Chicago Deeply Held Religious Beliefs November 17, 2008March 12, 2017 CHICAGO – I Give it up for Garrison Keillor. Wow! America is cool We are being admired by Swedes! We don’t have to pretend we’re Canadians. We elected Barack Obama! By Garrison Keillor Nov. 12, 2008 | Be happy, dear hearts, and allow yourselves a few more weeks of quiet exultation. It isn’t gloating, it’s satisfaction at a job well done. He was a superb candidate, serious, professorial but with a flashing grin and a buoyancy that comes from working out in the gym every morning. He spoke in a genuine voice, not senatorial at all. He relished campaigning. He accepted adulation gracefully. He brandished his sword against his opponents without mocking or belittling them. He was elegant, unaffected, utterly American, and now (Wow) suddenly America is cool. Chicago is cool. Chicago!!! We threw the dice and we won the jackpot and elected a black guy with a Harvard degree, the middle name Hussein and a sense of humor — he said, “I’ve got relatives who look like Bernie Mac, and I’ve got relatives who look like Margaret Thatcher.” The French junior minister for human rights said, “On this morning, we all want to be American so we can take a bite of this dream unfolding before our eyes.” When was the last time you heard someone from France say they wanted to be American and take a bite of something of ours? Ponder that for a moment. The world expects us to elect pompous yahoos and instead we have us a 47-year-old prince from the prairie who cheerfully ran the race, and when his opponents threw sand at him, he just smiled back. He’ll be the first president in history to look really good making a jump shot. He loves his classy wife and his sweet little daughters. He looks good in the kitchen. He can cook Indian or Chinese but for his girls he will do mac and cheese. At the same time, he knows pop music, American lit and constitutional law. I just can’t imagine anybody cooler. Look at a photo of the latest pooh-bah conference — the hausfrau Merkel, the big glum Scotsman, that goofball Berlusconi, Putin with his B-movie bad-boy scowl, and Sarkozy, who looks like a district manager for Avis — you put Barack in that bunch and he will shine. It feels good to be cool and all of us can share in that, even sour old right-wingers and embittered blottoheads. Next time you fly to Heathrow and hand your passport to the man with the badge, he’s going to see “United States of America” and look up and grin. Even if you worship in the church of Fox, everyone you meet overseas is going to ask you about Obama and you may as well say you voted for him because, my friends, he is your line of credit over there. No need anymore to try to look Canadian. And the coolest thing about him is the fact that back in the early ’90s, given a book contract after the hoo-ha about his becoming the First Black Editor of the Harvard Law Review (FBEHLR), instead of writing the basic exploitation book he could’ve written, he put his head down and worked hard for a few years and wrote a good book, an honest one, which, since his rise in politics, has earned the Obamas enough to buy a very nice house and put money in the bank. A successful American entrepreneur. The last American president to write a book all by his lonesome self, I believe, was Theodore Roosevelt, who, on graduation from Harvard, wrote “The Naval War of 1812,” and in my humble opinion, Obama’s is the better book for the general reader, but you be the judge. Our hero who galloped to victory has inherited a gigantic mess. The country is sunk in debt. The Treasury announced it must borrow $550 billion to get the government through the fourth quarter, more than the entire deficit for 2008, so he will have to raise taxes and not only on bankers and lumber barons. His promise never to raise the retirement age is not a good idea. Whatever he promised the Iowa farmers about subsidizing ethanol is best forgotten at this point. We may not be getting our National Health Service cards anytime soon. And so on and so on. So enjoy the afterglow of the election a while longer. We all walk taller this fall. People in Copenhagen and Stockholm are sending congratulatory e-mails — imagine! We are being admired by Danes and Swedes! And Chicago becomes the First City. Step aside, San Francisco. Shut up, New York. The Midwest is cool now. The mind reels. Have a good day. CHICAGO – II Saturday, there were ad hoc rallies in 300 cities to protest California’s Mormon-backed Prop 8, which – at least for now – overturned the ruling of the California Supreme Court and the twice-passed will of the California legislature, thereby taking away rights that had been granted to a minority. The biggest rally seems to have been in San Diego – 25,000. Here’s a post from the one in Chicago: Jinx Titanic: I have never seen ANYTHING like this in the city I call home! The march was infectious and it is true, the police and onlookers were stunned. The most fantastic moment was the taking of the Michigan Avenue Bridge. It was, in fact, taken; and though traffic was at a standstill, I did not see an angry motorist. Instead we were greeted with honking horns and cheers. Most remarkable was that the march grew, and grew, and grew and grew. I am still stunned and so proud. I want to send the Mormons and the Knights of Columbus a big thank you letter for getting our movement back on track! FINALLY A REAL PRIDE PARADE IN CHICAGO! ☞ Click here for a report on one of the many smaller rallies – this one, in Grand Rapids. And here for Harvey Fierstein’s take on marriage equality. But since it’s pretty much all about religion, here is an article that ‘Frasier’ co-creator David Lee wrote for The Advocate six years ago. It was based on a speech he gave to the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force when he got their leadership award. It remains relevant today. DEEPLY HELD RELIGIOUS BELIEFS by David Lee I used to think of a leader as someone who heeds the call to pick up a sword and lead the charge. For me it has usually been a little different. Picture a group of people in a line. When volunteers to lead the troops are asked to take a step forward I usually stand firmly in my place. Then I turn around only to find that everyone else has taken a step backward. That’s how I come to leadership. The Laura Schlesinger incident of a few years ago is a good example. Early on no one, not one gay person, who worked at Paramount – and, trust me, the place is crawling with us – objected openly to their own studio producing her TV show. Of course, I said to myself, ‘Boy, what we need is somebody to stand up to Paramount, somebody the suits can’t fire, somebody they have to pay attention to.’ Then NBC picked up FRASIER for another three years and all of a sudden I fit my own description. I think I muttered something leader-ish like ‘Oh, s–t’ and soon found myself outside those famous Paramount gates with a picket sign and bullhorn. I now find myself in a similar position around another subject: the anti-gay bigotry of some of our major religious institutions. I keep looking around for someone, anyone to say something, anything in response to the incessant bile about of gay and lesbian people that is spewed forth daily by the some of the world’s so called spiritual leaders. I keep looking around for someone to finally say ‘Enough. This has got to stop!’ And what I see when I turn around is a bunch of folks who have taken a step to the rear. Sadly and shockingly our major gay political groups are the most conspicuous in their silence. And so I mutter ‘Oh, s–t’ and forge ahead. First, let me make it absolutely clear that this is not an attack on religion. I am on a spiritual path myself. I’m sure many of you are too. What I am attacking is homophobic bigotry that justifies itself in religious belief. And the free pass that we in the gay community have given much of this stuff over and over again. Folks, the time for polite silence is finished. We have got to start defending ourselves when attacked. And we are under a massive attack. The Mormon Church is the fastest growing cult in the world. Every year they send out 30 to 40 thousand new missionaries. They are not trying to convince people that gays and lesbians are cool. As late as the last decade this group was attaching electrodes to gay men’s testicles trying to shock them back into the hetero fold. There is a task to be tended to here, yet the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force has said nothing. Evangelical Christians and Southern Baptists – the largest religious group in the US – are snatching up television stations by the handful. They are not doing this so that they can air Queer Eye. Have you watched these guys? We are defamed loudly and repeatedly by bible thumping bigots and yet the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation is silent. My writing partner, David Angell, with whom I produced CHEERS and created WINGS and FRASIER, and his wife Lynn, were in the first plane to hit the World Trade Centers on 9/11. I received, in my grief, an e-mail that began with the following words: Islam Is Not the Enemy. As an American I had to agree. Despite my personal loss, I knew that it was proper and good to discourage an unfair backlash against innocent Muslims after 9/11. As an American I understand that Islam is not the enemy. But what about as a gay man? Have we have forgotten that there is no sect of Islam worth noting that even tolerates homosexuality, and in countries where Islam predominates punishment can be anything from imprisonment, to torture, to disfigurement to death. Islam may not be the enemy of my country, but I’d be hard pressed to find a bigger enemy of gay people. Human rights transgressions are being carried out daily in its name, but what do we hear from the Human Rights Campaign? Nothing that I know of. The number of Catholics in this country is increasing by leaps and bounds, mostly by immigration. The leader of this sect now sends “instructions” (his word) to Catholic politicians on gay issues. He has told them that it is their ‘moral duty’ (his words again) to oppose any gay rights reforms. This is absolutely outrageous. The sovereign head of another country giving instructions to our government officials. Yet have you heard one word from our national organizations? Has anyone quizzed these Catholic congressmen, senators, judges and justices about whether they intend to follow these orders from the Vatican? I’d love to hear if they have. Don’t get me wrong. The NGLTF, GLAAD, and HRC are amazing vibrant organizations who have made tremendous contributions to the cause. But on this issue these groups are asleep at the switch. Why? Here’s what I think. We as a group have become tolerant of intolerance. Whenever anyone justifies their bigotry with what I call DHRB (deeply held religious beliefs) we roll over as if that were the end of the discussion. We have confused respecting a persons right to hold whatever religious beliefs they chose with respecting those beliefs. The truth is there are plenty of DHRB that are simply not worthy of our respect. Can we start with the ones that have no respect for us? Can you imagine an African American respecting someone’s DHRB that the Bible justifies slavery? The right to believe it, yes. The belief itself? No way. We are terrified to call a bigot a bigot if the bigotry is a result of DHRB. We are horrified that we might be accused of attacking someone’s religion. As if attacking bigotry hiding behind the skirts of religion and attacking religion were the same thing. The church homophobes have it easy on this one. They say the most vile, cruel, untruthful things about us, usually to raise funds, and then use their tax exempt dollars to promote anti-gay legislation. If we dare to defend ourselves we are accused of assaulting their faith. They even use the word ‘bashing’. What an insult. Try telling Trev Brody or any of the thousands of other gays who have seen the wrong end of a baseball bat, that someone taking issue with your religious views is equivalent to their experience. Why are we not talking about this? Is there no one who has the guts to stand up to these bigots? Is no one willing to say forcefully that homophobic DHRB have no place or value in a civilized 21st century? What happened to the gay movement’s “bad cops”? We seem to have evolved into nothing but a bunch of flabby “soft cops.” I find myself missing those bad cops from a decade ago, the Act Up folks. More than anything we need to be reminded once again that ‘Silence Equals Death.’ It is as true about homophobic religions as it is about AIDS. We have got to start talking about religion. All of it. The good guys – and there are many – and the bad guys. It must be a compassionate discussion but we must not in our compassion shy away from the truth. Yes, it is a dynamite issue. Yes, people will take offense. Yes, the opponents are formidable. But I hope respectfully that the NGLTF, GLAAD, the HRC and our other leaders will jump into the fray. I hope that when the call comes for volunteers to lead the charge, they do not take a step backward. ☞ One organization currently working to generate that discussion: Faith in America.
Michael Lewis Explains It All November 14, 2008March 12, 2017 CARTOONS Yesterday’s links somehow led to the wrong cartoons. Doh! The ones I liked were: a Mike Luckovich drawing of Lincoln sitting, as he does, at the Lincoln Memorial, but with his two thumbs up (Obama has just secured the nomination) . . . a Tom Toles drawing of the White House beneath the phrase, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal” and above the phrase, “Ratified November 4, 2008” . . . a double-pane Jack Ohman drawing of a black woman gazing out a bus window in the pane labeled “1955,” and a black man in just the same pose gazing out the window of the Presidential Limo in the pane labeled “2008.” NEW YORK TO DC: TAKE THE BUS! The Delta Shuttle is rolling out wifi this Spring for an extra $9.95 a flight. Add $339 for the flight itself, $35 for the cab to get to the flight (LaGuardia) and $20 for the cab when you land at National – all in, $405, give or take; $810 round trip. (Unless you want a wider seat – Delta adds a First Class section December 1 that adds another $170 or so each way: $1,150.) Door-to-door travel time each way – when traffic to and from the airport, weather, air traffic control, and so forth, are all cooperating: around two and a half hours. The Acela offers no wifi and takes four hours, door-to-door, but you don’t have to take your shoes off to go through security and the round-trip cost, with cabs to and from the station (you could take the subway) is a more modest $450 or so. You can even plug in your laptop. The slower train adds half an hour, so all in you’re at maybe four and a half hours – and there’s no electrical outlet at your seat – but round-trip is about $215(because I know you’ll take the subway). But . . . ta-da! . . . these express buses between Washington (Dupont Circle) and New York (Herald Square) have free wireless for the approximately five-hour door-to-door journey, at less than $60 round-trip. Some of the buses allow riders to vote on which movie to watch, and to offer free water, and I’ve heard some of the buses even have AC power at the seats – none of this is stated on the web site, so it may depend on which bus you happen to catch. Bring a very good book in case the wireless is on the fritz. Or just bring this: MICHAEL LEWIS EXPLAINS IT ALL This is the piece everyone is reading to see the sweep of what went wrong in our financial markets. You may enjoy (?) reading it, too. Have a great weekend.
This One November 13, 2008March 12, 2017 CARTOONS I particularly like this one and this one and this one. PARADISE The reviews just keep coming. If you want to visit Costa Rica, grab some friends, choose a house – this one or this one or this one – and know that for each week you stay, I will extend your access to this web site by three weeks. EDUCATION It’s just one email, but it says a lot about the hole we’re in: From: SF State President Robert A. Corrigan Date: Tue, Oct 28, 2008 at 7:45 PM Subject: The budget and the spring class schedule Dear Allison: Yesterday you received a message from the Registrar informing you that registration for the spring 2009 semester is going to start several weeks later than originally scheduled. I am writing to explain why we have taken this action and what recent changes in the state budget mean to all of us at SF State. As you have no doubt read, the long-delayed state budget – which started with a deficit – has worsened in recent weeks, with revenues falling well below projections. In response, the Department of Finance has required state agencies to make a $390 million General Fund budget cut – $31.3 million from the CSU alone. SF State’s share of that cut will be slightly under $1.9 million. We are going to be able to cover that reduction from funds we held in reserve earlier this year, in case something of this sort might happen. That is the good news. Now, however, it is looking very likely that the CSU and other state agencies will be told to cut their budgets again in mid-year. We do not know the size or exact timing of such a cut. We do know, however, that it would have major impacts on SF State. Among them would be reduction of the class schedule. With this in mind, we felt that continuing spring registration as originally planned would be unfair to students. You might register for classes only to find out later that they had been cancelled. Much better, we think, to wait a few weeks, plan carefully for potential cuts of various sizes and see what new information we can gather, then offer you a class schedule that we believe is realistic, one you can count on. . . . ARBITRAGE Chris Brown: ‘I thought you might enjoy this strange item which illustrates the [occasional] inefficiency of the stock market. When one company spins off part its business, they often issue ‘A’ shares in the IPO, and then decide to spin the rest of the company off as ‘B’ shares. In several cases, the B shares are equal with respect to dividend and ownership stake, but have superior voting rights. You’d expect that the B shares would ultimately trade for the same or just a little more than the A shares, but for at least four companies I’m aware of, the shares are trading backwards from the expected relationship (e.g. BBI/BBI.B, CMG/CMG.B, MWA/MWA.B, SPWRA/SPWRB). Ordinarily, hedge funds would help close the spread by buying the cheaper B shares and shorting the overpriced A shares. (Full disclosure: My fund has positions in some of these, long B and short or synthetically short A. I’m betting these spreads will narrow.)’ ☞ I should perhaps have posted this sooner. Since Chris sent me this, some of those spreads have narrowed. Then again, this is not a game for casual investors, not least because some of the A shares are unshortable, and the transaction costs of setting up a ‘synthetic short‘ can eat up much of the potential profit.
$ 1975 $ November 12, 2008March 25, 2012 I’ve argued that we face a long Iraq hangover much as we suffered a long Vietnam hangover. In both cases, we attempted guns and butter . . . the butter during Vietnam being our attempts to aid the poor; the butter this time being our attempts to aid the rich. For those interested in divining parallels, here is a piece I wrote in the early stages of the post-Vietnam hangover, 33 years ago (I was six). One difference: we’re in a weaker position now. The debt on our balance sheet, in proportion to our economy, is more than twice what it was then. But another difference: for all President Ford’s decency, he was no Barack Obama. Leadership matters.
Love and Money November 11, 2008March 12, 2017 To get into the mood, here‘s Frank Sinatra. And now: LOVE . . . Keith Olbermann has some thoughts. . . . AND MARRIAGE Betsy Uprichard: ‘Forty-five years ago I picketed and went to jail for civil rights. Last week I was very proud to see that my efforts were not in vain. But now I find that my fellow citizens have voted against my right to marry a person of my own choosing. Discrimination and bigotry in another guise, in another time. Can you ask our incoming President to please try to find a way to give me the rights that all our other citizens enjoy by allowing me to marry my partner of 27 years for the third, and hopefully final, time?’ (Being from San Francisco, Betsy was first able to marry in February, 2004, when Mayor Newsome ordered the city and county to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Six months later the California Supreme Court voided those marriages, saying the mayor had no authority to do so. In 2005 and then again in 2007, the legislature voted to allow marriage, only to be vetoed by the governor. This May, the Court overturned the ban. For a second time, Betsy could marry her partner. Last week, by a narrow majority, California voters annulled that right – eliciting the aforelinked Keith Olbermann comment.) Here are things I think people on both sides of this issue might agree on: 1. The government should never, ever be allowed to tell churches whom they must or may not marry. 2. We all deserve equal rights under the law.* 3. Unless and until the Supreme Court makes a national ruling, the good people of Massachusetts (and their judges) may come down differently on this issue from the good people of Mississippi (and theirs). 4. In the meantime, if two people are legally married in a state (or country) that does recognize their right to do so, Uncle Sam should treat that married couple the same way it treats any other couple (even if Mississippi doesn’t). As for the President elect, I assume his primary focus will be the economy, energy, health care, education, and national security – not gay marriage. But there are three things I think he will do: First, he will keep the Supreme Court, where all this is likely to be decided eventually, from tilting even further right if and when progressive Justices Stevens (88) and/or Ginsberg (75) retire.He may even get the opportunity to tilt it back a click if one of the (younger) conservatives should go. Second, he will use the bully pulpit to bring folks along on this issue – especially in the black churches.Indeed, he has already done some of this.** Finally, I think he would sign a bill, if Congress passed one, requiring the federal government to recognize marriages performed in states where they are legal. * The government can set speed limits – but it can’t set a lower limit based on your gender or your skin color, your nationality or your political affiliation, your religious affiliation or your sexual orientation. That same reasoning should apply liquor licenses, hunting licenses, drivers’ licenses, peddlers’ licenses, concealed weapons permits, unemployment benefits, Medicare benefits, Social Security survivor’s benefits, college loans, pilots’ licenses, plumbers’ licenses . . . so maybe also marriage licenses? ** During the campaign, he went to Ebenezer Baptist Church and said that we need to get over homophobia in the African-American community — that “if we’re honest with ourselves, we’ll embrace our gay brothers and sisters instead of scorning them.” Or so recalled Michelle Obama this summer, saying, “Barack’s got the courage to talk to skeptical audiences. That’s why he told a crowd at a rally in Texas that gays and lesbians deserve equality. Now, the crowd got pretty quiet. But Barack said ‘now, I’m a Christian, and I praise Jesus every Sunday.’ And the crowd started cheering. Then he said, ‘I hear people saying things that I don’t think are very Christian with respect to people who are gay and lesbian.’ And you know what? The crowd KEPT cheering.” $$$ iPHONE TIPS AND TRICKS Click here. (Sorry; fumbled the link yesterday.) Tomorrow: Back to Money
Building a Different White House November 10, 2008March 12, 2017 iPHONE TIPS AND TRICKS I largely love my iPhone, but would have loved it more these last 18 months if I had known how to use it. Click here for the ‘tips and tricks’ several of which I had missed. W. Spooky to see this movie even as he is still President. I came away feeling it had to have been something of a cartoon (though what movie doesn’t oversimplify for the sake of drama or, of necessity, in trying to show a lifetime in two hours?). Could this really have been the man we elected? Twice? And yet, well, yes, this seems to have been more or less what happened. And there were at least two damning scenes it could have recreated but didn’t: the famous January 7, 2001 CIA briefing at Blair House, where the incoming President was told that Osama Bin Laden represented a ‘tremendous’ and ‘immediate’ threat but chose to ignore it . . . and his very first National Security Council meeting ten days into his Presidency, where the agenda already included a ‘Political-Military Plan for Post-Saddam Iraq Crisis.’ DOONESBURY Meanwhile, Garry Trudeau has a new paperback out, The War in Quotes. And you’re thinking, yes, we know all that. But it’s really worse than we remember. Use Amazon’s ‘look inside’ feature to read some of the quotes. RAHM A great choice for Chief of Staff. Brilliant, tough, savvy, principled – with the workings of both the White House and Congress in his blood and a close relationship with the President-elect. My guess is that he’ll be at least as tough in reining in the left wing of the Democratic Party as he is in pushing Republicans to compromise. He is a centrist, ‘DLC’ Democrat, as evidenced by his recent book, The Plan: Big Ideas for America, co-authored with DLC President Bruce Reed. And he is funny. Or at least easily made fun of. To get to know him better, you might enjoy this roast.
I Still Can’t Get Over It And It's Already Been Two Days -- I Should Let It Go? November 7, 2008March 12, 2017 NO DRAMA The hallmark of the Obama campaign was ‘Obama – no drama.’ That style bodes well for the next four years: serious people of good will working in common purpose to make things better. DRAMA Apparently, there was a little drama on the other side. And the woman selected as #2 thought that Africa is a country, with South Africa one of its regions, like the south of France. Click here. LET IT GO! I know . . . it’s probably not constructive and perhaps not even good sportsmanship to keep piling on. Yes, they took ads saying Obama wanted to give kindergartners comprehensive sex education, but we won, so what harm? And yet I find myself still signing on to ‘Team Obama’ at web boggle to help defeat Team McCain/Palin – even though they’ve disappeared. I know. Not healthy. And yet I feel the need to share the story of Skipp Orr, whom I met Tuesday night in Grant Park watching President-elect Obama take the stage. A long-time Obama supporter, Skip had flown in from Japan for this. (A pretty amazing guy, by the way: from ages 2 through 9 he suffered from a disease of his legs that required therapy at Warm Springs in the same pool FDR bathed in, yet fought the disease so effectively he not only regained full use of his legs, he nearly made the U.S. Olympic track team. But that’s not the story I want to share.) As President of Boeing Japan, he found himself at a Democrats Abroad meeting pitching John Kerry – and then found himself outed as a Democrat in the New York Times. The next day Karl Rove called Boeing headquarters noting his displeasure – and referring to the great deal of business Boeing does with the government. Basically, he wanted Orr fired. Wow. Like outing a CIA spy to punish her husband. Or firing a slew of Republican-appointed U.S. attorneys for not being partisan enough in their administration of Justice. Or – well – accusing your opponent of wanting to teach comprehensive sex education to kindergartners. I think it was even worse than most people realize. Monday: Something More Positive
Hope Won November 6, 2008March 12, 2017 DON’T SELL AMERICA SHORT* David Gergen summed it up perfectly yesterday: ‘Hope won.’ *But don’t sell all your RSW just yet, either, if you’re using it to hedge the market. Blake B.: ‘It is so wonderful to be proud to be an American again. I have received numerous messages from European friends cheering us on.’ ☞ In certain circles, just having European friends makes you suspect. Especially if they are French. But the Europeans do know a little about civilization . . . and civilization is not entirely a bad thing. OOPS Lots more to say on so many topics, but too sleepy to say it without making dumb mistakes – like this one I made Monday: Kay Lawson: ‘Sorry Andrew. Trig Van Palin is a male member of the human race, so he cannot be Sarah’s granddaughter.’ ☞ Oops. I thought Trig was always a girl’s name. But a more serious reason the conspiracy theory is probably wrong: Scott Nicol: ‘Incidence of down syndrome starts climbing at 30 years old and skyrockets at 40. Sarah was 44 when Trig was born. At that maternal age about 1 in 40 babies have down syndrome. For her teenage daughter the odds are about 1 in 1500.’ DON’T SELL YOUR GLDD Our dredging stock may be down, but revenues and earnings are up nicely. How many other businesses do you know that saw revenues jump 32% last quarter? So I continue to like Great Lakes Dredge & Dock for the long haul. Renewing our national infrastructure may be a theme of the next decade; and Dubai still has a lot of sand to move around.
Thank You November 5, 2008March 25, 2012 This is such a great day for America, I don’t want to spoil it by saying anything else.
Election Day November 4, 2008March 12, 2017 Please vote for Barack Obama. Don’t trust my judgment, trust Warren Buffet’s. Or Paul Volcker’s. Or Bob Rubin’s. Or Susan Eisenhower’s. Or Colin Powell’s. Or the Arizona Star. Or the Anchorage Daily News. Or the Chicago Tribune – endorsing a Democrat for the first time in 161 years. The world yearns for an American president in whose intelligence, judgment and goodwill it can trust; for whose experience and life story it can feel admiration; around whose leadership it can rally. The world yearns for an America it can root for again. And having much of the world rooting for us again would be good for our national security – and good for business. # Some Obamaramians have been working toward this day for 20 months. I think they can be excused this video. # And now, to lighten the tension over tonight’s results, a bit of comic relief: BOREALIS Delta is merging with Northwest, and supposedly remains psyched to deploy WheelTug® motors in its fleet of 737s. “We are counting the days,” says Borealis, “as final pieces slide into place so that we can start to test this first motor that is the right shape for the 737NG wheel.” I am counting the days as well: three thousand two hundred seventy-six of them since I first told you about this stock (“A Stock That’s Surely Going to Zero.”) It was around $3.50 a share then; it last traded at $2 (someone taking a tax loss?). We will grow old together with this stock. But I can think of worse things than rocking on the porch in such good company. Here (for the engineers on the porch) is their latest technical paper – the gist of which, as I understand it, is that fuel-efficient hybrids could be even more fuel-efficient with a Chorus Motor. And here is its companion paper, explaining the geopolitics of cobalt, which led to the geopolitics of neodymium, a Chinese-controlled rare earth metal fundamental to the current technology of hybrid cars – unless (you saw this coming) you use a Chorus Motor, in which case it’s not needed at all. The idea that supply security can arrive together with improved quality and reduced costs is an unexpected win-win proposal – but it is in fact why neodymium magnets supplanted cobalt in the 1980s. And it’s why Chorus is now ready to supplant neodymium. I know, I know. But I remind you of television. Invented in 1926, nobody made a dime from it until 1950 or so. Yet it did become quite popular. (Of course, I am also reminded that Philo Farnsworth, who invented it – and, more to the point, of his financial backers – whose ship never did come in.) Up at subsidiary Roche Bay, joint-partner AXI stock has fallen 95% from its high, yet AXI says the iron ore deposits are real, and that it now hopes to refine them into 98% pure nuggets on-site, in part because the heat from that process can be used to keep warm. It’s freezing up there. (I am taking some liberties with their press release; you can read it for yourself.) At $2 or $3 a share, Borealis is once again valued at $10-$15 million. Is it a wild, some would say delusional, speculation? Well, it’s a speculation – that’s for sure. But to me it seems like a lottery ticket where you have only one chance in five of winning (say) – so you will probably lose every penny – but that pays fifty times your money (say) if you win. That’s a bet few can afford to take, but a good bet nonetheless. Now get out there and vote for a brighter tomorrow.