BarrieBergman

I Was Born a Poor Black Child

I was raised in a very traditional American family.  My parents, both first generation Americans, were similar to Ozzie and Harriet.  All of their parents emigrated from Russia in the early 1900’s to get away from the Pogroms (the Tsar’s army killing Jews).

In a way I’m here because of a search for religious freedom and because of a search for separation of Church and State.  My parents believed in keeping a very low profile politically in their community, because of their family background and being Jews in the South.  They were lifelong Democrats, but they never let anybody know it.  No matter how hard I’ve tried to rebel in my life, this apple has never fallen very far from my parents’ tree.  My politics are similar to my folks, and I’m not very outspoken publicly.

All these reasons come together in my fear and loathing for what is going on in the Republican primaries for President.  The devolving race to see who can be the most conservative among Mitt and the three dwarves is mired in social issues that were settled fifty to one hundred fifty years ago.  To talk about rescinding women’s rights or calling people who went to college “snobs and elitists,” makes me check the window for the guys on horseback coming to drag us away for our beliefs.

I know this crap is all posturing and positioning, but as our economy improves and we extricate ourselves from wars that we should never have started, the Republicans are running out of issues.  How about a campaign to help Angelina Jolie adopt more children or to find Katy Perry a new man?  Whaddya think, Newt?

Goofing Off

I'm busy watching tennis at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells this week.  A man has to have his priorities.  I'll be back to blogging next week.

We’ll Get Rich a Few Days Later

I read recently that rich people are more likely to cheat at stop signs by jumping the queue than people of modest means.  The wealthy are also more likely to fudge on taxes, and in other places, than their poorer compatriots.   The theory is that the rich are empowered and feel more entitled than those of modest means.

Before you poor schlubs out there start to feel superior, you’ve got to realize that as soon as you get wealthy, you expect the same entitlements as your formerly rich betters - so much for the nobility of the poor.  As I have often mentioned, I’ve been poor, and I’ve been rich, but rich beats the crap out of poor.  However, that is a topic for another day.

Ethics are an interesting matter.  When I first decided to write a book, my title was going to be We’ll Get Rich a Few Days Later, which referred to having a strong ethical base in business.  Instead, I named my book Nice Guys Finish First, because my publicist talked me into it.

I still like the first title, although the second title took me to great riches and fame.  In a time of Rush Limbaugh and mass cheating in politics and sports, doing the right thing is an American value we should return to.

In the same article I alluded to, it was discovered that more affluent people fudged on change.  They were much less likely to return money, if a cashier gave them too much change on a cash purchase.  My wife Arlene and I have given money back many times.  About half the time the person is reluctant to take the money and acknowledge they made an error.  Some times you can’t do the right thing even if you want to.

Nice Guys Finish First:  amazon.com
Website:  barriebergman.com
Blog:  http://barriebergman.typepad.com/barriebergman/   

We’ve Got a Barn, Let’s Put on a Show

I love living in Southern California.  The weather’s great, it’s beautiful, and there’s lots to do.  Last week we went down to Oxnard, where a lot of the country’s fruits and vegetables are grown, to a totally unlikely car museum.

The museum is called The Mullin Automotive Museum, and it features French cars from the 20’s, 30’s, and 40’s.  The cars are Bugattis, Talbot-Lagos, Delahayes, and others.  They are mostly art- deco, rounded, curvy, and gorgeous.

Because they are so rare, many of them exceed one million dollars per car.  This place is so unique and so well done, it should be on everyone’s list, who appreciate beauty and style.

Also last weekend we saw Nashville song-writer Matraca Berg in Santa Barbara in a singer-songwriter series called “Sings Like Hell,” which my old friend Hale Milgrim, former president of Capitol Records, is very much involved.

Matraca, whom I have loved for years, is not a household word, but she’s written a bunch of hit songs for other people, and has been nominated for two Grammy’s.  She got on stage and said she hadn’t played a full set by herself in a year and that she had been to a party before the concert, but she “hadn’t gotten trashed.”

She said she was nervous, so that was the reason she carried a glass of wine on stage with her, which she finished.  She forgot the lyrics to four songs and had to restart each of those songs.  At first it was amusing, but after awhile I thought it quite unprofessional.

Artists have a responsibility to their audience.  They need be rehearsed and ready to perform, when they hit the stage.  I paid my hard earned money to see a concert, not a rehearsal.  If they aren’t performers, don’t perform.  By the way, I still loved her, but I’m a sucker for cute girls with good voices.

Flying Down to Rio

For the last several weeks my wife Arlene and I have been visiting in South America.  It was a fascinating trip and lots of fun.  We visited Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, and took a cruise up the Brazilian coast, which included a stop in Uruguay.

Rio was my favorite, even though Buenos Aires is a beautiful city, the “Paris” of South America.  Rio has an energy and vitality that only comes when a country is doing well economically.  Brazil has a huge amount of land and wonderful natural resources.  They are now being successful at using their products, including enough oil to be self-sufficient.

The people in Rio were sensational.  They are happy, forthcoming, and most of all beautiful.  We stayed at Ipanema Beach, and the women and the men . . . you get the idea.

Over and over we were befriended by strangers, when we were lost.  Several people took us by the hand to show us how to get somewhere, rather than just pointing.  I’ve only encountered courtesy like this in one other place, and interesting that it was in Portugal, the people who settled in Brazil.

The only problem I had with the trip is the density of people in the cities.  Rio has 17 million; Sao Paulo has 25 million.  I have encountered the population bomb in Asia before, and it’s really frightening.

As a planet we have got to figure out how to limit the expansion of population, or we are sure to run out of everything we need to survive.  We need to start now.  No one wants any government to limit family size.  In China it got a lot of female babies killed, but we better do something and pretty damn quick.

The Name Game

I love celebrity baby names.  It’s not enough to be screwed up themselves, celebrities need to screw up their kids with wacko names.  I know what it’s like to have a name that no one ever spells right.  My father decided to spell Barrie with an “ie” and that was the last time anybody ever spelled it right.  This is the reason I’m so weird today.

Mariah Carey named her baby Monroe, which I suppose is after the Doctrine.  She’s such a history buff.  Gwyneth Paltrow named her kid Apple, but that’s okay because she’s perfect.

Ethan Hawke called his Indiana because David Letterman is from there or maybe because the ugliest city we ever had a store in was Evansville.  Victoria and David Beckham have Harper, whose sexual orientation is unclear.

Viola Davis has Genesis, doubtless named for the band.  Alicia Silverstone has Bear Blu, which totally escapes me, and Mike Tyson has named his progeny Morocco, so he can be called “The Rockin’ Moroccan.”  Natalie Portman’s little dancer is Aleph, while Kevin James’s son is Kannon, what a little firecracker.

January Jones has Xander, a totally mad name.  Jewell calls her child Kase, which I believe is a travel bag.  Jessica Alba’s girl is Haven, which I suppose left out an “e,” but it could be a place to hide.

All this is just ammunition for my oft-held belief that people should be licensed to have children.  To use kids to encourage one’s own ego is so unfair.  I’m thinking of changing my name to Alvin.

Interesting Times

If I were running a company today, the company would be doing great and expanding like crazy.  In the interest rate environment we find ourselves in, it’s almost impossible to do poorly.  I would be borrowing as much as I could from any bank, that would lend it to the business, and expanding as fast as we could go.

I always pushed hard for growth, when the economy was at its worst.  Most people stopped growing and sat on the sidelines, but I felt the time to expand was when others backed off.  It was easier.  It takes cajones to do this, particularly because banks hate it.  But, if the organization is good enough, the style really works. 

Banks, which are run by people who can’t make it in real business, always believe in going with the trend, while I believe in going counter-trend.  Running counter-cycle is the best way to make money that I know, but it’s hard to swim upstream, when everyone thinks you’re crazy.

As the economy gets better and companies make more and more money, the Stock Market is going to go up.  My fearless prediction for this year is somewhere in the 10-15% range.  I also believe that Congress will begin to act more responsibly and start to limit spending.

I’m an eternal optimist, so don’t base any investment strategies on anything I say, but if you do and you make any money, I would love a piece of the action.  If you lose money, call Newt Gingrich.  He told you the world was coming to an end.

In Sickness and in Health

Yesterday, in a humbling experience, I had to call my insurance carrier to get an early refill on a medication I take.  We are taking a trip out of the country, and I’ll be away when the normal refill is ready.  The insurance company insisted I call personally, which is a torture I don’t normally have to endure.

It took two phone calls, four menus, and two humans to make the decision to let me do something that in the long run wouldn’t cost the insurance company a penny.  I repeated the same exact information three times, and at the end I wasn’t sure I still spelled my name with an “ie.”

It’s obvious that this procedure is created to get customers to give up and go away, which I almost did, and paid the money out of my own pocket.  Everyone was friendly, but non-committal.  I finally got my authorization, after about twenty minutes, and went on my way to wellness land.

I spent a large part of my business life trying to inspire organizations to give good customer service.  How can any company treat a consumer the way I was treated?  The health care industry is one of the worst offenders, but there are plenty of others.

Can’t businesses get their IT nerds to make these processes easier?  Why do we have to repeat the same information over and over?  Can’t a machine or a human input the info the first time you give it?  Doesn’t anybody give a crap?  I once intended to write a book titled, “Nobody Listens, Nobody Follows Through.”  I decided not to write it, because it was so dark.  I’m currently sharpening my pencils, getting ready to write.

Arts and Crafts

I’m on several boards of art organizations.  Up until a few years ago these organizations were funded by either a university or by the local government.  In our present economic environment, the arts in our country have gotten short shrift.  We’ve cut school budgets, community playhouse budgets, dance funding, music funds, and painting classes.

What place does art have in a successful society?  Why should we care about local drama classes?  Art is a mirror of our society.  It’s a way of looking at ourselves in a skewed prismatic mirror.  Art points out our foibles and our strengths in a different way.  Strong societies nurture art.  I hope we get the message before we lose some of our most valuable resources.
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The short term Kardashian wedding seems to have started a trend.  Celebrities are throwing away marriages as fast as they can start them.  I, for one, am terribly worried.  Just last week Heidi Klum and Seal, a marriage for the ages, split up.  Now my favorite fat person, Aretha Franklin, announced her wedding is off, stillborn before she could even enjoy marital bliss.  I think we need a congressional commission to look into this growing problem.

Musings

I kinda like Mitt Romney.  He’s handsome, prolific (lots of kids), and he’s a good businessman.  He jumps around on issues, but then don’t most politicians.

I’m probably not his target demographic, since I’m a Democrat, and I’m not going to vote for him.  But among the respective Republican candidates, he’s an easy choice.  Thus, I’m sick of Romney getting pilloried for being a good business person.

If more people in government had a clue about how to make money (i.e. buy low, sell high) we might be able to finance our debt without running a series of fund raisers.  Perhaps, if we could get some of the same greedy bastards that run Wall Street to run the government, we would do better – Oh wait – we tried that under Bush, and look how it turned out.
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A fan at a hockey game was recently fined $200 for throwing a banana at a black player.  Police said there wasn’t enough evidence to charge him with a hate crime.  What do you think it was, a dislike crime?  Later in the game another fan threw a bagel at a Jewish player, but he wasn’t charged because there was no cream cheese or lox.  Yeah . . . I’m just kidding about the bagel.

It’s OK for hockey players to beat the crap out of each other, just don’t throw stuff on the ice, except in Detroit, where they throw octopi for some unfathomable reason.