I watched an NFL football game last night. It was played in Philadelphia and it was broadcast on national TV, but the game was incidental; the star of the show was Rocky. Sylvester Stallone was all over the place; on the sidelines before the game and in the broadcast booth during the game, and everyone within shouting distance wanted their "Yo" moment. They love Rocky in South Philly.
Rocky is a big deal in Philadelphia--except in that rarified world of locked jaws and hyphenated names that rule the city's arts community. The Philadelphia art mavens view Rocky's statue like a boil, and years ago they banned it from the steps of the Philadelphia Art Museum where it attracted more interest than the exhibits inside the museum. A museum which over the years has been forced to close its doors on certain days for lack of funds to pay the poor security guards.
Rocky was shuttled off to the sports complex in South Philly, and the art mavens thought, that was that. But the public clamored for Rocky's return and after much pressure and wringing of silk hankies, he was allowed to return to the Art Museum area, but not to his old home atop the steps. Rocky was planted on the side of the building, discreetly away from the main entrance, and presumably away from the windows of the curator and her smug accomplices inside that blue-blooded palace of privilege.
Never-the-less as ESPN reminded us last night, you can't keep a good man down--even on the Main Line.
Sylvester Stallone is as far removed from Philadelphia's snooty art denizens as Albert Barnes was in his time. Dr. Barnes despised the exclusive, condescending ways of Philadelphia's coupon-clipping arts crowd and he was careful to remain apart from that world even as he prepared to enter the next world. Dr. Barnes left very careful instructions in his will about what to do and what not to do with his incomparably valuable collection and he left an estate to finance that gift.
Of course you know the rest of the story. At the same time as the Philadelphia arts community was banning Rocky from the steps of the Art Museum, apparently they were planning to hijack the Barnes Foundation. And they did! Now they are building a new palace across the street from the Art Museum to house the Barnes Collection.
May the shadow of Rocky darken its doors.
I read the following stories within minutes of each other.
Bush Accepts Bolton's U.N. Resignation
Dec 04 11:18 AM US/Eastern
Unable to win Senate confirmation, U.N. Ambassador John Bolton will step down when his temporary appointment expires within weeks, the White House said Monday.
Congress open to passing bill on immigration
By Charles Hurt
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
December 4, 2006
Congress will approve an immigration bill that will grant citizenship rights to most of the 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens in the U.S. after Democrats take control next month, predict both sides on Capitol Hill.
My take: The new Congress-in-waiting is repelled by a U.N. Ambassador who, as best I can tell, gets along pretty well with his peers, and who has done a reasonably good job of representing a country that is out of step with most its peers, U.N. members.
Meanwhile, that same Congress will welcome with open arms 12-20 million people who broke the law to get here; and who leap-frogged over every law abiding immigrant standing in line to become a U.S. citizen.
We have lost our way.
Why is bad news more interesting than good news? The local TV news is about fires, rapes and murders—and weather. Have you ever seen anything on a local TV newscast but disasters, criminal events, and weather? (Some would classify weather forecasting as a criminal event.)
And newspapers are no more cheerful. But I’ll cut newspapers some slack on the weather. Your house could blow away before the newspaper arrives, and so we don’t pay much attention to weather reports in the newspaper. But newspapers print the same dreadful news, along with the national dreads, which local TV rarely mentions (the local dreads, the weather and the commercials don’t leave much time for national news on Channel X).
The daily newspaper national news usually includes a mix of sports, business and politics from Washington, London, Sri Lanka, Sao Paolo, and other places we can’t pronounce or locate on a map. Of course if your newspaper is a weekly, the weather section is ludicrous. But weekly newspapers have an especially sobering section that warrants extra space—the obituaries.
We don't pay enough attention to the good stuff. And so, I put together a sampling of news that I think should merit attention. These are listed in no particular order; simply as they fell from my still functioning, 67 year-old, non-Alzheimer affected brain.
Dateline: Durham, NC. "The Duke University Lacrosse team had a 100% graduation rate this year." It's true. Did you know that? We hear a lot about dumb jocks that can’t get to the verb, but not much about student-athletes who go to class, study, and earn a diploma. The Duke Lacrosse Team's academic achievements will be good news for some, but bad news for others; depending on their persuasion about that dreadful event with the dancer.
Dateline: Washington, DC: The National Center for Health Statistics: "In 2002, 2.6 million babies were born to parents with a marriage contract." The report said that another 1.4 million children were born out of wedlock that year. (And 1.4 million were killed in the womb.) Why don’t we celebrate parents who don't kill their babies? I don't care if they have a marriage contract; although I wonder why one would bring a child into this world without a social and legal umbrella. Note: 2002 is the most recent period I could find statistics for. Maybe it's better now.
Dateline: Atlantic City, NJ: "Last night, in Atlantic City, Bill Cosby held forth with two hours of non-profanity laced stories. They were rolling in the aisles." Mr. Cosby is dealing with his own set of dreads at the moment, but we should not forget the wholesome humor he has entertained us with for decades. He is a funny man and he does it without four-letter words.
Dateline: Philadelphia, PA. "Not one Philadelphia city official was indicted yesterday." (OK, I made this one up, but I'm sure there were a few days in the recent past when that statement would have been true.) Unless you live in Philadelphia, you cannot appreciate what a joyous reception that headline would receive. Of course, no one would believe it. Maybe they could run it in the funnies section.
Enough. I don't purposefully watch the local news on TV, but occasionally it drifts into my space, and without exception, I am amazed at the negative content. Maybe I should say the continuity, for it never changes: fires, rapes and murders. Local newspapers are no different; they too headline the dreads.
But the dreads can mean different things to different people. For some, they can be happy events, in a perverse sort of way. Take the NY Times for example. A few weeks ago a low level White House official was convicted of something to do with the Jack Abramoff scandal. You know the guy in Washington who bought off some Republican Congressmen? (They don't tell us that he bought off some Democrats, too.) Anyway this low level White House official got caught with his hand in the cookie jar, or his ass in a G-5, I'm not sure what. I had never heard of him before that event, and I can't remember his name now. I'm sure you can't either. And that's my point. The NY Times had this poor slob's color photo ON THE FRONT PAGE ABOVE THE FOLD, a space normally reserved for stock market crashes, declarations of war, and the death of world leaders. So much for objectivity in the newsroom. I assume this sad event was a happy one for The New York Times. (I'm not taking sides; I could pull a similar story from Fox News.)
This is one--but only one--of the reasons TV, newspapers, and news magazines are threatened. Not because they are partisan, but because they attempt to hide it. The Internet is a refreshing change. Amateur news on the web is unabashedly awash with opinions, and it is delivered head-on, not cloaked in oblique language. It comes from the bottom up, not top down from the editor's desks of the establishment news industry. And it is delivered in real time, not shackled to the 6:00 newscast, or the lumbering printing press.
The rise of the Internet and specifically the blogging format will surely go down as one of the most important events in news gathering history; perhaps all of history. It has liberated thought. Expression is unstructured, even out of control at times; uncontrollable might be a better description. But this medium has revealed some very good thinkers--and exceptional writers. And it has shrunk the world like nothing else in history. The establishment should be worried.
That is the good news.
When I was growing up, my parents moved a few times. Four elementary schools, two junior highs (middle school), and two years in a boarding school gave me opportunities to make new friends--and to be tested. There is a bully everywhere you go, and they always pick on the new kid. I had a lot of fights, but I never started one.
It is human nature to avoid conflict, and that was my first tactic--always. First I tried to appease them--you know, attempt to make friends, but that invariably failed. And sometimes I tried to bribe them--"You want to ride my bike?" But that stuff never worked for long; they kept coming back until I stood my ground. Their weapon was fear. Once I penetrated that flimsy veil, it was all over. But to do that, I had to clean their clock.
I learned a lesson from that--you can fight them now, or you can fight them later.
Is it any different with the terrorists?
US AIR is now US AIRWAYS. Or is it America West under wraps? One thing it is--on this day--is an incompetent and rude airline. At 10:15 this morning, US AIRWAYS gave another slipshod performance as they obstructed my check-in for a flight from Philadelphia to Houston (within the 24-hour window).
"Sorry we can't access the seating chart at this time, see an agent at the airport ticket counter or use an automated ticketing kiosk," the message read, as it rejected me yet again (I tried 3 or 4 times before I gave up). By the way, this is standard operating procedure for US AIRWAYS, especially when one is flying on a US AIRWAYS affiliate. They can't run their own airplanes on time, and so what do they do? They add another party to the equation and then hide behind an automated computer message.
But AHOY--there was help. "Click on Live Help!", the screen read. I did. Guess what? I was greeted by a form to fill out, before I was permitted to chat with a "Live Help" agent. And the form included a box with space to describe my problem. I filled out the form--with the same information on my reservation--and I described my problem, which was that I was traveling with a 9-year old kid, and waiting until I got to the airport to check in was a large hassle, which is why I had accepted their offer to check-in online.
I clicked again--on the "Live Help" icon. "Sorry, all of our representatives are busy," it read. Could I make it up? No queue to get in, no alternative suggestions, no nothing. ("Kiss off," is my interpretation of that screen.) And so, in desperation, I clicked the back arrow to retrieve the words I had written to describe my dilemma, because I stupidly thought I might try again later, and that would save me from having to compose another message. The words were gone.
For 5 years, my family has used this airline to shuttle 3 children between parents and grandparents in Houston and Philadelphia. We have used US AIRWAYS simply because the parents live close to George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston. It is rare to enjoy a hassle-free flight with this company; Late departures, late arrivals (very late), tardy baggage retrieval, rude agents (there are some nice employees, but I wonder how any of them keep their heads up with so many unhappy customers). And did I mention high prices? Thank you Southwest for bringing down the cost of travel in Philadelphia.
Never again. I hate US AIRWAYS--and I hate myself more for giving them my money. From hence forth it will be SOUTHWEST AIR. I will gladly drive the extra miles to and from Houston's Hobby Airport and when I roll past George Bush Intercontinental Airport on I-45, I will hoist a middle finger to salute US AIRWAYS.
When will the government stop bailing out these losers, and let them die?
According to Chairman Edward R. Whitacre, "at&t will not give its pipes away." Mr. Whitacre is a lifelong employee of the old AT&T and the Bell Telephone system, and no doubt (in his mind anyway) his crowning achievement was to put the telephone company back together--at least the parts not owned by Qwest and Verizon, which by-the-way, include MCI, that old Bell nemesis that started this mess back in the last century.
The pipes Mr. Whitacre is referring to are the last mile connections to our houses and places of business, favorite bars and so on. The last mile is an industry buzzword for the copper wire that connects us to the old telephone network. I say "old" for even though the telephone network is still the big kahuna for talking and faxing (about 180 million U.S. telephone subscribers use it every day), it is aging fast. In fact it is technologically dead, a condition that Mr. Whitacre will not admit, for at&t is racing forward with a new hybrid system to transmit voice and data and video that relies on that poor, brittle, slow copper wire for the "last mile."
Mr. Whitacre does not talk about the miles in between the last miles. In the last few years, tens of thousands of miles of copper have been replaced by fiber optic cable. More than we need. There are more unused strands of fiber-optic cable strung around the world than stars in the sky. And those strands of glass connect population centers all over the world; East, West, North and South; yep it runs under the oceans too. Compared to copper wire, fiber-optic cable is like a Ferrari is to a Volkswagen Beetle. It ain't no contest Alice.
Messages race around the world on fiber (and satellite), but when they get to our neighborhoods they screech to a halt and crawl into the house on copper wire. Mr. Whitacre likes it that way. Now don't get me wrong; at&t (and Verizon and Qwest) have miles and miles of fiber-optic cable too, but they also have lots of competition for that long haul business. And so they have staked out the last mile to defend their turfs; not with innovative products and services--no, with money. Money thrown at the politicians in Washington.
Mr. Whitacre says he paid for that last mile and therefore deserves a decent rate of return on his investment. (I'll get back to that in a minute.) And furthermore, he says, "I'm not going to let my competitors use it for nothing." He claims to be talking about Yahoo and Google and Microsoft and a hundred other companies that are bringing new and better communications tools for us to use. But he is really talking about us--the consumers. He wants to build a fence around that last poor little strand of slow-poke copper and charge extra for certain Internet activity. at&t can't compete with better products and services and so why not just lock the gate? Of course we, the poor lobby-less consumers, do not have a Congressman hooked on our tool belt, but if we did, we would point out that we already paid for access to our ISP--handsomely in fact, to the tune of $40 per month and up for broadband service. And our ISP pays for every bit and byte of data that it transmits over Mr. Whitacre's slow poke last mile.
Now back to Mr. Whitacre's claim that at&t deserves a decent rate of return on its investment. Why? Is Disney guaranteed a decent rate of return when they make a bad movie? Remember the New Coke? Was Coca-Cola rewarded for that flop? If you're old enough, you surely remember the Edsel, the largest disaster in automotive history. Who reimbursed Ford for that fiasco? If at&t can't make money under the present Internet open source system, step aside. Who cares if at&t carries Internet traffic or not? Do you? I don't?
Mr. Whitacre has worked for a monopoly for so long that he can't stop looking to the government to bail him out. He's used to bullying his way to success, the consumer be damned. Sadly he has the money to do that in Washington. But it will be a temporary victory, for the Googles and the Skypes of this new age will surely find a way around Mr. Whitacre's legislative roadblock. Where will at&t turn then? Probably to new management; executives seasoned in the rough and tough world of free enterprise. at&t and the other Bell survivors will have to flush out the current crop of monopolist bred managers, if they are to survive.
Remember the old phone company? That would be pre-1984 when we had only one choice for telephone service, and for most of us that choice was the local Bell operating company; Bell of Pennsylvania, Illinois Bell, Southwestern Bell, blah, blah, blah.
Back then, the telephone and the telephone company were one in the same. Some of us still rented our phones from the telephone company, but regardless of whether we rented or purchased the handset, we gave no thought to the instrument or the service. You know why? Because they worked--all of the time. "Five 9's" the engineers dubbed it, which meant the telephone network was designed to work 99.999% of the time. And it did. Not sexy, and not mobile, but very reliable.
Fast-forward 22 years. I'm writing this note from a house in Chesterbrook PA., 4 miles from the largest shopping center in America. The house is 150 yards from the Pennsylvania Turnpike, and it is surrounded by an office park that houses some of the largest drug companies in the world, and a colossal family of mutual funds, all household names. And because of this concentration of high-tech commerce, there may be more T-1 lines running under this house than tree roots. You get the picture? This is not a remote outpost. And yet, I have to walk outside to use my Sprint cellular phone for it will not pickup a signal inside the house (and often not when I’m outside the house). For some unexplainable reason, Sprint overlooked Chesterbrook , PA, a residential community with prices ranging from the mid hundreds of thousands to the low millions, and I must roam on another cellular carrier's network to use my mobile phone.
The Chesterbrook streets and landscaping are torn up now, because Verizon is installing a new hoop-tee-doo Optical Fiber network, that will carry not only telephone conversations, but hi-speed internet access, hi-definition television programming, on-demand movies, and a new telephone service called VoIP. VoIP stands for Voice over Internet Protocol which for us non-techies simply means the old copper wire telephone network that performed flawlessly (remember Five 9s?) for about 150 years, give or take a decade or two, is about to become history.
FTTH, Verizon calls it, which is shorthand for "Fiber-To-The-House." (They don't talk about what you do with it inside the house; they only bring it TO the house.) But fiber is fast and they say we will be able to download movies and games and all kinds of stuff that will transform our lives and cement our butts to the couch for even longer periods of time. And to make sure that we remain on the couch, the telephone company will display incoming calls on the TV. Wow!
Unless, of course, you live in that outback called Chesterbrook, PA and subscribe to Sprint PCS cellular service. In that case, pray that you have a digital video recorder that can play back the hi-definition video segment that you missed while you were outside on the phone.
