Across the Atlantic

Across the Atlantic : Latest Posts

12 March 2010 00:03

I know Jack

How Jack Daniels took over the world.

Last week I had the wonderful experience of touring the Jack Daniels' distillery in the small town of Lynchburg, Tennessee.

One can take a virtual tour of the distillery here, but it's nowhere near as good as the real thing, primarily because you can't smell anything online. The distillery is one of the more odiferous places I've visited. The barrel houses, distilling stills and mellowing warehouses smell of whiskey and white oak, and the whole place is overlaid with the scent of sour, fermenting mash, a porridge-like stew made from corn, rye, malted barley, yeast and water out of which the whiskey is distilled. The mash sounds icky but smells wonderful, like very yeasty ...

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03 March 2010 10:17

Here it comes. Bank reform. Anytime now.

America is inching closer to a comprehensive bank reform package.

PHILADELPHIA - It's been a long, slow, depressing process, but the wheels of the US legislature are gradually grinding towards a final, comprehensive banking reform bill with the encouraging news that top senators are close to a deal.

Late last year the House of Representatives passed its bill, and all eyes have been on the senate to come up with its version so that the two arms of American lawmaking can begin wrestling over a final bill that will then go to a vote, and, insha'Allah, become law some time this year.

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24 February 2010 19:26

Tea parties and social unrest

Just how scary is the US Tea Party movement?

PHILADELPHIA - Over the last few weeks, a ragtag social movement dubbed the Tea Party Movement (TPM), which has been coalescing countrywide around issues like taxation, bank bailouts and the growing role of government in the economy, has come to great prominence in US media.

A major, front-page story in the New York Times last week underscored the growing importance of this grassroots movement, which emerged on the scene last year with a series of anti-tax demonstrations. The movement - although it's perhaps too decentralised and amorphous to call a ‘movement' - is essentially a response from Americans who are reeling over the brutal impact of the Great Re...

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