Mr Biz on DougStephan.com

LAKE WORTH, FLA. (June 22. 2003)--Harry Potter, wizard boy extraordinaire, meet NBA star-turned-motivational speaker-actor John Salley. For that matter, meet Dennis Rodman, or Michael Jordan.
Wall Street analysts take note. No, make that notes with an "s." The times they are a changing, and the dumbing down of America has taken an educational hit. Maybe we are becoming less dumb.
In some urban circles, and suburban wannabee enclaves, it has been counter-culture chic to play dumb, or be dumb.
When I called Gateway to complain about a problem with my new computer, a woman located in India answered the phone. She was articulate, literate, understandable, fairly competent, worked cheaply by U.S. standards, and filled the American brain gap for corporate America.
But listen up, kids are lining up at midnight to have their parents shell out $16, $20, or $30 for the latest Harry Potter episode.
For the commentators who fear kids will spend the summer away from healthy outdoor activities, curled up with Harry, I suggest they try lifting the 800-page tome above their head every 20 minutes or so.
It's true that there is a heavy middle class, white, SUV, soccer mom bias to the lines at Barnes and Nobles, Books-a-Million, or COSTCO, but that's the usual case in fad buying. It is true for expensive concert tickets which kids could never afford on their own, or Cabbage Patch and Elmo Christmas gifts.
But, if "trickle down" economics might not be foolproof, "trickle-up" wisdom is.
John Salley was the slick talking Miami Heat forward, when my younger son was of an impressionable age.
My son's reading was limited to school assignments, and not much of that. As a pseudo "Bad Boy" of the NBA with a smile, Salley usually grabbed a mic away from an announcer after a game; appeared on talk radio, and wrote articles for the local sports section. My son liked John Salley. He also liked Mitch Richmond, a local kid who starred for the Sacramento Kings, and started a "Solid as a Rock" scholarship club for kids with improving grades in school.
So, when the kid asked if he could subscribe to Sports Illustrated, I said, "sure."
The next shocker was when he spent his working money on a book. A hard cover book! We can now overlook the fact that it was a ghost-written biography of rainbow-haired Rodman, but heck, the kid was reading.
This was followed by bios of Michael Jordan, some humor by Dave Barry, and Drew Carey.
Drew Carey? Literature?
Handing me the Drew Carey book to read, my son mentioned that comedian Carey is a former Marine, and lost his dad at age eight, and had battled suicidal fits of depression.
As my teenager, five-varsity-letter athlete discovered reading, I learned that John Salley on the serious side, had dedicated his life to making kids look for the positive aspects of their own lives; that pop cult figures can teach lessons to kids, even if the lessons are sanitized by ghostwriters.
I learned that the catalyst for reading: Classic Illustrated Comics, Cliff Notes, Drew Carey, Spiderman, Hustler, is less important than starting a lifelong road to education.
A few years later I visited my son in London, where he was spending a semester as a college intern. I expected to hear about Manchester United, local bookmakers, and the best golf courses.
Instead, a somber young man came to my hotel room, and told me to sit down, he had something serious to discuss.
Still weary from the trans-Atlantic flight, he indeed caught my attention. I was now ready for an unexpected wife and child, a major felony conviction, a request for sex-change surgery, or news of a living arrangement with four lesbian students from Sri Lanka.
"Just sit there, and listen to this, this is one of the saddest days of my life," he said softly.
He opened a slim book of poems by British Poet-Laureate Ted Hughes, and started reading. The Sports Illustrated page-turner had been taking courses in poetry and theater, and on that very day, Hughes had died--just as the class was studying his works.
At that moment, I knew that my dad and his two brothers, all antiquarian booksellers during their careers, would be very proud.
The hype of Harry repeats the essence of my own experience, millions of times over. Kids are reading, and reading something which most critics feel has literary and moral values. Even the anti-Harry debate sparked by those opposed to the occult and witchcraft, provides a subject for real conversations between generations.
Think about it: parent-child relations can actually move on from the jewels in Britney Spears' navel and American Idol, to what the family is reading.
The final proof that Harry Potter is a positive economic, social, and moral catalyst for the United States came Friday afternoon.
I was talking to one of the most successful young corporate CEO's I know. He is part of the "me," and "now," and "have" generation. His favorite comment at (always brief) meetings is: "If you can't tell me the whole situation in 30 seconds, and can't email it in one short paragraph, it can't be important, and I don't want to know."
One of his little generosities is handing the unopened best sellers, business, sales, motivational, and academic business texts given to him as gifts, or purchased online at the spur of the moment--to employees with a "here, read this, it is supposed to be good."
Although in seven years of acquaintance I have never been elevated to the social or economic strata to be invited to his home, it is apparently a bastion of modern technology and luxury. The significant point is that while fully literate with high-speed computers, he once chuckled that he did not own a printer for his home computers. "Why? So I can print out long memos? I don't want messages I need to print. Tell me in one line. Get to the point."
This instant culture is particularly interesting politically. I recall focus groups asking people what made them vote for Bill Clinton, not just once, but twice? People would say he was very educated, very complete with his answers. They claimed in their personal lives that they want the fast food, and instant information, and CNN Headline News, but when it came to real life decisions they most respected a Rhodes Scholar who would get up at a Town Hall Meeting, and take 15 minutes to comprehensively answer a serious question, to a serious citizen, on a matter which that person thought was important to their life or their nation.
American children are lining up to read an 800-page book.
Let's try it again: TV-watching, Pepsi-guzzling American kids, are opening a brand new 800-page hard-covered book.
One more time for the West Coast: many of the same kids who like Sponge Bob Squarepants, and RealWorld, are reading an 800 page book.
My late grandmother used to call me before school every morning and refer me to an article in the New York Times. Then she would tell me a word, and make me spell it back to her three times. "Use a word three times and you own it for the rest of your life," she would say.
Amazing things can happen when Harry meets Salley, et al.
Oh, the wealthy CEO?
He was rushing home to get some rest.
"Gotta get up later and get on line around 11 p.m. at the book store, I promised the kids Harry Potter," he said.
America is alive and well and living in Borders.
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MARK SCHEINBAUM is chief investment strategist for Kaplan & Co., BSE, NASD, SIPC, a former UPI Newsman, and political science instructor.

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