You may be tempted to laugh at this photo, but you'd better think twice. Richard Simmons is taking on Ultimate Fighters now.


Further to my insane Right Wing ramblings in a recent post, here is an excellent commentary by James Lileks on those who protested the one year anniversary of the liberation of Iraq this week. Definitely worth a read.

For those of you who are hip to the New York City rock scene (Hives, Strokes, White Stripes (yes Jay, I know they are from Detroit, but its the same damn thing)) you should also check out Interpol (lyrics to "NYC" posted below) and The Walkmen on your favorite file sharing site.

I had seven faces,
Thought I new which one to wear,
But I'm sick of spending these lonely nights
Training myself not to care.
The subway is a porno.
The pavements they are a mess.
I know you've supported me for a long time,
Somehow I'm not impressed.

But New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)

The subway she is a porno.
The pavements they are a mess.
I know you've supported me for a long time,
Somehow I'm not impressed.

It is up to me now, turn on the bright lights...

But New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)
But New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)
New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)
New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)

had seven faces,
Thought I new which one to wear,
But I'm sick of spending these lonely nights
Training myself not to care.
The subway is a porno.
The pavements they are a mess.
I know you've supported me for a long time,
Somehow I'm not impressed.

But New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)

The subway she is a porno.
The pavements they are a mess.
I know you've supported me for a long time,
Somehow I'm not impressed.

It is up to me now, turn on the bright lights...

But New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)
But New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)
New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)
New York cares (Got to be some more change in my life)

I got into a scrape today with a militant Starbucks employee. Today their coffee of the day was what they call "fair trade" certified. My comment to him was that if Starbucks really wanted to make a positive impact their coffee should be free trade certified. This touched off a debate during which he may or may not have spat in my coffee. My main point was only that if the coffee did not have to be fair trade certified (whatever that means exactly) it would presumably be cheaper. Starbucks would therefore be able to buy more of it, which would increase the overall wealth of our hard working Central American coffee producing friends. Buying less at an artificially inflated price does a disservice to both the buyers and the sellers (taken as a whole). I did not, at any point, bring up the fact that I am presently studying economics at the Masters Level and he is presently working at Starbucks. Even so, he was having none of it, insisting instead that greedy, rich, capitalists were the reason coffee growers lived in poverty.

The Economist says it better in this article from last week. Here is an excerpt, but I urge you to read the entire thing:

But goods and services are not just lying around waiting to be grabbed by the greediest or most muscular countries. Market economics is not a zero-sum game. America consumes $10 trillion worth of goods and services each year because it produces (not counting the current-account deficit of 5% or so of the total) $10 trillion of goods and services each year. Africa could produce and consume a lot more without America producing and consuming one jot less. It so happens that the case for more aid, provided of course that it is well spent, is strong—but the industrialised countries do not need to become any less rich before Africa can become a lot less poor. The wealth of the wealthy is not part of the problem.

To believe otherwise, however, is very much part of the problem. For much of the 20th century the developing countries were held back by an adapted socialist ideology that put global injustice, inequality and victimhood front and centre. Guided by this ideology, governments relied on planning, state monopolies, punitive taxes, grandiose programmes of public spending, and all the other apparatus of applied economic justice. They also repudiated liberal international trade, because the terms of global commerce were deemed exploitative and unfair. Concessions (that is, permission to retain trade barriers) were sought and granted in successive negotiating rounds of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. A kind of equity was thus deemed to have been achieved. The only drawback was that the countries stayed poor.

Towards the end of the century, many developing countries—China and India among them—finally threw off this victim's mantle and began to embrace wicked capitalism, both in the way they organised their domestic economies and in their approach to international trade. All of a sudden, they are a lot less poor, and it hasn't cost the West a cent. In Africa, too, minds are now changing, but far more slowly. Perhaps that has something to do with the chorus that goes up from Africa's supposed friends in the West, telling the region that its plight is all the fault of global inequality, “unfair trade” and an intrinsically unjust market system.

Is it possible I'm starting to take this MBA thing waaaaay too seriously?

At Rotman this week we began the Integrative Management Challenge. The IMC stretches through the fourth quarter of first year right through to the end of the program. The premise is that teams of four compete against each other in guiding a company through a complex business simulation. Each team is responsible for all the decisions of the firm, and is accountable to a real-life board of directors, made up of business leaders and Rotman alum for their performance. Our labour contracts will be negotiated with actual union negotiators and we will produce our own strategy, marketing and operations plans to maximize profits over a simulated 3 year period. The IMC finally gives us a chance to integrate everything we have been studing in first year, and its another chance to do what people here at Rotman do best - compete with each other. Our first task this week is to go through the complicated and highly policital process of picking our teams. Those who are interested can find out more about the IMC via the link.

One more Rotman-related note today. This business school is Messenger nation. It's all about continuous connectivity. These people have it on all the time, even in class. They have 100+ people on their buddy list, and if you are in a study group, you are expected to be available on Messenger pretty much 24-7. "Hey Don, I couldn't get you on Messenger at 11:00 last Friday night, what was up?" "I was drunk."

Well, Steve Moore finally got what he had coming to him last night. In retrospect, I should have known trouble was brewing. When I sent my TAML intern to Vancouver to interview the Canuck tough guys last week about possible retribution against Moore the conversation went like this:
TAML: So any plans in the works for Moore?
Brookbank: It was not necessary to lay a concussion on Markus. Out on the ice Monday, I could get upset. Things could get out of hand. Then in self defense, I could do something to you that he will not like, right there.
TAML: Oookay... Mr. May?
May: Every man! Every man has to go through hell to reach paradise.
TAML: What do you mean by that?
Bertuzzi: (Grabs the microphone) He's gonna learn about loss. (Walks away)

Now Moore, of course, got more than he deserved, but that's only because Bertuzzi hurt him much worse than he intended. But Moore had to expect something to happen to him. You can't just put the leading scorer in the NHL on the shelf with a cheap shot and not expect a reaction.

The good news is Bertuzzi has agreed to come to Toronto and hang out with me to ride out his suspension and wait for the heat from the police investigation to die down. Thursday night we're going to get some Colonel Chicken and some Heineken brew. Then we'll watch Survivor All-Stars and the Canuck game on TV. I've got the fold out all set up for him.