Black Friday: Been there, done that

Some stores opened at 12:01 a.m. today. JCPenney opened at 4 a.m. Many others at 5. Even the Harley-Davidson dealerships in Roanoke and Christiansburg opened at 5 with deep discounts on bikes, parts and clothes until 8 a.m.

It’s Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, the busiest shopping day of the year…the day most retailers hope to sell enough to put their businsses into the black.

Odds are that won’t happen this year. Analysts say worried consumers will hold on to their money and avoid the "big ticket" items that make cash registers sing at the mall.

Even worse, shopping malls and other businesses are in trouble. Many have already missed mortgage payments and more will face foreclosure in the coming year.

Amy and I avoid the madness of Black Friday. We last participated in the annual ritual in 1991 when we went to New York to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and then stayed over on Friday to Christmas shop in Manhattan.

Big mistake. Take the crowds you see at Valley View Mall on Black Friday and multiply them by at least 500 and you might have some idea of what the streets of New York are like on the day after Thanksgiving.

The only shopping spectacle that tops Black Friday in the Big Apple is the day after New Year’s in London. We spent New Year’s Eve in London in 1986 and witnessed the post-New Year’s shopping blitz when hoards descend on the city’s West End like iguanas in a feeding frenzy.

No more. Yet, in a moment of fever-crazed madness brought up by pneumonia-induced lunacy, I suggested last night we might want to get up this morning and hit the Harley Dealer at 5 a.m. to check out the bargains. Amy went along with the idea with some misgivings and got up in the wee hours but I refused to budge. Sleep became my moment of sanity..

We’ll shop locally this year and buy what we can’t find around here online. It’s easier that way.

(Photo courtesy of Reuters. Copyright © 2008 Reuters Limited)

November 28, 20082 CommentsRead More

Thanksgiving 2008

For some, Thanksgiving 2008 brings more trepidation than thanks, more fear than hope, more dread than optimism.

A slumping economy, massive layoffs, rising foreclosures, seemingly-endless wars on two fronts and a daily news diet that features mostly bad news should send even the most idealistic into the depths of depression.

But in shouldn’t. Americans are a resilient bunch. We find hope when faced with adversity, we keep the faith when others lose hope.

Reports Todd Lewan of The Associated Press:

A Thanksgiving ago, many of us were fretting over delays at the airport, our holiday season shopping lists, even things like whether to get another Botox injection or a new set of wheels.

Now we worry about keeping gas in the car. Or just keeping the car.

This Thanksgiving, a slumping economy is making many Americans more fearful than thankful.

And yet, as grim as these days are, millions of Americans are still preparing to turn a meal into a celebration — to find joy in the midst of growing hardship.

You could see glimmers of it everywhere — from the suburbs north of Los Angeles, where families who once lived in new homes lined up for free food, to Denver, where dozens down on their luck answered an Internet ad for Thanksgiving dinner, to a church on Wall Street, where a clergyman repeatedly struggled to answer the question of the moment: Will the hard times ever end?

With me still layed low by pneumonia and Amy hobbled by the flu, we will spend Thanksgiving away from family and friends. We can’t risk my mother getting sick from any of the various germs that are having a party in our bodies.

But as we fight fever and sniffles and respiratory problems, we still find many reasons to be thankful on this holiday. Despite these temporary assaults on our wellness, we both remain relatively healthy as we head into our golden years. Despite a retirement nest egg destroyed by the stock market and falling real estate prices we still have food on the table and money enough to pay our bills.

I’m still able to take my cameras out to sporting events and other activities and record them for the local newspaper and this web site. I’m still able to write and report on national events on the web and local activities for the paper. These are all things I love to do. Anyone who is still doing what he or she loves for so long is truly lucky and should be thankful.

Amy finds fulfillment in volunteer activity at Angels in the Attic. I’m thankful that I’m still sober after so many years and can continue to successfully battle the beast of alcoholism one day at a time.

We’re thankful for the many new friends we’ve made since coming to Floyd and the many old friends who stay in touch.

To all of you, our best wishes for a Happy Thanksgiving. We live in interesting times. Let’s make the most of it.

November 27, 20081 CommentRead More

When all else fails, blame the media

A common mantra from the right-wing blames the media for a lot of what’s gone wrong with the Republican Party and the conservative movement in recent years.

The media is left-wing, they whine. The media loves Barack Obama, they claim. The media determines the outcome of elections.

I’ve heard these complaints for most of my 40 plus years of working in both journalism and politics. Hell, I even used to use the media as the bad guy in campaigns when I worked for the Republican Party in the 1980s.  To paraphrase an old lawyer’s axiom:

When the issues are against you, argue the facts.

When the facts are against you, argue the issues.

When both the facts and the issues are against you, pound the table and blame the media.

As Seinfeld used to say: Yada, yada, yada.

According to most polls, the American public distrusts the media almost as much as they distrust politicians. The approval ratings of journalists rank just a little higher than Congress and the President and both of those ratings are at the lowest point in decades.

At this point, somebody will jump up and say "yeah, but the approval ratings of both Congress and the President are at all-time lows because of the media.

Bullcrap. As my granddaddy used to say: Don’t piss down my back and tell me it’s raining.

• George W. Bush’s approval rating is the lowest in history because he’s a lousy President, perhaps even the worst in history;
• Congress is held in such low esteem by the American public because it is, by and large, an ineffective legislative body;
• The media didn’t elect Barack Obama President. He ran an incredibly effective campaign that registered with 53 percent of the voters. John McCain ran an incredibly stupid campaign and compounded it by picking the bimbo of the century as his running mate.

McCain came under fire from many prominent media conservatives. As Brian Normoyle wrote in The Huffington Post:

Traditional media conservatives abandoned John McCain like rats deserting a sinking ship. Andrew Sullivan questioned his integrity, Peggy Noonan and Kathleen Parker his judgment. William Kristol advocated McCain fire his entire campaign and start from scratch and even Charles Krauthammer seemed perplexed by his frenetic behavior while admitting Obama passes the Reagan presidential-mettle test. Stinging as those resounding critiques may be, the final nail in the campaign coffin may have been hammered in by endorsements.

Andrew Bacevich endorsed Obama in March and Wick Allison did it in September. Then there were the two iconic Christophers: Hitchins and Buckley, son of National Review founder William F. Buckley who is widely credited as the father of modern conservatism. The nation also heard earlier this month from the Chicago-Tribune, who endorsed a Democrat for president for the first time in the 161-year history of the paper. And this was all before the middle of October. As if it couldn’t get any worse for McCain, none other than Colin Powell offered a full-throated, unequivocal and irrefutably measured endorsement of Obama on Meet the Press.

I’m a libertarian by philosophy. I’ve always been a political independent but I worked on the 1984 Reagan-Bush campaign, helped elect several Republicans to Congress and served as a political field operative for both the National Republican Congresional Committee and the Republican National Committee.

But I walked away from politics when the GOP let the radical elements of the right-wing take over and turn the party of the elephant into a haven for homophobes, bigots and intolerance. I walked away from George W. Bush when he shredded the Constitution and used the USA Patriot Act to destroy the personal liberties that once provided the foundations of this country.

I returned to my first love — journalism — but I did not return as a liberal or a conservative, right-wing or left-wing, Democrat or Republican.

I returned as an American…and in these petty, partisan political times there is a difference.

November 26, 20085 CommentsRead More

Gloom and doom at the retail counter

Area businesses, along with retail outlets around the country, gear up this week for "Black Friday," the day after Thanksgiving that may or may not put them "in the black" for the year.

Black Friday is the busiest shopping day of the year. Many businesses open in the pre-dawn hours. Even the Harley-Davidson dealerships in Christiansburg and Roanoke open at 5 a.m. with huge discounts for the first three hours.

Many businesses aren’t waiting for Black Friday. Some offer deep discounts before Thanksgiving, hoping to encourage buying from a nervous public that’s worried about the worst economic conditions since the Great Depression.

Many economists expect massive business closings after the holiday season. Consumers are expected to stay home on Black Friday and the rest of the shopping season and those who do venture out are expected to buy less. Some stores, like Sharper Image, didn’t even make it to the season. They’re gone and others will surely follow.

Most people I’ve talked to say they are scaling back dramatically this holiday season. No big ticket items — just small gifts and a shorter list for holiday largess.

Probably just as well. Conspicuous consumerism has, for too long, been a hallmark of American excess.  A $25 Timex is more accurate than a $25,000 Rolex. A 50-cent pair of jeans from the Angels in the Attic thrift store in Floyd lasts just as long as the $75 designer duds from Macys.

Some analysts say the current economic crisis is a much-needed correction in American business and buying habits.

Perhaps it is.

November 25, 20081 CommentRead More

Revelation

On Saturday, I missed photographing the best game the Floyd County High School varsity football team has played all season.

I missed it because I’m entering my fifth week of battling pneumonia and couldn’t chance standing out in the freezing cold of a football field on a Saturday afternoon. I missed it because I’m an idiot that hasn’t listened to his doctor about the dangers of trying to come back too soon from a disease that has laid me low for three of the last four years.

For much of my life I’ve defied the odds and come back from injuries and diseases that should have put me in a graveyard. I’ve always been able to bounce back and work while injured or sick.

No more. As my 61st birthday approaches in less than a month I have to realize that the body is not as young or a resilient as it used to me and that this cat may have used up most of his nine lives.

I had planned to return to work on Monday. Now it will be at least another week, Dec. 1, before I can be fit enough to tackle a full schedule without tiring too easily. I hope to be fit enough to shoot the state semi-final game at Floyd next Saturday but that will be possible only if I do very little over the next week.

Even when I do return to the semblance of a normal schedule, I need a severe lifestyle overhaul. Less fatty food, less caffiene, more exercise and a more moderate work routine.

There’s a sign on the door of Blue Ridge Muse right now. It reads: "Temporarily closed because of illness."

I need to make sure "temporarily" does not turn into "permanently."

November 23, 20085 CommentsRead More