Got back yesterday afternoon, unpacked, made sure that everything at the ranch was OK, then hit the sack. Now I have a day or more of number crunching on the computer to figure out what's going on with my view of the market.
Regarding the Pope, given that he was the leader of a (small) national entity, that he was the leader of the world's largest organized religion and as such represented lots of people in nearly every nation on the planet, and that he was a genuinely positive influence on the world and truly respected by millions if not billions of people, I think that it's fine that schools and US government entities were flying flags at half staff. Mother Theresa and Gandhi weren't comparable, even though they were probably very fine individuals and made great contributions. I considered lowering the flags to be an act of respect not only for the Pope, but also for all of those who admired him. TV stations in Europe had hours of uninterrupted coverage of the ceremonies leading up to the funeral, and it really seemed to be the news of the year while we were over there.
You'll find me to be a person critical of much of papal history, but John Paul II was one whom I admired.
Harking back to a prior discussion that you and I had, remember that every person in the world has a religion. Some religions worship a (G)(g)od, others do not. Some religions have names attached to them, others do not. Some without names can still be categorized because they are unwittingly shared in common by thousands or millions of people. |
