Is this an open book test?

A week ago NewMexiKen posted some of the mock exam in American Economic History at that football school, Cal Berkeley.

Here’s a link to Professor DeLong’s actual midterm if you’d like to take the test.

If you’re too rushed to click, try these one-paragraph discussions:

2. Were there important economic causes of the Civil War? If there were, what were they?

3. Why was America a relatively equal country (for white guys) until after the Civil War? Why did it then become an unequal country in the next half-century?

Best line of yesterday, so far

“Give me your tired, your poor and your fingerprints.”

Tom Friedman in yesterday’s column arguing that we need “our old habits and sense of openness” — we need a 9/12 candidate, not a 9/11 one.

“You may think Guantánamo Bay is a prison camp in Cuba for Al Qaeda terrorists. A lot of the world thinks it’s a place we send visitors who don’t give the right answers at immigration. I will not vote for any candidate who is not committed to dismantling Guantánamo Bay and replacing it with a free field hospital for poor Cubans. Guantánamo Bay is the anti-Statue of Liberty.”

Greed is good

Interesting stuff today too from Paul Krugman writing about Countrywide Financial and its CEO. The column includes this:

But Countrywide made more questionable loans than anyone else — and its postbubble behavior does stand out. As Ms. Morgenson reported in yesterday’s Times, Countrywide seems peculiarly unwilling to work out deals that might let borrowers hold on to their homes — even when such a deal, by avoiding the costs of foreclosure, would actually work to the benefit of both sides.

Why block mutually beneficial deals? As the article points out, Countrywide can make money from the fees it charges on foreclosures, while the losses from mortgages that could have been saved, but weren’t, are borne by others.

Gordon Gekko, father of many children.

Money and Other Subjects

NewMexiKen has long been a fan of Andrew Tobias — reading his early, popular books and using for several years the financial software he developed, Managing Your Money.

Today Tobias writes briefly about the Tough Years Ahead, starting with:

“And it could be a decade or two before homes and condos in some places return to their peak prices (at least in “real” terms, adjusted for inflation).”

Interesting stuff, whether one agrees with it all or not.

The Future of Newspapers

Dilbert creator Scott Adams takes a shot at predicting the future of newspapers. “Clearly I am not qualified to make this sort of prediction. But being unqualified has never dampened my enthusiasm for publicly embarrassing myself. I think it’s time to take another run at this prediction.”

He’s actually quite interesting, beginning with this: “I predict that the end of printed newspapers will happen in the time it takes for most people to upgrade their cell phones two more times.”

October the first

It’s the birthday

… of James Whitmore. The actor, twice nominated for an Oscar, is 86. He was the sole cast member of Give ’em Hell, Harry!

… of Jimmy Carter. The 39th President is 83 today.

… of Tom Bosley. Richie Cunningham’s father is 80.

… of Julie Andrews. Mary Poppins is 72. Ms. Andrews won the Best Actress Oscar for Mary Poppins; she was nominated for The Sound of Music and Victor/Victoria. Of course, her claim to fame really was as Eliza Doolittle in the stage version of My Fair Lady.

… of Rod Carew. The baseball hall of fame player is 62.

Rod Carew lined, chopped and bunted his way to 3,053 career hits. His seven batting titles are surpassed only by Ty Cobb, Tony Gwynn and Honus Wagner, and equaled only by Rogers Hornsby and Stan Musial. He used a variety of relaxed, crouched batting stances to hit over .300 in 15 consecutive seasons with the Twins and Angels, achieving a .328 lifetime average. He was honored as American League Rookie of the Year in 1967, won the league MVP 10 years later and was named to 18 straight All-Star teams. He remains a national hero in Panama.

National Baseball Hall of Fame

… of Tim O’Brien. The novelist is 61. O’Brien is the author of Going After Cacciato, winner of the 1979 National Book Award in fiction, and The Things They Carried, which was named by The New York Times as one of the ten best books of 1990, received the Chicago Tribune Heartland Award in fiction, and was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. In the Lake of the Woods was named by Time as the best novel of 1994. The book also received the James Fenimore Cooper Prize from the Society of American Historians and was selected as one of the ten best books of the year by The New York Times.

… of Mark McGwire, 44.

Chief Justice William Rehnquist would have been 83 today.

Vladimir Horowitz was born on this date in 1903.

Vladimir Horowitz, the eccentric virtuoso of the piano whose extraordinary personality and skill overwhelmed six decades of concert audiences, died suddenly early yesterday afternoon [November 5, 1989] at his home in Manhattan, apparently of a heart attack. Though standard biographies list his birth date as Oct. 1, 1904, Mr. Horowitz recently celebrated what he called his 86th birthday.

Held in awe by aficionados of the instrument, Mr. Horowitz virtually cornered the market on celebrity among 20th-century pianists. His presence hovered over several generations of pianists who followed him.

The New York Times

The first World Series game ever was played 104 years ago today. The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Boston Pilgrims 7-3. Cy Young was the losing pitcher that day but went on to win two games as Boston won the best-of-nine series, five games to three.

Yosemite National Park

… was established on this date in 1890.

Yosemite Valley

NewMexiKen photo, 2005.
Click for larger version.

Not just a great Valley…

but a shrine to human foresight, strength of granite, power of glaciers, the persistence of life, and the tranquility of the High Sierra.

Yosemite National Park, one of the first wilderness parks in the United States, is best known for its waterfalls, but within its nearly 1,200 square miles, you can find deep valleys, grand meadows, ancient giant sequoias, a vast wilderness area, and much more.

Yosemite National Park

Tuppence, tuppence, tuppence a bag

NewMexiKen’s seven regular readers may remember my post on feeding the birds — What’s the deal about feeding birds? I had wondered whether it was OK to sporadically feed wild birds; would they become dependent on my handouts and starve if I was away.

So yesterday I dropped into the Wild Bird Center, a store specializing in outdoor bird stuff — feeders, birdbaths, books, feed. I was told that the birds that flock to my backyard to eat the seed I put out are “professional birds” and that their profession is finding food. Not to worry, they’ll show up if I make it easy for them, but they’ll do just fine if I stop, too.

So I bought a 20-pound back of bird seed for $15. On with the show.

September 30th is the birthday

… of Deborah Kerr. The six-time Oscar nominee for best actress is 86 today — among the nominations: The King and I, From Here to Eternity and The Sundowners.

… of Elie Wiesel, 79. The Writer’s Almanac has background.

… of Angie Dickinson. “Pepper” is 76 today.

… of Johnny Mathis. Chances are the singer is 72 today.

… of Barry Williams. Greg Brady is 53 today.

… of Fran Drescher, 50. (Only 50?)

… of Dharma. Jenna Elfman is 36.

Truman Capote was born in New Orleans on this date in 1924. The Writer’s Almanac has a couple of paragraphs on Capote. The New York Times has his obituary from 1984.

James Dean was killed on this date 52 years ago at the junction of California Highways 41 and 46. He was 24.

[Dean] and his mechanic, Rolf Wuetherich, were traveling in Dean’s new Porsche Spyder 550, which he planned to race that afternoon in Salinas. Dean had traded in his Porsche Speedster just nine days earlier, purchasing the Spyder for $6,900 and naming it “Little Bastard.”

From JamesDean.com.

NewMexiKen’s very own grandfather was born in Alvord, Texas, on this date in 1881. He died before I was born, but I met his mother, my great-grandmother, when I was a small child. She was not quite 16 when my grandfather was born; she was 87 when I met her (and lived to be 93).

Britain and Germany Make Anti-War Pact

From The New York Times, reporting on an event of September 30, 1938:

Prime Minister Chamberlain and Chancellor Hitler, at a final conference at Munich yesterday, agreed that: “We regard the agreement signed last night and the Anglo- German naval agreement as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again.” Terms imposed on Czechoslovakia were found to be milder than Hitler’s Godesberg plan. They provided immediate occupation of about half of the Sudeten area, the rest to be allotted by the International Commission or to be subject to plebiscite.

Keeping things in proportion

EUGENE, Ore. — One of the first people in the press box today was the Pac-10 Commissioner, Tom Hansen.

Two weeks ago in Gainesville, I sat next to SEC Commissioner Mike Slive at the Florida-Tennessee game. He’d taken a private plane in from Birmingham that morning and gotten a police escort to the stadium. Hansen?

“My private jet is called Southwest,” he said with a smile.

The Quad

This week’s New Yorker

A quick look at health-care politics from Hendrik Hertzberg in The New Yorker. It wouldn’t take you long to click and read it all, but NewMexiKen liked this summary:

Our health-care system has continued to deteriorate. We spend twice as much as the French and the Germans and two and a half times as much as the Brits, yet we die sooner and our babies die in greater numbers. Thirty-eight million Americans were uninsured in 2000; now it’s forty-seven million. Employer-based health insurance is increasingly expensive, stingy, and iffy. Companies, especially manufacturing companies, are beginning to realize that being deputized to pay the health-care costs of their employees and retirees puts them at a competitive disadvantage in the global economy.

Whether change comes will depend entirely on the next election. If a Democrat wins the Presidency after outlining his or her intentions as specifically as the leading contenders have done, and if the Democrats substantially increase their congressional majorities, then it will happen. If they don’t, it won’t.

Elsewhere in the magazine, Louis Menand has an informative essay about Jack Kerouac and On the Road (50 years old this year): Drive, He Wrote.

And I liked the lead from Anthony Lane’s review of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford:

“It is no mean feat to make a boring film about Jesse James, but Andrew Dominik has pulled it off in style.”

Away from Her

NewMexiKen recommends you see the film Away From Her starring Julie Christie, Gordon Pinsent and Olympia Dukakis. The film was released last year and is available on DVD. It’s an adaptation from Alice Munro’s short story “The Bear Came Over the Mountain.”

In its way it’s the most depressing film I’ve ever seen, yet strangely redeeming — and valuable for what you might learn. I wish I had seen it five years ago; I would have understood my dad’s reaction to the death of my stepmother better, if nothing else.

Life is so f***in’ perverse.

Update: Munro’s story is online — The Bear Came Over the Mountain.

Stupidest line of the day, so far

“I’m pretty sure there will be duck hunting in heaven and I can’t wait.”

Governor Mike Huckabee to the NRA

(Jon Stewart responded to the clip with: “Governor are you saying that our heaven is duck hell?”)

Or how about John McCain when asked whether he thought the Constitution established a Christian nation.

“I would probably have to say yes, that the Constitution established the United States of America as a Christian nation.”

These guys aren’t presidential. They all act like puppies desperate to have their ears scratched.

September 29th

Goodness gracious, great balls of fire, Jerry Lee Lewis is 72 today.

Ian McShane is 65. Big party at the Gem. (McShane played the c***s**k** Al Swearengen on Deadwood.)

Bryant Gumbel is 59.

Gene Autry was born in Tioga, Texas, on this date 100 years ago today. The following is from the biography at the Official Website for Gene Autry:

Discovered by humorist Will Rogers, in 1929 Autry was billed as “Oklahoma’s Yodeling Cowboy” at KVOO in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He gained a popular following, a recording contract with Columbia Records in 1929, and soon after, performed on the “National Barn Dance” for radio station WLS in Chicago. Autry first appeared on screen in 1934 and up to 1953 popularized the musical Western and starred in 93 feature films. In 1940 theater exhibitors of America voted Autry the fourth biggest box office attraction, behind Mickey Rooney, Clark Gable, and Spencer Tracy.

Autry made 635 recordings, including more than 300 songs written or co-written by him. His records sold more than 100 million copies and he has more than a dozen gold and platinum records, including the first record ever certified gold [That Silver-Haired Daddy of Mine]. His Christmas and children’s records Here Comes Santa Claus and Peter Cottontail are among his platinum recordings. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, the second all-time best selling Christmas single, boasts in excess of 30 million in sales.

… Autry’s great love for baseball prompted him to acquire the American League California Angels in 1961. Active in Major League Baseball, Autry held the title of Vice President of the American League until his death [1998].

… Autry is the only entertainer to have five stars on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame, one each for radio, records, movies, television, and live performance including rodeo and theater appearances.

Autry’s Melody Ranch radio show aired from 1940 to 1956. His television program from 1950 through 1955 (91 episodes), and long after in syndication.

According to The Writer’s Almanac and others, Miguel de Cervantes may have been born on this date in 1547.

Tough Love

This is a NewMexiKen perennial and today is the day.

Dear Abby,

I recently read your column advising grandparents on “tough love” for grandparents to give misbehaving grandchildren, whose own parents let them run wild. I have followed your advice, and enclosed a picture demonstrating my technique when my grandson just won’t behave while I’m babysitting for his parents. They have told me not to spank him, so I just take him for a ride, and he usually calms down afterward.

Sign me,
Tough Love Grandpa

Best simple answer today, so far

Everybody’s asking today, “Why are the Republican front runners skipping all the debates sponsored by racial and ethnic minorities? That just doesn’t seem smart.” I think people just don’t want to admit the obvious:

The Republicans are the party of racists.

Digby

Meanwhile the Democrats are the party of idiots.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton said Friday that every child born in the United States should get a $5,000 “baby bond” from the government to help pay for future costs of college or buying a home.

The Associated Press

Let’s borrow even more money — but this time we’ll give it to the poor saps that have to pay it back, the newborns. As Functional Ambivalent points out, what has she been smoking?