I love debate. I think when you get people to engage in debate you get them to start thinking and you get them to start participating (it’s especially fun when its about things they’d not given much thought to already). Plus, I like to know what people think and get to know them beyond any obvious commonalities we might share. (Perhaps this is why Facebook and social media in general has never interested me much beyond the marketing implications for each. I’d rather have five very good and reliable friends than 200 acquaintances. This is why I don’t accept…
Breakfast at work
One question that pops into my mind at least a minute of every work day is why people come to work in the morning and then eat breakfast at their desks. Unlike lunch, which is bookended by work on both sides, breakfast and dinner are both meals you can eat at home before and after work, respectively. I don’t understand why you’d wake up, get ready for work, make your commute and then make cereal, toast or hot oatmeal at the office and then sit at your desk to eat. Depending on how particular and observant you are, the idiosyncrasies…
What could possibly go wrong?
Former Secretary of State, John Kerry, once asked, “What’s the worst that could happen if we’re wrong about global warming?” How about regulating the drive and initiative out of American businesses and stifling growth and employment. Prohibiting, or severely limiting, new business startups – restraining innovators from developing new technologies, jobs and growth. Dominating American homeowners and property-owners, reducing their ability to use their own land and forcing them to buy only certain products, appliances, foods, building materials – all because of ‘environmental’ concerns. Emptying our breadbasket, American agriculture, by layering on unreasonable rules, requirements and restrictions for merely…
What kind of person…?
Brand managers love to develop a persona for their product audiences. It’s helpful to marketers, in general, to have some idea of who uses your product or service. If you know what drives them, what they like, what they don’t like and what kinds of messages are meaningful and relevant to them, you stand a better chance of reaching them with a relevant message, at the right time, to get them to act. While visiting one of my clients last week, I ventured into their restroom to find a guy standing at the right-most of the three urinals. He…
Eastern seaboard
I’ve always loved the phrase “Eastern seaboard.” It sounds so official… so military… yet, so nuclear attack. You only really ever hear the phrase in movies or television shows, and when you do, it’s usually because something big is going down on the Eastern seaboard. But I can’t help but wonder why nothing ever happens on the Western seaboard. You never hear anything at all about the Western seaboard. It’s like our country’s overlooked seaboard. I know there are always earthquake threats, along with the occasional tsunami. I thought of this today because as I was sitting in the…
Lazy vs helpless
Conservatives are often accused of being heartless and cruel to the suffering. According to most research, self-described conservatives donate more time and money to charity than do self-described liberals – they just don’t spend any time talking about it. Conservatism is about empowering the individual because all people are capable of reaching their potential and accomplishing great things. “Great things” doesn’t mean that everyone is capable of curing cancer or single-handedly advancing the productivity of society. “Great things” means doing something great at any level. Sometimes greatness is opening a restaurant by preparing food in a way that no…
Virtue of self-sufficiency
As the saying goes, give a man a fish and he can eat for a day. Teach a man to fish, and he will eat for a lifetime. The point is not a new one: teach someone to do for themselves, and with hard work and perseverance, they can make something of themselves. Hard work doesn’t always produce riches. Life is not fair, and you can be the most moral and well-intentioned, hardest worker in the country and you might still make minimum wage. But I don’t think you work hard just so you can be rich. To me,…
Selfishness
People are selfish. But, being selfish, and aware of one’s own selfishness, is the key to a thriving society. When on an airplane, they tell you that if the oxygen masks come down, always put your own on before you help the person next to you. This is a great metaphor for life. Before we can be at all helpful or useful to others, we have to have our own house in order. People need to be grounded, satisfied with who they are and what they’re doing with their life before they can start helping others. People love to…
Decapitations happen
Everybody makes mistakes, right? As I often tell people at work, I don’t mind mistakes. I just ask the people learn from them and don’t make the same mistake twice. So when this Syrian group of Islamist rebels, Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (or ISIS), who are linked to al-Queda, mistakenly cut the head off of the wrong infidel, at least they had the good sense to apologize. “Sorry…” Man, I wouldn’t want to be the guy that had to answer for that one. Talk about an administrative error. And I don’t think al-Queda management is as for…
Happy anniversary, the Bubbler
Today is the one year anniversary of The Bubbler. I have to admit, it started off with great ambition, and lasted more than three months as an experiment. Then life got in the way, the Bubbler wasn’t going the way it was intended, and suddenly, it was abandoned for other things. But I’ve recently had some revelations, and I now see that I was a year ahead of its time. I now know where the Bubbler fits in to the great solution. So stay tuned. We’re not dead, yet, and the Bubbler will have its place. Until there, happy…