Maybe I’m more tired than I realized or maybe it’s just been too long since I last posted.
I forgot my password.
More than the date of my last post, this loss of memory brings home how long it’s been since I’ve put my words on the screen. For the last few months, I’ve been tied up writing words for others. Along the way, I think I forgot that I needed my own. With that in mind here’s a brief review of some of the things that have tickled the edges of my mind during the last three months:
- Please tell me I’m not the only one that wishes the Democrats told the Republicans to go ahead and filibuster. Mind you, I have little liking for the health plan (doesn’t really fix the problem), but I have even less liking for the threats of bullies.
- Does the Christmas plane bomber feel surreal to anyone else? Smuggling explosives in underwear seems like a risky venture. What’s even more surreal is the notion that we’ll somehow be safer by stripping people via x-ray. Maybe I’m simple minded, but I always thought it better to ferret out an airplane plot before the plotter arrived at the airport. I’ve been through airport security enough to realize that TSA peeps are trying to do their job, but they’ve been handed an impossible mission. We all make mistakes at our jobs because we’re human. To think the TSA (or x-ray machines) won’t make a mistake creates a false sense of security. Whenever I enter a scanner in the future, my thought will be, “How much real intelligence could this thing pay for?”
- Does anyone really believe that Google’s threat to pull out of China wasn’t somehow connected to less than desired profits versus the attempts of hackers? Maybe I’m cynical, but I doubt that recent events are really the first time someone has attempted to hack the email accounts of people China likes to watch.
- I want to believe that out of the tragedy in Haiti good things can happen. But what are the odds that the people who need the help and donations the most will fall to the bottom again?
- Ben Bernanke, by the slimmest margin in history, was confirmed for a second term as Fed chairman. Now, whether you blame the man for the downfall of America or praise him for avoiding a second Great Depression, the fact remains that not reconfirming him would have made the market take a tumble. No matter how populist you are, your 401k would still take a hit (again). It’s very easy to say that he aided and abetted all the decisions that led to the financial meltdown, but we participated, too. You really want to remove the guy who seems to have a semi-decent handle on what’s happening from the steering wheel? Politicians trying to duck the target aimed at their back by pinning it to Bernanke’s seem hypocritical at best.
- For all that I’m not an Apple fanboi (or grrl, in this case), I was surprised at how little was surprising about the long-awaited iPad (besides the name). Maybe Apple set the bar too high, but the iPad seems like much less of a game changer than say the iMac or iPhone. Perhaps developers will turn it into something amazing, but if the iPad represents the future of Apple…
I’ll probably write in more detail about these topics and others in the weeks to come, but it seemed time to prime the pump.
