My boss on 9-11 and his company's impending doom

Just overheard my boss talking to a hunting buddy of his. Nice guys, mostly, except they support a genocidal murderer for president.

Boss opines, "Yeah, 9-11 has really hurt our business. We were booming before then." He pauses for a moment, perhaps reflecting that we had gone from five stores and runaway profit to one store and constant losses in just three years, possibly wondering how the company their father started in 1934 during the Depression had survived for so long and now seems on the verge of extinction just as they finally get a president and Congress who 'really understands the problems of the small businessman. I don't know, maybe he was just daydreaming about some small animal he hoped to blow away this weekend.

Then he continues, "You know, though, it took a while after 9-11 for the effects to sink in..."

And that was it. No follow through, that 9-11 wasn't the cause of the problem, that our business is a basic goods industry and wouldn't have been effected by a disaster 2000 miles away. I wanted to explain to him that there was a delayed effect because of the insurance companies that no one regulated who decided to recoup all of their losses from 9-11 in a four year period, and hiked rates dramatically, and how Bush's tax cuts kicked in and gave our bigger competitor's more money so they could undercut our prices and out-advertise us, and how our business relied a lot on government business which was in decline because the tax cuts took money away from the government agencies that used to by our product.

I didn't. I'm barely employed now, just taking their money until they decide to let me go. It's just amazing, though, how much of a disconnect their is in their minds. Against all evidence, they support their oppressors and oppose the policies that caused them to thrive for 70 years.

It's so quiet here today that my boss has been talking to his friend for two hours, uninterrupted by customers or business. Haven't even heard the phone ring.

... but telling of the state of the Union.

I wonder if there is some drug that can treat Republicanism?

four big companies owes us 120k. like pulling teeth getting money from them. the profit we made off some of it gone in the interest of this loan to pay our bills.

not an easy thing to do, keeping a business going in todays world

I've gotten more bankruptcy letters than I can keep up with in the last three years.

Our biggest companies, though, all went to our big corporate competitors. The last one left yesterday. I'm glad I've never liked being a controller. :-)

that provided brain-injury treatment for veterans and others, because the state of Florida ran out of money for veterans.

I don't think they had to pay us for services already rendered, either.

Getting paid by insurance companies had always been like pulling teeth for us.

It is sad.

So much for small businesses! If I was you, I'd be looking for another job now before you get the ax. It isn't so easy finding work in the good ol' USA anymore.

Your boss will awaken when his store and home are bankrupt. I guess that is what it takes for people of the * mentality!

Their father has set them up well. They've grown up in the company, never had to work for a living, always worked for their own company. When their father passes they will be millionaires. They don't care much.

That's the problem with sons inheriting their parent's hard work. They don't know how to work, they've never had to. They don't even understand that. They think "I work hard all day, I deserve what I have," not understanding that the majority of Americans work at least as hard all day long, but lacked an enterprising father to give them a business to run.

It'll put 20 people out of work. Used to be 35. They'll feel comfortably concerned for the unemployed, but they won't feel any actual stress. They'll look at it as time for retirement.

They aren't bad people, even. Just weak.

This congress understands BIG business and the campaign dollars coming from BIG business, not small. Nine-eleven is just a convenient excuse for shitty management. Junior will never realize that he drove his father's company into the ground all by himself.

I know this wasn't your point, but your boss's business being hurt "by 9/11" . . . tell him, "At least we're not Cantor Fitzgerald."

I'm sorry it's been rough for your business. Too bad your boss can't recognize the cause.

and consistent with what I know. Thanks for sharing.

People who have supported Republicans all their lives or at least since Ronald Reagan, who simply don't make the connection between those Republican policies (starting with St Ronnie) and the decline of the middle classes and small businessmen and so on. They continue (because they're told this not just by Fox but by all the mainstream media) that it's the sins of Liberalism that has destroyed their way of life.

It seems there's not much that can be done about this. Maybe if you can ask a lot of leading questions and get these people to think about what's the true source of all this, them perhaps you can get them to understand who really is to blame.

But people are blinded by the right's rhetoric. They really believe that there shouldn't be inheritance taxes, even though the vast majority of people don't leave a taxable estate behind when they die. They think that providing free health care to all is less important than a military that costs more than that of all of the rest of the world put together. They're convinced that small business are hurt by regulations that insure a safe workplace is what puts them out of business, not the tax preferences that allow large companies to transfer all profits off-shore.

In short, these people have been co-opted by those who quite frankly don't give a shit about them, and they don't understand it. They listen to Rush Limbaugh and other right-wing talk radio and have no ability to think critically about what they're being told. Part of this is the larger failure of public schools over the last couple of generations, the failure to teach critical thinking. Not that the church sponsored ones the right wing wants to install instead would do better, they'd actually be worse.

If people really were capable of thinking for themselves and understanding the issues I've indicated above (as well as the many others I haven't even touched on) then perhaps 20% of the electorate would support Bush and his miserable policies.

make sure you swipe something nice for yourself before it goes down -- it's the american way!

...at least do it when you no longer depend on them for money -- either because they lay you off, or because the whole business tanks, or (hopeing hard) if you can get a better job before they go under.

Though I think they do blame Bush. The auto parts company they work for went from operating 24/7 to one shift, Monday - Thursday. They got there hopes up in December when things picked up a little, but now it's so slow, they're worried the whole thing will fold.

cover your ass.

Type it up and don't sign it. Include whatever references you can find.

Leave it on his desk.

Worth a try. (Unless they already have you pegged as the lone 'liberal' at the place so they'd know it was you.)

They put a gag order on me a while back.