Category: Commentary

“Waiting insistently in front of a tightly closed door is unfair to all of the open doors! Give a chance to the open doors!” ― Mehmet Murat ildan

At more than seventy-five thousand pages long, the US tax code is so complex, it makes War and Peace seem like a beach read. And it is always changing. Between 2001 and 2012, the code was amended 4,680 times or more than once a day.

“You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” – C.S. Lewis

Toy giant Hasbro has explored other businesses over the decades. At various points, the company, named after the founding Hassenfeld brothers, sold school supplies and cookware, and it even operated a chain of daycare centers.

“The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt

On May 3, 2003, New Hampshire lost its most iconic landmark when the Old man of the Mountain fully collapsed. Today there’s a  memorial viewing plaza at the spot the face-shaped rock once loomed over.

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on your own, and you know what you know. And you are the guy who’ll decide where to go.” – Dr. Seuss

Ray-Ban sunglasses probably owe Tom Cruise a lifetime supply of shades. Sales of their wayfarer-style glasses were so-so until Cruise sported them in 1983’s Risky Business, at which point they shot up 50%. Their aviator design also exploded after Cruise sported them for 1986’s Top Gun.

“The key responsibility of leadership is to think about the future. No one else can do it for you.” – Brian Tracy

Ancient Rome’s Laws of the Twelve Tables decreed that the punishment for composing or singing a song that slandered another person was death ( though there’s no evidence the penalty was ever given out).

“Make your life a masterpiece, imagine no limitations on what you can be, have, or do.”  – Brian Tracy

Painter Norman Rockwell often used real people as models for his art, including neighbors, friends, and relatives. In The Scoutmaster(1956), he painted a young Boy Scout named Howard Lincoln, who later grew up to be chairman of Nintendo of America.

“It ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.”— Sylvester Stallone in Rocky Balboa

Adam Rainer knew what life was like as both a little person and a giant. Rainer was reportedly four feet, six inches at age eighteen. Thanks to a pituitary gland disorder, he grew three inches a year from twenty-one to thirty-one and beyond, eventually topping out at seven feet, eight inches.