Send ProFlowers, Send Disappointment

I am astonished that ProFlowers delivers their products to sick patients confined to hospital beds. The patient must await someone with a knife or box cutter to open the pasteboard container, and scissors and water to arrange the mediocre flower bud stems. Call a real florist who takes pride in cheering up the sick.

In fact, sending ProFlowers 'Get Well Wishes' is just as disappointing to a sick person at home, especially someone confined to bed or in a sling or cast. I speak my opinion as I have received ProFlowers in both situations above mentioned.

Here is a 2011 'testimonial' to ProFlowers on sending Romantic Greetings to someone you love: Great way to ship a cardboard box to the one you love! He describes spending $80.00 at ProFlowers, which would more than cover very decent, hand-arranged, personally-delivered flowers from a real, local florist. He wrote:

"I clicked on and purchased flowers based on their picture and that is what I should have received. That is what I was buying. Sending me a box of flowers and a vase is just unacceptable. It would be like ordering a Big Mac from the photo on the menu board at McDonalds and them bringing you a bun, a couple hamburger patties, and some condiments."

He further wonders about ProFlowers sending funeral flowers. Does anyone at the funeral ever remove the flowers from the ProFlowers box and arrange them?

Send ProFlowers only to those who know flower-arranging, and who love a challenge. There are a large number of national florists who will deliver professionally arranged flowers from your local florist, ready for the recipient to immediately enjoy. If you cannot afford that, then send a lovely card instead. Don't disappoint your recipient with ProFlowers.

Democracy's Demagogues

A demagogue is a political leader who rises up in a democracy by appealing to the emotions, prejudices, and ignorance of the less-educated, poorer segment of a population. Performing as a popular rabble-rouser, he uses rhetorical skills to garner power and promote his political motives. A Demagogue usually opposes thoughtful deliberations, instead using any national crises to advocate for immediate action which advances his long-range goal of increased power to himself. Demogogues demonize political opponents by accusing them of weakness, iniquitous motives and disloyalty to the nation.

Demagogues have appeared in democracies since ancient Athens (i.e. Cleone, Alcibiades) to the present day. Adolf Hitler, the Uber-demagogue who afflicted the entire modern world, was democratically elected by his people. Democracies were instituted to ensure freedom for all and place government authority in the hands of the people. The demagogue exploits democracy's fundamental weakness: that ultimate power is held by the people, with nothing preventing the people from giving that power to a demagogue. The demagogue often displays hypnotic power to appeal to the lowest common denominator of a large segment of the people, the poor, the uneducated and the ill-informed. Charming the masses, demagogues exploit the freedom secured under democracy to gain a level of power for themselves that overrides the rule of law, and undermines democracy.