John McCain is attempting to sell his soul to the devil. Woe to America if he succeeds.

It’s an old story that gets told in many ways, but the plot is always pretty much the same.

Some person, in search of wealth, or glory, or love, or vast unfettered power, sells his soul in exchange for what he wants.

He bargains away morality, decency, and civility. And then becomes a helpless tool of a devil until he is whisked off to hell.

Such is the story of John McCain.

Once, or at least we are told so, John McCain was a man of honor. Once, at least on some issues, he stood firmly on principle.

Once, his word was trusted.

But then John McCain decided he needed to be President. That personal feeling of need became more important to him than anything. More important than the truth. More important than the future of the United States. More important than his own highly touted honor.

So John McCain lies about his own record, claiming he is a "maverick" — a baldfaced lie from a man who voted with the President 90% of the time to claim.

John McCain directly or through the people working to get him elected lies constantly about his opponent, Barack Obama. McCain and his running mate Sarah Palin incite mob violence and skinhead assassination plots by falsely implying that Obama is a terrorist, or some unstated-but-unimaginable thing worse.

John McCain sews seeds of doubt and hatred in a society that Barack Obama is attempting to bring together.

McCain lies about big things like the economy and the war in Iraq. He lies about inconsequential things like Obama’s heritage. He repeats lies. And repeats them. And repeats them again — all in a desperate sell-your-soul attempt to win the Presidency.

It is a presidency that in the hands of John McCain will create a living hell for most Americans.

It will be a hell plagued by wars, terrorist attacks, the end of the successful Social Security and Medicare programs, increasingly unaffordable health care for most Americans, simultaneous inflation and recession, the U.S. Government's financial collapse, forest and wildlife dieoffs, polluted water supplies, police intrusion into the homes of peaceful Americans, and eventually, as Sarah Palin’s power grows, even the death penalty for first degree murder meted out to hapless young rape victims who dare to abort the babies of their rapists.

But McCain’s deal with the devil only can work if you stay home and fail to vote for Obama.

Please, on Election Day remember this: your vote for Barack Obama will do more than help him become President. It will also save America from a living hell.

Give Barack Obama your vote and let McCain and Palin go to hell by themselves.

“What, your hand got shredded with a saw? No health insurance? Bummer, pal. Now scram.”

“I recently took care of a young contractor who had shredded his hand using a saw and cut right through one of his tendons,” an emergency room doctor from Massachusetts writes.

"This is a serious injury that requires expert attention. After cleaning and closing his wounds to the best of my ability, I referred him to an orthopedic doctor for outpatient surgery. A couple of days later, I called him up to see how he was doing. I was shocked to hear his story: he had called every orthopedic doctor in the area, but no surgeon would see him because he had no health insurance. This man is young, hardworking, and needs the use of his hands to provide for himself and his family, yet his lack of health insurance put his career and family in serious jeopardy."

Nor was this the only medical insurance horror story this same ER doctor encountered. For example:

"On the last shift I worked, the paramedics brought in a 95 year old man who was found on the floor. No one knew how long he had been lying there. Our paramedics were horrified by the sight of this man's home. They described a disheveled apartment that hadn't been cleaned in months; no food in the fridge; and no signs of anyone helping. When I went to examine this man, he was covered in urine and stool that was days old. After taking care of him, I decided to call Elder Protective Services to report the situation. I was surprised to find out that they already knew about his situation and "see him regularly." The last time they saw this man was two weeks prior to his visit to our ED."

This and other stories come from a website established by Doctors for Obama. It’s generously seasoned with horror stories from concerned doctors about what happens when a nation does far too little to medically insure its citizens.

Stories from doctors? Didn’t they used to be opposed to government involvement in medical insurance? Not any more.

"This is why I am so frustrated with my job. Our healthcare system does not allow paramedics, nurses, and doctors to take care of the people who need it the most: 1. hard working Americans who are simply trying to provide for their families; and, 2. elderly Americans who have worked so hard to make sure our lives are better than theirs. In this election year, I believe that solving the healthcare crisis is the most serious issue on the agenda. After reviewing the candidates' plans, I have concluded that the choice is clear: Senator Obama's plan provides a road map to meaningful, realistic reform; Senator McCain's plan will make matters worse."

Please read more of what the doctors say about the disgraceful healthcare situation in America. And remember, the McCain healthcare proposal wants to tax your health benefits under a plan that would do little or nothing to alleviate the situation for people like the man with the shredded hand, or the 90 year old American starving to death in a pool of his own feces.

Obama has a plan that might finally bring America’s medical insurance into the modern world — instead of leaving it where it is now, in the Third World. Give him your vote.

"Help, I’m on trial for capital murder! Get me the dumbest representation you can find!"

Actually, none of the people shown above ever came close to a law degree. Which in a way is part of my point. Bear with me through a few hypothetical questions:

If you were in trial for your life on a bogus murder charge, would you want a lawyer who only got into law school because of family connections, and who graduated despite miserable grades — most probably with the help of those same connections?

Yet America has twice “hired” George W. Bush to be President of the United States — a life-and-death matter connected to national security, the economy, the ability of future generations of Americans to survive in this world, and more.

That’s the same George Bush who was a Yale legacy and got a “low pass,” from the Harvard Graduate School of Business, most probably because of who his father and grandfather were, rather than his embarrassingly lackluster showing.

Suppose you needed brain surgery. Would you say, “Hey, this is a matter of life or death. Get me a surgeon who was such an irresponsibly wildass student that he graduated fifth from the bottom of his class in medical school?”

Well, if you wanted someone who “knows” national security, economic policy and diplomacy — matters arguably as important to your health and future safety as good brain surgeon — would you ask for the guy who graduated fifth from the bottom of his class at the United States Naval Academy? That would be John McCain.

McCain's grades at Annapolis were "marginal." He drew so many demerits for breaking curfew and other disciplinary issues that he graduated fifth from the bottom of the Naval Academy class of 1958. Despite his low class standing, and no doubt because of the legacy of his family of famous Admirals, McCain was leap-frogged ahead of more qualified applicants and granted a coveted slot to be trained as a navy pilot.

Suppose your house for mysterious reasons suddenly was in danger of collapse. Would you pick up the phone and call for a house engineer, insisting on one who had to go to five different second and third-rate colleges to get a degree — in a subject other than engineering?

Well, the economy is collapsing and if John McCain gets elected President at the age of 72 and anything happens this cancer survivor who isn’t making full disclosure of his medical records, your President will be Sarah Palin.

Palin attended such highly regarded (ahem) institutions as Matanuska-Susitna College (one term); North Idaho College (three terms) Hawaii Pacific University (one term) and the so-so University of Idaho (total of five terms) before she finally got her degree in journalism. Perhaps that helped her get a job as a sportscaster, but she surely didn’t learn very much in her journalism classes about international relations and policy, or economics, or history, or even — odd, somehow for a journalism major — the name of a single newspaper.

Barack Obama, on the other hand, attended highly-regarded Occidental college for two years and then earned his B.A. from prestigious Columbia University, where he majored in International Relations.

He received his Juris Doctor law degree from Harvard University, where he also had the prestigious job of Editor of the Harvard Law Review. (Ask any practicing lawyer.) And he graduated magna cum laude — the highest honor for scholarship in his class.

He got this education without any legacy or family connections.

He is the author of two books on government policy and his own personality history. He taught law at the prestigious University of Chicago law school.

So, with the economy and national security hanging in the balance, with your ability to make a living hanging in the balance, with your 401(k) hanging in the balance, with your ability to keep your health insurance hanging in the balance — with all that, do you once again want to hire the dumbest guys in the room?

Or will you wise up and vote for somebody with the smarts to save this nation from disaster — Barack Obama?

Does John McCain support and honor disabled vets? Not according to the disabled vets.

Disabled American Veterans say he voted with them a paltry 20% of the time. They explain here:

The votes listed under the Key Votes section of the DAV web site are recorded roll call votes. They are related to important issues, such as:

* Budget
* Appropriations
* Amendments to increase funding
* Emergency supplemental funding for VA

In most cases, with recorded votes, we have notified members of Congress of what our position is, how we wanted them to vote, and why.

And how did Barack Obama do by comparison? He voted for the disabled vets 80% of the time.

So now, when that white haired patriot sneers that Obama doesn’t support the troops, ask him what kind of support he gives when they come home wounded and maimed.

Yeah, let’s deregulate everything. How about starting with traffic regulations? Hungry for a flesh-and-steel sandwich?

What caused the subprime market meltdown?

“Greed,” says John McCain.

“Greed,” echoes Sarah Palin.

Yeah, they say, and we gotta get those greedy, conniving, evil, predatory Wall Street lenders and show 'em what for.

Give me a break!

John McCain—deregulate, baby, deregulate—seems never to have met an economic problem that deregulation (and perhaps a few more tax cuts for rich corporations and individuals) couldn’t fix. After all, “market forces” balance everything out after a while. Right?

Small problem: “Market Forces” are a hanging judge. And the judge is currently hanging the entire economy of the United States from a very tall tree.

Of course the Wall Street guys were greedy. Greed is as American as apple pie. But blaming greedy bankers and predator lenders is like blaming a bullet for shooting you. Greed and predation is what they do. Regulating greed to keep it under control and thwart predatory behavior is what governments are supposed to do.

It’s deregulation that
shot the economy dead

It’s the function of government to protect us from the market manipulations that are a byproduct of rampant greed. Just as it used to protect us from greedy usurers. People used to go to prison for charging the kind of interest rates the banks are getting on credit caards now.

Marketplace regulation is no more onerous than government traffic regulations that help to shield us from highway traffic accidents. In fact, imagine that highway traffic accidents were the major campaign issue now.

People are still getting killed with a 65 MPH speed limit? Tell yuh what. Let’s deregulate speed and eliminate all speed limits. Get rid of those speed limit signs. Get rid of those rumble speed bumps. Get rid of that radar.

Even more people are getting killed with no speed limits? Easy fix. Just get rid of the highway patrol.

Still more people getting killed? Well, let’s take the dividers out between the eastbound and westbound lanes so that cars can go in any lane, any direction they want. And just to encourage “innovative” driving, we’ll give a tax break to anybody who takes a spin on the Freeforall Highway.

The “gotcha” doofus
will strike again

I should interrupt this rant to mention that some doofus with his finger on the “gotcha” button shoots me either an e-mail or a post every time I discuss this subject, reminding me that Bill Clinton signed the repeal of the Glass-Steagall act, one of the more important regulations that used to protect us.

Well, yes Clinton did—when it was attached to other legislation that he really needed and it all got shoved down his throat by mischief-making Republicans. And if Republicans are so offended now by its repeal, why didn’t they reinstate it during the six years they controlled both houses of Congress and the White House? And why didn't John McCain complaint about it once in those eight years?

There's no point in
bailing out the boat if you
don't fix the leak

Bailing out the banks will do us no good at all if once the bankers are bailed out (or even before that) they can jump into their 500 horsepower Greedsters and go roaring down the highway again.

But of course, I never met a Republican—John McCain and Sarah Whatzername most certainly included— who could think ten seconds ahead.

Oh, for those of you who are interested in such things, the Direct Marketing Association— those wonderful folks who brought you spam and junk mail—are holding their convention this week.

And just take a wild guess what they’re complaining about.

Michael Bloomberg attempts to declare himself "Emperor And Beloved Mayor Of New York For Life"

New York:- Mayor Michael Bloomberg has decided to shred the will of the voters and declare himself Emperor.

Oh well, actually just Mayor for a third term (and perhaps a fourth and fifth term after that) which would in effect make him Mayor For Life.

New York City has a term limits law, which limits the Mayor and City Council members to two terms in office. Bloomberg is determined to trash that law, which was approved in two different referendums by the city's voters.

Bloomberg is supported in his decision to usurp the law by former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who at the end of his own mayoralty briefly considered seizing power and continuing on as mayor “for an extra three months” on the grounds that after 9-11 he was “indispensable.” Turns out he wasn’t.

City Council members say it’s
easier than finding honest work

Under the the city’s bizarre charter, the City Council can overrule voters by writing a new election law eliminating term limits, then passing it without voter approval. By going along with the mayor, Council members get to save their rear ends when their own terms expire.

With an extra term, they will be able to go back to drawing city pay for what is essentially a do-nothing job in this strong mayoralty city, rather than having to seek work as low-level lobbyists, influence peddlers or ambulance chasers.

The Emperor-To-Be is declaring this a “one time only” deal until, of course, the next time. However, his usurpation of the law theoretically would not extend to future mayors, if there ever are any. 

“Let them spend their own billions to seize power,” somebody close to City Hall — well, anyway, somebody only a few blocks away — declared huffily.

Lauder capitulates and 

saves himself billions

Emperor Napoleon Bloomberg had feared loud opposition to this power grab from fellow billionaire Ronald Lauder, who himself twice tried unsuccessfully to run for mayor. In 1989, Lauder spent $12 million in the Republican mayoralty primary and won 37,000 votes for his money — the equivalent of almost $350 a vote.

Lauder in the past had been a champion of term limits and it was feared at Bloomberg Palace that Lauder might launch an advertising campaign against the Bloombergeonic power grab. This would force both Lauder and His Majesty, Emperor Napoloen Bloomberg into a political advertising war in which they’d have to match each other’s spending, billion for billion.

It is not known  precisely how His Royal Majesty, Emperor Napoleon Bloomberg convinced Lauder suddenly to reverse his own highly principled stand on term limits.

While the word passing from Bloomberg Palace to the press is that it’s only because in a financial crisis, His Royal Majesty, Gracious Emperor Napoleon Bloomberg feels just as indispensable as Giuliani felt after 9-11, Lauder must surely know the maxim coined by the late French general and president Charles DeGaulle: “The cemeteries are full of indispensable men.”

More likely, His Royal Majesty, Most Gracious Emperor-for-Life Napoleon Bloomberg hissed into Lauder’s ear, “Listen Ronnie, if you don’t go along with this I’m going to have Ray Kelly send some cops over to squeeze your nuts between two bricks.”

Up next: public hangings
of weeping 10-year-olds

Kelly is the Emperor’s police commissioner. His cops are already known for such draconian measures as roughing up and arresting cyclists on phony charges when they demonstrate against the mayor, confiscating their bicycles and holding them in jails until some judge has an apoplectic fit over the matter. There's one such example here. 

Now it turns out that the Emperor’s police commissioner is also arresting children and leading them out of school in handcuffs for minor and non-criminal offenses.

A Palace spokesperson who requested anonymity because the Emperor hasn’t officially been crowned yet, confirmed this and added: 

“At His Majesty, Most Beloved Gracious Emperor-for Life Napoleon Bloomberg Dada’s inaugural coronation, there will be a display of imperial power during which any protesters against His Magnificent Imperial Graciousness will be tied to posts and flogged, while approximately 300 ten-year-olds will be executed in a mass simultaneous hanging for grave transgressions — not only smoking pot but also stealing a piece of blackboardchalk or throwing an eraser.”

Suddenly, the U.S. economy makes “The Blunder” a novel for all of us

Life in an advertising agency — the starting point for this book — has for decades been the kind of business that gives the people who work in it nightmares. That goes most especially for the people who actually write and design the ads.

Your survival depends on how people judge your work, and objective judgments are difficult. Is that TV spot you wrote brilliant, mediocre, or just plain stupid? To some extent it depends on what your boss thinks. And what your boss thinks of your work may depend first on what your boss thinks of you.

For example, I once had a hostile boss who belittled a piece of advertising I had done. He didn’t like copywriters who were older than he was, and I was ten years older. I had to go around him to sell an ad to my to one of the agency’s clients. I was initially rewarded for my efforts with scowls, abusive language, a less-than-sterling job rating, and no raise.

Then the work I had sneaked past my my boss won a major advertising industry award. Since he had “creative directed” the work (by telling me it was lousy and that I was a hack for doing it), he was entitled to share the award with me. Guess what. When we got up to the stage, my boss literally straight-armed me to grab his silver trinket and make an acceptance speech before I could accept mine.

The short, uptight
life expectancy of ad people

Even if they’re very good at what they do, advertising people have short career life expectancies. There are always exceptions, of course, but if you’re not the head of your department by age 45, or CEO by 50, your career probably will find itself on a steep downhill trajectory.

There aren’t many creative people who last long past age 50 at most advertising agencies, much less the traditional retirement age of 65. As Piet Verbeck, one of the great creative directors of the 1970s and 1980s, and still writing ads today, once thundered in an industry publication, “The company cafeterias at most advertising agencies look like the Student Union.”

Since the endangered ad makers are often still highly productive when someone decides it’s time for them to go, new and usually younger bosses tend avoid firing them directly by playing mind games or worse to make them quit.

These have included moving a mid-level supervisor from relatively nice office space into the equivalent of a broom closet. Or badmouthing the employee at every opportunity. Or simply failing to invite the employee to critical meetings and briefings.

Consequently, middle-aged advertising people, often still with a child or two in college and a mortgage that isn’t quite paid off tend to suffer panic attacks and nightmares. 

Life in a cardboard box

I once had my own recurring advertising nightmare. In it, I slept in a corrugated refrigerator carton in front of Bloomingdales, the Manhattan department store. It was always during the iciest, windiest day in February. Fear of homelessness made a kind of sense. Why the dreams involved Bloomingdales is beyond me, but I woke up trembling more than once.

So I think every seasoned advertising copywriter and art director will suffer a flash of recognition from the first sentence of Chicago copywriter and creative director Joe Kilgore’s book, “The Blunder.”

“Brice Lanning had become a relic,” it begins. And from there the nightmare grows, involving a much younger boss who takes away Lanning’s most important account, followed a drunken binge, an equally drunken attempt at sabotage, and a fast downhill slide into homelessness.

Shades of Steinbeck?

I don’t want to reveal too much more of the story, but I will tell you that Kilgore’s homeless character ends up on a long odyssey that takes him from sleeping on a dock on the Chicago River to the Southwest. (Kilgore grew up and spent his early career in Texas before moving to Chicago.) Somehow, the plot brought to mind the kind of agony and misery in America that I last saw explored in John Steinbeck’s book, The Grapes of Wrath, about migrant farm workers during the last depression.

And that’s what suddenly makes “The Blunder” a novel not just for advertising people, but for everyone in this drowning economy. With banks failing, unemployment growing, George Bush all but hiding out in the White House, and John McCain’s campaign desperately trying to change the subject, the middle class suddenly is grappling with survival issues. Or had better start thinking about it.

The Blunder might be one place to begin, while you still have the $14.95 to pay for it.

Attention Yale and Harvard: Are you proud of yourselves for admitting and graduating this guy on a legacy? Or is it just that in America, idiots rule?

There are several ways to get admitted to an Ivy League college.

You improve your chances if you have outstanding high school grades, perfect scores on your SATs, write a terrific essay, and spend your spare time feeding the homeless, doing insightfully original but reproducible experiments in astrophysics, and serve as captain of the high school football team.

Or you can be a complete idiot but come from a fabulously wealthy family, have a grandfather and father who attended the same Ivy League college, one of them a United States Senator, the other an important senior U.S. Government official.

Guess which one describes how President George W. Bush got into Yale?

Not only Yale, but after that, the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. He must have been quite an achiever, right?

No such luck. For example, there’s this report from a book by Kitty Kelley.

At Harvard Business School, class of 1975, Bush would sit in the back, "chewing tobacco and spitting it into a dirty paper cup," recalled one unidentified classmate.

Another classmate, Steve Arbeit, said Bush was "so inarticulate it was frightening. The reason I say that he is dumber than dumb is not that I saw his test scores or his grades; it's the comments he made in the classes we had together that scared me."

Macroeconomics professor Yoshi Tsurumi recalled showing the Depression-era movie "Grapes of Wrath" to help the class empathize with the poor.

Bush asked, "Why are you going to show us that Commie movie?" When Tsurumi called on Bush to discuss how the Depression affected people, Bush answered: "Look. People are poor because they are lazy."

Tsurumi said Bush "came across as totally lacking compassion, with no sense of history, completely devoid of social responsibility and unconcerned with the welfare of others."

Kelley anonymously quotes two of Bush's former classmates at Yale as saying he snorted cocaine. One classmate claimed to have sold cocaine to Bush. The second recalled "doing coke" with Bush.

What troubled other classmates more than the drugs, however, was the future president's generally unimpressive character. "Georgie, as we called him then, has absolutely no intellectual curiosity about anything," said Tom Wilner, a 1966 Yale grad. "He wasn't interested in ideas or books or causes. He didn't travel; he didn't read the newspapers; he didn't watch the news; he didn't go to movies."

Still more of Kelly's report available on the Internet adds a few additional enchanting details such as:

Alf Nucifora, another classmate, recalled George as a "nonentity with a rich boy's attitude who obviously got into school because of the divine right of kings...You did not see a great future for this man. There's no way that any sane individual could ever have made such a prediction."

During his first year George came to the attention of Yoski Tsunumi ...

Professor Tsurumi continued: "His strong prejudices soon set him apart from the rest of the students. This has nothing to do with politics, because most business students are conservative, but they are not inhumane or unprincipled...even among Republicans his kind was rare....I gave him a 'low pass.' Of the one hundred students in that class, George Bush was in the bottom 10 percent. He was so abysmal that I once asked him how he ever got accepted in the first place. He said, 'I had lots of help.'”

If you want to know why “legacies” at ivy league schools have a bad name, all you have to do is look at the current President of the United States, who evidently still seems to be in the bottom ten percent — this time among presidents. What does this tell us about the value of a Yale or Harvard degree?

I’ll leave that to you. Meanwhile, if you think the military academies are any better, consider the student whose father and grandfather were admirals and who legacied his way into Annapolis, the United States Naval Academy. Guess what? He graduated fifth from the bottom of his class of 899 midshipmen.

His name? You guessed it:

John McCain.

Financial terrorists: The list

If an American citizen left an explosive device on Wall Street that brought down banks, sacked the stock market and destroyed the fortunes of millions of Americans, he’d be considered a terrorist. And probably a traitor.

Below is a list of members of the House of Representatives who threw an economic bomb on September 29, 2008 by voting down a rescue of the financial system. The bill they voted down wasn't perfect, but make no mistake about it. Whatever they claim their motivations to vote against it, they’re sabotaging banks, sacking the stock market, and destroying the retirement, savings and future of millions of Americans. In short, they've sabotaged the United States of America.

If this isn’t financial terrorism, what is?

Write to these economy killing excuses for law makers and tell them what you think of what they’ve done — most especially if you live in their district. You can find their addresses here.

Abercrombie
Aderholt
Akin
Alexander
Altmire
Baca
Bachmann
Barrett (SC)
Barrow
Bartlett (MD)
Barton (TX)
Becerra
Berkley
Biggert
Bilbray
Bilirakis
Bishop (UT)
Blackburn
Blumenauer
Boustany
Boyda (KS)
Braley (IA)
Broun (GA)
Brown-Waite, Ginny
Buchanan
Burgess
Burton (IN)
Butterfield
Buyer
Capito
Carney
Carson
Carter
Castor
Cazayoux
Chabot
Chandler
Childers
Clay
Cleaver
Coble
Conaway
Conyers
Costello
Courtney
Cuellar
Culberson
Cummings
Davis (KY)
Davis, David
Davis, Lincoln
Deal (GA)
DeFazio
Delahunt
Dent
Diaz-Balart, L.
Diaz-Balart, M.
Doggett
Doolittle
Drake
Duncan
Edwards (MD)
English (PA)
Fallin
Feeney
Filner
Flake
Forbes
Fortenberry
Foxx
Franks (AZ)
Frelinghuysen
Gallegly
Garrett (NJ)
Gerlach
Giffords
Gillibrand
Gingrey
Gohmert
Goode
Goodlatte
Graves
Green, Al
Green, Gene
Grijalva
Hall (TX)
Hastings (WA)
Hayes
Heller
Hensarling
Herseth Sandlin
Hill
Hinchey
Hirono
Hodes
Hoekstra
Holden
Hulshof
Hunter
Inslee
Issa
Jackson (IL)
Jackson-Lee (TX)
Jefferson
Johnson (GA)
Johnson (IL)
Johnson, Sam
Jones (NC)
Jordan
Kagen
Kaptur
Keller
Kilpatrick
King (IA)
Kingston
Knollenberg
Kucinich
Kuhl (NY)
Lamborn
Lampson
Latham
LaTourette
Latta
Lee
Lewis (GA)
Linder
Lipinski
LoBiondo
Lucas
Lynch
Mack
Manzullo
Marchant
Matheson
McCarthy (CA)
McCaul (TX)
McCotter
McHenry
McIntyre
McMorris Rodgers
Mica
Michaud
Miller (FL)
Miller (MI)
Mitchell
Moran (KS)
Murphy, Tim
Musgrave
Myrick
Napolitano
Neugebauer
Nunes
Ortiz
Pascrell
Pastor
Paul
Payne
Pearce
Pence
Peterson (MN)
Petri
Pitts
Platts
Poe
Price (GA)
Ramstad
Rehberg
Reichert
Renzi
Rodriguez
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Ros-Lehtinen
Roskam
Rothman
Roybal-Allard
Royce
Rush
Salazar
Sali
Sánchez, Linda T.
Sanchez, Loretta
Scalise
Schiff
Schmidt
Scott (GA)
Scott (VA)
Sensenbrenner
Serrano
Shadegg
Shea-Porter
Sherman
Shimkus
Shuler
Shuster
Smith (NE)
Smith (NJ)
Solis
Stark
Stearns
Stupak
Sullivan
Sutton
Taylor
Terry
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Thornberry
Tiahrt
Tiberi
Tierney
Turner
Udall (CO)
Udall (NM)
Visclosky
Walberg
Walz (MN)
Wamp
Watson
Welch (VT)
Westmoreland
Whitfield (KY)
Wittman (VA)
Woolsey
Wu
Yarmuth
Young (AK)
Young (FL)

“What, me worry?” Billionaire apartment buyers don’t fret about financial crises — as long as you give Paulsen and Bernacke $700 billion carte blanche

“…the continued depth of wealth at the very high end seems to be totally undaunted by the economic outlook,” reports Kirk Henckels. He’s executive Vice President and Director of Private Brokerage at Stribling, a Manhattan real estate brokerage firm that sells residences to — and keeps track of — people who are rich enough to be different from you and me.

In his “Mid-Year Luxury Report 2008” (the photograph at left is part of the back cover of that report and shows Henckels and his boss) Henckels talks about the still robust market for Manhattan housing in the “over $5 million” category and the people who are financially, umm, untroubled enough to buy them.

“ This group is still fast to act when a first rate piece of real estate or art comes on the market,” burbles Henckels, happily, “Witness the art sale this last June when a Monet fetched a record $80.4m and the sale of a $95m mansion in Palm Beach.”

Stay suspicious

Admittedly, all this was written some days prior to the growing crisis that has financial-gurus-turned-public-servants Henry Paulsen and Ben Bernacke offering to save the financial derrieres of the rest of us poor taxpaying slobs — provided we pony up $700 billion of our money and keep our lips zipped when it comes to questioning what they’re doing with the money, whom they’re giving it to, and how good their judgment is.

Remember, Paulsen is the same financial genius and investment banker who was saying in public, as recently as last July, that the fundamentals of the U.S. economy were strong. He didn’t know a disaster from a dingbat then. And now he’s asking us to trust him to incur the largest deficit in American history.

Why do I suspect that Paulsen and Bernacke want secrecy and freedom from Congressional oversight so they can secretly rescue the vast fortunes of people who otherwise wouldn’t be know where their next $95,000,000 mansion in Palm Beach is coming from?

But I digress. Here are some more eyebrow-raising observations from the Stribling white paper concerning the oblivious-to-it-all rich:

$7,000 per square foot
living quarters

• “…there has been a doubling of the number of sales over $20m [of cooperative apartments in Manhattan] from 6 in the first half of 2007 to 13 in the first half of 2008."

• “The highest sale was a duplex penthouse at 1060 Fifth Avenue that required work to combine the two floors and the purchaser has his own hedge fund.”

• “Also of interest is a pending sale on Fifth Avenue in the East 60s that, at $48m, translates to $7,700 per square foot.”

“You paid only $49 million
for a house?
Excellent buy, old boy!”

Townhouses, says the same Henckels-Stribling report, “enjoyed the same boost in prices as cooperatives with 5 sales over $30m, ranging to $49m this year versus last year’s top sale at 33m.”

And then he adds, “The highest sale at $49m was for the Milbank house at 14 East 67th Street, known more recently as Bob Guccione’s house. Even at this price it was arguably an excellent buy as it is very hard to find a 48 foot wide, 22,000 square foot house with full swimming pool in such a good location for $2,227 per square foot. That’s a bargain relative to the aforementioned $7,700 per square foot cooperative sale.”

Oh the poor babies! Billionaires so desperately need to have a 22,0000 square foot house in Manhattan with a swimming pool, and have such a difficult time locating one at an "affordable" $49 million bucks that John McCain, in the midst of this financial disaster we’re having, wants to give them a tax cut.

Yes, we need a bailout but —

Who knows if the economy can be saved? Banks need a bailout. But they also need to be temporarily nationalized and permanently regulated under close government scrutiny. The Paulsen-Bernacke plan boils down to “shut up, close your eyes and trust us.” That’s an outrage.

We need a bailout. But we don't need a tax cut for people who are pitiable if they're "only" paying $7,700 a square foot for a place to flop.

The rich idiots who got the banks into deep cow plop need to be dismissed the way dismissal happens to the rest of us — no golden parachutes. Give them two weeks severance pay and a security guard who escorts them to the door. And the Republican politicians who let the rich idiots run wild without regulation also need to be shown to the door by the voters.

We also need, as I’ve advocated before, an excess wealth tax. Such a tax would discourage the kind of rampant greed that’s bankrupting America. This tax would pour vast amounts of wealth back into the industrial economy where it can do the United States some good, rather than into private residences for people who simply can’t make do without a 22,000 square foot pied-a-terre, for $49,000,000, “in a good location,” of course.

Will real reform happen? I dunno. But if it doesn’t, I’ll see you on the bread line.

I complained to AARP that they're just shilling for insurance companies. Here's who I think replied to me.

AARP talks a good game about reforming healthcare for seniors. But I believe them about as far as you can throw a concrete block

Recently, they wrote to me asking me to enlist in their "Divided We Fail" healthcare "reform" effort by sending them money.

I wrote back to say their current "Divided We Fail" campaign is nothing but a vacuous plan with no substance, demanded by a company that shills profit-making medical insurance. Did I get back a reply? I sure did. But it was either from an illiterate or a robot.

Hey, I could be wrong, but I’ll let you draw your own conclusions, by letting you read the correspondence between me and AARP.

AARP started it all when
they sent me this e-mail:

Dear Crank [Real name redacted],

We have recently written you about the growing health care problem in the United States. As you know, in these difficult economic times, millions of Americans, especially those over 50, are finding it harder then ever to get by.

Meanwhile, health care costs are spiraling out of control, and many Americans are being forced to split pills, postpone medical treatment and even forego necessary medications. This is just not right!

We need to cure our ailing health care system – and you can help by supporting the most aggressive grassroots effort in AARP history – Divided We Fail. Through this massive effort, we will demand actions, answers and accountability from our leaders in Washington.

But, we can only succeed and create change with the support of AARP members like you. Can we count on you?

Support our work by clicking here now to give a secure, online gift. There is a lot of work to be done – and membership dues don’t go far enough – but with your gift of $15 today, we can continue our work to:

Lower the Cost of Prescription Drugs. Since 2001, the average price of prescription drugs has grown at more than double the rate of general inflation.

Keep Medicare Premiums Fair. Monthly Medicare premiums have doubled since 2000.

Improve Patient Care …and Provide Better Options for Long-Term Care. Patient care is more than caring for you when you are sick. It is also about keeping you from getting ill in the first place, and helping you avoid more costly health procedures.

Please contribute today. Peter, your online gift is urgently needed to help us make quality, affordable health care a reality for all Americans – especially seniors!

Individually, we accomplish little. But when we stand together, we can accomplish anything. Divided, we fail.

Thank you for your help in this and all our legislative efforts.

Sincerely,
Bill Novelli

Chief Executive Officer

I thought, “This is pure bullpoop."
And I replied via e-mail with this:

Absolutely not! AARP fought for the lousy drug plan we have now. The so-called "divided we fail" message says nothing. "Tell your Congressman to fix this mess?" All you do is denigrate Congress and further the division. How should Congress fix the mess? You never say, do you?

When AARP sponsors a single payer plan for all Americans, and negotiated prices with drug companies, then I'll support you. Until then, so far as I'm concerned, AARP is nothing but a shill for an insurance agent who manages his own finances so ineptly (or perhaps greedily) that he has to go begging for money.

Then somebody
— or some thing —
at AARP replied to me.

The reply, as you’ll see, had nothing to do with my complaint that AARP is in effect pretending to sponsor nonspecific "legislation," while its interests lie with leaving healthcare and the Medicare drug plan in the hands of the insurance companies. Here is AARP's reply:

Dear Mr. Crank, [Real name redacted] Thank you for your message sharing concerns that a donation is required before signing our online petitions. We have shared your message with our web activist team and it's my pleasure to clarify this issue.

We apologize for any confusion our online messages have caused. You are not required to provide a donation in order to sign our petitions. We are grateful for any support you can provide, be it through signing our petitions, getting involved through volunteer work, or making monetary contributions. Your involvement is key to our progress and we look forward to your continued support.

Occasionally, we send messages to activists like you requesting donations to help with our advocacy work. Additionally, upon signing our petitions, you are sometimes sent a follow-up message requesting a donation, or you are immediately directed to a new page thanking you for your signature and also providing the opportunity to make a donation via our online form. We recognize that many of our activists are facing financial hardship, and we understand completely if you are unable to contribute monetarily.

Again, as with all of our efforts, we are thankful for your involvement and with your help, we will gain the strength to convince Congress to ease some of the financial burdens our members are facing.

I hope this message clarifies this issue for you. We look forward to continuing our relationship with you and working to positively impact the lives of our members, their families and society as a whole. It is the combined interest, energy and commitment from members like you that gives AARP the power to make life better.

Sincerely,
Hilda Member Communications
Member@aarp.org
Toll-free 1-888-OUR-AARP (1-888-687-2277)
Toll-free 1-877-434-7598 TTY
Be a champion for change! AARP's Divided We Fail initiative is amplifying the voices of millions of Americans who believe that health care and long-term financial security are the most pressing domestic issues facing our nation. Demand action and answers from elected officials and candidates by signing the Divided We Fail pledge at http://www.dividedwefail.org/pledge

Huh? Is AARP staffed by illiterates or robots?
Beats me, but I sent a reply to “Hilda.” Here it is:

Dear "Hilda," Did AARP give you a reading comprehension exam before they hired you? Or, before they plugged you in if, as I suspect, you're a machine?

My message made no mention whatsoever of donations. What I had to say is repeated in the next paragraph. Incidentally, I think your reply is such an obvious non sequitur and example of how AARP isn't listening to its own membership that I plan to post our correspondence on my blog, The New York Crank [Http://TheNewYorkCrank.blogspot.com] within the next 24 hours.

Here's what I said:

>>Absolutely not! AARP fought for the lousy drug plan we have now. The so-called "divided we fail" message says nothing. "Tell your Congressman to fix this mess?" All you do is denigrate Congress and further the division. How should Congress fix the mess? You never say, do you? When AARP sponsors a single payer plan for all Americans, and negotiated prices with drug companies, then I'll support you. Until then, so far as I'm concerned, AARP is nothing but a shill for an insurance agent who manages his own finances so ineptly (or perhaps greedily) that he has to go begging for money.<<

Thanks for providing the provocation for me to post our correspondence on my blog.
Crankily yours,
The New York Crank [Real name redacted]

Will Hilda have a meltdown?
Will AARP ever meaningfully address
the needs of its members? Stay tuned.

So far I haven’t heard back from “Hilda,” much less from Bill Novelli, who is not only the CEO of AARP but also the co-founder of a national PR firm that for some weird but unexplained reason (maybe you can guess) doesn’t publish its client list on the web. http://www.porternovelli.com/index.aspx

If you want truly meaningful drug legislation — a no-hole drug benefit, universal healthcare and a single payer system, let AARP know about it. Send them a blistering note at Member@aarp.org.

Tell them the New York Crank sent you.

The birdbrains who are pecking America to death. Part 2.

Back in May, before the election heated up, I posted a piece called “Pecked to death by birdbrains.” I was railing against the U.S. Post Office. That was nothing compared to what’s going on today.

Now I have to rail against my fellow citizens — a nation overwhelmingly of birdbrains about to pigeon step in single file off a cliff.

As I write this, the stock market is failing. Our savings institutions are trembling on the brink of collapse. The newspapers are beginning to write stories about potential runs on banks, something that hasn’t happened since the Great Depression of 1929, which threw our nation into ten years of abject poverty.

Right now, Americans are still dying in Iraq, while the Taliban is regaining territory in Afghanistan, and Iran may be futzing around with a nuclear bomb.

And how are Americans reacting to this? According to the polls, we’re drifting from favoring Obama to favoring the know-nothing McCain-Palin ticket. Which essentially means four more years of mindless Bush policies that got us into this mess in the first place.

We’re talking, folks, about two people who know zilch about what affects stock prices, less than zilch about banking, and squat about how to deal with the mess we’re in today.

Denial of on-the-record facts

John McCain recently denied he said he didn’t know much about economics. If he truthfully believes his denial, he’s also suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease. Here, Senator McCain, is the truth:

Actually, the quote came from a 2005 piece by Stephen Moore, in which McCain said: “I’m going to be honest: I know a lot less about economics that I do about military and foreign policy issues. I still need to be educated.”

McCain also said this, per a December 2007 Boston Globe article: "The issue of economics is not something I’ve understood as well as I should. I’ve got Greenspan’s book.”

He’s “got” a book? One book, by one at least partially discredited economist? And on that, assuming he ever reads it, he’s going to base policies that could help the United States survive hard times or drown in a sea of red ink? He's going to get an economic education when he gets around to it, and meanwhile sink the rest of us if he gets an F? Or even a C minus?

What McCain, Palin and Bush are for is “less government.” Except, it was “less government” — the elimination, for example, of the Glass-Steagall Act — that sent the banks and brokerage firms of America reeling toward a round of disaster that hasn’t been equaled since, but may be equaled again shortly.

The U.S. Government lacks the money to pay off all the FDIC-insured bank accounts that will become worthless along with the banks that hold those deposits. Yet John McCain, who may or may not have gotten around to reading one not-entirely-trustworthy book on economics, wants to cut taxes as a cure all for everything from low housing prices, to collapsing banks, to failing brokerage houses, to troubled automobile companies to — well, to warts, for all I know.

But wait, there’s more!
Like starting a nuclear war!

Georgia invades South Ossetia. So Russia invades Georgia. And suddenly, we’ve got Bush-McCain-Pallin responding to this near-nuclear situation by pouring gasoline on the fire and encouraging NATO membership for Georgia. This would require us to invade Russia. And you know what that means in terms of nuclear war.

Kaboom!

McCain-Pallin agree with Bush that we should surround the Russians with NATO nuclear missiles, right in the countries that border them. When the Russians tried the same trick in Cuba back in 1962, we wouldn’t stand for it. The event was called the “Cuban Missile Crisis” remember? We nearly risked World War III to get the Russians out of a neighboring country. Why should the Russians stand for it when we wouldn’t?

We’re heading for a meltdown — financial, international, diplomatic, nuclear. When it comes, most of the people reading this won’t be alive long enough to get past the next sentence.

But America “feels good” about the McCain-Palin continuation of the Bush program of national suicidal idiocy.

P.T. Barnum and the
North American Birdbrain

P.T. Barnum, the father not only of the three-ring circus but also of the theatrical con job once said that, “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.”

But today’s North American Birdbrain exceeds anything even P.T. Con-em could have imagined.

The one thing I don’t have to worry about is this: When your bank collapses and your city explodes, you won’t come running to me. The reason?

Both of us will be nothing but a small, radioactive cinder.

Mayor Sarah Palin to Wasilla rape victims: “I want to rape you again! Here’s a bill for getting violated. Have a nice day.”

Shocker: When Sarah Palin was Mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, her appointed police chief fought to stick rape victims with the bills for rape kits the local hospital used.

The kits help to establish there was a rape and identify the rapist.

Said Palin’s Police Chief Charlie Fannon: "I just don't want to see any more burden put on the taxpayer."

Oh dear, the Palin administration didn’t want to stick the taxpayers with the bill for rape kits when they could stick it to the victims, instead.

Points out the blog Daily Kos, the total bill to Wasilla for all this forensic work on behalf of its rape victims would have been between $5,000 and $14,000 a year. And that’s less than Sarah billed the state of Alaska for sleeping in her own home.

I mean, talk about her "small town values!"

See the post, “Justice, Maverick Style,” here for the details about the small-minded excuse for a human being that John McCain wants to succeed him as president.

A pit bull with lipstick? This is what pit bulls do to babies. What ‘till you see what a McCain-Palin mad dog administration does to your family.

The photograph was published some time ago in The Baltimore Sun. It shows what a pit bull did to a baby.

The Republican party has declared Sarah Palin to be “a pit bull with lipstick.” 

Don’t you believe it. Truth is, Sarah Palin is Senator McSame’s lap dog, his More-Of-The-Same-Dame:

"Pit bull" image with
no-change lap dog politics

• Same unchanged deference to lobbyists who have secretly been writing the laws for their well-heeled clients instead of the American people. Republicans  talk a good game about "country first." But what they're really doing is putting profits for their greedy corporate donors and lobbyists first and the rest of America behind the eight ball.

• Same unchanged disregard for any proposal that will really fix the unemployment mess.

• Same unchanged disinterest in America’s rotting infrastructure which only the government can fix.

• Same blithe disregard for any measures that would really protect the environment.

• Same emphasis on cutting taxes for corporations and billionaires. Meanwhile, they want to tax your healthcare benefits.

• Same unchanged hatred for the kind of government regulation that used to prevent messes like the subprime mortage meltdown until Republicans repealed the regulations.

• Same unchanged lack of a meaningful proposal that would get every American citizen who wants it some form of affordable healthcare coverage.

• Same unchanged endless war in Iraq.

• Same unchanged financial responsibility that is digging a deeper and deeper grave for the United States of America, as foreign powers grab up our national wealth and laugh all the way to the bank.

McCain will make today's
bad situation even worse

A McCain-Palin administration will not only continue the situation but worsen it, lowering the already low international regard for the United States which has destroyed our worldwide leadership and which will keep us oil-dependent for many more years (That’s what “drill-drill-drill” is really-really-really all about. Making money-money-money for the swimming-in-profits oil companies while diverting major efforts from solar, wind and other energy sources.)

Ever see lipstick
on a real pit bull?

Yeah, sure — McCain is for “change.”

He’s about as much for change as a rabid four-legged pit bull will convince you it’s a hockey mom if someone paints lipstick on its drooling jowls.

Meanwhile, although she has finally — finally! — scheduled one measly press interview with Charlie Gibon, Sarah Palin has thus far refused to hold any full-court national press conferences where Americans can learn the answers to the questions we have on our minds instead of just the answers Republicans want to give us.

Maybe Sarah thinks it’s cute as a pit bull that she wants America wants to vote for her without knowing anything about her.

Well, here is one of the few things we do know about the woman who John McSame says will help him create “change.”

Sarah's shady college record?
Let's shed some light on it.

Sarah Palin thus far has offered no explanation of why she went to five different (mostly second-rate) colleges in six years before she got her four-year degree. In the absence of Palin’s willingness to divulge facts, we’re free to speculate on this national political figure. So permit me a few crankily speculative question:

• Despite her ability to make a fine speech, is Sarah Palin such a scholastic dimwit that she managed to flunk out of college one or more times?

• Was she caught cheating on exams or upsetting somebody else’s lab experiment so she’d come quit higher on the curve one or more times?

• Did she have one or more mental breakdowns?

Did she have to drop out of college (and — heaven forbid! — have an abortion because she was pregnant?)

The colleges themselves are forbidden by law to divulge their records. So we’ll just have to wait and see whether the Republicans and Sarah will share their secret information.

Wait a second! Wait a second! Did a right wing blog just lend credence to rumors that she had an extramarital affair?

Ordinarily I'm not big on directing readers to Republican-slanted websites the likes of Matt Drudge's. But I'm making an exception in this case because it relates to the very newspaper that had some Republicans rejoicing when, with remarkable accuracy, it outed John Edwards and his extramarital affair.

And Edwards wasn't even running for any thing. Anyway, now that same newspaper is suggesting that Sarah's been up to some extramarital hanky-panky.

Matt Drudge reports. You decide.

Barack, dude: If you want to win this one don't get sidetracked by an Alaskan barracuda

Dude, I know it isn't easy, what with the Republicans trying to refocus attention from the real issues in this campaign to their nomination of a "hockey mom" who's evidently under some kind of criminal investigation for abuse of power in office. 

I know that raises questions as to whether McCain and the people around him have either the integrity or the competence to vet a cow in a milking barn, much less a vice-presidential candidate who's a heartbeat away from a doddering old dude with a history of cancer.

But when it comes down to pulling that lever for you (or making an x, or stabbing a chad, or touch-screening your name) only one thing matters.

As a Democrat who built a successful economy before the Republicans wrecked it kept reminding himself, "It's the economy, stupid."

So dude, keep reminding people that with or without Barracuda Sarah (who evidently, in violation of the law, fires civil servants if they're not political hacks) the Republicans want to kill Social Security. The Republicans want to kill Medicare. The Republicans want to kill your job, your income and your future.

The Republicans want to screw over the average American by cutting taxes for the rich again and meanwhile running up an even bigger national debt for our children – all this while the rest of America tries to hang on to our houses, pay off our mortgages and college loans, and hang on to our jobs (if we still have a job that hasn't been "outsourced" to India or China.)

Dump McCain by voting for Barack and we also get to dump the war that's draining your tax money and pouring it into that leaky sieve called Iraq instead of into medical care and infrastructure and job creation for America.

Dump McCain and America has a chance. And that hockey mom will be free to go back to Alaska and ask the criminal lawyer she's hired to defend her how her case is going. 

Hey man, I've just got back from almost three weeks of vacation. And whaddya know? I'm still cranky.

So long until early-ish September

Even a crank needs a vacation. I'm on mine. You got a problem with that?

See you shortly after Labor Day. Meanwhile, watch out for lies from the McCain camp. They're as big as elephant droppings. In fact, elephant droppings is exactly what they are.

Answer quick, John McCain: You have a goose that lays golden eggs. You should A) Kill and eat the goose B) Smash the eggs C) Drill for oil

It’s becoming clear that we Americans have a unique talent for ruining ourselves and our nation. It didn’t used to be this way. But the Republican Party and their know-nothing candidate, John McCain, seem hellbent on driving this country’s economy off a cliff.

Drilling our way to national ruin

Case in point: McCain’s contagiously stubbornly ignorant insistence that we can drill our way out of current high gasoline prices by drilling for small amounts of oil that won’t come to market for about ten years anyway – meanwhile endangering with pollution our coastlines and unspoiled wilderness of Alaska.

Bob Herbert, one of the more sensible op-ed columnists at the New York Times, sums it all up here.

Was P.T. Barnum
America’s greatest genius?

The McCain mission for economic suicide keeps chanting, “We have to drill here and drill now. ... Drill here and drill now. " More and more Americans are falling for this con, thus demonstrating P.T. Barnum’s observation that at least in America, “There’s a sucker born every minute.”

Meanwhile, golden opportunities – hard times always lay golden eggs for those who look for them – are falling into the hands of this nation’s competitors. We could have a new and highly profitable industry manufacturing wind generators. Instead, orders for these high tech energy machines that generate power essentially for free after they are installed are going to other nations, from Denmark to China, while McCain’s backward policy keeps demanding we pump for oil.

And because we keep spending our money on oil, we’re showering other nations with a gusher of our own cash – not only nations like Saudi Arabia, that pump the oil, but also nations like China, from whom we keep borrowing more and more money because our own has less and less value thanks to all the oil we consume.

How about buggy whips, John?

John McCain’s yearning to somehow find a few drops more of oil is about as forward thinking as a huge Congressional appropriation to save the buggy whip industry. Oil is a backward technology. It’s time to move on, before the rest of the world eats what’s left of our lunch.

But John McCain thinks – and perhaps he’s right, suckers – that he can win a presidency by yelling “Drill, drill, drill!”

If that’s our solution, we’re dead, dead, dead. And when our economy goes, so will our living standard, our colleges and universities, our technology, and our national defense.

Attention all attention-seekers. Stop climbing the New York Times’ new office building. Climb this instead.

I’ve been meaning to rant about this for some time now, but you know, it’s summer and I’ve been lazy.

Well, enough with all the procrastination. And besides, more than enough bloggers (not to mention Paris Hilton) have been rightfully pointing out what an idiot John McCain is, not to mention the idiots who surround him. There's no percentage in my wasting breath on more of the same.

McCain, McShmane.
How about those building climbers?

So instead of slamming the too-easy-to-slam McCain, here’s a gratuitous sneer for all those dudes who may put a newspaper out of business by diverting the company’s capital from publishing newspapers to protecting their physical flanks from dingbats who like to climb buildings.

It hasn’t happened once. It hasn’t happened twice. It’s happened three times: Idiots with a penchant for idiocy have noticed that the Times’ new headquarters on Eighth Avenue in Manhattan seem just perfect for climbing.

Perhaps that’s because the architects surrounded the building with bars that trigger thoughts of jungle gym in juvenile minds. (Picture)

The pursuit of splat-iness

At any rate, the climbers keep climbing, endangering pedestrians and passers by, not to mention news gatherers going in and out of the building. And the Times keeps having to modify the building to discourage climbing and the big splat that one of those climbers will make one of these days.

Let’s take these climbing attempts for what they are. The perpetrators are not only guilty of suicidal idiocy. They’re not only recklessly endangering people on the crowded streets below.

Their actions also constitute an attack on the solvency (and therefore the freedom) of the press.

Yo, climb this

Look, Dumbo, if you want to climb a challenging building, go climb the Washington monument. It looks a lot harder. You’ll stand out better against one of its plain granite facets. And if the police don’t shoot you off it, you’re more likely just to fall in front of a throng of tourists, all of them holding cameras.

This will assure you of a posthumous You Tube moment, plus your constitutionally guaranteed 15 minutes of fame.

Get out of New York and go for it, fella.

Deadeye Duck! AFLAC spokesbird shoots down hostile Chief Marketing Officer

Back in February of last year, I did a cranky rant called “The tale of the duck and the dumbbell” about Jeffrey Herbert. He was the CMO (that’s corporate jargon for “Chief Marketing Officer”) who had just arrived at his job at the AFLAC insurance giant and announced he was going to do in the duck.

Wing-clipping, down-sizing,
seat-busting threats

Well, maybe that reference to "do in" is a bit extreme. Actually, various press reports had Herbert plotting to “downsize” the duck, "clip its wings" and make it "take a backseat." My own cranky blog piece, comparing Jeff Herbert to Elmer Fudd, stated:

Y’see, in violation of the late David Ogilvy’s rule that “the consumer is not a moron, she is your wife,” Chief Marketing Officer Jeff Herbert-Fudd has decided that a moron is exactly what you and your wife are.

According to Advertising Age, “’Our industry is a difficult one for the average consumer to understand,’ Mr. Herbert said. ‘We want to move our brand from being known to owned.’ And that means new creative, new products and a rethinking of the media plan.”

In short, CMO Jeff Herbert-Fudd plans to kill the Duck. Or at least roast its hiney to an unrecognizable crisp.

In keeping with The New York Crank’s editorial policy of calling an imbecile an imbecile, we crankily reminded the high mucky-mucks of advertising:

CMO Jeff Herbert-Fudd, like another dodo named George Bush, can’t get the first rule of success through his head: "If it ain’t busted, don’t fix it." Ignoring the rule is how we got into Iraq. It's also how CMO Jeff Herbert-Fudd is going to shoot down the most successful advertising symbol in decades and help send the company into a tailspin.

Did Herbert listen? Well, maybe halfway. While the duck never entirely went away, he was upstaged for quite some time by a billy goat who said “naaa” when asked if he enjoyed the kind of insurance benefits AFLAC afforded. (Get it, get it?)

Ducks and goats
quacking and sacking

Little by little over the past few months, I became aware that the billy goat was gone from AFLAC advertising, leaving only the duck to do the spokes-quacking. What was going on here?

A little research provided the answer. In trying to fix what wasn’t broken, CMO Jeff Herbert in less than a year on the job got his career at AFLAC quacked. Oh very well then, croaked. The official word was that he “resigned.” Isn’t that almost always the official word?

All this is proof again that if you try to bury a TV advertising symbol that has made 85% of the public aware of your brand under a dumb media plan that uses billboard advertising and TV billy goats, management will eventually take you for the expendable jackass you are.

I have only one thing to say to the person at AFLAC who made the decision: Good for you, ducky!