Posted on
January 30, 2008,
11:21 pm.
When A Man Falls is a film about three men, but one in particular; Gary Fields. They all have problems that similarly affect their personal lives. Gary avoids his wife by refusing to talk to her about his problems work. After work, Gary stays at the office until 10pm and then goes home to open a bottle of wine for himself and then sleeps on the couch in front of the T.V.
Then there is Bill, the janitor at his office whom Gary passes by on his way out. Bill is obviously socially awkward and probably a little OCD. He has no confidence and avoids confrontation at all costs, just like Gary in a way. Bill’s only escape from the insecurities of life is through his dreams.
Then there is Travis, an old friend of Bill’s. Travis sold his car after the death of his wife in a car wreck. He hasn’t driven for years and hasn’t seen any other women since his wife’s death.
This film was great because of the way it expressed the emotions of the characters via the portrayal of their thoughts and actions, and especially everything was tied together at the end. Despite the pacing of the film being somewhat plodding and slow, it was interspersed with some quirky and funny moments via Bill’s dreams. I also enjoyed the music, which was composed of the operas to which Bill listened while cleaning up the office at night.
I recommend watching the film if you can.
Posted on
January 30, 2008,
2:35 pm.
The Financial Ninja has some “scary” Federal Reserve Charts that help explain why the Fed will be cutting rates furiously. The charts are:
- Total Borrowings From Fed
- Non-Borrowed Reserves
- Net Free Borrowed Reserves
- Board of Governors Monetary Base
You don’t have to be an economics major to see that something is amiss in the charts. You see some pretty large slopes and spikes on the charts.
Now as to whether I would describe these charts as scary, I don’t think I have the background experience to say whether the charts are scary or not. All I can go on is my feeling that we’ll be able to work things out in the end and that what worked in the past won’t necessarily work in the present or the future.
Posted on
January 26, 2008,
9:36 pm.
Today was one of the last couple of Peach Peloton rides. We started at Bernd Elementary school at around 9am. The temperature was in the high 30s to low 40s and was a little damp as it had rained in the very early morning, the northern part of the rain clouds just barely scraping by Macon.
I think every time I have been on a winter training ride, from the time we get going ’til about 30 minutes into the ride, I have always asked myself, “What am I doing out here in the cold?” I don’t think I’ve answered that question yet. But as I am asking myself if I’ve temporarily lost my sanity, I know I must have a sour and mean look on my face as I push myself along on my bike and the chill from the wind forces me to grit my teeth. I imagine that I look like someone from whom you would stay away.
Anyways, those feelings last only for about half an hour, basically until my body and fingertips warm up. But today I think was the longest it has ever taken me to regain warmth and a half-way decent attitude: probably 45 minutes. It was cold out there, a little damp, muddy water was being flung into my face from the back wheels of the rider in front of me, and my fingers hurt. But as time went on, I slowly recovered, and the rest of the ride was truly one of the best this winter.
There were six other riders and myself, making a total of seven. This seemed to be the perfect number. I think we could be described as the most dedicated of the winter riders. We rode a total of about 107 or 108 miles. Throughout the ride, we had many smooth and fast rotations going. Everyone knew what they were doing and showed that they were skillful and confident in their bike-handling abilities. It was a pleasure to ride with them all.
Today was a great warm-up for the assault on Pine Mountain coming up in a week. 128 miles total. Plus sag wagon. I’m sure that will be an interesting ride. I know it will be a long one.
Posted on
January 25, 2008,
4:51 pm.
I found this quote over at Overcoming Bias:
“The simple fact is that non-violent means do not work against Evil. Gandhi’s non-violent resistance against the British occupiers had some effect because Britain was wrong, but not Evil. The same is true of the success of non-violent civil rights resistance against de jure racism. Most people, including those in power, knew that what was being done was wrong. But Evil is an entirely different beast. Gandhi would have gone to the ovens had he attempted non-violent resistance against the Nazis. When one encounters Evil, the only solution is violence, actual or threatened. That’s all Evil understands.”
– Robert Bruce Thompson
What immediately came to my mind is the current situation in the Middle East, Iraq, Syria, and especially Iran. By all outward appearances and indications, the leaders of Iran appear to be religious whackos that would destroy Israel if they thought they could get away with it. They claim they are developing nuclear capabilities only for civilian and peaceful uses, but this claim lacks any sort of credibility. Who is the judge of when diplomacy and non-violent sanctions can no longer work? I get the feeling that in the next ten years, the world will most likely be witness to a “test” detonation of a nuclear weapon, either in Iran or in Israel. By then it is too late. As Thompson pointed out, Evil cannot be persuaded with non-violence.
I have a difficult time of seeing the Iranian leadership in any other light.
Posted on
January 24, 2008,
1:19 am.
I have been reading that one of the legacies of Alan Greenspan’s tenure at the Fed is his tolerance for experimentation, innovation, and greater risk-taking by the banks. I have no problem with innovation or risk-taking because they are some of the important factors that have have driven this economy and country. The only problem I do have with the Fed’s allowance for such risk-taking (only to bail out those who risked/gambled too much) is that I think it conflicts with the Fed’s own mission statement.
The Fed states that its duties fall into four general areas:
- conducting the nation’s monetary policy by influencing the monetary and credit conditions in the economy in pursuit of maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates
- supervising and regulating banking institutions to ensure the safety and soundness of the nation’s banking and financial system and to protect the credit rights of consumers
- maintaining the stability of the financial system and containing systemic risk that may arise in financial markets
- providing financial services to depository institutions, the U.S. government, and foreign official institutions, including playing a major role in operating the nation’s payments system
Now these are broad, general pronouncements, but I think there is an argument to be made that if the Fed is encouraging risk-taking that it is not following its duty of, say for example, “supervising and regulating banking institutions to ensure the safety and soundness of the nation’s banking and financial system.” Again, I have no problem with risk-taking, so I guess my beef is just a nit-picky one of lack of uniformity.
A second topic I want to discuss involves the effects the Fed’s policies have on the economy. I was googling around the web and I found an interesting powerpoint presentation that provides a summary of Edward Chancellor’s presentation to The Global Borrowers and Investors Forum on June 23, 2005. It’s entitled The Destabilizing Stability of the Greenspan Era and basically outlines three arguments against the Fed policy at that time (a policy which I’m just going to assume is still being followed by Bernanke).
The most interesting argument came from a Hyman Minsky hypothesis: “each stage [of the business cycle] nurtures forces that lead to its own destruction.” The three cyclical financial stats are described as “hedge,” “speculative,” and “Ponzi.” I don’t think there could be a more apt description of what occurred in the most recent of failed business cycles, the subprime market.
But getting back to one of the general themes: the pursuit of stabilization can lead to destabilization. Very Sophoclean in that the attempts to avoid the prophecy in the end actually fulfill the prophecy. But in the real world, we can never tell that if those steps weren’t taken that things would have been worse.
In an attempt to sum up, though the Fed may have given itself conflicting roles and duties and though it may destabilize by its attempts to stabilize, the Fed must in the end do its best to protect the economy through whatever means and authority it has. Meanwhile I’ll continue to be amused by apparent contradictions and will try to better understand what is going on in the world.
Posted on
January 23, 2008,
2:38 pm.
Mack Frankfurter’s article entitled “Retrospective: The Mysterious Case of Massive Liquidity” is a small history of how the world has created the current, huge amount of liquidity and the types of problems such liquidity poses. The author compares liquidity to a drug addict, which I assume is meant to convey the seriousness of the situation.
The problem with liquidity is that it is like an addictive drug–initially it produces euphoria which then disappears with increasing tolerance. Once an economy is hooked it needs more and more in order to sustain itself and withdrawal can be difficult. The riddle is whether the central banks have succeeded in breaking the cycle, not the inflationary cycle which in fact it has enthusiastically subsidized, but the deflationary cycle. Has the sheer bulk of global liquidity forestalled the kind of contraction that paralyzed business activity in the Depression and demoralized speculative activity for a generation after that?
I recommend reading this if you’d like to try to gain a better understanding or additional perspective about current economic matters.
Posted on
January 22, 2008,
3:04 pm.
I had a pretty good chance of being right on my prediction for today’s front page of the New York Times. I’m not a soothsayer quite yet.
Posted on
January 21, 2008,
8:51 pm.
World markets have panicked and the Dow futures are already down 500 points. I think there is a good chance that tomorrow’s NYT print headline will be about the plunging markets.
It seems pretty clear now that Bernanke has not been aggressive enough in any attempt to fix what is broken. The Fed’s actions have not instilled any confidence and have not assuaged any fears. Now is the time for decisive and strong action of ANY type.
Jim Sinclair predicts that bad things will happen if the Fed does not take emergency action to address the markets:
If the Federal Reserve fails to take emergency action before the US opening tomorrow, you will see the DJII open down 1000 points as the public joins this professional panic…. It is a better wager that the Fed will immediately drop rates by 1 full percentage point. It is a slam dunk that all Western central banks will cut loose and flood the world with more liquidity than ever seen before. If central banks fail to cause a torrent of liquidity from their unending check books then $450 trillion of derivatives will take us to the world of Mad Max. Monetary inflation ALWAYS causes PRICE inflation even without strong business conditions. Prices of hard and transportable assets rise regardless of business conditions. All currencies fall and the stronger currency is the laggard in the race to the bottom of the tank.
I’ve had a small e-mail conversation with an old friend regarding the markets. My first answer to his questions were somewhat idealistic. The Fed shouldn’t reward bad behavior by bailing out the banks or the people to whom they loaned money. But there is no reason to cut off the nose to spite the face was his reply. Providing liquidity in this situation is necessary he said and also that he he thinks a healthy dose of improvidence is good in the long-run. “Risk taking is necessary for economic growth, and considering the structural drags in our economy, we have to have dynamic, rambunctious sectors.” Totally agreed. This is probably one of the largest reasons for this country’s success! Our system allows for experimentation and risk-taking and, unlike other cultures, we do not punish our risk-takers who fail.
As I said in my first response, things like this have happened to our economy in the past. I am confident we can weather this storm as we have weathered previous others, painful though it might be.
Posted on
January 21, 2008,
4:44 pm.
I’ve never even considered the possibility of an upright italics font set. Typically, an italicized font will slant a bit to the right. Not so with this set – take a look.
As you can see, the lowercase letters are rather unique. But in the end, it looks more like a script-type font as opposed to an “upright italics.” I think it’s just a clever label. Sibylle Hagmann created this font for Village.
Posted on
January 19, 2008,
12:08 am.
I’ve never seen such a mixture of seriousness and ridiculousness, sadness and happiness, mystery and intrigue. King of Kong is a documentary about two classic arcade gamers fighting for the world record for Donkey Kong.
All the characters in the film can be described as geeks or nerds, but all have their interesting quirks, traits, and hobbies apart from their passion for gaming. There were moments that gave me goosebumps (or was it because of the lack of heating in my apartment?). There were many moments when I laughed out loud, such as when Steve Wiebe’s kid daughter exclaimed that people sorta ruin their lives to get into that book, meaning the Guinness Book of World Records.
I know this wasn’t a well-written review; I wrote this down while watching.
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