It's Time To Blow Up the Maskhole's Sick and Twisted Plan
For businesses wanting a competitive edge, a "let's all live" marketing strategy is the opportunity of the decade!Well, it’s started. The United States has reached the point, in many parts of the country, where there are more vaccines available then there are people willing to take them.
Most of this so-called “vaccine reluctance“ is driven by pure politics.
Donald Trump‘s visceral hatred of Joe Biden, who beat him like a drum in the last election, and the Republican party’s commitment to raw power over anything that may help Americans, have brought us this crisis.
If Trump, Fox and the GOP can convince the people who follow them that they shouldn’t get vaccines, they can prevent President Biden from getting this pandemic under control.
If they can prevent Biden from getting the disease under control, they also prevent him from getting the economy back in shape.
And - Bingo! - if they prevent him from getting the economy back in shape, Republicans see victories in the 2022 midterm elections and might even take back the White House in 2024.
This is their simple but brutal math, and they frankly don’t care who it kills. The more the better, in fact, because chaos hurts the (Democratic) party in power. After all, they’ve already shown us they’re willing to kill a half-million Americans just to try to win the last election.
And, as village idiot and Senator Ron Johnson said yesterday as he was discouraging general consideration of vaccine documentation, “Why is this big push to make sure everybody gets a vaccine, to the point when you better impose it, you’re going to shame people, you’re going to force them to carry a card to prove that they’ve been vaccinated so they can just stay in society. I’m getting highly suspicious of what’s happening here.”
Right. It’s just a public health emergency that’s killed a half-million Americans. No big deal for rich Republicans.
So it’s up to us to blow up their plan. And if enough of us take one small, simple step we may be able to pull it off. Here’s how:
I’m calling restaurants, bars, stores, and other places of business that I’ve patronized over the past couple of years. Taking it slow, just one or two a day. Casual.
My conversation goes something like this:
Me: “I see we’re getting close to the point where the economy can open back up. I’m so excited about coming back to your (restaurant, store)! I love your (mention dish or product so they know I’m a real customer)! I just wanted to make sure, first, that you’re requiring proof of vaccination before you let people in?”
Them: “We don’t have any specific policy about that, but you’re more than welcome to come. All of us who work here are vaccinated!”
Me: “Well, let me give you my name and phone number and you can call me if you decide to change your policy. For at least the next year, I’m only going to patronize businesses that require proof of vaccination to get in the door. Even though I’m vaccinated, I don’t want to be exposed to someone who’s not and who might be carrying around one of those weird variants.”
Them (usually sounding a bit rattled): “I’ll be sure to tell the manager that you called...”
This can work.
The primary imperative of every business is something called “differentiation.” When I taught marketing and ran an advertising agency in Atlanta, I’d always ask, “What makes you different from your competitors? What is it you’re offering that they aren’t or can’t? Simply put, ‘what is your unfair competitive advantage?’”
More often than not, the answer to that question became the focus of a great marketing campaign.
America is experiencing a mind-boggling amount of pent-up demand right now. People want to go out and eat, drink, celebrate, dance and buy things. But many, almost certainly a majority, want to do so safely.
So, if even a small but meaningful percentage of businesses decide it’s good marketing to cater exclusively to people who have taken the time and trouble to get vaccinated, it’ll create a social pressure that will begin to wear down those who people Republican politicians and Fox News have convinced that the virus is no big deal.
But big deal or no, they still want to get into the restaurant! And that could get us to the 75%-85% vaccinated herd immunity threshold we need for a safe country regardless of Trump’s or Johnson’s inane sputtering or Tucker’s smarmy “questions.”
Back in the 1980s a dear friend of mine, Tom Larsen, owned one of the finest high-end restaurants in Boston, The Pillar House. Every restaurant in town at that time had both smoking and no-smoking sections, but Tom was committed to serving extraordinary food in a clean environment where you could actually smell and taste the flavors his chefs so meticulously curated.
So in 1986 he banned all smoking at The Pillar House, even in the bar and the bathrooms: his was the first consequential restaurant in Boston, and one of the first in the nation, to do so.
I remember when he made the decision. We discussed it quite a bit, in fact. I was fully expecting he would lose business, but instead, as word spread, his business continue to grow!
The restaurant got enormous publicity (it was picked up by the AP nationwide!), their non-smoking customers became fanatically loyal, and the few hard-core smokers they lost were insignificant to their business.
As an added bonus, restaurants around the country, reading about Tom’s experience, started emulating him. Non-smoking restaurants became a thing in 1986, and within a few years became the norm. Even Boston’s Newton-Wellesley Hospital went smoke-free, the first hospital to do so in the area, citing Tom’s restaurant as an example.
There are a lot of us out here who don’t want to be exposed to GOP- and Fox News-maskholes and the viruses they may be carrying.
They’re this generation’s version of the selfish smokers in the 1980s, and we’re the health-concerned non-smokers. We would very much like safe spaces to enjoy shopping, dining or other activities without smoke or germs being blown on us by inconsiderate people.
For businesses looking for a competitive edge, this “let’s all live” marketing prescription is the opportunity of the decade!
And with just a few simple phone calls, you can help make it happen.
Original daily post with link to Pillar House timeline: HartmannReport.com
= new reply since forum marked as read
Response to thomhartmann (Original post)
"Why on earth would someone pay huge money for a black market vaccination card when they could just go get vaccinated?"
FOR FREE! Don't forget, the vaccine is free.
Let me see, should I spend big money for a fake vaccine card or get one FOR FREE by getting a couple of shots? Hmmmmm.... decisions, decisions! 🤔
I am fully vaxxed and proud of it, thank you very much. But seriously, how illogical is that? 
This is something they can control - the people who work for them. If the servers and waitstaff have been vaccinated, it's a big step towards being ready to open up for the public.
Restaurants don't want to lose customers, and they shouldn't, if they can confidently state that their employees are 100% vaccinated. After awhile they will see that it does improve their business. Those owners will be more likely to take the next step and require customers to prove that they've been vaxxed also.
it was easy (in one sense) to ban smoking because all businesses had to do was post signs that said no smoking and if they saw someone smoking that person was obviously breaking the rule.
vaccines are not that apparent. they are not visible. how do you ban anti-vaxxers when they can simply lie and say they have had the vaccine or show some bullshit vaccine card?
i like the idea of "let's all live" campaign but i don't know how it would get implemented in real time in stores/businesses.
HOWEVER--did you hear congressman bobby rush's comments the other day? i was thinking more along the lines of public service announcements on various forms of media (and it would be perfect to call it the "let's all live campaign" )
here's what bobby rush said:
"Stop playing Russian roulette with your grandparents and your aunts and uncles and your mothers and your daddies, stop playing Russian roulette with their lives and your lives. Get your shot. Get your vaccine."
"If we were giving away Chicken McNuggets here tonight, the hall would be overflowing. And most of you who would be there don’t know what is in that Chicken McNugget. You trust McDonald's, you ought to trust our doctors who are telling you that the only way we can [beat] this pandemic and stop our loved ones and neighbors, our loved ones from dying from this dreaded disease is that you and I get our vaccine."
i heard someone play this clip on WCPT the other evening when i was driving home but, unfortunately, the only place i can find it online is at a chicago/fox link. so here's the link: https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/congressman-bobby-rush-tells-vaccine-skeptics-stop-playing-russian-roulette-with-lives
if an ad campaign like that got started then the stores could post signs that let customers know they support it: "be sure to get your covid vaccine. LET'S ALL LIVE"
(love you thom, love your show!)
You Know damn well that these republicans that are causing all this Anti- vaccine rhetoric are vaccinated. Fucking hypocrites.They don't want to die, who else will spread their lies. We have to were a seatbelts,need car insurance, have to ware shoes and shirt no service,cant go over the speed limit etc. what's the difference. Get vaccinated save your self and your loved ones not to mention everyone else.
