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Jim Cramer was on Good Morning America this morning. And the  last time I saw Cramer on the morning show he said pretty much the same thing as today. He was reacting to a recent poll about the state of the economy and he suggested that things were not as bad as the common man believed they were. 

As a new poll suggested, most people believe times are going to get worse. Maybe Cramer is talking to the wrong people, or getting paid for pushing a positive message in the middle of the Great Recession.

To back up his claim Cramer says that he talks to CEO’s of companies and they tell him things are going great. So rather than being in tune with the average man and getting a real pulse of how bad things are, Cramer talks to the people who have laid off workers across the country, to save the money it takes to say “things are great”.

But it’s the laid off workers that are feeling the pain. And the furloughed state employees. And those that have to work twice as hard for those very same companies because their coworkers were let go so the company can tell Cramer “things are great”.

And maybe those same CEO’s are telling our President Obama that “things are great” also. Well they are not great. And small businesses are not being asked how things are by the right people or dumb asses like Cramer would not be saying that “things are great”.

Normally I may not get into this topic for an entertainment blog. But having owned a small business for 23 years I have seen it all. But when someone in his position makes a point that is so far off track from the real world, then someone needs to speak out.

It’s sad too that the answer is obvious to anyone out of a job. Bring back the jogs from overseas. There’s your damn answer for how to employing more people.

Irving Azoff of Live Nation Ticketmaster appeared on CNNMoney.com video for Fortune and showed how far out of touch he was with the fans that he wants to sell tickets to. He talks about concert ticket prices still being too low and basically blames low prices and the fans for all the problems his company is going through selling tickets this summer.

As Azoff talks about the reason ticket sales are down in the US he says something about the economy and then goes on to say about ticket buyers, “If they could figure out a way to steal tickets, they would. Just like they steal movies and music, but so far they haven’t figured out a way to do that”.

It reminds me of the same things BP’s Tony Haword said in the press that got the American public against him and BP. How can you sit there and call your customers theives, as you explain that they are bitching because of he economy and not the high ticket prices.

Azoff goes no to explain that he considers the Live Nation Ticketmaster company as an ecommerce opportunity more than a concert ticket promoter or ticket seller. That explains his line of  thinking. Live Nation and Ticketmaster are not there for the fans, the customers, they are there to make money for shareholders.

It’s that type of thinking and greed that got this country in the situation we have been in the last few years, screw the customer for the profits of the shareholder. Can we now hope to see Irving Azoff sent to Russia and work his magic there instead of here?

Billboard.com is reporting the  number of albums sold the week ending May 31 was the fewest albums sold in a week since the 1970’s. Less than 5 mil albums were sold for a particularly slow album release week, but it is also part of a trend that has decimated the music industry as they fight the pirating of their music.

Since the music is being pirated the artists are not getting paid as well and are now forced to tour year after year to pay for things. The younger generation that has done most of the pirating on the web still have the most reasonably priced concert tickets for the most part, with the exception of Lady Gaga’s ticket prices.

One of the reasons given by Live Nation for raising the ticket prices recently was to counter the loss of income from album sales. But the concerts that have been jacked up the most are the older artists such as The Eagles, Roger Waters, Rush, etc.  I can’t imagine a huge number of their fans are trolling the web to pirate songs.

Most of the older artists have been receiving royalties for decades for their best work and don’t need to jack up their fans with high ticket prices. Not only that, the quality of the music is suffering a little with the age, and even old ears can tell the difference.

I would suggest to the artists that maybe they need to cut their budgets a bit to help out the fans and keep the concert ticket prices down so the fans don’t have to sacrifice so much to attend a concert. The music business has changed dramatically the last few years, just as the ticket business, and the money just isn’t there right now.