Too Venal for Words category archive
Driven to with Distraction
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Believe it or not, I’ve seen worse.
Something for Nothing 0
For example, David Brooks gets a paycheck.
The Fee Hand of the Market 0
If you want to flee from danger, you’ve got to pay for it. It’s simply supply and demand: they have the supply, so they make the demands.
The soaring fares prompted a backlash on social media, and the online car sharing service quickly reversed its position, offering free rides and agreeing to refund users up to $200 Australian dollars ($165).
At this rate, Uber will make regular gypsy cabs look like limo services.
Glass Seeings 0
Michigan Republican operatives make spectacles of themselves.
. . . and persons who wander about wearing Google Glass wonder why they are greeted acrimoniously . . . .
The Secesh 0
Still fighting after all these years.
Tip Jarring 0
Connie Schultz reminds us of a scummy fact:
This is true where you live, too. I’ve learned that from experience, too. Regardless of what city I’m visiting, it’s a fair bet that I will find yet another story about yet another restaurant or banquet hall that skims — no, let’s call it what it is: steals — tips from servers, valets and bartenders. Most of them are hourly wage earners who depend on tips to make minimum wage.
Businesses get away with this egregious practice because most patrons never think to ask, especially when the jar on the counter says “tips.” Never trust that little sign, by the way. My first column on this issue, in 2004, was about a large jar marked “tips” at a coat check in Cleveland. After making small talk with the weary clerk behind the counter, I discovered that not a cent of the jar brimming with bills went to her or her co-workers.
Twits on Twitter 0
Twits of shameless commerce.
The Wedding Industrial Complex 0
Honestly, you can’t make this stuff up (see the second letter).
Mean Girls 0
You can’t make this stuff up, and, as John Romano points out, sometimes there’s more to it than you see at first glance.