29 Aug 2008

Posted at 16:36h in The Friday Brief by
The nineteenth century French writer Alphonse Karr is credited for our title. Perhaps a better way to express the sentiment comes from Ecclesiastes; “what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.” As Democrats bask in the afterglow of an Olympian-like celebration of their hero and his landmark speech, and Republicans get ready for their similar week of bashing and promising things sound the same to this writer. If this country was truly interested in alternative energy we would have found a way to harness the wasted, endlessly renewable, gas from political conventions long ago.

15 Aug 2008

Posted at 16:49h in The Friday Brief by
The summer of ‘08 has been anything but a typical lazy, quiet break from an otherwise frenetic calendar. Global equity markets dropped like October meteors in July; oil and gasoline prices exploded past record highs as the summer driving vacation season approached; record levels of rainfall in the mid-west sent the mighty Mississippi River pouring over thousands of acres of rich farmland, destroying much of the nation’s bread basket; thousands of Americans have lost or are near losing their homes to foreclosure; China puts its best national face on for the rest of the world as they host the 2008 Summer Olympics – a time for peace and international friendship, and two Russian and Georgian women hug during their medal ceremony as their countrymen kill one another.

15 Aug 2008

Posted at 14:31h in The Friday Brief by
The summer of ‘08 has been anything but a typical lazy, quiet break from an otherwise frenetic calendar. Global equity markets dropped like October meteors in July; oil and gasoline prices exploded past record highs as the summer driving vacation season approached; record levels of rainfall in the mid-west sent the mighty Mississippi River pouring over thousands of acres of rich farmland, destroying much of the nation’s bread basket; thousands of Americans have lost or are near losing their homes to foreclosure; China puts its best national face on for the rest of the world as they host the 2008 Summer Olympics – a time for peace and international friendship, and two Russian and Georgian women hug during their medal ceremony as their countrymen kill one another.

08 Aug 2008

Posted at 15:08h in The Friday Brief by
Oil is dropping like arock. It stands at $117.42 a barrel in New York, 20% below its record high of $147.27 reached July11th. Copper heads for its biggest weekly drop since March and down 12% since June. The dollar is climbing to a five?month high against the Euro putting further pressure on oil and other commodities. And gold fell to an eight?week low in London on speculation that dollar gains will spur gold sales by investors who bought the metal as a hedge against a sinking dollar.