If I am so smart, why am I not rich?

I was having this discussion with a fellow engineer back in the late 70s and suggested that, in this society, J. Paul Getty or John D. Rockefeller would have to rank as the some of the smartest people who ever lived. He said: "NO! That can't be true!" Then I responded: "If we are so smart, why aren't we rich?" I suspect that personal and intellectual integrity has something to do with it. Among other problems integrity raises are observations that, in polite society, are considered tactless. If you are going to "Go along to get along" as Carl Albert and Sam Rayburn used to say, it helps not to raise ugly truths that disturb the tranquility obtained by soothing lies.


"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."