Few manmade things and fewer people really change the world in significant ways and it seems that too many of those ways are seldom changes for the better.  Steve Jobs was the exception to that unwritten rule.  Although he didn’t invent the personal computer or the portable music player or the multi-multi-multi-purpose cell phone, his vision and unflappable determination are the reasons that so many of us use and take such devices for granted.  He has been globally praised and eulogized since his untimely passing for the products he championed, yet his greatest gift was a patchwork Zen/Yoda/Hippie philosophy to search for truth within, trust the force and do others no harm.  He often commented on the perceived competition between Mac and PC as the “fire that stoked the flame of creativity”and openly admitted that the successes of Apple and Microsoft would never have materialized had either eliminated the other.  For me, his motto, “Think Different!”, was never given its due.  Certainly, the images that accompanied its initial campaign, (Einstein, John Lennon, Bucky Fuller…), fit the mold of the world’s most out-of-the-box intellects, but the difference for them and for Steve Jobs was not rooted merely in their most popular ideas and creations but in the uncompromising pursuit of their perfection and an unflinching commitment to the betterment of society.  The work and lives of these individuals should be the benchmark and model for the free market system that we have allowed to go so far afield.  Simple concepts like quality and fairness, (in employment and trade), and respect for humanity and ecology should never be arguable platforms in business or politics; yet, in a world tethered by the reliance of one nation to another, we find ourselves on the brink of trading our future for a handful of magic beans, (these would be in the form of goofy, basically worthless, printed currency).  A “long, austere road ahead” while waiting for more positive job-growth and responsive market indicators is neither policy nor sanity.  There will be no winners in continuing along the path we’re on and the one-step-forward-two-steps-back dance we’ve been doing might work on DWTS, but only if we were very, very old or transgender…in the real world…not so much.