Our Art Director Has Gone Insane

My latest Money and Markets is up now. You can find it at: http://moneyandmarkets.com/press.asp?rls_id=391&cat_id=6&

I have to say despite my bitching yesterday, the shortened version is actually pretty good. And Martin asked me to rewrite the lead and he was correct. I like the new lead I wrote better. Here's the new version...

I'm not much of a poker player — I talk too much and I'm too honest. Poker is a game where stone-faced SOBs end up with all the chips. Now, as I watch conflicts sprout up around the globe, I can only hope that we have some stone-faced SOBs on our side of the table.

Reason: The stakes are just too high. Sure, ideological differences are part of the reason for what's going on in the world today. But I think there's another, more tangible prize at the heart of it all: scarce natural resources such as oil, natural gas, metals ... even water.

Kudos to my editor Nilus for putting up with me. My new lead benefited tremendously from his editing.

Now, it's time to kill the art director.

Exhibit A is my Money and Markets from last week, "Kicking Butt by Kicking the Oil Habit." I direct you to the photo that was inserted with a caption that I DID NOT write...

For the record, I DO NOT believe nuclear power is the pot at the end of the rainbow. It's one of a number of answers to our energy problems, and the main answer is we have to change how we use/waste power in this country. Conservation is very important and hardly ever mentioned.

Well that was enough to put me in a bad mood. Now let's look at the next photo in the story. See if you can figure out what's wrong with it...

If you guessed: "that photo doesn't look like uranium mine," you'd be correct.

Well, I shouldn't complain too much. I'm not trying to be a diva. I'm getting published. And the edited (shortened) versions of my Money and Markets pieces are good for the short-attention-span crowd.

Check out my new gold and energy blog at MoneyAndMarkets.com