Amazon wrote:

The definitive history of water resources in the American West, and a very illuminating lesson in the political economy of limited resources anywhere. Highly recommended!

Publishers Weekly wrote:

This stunning work of history and investigative journalism tells the story of conflicts over water policy in the [American] West and the resulting damage to the land, wildlife and Indians.

This timely and important book should be required reading for all citizens.

Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water

The book is a very important one, and one hopes it will be widely read in this country.

Acidus recently asked, "Do salesmen/upper management need to better understand their products?"

Perhaps what's central to success is to understand scarcity, the lack thereof, and which model applies in any given scenario.

Looming threat to water security

Whoever controls the world's water is controlling the world's life."

Like Water for Profit

Sell telecom, buy energy.

Barrels, not bits.

Bits are worthless. Go for scarce. Go for oil and water.

Vivendi was right to sell media holdings; it should sell more of them. Shareholders should stick with the water company.

The question is whether $40 a barrel oil is or isn't a transitory peak. My view is that it's the new reality. The era of cheap oil is over.

Ugly Reality No. 1. We love unlimited energy, but we don't want to do anything to get it.

Ugly Reality No. 2. The Middle East remains the largest pool of oil reserves in the world. That's bad news.

Ugly Reality No. 3. There are disturbing signs that Hubbert's Peak is arriving as predicted.

Relationship of oil, stocks leads to ugly truths

This entry is posted in response to k's comment on this quote:

Alarmed by his company's escalating health insurance costs and a frightening scarcity of remedies, Ford Motor Co. Chief Executive William C. Ford Jr. declared in December that the nation needs an entirely new health care system.

Then he tapped Ford's vice chairman to craft a proposal to develop one.

k's comment on this was:

The excerpt above truly struck me. This is Ford motor company devoting resources to crafting a new health care system for the country.

I would point out that this is certainly not the first time this has occurred. There is a fine line between government and industry, and Ford has a history ...

Defense issues, including the missile gap, played a prominent role in the campaign of 1960. President-elect Kennedy, very much concerned with defense matters although lacking Eisenhower's mastery of the issues, first offered the post of secretary of defense to former secretary Robert A. Lovett. When Lovett declined, Kennedy chose Robert S. McNamara on Lovett's recommendation.

In 1946 McNamara joined Ford Motor Company as manager of planning and financial analysis. He advanced rapidly through a series of top-level management positions to the presidency of Ford on 9 November 1960, one day after Kennedy's election. The first company head selected outside the Ford family, McNamara received substantial credit for Ford's expansion and success in the postwar period. Less than five weeks after becoming president at Ford, he accepted Kennedy's invitation to join his cabinet.

Although not especially knowledgeable about defense matters, McNamara immersed himself in the subject, learned quickly, and soon began to apply an "active role" management philosophy, in his own words "providing aggressive leadership questioning, suggesting alternatives, proposing objectives and stimulating progress."

Initially the basic policies outlined by President Kennedy in a message to Congress on 28 March 1961 guided McNamara in the reorientation of the defense program.

McNamara played a much larger role in the formulation of nuclear strategy than his predecessors.

As defined by McNamara, assured destruction meant that the United States would be able to destroy in retaliation 20 to 25 percent of the Soviet Union's population and 50 percent of its industrial capacity. To make this strategy credible, McNamara speeded up the modernization and expansion of weapon and delivery systems.

Robert McNamara

While the president is thinking about his second term, many of those in his cabinet are thinking about getting out.

Discipline Takes a Break at the White House

Stories, like plants, die if they are not tended. So do the reputations of newspapers.

Weapons of Mass Destruction? Or Mass Distraction?

Hilary Rosen asked, "If there are easier jobs available, for more money, then why take a hard job?"

Here's to apathy!

Hollywood's Casting Problem: Who Will Run the MPAA?

It's sad to consider that after four years of the best education money can buy, these students have only over the last year "been forced to relearn the lessons" of their parents' generation. One would hope that the well educated wouldn't need to witness firsthand a repetition of mistakes of the past to get the point.

Do you understand the difference between "Is it worth buying?" and "Can it be sold?"

In Their 20's, Thinking About War

I sometimes have no idea what time of the day it is. The days of the week are completely irrelevant. The only thing that matters is the date and time. Since we work seven days a week, it doesn't matter if it's Monday or Saturday. It's kind of nice, I think -- one less thing to worry about.

The Things They Wrote