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May 13, 2013
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Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
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May 3, 2013
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Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
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Jewish World Review
Don't let the doorman hit you on the way out
By
Jim Mullen
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
A few weeks ago, there was a huge crisis in New York City. No, not the 1,000-point dip in the Dow, the attempted car bomb in Times Square or an unexpected foie gras shortage. This was an event that made titans of industry tremble and the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies shake. It was all doctors, lawyers, bankers, brokers, fashion designers, Broadway actors, soap stars, interior designers and trust-fund babies could talk about at their $100-a-plate restaurants, and was the lead story on every station's 11 o'clock news for two solid weeks: The doormen at New York apartment buildings were threatening to go on strike.
Oh, the humanity! All up and down Park and Fifth Avenues one could hear the sound of wailing and gnashing of teeth. The newspapers were full of front-page stories following the daily negotiations.
"How will we live?" "Where will we go?" went the lamentations of the wealthy. Building managers and the owners of two, three and four-million-dollar homes held meetings to set up schedules for tenants to share lobby duty in case the unthinkable were to happen. "This," said one advertising executive as he climbed into the limo that would drive him to work, "could be worse than the elevator-operator strike." Is there a person alive who can forget that tragedy?
Management predicted that hundreds, maybe thousands, of people might starve because their personal chefs wouldn't walk up 10 or 20 flights of stairs to cook meals for the helpless rich. It turned out that, despite the low expectations, many wealthy tenants could be taught to push the button for the floor they lived on, and remember the button for lobby, too. It wasn't easy and there was much resistance to the idea, but they were surprised to find out what they could do in a crisis. And in a rare display of kindness, the ones that did learn helped the ones who could not. Once they pieced together how to use an elevator, some felt like they could do anything.
The doorman strike had the potential of being much worse, an even harder burden for the wealthy to bear. Those unfamiliar with people of wealth and privilege may wonder why they need someone to open the door for them, for someone to say, "Good afternoon, Mrs. Pushface," for someone to sign for their FedEx deliveries, for someone to buzz their apartment and announce visitors -- because it's something the rest of us do for ourselves all the time.
The truth is that the wealthy are like spoiled poodles; they can barely do anything for themselves. All their survival skills have been bred out of them. They can no more open their own door than any domesticated beast lacking opposable thumbs can open one.
They must be let in and out of their homes with the aid of a human. Like pets, we all wonder sometimes if it's worth the trouble to have them. They seem to have no practical purpose, and some days all they do is cause problems. Worst of all, most of them are not neutered and continue to breed, unchecked. Why no one has invented a human-sized, thick plastic flap, like doggie doors, that the rich could push in and out of by themselves is a wonderment.
The strike was called off at the last minute.
"They got more money just for opening doors," huffed one Park Avenue resident. "If they want more money, they should earn it. The way my great-grandfather did."
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Comment by clicking here.
Jim Mullen is the author of "It Takes a Village Idiot: Complicating the Simple Life" and "Baby's First Tattoo."
Previously:
Picasso fiasco
Purple (hair) Daze
Let me hear your body talk
Working from work
Babies deserve clean restrooms, too
3-year-old bear-killers are a thing of the past
Money-making ideas on the fly
Collecting and hoarding
Chain of fools
Please come pick up your acting awards, ESPN commentators, you've earned them
You've been superpoked by the U.S. gov't
e-Readin', e-Writin' and e-Rithmatic
A pose by any other name
Warning: Column contains 2010 spoilers
He loves only gold, only gold
Think about direction, wonder why …
Flushing your money down a diamond-studded toilet
More like wack Friday
The good, the ad and the ugly
The desert of the real
Let books be large and in charge
I was insulting people way before the Internet
GPS drill sergeant: Left, right, left!
Butterfly in the sky, you make winds go twice as high
Music to my ears it's not
You don't light up my life
Fair or not: Country living is far from Little House
A parable for the ages
Top 100 Cable news stories of the century
Green dumb
A developing story
Thinking outside the lunch box
What's good for the goose is good for the scanner
Newspapers will survive, but network TV?
A really big show of generation gaps
When pigs flu
The reports of our decline have been greatly exaggerated
Mergers and admonitions
Invest in gold: little, yellow, different
Stuck in Folsom Penthouse
Collecting karma
Setting loose the creative juice
It's all in the numbers
You're damaging your brain with practical skills
The real rat pack
The unspeakable luxury of the Park-O-Matic
Gross-ery shopping
© 2009, NEA
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