letters to the CEO (and the people)

I was in Marshall's last night, and thought it would be nice to buy a sweater. My girlfriend has been bothering me about my current wardrobe, and it's Marshall's, so they couldn't be too expensive. Turns out, for 20 bucks, you can buy a sweater made in china, or a few from india. For forty dollars, you can buy an Italian made sweater. For no amount of money could you purchase a sweater made here, in the United States of America. And this wasn't just from off-brand manufacturers, it was from major American clothing companies. My personal favorite was when the American flag was on the label, right under which it said Made in China. I'm looking at you, Ralph Lauren. Don't be a douchebag, you put a flag on it, you make it here. Stop attempting to deceive people about where your goods are made. Of course, the people are the other half of the problem. Don't just buy things because they are cheap. Buy what you need, but buy it from suppliers and manufacturers that produce here. Say a chinese made sweater is 20 dollars. An American made sweater, of the same Italian produced wool, is 35. Instead of buying 2 chinese sweaters, buy one American. You'll help the economy 10 times better by purchasing items made here, than by paying the chinese to keep dumping pollutants into the air. And what really grinds my gears? Cheap, crappy, chinese/indian/taiwanese made tools. Just because that hammer is 5 dollars, and the US produced is 10, does not mean you should buy it. Do you like your body the way it is? Then don't buy tools that will break, shatter, splinter, or crack while using them. It's just not smart. If you can't find it in a store, do some research online, the goods are out there. Do the economy some good, buy American.

recent decline in gasoline prices

I'm sure, that like everybody else, you are extremely excited about the recent steep decline of the price of a gallon of gas. But, why did the price suddenly go down? The price of a barrel of oil dropped. Why did that go down? Either OPEC is just fucking with us, they finally realized that people were buying less, or they just decided hey, lets drop the price today, we've artifically inflated it for long enough. It could also be the financial crisis. As soon as the market crashed, maybe the hedge fund guys, or the speculators sold off their oil stock, and so the price of a barrel dropped as a result. Either way, I wouldn't expect it to last too long. The price will climb again, most likely in time for everyone's summer vacation, with the large vehicle that gets poor gas mileage to fit everything. Invest in alternative energy, bankrupt OPEC, and get us one step further towards once again being a truly independent nation.

people get paid for this?

What the hell? People get paid to send you spam mail, to call you at dinner, and now to blog? Who's got the time to make a blog interesting enough that people will pay you to do it? Why not become a writer? While I don't expect great works of literature out of these people, most of whom seem incapable of spelling basic words correctly, they could at least produce something. Or they could get a real job, like the rest of us.