Faith + Reason = Truth

Back in my crazy financial gunslinger days, I lived for days like today where a big decision or announcement was due that could have a big impact on a stock. I'd bet a pasture, if not the farm, on whether or not the news would be in line with what people thought it would be.  If I thought it'd be in line with expectations or even slightly exceed them, I wouldn't touch it, because then even when you're right you lose (buy the rumor, sell the news).  If I thought a surprise altogether would happen, I'd go with the short term puts or calls, depending on where the potential surprise may have lodged itself.  That made me a few overnight killings percentage-wise, but these weren't large sums being thrown around.

Back to today. I actually looked at Google's stock price this morning with the excitement of the big FCC 700 mhz auction decision due out.  It was around $516, with a recent low of around $508 and high of $558.  GOOG is obviously the ultimate long-term play, but I was whisked back to my "what's the impact on it TODAY?" mentality for a few exhilarating moments.  But then I was stumped:  in my mind, the market expectation was that 0-2 of Google's 4 "demands" for the upcoming auction would be met by the FCC's decision, so my choices would have been:  0,1, or 2 demands met would be par; 3 or 4 would be unexpected upside, and might have had calls purchased accordingly in the good ol' days (not today though, with speculation on both sides running so rampant as to make either side unattractive in the short term as far as I'm concerned). But here's what stumped me:  would it really have been a good thing for GOOG if all 4 conditions had been met?  If that would have come to pass (it didn't; 2 of the 4 were met, and GOOG closed at $510, which I think was it's low for the day, and was still at $510 in the after hours), then of course Google would be obliged to not only bid in the upcoming auction, but to knock it out of the park and win the nationwide footprint, which in my mind is going to go for upwards of $12-15B.

I've seen estimates as high as $10B for the rights to the nationwide footprint of spectrum, and the supposed minimum for just a slice is $4.6B, but Google would have demolished all estimates in order to become a nationwide wireless service provider overnight if all 4 of their conditions had been met.  And I don't know that that would have been an enticing short-term development for near-term calls. It can kind of go back to an old post of mine that discussed the definition of "winning" in military terms, with many instances of the side that loses far more people actually "winning" the war because they have gained their sought-after objective(s).   In business though, where $ stand in for soldiers, the cost in $ in the achievement of stated objectives can indeed be too high and thereby negate the apparent victory in reaching those goals.  I'm wondering if this FCC decision may have served to save Google from itself, with its recent larger and more aggressive appetite for growth and technological progress through very expensive acquisitions potentially slipping all the way into a full-blown stupid financial move, just because they could or because they felt like they had to.

How times have changed for the U.S. auto consumer! Seems like only yesterday that Hitler killed himself, the Russian tanks rolled into Berlin, we dropped a couple of atomic bombs on a highly-populated Pacific archipelago and completely incinerated and/or irradiated 100,000 civilians going about their daily lives, and then promptly turned around and funded the rebuilding of the German and Japanese economies.  With funding and no defense expenditures or military development needs to distract them, both economies roared past those of just about every other nation except America.  Germany soon dominated the low end of the U.S. car market with their "people's car", or Volkswagen (Wired's writeup on a Beetle anniversary spurred my thoughts for this post), only to be replaced in the 1970's by entrants from Japan (particularly Honda and Toyota).

Then, both the German and Japaneses auto manufacturers gained a toehold on U.S. soil by being cheap and simple, with the added benefits of reliability and fuel efficiency offered by the Japanese.  Today, German autos are known for their performance, expensiveness, and UNreliability, while the Japanese are known for their comfort, unmatched reliability (still), and fuel efficiency.  Neither country continues to be known for the affordability of their vehicles, however.  So who's it going to be?  America is actually building pretty cheap cars these days in terms of cost and quality, but consumers have ruled in favor of reliability and performance, leaving American car makers without a meaningful slice of hearts and minds to dominate.

35 years ago, a Japan barely 30 years removed from the smoking ruins of their country and their industrial economy managed to come up with something that, even when faced with high import tariffs from the U.S., managed to dominate an important (and previously unknown) segment of the American auto market.  Can American automakers come up with a similar feat, or better yet, create their own previously unknown yet import segment to dominate?  Or will they continue to be pushed to the fringes, such as full-size pickup trucks and throwback nostalgic car designs that are designed to appeal to the good ol' day longings of a population demographic that is getting older and older?  Come to think of it, Toyota is even beating them to the creation of THAT market segment (aging baby boomers) with their Scion xB, a boxy contraption initially designed to appeal to youngsters, but that has such incredibly low ground clearance that it's actually also very appealing to elderly folks who appreciate not having to step up into their vehicle, while also giving the vehicle much more interior vertical space!  Could we be looking at the evolution of the next "People's Car" right before our very eyes (the xB has a low price tag to boot, though not the absolute rock-bottom bare-bones pricing that previous P.C. incarnations boasted)?  Only time will tell.

Quickly:
My wife just hit me with an email containing "Honesty alert:  it really bugs me when you call God an It,       even if you do capitalize the I."

To which I replied along the lines of "my bad - must be the Jewish mystic/Kabbalist in me." To which she then made a comment about a red bracelet, Madonna, and subsequent deterioration of the conversation took hold from that point on, even though I informed her that Jesus could have been accurately described as a Jewish mystic (her foil to that remark was that even so, Jesus still referred to God as "Father" rather than "It").

All of this, coming barely a week after being addressed as "Bodhisattva Worth" by one of my favorite Commenters - not bad for a Roman Catholic in good standing with the Church!

So to anyone else who has issued their own internal honesty alerts, I have not meant to offend anyone's sensibilities, and as any regular reader of this blog knows, I hold people's wonderful and varied faiths in the highest regard and give them my utmost respect.
 

Finally, a firsthand demo of the phenomenon that is Facebook. Thanks to my college niece who was visiting the house last night, I was the lucky recipient of a guided tour by a crusty veteran. For background, she uses MySpace as well as Facebook, but as she explained, "I used MySpace all the time and still do some, but once I got to college, EVERYONE was on Facebook, so that's what I spend most of my time on now."

Things that immediately struck me:

1 - pictures, and lots of them; the "walls" are just plastered with photos of the various people that are associated with you; I almost had a "peeping Tom" feeling as I glanced at all of these college-aged kids in various states of revelry with each other, knowing none of them, wondering what they would think about people they've never met seeing them like this. I don't see just plain old words having much of a fighting chance against all of that visual competition.

2 - the creativity of these kids is stunning. My niece, being 19 years old, obviously has her acquaintances mostly in that age range. She's in several groups, or "networks," which can be based on high schools, colleges, junior highs, even elementary schools, as well as places of employment or other commonalities, not to mention the multitude of special interest groups ("Causes" is, I believe, the terminology for these), sports teams, etc. One of the groups was called something like "I Will Go Slightly Out Of My Way to Step on That Crunchy Looking Leaf." And that's exactly what that group, or cause, or wall, or whatever it is, is about.  There are literally pictures of people  holding their foot above a crunchy looking leaf, just off the sidewalk for example, posing, looking back at the camera for the picture, as they go slightly out of their way to step on a crunchy looking leaf. But that's not the shocker, this is: that group has over 200,000 members. As for a "Cause" such as "Stop the Seal Hunt", there are open and easily visible stats, including how many members it has and how much money those members have contributed. Some have received hundreds of $, some thousands, and I'm not sure how high it goes - however, it's readily apparent that these are, after all, starving college students, and though their passions run wide and deep, they don't have the cash to back them up in the form of online donations!

Now that I've seen it firsthand, I kind of get it even less than I did before. Yet I can clearly and instantly see the addictiveness, the dependence, the kinship, the energy, the creativity, the openness that these millions of people seem to possess. It is not like anything I've come across or even imagined, and contrary to my previously-held opinions about it, it isn't going away and it isn't going to be easily duplicated or replaced. This company's founder has found and seized the holy grail of demographics, the college kid and everyone they've ever bumped into in any social setting in their entire lives; he knows it, and he won't be letting go of it anytime in the near future.

In keeping with the "language as a barrier to nowness" theme, let's take a look at finding things. One can ask for something, or one can look for, or "seek," something directly. When I'm already late and I go for my keys on the key ring and they're not there, I can either yell out to anyone in the house within earshot "where are my keys?" and hope for a simple "on the kitchen counter next to the coffee maker," or I can look for them myself. Communicating my query to someone else may work, and it may work more quickly and with less effort than actually seeking them out myself.  However, in my experience, it's more likely that I won't be heard at all due to other competing noise, or I'll be misunderstood, or no one else will know any more about the location of my keys than I do.  In which case I've just wasted a little time and effort and gotten no closer to the objective of knowing where my keys are.  Maybe I would have been better off just silently and efficiently looking for them while focusing on that and that alone, rather than on diluting my attention and locating abilities by wondering "why isn't anyone answering me?" or "why don't they know?" or "who moved them and why?"

Similarly, people tend to think of prayer as "talking to God." That could not be farther from the truth, in my opinion - what could you possibly have to say to God that would be worth His (Its) attention?  If one could focus on listening, or contemplating, or experiencing, nowness with God, rather than on what words are swimming around in one's head, then one might actually gain something of extraordinary value.

Yet another example is in communicating with other people: are you actively seeking to know, to understand, the other person's thoughts or needs, or are you intent on disseminating yours? Either way, what do you think makes you more interesting and desirable to be around as far as the other party is concerned (hint: again, no words or thoughts of your own need to be cluttering your mind).  The more you actively listen and engage with a lot of head nodding and "uh huh" and "REALLY?", the more interesting you become to the other person.

When someone wants to know what you think, share it with them. When you have something you need to convey, or that you feel the other party would somehow benefit from knowing, then by all means communicate it! But if seeking what THEY know is your objective, as it so often should be, then the less said on your part the better.

I want to just sit down and start typing as a blog post, but I'm not going to.  I'm going to put more into it, and then post it as one long-winded entry. It has to do with concepts like "being in the moment," "living in the now," "flow," spiritual awareness, etc., which are all advocated as the preferred state of conscious being, as opposed to thinking about what you need to do or should do or will be doing or planning or worrying, etc. It's just doing, and being keenly aware of all that surrounds you, coupled with being completely absorbed in whatever it is you're doing.

Then, there's the fact that people are guilty of almost perpetually not living in the moment, whereas animals spend their entire existences in the moment.  They sleep when tired, they get food when hungry, they find shelter when required, they procreate when they feel the urge, they defend themselves, they hang out and do nothing but "be." And make no mistake, when a lioness is bounding across the grassy plain hot on the trail of a single wildebeest in the midst of thousands of others that were not singled out by her as this one was, she's not simultaneously fighting off thoughts about what place settings she'll be showing off to her friends, or wondering if the cubs have been picked up from football practice yet. She is, shall we say, "focused on the task at hand."

I think there is a tie-in, a causation, between our tendencies and those of animals. And I think it is language itself, which animals do not have but which people (possibly unfortunately) do. Without language, people could not think about what they aren't doing, because they would have no construct with which to formulate the thoughts. They would be forced, like animals are, to only deal with what they are directly experiencing. If they haven't experienced it, they cannot comprehend it. Only language provides frames of reference, called "words," to allow people to fathom what they have not directly experienced first hand. And that very ability is what distracts us from truly living in the moment and fully experiencing with 100% of our focus and sensory capabilities whatever it is we find ourselves faced with at any given moment.

Finally, this state of all-encompassing mental emptiness for everything other than the present moment is the very goal of various types of meditations as well as some entire religious experiences.  Were it not for language, would we simply directly experience God and Creation at all times, in the way that animals might if they had our higher level of mental faculties, without being continually distracted from that Presence by all of the words going through our minds, words that have nothing to do with the present moment and experience of existence, words that only serve to distract our thoughts and senses from the task and experience and surroundings at hand?

For other posts in this series, search under the "Seeking" Category that can be found in the right hand column of this blog or click the underlined Seeking link earlier in this sentence.  This is going to be fascinating to explore - my apologies in advance if you don't find the topic as riveting as I do!

Giant fiery explosions and a huge black plume of smoke in downtown Dallas right now. I doubt that it's on purpose, and details are sketchy (aren't they always?), but supposedly it's some sort of gas explosion.  I can see it from my 28th floor window, and it's just creepy, with all the soot falling from the sky and the sirens continuously blaring by below.  It's coming from just behind Reunion Arena, where the Dallas Mavericks and Dallas Stars used to play before the American Airlines Center was built some years ago.

Yesterday afternoon we had the big power outage in San Francisco that took down many important websites for several hours, including Netflix, TypePad, FeedBurner, and many that I don't frequent. I'm not sure what they've determined as the cause of that, if they have yet.  We also just had the huge underground steampipe explosion in NYC. This morning on the way up the elevator, I read that the TSA (authority that protects airports and airplanes) has issued a warning for U.S. airports to be on alert for what appear to be "dry runs" for terror attacks.

I'll report back if there's anything worth reporting. In the meantime, more sirens continue to blare and the fire and black smoke continue to rise high into the sky.

A lunch companion asked if I still "follow the market" (apparently someone had informed him of my jaded view of publicly traded stocks since my own blowup a few years back, which altered my perspective on stocks and economic activities, to say the least). I replied the usual, along the lines of "well, not really; I keep up with headlines, read some economics and finance blogs, analyze an earnings release and a few financial statements every now and then for fun," with my usual open-ended follow-up of "why do you ask?" He's wondering what to do with his investments, of course, so after a quick appraisal of the current environment (Dow 1000-point plateaus being reached too quickly, private equity firms cashing out of their holdings by going public themselves, etc. - you can see where my sentiment lies), I offered the following advice:

1. you will not get rich from stock investing
2. you will not retire "early" due to your stock market holdings
3. you will pay taxes to the government and thereby not get to keep all of what you earn every time you are lucky enough to GUESS correctly, and you will not be reimbursed by the government for any of the times you get it wrong
4. find something, preferably TODAY, that you could do and get paid for and enjoy, or at least not despise, doing until you are 70 years old, since that's how old most of us will have to work until in order to pay for our longevity, our lack of adequate health care, our debt, and our materialistic motivations
5. once the thing has been identified, take your 1st step towards it today, if you have time; if not, then tomorrow, 1st thing when you wake up, after setting the alarm clock for a little earlier than normal, if necessary.

This is not as pessimistic as it might sound. Who doesn't want a good reason to stop doing what makes them miserable on a daily basis, 10 hours a day, 5 days a week (or more)? And short of that, short of stopping the thing the makes one miserable, the very next best thing one can do is to engage in what brings him or her joy or at least hope for the future, so that the next stage in life can be commenced as soon as possible. The knowledge and act of preparation even makes the daily drudgery of present economic existence not only less miserable, but actually downright bearable!

If you have always wanted a degree, or a more advanced degree, or even a PhD, or you have wanted to learn electrical wiring, or if you have wanted to become an expert in anything at all, you can get there in 10 years.  This is what psychological studies of human performance and "expertness" tell us. Of course, you have to work hard at it for 10 years, and you have to work at it every single day of the week (no Sabbath for you!), but not all day every day.  Just like practicing piano scales.  If you do that, you will very likely be considered an expert in the field after 10 years or possibly even sooner, depending on your current background in the field.

So if you are 50 and want that Geology or Psychology or Accounting or Engineering knowledge that your heart has always longed for, get going today, and by the time you are 60 you will be an acknowledged expert in the subject (probably much sooner than that though until you are serviceable and employable and revenue-generating). You can then ply your craft for a good 10-15 years before retiring, but then, since you love it so, you will probably be one of those who never truly retires and stays current in the field until the day you die. How's that for a happy ending?

Readers, I implore you:  PLEASE use the internet to keep yourself informed of things that are filtered/censored/edited out of your news horizon. 5pm Central Time in the U.S., and I do a quick headline search.  Financial Times - blah. CNN - blah blah. Google News - blah blah blah. Jerusalem Post (www.jpost.com) - NOW we've got something! Check out this baby's headline, front and center on their site:

"Britain does not rule out military strike on Teheran"

That will grab one's attention, as it did mine (and no, planes are not in the air as I type this - at least not that I'm aware of). This may just be a ploy by G.B.'s new Prime Minister Gordon Brown to deflect some of Tony Blair's Middle East pub, but he [Brown] says "I believe that the economic sanctions imposed on Teheran will be effective, but I wouldn't… rule out action of a different kind" in what the Jerusalem Post dubbed his first interview from 10 Downing. The rest of the article blathers on about the U.N. (more blah blah blah), but it just seemed like an important enough statement by the Prime Minister of Great Britain that it would have garnered at least a tiny mention at other major news sites.

It's free, it takes virtually no research activity whatsoever on your part - just hit a few sites for content that you wouldn't think would normally make their way through your country's typical media filters. That's all I'm asking you to do. You just might be amazed at what goes on out in that big, scary world that nobody tells you about!

After reading AT&T's response on Friday that implored Google to just enter the new wireless spectrum bidding under the current rules and let the consumer decide who has the best service/offering under those telco-stacked constraints, I can unequivocally state without even seeing Google's offering that it will be far superior to anything the telcos have. What do I base this on?  Google's entire history of putting the user 1st, and every telco's entire history of putting the customer last. I've worked at telecom companies since 1992, companies engaged in everything from payphone billing to cellular service to wireless equipment manufacturing, for several of the largest companies in the industry. Customers aren't customers, they're "subs"; billing mistakes are not corrected unless they have to be; quality of service is not as good as it can be - it's only as good as it has to be. And the only thing that keeps them from charging more is a competitor or competitors that prevent them from doing so. Google? Free. They don't ever offer anything until they figure out a way to offer it for free, except for advertising, in which case you pay no more than the minimum going rate as set by the market, not by a "board" or "regulators" or long-term contract with penalties. When you set your bid for pay per click,  it's the amount you would pay no more than, but if it's higher than the present rate, your bid will automatically be reduced to charge you as little as possible. Would that ever happen with telcos? Ever? Imagine saying "I'll pay $45 per month for wireless service, but if other people are only paying $41, I'd like to only be charged $41." You can't imagine that, because it's simply unimaginable. Can you see Google offering that? Of course you can, because it's what they already do for almost all of their revenue. Which is why, depending on how hard Eric Schmidt at Google wants to push this and how deep in the back pocket of the telcos the FCC board really is, we could be staring at nothing less than the beginning of the end of customer exploitation by wireless carriers as we know it.

A vast, ancient lake located beneath Darfur in The Sudan has been detected by satellite imagery.  It's being described as the size of Lake Erie in North America, making it one of the world's largest lakes.  However, after scouring several articles about the discovery, announced on July 17 by scientists from Boston University, I cannot see any details about the depth of the lake, which of course is crucial for determining how much water is actually contained.  The BBC also has coverage and background on how the killings, rapes, and all around sub-human barbaric behavior that goes on there on a daily basis is rooted in a lack water in the area due to long droughts which have brought different groups of people in contact with each other to battle over the scarce resource.  And you thought fighting over oil got nasty!  Here's a bit of what the BBC had to say:

"Analysts say competition for resources between Darfur's Arab nomads and black African farmers is behind the conflict.

More than 200,000 Darfuris have died and 2m fled their homes since 2003.

'Much of the unrest in Darfur and the misery is due to water shortages,' said geologist Farouk El-Baz, director of the Boston University Center for Remote Sensing, according to the AP news agency."

A trick knee has derailed my cousin's imminent year-long Iraqi adventure. As readers of this post may recall, he was supposedly headed to Iraq for a year even though his 6-year active duty status in the National Guard ended in April. But while finishing up his 2-week training tuneup in Wisconsin, he was declared physically unfit for duty due to an apparently ligament-free knee that has tormented him since he was younger and has never had surgery. So after receiving a letter from the family doctor back home about it, the Guard x-ray'd it, confirmed the diagnosis, and flew him back home.

Today, the Financial Times is reporting that the Pakistani Supreme Court has reinstated one of their own, who had been barred by Gen. (sorry, I mean "President") Musharraf because of overstepping his judiciary boundaries. Here's an excerpt from the article that details exactly how the judge allegedly crossed the line, "By accepting, in particular, that there should be an investigation into alleged 'disappearances' of terrorism suspects and by reversing the privatisation of a large steel mill, Mr Chaudhry appeared to have overstepped the mark."  The short piece also mentions a few of the General's own constitutional transgressions:
"Rules in the constitution that Gen Musharraf has either ignored or circumvented since his 1999 coup include those barring a serving army chief from holding public office and from standing for election within two years of giving up the post."

Understand that this is a military dictatorship, that it is strongly supported by the U.S., that it faces popular opposition from Islamic fundamentalist groups, and that Osama bin Laden and his closest "cabinet members" are presumed to be in hiding along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, which is best described as "tribal frontier not governed by any national government." I won't say "lawless," as I'm sure they most likely do have their own system of recognized and abided-by, if not formally written, laws in place. If he is democratically forced out of office, as can now happen, what does this mean for al-Queda? Is it better for them to have an Islamic fundamentalist government in power that sympathizes with them, but which might also encourage a strong and open U.S. occupation of the area that could go to work rooting them out (and, by extension, more U.S. citizens like my cousin to be deployed there), or is it better to have an American-backed unpopular military dictator that is, in practice, leaving them alone in the places it matters most while winning for them the hearts and support of the population that opposes Musharraf?

CNET had an info-jammed story yesterday about Microsoft's product naming strategy. A sample:

"When Microsoft showed off Silverlight at an April conference, it generated near-instant buzz.

Interestingly, though, it was not the first time Microsoft had talked about the technology. But when the company had done so a year earlier, it was under the name 'Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere,' which just didn't excite people the way  Silverlight did."

From May 9, with rumors of MSFT purchasing YHOO swirling, here is a sampling of my thoughts of that being a bad idea for MSFT, as posted here at worthreading:

"The solution is simple, really:  just make up a creative-sounding word that in no way implies any association whatsoever with Microsoft, and then take a small percentage of the billions that would be used to buy a Yahoo and instead start building the new brand."

I've learned over the past 5 months of blogging that most people don't bother to click on outgoing links to full stories, which is why I'll occasionally quote some of them directly in posts along with pasting the link. That said, if you have any interest whatsoever in how branding works (and doesn't work), head over to the CNET article and learn something useful.

Amidst the flurry of online metric news over the past couple of days, I would simply like to stand and applaud. This blog isn't an income source, yet I still give thought to increasing my readership, writing about topics that I believe other people might find interesting, and doing my utmost to avoid wasting people's time. If this were a revenue-generating venture, I'd REALLY be freaking out over metrics to an exponentially larger extent than I already do.

In the beginning, I looked at visits to the site, which was followed about 5 seconds later by switching to caring about unique visitors to the site, both of which were easily and cheaply accomplished with Google AdWords. However, while the 1st night of AdWords generated a vast number of purchased visits, an effortless drilling into the data revealed that a stunning percentage of them came from the myspace.com domain, and about 80-90% of them left after spending less than 5 seconds and clicking on no other pages or outgoing links at the site. Lesson learned on Night 1: visits and unique visitors are utterly meaningless if trying to effectively advertise on a site, because most of the visits could be nothing more than click-throughs that instantaneously click right back out.

Next, I started paying more attention to subscriber stats. Even these, however, can be meaningless, as demonstrated by my own subscriptions to other feeds.  There are many of which I simply glance at headlines from my Netvibes page (is "portal" still a word?), and there are some of which I visit their actual site and see actual ads if there are any. So sub counts can also be pretty misleading.

What I find most useful at my own blog as gauges of my writing effectiveness and interest level to readers are 2 things and 2 things only: time spent per visit and pageviews per visit.  When all visitors to the site spend, on average, 2 minutes or more per visit, and when pageviews per visit are 2.5-3.5 for all visitors on average, I feel good. People have bothered to read for a solid 2 minutes, and that's a long time! Better yet, they have been motivated enough to actually sample another offering or 2! If the metrics dip below those threshholds, I'll consider the subject of the post, how much effort I put in, etc., to see what went wrong.

My apologies for the mundane details I have subjected you to here, but I'm just psyched that companies will finally be focusing on more meaningful metrics. This, in turn, will hopefully lead to more interesting fare for our online consumption, as opposed to being sucked in by effective headline writers and then retreating to another site as quickly as possible (too late though - they've already logged you as a hit and can now charge higher ad rates or be sold for more millions). Under the current rules, I would think that audience-grabbing headline writing skills would be valued above all else, since visitor counts are all the ad rates are based on at this time. While valuable, it's plainly not (or should not be) the only thing that matters.

8 paths to personal fulfillment, based on my own extensive study and practice:

1) Look within yourself. You will find what motivates you, what brings you joy or sadness, and eventually, what you believe. This is your soul, or essence, or spirit.

2) Look outside of yourself. You will find that you are not everything; instead, you are a part of something, and everything else is a part of that same thing.

3) Expose yourself to as much as possible. Experiences, physical locations, acquaintances, subject matters, everything you can think of: directly experience as much variety as you can.

4) Drill as deeply into 1 specific thing as possible. Again, an academic subject, a culture, a physical place, a talent, anything you choose: learn and experience that subject as deeply and completely as you are able.

5) Be as generous and giving as you can. Cultivate an awareness of needs, and when you come across people or circumstances that you can help, help them in the way that you can.

6) Be self-centered. Know what you require, and take the necessary actions to attain it. This may be food or shelter, or love from another, or freedom to contemplate and search, and the necessary actions to attain them will be activities such as work, social interaction, alone time, and the awareness that you cannot help everyone and everything or do everything that other people think you should do.

7) Think. Read, watch, and listen to everything you can that is deemed by yourself as worthy of your learning capacity and effort. Sense it, concentrate on it, process it, and make new concepts and ideas within your mind from it.

8) Do. Apply what you learn in the ways that you are able. Build something, or calculate something, or write something, or present something, or otherwise share the things that you have created within your mind with your learning and thinking. This can be a long and drawn out effort with a final finished "product", or an ever-evolving/changing/improving work in progress that will never really be "done" in the sense that work on it will cease. But there must be a physical going forth to apply what you know, even if that is as seemingly effortless as discussing the concept with other people face to face or as a blog post.

In a nutshell, no single philosophy or path can be so narrowly interpreted or followed to provide what you seek. You may hear generalizations such as "Eastern traditions look inward, while the West looks outward," or "become an expert in something to make yourself more valuable" or "get a well-rounded education so that you will be familiar with whatever life throws at you." The answer is, of course, all of the above, for all of the old sayings and wisdom have roots in timeless truths. Too challenging to be all things, to do all things, to know all things? Certainly! But the end result of having successfully "done" it all is not the objective here; fulfillment is. And the most fulfilling activities are those which stimulate, those which result in knowing oneself more fully, those which help others, those which keep one occupied, those which sharpen the body and the mind, and those which lead us closer to answering the eternal "why am I here?" So what are you waiting for? And one more thing:  the order of Paths 1-8 above are of no importance, as the more you pursue any one of them, the further along you will be in the rest of them

I took the family to Austin for the weekend for a visit to my other hometown (I attended the University of Texas) so that I could take in a Media Day for a cross-country solar car race between high school teams (the Dell-Winston Solar Car Challenge). While there, it was determined that Saturday would be spent at a water park on Lake Travis called Volente Beach, and the first things we noticed on the girls who worked there were the...accents. Unlike the rest of Austin, which is becoming more and more like San Antonio with its large and growing Hispanic population (the Mexican restaurant that we stopped at for dinner on the way into town on Friday not only served great Mexican food and spectacular margaritas, which is why we eat there every time we're in town; it also featured live entertainment with a couple of Ricky Martin and Shakira knock-offs fronting a band that performed only songs with Spanish lyrics, which the kids loved), the water park featured another accent in the mix. My wife said it reminded her of Disney World with the employees having exotic looks and accents. Eastern European was my guess, and more specifically, Romanian. Not that I've ever been to Romania or am in any way familiar with the language; just something about it and the people who spoke it seemed, well, Romanian. They were probably high school age, maybe early college, and as we were leaving, I asked one of them where her accent was from. The girl (one of the non-Romanians) replied, "Columbian." Then I asked why they ALL had either her accent or an Eastern European one, and she said they were all employed there, everyone at the park, as part of a foreign exchange program. She said they were all either Columbian or Romanian, or as she pronounced it, "Ro-MAH-nian." So there you have it - I KNEW I should have worked for the CIA with all of my language recognition prowess!

You will find a short post from me yesterday on the impressive qualifications of the top military man in Iraq, General David Petraeus (he of the Latin nomenclature - I think it's only a matter of days or weeks now before we start referring to the 3rd Infantry Division as the Tenth Legion, but that's another topic of yesterday's post if you're interested).  Coincidentally, Charles Krauthammer has an op-ed column in today's Washington Post (requires a free email address-based registration, which as always pointed out by myself, you ought to already have with the Washington Post anyway) that details the recent success we're having at turning the tribal tide against al-Qaeda.  Yet as Krauthammer points out:  "what cannot be said -- although it is now heard daily in Washington -- is that the surge, which is shorthand for Gen. David Petraeus's new counterinsurgency strategy, has failed. The tragedy is that, just as a working strategy has been found, some Republicans in the Senate have lost heart and want to pull the plug."

I have a cousin who has served in the National Guard, active duty, for 6 years.  I'm in Texas, he's in New York, but did a good deal of training in Texas, so he got to spend some time at Christmas and a few weekends here and there with us a couple of years ago.  I've known him since we were kids in New York (he's several years younger than me), and he's just a great kid who never really had any intention of fighting a war, as he joined well before 9/11.  He was looking for college tuition assistance and real-world skills, so it seemed like a good idea at the time.  In any case, we had a few scares along the way with him possibly needing to go to Iraq or Afghanistan, but his 6 years active was up in April I believe and he never had to go overseas; then we got word a couple of weeks ago that he had been extended and is now on his way to Iraq for a year's tour.  My 19-year old niece, a sophomore in college who's very family-oriented and feels pretty deeply connected to all family, even those that are thousands of miles from here, said "they can't do that!"  To which the only response from older, wiser, sage Uncle Tom (that's me) was "apparently they can."  He shipped out last weekend.  His specialty is explosives ordinance something or other - not a good specialty to have in Iraq.  Not good at all.  Would I give everything to not have him go over there and do what he does?  Of course I would.  I'm selfish that way, as we all are.  And I'm sure parents and wives and siblings and friends felt the same way in World War II and every other war.  But loved ones are not the ones making these decisions, so they must go, and we must hope for the best.  I would like nothing more than this to end, with total victory however it is measured, and be done.  That's not going to happen if we trickle along indefinitely, and it's not going to happen if we just say "we're done" and quit and come home.  If that occurs, we'll be right back over there in a matter of years, starting from scratch.  I happen to think that al-Qaeda's really got not much left in the tank, that they are unwelcome and unwanted, and that they are on the verge of not only defeat but also total collapse and extinction in Iraq, along with their Iranian and Syrian semi-covert backing.  Let's just call their bluff, go all in, finish the job and get everyone home, can't we?

Many of the parallels between the U.S. and imperial Rome are obvious:  unrivaled (which is not to say unchallenged) power of the "known world", far-flung campaigns to secure natural resources (grain then, oil now), subject of world envy while simultaneously despised by that very same world.  Even going down to the very name of the U.S. General in charge of Iraqi operations, General Petraeus (ok, this is getting a bit silly, Mr. Bush).  However, if one can get beyond the Daily Show-esque comic element of his name, his qualifications are actually quite impressive - and I would go so far as to say downright amazing.  Here's a snippet that I copied from his entry at Wikipedia:

"Petraeus was the General George C. Marshall Award winner as the top graduate of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College - class of 1983. He subsequently earned a Master of Public Administration (1985) and a Ph.D. (1987) in International Relations from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. He later served as Assistant Professor of International Relations at the U.S. Military Academy, and also completed a fellowship at Georgetown University. He has a BS from the U.S. Military Academy - class of 1974."

Could a candidate possibly be more qualified than this?  I doubt it.  While this does not ensure or even necessarily increase the U.S. chances for "victory", however that ends up being defined, it should at the very least result in an extraordinarily well-informed assessment of the situation from the ground forces level.  What is done with that assessment is anyone's guess, but I would hope that the appointment of such a well-credentialed, educated, and qualified individual to the top post indicates a sincere willingness and desire on the part of President Bush to determine exactly what our prospects for victory are, as well as what is likely to occur if victory is not achieved.  Someone who has excelled at West Point, Princeton, and Georgetown will have an excellent foundation in both military history and international relations, accompanied by a scholarly perspective of the whole affair.   There may yet be hope for this to come out as well as it possibly can, if not as well as once assumed.

A famous soccer player is making his debut in the States this month, I believe "Beckham" is the name, and in the spirit of welcoming him to the Dallas-Fort Worth area when his L.A. visits our neck of the woods (the huge highway billboards with his face plastered on them have been up for a few months now in Dallas, trumpeting his team's upcoming game with FC Dallas), I thought I'd compare gas prices (or, as you Londoners say, "petrol") between Mr. Beckham's former and current countries.

In Arlington, half way between Dallas and Fort Worth and the site of the partially-constructed new $1B Dallas Cowboys stadium, the Texas Rangers baseball team, and Six Flags Over Texas, I paid $2.77/gallon last night.  Checking petrol prices in London online, it appears that it goes for something on the order of 95 pence per litre, whatever that is.  Cutting to the chase, when the pence/dollar/pound conversion wizardry is performed, as well as the gallons to litres math, we come to a price of around $7.22/gallon in London.  And Americans are screaming bloody murder every time the price creeps up towards $3!  I honestly don't know how they get by over there with costs as high as that, so I asked a friend who's been there a few times but lives here.  He says it's simple:  people don't drive, and if they do, they have little cars.  I think I would enjoy that state of affairs, personally, but being in Texas as I am, I am instead relegated to my 3/4 ton Chevy Silverado HD (stands for "Heavy Duty"), full 4-door crew cab, 13.5 miles per gallon behemoth that requires me to "dock" in remote areas rather than to park up close in crowded lots.

Forgive my wandering though:  for all the talk of "gas simply can't get more expensive than $3-4/gallon - the public won't stand for it!", I would merely point eastward across the pond and ask what, exactly, is the public going to do to stop it?  Finally, yet another digression:  in frequent travels along the highways south of DFW, there is a site to behold on a more and more regular basis.  18-wheelers, but with enormously long flat-beds (I'd say roughly double the size of a normal 40-53 foot trailer) and what looks to be a single gigantic propeller blade strapped down to it.  I've seen this site rolling down the highway sporadically over the past few years, with noticeably increasing frequency as of late.  Back in April I finally found out what they are:  blades for wind turbines, heading out to the windy, elevated bluffs of West Texas to take their place in wind farms cropping up there and into New Mexico.  Texas:  horses and cattle in the 1800's, oil and gas in the 1900's, and wind in the 2000's.  It's good to be blessed with natural resources!

This might be a stupid question - and don't tell me "there's no such thing as a stupid question" - trust me, there are.  I've heard them.  They exist.  Ok, back to the potential assanine query at hand:  why are there no term limits for members of the United States Congress?  George Washington, great and wise leader that he was, set the precedent by refusing to seek a 3rd 4-year term as President, worrying that it would lead to despotism, abuse of power, and eventually another monarchy the likes of which America had just won its freedom from.  Franklin Roosevelt later ran for and was elected to 4 successive terms, with WWII as his reason for breaking precedent, but after him it was deemed a good thing to have no President serve more than 2 terms.  In more recent times, a relatively young Bill Clinton pondered whether it might sense to have the rule changed to "no more than 2 SUCCESSIVE terms," but the rule remains.  No more than 2 terms, period.

Yet it seems to me that the exact same rationale ought to, nay, does, apply to members serving in each chamber of Congress.  Times change, and so should Congressional representatives.  Incumbency is a much greater advantage to Congressional reps than it is to Presidents, effectively guaranteeing that a member will serve as long as he or she wishes.  No wonder we have such partisan animosity in this country!  How different would our system be, how much more effective and less pork-fed, if members were only allowed to serve a maximum of 6 years?  I'm sorry, but I don't care who you are, if you serve with people for upwards of 6, 8, 12, or 40 years, you're going to garner a lot of favors owed to you, as well as incurring a pretty steep bill yourself.  Take away that lifetime/career ambition though, and you may actually get public servants in there who not only start out with a servant's heart (as I believe most do), but don't get to stay long enough for it to be corrupted or otherwise transformed into something altogether different.