The Story of "Street Juice"

When I lived in Baltimore, Maryland, I was struck by the number of panhandlers there were at major intersections in the city begging for money from the cars waiting at the red lights. So many, and, even more remarkably, in a city in which white males are only 12 percent of the population, almost all of the panhandlers were young, able-bodied, white males.

Clearly, there was a social phenomenon at work here, so I began stopping and talking to them to see what I could learn. Every single panhandler I talked to was a heroin addict. I.e., they were committing a slow suicide—numbing the pain until death.

Jesus, what happened to my people?

So, I had an idea. I bought a printer that could handle tabloid-size paper and began putting out a little four-page satire "newspaper" called Street Juice. The idea was to put a $1.00 price on the cover and then give it to the panhandlers to sell and let them keep the dollar. Eventually, I would make money back from reverse advertising.

I put out 16 issues. Then I had to return to Kansas City to pursue my lawsuit against the SPLC.

But here's the takeaway from that. It was working. How do I know? Because the panhandlers themselves were reporting that when a new issue came out every four days, or so, the sales would spike. In other words, motorists were beginning to look for the new issues. One guy reported that the local police precinct had begun buying a dozen every time a new issue appeared. Sometimes I would stand off to the side and watch and you'd see a driver from four or five cars away read the big bold headline and get out of the car laughing, run up to the panhandler, and buy a copy.

The point?

If you see panhandlers in your city working the intersections, and you want to help them but don't like the idea of "rewarding begging," buy five or more copies of Ollie's Apology. You'll get a discount and a big yellow removable sticker to put on the front cover sure to attract the attention of someone sitting in traffic.

Then stop and talk to one of those panhandlers. Tell him or her that they can sell the books for $20.00 each and keep the money.

You'll be helping them and helping me avoid the censorship swallowing up our civilization and helping kickstart Ollie's Apology into making a real difference. Click to order 5+.