Oh, Poor Us...

Is this article supposed to make me feel bad for eDiets?

These guys snatched up remnant inventory from publishers on a CPC basis during the online ad downturn and now that we're experiencing an upswing, there's less remnant inventory for them to lock up at next-to-nothing prices. In other words, their acquisition cost targets were so low that there's no place for them to go to get inventory cheaply anymore without being pre-empted.

The days of foisting every bit of risk off on publishers is over. Demand is back up, and unless a company wants to deal with sketchy spammers or tier four pop-up companies, there's no reason to expect to be able to continue "nickel a click" deals. eDiets also attributed rising acquisition costs partly to "spikes in sell-out rates, which lower the availability of 'make good' advertising inventory." In other words, their cost per click is so low it's hard for them to get a makegood on underdelivered clicks.

What some companies playing in the PPC space don't understand is that success is not all about driving your Cost Per Click down to pennies. Higher-priced inventory can actually generate new customers more cheaply if the offer is compelling enough.

Just Plain Lazy

The last time our president secretly diverted funds in order to pay for a war, we called it "The Iran-Contra Affair" and it became one of the biggest scandals in U.S. history.

The last time our president addressed the American public and told an out-and-out lie, we called it "The Monica Lewinsky Scandal" and President Clinton was impeached for it.

The last time we thought someone in the administration had profited directly from improper and unethical business deals, we called it "Whitewater" and we launched a full investigation.

It seems that we're willing to let this administration get away with things the public has gone positively apeshit over in the past. It's time for the public to get off its collective lazy ass and insist that something be done with all of the evidence of the administration's impropriety. It's great to be able to bring a lot of this stuff to light, but it doesn't do anyone any good if we don't do something about what's happened.

Things That Ticked Me Off About Last Night's Press Conference

It gave me no pleasure to watch President Bush squirm under the weight of reporters' questions last night, but it ticked me off to no end that Bush refused to acknowledge that his approach to Iraq and, separately, to the War on Terror leaves no room for improvement.

Speaking of squirming, that's how the President came off last night - at least in my view. Yet, mainstream news coverage of the press conference paints a much different picture, one of a composed and unwavering chief executive. I have yet to see a mainstream news piece that points out the President's obvious difficulty in thinking on his feet last night.

Okay, so the President had an off night. No biggie. But what really makes me upset is Bush's flagrant attempts to distance himself from bureaucratic foul-ups that happened on his watch. The President affirmed his expectation that he should get accurate information concerning FBI investigations from his briefings, but failed to take responsibility when that information turned out to be faulty. But if briefing information is consistently inaccurate, whose responsibility is it to fix the system and hold those responsible accountable? That responsibility belongs to the President.

The same kind of responsibility-shirking shows up in the President's comments about the evaluation of terror threats. Repeatedly, Bush asserted that his response to the 8/6 PDB was appropriate, given that the nation wasn't "on a war footing." The bigger question for me was "Should we have been on a war footing at the time of the 9/11 terrorist attacks?"

Considering the first World Trade Center bombing, the attack on the U.S.S. Cole, Clinton's actions in Afghanistan and the 1998 embassy bombings, I think we should have been in a heightened state of alert, if not "on war footing." The Bush administration knew Al-Qaeda was dangerous, knew for quite some time that Al-Qaeda was determined to attack targets on U.S. soil and had Osama Bin Laden on the FBI's Most Wanted List for a long time. That PDB should have set off alarms all over the place.

Even if Bush was unapologetic about his reasons for going into Iraq and his approach to the War on Terror, his inflexibility with regard to the June 30th deadline for relinquishing control over Iraq to a new Iraqi government is a huge cause for concern. We don't yet know what this new government will look like. Yet Bush is determined to meet that deadline even if circumstances beyond our control indicate that a review of this timetable is in everybody's best interests. I think it's an ego thing. Bush doesn't want to admit that June 30th, a scant two and a half months away, might be an unrealistic deadline, even as our troops fight off insurgencies. Classic hubris.

Now It's Cheney's Turn to Laugh at You

Dick Cheney, desperately searching back
issues of Martha Stewart Living for
instructions on how to remove
bloodstains from paper money

Give Dick Cheney the benefit of the doubt for just a second. Let's assume that the $178,437 he received from Halliburton in 2003 really was deferred compensation for his services rendered in 1999. Let's also assume for the time being that his claim that this compensation is not tied in any way to performance is also true.

Does that change the fact that Halliburton and its subsidiary, KBR, are still under investigation by military investigators for overcharging the government for oil and meals served to U.S. troops in Iraq? No, it doesn't. At worst, Cheney's compensation is dirty money. At best, he doesn't seem to care about the risk of the appearance of impropriety.

Even if you do take what Dick Cheney says as gospel, the facts clearly show that he has no qualms about taking money from a company that may very well have defrauded the government. Especially when your family has taxable income of over 800 grand, wouldn't it make sense to refuse the $178K from the potentially dirty company?

What this tells me is that Cheney doesn't give a shit what we think. Evidently, he thinks nothing of putting his personal gain above the principles that all government officials should adhere to. Let's toss this asshole and his blood money out of office in November.