SO much hype these days about new opportunities to “make money fast” — I call persons who heed and act on this type of call “Fast Eddies” — when, in fact, the only institution that really “makes money” is a mint, and nowadays, only representations of money, being illusions representing the great illusion, money. It isn’t altogether inappropriate to try to “make money,” though counterfeiting is indeed a federal crime — a no-no in the all to human game of money, which, w...

IT’S hard to comment about about something that appears like “ghost” marketing (marketing an “unavailable” product), though this new approach to seems to be popping up more and more these days. You know the basic story: A product or service fails “due to COVID,” and whether the failing is real or not, public response results in a rush of demand, creating a sales boom, often with the product being offered at higher price. Clever, if, in fact, it’s all true. But whether true or ...

I’VE had the unique experience of watching America transform from a nation of creative manufacturers and traders into a nation ruled almost entirely by business — an industry that neither creates nor produces, bent almost wholly on “making money” typically through management. I watched with horror the businessification, sometimes commercialization, of health care, then food production, then technology, then education, then transportation, now politics. What’s left from which to “t...

THERE is something faster than the irritating “Fast Eddies” — con men, women and children (see yesterday’s post) — playing so prominent a role in contemporary society. Emotions.

Before I go on, I would like to make a critical distinction between emotions and feelings which are too often lumped injudiciously together. By “emotions” I mean the body’s release of circulating chemicals either in a local blood vessel plexus or the general blood stream. Okay, let’s call them what ...

THIS is a gripe: Whenever I travel the highways nowadays, everyone seems to be speeding except me, creating a definitely dangerous situation. I mean, when the sign says “Speed Limit 55 mph” does that really mean minimum speed? What’s with the need to speed far in excess of the speed limit not just on freeways (hey, is this really Germany and the Autobahn?) but in urban and even suburban areas. Is it really a 3 year olds responsibility to watch out for speeding cars? Or is everyone on sp...