I was watching a repeat episode of Deep Space 9 ("Who Mourns For Morn?") the other day.

Quark is seen to tear bars of gold-pressed Latinum into powder after the Latinum has been removed. My first thought is that there is a huge quantity of Latinum, leaving only a honeycombed shell of gold.

Later on, however, Quark says of aprox. 2cc's of Latinum: "Wow! That must be 100 bars' worth".

So, Ferengi are capable of tearing solid gold bricks in half with their bear hands. And yet you never get to see them beat up on Klingons. Why is that?

On the other hand it was a good Ferengi episode, because Quark actually managed to turn a profit. The Ferengi are the galaxy's greatest traders, and there's good evidence to suggest that Quark is one of the best Ferengi, but he keeps on being outwitted by hew-mons. I suppose the scriptwriters require it as some kind of moral message, but it always seemed skewed to me.

In this instance, Quark only turns a profit because Morn feels guilty about having set up Quark, and not because of his business acumen, so it still doesn't really count, but it's as close as he ever seems to get.

Bah. I don't know. I suppose I think that with this massive physical strength, and this great trading acumen, they should have conquered the entire quadrant by now. I like Ferengi, and it always annoys me when the scriptwriters ignore these huge advantages they have.

winter"Me? A Trekkie? Naah."mute