The Press

Those that can’t… consult

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Periodically I can’t resist poking fun at “traditional” journalism, where they take a simple thesis, “humanize” it with an interview of example, and then roll to a simple conclusion. The conclusion is often driven by the all-too linear narrator, who tells a story that is supplanted by corroborating facts.

In the usually-vapid managing your career section in the WSJ (these sections are much less illuminating than their hard-news elements) a recent article was titled “How one executive used a sabbatical to fix his career“.

While the article ostensibly showed the linear story of a person who was 1) having a hard time with their career 2) took a sabbatical 3) then performed better, the real story “behind the scenes” was much more interesting. Let’s review…

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Selected 2007 Posts, Part 2

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On Tuesday, I posted a selection of my posts from 2007, encompassing the categories Education, Management/Leadership/Business, and Markets/International Trade. Here are the other categories, which are Policy/Politics, Media/Blogging, History, Thought Processes & Fallacies, and Books/Photography/Recordings.

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CNBC Has Competition

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It’s about time. CNBC is maddeningly journalistic rather than business-oriented in its style, and its news coverage and program selections are shot through with leftist, anti-business bias. You would think that a network devoted to markets and business would be run by people who actually know something about markets and business. Instead we get hot babes and snarky voiceover “analysis” from j-school hipsters who have all the elitist and group-thinking instincts of modern professional journalists. What a herd. Every once in a while they stumble onto something good and unique but not PC, like Kudlow or the WSJ editors’ show, but then they try to kill it by changing its scheduling and promoting the conventional-wisdom news show or screaming-asshole trading show of the moment in its place.

Finally, they are going to have real competition. This will benefit everyone other than CNBC’s owners and staff.

A Great Journalist / Writer – Michael Lewis

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Recently on my travels to and from San Diego I had a few hours of uninterrupted time and I chose to read some interesting paperbacks. I usually pick something like a business book or a military history book but this time I decided to liven it up a bit and pick two books by Michael Lewis, one titled “Moneyball” about baseball and “The Blind Side” about football.

I remembered Michael Lewis from reading “Liar’s Poker” in the 90’s about Salomon Brothers, the famous trading firm. The name of the book was from a game that traders would play involving betting on the digits on US currencies, a game that could be played for big stakes.

Liar’s Poker is a fascinating book about a period of time when Salomon was essentially the “king of the world” to borrow a phrase from the highest grossing movie ever. If you are interested in what is happening in the sub-prime market with collateralized debt obligations (CDO’s) or the “securitization” of debt this is a great place to start since Salomon basically invented and popularized the practice for home mortgages.

One interesting element of the book is that Michael Lewis actually was a bond salesman in real life, and this enabled his book to be far more “real” than it would be if written in an interview type format. This was his first book; I think at the time he started out planning to get into finance and then decided to write a book; in retrospect you could also see him going into this business as a writing opportunity. To contrast this with other journalists that we take swipes at from time to time, Lewis clearly understood his material as only a true “insider” could.

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Nuclear Power and The Chicago Tribune

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On the editorial page of the Chicago Tribune they recently wrote an article titled “Restored Faith In Nuclear Power”. This article summarizes the recent earthquake in Japan and the fact that it occurred right under a nuclear plant. Even though the plant wasn’t rated to support an earthquake, it withstood a 6.8 magnitude earthquake with only minor damage and no radiation leakage.

Next, the article talks about the fact that there is some nuclear construction occurring in the US. They cite the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and the fact that they restarted the Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant in mid-May 2007 after a $1.8 billion effort, which took 5 years. Other nuclear plants on the drawing board are supposedly reducing the licensing frame to four years and construction to three years, meaning that nuclear plants could come online in seven years.

The article also mentions that the UN report on global warming mentioned that nuclear power had to be part of the mix alongside wind and renewable resources to reduce global warming. Thus, they conclude, the US can have faith in nuclear power, and left the feeling that in fact more nuclear power is on the way.

While I personally believe that nuclear power IS an essential part of our energy portfolio and that encouraging nuclear power is good for the country and our balance of trade, I think that this editorial is way too optimistic and there in fact is little hope of a nuclear power revival in the US.

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