Time to take a stand

First: and excerpt from Stephanie 2004, and I don't know if she has changed much since (although she does have a presence on Facebook, so maybe she has changed)

Community Solutions: Stephanie Mills Presentation:

"I've got to say upfront, I now have a computer. Somebody gave me a laptop. And it's holding down a stack of papers very nicely. But I am kind of like this Rip van Winkle type, because I left San Francisco and the world of offices in 1984, and I just went to Michigan and kept on being a writer the way I knew how. I corresponded. I write letters and use stamps and the telephone, and that kind of thing, and I noticed over the years that addresses of organizations no longer tell me where they are. And I don't think that's trivial. It's very important to me to know something tangible about the folks I'm engaged with. What part of Turtle Island do you live in? What qualities inform your experience? Gary Snyder is a wonderful author on the subject of the nuances of place, and he says, "what kind of boots do you wear in December?" Those aren't negligible matters, really. In some ways, I guess one of the threats of technology is just to make matter a big sort of box of raw material rather than this or this soil, or this carving, or this foodstuff, it all can become generic and available to be transformed and turned into a product and sold."

The question I pose is : how far to take Luddite-ism?

Why stop with computers, let's drop the telephone, and maybe question the postal service. After all, how do your letters move from point A to point B?

I may agree on local-centrism for some things, but not all.

I will buy my iPhone, manufactured in China, but will stick to local, pasture raised chicken - a non-fungible product. You cannot buy a local chicken from China - by definition.

Technology, esp. the internet is a liberating technology.

Stephanie again:

"I've begun teaching recently and discovered that people do their research on the Internet. And it's like, there's a realm of information out there. So I'm immediately thrust into a position of global ignorance by the fact of the World Wide Web, because if I don't know what's on the Web, I don't know anything really, or I don't know most things.

That's sort of a radical monopoly, in a sense. It sort of sets a new standard of what it means to be knowledgeable and well-informed. However, good Luddite that I am, I find that the value of face-to-face contact hasn't been completely supplanted. The personal networks that can operate by chance encounters, people sending reprints in the mail, the whole sort of goddess network, is still working fine, but at a different scale, at a more, for me, manageable scale. I guess – thinking about the Web – I don't really want to know everything that's on the Web. I would be happy to know adequately the life cycle of the slime mold."

Let's close libraries, because they contain too much information.

When I first had access to the family car (another piece of technology) I could (and did) go to the Michigan State University Library and cruised he isles.

I could chase ideas up and down the stacks.

Today, I can do the same at "light speed"

If I'm curious about a topic, a tid-bid of history or culture, I can access it in a few moments.

From the trivia of a movie I might be watching (technology again) to recalling a city in Siberia when geo-tagging photos I've digitized (that damn technology yet again)

I can share thoughts with friends and associates regardless of time of day (few want a call from me at 3AM, but I can post an email), I can video chat with grandchildren half a continent away, soon with family overseas.

Huh?

I'm really unsure of what to make of this

Sure, Reagan was an actor, but then he became president

Obama is president, and goes on late night pseudo-news, on the COMEDY Channel

Obama, Jon Stewart and Change - NYTimes.com:

"Late-night television has come a long way since Bill Clinton, then a presidential candidate, played his saxophone for Arsenio Hall during his campaign for the White House in 1992. The lines between entertainment and news are increasingly blurred – in part because Mr. Obama has been willing to bring his presidential platform to settings his predecessors might have regarded as unconventional, to say the least."

Next - Blame Canada

Apologies to SouthPark on Blame Canada

But then, who else to blame?

No Second Thoughts - NYTimes.com:

"When times get tough, it’s really important to believe in yourself. This is something the Democrats have done splendidly this year. The polls have been terrible, and the party may be heading for a historic defeat, but Democrats have done a magnificent job of maintaining their own self-esteem. This is vital, because even if the public doesn’t approve of you, it is important to approve of yourself."

Demographics and more

Combination of Demographics and a society that doesn't clear mistakes ...

Japan Goes From Dynamic to Disheartened - NYTimes.com:

"Few nations in recent history have seen such a striking reversal of economic fortune as Japan. The original Asian success story, Japan rode one of the great speculative stock and property bubbles of all time in the 1980s to become the first Asian country to challenge the long dominance of the West.

But the bubbles popped in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and Japan fell into a slow but relentless decline that neither enormous budget deficits nor a flood of easy money has reversed. For nearly a generation now, the nation has been trapped in low growth and a corrosive downward spiral of prices, known as deflation, in the process shriveling from an economic Godzilla to little more than an afterthought in the global economy."

On doing business

J.P. Morgan Quotes (jp morgan quote do list):

"Asked: 'Is not commercial credit based primarily upon money or property?'
'No sir,' replied Morgan. 'The first thing is character.'
'Before money or property?'
'Before money or anything else. Money cannot buy it...Because a man I do not trust could not get money from me on all the bonds in Christendom.'"

Don't expect change - much

Will: The Energy Future Will Look Familiar - Newsweek

"Although the economies of developed nations are expected to be, on average, 50 percent larger in 2035 than in 2005, energy demand is expected to be slightly lower because of efficiencies. Recently, Tillerson says, “more than half the growth in demand has been met by efficiencies” driven by higher prices.

Today, however, “we’ve got the entire country in a crouched position.” He is not. He is temperamentally percussive, as befits someone who, as a University of Texas undergraduate, manned the bass drum in the Longhorn Band. Ethanol? A monument to “the power of the farm lobby.” The Chevy Volt, the $41,000 four-passenger electric car with a tax credit of up to $7,500 to bribe people to buy it? “That’s your government at work.” ExxonMobil at work includes labs doing research on algae-based biomass fuels.

So: There is ethanol promoted by government, which need not turn a profit. There is algae research by Exxon-Mobil, which does need to. Which do you think is most apt to serve the nation’s needs?"

Wishful Thinking

Not like computers where Moore's Law describes the increasing power from the same mass (real estate on the chip), more battery power = more electrons, which come with protons and neutrons (ie Mass).

High Battery Cost Curbs Electric Cars - WSJ.com:

The push to get electric cars on the road is backed by governments and auto makers around the world, but they face a big hurdle: the stubbornly high cost of the giant battery packs, which can account for more than half the cost of an electric vehicle.

Both the industry and government are betting that a quick takeoff in electric-car sales will drive down the battery prices. But a number of scientists and automotive engineers believe cost reductions will be hard to come by.

Unlike with tires or toasters, battery packs aren't likely to enjoy traditional economies of scale as their makers ramp up production, the scientists and engineers say.

These experts say increased production of batteries means the price of the key metals used in their manufacture will remain steady—or maybe even rise—at least in the short term. They also say the price of the electronic parts used in battery packs as well as the enclosures that house the batteries aren't likely to decline appreciably.

sic transit gloria mundi

Layer on demographic decline ...

The Great Deflation - Japan Goes From Dynamic to Disheartened - NYTimes.com

Few nations in recent history have seen such a striking reversal of economic fortune as Japan. The original Asian success story, Japan rode one of the great speculative stock and property bubbles of all time in the 1980s to become the first Asian country to challenge the long dominance of the West.

But the bubbles popped in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and Japan fell into a slow but relentless decline that neither enormous budget deficits nor a flood of easy money has reversed. For nearly a generation now, the nation has been trapped in low growth and a corrosive downward spiral of prices, known as deflation, in the process shriveling from an economic Godzilla to little more than an afterthought in the global economy.

Country-Wide, indeed

A sad chapter closes

The questioner wanted to know what, if anything, worried Mr. Mozilo, according to a participant.

“I wake up every day frightened that something is going to happen to Countrywide,” Mr. Mozilo said.

A year and a half later, that day arrived. In January 2008, Countrywide, the company he had built from a two-man mortgage operation into a lending behemoth, had to sell itself to Bank of America at a bargain price because it was being smothered by losses tied to a mountain of sketchy loans.

Yet almost until the moment Countrywide was taken over, Mr. Mozilo was publicly buoyant about its ability to ride out the mortgage crisis. Privately, however, he occasionally offered a gloomier assessment of Countrywide’s prospects and practices, according to e-mail and interviews.

Prior posts here about Mr Mozilo and this mess

Fox to henhouse ...

The banks may be guilty as hell, but let's not forget who encouraged them

The damn politicians

Editorial - The Foreclosure Crises - NYTimes.com:

"This latest foreclosure crisis should settle one issue once and for all. The banks that got us into this mess can’t be trusted to get us out of it. The administration and Congress need to act."

Worthwhile reads

Doc Searls Weblog : Loose Links

Foundation or Government?

On CNBC : Oct 5

Leon Cooperman to give ½ estate to charity

Joe Kernan – "philosophically – does this have anything to do with not wanting to give it to the Government where 90% falls through the cracks?"

Hedge Fund Billionaire Leon Cooperman Donates Most of His Fortune to Charity - DailyFinance:

"Cooperman says his story is the American dream. Now he wants now to donate most of his fortune to 'those that are disadvantaged to experience the American dream.' Cooperman follows in the footsteps Warren Buffett and Bill Gates. He was asked to donate half his fortune to the Gates foundation, but he says he'll donate every dollar he makes to the nonprofit sector, wanting to give back to the system."

Lesson(s)

Lesson

Don't lever up a consumer discretionary and highly seasonal company going into a deep recession.

Don't go the raw PE route with a product/company build on personal touch reputation.

Harry & David still struggling under weight of debt, recession | lansingstatejournal.com | Lansing State Journal:

"Since New York-based private equity investors bought Harry & David six years ago, the company has sliced its work force by a third and cut back on raises and benefits."

Dumb

Bit o'History

How Germany Ended Its World War I Reparations Payments - TIME:

"Not quite. Germany's last $94 million payment issued on Sunday isn't a direct reparations settlement but rather the final sum owed on bonds that were issued between 1924 and 1930 and sold to foreign (mostly American) investors but then never paid. The story of German reparations involves several payment plans, years of inflation, broken promises, canceled debts and a man named Adolf Hitler who flat out refused to give anyone anything."

Headed home

Headed home from a bit of paradise

Great week

Will post some of my own shots late (not as good as this one)

from http://www.art.com