(Celebration, Florida) The Town Walt Built. Property Poetry.

In 11-square miles, with pastel-colored condos and warmly hued-homes,

Like the Magic Kingdom nearby, there opened a master-planned community.

Walt himself dreamed of a Disney-themed town that the company owned,

Named “Celebration” with housing, shopping, and public space in proximity.

Now 20 years later, the company sold the center of the city,

The condo owners have filed suit asking for repairs.

The legal claim about the condition is more than whether they’re pretty,

But the new owners, Lexin Capital, claim the fault is not theirs.

Even if this new urbanism seemed like the perfect plan,

Walt isn’t here to take care of the citizens.

This was the early vision of the man,

Yet property management and maintenance takes discipline.

Disney provided vision, money, and development of aesthetics,

At the beginning, it hired architects, builders, and planners.

“Now, we’re slapping on whitewash, or lipstick on a pig,” a board member said it’s pathetic.

Neighbors treat each other well; however, even Democrats show Republicans good manners.

Repair, replacement, and maintenance could cost over 15 million dollars,

A Utopian population of about 10 thousand, worry about resale value of property.

Disney sold its interest over 8-years ago, and now claims they only control exterior paint colors,

The name “Celebration” in its current condition, they say, turns Walt's vision into mockery.

(end)

Adapted from an article I read by @LauraKusisto

http://www.wsj.com/articles/leaks-and-mold-are-ruining-the-disney-magic-in-celebration-florida-1479249246

Poetry ©Mark H. Pillsbury (2016)

The Most Important Venn Diagram in Politics

Venn Diagram in Presidential Politics: 2016

I wrote previously about arbitrage (02/22/2013):  http://rostranovum.blogspot.com/2013/02/beginning-with-letter-arbitrage.html

Arbitrage is the method of finding a trading advantage because of some sort of unknown inequality. I’m fascinated by finding the angle or the area of analysis no one else is looking for?

There’s always a hinge-issue, a decision-point, a key deciding group that swings elections, and finding that group keeps political scientists busy every four years between major elections.

With so much of this cycle focused on the personalities and idiosyncrasies of the top candidates, feeding the cult of personality the salacious purple Kool-Aid of the 24-hour news cycle has dominated the thinking of the professional political class.

But I don’t care about the pundits; I’m interested in a large chunk of US citizens otherwise forgotten in our society. These voters are disaffected, disengaged, and outcast.

In the 2012, 58% percent of registered voters turned out for the very close election between President Obama and Mitt Romney; however, 93 million registered voters did not vote.

Currently, the federal agency which tracks employment, the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics, said 94.6 million working adults were no longer participating in the workforce—they aren’t employed and they no longer are seeking employment.

A Venn diagram is a diagram that uses circles to illustrate the relationships among sets, and in this case the two sets are as follows: Set A is the large block of registered adults who did not exercise their voting rights in the last Presidential election. Set B is the large group of adults that are of working age and cannot find a job, to the point that they are a group no longer even looking to find a job.

In a Venn diagram, the region in both A and B, where the two sets overlap, is called the intersection of A and B, and it is the area of critical importance in my current thinking regarding Tuesday’s Presidential election. It is the area where the non-voters and the unemployed intersect, a powerful voting block of motivated citizens (hypothetically).

It is at this intersection, where sincere political analysis raises a number of questions:

• How big is the overlap of Set A (non-voters) and Set B (non-workers)?
• Are the the millions in the overlap region motivated enough to decide to vote this Presidential election, as opposed to not voting last time?
• If these people do actually vote, for whom will that voting block cast their ballot?
• Is this voting group big enough to swing the election either way?
• How do these folks think about the direction of our country, or the quality of the nominees?

Wouldn’t this be a great group to track over the next 48-hours…

©Mark H. Pillsbury