The future is looking good for Norah Jones. After keeping her fans waiting for two years, Norah released her second album, Feels Like Home, in February. It already looks like it’ll be as successful as her first. And this time around, everyone in the music industry is taking her seriously.
一个年轻的女子坐在一架钢琴前，飘逸的棕色长发衬托出一张亲切的脸庞。接着她开始唱歌，她那出人意料的成熟嗓音令在场的每一个人为之着迷。她，就是诺拉·琼斯——一位获奖歌手，同时也是一个词曲作家。
1979年3月30日，诺拉·琼斯出生在美国纽约，她是传奇人物、著名吉他手拉维·仙卡的女儿，但她本人则完全是由其母亲苏抚养长大的。那些年中，她偶尔才能看到她的父亲，直到18岁，她才见到她的妹妹。4岁时，她随母亲搬到了德克萨斯州达拉斯市的郊区。她在音乐上受到的最早影响来自于她母亲所收藏的大量唱片。诺拉·琼斯五岁开始在教堂唱诗班唱歌，两年后开始学习钢琴，初中时候一度演奏过低音萨克斯管。
从德州到纽约
高中毕业后的两年里，她就读于北德克萨斯州大学，主修爵士钢琴。上三年级之前，她决定去纽约旅行一趟。这次旅行原本只是暑期出游，但很快琼斯就意识到自己不会马上回去了。
痴迷音乐的琼斯深为当地的音乐人和词曲作家所吸引，而他们在看了她的歌唱表演后也都催她赶快开辟自己的事业天地。琼斯于是一边当女招待，一边拉起一支乐队，自己担任主唱，当然还兼钢琴演奏。2000年10月，这支乐队雄心勃勃地送了一盘录音样带给旗下拥有众多布鲁斯乐、爵士乐、民间音乐及乡村音乐乐手的EMI蓝音符唱片公司。
签约蓝音符
2001年1月，琼斯见到了蓝音符唱片公司的老板布鲁斯，她放了一盘磁带，里面有她唱的三首歌，希望藉此有所突破。小姑娘的才华打动得布鲁斯当场与她签了约。只经过一年多一点的准备工作，诺拉·琼斯就推出了她的首张专辑《远走高飞》。该专辑已卖出260万张，这个数字比蓝音符历史上任何一张专辑的销售量都要高出十倍。尽管缺乏宣传，这个专辑仍在流行音乐排行榜上节节攀升，而其单曲《不知何故》也打入了“40大成人单曲排行榜”。
在2003年的格莱美颁奖典礼上，这位声音迷人的新爵士乐歌手气势夺人，一举拿下五项主要项目的大奖（年度最佳专辑奖，单曲《不知何故》获年度最佳唱片奖，最佳新人奖，单曲《不知何故》还获得最佳流行女歌手奖，最佳流行声乐专辑）。而这一切对琼斯来说显然不过只是个开始。
诺拉·琼斯前景光明。让歌迷苦等了两年之后，诺拉·琼斯2月又推出了她的第二张专辑《宛如回家》。看样子它和第一张专辑一样成功，但这一次，音乐界再不会有人对她等闲视之。
If I Were Obama假如我是奥巴马
I’m mystified by all the hand-wringing about what a terrible time it is to be a new U.S. president.
Think of the presidents who have been judged by history to be truly great—Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, George Washington—and they’ve all served in times of crisis. But imagine what it would be like to be president when the crisis first unfolds, such as Herbert Hoover or now George Bush.
After all, the electorate wouldn’t be clamoring for change if everything were great, if easy credit remained there for the asking, stocks were hitting new all-time highs and speculators were still flipping Las Vegas condos. Crisis provides the political cover for undertakings that would otherwise be unthinkable.
Among other boons, for the time being we can forget about the deficit, because one thing we know from the Great Depression and Keynesian economics is that in crises like this the government has to get out there and spend. World War II produced the biggest deficits as a percentage of gross domestic product in U.S. history—and an end to the Depression. There will be time to balance the budget later.
With that in mind, here are my prescriptions for the economic crisis, were I stepping into the White House.
Shoring up the banking and financial system must take first priority. Confidence, which eroded steadily after the demise of Bear Stearns, must be restored. We learned from the disaster at AIG that you can’t build a moat around the big banks and call it a day.
The non-bank participants in the global financial system are just as important, since the chain is only as strong as its weakest link. This means providing capital and liquidity to insurance companies and industrial finance arms like GMAC and GE Capital in return for preferred stock and ownership stakes where appropriate. These should be good investments, since so much of the crisis is psychological, and values will rebound when confidence is restored.
The U.S. needs a comprehensive policy for faltering industrial concerns, probably starting with the auto industry.
This can’t be another case-by-case, ad hoc approach that arbitrarily favors some companies deemed too big to fail while consigning others to bankruptcy court. I favor the Warren Buffett approach: preferred shares that pay interest and warrants to acquire an equity stake at an attractive price. In fact, I might even ask Mr. Buffett to step up to this task. This can’t be a bailout of private-equity firms or existing shareholders. Someone in the Treasury will have to start thinking like a distressed-asset manager, since he or she will be managing the taxpayers’ money to earn a profit and will have to make tough-minded decisions about which investments are likely to pay off and which aren’t.
Will this be branded “socialism”? Not if the U.S. consistently manages its stakes as though it had a fiduciary duty to taxpayers, as opposed to management, labor, and other interests. The U.S. should be as tough on these companies as any private-equity firm, do what it takes to turn them around for the long term, and then get out, hopefully at a profit.
Another lesson from the Depression is that spending on infrastructure helps, and can also be an excellent long-term investment. China just unveiled a 586 billion program that includes spending for airports, rail lines and highways, housing and other programs. These should raise quality of life, enhance productivity, and provide an economic boost. There’s no shortage of similar needs in the U.S.
If I’d just been elected on a promise to reduce dependence on foreign oil, I’d pour money into public transportation, including links between airports and central city transportation hubs. (I’d like to make a personal plea for an efficient rail line between New York’s Kennedy airport and Midtown.) And I’d invest in education and the arts, which will be starving for new facilities given soaring state and municipal deficits. I would certainly not be investing in bridges to nowhere, which is why this program has to be run from the White House, not Congress.
