I hate playing "gotcha" with the New York Times, I really do, because it's a great paper that I've been reading for twenty years or so.
But some things are hard to ignore. So here I go:
Two articles, a week apart, seem to make the claim that New York's real estate brokers have it rough:
That 6% is Getting Harder to Earn March 30, 2008.
Who Asked You? March 23, 2008.
In both articles the primary point of view represented is that of the broker! Especially brokers from The Corcoran Group.
Now it's clear to me that the Times or its real estate section has some kind of relationship with Barbara Corcoran (that's un-substantiated, but hey, this is a blog!), and I'm sure she gives them a lot of great quotes, but bias is bias.
As I wrote in the comments section following the first article on the Times Web site, it has seemed to me since I moved there in 1993 that New York's high real estate prices have mostly to do with all of the non-essential folks that make money on apartments. Everyone who's ever lived there has a horror story.
In addition, the Times has a columnist who's made a good chunk of his recent career by demonstrating from an economic standpoint that brokers work against their customers' best interests. Am I missing something?
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Friday, March 28, 2008
Left Coast
A lot of moving to Marin County, CA, from NYC, NY, has to do with changing my New Yorker's View of the World.
So imagine my surprise when I went to a local farmer's market, and found that it was head and shoulders above New York's fabled Greenmarket. Isn't the Greenmarket the best in the world? Didn't I hear celebrity chef Tom Collichio (or was it Padma Lakshmi) say that on the TV?
A little more looking around and I find others feel this same way.
Well, you could say that Greenmarket is the best, because it's surrounded by the greatest city in the world. Hard to say, though. There's just something about left coast clean livin'.
Image from Ric Miller at sausalito.org
The Tanya Harding Candidacy
I can't believe that Hillary Clinton's plutocratic friends are attacking Nancy Pelosi for suggesting the Democratic SuperDelegates should vote for whomever has more votes at the end of the primaries. Despicable. (I also don't like the comparison, made by Nicholas Kristof, likening Clinton to Ralph Nader in 2000, but one thing at a time!)
Will (the) Clinton(s) stop at nothing to win this election? I'm all for never give up, but not everyone can be president!
It's easy to say it's killing the Democratic Party, but it's killing the Democratic Party. I like the term -- and I'm not sure who came up with it -- that HRC is now running a Tanya Harding Candidacy. And she is. Hope Barack Obama has some strong knees!
Will (the) Clinton(s) stop at nothing to win this election? I'm all for never give up, but not everyone can be president!
It's easy to say it's killing the Democratic Party, but it's killing the Democratic Party. I like the term -- and I'm not sure who came up with it -- that HRC is now running a Tanya Harding Candidacy. And she is. Hope Barack Obama has some strong knees!
Happiness
A recent edition of the New York Review of Books discusses the number of books that have come out recently that are devoted to the subject of happiness.
The author notes that in surveys across the board people claim to be happy, humanity rating itself as a 7 (from 1-10) on average. As such, she can't resist the low-hanging-question: if so many claim to be happy, why do we need all of these books?
Advertising, is my response. Maybe we're all happy but we're so caught up in chasing the uncatchable American Dream that we can't just relax and enjoy it. In this country, anyway. If it weren't for that, no one would play the lottery!
The author notes that in surveys across the board people claim to be happy, humanity rating itself as a 7 (from 1-10) on average. As such, she can't resist the low-hanging-question: if so many claim to be happy, why do we need all of these books?
Advertising, is my response. Maybe we're all happy but we're so caught up in chasing the uncatchable American Dream that we can't just relax and enjoy it. In this country, anyway. If it weren't for that, no one would play the lottery!
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
The Times Has Got Your Back!
There's a story in today's New York Times about the prevailing economic meltdown entitled: Can't Grasp Credit Crisis? Join the Club.
What's there is an extremely oversimplified version of what's been going on in the American economy for the past 6 months.
Now while it's correct to say that there's a lot going on that people don't understand, the tone of the article -- that that's ok -- is objectionable. In addition, the writer plays down the over reliance of the American economy on what Russ Winter calls "Black Box Crony Capitalism," and completely ignores the predatory lending practices that were the engine behind the meltdown in the first place.
It makes me want to say, as much as I hate to say it, that the New York Times seems to be committed to helping us forget history. And everyone knows what happens when you do that -- or do they?
Or maybe it's just a matter of knowing your target market.
What's there is an extremely oversimplified version of what's been going on in the American economy for the past 6 months.
Now while it's correct to say that there's a lot going on that people don't understand, the tone of the article -- that that's ok -- is objectionable. In addition, the writer plays down the over reliance of the American economy on what Russ Winter calls "Black Box Crony Capitalism," and completely ignores the predatory lending practices that were the engine behind the meltdown in the first place.
It makes me want to say, as much as I hate to say it, that the New York Times seems to be committed to helping us forget history. And everyone knows what happens when you do that -- or do they?
Or maybe it's just a matter of knowing your target market.
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