DanKohn.com

Evidence on how New York’s chronically dysfunctional legislature is a result of not having independent judges or bureaucrats redistrict.

“States where bipartisan commissions or judges draw district lines have far more competitive elections, and routinely see control shift between parties…. The arrangement turns the notion of bipartisanship on its head. Opposing factions go at each other, tooth and claw, over every issue where the public would want them to compromise. But in the one area where they are expected to battle, elections, they do not…. New York State legislators are literally as likely to die in office or be arrested as to lose at the ballot box.”

This, along with improving voting machines, is one of the fascinating areas of politics where real progress could be made, yet is a completely non-partisan issue.

Star Wars producer Rick McCallumargues that the ’sky is falling’ because the Internet means the end of DVD sales which means the end of the movie business:

“My passion about digital technology and the digital pipeline is just a small little brush fire,” says McCallum. “This other thing is a tornado. The business will implode once you can download a movie, give it to your friends and not have a moral problem with doing it. Then we’re screwed. Literally, our very lives are at stake now. George and I are just praying that we can finish ‘Episode III’ in time, before it’s all over.”

I actually agree with him.