Free the polar bear from rules and laws!
MANY of us idealise grassroots politics, in which ordinary citizens join together to take action on some issue of concern. So in this age of spin, it鈥檚 only natural that commercial interests are creating groups that purport to be the genuine 鈥済rassroots鈥� but are in fact anything but. And it鈥檚 also only natural that genuine grassroots groups take a dim view of this chicanery and call the creation of such fake groups 鈥渁stroturfing鈥� 鈥� named after the plastic grass used on some sports fields and defined in New 杏吧原创 as 鈥渢he practice of disguising an orchestrated campaign as a spontaneous upwelling of public opinion鈥� (10 February 2007, p 48).
You might think astroturfers stay in the shadows and keep quiet about what they are up to. You鈥檇 be wrong 鈥� or so it would seem. A surprised Feedback recently stumbled upon the website of a public relations firm called 鈥淧olicy Communications鈥�, which boldly boasts of delivering 鈥� for our clients鈥�.
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One of these successes is a 鈥淕rassroots Power Network鈥�, of which Policy Communications says: 鈥淲e developed and now manage one of the nation鈥檚 most sophisticated electronic grassroots advocacy networks鈥︹��
Another success is 鈥淧artnership for the West鈥�, described as 鈥渙ne of the West鈥檚 largest and most active pro-growth grassroots advocacy networks鈥�. We don鈥檛 know much about this organisation, but if you click on its name you are taken to , which may or may not be the same thing. Policy Communications CEO Jim Sims boasts of being 鈥渢he driving force鈥� behind the creation of this organisation, which he calls 鈥渁 national non-profit grassroots network of citizens who believe in less government regulation, more individual freedom and common sense environmental conservation policies鈥�.
鈥淎 sign spotted by Tao Jones at Beaver lake park footbridge near Seattle, Washington, reads: 鈥淪lippery when wet equestrians dismount鈥�
An illustration of the kind of common-sense policies favoured is a national 鈥済rassroots鈥� campaign to 鈥渟ave鈥� the polar bear from being put in the 鈥渞egulatory 鈥榡ail'鈥� of the . It鈥檚 possible that the only link with Policy Communications here may be Sims himself, but we鈥檙e in little doubt that the oil and gas exploration and production companies mentioned in the 鈥淥ur clients鈥� section of the Policy Communications website are delighted that the CEO is involved in this particular 鈥済rassroots鈥� campaign.
As to how much all this activity is a spontaneous upwelling of public opinion as opposed to an orchestrated campaign, we cannot say. But we are bound to wonder.
A COMPANY intranet posting seen by Ronald Davis of Ontario, Canada, informed him that 鈥淎 Root Cause Analysis鈥� was requested to investigate a negative trend identified by a significant increase in the number of slips and falls reported in 2007 compared to those reported in 2008.鈥�
鈥淭his sounds like a trend that ought to be encouraged,鈥� observes Davis.
PROPER terminology is always important in matters scientific, so Feedback was delighted to receive a copy of a paper with a formal description of Anthropoidipes ameriborealis by . Many extinct species have been named for fossil tracks, but this is the first extant animal to be named for its recent tracks.
That makes sense because this elusive species native to the western mountains of North America is best known for those tracks. And Feedback has to agree that the Latin for 鈥淣orth American ape foot鈥� sounds far more scientific than 鈥淏igfoot鈥�.
THE cleaning instructions on a label on the neck of the pyjama top purchased by Marian Brink left both her and her husband Johan in a quandary. Instruction number 4 stated the garment was 鈥淒ry cleanable鈥�. Instruction number 5 said: 鈥淒o not dry clean鈥�. For a while the Brinks were stumped. Then they realised that no one takes pyjamas to the dry cleaners anyway.
AN ADVERT warning people not to waste food appears on the back of the autumn edition of Outlook, a magazine of local news in the UK. It provides some shocking statistics. 鈥淓very year,鈥� it tells readers, 鈥渁n average household (with children) throws out: 440,000 ready meals, 1.3 million unopened yogurt pots, 5500 whole chickens.鈥� An alarmed reader, Mark Sawko-Michalski, has worked out that on average these families must throw out over 1200 ready meals, over 3500 unopened yogurt pots and 15 whole chickens per day.
鈥淪ince neither my family, nor any other family I know creates such vast amounts of waste,鈥� Sawko-Michalski says, 鈥淚 can only assume one monumentally wasteful family somewhere in Oxfordshire is pushing the average up.鈥�
Error in error message, part 97
FINALLY, the error message that Mark Stoakes received when he tried to delete a file from the hard drive of a computer running Microsoft Windows 2003 Server told him: 鈥淐annot delete [file name]. There is not enough free disk space. Delete one or more files to free disk space, and then try again.鈥�