Politics
What Michael Chertoff, the head of Homeland Security, said yesterday: Chertoff, fielding questions from reporters, said government officials did not expect both a powerful hurricane and a breach of levees that would flood the city of New Orleans. "That 'perfect storm' of a combination of catastrophes exceeded
Uncategorized
Finally got around to creating a new blog a couple of weeks ago. I switched from Movable Type to WordPress for it—WordPress has improved immensely in the two years since I picked Movable Type as my blogging platform. I love Portland. I'm glad I'm here.
Music
I haven't been able to get this song out of my head for the last couple of days. Half way home, we'll be there by morning Through the Mississippi darkness Rolling down to the sea If only it were so, for about a million people...
Me
I was having lunch at the PSU Subway this morning and enjoying the music, particularly "Heart of Glass" by Blondie. Then I realized that the kids working behind the counter probably hadn't been born when that song was released. Ah well. At least the sub was
Intellect
I retain vivid memories of the astonishment and disbelief expressed by the architecture students to whom I taught urban land economics many years ago when I pointed to medieval cities as marvelously patterned systems that had mostly just "grown" in response to myriads of individual human decisions. To
Life
I walk quite a bit because I don't own a car, and I was looking forward to moving from Houston to Portland in part because the drivers here are better. And the drivers here are better. Unfortunately, a lot of the bicyclists are insane. A day rarely passes
History
WASHINGTON, Jan. 11 (AP)--A father of two sons killed in Korea said today he refused to accept the Medal of Honor on the ground that President Truman is unworthy to bestow it "on my boys or anyone's boys." The 65-year-old father, Halsey McGovern,
History
Blame for the "wanton spilling of American blood in Korea" was placed upon the shoulders of the Truman Administration by the delegates to the State convention of the California Republican Assembly yesterday. In the concluding session of the convention at the Hotel St. Francis [in San Francisco], the
Music
Mark Hasty dares Spandau Ballet fans to "go public". Hi.
Sports
Went to my first Portland Beavers game tonight, at PGE Park. What a great place to spend a beautiful summer evening! I'll have to fit a few more games in before the season ends. The game got off to a fast start, with Salt Lake scoring three runs
Society
Tom Kirkendall has posted several score times this year on the subject of how certain prosecutors, aided by the post-Enron political environment and the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley law, have been interpreting questionable business practices as grounds for criminal charges. I agree with Tom that the Enron Task
Remarks
[Plato] realized that the possession of goods was not a means of getting happiness, but an effort to make up for a spiritually depauperate life: for Plato, happiness was what one could put into life and not what one could loot out of it: it was the happiness of the