Another Brick in the Wall

For those who have been spending their Easter holiday away from the news or are living abroad: one of the chief aides to UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Damian McBride, resigned yesterday. The reason for his departure was the revelation of certain emails which he sent from his 10 Downing Street address. In these missives, […]

The Management Secrets of Emperor Diocletian

If there is one day in the year when it is positively encouraged to be down on the Roman Empire, it would have to be today, Good Friday. I recall seeing an oil painting reproduced in a children’s Bible, which showed Pontius Pilate washing his hands in a jewel-encrusted golden bowl; a beaten, bleeding Christ […]

The Soft Focus Administration

OK, so I’m disappointed. We’re 77 days into the Obama Administration, and not everything is perfect. The economy hasn’t recovered. Carbon emissions haven’t stopped. My mortgage isn’t paid off. I still have to get up at 5:30 AM to get ready to go to work. I want a bailout but there wasn’t a cheque in […]

Notes from a Recession

Recently, I was amused by a news item about what could generously be described as a “Christmas theme park” located on the Dorset / Hampshire border. Called “Lapland New Forest”, its website made some outrageous promises about a “magical” experience, frosted by realistic looking fake snow and augmented by a stunning “tunnel of light”. The […]

The Funny Side of the Subprime Crisis

As presented by the Long Johns (John Bird and John Fortune):

The Great Stick-Up

Less than twenty four hours after explaining to my colleague what created the credit crunch and the subsequent economic turmoil, my own job was swept away by the rolling tide. There is very little to tell; the processes involved were not transparent, all I know is that there was a meeting of senior shareholders, most […]

Economic Crisis for Dummies

I think I’m a reasonably good manager in at least one respect: I try to shield my team from the horrors of what exists outside of our limited domain. I don’t rehash every argument I’ve had, or tell them every silly quip that has been said by my superiors; I try to create an atmosphere […]

Kucinich on the Bailout

I had to stop myself from shouting “Amen” and “Halleluiah” during this rant by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH):

You First. No, You.

The $700 billion bailout of American financial institutions is likely to be rubber stamped this week. I can’t say that I’m particularly happy about it, but at least this morning’s television news wasn’t as polluted as usual with bankers crying out for Uncle Sam to rescue them. It’s been reported that matters became so pathetic […]

An Alternative Bailout Proposal

As sent to me by Robin Yassin-Kassab: Now here’s a bail out plan that works! I’m against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG. Instead, I’m in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to America in a “We Deserve It Dividend”. To make the math simple, let’s assume there are 200,000,000 bonafide U.S. Citizens 18+. Our population is about […]

Me And My Blog

Picture of meI'm a Doctor of both Creative Writing and Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering, a novelist, a technologist, and still an amateur in much else.