Posts Tagged ‘ morality ’

The Inestimable Larry Miller

December 13, 2006
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The Inestimable Larry Miller

Larry Miller is one of the funniest comedians around. Rather like a younger Bob Newhart but with a bit more of an edge, the balding, pudgy Miller has made a name for himself as a comic character actor in numerous movies and tv shows, but where he made his name was as a hilariously funny standup comedian who applied traditional morality and sound common sense to our crazy Omniculture society, a place that is simultaneously puritanical about progressive political shibboleths (such as tobacco, fatty foods, and economic freedom) and aggressively nonjudgmental about self-destructive personal behaviors such as sexual weirdness, drug abuse, willful ignorance, and atrocious manners. Miller caught the inconsistencies and incongruities of that condition admirably, as in his memorable monologue about the five levels of alcohol drinking while on a night out, available here.  Miller has also become an accomplished writer of comic essays, primarily for The Weekly Standard‘s webpage, and he has a new book out, called Spoiled Rotten America, which sounds like great fun and a nice Christmas gift for your favorite blogger. Comedy writer Warren Bell reviews it here. Here’s an excerpt from the review: Larry Miller is profound. He possesses an ability to look deep

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Macy’s Name Change Backfires

December 12, 2006
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Sometimes it’s important to respect traditions and follow conventional morality even when it doesn’t seem to make logical sense on the surface. Consider, for example, Macy’s recent travails. The retail giant bought numerous other stores in the past couple of years and decided to change all their names to Macy’s, to strengthen the corporate identity. Macy’s also reduced service and merchandise quality at the stores. That’s exactly the type of crude corporate behavior one sees in old movies (and many new ones as well). The effort backfired badly. Sales are down, and Macy’s investment rating has been lowered. As the Chicago Tribune reports, The shock of Federated Department Stores CEO Terry Lundgren’s decision to eliminate beloved names such as Marshall Field’s, Kaufmann’s and Famous-Barr is proving a more difficult and time-consuming fight than expected for Macy’s owner, wrote analyst Dana Cohen at Banc of America Securities. Cohen estimated that sales plunged 11 percent in November from a year earlier at Field’s and the other former May department stores, all now Macy’s. Another analyst, Carol Levenson of Gimme Credit, has put the stores’ sales decline at anywhere from 20 percent to more than 30 percent for the three months that ended

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