Wade Rathke:

New Orleans      The old saying was always that “pride cometh before the fall.”  In the case of Alphabet-Google’s Sidewalk visions of grandeur, it turns out pride — and arrogance –came from the very beginning, throughout, before the fall, during the fall, and now after the fall as well. Sidewalk was one piece of the […]

New Orleans        Rumor or reality?  I wasn’t sure.  My daughter had heard from a real estate agent who specializes in New Orleans historic districts like the French Quarter, Marigny, Bywater, and elsewhere that, contrary to nationwide home sale collapses of 50% during the pandemic, sales were booming in the Quarter.  I found that hard […]

New Orleans        It is no secret that opening versus stay-at-home from state to state and nationally has now, somewhat amazingly, but unsurprisingly as pandemic combines with polarization in the United States, become equally politicized.  Having recently returned from my monthly commute from Louisiana to Mississippi to Arkansas and back, I can’t help but reflect […]

Pearl River     We all wonder what the world of life and work is going to look like at the end of this 2020 Great Depression under the helm of the modern-day Herbert Hoover.   Just as an aside, perhaps every one-hundred years Americans need to be reminded the hard way that electing a businessman is a […]

Pearl River     What’s the issue with masks?  We see them everywhere and nowhere. United States Vice-President Pence toured a nursing home while in Indiana.  They see a box of KN95 masks.  Hey, here’s a good photo op, say he and his team.  Let’s have the Veep look like he’s delivering masks to the nursing home, […]

Little Rock      I thought I was paying pretty close attention, but this one slipped right by me.  Who knew that part of the giant stimulus package included a first-of-its-kind paid leave provision?  It must be me, but why do I have the sneaky suspicion that maybe I missed the reports about paid leave, because they […]

Little Rock      There is talk everywhere about “re-opening.”  When?  How?  The “new” normal is a question on everyone’s mind.  I find it interesting and curious how much you hear about people working from home.  The Times cited a poll the other day, saying that Gallup found that almost 60 percent of Americans working from home […]

New Orleans       The irony and contradictions around so-called “essential” workers are vexing – mainly to the workers themselves.  They have to go to work because they are, by definition, essential, yet employers in the main seem both committed to labeling them as essential and continuing to treat them, their health concerns, and their wage […]

New Orleans      It used to be that masks and guns were a bad combination that spoke of trouble with capital letters.   Until recently, I would quip that if you were trying to raise money from a foundation these days that you needed a ski mask and a gun.  Now the world is topsy-turvy.  A […]

Pearl River     We’ve been fighting payday lending for over fifteen years in Canada with some success as well a truckload of frustration.  The issue has been in our sights for several decades in the United States as well.  In Canada, ACORN has been stymied as the federal government pushed the issue into a province by […]