Richard Branson has already committed profits from Virgin Airlines to combat global warming and has now offered an enormous reward of $32 million, along with the full endorsement of eminent Australian environmentalist Tim Flannery (Australian of the Year) and others for someone to invent a way of removing carbon dioxide from the earth's atmosphere. Whilst wild in its optimism, this is one way of flauting John Howard (Il Diablo's best mate) and his idiotic assumption that the jury is still out on global warming. OK . . selling resources to the world's developing nations - namely China and India (and if I get another call from India trying to sell me a better mobile phone deal I'm going to fly over there and burst into a call centre to garotte their manager) is why our stock market is soaring and the resources boom fattening the bank accounts of those who can afford to invest. (I'm sounding rather intelligent for someone who's just opened their second bottle). Anyway, what do you think of Richard Branson? This is the man who guards Virgin's brand as closely as MacDonalds guard their own. He turns up on Rove Live (Aussie variety show) in someone's back yard and gets tossed into their pool, like the guy next door - I guess proving he's a man of the people - he shows up at the graduation of every Virgin flight attendant ( Few bosses really give a shit about anyone's achievements, work or otherwise). Then he has a reality TV show where contestants face a Donald Trumpish humiliation in order to secure a job in the Virgin conglomerate - even to the point where he makes them walk a tightrope between two airborne hot air ballons! He's an anachronism. Is he serious? Seems to be . . . maybe he has the formula right for this generation - the common touch. He's conquered TV, airlines, Credit Cards - embraced commercialism, remained true to the cause and still portrays this grounded persona despite his wealth and accolades. His latest innovation, Virgin Galactic will have us flying into space and in Australia his sponsored Rock Festival "V Festival" takes off later this month which many promotors feel may threaten the lively rock festival season because he can afford to draw the big acts. So what to make of this self-made multi-billionaire . . . smart businessman, ecologist, entrepreneur, man of the masses, social commentator . . . for me, the jury's out . . . but anyone willing to put up that kind of dosh
for a CO2 eating solution? Well it's gotta be a win win . . . he is one of the 10 people I'd like to invite to dinner.
Yo Helen... One of my mates is a plumber and he had done some work for Dicky at his house in the UK. He said Richard was a REAL down to earth guy... treated him just as one of the guys... he even said Richard talks to the old ladies on the street every morning when he goes out to get the mail... I think he's top-shelf...
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