"Nowadays, you can't turn on the TV without some talking head telling you about the economy. Yet, in a world overrun by 'analysts,' only one man has the guts, the brains, and, quite frankly, the poetry to put it all in perspective.That man is Michael Silverstein... Silverstein is a true intellectual." — Gersh Kuntzman, The New York Post

"Few people have found much to laugh about in the stock market this year. Michael Silverstein is the exception. The Bard of the Bourse can find humor in losing money, globalization and stock options." — USA Today

More Of What The Critics Are Saying
About Silverstein's Verse

 

The second largest army of occupation in Iraq today isn’t British or Polish. It consists of 25,000 private contractors—”security consultants”—supplied by corporations to provide military support, and on occasion, to fight and kill. The Pentagon thinks this kind of privatization is a good idea. But it makes a lot of other people nervous...

Corporate Warriors

The soldiers we know best, they fight for their country,
They join up to meet manhood’s most trying test,
And also, perhaps, to show home folks they’re worthy,
By being a part of an honor-bound quest.

But then there are those who now fight under contract,
For companies renting them out by the day,
Some of these men see nobility here,
Others sign up ‘cause they just like the pay.

The issue here, though, isn’t fighters’ own motives,
It’s licensing out legal rights to wage war,
In the past privateers and paid mercs were quite common,
Their history’s one that we should not ignore.

When battle’s a business and fighters employees,
And casualties outsourced, an off-book expense,
A door has been opened, one long shut and boarded,
War fought for just cause soon becomes a pretense.

It’s a slippery slope, this allegiance for hire,
Strange outcomes from deals like this can accrue,
Mix profit and warfare, one day you might find,
The bite that you bought has come back to bite you.

**********

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Michael Silverstein

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