After viewing Affleck's future Oscar-winner recently, I got stuck on a few items of semi-importance. None of them will go away. Argo deserves high praise from cynics. The fact is, major American films are usually so pointless and forgettable that when something makes you not want to talk about where...

Walter Cronkite brought us the evening news for decades; we watched in awe. Uncle Walter packaged stories of import that made tens of millions stop, sit, lean forward, and grab it in. There was never a doubt that Cronkite was in charge.

These days we have Brian Williams presenting segments...

These days people communicate in funny ways. I often wonder if anyone is paying attention to the words they write down (forget what they say -- we either babble or murmur). But if someone goes "Speaking of" while responding to you, have you noticed it rarely has anything to do...

I've been known to be a bit of a reluctant soothsayer and this coming year is the one that, well, I'm saying a lot about. A lot of the "big stuff" that everyone's been waiting around for (not hovercrafts, no) will begin to emerge around 2012.

Here...

I see that smug Anthony Bourdain has a new Travel Channel show called The Layover. He gets off planes and tries food out. Big deal. I do layovers for a living -- and believe me they are not at all fun.

Unless...

My work involves a lot...

Yesterday I killed my Torch -- the 13th model BlackBerry I'd owned, overused and obsessed over since 1996. The little device had been with me, on my person, since Research In Motion delivered me the teeny RIM pager that untethered me from my desk forever. The pioneering Canadian company was...

Athens is the dirtiest, foulest, most-disorganized city I've visited in decades. The capital city of Greece is ripe with pollution; there isn't a motorbike that doesn't snort emissions far worse than cars. I can't get enough of it and you can sense the excitement in every section of town. Each...

Bad shit is everywhere. It's unavoidable. The economy is in shambles, we still have millions of Americans without health insurance, unemployment sits at 9.2%, 43 out of 50 states are operating on a budget deficit, the Kardashians are still talking, our weather is unbearable, and I just learned that iTunes...

I am a big fan of Fred C. Trump, father of that guy who simply won't shut up. The elder Trump stood for something; he was a self-made real estate mogul who, unlike his slicker, stranger, galling son, was quite low key and parked his ego at the office door....

Let's say you go to work, like me, and at the end of the year you get an award for doing your job. Silly, right? Wrong. That is what the "self-servicing" entertainment industries do: give awards for best film, music, TV, book, magazine, and hairstyle (well, not that).

Hello, and...

It's so damn sad to think of anyone spending years in a room, depressed and drinking and hoping for a better life. But it's worse when it is someone you thought "had it all." Reading about the death of Gerry Rafferty, whom you had to know if you turned on...

Grandma got run over by a reindeer on her way to Kohl's at 3 a.m on Black Friday. Don't ask me why the store was open and how come employees don't revolt, but, oh, of course, it's the nation's most-celebrated phony holiday.

Ah but not for me! I'm certain...

There's a Kurt Vonnegut short (very short) story called Harrison Bergeron. In it the United States Handicapper General, under the auspices of the 211th, 212th, and 213th Constitutional Amendments, has stamped out individual talents and characteristics for the sake of total unimpeded equality. The population is fed mindless entertainment, all...

"I think anybody who's occupied...office has to remember that success is determined by an intersection in policy and politics and that you can't be neglecting of marketing and P.R. and public opinion."

--Barack Obama

Fact: Marketing and PR has won this election--public opinion is being swayed by the constant appearance...

My PR agency, which creates and manages campaigns for technology firms and entrepreneurial ventures, has been around for 20 years. We've got 15 staff and about $2 million in annual revenue. I've also written 12 books and spend half my time doing speaking engagements, and so I've made...

Here we are, in one of two months where we are actually supposed to work. Funny, right?

No. Not really. This is the true month of our discontent. We have nothing getting in the way of us accomplishing all the goals we have set in front of our faces.

Think...

He is everywhere. We do not live under a rock so we know the star is being treated for cancer. It's sad, but he's moving on. He's learning to cope; looks fantastic while undergoing chemotherapy. He's gonna beat this thing. He may have passed the HPV virus onto his star-wife....



This post has been a long time coming.

If you work for a living, 

every now and then you are fortunate to have dreamy clients - the ones that...

This is not a rant. It's a reintroduction to something you knew in 2009 all too well: The Great Recession.

People tried to tell us it was over. I, like you, was skeptical. Here is a look at how to recognize that we are back in the throes of a...

I did a lot this summer but mostly I wasn't here.

Well, I was here but also not there. First I went for a brief trip on business to the nonstop town of Tel Aviv ... where I found myself enveloped in the perfect storm: strep throat, jet lag and...