I am the American Voter

Democracy is a pathetic belief in the 

collective wisdom of individual ignorance.

― H.L. Mencken

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.

But that's as far as I go.

All that "one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all" stuff that follows is socialism.

Jesus would never approve that shit.

Besides, socialism is the reason gas is so pricey.

I spent $110 yesterday to fill the Ford F. 

F is right!

It's all the Dems fault—them and the Blacks and all the other freeloading coloreds.

Oh, and the child molesters. Can't forget them.

Go back to where you came from, I say (but not aloud). Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

Why can't we all just get along?

I'll tell you why.

Too many people want their own bathroom.

What's wrong with men's room and women's room?

And women—don't get me started on women.

I'll never forgive Jane Fonda.

Never ever ever.

I am the American voter.

Cartoon: Dave Whamond

Supreme Justice

A brief note to urge mothers to drop their unwanted children at the doorstep of Amy Coney Barrett. You can obtain her street address from Ruth Sent Us. She loves foundlings.

Up

The Uncola.

— Advertising slogan

In 1919, St. Louis adman Charlie Grigg saw big money in soda pop.

So he quit advertising for sales and joined a beverage company.

An innovative guy, before long he invented two successful soft drinks for the company, "Whistle" and "Howdy."

But it was his third invention that made Grigg's name.

In 1929, Grigg—now heading his own beverage company—introduced "Bib," a name he would change seven years later to "7 Up."

The "up" in 7 Up came from lithium, a mood-enhancing substance used to treat depression in the early 20th century.

Grigg added tons of it to 7 Up, to distinguish it from other lemon and lime pops.

A well-known picker-upper, lithium was a popular ingredient in patent medicines at the time; and doctors would advise depression-sufferers who could afford it to vacation at spas near lithium-rich springs, where they could drink and bathe in the mind-altering waters.

Grigg’s formula was perfect.

His timing was also perfect: 7 Up appeared just two weeks before Black Tuesday, the event that triggered—no pun intended—the Great Depression.

Sales of 7 Up soared.

Consumers believed Grigg's claim that the pop buoyed flagging spirits (7 Up is a "savory, flavory drink with a real wallop," his ads said).

They also liked to use 7 Up as a hangover cure (it "takes the ouch out of grouch," the ads insisted).

Grigg's invention became the third best-selling pop in the world—until the federal government intervened.

In 1948, the feds banned lithium in all foods and beverages, determining it to be a cause of birth defects, kidney failure, and death.

Without lithium, 7 Up's sales tanked.

But in 1968, with the help of ad agency J. Walter Thompson, 7 Up staged a comeback.

JWT tapped into the counter culture, labelling 7 Up the "Uncola" and positioning it in ads as if it had been concocted by The Beatles.

The agency hired designer Milton Glaser—famous for his Bob Dylan poster—to create campaign graphics and rented thousands of billboards alongside America's busiest highways, where college kids would be sure to see them.

JWT also launched a TV campaign that featured a genial Black actor who explained why kola nuts were inferior to lemons and limes.

The ads worked so well, 7 Up's sales skyrocketed. 

The pop reclaimed its rank as the third largest-selling soft drink and at the same time became inextricably linked to America's "rebellious youth."

By the 1990s, however, those youth were in their 50s, and 7 Up became, in the words of one Wall Street analyst, "what old people drink."

Today, the brand has less than 1% market share.

Above: The Seven Ups by Robert Francis James. Oil on fiberboard. 8 x 10 inches.

Exceptions

 Exceptions are so inevitable that no rule is without them—except the one just stated.

— Eugene Rhodes

Among Ralph Waldo Emerson's many contributions to Philosophy Americana is the oft-cited "Law of Compensation."

You get what you give, it states in a nutshell.

"Nature hates monopolies and exceptions," Emerson says. 

"There is always some leveling circumstance that puts down the overbearing, the strong, the rich, the fortunate, substantially on the same ground with all others."

If only this were true.

It's not.

Nature may hate exceptions, but exceptions—the overbearing, the strong, the rich, the fortunate—always win the day.

Always.

Consider these injustices:

• Pretty people are paid 15% more than plain-looking people.
  
  
• Blonde women are paid 7% more than brunettes and redheads.
  
  
• Educated workers of color are paid $10,000 less than their white colleagues.
  
  
• Rich people enjoy lower income tax rates than other earners.  
  
  
• Poor people die in wars; rich people do not.

Try all you might to level the playing field, exceptions will always emerge to take the lead. 

And so rich parents cheat to get their kids into Ivy League schools; advantaged whites fabricate degrees and credentials; and the super-rich lie to the IRS about their income.

Emerson notwithstanding, the Law of Compensation applies to schmucks only.

Exceptions are exempt.

No one has better depicted this truth than Woody Allen in his 1989 film Crimes and Misdemeanors.

In Crimes and Misdemeanors, a rich ophthalmologist (played by Martin Landau) arranges the contract-killing of his mistress, only to escape any consequence, while a smart, devoted documentary filmmaker (played by Allen) must kowtow to a slick, fast-talking TV producer, only to lose his love to him.

The exceptions win. 

The nobodies lose.

C'est la vie.

Pride of Workmanship

To win in the marketplace you must first win in the workplace.

— Doug Conant

Lunch this week at the Wildflower in Tucson reminded me that employees thrive on hard work, when it's demanded of them.

Expecting her to answer "higher wages," I asked our waitress at the end of the meal why the restaurant was able to attract good help.

She responded by saying the owner held every employee to impeccably high work standards—a brisk form of accountability that she found refreshing in the food service business.

"The owner has an 'employee first' approach, if you know what I mean," she said.

I did.

"Employee first" is a business ethos. 

New York restaurateur Danny Meyer pioneered it.

After years of watching restaurants he worked in fail, Meyer arrived at an important realization: the true customer of a restaurant is not the diner, but the restaurant worker. 

So Meyer designs restaurants that cultivate proud—and loyal—workers.

The keys to those environments are discipline and dedication. 

Slackers need not apply.

"Your brand is never better than your employees," Meyer once told executive coach Erica Keswin. "And your employees are never better than the degree to which they are engaged in the reason your company exists."

A new study by Gallup finds that most workplaces are "broken."

Six of 10 employees are "emotionally detached" from their jobs; and 2 in 10 are "miserable."

A mere 20% of the workforce is engaged. 

No surprise, organizations with engaged workers enjoy 23% higher profits than those with disengaged ones. 

They also enjoy lower absenteeism, turnover, and accidents.

In pursuit of those things, some misguided companies think they can instill "employee pride" through propaganda.

They remind me of the restaurant in "Office Space" that demanded its servers wore "flair" to demonstrate a "fun attitude."

Propaganda gets you nowhere.

High standards, on the other hand, appeal to employees' self-worth.

High standards separate the wheat from the chaff because they make the work worth doing.

They also discourage half-assing your way through the workday.

"There are people who try to look as if they are doing a good and thorough job, and then there are the people who actually damn well do it, for its own sake." novelist John D. MacDonald wrote.

The latter are the people you want in your organization.

But sadly, perhaps because they're run by insufferable assholes, most American companies have forgotten about pride of workmanship.

Which is why 80% of workers are either disengaged or miserable.