bleumangue

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    • Tue Mar 11th 12:35 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Spitzer's Legacy on Wall Street
      A cogent, precise, and hopeful article. See, I don't summarily dismiss your "insights"!
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    • Tue Mar 11th 11:59 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Spitzer: Self-Destruction
      I appreciate what you wrote because you address the issues that create the people whom we might choose to lead us. Being 62, I've lived through enough to see the spectrum of human leadership behaviors on display and long enough to be wary of "charismatic"... types. It would be nice to separate the man from actions that have no real bearing on job performance, but unfortunately in this case you can't just uphold the LAW for some people. Spitzer got tangled in his own web by lies of omission and convenience. He would not have gotten elected had he revealed his core beliefs. That's the really sick underbelly of all leadership positions. To place yourself in a position to do the next right thing you really get nudged into doing a lot of wrong things first. I guess the trick is to know WHEN to STOP. He should have watched "Cool Hand Luke". "A man's gotta know his limitations."
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    • Thu Mar 6th 10:40 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      The Thornburg Meltdown: Resolution Trust Corp. Redux?
      I agree with everything you say but would go one step further to encorporate the Chinese model. Find the top 50 people responsible for this abortion and execute them. Then, you can save the asses of the rest with my tax dollars.
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    • Tue Mar 4th 21:55 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Teenagers Shun CDs
      For once Barry I like agree with EVERYTHING you wrote like a gigabillion %.
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    • Mon Mar 3rd 12:01 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Ben Stein Watch: In Defense of Exxon Mobil
      NJ regulated ob/gyn-s right into neighboring states. It did it with insurance companies to such a point that to lure them back it had to agree to absurd rate-worthiness conditions. When people and job sources vote with their feet across the rivers (Good-Bye to warehouses off NJTpke exites 8/8a) then the morons try to pass legislation taxing food - not just restaurant food - but food "food".
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    • Sun Feb 24th 10:25 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Netflix & Microsoft Move On; Blockbuster Still Stuck in the '80's
      Your suggestions may make sense in a mathematical way but they seriously don't understand the "shopping experience". Somewhere in your schooling you must have heard about the importance of owernership of the object for sale. Color, smell, touch the pretty DVD box. I've rented on-line and from video stores. The 2 experiences are not comparable. It's not only about the DVD. It's about having a shopping experience with the other humans in the store. Watch the shopping experience on HSN or QVC. They vicariously suck in all your senses. They do it so you can feel that you did. Netflix business model is based on the belief that we consumers exist to cocoon; having all our needs supplied by forces outside a habitat from which we will never, or minimaly, venture out. That's what Blockbuster is not selling; and I'm not buying.
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    • Sun Feb 17th 13:23 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Monolines: The Spitzer Debate
      Who to believe? Who to believe? Who to blame? And what to do with the Names and Addresses and Recent Photos when we find out? A conundrum for a simpler time.
      If I'm in the business of selling apples then I have no business having oranges in the Inventory and telling people that I sell apples. It's called BAIT & SWITCH. And yes, the Soviet and Chinese "economies did not run too well" but they had a damned fine and public way of dealing with the purpetrators that would have eventually made them run even worse!
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    • Sun Feb 17th 12:25 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      eBay 'Boycott' Shows Lack of Trust Between Buyers and Sellers
      It's always great to hear from the the "ex". It's the only frakking way anybody get's a half-ass idea of what's really happening! User 104113: you're my Gennifer Flowers of E-bay!
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    • Sun Feb 17th 12:16 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Food Shoppers Not Trading Down to Private Labels
      Just to digress. Is Lukoil substantially and intrinsically different from Exxon? (I have been led to believe that they are one and the same.) Or put in quantum physics terms: Is my commodity is vastly different from your commodity because I looked at it and you didn't?
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    • Sun Feb 17th 12:07 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Food Shoppers Not Trading Down to Private Labels
      Thank Goodness I saved the glass, paper and plastic containers of "top shelf" food products for reuse. Now I can delude myself more easily into believing that my net worth hasn't changed facing fixed income in a bear market recession compounded by 5% inflation. This has worked well for me in the past with generic Vodka and wine. Seriously though, I opine that the analyst is lying by omission. Private labels may be increasing prices - but they also are offering many more "loss leaders", coupon discounts, and general "on sale" items - at leat in the NH to NJ area. My gut feeling is that somebody somewhere is fudging data. Personal experience has proved to me that the daily paper pecking order of reading goes: supermarket ads; obits; and comics. Common sense tells me that supermarkets don't own, run and operate their own lands for food production. They buy the stuff from the same people that sell the higher priced items. Somewhere down the line the US Government does the same thing. Their branded label is called "Surplus Food". So what mathematical equation could be at work here? 3 items of private brand equal 1.3 generic? I'd say Mr. Driscoll's analysis is a product of MSRP thinking. That is, solid and factual, and having little to do with reality.
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    • Fri Feb 15th 14:40 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      NY Times Exec. Editor Likens Newspapers to Vinyl Records
      When Video gaming took precedence over reading a book, the end of print media was near. When the internet could provide pictures and captions instantaneously the end of print media was nearer. I don't need anybody to tell me, interpret for me, qualify for me what a picture of a typical "news-worthy"... event means. I really don't give a FF what any candidate has to say because nothing ever changes and it's not going to help pay my mortgage anyway. So what does that leave? American Idol. YouTube. Veoh. Survivor: DeKalb. The Newspaper in print form is an anachronysm. The print media does not provide any means to change anything, it merely provides info on a bunch of stuff I have no control over anyway. Who cares about the 5th guy on the left in Palestine. I've got enough crap to deal with in a more or less sober fashion than to worry about how many morons buy houses next to rivers or volcanos. I can't remember reading an Editorial in any east coast paper within the last ten years that exuded printed word PASSION. All I get from print media on a daily basis is that I am about to be pillaged, burned, raped, murdered, assaulted, bombed, mutilated, poisoned, and be made homeless, unemployed, imprisoned, or condemned to damnation because I happen to be on this frakking planet. The ONLY newspaper that I have any positive feelings about is an Amish newspaper out of PA or OH. After the schoolhouse murders in the Amish community, they printed crop & planting forecasts and news that was of immediate relevance to the Amish community. Not a word about the obscene events that took little girl's lives. They dealt with the dealable. As for papers like the NYT or the BG or WP or St.PT or the MH - get more Ben Steins, or, encourage copious amounts of reporter alcohol consumption for more decisve writing.
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    • Fri Feb 15th 13:06 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Love Affair With Credit Cards Is on the Rocks
      Stupidity lending came to the public because of greed. The CC companies knew that most people repay over time. The CC companies got their monies from the POS and the user. People who used credit as it should be used were (and probably still are) called "DEADBEATS". The latter did not generate multiples of what POS were forced to pay. Some stores got smart and started to refuse to honor certain CC cards. More people carrying balances were needed in this crazed ponzi-like scheme. More stupidity lending ensued. Couple that with the constant barrage of "BUY" it was not science that it might lead to stupidity borrowing. But gaming the system can't alone explain all the defaults. The CC companies at one point a few years back started offering year-end summary spending reports. Personally, this was a bit scary - but it did show that data could be amassed and vectored. Yet, Nobody on the the lending end noticed that users were charging "GROCERIES". WTF did the CC companies think people were using cash for? Plasma TVs? The CC companies are not in the business of lending money. They are in the business of keeping their employees paid with funds provided by people in debt. Amoral? No. Imprudent, greedy to excess, and self-centered? Yes. This country survives on our selling of each others' shit to ourselves whether it's called "services" or "arts & crafts" or "lawn sale". Now perhaps if we were selling that shit to other countries we wouldn't be buying food on credit. I also will note that the major reason that people go into debt is "health-related&q... Throw job-loss or pay reduction for any reason into the mix and there is a recipe for a credit disaster. I firmly believe that identity theft is rampant not because somebody wants to be a spy with multiple passports but that it will provide access to more credit. But I digress. The bottom line here is that a user in financial trouble regardless of the fault will grab at any lifeline to stay alive and hopeful. If Moderation was an operative word on both sides of this mess then it might be a lot easier to discern the gamers from the needy and to get a viable start on what not to do in the future.
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    • Tue Feb 12th 15:33 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      MainStreet.com: Worst Idea Ever?
      Please help. I'm trying to find links to the Kobe Bryant marital advice section as well as diet and exercise tips from the Olsens. It never ceases to amaze me that someone somewhere was clever enough to parlay this tripe into a (hopefully short) paying job. I saw the emergence of this type of presentation with "commercials-we made-that-were-hilario... With credit to Lewis Black for the concept - The same people that will take advantage Mainstreet dot com are the same ones who think that the Flintstones were a documentary.
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    • Mon Feb 11th 18:50 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Ben Stein Watch: In Need of Rescue
      Mr. Salmon: And your problem with BS is exactly what? Telling the sheep that they're to be shorn ad infinitum? Or pissing off the shearer. I'm sorry. Am I confusing the issue with facts?
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    • Mon Feb 4th 18:33 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Merrill Lynch Opens Legal Hornet's Nest
      WOW! Thanks for an in-depth and insightful article. I'm from MA and just about any Yankee will tell you that you don't screw with the Powers that Be unless they're getting a slice of the Soda bread. Billy Galvin's no slouch and neither was Finneran. I loved Howie Carr's rages against "The Corrupt Midget". But nothing comes of such things but hightened emotions because you can't fight BC, I mean City Hall. You couldn't make this stuff up. I just wonder if any deals like this play out in NJ and how hard would it be to find out? I'm glad that Mr. Shapiro feels that these practices are "obscene". It a the least shows me that there may be some hope for the "Cesspool State" and I can take a break from building my Ark.
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