Believe it or not, there was a time when chicken was considered a luxury item. Today, chicken is easily available and cheap at fast-food places like KFC, Popeyes and your local fried chicken spot, but that wasn’t always the case. Do you wonder why you see few European or Asian auto brand pickup trucks in […]
Unintended Consequences
The spill that forever altered the Prince William Sound (aka Exxon Valdez)
On March 23, 1989, the Exxon Valdez oil tanker left the port of Valdez, Alaska, bound for Long Beach, California. The ship contained 53 million gallons of crude oil. Shortly after midnight, the ship struck the Bligh Reef, a well-known navigation hazard in Alaska’s Prince William Sound. The collision tore apart the ship’s hull and […]
Top 10 unintended consequences of Prohibition
The purpose behind the 18th amendment (Prohibition) was pure. Its advocates thought the law would cure the country of alcoholism, family violence, and political corruption. Sounded good in theory, but the actual practice of Prohibition opened up a lot of unintended consequences that weren’t foreseen. In the 13 years Prohibition was alive, a lot of […]
The Sedition Act of 1918, Second Order Thinking and how not to handle a major Flu Pandemic
In 1918, President Woodrow Wilson with the help of Congress passed the Sedition Act of 1918. The law extended the Espionage Act of 1917 and covers a broader range of offenses. The main component of the law was to ban any speech or expression of opinion that would cast the government or the war effort […]
Leaning Tower of Pisa
Reading Time: 4 minutes and 2 seconds In 600 BC, the town of Pisa was founded, its name comes from a Greek word meaning “Marshy Land.”In 1063, the Pisans from the city of Pisa attacked the city of Palermo on the island of Sicily in 1063. The attack was successful, and the conquerors returned to […]
China: The Four Pests campaign
Reading Time: 3 Minutes China between 1958 and 1962, the Great Leap Forward took place. The Great Leap Forward was an economic and Social movement, led by the Communist Party of China. One of the movements first campaigns was the four pests campaign, also known as the great sparrow campaign. The thought behind the campaign […]
Beware the Ides of March
Reading time: 3 minutes and 40 seconds Beware the Ides of March, is a famous line from the Shakespeare play, Julius Ceasar. The Ides of March was, officially March 15th on the Roman calendar. It was a day used by the Romans to settle debts. It is better known in Roman History as the day […]
William Henry Harrison and the shortest Presidential term in U.S. history
.Reading time: 2 minutes and 56 seconds In honor of one of my favorite US holidays, Presidents day I will discuss the President who served the shortest presidential term in U.S. history, William Henry Harrison. William Henry Harrison was a former military officer, congressman, governor of the Indiana territories and a U.S. Senator. Harrison was […]
Unintended Consequences: The 3/5th Compromise
Article 1 Section 2 clause 3 of the United States Consitution states ” Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several states which may be included within this Union according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free persons, including those bound to Service for […]
Unintended Consequences: Thomas Edison, patents and the creation of Hollywood
Most people know Thomas Edison as a famous inventor. More specifically, people know him as the creator of the light bulb. Most people don’t know that Edison had an unintended hand in creating the Hollywood movie industry. We will explore how that came to be in this blog post. In 1891 Thomas Edison built a […]