Word: pitchmen
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...evidence of the decline in America's morals, Trippett catalogues examples of public skepticism as to the claims of various pitchmen, politicians and bureaucrats. Yet what is wrong with a public attitude of self-reliant doubt? Would a country of credulous gulls be more moral? He also points a finger at the "relaxation of moral codes" as a reason for "increased deception." Yet this famous "relaxation" means in practice that Americans have been freed from 19th century sexual taboos - and 19th century hypocrisy. Finally, when was this Golden Age when Americans did not attempt to con and cheat...
...charges grew out of a four-month investigation by New York and CFTC officials. Scam busters discovered seedy boiler rooms where pitchmen used computer lists to contact unsuspecting pigeons, or potential victims. The salesman, in a follow-up phone call, might then say discreetly, "If you act now, I can squeeze you in on a contract." While most of the contracts have not yet fallen due, investigators allege that brokers in fact do not possess the oil to back up the bogus deals. Eventually, customers would find that the salesmen had either left town or were no longer in business...
DIED. Long John Nebel, 66, dean of all-night radio talk-show hosts whose early specialty was interviewing hypnotists, UFO freaks and sundry other pitchmen of the occult; of cancer; in Manhattan. An eighth-grade dropout with a quicksilver tongue, Long John (6 ft. 5 in.) worked as carnival huckster, mind reader and auctioneer before going on Manhattan's WOR in 1956. Indefatigable, he came to command 42 hours of air time a week on WNBC, more than any other host in radio history...
...Reserve governors to agree-and even if he did, he would practically be inviting an outraged Congress to take away the Federal Reserve's cherished independence. One newspaper cartoon pictures Burns and Carter as a Washington version of Price and Pride, A. &P.'s smoothly complementary TV pitchmen: Burns presumably cautioning the proud Carter not to jazz up the economy so much as to make the inflationary price unacceptable. That may be overstating the prospects for harmony, but the two men at least realize that for the next year they will have to try hard to get along...
...investigation of American culture. He spends his spare time at plays, operas and especially movies. He is a considerable student of television, whether afternoon cartoons or old movies on the late show (he has worked up imitations of Humphrey Bogart's "Hello, sweetheart" and any number of commercial pitchmen). In a more Russian vein, he has begun reading Alexander Solzhenitsyn, whose books fill him with "pain and awe," according to Mrs. Saunder...