3.14.2006
A Musical Tidbit
The Equities World (As Of Today)
Well, in order for parties on all sides to be happy, they've gotta come away feeling good. In order to..uh.."feel good," The NYSE has to ensure that it's got a good deal and not hedging its future on a massive buy-out that's sure to put it down the monetary tubes for quite a while. The LSE wants itself to be value at the highest mark possible, so all those in on benefitting from the now pending (allegedly) deal benefit, well, a lot. A heck of a lot. Ahh, the world of finance. Everyone's stingy. Everyone drives luxury. Everyone takes pills. Everyone loves green.
How will you make out? I honestly don't know, but we all know that while the thumbs are twiddling, the pound and dollar signs are blinking fast, boldly, and greedily.
3.13.2006
What To Do?
Supposedly, America sees itself as a bastion of freedom and free trade stalwart whose only job is to iterate the need for goodness throughout the world. However, this simply cannot be while those in the highest offices of the country riddled with fear at the thought of an Arab company – one of the largest operators of its kind in the world, I might add – working less than half a dozen of their constituents’ docks. Apparently, the British offer citizens of the world’s wealthiest nation feelings of security that one of the most heavily protected and strictly neutral lands in the Persian Gulf region “probably will not.” Perhaps congressmen and –women have received too many calls from folks asserting their anxiety at the sheer thought of DP World holding the keys to the cranes on little snippets of our soil.
I hardly think this is “our soil.” America was built by immigrants. Travel to New York and you’ll come to know no less than 100 languages spoken within the city’s districts. Travel the country and you’ll see Islam to be the fastest growing religion among both foreign- and domestic-born individuals; in a few years the number of Muslims in the US will have surpassed those practicing Judaism. Why has this attempted acquisition been rejected by the alleged majority? Racism.
Whether the millions of haters and uncomfortables will agree to this or not, an outcome that has forced DP World to leave the operation of the ports to another organization, subsidiary, or something else entirely is in no way good PR for America. Thanks for bowing down to mass ignorance, senators. Way to help spread them “goodness.”
Note: It is an impossibility to win the “War on Terror.” Whether rogue or internationally recognized and diplomatically tied, groups with agendas are all prone to resorting to terrorism. Bombs and killing of innocents are not the only faces this horrific and unjust practice shows. The Baathists did so. The Taliban did/does so. Al Qaeda does so. We do so.
Let’s begin to ask: Why do so many self-professed religious believe in war and killing? Maybe all evangelicals, kneelers, changers, and meditaters should cease to prescribe to convenient faith, analyze what they see to be right and wrong, and find the correct term for what they’re backing and promoting: evil.
3.07.2006
When Kansas is King
The citizens of this country are of course now far too entrenched in the exploitative processes developed and honed by the big guns that any sharp turn from the status quo would be considered more a debasement of our “democratic” processes than a drive to a truly fair and balanced system in which the men and women ordinarily looked over for the purpose of advancing the agendas of the fortunate few are provided with equal reign and heretofore silenced no more for the sake of retaining a false and fundamentally unstable calm.
What should be done to appease the gods of justice? A wash down, if you will. Not to imply a “start over”, per se, a new march to revamped civil rights legislation will allow boundaries of not only race and social status to come undone, but a new, vigorously upheld statute to rid purportedly free countries of crackdowns on liberties because of security protocols in the form of needless surveillance, the detention of innocents, and the filtering of information to sustain peace. In the minds of many authoritarian figures, the words of the world’s most positively influential inhabitants are considered inapplicable in the 21st Century. As reasonably knowledgeable folk are quite well aware, threats posed by rogue syndicates have not been problems faced by humans only in the past decade or so.
Everyone has an agenda. Whether it be good or bad, the processes of executions are astonishingly similar. Discussion and debate will be a strong aspect of civilization, as it has been for millennia already. The questions one must ask are: Who will lead, and who will moderate?
Bono's RED Initiative
Recently, the man better known as Bono, along with a list of organizations, clothing manufacturers, and a credit corp, rolled out a line of products, as well as promotions, that will bring increased awareness to the world's AIDS epidemic. Whether it be help in the form of a 1%-of-purchase donation or a chunk of the change from the sale of Armani sunglasses, the RED launch is designed solely to bring relief and increased attention to the world’s neediest AIDS victims.
I myself wholeheartedly commend this effort, particularly when the current state of the developed (and heavily commercial) shows little sign of bringing ideas to fruition to combat this widespread disease where it matters most. Perhaps many fortunate public figures believe in expendability. I, personally, do not. Any drive whatsoever to eradicate injustice and widespread hurt is a go in my book. The only reservation I hold to RED is small number of affiliations with which it is connected. Still, any work to eradicate this multi-continental crisis is surely worth it, how ever many jump on board in the months and years to follow.
3.06.2006
A Trip to "The Beginning of Time"
The 100-page journey through the snow-blanketed valleys of Narnia is a rather simplistic one, but I'd expect nothing more from this book. In fact, actually quite nice to depart from vast quantities of alliteration and fine print to wander through an easy-to-read piece. However much praise has been given to the author for writing this series, I can't grasp why they are classics. Rarely will anyone go through a Dickens and come out unchanged, even unscathed. The Chronicles, on the other hand, seem appropriately left for sandy shore reading.
Well, onto The Horse and His Boy.
3.03.2006
This Week in The World
The clash between democrats and republicans, and republicans and, well, republicans (a bit redundant, eh?) over the 5-port takeover by Dubai-based operator DP World, has grown into a maelstrom of misrepresentation, discrimination, and racial ignorance. Furthermore, the irrationality shown amongst the “debating” factions simply is an uncompromised display of a lack of intelligence. It is no doubt a massive back step in developing peaceful diplomatic ties with foreign nations, and the arrogance portrayed by the American sector of the global political spectrum is deserving of exploitation of a grand scale.
What many fail to recognize and, astonishingly, vigorously opt to ignore, is just how important relations with the UAE (United Arab Emirates) and the greater Middle Eastern region in which it resides are. Instead, deeming our coastal areas horribly unsecured and promoting US trade agendas whilst leaving those overseas to squabble over preposterous restrictions and tariffs, is what many in Washington think to be the best course of action. Paranoia has thus subjugated Congress throughout, and has clearly made great advances in the heartland of middle North America as well. Labeling their thoughts and actions as utterly wrong fails even to break the surface of this issue.
Those claiming to be of Islam and yet strongly hold to radical and extremist views and practices are not on Dubai’s list of most highly regarded peoples. Any allusion to such thought or any such allegations is not only baseless, but likely to be quite offensive to the those of the UAE. Perhaps there exist a number inside the region that would like to bring harm on the government and/or the people of the United States, but in all likelihood, the chance of UAE collusion with organizations controlled by or connected with terrorists is quite similar to that of the now deposed Baathist party. Indeed, only stronger bonds with one of the world’s most wealthy and influential group of Arabs will allow America, and the West in general, to push its policies in the coming decades with the least threat to the security of its people.
Given the breadth of terrain upon which strife of many magnitudes ensues on a continual basis, it’s rather difficult to measure the failure or success of initiatives – whether executed by militaries or otherwise. The unending flow of information leaves some to suspect that despite the news being good or bad, it undoubtedly leads to over consumption and perhaps hastens the “watering down” effect. The mistakes made during both the engineering and the performance of the coalition before and during the still-very-present war in Iraq, lead one to aggregate the headlines and the lines to form a phrase as lurid and stark as ‘inexcusable tragedy.’
To seriously analyze and repair the damage done to amend the center of the Middle East into something of a solid entity – or at least anti-amalgamous, self-serving nation, the Bush administration and its allies must cease to tantalize their citizens with muddied assessments of “the situation” and false propaganda marketed to occupy the press and its followers for the sake of treading the path to founding disturbing, uncivilized, and entirely unstable Soviet-style states.
It is clear that the world’s most powerful unnatural forces have to catch up on their lessons of history. A repeat, as it so happens, may be closer to fruition than even the most skeptical of Churchillian thought have presumed thus far.
2.28.2006
Concept Alley: Saab's New Aero X
Do You Motor? Are You Thirsty? Time to Satiate Yourself With Foreign flavors (Unless you already do)
The first headline declares something or other about the closeness of objects in mirrors. Anyway, it's pretty much easily summed up like this: Japanese automakers are the kings of the market in the US, and Ford and GM are showing horrible signs of...hm, what's the right word...deflation? Yes, each offers grim news so as to allow one to posit that they're at the bottom of the barrel in terms of sales and shares, and...share. A few bylines about some large European makers having trouble getting vehicles off their hands is in the lead article as well.
Well, I guess our honeymoon with the big and the bad is pretty much over. Hey, those Aveo's are pretty cheap and economical, right? Too bad they crumple like cheap looseleaf in accidents - both staged and real.
2.27.2006
Performancing - Not New, but Still Great
First off, it's simple. There's nothing that doesn't have to be here, and it's nestled inside a relatively solid and stable program (Unlike Flock, which in my humble opinion, is much prettier, but quite a ways from being the majority's choice). You can easily post to any number of blogs - from numerous services, I might add - and you can edit existing posts seemingly much faster than by using the clumsy process of signing each time to [insert preffered weblog host here] in a window or tab. All but spellcheck is present in Performancing - something many feel no need to utilize.
My recommendation: If you want fast blogging in a clean interface that leaves you feeling you're not taking up most of your day performing needless tasks (chalk it up to the half-window presence (set by default) of the extension), get this tool now. Of course, if you do not use Firefox, consider the abovementioned nothing but a cheeky read.
S-Shift Transmissions Going The Way of the Dodo?
Sure, since the latter half of the 20th Century, computers have silently aided the driver in getting from A to B, whether it be providing the right mixture of fuel and oxygen or keeping the accelerator-happy at bay with limiters designed to keep the number of Audubon wrecks as low as possible. I'll never say good riddance to six, or even five speed gates, no matter what else comes along.
That DSG is pretty darn impressive though, eh?
