WE MOURN, WE REMEMBER London, July 7, 2005 – 50 killed, 700 injured; Madrid, March 11, 2004 – 191 killed, 1500 injured; New York and Washington DC, September 11, 2001 – 3000 killed, 2300 injured; Iraq, 22,000 civilians killed, 41,000 civilians injured; Afghanistan, 3,500 civilians killed, 6,300 civilians injured; in the streets and alleys and trenches of the Mid-East war, 2,300 U.S. and coalition troops killed, 8,000 seriously injured; Africa, innocent millions are dying from starvation and disease and war. When does the madness stop?
Questions of the Week
1. Are we really and truly facing an ideological war that was going to happen regardless of Iraq?
2. Why is no publishing executive sitting in jail with Judith Miller?
3. Unemployed Germans have to work to get full unemployment insurance benefits—paint a building, make lunches, clean public areas, etc. Is this bad?
4. Should movies be available for download or purchase on day of theatrical release? Is it time to short movie chain and popcorn stock?
5. How innocent are the moaning investors who lost money on scam tax shelters designed for the sole purpose of screwing the IRS?
Weekly Citizens’ Award to Judith Miller of the Times, jailed for standing on an important principle. Maybe while cooling her heels in her ten by ten concrete room, she can write: ‘The Gulag Archipelago and the First Amendment.’
Weekly Wimp Award On the opposite side of the same principle that landed Judith Miller in the slammer, Time wimped out big time. I cancelled my subscription a hundred years ago, and now I know why. Also, where are our senators and congressmen who should be hollering bloody murder? And everyone who hasn’t cancelled his Time subscription is complicit in this sad day, the day that accelerated the race to end free speech.
Weekly Chutzpah Award goes to Richard Scrushy, canned CEO of HealthSouth and mastermind of a $3 billion fraud who, if there were any justice at all, should be spending the next thousand years in the coop (I’m still pissed that his Bible-punching brethren let him off) said of his prosecutors, “I forgive them.” Eeeeeeeyyyyyyyuuuuuuukkkkkkk!
Hooters, the Family Restaurant? Chow, a food mag, reports that 30% of Hooters diners are women and 10% of the tables have children present. If you ask me, and you didn’t, it’s time to dump the T-shirts and get back to serving their d.o.m. (dirty old men) target market.
Once Upon a Time The News & Record, a local daily in Greensboro, NC, starting next week, will give unhappy readers the ability to go online and offer their own version of stories they don’t like. This is so not new. This is what got defrocked journalists the big boot. This is what governments of the world, including our own, do every day.
Night and Day, You are the One No, not Cole Porter, but Sandra Day O’Connor, whose resignation threw special interest groups into a frothy dither as they busily cranked up their dirt machines, hoping to ensure that anyone opposed to their ideological views gets ‘Borked’ and anyone in agreement with their ideological views gets ‘Thomassed.’
Deposit Money Here, Deposit Body There .ABN Amro, one of the world’s largest banks, bought a chain of rehab centers and health clinics well known to celebrities suffering addictions or breakdowns. Let me see: I give you my money, name you as my trustee, and then you have me committed. No, there’s no conflict here, of course I’m higher than a kite and about to collapse into a month of uncontrolled sobbing.
Favorite Politician – No, not Oxymoronic James Stockdale died this week. He was Perot’s ’92 running mate, a Medal of Honor recipient, a true American hero, and a gentleman who, in his opening Gore, Quale, Stockdale Vice Presidential debate remarks, humbly asked two questions that every politician should humbly ask: “Who am I?” and ”Why am I here?”
Get Less If Deutsch Telekom sells its Lagging T-Mobile unit, as is rumored, does their pitchwoman, Catherine Zeta Jones, the world’s sexiest lady, go with it. Whatever users T-Mobile has, CZJ is the single reason. Without her, T-Mobile is not only lagging, it’s a zero.
Smell Soap? The world-wide housing bubble is showing definite bursting signs. Australia is leveling off after a six year run of 15% compounded growth. Remember, for every spec winner, there’s a spec loser, so don’t get caught with your specs down.
Fat Food Fight Thinking of suing your favorite hamburger emporium because your waist blocks your view of your feet, think again. Thanks to the good folks at National Restaurant Association, twenty states now have laws banning ‘you made me a fat bastard’ suits, and eleven more have bills pending. Of course that still leaves nineteen states, including California where only leaves and grass are eaten or smoked, to cash in on your God-given right to get rich the old-fashioned American way.
Take an Aspirin and Hold it Tightly Between Your Knees More giant healthcare oligopolies are being created at ever increasing prices. This week UnitedHealth said it would acquire PacifiCare Health for $8.14 billion, or $2,500 per enrollee. Last year, WellPoint and Anthem merged in a $16.5 billion deal, or $1,260 per member, about half the UnitedHealth/PacifiCare deal. That wrenching pain in your ass isn’t hemorrhoids or the proctologist’s practiced pointer, it’s the cash being sucked out of your system.
Ay! Taco Grandé! By some estimates, 20 billion American’s will cross the Rio Grande this year. That’s dollars, my friend, gringo greenbacks earned by Mexicans in this country that flow to Mexico, its second largest source of foreign exchange after oil exports.
Volkswagen Bugs Not the beloved Beatle, but cockroaches, the two-legged kind. Apparently two former VW executives skimmed the corporate treasury to fund a network of fake companies and paid bribes to keep their dirty little secret, well, secret. Corporate greed knows no boundaries, it seems.
Fickle Footsie of Fate Boo on the money that left the London Stock Exchange on word of yesterday’s bombings. I think we should list the cowards who ran for cover and prevent them from ever again using the stock markets of the free world.
Social Sescrewity You’ll be happy to know that the ousted CEO of Morgan Stanley is departing with $113 million stuffed into his pockets. Johnny Mack, his replacement, gets only $25 million a year, but at least he has a job.
Corporate Crooks Update Richard Scrushy faces a ton of civil suits and the SEC wants his other nut. Prince Eliot is gong after Bank of America’s Theodore C. Sihpol, III on the four of thirty-three counts that the jury left in limbo. Daniel Bayly, former Merrill Lynch investment banking head who ‘floated’ Nigerian barges for Enron, goes to the slammer on July 14th for two-and-a-half years.