Who says the Occupy Wall Street demonstrators have no demands?

You want demands? I'll give you demands. I've posted them on a blog called No More Mister Niceblog, where they're attract more eyeballs than the eyeballs scanning my own blog. But I encourage you to visit No More Mr. Niceblog and examine the post entitled, "A list of demands for the Occupy Wall Street demonstrators."

Among the topics covered are reinstatement of the Glass-Steagall act, laws preventing commercial banks from operating across state lines (as used to be the case until the 1980s or so) more income tax brackets, with steeper brackets at the top. And even more demandsmore.

More? The demands also deal with Social Security and Medicare, college tuition and college loans, and the need for a constitutional amendment declaring that corporations are not people, but artificial constructs.

Just go here and scroll down until you can read the damn thing.

A once-bad ad agency becomes a lot worse

Years ago, in its heydey, an advertising agency named for its founder, Ted Bates, was both famous and infamous.

It was the agency famous for showing hammers banging inside peoples’ heads in TV commercials that promised, “Fast, fast, fast relief” with Anacin. It was famous for selling M&M candy by telling people it “melts in your mouth, not in your hand.” These lines, promising a distinctive product benefit, were called “USPs” or unique selling propositions.

But infamously, some of the selling lines, like the one promising fast, fast, fast relief, brought to mind a movie called The Hucksters. In one scene, the film portrayed a client who deliberately spits a gob of saliva on an ad agency conference room table and then declares:

“Gentlemen, I’ve just done a disgusting thing. But you’ll never forget it.”

Ted Bates did that sort of work. Disgusting. But unforgettable. I never worked there, but I knew some copywriters who did. They went through the workweek in a state of overwhelming depression. Their most animated moments were those they spent plotting to jump ship for a better advertising agency where they could proud of their work.

But at least you knew what Ted Bates stood for. And at least you knew what the products it advertised were supposed to do for you. No longer.

These days, Ted Bates is just “bates.” Yes, with a lowercase b. Why this affectation?

Perhaps because bates, now merely another generic cog in the wheels of an advertising conglomerate, has little else to say or show for itself. WPP, the company that now owns bates, is one of a handful of advertising conglomerates that literally control the business. And what advertising agencies are supposed to produce first and foremost these days is not memorable advertising, but big profits for the parent conglomerate.

If bates can’t be famous for what they do any more, perhaps they can be famous for an all lower-case name, and a new logo that has some comic book voice balloons in it. That seems to be what substitutes for thinking these days. Pathetic!

Even more pathetic is that the new bates has evidently forgotten how to communicate in plain English. They’ve gone from ugly-but-straightforwward shouting at TV viewers about headache relief, to locutional blubbering worthy of Jacques Derrida.

Here is one of their “regional chairman” explaining what the advertising agency is all about, as reported in an English trade journal named Brand Republic. Notice that he never mentions advertising:

"Change has always been what we do best, and remains so. In a world where change is so rapid and fundamental, being change experts is even more relevant than ever. However, our insights on change need to lead to an active benefit to clients. It needs a sharper ear to the ground, an understanding of inflection points, and real time action," said Tim Isaac, regional chairman of bates.

And this means what in terms of the look, language, drama and brand images created by advertising?

My guess is, absolutely nothing.

The late Rosser Reeves, the genius behind the USP at Bates and the ugly-but-perfectly-clear ads that emerged from it, must be rolling around in his grave.

Here's something that I'll bet the women who sympathize with Occupy Wall Street haven't tried yet...

Might work, at least for the ones who married Republicans.

Wall Street's reply to the national Occupy Wall Street protest movement: "Let 'em eat cake!"

Check out this video. It was taken as an Occupy Wall Street demonstration passed 55 Wall Street, a former bank building now converted to luxury apartments and a chi chi restaurant run by Harry Cipriani

As you'll learn from Cipriani's own website:

On one of the world's most famous streets, Cipriani reinvents the power breakfast and business lunch to provide an experience worthy of its location. On a spring afternoon you will enjoy a cocktail on the balcony overlooking Wall Street once the exchange has closed and there are a few moments of respite on Wall Street business person's busy schedule.

These champagne-swilling folks on Cipriani's balcony don't have a clue. Their behavior is so embarrassing to America's greedy right wing that even some members of the right are making excuses. You'll hear, based on the appearance of one or two people in tuxedos, that this was a wedding. It wasn't, unless tux, or business suit, or tie-less were all acceptable dress options. (Was that the case at any wedding you've attended?) You'll hear that these were ordinary working class people out having a relaxing drink after work. Working class $40,000 a year men and women swilling champagne? At Cipriani prices? Gimme a break!

No, these are the well-to-do heirs and heiresses-apparent to Queen Marie Antoinette. As the story goes, when told that the people of Paris were in the streets demanding bread, Marie Anbtoinette mocked, "They have no bread? Then let them eat cake."

I'm fighting hard to avoid imagining a guillotine set up in the square at Wall and Broad, across from the from of the New York Stock Exchange.

Incidentally, I wandered down to the protest encampment at Zucotti Park yesterday, to take it all in for myself. One of the first things I noticed was, despite all the chatter about the protest being an action by "a bunch of hippie kids," there was plenty of gray hair among the demonstrators.

This may (or may not) have begun as a youth movement. Now however, we are seeing more of those of us who are old enough to remember when incomes were distributed a bit more equitably, there were tax brackets into the 70- and 90-percent range, and yet nearly all of America felt prosperous, well fed, well housed, and confident of the future despite high taxes. And why shouldn't we have felt that way? The taxes supported not only a new interstate highway system and other infrastructure, but also a space exploration project that fed work to thousands of contractors and subcontractors, creating millions of jobs.

The lessons from the gray heads among us is simple: when you feed the greed, you do it by sucking the prosperity out of America. Most billionaires would easily survive a national economic meltdown. They'll simply move to Zurich or a ski chalet in Gstaad, and steal from someone else. It's the rest of us who are screwed.

Meanwhile, across Broadway from Zucotti Park, a couple of 20-something pranksters, wearing suits and ties despite yesterday's balmy Sunday weather, were pretending that they were Wall Street billionaires, waving signs that said, "We are the 1 Percent," while loudly announcing that "we like the status quo," and insisting they had a right to keep all of America's wealth.

It was a pretty funny bit that reminded me of what "Billionaires for Bush," once did to poke fun at the previous administration. While Billionaires for Bush still have a website that proclaims the motto, "Small Government, Big Wars," they seem to have simmered down lately. Which made room for the two jokesters who said the name of their movement is "Occupy Occupy Wall Street."

Waving signs that said, "Bankers of the world Unite!" they insist, with mock seriousness, that their aim is to launch a counter-protest movement so that the rich can keep "pretty much all the money in America."

Everybody seemed to get the gag when I was there. One exception was the Washington Post, which took them seriously, reported that the investment bankers were protesting, and then had to print a retraction. Which tells me that some reporter has the sense of humor and insight of a rock.

Meanwhile, the Occupy Wall Street movement is opening a wide fissure in the real status quo. The job of those protesting in the streets is an enormous one – literally to democratically wrest control from the people who have all the power, all the money, and (sadly) who control with bribes described as "campaign contributions" all the Republicans and too many of the Democrats.

And yet I have a gut feeling that in time the Occupy Wall Street movement may succeed.

Michael Bloomberg’s grave mistake

The chaos created by New York mayor Michael Bloomberg’s police department has been covered up the whazoo. You can even read about it on Bloomberg News. To sum up:

• A handful of demonstrators began an “occupy Wall Street” movement.

• Bloomberg sent in the cops. If you’ve seen the videos, you’ve seen that most of the uniformed guys were doing their sheepish best to follow orders without being brutal. The worse most of them (with a few exceptions) could summon up by way of intimidating the protestors were commands to “Get the fuck back.” This was hardly consistent with the Police Department motto here, “Courtesy, Professionalism, Respect,” but it wasn’t a grave offense against humanity, either.

• Then some white-shirted command-level people – the ones highest up the food chain, and in frequent contact with their commissioner, who takes orders from the mayor – started to run amok. One, for no reason, walked up to a young female demonstrated, pepper sprayed her in the eyes, then walked away. The internal affairs folks at NYPD are “investigating” the incident. Yeah, sure. Burying it, more likely.

Why hasn't the deputy inspector who did the pepper spraying been suspended pending conclusion of the investigation? Once upon a time, New York cops who were known to perform psycho acts like this were called "rubber guns" because even if they were protected until they could collect their pensions, they were kept on unarmed duty at the precinct house, doing chores like sweeping out the detective squad room.

I haven’t brought up the entire demonstrater-police mess before because I detest Bloomberg enough to follow the advice of Napoleon Bonaparte here: “Never interrupt the enemy when he is making a grave mistake.”

Bloomberg’s mistake has been to unwittingly fertilize and water a small group of justifiably discontented demonstrators enough to turn them into a national movement. Now the demonstrations have grown exponentially in New York and are popping up in big cities all around the United States.

As for Mayor Bloomberg’s character, you only have to pay attention to a remark he made, not only after the pepper spray incident but also after the police entrapped roughly 700 of the demonstrators by luring them into a traffic lane of the Brooklyn Bridge and then arresting them for being there. Incidentally, these arrests mean that instead of a traffic jam on the Brooklyn Bridge, there’s going to be one in the city courts.

“The police are doing exactly what they’re supposed to,” Bloomberg said.

I rest my case.

Fallout from Onion spoof reporting on a “hostage-taking” Congress proves nobody in Washington has a sense of humor. Least of all Republicans.

If there’s anything Congress hates more than an agreement that could put the United States back on a stable economic footing, it’s a spoof that highlights its Republican-driven incompetence and irrationality.

Case in point:

The satirical newspaper The Onion ran a spoof – both online and in Twitterfeeds – that purported to follow Congress taking twelve children hostage and demanding $12 trillion to let the kids live.

A half brain-dead idiot would have to know it was a spoof, and a damned pointed one at that. It featured a Photoshopped picture of John Boehner holding a pistol to a little girl’s head. That’s it, at top right.

The spoof included a Tweet that said, Three-course lunch from Charlie Palmer's Steakhouse delivered as per Rep. Boehner's demands #CongressHostage

And what was that, if not a pointed reference to the fact that in the United States, wretches starve while the Congressmen, who could turn around the economy if they wanted, instead stuff their faces and make trouble for the nation?

The spoof even included a followup story that involved the pompous pontificating of Senator Mitch McConnell, who has had a major hand in holding up agreements in the Senate. Here’s the Onion explaning McConnell’s alleged position on the ransom:

Obviously, the most important thing here is to reach a deal that works for both sides," read a statement from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on the disputed $12 trillion agreement that would free the young children currently being held at gunpoint by the country’s legislative branch. "But many important questions still remain: How will the ransom money be allocated? How can we cut needless expenditures such as individual ski masks for every congressman? Should there be a stipulation to take one of the children with us to ensure a clean getaway? Unfortunately, it may be quite some time before we can reach an adequate consensus on these and other issues." At press time, FBI officials said Congress had moved to extend the money drop-off deadline until early December.

The bad congressional behavior that inspired this spoof was so pointedly reflected in this story that the Republicans must have had a Category Five meltdown. Next thing you know, the Capitol Police — this is for real now — began investigating the Onion reports.

C’mon! What’s to investigate? We know where the report originated. At the Onion. We know what their motivation was: to spoof Congressional bad behavior. And we know who did it: The Onion staff members.

I met a few dumb cops in my police beat reporting days, but never this dumb. Why do I suspect that the cops aren’t "investigating" on their own?

Why do I think that somebody on the Republican side of the aisle is putting them up to it — perhaps by threatening sotto voce to cut the Capitol Police budget is they don’t make a big deal out of this to punish the Onion staff?

Instead of investigating The Onion, I have a better idea. Let's investigate Congress.

High Tech Thomas Favors Low-Tech Lynchings

Famously, during his U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings, now-Justice Clarence Thomas decried his own "high tech lynching" when accused of sexual harassment of a woman who worked for him. (A recent check indicates this link isn't working. Oh, damn!)

But when it came to an opportunity to prevent the low-tech lynching of Troy Davis, now executed for a murder he probably didn't commit, Mr. Thomas took a pass.

More in the post, "Capital Punishment For Dummies," recently left at No More Mr. Nice Blog at the invitation of the blog's proprietor.

Republican budget cutters to vets who went through hell sacrificing for America: “Screw you!”

If you need still more proof that the budget-cutting Republicans who refuse to raise taxes and want to kill off Medicare and Social Security have no interest in America, its economic future, its military security, or even its heroes, check out this:

Yup, the same crowd that embraces people who shout out at meetings with Ron Paul that uninsured Americans should die (and then complain about nonexistent “death panels”) now want to cut so deeply into the budget that even those who fought, suffered, or were grievously wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan are on greed's chopping block.

Republicans are not interested in the future of America. They are interested only in the propagation of their greedy, anti-American, anti-full employment doctrines.

If you vote for a Republican – you encourage these callous psychopaths, who are the real death panels. A vote for a Republican – any Republican – is a vote to bury America to benefit the greedy few.

Remember: Not one Republican. Not now. Not ever. Say it to yourself. Think it to yourself:

Not one Republican. Not one Republican. Not one Republican.

Credible shmedible! Who gets to search the body cavity?

No, the ad at right is not there by mistake. I’ll get around to it. But first I have to tell you the news:

A woman was arrested on “credible evidence” that she was smuggling heroin across the Mexican border in a certain, umm, body cavity. She was busted in or near Las Cruces, New Mexico. A judge ordered that she be taken to a hospital so that her, you know, body cavity could be searched.

The hospital found nothing that didn’t belong there. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Then the hospital billed the woman $1,122 for, uhh, professional services.

The good news is that the rather embarrassed Metro Narcotics Agency is picking up her hospital bill. Thus they avoid becoming a target of unquenchable ire and extreme ridicule. But the whole incident raises a number of questions:

• New York City was in near panic mode on the 9/11 just past over “credible evidence” that there was a plot to bomb us, or blow us up somehow, or something or other. A lot of cops and firemen made a lot of overtime money converging with lights flashing and automatic rifles at the ready around various points in town. A lot of TV newscasters spent a lot of time talking about nothing else. I rode the subway on 9/11, and for the first time in months, if I had seen something (which I didn’t) I could have found a cop to say something to. Which raises the question of whether we ought to have a legal definition of "credible evidence." Was the evidence that some desperate guy on a waterboard said something to keep the CIA from forcing more water up his schnozz? Was the evidence two guys overheard talking in a bar in Toledo? I mean, come on!

• The woman in Las Cruces got billed $1,122 for the body cavity search that was forced on her. Which involved what? Let’s say someone at the hospital looked into not just one of her cavities, but every orifice in her body, from ears and nostrils on down. How much medical skill does it take, and how long does it take, to shine a light in, stick your umm, tongue depressor in, look around and say, “Nope, no shipment of heroin in here!” Let’s generously say ten minutes. That comes to $122 a minute in compensation for the hospital. And you wonder why your medical insurance is so expensive, or why Medicare is supposedly going broke?

• What kind of qualifications do I need in order to get hired as a body cavity searcher? I promise you, I’m not being kinky. Some of those cavities can be downright unpleasant. But at $122 a minute (that’s $7,320 an hour) I’ll grit my teeth and take the work.

•Finally, an explanation of the ad above. It appeared next to the article about the $1,122 orifice search on the website of the Las Cruces Sun. A subhead says, “Like floating on a cool pool of energy savings,” whatever that means. But then the ad shows its true Dada-ist colors when it says, “Save $700 in home energy. Air mattress not included.” As if one would naturally expect an air mattress to be included whenever I buy something from the local power company. While they’re at it, why don’t they mention that the pool is not included either, or the water?

But never mind all that. Just tell me were I get that $7,320-an-hour job searching body cavities.

“To demonstrate my displeasure with you, President Obama, I’m going to blow my own brains out.”

This evening we may experience yet another example of the limitless capacity of most Americans to vote down their own future.

At issue: a special election for the seat in Congress formerly held by Anthony Weiner, the loose-screw congressman who was fond of e-mailing photographs of his, umm, weiner to young women.

On the right is Tea Party radical Bob Turner who will vote with the Republican congressional roadblock to bring down the president by voting against anything Obama is for, regardless of the consequences. Against: healthcare, Medicare, Social Security, abortion, an infusion of capital into the economy or, if the issue ever comes up, washing your hands after flushing the toilet.

On the other side is a Democratic party stalwart, David Weprin, who will support Social Security, Medicare, programs to get more of us employed, infrastructure repair and improvements, better schools, and a woman’s right to decide whether or not she will bear a child.

The district, I’ve heard, is roughly two-thirds democratic. So who is projected to win?

At this moment, it’s Bob Turner, the Tea Party wing nut.So what’s going on here?

Simple. Lots of democrats, like me, are pissed off at Obama, who has fiddled around attempting to compromise with the uncompromising right wing of Congress while the economy continues to go down in flames.

Add to that, Obama’s position on Israel isn’t quite as pro-Israel as some people in the district would like. So even though Weprin is an orthodox Jew who is as likely to vote against Israel’s interests as Michelle Bachmann is to start shooting gay porno films, the voters in the old Weiner district are going to get even with the President.

The polls show a slight lean toward Turner. To demonstrate to Mr. Obama how mad they are, the democratic district may vote today for a man who will cut their Social Security, destroy their Medicare, jerk the rug out from their school-age and college-age kids, vote to sink the economy, and force their daughters to bear the children of rapists.

That’s like the idiot kids who blow their own brain out to punish their teachers.

Morning After Report: Yep, my fellow Dems did it, last night. They pulled the trigger and blew their own brains out, voting to destroy their future and the future of the kids in order to tell off President Obama. Bob Turner Won.

The New York Times reported:

“I am a registered Democrat, I have always been a registered Democrat, I come from a family of Democrats — and I hate to say this, I voted Republican,” said Linda Goldberg, 61, after casting her ballot in Queens. “I need to send a message to the president that he’s not doing a very good job. Our economy is horrible. People are scared.”

Unfortunately, Linda, you also sent yourself a message. It reads, "I'm mad at Obama, so screw me!"

The Times also reported:

Mr. Turner predicted that voters elsewhere would also rebuke Mr. Obama in the elections next year.

“We have lit one candle today,” he said. “It’s going to be a bonfire pretty soon.”

Nice going, Dems. You've added one more obstreperous Republican to the ranks, one more for the President to "compromise" with.

Sorry, I gotta run out on you for a while. I've got "Mal de Republicanism."

I'm gone until after the Labor Day Weekend. I'm outta here. On vacation. I have my reasons for blowing town.

First of all, I'm having problems with Republicans stealing my stuff. Now, Republicans haven't had an original idea in years. Their political ideas were new three centuries ago. Their notions of religion and freedom of religion are medieval. Their ideas about economics and science have the sophistication of a Neanderthal throwing rocks at an elephant

To make up for a complete lack of imagination, they steal. They make money for their rich buddies by stealing money from the middle class and the poor. (I guess they've either got the Robin Hood story backwards, or identify with the Sheriff of Nottingham.) Okay, the world is watching when they pull that kind of flim-flam. But I draw the line at their stealing from me.

At the beginning of this month, I posted a piece suggesting that Eric Cantor and other "Tea Party" Republicans were treasonous in their political behavior, which was sinking the U.S. economy.

And guess what? As you've probably read in the papers and noticed on TV, Rick Perry, the know-nothing governor of Texas who's seeking the Republican nomination "suddenly" got the bright idea of declaring that Fed Secretary Ben Bernake is guilty of "treason" and sinking the U.S. economy. They stole my hammer. And now they're trying to drive a rubber band into a brick wall with it.

Is somebody on the Perry campaign staff is gleaning my cranky little blog for ideas? (Is that really you, Rick?") Mabe.

Or maybe it was merely a coincidence – a spontaneous idea that flew into Rick's mouth. At any rate, I've had it with the Republican crazies and those who kowtow to them. I've had it with Michelle Bachmann. I've had it with the sudden reemergence of Christine O'Donnell. I've had it with Ron Paul, Rand Paul, Sarah Palin, and – well, you get the idea.

So I'm taking a short vacation, from this blog, from work, even from New York.

See you in September.

How the middle class is getting nickeled and dimed to death

NOTE: Don't leave until you watch the video at the bottom of this rant.

Yikes! The month's electric bill arrived yesterday from my power supplier, Consolidated Edison of New York. According to their bill, I used 116 kilowatt hours of power. for which they’re charging 13. 3190 cents per kilowatt hour, a total of $15.95.

Therefore my bill ought to have been $15.95, right? Hell no! It was $48.56.

So how can anybody be billed $48.56 for $15.95 (retail value) worth of electricity? I am so glad you asked?

1. The "somebody else is a deadbeat" charge. Con Edison charged me a 55-cent “Merchant function charge.” What’s that? Con Ed helpfully explains that it’s a “Charge associated with procuring electricity, credit and collection related activities and uncollectible accounts.” Which means, in part, that they’re charging me extra because they couldn’t get the money out of some anonymous deadbeat, so they're taking it out of my pocket. God help us all if Con Ed's chairman ever goes to Las Vegas and loses his own wad.

2. The "you-pay-my-taxes" charges. Con Ed also charged me for “Taxes on Con Edison gross receipts from sales of utility services and other tax surcharges.” In other words, I’m paying a tax because I, and a bunch of other consumers, gave them money and Con Ed doesn’t want to pay its own taxes on the money we're pouring into their coffers.

3. The "shipping not included" charge. I paid a “delivery” charge of $10.78 because the power company is “maintaining the system through which Con Edison delivers electricity to you.” It's like having an extra charge tacked on to your groceries because the supermarket has to sweep out the store at night. Well, I suppose the power company is entitled to a delivery charge, although a charge costing two-thirds of what the product itself costs sounds a trifle steep to me. Suppose you bought a necklace for, say, $1,000 and the jeweler tried to charge you $666 for delivery. See what I mean?

4. The "this is only temporary (har-har!)" charge. I have to pay charges for renewable energy, a “temporary” New York State surcharge of 46 and a half cents per kilowatt hour (I’m betting that charge is "temporary" until they raise it to 63 cents). There was also another gross receipts tax on the “delivery” charges that Con Ed socked me with, plus there were sales taxes. These brought the bill for my less-than-fifteen-and-a-half bucks worth of electricity up to the $48.56.

I keep finding the same kind of nickel-and-dime charges on my cell phone, cable, Internet connection and landline telephone bills. While buying legislators to destroy the middle class by reducing the services, benefits and Social Security and Medicare support you and I get from the government, the corporate honchos get bigger and bigger salaries and tax breaks. And now they're doing even more to destroy us with these blood-from-a-stone charges.

Which brings me to this:

Is Rep. Eric Cantor deliberately trying to sink the U.S. economy to line his own pockets? If so, it isn’t politics he's playing, it's treason.

Mr. Cantor, the Republican congressman from Virginia, may be trying to line his own pockets by working to destroy the U.S. economy, if you read between the lines of this article.

In essence, he's gambling that he'll make a lot of money if we suffer an economic collapse – the kind of collapse brought on by a loss of confidence in the U.S. Dollar and the U.S. Treasury. And that's just the thing that's happening now thanks to Cantor's no-budging-on-the-budget stand on the debt ceiling.

Such an act isn’t merely politics. It isn’t merely greed. It’s an act of war against the United States that will contribute to the ruin the national economy – an act committed so that Eric Cantor can make money while millions of Americans lose their jobs, their homes, and their standard of living, and while the United States capacity to defend itself is weakened. I read that as treason, pure and simple. Treason, treason, treason!

Moron Business 101 for Budget Balancing Republicans (and also for President Barack Obama)

Okay, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to your first day at the College for Dummies, class for slow learners in economics and business administration. Let’s start with a quiz.

For the following question, let’s assume that you own a candy store that brings in $30,000 a year and that it is in debt for $30,000.

Let us also assume that you also want to stay in business and not turn into the most ghastly failure in your town’s business history. However, you have some problems.

Your overhead is $15,000 a year. Fresh stock costs you $15,000 a year. You’re nearly out of stock, and a lot of your products are old, stale, out of date, and looking tired. Moreover, the big, new, and very shiny China Candy Store across the street not only sells fresher candy, but also milk shakes and hamburgers, so it’s attracting nearly all of the business you used to get.

Oh, and one more thing: A friendly banker is ready, willing and able to lend you all the money you want – provided you use it to buy fresh candy and other products, freshen up your store’s infrastructure, and advertise.

Should you:

A) Say, “No, I’m going to pay off my debt first so my son won’t have to inherit any debt when I die. To do that, I’m not going borrow any moey so I can sell fresh candy or renovate my store or add new products and employees. Instead, I’m going to keep selling stale candy until I run out of stock and have nothing to sell and no customers. That’s the only practical way to pay down what I owe and leave something for my son.

B) Borrow enough money from your friendly banker to get fresh stock, open up a milkshake and hamburger counter that competes with the China Candy Store across the street, and renovate your premises so it will look nicer and attract more business than your competitor’s. Oh, and also spend some money on advertising, so people will know what a great candy store you’re running these days and will want to patronize your store again. As the money starts coming in, use some of it to slowly pay off your debt, and the rest to keep refreshing your stock, your advertising, your product offerings, and to hire new employees to handle the overflow business you start getting.

C) Go home and beat the crap out of your wife, Democrata. Tell her it’s all her damn fault that you’re in hock and you’ve got almost no customers left, and that if she didn’t keep asking you to borrow some more money to get your business restarted, everything would be better.

D) Call your banker and say, “Look asshole, stop saying that if I don’t borrow some money and fix up my business and start selling more, new and better products I’m gonna go bankrupt. Bankruptcy isn’t so bad. Even if the Sheriff padlocks my store, people can pass money to me through the mail slot and I can slip stale candy back at them through the same slot. And if the Sheriff has the nerve to seal the mail slot, I'll pass the candy through the keyhole. And that way I can pay off my debt. And if the sheriff comes and starts selling off my stale candy and store fixtures, the money from those sheriff’s auctions will pay off some of the debt, too.

E) Borrow money from your banker, but instead of using it to by fresh stock and renovate your store, use it to firebomb the China Candy store across the street. And maybe some of those Muslim-owned stores down the block.

ANSWER: If you chose B. You’re a Democrat. If you chose A, C, D, or E you’re either a Republican and an idiot, or you’re Barack Obama trying to pretend you’re reasonable.

What to cut when Congress demands budget cuts

1. Cut congressional salaries. Cut them down to the monthly stipend that Social Security recipients get. If Social Security payments go down, or stay static, keep congressional salaries at the same level.

2. Cut the salaries of congressional aides. (See above).

3. Cut the congressional medical plan. Put them on exactly the same Medicare program that seniors receive. If Medicare gets means tested, means-test the congressional representatives, too. Some of those guys are millionaires. They should pay out of their own pockets, just like the seniors who, after paying into the system for decades, will be declared "too rich" to get the Medicare they bought.

4. Ditto congressional aides.

And if the U.S. Government defaults...

Let's default from the Capitol Building down. First, Mr. President and Mr. Secretary of the Treasury, don't pay Congressional salaries. Or benefits. Or expenses.

And for the love of heaven, don't pay to have their toilets cleaned. Tell them to do it with their own toothbrushes.

Bad news from all over: from budget crises, to Christian vs. Muslim extremists, to Saudi Arabian beheadings, to Texas executions to dumber Americans

1. Nevermind the budget crisis. The U.S. Government isn’t the only flat broke entity.

"A recent study by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that 47% of Americans say they cannot raise $2,000 within 30 days without selling an asset. (Surprising and sad.) Pawnshops and payday lenders service a huge and - in this economy - growing market."—Alexander Green from an e-mail letter sent to Oxford Club members on June 26^th, 2011

2. You think those Muslim extremists are bad news? Watch out for those pro-Christian extremists.

On July 22, 2011, a man dressed as a police officer opened fire at a youth camp on the Norwegian island of Utoya, killing scores people in a two-hour long massacre, authorities said. The alleged gunman, identified in media reports as 32-year-old Anders Behring Breivik, is also suspected in a bombing that left seven people dead in the capital of Oslo earlier in the day. In all, the death toll was estimated at 76 by the following Monday. "What we know is that he is right-wing and a Christian fundamentalist,”said one official.

3. Fun fact for Budget Crisis fans.

Even Congress’s own budget office says that the that to dig ourselves out of the financial hole our government is in, we ought to consider increasing revenues [that’s code for raising taxes.] But nobody seems to be listening. Not President Obama. Certainly not the Republicans. The Congressional Budget Office states…

Under current laws and policies, an aging population and rapidly rising health care costs will sharply increase federal spending for health care programs and Social Security. Unless revenues increase at a similar pace, such spending will cause federal debt to grow to unsustainable levels. If policymakers are to put the nation on a sustainable budgetary path, they will need to let revenues increase substantially as a percentage of gross domestic product, decrease spending significantly from projected levels, or adopt some combination of those two approaches.

4. A big “tip of the head” to our pals the Saudis. (And also to the Texans.)

During 2010, our big buddies, the Saudi Arabians, executed (mostly by decapitation) “at least 27 people” according to Amnesty International. You can read the full story here, but beware: the photograph accompanying the story is fairly horrifying.

Besides, if you think that’s something, consider Texas. They had 318 prisoners sitting on death row at the beginning of this year.

5. The dumbing of America.

The United States once had more college graduates among 25 to 34 year olds than any other nation on earth. As of last year, 11 other countries were whupping our butts when it came to leading the world in college graduates of this age. So what do those rocket-scientist deep thinkers in the Tea Party want to do? Why, cut government spending on education, of course! They claim government spending on education is “dumbing us down.”

So what will contributing nothing to our schools give us? Duh?

The Speech to the nation on taxes and the Tea Party that President Obama will never make

My fellow Americans: this morning Federal Agents, following my executive order, arrested Eric Cantor, Michelle Bachmann, and group of other so-called Tea Party Republican legislators and flew them to the U.S. Army base in Guantanamo, Cuba, where they are now incarcerated

I gave this order under the authority granted to the President of the United States by an overwhelming vote of Republicans after 9/11, which allows me to determine who is an enemy combatant and order their arrest and incarceration without trial. Some Democrats protested that this was an unconstitutional power, but most Republicans insisted on it, and since they refused to take back down from this position, I am using it.

The arrested individuals are in every respect enemies of the United States, combating us through our economy. They will be charged with conspiring to destroy the economic structure of the United States and, in so doing, attempting to destroy the lives of million Americans citizens, most notably the elderly, infirm, and helpless. This is every bit as much a crime against our citizenry as blowing up a car bomb in Times Square, only on a far greater and more vicious scale.

The courts have not ruled that waterboarding is torture and illegal, and therefore I am happy to tell you that after enhanced interrogation, Representatives Cantor and Bachmann and some of the others confessed to a deliberate attempt to sabotage the United States so that they could overthrow the current administration – in effect, create a governmental coup-by-crisis so that they could take over Washington.

Because of security considerations, most specifically concerns that armed Tea Party zealots will attempt to assassinate the jury, the accused will not be tried on U.S. soil. Instead, they will be tried in Guantanamo and, if found guilty, they will be executed for treason.

Now, I would appreciate it if the remaining members of both houses of Congress would get back to work, before I beome annoyed. I want the debt ceiling raised, and paid for by instituting new tax brackets for the wealthiest Americans, going up to 80 percent for that part of any individual’s income that goes over three million dollars a year. Taxes on excess corporate profits must be taxed similarly. And I am asking for a new job export tax, equivalent to five years’ salary for any American employee whose job is shipped overseas by a corporation, wherever it does business.

We understand that all Americans will have to share at least some of the pain. Therefore, Social Security and Medicare deductions on pay will get extended to cover all earned income. It is my intention to balance the budget

Thank you and goodnight.

You're welcome and good riddance!

Rupert Murdoch's notorious News of The World put itself out of business this weekend after scandalous revelations surfaced of its staff and agents hacking into the cell phones of dead soldiers, murder victims and others.

Let us hope that Murdoch's Fox News channel is next.

Is it time for the Democrats to put up an anti-Obama primary candidate?

It’s time to come right out and say it. Barack Obama hasn’t merely disappointed his base. He has betrayed us.

He has put Social Security and Medicare on the table – to him nothing more than chips than he can exchange for some vague Republican promises to fiddle around with tax revenues.

This will “cause some political pain…” I heard him say on TV this morning. Political pain?

How about real human pain? The pain of hunger among many seniors and disabled kids, just for openers. Not to mention the pain felt by all of us over 65, who cheerfully accepted Social Security and Medicare deductions from our page checks for decade after decade – because we knew the money were putting in would tide us over and take care of us when we were ill in our old age.

And now we're being cheated out of delivery of a promise and a lifetime of contributions. The Republicans are raiding Social Security as if it were an abandoned bag full of money. And Obama says, well okay, my own supporters don’t want you to do this, and you do want to do this, so we’ll compromise. You can do it.

He “compromised” this way at least once before, when he bargained away his once staunchly defended “public option”

I don’t know what Obama thinks he’s doing. I don’t even know if he thinks. Some deep personal flaw leads him to turn on the people who put him in office — perhaps assuming that come the next Presidential election, Democrats will have no one to vote for save Obama anyway. If that's his thinking, he is a terribly flawed president indeed.

It’s time for us to turn on him. We need a prominent and thoroughly gutsy United States Senator, former senator or a civil servant with experience on the highest level to prepare pronto to run against Barack Obama in the presidential primaries.

In my heart of hearts I know that Russ Feingold or Barney Frank or Bernie Sanders couldn’t carry a national election, even though if we had one of them in the White House, we'd have a great president. Which leads me to one simple question:

Hillary, where are you when we need you?

Luddite would-be rapist tries an attack the old fashioned way – with a bow and arrows

While it was clearly nothing less than a nightmare for the two victims and I don’t mean to belittle their terror and agony, there’s something about this story I have to love.

A young couple, he a New Zealander named Matt Scheurich, she a French anthropologist in graduate school, were enjoying a picnic and swim at a river in New Guinea when a native rapist attacked them – with a bow and arrows.

Here’s an excerpt from the story in The Huffington Post:

He fired an arrow at Matt Scheurich as the 28-year-old New Zealander relaxed on a river bank while his girlfriend, a French doctoral student studying tribal life, swam in the river.

The first arrow hit Scheurich on the right side of his chest, Dr. Turharus said. The attacker then emerged from his hiding spot and fired a second arrow at Scheurich which hit him in the left side of his chest and deflected down into his stomach.

"Normally they use these arrows for hunting, for shooting at cassowaries and bears," Dr. Turharus said.

Cassowaries are large, flightless birds native to Australia and Papua New Guinea.

The attacker also threw rocks at Scheurich's head, the doctor said. The man then attempted to sexually assault the French woman, but she managed to bite his hand and run to a nearby village…

Think about it. In a day when terrorists who want to restablish medieval Sharia law born of a nomadic culture attack with airplanes and IEDs…when forgers pursuing an ancient art now use their MACs to scan and copy $100 bills…when American rapists use semi-automatic pistols …. this dude tries to pull off a rape with his bow and arrow and by throwing rocks.

That’s Ludism for you. And if you managed to doze through this little nugget in your history class, Luddites were followers of Ned Lud, a 19^th Century technophobe who tried to protect the jobs of hand weavers, who were being automated out of their jobs, by smashing those newfangled weaving machines.

The escape from rape was also begun without the help of technology. The intended rape victim bit the rapist’s hand. But after she ran to safety, she activated a temporary locator beacon. She and her fiancée were evacuated by aircraft. Saved by technology.

Now the would-be rapist, whose identity is known, is being sought, presumably with every high tech tool at the local constabulary’s disposal.

“It might take some time, but it won't be difficult,” one of them said.

I’m not sure what this bodes for folks who, thanks to technology, have seen their jobs exported, their incomes reduce sometimes to nothing, and their lives and future wrecked by the onslaught of applications designed to make sure the rich grow richer while the rest of us grow broke.

Nor do I think there’s a ray of hope here for those of us who have to keep updating our computer technology at the whim of Apple and Microsoft executives. When humanity stands up to the cold hand of technology, it seems that technology wins almost every time.

But I can tell you this. When the high tech forces of the super rich come for me, I’ll be ready to fight them until they zap me off the planet. I’m sharpening my arrows now.