Snipets and Snipes

This weeks post is a bit disjointed, as that is how I am feeling and how the world appears to be right now. Yet there is always sinew, some type of connectivity… the trick is to puzzle it out.

The chorus harmonizes the economy is “fine”,but is offset by the falling stock market, a barrel of oil costing$100.00+, new home sales fell to the slowest pace in 13 years, with the median price of that home dropping to a 3 year low. “Stagflation”, that deadly mix of high prices rising at the fastest pace in a quarter century as the economy loses steam is at the door, if not already knowing at your leg. Nervous shoppers gave retailers the worst January in almost 3 decades, high food prices, the credit crunch all contributed to low sales and drove employers to cut jobs~ the first nationwide job loss in 4 years. However, the economy is nothing if not unpredictable and that $600 check will soon be in our collective hands. With that and the *sarcasm note* leadership of President Bush, who recently remarked, “Gas is almost $4.00 a gallon? That’s interesting, I didn’t know that”, we will pull through. That and as my friend, as economically savvy as the next person ,says the 79 cent menu at Taco Bell apparently worries no one but herself and me. Clues or bread crumbs anyone?

I caught an excellent Independent Lens the other night, “Hard Road Home” here and here is Exodus web site about the movie. A inspiring look at a ex-con, Julio Medina, who has changed not only his life but has developed a program to help others change theirs. It was a timely piece because approximately 1 in 100 Americans are incarcerated as I write these words, and the rate is that four out of every 10 will go back to prison. A complex mix of social societal problems contributes to that rate, and while Exodus is still working on tracking to create a database, early figures show their rate is half that. “We’ve locked up more people in this country than any other country. Obviously, the approach is not working… We try to tell people that this is not the Promised Land. You’re now in the wilderness, man.” -Julio Medina, executive director of Exodus Transitional Community. More clues…

We talk a lot about personal responsibility, think it highly important, yet in 2007 Ford had to recall some 3 million cars, vans, SUV’s, and trucks due to a cruise control switch default that causes engine fires. The same switch led to a previous recall of about 6 billion vehicles in January of 2005.The recall concerns 12 models built from 1992 to 2004~tha is 12 years of recalls due to a switch. I can only assume corporate responsibility is slow in coming, if at all. Does this have an effect on our economy? Seeing a vague breadcrumb trail yet?

On the personal responsibility front, I note that the American worker is warned this week about using work email for personal reasons, and that such use can get you fired. Nonetheless, the Vice President has “lost” the emails Congress subpoenaed. Yet tech folks will tell you all emails are still out there somewhere~ kind of like the truth…*brushes some more crumbs from my chest*…

The last word today is empathy: try to see your polar opposite as a human being, much like you in many ways. It may just help, and perhaps together we can follow that breadcrumb trail out the rabbit hole.