Random Current Events...
Who the hell winks at a debate? Even more so if it is of the gravity that a debate between candidates for the Vice President of the United States of America carries! I realize that vast quantities of people in my country voted on "charm" and "values" to put the current moron in office, and it infuriates me that so many people are returning to that formula. Despite much hue and cry, Sarah Palin isn't a pig in lipstick, a "hockey mom" in lipstick, or a barracuda in lipstick; she's George Bush in lipstick. And attractively packaged with a pair of breasts! Now, not only can easily charmed men want to have a beer with one of our highest officials, they can want to bang selected official! (You know, gay dudes what fancy 'W' aside...)
The financial collapse is also hysterical to behold. One of the guys I play volleyball with is a professor in Duke's business school, and his whole take has been pretty funny as we've seen this whole thing evolve. Eminently practical, he sets up a chain of either/or choices that demonstrate how ridiculous the situation has become, and further point out the fact that a "bailout" is pretty much inevitable. I cannot recreate it here, because I don't remember it all and it would be belittled without the non-"verbal" communication that's so hard to include in a journal. The real sticking point is HOW the money is going to be used, overseen, etc. A very real factor in this whole mess is the obfuscation of who has what money and assets, and dumping 700 BILLION dollars into a pit of confusion is unlikely to solve the problem in and of itself. Lastly and also, Americans want blood. No no, I'm not talking about Iraq - most folks have had enough of THAT kind. What I'm talking about is almost assuredly a scapegoat. IDEALLY, we could systematically find and prosecute those whose financial practices were SO reckless that they cheated their business partners and investors - but I'm not naive enough to believe that this has a chance in hell of happening. So these financial "gurus" are boggling at the fact that they're not getting their massive check instantly and without question, JUST because people are bitter about ever single living American being on the hook for vaguely 2 grand. I'm not normally vindictive when it's not practical (and plenty vindictive when it is) ... but I totally agree. The financial professions have ALWAYS bugged me, and to a certain extent I appreciate some sectors crashing and burning. Maybe it'll get the rest of them back in line. Haaahahahaha, that was a good one.
It's interesting to me, though, that ACCOUNTANTS were taken to task in Jane Jacobs' book Dark Age Ahead as one of the primary examples of failure in the self-policing of the learned professions, as well as a factor in the failure of "transparent" government. An excellent read, here's a short summary that agrees largely with what I got from the title. Excellent book, though by no means perfectly written. I highly recommend it for substance, if not style.
I also find it somewhat mind-boggling that we have the following news coverage...
Vice Presidential debate: 4,133 articles in Google News.
Financial news regarding the "incident": 2,776 articles.
"Hey look - Steve Fossett's plane!!!": 4,318 articles.
WTFJournalism? I guess fluff and human interest is a lot easier to write than something that might involve "research" or something. Whoah!
Oh well, back to Waaaaaagh!
The financial collapse is also hysterical to behold. One of the guys I play volleyball with is a professor in Duke's business school, and his whole take has been pretty funny as we've seen this whole thing evolve. Eminently practical, he sets up a chain of either/or choices that demonstrate how ridiculous the situation has become, and further point out the fact that a "bailout" is pretty much inevitable. I cannot recreate it here, because I don't remember it all and it would be belittled without the non-"verbal" communication that's so hard to include in a journal. The real sticking point is HOW the money is going to be used, overseen, etc. A very real factor in this whole mess is the obfuscation of who has what money and assets, and dumping 700 BILLION dollars into a pit of confusion is unlikely to solve the problem in and of itself. Lastly and also, Americans want blood. No no, I'm not talking about Iraq - most folks have had enough of THAT kind. What I'm talking about is almost assuredly a scapegoat. IDEALLY, we could systematically find and prosecute those whose financial practices were SO reckless that they cheated their business partners and investors - but I'm not naive enough to believe that this has a chance in hell of happening. So these financial "gurus" are boggling at the fact that they're not getting their massive check instantly and without question, JUST because people are bitter about ever single living American being on the hook for vaguely 2 grand. I'm not normally vindictive when it's not practical (and plenty vindictive when it is) ... but I totally agree. The financial professions have ALWAYS bugged me, and to a certain extent I appreciate some sectors crashing and burning. Maybe it'll get the rest of them back in line. Haaahahahaha, that was a good one.
It's interesting to me, though, that ACCOUNTANTS were taken to task in Jane Jacobs' book Dark Age Ahead as one of the primary examples of failure in the self-policing of the learned professions, as well as a factor in the failure of "transparent" government. An excellent read, here's a short summary that agrees largely with what I got from the title. Excellent book, though by no means perfectly written. I highly recommend it for substance, if not style.
I also find it somewhat mind-boggling that we have the following news coverage...
Vice Presidential debate: 4,133 articles in Google News.
Financial news regarding the "incident": 2,776 articles.
"Hey look - Steve Fossett's plane!!!": 4,318 articles.
WTFJournalism? I guess fluff and human interest is a lot easier to write than something that might involve "research" or something. Whoah!
Oh well, back to Waaaaaagh!