Current Affairs

For me the greatest impact of Barak Obama’s historic victory yesterday is the generational shift that it enables. I’m not talking about his generation, although there’s clearly a passing of the baton from the 60’s generation (people born in the 40’s) to the 80’s generation (people born in the 60’s). I’m talking about his kids (and your kids and my kids) generation.  About the millions of children who woke up this morning with real possibility – with the realization that there are truly no limitations on their ambitions.  I’m talking about the son of my best friend – about as aryan looking as one can be – who now likes to wear white shirts because he thinks they make his…

For those that scoffed at my posts (here and here) about the US savings rate falling below zero (written during the summer of 05′) here’s another, somewhat less scientific data point (not that the skeptics need further convincing these days). The National Debt Clock which counts the total national debt (not consumer debt, but that of the government) ran out of digits a few weeks ago.  Oy.

Information tracking company Filtrbox has put out a handy little widget for tracking TeamUSA at the Olympics.  By choosing both sports (for example: "USA Cycling – Men’s Road") or an individual athletes ("USA Cycling – Men’s Road: Levi Leipheimer") you can keep up to date on your favorite Olympic stories.

China has effectively closed off Mt. Everest peak attempts this year by baring teams from being on the mountain between March and June (which effectively closes off the window for an attempt from the Tibet side this year).  All of this is apparently in reaction to protests in recent years over Tibeten independence and the plan to have the olympic torch scale the mountain during that time period on its approach to China for the games (apparently the Chinese would prefer not to have the torch run into protesters this year).  Yikes! See stories here and here.

I admit it – I’m not a huge baseball fan. I used to love baseball. I collected baseball cards, followed the box scores and (in true nerd fashion – especially for that era) kept complicated spreadsheets tracking the stats of my favorite players. The Bill James Baseball Bible was my religion. That was before 1986. That was before, in the time between I left my neighbors house where I was babysitting to be with my dad to enjoy the Sox winning their first World Series since 1918, the world stopped, all reason was thrown out the door and I ended up pacing my room all night cursing the fate that had caused me to be born and raised in Boston….

The Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art puts on a fantastic (and very fun) art auction every year.  My wife, Greeley, and I have been regulars for several years and always have a great time. This year Greeley is even more involved as the event chair (putting on an art auction is an incredible amount of work!).  I’m playing a more peripheral role as the stand-in event photographer (the regular event photographer is out of the country, so with the qualification of owning a brand new digital SLR camera – a birthday present from Greeley – the photo duties are falling to me). Here’s the event flier (see link below).  If you’re around Boulder on October 19th, I’d highly recommend coming…

The following is an article that was published in The Jewish Week.  It’s of particular interest because it came to me by way of a Pakastani-born muslim friend who currently lives in Dubai (with the subject that included “Please reprint/forward this where you can”). The Respect Of A Cousin After the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten’s 12 caricatures of the prophet Muhammad were republished in European newspapers, riots erupted in Damascus, Gaza, Beirut and elsewhere throughout the Muslim world. The violence is an extreme manifestation of the deep hurt felt by virtually all Muslims. As we condemn the violence on the streets, perhaps we should take a moment to understand the hurt in the hearts of the great majority of Muslims who…

It’s funny that network news programs remain popular. Why get your news from such a limited source – and to boot, one that knows nothing about what you’re really interested in? Take, for example, the nightly reporting of the Dow and Nasdaq. Is that actually relevant to most people’s lives? The answer is no – but it’s a proxy for something more specific that you’d otherwise want but the new isn’t in a position to give you. Same thing with the news – you don’t really get what you want, but it serves a proxy for what you do. Not for long . . .