Nov. 20, 2009 Rabbi David Aaron: How to make every second of your life come first Caroline B. Glick: Whither American Jewry Nov. 19, 2009 Binyamin L. Jolkovsky: Please Listen to this Godcast (5 minutes) Jonathan Tobin: ADL Crosses the Line with Report Bashing Obama Critics Nov. 18, 2009 Rabbi Yonason Goldson: What Judaism has to say about the secret of the Mona Lisa's smile JWisdom.com: The (Jewish) Dating Game with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (8 minutes) Nov. 17, 2009 Steven Emerson: How Does the 4th Amendment Impact Terror Finance Investigations? JWisdom.com: If Frank Sinatra married Edith Piaf with Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein (2 minutes) Life lessons from what would be regarded as the most inappropriate lyrics ever sung Nov. 16, 2009 The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : When borrowing is stealing JWisdom.com: Deconstructing faith with Rabbi Warren Goldstein (9 minutes) Nov. 13, 2009 JWisdom.com Sarah's subjective reality with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 6 minutes) Caroline B. Glick: Obama's failure, Netanyahu's opportunity Nov. 12, 2009 The Kosher Gourmet By Marialisa Calta : A sweet sweet potato treat JWisdom.com Does God get tired? with Rabbi Harvey Belovski ( 5 minutes) Nov. 11, 2009 Rabbi Avi Shafran: Jews and money: When anti-Semitism isn't JWisdom.com Marriages are not made in Heaven with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (VERY fast 15 minutes) Nov. 10, 2009 Michael Doyle: Author of book exposing CAIR ordered to remove supporting documents from Web JWisdom.com If the creation so loudly shouts the existence of the Creator, why aren't more people believers? with Rabbi Naftali Brawer (9 minutes) Nov. 9, 2009 Mark Steyn: Shooter exposes hole in U.S. terror strategy JWisdom.com It's never too late to have a happy childhood with Sarah Chana Radcliffe (5 minutes) Nov. 6, 2009 Rabbi Berel Wein: Choosing to hear JWisdom.com Zero to 1/60th: How to Empower An Hour with Gavriel Aryeh Sande (7 minutes) Caroline B. Glick The mullahs' big week Suzanne Fields A Fallen Wall for Fallen Man Nov. 5, 2009 The Kosher Gourmet: Three scrumptious -- but simple -- butternut squash dishes JWisdom.com Hidden Hints: Unlocking Faith & Prayer with Rabbi Jay Yaacov Schwartz (10 minutes) Nov. 4, 2009 Tom Hamburger and Kim Geiger: Should prayers be covered? JWisdom.com When God played peacemaker With Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes) Nov. 3, 2009 Martin Peretz: Beware, Barack. Beware, Rahm. Beware, Axelrod JWisdom.com Are you are closet idolater? With Sara Yoheved Rigler (10 minutes) Nov. 2, 2009 Paul Greenberg: The Holocaust is now on Facebook JWisdom.com Abraham's Strange Change With Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer (5 minutes) Oct. 29, 2003 Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review Feb. 7, 2008 / 1 Adar I 5768 Where Industry Has Failed Us By Paul Johnson http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Although international business is fond of boasting of all the marvels it has created in the public service, no one draws attention to the opportunities that have been missed. They are many — and important. For instance, what happened to supersonic air travel? It's been more than a quarter-century since Concorde inaugurated trans- atlantic supersonic jet service. For all practical purposes the big commercial aircraft manufacturers — Boeing and its European competitor, Airbus — have abandoned supersonic jet travel. Passengers still have to endure long hours in the air — transatlantic, transpacific, transasiatic — that could have been cut in half by aircraft flying at twice or three times the speed of sound. Boeing and its followers have instead concentrated on producing huge subsonic aircraft that carry large numbers of passengers at low cost. The result has been an enormous increase in the volume of airline travel, with the consequent increases in discomfort, chaos and delays. Air travel has now become so disliked a form of transportation that some cruise lines, such as Cunard, are making a point to advertise particular cruises as involving no travel by air. "Port to port" has become a term of approval. Certain large airports, of which London's Heathrow is a prime example, have become targets of bitter criticism for overcrowding, delays, lost luggage and other horrors. Heathrow is the busiest international airport in the world, which is the prime reason for its iniquities. Moreover, those who live within 20 to 30 miles of these large airports have become loud and insistent in their complaints about the noise generated by jets requiring long runways for takeoffs and landings. This has generated organized protests that have prevented such airports from modernizing through the expansion and laying down of new runways, which in turn has intensified the hell on earth that such airports have become. What, you may ask, has become of the plan to have commercial planes capable of vertical takeoffs and landings, something much talked about in the mid-20th century? You may well ask. This type of aircraft would have solved the problems of airport noise and construction costs, giving air travel a new lease in popularity. But the manufacturers abandoned those plans. Why? For the obvious reasons of technical difficulty and expense. Boeing & Co. took the easy way out and built bigger conventional airplanes. Taking the easy way out seems to be the current motto of many giant corporations, such as General Motors and Ford. Why haven't more brainpower, skills and capital been invested in producing and mass-marketing an efficient electric automobile? Toyota and Honda make hybrids that are becoming hugely popular in London, for instance, because their low consumption of fuel exempts them from the congestion charge levied on all private autos entering the center of the city. Why has the U.S. over the last half- century lost its lead in producing new types of cars? Hybrids are cheaper to run, quieter to drive and have less deleterious effects on the environment than do conventional autos. We all ought to be driving them. Such a change would have vastly lessened the sting of rising oil prices, as well as the ability of the producing areas, such as Russia, the Middle East and Venezuela, to blackmail the world — especially the West. Once again Big Business has let us down. A similar charge can, in general, be levied against technologists, scientists and, indeed, governments for failing to take full advantage of the possibilities of nuclear energy production. I vividly remember — being 16 at the time — when the atomic bombs were dropped on Japan and how the horror of these weapons was mitigated by assurances that this new power would usher in an era of cheap energy for the entire world. We believed it, and it could have become true. Nuclear power stations were designed, built and, on the whole, functioned cheaply and with great efficiency. However, they always aroused the anxieties of the few yet noisy flat-earthers and antiprogress agitators who inhabit every society. There were rare but alarming accidents, which fueled the agitation. Unwilling to take on the opposition and worried about the greatly exaggerated costs of decommissioning, many governments virtually abandoned the nuclear option. And the media played an ignoble role in increasing the cowardice of those in power. Hence, the unease over the world's shortage in conventional sources of energy and the inevitable steep rise in their costs — something a rapid and overwhelming proliferation in nuclear-power states could so easily and completely have prevented. Missed Opportunities The second half of the 20th century was, in some key respects, a time of stagnation. Have we learned any lessons from the failure of industry (and governments)? We could be enjoying universal supersonic jet travel, with aircraft capable of vertical takeoffs and landings; electric cars; and cheap nuclear power. Instead, we've been deprived of these things by timidity and cowardice in high places, by a lack of vision and initiative and by a failing of the energetic, entrepreneurial spirit of technical adventure that dominated the West from 1750 to 1950. We ought to ponder these failures, examining carefully what went wrong, and determine that the West shall take a more ambitious and, if need be, riskier road in the 21st century. Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here. BUY THE BOOK Click HERE to purchase it at a discount. (Sales help fund JWR.). Eminent British historian and author Paul Johnson's latest book is "American Presidents Eminent Lives Boxed Set: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Ulysses S. Grant". Comment by clicking here. Previously: 12/19/07: People who put their trust in human power delude themselves 12/12/07: What is aggression? 12/04/07: Pursuing success is not enough 11/07/07: Are famous writers accident-prone? 10/31/07: Courage needed to disarm Iran 09/20/07: Who Will Say ‘I Promise to Lay Off’? 07/24/07: Greed is safer than power-seeking 04/02/07: Benefactors must be hardheaded 03/07/07: American idealism and realpolitik 11/28/06: Space: Our ticket to survival 10/24/06: Envy is bad economics 10/11/06: Better to Borrow or Lend? Rethinking conventional wisdom 08/22/06: Don't practice legal terrorism 08/08/06: A summer rhapsody for a pedal-bike 08/03/06: Why is there no workable philosophy of music? 07/11/06: Historically speaking, energy crisis is America's opportunity 07/06/06: The misleading dimensions of persons and lives 06/06/06: First editions are not gold 05/23/06: A downright ugly man need never despair of attracting women, even pretty ones 04/25/06: Was Washington right about political parties? 04/12/06: Let's Have More Babies! 04/05/06: For the love of trains 03/29/06: Lincoln and the Compensation Culture 03/22/06: Bottle-beauties and the globalised blond beast 03/15/06: Europe's utopian hangover 03/08/06: Kindly write on only one side of the paper 02/28/06: Creators versus critics 02/21/06: The Rhino Principle © 2006, Paul Johnson

Arnold Ahlert  Mitch Albom  Michael Barone   Dave Barry  Tony Blankley  Andy Borowitz  David Broder  Stratfor Briefing  Mona Charen  Linda Chavez  Ann Coulter  Greg Crosby  Larry Elder  Suzanne Fields  John Fund  Frank J. Gaffney  Lloyd Garver  Jonah Goldberg  Julia Gorin  Jonathan Gurwitz  Paul Greenberg  Lewis Grossberger  Victor Davis Hanson  Betsy Hart  Nat Hentoff  David Horowitz  Laura Ingraham  Cheri Jacobus Jeff Jacoby  Paul Johnson  Jack Kelly  Ed Koch  Ch. Krauthammer  Michael Ledeen  John Leo  David Limbaugh  Kathryn Lopez  Rich Lowry  Michelle Malkin  Jackie Mason  Dick Morris  Bill O'Reilly  Jim Mullen  Clarence Page  Kathleen Parker  Dennis Prager  Wesley Pruden  Tom Purcell  Jonathan Rauch  Celia Rivenbark  Robert Robb  Cokie & Steve Roberts  Pat Sajak  Debra J. Saunders  Culture Shlock  Roger Simon  Michael Smerconish  Thomas Sowell  Mark Steyn  John Stossel  Cal Thomas  Bob Tyrrell  Diana West  Dave Weinbaum  George Will  Walter Williams  Byron York  Mort Zuckerman  Robert Arial  Chuck Asay  Baloo  Chip Bok  Dry Bones   Lisa Benson  John Branch  Gary Brookins  John Cole  J. D. Crowe  John Deering  Brian Duffy  Everything's Relative  Mallard Fillmore  Jake Fuller  Bob Gorrel  Joe Heller  David Hitch  Jerry Holber  Steve Kelley  Jeff Koterba  Dick Locher  Chan Lowe  Ranan R. Lurie  Jimmy Margulies  Rick McKee  Michael Ramirez  Kevin Siers  Jeff Stahler  Ed Stein  Danna Summers  John Trever  Gary Varvel  Kirk Walters  How 2  Lori Borgman  The Savvy Consumer  Elder matters  Fixit  Dr. Peter Gott  GET A JOB! by Marty Nemko  Richard Lederer  Tech Maven  Every Monday Matters  Nutrition Myths  Bookmark These  Bruce Williams  How Stuff Works