I love my mom. And she listens to the Fox TV version of talk radio. It made me sad when I visited her last month. Everything is either jingoistic, or promotes the destruction of liberal thinking. And it’s all filled with manipulation and the very thing she and others like her profess to hate—fake news. I am an Independent. Which is to say I don’t think either of the two major parties in the US have all the answers. Rather…
I’ve been a copywriter my whole life, but didn’t discover it as a career until I was 32. When I did, I had visions of doing big super bowl ads. That never happened. But I did end up doing work that I’m quite proud of, and that was extremely effective. Only the big, high-profile work was never meant to be. Yet. That said, I always bring big concepts into every project I work on. I’m a big fan of concept. …
Freedom is like Love. It’s a good idea, but one so vast that human beings are incapable of comprehending it. Like the universe. Like God. We are not designed to understand these things in their entirety. This is why we gravitate to soundbites that simplify our ideas of these things. It’s why “fake news” works. It’s why we go to meetings every week where we are told to “love each other.” It’s why politicians can spin lies—and somehow get away…
I was sitting in my first big client meeting where we were rebranding a Fortune 200. There were four of us from the agency at the table, while the other six seats were filled by C-level folks from the company. About ten minutes into the meeting, after the executives from the company had finished their introductory arguments on why they needed a rebrand, I wrote a tagline on a notecard. As the clients continued to talk, and reinforce what I…
I’ve known some pretty important men in my lifetime. Doctors. Businessmen. Philanthropists. Men of high regard who built lives that most anyone would look at and say, “There’s a successful man.” My uncle Finley Fox, who I only ever called Junior, died on Friday. I flew in from Charlotte and was blessed to be there when he crossed over. This was his 83rd year alive. And for my own 55, he was always a part of it. Until Friday. During…
I am white. I am a male. I was born in the United States in the 1960s. I had nothing to do with any of these things. And yet, these things define me.
