Worse than the Great Depression?

I just came accross this article by Jack Cafferty bringing up and explaining a quote by a leading financial investor, George Soros. Soros claims that the financial crisis we are in is worse than even the Great Depression. Soros said that "The economy went into freefall and is still falling and we dont know where the bottom will be until we get there and there's no sign that we are anywhere near a bottom". He also says that our problems originate in the 1980's with deregulation, and that now is the begining of the end of the free market. As we start our unit exploring financial situations, it should be remembered that each system of an economy has its risks, and that each one controls the ordinary John and Sally. No form of economy is safe from risks, the largest example of Communism failed in the early 90's, and now we, the free market, are in a crisis. Thats not to say that we will plunge into chaos and anarchy, as is mentioned in the article, we have much more safe nets and are no where near the statistics of 25% unemployment of the Great Depression. But no one knows how our example of the free market could turn out after this crisis, it could turn into something we barely even notice. The fact is that there is no perfect form of economy where everyone lives in harmony and peace, People can only try.

The Ultimate Exaggerated Holiday

Recently, that holiday we all love or hate just came and went. Obviously, I am talking about Valentine's Day, the so-called 'Hallmark Holiday'. I think it is fair to call it that, since around this time of year we are bombarded with commercials to buy our loved ones this or that. And I have little problem with commercials for cards, flowers, chocolate, or even jewelry, because this kind of stuff is what people are looking for on Valentine's day. You cant really get angry at marketers for advertising things for a holiday which are in demand, but I think the reason many people hate the holiday is because of those other guys that try and adjust their random product to fit into the theme of hearts and roses and proceed to attempt to sell it with a special "one time offer" Valentine's Day theme. Valentine's day was a prime chance for marketers to sell and exaggerate their products. I really saw an Officemax commercial based for Valentine's Day products. It might just be me who thinks it, but whoever resorts to buying paper and staples for their significant other for Valentine's Day ought to get their priorities straight. In today's world, marketers try and find every reason to convince people to buy their stuff, and it doesnt even matter if their product has no relation to the event to begin with; as long as you can market it to the widest range of people and make it look so much more appealing than it really is. Holidays like Valentine's day are so often used to sell products which are over incredibly over romanticized that we forget the true meaning of February the 14th, which is that other meaning of romanticism, (and of course to buy roses and Hallmark cards). Anything further than that is just ridiculous.

Romanticizing a Blanket

So I know this is two days late, but I thought it was by sunday, not Friday. But anyways, something I find very over-romanticized and laugh at every time I see on TV is infomercials, but my favorite overly dramatic infomercial would have to be Snuggies. The commercial can be found here. Sure we all love a good blanket in front of a fireplace, and who doesnt like being warm when its cold, but the snuggie commercials go a bit far. Is it really that difficult to pick up a phone, read a book, or do simple tasks in a normal blanket? I for one have ever experienced blanket-induced disabilities, and when Im cold at a sporting event, I wear a coat. I usually dont mind a good infomercial, they give a little unintended comic relief, but Snuggies may go a bit far in romanticizing their product. The commercials make Snuggies seem like a necessity, without which you could never be comfortable. And then they even go farther and portray the snuggie as a sociably normal thing. I for one, and I dont know anyone else who would, would never wear basically a bathrobe around town. So although a Snuggie might be warm and nice around the home, it cant be very different from a normal blanket, and the benefits of simply a backwards bathrobe are incredibly over-romanticized and exaggerated. It may not be very practical, but it does work well as just a comedic relief among a million boring commercials

Congratulating the 'Daddy' of all Republicans

When I think of satire, I usually think of "The Daily Show" or "The Colbert Report", and only recently have I begun to think of Mark Twain in that sense too. Satire seems to often be a smaller or less influential figure attacking a larger idea, such as Mark Twain satirizing all of the south. So it me by surprise when I came upon a somewhat influential person taking on another of about equal status. I dont know why, but i found it very amusing to read, even though it doesnt seem to be written with the purpose of highly entertaining the reader. Here, in "A History Lesson for Rush Limbaugh", CNN's James Carvil attack's Limbaugh with heavy sarcasm a dash of juxtaposition and a bit of exaggeration. It would have been easy for me to read over this just a few months ago and maybe only just pick up on a bit of sarcasm, but while reading the article I felt like i was reading what Carvil meant instead of just reading what he wrote. And I have to thank Twain and AmStud for my sharpened satire senses. Now with my super satire senses, I can read beneath the seemingly innocent words and into the sarcasm and mockery which lies beneath.

The Ultimate Way to Simplify Your Life

Have you ever wanted to simplify your life? and I mean beyond doing away with meaningless stresses, but also eliminating cell phones, computers, fights, clothes, gossip, etc etc. If you are really committed to making your life as simple as possible, you may want to consider following the footsteps of A.J. Jacobson, who lived according to every Biblical rule for one year as a Journalist in Manhattan. He wrote about his year in his book 'The Year of Living Biblically'. To get an idea of what he experienced, here are some of his 700 rules. From 'no gossip' to 'giving thanks', from 'No clothes made of two kind of stuff' to 'do not trim the sides of your beard', Jacobs attempted to follow every rule he could find in the Bible. Because the Bible is such an ancient text, it goes without saying that following it exactly will be no easy task, but if ancient times were so much simpler, wont following it make our life easier? and if so, if Thoreau wanted to simplify his life, why didnt he just resort to the Bible's rules? According to his website (I did not read the book), Jacob's year had several effects. In some ways it made him appreciate life more and to give thanks to things we all take for granted. But in other ways, it presented him with a new kind of stress of following God's law. Simple things such as finding a seat or buying clothes became stressful chores. So in some ways, life was simpler under the Bible, but in other ways it stressed his life to a new level. If someone had attempted this in Thoreau's time, however, the stress may have been a little toned down compared to today. Most clothes were one material, and certainly there would have been less peer pressure about shaving your beard. I would like to have seen Thoreau attempt this feat of such strict living, but from the sounds of it, it seems as if he achieved the same while living in the woods as Jacobs did after living a year Biblically. I get the impression from the authors' conclusions that they both appreciated the little things in life more and had a new sense of gratitude for a simple life. Perhaps living in solitude in the woods brought Thoreau as close to the Diving Spirit as Living Biblically brought Jacob's to God.

The Race for Stuff

While watching the clip from 'Far and Away' when the settlers are running and fighting for plots of land, I was reminded of the Wal-Mart employee in New York that was trampled to death among shoppers racing through the doors to get to sale items. The shoppers broke the doors off their hinges in the early morning hours of Friday to get inside the store to begin their blitz for on sale items. Everything from the race to claim property to the disorganization and the onslaught of people is the same. The only difference that stood out for me was the glorifying music playing in the background of 'far and away' as opposed to the chaos of the Wal-mart videos. But 'Far and Away' was a movie meant to glorify the 'American Destiny', and it is very likely that the actual land rush was very similar to the Wal-mart on Friday. The reason these two events so far apart in time are so similar may be that property and land have become something necessary to acquire in order to achieve happiness or success. In the 1800s land and the frontier was associated with a new start to life and, as shown in the Oklahoma land rush and 'Far and Away', everyone was competing and racing for their own plot of land. This race for stuff was repeated last Friday, demonstrating that the idea of moving west has translated into getting the latest and greatest thing. Even if it means trampling and killing a man to get to a set of shoes on sale.

Progress to Some, a Hurdle for Others

While on surfing the Internet community on Facebook, I got a little sidetracked and came upon a link titled something along the lines of 'anti-pro-ana' to a group that attempted to spread the word about eating disorder groups. I searched for news stories and found one on newsweek that detailed about how these and groups of the other side are actually very numerous. Many have touted Facebook and other social networking sites as places where people can find others with similar interests as them, as well as keep in touch and keep up with friends. And with the sites growing at incredibly fast rates, there are more chances for people to find similar interest groups. Its usually said that this growing community of people and shared idea is a good thing. But, as we usually do in American Studies, we should put a question mark after saying that this is progress, and my discovery on Facebook today prompted that. With the Facebook population growing, people have created support groups for people with eating disorders. This isnt a support group to help teens get out of their disorder, but one that encourages girls to go on extreme diets to lose extreme amounts of weight. some even have places where members can post pictures of themselves and other users can comment on "problem areas". Like one former member said "I was encouraged to stop eating when I saw how many people were doing it". While the progress in many areas because of these sites is undeniable, there are other topics where these websites have caused damage, this being one of them. But to go even further and put a question on our question mark, there are some good sides to the groups that can be called progress. Marcia Herrin, a Dartmouth professor, is glad to see that teens are comfortable talking about eating disorders and arent as afraid to share and admit that they have a disorder. So while these networking sites are a progress in social communities and the spreading of ideas there always must be a question mark, because things dont always seem as they are. Then again though, you should look for yet another question mark; one that reveals a silver lining to a situation. When it comes to these groups, people have to decide if the progress the group presents is greater than the harm it causes, because every situation of progress has a question mark and a drawback.

By the way, I checked for the group again today but it turns out facebook deletes the groups when the find them because they violate the terms of agreement by "promoting self harm or Harm to others".