Pondering the War Between the States

Talk about an opinion piece one wouldn’t expect to read in a mainstream newspaper today.

Just check out the first two paragraphs of the op-ed by historian and author Kirkpatrick Sale which appeared in the Charleston Post and Courier under the title “Understanding the Sesquicentennial – and the war’s real causes“:

“What is important to remember as we approach the Sesquicentennial of the start of a certain war is first that it was not a civil war, second that it was the Union that started it, and third that it was not started over slavery.

“And unless we understand that, we cannot come to grips with our past.”

The 2012 Ferrari FF: A dream come true

Most of us won’t be in the market for a Ferrari anytime soon, but car aficionados can always dream.

For those who muse about a future filled with torque, horsepower and more speed than a Greatful Dead reunion, there is the Ferrari FF.

The Wall Street Journal has a captivating review of the 2012 Ferrari FF, including a decidedly atypical introduction:

Imagine the Alps, perfected. Each breath tastes of diamonds. Snow-laced massifs vault into a dark-blue sky and green hills cascade to the valleys below, a panoptic of edelweiss and immortality. Here the cowbells play Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” and busty women in over-tight dirndls repair the roads.

Now imagine all this upside down, flying past your windshield at 32 feet per second squared as you plunge to your picturesque Alpine death in the Ferrari FF. And everything was going so well.