Didn’t I hear this on a Cheech and Chong album once...
The 17-year-old Coeur d'Alene High School student was upset after a prank in which the other student put peanut butter in his cheese sandwich days before. He told a school resource officer that, “he hated peanut butter and it made him more mad than he could explain,”
Mar 10, 2005
“I myself have great problems with screwing together such furniture.”
Swedish home furnishings giant IKEA is guilty of sex discrimination by showing only men putting together furniture in its instruction manuals, Norway’s prime minister says.
Swedish home furnishings giant IKEA is guilty of sex discrimination by showing only men putting together furniture in its instruction manuals, Norway’s prime minister says.
I alluded to the changing face of a neighborhood and the implications it could have nationwide so, here’s a nugget for thought.
I’ve been working down in the Wall Street area these days which has been very much the treat since I was never really a big haunter of the downtown neighborhood and so the experience has been one of exploration and discovery as I become familiar with the environs.
It has changed greatly though since the days when I rode the yellow beast. Time was, I could drive my car right up Broad Street past the NYSE building and Federal Hall. Not anymore, since September 11th the area around the Exchange has been marked by heightened security, with those obstacles blocking any vehicular traffic, bomb sniffing dogs, pick up trucks parked at angles to prevent someone from driving right up in front of the building, plenty of guards and police too.
So, all these steps and precautions have been taken - all at great expense but, to protect what? A future museum?
If you hear a ticking sound, it’s the days of NYSE’s trading floor counting down because those days are numbered. Those days of men dressed in sharp, crisp and expensive suits, making their way to the southern tip of Manhattan Island to move billions of dollars and live a lavish lifestyle are coming to a rapid end.
Your first thought might be that the planes hitting the towers on September 11th somehow succeeded in their work but, the truth is the groundwork was laid long before that fateful day, if anything the planes flying into the WTC only hastened the process.
This is testimony by Laura S. Unger, Commissioner, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Concerning the Effect of Technology on the Capital Markets:
Technology has changed the world faster than many of us could have imagined, and continues to change it at a pace that is both exciting and daunting. More and more information is available to us everyday. Nowhere can the effect of technological change be seen any clearer than in the securities markets...
...In a way, the Internet is the wild card that makes it difficult to predict what the securities market will look like five or ten years from now. By some estimates, 21 million people will have online accounts by the year 2003.[1] According to a study published in February 1999, the key economic factors that will have a large impact on the growth of electronic commerce will be ease and cost of access, convenience, and the appeal of mass customization.[2] Financial services is one of the top five categories of business-to-consumer electronic commerce today.[3]
The Internet is dramatically transforming how individual investors participate in the market by providing them with more timely and high-quality information. In this respect, it furthers one of the most fundamental principles of securities regulation — transparency.
Currently, about 147 million people use the Internet worldwide. Approximately 77 million of these users are in the United States. One source estimates that 21 percent of all domestic households have Internet access.[4] Predictions are that there will be 300 million users worldwide by the end of the year 2000, and 720 million by the end of 2005.[5]
Now, this is over five years ago!
So, when I look from the office I’m in at the surrounding buildings, I imagine I shouldn’t be surprised to find instead of looking out at harried financial workers working late and putting in long hours, I’m looking across into the living room of someone who has moved into a formal commercial building converted into a luxury rental.
Then there’s this testimony in Congress from 2002:
There is a quiet revolution starting in the U.S. Listed marketplace. Investors and traders who have become disenchanted with current market structure are moving beyond the experimentation phase. They are starting to employ ATSs like the ones represented here today. The value proposition is clear. Execution that is electronically matched without human intermediation takes one middleman and the resulting economic impact of that middleman out of the equation. What makes that possible today? I would submit to you that advanced technology, industry protocols, and high-speed networks support this type of healthy competition without the resultant risk of fragmentation.
This quiet revolution combined with the decimalization of stocks, the consolidation of the New York Stock Exchange specialist units, the requirement to submit quality of execution data for the public record, and the extended bear market in the U.S. Equity markets is in the process of causing profound change to the security industry.
Or how about this:
...But many planners see a domino effect that could intensify patterns of sprawl - just at a time when urban areas were making a modest comeback. Backup facilities and satellite offices need a labor force nearby, as well as infrastructure and commercial development. Westchester officials already are saying the NYSE facility would trigger growth. Some Fidelity employees now working in Boston have moved to the suburbs in anticipation of needing to be at regional sites in Smithfield, R.I., or Merrimack, N.H., one executive said.
While real estate specialists see no conclusive evidence of a wholesale exodus to the suburbs, security concerns and soaring insurance premiums for urban properties have become reasons for businesses to quit the city. Some government agencies are already headed in that direction, as in the case of the Office of Homeland Security, mulling headquarters in rural Virginia rather than Washington D.C.
“We're going to look back 20 years from now and ask how this happened,” said Harvard law professor David J. Barron, who believes that such symbolic moves, as well as legal and policy frameworks, dictate development patterns. “We built the [interstate] highways for defense, and the next thing you know we had a whole way of living that no one ever necessarily chose.”
Now, let’s put it in other terms - New York City’s history has been built around commerce, first because of its geographic location as a port it being a portal for the movement of goods from this country out into the world. Over the last fifty years, New York as a port has diminished in importance as carriers have chosen to use other ports for larger ships and shipping itself has undergone a transformation (I believe Virginia has the busiest port now on the East Coast and Newark has taken the rest of New York‘s freight traffic). This is an industry that’s gone from the city now (ever hear of On The Waterfront?).
Financial services were a sector where the city relied on a lot of revenue - taxes, jobs and the ancillary benefits resultant from having the industry located in and around Wall Street.
What happens though, when trading becomes electronic and decentralized? What replaces that industry and those jobs. What does it mean for New York and the nation?
The merger announced May 3 combining the Deutsche Börse Frankfurt (Frankfurt Stock Exchange) and the London Stock Exchange (LSE) will create the biggest stock exchange in Europe. The new entity, to be named International Exchange (iX), will be the fourth largest stock exchange in the world following the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), Nasdaq and Tokyo.
Most commentators see the Frankurt-London link-up as being a “first step towards a global stock exchange” which might well result in a unified pan-European stock market within the next two years. The British newspaper the Guardian writes: “A single global stock market is now one step closer to reality.”
But this increasing concentration is also intensifying rivalries within Europe and between Europe and the United States. In the same report quoted above the Guardian warns: “The merger of the London Stock Exchange and Frankfurt’s Deutsche Börse might be a blow to the former.” However, it then goes on to say: “but that's no reason to stand in the way of globalization.” Other commentaries place more emphasis on the emergence of a European rival to counter market domination by the NYSE.
Yes, it’s a changing world we live but, it’s always better to try and anticipate the change rather than get swept up by it.
I’ve been working down in the Wall Street area these days which has been very much the treat since I was never really a big haunter of the downtown neighborhood and so the experience has been one of exploration and discovery as I become familiar with the environs.
It has changed greatly though since the days when I rode the yellow beast. Time was, I could drive my car right up Broad Street past the NYSE building and Federal Hall. Not anymore, since September 11th the area around the Exchange has been marked by heightened security, with those obstacles blocking any vehicular traffic, bomb sniffing dogs, pick up trucks parked at angles to prevent someone from driving right up in front of the building, plenty of guards and police too.
So, all these steps and precautions have been taken - all at great expense but, to protect what? A future museum?
If you hear a ticking sound, it’s the days of NYSE’s trading floor counting down because those days are numbered. Those days of men dressed in sharp, crisp and expensive suits, making their way to the southern tip of Manhattan Island to move billions of dollars and live a lavish lifestyle are coming to a rapid end.
Your first thought might be that the planes hitting the towers on September 11th somehow succeeded in their work but, the truth is the groundwork was laid long before that fateful day, if anything the planes flying into the WTC only hastened the process.
This is testimony by Laura S. Unger, Commissioner, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Concerning the Effect of Technology on the Capital Markets:
Technology has changed the world faster than many of us could have imagined, and continues to change it at a pace that is both exciting and daunting. More and more information is available to us everyday. Nowhere can the effect of technological change be seen any clearer than in the securities markets...
...In a way, the Internet is the wild card that makes it difficult to predict what the securities market will look like five or ten years from now. By some estimates, 21 million people will have online accounts by the year 2003.[1] According to a study published in February 1999, the key economic factors that will have a large impact on the growth of electronic commerce will be ease and cost of access, convenience, and the appeal of mass customization.[2] Financial services is one of the top five categories of business-to-consumer electronic commerce today.[3]
The Internet is dramatically transforming how individual investors participate in the market by providing them with more timely and high-quality information. In this respect, it furthers one of the most fundamental principles of securities regulation — transparency.
Currently, about 147 million people use the Internet worldwide. Approximately 77 million of these users are in the United States. One source estimates that 21 percent of all domestic households have Internet access.[4] Predictions are that there will be 300 million users worldwide by the end of the year 2000, and 720 million by the end of 2005.[5]
Now, this is over five years ago!
So, when I look from the office I’m in at the surrounding buildings, I imagine I shouldn’t be surprised to find instead of looking out at harried financial workers working late and putting in long hours, I’m looking across into the living room of someone who has moved into a formal commercial building converted into a luxury rental.
Then there’s this testimony in Congress from 2002:
There is a quiet revolution starting in the U.S. Listed marketplace. Investors and traders who have become disenchanted with current market structure are moving beyond the experimentation phase. They are starting to employ ATSs like the ones represented here today. The value proposition is clear. Execution that is electronically matched without human intermediation takes one middleman and the resulting economic impact of that middleman out of the equation. What makes that possible today? I would submit to you that advanced technology, industry protocols, and high-speed networks support this type of healthy competition without the resultant risk of fragmentation.
This quiet revolution combined with the decimalization of stocks, the consolidation of the New York Stock Exchange specialist units, the requirement to submit quality of execution data for the public record, and the extended bear market in the U.S. Equity markets is in the process of causing profound change to the security industry.
Or how about this:
...But many planners see a domino effect that could intensify patterns of sprawl - just at a time when urban areas were making a modest comeback. Backup facilities and satellite offices need a labor force nearby, as well as infrastructure and commercial development. Westchester officials already are saying the NYSE facility would trigger growth. Some Fidelity employees now working in Boston have moved to the suburbs in anticipation of needing to be at regional sites in Smithfield, R.I., or Merrimack, N.H., one executive said.
While real estate specialists see no conclusive evidence of a wholesale exodus to the suburbs, security concerns and soaring insurance premiums for urban properties have become reasons for businesses to quit the city. Some government agencies are already headed in that direction, as in the case of the Office of Homeland Security, mulling headquarters in rural Virginia rather than Washington D.C.
“We're going to look back 20 years from now and ask how this happened,” said Harvard law professor David J. Barron, who believes that such symbolic moves, as well as legal and policy frameworks, dictate development patterns. “We built the [interstate] highways for defense, and the next thing you know we had a whole way of living that no one ever necessarily chose.”
Now, let’s put it in other terms - New York City’s history has been built around commerce, first because of its geographic location as a port it being a portal for the movement of goods from this country out into the world. Over the last fifty years, New York as a port has diminished in importance as carriers have chosen to use other ports for larger ships and shipping itself has undergone a transformation (I believe Virginia has the busiest port now on the East Coast and Newark has taken the rest of New York‘s freight traffic). This is an industry that’s gone from the city now (ever hear of On The Waterfront?).
Financial services were a sector where the city relied on a lot of revenue - taxes, jobs and the ancillary benefits resultant from having the industry located in and around Wall Street.
What happens though, when trading becomes electronic and decentralized? What replaces that industry and those jobs. What does it mean for New York and the nation?
The merger announced May 3 combining the Deutsche Börse Frankfurt (Frankfurt Stock Exchange) and the London Stock Exchange (LSE) will create the biggest stock exchange in Europe. The new entity, to be named International Exchange (iX), will be the fourth largest stock exchange in the world following the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), Nasdaq and Tokyo.
Most commentators see the Frankurt-London link-up as being a “first step towards a global stock exchange” which might well result in a unified pan-European stock market within the next two years. The British newspaper the Guardian writes: “A single global stock market is now one step closer to reality.”
But this increasing concentration is also intensifying rivalries within Europe and between Europe and the United States. In the same report quoted above the Guardian warns: “The merger of the London Stock Exchange and Frankfurt’s Deutsche Börse might be a blow to the former.” However, it then goes on to say: “but that's no reason to stand in the way of globalization.” Other commentaries place more emphasis on the emergence of a European rival to counter market domination by the NYSE.
Yes, it’s a changing world we live but, it’s always better to try and anticipate the change rather than get swept up by it.
Mar 9, 2005
The Yuan and you...
Critics of China’s foreign exchange restrictions say that the yuan’s peg to the dollar undervalues the currency by as much as 40 percent, making Chinese exports artificially cheap and giving its manufacturers an unfair advantage.
China has promised to eventually allow the yuan to trade freely, but has not said when. It contends that the country's economy and its fragile financial system require a stable currency.
All right, so I hinted at wanting to talk about the Yuan so, maybe tonight I’ll finally get around to it. If you don’t know, the Yuan is the currency of China (like the dollar here). Over the last ten years, as China has experienced this big growth spurt we all keep hearing about, the Chinese government has been keeping things going by not tying the value of the Yuan to any of the world’s other currencies. Things are cheaper in China because, the Chinese government says they’re cheaper!
Let that roll over in your mind for a second.
Okay, let’s say for example the feds suddenly decided to make a dollar worth a dime (a ten worth a dollar, a hundred worth a ten) everything would suddenly get cheaper over night - of course, your wages would go down as well and relatively speaking you’d still be in the same fix but, I think you get the drift.
Now, another thing that happened, is our currency is off the gold standard. However, since World War Two ended, the dollar has been the “imperial currency” of the world which helps things along of course and makes the rest of the world have a vested interest in our economy. Everybody trades with everyone else and the dollar is being used as the common yardstick for everyone in determining the value of goods. Being the country issuing the currency the world uses for this is a good thing.
Under the Bretton Woods system, central banks of countries other than the US were given the task of maintaining fixed exchange rates between their currencies and the dollar. They did this by intervening in foreign exchange markets. If a country’s currency was too high relative to the dollar, its central bank would sell its currency in exchange for dollars, driving down the value of its currency. Conversely, if the value of a country's money was too low, the country would buy its own currency, thereby driving up the price.
The dollar became the world's reserve currency. Yet there were limits placed upon each country and especially the US. Each country had to police its own reserves and currency or be forced to revalue. And the US was constrained because the dollar was fully convertible into gold. This changed in 1971 when Nixon closed the gold window.
But, what if that we‘re to change?
What would the impact on the economy of our country be particularly in an era where the federal government keeps “borrowing against the future,” driving up bigger deficits.
Let’s just say, it wouldn’t be pretty.
That sinking dollar... President Bush continued to wend his way through Europe today. At Weisbaden Army Airfield in Germany he told U.S. troops who’d served in Iraq that America stands with them. He's on what many see as a fence-mending trip to ease tensions over the Iraq war. But Marketplace commentator Robert Reich argues the real action is taking place in another part of the globe entirely.
Well, I’m a layman when it comes to these things but, I had heard some rumblings along these lines and then the other night a few weeks back, I caught a Robert Reich piece on NPR’s marketplace and Reich certainly explains the situation much more eloquently than I ever could so, why don’t you give a listen for yourself and make come to your own conclusions about the implications.
Mar 4, 2005
It’s been a busy week which just managed to rocket by - unfortunately it’s times like these when getting around to writing something suffers. So, tonight I’ll provide teasers to just what is on the radar these days...
I’m looking around for information currently on the Yuan after hearing an alarming piece on the radio the other day. Just something I want to bring to your attention dear readers. Then, there was the commentary I was going to make on an ad I saw just prior to a movie the other day and how it encapsulated everything that was wrong about the attitudes many people take towards driving and their cars. Lastly, I wanted to comment on something more local, something which has to do with a neighborhoods’ transformation here in New York and how the transformation of several very small blocks in the city could have implications nationwide.
I’m looking around for information currently on the Yuan after hearing an alarming piece on the radio the other day. Just something I want to bring to your attention dear readers. Then, there was the commentary I was going to make on an ad I saw just prior to a movie the other day and how it encapsulated everything that was wrong about the attitudes many people take towards driving and their cars. Lastly, I wanted to comment on something more local, something which has to do with a neighborhoods’ transformation here in New York and how the transformation of several very small blocks in the city could have implications nationwide.
Mar 1, 2005
Another good article about Jef Raskin:
Whenever you point and click and drag an icon around on a computer screen, you are doing so thanks to Jef Raskin, a pioneering computer engineer and father of the Macintosh computer. He died over the weekend, at 61, of pancreatic cancer.
Contrary to Silicon Valley lore it was Raskin and not Apple Computer (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people ) Chief Executive Steve Jobs who discovered and saw the marketability of technologies that would kick start the PC revolution.
and an interesting article written by the man himself:
Microsoft Word requires at least 30% more keystrokes and 100% more mouse moves to accomplish certain editing tasks than would an optimal word processor. Decreasing physical work not only saves time but also decreases incidents of repetitive stress injury. Good design can eliminate many of the steps that are most damaging to nerves and tendons.
Whenever you point and click and drag an icon around on a computer screen, you are doing so thanks to Jef Raskin, a pioneering computer engineer and father of the Macintosh computer. He died over the weekend, at 61, of pancreatic cancer.
Contrary to Silicon Valley lore it was Raskin and not Apple Computer (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people ) Chief Executive Steve Jobs who discovered and saw the marketability of technologies that would kick start the PC revolution.
and an interesting article written by the man himself:
Microsoft Word requires at least 30% more keystrokes and 100% more mouse moves to accomplish certain editing tasks than would an optimal word processor. Decreasing physical work not only saves time but also decreases incidents of repetitive stress injury. Good design can eliminate many of the steps that are most damaging to nerves and tendons.
On the radar:
Plot: Frank Miller wrote the graphic novel series that inspired the film. The film will comprise three intertwining vignettes revolving around a dark set of characters who call the fictional corrupt town home. In 'The Hard Goodbye', the brutish ugly Marv awakens to find his beautiful Goldie has been murdered quietly during the night and sets out to take down those responsible. In 'That Yellow Bastard', police officer Hartigan has only one hour left before his shield is finally put to rest, but when he learns of a young girl out there helpless in the hands of a drooling lunatic - he knows he'll go out with a bang. Finally, in 'The Big Fat Kill' the life of an eccentric artist/ex-marine takes a number of bizarre turns after he prevents a beautiful woman from committing suicide.
Saw the previews for Be Cool, the follow up to Get Shorty which looks like it has great suck potential (even with the A-list cast). I get nervous when I see John Travolta and Uma Thurman trying to recapture the magic of their dance scene from Pulp Fiction.
Plot: Frank Miller wrote the graphic novel series that inspired the film. The film will comprise three intertwining vignettes revolving around a dark set of characters who call the fictional corrupt town home. In 'The Hard Goodbye', the brutish ugly Marv awakens to find his beautiful Goldie has been murdered quietly during the night and sets out to take down those responsible. In 'That Yellow Bastard', police officer Hartigan has only one hour left before his shield is finally put to rest, but when he learns of a young girl out there helpless in the hands of a drooling lunatic - he knows he'll go out with a bang. Finally, in 'The Big Fat Kill' the life of an eccentric artist/ex-marine takes a number of bizarre turns after he prevents a beautiful woman from committing suicide.
Saw the previews for Be Cool, the follow up to Get Shorty which looks like it has great suck potential (even with the A-list cast). I get nervous when I see John Travolta and Uma Thurman trying to recapture the magic of their dance scene from Pulp Fiction.
If you live in the five boroughs and you own a car, I give you this gift. Which I came across last night while trying to find out if Alternate Side of the Street Parking would be canceled today.
Something for you to idle away the time with when you find yourself bored, an online picture puzzle.
Feb 27, 2005
Just a quick mention...
from Roger Ebert:
Countless college graduates enter this dream world every year, without reflecting (a) that there are many fewer positions at the top than at the bottom, and (b) that therefore, if the corporations are still hiring at the bottom, it is because there are fatalities at the top. You can always get someone younger and cheaper to do the job of the older and more experienced.
There's one scene in the movie that works well even though it's less than convincing. The conglomerator Teddy K jets in for a meeting with the staff, at which he recites various corporate platitudes to an adoring audience (one of the keys to success in business is the ability to endure the gaseous inanities of Management-Speak as if they meant anything). Then Dan stands up and, with everything to lose, explains clearly and mercilessly just why Teddy K is full of it. Whenever anyone speaks the plain truth on such an occasion, there is a palpable shock; how can such enterprises survive realism? Consider the soldier who asked Donald Rumsfeld, please, sir, may we have some more armor?
Saw the movie today and I have to admit it was just a plain, very enjoyable, decent comedy. A lot of fun to watch. I can’t imagine why a relatively good movie is so hard to make, If you get a chance it’s worth catching.
from Roger Ebert:
Countless college graduates enter this dream world every year, without reflecting (a) that there are many fewer positions at the top than at the bottom, and (b) that therefore, if the corporations are still hiring at the bottom, it is because there are fatalities at the top. You can always get someone younger and cheaper to do the job of the older and more experienced.
There's one scene in the movie that works well even though it's less than convincing. The conglomerator Teddy K jets in for a meeting with the staff, at which he recites various corporate platitudes to an adoring audience (one of the keys to success in business is the ability to endure the gaseous inanities of Management-Speak as if they meant anything). Then Dan stands up and, with everything to lose, explains clearly and mercilessly just why Teddy K is full of it. Whenever anyone speaks the plain truth on such an occasion, there is a palpable shock; how can such enterprises survive realism? Consider the soldier who asked Donald Rumsfeld, please, sir, may we have some more armor?
Saw the movie today and I have to admit it was just a plain, very enjoyable, decent comedy. A lot of fun to watch. I can’t imagine why a relatively good movie is so hard to make, If you get a chance it’s worth catching.
Feb 24, 2005
Feb 15, 2005
Blog Sensei made reference to Senator Barbara Boxer today, which was interesting in only that I had heard an interview with the senator last week on Fresh Air with Terry Gross on NPR and came away significantly impressed. Click on the link below and listen for yourself:
Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) recently made headlines with her tough questioning of Condoleezza Rice during her confirmation hearings for Secretary of State. Boxer was also the only senator to object to the certification of Ohio's electoral votes, bringing about a two-hour debate on the matter.
Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) recently made headlines with her tough questioning of Condoleezza Rice during her confirmation hearings for Secretary of State. Boxer was also the only senator to object to the certification of Ohio's electoral votes, bringing about a two-hour debate on the matter.
Feb 14, 2005
Really great article posted online at New York magazine’s website about getting fired at 50.
My new boss was gracious but perfunctory. “You work here, you belong here. There’s all kinds of stuff for you to do, but you’re the one who has to make it work.” He called out to his secretary. He was awaiting a report and wanted to know if it had arrived. “Stop worrying,” he said and rose from his chair to see me out.
Three months later, I got a call from his secretary asking if I could come in to see him the following week: Thursday at three o’clock.
Why had he summoned me? It was a call I’d been waiting for without quite knowing it. But when his secretary called, my stomach knotted up. My mind became strangely blank.
My new boss was gracious but perfunctory. “You work here, you belong here. There’s all kinds of stuff for you to do, but you’re the one who has to make it work.” He called out to his secretary. He was awaiting a report and wanted to know if it had arrived. “Stop worrying,” he said and rose from his chair to see me out.
Three months later, I got a call from his secretary asking if I could come in to see him the following week: Thursday at three o’clock.
Why had he summoned me? It was a call I’d been waiting for without quite knowing it. But when his secretary called, my stomach knotted up. My mind became strangely blank.
Rafik Hariri, a billionaire who helped rebuild his country after decades of war but resigned as prime minister last fall after a sharp dispute with Syria, was killed Monday in a massive bomb explosion that tore through his motorcade.
At least nine other people were killed and 100 wounded in the blast. It raised immediate fears that Lebanon — largely peaceful since the 1990 end of its civil war — was headed toward a new and bloody chapter in its differences with Syria, which maintains about 15,000 troops in the country.
My friend’s wife arrived on Beirut on Thursday. She’s on a business trip for her job and this is the first time she’s traveled to the Middle East.
Before she left, her husband (my friend) and I were discussing the trip, I was asking him what precautions she was taking, thinking how dangerous Beirut could be. My understanding being Lebanon is still very much run by the Syrians through proxy. He said his wife had been told Beirut had really ‘come back’ and since September 11th it had become quite the tourist destination for those in the Arab world not wanting to suffer the ignomy of increased security and profiling in Western nations.
She’s all right thankfully, although apparently she was staying only blocks from where the blast took place. As if the stress of a long business trip in and of itself wasn’t enough - now this.
Makes you wonder how the Israelis can deal with this kind of stuff on a regular basis and stay sane. Is there a question anymore, the rules as we know them in this country are not the rules by which a lot of the rest of the world operates? You have to ask yourself, does it really make sense to approach the world in a naivé fashion thinking the rest of the world will just ‘be nice’ at the asking?
Feb 13, 2005
Feb 12, 2005
According to information received by the artist, police officers in Clovis, New Mexico charged 31-year-old Dean Young with distribution of sexually oriented material to minors for the display of two stickers on his yellow Ford Focus. A Clovis police officer, Kirk Roberts, noticed the stickers when they drew the attention of his son, who saw them on Young's car while the officer’s family was gathering at the restaurant where Young works as a waiter.
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