2008 Presidential Election

Tomorrow is one of my favorite days of the school year. I have the opportunity to meet 120 new seniors and reteach what I've already taught. This is now my 8th semester teaching economics, but every time I teach it, I pick up something new. Now, I have a chance to start fresh with new students. As I've always said before, once I lose that drive and passion to teach better, it's time to leave teaching and pursue something different.

As for Civics, I get to keep my 2nd period students and teach them what 3 1/2 years at Claremont McKenna College taught me. This will also be a trial run for how I teach AP Government next semester.

It's 3:07 AM in the morning, a normally insane time in the morning, but this is my space to rant and so I will!

Today, I took a day off from school... but not really. I woke up at 5:30 AM in the morning, hastily packed for my brief sojourn to Northern California and had my groggy brother drive me to Long Beach Airport to catch an early 6:50 AM flight. I have taken a liking to Jet Blue for a variety of reasons. Number 1 reason: cost. A round trip flight from Long Beach to Oakland cost me only $97. The only downside is that I had to catch early morning flights which is inconvenient for those having to take me to the airport (my brother) and pick me up from the airport (Mr. Lopez).
After watching some fascinating biography stuff on Harry Houdini's genius in marketing, ESPN news footage of Theo Epstein rejoining the Boston Red Sox and whatever caught my fancy directly in front of my aisle 21C seat, I landed at Oakland International at 8:05 AM.
It's now 8:30 AM and I'm in my PT Cruiser, cruising down the 580 South towards Hillbrook School in Los Gatos. After facing some massive traffic, I arrive to meet Mrs. Chai (my sister) in her classroom and we spontaneously decide that I should teach her little 3rd graders some economics.... and so I oblige and create with her a modified budget plan for 3rd graders. I thought it was quite a success and hopefully they learned a thing or two.
One more day here in SF on my vacation/econ conference. The actual international econ conference so far has been okay... some stuff I might be able to use in the classroom, but honestly that $200 stipend that I'm getting to go to this conference is basically paying for my trip. Here's a breakdown of my expenses thus far:

---

JetBlue flight - $97.00 Dr. Pepper & Chips - $5.00 Gas Fillup on PT Cruiser - $31.99 Fox PT Cruiser Rent a Car - $48.00 Parking at Cal State Hayward - $1.50 Bay Bridge Toll Fee - $3.00 Given that I have at least three more trips across the Bay Bridge ($9.00), another half a tank or more fillup on my PT Cruiser ($20-$25), and a Saturday night dinner with Lucas, I'll probably be right about $225 or so.... What was the opportunity cost of my whole adventure? .... $25, a sub day, and a relaxing Saturday in Socal.... certainly not a high opportunity cost....
Although given that I would have eaten and spent some money on gas, the opportunity cost was probably LOSING $10 or so since two days' worth of meal was included in my expenses!!!! How stupid of me not to consider that originally... shame on me for ALMOST not fully grasping the idea of opportunity cost!!!

December 2005 has passed, and the Santa Claus rally didn't come.... until after the New Year. On the first trading day of the New Year, the Dow rallied to gain over 130 points and today, Nasdaq led the charge as all three major indices gained ground.

The major reason for this optimism is that the Federal Reserve has indicated that they plan on easing up on its recent tight money policy campaign. Currently, the federal funds rate stands at 4.25%. It is unlikely that the FOMC will continue raising rates much longer. Look for another quarter percentage point increase as freshman Ben Bernanke takes the helm of the Fed in early February. With inflation seemingly under control, the Fed seems poised to keep the federal funds rate constant at 4.5%.

My predictions on stock market performance:

Dow: +12.5%
S & P 500: +8.4%
NASDAQ: +11.5%

Look for another year for the Bulls....