Kissing Cuba

OK, the Communists took over. Fidel Castro and Che Guevara overthrew the creeps we had installed in Cuba and, despite our best efforts, the Communists stayed in power for over fifty years.

The people who left Cuba are really angry. They came to the United States, dealt drugs, and moved on to other things after they made their money. But they are still angry. They want the rest of the United States to be angry, too.

We're not.

How long are we going to be in a grudge match with that tiny island nation Cuba? There's no point to it now.

There's no Cold War anymore. There's no domino theory. Nuclear missiles are not on Cuba's shores.

For one, I will be glad when our foreign policy respecting this island nation is taken out of the hands of a few frothing radicals and put back into the hands of reasonable people. That's all the Congressional Black Caucus is asking for. And it's about time.




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Obama Fingers!

Der Spiegal reports that a German frozen food company is selling fried chicken with a curry dipping sauce as "Obama Fingers." Lacking our cultural reference to fried chicken and racial stereotypes, it was meant to be a "homage to the American lifestyle and the new US President."

You know that the American brand is doing well when fast food is named after your President. President Barack Obama embodies the message of hope.

Judith Witting, sales manager for Spreche, the company in question, claimed the idea 'was to get in on the Obama-mania which is continuing to grip Germany. The word "fingers" in the name refers to the fact that it is a finger food. "It's like hotdogs," Witting said. "No one would ever think they are actually from dogs." '

Charming cultural disconnect. No one was suggesting that Spreche was actually selling the fingers of our President.

So those Germans don't get it. But does it really matter? We finally have a President that doesn't embarrass us. Let's be grateful if someone thinks that naming fast food after our President is good for sales.

What a pleasant change.

Pine Cone Sex Scandal

In Belgrade, Serbia, a lonely lady with a libido found a solution by using a pine cone to satisfy her urges. It was just a regular pine cone, nothing extraordinary. She was inspired during a hike in the woods.

The problem is that it got stuck and two hours of surgery were required to get it out again.

What a way to make the record books!

Pirates and the Somalia War

After the war in Somalia, the ocean waters off of the country's coastline became a dumping ground for toxic chemicals that killed the fish that the local people relied on to eat. Children were dying of pollution, not in some abstract way, but quite literally. In fact, it was not just children. Adults died of the pollution also.

Deprived of a means of support, a few of the local people turned to piracy.

That doesn't make it right, but we must understand that when a nation is cast adrift it can become a target of international illegal corporate behavior.

The root of the piracy problem is ecological. We can't keep dumping in the oceans as some kind of infinite waste bin without consequences. People are already suffering with disease and no fish to eat. This is unacceptable.

Reagan Was Wrong

I know a lot of people who call Reagan the best President we ever had. Personally, I could never see the appeal of orange blush and dyed red hair, but that's just me.

Aside from petty complaints, Ronald Reagan ushered in a free market free-for-all that has ended with our banks broken and our people in debt and horrible unemployment. The unemployment is almost as bad as it was back when Reagan was President.

One of the first things Reagan did was to eliminate all programs for researching or supporting alternative energy. Not really thinking ahead there, was he?

And then there was the famous idea "let industry regulate themselves." Now we have people who die from bad food and bad juice. Food poisoning happens all the time. That never used to be the case. One thing you used to be able to rely on is the safety of the American food supply.

The motto of the Reagan era was "Greed is Good." We are now living with the results of this failed philosophy. Families are being thrown in the street because of this philosophy. People are killing their children because of the economic tragedy that has befallen this great nation. It's about time these bad ideas are reversed.










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Easter - What Does It Mean?

So this nice guy gets arrested, beaten up, forced on a march where he is yelled at and has things thrown at him, and then is sent to die by being nailed to a cross until his chest muscles give out and he slowly suffocates. Never one to waste an opportunity, he saves the soul of the guy next to him before he dies.

Then three days later he rises from the dead to show everyone that he is indeed the son of God and has defeated death. Christianity is born.

This miracle is celebrated by coloring eggs, hiding them, and having little children run to find them. There's lots of candy eaten, often in the shape of a rabbit. Branches from a pussy willow tree are put in a vase and little wooden eggs are hung from them as decoration. In Poland, there are contests where one person hits the egg of another person and the one whose egg is not broken is the winner.

The truth is Easter is the combination of a pagan holiday for the Saxon goddess Eastre and the Christian commemoration of Christ's resurrection, which explains some of the disconnect between how we celebrate the holiday and what is alleged to have happened on that day two thousand years ago.

What does this all mean? The roots of Easter are the celebration of rebirth and revival, explaining the whole egg thing as it relates to fertility. The Easter bunny could - only a guess - relate because rabbits are very fertile. Again, referring to birth and rebirth.

The plastic grass is a little harder to tie in, but let's just call it a reminder that we are killing Mother Earth with pollution.

What I take from this holiday - which I celebrated as a young child but no longer do - is the message that every year we get another chance to get it right. And that no matter how bad we've screwed it up, there's always hope. After all, it's Easter!













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Arlen Specter's Narrow Miss

Arlen Specter narrowly missed defeat in his reelection bid for the U.S. Senate after his prosecutorial role in cross examining Anita Hill during Clarence Thomas' Senate hearing. Anita Hill was a law professor who said that the Supreme Court nominee sexually harrassed her while she worked for him. He won the nomination anyway, but Senator Arlen Specter's behavior towards her while questioning Professor Hill made many women angry. It was the way Senator Specter treated everything Anita Hill said with disbelief.

There is no doubt that any man who came forward with allegations, whether of sexual harrassment or not, would have been taken more seriously than Professor Hill was.

The next election, Senator Specter faced a very tough reelection race from a woman but won it despite the anger directed towards him.

So now he is in a tight race again. This time, with a former AIG executive. I really have a hard time thinking that Arlen Specter won't beat someone with that kind of baggage.

Senator Arlen Specter has always been a moderate Republican. I even heard him say once, "Democrats vote for Republicans" by way of explaining why he was an independent thinker and didn't tow the party line all the time.

I interned for Senator Arlen Specter and he is a very bright man, but not so personable to his staff. In fact, someone could work for him for years and the Senator won't even know his name. Odd for a politician. But you are voting for a Senator to fight for you, not Boss of the Year.

Let's hope he doesn't pay the price for his independence.










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Nissan Cube - Just Try Buying One

I can't even imagine what "a raindrop-inspired roof" would look like. Does the roof leak?

We bought a Nissan Altima recently, and I really wanted a hybrid. All I got from the car dealership was a lot of noise about how bad they were, how rescuers didn't want to get you out of a crushed car with all the electrical stuff in there, etc. It was a roundabout way of saying they didn't have any in stock.

So, yes, in the end, I got a non-hybrid. I love it, it is fine, but I still would have preferred a hybrid Nissan Altima. But we were under the gun because our car failed inspection for the second time and the local parking ticket lady was on to us.

Sallie Mae Gets It Right: HIre Americans. The Big Four are Traitors.

List of traitors who need to follow Sallie Mae example: Booz Allen Hamilton, PricewaterhouseCoopers, KPMG/BearingPoint, Deloitte Touche.

Sallie Mae recognizes how dependent it is on the Federal government. So it decided to do the good business thing and get rid of the support jobs in foreign lands and bring those jobs back home.

Booz Allen Hamilton, PricewaterhouseCoopers, KPMG/BearingPoint, Deloitte Touche are not so smart. They all make a fortune off of Federal Government contracts. Yet, all of their support staff, hundreds of formerly American jobs, are in India now.

NEWSFLASH TO BIG FOUR:

When you make your money off of American taxpayers, you need to hire Americans. It seems like obvious business sense, but I guess anyone can get a big head and think they don't need to pay attention to the basics of their business. You know, like Wall Street.















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Seven Deadly Sins of Banking

This report has caused quite a stir even though almost none of the reporters writing about it have read it. But that doesn't stop them.

Bank loans are defaulting. The prediction is that they will default even more in the future. The cry is that not enough bailout money was given to the banking industry to forestall disaster. Worse than the Great Depression! Now run around and scream like a crazy person.

The problem is being approached from too narrow a perspective. Banks will not have defaulted loans if people have jobs. The focus needs to be on getting jobs for people and loans for small businesses. That is the foundation that our banks stand on.

If people are paying their mortgages then they will have an income to do it with. There will be no need for panic or for cries of Great Depression II.

Unlike 1929, the U.S. Government is taking a proactive role in addressing problems with our economy. The hyped-up fear is misplaced.