Gates, Crowley hold new "Beer Summit" In Cambridge Bar - No Obama

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According to WBZTV.com, Harvard Professor Skip Gates and Cambridge police Sergeant James Crowley were seen at the "River Gods" bar at 125 River St in Cambridge, Wednesday night. (Now,you know the owner of River Gods was just jazzed over the appearance of Gates and Crowley.)

President Obama wasn't there this time

If you remember, Sgt. Crowley arrested Professor Gates at his own home in an encounter that launched a new conversation on racism and racial profiling, where I said that Gates was arrested for being an uppity black man:



...and led to the famous first "Beer Summit" with President Obama:



Both Gates and Crowley said they would meet again and create a joint program to work to eliminate racial profiling.

What drinks the two had is not reported as of this writing and they only stayed for a hour (probably left after the buzz of their meeting got hot), but I noticed by the bar's website that they met on River Gods "Primitive Sounds" night, featuring "Roots Rock and Roll, Gospel, and Blues" with "DJ Easy Ed" as the guest. So Gates and Crowley, black and white, meet on a night mixing Rock and Roll and Blues.

For some reason, I don't think that was an accident.

Tom Hayes: CNNMoney.com gets "Cash for Clunkers" wrong

You'd expect an author at CNNMoney.com to understand the relationship between cashflow and business success.  You'd expect an editor to send this article back to re-write either for more research or more objectivity.  Here was the basis of Peter Valdes-Dapena's misguided assessment:

"...majority of sales would have taken place anyway at some time in the last half of 2009, according to Edmunds.com"

So? This isn't news, and it misses the point of the Cash for Clunkers initiative.

Valdes-Dapena and/or his editors may think selling cars sooner rather than later is a valid reason to criticize the program, but as any businessman can tell you: success in business is about cash flow. Any retail operation needs to keep their stock turning over. At a time when the inventory was sitting idle on the lots this program provided a much needed infusion, enabling dealers to pay staff, utilities, creditors, and suppliers.

Did the Cash for Clunkers program solve the economic crisis? Of course not.  Nor was it intended to. The goal was simple: turn over inventory in one segment of the industry - to keep dealerships from failing in huge numbers before the manufacturers could recover. Save some jobs and hopefully avert a catastrophic spread of deterioration in the auto industry that would further delay economic recovery.

The article may fool a person with no entrepreneurial experience, but it reflects either a shallow grasp of money and business or a thinly-veiled attack on the government's attempt to avert a breakdown in the delivery mechanism of an industry it was actively seeking to save - without proposing any alternative that might have been even marginally effective.

The public may think "Cash for Clunkers" was as simple as just selling cars, the author obviously wants to, but the reality is much subtler. Edmunds didn't surprise anybody (except maybe CNNMoney.com staff) with the news that one of the primary effects was to accelerate the decisions and purchases:

In business, my friends, timing is everything.

 
Thomas Hayes is an entrepreneur, journalist, and political analyst who contributes regularly to a host of web sites on topics ranging from economics and politics to culture and community.

Jewish afro? "Orgasm-inducing Jewfro?" What?

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Have you ever heard of a "Jewfro?" This question is under the category of "change of pace", which is a good thing if only to keep the mind fresh, but I'm also curious to learn more about it.

My friend Sarah was talking about her new hairdo and made a passing reference to it being a "Jewfro" or "Jew-fro" as she spells it. I stopped her and said "what?" as I thought she made up the term since she and I regularly talk about Jewish culture and traditions. But when she broke out with that term I knew I'd been sheltered too long.

She says a Jewfro is an "an Afro, but particular to Jews." But as a person who has Jewish lines in his ancestry, and had a short Afro when I was young...

Here..

Lars checks out Zennie's Jewfro

I figured I'd had a right to use the term, but I'd never known of it before!

Moreover, I had a lot of fun talking about it with her and my other friends, and realized that we'd gone a little too far in punishing people who make offhand comments that identify an ethnic characteristic.

The Bob Griese Taco Issue was the last straw for me. I got the impression the ESPN analyst would have been skewered if he said the singing group DeBarge used too much Jerri-Curl!

I researched the term Jewfro over at Urbandictionary.com's "Jewfro Section" and found some, shall we say, interesting and in some cases howlingly funny definitions, many that I could not have created if I tried:

1. The Jewish man's afro - by Mia Mar 9, 2005
2. An orgasm-inducing hairstyle worn by people of jewish descent. It consists of curly hair and is often large. Famous wearers of the jewfro: Matt Stone (creator of "South Park") Matt Stone's jewfro not only made me want to give him my virginity,but to also hump my chair. - by Amanda and Thais Oct 29, 2004
3. A curly mop of hair with lots of volume, sported by many a Jewish brother.
Matt Stone doesn't look as cool now he's cropped the jewfro. - by Pete Rakowski Jan 3, 2005
4. A large, round and often boulbus hairstyle found most often within the jewish comunity. It's not a fricken afro, I am not black, it's a "Jewfro" for christs sake. - by Sam Freund Feb 28, 2004 

Matt Stone's orgasm-inducing Jewfro

(A Jewfro's orgasm-inducing?  Ok.  I'm jealous.  I was told to go bald for the same reason!) 

So the video you see has led to an interesting set of comments on YouTube, where I regularly read my comments (I don't read them on other newsite blogs because frankly some of them are written by total stalker nutcases, one of which I'm filing a restraining order against), some of which I'll share:

jimisback - My wife has one. But she is not Jewish or African American. It is natural too.


kenrg - LMAO - You really never heard that before? Goes back at least to the mid-70s.


karakaraman01 - Zennie she right she didn't make it up, Seth Rogen uses that term in most of his movie.


Eurotrash4367 - I heard it said by Adam Sandler in one of his movies.

Ok, so it's real the term and the style. But for all of this, it's shockingly not a Wikipedia definition! At any rate, I'm happy to know we can at least laugh at our ethnic differences and learn they're really ethnic similarities, too. 

But with all of this, I'm remaining bald because a woman friend of mine came up with a song called "I like em Bald!" and sang it for me - to my surprise - at Foley's Pub in San Francisco.  So my look stays!

LA Lakers - Will The Lakers go 20 and 1? Take my poll.

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I was watching "The NBA on TNT" when NBA Legend Charles Barkley said that he believed the Lakers would, not could, go 20 and 1 to open this season.

Jack Nicholson. LA Laker

At first I thought he was crazy. Then I thought about it and considered the acquistion of the always hungry enforcer Ron Artest and reconsidered the possibility.

Consider this: The Lakers have only four away games of the next 19 games. That's right. The LA Lakers have 15 home games of the next 19 contests. So that,and given their talent and smart trades and they could do it.

I think they can.

But what do you think? Will the LA Lakers go 20 and 1? Take my poll:

create fun quizzes & tests on pollsb.com

Bay Bridge Closure - Caltrans should not rush repairs to bridge

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The latest news in the Bay Bridge Cable Collapse Disaster is that CalTrans spokesperson Bart Ney told KRON-TV that the Bay Bridge could reopen under a "best-case scenario" Thursday if repairs and bridge testing were completed in time.

My response: please don't rush this. Let's get it right.

In fact, it's not even a good idea to put out the message that this process could be done in a jiffy because if it is, the bridge is re-opened, and we have another Bay Bridge Cable Collapse Disaster, it will be a life-changing event for drivers, passengers, and California.

Everyone would call for the heads of the people ruining CalTrans, and the next "F-U" letter sent by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will be to Caltrans Director Randy Iwasaki.

The quality problems my blogging friend Yobie Benjamin points to should be adressed as part of this repair and evaluation process and a public report issued. This should not be considered a problem that needs a "band-aid, quick-fix" solution. Please, no.

In fairness to CalTrans' Ney, he did say that officially there's no timetable and that's the response he should stick with.

CalTrans needs to take its time with this and make sure the Bay Bridge Cable Collapse Disaster does not happen again.

Bay Bridge Closure - BART wants 24-hour service if CalTrans pays them

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I've got an important update especially for late-night workers who pray that BART offers a 24-hour service schedule - right now they're not - in the wake of the Bay Bridge Cable Collapse Disaster (as I'm calling it).

I just got off the phone with BART Spokesperson Linton Johnson. Johnson explained that BART would like to offer a 24-hour service but they're hampered by, economics, operations maintenance, and commuter commute demands.

The first issue is economics. "The fares, at $3.18, don't come close to covering the operating costs to run trains in a 24-hour schedule," Johnson said. The Labor Day Weekend Service was provided after months of planning and CalTrans, which operates the San Francisco - Oakland Bay Bridge, paid BART to cover the loss of revenue due to the simple fact that fewer people ride the trains between 12 midnight and 4 am, when the morning commute starts.

The second problem is operations maintenance. Linton Johnson says "It costs hundreds of thousands of dollars each day just to provide that extra service." And even if CalTrans were to step forward and give what would be by my estimate $1.2 million to $1.7 million (depending on the estimated days the bridge is closed) to help BART provide 24-hour service, there's the additional problem of now having extra trains that have to be taken out of service because they were used at night - trains needed for the AM and PM commute hours.

Which leads to the third consideration: commuters. Johnson isn't saying BART doesn't want to provide 24-hour service, but he stresses they didn't see this accident coming. So, they're trying to alter their system to provide service to a crush of riders that don't normally take the train. That's the first priority.

"BART wasn't designed for 24-hour service," Johnson observed. And he's right. A train system, as in New York for example, has two tracks going the same way, so one car can be worked on just as another is going by. BART's work tracks are in rail yards at the Richmond and Fremont and Daly City terminus stations; there are few points to allow such maintenance on the BART system.

So the bottom line is BART would love to extend its current service to a 24-hour schedule, but CalTrans needs to pay for it. And even then, BART's risk is that fewer trains would be available for the morning commute due to maintenance requirements.

My view is such a price is one CalTrans should be willing to pay and BART's problem of fewer commute trains one they should be willing to bear. More people have flexible schedules anyway, so it's something BART could do with less pain than in a pre-Internet past.

The alternative is to have a Bay Area economically crippled between the hours of 12 midnight and 4 AM, and in this recession this region can't afford any more fiscal hits.

Ares I-X lifts off on flight test (video)

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The Ares I-X successfully launched into a clear blue Florida sky this morning and without incident, "testing concepts for the future of new rocket design" as the Kennedy Space Center spokesperson said in the video.

Indeed, it went off without a hitch - I'll deal with the vibration issue I mentioned below - and what's really neat is that you can see the video of the launch from a camcorder placed in the rocket itself and posted in this blog. The video also shows the breaking away of stages of the rocket as it happens. How huge is that?

Gushing aside, here's vital information on the vehicle that I saw over at spacefellowship.com. One important item of information is the rocket was built entirely here in America: Utah, Alabama, Tennessee, and Texas contractors created the Ares 1-X.

Spacefellowship reports:

The 327-foot tall Ares I-X test vehicle produced 2.6 million pounds of thrust to accelerate the rocket to nearly 3 g’s and Mach 4.76, just shy of hypersonic speed. It capped its easterly flight at a sub-orbital altitude of 150,000 feet after the separation of its first stage, a four-segment solid rocket booster.

Parachutes deployed for recovery of the booster and the solid rocket motor will be recovered at sea for later inspection. The simulated upper stage, Orion crew module, and launch abort system will not be recovered.

“The most valuable learning is through experience and observation,” said Bob Ess, Ares I-X mission manager. “Tests such as this — from paper to flight — are vital in gaining a deeper understanding of the vehicle, from design to development.”

Wednesday’s flight offered an early opportunity to test and prove hardware, facilities, and ground operations – important data for future space vehicles. During the flight, a range of performance data was relayed to the ground and also stored in the onboard flight data recorder. The 700 sensors mounted on the vehicle provide flight test engineering data to correlate with computer models and analysis. The rocket’s sensors gathered information in several areas, including assembly and launch operations, separation of the vehicle’s first and second stages, controllability and aerodynamics, the re-entry and recovery of the first stage and new vehicle design techniques.

No word on the vibration issue, which means the dampening systems developed worked.

The objective of this flight is to test a program system that will eventually lead to America's return to the Moon after 2020.