I, too, have followed the World Cup, as well as Mr. Jefferson's remarks on it. Let me put in a word for swimming. I wrote, when I still lived in London, that I wished all men were taught to swim in their youth. "They would, on many occasions, be the safer for having that skill, and on many more the happier, as freer from painful apprehensions of danger, to say nothing of the enjoyment in so delightful and wholesome an exercise."

America's publishers celebrated Book Exposition America in Washington, D.C. this weekend. As an old printer, I was eager to attend. There were many interesting titles, and even a T-shirt with my picture on it.
Does the printed book have a future? Terry Teachout (his blog is called About Last Night) thinks we'll all be reading glowing hand-held screens, clicking up our favorite titles like songs on an iPod. Terry is a smart guy, but the glue and paper book may still have life in it yet. If you want to invest in new technologies, I suggest audible books. If someone wants to click rather than flip, they'll chuck text altogether.

Thinking of investing in Zambian treasury bills? Or oil refineries in Bashkortostan? The Business section of today's New York Times recommends against it. Good thinking! Not every new country is as prosperous as the United States; come to think of it, we weren't for quite a while.
Since other people are quoting what was said at the Constitutional Convention, may I refer to something I did not say?
For years, it has been alleged that I spoke out at the Convention against welcoming Jews to this country. "I warn you," I am supposed to have said, "if you do not exclude the Jews forever, your children and your children's children will curse you from their graves." This lie first appeared in a pro-Nazi magazine in North Carolina in 1934; it still pops up in publications in the Middle East. Mr. Julian Boyd and Mr. Charles Beard exposed it at birth. Of course there is no trace of it in the notes of Mr. Madison, or any other gentlemen who took them. I would have thought that my own prose style was proof enough that this was a lurid and clumsy fraud. Curse you from their graves indeed--what is this, The Da Vinci Code?
Before you open a book (or a file), open your brain.

Business fall out from the president's speech: If there is a Goya Foods distributorship begging in your neighborhood, snap it up! There will be no shortage of customers.
As for myself, I learned my lesson when I called the Pennsylvania Germans "boors" in 1751, and suffered for it in the Assembly elections of 1764. Those who have perhaps fewer new objects to engage them, have long memories. NowI am everyone's friend, and hope everyone will be friends with me.

Real estate is cresting; the yuan is still too tightly controlled. Keep your money liquid, and it will keep you.
As for W's polls, the following letter may be of interest.
"To George W. Bush, President of the United States
"Courage, amigo. If the American public abandons you, you can always import another. A new population of my countrymen among you would be grateful, and their exodus from here would certainly stabilize my own poll numbers.
"You friend,
"Vicente Fox, Presdent of Mexico."