10/7/19

Cut The Crap — Hunter Biden

Your Big Red Car hasn’t posted a “Cut The Crap” sentiment in a while, so here is one today on Influence Peddling.

Hunter Biden is the son of former Vice President and current seeker of the nomination of the Democrat party Quid Pro Joe Biden. [Please forgive me. I couldn’t help myself. I have never liked Joe Biden. I always thought his Amtrak, the Senator from MBNA shtick was obsequious. I also am very cool on Ted Cruz, Ben Sasse, Jeff Flake, and John McCain.]

Here’s Hunter taking in a basketball game with Dad and a pal of theirs. Who wouldn’t like this guy?

Anyway, unless you have been in some far away place — like the Ukraine, as an example — you probably have heard that Hunter Biden was named to the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company called “We Want Some Influence and Are Willing to Buy It at Full Price.” No, actually the company’s name is Burisma Holdings.

The Big Cheese at Burisma appointed Hunter Biden to the Board of Directors of his company and compensated him at the rate of $50,000 per month for a five year period — that, my friend is what called a “good” side hustle. Biden’s “company” also did some other work directly for the company deriving additional income.

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10/6/19

The Confusing State of Crypto in China

There is a huge amount of confusion as to the status of cryptocurrency regulation in China. The other day I read a commentary that suggested that all was rosy in China, when I was of the opinion that it was not.

Read this and you can judge for yourself. This is not intended as a nudge in any direction. It is just simple facts.

I did some research. Nothing ruins a good conversation like facts.

So, let’s review some facts, shall we?

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10/5/19

Ageism — Political Ageism

Senator, and candidate for the Democrat nomination to be eviscerated by President Trump in November 2020, Bernie Sanders had a heart attack that resulted in the installation of two stents in a blocked artery. [OK, the crack about being eviscerated is a little strong. Sorry. Wait, I don’t apologize to anybody about anything. Do I?]

Bernie Sanders is out of the hospital, resting comfortably, and contemplating returning to the campaign trail in a week. Bernie, don’t do it. You’re done, amigo.

God bless you, Bernie Sanders. Best wishes for a speedy and complete recovery. Godspeed.

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10/4/19

Big Red Car — Fast Site

About a month and a half ago, I got hacked. That made me focus on the Big Red Car website. It was very frustrating. Lots of time on the chat with support from a bunch of different places — talking to you, AWS.

I changed a lot of things — hosting, security, analytics, CDN, cache, backup, image optimization, fonts, SSL, subscription, SEO — had to. I had let the site get a little overgrown and spindly.

So, I have been doing some work on it. Have three or four more things left to do, but today, I got the speed where it needs to be.

The site is loading in less than a second. For a site this large, that is a superb speed.

I use GTMetrix to measure performance and keep my results. It has taken at least a month, but to see an A-96% on PageSpeed and an A-90% on YSlow with a 0.8 second load time, is pretty damn good.

The smartest thing I did was to turn loose WPSpeedGuru in the person of Alexei Kutsko.

I cannot believe how much better the site does on search rankings. I never really configure it for that, but the speed makes all the difference.

I hope you enjoy it.

If there is some change you’d like me to consider. Drop me a comment. It feels like you do when you finish tying a big, fat, beautiful Monkeys Paw.

 

 

 

10/4/19

Product Positioning — May I Please Have A Hard Seltzer?

Somewhere in the dark recesses of your mind is a thought trying to break its way into your consciousness — it is repeating a mantra: Product, Price, Placement, Promotion — maybe joined by: Positioning, People, Packaging. A lot of P’s.

Image it like a Gregorian Chant coming at you like a throbbing headache.

Do you recognize the basics of marketing? Yes you do.

Product

Packaging

Price

People

Placement

Positioning

Promotion

Could there be some overlap in these subjects? Sure, but work with me on this.

Today, we talk about the positioning of a relatively new product — hard seltzer.

Hard seltzer is an emerging product with $295MM in sales last year. It is not yet an important slice of the beer, wine, and spirits market, but it suggests, and illuminates an interesting phenomenon.

You have to position your product for the audience you want to attract and appeal to. Getting out in front of the competition in an emerging market is always a big of all right, no?

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10/4/19

The Wackiness of Politics in Minneapolis

You may have noticed that your Big Red Car has been steering clear of politics recently. No reason, but I have.

Today, I saw something so wacky that I started laughing. Laughter led to bemusement and who do I share my bemusement with? That would be you, dear reader.

So, the Trump campaign — Trump2020 — announces it is holding a campaign rally in Minneapolis in the same Congressional District as Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

Congresswoman Omar, the Assistant Squad Leader for The Squad, has been an ardent critic of President Trump, so somebody with a sense of humor over at Trump2020 said, “Hey, let’s go hold a Trump2020 rally in Congresswoman Omar’s District, say what?”

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10/3/19

Who Is Accountable For Bad Policy?

Comes now the issue of the $15 minimum wage, one of those issues championed by the left that was predicted to have catastrophic results if enacted.

Sticking their heads firmly in the sand, the liberal left in places like New York State refused to study, investigate, or reason with the voices who protested, recommended caution, or who suggested another way. Instead the hands on the whip enacted legislation to achieve their political ends back in 2016.

Now, those chickens have come home to roost.

In New York State, a law was enacted that increased the minimum wage as subdivided by the following entities:

New York City — big employers defined as 11 or more employees

New York City — small employers defined as 10 or fewer employees

Long Island, Westchester

The balance of New York State

For New York City, the minimum wage was raised to $15/hour on 31 December 2018.

Opponents of this new law had pleaded before its inception during the debate that they could not sustain that level of compensation and would ultimately go out of business.

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10/3/19

The Whistleblower — Exclusive Interview

The call came in yesterday. It was a little mysterious, so I was understandably cautious.

“Listen, Big Red Car, how would you like an exclusive interview with THE WHISTLEBLOWER?” the voice asked in a furtive whisper.

“You mean, THE whistleblower?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Sure, when?”

Today, I am sitting with The Whistleblower and we are going to chat about his complaint.

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