It seems like it’s been a while since I’ve heard the word “choice” used as a selling point for a company. This past weekend I went to Gwinnett Place Mall where several storefronts were closed to make way for new storefronts. Covering each of them was a big sign that said, “Simon Malls: More Choices.” Nevermind that Simon now owns six malls in the metro area: Gwinnett Place, Lenox Square, Mall of Georgia, Northlake, Phipps Plaza and Town Center. Thankfully, for those who actually like shopping in malls — I don’t — there are fourteen regional malls (as listed in the AJC’s guide to malls). That means Simon owns forty three percent of the malls in the metro area. As aggressive as Simon’s marketing and promotions campaigns are, I can only imagine that their strategy is to increase their share even further.

As I walked around the mall, I spotted the Waldenbooks and decided to venture in. While I can never expect too much from a mall bookstore, I still felt a bit of a shock when I saw the philosophy section. All the books I saw there were books about Buddhism, Tao, Ayn Rand and Machiavelli. Somehow it was fitting that a bookstore set in a mall that benefits more from a less-informed consuming public would sell books that encourage its customers to feel at one with their own greedy backstabbing selves.

Wal-Mart’s commercials, meanwhile, have started to steer away from talking up their low prices and toward a more wholesome message relating to their values. Valuing employees. Valuing customers. With a quarter of a billion dollars in annual revenue and nearly three billion dollars socked away in the bank, they are the largest retailer. If they want to continue to be the top player, they know where they have to focus: keep the business strategy as price leader, despite what the commercials may claim.

A Senate report on gas prices back in 2002 details, among other things, the chilling effect consolidation has on the price we pay at the pump. I should take this moment to give a shoutout to my poor fellow netizens who had to endure a mass email calling for a boycott of those evil companies that charge more for gas. This comes with a reminder: if you want lower gas prices, demand less gas.

More recently, Europe slapped Microsoft on the wrist for behaving like a bad monopoly. The fine: five hundred million euros. Nevermind that at last count, they have nearly six and a half billion dollars in the bank. A report from the Stanford School of Business reveals, meanwhile, why Microsoft charges such a small price for Windows and so much for Office. Under current market conditions (especially unregulated), Microsoft could get away with charging $1,800 for Windows. It all goes to show that in order to force Microsoft to truly innovate and create a more stable operating system, hit them where it counts. Open up Office document formats so that other development firms can more easily create their own office productivity software.

Speaking of values, price leadership and monopoly, if the Republicans want to win, they have only one issue to focus on: taxes. With so many voters having such a myopic viewpoint, patriotism and war should take a back seat to taxes. Forget about good government and good policy setting. Taxes are all the taxpayers care about. After all, as Rupert Murdoch has already pointed out, nobody really cares about freedom. Or, if they do, nobody realizes the true price of freedom.

After looking at my stats and seeing that for the first time ever my site is getting an average of over a hundred visits a day, I thought to myself that maybe I should try posting a little more often. I suppose I’ve been posting a lot less because I’ve found myself concentrated on things I shouldn’t blog about either because it’s nothing worth mentioning or for privacy reasons. In either case, there is simply too much going on in my life for me to concentrate on blogging.

In other news, I recently tried turning in my paperwork to finalize my change of major to Human Resources Policy & Development only to find out that the program is now under review. So now, like the Theater program, HRP&D is not accepting any new majors at this time. At this point, until a final decision is made, I’m kind of in an academic limbo. If I could register for classes for the HR major, I would, but those classes are limited only to HR majors, so I’ve opted to take some more Management classes over the summer.

Last week I went to Nashville with the University Singers for the American Choral Directors Association district convention. We were one of about four or five college choral groups to perform, and that’s out of about ninety who submitted tapes.

One of the great things about the University Singers is that it’s such a diverse group. There are jews, christians, and muslims. If I tried to name off the top of my head how many nationalities and ethnicities are represented, I would certainly leave out several. My experience with this group has been the opposite of the experience represented with the ΠΚΑ incident, which only served as an example of institutional racism and ignorance.

At the convention we were able to watch a few of the other choral groups who performed. They were all white. They sang challenging songs, indeed, but there was very little variation as far as how they sang. Then we sang. We sang Spanish, Latin, Russian; we sang a couple of spirituals. Our repertoire required that we have a change in color from one song to the next. In other words, not only did we have to pay attention to how we shaped our vowels from one song to the next or whether we used straight tone or vibrato, but we had to know what we were singing (the translation) and the historical and cultural background to have a true understanding of how we should portray the music.

My experience with the University Singers only makes me wonder how many other examples of diversity can be found around the campus. I bet there are dozens, if not hundreds. What gets media attention, though, isn’t what happened in Nashville. Nor is it any other great example of diversity. It’s what happens at some frat party.

Well, I started this one out thinking this quiz would juge me as having a heart of lead. I guess the quiz was wrong, then.

Heart of Gold

What is Your Heart REALLY Made of?
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C|Net is briefly getting into political news by reporting on a couple of Republican Senate staffers who accessed files in the home directories of Democratic members of the Judiciary Committee. While their apparent intent was to help ease the process of getting certain judicial nominees on the bench, there is still more investigation to be done.

Georgia State is getting a little bit of a black eye in the media (video) over an incident in the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity, which held a Hip Hop-themed party where two members showed up in blackface.

A proposed new road would cut through the Bobby Jones Golf Club in order to bring another connection between Northside Dr. and Peachtree St., and to reroute traffic going to Piedmont Hospital. The neighbors are still not sure what to think.

Among other really amazing articles, Harper’s is setting into perspective the extent to which homeland security spending is way overblown. No pun is intended here.

Hillary Clinton has something to say about the economy: the worst policy is no strategy. President Bush has no strategy.