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Health & Fitness

Occupy This!

The Occupy Wall Street movement is forgetting something very important: Me.

This blog is about being new in Stamford, and owning our first-ever home at, um, an advanced age, and I promise I’ll get back on topic in a moment. But first, bear with me while I get something off my chest.

You may have heard about all these people gathered down by Wall Street. These are people presumably without jobs, yet they evidently didn’t have the time to come up with a name for their movement with a better acronym than "Ows." I mean, come on, are you disenfranchised, or did you just bang your finger with a hammer?

While I agree with their complaint that there’s something wrong with the distribution of wealth in this country, their slogan about the "other 99%" is more indicative of the fact that there’s something wrong with the distribution of intelligence in this country. Because if the money resides with 1% of the citizenry, then that’s exactly the percentage of the vote the Republican Party should get in any election. Anybody earning, say, less than a quarter million dollars a year, would be an idiot to vote Republican. But that’s how easily fooled the American people are. And I should know; I’m in advertising.

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Keep in mind: this is a non-partisan argument I’m making here. I’m not saying the Republicans are right or the Democrats are right. (In fact, none of them are right; most people in Washington these days are self-serving fakes.) I’m just saying that there are certain people who are natural constituents of the Republican Party and every one else should be voting Democratic.

But that’s not what I wanted to get off my chest.

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[GETTING BACK ON TOPIC...NOW!]

What’s got me peeved is that the protesters are occupying the wrong place. Here’s what they should be occupying:

Trade schools.

Because right now, in the midst of our stumbling economy, with millions of people out of work, I literally have thousands of dollars to give away to folks who can come to my house and do some basic carpentry, or cut down some trees, or redesign my landscaping, or do some electrical work, or finish the kitchen renovation which we started in July.

But can I get anyone to come and take my money? No, I cannot. Which I can only assume means that all these tradespeople are too busy. That, I remember from high school economics, must mean that there aren’t enough tradepeople which, in turn, means that these trades are something that wise Wall Street occupiers should learn more about.

So, in conclusion, let me say that any change that occurs in this great land of ours should begin with getting my stove to work.

For more on our adventures as first-time homeowners at age 57, and moving to Stamford, visit http://theupsizers.wordpress.com/

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