Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
Issue link: http://www.epageflip.net/i/323481
6 JUNE 4-10, 2014 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM President Obama's poll numbers have been in the toilet of late. He needs a dramatic movement to perk up his ratings. Current events run amuck. As Willie Yeats once wrote, "Things fall apart; the center cannot hold/ ... The ceremony of innocence is drowned;/ The best lack all conviction, while the worst/ Are full of passionate intensity." The Ukraine has been carved up by Putin. The new billionaire Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko made his fortune selling chocolate. Can we expect a Ukrainian Willie Wonka to successfully stand up to Vlad the Inhaler of Crimea? Yet another nut with a gun committed another mass killing in California. The news media keep showing the murderer's YouTube videos; glorifying him while pretending to be appalled. This week's gun nut will probably end up on the cover of Rolling Stone in a glamor shot thus inspiring other nuts with guns and grudges to do the same thing to get their fifteen minutes of fame. Watching the media repeatedly show his YouTubes reminded me of the gleeful hysteria of network weathermen when they have hurricanes, tornadoes or snow storms to salivate over. China, Japan and Vietnam are about to come to blows over some uninhabited rocks in the China sea. Obama visits Afghanistan but doesn't meet with Karzai, begging the question of why we have Americans dying to support Karzai's government. Rubbing Dulcolax in our wounds, The Wall Street Journal had a recent article that revealed America's toilet gap with Japan. America is behind in the most basic field of human endeavor, toilet technology. Japan has mastered the Smart Toilet. America has dumb toilets. More than 75 percent of Japanese homes are equipped with smart toilets that lift their lids automatically. Their toilets have built-in bidets. Japanese toilets have computer apps which allow users to sync their smart phones to play music from speakers built into the toilet bowls. Some of these toilets cost more than $5,000, which seems a bit much, but they are really cool toilets with lots of buttons. Our own toilet companies are being eliminated or bought outright by Japanese toilet companies. American Standard Brands, a once proud name in American toilets has been purchased by Lixil Corporation, a Japanese company. The CEO of Lixil sees beyond the bowl. He knows that America will want Smart Toilets. He compared Smart Toilets with smart phones. Until smart phones were invented, we didn't know we wanted one. Once Lixil gets through with us, we will all want Smart Toilets just like we all want Smart Phones. A multimillion dollar ad campaign is coming from American Standard to push Smart Toilets. No less an authority on toilets than Whoopi Goldberg said on the Oprah show that her smart toilet "was the greatest invention on the face of this Earth." Smart Toilet sales are estimated to reach $12 billion in 2017. Japanese toilets are going to wipe out American toilets. It is the New Millennium for toilet technology. Can we sit back and let the Japanese waste America's Smart Toilet market? Can we afford to lose the Smart Toilet race? Nay, a thousand times, nay! I say "No way, Jose!" America once was able to put a man on the moon, can we not put Americans on American Smart Toilets? Obama should call a special session of Congress like President Kennedy did in 1961 when faced with the space gap with the U.S.S.R. Obama's poll numbers will burst into the stratosphere if he goes before Congress and modifies JFK's stirring words to get America moving again in toilet technology. The speech writes itself: "I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing men and women on American Smart Toilets and returning them safely to Earth. No single toilet technology project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long range exploration of Smart Toilet technology. We choose to manufacture the Smart Toilet in America, not because it is easy, but because it is hard, because that goal of Smart Toilets will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win." One day American Smart Toilets will be flush with success. On that proud day we shall credit President Obama. Godzilla Versus the Smart Toilet by PITT DICKEY PITT DICKEY, Attorney, Contribut- ing Writer. COMMENTS? Editor@ upandcomingweekly.com. Smart Toilet sales are estimated to reach $12 billion in 2017. "I feel confident that the nurses will always be there with Jack at school, making sure he is safe." – Al F., Jack's dad With BAYADA Pediatrics… Call 910-486-5001 | www.bayada.com Compassion. Excellence. Reliability. Jack F. and his BAYADA School Nurse Katie Mitros, RN BAYADA Pediatrics provides IEP driven nursing services in public and private schools from early childhood through high school. • Daily, one-to-one care during school hours, transportation, and field trips • Training and assistance for school staff and IEP teams • Trained and fully insured pediatric nursing specialists Corporate Sponsors: Utley & Knowles CPAs COMING SOON! Up & Coming Weekly's 17th Annual Best of Fayetteville Awards Who will be this year's "Best of the Best"? Ballots available in the next editions of Up & Coming Weekly or Vote Online! www.upandcomingweekly.com Check out the details on the Best of Fayetteville Awards Party on September 16th. Mark your calendars for the fun and vote for your favorite people, businesses, organizations and venues. PRIMARY LOGO & IDENTITY GUIDELINES Standard Times New Roman Minimum Logo Width - 1.5" 1.5" is the safest minimum size for the primary logo. Minimum Alt. 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