Dave Ross Commentary – Listen: How Oprah came to own the letter “O”

It’s a measure of how big you are when you’re known not only by your first name, but the first LETTER of your first name.

How did Oprah do this? By realizing that most people aren’t thinking about whether Israel should make peace with Hamas, but … is fantasy football a want or a need?

I clicked on Oprah’s website, and up came Suze Orman — proclaiming no one NEEDS fantasy football. But then Oprah asks… well, what about shoes?

“Do I need this pair of shoes or do I want this pair of shoes?” Oprah asked.

A question all of us will face someday — Suze has a simple test:

“You have holes in your shoes. It is snowing out. You need a pair of shoes,” says Suze.

There it is: the amazing thing about the Oprah phenomenon is not just that she was there with the kind of advice America was thirsting for — but that so many Americans had actually reached adulthood still needing that kind of advice.

Oprah realized that millions of people were drowning under thousands of day to day dilemmas — like what book to read, and what FOOD to buy!

“You may want to buy caviar? Do you need to buy caviar? No. You’re not buying that?” asks Suze.

“I’m buying it. I’m saying I wouldn’t get very much then, because I don’t need anything,” says Oprah.

Which bring us to the payoff —

“When you have money it don’t matter Oprah whether you need it or you want it, you can have it,” says Suze.

How can you debate that? When your old shoes have holes, buy new shoes. And nobody NEEDS caviar, but if you HAVE PLENTY OF MONEY — feel free to buy whatever you want! Oprah’s genius was in motivating Americans to accept the obvious.

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