2008-09-27

Obama's to Lose

0 comments



As a biased Obama supporter, I realize that my opinion is subject to scrutiny. However this graph from Pollster.com reveals the truth that McCain has only led Obama twice in the national polls. A fact which may come as a shock for anyone who firmly believes that Obama is a Muslim, the Anti-Christ, a typical "tax and spend" liberal, a celebrity, etc...

The first lead came in March thanks to constant scrutiny by the press over the Reverend Wright issue, and the second of course came briefly thanks to Governor Palin's nomination to the ticket (someone who even conservatives seem to now be running from). What this tells me is that this race is now firmly back in Obama's hands, and is essentially his to lose. Friday's debate therefore, no matter how you scored it, will most likely do nothing more than be used as fodder for future campaign commercials.

UPDATE: I wrote that last sentence while watching the debates on Friday. Then today, John McCain gives us this head-scratcher. The problem that the McCain campaign will have to deal with however is that America seems to disagree with his tactic (or is it a strategy?).

2008-09-25

"Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life. " - Berthold Auerbach

4 comments


With the increasingly dour news coming out of Washington today, I needed something music related to clear the mind. A mind laxative if you will. Plus, Chris’ eloquent post a couple months ago detailing the brilliance of Lil Wayne, inspired me to take a stab at creating a music post of my own. We'll call these the "OSS September Music Awards" or OSSSMAA for short.
Best chance at following Vampire Weekend’s meteoric rise through the blogosphere:

Best (and most confusing) trend in music:
Beach Boys envy
Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal
Panda Bear - Comfy in Nautica


Beach Boys - Don't Worry Baby


Best music search tool you don’t have yet:

Best online music promo:
Emusic (leave your email address in the comments section and I'll refer you... it's a win-win)

Best album receiving a 3.8 rating by Pitchfork:
Kings of Leon – Only by the Night

Best chance at alienating their fan base thanks to their most recent turd sandwich album:
My Morning Jacket – Evil Urges (just try and get through "Highly Suspicious")


Best album of 2008 that has no chance of winning an Album of the Year award:
TV on the Radio - Dear Science


UPDATE: I had the Young Coyotes video posted twice, and forgot to include the Panda Bear video. My apologies.

2008-09-22

A Blogger’s Manifesto

1 comments

Back in July I decided to start a blog... clearly. What may not be as clear is that it was a decision driven primarily by the realization that the right side of my brain had begun to atrophy after 3 years working as a CPA. Since then the response can perhaps best be described as irrationally exuberant, as friends begin to find this site and most begin to wonder why someone with a 9 – 5 job (or 8 – 8 as the case may be) would decide to undertake something so personal and potentially time consuming. I mean we all work enough as it is, right? Still others have asked what I possibly hoped to accomplish in the few hours a week that I could conceivably hope to devote to the site. To answer all that requires an exploration of a word that I have always sought to avoid; passion.

Who am I?
I have previously provided a more thoroughly ridiculous answer to that question here , however I will only further add that I would characterize myself as someone who is continually overwhelmed by what is required of my time, yet someone who actively seeks to carve out time for the real passions of my life. The concept of passion has always frustrated me though. I don’t know if it’s because I have never been absolutely sure what my passions were or simply my unwillingness to repeat the all too common responses of “people” or “new experiences”. What I do believe however is that not having an answer to that question has led me down the path of least resistance, and plopped me down smack dap in the middle of Corporate America.

Passion, in my opinion, is the ethos of high school or college thanks in part to a plethora of new and exciting experiences which virtually define that chapter of our lives. However once graduation passes and the excitement of starting your first job begins to wane, the reality of the working world is left in its wake. A reality that for many, leads to a near state of depression as a result of a job that they either don’t enjoy, or a career in which they feel trapped.

This realization led me to conduct a case study whereby I tested the correlation between a person’s happiness and their work experience. This study was performed on my immediate group of friends, and the results ended up looking identical to a demand curve (i.e. as you increase the number of years at a specific job, inevitably demand for that job decreases). What's worse is that it took on average two years for someone to go from day 1 at their first job to beginning the process of looking for another one. Business owners take note.

So what does this mean to someone still at the very beginnings of what some experts have described as a “Career destined for greatness” (ok maybe only I say that)? It means that it should come as no surprise that the #1 casualty of starting out in the working world is losing the passion which defined our lives up to that point. A truth that is further exacerbated if our paths were set without fully considering the consequences of where we would ultimately end up. It seems that the financially secure path, may in fact end up costing more in the end.

Why “One Stop Schop”

“For every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.”
- Arthur Schopenhauer

A quick background story about the origins of this site begins when I finally decided to take the leap into the highly intellectual (debatable I know) world of blogging. The bug first bit me after reading Bill Simmons’ marathon pop culture and sports related posts (still convinced he has one of the best jobs around) and Andrew Sullivan’s professionally crafted political commentary. But it wasn’t until I found sites like Tech Crunch, AVC, TedTalks (the #1 Podcast hands down), etc… however that I decided I needed a place to track my thoughts. Currently, as my friends and family love to point out, politics seems to consume much of my conversations outside of work, yet my passions extend well beyond the realm of whether or not Obama is elected in November. Although I do apologize if the focus of this blog is severely skewed in one direction until the election is over, especially since “free time” has gone the way of the condor with increased demands at work, planning a wedding, playing in a city softball league, and various other "important" tasks on my plate.

The first hurdle I had to clear, once the decision was made, was the obvious; what word or phrase could possibly convey all the thoughts that were swirling around in my head? The site I wanted to create would link / comment on news varying in degree from what new start-up Union Square is backing, to what is currently consuming Matt Chandler’s (my Pastor) thoughts and prayers, to what music the good folks here, here, and here are listening to.

Through that brain-storming session, I came upon hurdle #2; Google Blogger is free. Now don’t get me wrong, I love things that are free. Free is almost always the preferable choice. The unfortunate truth about “free” in the context of blogging though is that it creates a world with no personal incentives. In fact I challenge any of you to type:

http://(insert_witty_phrases_here).blogspot.com/

See how long it takes before you find an unclaimed site. It's ridiculous.

The more I thought about a concept however, the more I kept coming back to my original idea of creating a site that encompasses the multitude and diversity of my pursuits… a “one stop shop” if you will (also taken). I then came across the Schopenhauer quote above which fit nicely into the theme and thus the title "The One Stop Schop" (for “Schop”enhauer) was born.

My fiancĂ© gives me a hard time about my many theories on life, but one such theory (we’ll call it The I'm Right, Your Wrong Theory) is that each of us continually operates under the assumption that we are 100% justified in our actions, while others are not. A belief innocent enough in a vacuum, yet one that poses intense problems when confronted by another opposing set of beliefs (i.e. my continual bout with road rage) . If this is the result of living in a free-market society that preaches the value of pursuing one’s own self-interest or simply human nature, I’m not sure, but what I do know is that we all too often fail to see the inherent limitations created by our own lack of understanding.

Enough Already!
Ok so while some people believe that the purpose of blogging is to reap various physiological benefits, the purpose of this site will ultimately be to start a conversation of sorts with whoever chooses to join in (anyone... anyone... Bueller...?). A conversation that despite being framed by the contributors of this site, will be one that continually entertains, challenges, and occasionally enlightens (though highly doubtful) everyone who decides to listen in and occasionally partake.

However, due to the aforementioned constraints on both my time and intellectual aptitude, this blog will never portend (SAT word of the day) to provide any expert opinions. Because quite frankly, opinions are overrated and everybody’s got one. Or as Andy Swan eloquently points out, “Information used to be power. Now it is pedestrian.” Google it seems is the great equalizer.

Welcome and enjoy!
Mike

2008-09-04

Indecision 2008: Oh the Irony

0 comments

Labels

12 Days of Christmas (3) 2008 Olympics (2) 2008 Presidential Election (2) 2012 Presidential Election (1) A Christmas Carol (2) A Christmas Story (1) Acumen Fund (1) Adventures in Niche Blogging (2) advertising (1) Afghanistan (3) Africa (1) AIG (1) alabama (1) Amazon Affiliate Program (1) American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (1) Anger (1) Apartment Locator (1) Apology (1) Apple (1) art (1) Ash Wednesday (1) atul gawande (1) Auto-Tune (2) awesome break (1) awesomeness (1) backwards hats (1) Balanced Budget (1) Bank Lending (1) Barack Obama (9) Barack Obama Newspaper Headlines (1) Barcadia (1) Barry Ritholtz (2) Bastille Day (1) Big 12 Controversy (1) Big 3 Bailout (1) Big Picture (1) Bikers (1) Bill Gates (1) birthday (2) blackberry (1) blake (17) Blog Action Day (1) Boing Boing (1) Bon Iver (1) Book of the Month (1) Books (1) Breast cancer (1) British Psychological Society (1) Brookings Institution (1) BTHO McCain (1) BTHO Obama (1) Bush Legacy (1) Business (1) Carlos Santana (1) Champs-Élysées (1) Charitable Giving (1) Charles Dickens (1) Chart of the Day (1) Chartible Contributions (1) Child Poverty Rate (1) China (1) Chris (10) Christianity (1) Christmas (2) CNBC (1) Coal Vines (1) College Football (1) College Station Texas (1) Comics (1) Congress (1) Congressional Budget Office (1) Conservapedia (1) Conservative (2) Consulting (1) Corn (1) Credit default swap (1) cross country (1) Curious Case of Benjamin Button (1) D.O.A. (1) Daily Show (1) Dallas (13) Dallas date night (1) Dallas Morning News (1) Dan Pink (1) Dave Eggers (1) David after the dentist (1) David Dewhurst (1) David Faber (1) David Feherty (1) Death (1) Death of Auto-Tune (1) Debate (1) Deep Ellum (1) Deep Fried Butter (1) Deficit (2) Delivering Happiness (2) Dennis Lehane (1) Department of Education (1) DFW (1) diabetes (1) Dick Cheney (1) Dikembe Mutombo (1) Dilbert (1) Direct-loan (1) Diversity (1) Documentary (1) Donors Choose (1) Doonesbury (1) economic stimulus (1) economic stimulus plan (2) Economy (9) Education (1) england (1) Environment (1) Ezra Klein (4) F-22 Raptor (1) Fannie Mae (2) Farewell (1) Farm Bill (1) FAS (9) Fast Food (1) Federal Budget (1) Feist (1) Festivus (1) Filibuster (1) Fiscal policy (1) food fight (1) Food Stamps (1) France (3) Freddie Mac (1) Free Chick-fil-a (1) Ft Worth (1) Funny (1) games (1) Gary Becker (1) General Motors (1) George Packer (1) Giveaway (1) Glenn Beck (1) Goldman Sachs (1) good reads (3) GOP (1) Government spending (2) Greg Mankiw (2) Gross domestic product (1) Guantanamo Bay (1) Gulf of Mexico (1) Haiti (1) Hans Rosling (1) Happiness (1) Happy New Year (1) Hasselhoff (1) Health care (10) Health care reform (8) Health insurance (2) Heritage Foundation (1) Hipster (1) History of war (1) Holiday Shopping (1) holidays (2) Hot Chip (1) Hot N Cold (1) House of Cards (1) Human Development Index (1) Iliveindallas (1) Illegal immigration (1) Immigration reform (1) Inappropriate (1) Inauguration Day (4) Income tax (1) Independence Day (1) Indian Superman (1) Industrial Revolution (1) Inefficient (1) Inspiration (1) Insurance (1) Internal Revenue Service (1) iPhone 4 (1) Iran (1) Iraq (1) Iraq War (1) Israel (1) Israeli settlement (1) Jack Bauer (1) Jacqueline Novogratz (1) Jay-Z (1) jcvd (1) Jimmy Fallon (1) Jimmy Fallon's House Band (1) Joaquin Phoenix David Letterman (1) Job creation program (1) Job Market 2009 (1) John Cornyn (2) John McCain (1) Jon Stewart (1) Kaiser Family Foundation (1) Kaiser Permanente (1) Kanye West (2) Karl Rove (1) Kat Perry (1) Kristi (1) Laser Portraits (1) Late Night (1) Late Night with Conan O'Brien (1) Lee Harvey's (1) Lent (1) Liar's Poker (1) Life (1) Life expectancy (1) light show (1) lights (1) Lil' Wayne (3) Links (2) Lobbyists (1) Lonely Island (1) mad men (1) Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (1) Malcolm Gladwell (1) Malthusian Trap (1) Mashable (2) Matt Chandler (1) Matt Simmons $500 oil (1) Mayo Clinic (1) McAllen Texas (1) McCain (6) media (1) Medicaid (2) Medical malpractice (1) Medicare (4) Mergers and Acquisitions (1) metro (1) Michael Jackson (1) Michael Lewis (1) Microfinance (1) Mike (85) Military (1) Milton Bradley (1) Mint.com (1) Missional Giving (1) Missional Living (1) MIT (1) MIT Media Lab (1) Mitch Daniels (1) Moneyball (1) Morocco (1) Mother's Day (1) Motivation (1) MTV (1) Music (19) My life in a cube (1) My parents joined facebook (1) NBC (1) Netflix (1) New Firm Logos (1) New season 24 (1) New Year's Resolutions (2) NEXT Worldwide (1) NFL (1) NHS (1) Nobel Peace Prize (2) Non-profit (1) Non-profit organization (1) Norman Borlaug (1) Obama (7) Obamacare (1) Oil Spill (1) One Stop Schop (5) Open-source education (1) Outliers: The Story of Success (1) Palin (1) Pamplona (1) Pan-American Highway (1) Parenting Tip of the Day (2) Paris (3) Party Ideology and the rationalizing voter (1) Paste Magazine (1) Paul Krugman (1) Peak Oil Theory (1) Pearls Before Swine (1) Pell Grant (1) Pentagon (1) PEPFAR (1) Perspective (2) Philosophy (1) Pick of the Week (1) Place de la Concorde (1) Politics (13) Politifact (1) Polk (12) Popular Mechanics (1) Potbelly (1) Poverty (3) President Bush (1) President Obama's Secret Plan to Brainwash Our Children (1) President-Elect Barack Obama (1) Project Leper (1) projection art (1) prosumer report (1) Quality-adjusted life year (1) Racism (1) Rahm Emmanuel Ari Gold (1) Ralph Waldo Emerson (1) Random (2) Random Site of the Week (4) Rap (1) Rasmussen Reports (1) Religion and Spirituality (1) Rick Santelli (1) Road (1) Road traffic safety (1) robbery (1) Robert Gates (1) Ronald Reagan (1) Roy Blunt (1) SAME Cafe (1) Santa Clause (1) Santogold (1) Sarah Palin (1) Sarah Palin 2012 (1) Sean Hannity Freedom Concert Series (1) Shutter Island (1) Silver Star (1) Site of the Week (1) Slate (1) Social Security (1) SOTU (1) Special Forces (1) Spending (1) Sports (3) Sports Nutz (1) Stanley Hauerwas (1) Stock Market (2) StoryCorps (1) Success (1) Supreme Leader of Iran (1) T Boone Pickens (1) T. R. Reid (1) Taliban (1) Tax (1) Taxation (3) Taxpayer Receipt (1) Technology (2) TED Talks (3) Texas (1) Texas AM (1) Texas AM Football (1) Texas Department of Transportation (1) Texas Government (1) Texas State Board of Education (1) Texas State Fair (1) thailand (1) Thanksgiving (1) The 2009 Stimulus Bill (1) The Big Lebowski (1) The Big Picture (1) The Blue Sweater: Bridging the Gap Between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World (1) The Credit Crisis (3) The Daily Show (1) The Daily What (1) The Decembrists (1) The Economist (2) The GAP (1) The Healing of America (1) The Laux Family (1) The Perfect Honeymoon (1) The Roots (1) The Schop Ten (1) The Village Church (1) The Wire (1) The Woodlands (1) This is Indexed (1) Time Magazine (1) TJ Lavin (1) Tony Hsieh (2) Top 5 Christmas Specials (1) Top Golf (1) Top Post (8) Tort reform (1) Torture (2) Torture Memo (1) Tour de France (1) track (1) Travel (4) Travel and Leisure (1) trends (1) Troubled Asset Relief Program (1) TSA (1) Tulsa Oklahoma (1) Unemployment (1) Unemployment Insurance (1) United States (3) United States Presidential approval rating (1) United States Senate (1) Universal health care (1) University of Texas (1) Unnecessary Quotes (1) Utz Potato Chip (1) Venture Capital (1) Video (10) Video Clip of the Week (5) Videre (1) Vietnam (1) Vimeo (1) Waiting for Superman (1) Wall Street (1) We Are Hunted (1) Wedding (1) Weekend Update (1) Welfare (1) What Is the What: The Autobiography of Valentino Achak Deng (1) Williams Shakespeare (1) Winner (1) Woodall Rodgers Park (1) Wordle (1) world diabetes day (1) Worst Commerical of 2009 (1) Ying Yang Twins (1) You Rent We Split (2) YouTube (1) Zappos.com (1)
 

One Stop Schop. Copyright 2008 All Rights Reserved Revolution Two Church theme by Brian Gardner Converted into Blogger Template by Bloganol dot com | Distributed by Deluxe Templates