Condo Auction in Ocean City

Fifteen new condominiums, and possibly as many as 80 condos, will be sold at auction Saturday at the Makai Condominium in Ocean City. The auction will be held at the condo building, 42nd Street and the Coastal Highway, beginning at 11 a.m., Saturday, Nov. 28, by DeCaro Real Estate Auctions, Inc.
Here’s a summary from the auctioneer [...]

Continued Slow-Motion Implosion of America’s Hollow Economy

Nobody can predict the future. But I have a hunch, so I might as well share it.
I believe the United States economy has been so hollowed out that we will not return to the prosperity we were accustomed to in the latter part of the 20th Century. There is no economic foundation on which to [...]

Corruption, Greed, Incompetence — And Here Comes Election 2010

Remember “Sex, Drugs, Rock ‘n’ Roll?”  How about “Fear And Loathing?”  A few choice words  have power to evoke an ethos or a zeitgeist! Forget about complete sentences. I’m talking poetry, headlines, book titles, songs.
“Hot, Flat, and Crowded” is the best recent entry in the field. (Thank you Tom Friedman).
“Corruption, Greed, and Incompetence” will be [...]

Ocean Downs Will Have Maryland’s First Slot Machines

It’s official. The first slot machines in Maryland will be at the Ocean Downs harness race track in Worcester County, not far from Ocean City, and near Berlin and Ocean Pines.
Maryland awarded its first slots license this week to William M. Rickman, owner of Ocean Downs, paving the way for 200   600  slot machines to be open for [...]

Ocean City Business at Mid-Season, 2009

The Boardwalk looks festive and crowded in Ocean City, Maryland. And you see a lot of cars in the parking lot at the WalMart between Berlin and Ocean City.
What you don’t see is very many tourists carrying filled shopping bags on the Boardwalk. And you won’t see every parking space filled along Baltimore Avenue and St. [...]

Health Care Public Option Is Not An Option, It’s A Necessity

Congress and health insurance companies are mired in dysfunction and denial
Polls show decisive majorities of Americans favor the “public option” health care reform proposed by President Barack Obama.
If U.S. democracy were working properly, the debate would be over, and Congress would be ironing out the details.
But entrenched powers resist change fiercely, and the dysfunctional U.S. [...]

“Age of the Unthinkable” — General Motors in Bankruptcy

See the USA in your Chevrolet. Dinah Shore could never have imagined what’s happened to the U.S. economy. If someone had predicted, five years ago, that General Motors and Chrysler would go bankrupt, I’d have said they were nuts.
“Chevrolet” was the first word I learned to spell. It was on the minimalist dashboard of my [...]

Summer In Ocean City

It’s hot in the afternoon, balmy at night. A bright half-moon is high in the sky. It looks like a slice of lemon. The unique aromas of Boardwalk foods mix with the salty air. Moon-buggy tractors with giant tires smooth the sand in the wee hours. It’s summer in Ocean City, Maryland.
So far, fears [...]

NPR Marketplace Reports on Ocean City Boardwalk Business

National Public Radio Marketplace reporter Kai Ryssdal interviewed Perry Pillas this week on the impact of the Recession on Boardwalk business in Ocean City, Maryland. Mr. Ellis is owner of the OC Babies clothing store on the Boardwalk (I think it’s between North Division St. and First St.) His wife, Margaret Pillas, is a member [...]

Washington Post Disses Baltimore Orioles

The state of the incredible shrinking newspaper industry is worse than I thought.
The Washington Post has discontinued regular staff coverage of the Baltimore Orioles baseball team.
For years and years, The Post provided excellent coverage of The Birds, supplemented with frequent columns by the great Tom Boswell. Heck, Boswell even wrote books about the Orioles, in [...]