I love Borders but even they’re getting kind of goofy. Their Memorial Day Sale this year ends two days before Memorial Day.

I keep hearing the opening lines of an old Buffalo Springfield song:

There’s something happening here

What it is ain’t exactly clear

The economy’s a basket case which means a whole lot of marketers, direct or otherwise, are going to be unemployed. Marketing’s the first thing management cuts when money’s scarce.

We’re screwed unless the economy rebounds pretty quickly and this is where we wind up with me feeling stupid because we seem to be doing everything possible to make sure the economy doesn’t rebound, including, believe it or not, increasing every tax there is, inventing a whole lot of new taxes (Fed beer tax up 225%!!!) and quadrupling (so far; they’ve just begun) the national debt.

What could we do instead? For starters, I suspect we could solve the whole mess by tomorrow at noon.

Maybe, just maybe, if we stopped fooling around and started drilling our own oil and gas, building more refineries and planning about 150 nuclear energy plants, then just announcing that we’re serious about doing this would:

• Jumpstart the stock market.

• Create millions of jobs.

• Generate enough revenue for governments to pay off the Chinese, erase deficits (even California’s), cut taxes to the bone (even New York’s and maybe even New Jersey’s), and open the country for business and investment … again. It’s possible that we might be able to afford to keep coddling the civil service unions indefinitely.

I don’t understand why we don’t produce our own energy. We know how. And it’s amazing that we’re not even talking about it. I should know why but I don’t and I feel stupid.

Apparently, the only thing standing in the way is what was called global warming 10 seconds ago, climate change 5 seconds ago and now, according to Eco-America, it’s, drum roll please, climate crisis.

Greenland once had palm trees, so we know that global warming and cooling don’t need us to keep on keepin’ on as they have been for millions of years.

We know that the globe isn’t warming right now and hasn’t for 10 years (and we’re probably entering a cooling phase). So if it isn’t global warming, what the hell is the crisis?

I don’t know, you don’t know and we don’t know how to find out.

Whatever the climate crisis is, it’s inspired the government to keep us from tapping our own resources and to force us to keep sending billions of dollars a month to people who want to fly more airplanes into our buildings.

It’s also inspired the Feds to plot a ukaseish kind of igno-cretin fatwah to force (there’s that word again) car companies to start producing hundreds of thousands of vehicles nobody wants, tiny things that would be perfect for munchkins with no luggage, content on a wind-free day to drive a distance of 40 miles at 12 miles an hour because any faster and they’ll all die if they hit anything – or if anything hits them.

In 10 years, old cars and trucks, real cars and trucks, will be treasures because the only other vehicles available will be near-useless fragile death traps.“Yep, Charlene and the kids died, but they were getting great mileage.”

A Canadian blogger (small dead animals) summarized it nicely:

Imagine if the President had instead said today, “This new fuel economy and greenhouse gas emissions rule will slow the increase in future global temperature seven thousandths of a degree Celsius by the end of this century, and it means the sea will rise six tenths of a millimeter less than it otherwise would over the same timeframe.” It loses some of its punch, no?

The government is eagerly grasping the climate crisis to force something called “cap and trade” on American industries. This will make Bernie Madoff appear to be a public benefactor. At least he paid a few bucks back to the first sucker investors and he still has a seizable asset or two lying around. Cap and trade is pure benefit-free spending; it’ll piss billions away for no reason at all.

I don’t understand why we’re doing any of that stuff. When I ask, people yell at me although that’s encouraging because one of the laws of nature is that he who talks loudest and fastest is almost certainly full of baloney.

We have no money and we’re in debt up to our eyeballs and the government insists on creating nationalized health care. We know it’s crazy-expensive, loonily-inefficient and doesn’t work anywhere it’s been tried. It’s the medical equivalent of an Irwin Allen movie, a disaster of major proportions. It kills folks with bureaucratic denials and/or long waits. People, the ambulatory ones anyway, are now running from national healthcare wherever it exists. Brits and Swedes and Germans fly to Mumbai for operations. Canadians come down here but, as soon as we adopt their health care policies, they’ll be calling Air India, too. So will we. I don’t understand why we’re even thinking about that. We’d be better off with M.A.S.H. units going from town to town. “Hawkeye! Think you and Trapper can do a double lung transplant after you finish with that hip replacement?”

We know that the trigger for the economic crisis was the government forcing (maybe they’re all into bondage, who knows?) the financial industry to give mortgages to people with no credit and nowhere near enough money to buy an outhouse, often no money at all. When the law of unintended consequences kicked in, the pigs – Lehman, AIG and so on – snuffled ‘round the trough. And the government’s doing it again! I don’t understand why. I’m just stupid, I guess.

I don’t even understand why Barney Frank and Chris Dodd aren’t in jail. I must have missed something.

They must. Here’s the inside spread of a self-mailer that landed in my mailbox last week. Tipped-on to the mailer are four cards, one for each of four friends. I’m supposed to hand out the cards so my friends can enjoy Netflix for a month free.

And for my trouble, I, their great customer for many years, get a month free? Nope. I get nothing, nada, zip, diddly squat. At least the sandwich board guys waving flyers at commuters outside Grand Central Station get minimum wage.

I sure hope this works but my bet is that it’s dead in the water. There’s no quid pro quo here, no answer to the WII-FM question. (What’s In It For Me?)

I think this might be a trend. See Reverse Relationship Marketing (March 6), Why so tough on current customers (March 5), Irritating Prospects (December 30).

Talk about Happy Trails to You.

There must be 2,000 SKUs in the Chick’s Discount Saddlery catalog and I have no use for any of them.

It’s the cheapest looking catalog you’ve ever seen, printed on old school newsprint, no cover, no glossy anything. Just a gazillion plain but very clear photos with straightforward copy selling everything anyone with a horse could possibly need, hundreds and hundreds of different things including bits, reins and bridles, horse blankets and saddles, grazing muffles, snaffle bridles, Navajo saddle blankets (30” x 30” for just $6.99), spur straps with rhinestones, girths and cinches, farrier’s equipment, boots, Ivermectin paste wormers, bucket straps. All cheap as hell.

Now all I need is a horse.

And somewhere to keep it.

And somewhere else to ride it.

And Gabby Hayes to look after it.

Davy Crockett would be so proud. Back in April I had a kerfuffle with Alamo Car Rental about overcharging for two things: gasoline and two extra hours. Neither was justified so I squawked. Alamo credited my MasterCard account for the gas charge but, it appeared, flipped me the bird about the two extra hours. (See April 30, 4th post below.)

Then, out of the blue, on May 4th the sainted Stephanie Sumter of Alamo sent me this:

Your information regarding the two hour charge was documented and forwarded to me for further review. Please allow me to begin with apologizing for any error that may have occurred when you returned the vehicle in Philadelphia.

I would like to correct the billing as you requested; however, I need just one additional piece of information from you. Would you kindly reply with the flight information if possible? If you would prefer to speak over the phone, I would be happy to contact you directly. Feel free to reply with your phone number for me to call, or call me at the below number.

Sincerely,

Stephanie Sumter

Manager

Alamo Rent A Car

Customer Service

I sent the fight info and Stephanie sent this:

Thank you for your reply. I appreciate the information you provided. I have adjusted your rental and refunded your MasterCard for the additional two hours in the amount of $75.10. Please allow seven to ten business days for this to post to your account. I have attached a copy of your rental receipt to this message as well.

Please let me know if you need any additional assistance with this matter. Thank you for choosing Alamo Rent A Car for your travel needs.

Sincerely,

Stephanie Sumter

So I’m back with Alamo. Congrats to a great customer service manager.