Proper therapy

This man sounds like my kind of therapist:

Neurosis,” he said, was “just a high-class word for whining.”

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (0)

Hmmm

I'm not sure whether to write the opera ain't over till the fat lady sings, or just curl up and hide.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (1)

Not what it says on the tin

Sorry about the absence yesterday. 

What a disappointment today, though. The Mail has a very promising headline:

Right, we've found the gene that can turn you into a leftie

Turns out it's still a distant dream. The story is about left-handers.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (1)

Customer service award

I'm a fan of TripAdvisor, which is made up of 'real' people's reviews, and which I've found to be an invaluable source for reasonable hotels. It's not infallible, though, and I think I might well become addicted to its blog. As they put it:

[W]hat do we really talk about over lunch at TripAdvisor? The stuff we can’t publish. Whether it’s funny, rude, bizarre, potentially libelous, incomprehensible, or all of the above, we love it, and we think you will too.

Some people have, ahem, different standards to the rest of us:

Subject: Columbus Studios Hostel
Title: Got what I paid for..
Rating: 2

For the price I paid to stay on New York's Upper West Side, I was surprised it wasn't worse. The room smelled like armpits and years of filth, but there weren't any creepy-crawlies, and I found the staff to be most gracious and helpful.

I could have done without the blood-stained mattress and the (actual) chunk of poop on my bedspread, but I didn't expect the Hilton.

Overall, in a pinch (or if I couldn't afford better, as was the case this time) I would stay there again. They were quite happy to give me new bedspreads when I reported the poop.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (0)

What Cohen wrote, and what Hari said about it

It's not often that a review of a review is utterly compelling. But Oliver Kamm's dissection of Johann Hari's review of Nick Cohen's book (are you still with me?) is devastating. Hari's distortions are simply incredible.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (0)

Not Boris

Oh dear, I think I'll be in a minority of about one when I write this here.

I realise that Boris is the Spectator's candidate for Mayor, and that he's an all round funny fellow and all that. But...

I can't for the life of me see how anyone could consider he'd make a good Mayor. I made a huge mistake last time round in voting for Ken Livingstone on a single issue, the congestion charge. Steve Norris was against, and I was (and remain) hugely in favour. But I stupidly ignored the more rounded picture - that Livingstone is a first class sh*t, and a man who disgraces the city he represents.

And that's my problem with Boris. It has nothing to do with his personal life, which I think is a red herring. It's that I think he is a buffoon. I simply don't buy this idea that beneath the exterior lies a piercingly sharp interior. I just think what you see is what you get - a teriffic writer, a wonderfully comical speaker, and a figure who shouldn't have even the tiniest real influence on anything of importance.

The idea that Boris Johnson might be the man to represent London on the world stage just embarrasses me. And I have seen no evidence - not just little evidence, but no evidence - that he has any worthwhile contribution to make on public policy issues or that he has any kind of vision for London, let alone the ability to implement it.

Talk about an impossible choice:al-Qaradawi's PR man or a buffoon.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (4)

Hurrah for Evan Davis!

It's not often I write this, but the Guardian has it spot on (well, almost) today:

I can't say I agree with his praise for John Humphrys, who seems to think the programme is about him, rather than the news, and I never got the Sue MacGregor thing - I didn't dislike her, she just seemed pedestrian to me. But Stephen Brook is bang on about Evan Davis - and about the awful Daniel Sandford, who deserves to be cast into the same broadcasting oblivion as Fiona Bruce and Natasha Kaplinksy - TV presences who force my finger on to the remote for a quick channel change.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (2)

Private equity, public good

In today's Wall Street Journal, my CNE colleague, Wilfried Prewo, puts the private equity issue in its proper place:

Private Equity has raised our wealth in four major ways.

First, private equity funds are not charities...Their job is to make money for their investors. Their short time frame puts them under pressure to raise a company's valuation, or net worth, fast.

...While their take-no-prisoners attitude in restructuring has not endeared private equity funds to labor unions and politicians, layoffs are usually outweighed by later employment growth. The public view has been distorted since the short term pain of restructuring receives much press, while the ensuing recovery and long-term job gains get short shrift.

...In a 2006 survey, the consultancy A.T. Kearney found that private equity firms contribute to sustained net job gains and revenue growth in Europe. This is good news for society. The profits earned by the funds when they exit are a reflection of the value they have added. The gain to the overall economy comes in the form of more competitive companies with solid prospects for growth and jobs.

Second, private equity offers an alternative new form of corporate finance. Financial innovation has allowed private equity funds to earn a high return where conventional finance could not. They have, on more than one occasion, taken over companies that were on the brink of disaster and that nobody else wanted to touch. When DaimlerChrysler sold off its flailing U.S. unit earlier this year for example, the only interested buyers were a combination of industrial and private equity funds.

...Third, private equity recharges entrepreneurship. "Family-owned" also means that the family are the prime source for managerial talent. But there is no guarantee that a great founder's entrepreneurial genes are passed on to subsequent generations; they may have the desire to be boss but not the DNA of a leader. In many private equity takeovers, fresh entrepreneurial spirit has been injected by putting second-tier, non-family managers in charge and giving them an equity stake in the venture as an incentive to perform.

Finally, private equity transactions have created a wider and more competitive market for buying and selling closely held companies. Before private equity firms came in, a company that was for sale usually attracted only few potential buyers, typically competitors from the same industry or large companies seeking to expand.

...At the end of 1999, the previous German government of Chancellor Gerhard Schröder announced a corporate tax reform that abolished the capital gains tax on the sale of corporate subsidiaries as of 2001. The unintended consequence was to help restructure German corporations and dismantle many corporate cross-holdings. What once was called Deutschland AG, or Germany, Inc., is now history. German industry owes much of its regained competitiveness to this and other supply side moves.

Private equity has a similar supply side effect. What the capital gains tax reform was for restructuring corporate Germany, private equity may do for closely held companies. As a capitalist tool of our time, it is proof that capitalism does not just enrich investors but improves social welfare as well.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (0)

I Tory sono già stanchi di Cameron, anche se stavolta non poteva vincere

Apologies for my absence yesterday. We moved four weeks ago, and the combination of decorators, builders, locksmiths et al all got too much!

Anyway, my latest Il Foglio column was in yesterday's paper. It's about Mr Cameron and his woes.

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (0)

President Cheney

Via Comment Central, here's the incomparable Daily Show's report on Dick Cheney's accomplishments in his two hours as President:

Email to a friend  |   Permalink  |   Comments (2)