In the olden days communists used to present the USSR as a worker’s paradise. Those people must not have known about Germany. If the Germans had publicized their working conditions, I’m sure Eastern Europe would have annexed itself to Germany. To wit, struggling Volkswagen has convinced its auto union to let employees work more hours for the same amount of pay. The work week will now be raised to 33 hours. Thirty-three hours!!

This is exactly what’s wrong with Europe. How is that continent supposed to be competitive with a 40 hour week in the US or 60+ hours in Asia? Don’t forget the Europeans get better benefits too. If anything this does make me respect European business more. They’re able to eke out profits from such harsh business conditions. No doubt it has to be from better product design. If European governments get the courage to abandon their paternalist socialism, the US and Asia had better be watching out for resurgent European business.

Since I kicked my fast food habit, I have spent a lot more time buying groceries and cooking for myself. One thing I’ve taken a shine to eating for breakfast is waffles. They’re easy to prepare when you can barely keep your eyes open. However I prefer a variety of foods and I wanted to add something to compliment my waffles. Well there is nothing more natural than waffles and pork.

So when I went to the grocery store I stopped in front of the frozen foods aisle and stared at the various choices of breakfast sausage. I hesitated because I felt pangs of guilt at buying something so notoriously fatty. I know I don’t eat a healthy diet, but breakfast sausage seems like I’m crossing some kind of blatant line. Gluttony won the day though and I grabbed the box with the best design. These Morningstar sausages looked so plump and tasty, and the green packaging seemed so refreshing. Then I noticed the “78% less fat” sign. That sealed the deal.

In hindsight I should have questioned how Morningstar got that 78% reduction in fat. I guess I was too excited at the prospect of a filling breakfast. So I took the sausages home and the next morning I took them out of the freezer with all the thrill of a six year old on Christmas morning. It was when I read the cooking instructions I saw these links were actually vegetarian! Boy was that a let down. I’ve eaten vegetarian foods before on earlier attempts to eat healthier with colossal disappointment. Boca Burgers should be used as a punishment.

I went ahead with cooking the sausages with much less enthusiasm. The cooking method seemed strange to me. Fill the pan with a quarter inch of water and fry the sausages until they brown. I tried that but the sausage never browned like natural ones. Once the water boiled off the sausages became stuck to my non-stick pan. Little bits of the sausage broke off as I tried to keep them moving so they wouldn’t stick. I gave up on achieving that beautiful golden brown and ate what I had.

There’s a noticeable difference between them and real sausage. A real sausage link will have tough outer skin and a tender inside. These Morningstar sausages had a uniform texture. It felt very artificial. They also lacked zest. They were quite bland. I will never make the mistake of buying these again. Unfortunately this takes me back to my original dilemma. Should I buy a very unhealthy sausage even though it’s absolutely delicious?

I’ll tell you, I have such pity for vegetarians now. To think those people eat crap like that all day long. Poor bastards.

This weekend I spent a few hours on the phone catching up with an old friend. One of the subjects we touched upon was travel. He’s one of those people who think traveling is one of the essentials in life. Of course I think that’s crazy.

Anyway he was trying to convince me to take a weekend trip to tour Chicago. I didn’t have much interest in that, but after much thought I found I was interested in visiting Shanghai. I am curious to know what the fuss is about. So looked up a few hotels and found plenty with rates I could live with. Then I looked up the airfare. I wasn’t surprised, but I was still disappointed to find that the cheapest flight was $900.

Also on that search page I found the costliest airfare I have ever seen in my life. What person would pay $9795 to fly? Why would Lufthansa charge that much? I don’t think this is first class service because all the rest were coach fares. Simple insanity.

I had been loosely following the Atlantic Yards saga for months now. It’s not that unique a story. Developer wants to build; neighborhood complains. Really the only thing special about this is that the parcel up for development is quite large. The reason I’m bringing this up is because the Economist actually took notice. All over the world people are reading about the fighting going on in downtown Brooklyn.

Somehow this fracas has become global news, so I might as well put my feelings out there. The first I heard of Atlantic Yards was months ago when Frank Gehry’s designs for “Miss Brooklyn” was unveiled. I still despise that ode to the homely, but what I also remember was hearing about how this development was the largest private real estate deal ever. It sounded like hyperbole to me, but I accepted it at face value because I had no reason not to. It wasn’t until about a month ago that I actually looked into the plans.

Forest City Ratner won the initial competition for developing this area of Brooklyn. Actually FCR was the only company to enter a serious bid. There was a second bid that was rushed in at the last minute, but I’ll discuss that a little later. FCR has a checkered past in New York City real estate. They have a reputation for building sterile, cold, fortress-like designs. Metrotech, the scourge of Brooklyn, was built by Ratner in the early 1990s. However hiring Frank Gehry was supposed to alleviate the fears FCR would build a monstrous Metrotech 2.

As I said I finally checked out the plans for Atlantic Yards. Boy was I shocked to discover the land that is actually affected by this. This is much ado about nothing as far as I’m concerned. The train yards (the Vanderbilt Rail Yards) only take up three blocks. Then you have roughly two blocks with apartment buildings that would be torn down. Whoop-de-friggin-do. I cannot believe this real estate project is the largest in the US. It covers five blocks, only two of which are inhabited.

DDDB‘s complaints seem to be about the size of the buildings FCR wants to build and the use of eminent domain to take over buildings from people who refuse to sell. Let me talk about eminent domain first. Eminent domain is unfortunate to have to use, but it does not trample on owner’s rights. DDDB’s rhetoric makes it sound like the owners are being robbed in the middle of the night. The reality of the situation is that these owners are being very well compensated for their loss. I have never heard anyone, including the opponents of FCR, say the compensation is not adequate. This project has turned these dispossessed people into millionaires, so they can move to almost anywhere they like. Sorry, when I say people, I mean owners. Any renters there will have to scatter to the four winds because renters have no rights.

The implied complaint about using eminent domain seems to be that these people shouldn’t have to move. It seems that our society has grown an enormous sense of entitlement. Somehow people have got it into their heads that because they’ve lived somewhere before, they have a right to be there. Sorry but no. You do not have a right to live where ever you want to. If that were the case I demand a house in the Hamptons. It is discrimination that I can’t live there just because I can’t afford any of the houses there. Neither are you granted a right to live in a neighborhood because you’ve been there ten or more years already. When you can’t afford to live in a neighborhood, you have to move to somewhere you can.

I suspect the anger over having to move, at least from the old-timers, stems from fear. These people have lived in that neighborhood for so long, they can’t comprehend living somewhere else. They’re afraid to learn a new commute, meet new neighbors and find new shops. That is the saddest thing in the world, and I can sympathize with those people. I lived in the same apartment until I finished college, and at that time I didn’t understand how people could move from home to home. Then once I finished school, I moved across the country. Doing that really opened my eyes and took away all my fears about moving. In the last five years I’ve lived in four different places. Instead of moving being a tragedy, it’s a tiresome nuisance. Back in Brooklyn, these old-timers never got over their fear of moving. They’ve been living the same routine for years, and don’t know how to live without it.

I would guess only half the people being moved by Atlantic Yards are old-timers. The other half are people who arrived in the last five years because the neighborhood was becoming cool. I don’t understand what the problem is with these people. I would have expected them to take their money and run to another up and coming place. I can only assume they’re protesting because of spite. They found their cute, little brownstone and don’t want to give it up.

The complaints about building size I find quite galling. Over and over I hear the phrase “out of scale” uttered by Atlantic Yards opponents. That complaint should never be spoken in New York City. Someone should tell these people NYC is famous for building sky high. Brooklyn is not a museum for 19th century brownstones. It’s a living community that thankfully is growing. People actually want to live there again. Building the two and three story structures that were good enough a hundred years ago, are no longer good enough. Tall towers are a must to accommodate the population growth.

DDDB have complained that the size of Forest City Ratner’s project are too tall, but the fact that they threw their support behind the plan from Extell Development Corporation makes me doubt their sincerity. Those buildings are much taller than the neighboring brownstones.

The buildings are still tall towers but there’s no eminent domain involved and the Nets won’t get their new sports stadium. I could respect DDDB more if they didn’t toss specious complaints into the debate.

To be honest, I am not enamored with either plan. They both waste a lot of possible living space with unproductive green space. Instead of building isolated towers on each block, I would rather see several different buildings placed adjacent to each other like a traditional New York street. This streetscape would be far more interesting if you built 30 different buildings, designed by 30 different architects. As long as the buildings were tall, we could maintain the same amount of living space as with the current plan.

So if my vision is so different from Ratner’s why don’t I oppose him? It’s a simple principle. I respect ownership. Ratner made the agreements with the government to develop this land. As the owner he has every right to do what he likes with it. If people are upset with the design or with using eminent domain to clear out original owners, they should be complaining to their city and state representatives for agreeing to the deal. They have no right to demand anything from Ratner. As owner his word is supreme.

I don’t pretend to understand fashion but this is just goofy. Why would any woman spend serious money on Target logos? Now I’ve known Target to have this bizarre cache for sometime. That’s actually something that has really confused me too. Target is just Walmart with better advertising. Just compare the stores. They’re both big boxes, except that Target stores are cleaner and better organized, although not by much. Well that’s not entirely true. Walmart stocks more food than Target. I’m surprised that makes up the difference in clientele.

I was reading an excellent article today on China’s self perception (By the way, read that article. It’s very good). As I was reading, I noticed to the left of the text the four international issues put out by Newsweek. Look down and see what the rest of the world is worried about.

Europe is worried about the chaos in Chechnya. Asia and Latin America are worried about China’s growing clout. Oh and congratulations to Latin America on that. Finally there’s a week where they aren’t worried about an insurgency, a coup or economic collapse. Then at the bottom you see the US edition of Newsweek. The cover story is the “Twenty Top Women on Leadership”. This is what Americans are worried about; a piece full of anecdotes and inspirational advice from women. I can’t even say women executives because the article starts off with Danica Patrick.

I would like to say I’m lucky to live in a land with no obvious problems, but I know that’s not the case. There are plenty of other issues more deserving of a cover story. Newsweek could have mentioned the non-aligned country summit in Cuba. They could have re-capped the Iran problems. Did you know the Europeans are now backsliding on UN sanctions? How about Newsweek cover the worldwide riots prompted by Pope Benedict’s speech? Geez, isn’t covering the Senate debate on whether the US should reinterpret Article 3 of the Geneva Convention cover-worthy? That will determine whether we legalize torture methods under another name.

All those stories are more worth being on a magazine cover than a filler story on women succeeding. Unfortunately intelligent debate does not move magazines. I guess Queen Latifah is more compelling to those standing on the grocery checkout line.

Wow what news to wake up to! While away at the UN’s 61st opening session, Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was overthrown by a military coup. The country had been democratic since 1992 and moved beyond “fledging democracy” status. The rebel troops are led by General Sonthi Boonyaratglin, the Army Chief of Staff. I believe he was recently dismissed by the prime minster, but I am still trying to confirm that.

The rebels have already met with the Thai king but it remains unknown if the king supports this coup. It’s also unknown how much support the rebels have. They have already occupied Bangkok but there have been no reports on how much of the military is rebelling or loyal. Shinawatra was a polarizing figure in Thailand. For all the enemies he made, he had at least as many friends. There is a definite possibility this will descend into a civil war.

I don’t expect this coup to have a great impact beyond Thailand’s border. Although the country dominated Southeast Asia, Thailand’s economic strengths are cheap labor and the sex industry. A shooting war would disrupt exports until companies could make alternate manufacturing plans. As for sex tourism, well, there’s always The Philippines.

In my life I have watched a grand total of 10 minutes of Jimmy Kimmel Live, but I heard about this on Celebitchy. Enjoy this clip of Matt Damon’s appearance on that show. Be sure you watch before you continue reading.

That was too hilarious. Given Celebitchy’s introduction I was undecided on whether it could be real or fake. Once I watched it and saw the camera pan to Ben Stiller sitting in the audience, I knew this was all a joke. Stiller checking his watch is just underlining it. It’s really great to see Matt Damon isn’t too stuck up that he will poke some fun at himself.

This is some seriously surprising news. Hearing voices in your head is one of the obvious symptoms of some kind of mental illness, but Dutch researchers say 4% of the population hear voices and otherwise appear normal. I can’t imagine how you could hear a voice in your head and think it’s just fine.

Like a lot of people, I’ve heard noises that weren’t really there. Usually if I leave my cell phone far from me, I’ll think I hear it ringing only to find, when I check the phone, I received no call. That’s a far cry from hearing a voice talk to you however. I wonder how detailed these hallucinations are. Can a voice know something that you don’t know (consciously know I guess)? Can you have a conversation with your voice?

As I read this article, a disturbing thought popped into my head. You just know somewhere out there is a religious person who thinks the voices in their head are angels or Jesus talking to them. I hope I don’t run in to any of these people.

In case you can’t quite remember Hungary, it’s a little country in Eastern Europe that was stuck on the dismal side of the Iron Curtain (that means it was communist). When communism collapsed across Eastern Europe, the Hungarians got their first taste of a free republic. That wasn’t even twenty years ago so I guess it explains this hilarious, to my American eyes, disturbance today.

The Hungarian Prime Minster was caught on video admitting his political party lied to win an election. Those of us living in old republics like America or in Western Europe assume this behavior is par for the course. The lying politician is a stock character. I imagine Hungarians aren’t quite used to the system yet because protesters have stormed Hungarian state TV’s studios demanding they be allowed to broadcast their complaints. All this hubbub over a politician admitting they lied.

I won’t claim to totally understand the Hungarian political scene, but from what I could gather, the lie the PM referred to is that Hungary’s economy needs tough reforms but the party did not mention this during the campaign. That doesn’t sound nearly so bad to me. Hopefully Hungarians will use this splash of cold water to realize they’re supposed to think hard and not blindly accept the words of their politicians.