head cabinet. Compatible with all Matchless amplifiers except for the Spitfire, Lightning, Nighthawk and Avalon.
Please indicate color choice in the "Note to seller" section at paypal checkout.
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Norris rejoins rotation as O's option Clevenger
ANAHEIM -- The Orioles added pitcher Bud Norris from the Minor Leagues to make Monday night's start against the Angels and optioned Steve Clevenger back to Triple-A Norfolk to clear a roster spot.
Norris was sent down to Double-A Bowie to stay on a schedule during the All-Star break with Clevenger recalled on July 11 to give the Orioles a third catcher and another left-handed bat off the bench.
Clevenger got just one at-bat during his time with the Orioles and was twice used as a late-game defensive replacement. The Orioles' Opening Day backup catcher, Clevenger was the odd man out when the O's made a trade for Nick Hundley from San Diego in late May.
The Orioles will have to make another roster move on Tuesday to clear a spot for Miguel Gonzalez, who was also optioned to make a start in the Minor Leagues over the break. Manager Buck Showalter said the team was monitoring an injury to a pitcher on Monday, and if that turned up OK, they would likely option a bullpen arm to make room for Gonzalez.


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Can one play maps created for Marathon 1 in Aleph One? I noticed there's a bunch on the Bungie archives
philtron wrote:I think the latest version of Aleph is able to run the original Marathon, so I'd think you could do it with custom map for M1 as well.
ravenshining wrote:To play a 3rd party M1 scenario, first download the files for your platform above. Next, if you are on running A1 on Windows or Linux, you need to encode your scenario files with MacBinary. I don't know whether you need to do this on OS X or not. Then, place your encoded scenario files wherever you want Aleph One to find them. Start up Aleph One using the original files, and finally select your scenario in environment preferences.
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It is currently August 9th, 2020, 2:49 am
Indycars wrote:
There seems to be 3 different styles of electric fuel pumps:
1.) Internally regulated to about 7psi, no separate pressure regulator needed.
2.) Puts out 14 psi and requires a dead head type pressure regulator.
3.) Puts out at least 14 psi and requires a return style pressure regulator.
Can all 3 styles of electric fuel pumps be used with a return style pressure regulator ???
legerwn wrote:working through the links included in this wealth of information on the century performance wed site linked here they recommend two regulators for what they call the best fuel system setup for drag racing. The first regulator is a bypass regulator followed by a dead head regulator to the carb.
This is the first time I've seen this (not sure how I missed it as I have been reading through this thread a bunch) and was wondering your thoughts on this one.
I would think that you would want the fuel flowing through the fuel line as close to the carb as you can,
I figured this is the reason for mounting the regulator as close to the carb as possible and have the regulator after the fuel log.
What would be the purpose of the second regulator?
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Fourth Installment of "Where Things Stand" in Iraq
Dec. 12, 2005 -- -- This is the fourth installment of "Where Things Stand" -- ABC News' effort to take stock of how life has changed for Iraqis since March 2003 when U.S. troops invaded Iraq. We believe this to be the first reliable national poll conducted in Iraq since June 2004.
What We Have Done
As in past years we are trying to help our audience -- and ourselves -- to understand whether Iraq and its people are in better or worse shape than they were prior to the U.S.-led invasion. At a time when "progress in Iraq" has become such an integral part of the political debate in this country (a not always well-informed debate), taking such measurements seems particularly important. Are Iraqis better off now than before the war? Have their lives improved in tangible, quantifiable ways? Are they optimistic about the future? Such questions are what this project is all about.
This is the fourth installment of "Where Things Stand." This time we faced a number of challenges and almost abandoned the project altogether -- because so much of Iraq continues to be a no-go area for our reporters. In the end, we managed to canvass the country in different ways.
ABC News, in partnership with Time magazine, the BBC, Japanese news service NHK and Germany's Der Spiegel newspaper, sponsored a rare and exclusive nationwide poll in Iraq. Conducted by Oxford Research International, the poll of 1,711 Iraqis represents a true nationwide survey of Iraqi opinion. We asked Iraqis about electricity supplies and local security, about the United States, the Iraqi constitution, the upcoming elections, and much more. Well-trained Iraqi fieldworkers interviewed people in 135 different locations around the country. Using the ABC News poll conducted in 2004, we were able to track how opinions have changed over the last 18 months.
We also partnered with the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, an organization that trains local journalists in conflict zones (more about the IWPR below). We interviewed and vetted 12 of their reporters, provided them with digital video cameras, and dispatched them -- in six teams of two -- to points across the north, south and central parts of the country. These teams, together with ABC News correspondents and other Iraqi stringers, visited nearly all of Iraq's main regions and cities, collecting stories and videotape wherever they went. They traveled more than 3,000 miles, through a dozen provinces, and interviewed more than 1,000 Iraqis throughout the country.
The poll and the IWPR teams are complemented by a research effort conducted here in New York -- combining interviews with experts, conversations with groups working on reconstruction in Iraq, and assessments of other surveys and research done in Iraq over the past year. On the eve of Iraq's Dec. 15 election for 230 seats in the National Assembly, this reporting offers a broad sense of how Iraqis around the country feel about their lives, about the future and about the vote itself.
What We Found
This latest report is filled with surprises -- and some fascinating paradoxes.
Iraqis are far more optimistic about their individual circumstances than when we last asked these questions; seven in 10 now say their lives are going well, and two in three believe things will improve in the coming year.
Such optimism covers nearly the entire range of living conditions -- significant improvements are seen in medical care, water quality and even in terms of security. This last finding was perhaps most striking: six in 10 Iraqis now say they feel safe in their neighborhoods. The only real exceptions to this optimism in our quality-of-life metrics involve electricity and the availability of jobs.
The bad news: First, while Iraqis are optimistic about their own future, they are actually pessimistic when it comes to the future of their nation.
Only 44 percent of Iraqis say they believe things are going well in their country; 52 percent said they felt the country was "doing badly." Support for the U.S.-led invasion has dropped: In February 2004, 39 percent of Iraqis told us they believed the invasion was wrong, but today that number stands at 50 percent. Even among optimistic Iraqis it appears the U.S. gets little credit for any improvements in their lives. Fewer than one in five Iraqis believes that U.S. reconstruction efforts have been "effective." Most Iraqis now say they "disapprove strongly" of how the U.S. has operated in Iraq. Not surprisingly, the percentage of Iraqis today who oppose the U.S. presence has spiked -- from 51 percent to 65 percent.
The second caveat involves a sectarian divide that has become a chasm.
Virtually all signs of optimism vanish when one is interviewing Iraq's Sunni Muslims. There's more on this in the Local Government section of the report; suffice for now to cite a pair of poll results. While 54 percent of Shia Muslims believe the country is in better shape than it was before the war, only 7 percent of Sunnis believe the same. Optimism about security -- 80 percent of Shias and 94 percent of Kurds say they feel safer -- is absent among Sunnis. Only 11 percent of Iraq's Sunni Muslims say they feel safer than they did under Saddam.
Overall, there is a Rorshach-test quality to all this. One could easily sift through the research and field reporting and conclude that Iraq is in danger of collapse; one could almost as easily glean from the same data that there is great cause for optimism.
At the heart of the "collapse" scenario is a litany of dashed hopes. Many Iraqis cannot understand why -- two-and-a-half years after the Americans arrived -- electricity and sewage are not more reliable, why more reconstruction projects have not reached their neighborhoods, why corruption remains so prevalent and why their local (and in many cases democratically elected) officials have not changed things for the better.
Yet there are ample reasons for optimism: The burgeoning commerce that now touches nearly all corners of the country; an economy growing, thanks in part to the high price of oil; per-capita income up 60 percent, to $263 per month; improvements in health care and education; and the widely held belief that next week's elections will make a positive difference. Seventy-six percent of Iraqis told us they were "confident" the elections would produce a "stable government" -- and despite the sectarian divisions, few Iraqis express concern about civil war.
As far as security goes, there is one more paradox. On the one hand, the proliferation of militia in some cities and towns has unnerved people, and it may prove destabilizing in the long term. On the other, in some places we found people crediting these same guards and gunmen with having improved the safety of their communities.
Above all, we were struck -- as we have been in previous installments of this series -- by the stoicism and faith of the Iraqi people. Time and again, Iraqis listed their troubles and itemized their complaints only to finish with bold expressions of hope. We met a young man in a Baghdad park named Murtada Mohammed. After telling us how poor services were in his neighborhood, how hard it was to afford goods and then how often he feels fear in his daily life, he finished this way: "Tomorrow will be better -- I know it."
Our poll suggests that there are a great many Iraqis -- across the country, and from many walks of life -- who are like Murtada Mohammed.
The Institute for War and Peace Reporting
The Institute for War and Peace Reporting is an international media development charity, based in London and Washington. It aims to strengthen local journalism in crisis-ridden countries by training reporters to be independent journalists. It often collaborates with international and regional media to transfer skills and experience.
The 12 reporters who worked with ABC News volunteered for the project. ABC News paid them a salary and expenses during the reporting period.
The assessments below were derived from a combination of data -- the poll, the IWPR and other reporting, ABC News' own reporting, and the research gathered over the last several months.
Questions were framed with pre-invasion Iraq (i.e., before March 2003) as the baseline. The region described as "central" corresponds roughly to Baghdad and the so-called "Sunni Triangle."
Where Things Stand - Assessments
North: Better
Central: Worse
South: Better
Security remains far and away the primary concern for Iraqis; 57 percent say it's what matters most. (The next closest category -- "getting the U.S. out of Iraq" -- draws just 10 percent.) Anecdotally, we continue to hear nightmarish stories about the lack of security -- and important ways in which this problem permeated so many walks of life. And yet the overall numbers -- in the north and south in particular -- suggest that the situation has actually improved.
Sixty-one percent of Iraqis now say they feel security is better than it was before the war; that represents a 12 percent increase since we last asked, and a fairly startling counterweight to the prevalent view in the press. Having said that, these numbers are driven almost entirely by Shiites and Kurds who were treated so brutally under Saddam Hussein. By contrast, among Iraq's Sunnis -- for whom "security" was almost ironclad under Saddam -- a whopping 90 percent report their security is worse today. In 2005, the majority of insurgent attacks have been concentrated in four of Iraq's 18 provinces, which are home to roughly 45 percent of the country's population: Ninevah, Al Anbar, Baghdad and Salah ah Din. Attacks have focused primarily on members of the Iraqi Security Forces, members of the Multinational Forces, Iraqi civilians and government officials -- as well as foreign diplomatic and media personnel.
Iraqis who do not feel safe tell us they take a variety of measures to protect themselves. Sixty-seven percent say they avoid U.S. forces; one in two stays clear of checkpoints if possible; and 43 percent are careful about what they say in public. Again, these are figures for Iraqis who say they feel less safe than before.
The impact of security shortfalls remains significant. Violence has hampered reconstruction, in western and central Iraq in particular, and it has meant that badly needed funds for electricity, clean water, education and salaries for health care professionals are spent instead on security. In one stunning measure of "Where Things Stand" in Iraq we found that as of October 2005, approximately $5 billion of the $18.4 billion appropriated by the U.S. Congress for reconstruction in Iraq had been diverted to security needs.
Many parents have become more afraid to allow their children, girls in particular, to attend school, and some Iraqis are too frightened even to visit the doctor when sick.
As mentioned briefly in the introduction, a strange calm pervades some cities where local militias have seized power. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Karbala, a major city in southern Iraq where such militia appear to have infiltrated the police and security forces. It's a development that outsiders, and some locals, view with fear and dismay -- how, after all, can the true authorities hold power and garner respect when bands of armed men outside the government set up checkpoints and rule the streets? Yet many locals -- in Karbala at least -- report that these militias have improved security. An "iron hand" may be at work, and it may be a fleeting calm, but for the moment it is noticed and appreciated.
A final note: The reach of the insurgency was felt by one of our IWPR reporters. While Mustafa Magid Al Dory was filming, he received word that his father, a mechanic, had been shot to death as he drove home. ABC News producer Bruno Roeber reports that Mustafa finished his work, including a visit to the ABC Baghdad bureau to brief the staff on his own reporting. He was distraught but determined -- and as Bruno put it, Mustafa seemed to "exemplify the stoicism of so many Iraqis." Just as the police recruits continue to line up for work in places that have been targeted repeatedly, Mustafa felt -- to use an overused cliché -- that life must go on.
The hope of course is that the political process, which has taken dramatic steps forward in the last year, ultimately will marginalize the insurgents, and that the continued training of Iraqi soldiers and police officers will ultimately yield a force that can effectively combat the foreign jihadists. Optimists note that the insurgents have yet to derail the political process.
Facts & Figures:
Total Iraqi Forces:
December 2003: 162,000 security-related officers
Current: 235,489 security-related officers
Goal: 330,810 security-related officers
Strength of Insurgency Nationwide (Estimate)
November 2003: 5,000
January 2005: 18,000
October 2005: 15,000 to 20,000
Source: Brookings Institution, Iraq Index
Click here for more facts on Iraq by the Brookings Institution.
Iraqi Police and Military Killed:
Jan.-Nov. 2005: 2,209
2003-2005: 1,300
Sources: Iraqi Interior Ministry, Iraq Coalition Casualty Count
Click here for more on Iraqi casualties.
Iraqi Civilians Killed: March 2003 to November 2005:
Estimates range from 10,183 to 30,163 Sources: Iraq Body Count; Brookings Institution, Iraq
Click here for more on the Iraq body count.
2) AVAILABILITY of JOBS
North: Better
Central: Worse
South: Same or Worse
This category divides across both sectarian and geographic lines: In central Iraq, with higher percentages of Sunnis, Iraqis say it has become more difficult to find work. There is optimism in the south and still more in the north, where -- as you will see in the Availability of Goods section -- there has been a significant increase in commerce. Overall, however, only 38 percent of Iraqis say that it is easier to find work today than it was before the U.S.-led invasion.
Unemployment overall is difficult to gauge. There is a growing "informal economy," and many Iraqis have taken second jobs. A U.N. survey published in May 2005 put unemployment at 18.4 percent; this is almost certainly a low-end figure. Using a combination of American and Iraqi official data, the Brookings Institution, a generally reliable source for facts and figures about Iraq, suggests nationwide unemployment currently hovers between 27 percent and 40 percent. As a Karbala student told us, "unemployment is another disease" affecting the nation. (It can be a dangerous disease -- American and Iraqi experts report that the unemployed are increasingly being recruited by insurgents, who offer as little as $50 to participate in an attack.)
The work rolls remain decimated because of the purging of the old army and much of the old Baathist apparatus. Whatever the political benefits or costs of that much-debated policy, there is no question that it put a great many Iraqi men out of work. Further, the Iraqi government no longer finds it practical or feasible to employ the sprawling work force that existed during the rule of Saddam Hussein.
The good news here is that per capita income continues to rise, even factoring in the unemployed. As mentioned earlier, our poll finds average monthly income at $263, up roughly 60 percent from February 2004. Essentially, if you have a job in Iraq today, chances are you are getting paid a lot more than you were before the war. Salaries and incentives for government workers, teachers, health care workers and others have continued to rise. Teachers and doctors in particular have remarked on this -- and, not surprisingly, students and patients have noticed commensurate improvements in the quality of teaching and health care.
It is also worth noting that there are all sorts of jobs in Iraq today that simply did not exist before the overthrow of Saddam. The proliferation of media is an obvious example: there are no fewer than 10 commercial television stations, 50 radio stations and 100 independent newspapers and magazines now up and running. Obviously this is more important as an indicator of free speech -- but it also opens up a small labor force that did not exist before. The same is true for theaters and production companies hiring actors and actresses, and paying them well. To take one small example: salaries for actors and actresses in television have increased from U.S. $200 for a 30-episode series to nearly $800.
A final note: efforts are being made by the Iraqi government to lure as many as 5,000 expatriate Iraqis back home to fill vacancies in the country's colleges and universities. Thousands of teaching professionals are believed to have fled Iraq during Saddam's rule, and thousands more left after the U.S-led invasion. Here again, salary increases are in play; teachers who might have earned $50 monthly during Saddam's rule are being offered $500 to $700 a month now.
Facts and Figures
Nationwide Unemployment
September 2005: 27 percent-40 percent
Source: Brookings Institution, Iraq Index.
Iraq GDP: (U.S. $ billions) 2002: 18.4
2003: 12.6
2004: 25.5 (Estimated)
2005: 29.3 (Projection)
North: Same or Worse
Central: Worse
South: Same or Worse
Electricity has, from the beginning, been one of the most tangible and visible ways to assess quality of life in Iraq. By many measures, the availability of electricity has improved in Iraq over the past year -- though reliability remains a problem, and throughout the country we continue to hear the complaint: How can the United States of America not manage to fix this problem?
Many people still spend entire evenings with no electricity. Entrepreneurial-minded Iraqis have bought generators and leased power to their neighborhoods -- only to incur the wrath of neighbors when the generators malfunction. Our team in South Baghdad met Saad Nima Lafta, who has bought a generator -- and a rifle for protection. And in a country where electricity comes at such a premium, so too does something as seemingly simple as ice. Many Iraqis have been using five-pound blocks of ice to help cool perishables such as milk and meat. Grocers have also begun using blocks of ice when the electricity goes out. The cost of ice has increased steadily over the past few years.
The influx of electrical appliances -- satellite dishes and televisions, air conditioners and refrigerators -- has boosted demand exponentially. U.S. and Iraqi officials say that demand is simply growing much more rapidly than electricity can be generated. We are mindful that when people report that their availability of electricity is "worse," this may well reflect the fact that their neighborhood is newly stocked with consumer goods.
According to the United Nations, Baghdad's 6.5 million residents enjoyed an almost continuous supply of electricity prior to the war. Pre-war Baghdad, the seat of Saddam's power, typically received ample electricity during the day because Saddam siphoned electricity away from other regions to use in the capital. Today, power is more evenly distributed, to the chagrin of Baghdad residents in particular.
While rural areas and the Kurdish north are getting more power than ever, central Sunni areas have seen marked declines in power availability due to this reallocation. In July 2005, Iraqi Planning Minister Barham Salih said he expected that every Iraq home and business would have restored electricity by the end of 2005. By all accounts, reaching this goal appears far off. As of late August 2005, Baghdad residents were only receiving two hours of power, followed by four hours of no power, per day, while on average Iraqis across the country had power only 50 percent of the day. Again, available statistics vary.
Insecurity has hurt the electricity grid. Since June 2005, insurgent attacks have blacked out Iraq's electrical grid twice. A U.S. Department of Defense report to Congress in October 2005 blamed low electricity supplies on "terrorist attacks, substandard operations and maintenance practices, increased and unchecked consumer demand, and an infrastructure that has been deteriorating for years."
A final note: Iraq's Ministry of Electricity has been working with neighboring countries to improve the productivity and reliability of its services. For example, the German company Siemens and Syria's Ministry of Electricity have begun installing three power plants in Syria as part of a new electric grid project to serve Iraq. These plants are expected to be operating in 2006.
Facts & Figures: Average Amount of Electricity Generated (Megawatts):
Pre-War (Estimates):
Nationwide: 3,958
Baghdad: 2,500
January 2005:
Nationwide: 3,289
Baghdad: 985
September 2005:
Nationwide: 4,247
Baghdad: NA (last available April 2005: 854)
Source: Brookings Institution, Iraq Index.
Oil Production:
Crude production (millions of barrels/day)
Pre-War: 2.5
September 2005: 2.10
Crude export (millions of barrels/day)
Pre-War: 1.7-2.5
September 2005: 1.38
North: Better
Central: Worse
South: Same or Worse
We said it last year, but it's worth repeating: Sewage treatment and clean water matter. It may seem obvious -- but of course those of us who take such things for granted may need a reminder of just how vital these quality-of-life indicators are for Iraqis.
We continue to find anecdotal horror stories of "sewage and garbage everywhere," as one resident in Baghdad's Al-Ra'ay district put it. There are children with stomach ailments and skin diseases caused by fouled water in Al Khahlaa, in the south; children at the Alshid Abdul Wahid Elementary School who cannot drink the water or use the bathrooms; and, most poignant of all, the scene our reporters found at a hospital in Baghdad's Sadr City. Here an ambulance had to plow through sewage on its way in and out, and the hospital staff discovered sewage coursing through hospital rooms, and then faced the terrible choice of whether to clean those rooms slowly and inefficiently, or to pump the sewage directly to the city streets. Ultimately hospital administrators and doctors explained their plight to people in the neighborhood; those neighbors understood, and accepted the decision to pump the filth out -- though that meant that sewage soon coursed along their streets. In many parts of the country people have resorted to buying bottled water -- or even Pepsi -- for their children.
And yet -- despite security conditions that have stalled projects and drastically increased costs, there has been progress during the past year in terms of water and sanitation infrastructure. Available potable water has increased since 2003 by 1.58 million cubic meters per day as a result of U.S.-funded projects. Additionally, Iraqi sewage treatment capacity has increased since 2003 by approximately 890,000 cubic meters per day, providing as many as 3.2 million Iraqis with a standard level of service because of U.S.-funded sanitary sewage projects.
The main station that pumps water to Baghdad has been attacked twice in recent months; contractors must now deal with saboteurs and thieves who have shot or drilled holes into the country's water or sewage pipelines. As a result, water pressure drops, and supplies are contaminated -- leading to much more work, and of course more expenditures. By now it is clear that the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority's April 2004 objective of providing potable water to 90 percent of Iraq's population was unrealistic -- U.S. officials have acknowledged as much.
Final note: There has been progress in southernmost Iraq, with the restoration of approximately 40 percent of Iraq's fabled marshlands. The marshlands were drained by Saddam Hussein's regime to punish those who supported the 1991 Shiite rebellion. There had been approximately 3,600 square miles of marshes here; by 2002 only 304 square miles remained. Today, there are 1,400 square miles of marshland. As a result of the restoration and newly installed water treatment and sanitation equipment, nearly 20,000 Iraqi "Marsh Arabs" now have access to clean water.
Facts & Figures:
Percentage of Sewage Treated
August 2003: 25 percent
August 2004: 35 percent
August 2005: 50 percent
Source: Brookings Institution, Iraq Index.
Percentage of Homes Connected to Sewer System
Overall: 37 percent
Baghdad: 80 percent
(<10 percent outside of Baghdad)
Source: Brookings Institution, Iraq Index.
North: Better
Central: Better
South: Better
This remains an almost unqualified success story. In all three parts of the country, large majorities of Iraqis told us they believed education had improved -- both in terms of the schools themselves and the quality of teaching.
Today 74 percent of Iraqis say that schools have improved since Saddam Hussein's time; this appears in part a reflection of their happiness that Saddam himself no longer dominates the texts. But teachers are also better paid, and many schools have been spruced up with the help of reconstruction funds.
A visit to a Diwaniyah school was typical: our reporters found praise for teachers and the supply of books, but also criticism because computers and other technical upgrades had been promised and as yet not materialized. The headmaster, Muthanna Abu Teeba, told us salaries had been raised across the board, and that faculty morale had risen -- then complained about mold in classrooms and the absence of computers.
Two problems persist, particularly in central Iraq. First, the deteriorating security situation has driven some parents to keep their children, particularly young girls, at home for fear of attack. Second, thousands of skilled teachers and university professors fled the country during Saddam's regime, and shortly after the U.S.-led invasion, also due to security concerns. As previously noted, significant efforts have been made by the Iraqi government to combat this exodus and lure qualified teachers back to their classrooms. The government has offered as much as $700 monthly to teachers who last earned roughly $50 a month.
USAID has had a significant impact in this area, having helped print and distribute more than 8 million math and science textbooks to Iraqi schoolchildren since 2003, while training nearly 52,000 secondary school teachers and administrators. USAID has also been at the forefront of distributing hundreds of thousands of desks, cabinets, chalkboards and more than 3 million school kits to Iraqi schools across the country. (It is sad but worth noting how little credit the U.S. receives for these efforts. It may be, as ABC producer Bruno Roeber suggests, that Iraqis are often afraid to give public credit to the Americans.)
As for Iraq's universities, they suffered "heavy looting" following the U.S.-led invasion, and according to Salah Adhab, a senior official in the Ministry of Higher Education, many of these facilities have yet to recover. According to a United Nations study, 50 university teachers have been killed and nearly 84 percent of higher education establishments had been "destroyed, damaged and robbed" since the end of the war.
Facts & Figures:
North: 56 percent
Central: 60 percent
South: 63 percent
Baghdad: 78 percent
Males: 74 percent
Females: 56 percent
Source: UNDP, Iraq Living Conditions Survey, published May 2005
Highest Education Level Completed
North: 7 percent higher; 30 percent elementary, 24 percent never attended school
Central: 9 percent higher; 31 percent elementary, 22 percent never attended school
South: 10 percent higher; 30 percent elementary, 24 percent never attended school
Baghdad: 16 percent higher; 27 percent elementary, 13 percent never attended school
Source: UNDP, Iraq Living Conditions Survey, published in May 2005.
North: Better
Central: Same or Worse
South: Same or Better
This remains a tough area in which to gauge progress. Without question there is exponentially more money spent today on health care than there was during the final years of Saddam's rule. Whether this money is being efficiently spent or fairly distributed is up for debate.
While health care may be "available" to all Iraqis, hospitals throughout the country remain in need of renovations and repair, and they often operate without the most basic medicines, or with ill-functioning equipment. Like Iraqi households, hospitals and health centers are affected by the degraded water and sanitation systems, and the on-again, off-again supply of electricity.
In central Iraq, complaints about health care were common. According to Dr. Ayad Abdul Kadhem of Sadr Hospital, "Almost anything is better than being a doctor in Iraq right now. The situation is so difficult in the medical field that many of us want to quit." The head of the ER at Baghdad's Yarmouk Hospital spoke passionately to us about the psychological toll he and his colleagues have felt -- and scores of doctors have, in fact, left Iraq in the past few years. The mass exodus of Iraqi doctors has had a devastating effect on the health care system in Iraq.
Still, by 62 percent to 36 percent, Iraqis told us that the availability of health care was "good." We heard positive reports from patients at Al Nasiriyah General Hospital in Basra -- compliments for doctors who, like so many Iraqi teachers, have been the beneficiaries of salary upgrades in the last two years.
In efforts to improve the health care system and to bring back many of Iraq's doctors living abroad, salaries for doctors have been increased dramatically, from $20 a month before the war to more than $200 a month, according to Iraqi Deputy Minister of Health.
Final note: USAID has provided supplemental doses of Vitamin A to more than 600,000 children under 2 and 1.5 million lactating mothers since the war began. In addition, USAID has helped provide skills-training sessions to approximately 2,500 primary health care professionals and 700 physicians.
North: Better
Central: Same or Better
South: Better
The proliferation of goods in Iraq has become something of an explosion.
Looser borders, the lifting of sanctions and more disposable income have made new products and foods available to more Iraqis since the war began. The 27 percent to 40 percent of Iraqis who remain unemployed have of course suffered in terms of their purchasing power. Even for the most basic foods, costs have doubled since the fall of Saddam.
And yet Iraqis as a whole are on something of a spending spree. Ownership is up by 10 percent for cars; up by 14 percent for air conditioners; up by 18 percent for bicycles; and 62 percent of Iraqis now say they have mobile phones. (Less than two years ago the figure was 6 percent.) Bananas and soft drinks, American spaghetti sauce and European cheeses -- all items that were extremely difficult to come by during Saddam's regime due to sanctions and government mismanagement -- are widely available today.
According to an Iraqi customs official at the Iran-Iraq border crossing of Zurbatia, more than $80 million worth of non-oil goods passed through his checkpoint in 2004. Overall, during the first 10 months of 2005, nearly $650 million worth of goods was exported from Iran to Iraq; Iran's Commerce Ministry estimates that figure could top $1 billion in the next year, thanks to the sale of goods ranging from fruits and vegetables to electrical appliances and building materials.
A final note: housing prices in Baghdad have nearly quadrupled since the Saddam era. In the North, ABC's Jim Sciutto discovered a mini-boom in housing with units selling for as much as $200,000. Experts believe this rush for real estate was due initially to the anticipated return of Iraqi exiles once Saddam was deposed. Elections in January 2005 and the new interim government, however, seem to have increased prices further.
North: Better
Central: Worse
South: Better
It is worth noting that when we last published this report, 11 months ago, there had been no elections in Iraq, and no constitutional referendum. Iraqis and the outside world were girding for the possibility of widespread and disruptive violence at the polls.
Today, faith in the electoral process runs high (with the exception of the disaffected Sunnis) and confidence in public institutions has risen. This is particularly true for the Iraqi Army -- up from 39 percent to 67 percent, and the police -- up from 45 percent to 69 percent. A smaller majority say they are confident in their local and national leaders -- but as we said at the outset, seven in 10 Iraqis believe the Dec. 15 elections will improve their lot. Another interesting development: basic interest in politics has soared. The percentage of Iraqis reporting such an interest has gone from 39 (November 2003) to 69 today. Asked what sort of government they wish for, 57 percent of Iraqis told us they would prefer a democratic state; 26 percent answered "strong leader"; only 14 percent expressed a preference for an Islamic state.
The geographic division used in this report is perhaps least relevant here. While a slim majority nationwide (51 percent) approve of their local government, sectarian differences are obvious. Iraq's Shiites and Kurds -- two populations widely persecuted under Saddam Hussein -- are not surprisingly filled with hope and high expectations for the country's current and future political leaders. By large margins, Shiites and Kurds approve of the recently adopted constitution and are confident that the elections will bring positive change. They also give the young Iraqi government generally good marks. The contrast among Sunnis is stark: Only 27 percent approve of the constitution; 48 percent say they are confident regarding the elections; and only 12 percent believe the government has done a good job.
Few Iraqis say they believe the country is on a course for civil war. Yet these sectarian differences, and the disaffection of the Sunnis generally, would seem to present one of the greatest challenges facing Iraq.
Our poll found considerable support for women's rights. Ninety-nine percent believe women can be doctors; 80 percent say they can serve in public office; and 78 percent say women should be allowed to "instruct men in their work!"
Al-Mahaba radio station -- Iraq's first independent woman's radio station – was launched in 2005.
Women's softball is a brand-new phenomenon -- we're not sure how widespread! -- since the Americans arrived.
Source: Ismael Khalil Ismael, founder and chairman of the Iraq Baseball Union
DRUG USE: Anecdotal reports of heavier use -- sparked by relaxed enforcement and the wish to escape the trauma of daily violence. n.b.: one gram of heroin cost $415 before the invasion; now it's only $20 to $25
INCREASE IN MARRIAGES: Weddings are on the rise since the fall of Saddam Hussein. This is likely due to a rise in government salaries and an end to compulsory military service, freeing more young men for marriage. It may also be reflective of newfound optimism.
There is no question that Iraq stands at a turning point. So many of the questions raised in this report could turn one way or another based on how next week's election proceeds -- less in terms of who wins and loses, but more in terms of whether it is conducted peacefully, and with the approval of a solid majority of the Iraqi people.
Clearly, there are signs of optimism within the report; equally clear, Iraqis are impatient with the American presence and eager to take the reins of their new nation. That sentiment -- expressed in one way or another by Sunni, Kurd and Shia alike -- could well result in more public pressure in the U.S. to bring American forces home, or at least draw the numbers down.


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Did Tom Brady Just Curse at the NFL Officials?
New England Patriots' star quarterback Tom Brady is often seen as the consummate professional, complete with Most Valuable Player awards, Super Bowl rings and a series of conquests that make George Clooney jealous. However, after officials reviewed his 4-yard, game-tying touchdown run late in the third quarter of the Patriots' 52-28 rout of the Buffalo Bills Sunday, Brady may have turned into the league's Most Vulgar Player.
Did Tom Brady curse the returning NFL officials that every football fan in America yearned for this week? Well, we're not expert lip readers, but you can bet that Brady didn't just say 'Forget you, Stitches!' at least not by the reaction of Patriots' wide receiver Wes Welker.


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The Saurus Vs. Madness Rap Battle Round. 2 [Gind Time]
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Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Seattle, WA
Casino cash: $8541
It's not like UT can't aford to fly to China to play their games and it's also not like games at WVU, ISU, KSU, KU are close anyways. They're already making long trips in conference. I'm not saying they're going to do it, but if they were willing to go to the pac and log all those miles, they'll probably be willing to take the same deal the ACC gave ND IMO.
I doubt the Pac, SEC or Big Ten will give them the ACC special though.
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Published on: May 06, 2013 | Written by: Clay Travis
On Thursday the SEC and ESPN officially unveiled the newest big moneymaker in college athletics, a 24/7 SEC Network.
The biggest news from the event was that the network will carry 45 football games a year, a daily tripleheader. Of course, OKTC readers have known that was likely for over a year now.
But what other news came out of the event? And what should SEC fans want and need to know about the SEC Network going forward?
Here are 15 thoughts that basically sum up everything you need to know about the SEC Network.
1. Why is this network a gamechanger?
Isn't this just the Big Ten Network redone?
The answer is no.
ESPN and the SEC believe that the SEC's Network is the most valuable regional sports network in the country. Now, they're calling the SEC Network a national network and they want to be in the same 75 million homes as ESPNU, but the real money for this venture will pour in from the roughly 27-30 million cable and satellite subscribers in the 11 state SEC footprint. In these 11 states the SEC and ESPN believe that the SEC teams are the single most popular teams in Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina.
That is, there is no more popular team -- and conference -- across the sweep of these states.
The state of Texas is football crazy and the amount of attention that the SEC brand has already received in the Lone Star State is staggering to executives.
Missouri's Tigers have a fervent fan base that is enthralled with the SEC, enough to ensure that the SEC Network is in all homes in the region.
Is there a single large state where the Big Ten team is the top draw in the state? I don't think so. Clearly, Nebraska and Iowa are the top teams in their states, but those states are the two smallest in the Big Ten footprint. (Ohio and Indiana are probably the top arguments for big states, but Indiana football is worthless. So Ohio State is really the only argument. Are the Buckeyes the most valuable team in the state of Ohio? Maybe.)
This matters because regional sports networks are presently receiving up to $3.50 per monthly subscriber in many regions of the country. Frequently those regional sports networks are not featuring the most popular teams in the region. The SEC Network will be playing the most popular teams in the vast majority of its 11 state footprint.
Ultimately, this network will be worth billions of dollars.
What we don't know right now, and ESPN and the SEC are still holding it as a closely guarded secret, is what subscriber fees the network is targeting for launch. In essence, what did AT&T UVerse, the first cable operator to agree to carry the network, actually pay ESPN for the carriage fees?
The guess here is that the SEC Network will initially start off in the range of a $1 a month in the 11 state footprint.
At $1 a month the SEC Network would be worth in the neighborhood of $360 million a year.
At $2 a month the SEC Network's worth $720 million a year.
At $3 a month the SEC Network's worth over a billion a year.
That's just in the 11 state SEC footprint. (The state of North Carolina will also be a "shadow" footprint. Why? The network is located in Charlotte and based on television ratings there is a substantial SEC fan base in Charlotte. Expect North Carolina to be an interesting cost battleground, somewhere below the 11 state cost, but somewhere well above what, say, the network will cost in California).
Assume that eventually the SEC Network will be in 75 million homes like ESPNU. That additional revenue from outside the SEC footprint will be substantial. So will the advertising revenue, which we'll discuss in greater detail below.
2. What will the programming be like?
This is the biggest question, will the SEC Network be primarily an advertisement/propaganda piece for the SEC or will it be focused on entertainment and ratings?
That's a big decision that the conference will have to make in conjunction with ESPN.
I know that many at ESPN and the SEC consider the Big Ten Network to be terribly boring. The idea is to be much more entertaining than the Big Ten's Network. But how much more entertaining? And how much freedom will the talent on the network have? If I was in charge of the network, I'd obviously push the envelope more towards entertainment than a conference advertisement, but will that argument win the day?
Essentially, how much do ratings matter?
The 45 football games and men's basketball games are by far the most important asset, but being entertaining is probably the second most important aspect of the station.
Will people watch for anything other than the games? Will there be any must-see programming? That depends on the content decisions.
3. Who owns the SEC Network and how will the money be distributed?
ESPN owns 100% of the network, but the SEC owns 100% of the content. Today the Sports Business Journal reported that all profits will be split 50/50.
I believe the SEC's deal with ESPN is structured to give the conference a guaranteed payment up until the point where the SEC Network begins to throw off substantial sums of money. Given that the SEC typically announces TV money each year at the spring meetings in Destin, it seems unlikely that the true value of this deal will be known for some time. That's because the SEC Network won't launch until August of 2014. Some SEC Network money will exist in 2014, but only a partial year's revenue.
That revenue won't be announced until May of 2015. But it won't be until May of 2016 that the true value of the SEC Network will start to reveal itself.
So stay tuned.
4. What about CBS's role in the SEC's television package?
CBS will have the first pick rights to each week's games for the next decade and CBS will also continue to have the SEC Championship game until 2023-24.
Right now CBS has the best damn deal in all of televised sports.
Assuming that eventually CBS will pay around $70 million a year -- up from $55 million pre-expansion -- CBS is paying just $5 million per each of the 14 games it carries.
This is highway robbery.
The SEC title game alone is probably worth $80 million or more by itself in an open market auction. (Put it this way, would you rather have the Sugar Bowl, Rose Bowl, or the SEC title game? ESPN is now paying the Rose Bowl $80 million a year).
So ESPN pays the Rose Bowl more for a single game than CBS pays for 14 SEC games, including the SEC title game.
In ten years the SEC will take the first round weekly pick and the SEC title game back to market and make hundreds of millions more. In the meantime, CBS has the best deal in all of televised sports.
By far.
5. Who decides the content?
There's a content board with four members from the SEC and four members from ESPN.
Commissioner Slive told me there was a substantial negotiating issue over who breaks the tie votes. (My guess is it's the SEC, but that's just a guess). The four members at ESPN and the four members from the SEC have not yet been decided, but Slive told me that he would certainly be one of the SEC's members. Assume that ESPN's Justin Connolly will be one member as well. The other members remain to be determined.
The content board will be the individuals who actually make decisions about what programming the network carries. That is, it's these individuals who will ultimately decide whether the network tends more towards a glossy advertisement or actual entertainement.
6. What issues with distribution might arise?
Ah, now this will be interesting.
We're 16 months from launch and the SEC already has a website up for fans to demand their cable or satellite companies carry the network.
The big question is this: will any cable or satellite companies fight ESPN and the SEC on carrying the network as part of the basic tier in the SEC's 11 state footprint?
ESPN is an expert in the dark arts of distribution. If a cable company balks at carrying the network in the SEC footprint, guess which teams will appear on the SEC Network more frequently? You guessed it, the teams in that cable company's viewing area. Hell hath no fury like an SEC fan not able to see his favorite team play.
Put simply, would I want to be a cable company refusing to carry the SEC Network inside the SEC?
Ask Auburn's trees how rational SEC fans are when it comes to their favorite teams.
But this could be a battle.
Especially with fractious companies like Time Warner, which has a substantial footprint in the state of Florida. Time Warner has been willing to fight the NFL Network and MSG and other sports ventures over payments. Could Time Warner be willing to fight the SEC as well?
We'll see.
Fortunately though the SEC's 11 state footprint is mostly Comcast and Cox Cable. With AT&T Uverse already signed up, if the SEC can announce a deal with either DirecTV or Dish Network, the conference would have everyone in the 11 state footprint covered.
Stay tuned for carriage battles.
But I think ESPN and the SEC will win this war.
7. This is not the Longhorn Network.
The much ballyhooed Longhorn Network has turned into an ESPN albatross.
The reason?
LHN has just two football games a year.
The SEC Network will have 45.
No one really wants the Longhorn Network. Hell, even Texas fans don't care that much about having access to it.
Plus, even with Texas's substantial fan base, it's hard to get lots of anger stirred up.
The SEC has 14 rabid fan bases that will demand to see these games. So eliminate all thoughts of the difficulty ESPN has had getting the LHN distributed.
These are not the same issues at all.
8. How good will the games be on the SEC Network?
They'll be good.
In fact, I think three or four times in 2014 the SEC will put the second best game on the SEC Network in primetime.
For the same reason ESPN put Duke and North Carolina basketball on ESPN2 back in the day, to make the station a must-have product.
When you look at weekly SEC schedules, there is a tremendous strength some weeks, the second and third games are nearly as good as the CBS telecast. ESPN will have the rights to all SEC football games with the exception of that first round pick for CBS. ESPN and the SEC will also be aware of the criticism that is sure to be levied, that the SEC Network's games won't be as attractive as the ones on CBS, ESPN, and ESPN2.
Look for that argument to give up the ghost early.
There will be really big games played on the SEC Network in its first year to make the channel a must-have for college football fans.
9. There will be no more pay-per-view football games in the SEC.
This is a big deal that I think should have been emphasized more at the official announcement on Thursday.
When I talked to Commissioner Slive after the event, he said I was the only person who asked him about this.
Thank my dad.
And countless other dads across the SEC who pitched complete fits over being forced to pay $40 or $50 on pay-per-view for the worst football game of the year. Up until now every SEC school retained one football game to put on pay-per-view themselves. These broadcasts were beyond awful. Now those games will probably all air on the SEC Network.
But the major point here is that SEC fans will now get all of these games for less than they were paying for a single pay-per-view game featuring their favorite team.
As a consumer that's a hell of a deal, one that probably should be trumpeted more than it has been so far.
The SEC Network will actually save fans money.
10. ESPN will handle all ad sales.
I have no clue what ad sales will be worth on this network, but it should be a pretty substantial amount when you consider the total amount of ad inventory that ESPN will have on a 24/7 network. According to Forbes ESPN recently did $3.3 billion in ad sales. That compares with around $6 billion in overall subscription revenue. So let's say that's a fair approximation of ad sales across the company's networks, that 33% of overall revenue is ad sales.
Then we'd just need to figure out the revenue that the SEC Network will produce to come up with a rough ad sales estimate.
Let's start with our conservative figure and say that once the network gets rolling, say in 2015, it will produce around $360 million in total nation-wide subscription fees.
That would mean the advertising revenue would kick in an additional $120 million.
That number would presumably grow as the subscription revenue grew.
So don't overlook the ad sales component to the new network.
11. How will the station handle bad news and how will ESPN handle its conflicts and the perception of SEC-bias?
This is the most difficult angle for ESPN to manage.
Bad news about the SEC will harm its bottom line. Clearly there won't be an Outside the Lines: SEC Network Edition, where ESPN attempts to prove wrongdoing and uncover scandal in the conference, but how will bad news be managed. Will there be much journalistic independence at ESPN.
What's more, if the SEC had its own version of Penn State, how would the network cover it?
And how does ESPN balance its reporting independence while it has hundreds of millions of yearly reasons to not hurt the SEC brand?
Plus, ESPN now runs the playoff. Just wait for the hue and cry to start up when multiple SEC teams are part of the debate for who advances to the playoff. Fans of rival conferences will swear that ESPN's in the tank for the SEC since the SEC's success runs directly to the ESPN bottom line.
This will be the biggest challenge for ESPN, managing this conflict, which will become a unique conflict for the network.
Never before has ESPN actually partnered directly with a league.
That presents a mount of business opportunities -- as you can see from the revenue figures -- but it also presents a bunch of challenges as well.
12. The station will be located in Charlotte.
Yes, that's outside of the SEC's present footprint.
Note, I said present footprint.
I still believe that eventually there will be SEC teams in the states of North Carolina and Virginia.
The SEC Network will help to make that a reality.
It's a question of when, not if.
13. Can you put big out-of-conference games on the SEC Network?
This is a fascinating question from a national distribution platform angle.
Can you put, say, Florida State at Florida or Clemson at South Carolina or Oklahoma at Tennessee on the SEC Network?
The home team's television package typically governs these games. That is, the road team appears on the home team's network.
Let's say that Florida State and Florida is a top ten match-up. But it is the same weekend as Alabama and Auburn, so CBS picks Alabama and Auburn.
Could you put big-time programs from out-of-conference on the SEC Network?
I think so.
Which means that the SEC is incentivized to play big national home-and-home games. Or to create their own neutral site games and have the SEC Network put those games on. It's something to think about going forward if the SEC Network truly wants to broaden its footprint.
The SEC teams are incentivized to play big national games.
14. Why does the deal last until 2034?
Because who knows what the television market will look like in 2034.
The SEC retains 100% of the content, ESPN is basically licensing that content to make a network which it owns 100%. So what happens in 2034? ESPN owns the SEC Network, but without the SEC content the station would have to be rebranded. Basically, the network would become valueless without the content.
So ownership of the station isn't really that important except for tax reasons.
So both sides will be incentivized to hammer out a new deal in twenty years, once the clear value of the network has become apparent.
It also protects both sides in the event the changing media landscape alters the payouts. Inevitably someone posts in the comments that the cable model is dead and as a result the SEC Network is dying. But they're wrong. In a DVR era sports are the single most valuable programming on American television.
Because we watch it live.
Worst case scenario, if cable completely collapsed and became a la carte, the SEC and ESPN could take all these games direct to SEC fans and sell it that way.
How many fans would be willing to pay $100 a year for access to 99 SEC football games and all the other sports programming? That's a dollar a football game.
Is there any SEC fan who wouldn't pay this?
So stop with your polly annaish the cable world is collapsing trope. Games matter now and games will always matter. When content matters this much, the monetization takes care of itself.
15. So how much money will SEC teams make from the SEC Network?
The easy answer is, that depends.
There are a variety of factors at play here.
Pre-expansion ESPN was paying the SEC $150 million or so a year. That worked out to about $12.5 million per team. (CBS paid about $4.5 million a team pre-expansion).
Now the SEC has added two more teams, 14 more games to the television package -- the previous pay-per-view games that each team controlled -- and rolled all its rights to ESPN.
The SEC will play 113 football games in its regular season in 2014.
That's 56 conference games, 56 out of conference games, and the SEC title game. (Interestingly, playing nine conference games actually decreases the SEC's football game inventory by seven games).
The easiest way to think about the SEC's TV rights package is that CBS owns 14 games and ESPN owns the rights to distribute the other 99 games.
45 of these games will be on the SEC Network, the other 54 will appear on ESPN's network of channels, and 14 will be on CBS.
As part of this new deal, I think ESPN has guaranteed the SEC a substantial payment as a floor before the revenue share kicks in on the network. What would that guarantee be? I'm certain it's more than what any other conference is presently receiving for its television rights. My guess is that the guarantee is around $350 million.
So bottom line, I believe that each SEC team is now guaranteed around $25 million a year from ESPN.
I believe that the 50/50 split would kick in once we get above that guarantee on the SEC Network in the years to come.
If you hit $3 a month on the subscriber fee in the SEC footprint over the next decade, then we're talking about a billion dollars plus another $333 million in ad sales. That's $1.333 billion a year in revenue. Take off the $350 million guarantee and the SEC and ESPN would be splitting right at 1 billion.
That's $500 million for each.
So we're talking about $850 million being split among 14 teams in the SEC, that's nearly $61 million a year per team just from ESPN.
As I said earlier, the CBS package will hit the market in 2023/24 and be worth another $250 million a year at least. That would be another ten million for each team.
That's $70 million or more in television money per team in a decade or so.
Bottom line?
The SEC is poised to make it rain in college athletics.
That rabbit is crazy; I'm Brian Waters!
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Kotter: "You're just gay. G-A-Y. Gay."
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He lost me at "In fact, I think three or four times in 2014 the SEC will put the second best game on the SEC Network in primetime."
No one knows how to dream bigger than Clay Travis. He sure is a fun read.
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(Actually, they didn't. They put the biggest game of the week on ESPN2.)
Today is not a good day to be a pussy.
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Just took a look at the SEC schedule. In weeks 1-3 alone, the third best game involving an SEC team is better than just about every other game.
Week 1:
Alabama vs Virginia Tech
LSU vs TCU
Georgia vs Clemson
Week 2:
Florida vs Miami
South Carolina vs Georgia
Toledo vs Mizzou
Week 3:
Bama vs aTm
Ole Miss vs Texas
Tennessee vs Oregon
Your move, everyone else...
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The state might have a say in such a proposal.
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The Southeastern Conference keeps building add-ons to the mansion.
The SEC Network was announced May 2, a full-immersion media initiative that will close the revenue gap between America's best football conference and America's most lucrative TV conference (the Big Ten). The College Football Playoff is coming, and no league figures to gain more financially from that than the SEC. And there is one other underrated cash geyser soon to begin spraying the SEC's way its whopper of a deal with the Big 12 to basically co-opt the Sugar Bowl, with ESPN paying a reported $80 million a year to televise.
That is new money and a new concept not quite cutting out the middleman that is the bowl, but taking control of the property and the vast majority of the cash.
"We created what I might call a paradigm shift," commissioner Mike Slive said Thursday on the "Wetzel To Forde" show on Yahoo! Sports Radio.
And the $80 million annually in TV money that comes along with that shift?
"We were comfortable with the amount," he said, chuckling.
In SliveSpeak that translates to, "We're making out like bandits with this deal."
Now here is the byproduct of the rich getting richer: There is no longer a viable excuse for the rich not to play a nine-game conference schedule. The SEC mansion needs quality competitive furnishings, not knock-offs from the FCS thrift store.
The Pac-12 is doing it now. So is the 10-team Big 12, which doesn't have a title game and doesn't need one with everyone playing every opponent in the regular season. The Big Ten formally announced last month that it is headed to nine games in 2016.
So the ACC and SEC should join the movement. Especially the SEC.
There is backlash to that, of course.
You've heard a lot of caterwauling from coaches, who would love eight SEC opponents and four games against Cadaver Tech if it were the difference between 5-7 and a berth in a bowl any bowl. You've heard some grousing from athletic directors, who say they need a guaranteed seven home games a year to make ends meet financially. You've heard coaches and athletic directors doomsaying about the physical toll of one more week in the meat grinder of league play.
Now hear this: Every SEC team should play a nine-game league schedule, with one decent non-conference opponent and two creampuff home games. Anything less and the league is cheating itself and its fans.
"I'm open-minded and I want to hear the discussions," Slive said, adding that the topic is sure to come up for the second year in a row at the league's annual spring meetings in Destin, Fla.
The reasons it should happen are abundant and obvious.
With an expansion to 14 teams, it is harder to make equitable schedules that establish true divisional champions with eight games. More teams means the need for more games to diminish the odds of a team riding a weak league schedule (ahem, Georgia) to a division title.
The commitment to the SEC Network translates to a need for more quality programming. That should mean fewer games against Samford, Alabama State, Southeast Missouri State and others. Nobody wants to see those games but the parents of the third stringers, whose kids may actually get to play.
The clear mandate to the as-yet-unnamed selection committee for the College Football Playoff will be increased reliance on strength of schedule as a differentiating factor. Slive correctly points out that league games are part of that, and nobody's league is harder than his. (No matter what Bob Stoops says.) But playing another SEC opponent instead of Western Carolina will absolutely boost strength of schedule.
And as noted above, the massive influx of new revenue drowns out concerns about needing an annual seventh home game to balance the books. If six home games every other year plus the increasingly fat SEC member check that arrives every June isn't enough to keep the athletic department running a surplus, then ADs need to stop spending like Steinbrenner on a bender.
(Exhibit A: Alabama blowing nearly $900,000 at the Fontainebleau hotel in Miami for the BCS Championship Game an extravagance Caligula himself might deem excessive. Bringing a 458-member marching band was a bit much, too. Maybe they don't need a dozen baton twirlers.)
Some schools undoubtedly would like to respond to a ninth league game by dropping any and all decent non-conference opponents. That should be vigorously discouraged, especially by schools that have established non-league rivalry games. South Carolina has to play Clemson, Florida has to play Florida State, Georgia has to play Georgia Tech, Kentucky has to play Louisville. And it would behoove the more traditionally ambitious schools like Tennessee and LSU to continue to play opponents from the West Coast or elsewhere.
Even with a nine-game SEC schedule.
Asking fans to pay ever-escalating ticket prices for bad games is an insult to the consumer, especially when there is money to be made elsewhere beyond the turnstile. It's true that college football fans especially in the SEC have come to tolerate multiple mismatches on the home schedule every autumn. But if some of the empty seats around the South last year were any indication, we may be reaching the consumer saturation point for bad football games.
That's something for all the SEC honchos to keep in mind when they meet later this month in Destin. For all the new money the league will soon be raking in, nine league games is the least it can do in return.
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Bob Stoops just got crushed by a superior SEC coach yet again.
Today is not a good day to be a pussy.
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Stoops should stick to being Bevo's bitch like the rest of the big whatever and learn to keep his foot in his mouth.
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Saul, I already went through this with you. You can't continue to hide behind Alabama football. It's an admission that you've lost all hope and all sense of personal pride. I beg you to think about what it does to your reputation and that of your family.
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Schedule 2013
Date Opponent Result / Time
8/31 vs. Virginia Tech 4:30 CT
9/14 at 5 Texas A&M TBA
9/21 vs. Colorado State TBA
9/28 vs. Mississippi TBA
10/5 vs. Georgia State TBA
10/12 at Kentucky TBA
10/19 vs. Arkansas TBA
10/26 vs. Tennessee TBA
11/9 vs. 14 LSU TBA
11/16 at Mississippi State TBA
11/23 vs. Chattanooga TBA
11/30 at Auburn TBA
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The SEC East (32) had more players drafted than the Big 12 (22). The SEC West (31) did as well.
That rabbit is crazy; I'm Brian Waters!
Kotter: "You are lucky I'm truly not the vindictive or psycho type...I'd be careful from now on, and I'd just back the hell off if I were you....otherwise, the Mizzou "extension office" life might get exciting"
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Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker, Archbishop of Myra in Lycia - Troparion & Kontakion
Troparion — Tone 4
In truth you were revealed to your flock as a rule of faith, / an image of humility and a teacher of abstinence; / your humility exalted you; / your poverty enriched you. / Hierarch Father Nicholas, / entreat Christ our God / that our souls may be saved.
Kontakion — Tone 3
You revealed yourself, O saint, in Myra as a priest, / for you fulfilled the Gospel of Christ / by giving up your soul for your people, / and saving the innocent from death. / Therefore you are blessed as one become wise in the grace of God.


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6 October: New launch date confirmed
We are happy to announce that a new launch date has been proposed and confirmed for the DMC-3 flight. SSETI Express is now scheduled for launch from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome at 08:52:26 CEST (06:52 UTC) on 27 October.
Preparations for the continuation of the launch campaign are well underway, and the team should arrive back at the Cosmodrome on 19 October.
27 to 29 September: The status quo
The launch campaign crew has left the Plesetsk Cosmodrome and headed back to their respective homes in England, Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany. Everybody had a safe and uncomplicated trip back(if you don't consider the waiting time at the airports!!).
The spacecraft is stored safely in its transport container. The propulsion tank and the various batteries are all full and should require, at most, a minor top-up when we return. The facility personnel have strict instructions to leave the transport container where it is, until the launch campaign team returns for the final preparations (again).
We all know that this further delay is frustrating - but we all are sure that in the end SSETI Express and its passengers will be launched.
News about a new launch date will be posted here when we have it.
26 September: There and back again
After finishing the final preparations of SSETI Express we found out that due to a significant failure on one of the other spacecraft the whole launch has to be postponed.
Unfortunately a new launch date has yet to be decided.
25 September: The end of the beginning
Today we only had to wait half an hour for the bus. Yesterday they had forgotten to issue the command - understandable, I mean, who would work on a Sunday except for a group of complete and utter space geeks?
After a team meeting the final plan towards handover of the spacecraft, we armed the CubeSats and validated the propulsion system's pressure. In parallel, the usual maintenance and extension work on the mission operation website and the TIDB was performed.
Following a delicious (?) lunch, we proceeded with two remarkable milestones. First we replaced and closed all thermal covers on the spacecraft access ports. After this step, no further access to the CubeSat or the propulsion module is possible. All foils were carefully grounded and a new accessible patch was prepared for the FPP (Flight Preparation Panel) access hole.
Second and last for today was the final preparation and shutdown of the on-board computer (OBC). We are theoretically never going to turn off the spacecraft again - this feels like a point of no return. Five days left before launch!
P.S. Pizza tonight - a well deserved change.
24 September: A day off
Today we were somewhat surprised when the bus didn't turn up to take us from breakfast to the assembly facility. After a lengthy wait we gave up and went back to the hotel to catch up on some much-needed sleep. A few hours later word gradually permeated the hotel that we were to be treated to a tour of the local space museum! This was a very interesting visit during which we learnt a lot about the history of the Plesetsk Cosmodrome, and Karl befriended a scale model of our rocket.
We then took an afternoon stroll through Mirny, stopping for lunch at the 'Cafe Grand'. The changes of scenery and routine were refreshing and welcomed by all, as were several of the local customs, which we sampled with gusto.
Upon our return to the hotel we caught up on a bit of work: reviewing the latest version of the Telemetry Interface web page (it will be ready soon!) and preparing ourselves for the last few days of serious work before the launch.
23 September: Fans and functionality re-alignment
The upcoming launch of SSETI Express has made headlines in newspapers all over Europe and on countless technical websites. The project has even been slashdotted, resulting in worldwide attention to our little spacecraft, and we have received a number of positive e-mails from people all over the globe encouraging and applauding this approach to hands-on education.
22 September: The final tests are completed
Today we repeated yesterday's functional tests of the functioning of the +y T-Pod, and the results proved to be virtually identical to those that we recorded yesterday.
The only uncompleted part of our Express software library is now being finished off with great enthusiasm by the TIDB group in France. This website programme will accept telemetry submissions from radio amateurs, transmit the data into the main mission database, and keep track of the competition scores.
The team here in Plesetsk has been enjoying some days of wonderful autumn sunshine and has managed to finish the third series of the famous space fiction comedy series "Red Dwarf" - this is helping us maintain our sense of reality.
21 September: Polishing up the web
Invisible to the general public, a major facelift of the SSETI Express mission website has been done in the launch campaign office during the last few days. Accompanied by detailed reviews, a smooth transition of the transformed set of web pages describing the mission's operational aspects was performed.
Finally, today at noon, mission management gave the go-ahead for the publication of the new site. The old pages are masked by redirection statements so that users' existing bookmarks still lead to the correct information.
Meanwhile, in the integration centre, an extended test sequence was conducted on the +y T-Pod. The reason for these extra test activities was a possible anomaly on the control electronics. After analysing the situation, we concluded that we would use the existing buffer in the preparation schedule to ensure a reliable functionality of the T-Pod by validation of its release mechanism.
20 September: Waiting and webbing
Today was fairly relaxed. When we arrived on site, the two CubeSats we'd left charging last night both had full batteries, so we disconnected them. They are now ready to fly. We then hooked up the one remaining Cubesat, NCube-2, and were happy to discover that it didn't need charging at all.
Now that we are very nearly ready for the launch we can confidently slow down while we wait for the final launch date to be confirmed. We spent the rest of the day working on the new look for this website - which will be updated very soon!


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The Obama administration has already said that this was wrong, and although some of the upper crust at the IRS were holdovers from the Bush years, this falls on the federal government...the current federal government.
ABC News later reported that it was not simply groups with the word "Tea" or "Patriot," but any group that was critical of the government. That looks very bad, and the president should address the nation.
Let's remember that this type of targeting of Americans is what eventually forced Richard Nixon to resign. Nixon, like Obama, was soundly re-elected. Watergate was directed out of the White House, so there is the added ugliness of the president of the United States knowing what was happening.
But Barack Obama has to address this as a big deal, even if he does not feel that it is. This matters to all Americans because we all have the same federal government. Politics has to stop at the water's edge, and that is where responsible government begins.
Our most protected form of speech is political speech. This is why the Voting Rights Act was important. If you water down political expression, you do even more damage to the First Amendment.
This issue can go away, and most likely will. Unlike Watergate, the Obama team is trying to get in front of it. The president enjoys addressing Congress through speeches and press conferences, so this is how he needs to address this issue.
Press Secretary Jay Carney's briefings are not enough to defuse what can cause people to trust their government less.
Time for Yanks to Clean (Some of the) House
All the talk about how well the Yankees are doing despite losing such high-end talent due to injury brings us back to owner Hal Steinbrenner and the number "189" (as in $189 million). Steinbrenner wants to lower the Yankee payroll from $203 million to $189 million.
To those of us working folk, please accept my apologies for how cavalier it sounds to throw these numbers around so easily. The good news about the Yankees' start this season is that they've shown they can win without a few big salaries.
The 2014 season will unfortunately not include Curtis Granderson in the outfield. The Yankees will free up $15 million right there. The team is already committed to Vernon Wells, Brett Gardner, and has Ichiro Suzuki for another season.
It will be hard to say good bye to Granderson, but the jettison of Joba Chamberlin is long overdue. Chamberlain is nothing short of a complete waste for this ball club. Even with his relatively light $1.8 million salary, be brings nothing to the Yankees. He needs to take his trampoline-jumping antics someplace else.
Minor leaguers Slade Heathcott, Mason Williams, and Tyler Austin are too good to not promote to the Bronx, and they come with low salaries. If this team eats half of Alex Rodriguez's salary ($15 million) for the next few years, they can probably unload him, too. It might be worth it to put this contract behind them.
The money the organization would save by avoiding the luxury tax could buy them out of A-Rod. By doing that, plus saving the money going to Granderson, Chamberlain, and Hughes, they could fall under the salary ceiling of $189 million.
They should also try to engineer a trade for a reliever like Matt Capps of Minnesota. Even if they absorb Capps' salary of $4.5 million, they would meet the ceiling, strengthen the bullpen, and keep all of the other muscle (Teixeira, Youkilis, and extend Jeter's contract.)
This scenario even accounts for keeping Robinson Cano and an amped-up new contract which the Yankees will have to surrender to. This is a way to make the team stronger with less money. It can be done, and this 2013 team is showing us how.


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