My take on the Democratic Convention

I'm glad the whole show is over and with it, I believe that the DNC did a much better job than the Republicans to energize their base and clarify what they stood for. In my view, Michelle Obama, Bill Clinton and even Joe Biden did a superb job in framing the issues.

I would have liked more specificity on the part of the President, to explain how he'll move forward if re-elected, but I thought his performance, if not great, was good enough.
At least, there was no major gaffe like the one the RNC managed to produce with Clint Eastwood, and if Obama carries on the rest of his campaign well enough, he should be re-elected. I rate him now at 7 out 10, while Romney moves down to 4...

The real issue in this presidential election

From the Republicans' standpoint the most important issue is to make Barack Obama a one-term president. This was eloquently said by Senator Mitch McConnell when he spoke at the Heritage Foundation in 2010. For him, Boehner, Romney, Ryan and most of the Republicans, the priority wasn't the Nation's debt, the deficit, the economy or even job creation.  It was crystal clear: Getting rid at all cost of Obama.

Obstructing him was the choice strategy and it has hurt America ever since our current president was inaugurated. I'm pretty sure that the secret wish from a large portion of the GOP was to see the economy tank, the jobless rate grow shoot into double-digit to secure the elimination of a president they despise.

This of course, begs the question, why? Is it racism? Quite probably. It's also the fact that the anglo-white male is on his last leg in terms of dominating the American political agenda. Women, latinos, asians and non-white are gaining influence upon the country and the tables are rapidly turning. This might be the last election in which the GOP is still likely to get some traction. Given their wicked priorities, I hope they don't!

Fall's in the air!

Cool morning temperatures and pleasant day-time weather; we've turned the corner and are now fully into Fall season. Good bye summer and welcome to what's indeed the best season of the year in the Rocky Mountains!

Shorter day perhaps, but still a lot of outdoor fun in store for all of us and the implacable reminder that winter is next. Let's make the very best out of that very special time of the year...

Miner's Day Celebration

In Park City, Labor day is called “Miner's Day” because our lovely little town used to be the home of one of the largest mining boom in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. By 1892, Park City was already famous for having one of the most famous silver mines in the world. This period of abundance came to an end in the 1950s when our community nearly became a ghost town before transforming itself as a fledgling ski town in 1963.

Over all those years, and through the hard work of its miners, Park City counts today as much as 1,200 miles of underground galleries, most of them running deep under many of our favorite ski runs from Deer Valley through Canyons! Yesterday was a wonderful opportunity after a parade through Main Street, a huge crowd gathering at City Park and that unique mucking and drilling contest, to remind us all where we, the Parkites, really come from.

In the 28 years we've lived in town, this was only the second time that we attended the mucking and drilling contest, but it was so fun that we may doing again next year!

Birthday present?

Yesterday was my brother's birthday. Yeah, another one of these that we'd rather dismiss in this dubious numbers-game! This said, my brother and his wife received an unexpected present on the wee hours of that day. First, as she was preparing an early morning tea, my sister-in-law heard a loud thumping noise around the house.

The disruption was so loud and so unexpected that she couldn't locate it right away; she thought it might come from the bedroom where my brother was still in bed, but that wasn't the case. She then looked up over the deck, by the kitchen, and saw a huge man apparently laying down on the floor.

After panicking a bit, she called the police and the fire brigade. Those came shortly and picked up a fellow that probably had drank too much, driven into the cul-de-sac street where my relative live and proceeded to rest on one of the chairs that was on the deck. That's when he later fell and made all that noise. Birthdays are often filled with big surprises!

Great French croissants near Park City...

If you ask my wife and try to understand what she misses most about France, she'll probably say: “Freshly baked croissants in the morning!” Since we live 5,000 miles (8,000 km) away from France, our seemingly only alternative is to catch the Delta flight between Salt Lake City and Paris in order to grab these precious delicacies and bring them home.

Yet, more than time and issues of freshness, there's of course the problem of affordability; a round trip ticket departing today would set me back $1,138 which would make for an expensive bundle of croissants, not counting jet lag and strain on the body.

Thanks God, there's a sensible alternative which consist in jumping in my car and driving less than 4 mile (6 km) to the Deer Valley Grocery~Café and get these precious croissants, as fresh and as delicious as their French-made counterparts. Life is good!

 

If I were a presidential candidate...

Just like Mitt Romney, I'd talk at length about my parents and grand-parents and how it was hard for them to make a living, but how through hard work and determination, they improved their lives and send me to school. All of this good stuff, except that they still lacked the money to leave France and board a ship headed for the United States.

That's also why I can't be president of this wonderful country! Except for the period of the German occupation, and for all my entire life in France, we were pretty much free to do as we pleased, except that with a European continent already settled for centuries, there was far less room for growth and enrichment than in a brand-new United States.

This said, I would also recognized that I didn't mind paying taxes and even if we reverted to the pre-Bush era rates, I would still love to pay one million dollars in taxes in one year, which means that there would still be plenty of money left for myself and my family. I would also make sure that we fix, once and for all, our public school system instead of re-inventing the wheel with charter schools and other private education outlets.

I'd cut a big chunk of the defense budget because spending as much as the next 14 biggest military spending nations in the world is a bit out of whack, and I'd ask for civility in congress, because it has become the highest demoralizing factor in our Nation's life.

 I'd cut other unnecessary government expenses, fix our crumbling infrastructure and if there's any money left, I'd start repaying our debt. Finally, regardless if I were a presidential candidate or nor, I'd stop seeing Clint Eastwood movies and wouldn't never set foot in a Staples store ever again.