Cynicism… what does it get you?
Like some guru urging an audience to be upbeat, I was telling myself… ‘Harv, you’ve got to get some of that going!’
So, starting on the path to positivity, the other day, among the first email messages, in my tech device, was an email stridently telling me my response was needed, immediately.
It was one of those… how shall I put this?… questionable emails, rather suspicious, urging me to click on something, so I’d get some wonderful grand prize.
A bit later, in the next batch of emails, several of them dearly wanted me to purchase discounted retail goods, Memorial Day Weekend specials, I wasn’t the least bit interested in buying.
Fairly typical news alerts were showing up, elsewhere in my tech device, with much of the news about senseless death and destruction, among battling, warring nations, and on our own nation’s highways. Driving 120 miles an hour can be hazardous. Battling politicians were jawing about our nation’s debt ceiling; if the damn thing isn’t raised, our economy will go down the drain. Soldiers won’t be paid, along with many other folks, and there might be steep job losses.
What’s going to happen with military equipment? If soldiers aren’t paid, will there be any money for filling gas tanks? I was facetiously wondering. Will empty gas tanks stop armored military tanks in their tracks, so to speak? I’ve not heard anything about battery-powered tanks… only battery-driven toy tanks turned up in my online search.
That, in and of itself, was making stock markets all jittery.
As I was trying to get positivity going, the next day there was some seemingly encouraging news, but with caveats. Western states were agreeing to a Colorado River-sharing agreement. That was in a Colorado Newsline article, posted in the Daily Post on Wednesday.
But if there’s less precipitation in coming years, more cooperation among the states may be necessary, which could be difficult to negotiate.
Hydroelectric power has been in the news. Without enough water rushing through reservoir turbines, hydroelectricity could be up the creek, so to speak? Nothing’s known for sure, just yet, but all this news can be concerning.
Did you hear about someone, apparently, using AI (artificial intelligence), posting a fake picture the other day, suggesting the Pentagon had been bombed, which caused stock markets to dive, almost like that SpaceX Starship rocket, that dived precipitously, and was destroyed less than four minutes after blasting off from its Texas launchpad.
And, one more thing, if you’ll indulge me for another moment, or two… it’s another thing about my family’s recent refrigerator ‘adventure,’ I mentioned, the other day. I was reaching out to the fridge manufacturing firm, with the past tense of the word ‘sing,’ in its name, for perspectives on the company’s methodology, its practices and procedures, regarding customer relations and media relations.
I’d reached out to the company’s customer relations and media relations departments, but I’ve not received any response.
Recalling my decades in media relations, I was wondering what I might have done, in similar circumstances, if someone had asked me about something similar.
I maybe might have pissed and moaned, some, to myself, but I wouldn’t have ignored the inquiry.
That just wasn’t in the old DNA I was steeped in, back then.
So anyway… regarding my getting some positivity going…
I’m still working on that.
Harvey Radin is former senior vice president in charge of corporate communications and media relations, Bank of America Western Region. He makes his home in Redwood City, CA.