Autobiographical Corner
Is there any metropolitan area more pathetic that Detroit? I attended a conference yesterday in Dearborn, at its crown jewel hotel, the Hyatt. One of the sessions dealt with legal issues surrounding Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking. The speaker at one point said, "Wireless is available almost everywhere, and soon it'll cover every inch of the world." I almost shouted out, "Except Dearborn!" Our conference room was not wired for wi-fi. Don't worry, I was assured, if you go into the lobby, I could get wif-i. During intermission, I went to the lobby . . . no wi-fi unless I had a password. I stopped a worker and asked her about it. She told me that I could get a password at the front desk. I went to the front desk, and the woman said, "Sure. It'll be $10." I explained to her that my conference room couldn't pick up a signal and therefore I'd only be able to use the wi-fi for about 20 minutes. No matter: $10. * * * * * * * I'm simply coming to detest Detroit. On my trip back from the Lions game on Sunday, I-94 was entirely shut down for over three hours, with the result that post-game time traffic got pretty gnarled. On my trip before that to Detroit, scrap got caught in my tire and caused a slow leak (there's trash all over the freeways in the Detroit area, so it's no surprise). And on this trip, no wi-fi. I get free wi-fi throughout my small town, at the Kalamazoo Radisson, at McDonald's, at Mackinac Island's Grand Hotel. But not in Dearborn, the home of Ford Motor Company. * * * * * * * People enjoying The Evening Eudemon? It's a product of my iPad. When I see an interesting passage during my evening reading, I send it to my mobile blogging software for posting. I realize readers would prefer a link, but that would defeat the technological ease. I'm sure I'll discover a way to post a live link without too much hassle, but for now, you'll pretty much just get a quote and URL address. * * * * * * * Last night's quote came from this outstanding essay about a recent New Yorker piece. Here's another excerpt, which is a quote by Nock about the State's habit of favoring big business:
When the State made some primary intervention to confer an economic advantage – as in the case of our railways, for instance, – and its beneficiaries got into a tangle with one another over the use of it, the regular thing has been to run to the State for another intervention to straighten the tangle out. Then another tangle, another agonized plea to the State, another intervention which piled complication upon complication, particularity upon particularity ”¦ and then the same sequences, with ever-multiplying complications and ever-increasing particularity, repeated again and again.
Who hectored the State into the shipping business and plumped for setting up the Shipping Board? Who pestered the State into setting up the Interstate Commerce Commission and the Federal Farm Board? Who got the State to go into the transportation business on our inland waterways? Who is always urging the State to "regulate" and "supervise" this, that and the other routine process of financial, industrial and commercial enterprise?
