Seven Sons

Sportsmanship.

BusinessWeek article on Ford’s use of retro technology to improve gas mileage in its new vehicles.  Direct injection, lightweight steel, four cylinders and turbos.  Not exactly rocket science, this stuff has been on the shelf since the 40’s.  But automakers SWORE they couldn’t make cars any more efficient than they already were, at least not without years of development and mounds of expense.

Will these cars suck like those of the 1970’s?  The 2011 Ford Explorer will have a four cylinder turbo putting out 275 horsepower, about 25% more than today’s V8 Explorer.  Torque and towing power?  If 18-wheelers can use turbos, I’m pretty sure the average personal vehicle can do so just fine.

In what appears to be another example of The General thinking not much further along than what’s for lunch that day, GM announced plans to chop the brands down to four.

Sure. It’s a pretty obvious move and a good one. Not sure why they wouldn’t cut to two. But four is a good start.

But here’s the Soup of the Day moment: The four they’re keeping: Chevorlet, Cadillac, GMC and Buick.

I didn’t stutter. Buick.

Don’t get me wrong, i think it’s sweet that GM wants to keep the single remaining Buick devotee in cars for the remaining days she has on the planet. Especially since she turfed her last Regal.

But Buick? Really? Were GM execs worried that all 4,429 members of Buick Forum would be upset and start an online protest? If so, apparently it’s unlikely they’d do so during daylight hours. Actually, I have to say I was shocked to find an online Buick community. I expected there to be only a few pen pals. But even Pen Pals have gone online it seems.

Everyone needs a friend.

And it seems like The General is worried about not having any. I thought General Motors pulled up short when they only let Oldsmobile go in 2000. They should have kept going then. Why not pack up Buick at the same time? A twofer. Get that Band-Aid off in one, hard, sudden pull. But they checked up. One couldn’t possibly alienate close friends like Michelle. Not when they keep you informed on the latest celebrity gossip.

Instead The General went back to picking around the edges.

Why not keep Saturn? And maybe let it live up to its original intent of offering cars that are inherently different from the rest of GM’s offerings. Supported by dealers that actually want to help the customer. Do something clever. . . like. . . I don’t know. . . A car with dent-proof door panels that gets 40 miles to the gallon?

Something interesting could have come of the integration of Opel vehicles into the Saturn line up. But instead they’re going to keep Buick afloat. It’s like building a raft out of cinder blocks. As far as I can tell: Anyone who owns a Buick now and plans to purchase a new Buick probably has one remaining purchase left.

The way the GM executives really think through the long term health of the company—it’s inspired.

Or maybe they drive Buicks. Or they feel the world just doesn’t have enough luxury crossover vehicles. No. I’ll bet they drive Buicks.

As long as the whole company doesn’t go belly up before I can get around to buying a used  Cadillac CTS-V it’s fine by me.

As a self proclaimed geek I’m a little late to the xkcd fan-boy party. Don’t make the same mistake.

Some background for the uninitiated:

• This strip plays on an on-going Wikipedia controversy – how to make it more neutral and therefore a better reference source… allow anyone to edit any article, or give more power to a set of super-users that can edit content and lock down articles.
• “xkcd” is an unpronounceable four-letter web address chosen for the fact that it is unpronounceable and that it is a four-letter web address. There is no more to it than that.
• While most of the comics are stick drawings, the creator Randall Munroe shows off his true artistic skill in several of his comics.
• If you visit the xkcd site, hover your mouse over the comic to get a second punch line or commentary.
• Always type “xkcd” in lower-case letters please, or you’ll look like a tourist.

Now celebrate the start of your journey down the path to honorary geekdom by going to xkcd and clicking the random button a few times.

Nate Silver over at FiveThirtyEight.com posted this earlier today, and I think I’ve never seen economic growth tracked as clearly in one chart as I have here. He nicked the data straight from the Census Bureau, there’s nothing statistically complex about it. But it pretty clearly sums up my own conclusions about why the Democratic Party is the real party of growth, at least in its post-1992 form. It’s really not that complex, though we seem to make it so: pursue reasonably pro-growth economic policies and tax the richest Americans at considerably higher rates, though not at the extreme rates of the 1950s and 1960s.

Meanwhile, the Republican Party continues to hump Reagan’s dead corpse and pretend He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named wasn’t a “real” conservative. He carried forth Reagan’s agenda as clearly as anyone could hope to, at least domestically. Wake up, GOP. I miss when you actually had sane politicians.

First of all, I have to say that a lightbulb makes a great cake. Just don’t get your fingers caught in the oven.

My daughter's Easy-Bake oven cakes

Yesterday there was an article on the NPR show Day to Day about a woman who has just published a 99¢-store cookbook. She buys ingredients at the discount store, mostly canned vegetables and packaged foods like Pillsbury buscuits, and turns out delectable dishes. She imagines that in this down economy there is a real market for a book that teaches people how to cook economically, and she is probably right. But while the reporter was charitably impressed by the woman and her food, I spent the entire article thinking how sad it must be to have to rely on a discount chain store with its dented cans rolling around under stuttering fluorescent bulbs for the components of your daily meal.

If you don’t troll around food blogging sites like I do, where these concepts are preached to the choir on a regular basis, tape these simple rules to your hemp-sack shopping bags:

• Learn to cook.
• Shop with a list.
• Buy in season.
• Eat less meat.

There you go. Four simple discount chain store avoidance strategies for a down economy.

Honestly I was going to include the “shop the perimeter” rule but Dina here makes a good point. You can’t usually get rice, flour, beans, nuts and other staples on the outer edge of your grocery store. But while you might hit up the baking aisle on a regular basis, allocating most of your shopping time to the produce section is a good habit to develop.

Random thought on a morning where it feels like we’re slipping back into the Ice Age…

• I’ve been a fan of Sirius Satellite Radio for just over two years.  Nice refreshing change from regular ‘commercial’ radio.  In that two year span, I’ve yet to listen to Howard Stern– the supposed ’savior’ of the brand.  Instead, I’ve become addicted to BBC Radio 1.  Which is, I’m sure, just as annoying in England as any other radio stations are here.  But it’s refreshing to hear DJ’s rambling on about the problems in their neighborhoods rather than mine. 
• As a result of BBC Radio 1, I found out yesterday that the economic downturn has hit the British auto industry as hard as it has the American one.  850 workers at one of the Mini plants were informed approximately an hour before their shift ended that they were being let go.  Which leads me to believe that any items produced during the last hour of the main shift on 02/16/09 are highly suspect.  And it also had the (unintended) effect of giving the now-displaced workers time to gather food with which to pelt their former managers and supervisors when they left the plant.  Classic.

Absolutely priceless. Time to buy! Time to sell! This is why we exist! Please throw us a lifeline. Stop thinking of the big picture.

“We’re not there yet?!?!”

Whoever scheduled these guys for “Power Lunch” has a great sense of humor. That, or he’s an idiot. The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable
is on my reading list.

The Financial Times carried an article this week that suggests tracking tick-by-tick stock market transactions for the purpose of predicting financial bubbles. I suspect that if this is done with elegant simplicity (for example, just putting all the data out there on the web in real time and letting investors and academics manipulate the data) it could possibly work. I also suspect it would change the dynamics of the market. A more transparent market should tend towards less volatility, and over a long period of time that should mean fewer recessions.

I would love to apply the same analytical strategy to figuring out how governments can apply inverse financial pressure to the economy without relying solely on the federal funds rate or a central bank. It is obvious today that in a recession the demand for government services goes up at exactly the same time that revenues go down. Furthermore, while additional public spending is exactly what is needed, most governments below the federal level can’t run a deficit or print money. This leads to a vicious cycle and constant downward pressure on the economy.

How about these ideas to get rid of this cycle once and for all?

- Bongo Bucks: In a recession, have state and local governments print their own money, legal tender within their borders.  It has been done before. Unemployment benefits, tax refunds and other government remittances can be paid partially in local currency. People will spend a higher percentage of their disposable income locally (big box stores don’t count) and stimulate the economy on a more local scale, which can have a multiplier effect.

- Hedge Nationalization: If governments were to enter the markets (including stocks, real estate, commodities) and trade in quantities invesely proportional to the changing price of the instrument, it would have the effect of smoothing out the markets. This would be a kindof strategic petroleum reserve, but for other types of commodities. Obviously dedicated capitalists don’t want the markets smoothed out when they are going up, but wouldn’t that be better in the long run? Or maybe the government just starts kicking in a buying when the market trends down? I see lots of problems with this idea of course, but I wanted to throw it out there for a discussion starter.

Complicated promotion? Or has the cheese really slid of Mr. Phoenix’s cracker? Watch the following and decide for yourself.

I’m going with an over the top promotion. I’m biased. i think he’s a pretty solid actor and smart enough to go all in on something like this. Let’s face it Borat has forever changed the way parody is approached and it was just a matter of time before some one went the other direction with it. Rather than have an actor immerse into a role, have the public figure of the actor become the role.

And now I have a deconstructionist headache this big.

Whatever. . . If he’s acting it only supports my notion that he’s a great actor. If not? Then this is one of the most intriquing celebrity meltdowns since Michael Richards hit the JC Penney White Sale.