| Latest Commentary: | Volume VI, Number 28 |
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Romney Wins CPAC Straw Poll, Giuliani’s Second -- The Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) is a pretty big deal in the Republican Party and American conservative movement. Over the week-end, it held its annual conference that featured the usual lectures to the faithful and cheerleading panel discussions. During the meeting, the paid registrants got to express their opinion on who should be the GOP’s standard-bearer in 2008. Ex-Governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney earned a plurality of 21%, and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani came second with 17%. Apparently, conservative is a fluid term.
Zimbabwe’s Commercial Farmers Face End to Subsidies -- The mismanaged disaster that is Zimbabwe is about to get a new dose of unhappiness, but this time it is in the form of medicine that tastes bad. The government of President Robert Mugabe has informed the commercial farmers who took over white-owned farms 7 years ago that they are going to lose their subsidies next season. This is actually a good thing for the country in the long run, but in the short term, it isn’t going to feel like it. US Property Derivatives Market to Open -- This morning’s Financial Times reported that four big banks have set up a property derivatives trading platform in the US. With $450 trillion (yes, trillion) in outstanding contracts, the property market dwarfs the $60 trillion total value of the stocks traded on the world’s 10 biggest exchanges. Until recently, though, there has been no derivatives market attached to property. This is, in general, a good thing, but it is not without a downside. Geico Cavemen Get TV Pilot -- Geico Insurance has two very good campaigns going on. The first is the gecko with the Elephant and Castle accent. It’s a cute pun, and it does the job an ad should do – connect the company with the product in the consumer’s mind. The other, the cavemen, is a much broader and potentially much bigger campaign, “Geico insurance, so easy a caveman could do it.” But the cavemen live in modern times, dress and act like anyone else, and in one ad, visit a therapist. Now, it seems the cavemen are going to get a shot at a TV series. © Copyright 2007 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux. |
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