"Washington" is YOU!

According to a recent New York Times/CBS poll, 82% of the American public now disapprove of their Congress. Obviously Americans are frustrated with our politicians in Washington, and their inability to get things done.

Our politicians however are OUR representatives, and we voted them in. Politicians aren't some alien beings--they are just ordinary Americans voted in by ordinary Americans. "Washington" isn't the problem, the American people are the problem. "Washington" doesn't cause short-term thinking, political paralysis or the lack of results. Our leaders' inability to solve our problems is rooted in our own citizen's lack of understanding of their own issues and problems, and their resulting poor choices for representatives. The pattern is well-established: Americans feel frustrated. Americans vote for some abstract notion of change by electing a new person to Congress. In a few short years, nothing substantively changes and people remain unhappy and frustrated. Most of those same elected representatives are subsequently voted out because they are "part of Washington", and the cycle repeats.

Do the American people have any idea of the scope and depth of our nation's problems? Do they really understand what "change" they are actually voting for? Why are Americans surprised by the lack of long-term planning, and the uncompromising, simplistic and highly polarized positions their politicians take? They are merely doing what you asked them to do, i.e. represent YOU!

In a nutshell, our country has promised way too much, spends way too much, and taxes way too little. We promise too much in the form of unsustainable entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare, which are IOUs that can eventually lead to our country's financial ruin. Even after the recent debt ceiling compromise, our government still spends too much on various programs. And regardless of what anti-tax conservatives say (sorry Norquist and Demint), we will need much higher revenues over the long term to put our fiscal house in order. Until the majority of Americans realize all this and accept the near-term pain we will all feel from fixing it, nothing will really change.

We don't need to "fix Washington". We need to fix ourselves. Americans need to understand that their problems are complex, long-term and painful, and that politicians with exciting sound bites promising quick solutions aren't the answer. We need more centrist views so there can be some middle ground for compromise and long-term solutions. We need to stop voting for polarizing representatives at the extreme left or right. So if you don't think Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck or Grover Norquist are too far right, or that Nancy Pelosi or Jon Stewart are too far left, then you really have nobody to blame but yourself for our nation's ongoing problems.

Things I Didn't Know about the Baltics

- Due to the "white nights", it never gets truly dark and both the sunrises and sunsets are long and beautiful
- Taxis in Stockholm and Copenhagen accept credit cards, and to save time, you can have the driver scan your credit card during the ride. Then add any tip.
- While people all recommend going to Tivoli in Copenhagen at night because of the beautiful lights, remember that the sun doesn't set until after 10 pm during the summer so twilight is the best you will get--it will never get completely dark. And for us, going early when it opens allowed us to experience shorter ride lines.
- Consider riding bikes in Helsinki--especially on Sundays when vehicle traffic on most of the side streets was minimal!

Who's To Blame For The Gulf Oil Spill?

There has been alot of finger-pointing over who is to blame for the recent crude oil spill and disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. In congressional hearings, Congressmen have sought to pin the blame on BP and other parties involved in the Deepwater Horizon oil drilling project. BP is certainly partially to blame because they are the lessee of the rig and has management responsibility for the drilling project. TransOcean is partially to blame because they own the rig and managed the drilling efforts as the project management. Haliburton might be to blame because it was their cementing process may have been faulty and caused the drill well to fail. And Cameron, the company that made the drill well's blowout preventer, may be to blame because their product is supposed to be the failsafe, last-line-of-defense, to stop the oil flow in the event of a failure further up the well or in the rig.

While any or all of these parties may be partially responsible for this environmental catastrophe, America's thirst for cheap oil is ultimately to blame. As a nation, we are desperate to maintain our current, oil-based way of life. Despite having plenty of natural resources, including energy, Americans continue to consume far in excess of what we can sensibly produce ourselves. Our insatiable thirst for cheap gasoline and oil forces our nation to ignore or downplay the many political, economic and environmental risks associated with finding or producing sufficient supplies of oil. In this particular case, the Deepwater Horizon project was a novel and even revolutionary, but ultimately risky, foray into deeper-than-ever-before off-shore drilling for oil. As evident now, regulators, engineers and risk analysts never considered what they would do if something went seriously wrong with the project. The disaster manifested itself because of a combination of a strong market demand for cheap oil, engineering hubris, lack of regulatory oversight and political near-sightedness.

Our insatiable appetite for cheap crude oil has already cost us dearly economically and politically over the past several decades. Now, we have an environmental catastrophe too.

The New American Dream

I look around my neighborhood and see the American Dream. I live in an upper-class community with large (some huge) homes with well-coiffed lawns and landscaping, and two or three cars parked in every garage. The super-sized suburban properties where I live in Western Howard County Maryland typically sit on from 1/4 acre to 1/2 acre to 10+ acre lots with the driveways alone being bigger than most European flats--the picture of the American Dream.

The problem is that the American Dream, our way of life, is irresponsible, wasteful and unsustainable. Most of the enormous houses have rooms or spaces that are not needed, consume unspeakable amounts of mostly fossil-fuel-based or non-renewable energy sources, and sit on excessive amounts of scarce land. As most everyone already knows, "suburban sprawl" consumes too much land with too few homes for our population, and only forces more road building and newer development further out.

Today, people in search of affordable housing and land are forced to commute from faraway suburbs in Western Maryland, Pennsylvania and even West Virginia to job centers in Baltimore or Washington D.C. These commuters waste a tremendous amount of gasoline--polluting our environment and increasing our dependency on foreign oil.

In order to meet the needs of this growing and spreading population, our food and product distribution networks have become highly specialized hub and spoke systems that become ever more dependent on truck-based shipping and are highly prone to disruption. To service these far-out communities, our energy distribution systems are being taxed and thus are vulnerable to failure or from attack by enemies.

Suburban lawns require fertilization whose runoff pollutes our already-fragile water systems. Gas-powered mowers used to cut grass only further drains our limited gasoline supplies and pollutes our air. Did you know that gas-powered mowers are responsible for 5% of all air pollution in the U.S.?

It is not new news that, as populations increase, land grows scarce and roads become more jammed in the U.S., the trend has been heading back to high-density development and living. The suburbanite's way of life is simply too wasteful for our society to sustain much longer. Most new major housing developments are already in-fill or neo-urban, mixed-use projects that seek to return us to traditional city-style living, i.e. smaller, connected or multi-unit dwellings with little or no land that are close to restaurants, stores, theatres, museums, parks, etc. Only cities allow people to efficiently use limited land and natural resources, and provide communities with the optimal balance of home, work and play. Cities were, and will be again, the only viable and sustainable place for people to live and work.

Non-renewable energy sources like oil and natural gas pollute our environment and their supply is finite. Americans must more seriously reconsider our reliance on them to heat our homes, propel our cars and power our factories. A return to a living model that is less car-dependent and more moderate in the consumption of limited natural and other resources is inevitable.

The New American Dream will be one of lowered expectations, more moderate consumption and of resource conservation. Americans must embrace a simpler, smaller and less-wasteful future. It is a future that returns us to high-density living with smaller living quarters, more walking/less driving, fewer gas-powered vehicles and devices, locally-produced foods and goods, and ultimately, a better quality of life. A declining dependency on foreign energy, food and other resources will also reduce our geopolitical risks and their associated costs considerably. Americans need to accept this new way of life sooner or later, or our standard of living will surely decline.

My 10 biggest differences between the pro and college basketball game experience

After taking my son to the Wizards game last night, here are my impressions of the main differences between the professional and college basketball game experience.

1. The college game has students and real energy. The pro game feels lifeless by comparison. Of course, the Wizards have been so bad this year, who can blame their fans?
2. The pro game is longer and feels like it.
3. The customer service at Verizon Center was noticeably better.
4. Wizards fans stream in late, walk around in the middle of the game, and generally don't seem to care about the game as much.
5. In Verizon Center, the dress code is far more diverse with ladies in dresses and stilettos, and men in suits, to adults and kids in hoodies and street clothes. College game attire is far more uniformly casual.
6. Verizon Center's Jumbotron is far nicer than Comcast Center's. Heck, Comcast Center doesn't even have a big center screen system.
7. Pro cheerleaders are more about boobs and booty than cheering.
8. Verizon Center marketing efforts are far more sophisticated with in-arena advertising blimps, fancier in-game promos and giveaways.
9. Seats are bigger and more comfortable (and I think they all have cupholders) at Verizon Center. Are the patrons just bigger on average?
10. Verizon Center serves beer.

Georgetown Basketball and Austin Freeman

Georgetown's leading scorer Austin Freeman was recently diagnosed with diabetes. What's interesting was that the Director of Georgetown Hospital's Diabetes Center, Dr. Stephen Clement, is reportedly Austin Freeman's personal doctor. How is it that Georgetown University Hospital's top endocrinologist takes the time to be a lowly basketball player's doctor? Does this say something about Georgetown University's priorities?

Post-Olympic Thoughts

• The Canadians are such wonderful, humble and proud people and it must have brought them incredible pride to have their athletes perform so well during these Olympic Games. It was also fitting that they won more gold medals than any other nation because "O Canada" is the best national anthem. Even though I'm an American, I used to sing my kids to sleep with "O Canada". Love it.
• I think it was far more important for Canada to win the men's hockey game. Hockey is part of Canada's identify while the sport is just one of many to Americans. While I was personally rooting hard for the U.S. Team, I appreciate that the Canadians really needed this win much more than we do.
• I have always wanted to do a ski trip to Whistler, but after witnessing the dearth of snow, the warm winter temperatures and relatively poor ski conditions during these games, I'm not so sure now.
• Really liked most of Mary Carillo's and Tom Brokaw's features during NBC's two weeks of coverage. They did a great job spotlighting the best of Canada--or was it just paid advertising by the Canadian Tourist Bureau? Learned alot and especially enjoyed Brokaw's piece on Gander.
• During the Closing Ceremonies, Al Michael's one sentence mention on the great Russian goalkeeper Vladislav Tretiak was one of the biggest slights by the TV commentators. Michaels referred to one of hockey's best goaltenders merely as a player "on the 1980 hockey team that was pulled after the first period". Okay, as an American, he's just a Russian goaltender we beat in the "Miracle on Ice", but Michaels could've given the guy a little more credit.

Olympics Agonizing Moments

After watching the first few days of Olympic events, my list of agonizing Olympic moments runs the spectrum from almost-gold-medal performances to spectacular failures:

- American Johnny Spillane fought valiantly in the nordic combine. He led for most of the final kilometer but faded with the finish line (and the gold medal) in sight, and was caught right at the finish by American-born Frenchman Jason Lamy Chappuis. To Spillane's credit, he seemed quite happy with the silver medal.

- American figure skater Jeremy Abbott finished a disappointing 15th after last night's men's short program (essentially eliminating him from medal contention) after singling a triple axel and then doing only a double lutz in lieu of a triple. How excruciating must it have been for him to have to complete his program knowing full well that he was completely out of medal contention? That final minute or so must've have felt like an eternity to him.

- In the men's 1500 meter short track speed skating final, two South Koreans battling for second and third place, knock each other out just before the finish to let Americans Apollo Anton Ohno and J. R. Celski snatch the silver and bronze medals.

- Dutch speed skater Annette Gerritsen falling in the Women's 500 meters. Years of training for hours a day, and your medal dreams are over just seconds into your Olympic experience.

And of course, to put all of this in perspective, we can't forget about the death of Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili. There was absolutely nothing more agonizing than that...