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"At many other times in history, this sentiment might seem sappy or air-headed or unrealistic. Not now. This spiritual appeal is the heart of coldblooded realism in this frighteningly dangerous world. Either we learn to respect one another or we shall perish." - Andrew Sullivan
I'm truly in despair by the turn of events in the financial system. Team Obama is charging down a perilous path, and there is so little mainstream debate about this stuff - just populist blather vs. elitists trying to hide their skeletons and lying to the populace to protect their "psychology".
Reading about the Geithner plan, I'm torn between whether I'm watching the biggest scam in history or just a bad "shoot the moon" strategy. My gut tells me that if Obama doesn't cut these clowns (Geithner, Summers, etc.) loose by the summer, the US is going to be fucked for many, many years.
As an ex-Wall Street software architect & trainer, long-time (10 years, at least) CNBC & Jim Cramer fan, etc., I actually have a certain amount of empathy for the Wall Street establishment. There was an element of meritocracy that you don't see in many industries, of ensuring that everyone with knowledge, skill, and talent was rewarded. I lament that it may all be coming to an end, and that we're lurching too far into punishing knowledgeable & talented people just because they are in "THAT industry"; on the other hand, there are fundamental problems with the system that need to be rectified, and the 'restore the status quo' patchwork approach that Obama & Geithner are currently chasing is probably not going to work. Ambivalence is the watchword.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/a/-/world/5375
Then again, this is The Times.... who sometimes just make shit up.
(Though part of me bets he heard it on an episode of Babylon 5 once; I can argue that I was 19 back then and a CS major ;-)
I have no idea what Steve's hormone imbalance is, but I'd surmise it has something to do with insulin.
We've been accustomed to believe that weight management isn't a hormone problem, it's due to gluttony and sloth. The evidence is starting to mount that it's more complicated than that.
From the Telegraph article...
'The job of determining how fuels will be used - whether we will store them as fat or burn them for energy - is carried out by the hormone insulin with LPL,' says Taubes. 'Because insulin determines fat accumulation, it's quite possible that we get fat not because we eat too much or exercise too little, but because we secrete too much insulin.
Regardless of the underlying reason, here's hoping Steve recovers.
With regards to low carb driving down insulin - it's not to say I don't believe in exercise or in eating well. What bothers me is being told that when I find a lifestyle (low carb) that works for me, one that (IMO) saved my father's life after a massive (smoking-induced) heart attack, I'm discouraged to follow it by acquaintances, family, and media because "you're going to die of a heart attack", or "your liver will fail"; when I continue to discover that there's little to no evidence to be found of such things occurring, and that it might actually be good for you, if your body is of a particular type.
After a couple of years off the wagon, I'm going back to my preferred eating lifestyle in 2009 and intend to stay there. I will miss beer and wine for a few months, but don't think I'm saying goodbye, just "see again you some day, in limited quantities". ;-)
They also can pull single-origin God shots from a handcrafted manual-lever Bosco espresso machine - less than a dozen of those in the U.S., apparently.
All of this is quite reasonably priced, too (espresso is $2 from a regular machine, $3.50 from the Bosco). They also will brew you an individual fresh cup of coffee, ground from scratch, through a lo-tech, but effective, paper filter + funnel, for $2.
I've been buying half-pound beans from them since I got my Aeropress for Christmas; usually they're roasted Fridays, so on Saturday I get a fresh half pound. The Espresso Temescal is godly. The Three Africans has a very bright flavour, great for mornings. At some point I may splurge to get a Silvia but for now the walk will suffice when I need a shot.
At the risk of offending my friends for misspeaking or sheer barbarism, here are my thoughts on the matter, speaking as a former Catholic that still respects the Church and believes in God, though is saddened enough by its actions that he no longer actively practices.
Much of the problem boils down to two concerns:
a) the ambiguity as to what gender and sexuality is, Is it a choice or a natural phenomena? And should that matter?
and
b) Is it "hate" or "bigotry" to criticize or even legally restrict an individual choice? In what circumstances should society be allowed to do this?
To begin with, I feel sexual identity is BOTH a choice and a natural phenomena: There are, for example, plenty of bisexuals. ( I don’t, for example, think that Lindsay Lohan was born homosexual. What if she decides to marry Sam Ronson? ). And yet, there are plenty of people that seem to clearly have been born homosexual (some guestimates say ~10% of the population).
On the other hand, LGBT scholarship has, for the past thirty years or so, tried to demonstrate that gender identity is an individual ‘choice’, not something dictated by genes or society, and that sexual identity is a continuum independent of gender identity (cue a side debate over Kinsey's studies).
Is it possible to have a relationship that respects the ‘institution’ of marriage when it’s based on an individualistic choice? Is that not shakier ground than restricting it to the dictates of the genes for 90% of the population (with, let’s say, 10% being naturally occurring homosexuals)?
On the contrary, I personally know two female friends that have a wonderful, loving marriage, but, to my understanding, both were born heterosexual, never identified as bisexual, and “switched” after they met each other, and “chose” a homosexual identity for themselves since wanted to be together. This is a case that is exactly what I believe religious folks fear - the arbitrariness of gender roles and sexual identity. Yet, even in this "dreaded scenario", the result STILL reinforced the institution of marriage, save for their inability for them to procreate.
You could argue that it’s hard enough to want to spend your life with someone else, regardless of gender role, sexual identity, etc., so why discriminate?
Calling religious folks “bigots” does not help matters. Let’s say I disagree with a life choice you’ve made, say reckless promiscuity, and think that such behavior threatens the cohesion of society. Is it “bigotry” to criticize that life choice? Is it “hate”?
Given the context of homo/bi-sexuality: that in many cases, it may be naturally occuring, but in many others, it’s a “life choice”, how can you call disagreements against those choices “bigotry” or “hate mongering”? It’s much more complicated than that. The Catholic Church, for example, has no problems with recognizing that homosexuality may be a naturally occuring phenomena. Its problem is with any sexual act that has no involvement with pro-creation. That’s why masturbation and married sex with a condom are both sins. Homosexual acts can’t contribute to Motherhood or Fatherhood, so are considered disordered.
It seems that inability to pro-create is one of the larger unavoidable problems with a same-sex union. En masse, the affluent countries are already in the process of committing mass suicide, marrying later, preferring their one designer baby, or being DINKs (dual-income no-kids), and leaving re-population to those who really don't want more kids but enjoy reckless promiscuity (thus raising the quotient of miscreants born) or can't afford/don't believe in birth control. Many have no idea how to fix this, and fear that mainstream same-sex unions will just speed the decline of Western society.
In the end, I do wish people would move past these soundbites and get to the roots of the problem. Respecting the institution of marriage arguably has nothing to do with gender identity or sexual roles, it has to do with personal responsibility to one’s family. This is sorely lacking in plenty of heterosexual cases. (Promiscuity, and the complications it brings when reckless and disrespectful, knows no bounds.) In my opinion, most religious folks aren’t bigots, and aren’t hate mongers - they seriously are concerned with changing a social institution that already is crumbling, and have serious preconceptions of what a homosexual or bisexual marriage might imply to its already shaken stature.
Once we figure out how to rid ourselves of preconceptions, we might actually be able to figure out a way for religious folks (which make up MOST of North America) to actually accept a (state recognized) marriage between same-sex partners, while protecting the institution from behaviour that undermines it and families.
I worked for Rogers Communications from 2002 through 2004 in a somewhat senior position (2 levels away from Ted). That company was inspirational in some ways, chaotic in other ways, but it all seemed to hold together, mostly out of Ted's ability to express a vision and dive into the grittiest of details to make it happen.
RIP, Ted.
* Open the book to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post the text of the next sentence* in your journal along with these instructions.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST.
"Wal-Mart protects its business processes and resultant ICT applications as a strategic asset."
I dug back a few pages to see that ICT stands for "Information and Communications Technology".
The book is The New Age of Innovation: Driving Co-Created Value Through Global Networks, by C.K. Pralahad and M.S. Krishnan.
I worry, reading the above, that I may lack a penis.
1. People like to trade things, like mortgages, because it spreads risk and wealth. Prior to the 1980's a lot of these mortgages were bought in pools by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which were government commissioned companies (created in the 1930's, and 1970's, respectively) that helped drive the housing markets. In the 1980's, this became much more deregulated, and all of investment banks got in on the game.
2. For a variety of reasons (debt burden, burst of the housing boom), houses are worth a lot less and lots of Americans have defaulted on their mortgages and other debts lately. Banks are thus "foreclosing" their houses and auctioning them off at much lower prices.
3. Thus, a lot of things that banks THOUGHT they owned actually are worth a lot less than they were. They're also not getting the interest income one would expect from owning these things. There's less wealth out there (we don't exactly know how much, but it's somewhere between half a trillion and a trillion dollars).
4. Banks that whose asset base was largely based on mortgages basically lost a ton of value and the math no longer works -- they can't really lend more money out as they don't have enough "safe" assets to offset the risk. A couple of these have been repossessed by the government for this reason (Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and now Washington Mutual). And when customers get nervous, they will withdraw their "real assets", otherwise known as a bank run Thus couple investment banks also had a ton of mortgages, and they didn't have enough "other real stuff" to balance out these losses or to tolerate the runs they were experiencing, and so basically either have to join forces with another bank (e.g. Bear Stearns was fire sold to JP Morgan Chase), or go bankrupt (e.g. Lehman Brothers).
5. When there's less wealth, there's less willingness on the part of banks & traders to loan money or to take risks on new forms of wealth creation (e.g. entrepreneurs). This is referred to as a "credit crunch". There's also less willingness to trade their other assets (e.g. ownership stakes in companies or contracts) because they need them to balance out the risk of the debt that they DO own.
6. A growing economy depends on credit as lubricant. It's essential. If your country lacks credit, the country basically can't create money. Good luck buying a house or a car, or getting a business started. An economy that isn't growing is basically "failing", because it becomes a zero-sum game -- any gains MUST be someone else's loss. Bad things ensue.
That's the situation the United States is in.
The Paulson recovery plan is a theory that they can fix the system by having the government buy all the "risky mortgage debt" that's causing the credit crunch, thereby taking on that risk, and hoping that the market will "discover" the right price for new credit because risk levels will return to "normal". Now, it's not like the government would lose $700 billion, they're just taking the risk on any future foreclosures. The end result might be that the government loses a bit of money or makes a bit of money, we don't know.
The problem with the plan is that they asked for "zero oversight", so the money could be used for corrupt purposes and really provides no hedge for the taxpayers if more foreclosures happen. They want "money for nothing and chicks for free".
The Dodd/Frank alternative plan is more inline with what normally is required to inject capital in the financial system -- the government would take ownership stakes in the banks in exchange for buying their risky assets, and they would limit executive pay to prevent rewarding the dodos that caused this mess. This is useful because it provides EXTRA actual value to cover the risk inherent in the assets. But, Congressional Republicans HATE this idea because it sounds a lot like socialism (government owning the banks and reducing the wages of executives). Of course, the world is a lot more complicated than this black & white interpretation of Capitalism vs. Socialism, but politics doesn't like nuance.
Roubini has a third idea: fix the underlying problem! Everyday Americans have been defaulting on their debts because their debt burden is way too high. Despite an improved economy and improved productivity, the wealth has NOT been represented in increasing wages in American workers. There are many theories as to why this is -- short-term thinking, negligence, greed, globalization, the shrinkage of unions, systemic ignorance, or flaws in our economic/financial regulations. Meanwhile, prices continue to crawl upwards, and consumerist culture remains an American beacon.
In the short run, Roubini's answer is to BOTH do the equity stake in financial institutions to inject capital in these companies burdened with risky assets but ALSO (more importantly) lighten the debt load on Americans. The long term answer is to fix the system so that wages return to their pre-1970's levels of growth.
In summary: Everything in our economy is intertwingled. That's the price of efficiency. But if it becomes socially (and legally) acceptable to take on large levels of risk, one crack can lead to a market-wide failure. Expect this pattern to continue: peace & prosperity followed by moments of intense and widespread chaos.
Update: A couple of revisions. I am starting 2 years before I was born because it would be remiss to skip two of my most beloved bands. And, well, it's my list.
1975 Black Sabbath - Sabotage
1976 Judas Priest - Sad Wings of Destiny
1977 Pink Floyd - Animals
1978 Rush - Hemispheres
1979 Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures
1980 AC/DC - Back in Black
1981 Duran Duran - s/t
1982 Iron Maiden - Number of the Beast
1983 Eurythmics - Sweet Dreams
1984 Metallica - Ride the Lightning
1985 Power Station - s/t
1986 Slayer - Reign in Blood
1987 Guns N' Roses - Appetite for Destruction
1988 Skinny Puppy - VivisectVI
1989 Aerosmith - Pump
1990 Depeche Mode - Violator
1991 Pearl Jam - Ten
1992 Tori Amos - Little Earthquakes
1993 Underworld - dubnobasswithmyheadman
1994 Nine Inch Nails - The Downward Spiral
1995 Bjork - Post
1996 Tool - Aenima
1997 Emperor - Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk
1998 Massive Attack - Mezzanine
1999 Mr. Bungle - California
2000 Weakling - Dead as Dreams
2001 System of a Down - Toxicity
2002 Porcupine Tree - In Absentia
2003 Dimmu Borgir - Death Cult Armageddon
2004 Arcade Fire - Funeral
2005 Opeth - Ghost Reveries
2006 Lamb of God - Sacrament
2007 Dillinger Escape Plan - Ire Works
2008 TBD ... Currently Ihsahn - Angl
I grew up with these guys, and they pretty much defined my early teen years. Here's hoping their next album is a return to form.
Suddenly I memorize,
asking what I left behind.
Nothing.
Can I ever comprehend?
Will my longing ever end?
Never.
Drawn towards these lands again.
Seeking death and sacred soil.
I ride the longing winds of my blackened soul
...eternally.
(with apologies to Emperor.)
I live 4 blocks away from the area... waking to lots of smoke this morning. My girlfriend's bike shop, open since 1914, is gone. I eat almost weekly at Shanghai Cowgirl directly across the street, and two of my favorite alternative clubs (BSC and Savage Garden) are across the street too -- all of those seem to be OK thankfully but closed for now.
- Mood:
indescribable
In some ways this is common sense -- the old "you have a finite amount of dates with someone before breaking up -- 2 years over weekends, or 6 months living together" nugget, for example. But to me this is just young-headed crap, where you treat your lover's qualities as if it were a scorecard, or when you have no idea what you want and are too narcissistic to care about what your partner wants. Admittedly, we're all superficial to some extent, but I hope people would learn to outgrow the "mememeememee" mentality...
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