Burnin’

Thanks to Kevin Kelly’s Cool Tools blog, I learned of real estate site Bulgarian Properties about six months ago. It’s a site I continue to revisit. Bulgaria is scheduled to join the EU in 2007. This means the time to invest is now. And one can find a home near the Black Sea for the price of a parking space in Chicago.

This traditional Bulgarian home is going for 11K in US currency

Once upon a time, I doled out story assignments to budding journalists. Doing so was part of my weekly routine as Asst. News Editor and later as News Editor of The College Reporter at Franklin & Marshall. The most enterprising reporter I had on staff was an agressive young man by the name of Ken Mehlman. I tended to give Ken the best assigments and eventually appointed him my Asst. News Editor.

Now, when I see Ken on TV promoting his boss–the President of The United States–mostly what I feel is a strong sense of detachment, and at times a tinge of regret. After college, Ken went to Harvard Law School. I opted for the environmental movement and Grateful Dead tour. Today, Ken shapes the news and plays a role with absolutely huge consequences. I, on the other hand, make ads for disinterested audiences. What’s my point? Merely, that it’s nice to be in a position to make a difference.

Bush-Cheney’s 2004 campaign manager on Meet the Press

According to Adbusters, one in four New York City residents is a Democrat. Therefore, it is not surprising that the Republican Party has never in its 150 year history chose to conduct its nominating convention in New York City. So what makes this year different? Two numbers: 9/11.

Given the mass mobilization of left-leaning activists and the very real anger they are about to uncork, I fully expect next week’s events in NYC to make Chicago in 1968 seem tame by comparison, even though it is clear the vast majority of protestors intend to be non-violent.

For reasons unknown, fighter jets have been buzzing the air space over Chicago for the past few hours. Their first pass was directly overhead and the sound made me think that a plane was coming down in our neighborhood, for we are on a landing path to O’Hare. But this sound was coming from the other direction, making me that much more disoriented. Considering what these mechanical fighter birds are doing in Najaf today, once can begin to grasp just how terrifying it all really is. Maybe that’s why they’re up there today, to remind a city of 10,000,000 that we are, in fact, at war.

Najaf, Iraq today

Rolling Stone reported yesterday that “The Dead” are breaking form by becoming political in their old age, something they’ve heretofore consciously avoided. What interested me though, was Bobby’s proclamation regarding the composition of the band:

“Going into this, I was thinking maybe we were gonna need a traffic cop,” says Weir. “But everybody’s listening to everyone else, and Warren has made us a little more muscular.”

Way to give credit where credit is due Bob.

Bobby trying to look like Jerry

In what may only be described as a culinary setback for the city, Hot Doug’s is temporarily out of business, due to a fire in the apartment above them. Doug is presently looking for a new location. The good citizens of Lincoln Square ought to lure him away from Roscoe Village. That would be another major score for the Square.

“I don’t believe in the dogmatic postulates of Marxist revolution. I don’t accept that we are living in a period of proletarian revolutions. All that must be revised. Reality is telling us that every day. Are we aiming in Venezuela today for the abolition of private property or a classless society? I don’t think so. But if I’m told that because of that reality you can’t do anything to help the poor, the people who have made this country rich through their labour and never forget that some of it was slave labour, then I say ‘We part company’. I will never accept that there can be no redistribution of wealth in society. Our upper classes don’t even like paying taxes. That’s one reason they hate me. We said ‘You must pay your taxes’. I believe it’s better to die in battle, rather than hold aloft a very revolutionary and very pure banner, and do nothing … That position often strikes me as very convenient, a good excuse … Try and make your revolution, go into combat, advance a little, even if it’s only a millimetre, in the right direction, instead of dreaming about utopias.” -Hugo Chavez speaking to Tariq Ali for CounterPunch.org

Hugo Chavez, the embattled President of Venezuela, yesterday defeated a recall in an election that brought out 94% of this oil-rich nation’s eligible citizens, many who stood in lines over a mile long to vote for democracy, not oligarchy. All this despite fierce and blantant opposition from the oligarchy-owned press, and a full course of dirty trickery care of Bush/Cheney, Inc.

The people celebrate their victory.

Mikela and Philip Tarlow suggested to me a year and a half ago that I write a book about Internet radio. At the time, I thought no, I want to do it, not write about it. Today, I see how intertwined the doing it is with the writing about it. The book is to help establish one’s authority on the creative consultant circuit. It’s a calling card and a necessary credential to play with the Big Boys. Which is cool. I’ve always wanted to write a book. And a guide to Internet radio is a highly marketable book proposition.

I’ve been saying for awhile now how blogs can and will transform marketing on the Web. Coudal Partners, a small advertising and design firm in Chicago, has brought the corporate blog to new levels of sophistication. This is the way an agency’s site needs to look today. Stale brochureware buys you nada. Letting people in, sharing ideas freely, that’s the route, and Jim Coudal and his partners have taken this high road by storm. It’s great to see.

Read my article, New Tactics | New Tools for more.

I am pleased to learn that gray wolves have made a substantial comeback in northern and even central Wisconsin. They were not reintorduced to the area. They came back on their own. I suppose this says as much about the wolf as it does about rural Wisconsin. Either way, you’ve got to love that kind of tenacity and resilience. The wolf has inhabited this territory for 10,000 years (since the ice melted), and from out of nowhere, they are suddenly faced in 1830 with a bunch of European farmers who show up and start shooting. Such troubled times the noble wolf endures.