The Blaisdell Blog

On October 24, 1921, Sgt. Edward F. Younger, approached four identical caskets laid in the city hall of Chalons-sur-Marne in France.   Sgt. Younger had, himself, been badly wounded in combat, been highly decorated for valor and received the Distinguished Service Medal.   But he was alive, and on this day he had an awesome task.   The four caskets before him had each been exhumed, quite at random, on Memorial day, 1921, from four World War I American cemeteries in France.   Each contained the remains of a soldier who had been unrecognizable and unknown at the time of his burial.   All anyone will ever know about these four bodies is that they were American soldiers and had fallen in “The War to End all Wars.”   Younger’s task was both simple and agonizing.   He would select one of these caskets for internment in the newly created Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.   Sgt. Younger moved forward (at what impulse we will never know) and placed a spray of white roses on the third casket from t

I like to tell people that I can teach them the essence of economics in three minutes.   Here is the lesson:             Our wants exceed our resources so we must make choices.   Each choice means we must give up what we forsake as a second choice.   That forsaken choice represents the opportunity cost.   A good choice yields satisfaction.   A bad choice does not and therefore represents a poor use of scare resources.   Economics is the science of choice making.               That is economics.   Now, don’t get me wrong.   Economics is a mathematical science.   You quantify all that choice making.   This quantification involves more Greek letters and obtuse symbols than a wall of graffiti.   Learning the details of that mathematical analysis takes several years of intense study, but the essence of economics is as I portrayed it.   Choice making.             In 1977 I had a choice to make.   I needed money and an organization called The Joint Council for Economics offered me a

In the spring of 2012, in eighteen days, my husband and I both lost our mothers.   One was 89 the other 91 years of age.   They died of the rigors and complications of old age.   No on lives forever, and if we do it right, our children bury us, never the other way around.   While I deeply needed and appreciate the good wishes of all of our friends, the fact is that our mothers lived lives that were celebrated more than they were mourned.             These women were made of steel.   Part of the, “Best Generation,” our mothers had lived through it all: the Great Depression, the dust bowl, wars, the Civil Rights movement, economic and social upheaval.   They sent their husbands to battle in World War II and their sons to the jungles of Viet Nam.   They saw their grandsons—and granddaughters—put on the uniform of their nation and ship out to Iraq and Afghanistan.   When we were attacked on September 11th my mother was my first call and I was steadied by her calm.   She had seen this