Davos and the World Economic Forum

Once again it's time for Davos.  Or more specifically the World Economic Forum at Davos, Switzerland.  For the better part of the week – some of the best minds in the business, economic and academic world – not to mention UN officials and assorted royals and entertainers – have come together to schmooze, network, appear on important panels and of course sit for endless media interviews.

There are many such gatherings – some famous like this one, some just small think tanks trying to save the world or even a small part of it.  Davos looms large to me because the TV network I work for always sends a large team to beam back the weighty interviews and report on some of the weighty panel discussions.  So for all the years since my (and Apple's) first iPhone I've been dutifully browsing the WEF app and checking WEF's tweets.

I was talking to a friend in Europe today who was all excited about an upcoming Aspen Institute retreat. Where ostensibly the participants – all credentialed big thinkers – will come up with more ideas to save the world.

Which brings me to the reason for this rant.

I politely suggested to my friend – as I have before – that maybe this time all those brilliant minds  -- instead of producing  really big new ideas -- might produce some rather small but practical ones which might actually work in the real world.  And also produce some practical ways to implement those practical ideas.

My friend said a recent survey found people really want ways to fix what’s broken.  Like the US Congress.  Or middle class jobs. Or Greece.  We agreed that may be an opening for practical change – if the change agents can find ways to help the rest of us understand that our society will simply perish otherwise.

I’m not against big ideas.  All societies need people with the ability to see our problems and suggest fresh ways to solve them.  It’s just that so many of those suggestions or plans or philosophies will never actually work in the world most people actually inhabit.  OK – full disclosure.  I got through philosophy in college – a prerequisite to my beloved broadcasting classes – by reading a book on the history of philosophy by Bertrand Russell. One manageable chapter for each unmanageable philosopher from Aristotle on up. As a philosopher himself Russell must have realized that obsessing about a tree falling in the forest was simply useless if not impossible for a realist like me.  Oh wait a minute… wasn’t there a chapter on Realism too?

Maybe my “just do it” brand of realism isn’t quite what Russell was describing. But that’s what we need.  A group of deep thinkers whose names we all know. Who will get together at one of these high profile forums or quasi-secret retreats.  And return to our real world with some real, do-able plan to just fix it.

Imagine Saving the New York Times

I really don’t like to sweat all over my iPhone. My iPhone is a thing of beauty and I hate to make it all yucky.

OK you say – so what?  Well – here’s the point.  I was reading the print edition of the New York Times today instead of reading it digitally on my iPhone or iPad as I mostly do.  I was reading print because I was on the bike at the gym. Sweating.  And then I turned the page and ran full bore into a lot of white space – and a love note from Yoko Ono. Of course. Today would have been John Lennon's 72nd birthday. “Imagine all the people living life in peace” Yoko wrote in big bold black letters in the middle of all that white. 
 

And even with our deeply polarized country about to vote for a president and a congress and then fall off the fiscal cliff  – for this morning at least Lennon’s wistful lyrics renew my foolish hopes for humanity.

So why am I telling you all this?  Because if I had been reading the Times digitally – on a smart phone/tablet app – I would have missed that full page message from Yoko Ono.  Or any other full page or half page or quarter page ad or public service message the Times would normally publish.  And it would have been my loss.

Print has not yet discovered how to create successfully such things as full page ads on an app.  Oh occasionally you’ll see an ad page briefly as you swipe through the pages. But only occasionally.  And never something like that “imagine” page.

And I think it’s wrong to blame just print.  Or broadcast.  Or cable.  Their corporate owners and the media advertising and marketing managers responsible for monetizing their product are still – for the most part – living in a siloed media world. Oh yes we have print reporters shouldering cameras. And local TV stations hiring “content” producers instead of reporters or writers. They all Tweet and Facebook and Storify that content in a frenzy of sharing.  It seems many media creators get it.  But somehow the marketing/advertising folks who pay their salaries – don’t.

People (like me) increasingly use ALL media – but at different times and for different purposes. Recently Nielsen reported that more than fifty percent of all consumers in this country have smartphones. iPad and other tablet sales are surging.  We stream movies and other video from our PC’s to our huge flat screen TV’s in the living or family  room.  And during last week’s first presidential debate – pundits discovered a new phenomenon. We were watching the debate on the big screen. But discussing it as it unfolded on Facebook and Twitter. It was the most tweeted-about event in company history with more than ten million Tweets.

The next morning maybe some of us new media mavens even read about it in a newspaper. Or at week’s end – in a magazine you could roll up and take out in the rain without getting your iPhone’s nice glass screen all spotted up.

I am as much in the new media moment as anyone who wasn’t born yesterday can be. But I have completely lost patience with the prognosticators who keep trumpeting the death of any media platform that wasn’t created by a guy in a hoodie.

Wake up advertising and marketing people!  Start putting ad packages together which span ALL media – not just an internet ad or a smartphone ad or a newspaper ad.  Yes you will have to be creative.  Find ways to make those smaller screens pay off without enraging those of us who like our apps and our content without annoying commercials. The expensive, award-winning ad for TV won’t work on a smartphone or tablet.  But something will.  Slice it and dice it and sell it as one integrated, pan-platform package. 

And I guess I’m slitting my own throat here but New York Times (and other newspapers and magazines) – find a way to single-price your pan-platform packages in the same way – so a little here and a little there in aggregate multiple platform ad revenue makes up for the bigger bucks lost in the smaller print runs.

Maybe then there won’t be so much talk about the death of print. 

After all -- if there are no more newspapers  -- what will you read while you’re eating that greasy burger and fries?  And how will you “paper train” your next puppy?  Or pack glasses and dishes for moving? What will you put under the bird cage? Or the litter box? Or on the floor when you’re painting that old chest of drawers? 

I’m writing this on my laptop, watching a TV news channel and using my iPad for research. That full page message from Yoko Ono which started it all – is sitting on the table with today’s print edition of the paper. The AP News app on my iPhone has just sent me an alert.

We need it all. New media, old media and media yet to be invented. You guys in marketing land – figure it out.  But remember.  One pan-platform ad package. Priced for the way we actually consume media today. Which is wherever and whenever and however we want it.

Our Kizzy Cat - in Memoriam

Our  Kizzy’s real name when we got him from the animal shelter was Kismet. Which means destiny or fate.  They had found him originally by the side of the road and picked him up.

He had already been returned once to the shelter – needed too much love the two men who took him had said.  Imagine. How can anyone or any animal need too much love.

Kizzy was a big Tuxedo cat.  With an offside white splotch on his mouth. When we adopted him we also had another very much loved cat – a small Siamese named Tempo.

Tempo was the top cat in the household until he died at age 18 about 10 years ago. The two of them were never exactly “fond” of each other but they accepted each other and occasionally would sleep together. Poor Kizzy was relegated to the foot of our bed because Tempo already owned the space between us just below the pillows.

After Tempo died and was buried in our yard, Kizzy took over.  He kind of demanded that we not get another cat and so we agreed.  He owned us now.

Our cats have always been indoor cats and have never traveled with us; we have always found a sitter who got to know them and love them too. Kizzy was no exception; he was always here when we got home – whether from a long, difficult day at work – or a trip.  Always running to the door, meowing with pleasure, so happy to see us again.  Asking to be picked up and held and petted.  And of course – fed.  Kizzy was very obvious with his “feed me” meow.

Two years ago our rather overweight cat began to lose weight.  Slowly. He stopped overeating. The vet (and we agreed) said older cats slow down this way. But then he developed a big lump on his side which lab tests couldn’t exactly identify.  The vet said it was likely a form of cancer which could mask itself in tests.

Kizzy survived our usual summer teaching months in Prague – here at home.  For a month with just Frank here and then for another month with the cat sitter.  It was his fifth year of this and we figured he knew we always came back.  And we did.  But Kiz was obviously failing.  We tried some digestive enzymes the vet recommended which seemed to help -- but slowly, our wonderful big cat was fading away.

This morning we came downstairs and he couldn’t move. Although he had eaten and been walking around when we went to bed.  The vet said later he probably had a stroke.  So we sat with him until the vet’s office opened and then had to call and take him on his final trip.

Tempo died at home ten years ago.  We cried and said our goodbyes and then buried him in the yard. Other cats died other ways. But we ourselves had never before had to take a beloved pet to the vet to be put to sleep.

It was horrible.  It IS horrible.  And yet so much kinder than what we do to our loved humans. Keep them barely breathing on intravenous lines hooked up to machines in cold hospital rooms.  Or the reverse – call in the hospice folks who say matter-of-factly your loved one is going to die and let’s just sit around and wait for it to happen.

Our wonderful cat was in our arms until the vet gave him something to put him to sleep.  We were there, petting him and talking to him as he fell asleep.  We kept petting him until the vet was able to inject the overdose of anesthesia which put him into his final, forever sleep.

And then we came home to an empty house.  And put all his cat things away.

His photo is on our mobile phones. And computers. And his spirit is everywhere we look. He was our special buddy, our wonderful friend and companion.  A cat with so much love he even lavished it on strangers who came over for dinner.  If you didn’t like cats you were plain out of luck around Kizzy.  He was determined to be liked.

Kizzy died about 8:30 this morning, September 27, 2012. There will be no big black and white cat to demand his dinner tonight.   Or to sleep in our bed.  Or on the rug outside the bedroom door when we stay in bed too long for him.  The cat dishes are washed and put away, his beds and special rug and toys – gone.  The litter box is empty – waiting for its next user.

Oh yes –there will be other cats in this house eventually; we can’t live in it alone. But not for awhile.

We are in mourning for our wonderful little friend. 

Goodbye Kizzycat. 

We will always love and remember you.

We hope you have crossed the rainbow bridge into a well-fed forever.

 

 

 

Fenway Park at 100

Friday the 13th may not seem like an auspicious day for the Red Sox home opener at Boston’s beloved Fenway Park. But it’s not the REAL opener anyhow for any red-blooded (or in the case of Beacon Hill – blue blooded) REAL Bostonian.

No – the REAL opener will come on April 20th –the actual 100th anniversary of the OFFICIAL opening day of what was then the brand new Fenway Park. On that date, the Red Sox hosted the New York Highlanders – who preceded today’s New York Yankees. Boston eeked out a win in 11 innings and went on to win the World Series that year--no hint of the “curse” that would settle on the team after Babe Ruth was sold to the Yankees. In fact the Red Sox won five World Series. And then came the Curse of the Bambino --- an 86 year drought finally broken with a series win in 2004.

I grew up just blocks from Fenway Park. I would often walk home from high school – and later from college -- through Kenmore Square. I think there were a lot more afternoon games then; apparently fans had no problem getting the time off from work because I could usually hear the cheers or the boos from the park – even over the traffic noise.

I loved the Red Sox as all of us did. And of course the Celtics and the Bruins. The Patriots too until they left home for somewhere in the middle of the state called Foxborough and dropped “Boston” from their name.

There wasn’t much to talk about in Boston when I was a kid except sports and politics. It’s probably different now. With no Kennedy on the state or national stage, sports are probably the ONLY thing people talk about.

As for the Red Sox -- so far this year hasn’t had an auspicious start. But then it’s not exactly great for the Yankees either. It doesn’t matter. It’s always been good baseball when Boston and New York play each other. And 100 years later --- it will STILL be good baseball at Fenway when they meet for the first time in this new season.

But only, of course, if the Sox sweep the three game series.

Ode to Steve Jobs

Last night when word came that Steve Jobs had died – it arrived via AP alert. On my iPhone 4. In a restaurant.

When I went to the Twitter universe to get more information – that Twitter app was on the same iPhone.

When I got home I tweeted several late articles on Jobs – which I found on the 12 news apps I have on my iPad 2. (Most of them are on my iPhone too).

This morning, at the gym, I started writing this blog piece on my iPhone – on Word 2007. Courtesy of the Documents to Go app.

There's an app for everything now thanks to Steve Jobs. But maybe not one that says simply “thank you”-- for changing the boring, the mundane -- to fun, to elegance- to – well - iLife.

I got my first iPhone in 2007-- 6 months after it arrived. It changed everything. OK -- the iPod had been around for years by then, not to mention the Mac laptops and desktops. I had never wanted one of those. Nor do I now. They were always for people who wanted computing made easy. I started using a computer in the days of DOS. And I’m proud to have learned – and (thankfully) forgotten it. In the Mac versus PC match-up – I’m the PC.

But then came the iPhone. And suddenly I lusted in my heart for it.

Tomorrow I will pre-order my fourth iPhone. Although there is absolutely nothing wrong with my one year old iPhone 4. That’s the genius of Steve Jobs. I don’t NEED the iPhone 4S. Most of us who buy one won’t need it. We just WANT it. Desperately. The way a starving person wants bacon and eggs.

Take this a little further --- to the iPad. I would venture to guess there is almost no one who really NEEDS an iPad. Certainly I don’t. With an iPhone, a powerful year old Vaio ultra-light laptop, and several desktop PCs at home – you could fairly say I’m more than covered.

But again – that's Steve Jobs' magic. I could only talk myself out of getting the iPad for a year. Then I just HAD to have it. And I DO have it now, courtesy of my incredulous husband.

Wants versus needs.

Marketing genius.

In the run-up to the iPhone 4S announcement Tuesday, more than one analyst talked about the bond between a piece of glass and its owner. A bond many of them called “love”. Well – maybe not the undying, ‘til-death-do-us-part love. But certainly a kind of love. How often do I tell someone how much I “love” my iPhone? Or for that matter, my iPad?

And don’t be offended, iPad 2. But I love your smaller sibling more.

I carry my iPhone everywhere. Walking, running, hiking. Into the radio studio at work (appropriately set to vibrate of course). It waits in line with me at Starbucks – bar code app at the ready. It’s always willing to Skype my friend or business contact in Europe or video the bridge collapse near my home and post it to YouTube. It finds me a restaurant, buys me a movie ticket, tells me when the next N train leaves the Times Square station. I can read books on it. It alerts me to all kinds of news events instantly and gives me instant access to all kinds of media and information. It’s like a little friend who knows all, sees all -- and tells only what I want it to tell.

OK maybe I’m a little over the top. But remember when I grew up we were tethered to the phone line, the living room TV, the desktop computer. Each in its specific place.

The iPhone set me free. To wander the world as I wish. Virtually. Or for real.

So thank you Steve Jobs. Like most of your devoted followers, I never met you. Never learned first hand what kind of a person you really were. But I knew you were a person who grabbed at opportunities the rest of us either didn’t see, or were afraid to see.

You changed my world, Steve Jobs.

You changed everyone’s world.

And tomorrow I will do just what you would have wanted me to do – along with millions of others just as over the top as I am.

I will buy Apple’s new iPhone 4s.

I totally don’t NEED it. But I totally do WANT it.

Can’t Anyone Fix Anything?

Did you ever wake up in the 5AM dark and say with a snarl, “Why can’t ANYONE fix ANYTHING when so much is wrong?”

No, I didn’t just wake up on the wrong side of the bed (does any mother still say that to her kid?).

First there was the business news. You’ll pardon me for starting there; I work in business news. I have to pay attention. So this morning – when we still have 14 million people officially unemployed – and probably 14 million or so more who’ve given up or are underemployed or in the black or underground economy – all anyone on the business cable channels wanted to talk about was whether the Federal Reserve would announce “Operation Twist” when its 2 day meeting ended this afternoon. Which sure enough – since I am writing this toward the end of the day – the Fed did. (It didn’t help to give Wall Street what it wanted; the market tanked big time anyhow).

And what is Operation Twist? Well – you can be sure it’s not the Fed’s name for a rather complex monetary policy. In very simple terms (which is all I understand anyhow) the central bank will sell some of its short term treasury holdings – and buy more long term ones. Which should push long term interest rates down even more than they already are. Which supposedly would make mortgages and other longer term loans more attractive. Thus magically resuscitating the moribund housing market – without doing anything to change bank policies which have made it almost impossible for normal people to qualify for mortgages. Or, in many cases, restructure old ones.

Nor is Operation Twist likely to improve consumers’ sour attitudes about the economy. So they will buy more stuff again. So small businesses can start hiring again. Even with lower interest rates, how many small business people do you know who will go running out to their local bank for a loan now – so they can hire the additional workers they don’t need to keep up with the non-existent growth in demand for their products?

Which brings me to the next issue – also part of the morning’s business news set up. Companies like Oracle –which makes software – are doing just fine, thank you, because big businesses are continuing to increase productivity by buying more complex software --- so they won’t have to hire any more people. Maybe ever. And maybe can even lay off a few more employees.

Which sent me out into the fog – wondering how all those jobless Americans can EVER find decent paying work again. And how the 90 percent of Americans who do have jobs can ever again feel confident about keeping them.

Then came the real downer. My customary early morning walk around a section of northern New Jersey which was badly flooded by Irene and then a week later - flooded again by Lee. Darling little houses with proudly tended flower gardens. Now stripped of all personal goods. Stripped, actually, down to the studs because plasterboard tends to crumble and dissolve in 5, 6, 8 feet of dirty river water.

Whole streets in normally vibrant neighborhoods are just dead now. No one living in the stripped-down houses. No kids biking to school. No one going off to work. Just – nothing.

One big cardboard sign scrawled in red saying it all – “FEMA – BUY ME OUT”.

How I wish I were still reporting local news. There’s a follow up story at every ruined house. Maybe even a business story in local contractors suddenly “flooded” with new work. But the microwave trucks are long gone now – on to the next big – or small -- story. My blue funk turns black.

Then on a pile of newspapers waiting for pickup I see a photo of Texas Governor Rick Perry – now a GOP Presidential candidate -- wearing a suit and tie and a big grin – and brandishing a pistol for no apparent reason. And later, on the car radio, some analyst opining once again that all those tax increases President Obama put in his debt reduction plan are just red meat for the Democratic base, not a prayer of passing the GOP-controlled House in gridlocked Washington as 24/7 electioneering takes over. Welcome to Greece.

I drive 10 miles out of my way – again - because Morris County is waiting for federal funds and design approval to rebuild a tiny bridge on a heavily travelled road that got washed out by an Irene-swollen, raging stream. More than 3 weeks ago. On a regular basis - multiplied by hundreds of car trips -- how much extra greenhouse gas does that add up to?

Why can’t ANYONE fix ANYTHING?? Does it seem to you that anyone – anyone at all with a name you can recognize – is living in the real world? Or even living???

No wonder I’m peevish.

Perspective

It’s been a week of putting things in perspective. And it’s only Wednesday.

The 10th anniversary of 9/11 went a long way toward reminding me what really matters in one's life and one's world.

Then there is the ongoing cleanup from the double flooding endured by so many financially fragile homeowners here – and in so many other places. Some of those sad people flew flags on 9/11 from gutted, stench-ridden homes. An acquaintance offered one explanation. These people have lost everything - yes - but what they’ve lost are "things". “Things” can be replaced. The people who died on 9/11 can never be replaced. The flood victims recognize that much greater sadness -- honor it and remember it -- because they are beginning their journey back.

Finally (I can only hope it's finally) -- today I opened an Email from a dear, now retired friend on the other side of the world. After his usual update on weather and his wife's garden - complete with smiley faces - came the real reason for the email. I am ill, he said simply. I have pancreatic cancer. All our plans are over. I must go to the hospital for chemotherapy.

Not just cancer -- bad enough in any form. But pancreatic cancer. One of the most deadly. Very few people survive for more than a short time. Of course I thought of Steve Jobs — but he had a rare form of pancreatic cancer, later had a liver transplant and has now said he can't run his beloved Apple any longer. There has been no update on Jobs' health ... but he's looked thinner and thinner in event appearances.

As I said at the beginning --- a week to put things in perspective. How bad is life if you are healthy and solvent, with an intact house and furniture – and someone who loves you?

So please, the next time I bitch about some inconsequential, stupid, perceived slight or annoyance or dislike – someone please hit me. Hard.

You don’t know what a charmed life you really lead, until you see what can happen when the luck runs out.

Remembering 9/11 - the Sequel

I thought there would be a lot more flags flying from homes and poles and mailboxes in the hugely Republican towns where I live. Without provocation many of these folks fly flags all year from their trucks, often forgetting to replace them when they become tattered and torn. They line their driveways with small flags on major holidays. They talk constantly about who is – and isn’t – a “real” American. Patriotism, seemingly, oozes from their pores.

So where were the flags today, the tenth anniversary of the September 11th terror attacks?

We don’t fly a flag on a regular basis. But this is the tenth anniversary of a day none of us who lived through it will ever forget. So my husband and I were determined to pay our respects. To the people who lost their lives and their families. To the heroes who searched for the dead and missing, some sacrificing their own lives after inhaling the toxic dust on “the pile” for months. To this country we call the United States of America.

We finally found our little flags, late last evening, at the one store that sells flags in the entire region. At 9:30 last night we drilled holes for them to stand tall -- in the structure which holds the rural mailboxes on our road. It was the very least we could do.

Today I walked and ran and drove through our town and several close-by towns. Expecting to see every house with some kind of a flag as a memorial, as a statement of solidarity, of nationhood. But where were the flags on this tenth anniversary of 9/11? Where were the flags as the commemorative ceremony was unfolding at the Twin Towers site?

Oh there were some. A house here and there. A Wendy’s on the highway where workers had climbed on the roof to make the flags visible to all. But in front of the grandest, most expensive homes I saw – there were no flags. Nothing. Just perfectly manicured lawns and bushes and flowers. All the more startling in a town where large sections had been devastated by both Hurricane Irene and the rainy remnants of Tropical Storm Lee. Perfection for your lawn, big house. But nothing for the worst terror attack in U.S. history.

Among the homes actually flying flags from formal flagpoles, a surprising number flew them from the top of the pole, as on a normal day. Perhaps not realizing that on a day where we remember the dead, the flag should be flying at half mast.

But then I saw the house that has now been seared into my memory. It was just a little, unadorned house. On a small piece of land. It had been severely flooded by Irene; its insides were already gutted and a For Sale sign was prominently displayed in the front yard. And yet its owners – who had already lost everything else – had found a flag. A good sized flag. Which was tacked up carefully across the siding for all the world to see.

That flag says so much. It says we who live here have lost a lot –but not so much that we can’t remember those who lost so much more. And it says something else that is perhaps purely American. It says we are down but we are not out. We will move on and rebuild our lives. As the 9/11 families have done. As Americans always do.

How much more does this flag say about the America we hope we live in than those grand homes with the perfect lawns I saw today?

It says everything.

Remembering 9/11

We went to find a flag today – my husband and I. A small flag or maybe two to fly from the rural mailboxes on the county road where we live.

Not that we don’t HAVE a flag. We have two. But they are oversized flagpole flags. We can’t even hang them from the straight-out short pole attached to our house. That’s made to push through the spine of today’s smallish decorative house flags – not for a FLAG-flag with grommets for ropes to raise and lower it. Although far too many people who profess to revere the flag of our country insult it every day by leaving it tattered, waving forlornly in the wind and rain. Or leave it flying at night, unlit and unremarked.

We wanted the small flags because tomorrow is September 11th, the tenth anniversary of the terror attack on New York’s Twin Towers, the Pentagon and Flight 93’s heroic demise in a Shanksville PA field. We want to fly the flag of our country once again as we did after that terrible day. Fly it to remind ourselves and everyone else that despite the political paralysis these days in Washington, we ARE one nation and we DO stand for the most important principles on earth. Fly it because the nearly 3000 people who died after the attacks, and the heroes who tried to save them, were and are unique and special. Fly it because they- and we - belong to a nation which can’t be so easily vanquished.

Of course every human being is unique and special. But the United States of America is also unique as nations go –a nation built on diversity and determination, our people springing from almost every other nation on earth. In an eerie echo, people from many countries who just happened to be at the World Trade Center were killed on September 11th, not just Americans.

Well, back to the small flags. We didn’t find them at any of the chain stores on our local highway which have put smaller, perhaps more patriotic stores, out of businesses. We will have to find the one store, miles away, which sells only flags and related merchandise – the one I did a story on along with a local, New Jersey flag factory after that first September 11th. And it seems to me that if for no other purpose than to sell merchandise – and why else do these big box stores exist anyhow – the management of these stores missed a major marketing opportunity in a down economy.

Until today – and our unsuccessful effort to find the flag of our country – I was trying to avoid this tenth commemoration of September 11th. I didn’t WANT to remember. I wanted to pull the covers over my head and just stay in bed all day – hiding from those terrible memories. But of course you can never hide from memories.

As reporters we have to separate our personal emotions from what we are covering. Otherwise it would be impossible to do the job; one would spend one’s professional life dissolved in tears. But that takes its toll in other ways; you spend a lot of time later remembering. The images and voices play over and over again in your mind, coming out of the little closet you try to lock them into when you least expect them.

Not that it would be really possible for ANYONE who lived through it to forget September 11th. Or for that matter, its precursor and warning – the initial attack on the World Trade Center on February 26, 1993. Which I also recall vividly, having arrived on scene with my cameraman soon after the truck bomb exploded. Had someone somewhere simply paid attention to convicted conspirator Ramzi Yousef’s own words – the second attempt to take down the twin towers might never have succeeded.

So now it’s the eve of September 11th, ten years later. I am determined to find that flag and show anyone who passes by that with all our divisions – the flag is still there. Along with our country. Our grit. Our derring-do.

We need to remember. And remember how we came together as a people, as a country, political and religious differences forgotten. To fly the flag of the United States of America from virtually every home – ten years ago tomorrow.

Welcome to Beautiful Prague!

I’ve been here a week now – the transition from the metro New York area to a small, Central European country 20 years out of Communism a little rough around the edges as usual.

It’s not that I don’t know the country and Prague, its architecturally legendary capital - well. I’ve been working summers here for 4 years now – and my husband and I have spent vacations here with an adopted Czech family since 1990.
But every time I think I have it down flat – this living in a foreign land – the country calls my bluff.

The transit unions were supposed to hold a huge general strike last Monday. They want to stop the social system reforms that are necessary here as well as in Greece and Spain. The unions would shut down Prague and other Czech cities, halt all trains, blockade major highways and roads. Wait– I forgot. That last part – the blockade – would be courtesy of the miners’ union. I’m not sure what they have to do with running the trams and buses and trains – but hey ---let’s all pile on.

Everyone, including me, was in a panic. How would we get to work on Monday.

My boss said – quite seriously – you might want to bike. Well, OK, that’s fine for full time Praguers. But I’m working here just 2 months. I haven’t GOT a bike. Or a car. Well, then, people said, call a taxi. But again – what about the huge traffic jams which were predicted? Walk? I don’t think so. I’m maybe 7 miles as the crow flies from work. And not even crows can fly in a straight line through Prague’s meandering streets.

As it turned out –the government pulled a fast one on the unions. It went to court. And on Saturday, the Prague Municipal Court ruled the strike would be illegal because the unions didn’t give the required 3 business days notice. They could strike but they’d be liable for all the financial damages the court could assess. Kind of like New York’s Taylor Law which forbids public employee strikes.

So the unions reassessed, called off the strike, and announced it Monday for Thursday. Quite legal now. And it did indeed shut down much of the city and to a lesser extent, parts of the country. The trains didn’t run. The Metro was closed for the first time ever. But officials managed to get the basic tram system running – slowly. And there were some city buses and some private buses contracted for the day.
The unions held a medium-sized rally and march through the city to the government’s offices. By New York standards – everyone was extremely well behaved.

People who had to get to work, did. I saw a lot more cars speeding down our street at 7AM. And lots and lots of bikes. Even a taxi or two.

But the anticipated traffic jams never developed. In fact – all over the city and the highways that feed into it – it was like a holiday. No trucks, almost no cars. A lot of Praguers just took a 4 day weekend. No wonder they mostly supported the unions!

And then there is the matter of my package.

You see, on my flight to Prague I didn’t want my checked bag to be overweight again. Delta has some pretty stiff fees if you so much as go one pound over the limit. Which keeps getting lower every year.

So before I left, I mailed a small, 4 and a half pound box of vitamins and supplements from myself in the US, to myself here in Prague. I figured the package would arrive around the time I did. And that it did. Arrived at the customs office of the Czech Post Office that is. And there is stayed with thousands of other packages. All held up by a new regulation which came into effect in April, which requires every foreign package to go to this customs office first – so the postal employees can determine if you will be required to pay for the privilege of collecting your package.

Technically, if the contents are valued at less than 22 euros, you don’t have to pay any duty. The Czechs – desperate for money to cut the huge budget deficit below 3% - lowered that valuation from 75 euros – which was already pretty low. And technically, if a package is sent from another European Union country, it’s supposed to sail right through and get delivered in a timely fashion.

Ha!

The notice of my package’s whereabouts which was supposed to be sent to me never arrived. And a week after the US Post Office traced it to the Czech customs office, I traced it as well on the Czech Post Office website. At least they have an English option!

So today I got up early, took all my tracking printouts and US customs declarations – and took a bus, a metro and a tram to Prague 5, the section of the city where this customs post office is located. I managed to find the right floor, reading directions in my very limited Czech. And I lucked out. A very nice postal employee who spoke more English than I do Czech helped me out. And an hour and three additional office visits later, I had my stamped declaration and I could stand in a very long line to collect my package.

But this is the Czech Republic. It wasn’t that easy.

Most of the people in the line were Czechs. Very angry and loud Czechs by the time they got to the final window and discovered the payoff for their wasted morning.

You see, the nice man in the first office explained to me, Czechs are buying all this stuff over the internet instead of in the proper Czech stores which charge them the country’s 20% value added tax. You know – we talk about using it in the US also. It’s like a sales tax on steroids. And over here in Europe where some countries have VATs as high as 24%, the money collected underpins the extensive social safety net. Which is now becoming a lot less extensive, even as the VAT keeps rising. Thus – Thursday’s transit union strike.

The Czech government thinks Czechs are cheating. They think the online stores - like Amazon for example – are in cahoots with the Czech buyers, valuing packages low so their customers can escape paying any duties which might be imposed.

So everyone who buys anything over the internet now has to jump through hoops to get it, and then pay up as well. And what about me – who mailed vitamins already bought and paid for in the US to myself here in Prague? Well, sorry. But I have to pay up too. 96 crowns to get my own vitamins. That’s around $6 dollars. About what I would pay in VAT taxes on the (purposely low) valuation I put on my package.

When in Prague… do as – well you know the rest.

James Tate and the Happy Ending

James Tate, the senior from Shelton, Connecticut, is going to his prom after all.

That's the lede -- as we often spell it in the newsroom.

But this is more than just a happy ending for a Connecicut teenager.

One of the reasons many of us love working as local news reporters is the ability to take one person's story and tell it to the world. The world can then make up its own mind about good or bad, fair or unfair, right or wrong.

But even if it's a story that speaks for itself -- it needs a platform. That's us -- News at 6, or 10 or 11. Radio. Blogs, websites, Facebook, apps. Even the Grey Lady. That's The New York Times for those of you who think Facebook and Twitter are the media of record.

So all of us with our platforms -- we huffed and we puffed and we blew the house down.

And why is James Tate going to his senior prom? Without saying she was right or wrong, Shelton's headmaster said the "international" pressure was too distracting. Getting in the way of what a high school is supposed to do. As in teach.

But the story of one romantic kid - which captivated the media and everyone else - is all about teaching.

Teaching us again - us reporters - why we're here in the first place. (The idealistic part about telling someone's story).

Teaching school officials (who should have known) about the power of social media -- and how the mainstream media are now interwoven with Facebook and Twitter.

And perhaps teaching James Tate and his fellow teenagers that there are consequences to every action -- even if all you wanted to do was ask a girl to the prom.

James Tate and the Shelton High School Prom

All anyone in this part of the country can talk about is a romantic kid from Shelton, Connecticut named James Tate -- who has been banned from his high school’s senior prom.

And what terrible thing did this teenager do? He and friends taped some big block cardboard letters up on the school’s outside wall – at 1AM – asking a girl to be his date to the prom. “HMU – Tate” said the signature. In a more elegant age he might have said call me. But this is 2011—so he said HMU. As in “hit me up”. Which, when I was going to my senior prom, was all about lending someone some money. As in “I’ll hit Dad up for the money for the prom tickets”.

OK – back to 2011. The girl said yes. But the high school’s headmaster Beth Smith said no. Seems she wasn’t amused. Nor did she think – like 99 percent of us – that this was a most creative way to ask someone to the senior prom. No – the headmaster thought that James Tate had been trespassing, being that it was 1AM and such, and by trespassing, had broken school rules. So she suspended Tate for one day.

If that had been all she did, I wouldn’t be writing about this because it probably wouldn’t have become the story of the moment on Twitter and Facebook – not to mention the mainstream media. No, it seems there are school policies at Shelton High. And, she said, school policy is that if you get suspended – you don’t go to your senior prom. Period the end.

But it’s NOT the end. James Tate has made network television appearances. Shelton’s Mayor thinks maybe the headmaster should revisit her decision. I’m writing about it along with hundreds of other reporters and bloggers. Not to mention all the tweets and comments and Facebook support page “likes”.

Some people think maybe we are all a little bats to make such an issue out of what is really just a school disciplinary matter.

But really, that’s not the point. At least not to me.

First of all, one’s senior prom is an event to be remembered for a lifetime. The right to those memories shouldn’t be cancelled for something that harmed no one. There was no violence. No one was bullied on Facebook or anywhere else. Tate didn’t flunk his finals. He’s going on to college.

And if I had a business which could use such a guy – I’d hire him in a minute!

It seems to me what America needs most these days is creativity and some derring-do. People who can come up with new ideas, new ways of doing things. And yet link them to the old ways so that all of us who aren’t 18 aren’t frightened off by those ideas. Well – finding a creative way to ask a girl to a prom is probably as old as proms themselves. We can all identify. And at a time when Tate could have used any number of digital, new media ways to reach his target – he chose one everyone could appreciate. Except of course Shelton High’s headmaster.

Come on Beth Smith. Give the guy a break. Bend your rules. Let him do the community service he’s volunteered to do. Cut off a lock of his hair maybe.

But reward his creativity – don’t stifle it.

Or maybe just reward a romantic deed in an age that is more about Lady Gaga than Rhett Butler.

And James Tate – when you graduate from Syracuse University – if you need a reference for that first real job – HMU. You know where I live. On Facebook.

It's a Wonderful Town

I haven’t spent much time in Manhattan lately.

Not by choice; it’s still the most magical place in the world to me – even if the Times Square neon – er-- video is somewhat over-the-top these days.

Actually it’s a good thing Mayor Bloomberg forced that pedestrian zone down our throats; Times Square was an accident waiting to happen. I remember trying to drive down Broadway at dusk ---so mesmerized by the video displays I hardly noticed the cars and pedestrians in the gridlock around me.

OK. So there I was yesterday -- running from meeting to meeting – and wondering if all those construction jobs lost when the housing bubble burst had somehow migrated to Manhattan. Recessionary construction slowdown? Are you kidding? There must be some kind of building going up on virtually every corner. And remember “dig we must for a growing New York”? Well so does Con Ed. It’s still digging. Everywhere.

So the traffic is as bad as ever. Maybe worse. Why am I not surprised?

And maybe it’s because I haven’t been rushing around in awhile – but is there ANYONE on ANY street who’s paying attention to ANYTHING?? New Yorkers have always been famously self-absorbed – gazes narrowed to block out the “other”. But this is getting ridiculous. It’s not just the hordes talking to themselves anymore (sorry, I mean talking into those little hanging mics connected to their cellphones). Now they’re texting, watching videos on their iPhones, you name it. Sure I brush by people occasionally when I’m weaving in and out of sidewalk crowds. I usually murmur – “sorry.” Or “excuse me”. It’s kind of automatic. But not with the texting hordes. They aren’t even aware their backpacks or shopping bags sideswiped anyone. They’re not aware of ANYTHING! And if it’s annoying on the sidewalks -- try driving in midtown. People don’t even look before they wander off the curb into the traffic. Talk about being in your own world! The problem is --- I’m sharing your world – whether or not you want me to!

Could someone please send all these people a text message – to look – before they leap? Er… walk?

Thank you.

Getting Real: Wisconsin, Washington and Fixing America

It’s very hard to sit here outside the closed circle of America’s political posturers – elected, appointed and self-appointed – and not go ballistic.

We need to stop being Republicans and Democrats and Tea Partiers and Liberals -- and start rethinking everything. We need to look at what works in other countries and in some of our states. And just as important – what DOESN’T work. We have to change. Fast.

And ideologues need not apply.

The total US debt is moving toward 15 and a half TRILLION dollars. PIMCO’s Bill Gross has dumped all the treasuries he held in his benchmark Total Return Fund

So yes – the GOP is right. We DO have to pull back. But cutting all the funding for public broadcasting won’t help.

On the state level, according to State Budget Solutions, unfunded pension obligations now exceed 1 trillion dollars. The Congressional Budget Office projects Social Security will run dry by 2037. Medicare costs for everyone – recipients and taxpayers - are out of control.

I pay taxes just like most everyone else. So here’s what I think.

On the state level, I agree there need to be changes to public union medical and pension plans. But we don’t have to let Republicans destroy public unions (and the few private ones that are left). We all know the real reason for the Wisconsin collective bargaining farce.

That said -- remember most federal government workers don’t have collective bargaining – but most of us would be thrilled with their benefits. The benefit packages for public employees were originally created to make up for lower than private sector salaries. Well that’s long gone

So it’s time for states and union leaders to sit down and reason together. Look at salaries in both private and public sectors. Look at benefits. Average it all out. Relatively few taxpayers who aren’t working for government still have traditional pensions. And we pay a huge part of our own health insurance and medical costs. It may not be particularly civilized. But it’s reality.

It would be very, very unfair to cut pensions and raise medical costs unduly for workers who have already retired or who are within 5 years of retiring. They can’t recoup.

So let’s start with a cutoff age. Say 50. Everyone younger – including state and federal workers – should have to wait until at least 68 before collecting pensions, Social Security and Medicare. Maybe even 70 since we’re all, supposedly, living so much longer. Unless you’re medically unable to work. Now this doesn’t mean you’d HAVE to work until you hit 68. It just means you couldn’t collect any public retirement money till then. If you’ve saved enough to tide you over --- well just as always, you can “retire” whenever you can afford to. We also, however, need to strengthen our age discrimination laws and enforcement if we want people to work longer. Age discrimination is very hard to prove now and in the name of saving money companies routinely lay off the highest paid people. Who are often the oldest people.

We need to change completely how we pay for medical procedures and drugs under Medicare. Right now the government pays per item. Which encourages doctors who don’t think Medicare pays them enough to do every unnecessary test and procedure they can think of. Even during routine physicals. And patients are often prescribed expensive drugs because it’s quicker and easier than counseling them to change the behavior or lifestyle that’s causing the problem. Moreover we must, must, MUST get all medical records into digital form. Online so any doctor can see any patient’s total history. Because Medicare allows patients to choose their doctors and see as many as they wish, costs are often ratcheted up when someone goes from doctor to doctor until she gets the drug or procedure she wants. Regardless of necessity.

I’m no economist but logic suggests that just raising the age to get pensions and Medicare coverage - as well as reforming the way Medicare is structured - would probably keep the system solvent through at least another generation’s retirement. If not beyond.

If we’re going to ask or require Americans to finance more of their own retirement -- we also need to change the way money flows through the stock, options, and bond markets. High frequency and general electronic trading in huge blocks has made it very difficult for the small, retail investor - no matter how smart -- to do well in the market. You have to be on it every minute and still the block traders will set up their servers right next to those of the NYSE (for example) where their computer-programmed flash trades will overwhelm any individual trade you might try to make. Which leaves average Americans with just one choice beyond low-paying CD’s: put all your money in the hands of big fund managers. Many of them the same people who bought into the derivatives bubble which caused the financial crisis. Thank you – but no.

So if this crop of legislators and leaders and government agency managers won’t drop the posturing -- let’s have a giant recall election (kind of like a country-wide tag sale) and replace them all with pragmatists. Who will look at what DOES work and what CAN work and forget about which party comes up with the idea.

In other words – they’ll get real.

The King's Speech

No I am not writing another rave review about the film which is leading the pack with 12 Oscar nominations – although I – like so many others – loved what I consider a great psychological-historical drama.

But it is worth noting that King George VI made his speech to his nation – and the rest of the World War 2 players - in English. Not French. Not German – although it was certainly meant for Hitler and the German nation as much as his own. Not Spanish, not Italian, not Dutch. English.

So what’s the point?

The United Kingdom – like the United States – does not have an official language. But unofficially – for all important speeches, documents, legal papers etc – the language is English. Despite the ethnic variety of the British population these days --- 96% - according to Wikipedia – claim to speak English well or very well.

Americans as we all know came – and still come -- from everywhere. All kinds of ethnic groups, all kinds of languages. But the language of the British King at the time of the US Revolution was English. And American English – as a distinct dialect separate from British English – has become the lingua franca of the developed world.

Except here. In the US.

All through our history, people came to America speaking their native languages. And as fast as they could –they learned English. Oh perhaps not the King’s English. But enough to get around and read the Daily News – New York’s mostly picture tabloid. Not that there weren’t stores and newspapers and churches for immigrants where they could enjoy a little bit of “home”. But the idea wasn’t to preserve “home” – after all they had come to America for a better life. And so they and their children rapidly integrated into the melting pot.

That doesn’t seem to be happening the same way today. We have large pockets of immigrants who never learn English, never melt into the pot.

And what reminded me of that was an article in an industry magazine called TV Technology which listed some of what the FCC laid on Comcast before its 4-1 approval of the NBCUniversal acquisition. The requirement that stood out was “more Spanish language programming”.

NBC already owns a Spanish language network – Telemundo – with its own network of broadcast stations. In fact there is so much Spanish language media in the US that an immigrant who lives and works in – say – New York City’s Washington Heights can get by comfortably without learning a word of English.

It may not be P-C to say this but no nation can survive without a shared language and a body of shared customs and knowledge. I spend a lot of time in the Czech Republic and have been trying to learn the language for years. It’s a difficult language and I know just enough to get around. But you can bet that if I moved there permanently – instead of just for a few summer months – I would be in school until I could read, write and speak at least everyday Czech. In fact if I wanted to become a permanent resident – and get the equivalent of our “green card” to work there – I’d HAVE to learn the language well enough to pass a written test. I think it’s a great idea. It IS, after all, The CZECH Republic. Not the English Republic.

We don’t need MORE Spanish language media. Or Chinese or Russian or Korean media. We need more emphasis on learning English. And the easiest way to do that is from TV, music, film and the like. It’s how many people in other countries learn English. It’s one way I try to learn Czech – watching children’s TV shows or reading the news crawl on the 24 hour Czech language news channel – dictionary and grammar book at hand.

If you are never forced out of your comfort zone, you never learn and grow. And a country where virtually every automated 800 number is answered “press 1 for Spanish” is not forcing a large and growing segment of our population to move forward.

What has become a de facto two language policy doesn’t do anyone any favors. It’s not the way to nation-build. And it’s not the way to grab onto the American dream. Which is – after all – why every immigrant came here in the first place.

LinkedIn Is Not Twitter

For me – social media began with LinkedIn. I joined it years ago – because it made sense. If you free lance or have your own production company as I do (both), networking virtually beyond your immediate circle of colleagues and contacts makes excellent sense. Especially if you hate networking the old fashioned way as much as I do. And if you are ultimately as bad at it as I am.

Have I ever gotten a job outright from LinkedIn? I don’t think so. But I don’t think that’s the idea – even though I’ve never fully milked the network’s potential. I’ve learned ways to solve problems from others in my profession. I’ve been able to mine my network and even those of my connections for ideas or expertise. And perhaps most important – I’ve stayed alive professionally during times of extreme drought. And anyone who’s ever sat at home desperately looking for work -- feeling totally invisible – knows what that’s all about.

But something has happened to the LinkedIn I’ve known all these years. It’s beginning to look a lot like Twitter. And Facebook. Each of which has its own purpose. Something users –perhaps addled from all that facetime online –seem to be forgetting.

Instead of seeing professional or educational updates when I check my network, I see tweets. And retweets. Sometimes about where my connection is vacationing (OK if it’s upscale enough it might qualify as a “status” update). Sometimes it’s a shortened link to a news story someone likes. But didn’t personally produce, write, shoot or report. The whole purpose of LinkedIn is being lost in a maze of nothingness.

I too write about nothing – although certainly not as stylishly as Seinfeld did. I LIKE writing about nothing sometimes. But that’s what my Facebook page is for. Where my friends hang out. Where we can get together and throw comments back and forth and feel like a little community – if only on some server someplace. I want LinkedIn reserved for work and education – so there’s someplace in this virtual world of sharing and liking and commenting and loss of individuality – where I can shut the office door, turn off the texts and chats – and just - well – network professionally. Sort of what LinkedIn advertises. Ya know?

Since I’m a journalist --- I use all media for journalistic purpose. I tweet and retweet information and stories on Twitter – which links to my Facebook page. I search the lists I’ve constructed on Twitter for good leads. I follow people who do the same thing I do.

Do I occasionally post something self serving to LinkedIn, which is then processed to Twitter and ends up on my Facebook page? Of course. I'm going to post this. Ultimately – if you’re a news person – everything is useable, everyone you know a possible source. (Yes, even your grandmother sometimes.) And in this incredibly competitive, 24/7 newsroom of a world --- if you don’t promote yourself all the time, you’ll be run over and buried under a heap of social software – by someone who does.

So please – give me my LinkedIn back. Keep your story links and shopping sprees and Starbucks double lattes for the other social media. I’ll even join you there. We’ll do lunch. Virtually.
Just NOT on LinkedIn.

Whither Dental Insurance?

Good Grief Charlie Brown! I had oral surgery today – but that isn’t the news. The procedure is fairly common and with anesthesia – painless. I couldn’t face sitting with my mouth open for an hour while a surgeon performed micro-surgery on my uncooperative, failed-root-canal-tooth. Anesthesia didn’t change the mouth open part (and people who know me will probably say I never shut it anyhow). But I didn’t have to know what was going on or hear it. If dental surgery can ever be considered “comfortable” – this was it.

Until I had to pay for it.

I have some dental insurance in my plan. It pays only, however, for preventive measures – like teeth cleaning and necessary xrays before getting a tooth filled. It doesn’t pay for the filling. Or the crown. Or the oral surgery.

So as I was sitting in the recovery room holding ice to my gauze-stuffed cheek – the moment of truth arrived. My credit card (or more accurately my husband’s because I couldn’t get mine out with just one available hand; the other, you’ll remember, was holding the ice pak) was taken and the receipt returned.

$2100. And that didn’t included the $350 or so for the initial consultation and the panoramic xray needed to be sure my remaining 2 wisdom teeth - never to be touched without major jaw surgery – weren’t affected. The nice lady at Guardian said oh yes –that panoramic xray would have been eligible for the 75% reimbursement. Except that the plan only allows for one set of full-mouth xrays every 5 years. And I had a set back in ’09. Every 5 years???? Whose mouth stays the same for 5 years?????

Back to the $2100. It could have been $400 less if I had opted to stay awake and totally panicked for the surgery. I figured I could live without a few things for myself at Macy’s when I start my Christmas shopping. I needed that IV drip!!!

What do people do who need emergency dental procedures – and who aren’t as lucky as I am? Who simply don’t have that money? Maybe pay it off over 2 years? I didn’t see anything in the surgeon’s office about installment plans.

Why isn’t dentistry in general simply included with our regular health insurance plans? After all – you can get pretty sick and cost the health care system a pretty big chuck of change from a tooth or gum infection. In fact a bad tooth left untreated can do more than make you sick. It can kill you. Not having your teeth – or for that matter your eyes – tied into your regular health insurance makes absolutely no sense at all.

Until you talk to your dentist.

I asked mine and his answer was that the various dental associations –which ostensibly represent their members – don’t want the hassle of dealing with a broken insurance system. One that will cost each dentist additional time and money. Dentists would have to hire full time insurance clerks – the way physicians do. One of the reason group practices are so common. So the dentists deal with maybe one half-baked dental insurer --- which most of their patients don’t use even if they are lucky enough to have separate dental insurance. And they charge the rates they wish to charge without all the red tape medical doctors must deal with --- not the least of which involves Medicare and Medicaid.

So -- no pressure from dentists and oral surgeons to be included in the health insurance system. Or maybe pressure applied by their lobbyists in the other direction. As in “don’t you dare, Congressman so and so, to include us in that new health insurance law”.

As a result, I paid $2100 out of my own pocket today. And considered myself among the lucky ones.

I Have Seen the Future at the NY Times

I have seen the future at the New York Times. And it’s not pretty for those of us who love real newspapers.

Now I’m no Luddite; I Tweet and Facebook like all you other addicts. I truly love my iPhone 4 and I read the Times as well as many other digital news sites via their very convenient apps. But there are times when nothing but the real thing will do.

Although it’s somewhat thinner these days – the Sunday Times is still the benchmark all other news outlets must match. I remember lining up at the nearest Manhattan newsstand waiting for 9PM on Saturday nights. That’s when the Sunday paper hit the stands – and you could take it home and sit on the floor with a glass of wine (and perhaps a boyfriend) and discover the weekend world. It was pure indulgence. That mess around you of sections read – or skimmed and kept for later – was a ritual I shared with all my friends and most of my fellow workers. It defined Saturday night in the city – when as often as not you read the Times first, and then headed to a midnight showing of a film – or down to some tiny cellar restaurant in Chinatown for the real deal.

And the future? It’s called Times Reader 2.0. Not, apparently, a totally new offering but now powered by Adobe Air. Bottom line, with 2.0 you can download the entire day’s edition of the NY Times to your laptop in – well – in a Flash. And take it with you to read whenever. Essentially what you can do on the regular website –but without the need for an internet connection –unless you want to keep your “paper” updated.

Remember a couple of weeks ago when Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger said flat out there will be no more printed version of the paper at some time in the future? He didn’t say when, but with advertising and readership continuing to fall, that time is probably sooner rather than later. Times Reader 2.0 is free for two weeks – and then you’ll need a subscription – priced cheaply for now at $4.62 a week.

I’m gonna miss those Saturday nights in the city even more when newsprint becomes extinct. Something to look at in a museum. Under glass. Remember how it feels, folks. Especially when you’re eating that greasy New York hot dog with one hand and holding that nicely absorbent newspaper with the other. Try doing that with your laptop’s touchpad. Or – Heaven forefend – your iPhone.

The Record Industry Deserves to Die

The recording industry deserves to die a long and miserable death. Not because of its long-standing talent policies. I don’t have a garage band. Not because of copyright issues. I don’t share my music indiscriminately over the internet. Not even because recordings cost too much. I am probably one of iTunes’ best customers and also have an active Amazon.com account.

No – the recording industry deserves to die because it is so paranoid about someone “stealing” a track or an album that when someone does buy a CD ---it simply can’t be opened! Or to put it another way --- “It’s the packaging, stupid!”

Now as I already said – I can download with the best of them; my iPhone’s iPod is expanding exponentially. But when I’m driving long distances – I still like to slip a CD into the player. My Mini Cooper has a fantastic sound system.

Except – I can’t.

A new CD arrived in the mail a few days ago – and without thinking I wrestled it out of its seemingly steel-clad Amazon cardboard mailer (another column perhaps?) and put it in the car. Without removing the cellophane from the CD album cover itself.

What was I thinking? Or NOT thinking?

Of course I couldn’t open the CD. Couldn't play it when I wanted to. Had to bring it back to the house and spend 10 minutes with a knife trying to get the cellophane off first – and then the really impossible seal that covers one side of the plastic cover-- keeping the CD intact from the prying fingers of the person who legitimately bought the damn thing and legitimately expects to play it.

Why, I asked myself for the 100th time, would anyone want to buy a packaged CD when you can download one in a couple of minutes for less money – and enjoy it immediately???

As far as I’m concerned the record companies killed themselves with impenetrable packaging. They took all the joy out of buying a recording you can actually hold in your hands. Their way of doing business is as dead as the Dodo. And despite my collection of 78’s, 45’s, LP’s, tapes and CD’s (don’t bother Merv Block; I know but they just don’t look right without the apostrophe) I’m ready to give up on the hard stuff.

As I said earlier – the record industry deserves to die and I hope the merchandising wizards are interred wrapped in their own preposterous packaging.

Boomers Looking for Work

Would someone like to explain to me how people in their 50’s -- who used to be considered at the peak of their earning curve – are going to make it through their (excuse me for throwing up) “golden years”?

All I ever read and hear about is how the imminent retirement of the baby boom generation is going to bankrupt social security and the nation. Hey guys – where have you been? Most boomers didn’t have the savings to retire before the recession. Remember all that talk about needing to work into your 70’s? Now – even with the improvement in the stock market since the recession ended –it may take 10 years or more for a 401K to get back just to where it was in 2007, when the financial crisis began. And even if you actually have some cash stashed away in income-producing savings – that income has been reduced to virtually nothing as interest rates have fallen.

So today I glance at the front page of the New York Times and there it is. What so many people know already. People over 50 have been losing their jobs in droves – and aren’t likely to find new ones anytime soon.

A few of the facts quoted in the article – which you can link to from my title: an April Gallup poll found more than a third of people who haven’t yet retired plan to keep working beyond age 65. It was just 12 percent in 1995. Now look at this figure from the Labor Department: if you’re 55 or older and unemployed – it takes an average of more than 39 weeks to find a job. That’s the most of any age group – including the 20’s somethings who would presumably cost employers a lot less in wages and benefits and be more technologically skilled. And we’re just talking averages. Many older people have been collecting long term unemployment benefits for as long as 99 weeks.

So here’s my question to all you political types who seem interested in nothing but getting elected or re-elected in November. Are you ready to deal with an army of homeless 50 and 60 somethings?

Many boomers have tried hard to update their skills – often taking out loans to do so. So what will you tell them to do with those new skills – if no one will hire them? There isn’t much of a demand for writing software in homeless shelters.

It’s not such a tragedy in your 20’s and 30’s when you have to scrounge for work. I certainly had to. But I and my friends were always sure we’d make it up later – when we were older and experienced and thus more valuable to an employer. Hah! Now an entire generation is teetering on the scrap heap of life.

As I said earlier – excuse me while I throw up.