World of Warcraft

Against my better judgement I have reactivated my WoW account. So now if you need me I'll be on Kilrogg as the Draenei mage, Hrathgar.

...I already know this is going to be a terrible idea.

A Productive Day

I realize that the name of this blog does not really lend itself to a good description of the content that can be found here. From the content posted thus far it is pretty obvious that the main purpose of this blog is to act as a medium through which I may vent certain political or economical frustrations. This post, however, will branch into the realm of the mundane and simply be about my rather productive day. These are noticeably rare despite efforts to at least try to be more productive with my time. I blame spending too much time at a job I don't like for the lack of any motivation to do anything but sit on the internet browsing until my brain is mush and the day is gone.

Awake to the sounds of Blackberry buzzing on my desk. Stumble out of bed and, remembering it's Sunday, head to church. Arrive back home to the prospects of stealing the bottom of the pot coffee one of my roommates made and making eggs. That done and not finding anything good on TV (not even a decent "Deadliest Warrior" marathon) I make up my mind to be as productive as possible. My roommate and I spend the next several hours cleaning the apartment. Now I enjoy a little squalor as much as the next guy, but our place was really getting bad. We probably easily filled one of the municipal garbage cans with crap that had just been hanging out because we're too lazy to really clean the place.

We also decided this would be the big DIY fixing broken stuff up day. Before we could get to work we needed an emergency trip to the Walmart to stock up on tools and supplies to augment my limited cache. Shopping at Walmart is a dangerous and potentially expensive ordeal if you go without a list. We went in for paper towels, light bulbs, screws, and garbage bags. We almost came out with that plus a 47" TV, cordless drill, and a new vacuum cleaner because we couldn't just find bags for the old Electrolux.

In what was left of the afternoon we successfully managed to reattach the dishwasher to the counter after it had been loose from its moorings for weeks. We also got the coffee table back to a suitable level of stability, and the couch no longer falls backward due to a leg needing to be reattached. All in all a decent number of projects done in a day.

Now we just need to convert one of our empty rooms into a MMA fighting area and we'll be all set for the summer.

Government Motors

I was reading an article about GM's bankruptcy in the Financial Times where Obama said that the government was a "reluctant" shareholder, that the government would not have a heavy hand in the company, and operations would remain "business as usual." They also tried to say that GM would be a public company again within a year.

Not likely. All this reminded me of an interesting quote from Milton Friedman, "Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program." 

Other than that I don't even know where to begin. Having read about this issue and after covering it in some of my business classes I can't say I was surprised to see General Motors file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. What irks me is that this does not seem like a real bankruptcy proceeding. It is more like the outright nationalisation of the auto makers and I don't see how this course of action could possibly improve the situation. Keeping things "business as usual" was part of the problem at GM, and with governments appointing most of the board of directors I don't see how they could not have a heavy hand in how the company is being run. 

I agree that what should emerge from "bankruptcy" should be a leaner, more nimble company, but does anyone think that's possible with the block holders being the government and the unions? The unions sucked the lifeblood out of GM and the government hasn't been innovative since it wrote the Constitution. 

Instead of being a reluctant shareholder in these companies I would rather see them go through real bankruptcy proceedings. Then maybe we would find out if there's anything people actually wanted to save.