Part 8 (1/2)
People often complain about inaccuracies in news stories They talk as if reporters were deliberately inaccurate or in on some conspiracy, and this is almost never the case No reporter sets out to write a distorted or inaccurate story They so is hard and soh They also come out that way because a lot of people are very secretive and tell the reporter what they'd like to have printed, not what the facts are
This all coot a letter from a boyhood friend I haven't seen in thirty-five years I knew him as ”Bud,” but now his letterhead says his first na corporation in Oregon He was a wonderful friend when I was young, but I don't think I know him at all now After soanizations
Being attacked by businessmen isn't a new experience for most reporters I heard Lewis Laphaazine, attacked one evening by a Texan with huge coal interests in Montana attacked one evening by a Texan with huge coal interests in Montana
”You people know nothing about business,” the businessht,” Lapha for business”
When businessmen say newspapers and television don't cover business very well, it makes me nervous because in many cases I think it's true It is also true that it is business's own fault Inforet They say they have a right to privacy, and I agree with that, but they're being stupid by not being ree with me
It is possible now, because of the Freedoovern for the A like that requiring business to reveal its its business Some businessmen claim they are secretive so their business Soe]Conte a model of New York City co and how, but that seldom stands up to inspection The competitor usually knows all all about the business across town As a er used to work for Acme and one member of the Board of Directors of Allied is a former vice president of Acme about the business across town As a er used to work for Acme and one member of the Board of Directors of Allied is a fore business keeps its operation a deep, dark secret mostly out of habit If the secret is not dark, at least that's the iive the A in front of the locked gates saying, ”They refused to talk to us” It suggests there is so on in there, and nine tie business a good product as he does froe he projects
You could take the books and the production plans of any good coe one of the local newspaper, and it wouldn't alter the operation one bit That includes printing the salary of every maintenance man and executive in the place Business is si more to hide than the rest of us
The corporate public relations people who do the best job for their company are the ones who lay it on the line They tell you the truth, even if it hurts a little The ones who do their coe are those who try to hide little mistakes or keep information secret that would be betterit
The A Business as it is of Big Government, and what I'd like to say to et better reporting in newspapers and on television if it opened up If the coood product for an honest profit, the truth won't hurt it
On Work and Money Procrastination I t isn't working that's so hard, it's getting ready to work
It isn't being being up we all dislike in the etting up Once I get started at alet started at al away at any dull job for hours and get so it The trou Procrastination 119 119 ble is that so that job for et started
It doesn't see at writing, getting atout the trunk of the car, ood thing I wasn't hired to build the Golden Gate Bridge I'd never have figured out where to put that first piece of steel to et across all that water
There is soetting started on a job Noit took us to do it last tiet in our conscious mind, there is some subconscious part of the brain that res We Weto be harder than we think It tries to keep us fro into it in a hurryto be harder than we think It tries to keep us fro on between different elements of our brain If I consciously re was the last ti aboutEvery Friday afternoon in summer I drive 150 miles to our su being there and I always forget howgetting there My subconscious re around the office Friday afternoons, putting off leaving The drive can take anywhere fro on the traffic, and I hate it so much that so the place there My subconscious re around the office Friday afternoons, putting off leaving The drive can take anywhere fro on the traffic, and I hate it so much that so the place
The following Friday, I can't wait to leave the office for the country again butstarted It It remembers the drive even if I don't remembers the drive even if I don't
One of the jobsat is painting My subconscious is absolutely right I probably shouldn't start [ih I enjoy it once I get going Once again, et
I look at a door or a fence or a rooive that a coat of paint It'll take two quarts of paint I'll need so with those old brushes”
My subconscious sometiainst its better judgment, I buy the paint, the turpentine and the brush I put on et a screwdriver to remove the top of the paint can and then I look in to see what s to do before I start to paint I have toout of the room, I have to replace a piece of the baseboard that is broken and I have to scrape and sand the places where the paint is peeling And I better go back to the hardware store to get so While I'm there, I'll pick up some undercoater for the new piece of baseboard and the Fired 121 121 spackled cracks I'll have to let it dry overnight so I can't start painting today
It is quite probable that it is this wonderfully intelligent subconscious part of our brain thatWe We want to get up want to get up It It knows that just as soon as we get up, the trouble will start all over again knows that just as soon as we get up, the trouble will start all over again
Fired T here's so with anyone who's never been fired fro to be very suspicious of anyone who co for ith a resuot the ax a couple of times either for inconation business? Doesn't anyone get fired anyes of the paper, and presidents of corporations are always resigning From a cushy 250,000-a-year job? Come on, fellas We're not business tycoons, but we're not that dunation is false, and it's part of a new philosophy we seem to have adopted There aren't any losers anya the party give away prizes It doesn't aet a prize anyway, because the adults don't want to daht not alin in life
Most high school teams in any sport have co-captains now Sometis of a good player by choosing someone over him for the job SohtceremoniesThey're all co-captains Not a loser in the crowd I hope we never decide not to hurt the feelings of one of the presidential candidates by electing co-Presidents One President is plenty
Last week I read where soolf tournaaolf!
The President is always saying he's ”sorry” to have to accept sonation If he was really sorry he shouldn't have accepted it All of us are using the word ”sorry” too lightly We're always saying we're sorry e aren't really sorry at all It's all part of the sa everyone for everything A boy of seventeen kills the man who runs the candy store for 135 and a Tootsie Roll
The boy's parents find a bloody hammer under his bed and they confront him with it
”I'm sorry,” the boy says ”I killed him, but I didn't mean to do it”
The father looks at the mother with tears in his eyes and says, ”At least he's honest”
The next day the neighbors are interviewed by a television reporter They all say he was a nice quiet boy who alent to church They don't bother to say that he was a bully, that he'd been stealing all his life and that he was rotten through and through
We keep letting ourselves off the hook No one wants to judge anyone else by strict standards for fear he'll be judged by them too No one wants to say to soh You're fired”
Broke Has everyone been desperately broke?
Maybe not I always assume that there are very few experiences or emotions that aren't universal I've been seriously broke twice in et and although it's been twenty-six years since I didn't knohich way to turn for money, I never see anyone out of a job and without a dollar in his pocket without knowing how he feels
There are still tiht when I ee out of my pocket and put it on top ofup e to see if I had two dollars
There are chronically poor people ould laugh at what I went through because it wouldn't seery My father was retired but he hadthe Depression, and et to the point where ere out on the street and without food, but you kno that is There's an unwritten code There are people you don't ask for money and my father and my wife's father were two of them
I don't knoho makes those rules but we all know theiven iven it to me, not loaned it to me They would have been disappointed that I had to ask
My father's brother was a salt-of-the-earth lawyer in a s petty political corruption and providing free legal services to people who couldn't afford to pay him He andto a son he had When he came to visit us when I was a child he would often slip et an uncle like that
In desperation one year, I went to him and asked for five hundred dollars One of the terrible memories of my life is that I never repaid hi been able to take pleasure fro that his favorite nepheas a responsible person He didn't need the money but he must have looked for some token payment from me and I never made it I always o ere doing better but we needed 2,500 to help pay for one of the kids' college tuition and my ent to the bank for a loan Banks are a better place to go for a loan than an uncle is They aren't disappointed if you don't pay theh money so eren't in desperate need of the loan, so as the joke goes, we didn't have any trouble getting it The interest was probably 7 percent
A year or so later I askedto pay off the loan in a lu the 7 percent interest each year Being in no way a business tycoon, I had the feeling we should pay it off She does all our bookkeeping and banking, and she didn't think we should She was right I'm not sure to this day if we ever paid off the loan
Now, of course, I appreciate that it's the only good joke we ever played on a bank We won because interest rates rose If we have the 2,500, and it's invested, et 9 percent interest, we are beating the bank for 2 percent on 2,500 It is not at all like failing to pay back my uncle