Friday, October 31, 2008
Older African-Americans in awe but on edge
My Environmental Law professor is featured on MSNBC today talking about 50 years of racial integration in anticipation of the first black president. He has an amazing background, including being SU’s first black professor. I quibble with their characterization of his classroom questioning as “pleasant but pointed,” however. Let’s just say one of the adjectives is correct.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
A beautiful day to hurt
While I was hiking today off the Mountain Loop Highway, Nick raced the “hardest cyclocross race of the season” at Steilacoom Park in Tacoma. He also took the camera and managed to catch a few shots of the day. The race hurt so much, he didn’t take any more photos after he climbed off the bike.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
New groovin’
I can’t believe this guy has been making music for years and I’m only now discovering it. Press play and start groovin’ to some awesome, uplifting music!
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Finally, the credit crunch in language I understand!
Hey all you climbers out there! Having trouble understanding the credit crisis? Don’t feel bad - even business reporters need some help understanding why it all happened, what it means, and what the bailout plan intends to do. Senior Editor of Marketplace, Paddy Hirsch, uses a whiteboard and understandable analogies to explain it to his reporters. It’s a bit longer than 8 minutes, but Hirsch doesn’t get bogged down in wonky terms or over-simplify things - and visualizing banks as wayward explorers is oddly satisfying.
Update: After watching the video Rod Mercer made the following observations about how the analogy could be strengthened:
What the video doesn’t address is why the climbers were willing to commit to such loads. It also implies that AIG was just another climber. In fact, AIG was the agent that was supposed to insure the other climbers against falling. AIG was the belayer. The climbers took huge loads thinking they were protected. What the gov’t did was take it’s eyes off the belay anchors: it unregulated AIG. The climbers thought they had a belay. To maximize performance, unregulated AIG pulled out the anchors, thinking they would never fall. Greenspan assumed self preservation would make them behave responsibly, but in the end greed won out: Climbers ran it out thinking they were anchored and belayers removed anchors thinking the climbers would never fall.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
No epic this time
Even with a wrong turn (I wrote right when I should have written left) and eight extra miles, yesterday’s adventure does not count as an epic. The weather was crisp and clear, the leaves had turned a beautiful golden color. All was well with the usual suspects (and Matt and Tom).
