Category: Historical

Looking for a new drinking game? Tired of all those non-serious non-thinking ones? Try Slate’s Democratic Debate Drinking Game.

The Christian Science Monitor proposes a single government for the Israelies and Palestinians:

If Israeli settlers want to stay in the West Bank – let them stay! But if they want to stay there and be part of a community built on long-term peace, then they cannot refuse to give equal rights within the whole of an expanded state of Israel/Palestine to all Palestinians who want to be a part of it.

The end of the dream of a monocultural “Jewish state”? Yes. But in the Holy Land, as in South Africa, it could be the start of a hopeful new chapter in human history. For Jewish Israelis, as for Afrikaans-speaking and English-speaking South Africans, they could still be living in a multicultural state in which their language, their culture, and their religion would be fully embraced.

If I haven’t been writing very much in here, it is because I’ve been trying to keep up with the media consumption I’ve been feeding on (magazines, movies and tv galore) and trying to complete a half-dozen other things.

Specifically, I’ve been having a grand time configuring my new “Virtual Private Server”, which is neat in theory but difficult to set up. I have to configure my server to run as I see fit, and eventually migrate all my web sites (including this one) to. At least I have full control over the server now. I’m also trying to configure myEclipse, an open source Java IDE, to allow me to develop and debug web projects. Of course, that hasn’t been going swimmingly either. And then there’s the two computers I’ve been asked to try to repair.

So, yes, that’s where I’ve been hiding, when I’ve not been out trying to live a little!

It’s time for the BusinessWeek Analysis & Commentary roundup. Having nearly reached page 40 of this week’s edition, I’m ready to provide my critiques of the commentaries, including where I find flaws or reaches within their arguments.

Drug Prices: This week’s editorial chimes in with the argument that high retail prices for precscription drugs are due in large part to the price controls in regulated economies elsewhere in the world. Striking their bleeding heart note, the writers say that Big buyers such as the government and HMOs can often negotiate low prices that rival those found in Canada. To make up for the discounts, though, the industry charges high retail prices. So those who are least able to pay — the uninsured — are often stuck with the biggest bills.

What this strikes me as is not a failure of the drug companies but a failure of government. For those who believes that one of responsibilities of a good government is to provide a minimum of adequate healthcare to all citizens, the government should be providing some relief in these situations. This strikes me as a social policy failure, and is not because other governments have implemented a solution (thought not necessarily the best one) to this issue. Being able to derive a larger amount of profit overseas does not guarantee that companies will suddenly become generous and lower prices elsewhere.

In fact, let’s follow this simple thought experiment. I’m an executive of a pharma company. I can only charge retail rates freely in the U.S., and elsehwere in the world I am restricted in my pricing. My shareholders are expecting me to deliver strong revenue growth each quarter. Suddenly, the regulatory structure changes, and I can charge my own rates in other countries. Do I lower retail prices in the US, knowing that more than 90% of the people don’t pay those rates anyway, or do I maintain my current pricing strategy in the U.S. and raise prices overseas? My apologies, but if you said scenario 1, you’re obviously unaware of the incredible pressure Wall Street exerts on publically traded companies to demonstrate ever increasing sales and more money that will translate in to profits.

The other issue raised is the migration of European pharma to the U.S. By attempting to blame this migration on lower drug prices in Europe, the writers miss an obvious point. U.S. and European companies service both markets. Where a drug is discovered is entirely unrelated to where it will eventually be markted and sold. The real reason is that public investment in the health scienes is higher here with more well-trained, well-educated personnel able to contribute, providing a higher value proposition. Companies are locating R&D in the major research centers in the U.S. because these are some of the best places for health research in the world, due in large part to the people located there. If corporations truly felt it was necessary to locate manufacturing and research in their largest markets, why would Levi’s be closing its last U.S. manufacturing site to move off to China? Because the two are really unrelated, and this is simply a red herring.

On Wesley Clark: I love it when the mass media labels Howard Dean as a liberal. Granted, he wants that label at the moment to carry him through the Democratic Primaries, but we’re talking about a fiscal conservative, small government, relatively pro-gun rights kind of guy. People hold up the whole “civil unions” bill as an example of his so-called liberal tendancies, neglecting the fact that the Vermont State Supreme Court left him little choice.

In any event, my only real comment on the commentary is to ask the question “when is a tax repeal a tax hike?” If I repeal part of a law that hasn’t taken effect yet, like the idiotic elimintation of the estate tax, would that be a tax hike? I’m just curious how the writers of the papers that influence public opinion would answer that question.

On the China job drain: There’s one aspect of this article that I was struck by more than any other. According to this article, Levi’s is moving its last U.S. manufacturing location overseas. According to my sister, Levi’s is slowly closing its own retail outlets, preferring to sell through third-party retailers like, say, Kohl’s. If all the goods are created overseas and sold by other companies, and very little save the corporate headquarters remains in the U.S. under Levi’s command, would Levi’s still be considered an American company? Technically, if it was still “headquartered” here it would be, but if most of its workforce is instead located in other countries and it does nothing but overhead work here, how could it truly be called a U.S. company?

The only aspect of overseas manufacturing, and more and more design, development and support, is that it has the potential to structurally weaken the U.S. I’m far from a closed-borders person (really, really I am), but if the U.S. allows itself to move more and more of its production and those services eligible, there has to be sufficient innovation to provide the same or even more opportunities to those people who are located here. If there is no satisfactory complement to the offshore movement of providing new opportunities, a gradual decline in quality of life will occur as people find themselves unable to afford the living standards they currently enjoy.

Also, one book reviewer found earlier in this issue that the argument that offshoring and paying criminally low wages so necessary is somewhat bunk:
One of the book’s most surprising findings is that employers who use alternative approaches to compete in low-skilled industries often rely on new labor-market institutions. In industries as diverse as hospitals, hotels, and hosiery, companies band together to train workers, set industry skill standards, and help each other learn how to make strategies such as teamwork really work. Often, local government bodies lend crucial support, with seed money for training and coordination with community colleges. There’s a clear role, the book argues, for government to support management choices that help less-skilled workers.

Here’s a great WaPo editorial on the real issues at stake in the Great File Sharing Debate.

This time of year I always find difficult, as the seasons lengthen and the winter rapidly approaches. I without a doubt miss the warmer days that have just passed and begin thinking longingly of the warmer months yet ahead. Even the time when the days reverse course and begin to lengthen still remains some time in the distance, when Christmas carols are sung and the winter solstice beckons. Even still, it takes so long before the merest moments of the day begin to brighten just a little longer.

As I was out on my walk this evening (well bundled, I might add! It’s already so cold), I found myself time and again taken back to, of all things, my consumerist tendancies toward very badly wanting to buy a Nintendo Gamebody Advance. Why I can’t say, seeing as how I’m outside the core market of, well, children, and how I know I’ll never use it once hte novelty wears off. I already have a Gamecube and a PS2 gathering dust, with games I’ve bought and never even opened. Honestly, who has the time? And the money could be better spent a million and one ways. I would love to apply that toward the money to frame the paintings I picked up in Hong Kong, say, or some of the other frames I need for photos and sketches collected on my travels. Or take the small rug I’d like to buy for my living room. Or some Halloween decorations. And yet I still find myself drawn to that darn Gamebody Advance…

To keep tracking of those soldiers killed in Iraq, the NY Times has started a rolling log on its inside pages. Every few days it updates the list as it receives confirmation from the Pentagon.

If I were the White House, this is not the kind of press I would want to see.

Last night I watched Far From Heaven, a surprisingly good drama about tension and change that occurred in the life of a successful family in 1950s Connecticutt just prior to the Civil Rights movement’s big push. Cathy, the wife of a successful business sales executive, is confronted with choices and change as she navigates her way through a series of events started when she discovers her husband with another man. She befriends her gardener, a strong black man in a city still polarized over race. As life moves forward, she is forced to react to the slander and gossip, making difficult choices that in the end cost her much. Definitely a movie I enjoyed.

I also watched Bloody Sunday last Saturday, which was an extremely powerful recreation of the protests and riots that led to the deaths of 13 in Northern Ireland by British soldiers and sparked much of the ensuing violence in Northern Ireland over the next several decades.

This story talks about a research paper that may cast doubt on whether the RIAA has sufficient grounds to verify an individual really was sharing files, should the case proceed to court.

BusinessWeek had a different article on the hybrid technology finding its way in to upcoming models and specifically addresses the emphasis Toyota has put on the technology. What I find most disturbing about the article is the conclusion, where the author beings with the line Sounds great. Now if only the hybrids can actually make money. BusinessWeek has a tendancy to alternate between the praising the long-term vision that Executives so often seem to lack, such as pushing a whole new method to replace the original combustion engine, and the shortsightedness that is emphasized on Wall Street and that is echoed in comments such as the one above.

Honestly, the value that Toyota is gaining from selling its first generation Prius hybrid, despite losing an estimated $8,000 a car initially, is incalcuble. They are the first in the marketplace with a “mass-market” car, giving them a perception advantage. They have real-world data to drawn on regarding performance, durability, safety, and marketing that provide them with an advantage over their competitors. This is already paying dividends in the next generation of cars and their announcement to offer more hybird models over the next few years. In fact, the value is summed up best by a quote in the same article from a Honda executive: “If Toyota can drive the cost of the technology down, they will have a 5-to-10-year lead on every other manufacturer.”