I’m really glad you came by my blog and I am truly sorry if my satirical take on your commercials was offensive. I guess I have to assume that any people I write about, including bestselling authors, may just find my blog and proceed accordingly. Please accept my apologies. (I do know you are all bestselling authors, actually, I even put links to all your books in the blog. It was a lame attempt at humor.)

I have been told since I posted the blog that the commercials were actually dealing with a rebate, unlike the original Toyota ones (and a number of other commercials over the years that ask what you’d do with the money you save). I guess I must also, besides assuming who I write about will see it, pay more attention to the details of anything I lampoon. A rebate is, indeed, real money and, as you say, should be used to pay down debt or put in IRAs or CDs, or some other form of practical investment.

As for the savings of $50 or $60 on zero percent financing, however, this savings isn’t real money unless, as I said in the piece, you had already earmarked the original payments and now are paying less. I do know some people who do that sort of thing (a friend of mine quit smoking and put the money he would have spent each day in a box and bought himself a very nice trinket at the end of the month) but most people will still barely be able to budget the zero percent payments, much less pull out the extra (hypothetical) $50 or $60. If you are going to do that, again, you don’t need to buy a car, you can just be disciplined and invest $50 or $60 per month. We know that, given the sad state of savings in America, that is fairly unlikely for most people.

But, as I said, this was supposed to be a humorous piece. It seems I missed that mark entirely. I’m truly glad you came by and I hope you had the opportunity to look at some of my other posts, which actually are funny.

Good luck with your gold mine in Argentina.