Editor's Forum: New exclusive website for the affluent

PITTSBURGH - We thank the reader who alerted us to an exclusive website for the affluent -- a discussion board that charges $10,000 for membership:

http://www.affluentbb.com.

The philosphy of this discussion board is as follows: "Affluence has its perks but it has its own special headaches that other people don't understand. Life happens to affluent people too. We need a place for us to share anonymously with our peers and to just make contact without everyone trying to take advantage. A place where we can just relax and be ourselves and feel completely secure and private."


The $10,000 fee at first struck us as excessive. After all, The Carbolic Smoke Ball is dedicated to assisting the downtrodden and hesitates to recommend that scarce resources be diverted for any other cause. However, the more we considered the issue, we began to ask ourselves -- just how much money do these downtrodden really need? We are constantly giving and giving, and yet we are told that there are still downtrodden in our midst! Frankly, that scarcely seems plausible.

Accordingly, we happily endorse this hefty expenditure since it will enable the affluent to interact with their peers without having to pretend that they are no better than common folk. The fact of the matter is, they are better, and the common folk need to stop kidding themselves otherwise.

Write to us at thecarbolicsmokeball@yahoo.com

The Hon. Rufus Peckham