HOW TO BECOME A CEO - AND MAKE A KILLING

TIPS FROM THE TOP ...(Excerpts)

*..."Me, I do not drink, ever. I do not want to lose control. Lose control and you lose. I do not smoke either. It’s a sign of weakness and slop. I don’t swear; that is I don’t swear out loud. I think swear words - everybody does that; but using vulgar language is more slop. And I don’t cheat on my wife. All that is bad for business, bad for getting ahead in business.  Distractions, weaknesses and slop. Rule#1: You must keep en guard to get ahead.  Besides, while everybody else is drinking, using crude speech, ingesting nicotine while squinting through their own smoke, and screwing around with other women - I can observe what is happening and pick my shots."

*..."Today's CEO is better off than were the kings in Europe during their glory years. He is more like a dictator - make that: He is a dictator. He rules.  If he’s good, he rules with an iron fist. His people love him for it.  He becomes wealthy and gets daily massages and all the perks in the world - and he gets adulation. The tougher he is the more he makes. The more he makes, the more he is liked, the more he ...it goes on and on. The CEO is today’s mega celebrity. He marries Hollywood celebs - or at least sleeps with them. He hires Pop-celebs for his advertisements, and has Rock celebs perform at his charity and anniversary bashes. He gets men inserted as Presidents of countries, ours included.  He rules absolutely. It is the most fun job there is. And I want it."

*..."My take on the America we are living in is: We are a Republic, not of States representing the people - but of many corporations, run by CEO/Dictators, who know how to get things done. We, I mean, the CEO’s are the true constituents, for it is their money and therefore, their vote that counts. We are a country of businesses of the people, businesses for the people and businesses by the people and all those businesses are run by the CEO’s. Congress, the Judiciary and the President, all serve at the pleasure of this fine aggregate.  When the President says he is going to do something, attack somebody, or study something, like mining effluents in rivers, for a couple more years - in the name if American interests, he is speaking about the interests as financially expressed by the CEO’s of America. I do not mean to sound like a patriotic flag waver; but by God, I want to become a member of this club of clubs more than I want life itself. Having a firm idea of your goal helps you achieve it, you know. Psychological studies have shown this to be the case."

*..."Now, you might think I would have been satisfied for the time being, being paid over a quarter million a year, and flying all over the country in a private jet and having the company pick up every bill I could possibly generate - but I wasn’t. And if you do not understand that, then you know nothing of the power of ambition, or the vice versa. It was not enough, especially when I saw I was already better, quicker, tougher and more ruthless than the few straight lined above me.

            There are a lot of things I am not sure about. Like, is there a God? Or, if there is life after death?  But I do have my beliefs. I believe, for example, there are hierarchies within hierarchies. There is a hierarchy among nations and America is at the top. There is a hierarchy in America and the CEO is at the top.

..."He missed the President’s speech, which was a whopper. It was about us being the good guys and anyone who was not with us was against us and not our friend anymore and how Democracy must flourish and how we must all do what we can to protect American Interests. Well! We stood in thunderous applause for over ten minutes. Everybody had a shot at an individual photo with the President. It was great and I’m not ashamed to be called a patriot. The picture is on my wall, next to the clock that shows the time on the East Coast.

            These $250, 000 meals are worth every penny in business card swapping alone. Once you claw you way into this club, it is hard to tumble out. We take care of our own; like the Marines - only better. You can bankrupt a company, devastate a town with unemployment, poison rivers, cut down the forest primeval, overstate your earnings, and improperly borrow.  You can do all that, but once you are in the Club of the Quarter Million Pounders somebody is going to hire you to run another situation, no matter what your recent exposure was. The trick is getting there. And there I was among the permanently eligible. Me, Albert Greves, trading cards with pirates, raiders, arms dealers and all the captains of industry.  I was arriving.  I wish my dad could have seen me. He would have been impressed. Surprised; but impressed, all the same."