FIGHT SOCIALIZED SOCIALISM!!!!!!!!

I AM SICK AND TIRED OF MY TAX MONEY BEING USED BY THE SOCIALIST AMERICA STATES!!! WE NEED COMPETITION FROM PRIVATE COMPANIES, EFFICIENCY, PROFIT, INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY - AND IF SOMEONE NEEDS HELP, THAT'S WHAT CHARITY IS FOR!!!! YOU LAZY SOCIALIST COMMUNIST FASCIST NAZI BASTERDS!! MORANS!!

Socialized Highways

Shouldn't we have 5 or more highways for every major route, all competing against each other? Won't that bring efficiency and the lowest costs overall? After all, government can't do anything so why trust them with highways and our common need to be mobile.

Yes, there should be AT LEAST 5 HIGHWAYS for every route, and at least five roads in any county from any point to point, all privately owned, privately developed, all paid for with tolls. Profit means efficiency!

Why should someone who drives less have to pay for those who drive more? I'm tired of Sunday drivers mooching off my hard-earned tax dollars. It's generational theft!

Socialized Education

Why should childless people have to foot the bill for educating the children of those who made *an individual choice to have kids?* That really chaps my hide. I only have gay sex. I take personal responsibility! There's NO chance I'm going to have a kid that will need schooling. So why do I have to pay for that for OTHER PEOPLE? Screw them. I make a responsible choice, I take responsibility for myself. If they want to have kids, it's their individual responsibility to pay for that kid's school if they want their kid to go to school. That's THEIR CHOICE SO STOP STEALING MY MONEY!

IT'S GENERATIONAL THEFT! THE YOUNG STEALING FROM THE OLD! KEEP YOUR GRUBBY LITTLE FINGERS OFF MY HARD EARNED MONEY YOU LITTLE IGNORANT SOCIALISTS!

Socialized Protection

If someone wants a police officer to drive through their neighborhood and check on their house, they ought to pay for it with their own money, not my tax money. I, for example, have a scary-looking pit bull and CFL outdoor lights. I don't need police. So why should I pay for someone else's protection? I'm a big guy and I'm not worried about getting attacked or into a street fight or mugged. Why should I pay for other people's protection? I don't need it! This is America! I should be free NOT to pay for other people's needs that I don't have!

And my house is not going to burn down. I don't need firefighters! I sprayed that protective stuff all over my drapes and furniture. I don't smoke or use matches or candles. THAT'S MY CHOICE! SO WHY DO I HAVE TO PAY FOR OTHER PEOPLE'S IRRESPONSIBLE CHOICES!? If they want their house to burn down, if they want to smoke and use candles and have gas stoves and fireplaces and "plug things in" -- that's THEIR INDIVIDUAL CHOICE, and they should pay for their own fire departments. Why should they mooch off MY HARD EARNED MONEY! THIEVES!

Socialized Defense

I was never afraid of Saddam Hussein and I didn't care if he did have WMD. I have a gas mask. I have duct tape for my windows and an Ionic Breeze. And if I should get nuked, I don't want to live in a world after it's been nuked, so I'm fine if I die from a nuke. So why should *I* have to pay for OTHER PEOPLE'S perceived security needs? Please! THIS IS AMERICA! STOP STEALING MY MONEY!

I didn't need the government to fight WWII for me either! OUTRAGEOUS! Have we ever paid off all that spending! I could easily have learned to speak German. That's my choice.

I also don't think my neighborhood is going to get bombed by Al Qaeda. I just don't think I live in a risky place for terrorism, and I choose not to use the banking system either so I don't care about cyberterrorism. You can't get your identity stolen if you don't use the banking system! That's MY CHOICE! SO WHY DO I HAVE TO PAY FOR OTHER PEOPLE'S DEFENSE NEEDS?!!?! IF YOU WANT TO BE SAFE AND YOU LIVE IN NEW YORK CITY, YOU CAN JUST MOVE AWAY! GET ANOTHER JOB YOU LAZY BUM! QUIT MOOCHING OFF MY TAX DOLLARS!

Socialized Space

NASA is socialism. NASA. NAZI. Ever noticed THAT?! I don't ever want to vacation in space. I don't use satellites and I don't need a cell phone. THAT'S AN INDIVIDUAL CHOICE and those who use those things should pay for them, not my tax dollars! I also don't want any medicine that may result from "outer space experiments". I'll keep my medicine from earth, thank you very much. I'm young, I'm male, I'm strong, and I don't even need medicine and I never will.

I don't need to know how the universe was created or the nature of physics. I don't benefit from "technology advances." If dresses, sandals, and mule stables was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me! Jesus didn't need "science" to SAVE THE WORLD!!!!! So why should I have to pay for ELITIST people's techno-fetishes? OUTRAGEOUS! This country is on a dangerous dangerous path.

Socialized Utilities

I don't use the Internets!! I never needed the government to create it. If I have something to say to somebody, I can damn well walk through the back woods to their house (or pay a toll) and TELL THEM MYSELF! So why should I pay for other lazy bastards who want the convenience and luxury of telephones! I never needed the government to create the phone lines. OR THE POWER LINES. I show individual responsibility for my power needs - I use a generator! Why should the government lay down power lines or the power grid with my TAXES! OUTRAGEOUS! If I want to be all fancy and "read at night" - hell I can go outside to the outhouse with a candle and read a book. I don't need the power grid! Or sewers! Socialized plumbing!!! OUTRAGEOUS!!!!

I don't recognize this country anymore. The foundling fathers are rolling in their graves....

You Can Bet H1N1 Affects Real Estate & The Economy

From The World Health Organization, the public health division of the United Nations, in Geneva, Switzerland:

29 April 2009 -- The situation continues to evolve rapidly. As of 18:00 GMT, 29 April 2009, nine countries have officially reported 148 cases of swine influenza A/H1N1 infection. The United States Government has reported 91 laboratory confirmed human cases, with one death. Mexico has reported 26 confirmed human cases of infection including seven deaths.

The following countries have reported laboratory confirmed cases with no deaths - Austria (1), Canada (13), Germany (3), Israel (2), New Zealand (3), Spain (4) and the United Kingdom (5).

Further information on the situation will be available on the WHO website on a regular basis.

WHO advises no restriction of regular travel or closure of borders. It is considered prudent for people who are ill to delay international travel and for people developing symptoms following international travel to seek medical attention, in line with guidance from national authorities.

There is also no risk of infection from this virus from consumption of well-cooked pork and pork products. Individuals are advised to wash hands thoroughly with soap and water on a regular basis and should seek medical attention if they develop any symptoms of influenza-like illness.

Notice that the focus continues to be on sensible precaution, attention, prevention... This is not an emergency declaration.

However if things rise to the level of a global crisis, I doubt we will hear many more figures or warnings. Once the barn doors are wide open......

From An Executive Producer of Cesar Millan

Okay, so rule #1 about blogging: most non-professional bloggers such as myself are not journalists. We don't have time to fact-check everything or chase down all the articles we link to, etc. Blogging is sort of a citizen sport, more about commentary and opinion than reporting. Nonetheless we have a moral obligation to try at least to be accurate.

My last post took Cesar Millan and his program to task for focusing too much on domination and not enough on the nuances of psychology -- I suppose when you have a weekly show to do, it can get kind of formulaic and frankly that's what I think of the show.

So a web savvy or surfing producer of the show emailed me earlier a long email in their defense, and that's fine, frankly I didn't read it closely but I will try to paste in some of the main points below to help round out the discussion, and lord knows I appreciate the time she took to defend her work and respect that she did so.

I sincerely regret not knowing that the lawsuit mentioned in the previous post was apparently settled in 2007 according to the producer, and I trust her. And I have neither the time nor the interest to research it further - but in the era of Google, you dear reader already have everything you need if you should so choose to do so yourself.

Frankly I'm already bored with this post. So without further adieu, here is I suppose a legitimate email from an executive producer of Cesar Millan's The Dog Whisperer. I told her I would post a follow up including snippets of her email but also that I stand by my post and my opinion, and I do. She was polite in her response. Now to follow through.

We placed our success rate (that is, long-term dog rehab success) at about 80% based on that book, which only covered the first three seasons. We are now filming our 6th season and have had even more impressive successes, primarily because we have been able to do more long-term follow-ups and repeat visits with cases, which we weren't able to do because of budgetary reasons back when we began Season 1.


Not only is the show real, the crew likes to call it "the only REAL reality show on television." Nothing -absolutely nothing - is pre-scripted. Cesar knows nothing (or only a bare minimum of facts) about any case before he goes on the consultation. Cesar won't repeat any of his actions for the camera (as is SOP, even in documentary work) because he says, "Dogs don't understand 'take 2'. He is there for the dog, 100%, and not the cameras - much to the frustration of the crew, but we've learned to adapt to each other over the past several years. ...

I'm not sure the defense above really answers the thrust of my criticism sufficiently, however I do recognize there are many angles to a complicated endeavor like producing a weekly show such as this. I accept results will be at best mixed, and to what degree exactly I don't know, and Ms. Peltier doesn't address fully (nor should she). I know what I know, she knows what she knows, and anyone reading this can think for themselves. More:

[The Humane Society] spent time on the set with us, and now are among our biggest supporters. In fact, they just collaborated with us on a powerful show about rescuing and rehabilitating puppy mill dogs. Ask the representatives of the prominent animal advocacy group Last Chance for Animals, or our thousands and thousands of friends and supporters in the Animal Rescue Community across the United States. Ask Martin Deeley, head of the IACP. You can even ask Ian Dunbar, the grandaddy of "positive reinforcement" training, who has met with Cesar personally (though I don't believe he's been on the set), and found that they share many more commonalities than differences.

Fair enough, I don't know about any of this, but I have no reason to distrust Ms. Peltier. And finally:

Finally, an FYI: the Flody Suarez lawsuit to which you referred was amicably settled in 2007. A read-through of the court records will show that although Cesar was named in the suit, the incident happened on his property only. Cesar was not even present when the incident occurred, but had loaned use of his treadmills to an accquaintance - a trainer not even associated with him. That was back in the day when Cesar would naively do favors for anyone who'd ever done him a favor. Unfortunately, celebrity attracts lawsuits and he has since learned the hard way not to be so blindly generous.


In short, you may or may not agree with Cesar's methods, which he himself asserts are just "options" for rehabilitation - but I assure you, the show itself is indeed "legitimate."


Sincerely yours,
Melissa Jo Peltier
Co-Chair, MPH Entertainment, Inc.

Well again I do sincerely regret not knowing that the lawsuit had been settled, and in my defense (although I don't have much of one on this point), I did say "If true..." I know, I know. I regret not knowing it had been settled (and no I haven't verified that either, I'm hungry, my dog needs to play, I don't really care).

As for the facts of what the lawsuit alleged, it makes no difference when it comes to the thrust of my commentary about the over-use of dominance I have witnessed on the program, my informed commentary about pit bulls (the point I care about the most), nor my notes about using a pinch collar.

Before Stewart vs CNBC: Stewart vs Crossfire 2004

To follow up on yesterday morning's comment about the power of satire, and particularly of Jon Stewart's satire, here is the following from 2004:



Mmmmm me loves me some Jon Stewart. Political satire has a rich American history and a critical role to play in a functioning democracy, and in the case last week of Stewart vs CNBC, in a functioning capitalist democracy. Sometimes satire is the most effective way to bring such large and discordant forces into sharp relief. Operative word: sharp. See clip above and prior posts to wit. Jon Stewart is an American patriot and national treasure.

You Know Nothing!

Apropos of nothing but humor as medicine...

I do not know who these ladies are, and I have never seen them before. But this is the most hilarious clip I have seen in months, sent by a friend. I laughed until I was crying... (FYI one lady uses a few choice words, in case you need to put your headphones on...)



Hi-larious.

Our Town & The United States of America

It's no secret I'm a living cliche at times and do enjoy the Sunday Morning Times, mainly its in-depth front-page reporting, and the always thought-provoking writing of their theater-turned-Sunday-columnist-culture-critic Frank Rich.

This morning, Rich provides insight into our collective national moment by highlighting the resurgent play, Our Town, the famous 1938 play performed by many talented and/or under-resourced theatres because it requires no set and a large cast of extras (a prescription for high school and community production if there ever was one).

But this morning Rich reminds us why the play is also enduring - its timeless call to a collective sense of ourselves and our nation, captured in these times by Barack Obama's famous refrain, "We are the United States of America," that has resonated with many Americans. Sometimes, though, we could do well to "remember" history so that we are not condemned...

Writes Rich:

“WHEREVER you come near the human race, there’s layers and layers of nonsense,” says the Stage Manager in Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town.” Those words were first heard by New York audiences in February 1938, as America continued to reel from hard times. The Times’s front page told of 100,000 auto workers protesting layoffs in Detroit and of a Republican official attacking the New Deal as “fascist.” Though no one was buying cars, F.D.R. had the gall to endorse a mammoth transcontinental highway construction program to put men back to work.

He continues to frame our current moment with references to Warren Buffet, AIG, and Bernie Madoff:

We’re still working our way through the aftershocks of the orgy of irresponsibility and greed that brought America to this nadir. In his recent letter to shareholders, a chastened Warren Buffett likened our financial institutions’ recklessness to venereal disease. Even the innocent were infected because “it’s not just whom you sleep with” but also “whom they” — unnamed huge financial institutions — “are sleeping with,” he wrote. Indeed, our government is in the morally untenable position of rewarding the most promiscuous carrier of them all, A.I.G., with as much as $180 billion in taxpayers’ cash transfusions (so far) precisely because it can’t be disentangled from all the careless (and unidentified) trading partners sharing its infection.

Buffett’s sermon coincided with the public soul searching of another national sage, Elie Wiesel, who joined a Portfolio magazine panel discussion on Bernie Madoff. Some $37 million of Wiesel’s charitable foundation and personal wealth vanished in Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. “We gave him everything,” Wiesel told the audience. “We thought he was God.”

Rich argues next a fundamental point discussed on this site. The American economy has no hope of recovery until we see a massive return of jobs and job confidence to restore broad-based consumer-driven markets, the cornerstone of real estate spending and values as well. A primary driver of the severity of this current crisis is the concentration of so little of our collective national income in the vast middleclass and working Americans, which I personally define as those earning less than $250,000 taxable income per year. Rich:

The simplest explanation for why America’s reality got so distorted is the economic imbalance that Barack Obama now wants to remedy with policies that his critics deride as “socialist” (“fascist” can’t be far behind): the obscene widening of income inequality between the very rich and everyone else since the 1970s. “There is something wrong when we allow the playing field to be tilted so far in the favor of so few,” the president said in his budget message. He was calling for fundamental fairness, not class warfare. America hasn’t seen such gaping inequality since the Gilded Age and 1920s boom that preceded the Great Depression.

From the link behind "such gaping inequality" above is the following chart demonstrating the magnitude of the widening gap:

The chart shows the share of the richest 10 percent of the American population in total income – an indicator that closely tracks many other measures of economic inequality – over the past 90 years, as estimated by the economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez. I’ve added labels indicating four key periods. These are:

The Long Gilded Age: Historians generally say that the Gilded Age gave way to the Progressive Era around 1900. In many important ways, though, the Gilded Age continued right through to the New Deal. As far as we can tell, income remained about as unequally distributed as it had been the late 19th century – or as it is today. Public policy did little to limit extremes of wealth and poverty, mainly because the political dominance of the elite remained intact; the politics of the era, in which working Americans were divided by racial, religious, and cultural issues, have recognizable parallels with modern politics.

The Great Compression: The middle-class society I grew up in didn’t evolve gradually or automatically. It was created, in a remarkably short period of time, by FDR and the New Deal. As the chart shows, income inequality declined drastically from the late 1930s to the mid 1940s, with the rich losing ground while working Americans saw unprecedented gains. Economic historians call what happened the Great Compression, and it’s a seminal episode in American history.

Middle class America: That’s the country I grew up in. It was a society without extremes of wealth or poverty, a society of broadly shared prosperity, partly because strong unions, a high minimum wage, and a progressive tax system helped limit inequality. It was also a society in which political bipartisanship meant something: in spite of all the turmoil of Vietnam and the civil rights movement, in spite of the sinister machinations of Nixon and his henchmen, it was an era in which Democrats and Republicans agreed on basic values and could cooperate across party lines.

The great divergence: Since the late 1970s the America I knew has unraveled. We’re no longer a middle-class society, in which the benefits of economic growth are widely shared: between 1979 and 2005 the real income of the median household rose only 13 percent, but the income of the richest 0.1% of Americans rose 296 percent.

Penultimately and for fun here, Rich doesn't miss the opportunity to pile on to the emperor clothes of CNBC and the righteous skewering by Jon Stewart shown earlier on this site. What's troubling is that the clips Stewart assembled were presented in full context and told a broader tale of CNBC and Wall Street insiderism that has become all-too-apparent now, and which CNBC is terrified to have revealed broadly.

Last week Jon Stewart whipped up a well-earned frenzy with an eight-minute “Daily Show” takedown of the stars of CNBC, the business network that venerated our financial gods, plugged their stocks and hyped the bubble’s reckless delusions. (Just as it had in the dot-com bubble.) Stewart’s horrifying clip reel featured Jim Cramer reassuring viewers that Bear Stearns was “not in trouble” just six days before its March 2008 collapse; Charlie Gasparino lip-syncing A.I.G.’s claim that its subprime losses were “very manageable” in December 2007; and Larry Kudlow declaring last April that “the worst of this subprime business is over.” The coup de grâce was a CNBC interviewer fawning over the lordly Robert Allen Stanford. Stewart spoke for many when he concluded, “Between the two of them I can’t decide which one of those guys I’d rather see in jail.”

Led by Cramer and Kudlow, the CNBC carnival barkers are now, without any irony whatsoever, assailing the president as a radical saboteur of capitalism. It’s particularly rich to hear Cramer tar Obama (or anyone else) for “wealth destruction” when he followed up his bum steer to viewers on Bear Stearns with oleaginous on-camera salesmanship for Wachovia and its brilliant chief executive, a Cramer friend and former boss, just two weeks before it, too, collapsed. What should really terrify the White House is that Cramer last month gave a big thumbs-up to Timothy Geithner’s bank-rescue plan.

Finally, Rich brings it brilliantly together so as not to ruin our Sunday morning coffee:

In one way, though, the remaining vestiges of the past decade’s excesses, whether they live on in the shouted sophistry of CNBC or in the ashes of Stanford’s castle, are useful. Seen in the cold light of our long hangover, they remind us that it was the America of the bubble that was aberrant and perverse, creating a new normal that wasn’t normal at all.

The true American faith endures in “Our Town.” The key word in its title is the collective “our,” just as “united” is the resonant note hit by the new president when saying the full name of the country. The notion that Americans must all rise and fall together is the ideal we still yearn to reclaim, and that a majority voted for in November. But how we get there from this economic graveyard is a challenge rapidly rivaling the one that faced Wilder’s audience in that dark late winter of 1938.

The Economy, Raffles, & Horses

I really do not forward chain emails, there are so many, but occasionally one comes along that's worth the read. As is the case with most email chains, I don't have proper attribution, though this is all over the Internet and in emails. But in our frustration trying to grasp the complexities of the economy and our own finances right now, it's nice to have a brief moment of clarity and humor. In case you haven't seen it yet:

Young Chuck in Montana bought a horse from a farmer for $100. The farmer agreed to deliver the horse the next day.

The next day the farmer drove up and said, "Sorry son, but I have some bad news... the horse died."

Chuck replied, "Well, then just give me my money back."

The farmer said, "Can't do that. I went and spent it already."

Chuck said, "OK, then, just bring me the dead horse."

The farmer asked, "What ya going to do with him?"

Chuck said, "I'm going to raffle him off."

The farmer said, "You can't raffle off a dead horse!"

Chuck said, "Sure I can, watch me. I just won't tell anybody he's dead."

A month later, the farmer met up with Chuck and asked, "What happened with that dead horse?"

Chuck said, "I raffled him off. I sold 500 tickets at two dollars a piece and made a profit of $998."

The farmer said, "Didn't anyone complain?"

Chuck said, "Just the guy who won. So I gave him his two dollars back."

The Best Things in Life

While we all now attempt to exercise our fair share of personal responsibility in our finances, it is an especially salient time to remember that the best things in life are (often) free.

Many communities have free events every week, and in large cities such as Houston, different parts of the city often have local events, from small neighborhoods to larger suburb cities or even micro-neighborhoods in the downtown area.

Here are two such events, both very different and appealing to different tastes. Of course in addition to this there are countless musician recitals at local colleges and churches, film festivals, area parks with nice amenities for kids, zoos, and in Houston, its world-class museums are now entirely free thanks to a giant grant from an estate. The museum district of any town should never be overlooked, nor should special arboretums and state and national parks.

Here are local events in Houston that caught my eye because they sound unique, fun, and free.

SpringFest to offer wine, art, music

The 11th Annual SpringFest, one of the largest wine exhibition and tasting events in Houston, will take place in Historic Old Town Spring Friday, March 6 through Sunday, March 8.

Wine enthusiasts are invited to attend this Texas-style event featuring local wineries showcasing top Texas wines, micro-brewed beer tastings, original art work from local artists, exhibits with furniture and art, and live entertainment featuring performances from Davin James, Shake Russell, Max Stalling, Todd Fritsch, jazz ensembles and more. The event is presented by Houston Press and KVST 99.7 FM.

Admission is free on Friday and Sunday; free Saturday until 4 p.m.; and $10 on Saturday after 4 p.m.

And another from an internationally renowned neurologist (a personal favorite topic):

Neuroscientist to speak March 18-19 at Lone Star College-North Harris

Dr. Janet Zadina, an internationally recognized reading specialist and cognitive neuroscientist, will speak March 18 and 19 at Lone Star College—North Harris, 2700 W.W. Thorne. Area teachers, counselors, and any professionals or community residents interested in hearing about brain research and education are invited to attend any or all of her four presentations, which will be offered free of charge.
The schedule is as follows:

* 9:30-11 a.m. March 18: “Anxiety and the Brain: Overcoming Hidden Stress Triggers,” Room CE-101 in the Continuing Education Building.

* 1-4 p.m. March 18: “Using Brain Research to Enhance and Energize Instruction,” Room CE-101 in the Continuing Education Building. ...

* 10-11 a.m. March 19: “Is It All In Their Head? How Brain Research Informs Our Understanding of Learning Differences,” Room CE-101 in the Continuing Education Building.

Awesome.

Our Pets Need Us Now & We Need Them

In the current financial challenge, many pet owners (I prefer "guardians") are choosing to give up their pets to shelters to avoid the extra expense of another mouth to feed and dependent to bathe. I understand. However I worry that viewing pets as another "expense" short-changes the very people who need their pets now more than ever.

Many people don't really understand their pets. Perhaps the guardian has never had a pet before or doesn't know much about their behavior, despite how much Dog Whisperer they watch. And then there is the very real issue of the expense.

However pets provide humans a distinct form of companionship unparalleled by anything else in the world. Pets are "beyond words." They have a unique tie therefore that bypasses our frontal cortex and speech center and goes directly to our emotional center, often dabbling with our unconscious minds.

Our pets allow us to project onto them and to work through difficult feelings through our at-times-complex relationships with them. They don't mind. We only need to feed and shelter them (they even don't need clothes). That seems like something I would not want to surrender, especially in difficult times. I'd reach out for help from loved ones and strangers before I would give up my companion dog, about whom I often say, "We're now like an old married couple."

It is sometimes said that a society can be judged by how it treats the least among them. I believe that, and most especially about animals that we humans have bred over the years to be domesticated and whose only defense is a faithful human guardian.

The best animal welfare organization I know and have ever been a part of is The Animal Rescue League of Boston, where I am a member of the President's Council and from where I adopted Tank. It was founded in 1899 by Ms. Anna Harris Smith, whose philosophy was "Kindness Uplifts the World." Kindness is indeed an end unto itself.

From the ARL Boston website:

The Animal Rescue League of Boston believes that the power and beauty of the animal human bond is intrinsic to efforts to stop all forms of violence in our society.

A fundamental premise of the humane community is that if a child is taught to be kind to animals, there is a greater likelihood that the individual will mature into a person who respects not only humanity, but also all living things. This premise has been the subject of sociological studies and is expressed in literature and the arts. With a deep belief in this premise, Animal Rescue League of Boston founder Anna Harris Smith initiated a humane education program for children by establishing The Kindness Clubs in the neighborhoods of Boston.

I look forward to helping ARL Boston expand its effectiveness and mission across the nation so that more people can hear this philosophy and experience the many rewards of animal companions.

Jennifer Hudson's Star Spangled Banner

Oh my. I watched Jennifer Hudson's performance of The Star Spangled Banner from tonight's Super Bowl three times... and cried each time. I am a big guy and not easily moved. Nor do I cry easily or often. But Ms. Hudson's performance was easily the best I have ever heard or seen of our national anthem. And I think in this particular moment in our nation's history, and with the crew of the recently downed aircraft including Captain Sully Sullenberger there, it was just a whole lot packed into those moments, and it came as an overwhelming surprise.

I cannot wait to get this for my car stereo. I don't know how the sound is on the following, but it was posted just after the performance obviously from a television screen, and at least it gives much of the flavor.

Wow. I always loved the anthem of course, but Jennifer Hudson has now made me a total sucker for it.



[UPDATE 10:33 PM CT] From the AP:

It was a completely different energy than the one offered two hours earlier by Hudson, who made her first public appearance since the October slayings in Chicago of her mother, brother and 7-year-old nephew. Her estranged brother-in-law has been charged in the killings.

Wearing a flowing white top with black leggings and a military-style dark jacket, the 27-year-old singer/actress looked apprehensive and took a deep breath before launching into the anthem.

Hudson, who clocked in at 2 minutes, 13 seconds, looked relieved when she was through.

When she returned to her dressing room, she anxiously asked pre-game show producer Rickey Minor "How did I do?"

"I told her 'Touchdown!'" Minor told The Associated Press after the performance.

"This was such an important performance, because it's the first time everyone has seen Jennifer. But she's in such a great place, with such great spirits and time can heal her wounds. She's on fire right now and totally grounded."

Minor, the music director for American Idol, has produced numerous Super Bowl pre-game performances, including Whitney Houston's 1991 anthem in Tampa that's considered the benchmark for singers. He said Hudson's two cell phones lit up "like slot machines" following her performance, and she received a moving text message from Jamie Foxx, her co-star in "Dreamgirls."

"His text said 'Amazing. It brought tears to my eyes,'" Minor said. "She's just getting so much love."

Although entertainers can perform live, Minor insisted that Hudson and Faith Hill, who sang "America the Beautiful" before the national anthem, use the tracks the NFL requires them to submit a week before the game.

Hudson made her performance personal.

"She's from the church," Minor said. "So we wanted to give it a gospel feel, use a little organ, rhythm and really give it a feel that matched Jennifer. We wanted her to emote the lyrics and connect with the song."

Hudson's now expected to resume her active work schedule. Hudson, who won an Oscar for best supporting actress for her role in "Dreamgirls," is scheduled to perform at next week's Grammy Awards, and her new video for "If This Isn't Love" is set to debut the week of Feb. 9.

Jennifer Hudson is quintessential Americana. And I think she's set the new "benchmark" for anthem singers.

Tasting the Pudding Before It's Made

Dr. Michael Watkins was my professor of advanced diplomacy at Harvard Business School, and no professor had more of an influence over improving and shaping my diplomatic skills than he did. For that, I owe him a tremendous debt. He is also a fantastic teacher, author, and human being.

But in his recent blog post on the website of his company, I think his attempt to relate the presidential transition to business transition falls very short of the mark, and is thin in its analysis. But that happens when one tries to view the world from the perspective of any single discipline, and it happens to the best of academics and accomplished elite consultants.

From Dr. Watkins' blog:

President Obama clearly understands that the moment demands heroism. He issued a ringing call-to-arms in his inaugural address: “Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.”

But does our new President have the heroism within him to force (yes force) the nation to swallow some very bitter medicine? Because he strikes me more as a steward than a hero. This is potentially a big problem because consensus-building-on-steroids simply isn’t going to cut it.

Dr. Watkins is definitely spot-on when he says "consensus-building-on-steroids simply isn't going to cut it." But where is the evidence that the actions of this administration will demand "consensus on steroids"? As an internationally accomplished diplomat, Dr. Watkins surely understands the tactical value of framing a strategy in public versus the actual strategy deployed, which can only be discerned in hindsight. It strikes me as imminently appropriate to call for unprecedented consensus in these times, but the call for consensus and the refusal to act in its absence are two very very different beasts. And while the call has now been made, the actual strategy deployed is far from clear.

Dr. Watkins' next comment, however, is a universal but not obvious truth that will surely come to bear, and that we can witness in our own lives and organizations with ease:

He and his administration can listen until the cows come home and what they will hear is a cacophony of conflicting agendas and parochial views.

Yes. Just yes. A thousand times yes. And this is precisely the nature of the beast this administration faces, just as the last administration faced it. But the ability and determination of this administration to confront this timeless beast cannot yet be discerned.

Hence the closing line of the post I offered on this blog for which I hope Dr. Watkins will cut an old student some slack(!):

"I’m not sure I find Dr. Watkins' post convincing in its analysis. By that I mean that I could chew more on the claims if they were backed by specific examples in modern turnarounds or in history - there are plenty from which to draw.

I am also struck that it is way too early even to attempt a judgment about President Obama’s abilities in this context and at this time. Certainly we have strong indications of the quality of his judgment and management skills from his career and especially his two year campaign for the presidency, which was no small feat.

But as with all managers, the proof is in the pudding, and not in the rhetoric. And we simply don’t have enough of it (the pudding) to make any consequential conclusions. But as the post implies, that does not mean we can’t know what to watch for.

Right now I am struck by his strong and effective grasp of both the necessary rhetoric and imagery needed in this moment of time to communicate the great American turnaround (a “rebirth” seems more compelling, as it is a time to remake the nation, not just change course). And that is encouraging - this is not a man with a tin ear for political dynamics as his predecessor had.

And if we’re going to consider the promise of his judgment or future actions based on the inaugural speech, I don’t think any particular lines are quite as instructive (though there are many profound ones) as his obvious choice to deliver a sober, nuts-and-bolts, clear speech. We all know this is a man who knows how to deliver a barn-burner, or inspirational, or soaring speech without parallel. But nothing at this point can be said about the inaugural speech more profound than his particular choice of tone and subject, which was not at all an obvious choice to make.

With the inaugural speech, we begin to see the early makings of the pudding. His choice of tone and subject, his clarity and specificity about this moment we face, and his very telling lines that promise a clear break from both the style and substance of the preceding administration were more telling than any of the words.

That was not the “broad stroke” thin-on-substance-but-a-great-speech-maker caricature of him that was made (always without reason) during the campaign. In the inaugural, we saw a man capable of embracing this moment, a man clearly capable not only of inspiring hope as was his trademark during the campaign, but a man capable of providing clarity, and clearly capable of the arduous and grand task of map-making.

For the rest of it, we have no choice but to keep watching - and participating - with open minds and cautious optimism."

The wonderful thing about really smart, confident, accomplished professionals and good human beings is that they can take criticism with grace and relish. I have the utmost confidence in Dr. Watkins. But at any rate, the grading has long been done, so that confidence could be a little disingenuous I guess.

Stultifying

I'm trying to get over a rhinovirus or allergies or something. Almost a week now. Yikes. But brandy I have found is helpful with the sinuses. As is a combination of nasal decongestant (they're all the same), Benadryl, Flonase, and Pseudoephedrine.

I find the cold/allergy aisle to be absolutely stultifying. Not only are there hundreds of brands for the same basic problems, but there are dozens of variations on each brand, each as indecipherable as the next. All of this for cold/sinus/allergy problems that even doctors can't reliably differentiate in person. Then, what's even worse, if you read the ingredients in every single brand, it's the same 3 or 4 basic ingredients just in different combinations or amounts: Phenylephrine (nasal decongestant), Diphendhydramine (antihistamine), and Ibuprofen. That's it really, in all of them. ALL.

The secret behind Nyquil for knocking you out? Benadryl. 25mg.

Benadryl (Diphenhydramine) is actually what most "non-habit forming" sleeping pills are. That's it. Read the label.

Cepacol lozenges are fun because it contains 2 ingredients: Benzocaine (sounds good right?), and Menthol. The Menthol is listed as an "oral analgesic" but the Benzocaine is listed as an "oral anaesthetic," like it puts your mouth to sleep. Like tasting cocaine. Whatever, it works.

I am starting to feel better this evening, so hopefully I will have the clarity of mind to return to real estate and economics blogging very soon.

When Wisdom Isn't Conventional

I have a great friend who is an excellent high net-worth financial adviser and who sends an occasional newsletter related to investment markets and macro economic issues. In the most recent email, which contained a narrative overview of the events of 2008 (and what an extraordinary timeline of events that was), the newsletter posited the following paragraph, which I think reflects a certain conventional wisdom about what happened September through November that I want to challenge:

Financial disasters that once would have sounded like alarmist fantasies occurred on a weekly basis. Banks failed, oil and gasoline prices smashed old records, and the federal government agreed to pump trillions of dollars into the financial system just to keep it afloat. The upheaval helped elect Barack Obama president and may have ushered in a new era of tighter government regulation, ending more than two decades in which free-market philosophies reigned.

The real kicker here is the connection between market "upheaval" and the election of Barack Obama, almost as if, as many cable commenters would say, that if economic matters are dominant, then Democrats get elected, and if national security or foreign affairs are dominant, then Republicans get elected.

Certainly we can look to limited historical patterns where this supposition holds true, but I do not think that's what happened at all this year. And so we shouldn't afford ourselves the false luxury of this conventional wisdom, lest we lose a deeper appreciation of what actually transpired.

The insidious nature about incorrect conventional wisdom ("CW") is that the reasons it may be incorrect correlates strongly to the complexity of the issue involved, thereby missing the deeper insight required to have a full and accurate grasp on that issue.

This year wasn't an election about "general climate" factors related to economics vs national security, for example. No, far from it. The nation was obviously reeling from years of bad news and a diminishing sense of the meaning of "America" in these modern and complex times.

As I watched it, I thought the primary thrust of the election was about an intense public reflection about the future meaning of the word "American" with which we all identify.

From the bitter election battle in December 2000, to 9/11, to the threat of lethal homeland terror, to natural catastrophes including fires and especially hurricanes like Katrina, Rita, Ivan, and Ike, to the Abu Ghraib revelations, to extraordinary renditions and warrantless wiretapping debates, to critical and multiple intelligence failures, and of course most recently since 2007 to a crumbling economy in the midst of an official recession since 2007... it's just been a breath-taking period for America and Americans that has shaken us to our core deep down, I think.

In that light, it appears to me that the election season since 2007 was infused with competing visions of how to define America in the future. Broadly speaking, Democrats and progressives pushed for an idea of a "new" America based on values of inclusiveness, diplomacy, the collective well-being, and of course "hope" for better days and newer more successful ways ahead.

Broadly speaking again, Republicans seemed to offer a future America based on the proven successes of America's past, an American "restoration" of its strong traditions, international strength, the triumph of rugged individualism that helped build the nation to greatness, and American exceptionalism globally - the "shining city on a hill."

While each of the two major parties had strong and imperfect standard-bearers, these contrasting visions were on display since the early campaigns of 2007.

In normal times, perhaps these contrasting visions may have still been in play, however the extraordinary circumstances of the past several years and the current climate of both international and domestic complex challenges led to a greater urgency behind the choice of vision for the next Executive administration. And Americans had the historic opportunity to witness both parties campaign against that urgent backdrop.

It is false to presume the conventional wisdom that the competition between Republicans and Democrats is simply about where to focus the nation: domestically or internationally, where Democrats supposedly win on domestic and economic issues and Republicans on international and security issues. The visions advanced by each party encompassed a broader notion of the meaning of America and how the country should face the myriad challenges now at our collective feet. This was especially true in the most recent election cycle.

Business types often fall into the CW that in 2008 when the economy fell into an emergency in September, the election outcome was fated in the favor of Democrats. But one particular episode in September at the time the crisis exploded weighed far heavier on the election results, I think, than the emergence of the severe economic threat alone and traditionally held "advantages" of either party. Namely, we saw how each presidential candidate responded to the proposed immediate measures to shore up the financial sector.

In that episode, I believe John McCain acted in a way that clarified Americans' perspective about which candidate had the stronger ability to achieve their vision for America in the future. McCain now infamously "suspended" his campaign (while continuing campaign operations and advertising), flew to Washington D.C., and pledged to cancel the first presidential debate in order to "focus" on the crisis and produce results. But he didn't produce results, or at least not in a way that was apparent to most Americans. And without the legislation he promised as a prerequisite for the debate, he did in fact show up for the debate anyway.

In contrast, Barack Obama pushed the idea that the president must be able to do multiple things at once (the "walk and chew gum" argument). I don't think that idea won as much as McCain's actions failed.

I think that episode, at the exact time most Americans started really to tune into the presidential race, and during the exact time the economic crisis came into the full public spotlight -- in that moment McCain lost the confidence of the electorate. And therefore I think the election was less about which set of ideas about America prevailed, and was more about which candidate was better equipped to succeed in his vision.

Conventional Wisdom has a strong allure. It is common, well-established, accessible, and in the Stephen Colbert sense, "truthy." But CW can often be flat wrong and therefore dangerous in its complacency about issues that require deeper insight. And that's why anyone seeking accuracy in an ever-increasingly complex world should regard CW with a high degree of skepticism.

Perhaps I'm wrong about my view in this particular instance of CW. But it goes without doubt that CW is a threat to our individual judgment about important matters in our own individual lives if left unexamined.

The unexamined life may in fact be worth living, but perhaps it cannot be lived as well.

We'll Have Iced Tea. Never Mind! Gotta go!

Last night my business partner (my mother also) and I went to one of our regular "conference rooms" -- IHOP. I love IHOP because there is never a bad time of day for a fantastic omelet, not to mention those Harvest Grain n' Nut pancakes.

Nonetheless, even my ferocious appetite has its limits. The kid waiting on us approached our table and in as friendly a manner as he possibly could muster, he introduced himself and asked for our drink orders. Nothing wrong with that. Friendly, hard-working guy.

But he also sounded like he was just out of a hospital bed with pneumonia. Sniffle, sniffle, sniffle...

I saw in my mother's eyes that she would not be eating anything... or touching anything that poor guy tried to put on the table. At about the moment he walked away to get our drinks, the restaurant manager walked by our table and let out an echoing loud, hacking cough that almost made me grab my cell phone for help.

That was it. My mom and I were torn about the ugly prospect of being one of "those" types... to leave just after sitting down, and we debated it. But neither of us wanted to eat anymore. Or drink. Or sit there and risk it... So we waited for our drinks to come, and I told the waiter we forgot an appointment and couldn't stay. He was very polite and offered the drinks for free, but I did lay down a $5 that I hoped he would pocket, and we left (and had a wonderful meal at a new Mexican restaurant in The Woodlands).

Why do sick people go to work?

Obviously, people who rely on hourly wages or tips often feel compelled to go to work sick because if they don't work, they don't get paid, and that is certainly understandable. Debatable, but understandable for sure.

It's also part of our crazy health care system in this country that hard-working people who really need the money are least likely to have adequate insurance or insurance at all for when they do get sick and need basic care, such as for strep throat, a sinus infection, or a cold that threatens to get worse.

It seems everyone's favorite refrain this time of year, as more and more of us come down with nasally voices from stuffed sinuses and endless sniffles, is "it's just my allergies."

But the truth is that it's very difficult to tell the difference between allergies and a common cold. (The link has a great comparison chart.) In fact, treatments are much the same because the symptoms are much the same. The difference: with a cold, the body's immune system is reacting appropriately, whereas with allergies, the body's immune system is reacting inappropriately.

Hence, several over-the-counter and even prescription medicines are branded as "cold & allergy" relief, because they contain some combination of antihistamine, nasal decongestant, and perhaps a little ibuprofen. If you can get it, and if you can stand it, Pseudoephedrine works really well to dry things up (including your tongue though).

The Inexcusable Working Sick

There is one inexcusable type of "working sick" people. These are the people who have paid-time-off but don't want to "use up" a personal day, and so in exchange, they go to work and risk infecting all their coworkers and colleagues (who invariably do get infected in a nasty chain reaction lasting for weeks). Yeah, have a nice time on that extra day of vacation this summer, thanks a lot.

To be fair, however, some blame must be given to the common corporate practice of granting generic "paid time off" days to employees in lieu of separate "vacation days" and "sick days." At first blush, it seems nice that if you want to take a day off, you don't have to give a reason or call in fake-sick (which is inexcusable also). But I think what's really going on is that corporate HR departments decided that to avoid employee abuse of "sick days" with fake-sick call-ins, they would just lump everything together and probably wind up doling out fewer paid days off in total.

Talk about unintended consequences. This has been all the rage for at least 10 years or more in the Fortune 500. I don't know of a single study that has examined whether giving employees an unintended incentive to come to work sick has had any impact on how many sick days the entire workforce requires in any year. I wouldn't be surprised if the total number of days has actually risen. And unlike vacation days, being sick is not something people can plan, which makes the impact on productivity even worse.

In my company, we are pretty good and flexible employers. We try to pay honestly for an honest day's work, and we never expect employees to check their humanity (or their family) at the door when they come to work. However, an employee showing up for work while sick is a terminable offense in our office. Zero.... tolerance.... Anti-tolerance.

Of course, in this economic environment, people may not only need the money, but they could also need the "face time" with the bosses to maximize their chances of just keeping their jobs. Ugh. Why must everything be so darn complicated? Why can't we just live in a black and white world? It sure would make being sick easier.

No matter. For me it's time for another dose of Benadryl, Flonase, and Pseudoephedrine.......

That Skinny Kid With the Funny Accent

Markos Moulitsas Zuniga is the most prominent person in the world of online progressive activism and publishes the largest and most influential political website in the world. Regardless of if or how much one agrees with him, he is an extraordinary person whose example serves to remind sincere Americans of all stripes what binds us at our common core.

In 2006, Moulitsas wrote about his entry and service in the U.S. Army.

Six weeks shy of my 18th birthday, I reported to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, to train as an MLRS/LANCE Operations/Fire Direction Specialist, managing operations and logistics for a missile platoon.

I was a mess of a human being. I was 5 feet 6 inches tall, weighed just 111 pounds, and didn't have a shred of self-confidence. In high school, I had been the short, skinny, Salvadoran war refugee with the funny accent who looked half his age (still do) and read books in the (then) lily-white Chicago suburb of Schaumburg. A deadly combination.

I was also a Republican. As a 17-year-old precinct captain in 1988, not even old enough to vote, I helped deliver one of the district's best precinct performances for Henry Hyde. I had a framed picture of me with George H. W. Bush.

From his bio:

The son of a Salvadoran mother and Greek father, Moulitsas spent his formative years in El Salvador (1976-1980), where he saw first-hand the ravages of civil war. His family fled threats on their lives by the communist guerrillas and settled in the Chicago area.

Markos Moulitsas is not the proverbial kid in his pajamas, blogging from his mother's basement. Far from it, bloggers and their blogs (at least the prominent ones), are the new and dominant political medium. Moulitsas has much to do with that. I am not a veteran, so I have come to my appreciation of the military as an institution from listening to veterans of all kinds, including Moulitsas, who writes movingly:

Military service is a sacrifice from the beginning. The cheap combat boots assigned to new recruits blister the toughest of feet -- after one particularly grueling 20-plus-mile road march with a 100-pound rucksack, I literally squeezed out blood from my socks. But basic training was the best thing to ever happen to me. They say they break you down in basic training so they can rebuild you into a real man. I was already broken when I arrived at Fort Sill. For me, it was all building.

Eight weeks later, I emerged a brand new person, this one weighing 140 pounds. And after my three-year stint, while I was stationed in Germany and missed deploying to the Gulf War by a hair, I emerged as a Democrat.

Many people go through life and find themselves at varying times on either side of any particular fence or another. Fences are, after all, simple and rather arbitrary constructions. No matter what labels we may assign ourselves over time, there is, at our core, something more solid, unmovable and real that transcends any label we'll ever come across.

The military is perhaps the ideal society -- we worked hard but the Army took care of us in return. All our basic needs were met -- housing, food, and medical care. It was as close to a color-blind society as I have ever seen. We looked out for one another. The Army invested in us. I took heavily subsidized college courses and learned to speak German on the Army's dime. I served with people from every corner of the country. I got to party at the Berlin Wall after it fell and explored Prague in those heady post-communism days. I wasn't just a tourist; I was a witness to history.

To be fair, Moulitsas goes on to suggest that the Army and military today is not the same as it was then, but his testimony certainly shows the potential of the institution, its history that produced most veterans with us today, and how our nation's international presence and even war offers transformative experiences for really the entire nation. Exactly what transforms and to what end is certainly worthy of reflection.

Not coincidentally, many of my favorite clients are veterans, and whether we talked about their service or not, I always learn a lot from them as human beings.

Markos Moulitsas Zuniga may have been a scrawny kid entering the Army, but he emerged as a ferocious force that continues today as he serves his country earnestly in different and prominent ways.

Moulitsas earned a JD from Boston University, near where I earned my MBA. Moulitsas is also a pianist and composer, and while there, he recorded a CD with a track named, "Along the Banks of the Charles," a reference to the Charles River, which divides the city of Boston and the city of Cambridge. It runs past downtown and along the campuses of MIT and Harvard. Moulitsas does a fantastic job of capturing what it feels like to be in Boston as a graduate student and break away from arduous study to retreat to the banks of the Charles... feelings of headiness, frightening momentum, and desperate optimism tempered by the high stakes of it all...

An appropriate way to begin blogging in the New Year of 2009.

Why Do Bad Things Happen...

In real estate, people sell their homes for many reasons, the most generalized category of which could be simply "life changes." Whether a family is being transferred or empty-nesters are looking to "downsize", it's life's big stations or events that often induce the change.

All too often, however, the life change is something painful. A divorce, a death, a catastrophic illness... any number of ways that life can truly surprise and shock.

It's an age-old question, but one that we confront in our business time and time again: why do bad things happen to good people?

On many days, I am likely to answer simply, "I don't know. But I bet they happen as often as much as good things happen to good people, or 'nothing' happens to everyone, or good things happen to good people, or -- as much as we think we see it too often -- good things happen to bad people." And yet that answer always feels like it falls short. And it does.

Some people approach the question by going cosmic. Perhaps there's some kind of karmic cycles playing out in and around us. Maybe it's of the social sciences domain, and we all invite the kinds of events around us by how we all live and work together as part of the grand social contract.

Once again, to all these ideas and more, I can still only answer with that great cosmic thud, "I don't know."

But I do know what I see every day. It is one of the more interesting and compelling -- and sometimes very difficult -- lenses through which we get to view the world as real estate brokers: life changes. We see, because we often have to, behind the social veil that gives most of us privacy over our most painful episodes in life.

Nobody really expects their real estate broker to be someone who can say credibly, "You are not alone." And I can't figure out how to say that in such a way that is helpful and doesn't perhaps imply a demeaning of someone's uniquely painful circumstance. So sometimes we as brokers are best left just to listen to what someone wants to tell us and respond to them and their unique circumstance the best we can, because every person's circumstance is unique in several ways.

People might not expect their real estate brokers to be credible on the point of knowing when someone's painful life circumstance is shared by others, whether someone is truly "not alone." Saying so to someone in the moment may sound like hollow or synthetic sympathy. But in truth, as real estate brokers, whether we say it or not, we really are in a position to know.

The Dismal Science?

Mirriam-Webster's Online Dictionary describes the etymology of "economy" as:

Middle French 'yconomie', from Medieval Latin 'oeconomia', from Greek 'oikonomia', from 'oikonomos' 'household manager', from 'oikos' 'house' + 'nemein' 'to manage'

Basically, the Greeks started it, the Latins copied it, and the French made it popular. The original meaning, however, is extraordinary: household manager. Or, perhaps more appropriately, "the state of household affairs."

I'm delighted. Because the idea of "economy" in the contemporary view is a total perversion of the root meaning. And the idea of "economy" as "household management" promises new understanding of affairs in our world of gross political neglect. (I mean political in both the "ideological" and "body politic" senses.)

Economics is not a science. It's really more a discussion.