The fight of his life - San Francisco Business Times:

Mike Homer helped raise the money for 2,000 medical research computers. Now researchers are using that equipment to save his life.After Homer was diagnosed with a rare and invariably fatal brain-wasting disease, his network of friends marshalled cash, clout and connections on his behalf.Along the way, a hard truth has sunk in: It isn't enough.

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Obama's inaugural speech

Barack Obama’s Inaugural Address

Following is the prepared text of President-elect Barack Obama’s Inaugural Address, as provided by the Presidential Inaugural Committee:

My fellow citizens:

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land - a nagging fear that America’s decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America - they will be met.

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sanh.

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions - that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act - not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology’s wonders to raise health care’s quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. And all this we will do.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions - who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public’s dollars will be held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day - because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control - and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort - even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus - and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West - know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world’s resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter’s courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent’s willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends - hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence - the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed - why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America’s birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:

"Let it be told to the future world...that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it]."

America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

King today and tomorrow

I've been reading Michael Eric Dyson's "I May Not Get There With You: The True Martin Luther King Jr." (2000, The Free Press) In the book, Dyson challenges us to remember King's message -- even the "dangerous" parts -- and to cast aside the antiseptic, highly marketable version of King today.

It's intriguing to me. I was waddling toward my third birthday when MLK was killed. Going to a mostly black elementary school, however, I was introduced to him and several other players that shaped black history by the time I was in second grade.

I embraced King's philosophy of non-violent change, but I've always wondered: How would I feel about him if I actually lived through the civil rights movement, and I myself was challenged/threatened by King to break from the status quo of a Jim Crow system that was the only society I knew? What if I viewed King in the 1960s like several view the Rev. Al Sharpton or the Rev. Jesse Jackson today?

So, on MLK day, a pullout from Dyson's book -- and a challenge for us all:

"[King's] methods of social protest were embraced by millions of whites as the best route to racial redemption. By embracing King, many whites believed the threat of black insurrection could be contained, perhaps even shrewdly diverted.

"To the chagrin of white leadership and the white press, Kiing stepped out of character -- at least the one they had written him into. He began to identify more strongly with the masses of black (and eventually, white and Latino) poor who had been invisible even within elite black circles. Moreover, King became increasingly anti-imperialist and chided the American government for its involvement in the Vietnam War. … In King's mind, race, poverty and war were intimately related. When King contended that all human life was tied together in a 'single garment of destiny,' he was lauded by liberal whites and integration-minded blacks. When he insisted that racism, economic inequality and militarism were the 'triplets of social misery,' he was attacked for oversimplifying complex social issues. …

"This is not the King we choose to remember. The King we prefer is easily absorbed into fast-food ads for his birthday celebration. Or he is touted, even by political leaders who opposed him when hhe lived, as the moral guardian of racial harmony. In truth, political conservatives have more ingeniously than their liberal coutnerparts appropriated King's image, identity and ideology. … When King changed his mind about race and class, he borth enraged conservatives and aliented liberals. While conservatives have zealously consumed King's earlier vision of race, evenn if to twist it perversely in a greatly changed racial era, liberals have refrained from appropriating King's words out of context to justify narrow interests. It is another thing altogether to understand the need to apply King's words skillfully, especially his more challenging words, to our current situation. Conservatives have retailed King's words. Liberals and progressives must retell his story. But we must make sure, in the interest of truth, to include the parts of King's vision that disturb us. …

"He bid America to make good on promises of justice and freedom for all persons, promises that had been extended almost two centuries before. Part of King's enormous genius was the ability to force America to confront its conscience. He also brilliantly urged American to reclaim a heritage of democracy buried beneath cold documents and callous deeds. …"

Thinking about the future

The macro social and political upheavals of the 1960s had already sent fissures along the micro Lavette, McAllister and Pavone street communities of America when my mother saw the Hatten family walking toward Columbus School for a PTA meeting.

The Hattens represented what was changing about Benton Harbor, Michigan. Sure, they had the same upwardly mobile spirit that had driven people a generation earlier from Benton Harbor’s low-lying, low-income Flats neighborhood to the highlands a half-mile away.

This was before the heavy industry economy collapsed, and the Hattens must have foreseen a bright middle-class future ahead that was based on hard foundry work or, if lucky, an assembly job at the Whirlpool appliance factory. They had earned a ticket out.

But the Hattens were different. They were black.

I don’t remember if my mother knew the family at that point. If she had, she probably felt some community bond with them. Their Lavette Street home, between the very American-sounding street names of Clay and Harrison, was just two blocks over from where my parents, two older sisters and older brother had moved just before I was born in 1965.

Our unspectacular but sturdily built frame house in the 700 block of Pavone Street dated from the 1910s. It was where my mother largely was raised by my great-grandmother as my widowed grandmother worked. My great-grandparents had lived there since probably 1919, themselves moving from Lavette Street.

Whether my mother knew the Hattens before that day, I guess, doesn’t really matter. What she saw was a family – one of the growing numbers of proud black families moving in as whites fled to suburbia – dressed in their Sunday best and voting to take part in their children’s education.

It was the American dream realized.

Except they were turned away at the door. No blacks allowed.

That was some 40 years ago, and though I regret never talking in depth with my mother about how it shaped her, I believe it was that moment that she committed to no longer standing on the sidelines.

She may have felt guilty for not standing up for the Hattens that day. I don’t know. But what bubbled out of that experience -- like a cauldron fueled by what her Congregationalist upbringing –-- was the belief that God didn’t mean for a black family to be turned away from a PTA meeting because of the color of their skin.

I’m reminded of the story for a couple of reasons, not the least of which is Barack Obama’s upcoming inauguration as president of these United States.

A black man. President.

I wonder what the Hattens would think.

But Obama’s inauguration is not the mountaintop. Instead, I would argue, an Obama presidency is the precipice.
We, as Americans, can forge a new era in our history. By reaching out and sacrificing –- splicing and reconfiguring the best parts of our cultural DNA –- we can create a new America. Or we can succumb to the worst that the past eight years has laid at our door.

Obama did not get to this point without the helping hands of many people -- black, white, Hispanic, Asian and otherwise. At the same time, his speeches, writings and potential policies leave me with a sense that he is a man who has searched his past -- even angered by it -- to find out who he is today and who he could be tomorrow.

It is who we ALL could be tomorrow. It is the hope of Barack Obama's presidency and the legacy I hope it/my generation leaves. Maybe then the Hatten families of this world will be invited through the school door.

Detroit's driving me crazy

I'm seeing the pros and cons of an automaker bailout. My heart and wallet sees all those jobs held by many of my friends and family in Michigan that are STILL tied to the auto industry; my brain sees years of mismanagement and Bob Lutz blabber-mouthing and political protectionism. (Where are you now John Engler?)

But I asked a friend of mine in Michigan, who for years was in community economic development in the Great Lakes State, and I'll share her thoughts below.

As an aside, for a sample of the frustrations that folks here in California and other places in the country have with the auto industry, see Thomas L. Friedman's "How to Fix a Flat" column in the Nov. 12 New York Times.
www.nytimes.com/2008/11/12/opinion/12friedman.html

Anyway, here are my friend's thoughts:

1. Putting a car company into bankruptcy is NOT like putting an airline there. I'll take a risk that the airline won't be able to honor my $500 ticket. Not so much the warranty on my $25,000 car. I believe Chapter 11 = Chapter 7 and they may as well skip the middle man.

2. Plus, it will put the suppliers who've been struggling for years straight into the tank. The actual job loss dwarfs the financial services sector losses. Of course, automotive engineers and line workers aren't as cool as derivative salemen. Nothing creative about these folks, nope. They just build things. (Yes - I'm bitter.)

3. Best case bankruptcy scenario and GM goes into Chapter 11, reorganizes, blows out their legacy and labor costs and emerges "lean and mean." The U.S. government has just gone directly into national health care without
passing go — and without planning for it. We'll dump all those retirees, and many of the active workers, onto the Medicaid and Medicare systems. I think this would cost significantly more than a bail out. Which is not to say we shouldn't go there, but a little prior planning would seem to be in order.

4. Re: Some of the supposedly boneheaded product moves made by the Big Three: All the foreign automakers followed the Big Three willingly into the light truck/SUV world, because they make money and — oh, yeah — we wanted to buy them. The Japanese automakers came to hybrids, and the Europeans to clean diesel, because their home governments adopted policies that pushed the price of gasoline up and created market demand for more fuel-efficient vehicles. It's no accident that electric/gas hybrids debuted in Japan years before they came to North America.
By contrast, our government adopted two equally short sighted strategies. They put the burden of fuel economy on the backs of the automakers, who logically argued that their customers were voting with their pocket books for low fuel economy. Then, they established policies that kept the pump price lower than it was in the 1980s, providing no market incentive for consumers to go for the more fuel efficient vehicles. You could not have designed a more perfect system to punish true innovation, and encourage growth of non-sustainable markets.

I'm not saying the Big Three hasn't done some really dumb things over the years. But there's more than enough blame to go around, and I don't quite know why it's more important to punish them for bad behavior than it is companies whose business decisions are responsible for the fact that many of us aren't retiring any time soon.

It seems to me that the financial meltdown has had a much more serious impact on Main Street — not to mention making the problems of GM in particular much worse than it would otherwise have been.

Eating crow

A few of my friends have pointed out this line from a mid-August entry: "You heard it here first: Obama has lost the election."

The Obama campaign at that time didn't have a message. It wasn't showing Obama as a leader, at least not the same type of leader he was during the primaries. And I saw the campaign going the wishy-washy way of the Kerry and Gore campaigns.

Thank God for John McCain and Sarah Palin! It was their election to lose.

At the same time, Obama found his message and pounded it consistently. He led. He breeds a level of confidence, that whatever gets thrown at him, he'll consider various points of view then act decisively.

McCain couldn't even lead his party beyond its own schizophrenia. He relied on the people who got George II elected twice and who failed to see that America had changed over the past four years. He pandered to the loudest, crudest voices in the Republican party -- the far right wing, religious conservatives -- instead of leading the party to a New Day.

He didn't put country first; he put party first because of his own (and Cindy McCain's) 20-year-old presidential aspirations.

McCain couldn't even lead through the financial crisis, despite "suspending" his campaign to get back to Washington. He couldn't even control a split in his own party.

And then there's Palin, the campaign's attack dog. McCain didn't control her, despite his well-crafted image as a leader, a moderate, a (dare I say it) maverick. He allowed the campaign shapers who pushed him away from the middle to change the minds of many moderates and independents who otherwise were ready to vote for him.

McCain's campaign can be summed up by the final crusader in the third (and what should have been the final) Indiana Jones movie: "He chose ... poorly."

I'm glad McCain was wrong. I'm glad I was wrong. And I'm glad the Obama campaign found its compass.

Now let's get the hard work done.

Glacial fog

One of the things that makes life here so cool is the weather.

This morning, as I'm sitting at the kitchen table looking out the window, what looks like a glacier of fog is rolling through the Golden Gate. I hear a foghorn, and I see a slight frosting of pink-yellow-orange sunrise over the top of the fog. It's like you can reach out and scoop it up.

A picture wouldn't do it justice.

Yesterday was beautifully clear and as I looked out the kitchen window I could easily see the Golden Gate Bridge towers and houses on hills in Marin County -- probably 10-15 miles away.