First, if you really think the Amway-Alticor empire is driven simply by sales of soap and household products, I’ve got some expensive Enron stock I want to sell you. Amway-Alticor has made its massive fortunes by deceiving people into thinking they too can get rich by becoming succesful Amway distributors. I think the appropriate word here recalls P.T. Barnum’s immortal “There’s a sucker born every minute.”
A little more than 30 years ago an ambitious hair-lipped salesman named Glenn W. Turner was busted by federal authorities for running an illegal pyramid scheme. His “Dare to Be Great” motivational tapes made the rounds and he tried to sell his flock a lot of elusive dreams about becoming wealthy. Since I read of Turner’s awful fate, I’ve wondered what the difference between him and Amway was. As a friend once told me, “Somebody found a box of soap.” Never in my life have I been approached by anyone who has attempted to sell me an Amway product. However, I have been asked more than once to become an Amway distributor, with promises of making a nice tidy sum to supplement my low-paying full-time job. Of course, I declined after being given a folksy and friendly pitch by a couple hoping to climb the ladder in the corporation by selling a distributorship to some unwary sucker like me. I’ve been told by several in the know that Amway takes distributors to retreats, herds them into a huge lecture hall and then has a few of the blessed people at the top of the pyramid give them pep talks that look and sound a lot like religious revival services.
I’ve since learned the average Amway distributor makes about $56 a month, despite all the talk of riches and economic rewards that come to those who apply themselves and the principles of the corporation. What most suckers don’t seem to understand is that only a very few will make the big bucks at Amway-Alticor.
I’ve seen the slick marketing used in Alticor-Amway’s TV ads that suspiciously follow DeVos for Governor spots though each side is claiming independance from the other to avoid campaign finance law violations. Both sets of commercials try to tell us DeVos didn’t lay off those 1,400 Michigan workers and send their jobs to China. Yet it was quite a coincidence, that 1,400 lost their jobs the same time the billionaire DeVos invested big bucks in China so he could sell products (not made in Michigan, but in a China plant) in the world’s largest market. These slick pros doing the ads for Amway and DeVos also want us to think those 1,400 were let go gently through benign processes such as attrition or early retirements. I know a man who was an engineer at Alticor for five years. One day, without warning, as he returned from lunch, he was met by two security officers who escorted him out of the building and to his car, not even letting him clean out his desk. The man had done nothing wrong. His job had been eliminated.
Let’s not forget Dick DeVos has spent a lot of money on toxic causes such as the attempt to enact a voucher system to steal money from public education to find fundamentalist Christian madrassas, which thankfully was turned away by voters soundly a few years back. Let’s not forget his wife, Betsy, who has been strangely AWOL during her husband’s campaign for governor, was chairwoman of the Michigan Republican Party and was quoted in the Grand Rapids Press not long ago as saying one of the reasons for this state’s economic trouble is Michigan workers are paid too much- an unfortunate admission of something most of the hard core right wing int his country believe. DeVos has been one of the country's most generous donors to radical right wing fringe groups seeking to rewrite out tax laws to makes themselves even wealthier and to gain control of our electoral system to force through their extremist agenda which is nothing short of a fundamentalist Christian rule in this country and an attempt to rewrite the Constitution and the history books to make it so. Here's just one example of the place DeVos holds in the Republican power structure:
In case you don't recognize him, that Karl "Turd Blossom" Rove on the left side of that photo rubbing elbows with Dick and Betsy DeVos. That photo is the best reminder that Dick DeVos in the Governor's mansion would be Michigan's version of George W. Bush in the Oval Office- a mistake we can avoid making if enough people bother to inform themselves, wake up and realize that a lot of the problems we are facing are ones created by Republicans in order to create a Neo Con Utopia in which everyone is "responsible " for their own education, retirement, health care, roads and whatever over "socialist" programs can be privatized to line some contributor's pockets.
DeVos has spent a great deal of time trying his damnedest to blame Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm for this state’s horrible economy, as if one individual can do that much damage as a Democrat in a sea of Republicans running Michigan. Since John Engler’s election as governor in 1990, the GOP has been in the majority in Lansing, sometimes dominating it with the governor’s chair, both houses in the State Legislature and the Michigan Supreme Court. Republicans have just about owned this state politically for the last 16 years and yet DeVos has the gall to suggest it’s all Granholm’s fault. And Dick and Betsy DeVos have been the prime movers and shakers. Dick is right- what they're doing in Lansing isn't working, but the recipe they're cooking with was written by Dick DeVos and a handful of other radical Republicans who refuse to see their policies are failures, the corrupt rule a horrible mistake.
Furthermore, it’s been difficult for Granholm to govern effectively when she must deal with snakes and sons of snakes who don’t want anything positive to happen to make her look good. A do-nothing legislature that wants to see her packing her bags rather than serve the people has been all too common in the last four years. When she was elected, Granholm faced a 63-47 GOP majority in the House and a 23-15 GOP majority in the Senate. If we were playing “Clue,” the guilty one eventually should be identified as the stonewalling, feet dragging legislators with an agenda to make the governor appear to be ineffective.
Then there are people who point to the wonderful philanthropy of the DeVos and VanAndel families. Just look at DeVos Children’s Hospital, the VanAndel Arena, DeVos Place, DeVos Hall, and the list goes on. There comes a time when a robber baron decides to use his massive fortune to put his name up in lights to get a sense of immortality. It also gets him out of paying taxes on the money while buying some really good PR. Sort of a win-win situation.
I agree with those who have expressed disappointment in Granholm, but I think she’s had to deal too often with people who don’t want her to succeed and I think Dick DeVos is not much more than a filthy rich smooth salesman who hasn’t really discussed issues and his plans.
To answer the man at the end of those new ads for Amway: Yeah, I got a problem with that!
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14 comments:
Go to your room.
Nice picture, by the way. Kudos on your technical expertise.
Congrats, Pol, you hooked a sucker!
They are still communists aren't they?
I smell sulfur!
It seems to be coming from upwind in the direction of Lake Michigan!
Could it be the pollution of the Grand River and Lake Macatawa?
(Capitalize the E, in E. coli, please.)
(and, all the letters in CAFO, por favor!)
Perhaps that sulfur smell is coming from igniting matchstick heads under crosses.
Are the white-robed Ku Klux Kri$tian Rite off on another Crusade?
Hi$tory was kind to the Dutch Empire when it thrived on the slave trade.
Hi$tory was kind to the West Michigan employers of Hispanic migrant workers.
Will the Future be so kind when the children of the slaves rise up in the East in November?
Will the Future be so kind when the children of migrants object to being raised in squalor and object to building miles of fences as a monument to their inferiority?
Will the Future be so kind when the residents of Dearborn and Coldwater explain the meaning of religious intolerance to the KKKRC? (“That’s Kaptain Kerk of the Wildwood, to you, little brown boy!”)
Will the Future be so kind when the medical professionals in China start selling their services through K-Mart?
Will Medicare wake up and learn to save money by sending us to Thailand for surgery?
Will the Baby Boomers retire to Nicaragua?
(Those are the names of foreign countries)
I hear a rumbling sound and feel the earth moving.
Has a tectonic shift begun in the Evangelical hard pan?
Is there more to life than objecting to abortions and gays?
Has somebody noticed that 37,000 kids die every day, while we Dutchmen fight obesity?
Has the U.N. allowed the weak and oppressed to stand up and object to the Empire?
Is the condom in the State Dept. passing out?
I smell sulfur!
There is no need to bash Little Dick. The Dems should be paying for his ads. He is aligned with warmongers and domestic white-collar terrorists. The few people who still vote are the few people who can still read. Bashing doesn’t add to their understanding. The voters have already decided who they will vote against. They just haven’t decided to vote. Bashing merely spreads hate, anger and fear. This is not our task as swinging Republicans. Leave that to the rich and powerful, former immigrants, VanDerHollanders, stage left (if you are watching, that is to your right).
Sign me up for a calendar with Jennifer in an “Ethanol kicks gas” T-shirt! (Fiscal Nov – Nov.)
Every defensive rant about allowing the CIA (and its former Director) into our bedrooms, on our phones, on our library cards, in our sex lives, for our own good, and how Patriots need to die for the Security of the Homeland without questioning the real motives rings the alarm clock.
Another batch of zombies begins the march toward the polling booths.
Insulting their intelligence motivates the American Idle zombies.
TVs are the new IVs!
TV ads are the IV Salient Solution to raise the zombies from their couches.
(Responding to a letter in the Banner, the AARP says, “Don’t Vote!”)
Rise up in fear!
“To arms, to arms!”
“The immigrants from the North are coming!”
“One if by Soo, and two if by the Ambassador Bridge!”
(or was it two if by Soo,…?)
Speak out, neighbor Hugo!
I smell sulfur!
Little Dick is guaranteed 34% of the vote.
By November the neocons will have solidified this base.
They have their work cut out for them.
They still have 46% support in Michigan.
Bush still must offend another 12%.
Give him the microphone!
Let Dick hold it for him!
The microphone, that is.
Perhaps he could send a condom to the oldest democracy in Latin America and make a few more threats toward our southern neighbors.
Speak up, neighbor Evo Morales!
I smell sulfur!
Venezuela, where mucho dinero is made selling us petro-fuel, celebrated its Bicentennial while the Puritans were stealing land from the indigenous in the “New” World, and teaching them how to love God and neighbor.
Overheard in Iran, ”The enemy of my enemy es mi amigo”. (trilingual globalocracy)
How can we make more enemies?
Let’s get creative!
Maybe we could tell the democratically elected President of Venezuela that we don’t like his choice of Secretary of Defense!
Perhaps he would take ours!
Welcome back, neighbor Fidel! Have we won your heart and mind?
Did you get our “Get Well, Soon” card?
How are things in Guantanamo? Does the screaming keep you awake?
I smell sulfur!
A little bit louder, por favor, Presidente and Nobel Prize Winner Oscar Arias!
I smell palm branches, and a wisp of roses.
“Ask not for whom the dove mourns,
the dove mourns for you.”
Pura vida!
I am not a moonie but I do know a few machinists that work in Ada for Devos. They have spent thousands upon thousands of hours building the machines that are used in China. many have even gone there to assemble them and train the chinese to operate them. This adds millions of dollars to our local economy. And where do you think the profits from that Chinese factory end up? of course in Devos's pocket but they will eventually be spent here.
I do agree with many of your points el grillo but just because Agit3 went silent doesn't mean anyone has to go way off into left field to compensate. You do give interesting print though, lol. Keep writing, I will keep reading.
Yeah, obviously the money goes somewhere but the fact remains that while DeVos is claiming to know how to bring jobs to Michigan his proven formula- and the one he lobbies George Bush and the rubber stamp Republicans in Congress for- is to outsource manufacturing work to China. Sure, the companies tend to still keep an office in the US and perhaps some work is done here and some profits remain here but what we are seeing is a global race to the bottom and many here don't seem to see the forest for the trees. This isn't about ONE factory or ONE round of outsourcing, it's about an entire philosophy that says it's OK to fire Americans in order to make a buck. DeVos' defense is that the Chinese law forbids products from other countries being sold there while I say again that sounds like a damn good law and imagine how hot the Michigan economy would be if Electrolux had to made their refrigerators here instead of making them in Europe and still hoping there's some American whose job hasn't been outsourced that can still afford a new fridge.
Speaking of electrolux, I am wondering why someone else never stepped in to manufacture apliances in Greenville. It seems if there was profit, it would be a sure thing to build them there, they could even buy the plant as it is for sale. the labor is in place, the suppliers are in place. Why does not someone step in and build refridgerators? My bet is that there is not enough profit to justify it. Come on already. There is enough money floating around to set this up. Why wasn't it done?
There is absolutly no reason we have to wait for any handouts from the "rich" like devos or electrolux. Why not take it upon ourselves to do this? Why don't those complaining about it take the risk and throw their money at it?
I mean if every employee at the old electrolux put their assets (House, bank accounts, cars, etc...) on the line and borrowed money against them, there would have been more than enought to run the business. At least until they lost it all, lol. they could sell shares in the new company, and they all could share the ownership and risk together.
the truth is that the numbers did not add up. It wasn't just a matter of making more money but a case of just staying afloat. Look at many of the companies that did this prior to Electrolux'x move. thier quality went to heck, they encountered new cultures and new headaches. they did not realize the profits that they hoped for and are now either moving again, selling those divisions, or closing down plants. many large corps are even moving again in the hope of regaining profitability.
No, go ahead and blame others for this mess. Don't take any risk yourselves. this is the new american way I think.
In China nearly 30 million Chinese live in absolute poverty.
Is it classist to bring that up?
Would it be classist to point out that legislation put into our "fair trade agreement" keeps organized labor from helping these people?
Would it be classist to point out that this piece of legislation was pushed for by corperations the likes of alticor, and the Chinese communists?
Child dad, would you propose elimination of all environmental and worker protection laws in the US to make us competitive with China? As Agno says, it is not "fair trade". At least DeVos was successful at keeping secret the technical designs of certain machines in Ada. The Chinese are notorius at industrial espionage and pirating patents then selling those knockoffs back to us while driving the original American patent owner out of business.
As long as we continue to think in terms of factory work and products that can be mass-produced by unskilled laborers we will watch those jobs leave the country. It will be a bitter pill to swallow, but the Michigan worker needs to find a job that solves some other problem. Dropping out of school to take a "good-paying job" is no longer an option. Depending on a diploma from high school that was earned with a "D average" effort is not going to keep you warm. There are many fields of employment that cannot find enough people, right here in Michigan.
O.K., there are some people who weren't born with 52 cards, but that is a totally different issue.
I'm willing to bet that the top 10 occupations in 1920 are nothing like the ones today. Either you adapt or fall behind.
Like them or not the DeVos family redistributes significant amounts of their profit thru a great deal of philanthropy. I thought that the left was all about wealth redistribution. So why is it that a multi-level marketing outfit like Amway is vilified by the left but a giant ponzi scheme like Social Security is untouchable by the same group of people. The only difference I can see is that joining Amway is voluntary! Someone must still be selling soap if Alticor has $6 billion in sales.
A Ponzi scheme, old scrotum, as if you didn't know, is convincing investors that you are delivering huge profits in the form of dividends, when in reality you are merely paying off old investors with a bit of the new investors money. This is the definition of the Bush contention that my Social Security check comes from the money my kids are contributing. My Social Security check was supposed to be a return on my investment of part of my wages during a long working life. I patriotically allowed my democratically elected representatives to "borrow" my contributions to spend on military adventures. They did allow me to ride on one of their gray yachts for a couple of years, and paid me a salary. That's Ponzi!
When it comes to slick preachers and naive followers you can't beat the folks who wiggle the President's strings. The 34% who support that agenda need to keep working to support you and me.
While pointing a finger toward Ada, you are missing the target. The corporation is guilty of not pushing hard enough to discipline the troops. They probably would have been accused of violating the rights of independent contractors, if they had (heaven forbit that my rights might be violated). The real culprits have in fact become very rich by misrepresenting the opportunity, and that abuse has actually reduced sales of product from what it might have been without them.
That, I must add, has nothing to do with the ability of one of the kids to provide leadership to a state that is running out of options. Little Dick didn't build Amway. He didn't, as far as I know, even set a record for selling very much soap.
Been there, bought the T.
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