Today, the Detroit Free Press had an extra Front Page. The entire page was an open letter to the United States Congress regarding the bridge loan they are considering for the Big Three automakers. It’s not something I’ve ever seen the Freep do (that’s what we Michiganders call the Detroit Free Press, btw.) In it they make a pretty compelling […]

A friend of ours happens to know the person who cuts Barack Obama’s hair so she gave them a few of her Obama mosaic posters: Turns out our president-elect was in for a haircut this week and they showed it to him. It also turns out he liked it a lot! They gave him one and they’re going to have […]

I was using the Internet Archive’s Way-Back Machine to take a look at some of my early blog posts back when I was on a site called Modblog (you Modbloggers are all sighing wistfully right now, admit it.) I had a post about three years ago on January 6th, 2006 that went like this: GM Proves That It Will NEVER […]

This is very interesting study about the effect of disorderliness on people’s behavior. (H/T Andrew Sullivan). The gist of the study outlined in the article is that a messy/trashy/disorderly environment encourages negative behaviors. Here are two examples: His group’s first study was conducted in an alley that is frequently used to park bicycles. As in all of their experiments, the […]

In my workplace, staffed by adorable lily-white conservative people who have absolutely no clue whatsoever about what it’s like to be poor, much less a discriminated-against minority, one of the most-loved sports is what I call Poor People Bashing. According to the Wonder Bread Crew, the melt-down of the financial markets is due almost entirely to two things: 1. Poor […]

Mitch Albom, author of Tuesdays With Morrie and The Five People You Meet in Heaven is an unapologetic Detroit lover. That’s no big surprise, I suppose, given that he works for the Detroit Free Press. Albom is also known for his plain talk and his editorial piece this past Sunday, “If I had the floor at the auto rescue talks“, […]

No, not Newt Gingrich. (Newt? Really? Your name is Newt?) No, it’s his sister, Candace. She’s a lesbian that’s been actively involved in LGBT issues as part of the Human Rights Coalition for quite awhile. She has just published an open letter to her brother Newt (dude, Newt?) on the Huffington post and it’s impressive. Dear Newt, I recently had […]

After a week of heading down, down, down, on Friday the Dow Jones Industrial Average surged again after about 3 p.m. Just before that surge came the announcement by President-Elect (love that phrase, “President-Elect”) Barack Obama that he was naming New York Fed president Timothy Geithner as his Treasury Secretary. He did that and here was the result: Yet Rush […]

I am so ambivalent about the entire discussion surrounding the Big Three auto companies asking for a $25 billion bailout. Truly ambivalent. First of all, I have been a loud and frequent critic of these dinosaurs of the business world. They have relentlessly pumped out gas-guzzling Humscalade after oil-gulping SubdivisionBlazer with absolutely no regard for either the environmental destruction they […]

It is sooooo good to be the king[‘s bankers]. For example, you can get a handout from the tax-payers of America to the tune of $154 BILLION and turn around and give your execs $504 MILLION in bonuses. Now that is sweet, you have to admit. That’s what you can do if you’re AIG, for example. And why can you […]

I am a fairly frequent reader of David Byrne’s journal/blog. He’s been pretty excited and upbeat and heartened by Barack Obama’s victory in the presidential election. As someone who travels the whole world over, I think his perspectives on the impact of this election on both the United States of America and on the world as a whole are worth […]