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Mike Shiloh, editor at TheLatest.Net, is an award-winning broadcast news reporter, anchor and Internet writer, a regular on CNN, as heard on WINK News Radio, KNTH, KKHT, KTRH, KRBE, KILT, KKHT, KKBQ, KVST, KNTH, KSEV and KQUE.
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Nu Obs & Ops
News, Observations and Opinions with a Sensa Humah
Fortune "Magazine:" Americans are "fearful" because of the loss of jobs...but corporations are doing better than they have in a while
Amazingly, as consumers struggle, U.S. corporations are staging a nearly unprecedented comeback that's largely escaping notice. The gargantuan, dispiriting job cuts that seem to dominate the news have also been the spur for an epic resurgence in profits.
Yes, 47% of Households Owe No Taxes. But Look Closer...
A question for those who say the housing and loan industries are in recovery: What about the resets in mortgages coming up over the next three years? Mortgages that used variable interest rates in the "Alternative-A" category will start to reset over the next few months. "Alt-A" -- meaning houses that cost a lot more than those in the "Subprime" category, and it was the Subprime mortgages that set off the mortgage crisis two years ago. Resets meaning that variable rates will increase and we don't know how many of those holding the mortgages will be unable to keep up the payments. We won't know how bad the coming resets will affect the economy until later this year, and the resets will continue through 2013.
A fundraising letter we received from Vice President Joe Biden: Under the misguided leadership of the Republicans, "our economy was in shambles. In fact, just days before the inauguration, we'd received news that another 700,000 Americans had lost their jobs....One year later we have brought the economy back from the brink of collapse. We are now in the process of building the economy of the future -- an economy in which America's besieged middle class shares in the wealth they create.
"Republicans want," Biden continues, "to stop us from expanding health care to the millions of Americans who don't have it. They want to stop us from rebuilding our economy and creating the jobs that Americans so desperately need. And they want to stop us from enacting the financial reforms that will prevent Wall Street from ever taking up to the brink of economic collapse again... I served in the Senate for 36 years and in all that time, I have never seen more Republicans committed to permanent, unyielding obstruction." Emphasis is the vice president's, who goes on to say that the November election this year will be crucial.
GO GREEN AND SAVE THE PLANET! (Not really, it's just corporate hype to save some bucks)
Isn't it thoughtful and community-minded of big corporations to allow us to "go green" by letting them email our bills and junk ads rather than their having to mail them? Gives you warm, green shivers doesn't it? Never mind that the real reason they want us to "go green" is because it saves them postage and printing costs.
The truth is it takes the procurement and refining of lots of metals and minerals (including gold and silver) and extensive molding of plastics and the use of hydrocarbons just to make a computer. And guess how you run a computer? Electricity that comes largely from the combustion of coal.
And never you mind that dead electronic devices have become a huge stream of toxic waste that we have yet to fully deal with.
I like paper bills and paper junk mail. Besides, I'm Irish so I don't need to "go green."
BREAKING THE ICE
...We got a new refrigerator not too long ago. When it happened my family leapt into the 21st Century. It's really nice because you don't have to use trays to make ice. The icemaker works great, but it's just not the same as having big squares of ice for a soft drink. These ice "cubes" are like big, thick half-moons. Every time I reach for a handful of ice, I drop at least one "cube" on the floor.
I'm going to try the built-in ice crusher soon. I'll probably find a way to drop some of that on the floor too. But since they're not ice "cubes" anymore, what do I say to my family? "Oh, I just spilled another ice half moon again?" "Oh, look, again I spilled some slush?" They're already worried about me. I can't say that. -- MS
THE TROUBLE WITH THE NEW H1N1 FLU SHOTS IS MARKETING!
Why does the cost of H1N1 flu shots keep going down? Two months ago they were unavailable in my area, then when the vaccine showed up it was $20 a shot. Now it's $10. Maybe they'd sell more of the shots if they tried a different marketing approach.
So many drugs have happy, smiley names, like Celebrex ("Celebrex good times, come on!!") and Ascenden ("I'm ascending, I'm floating my way up into the sky, ahhhhhhh") and even old Dimetapp (sounds cheap, huh?...but based on the real price they ought to call it "50-cents-a-tapp").
The drug companies should rename the H1N1 shot and maybe call it "FluOver," like "YOUR flu fears are OVER!" (or like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest).
Or maybe they should call it "Affluent" to give consumers the feeling they're rich because they've had their shot. Millions of people are out of work. We need to hear words like "affluent."
Considering how dangerous the shot appears to be to some people, maybe they should market it as "Advench-aflu." ("Be adventurous! Get pandemic relief with Advenchaflu!")
Or just market it as protection against a very strange flu, and base the campaign on price ("Your expensive $20 flu shot is now PRICED JUST RIGHT! Get your shot, give us a $20 bill and we'll give you TEN DOLLARS BACK, guaranteed! Now that's change you can believe in!").
KIND OF LIKE BRAIN DROPPINGS...
"Why do Americans choose from just two people to run for president and 50 for Miss America?"
"Children: You spend the first 2 years of their life teaching them to walk and talk. Then you spend the next 16 years telling them to sit down and shut-up."
'If you think nobody cares if you're alive, try missing a couple of payments."
"How is it one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?"
"You do not need a parachute to skydive. You only need a parachute to skydive twice."
"Some people say "If you can't beat them, join them". I say "If you can't beat them, beat them", because they will be expecting you to join them, so you will have the element of surprise."
"TV can insult your intelligence, but nothing rubs it in like a computer."
-- From Onelinerz.net: TheTOP 100 funniest one-liners on the internet
SIX STRANGE FOODS
AlterNet has come up with "The 6 Weirdest, Scariest Processed Foods," and they are remarkable. I already knew (did you?) that the prime ingredient in the white filling in Oreos is Crisco, a vegetable alternative to lard, but a fat is a fat. The other prime ingredient is sugar.
Did you know that the addition of chemicals liketrisodium phosphate in Kraft Easy Cheese (the cheese from the spray can, remember?) causes much of the calcium to be leeched from the cheese-like product squirted from the can? So Kraft has to add extra calcium to make up for it.
Canned condensed soup contains about 90% of the sodium (salt) you should have in one day. AlterNet says Spam is essentially pork-flavored Jello. And what are those things that look like blueberries in blueberry waffles? Are they blueberries? No, they're bits of blueberry-flavored sugar.
And you may have looked at the ingredients in Kraft's guacamole dip and noticed that avacado is not an ingredient. Real guacamole is always made with avocado, so how does Kraft do it? Flavoring. AlterNet points out that when this was brought to Kraft's attention, the dip was renamed "guacamole-flavored" dip.
With as much Easy Cheese, Spam, Oreos and condensed soup we were fed when we were children, how did we live through childhood?
NOW LISTEN UP YOU PEOPLE!!
On blogs such as this one you're supposed to rant, so I just wanted to mention that one of the things that really bugs me about some people is when they say, "Listen up!" As soon as you say that I immediately stop listening. If I were in the military and my DI said that, I'd listen. I'm not so I don't.
I also stop listening to anyone who refers to me as part of a crowd when that person addresses us as "You people," or even worse, just "people." As in "listen up, people." What? I was listening kindly till you addressed me in that demeaning, stupid way. -- MS
QUOTE OF THE YEAR (SO FAR:)
"Let’s get one thing clear once and for all: the only person who has ever been allowed to “reach out” (and, in her case, touch someone you love) was Diana Ross. Anyone else should just “get in touch with” their colleagues, perhaps even “write a letter” asking for their views. What was once a mild rash has become a contagious bug and we need to find a vaccine for all this reaching out. Not only is it a drippy, meaningless phrase, it also conjures up an unpleasant image of people’s sweaty paws grabbing at you.
"The people who 'reach out' are also those whose thinking is always “blue sky," who can’t describe anything vaguely contemporary without incorrectly enlisting phrases such as “minimalist” or “modernist” and who don’t have to hurry to the airport but need to “rocket” there. But for now if we can just get everyone to delete “reach out” from their memory banks, opening our emails will be a less tense experience. And if they don’t, perhaps we’ll have to reach out – and grab them by the throat."
-- Monocle magazine
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Forget That Survey. Here's Why Journalism Is The Best Job Ever
More American adults lacked health insurance coverage last year than in any year since Gallup and Healthways started tracking it in 2008. The uninsured rate has been increasing since 2008, climbing to 17.1% in 2011.
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