Inversely Proportional

I was perusing the news reports this morning. And that's what I do in the morning, peruse the news reports. I examine the Boston Globe headlines sent to me, scan a couple of more interesting looking ones (a story about 12 men returning from a funeral brutally beating a man to death outside a bar apparently because he tried to bum a cigarette, an editorial about increasing penalties for pitchers throwing at the batters' heads, possible Obama sightings on Martha's Vineyard, etc), and then move onto the full news feeds from Google News and maybe some financial stuff from Marketwatch.

Anyway, I came across a report about Burger King. It's a financial one. But it reflects on the American culture. It seems that Burger King has had a really good quarter. They made $58.9 million for the quarter, an increase of $8.2 million over the same quarter last year.

This is happening at the very same time that we (the collective "we" that is, the US) have been complaining about fast food and poor diets.

I see a pattern here. I spotted it a number of years ago. Remember back when we had that oil embargo thingy in the 70's? And everyone was complaining about how terrible it was that we were importing 18% of our oil?

Just look how we improved things...


Today, we are importing approximately 60% of our oil.

See the pattern yet?

Consider why your kids do the opposite of what you tell them to do.

Consider why Jerry Lewis movies were so unpopular with film critics and why the movie goers loved them.

Consider Rap music.