Goldfinger. He's the man, the man with Midas touch.
1964’s “Goldfinger” is arguably, the best James Bond Movie ever. It had it all: Sean Connery(of course) as British Secret Agent 007, the tricked out silver Aston Martin DB5 with machine guns and and ejection seat, the mute, hat-tossing assassin Odd Job, the sexy bad-girl-turned-good-by-James-Bond Pussy Galore (How did they get away with that name in 1964?), and, of course, the fantastic uber-villian Auric Goldfinger.
Mr. Goldfinger had a plan to corner the world gold market by infiltrating Fort Knox, Kentucky. And, what a plan it was! He was going to use a team of female aerobatic pilots to spray nerve gas over the Fort, a high-powered laser beam to break into the vault, and a nuclear bomb to contaminate the US Gold Reserve.
This was the coolest movie of 1964.
In 1964, Auric Goldfinger was considered an evil genius. Today, Mr. Goldfinger would be thought of as a schmuck. After all, in 2011, we know that there are much easier ways to rip off Uncle Sam – like selling phony power wheelchairs or non-existent AIDS medicine.
.According to a recent government report, Medicare and Medicaid fraud amounts to around 60 Billion dollars a year. Yes, that’s Sixty Billion with a ‘B’. Each and every year we have 60 Billion health care dollars that disappear down the rabbit hole, and never go towards paying for health care.
How much money is this? Well, roughly, each and every American citizen is paying around $200 a year to finance this fraud.
Or, to look at it another way, every year the amount of money that we lose to Medicare and Medicaid fraud is roughly equivalent to 40% of the value of the gold currently held in Fort Knox.
And this money is being stolen from us with something as low tech as a CMS-1500 Insurance claim form.
No laser beams, nerve gas or atomic bombs required.
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Back in the day when this song was written, “Sue” was a very popular name for young ladies – in fact, it was #11 in 1969, the year that Cash first recorded this song. Today, the name “Sue” doesn’t even make the top 100 girl names. “Khole“ made the list for 2010, as did “Nevaeh“,“Brooklyn“,“Destiny“,“Aaliyah“,“Valeria“, and “Serenity“ – but good ‘ole “Sue“ has been relegated to the dustbin of history. Thank goodness for "Glee" - at least some "Sues" are still in the national spotlight. Somehow, I can’t see “A Boy Named Aaliyah” making the Billboard Hot 100.
Fortunately for “Sue”, it still remains very popular today, albeit as a verb.
While I’ve been off the topic lately, I am constantly reminded that the legal community continues to play a significant role in the downfall of out health care system.
This upsets me, of course, but what can I do about it? Maybe I shouldn’t watch so much TV.
There has been a rash of TV commercials as of late, imploring people to call one law firm or another if they have this disease or if they have used this drug or that medical device. Just yesterday I saw multiple commercials about class action lawsuits for “Ice Cold Therapy Treatments”, “DePuy Hip Replacements”, “Accutane” (an acne treatment)and “Avandia” (a medicine for type II Diabetes). In a 24 hour period, I probably witnessed commercials that cost around $100,000 just to broadcast – I shudder to think about all the other commercials that I missed and that were broadcast on other networks. And this expense it repeated each and every day.
These 4 examples represent only a few of the active class action lawsuits that are out there – a quick Google search for “Class Action” got me the following suits that are currently out there:
Guess what pays for all of these lawsuits, judgments, and settlements? Our health care dollars.
Oh sure, the pharmaceutical company initially foots the bill, but guess what – they then pass it back onto their customers in the form of higher costs for your favorite pills. Which is part of the reason why the premiums for small group health insurance with pharmaceutical coverage grow by as much as 30-50% a year.
So when you find out just how much your monthly premium is going up next year, please don’t blame Isabella, Jasmine, or even Addison. A lot of the blame can be placed squarely on good ‘ole “Sue”.
How do you do!
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My recent post on Billy Mays has really had me reflecting on this great TV pitchman. From his humble beginnings as a hawker on the Atlantic City boardwalk, Billy built his company from nothing into a multi-million dollar enterprise. In the course of doing this, he made himself and OxiClean into household names.
Reading up on Billy, I was amazed to see all of the products that he helped bring into the public spotlight. He sold us the Awesome Auger, the Big City Slider Station,the Ding King, the Gopher, the Grater Plater, the Hercules Hook, the Jupiter Jack, Kaboom! Cleaner, and all types of Mighty Putty.
He sold us Orange Glo, the Quick Chop, the Tool Band-it, the Turbo Tiger,the Vidalia Slice Wizard and Zorbeez cloths.
In spite of his successes with this myriad of products, I think that Billy will always be remembered as the ‘OxiClean Guy’. Billy sure knew a lot about white powder
Not only was Oxi-Clean a runaway commercial success, it was an absolutely brilliant business idea. You see, OxiClean is a relatively simple chemical that was around for years before anyone ever heard of Billy Mays.
Oxi-Clean is really just sodium percarbonate, which is an oxygenating bleach. Anyone can buy this chemical in bulk for around 50 cents a pound.
But Billy had a brilliant idea – take a simple chemical, give it a catchy name, advertise the hell out of it on TV, and then sell it at a ridiculous markup.
This brilliant idea helped make Billy Mays millions.
What in the world could have ever inspired him?
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Who doesn’t love Yogi Berra – all time baseball great and part time philosopher? As a boy, I practically grew up in his bowling alley, which he owned in partnership with fellow Yankee great Phil ‘the Scooter’ Rizzuto.
Yogi became well know for his Yogi-isms – little philosophical pearls of wisdom and sayings that, at first take, don’t seem to make much sense. However, after you think about them for a while, they start to make a lot of sense.
Some of my favorites include:
"90% of the game is half mental."
“95% of short putts don’t go in”
"Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded"
“Pair up in threes”
"It ain't over till it's over."
"When you come to a fork in the road, take it."
"Thank you for making this day necessary."[
"You can observe a lot by watching."
"I really didn't say everything I said"
…and my all-time favorite:
"It's déjà vu all over again"
Yesterday, I actually experienced déjà vu all over again. I just happened to catch a news report on regarding comments made by Rep. Steve Cohen (Dem-Tennessee) Rep. Cohen pointed out that, when talking about National Healthcare, Republicans used the same Spin Doctoring techniques that the Nazis used. According to Cohen “They say it's a government takeover of health care, a big lie just like Goebbels. You say it enough, you repeat the lie, you repeat the lie, you repeat the lie and eventually, people believe it. Like blood libel. That's the same kind of thing. The Germans said enough about the Jews and the people believed it and you had the Holocaust. You tell a lie over and over again. And we've heard on this floor, government takeover of health care.”
Republicans are now criticizing Cohen for “calling them Nazis”. In truth, it seems that Rep. Cohen was just pointing out how our representatives manipulate public opinion by using the same propaganda techniques that were employed by the Nazi Party. And, for the record, the conservatives don’t have an exclusive on these techniques – I have seen both parties use them with equal regularity and effect.
The thing that really struck me was that Rep. Cohen’s speech seemed to be taken, in some parts, almost word for word, from one of my earlier blogs. In case you missed it, here’s where you can read it for yourself:
Ok, I think that the likelihood is very small that Rep. Cohen or one of his speech writers lifted material for that speech from my blog. However, it was reassuring that I’m not the only person who sees how public opinion is being manipulated by Spin Doctors. I would bet that the reason why his fellow Congressmen and Congresswomen are so upset with Rep. Cohen is that he let the cat out of the bag about Spin Doctoring. You see, once the public recognizes the tools that are used to sway their opinion, those tools lose their effectiveness.
Rep. Cohen is relatively new to Congress, having only served the last four years. Maybe this whole speech was a rookie mistake. F*cking newbies – you’d think that they would read the FAQ section before they accidentally go and blow it for everyone!
As you might guess, I have very strong feelings about the art of Spin Doctoring. I think that everyone should be aware of this technique so that they can start seeing through it. In fact, here are my three posts on this subject to date:
The bottom line here – as I’ve said before – is that we have to start cutting through the smokescreens and the BS and identify the real issues if we have any hope of making significant progress in the whole health care issue. Therefore, I’m thankful that Rep. Cohen for making the American public aware of how they are being manipulated by the professional propagandists.
But let’s get something clear right now. In my opinion, the Spin Doctors who use their skills to mis-lead the American public and promote the agenda of those who wish to continue bilking Americans out of Billions of dollars each year aren’t Nazis.
I think that the term “traitors” is a much more accurate description for these scum.
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I used to be one of your biggest fans. I still use OxiClean in almost every wash. So how could you do this to me???!!!
Okay – a little background for those of you who are arriving late. I was watching the “pitchmen” show on the Discovery Channel the other day. It is a great reality show about those guys who sell all those crappy plastic products on TV. Then I saw it – my idea – being sold and marketed by Billy May’s old company.
Last March,, while blogging about the high cost of prescription medicine, I suggested that what we really need is a medicine cabinet with a lock on it. Missed that blog? Read it here:
So I’m watching the Pitchmen show and – there it is – my idea materialized in 6 ounces of Chinese plastic. OK – it wasn’t EXACTLY my idea – a Medicine Cabinet with a lock on it. What they are selling is something called a ‘Rx Locker” – which is a little locking tub where you can keep your prescription medicine – but the IDEA is pretty much the same.
Well, maybe I shouldn’t be so hard on poor Billy – he probably had already blown up his heart from doing too much coke long before the Rx Locker was ever introduced. (Side Note: Who was shocked to discover that Billy did a lot of coke? Me neither)
Maybe my ire should be directed elsewhere – like at Anthony Sullivan – master Pitchman and Billy’s old business partner. After all, Sully was the guy who pitched this product on TV. Plus, he’s a foreigner, so he is already suspect. Plus, he’s the guy who sold me that cruddy mop at the home show.
BUT WAIT - THERE"S MORE !
Sully isn’t acting alone – celebrity Disc Jockey Kennedy was all ga-ga over this product. (I had never heard of Kennedy before – she’s apparently big in LA. I can see now why she’s so successful – she has a face made for radio). Kennedy then got her friend Dr. Drew Pinsky to act as a spokesperson for it. (You know Dr. Drew from that old MTV show – the one that made Adam Carolla semi-famous).
In fact, it’s beginning to look like a conspiracy to me. Luckily, my blog is like a little Zapruder film. Does anyone have Oliver Stone's phone number?
Maybe I shouldn’t really care about them stealing my idea. After all, they are marketing it all wrong. According to Dr. Drew the Rx Locker is “Designed to act as a deterrent for teens who might take prescription drugs from parents or grandparents and use/abuse them without a prescription”
Yeah, he’s totally missing the boat if he thinks the reason for buying this thing is to keep Junior out of Grandma’s Xanax. That kid could probably hack his way through the Department of Defense’s firewall – what makes you think that a $10 piece of plastic is going to stop him. Besides, the kid is probably smart enough to buy a spare Rx Locker, smash Grandma’s with a hammer to get at the good stuff, and then replace it with the new one, leaving Grandma wondering why her combination keeps changing.
No, the real need is for a more substantial piece of hardware, like a wall safe with a mirror on it like I suggested in my blog. ½” of cold rolled steel will keep Junior out of Gramps pharmacopia – or at least keep him occupied until they get home from Bingo.. Beside, do Grandma and Grandpa really care about Junior stealing some industrial strength laxatives? Not when Grandma’s bottle of Boniva is worth more than their Camry.
Plus, a true combination safe/medicine cabinet has other benefits as well – like stopping nosey visitors from spying your tube of anti-fungal ointment and your box of hemorrhoid medicine.
Maybe I should give Sully a call myself – what do you think? Or maybe I should give Vince a call – I think that he must be out of prison by now after he beat up that prostitute.
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