Yesterday, in a special commentary (read: jeerleading segment) called "Chutzpah", Ms. Brown dogged Wells Fargo for canceling a "swanky Las Vegas trip that it had planned for its employees last weekend at two high-end casino resorts". It was only canceled after the trip was reported in the AP--"economic crisis be damned", Campbell chimes.
Yes, because the last thing we want are banks spending money at places that employ people in an economically depressed region like Las Vegas.
Moving along, she goes on to mock them for taking out an estimated $200,000 worth of ad space in the NYT and the W. Post...which Wells Fargo did to explain to the country that it had to cancel its employee recognition program because the populist-shilling media are full of mewling dunces, and because Paulson essentially forced them to take the bail-out money against their wishes.
This is where it should be mentioned that this trip was to recognize outstanding workers--tellers, cashiers, and, yes, some brokers, too. Here's Campbell's sarcasm-laden, but bull-free recommendation for Wells Fargo.
"You wanna thank your workers? Try email; put the letter on your website instead, it won't cost you a dime."
From the bottom of my proletariat heart: Campbell Brown, that was a comment from a pampered, soulless, nitwit. You work at CNN. You have people dress you everyday, and put your makeup on for you. How about you don't comment when a company actually tries to do something nice for its non-commissioned employess. You wouldn't know anything about that. We workers are smart enough--and petty enough--to know that if it costs the company more, they mean it.
And (it must be said) it's called bullshit, sweetheart. Perhaps this confusion on who the bad guys are is rooted in this underlying confusion. Bullshit is a smelly, foul, useless excretion; clearly we can do away--cut--that. The bull is beneficial; it's the reason we take up the task of cutting the bullshit. Here's a cheatsheet:
Bull = Good. Bullshit = Bad.
Print that up, and hang it on your mirror. You can stare it while the beautician masks your age so they don't can you for a 25-year old FoxNews blonde.
Motley Fools has much better coverage, but still misses those poor workers.
Last (to bring these guns to bear on the CEO of Wells Fargo for a minute), the ad used the word 'boondoggle', and therefore gave occassion for that relentless scourge of a term to be weaponized against me yet once more. You, too, have earned my ire.
4 comments:
A little story for you; when I was about 6, I regularly read a UK comic, "The Beano", which had a wild-west-type character who regularly rode with the Wells Fargo pony express. My father used to work for a company called "Chelmer Cargo". One day, I suggested a new advertising slogan to him; something along the lines of "We're quicker than Wells Fargo - we're Chelmer Cargo". My father smiled and congratulated me. Inordinately proud of my youthful marketing skills, I went around repeating the slogan for days. It was only approx. 15 years later that I discovered that my father, an Italian with very little knowledge of American corporate history (or of storylines in "The Beano"), had never heard of Wells Fargo - and was thus humouring me from minute one. Frankly, it brought a lot of my basic self-esteem into question.
BTW - Las Vegas is suffering economically? Over here, we're
repeatedly told that it's the fastest growing city in the USA.
Cheer up, buckaroo. You've acquired a nice stew of friends to appreciate your bad jokes, now.
It was, thanks to the real estate bubble. Housing was so expensive in California, that hordes of people started moving to La Vegas; where housing was much cheaper. The influx of California money (people selling their $150,000 bungalows for $700,000, while only having paid [maybe] $10,000 to principal) drove the housing market in Vegas through the roof. They all built new homes (probably worth $250,000, but paid $400,000. What a steal!) This, of course, brought wealth for the whole economy; roofers, plumbers, carpenters, grocery stores, etc.
One day, someone said, "Wait a minute! I just bought a cheaply constructed mansion for too much money in an area with only casinos as the major industry...in the middle of a desert!" And then they left.
When you fly into Vegas, you can see literally hundred of paved streets dissecting vast tracts of empty plots. If you go into the neighborhoods, there are "For Sale" signs up and down them. They're in for a world of hurt.
We're somewhat lucky in the tiny ol' U of K in that anywhere "housing bubble-y" is still likely to be near enough to a major centre of employment, so things should recover come the upturn.
On the other hand, California to Las Vegas certainly isn't commutable; on a US visit a few years ago, myself and some work colleagues decided on a weekend in the "entertainment capital of the world" and drove up from Orange County. I started off singing Elvis in a ZZ Top stylee, but by the end of the journey was bored out of my European-short-distance mind. AND I subsequently lost my $200 weekend's betting money within half an hour.
Those who moved did so simply because they knew they could make such a huge (uncalledfor) profit on their old home; while simultaneously trading down to a mortgage payment 50% less attached to 100% more house. It was too good to be true, and worth a cut in pay, or job change.
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