An abiding confidence

An abiding confidence
Russians, men and women who fought Hitler during World War II, gave me strength in the days following the terror attacks. "Never did it cross my mind that we would be defeated by the Nazis," said a handsome, white-haired Russian on my television screen. The History Channel was broadcasting a description of how the Russians dismantled an entire Moscow tank factory, transported and rebuilt it behind the Ural mountains, and began churning out well-engineered tanks to throw against the Nazi forces.

I have a personal mantra when problems arise: Give it time, try hard and have confidence. If we strive for peace in the Middle East, and fight terrorism with all the intelligence and courage we can muster, we will suppress an age-old problem. The first part of this formulation must receive as much attention as the second, or we simply pull off the top of the weed, leaving the root alive.

And we must have an abiding confidence that we can reach our goal. Abiding-which means enduring, long lasting-may be the hardest part. Those Russian soldiers, who came ever so close to defeat in 1941, never doubted their eventual victory.

The weekend after the terrorist attacks I went to a photography seminar, a Sunday affair here in Austin. It struck me how much progress the electronics industry has made in delivering great products to photographers, both professional and amateur.

A successful art photographer prints his black-and-white images the conventional way, in a darkroom with fiber paper and chemicals. But to create a portfolio that he can send around to museum curators and galleries, he uses a scanner, an inkjet printer, Adobe Photoshop and other tools from the digital side of photography.

The digital photography technologies that engineers were bringing to the market 10 years ago at very high prices are now available at more affordable prices. And the revolution in photography is just starting: Only a tiny fraction of the $40 billion film photo-printing industry has gone over to digital printing.

Bringing a new technology, such as digital photography, to the masses takes time and investment.

Suppressing terrorism will be achieved, but it takes time. Engineers will develop new products that will help to revive our economy, as well as developing tools to identify terrorists.

It's a big job. May we all keep an abiding confidence.

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