Ah, greed. How quickly it can seep into our brains and cloud our, otherwise, clear thinking. I have spoken to people about legitimate network marketing companies, only to have them reply,“I just don’t do that type of thing”.
Then, astoundingly, later, I have had some of them call me to propose a blatantly illegal pyramid structure they would like me to participate in. In response to my confusion as to why they would turn down a legal business opportunity, to be taken in by this obvious scam, they reply, “But all kinds of doctors, lawyers, accountants are doing it!’
We mentioned the great program, PopTech, last week. If you haven’t watched it yet, here’s another excellent presentation from the October 2008 conference. Debt-crisis expert Juan Enriquez diagnoses and prescribes a reasonable 10-point remedy to America’s pressing financial ills.
Juan calls it a “systemic problem“. Please understand what he means. Only if you do, can you be informed and educate your elected officials who you hired to act on your behalf. For all of our sakes, please listen carefully, then follow up at PopTech.
Do you have your head around what “our” Federal Reserve Bank, mortgage bankers, financial “experts” and insurance executives have done with derivatives? $531 trillion???
BUT DO YOU KNOW WHAT MONEY REALLY IS AND HOW IT’S CREATED?
Our last post talked about the adult entertainment industry’s request for a government bailout as a canary in the economy’s coal mine – a harbinger of the thinning oxygen of cash flow.
But to see one canary doesn’t necessarily give us good direction. What are the other canaries to watch? There are so many. We’ll look at just a few.
This week we’ll focus onspecific “non-traditional” revenues, forms of value added taxes, or goods and services taxes [Wikipedia] based on your travel, entertainment and gambling activities. In the coming weeks, we’ll observe others.
WHY SHOULD YOU CARE ABOUT NON-TRADITIONAL REVENUES?
We all know the story of the coal miners who would take a canary in a cage with them as they entered mine shafts. If the canary died, it indicated oxygen depletion and acted as a warning to the miners to move quickly to avoid their own deaths.
The livelihoods of real people and their families are at stake with every loss of a job, but if watch the big picture, we see interesting changes.
“Hustler publisher Larry Flynt and Girls Gone Wild CEO Joe Francis said Wednesday they will request that Congress allocate $5 billion for a bailout of the adult entertainment industry.”
FORGET YOUR RELIGIOUS OR POLITICAL PERSUASIONS FOR A MOMENT…
enlightened organizations: global trends: inspiration: best practices
Ode Magazine
click for website
THINGS AT ODE-TRULY POETIC
Ode (from the Ancient Greek) is a form of stately and elaborate lyrical verse[Wikipedia]. Ode magazine is included in our list of Enlightened Organizations for its commitment and success in lyrically focusing on what there is to celebrate in the world!
This month Ode magazine honors the heroes whom they call Intelligent Optimists:
“Intelligent Optimists, individuals who aren’t famous yet but should be because of the work they’re doing to bring positive change to their communities, their countries and the world. That’s how we got 25 reasons to be optimistic in these challenging times.”
IT’S NOT HARD TO PREDICT, NOW THAT WE’RE IN THE MIDDLE
Thirty years ago, not many people were looking forward to this transition. Not even a few year ago. Otherwise, books like Michael Mandeville’s 2003 book, The Coming Economic Collapse, would have been best sellers.
Now that we’ve experienced the last quarter of 2008, detailed info what what comes next is available online if you want to read it.
Our focus is help folks get through the mess, but also to realize that life on the other side will be much different, and can become very positive and life supporting. Each Monday we’ll try to post a few articles touching on the immediate 2009 economy, what comes after the meltdown, and how to survive and thrive with your business.
Economist Paul Krugman was one of the few voices of dissent during the early Bush-2 administration when most everyone was in lockstep.
Welcome to the first Monday edition of Global Trends, focused on what’s happening today that is turning your life on its head. We can’t ignore it any longer. If we bury our heads in the sand, there won’t be any sand left within months, not decades.
“THIS IS GOING TO BE A HARD TIME”
PopTech (The PopTech story) has begun a series of video interviews, Diagnoses and Prescriptions: Global Economic Crisis. Here’s an insightful one with Robert Borosage on what to do to fix things.
Joe Scutella, lifelong entrepreneur, musician and deep-thought kind of guy. He created Pal Joey’s, a wonderful restaurant/club in Erie in the 1980s, relocated to Florida to run a chain of sports bars, then Nashville. He played the southeast and southwest for a decade. Now he mixes his music with wine as a connoisseur, broker and journalist. Joe retains his philosophical and poetic bent. And what better place for folks to hone their word-smithing craft than in country music, the home of the 3-minute story. In his latest post… “Joe is contemplating the view in the rear view mirror and hoping it stays where it belongs.”…