Ward on Words

My son turned nine yesterday. He is my first-born; his birth nine years ago signified that precise moment when I became, like all parents, equally connected to the past and future. As a parent, I pass on the lessons I've learned through my life experiences to my children, who (one hopes) will use them as guideposts as they move forward to inhabit the future. The end of this dreadful year leaves me feeling melancholy, and it is my role as a parent that worries me most. I know that I will at some point have to answer to my children - I will have to explain how we took astronomical surpluses and made them vanish – poof – like Harry Potter vanishes when he drapes his invisibility cloak over himself. Of course, Harry reappears the moment he takes the cloak off. Our federal surplus, however, has vanished – and our children will be paying down this debt for many years to come. I'll have to explain to my children how a president who coined the phrase "compassionate conse...

In a day that brought us the news that banks who got billions in the bailout aren't keeping track of their money, here's a story about the kind of wealth that springs from generosity. To me, this story in today's NY Times exemplifies the true spirit of Christmas: It's about a successful businessman who never sought credit for helping others during the Great Depression. He instead believed his generosity toward others was simply "the debt we owe one another and ourselves." A wonderful sentiment, then and now.

Christmas is here with a vengeance and with it, the annual denunciations of It’s A Wonderful Life , a movie that wound its way into the cultural slipstream in the early 1980s and has never left it. This year’s popular denunciation can be found here in the NY Times. It’s a great review by Wendell Jamieson, who calls the film a “terrifying, asphyxiating story about growing up and relinquishing your dreams, of seeing your father driven to the grave before his time, of living among bitter, small-minded people. It’s a story of being trapped, of compromising, of watching others move ahead and away….” When reading this, I thought to myself that Jamieson is spot on – It’s a Wonderful Life truly is a dark and foreboding film, though remarkably uplifting at the end. To me, it’s a tribute to the filmmakers that a film about the relinquishment of dreams can provide such inspiration and hope. Jamieson also thinks that Pottersville, with its strip joints and gambling halls, would not on...

The mother of the father of Bristol Palin's illegitmate baby was arrested today on drug charges. Also today, Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich quoted Kipling while notifying Illinois residents that he will fight these needless corruption charges until his dying breath. Christmas – and all the marvelous spirituality that comes with it – is in less than a week. Sometimes it is hard, as Kipling said, "to keep your head when all about you are losing theirs...."

Last week, when the world was abuzz over the expletive-laden discourse Rod Blagojevich had engaged in over a vacant U.S. senate seat, a terrifying news story happened concurrently that was relegated to the sidelines, if noted at all by the news media. I’m talking about the release of the first Congressional Oversight Panel (COP) for Economic Stabilization. You can download the report here . The COP report opens immediately with the acknowledgement that the four members of the panel are not necessarily working in sync. And you don’t have to get far into the report to come to that conclusion: on page two of the report, it’s clear that Representative Jeb Hensarling (R-Dallas) does not approve of this report. In a press release filled with vagueness, Hensarling tries to explain his opposition to the report. He states his goal is “to do whatever I can to ensure that [TARP] works.” And right now, the action he is taking is to vote against the first COP report. I read his brief...

Who knew that getting a seasonal job at Best Buy would be harder than getting into Harvard? According to a story on NPR today, more than one million people applied for 24,000 seasonal jobs this year at Best Buy. That's 40 applicants vying for each job. By contrast, in spring of 2008, Harvard had received approximately 27,000 applicants for almost 2000 spots, which translates into roughly 13 applicants for every student admitted.* You can listen to NPR's story here . And you can read about Harvard's applicant pool here . *Math skills highly questionable, due to lifelong interest in language arts. Apologize in advance if ratio is off in anyway.

I’m a dreamer – yes I am, a died-in-the-wool dreamer who dreams that liberty and justice and the American way mingle together in peaceful co-existence. But lately, as you can imagine, my dreams leave me with the strange, nightmare sensations of anxiety, panic and fear. I wake up these days realizing that what we're witnessing today is a total failure of leadership. We live in a society where we simply cannot trust bankers, mortgage brokers, priests, presidents, vice-presidents, the CIA, Treasury secretaries and governors. At least not the governors of Illinois. Especially not the current governor. Just last month – in fact, it was just the day after the celebratory send-off party in Grant Park for Barack Obama as he said good-bye to his senate seat and hello to the presidency – Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was recorded as saying, “I’ve got this thing and it’s f***ing golden, and uh, uh, I’m just not giving it up for f***in’ nothing. I’m not gonna do it. And, and I ...

At least I thought I voted for change, way back in 2002, when I cast my vote for Rod Blagojevich for governor. George Ryan, the Republican governor who preceded Blagojevich, had left office under a cloud of suspicion (sending millions of dollars in state contracts to friends and family, granting truck driver’s licenses to unqualified drivers in return for cash.) He now sits in jail, waiting patiently for the early release that Illinois Senator Dick Durbin inexplicably seeks for him. During his term as governor, Ryan had met with Fidel Castro and ended the death sentence in Illinois due to concerns that it was not administered fairly, an action led to his nomination for the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize. Yet he balanced a desire to help others with an insatiable greed. In 2006, he was convicted on multiple charges of corruption and has served less than two years of a six-year prison sentence. In 2002, Blagojevich charged into the governor’s office waving the flag of reform. Yesterday,...

‘Tis the season to bring love and joy into the world – and here’s one of the loveliest stories of the year… It’s a story that begins in October 2008, when the economy is in a state of collapse; the culture is in crisis, and faith in humanity – at least, my faith in humanity – is at an all-time low. It is precisely at this time that my next-door neighbor, Annie Jennings, comes home from high school bearing an orange rose. She presents this flower to her mother, Ellen, with the announcement that she is one of the “Sweet 16,” a member of Libertyville High School’s Homecoming Court. Annie is not quite 18 years old, a high school senior with stick-straight, sandy blond hair, glasses and a big smile. We hire her to feed our cat whenever we head out of town and we leave knowing our cat is in very good hands. So when I learn of her selection as a member of the homecoming court, I am intrigued. This is the girl who watches my cat, after all. Ellen is curious about what it means to...

We packed up the van and headed down to Springfield, Illinois to spend time with family over the Thanksgiving weekend.  My in-laws have a wonderful home that our children simply love to visit.  What makes a home?  The people who live in it, of course.  And certainly, the physical structure of a house is important.  Walls, roof, flooring, when put together in the right way, create a structure that provides shelter from the elements. For me, my home is my anchor.  It is the place where my life is lived, the place where my children are raised.  It is the place we, as a family, learn to love – and live – with each other.  When in Springfield last week, we drove by a home that has lost its mooring. It is called the Maisenbacher house - and it has recently become a homeless home.  By that, I mean the structure has been uprooted and now sits squarely in the middle of Jackson Street in downtown Springfield. Check it out: Through the illus...

The image of the Big Three CEOs flying their own private jets to D.C. (strange how the idea of jetpooling never crossed their minds) to beg for federal money somehow makes me think of an influential album released 40 years ago. I'm speaking of Beggars Banquet by the Stones. If there's any beggars attending any banquets, it would be CEOs who know how to beg for cash like the best of the bums. So with the image of fat cats sitting on leather seats in the privacy of their own jets in mind, let's take a look at how beggars fared at the banquet 40 years ago... The first thing you realize as you listen to the songs on the album is that Beggars Banquet is unbelievably timely, in spite of its age. It opens with a bang: Sympathy for the Devil , a song about Lucifer, the Devil, a song loaded with a history of violence and rage. It was a song played during their Altamount concert, where a man was stabbed after he had pulled out a gun (though not necessarily played at the ...

Oh to be a highly compensated Chrysler executive! You get to run your company into the ground, hold your hand out in the hopes it will be filled with government bailout money AND look forward to a big bonus at a time when everyone else is worried about hanging on to their job. According to this article in the Detroit Free Press, Chrysler plans to hand out $30 million in retention bonuses to its executives. And at least six Chrysler execs "are due to receive bonuses of more than $1 million a piece." As they move to line their pockets with millions, Chrysler executives are joining with Ford and GM leaders to ask the federal government for $25 billion in loans. Really? Seems that free markets are fab when you've got the feds to cover your losses. This I do know: when I buy my next car, it will not come from Detroit. Maybe the feds feel compelled to support failed business leadership - but I won't.

TARP:  A Word with Multiple Meanings In layman's terms, a tarp is a piece of material used to cover and protect exposed objects or areas. Here you see how my family employs a tarp to protect us from the elements during a camping trip. In the current language of American economics, TARP is the acronym for the federal government's Troubled Asset Relief Program, led by the brilliant investment banker, Henry Paulson, who now serves as the nation's Treasury Secretary.  TARP is the Fed's attempt to protect the nation from the collapse of our economy. TARP is also a shifting landscape – in a statement today, Paulson announced changes in how he wants to invest those billions of TARP-assigned tax dollars.  He's decided that purchasing illiquid mortgage-related assets is no longer "the most effective way to use TARP funds."  He's now looking at shoring up the consumer credit market (because consumers need more debt in their lives) and "exploring ...

In the early winter of 1918, after four years of a terrible war that destroyed much of Europe, the Allies and the Germans decided to stop hostilities on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month . That they could be so poetic in their timing of the cessation of battle, after years of the brutality and horror brought by World War I, is astonishing. The official end of World War I happened later, when the Treaty of Versailles was signed in June of 1919, but the day that marked the end of fighting was the day that President Wilson chose as Armistice Day, the national holiday to honor the soldiers who served in that war. Of course, the "war to end all wars" did nothing of the kind. As time went on, we added more wars to history, more heroes to be mourned and remembered. In 1954, after World War II and the Korean War, President Eisenhower changed Armistice Day into Veterans Day to honor the heroism of the veterans of all wars. War Stories My father was a veteran of the K...

They came with tables... They came with blankets... They came in droves... This was the scene you could find last Friday at Old Orchard mall in Skokie, Illinois.  And no - these are not Springsteen fans waiting in line to buy concert tix - these people are patiently waiting (some even pulling an all nighter in the chill of the midwestern winter) in the hopes of scoring L.L. Bean gift cards being given away as part of the grand opening celebration of the retailer's newest store.   The Motivation of Money While Volkswagen is hoping to lure consumers into showrooms with a strangely clever ad campaign , L.L. Bean is using one of the oldest promotions in the book - handing out money just for showing up.   In a time when economic news seems woefully bleak, the appeal of L.L. Bean gift cards was enormous, with a large crowd of people lining up for the opportunity to draw a card worth anywhere from $25 - $500. According to Greg Elder, L.L. Bean vice presi...

Okay, so I confess that I'm scratching my head over Volkswagen's new Routan Boom ad campaign, you know, the one where Brooke Shields informs us about a fertility boom caused by breeders in dire need of German engineering. You can see the ad http://www.vw.com/routan/en/us/">here . It's clever.  It's funny.  But it's weird. Frankly, I'm uncomfortable with any ad campaign that promises to let us "witness the most important story of our time.  Ever."  (Check out the website, I'm telling you - this claim is front and center!) Especially an ad campaign launched at this critical time in our history – a nd suggests people are having babies in order to buy a particular brand of car. Pitching the Pitch Just imagine how the agency pitched this idea to the folks at VW: "The minivan is a car associated with breeders - and to make that point, we'll create a "documentary" on The Routan Boom - an explosion of babies being ...

I was an American Studies major in college, which I've lately realized does not give me the expertise in finance needed to figure out what has gone wrong with our economy.  Waiting until after the market crashes is probably not the best time for a crash course in new vocabulary terms like "credit default swaps" and "collateralized debt obligations." If only I'd gotten an MBA instead of an MFA! From my rudimentary research, credit default swaps (CDS) are contracts that promise to cover losses on securities in the event of default.  But apparently, as we have all learned, people who own these contracts don't necessarily have the money to cover losses should a default occur.   Apparently people bought and sold the idea of money without actually having any money to back it up. Visualizing the Vague In all honesty, I have not been able to uncover what it means to own a collateralized debt obligation.  But you can read more about it here in this nifty int...

Chicago. The City that Works. Urbs in Horto . City in a Garden. City of Broad Shoulders. A city with a complex relationship to race. A city that Martin Luther King, Jr. visited in 1966 in an attempt to bring the civil rights movement north. A city where, during that same visit, Dr. King was hit by a brick thrown by angry whites during a march through Marquette Park. "I've been in many demonstrations all across the South," said King after the march in Chicago. "But I can say that I have never seen – even in Mississippi and Alabama – mobs as hostile and hate-filled as I've seen in Chicago. I think the people from Mississippi ought to come to Chicago to learn how to hate." Last night, in a Chicago park that had been a key battlefield during the 1968 Democratic convention, an enormous crowd gathered to witness history. White people. Black people. People of all ethnicities came to Grant Park to see Barack Obama. They didn't come to hate....