Currently reading Lure the Tiger out of the Mountains – The 36 Stratagems of Ancient China.

It’s hard for me to do this book justice by praising it, so let me just describe it in simple terms: the book is a collection of 36 chengyu with an illustrating anecdote from Chinese history and contemporary examples circa 1990ish or so.

One I read yesterday is chen huo da jie 趁火打劫, Loot a burning house. It’s about taking advantage of your opponent’s misfortunes. You can also lead him into a situation where you can then loot him for all he’s worth.

One example the book gives is ambulance-chasing lawyers. Another is the concentration of immigration lawyers in southern California and Texas.

Can you think of any other examples? One that instantly comes to mind: the funeral industry. The funeral industry (or, mortuary services, if you will) makes money off people terrified of what happens after death and their grieving families.

Others could be tabloid news-programs and magazines — Inside Edition took the ball 9/11 gave them and has showed no signs of dropping it, and let’s not even get into the children misfortunate enough to have been born in the aftermath of 9/11 who are now marked for life as “9/11 Babies”, by both the eat-its-young media and their parents, who no doubt would’ve eaten these kids if it meant a few extra seconds in the spotlight.

Any others?