Car Commercials Then And Now

I know of which I speak because I spent more than 30 years rising to the height of a Mediocre Automotive Career.

 

Back in my day we knew how to make Automotive Commercials...Or did we?

 

To me today’s Automotive Commercials are strange...

Ø They show the car we ought to buy driving through the downtown streets of major metropolitan cities but the streets are empty, except for the car we ought to buy...
>Why are the streets empty?

Ø The car we ought to buy almost hits a lonely pedestrian walking across the empty commercial street...
>The reason the car was stopped before hitting the lonely pedestrian is because the car’s computers stopped the car.
>The reason the driver did not stop the car is because he never expected to see anyone walking across the empty commercial street.

Ø Now commercials show cars sliding sideways on frozen lakes...
>Why is the car we ought to buy driving on a frozen lake?
>Why would we want to buy a car because it can slide sideways on a frozen lake?
>Henry Ford’s Model T could slide sideways on a frozen lake without 27 computers installed.

Ø Today’s commercials show the car we ought to buy driving fast through a mess of leaves so that the leaves are disturbed and fly all around as the car we ought to buy drives fast through them...
>Is it the implication of this technique that the competitor’s cars could not make the leaves fly all around as they drove fast through the leaves, therefore, we ought to buy the car we ought to buy because the cars we don’t want to buy can’t disturb leaves?

Ø We see a family of 5 driving along all happily hooked up to the electronic devices of their choice and no one is talking to anyone else (especially the driving father)...
>Actually I understand the selling feature of this bullet point for the not-spoken-to- father.
> The happy children are so enraptured with their electronics that they don’t pester the not-spoken-to- father with, “Are we there yet?”
> Actually they really don’t want to be there yet because, if they were there yet, they would have to stop enjoying their electronics for a few minutes.

Ø One of latest commercial techniques is to show cars driving on bridges...
>Is this sales technique trying to imply that the competitive cars cannot drive on bridges?
>I don’t know about you but I certainly will not buy a car whose computers stopped it at the entrances to all bridges.

 

Back in the Mediocre Old Years we used to ask the customers to buy our cars because they were good cars and we told them why they were good cars.

 

I guess that’s why we and our commercials are sitting atop the Ash Heap of History.

 

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

Let Me See If I Understand This Foolishness Correctly

Currently there is a TV commercial running that says the price of Silver will hit an all time high in the relatively near future. When it does those of us who own a bunch of Silver are going to become Stinking Rich.

 

The Sponsor of the commercial has a bunch of Silver and he is offering to sell it to us for a price that is far below what it will be when it gets to its all time high in the relatively near future.

 

I know I claim to be smart and I also know that a few of you have doubts about just how smart I am. I guarantee I am smarter than the Sponsor of this commercial.

 

If I owned a whole bunch of something that I knew was going to shoot up in price in the relatively near future, I sure as hell would not be willing to sell it to you at what is going to prove to have been a Bargain Price in the relatively near future!

 

I see that a whole bunch of you now get my drift because I just heard that bunch of you say to your collective selves, “No way, Jose, I would hold onto all that Silver until the Relatively Near Future has become the Recent Past and I would sell it at its all-time high and I would become Stinking Rich”.

 

It’s not Rocket Science.

 

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

Why Are They Treating Us Like Mushrooms?

This bit of Foolishness was written a few years ago when our economy was in the dumpster.

************************

You say you don’t know what it means to be treated like a mushroom. Your Mushroom Education is about to begin.

You are being treated like a Mushroom if you are being kept in the dark and being covered up with bullchit.

My newspaper recently had an article about the First Quarter U.S. Economy shrinking by 2.9%. From the headline itself we start getting the chit thrown our way...

Economy Shrinks In First Quarter, But Growing Again

In the World of Control (patterned after George Orwell’s 1984) this headline is intended to keep us sheep from recognizing the truly disastrous situation we very well might be headed into and, worst of all, keep us from doing anything about it because it is Already OK (...“but growing again”).

Then in the body of the article they insulted our intelligence when they blamed Winter for the decline. Even Fox News (Fair and Balanced and Sometimes Not Too Sharp) parroted this silliness on TV recently. Not one of the Fair and Balanced Talking Heads missed a syllable as I was shouting at the TV, “It gets cold every Winter!” They acted as if they did not hear a word I was shouting.

It gets worse. The Winter Excuse was expanded upon in my newspaper the next day...

The economy was held back by an Unusually Cold Winter, the Expiration of Long-Term Unemployment Benefits and Cuts to Food Stamps, which Curbed Consumer Spending.

There you have it. There is a nutshell is the Good Ole USofA’s  Plan For Prosperity...

Ø We must prevent winter from ever coming again.

Ø We must continue and increase long-term unemployment benefits forever.

Ø We must increase food stamps dependency.

How can you argue with that logic?

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

I’ve Never Believed I Should Put My Money Where No Man’s Money Has Gone Before

There I was in this guy’s Very Big Impressive Palatial Office. He was selling me hard on how I should invest all of my money in his Bitcoin Cryptocurrency. He was a very high-pressure salesman and he laid out for me the benefits of the Bitcoin by use of a series of questions and probing statements. You would be proud of me. I handled everything he threw at me...

• Palatial Office Guy (POG)... Do you want to join up with the stinking rich?
• Me... Huh?
• POG... Do you want me to tell you the best part?
• Me... Huh?
• POG... To become stinking rich you do not even have to know what you are doing because you have me!
• Me... Huh?
• POG... You just have to trust me, give me all your money and I will handle the rest for you!
• Me... Huh?
• POG... You just put your trust in me and, before you know it, you will have a Palatial Office as big as mine!
• Me... Huh?
• POG... Of course, there may be some dramatic fluctuations in the value of your Crypto Nest Egg but I promise you Bitcoin will always bounce back higher than where it was before it dropped like a rock!
• Me... Huh?
• POG... Did I say you had to trust me?

************************

I hope I have not confused you. Watch this video and it will all be made clear in your mind...Or will it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeMv9uKpAZg&feature=youtu.be

 

If that confused you, this one will be better. Trust me.

https://youtu.be/4APcgsRdW6w

 

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

An Exercise In Arithmetic, Mathematics and Logic

I will never stop reading what members of our Congress have to say about anything and everything. It is so educational! I love to be educated! I just love to be smart! 

In this case this bit of Making Me Smarter is from a candidate for Congress who is not yet a Member of Congress but she’s going to be. Can you imagine how much smarter she will be after she gets into Congress!

 

There I go getting ahead of you. It’s my fault. I apologize. Allow me to start making amends by pecking this below...

In an interview with PBS on July 13, the candidate was discussing the viability of capitalism in America when she was asked about the current strong economy and low unemployment rate of 4%.

She responded: “I think the numbers that you just talked about is part of the problem, right? Because we look at these figures and we say, ‘Oh, unemployment is low, everything is fine, right?’ Well, unemployment is low because everyone has two jobs.”

I’ll make this point about the Unemployment Rate and then I will move on to today’s Foolishness...Or Is It? ... According to PolitiFact.com... “When the Bureau of Labor Statistics determines the unemployment rate, a person is counted as employed as long as they have at least one job. They don’t get counted twice if they have two jobs”.

 

In my self-proclaimed capacity as leader of the Imitation Smart People, I will analyze this for all of you using the Arithmetic I was taught by Sister Mary Luke...

Ø I’ll start by using a big inaccurate number by assuming we have 1,000,000 workers in the Good Ole USofA’s labor force.

Ø Let’s also assume we have 1,000,000 jobs in the Good Ole USofA.

Ø Let’s assume that 500,000 of our workers do not have jobs and 500,000 of our workers do have jobs.

Ø Let’s keep on assuming and assume that every one of the 500,000 workers who do have jobs actually have 2 jobs.

Ø According to our future Congresswoman this means that we have Full Employment in the Good Ole USofA because there are 1,000,000 jobs and there is a worker working in every one of those 1,000,000 jobs!

Ø Using logic and not arithmetic this means that the 500,000 who do not have jobs actually do have jobs because we have Full Employment in the Good Ole USofA and Full Employment means every worker has a job! (See above bullet point.)

 

If you are confused by all of this Irrefutable Logic and Arithmetic don’t feel badly. I have an advantage over you because Sister Mary Luke was very good at teaching Arithmetic and, I also was taught by Father Hatrel in High School and he told me, “Mathematics Is an Exact Science”.

 

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

Lagniappe: I don’t feel qualified to explain to you the difference between Arithmetic and Mathematics. I recommend you wait until this Future Congresswoman gets into Congress and then you can send her a Tweet and ask her. She’s getting sharper every day...Or is she?

 

My Potted Plant Outfit Has Come In Handy Again

Last week I put on my Potted Plant Outfit and went slithering around our Transportation Department in Washington D.C. to see what’s going on in the world of Transportation. It just so happened that I picked an action packed day to go slithering about.

 

It was absolute chaos! The office was full of advocates from People for the Advancement of the Right to Take Any Animal Anywhere who were busy advocating their cause.

 

You may not be aware that our Airlines are under assault by this and 32 other organizations of a similar persuasion.

 

Here is one of the conversations I overheard...

Ø Animal Advocate (AA) said, “Peacocks are not that big! An Ostrich is big but a Peacock is only large and large is not big”.

Ø Beleaguered Transportation Official (BTO) said, “Looks pretty big to me”. (What the BTO should have said, “That’s silly! Get the hell out of my office!”)

Ø BTO said, “Innocent passengers have been injured by Peacocks on Airline Flights”.

Ø AA said, “That’s an exaggeration! There has not been an Airline Peacock Attack since last week!”

Ø BTO said, “You may have a point. I’ll take that fact under advisement but first I will need to talk to that passenger who was attacked by that Peacock”. (What the BTO should have said, “That’s silly! Get the hell out of my office!”)

Ø AA said, “You will have to wait. He will not be out of the hospital till after Labor Day”.

Ø AA said, “I’ll bet you are not going to take the feelings of the Peacock Community into consideration, are you? Peacocks are people too. These proud sensitive animals have been raised to care for their emotionally challenged caregivers. Your preventing them from fulfilling their mission in life takes a very hard toll on their psychological makeup”.

Ø BTO said, “I never thought of that. I’ll be certain to call an emergency meeting of our Rules Committee right after lunch today to consider the very cogent point you just presented me with”. (What the BTO should have said, “That’s silly! Get the hell out of my office!”)

Ø BTO said, “While you are here, we should discuss Pooping by Birds on our planes. Our Janitorial Union has filed a grievance against this new rather unpleasant responsibility”.

Ø AA said, “Well I never! I am of a mind to file a counter grievance against their grievance with my Congressman. You may be aware that he is a proud owner of 2 Dogs, 1 Cat, an Iguana and a growing Baby Elephant. Just yesterday he told me he is planning to take a trip to his Tiny House on Lake Tahoe. You think you have trouble with my single Sensitive and Caring Peacock. You just wait!”

Ø BTO said, “Oh, my gosh and here I am only weeks before retirement!” (What the BTO should have said, “That’s silly! Get the hell out of my office!”)

 

The Bottom Line: As soon as our 9% Approval Rated Congress gets back from vacation it ought to pass a Federal Law that a BTO ought to be allowed to say to an AA, “That’s silly! Get the hell out of my office!”

 

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

Lagniappe: If you want to know more, read below but I warn you there is a lot of Silly and Frightening in this article...

 

Pets-on-Planes Crackdown by Airlines Gets Boost from U.S. Agency

By Alan Levin and Mary Schlangenstein

 

May 16, 2018

 

Regulators are making it easier for U.S. airlines to limit the growing number of dogs and other animals being brought onto flights by passengers saying they are needed for emotional or psychological support.

 

The Department of Transportation Wednesday said it won’t penalize airlines if they refuse to let passengers take aboard more than one support animal, demand assurance that a passenger has a disability or require proof of an animal’s vaccination and training. The agency also will allow airlines to impose “reasonable restrictions” on the movement of emotional-support animals in a plane’s cabin.

 

Service animals including seeing-eye dogs won’t be restricted under the proposed changes.

 

“The department has heard from the transportation industry, as well as individuals with disabilities, that the current regulation could be improved to ensure nondiscriminatory access for individuals with disabilities, while simultaneously preventing instances of fraud and ensuring consistency with other federal regulations,” the agency said in a release.

 

The DOT’s actions come as the three largest U.S. carriers have altered their policies on animals since the start of this year in reaction to soaring numbers of passengers claiming they needed them to provide emotional support. Those increased numbers also led to at least two incidents in which passengers were injured, including a man who suffered severe facial wounds from a dog last June on a Delta Air Lines Inc. flight.

 

Delta and United Continental Holdings Inc. in March began requiring 48-hour advance notice to travel with an emotional support animal, along with documents that could include proof the animal is trained and vaccinations are up to date, and a letter from a doctor or mental health worker on the person’s need for an animal or identifying the disability involved.

 

American Airlines Group Inc. said May 14 it will adopt similar policies July 1. The carriers have not changed policies for trained service animals used by people with visual or hearing impairments, seizures or mobility issues.

 

“Delta supports regulatory reform to further ensure the safety of all our customers and employees while supporting the rights of customers with legitimate needs for service animals,” said Ashton Kang, a spokeswoman.

 

Delta said in January it was flying about 700 service animals daily, a 150 percent increase since 2015. The company also reported an 84 percent rise since 2016 in “animal incidents,” including urine, feces and aggressive behavior.

 

United noted a 75 percent jump in animals on board from a year earlier, and a “significant increase” in onboard incidents involving them. American and United are banning certain animals totally from traveling in the cabin, including hedgehogs, ferrets, insects, rodents, snakes, spiders, amphibians, sugar gliders and non-household birds. American also barred those with tusks, horns or hooves, except for trained miniature horses acting as service animals.

 

The Transportation Department is also seeking public comment on possible new regulations to restrict the use of support animals.

 

The government should issue clearer guidance as soon as possible to deal with the “exponential increase” in passengers claiming the need for such animals, said Sara Nelson, international president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA.

 

“Flight attendants and passengers have been bitten, attacked and inconvenienced by animals that are not properly trained to be in a confined public environment,” Nelson said. “This is interfering with the rights of our veterans and people with disabilities who legitimately need these animals to travel.”

 

 

 

If You Believe I Am Great, Tell Me I Am Great And I Will Give You A Gift. If You Don’t Believe I Am Great, Tell Me I Am Great And I Will Give You A Gift.

Hundreds of thousands of times a day companies seeking to make what they make and sell better ask for input so they can Sell More, Satisfy More and Make More Money.

 

Here are three of the ways this is done...

Ø Hiring Mystery Shoppers to go into their retail outlets and actually experience how customers are treated on any given day.

Ø Sending out Surveys to their customers to find out the truth about what the customers think about their product and what they experience when they try and buy their product and/or how their product functions after the customer actually tries to use it in the real world.

Ø The Food Industry prints a link to a Satisfaction Survey on the back of Sales Receipts. In return for participation in the survey, the customer is offered a reward like 2 pieces of chicken and a biscuit, a food item, etc.

 

Notice the keys kinds of information the seller is trying to obtain in order to ensure future success...

Ø Actual purchase experiences.

Ø Does their product fulfill the needs of the buyer?

Ø Does their product taste good?

Ø Will the customer come back again for more of the same?

Ø Is their product being kept fresh up until the point where it is actually purchased?

 

All of this effort on the seller’s part implies a promise along these lines...

We commit to you that we will use the feedback you give us to improve our product in order to obtain you future purchases of what we have to sell to you. In other words...If You Tell Us What We Did Wrong, We Will Make It Right or If You Tell Us What We Did Right, We Will Continue To Do It Right.

************************

The Noticer (me) has surfaced. I have laying on my computer desk an actual sales receipt from one of the largest fast food companies we have today. On the reverse side of their sales receipt is a wrongheaded thinking offer from them to me.

 

It simply says...”Rate us HIGHLY SATISFIED and Receive ONE FREE ITEM of equal or lesser value with purchase”.

 

You know I am never at a loss for words but when I first saw this, all I could think was, “Huh!?” (Yes that’s both an Exclamation Point and a Question Mark.)

 

This “survey” implies promises along these lines...

Ø We don’t want to know our weaknesses.

Ø We don’t want to know what we have to do to improve.

Ø We don’t care if you like us.

Ø We don’t care if you like what we have to sell.

Ø Next time you come in, we promise we will have the same warts on our food and our customer service.

Ø We don’t care if you are satisfied.

 

This is the bottom so here is the bottom line...

We Really Don’t Care If Mikey Likes Us Or Not!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLQ0LZSnJFE

Grown Up Mikey...

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

When The City Comes After Your Home-Based Business Don’t Expect Logic And Common Sense To Save You Home-Based Business

This article is from the Wall Street Journal...

“Overzealous regulators are targeting yoga teachers, accountants and even YouTube video creators.”

“By C. Jarrett Dieterle and Shoshana Weissmann

July 15, 2018

(The majority of this article is about Kim O’Neil and that is the only part used for this Blog Posting)

Chandler, Ariz.—a city of some 250,000 southeast of Phoenix—describes itself as “built on entrepreneurial spirit.” You could forgive Kim O’Neil for not buying it.

 

Ms. O’Neil and her family are longtime residents of Chandler. Until recently she ran a medical-billing company in the town. For years she worked out of leased office space, but when Ms. O’Neil’s father became ill in 2013 she moved the business to her home. After her father died in 2015, she continued to run the business out of her house, because she could fulfill her work obligations while caring for her elderly mother.

 

In the summer of 2016, Ms. O’Neil received a letter from the city of Chandler informing her that she was illegally operating a home-based business. She needed to apply for a permit within seven days or face action from the city government. Ms. O’Neil assumed the permit would be easy to obtain. Her business was conducted entirely within her home, had no signage or visiting customers, and didn’t require the storage of commercial equipment or inventory.

 

Chandler officials didn’t see it that way. They told Ms. O’Neil that her three employees were not allowed to work on-site, though they parked in her driveway and didn’t cause traffic concerns. Eventually, in an attempt to appease city officials, Ms. O’Neil instructed her employees to work from their own residences rather than her home.

 

City officials were still unmoved. They informed Ms. O’Neil that she would have to build a parking facility, submit architectural drawings of her home, and obtain approval from every neighbor within 600 feet. Doing so would have been expensive, but that wasn’t all. The city even suggested Ms. O’Neil might have to attend monthly meetings with city officials. Her business bothered no one and was entirely self-contained in her home, but Ms. O’Neil eventually gave up. She shut down her business, calling the episode “one of the most stressful experiences of my life.”

 

Some regulation is necessary and nuisance laws can play an important role in ensuring that a home-based business doesn’t unduly burden the neighbors. But many local rules hurt small businesses with no discernible benefit. Not all businesses may be appropriate to run out of a home, but operations like Ms. O’Neil’s are the sort of entrepreneurial endeavors that government should be supporting, not thwarting.”

 

Mr. Dieterle is director of commercial freedom and a senior fellow at the R Street Institute. Ms. Weissmann is a policy analyst and the digital media specialist at R Street.

************************

Kim O’Neil’s business was completely self-contained within her home and, if she did not tell her neighbors that her home contained a home-based business, her neighbors would probably never have known the business was there.

 

Beware of a bureaucrat with a set of regulations.

 

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

This Is All So Confusing!

I have never bought a Papa John’s Pizza. That proves I don’t have a vested interest in protecting him and his Pizza Company because I fear I will be cut off from his delicious pies.

 

I have several reasons for sympathizing with Papa John (John Schnatter)...

Ø I like hard workers and he must be a hard worker because he started his Pizza Chain of more than 5,000 locations in 45 countries in a converted broom closet in his father’s Jeffersonville, IN Tavern.

Ø He can’t be all bad because he stood up to all the craziness of NFL players kneeling during our National Anthem.

Ø My grandchildren call me “Papa”.

 

It now appears he has been kicked out of the company he has worked so long to build because of what people within his company are saying about things that happened in his company and a report that he used The N- Word!

************************

First Let’s Talk About The People Reporting About What Happened Within Papa’s Company

I decided that I would drive up to Kentucky and ask the reporting people about what they have reported and see if I can figure out if what they have reported has a basis in fact.

 

I tried to find out the names of these internal company reporters but that was not easy. I read an extensive article in the Wall Street Journal and here are the “names” I came up with...

I have listed their “names” each and every time I saw their “names” repeated in the article. 

Ø “citing people familiar with the matter”

Ø “People close to the company said”

Ø “they said”

Ø “said one of the people”

Ø “said one of the people familiar with the company”

Ø “The people close to the company said”

Ø “said a person familiar with the meeting”

Ø “this person said”

Ø “said the people close to the company”

Ø “one of them said”

Ø “said a person who attended”

Ø “this person said”

Ø “said some of the people close to the company”

Ø “A person familiar with the company said”

Ø “said one of them”

Ø “said one of the people close to the company”

Ø (Again) “said one of the people close to the company”

Ø “One of the people close to the company said”

 

It’s must be only in a court of law that the accused has a right to face his accuser but not in a Pizza Parlor.

************************

Now Let’s Talk About Papa’s “Use” Of The N-Word

Quote from WSJ... “John Schnatter’s relations with Papa John’s International Inc., the pizza giant he founded, appeared to crumble abruptly and irreparably after reports this month that he had used a racial slur.”

 

I know what most of you are thinking... A Racial Slur! He ought to know better! He ought to be fired! Adios, Papa!

 

Paul Harvey is visiting with me today and, as usual, he asked me to tell you the rest of the story. Here is another quote from the same article in the WSJ... “The company agreed to bring him (John Schnatter) back to events such as one involving the National Hot Rod Association in Chicago in May and arranged to have Laundry Service (Papa John’s Ad Agency) conduct a role-playing session that would pose tough questions he might face from reporters. Asked during the session whether he was racist, he said, he answered “no,” and went on to use “n—” when explaining that Colonel Sanders used the word but Papa John’s didn’t. He said he resisted the marketing firm’s suggestion to use rapper Kanye West in ads with him because Mr. West used the “N-word” in songs.”

 

I have a question for my Dear Readers... Is saying the N-Word the same as using the N-Word? If you say that someone else said the N-Word, is the sayer who said that someone else said the N-Word just as guilty as the sayer who actually said the N-Word?

I don’t think so.

 

What if you say the N-Word in your sleep?

 

Now I’m getting silly...Or am I?

 

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

 

Lagniappe: The CEO who replaced Papa declined to be interviewed.

 

Was Jesus Conceited?

Saint Matthew at 26:11 quotes Jesus as saying...“The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me”.

 

Can you imagine how the Modern News Media would treat Jesus for daring to say such a thing as this?...

Ø Jesus caught on a hot microphone being heartless!

Ø Does Jesus really think he is that special?

Ø National Inquirer: Inquiring minds want to know. Is Jesus really as uncaring for the poor as he appears?

Ø How can he really be the Son of God when he apparently is so self-centered as to say, “You will not always have me”?

Ø A Gallup Poll reveals that 72% of Americans say they agree with the statement, “We prefer a God with at least a modicum of humility!”

 

Jesus showed how really smart he was because he did not wait till 2018 to come walk among us.

 

If he had waited he might have been overheard on a hot mike saying, “Beam me up, Father, there’s no intelligent life down here”.

 

Would I kid u?

Smartfella