LET'S PASS A LAW THAT ELECTED LEADERS MUST TAKE ECONOMICS 101.

You know, I promised not to use this as a political mouthpiece and I only wrote 3 posts that even mentioned my view on the election last year. I heard from several readers that while they had a different opinion than mine (the way it is supposed to be), they appreciated my attempt at striking a balance and not being off the edge in my views.

You may recall my ideal ticket was a Republican and a Democrat for President and Vice President. And when Obama won I said the people have spoken and I would support him. And I continue to do so.

From my point of view, the jury is still out on him. I think he has done a bad job domestically with the banks, auto companies and the stimulus bill, but in fairness, he may not have had a lot of choices.

And I think he has done a decent job at taking the first step to rebuild our reputation in the rest of the world. He isn't changing anything as he probably really can't. Every President is almost always limited by their countries geopolitical realities regarless of their political party.

So he is forced to follow almost all of Bush's policies internationally (Iran, Russia, Guantanamo, Iraq, etc) just as Bush had to follow for the most part Clinton's policies. But Obama's tremendous gift of communication is allowing him to reframe the same old issues in a much better way and create in the minds of the rest of the world that we are more willing to negotiate their concerns (even though we can't really do anything much differently). I think he has made much progress by just telling people he cares about them and is listening to their concerns.

So, this post is not about Obama. It is about his bedfellows.

But tonight, as I am nursing my hernia operation I had today and feeling sorry for myself, I received a Breaking News alert that said the Democrats are going to try and institute a surtax on couples making more than $350,000 to pay for $550 billion of the ridiculous health care reform plan that is being bantered about in DC.

On top of that, they said that if the health care savings that they anticipate in the plan aren't met, they will raise the tax on these taxpayers even more. In other words, if the Democrats are wrong in their estimates of the savings in health care costs they guess can be obtained by going to a government run system (read rationing) that still leaves 36 million or so people uninsured (and they are wrong) they will punish themselves for their lousy analytics by making the taxpayers pay even more. This is America?

I am so livid I cannot believe it.

I am aware of and sensitive to the fact that the majority of people in America do not make over $350,000 a year so it is easy to say "Screw em-they have too much money anyway." And that might be the logic behind the Democrats proposal given their track record this year to date.

The error in that thought process is as follows: It is true that it can be possible to not have people make $350,000 a year or more. There are several models of that in real life-Somalia (except for the pirates), Sudan, Eritrea, Moldova, Afghanistan, etc. And since these countries are heavily dependent on aid from American based charities, the poor (which are the majority) in these countries will suffer more since a large percentage of the contributions that charities raise here to send to poorer countries is from couples making over $350,000. Now they won't have the money to give because the government will have it.

One could argue that this will be okay if the money goes to give Americans better health care (you know-the "keep it at home instead of helping those "other people" argument). But that is not the case-the health care proposal will deliver worse health care, not better. It will provide coverage for 13 or so million people that are uninsured and that is good, but the rest of American's who are happy with their health care other than the cost will wake up wondering if they should take French lessons since they will have moved to a Canadian type of system of socialized medicine.

Which brings me back to the title of this post.

The last I looked, the unemployment rate had gone much higher than the Administration said it would and VP Biden said this week "We (the administration) simply got it wrong". Well, they have this wrong too because it is contrary to basic economics. I, for one, will not feel better when they increase taxes $550 million dollars and then say "Oops, we got it wrong".

If you tax couples making over $350,000 annually $550 billion more in taxes, that is $550 billion less they will have to donate a portion of to the charities mentioned above and a lot less to invest in companies through the purchase of their stocks and bonds which would create jobs.

Therefore, all the jobs that would have been created to solve the unemployment problem (you can hire a lot of folks for half a billion dollars) will not be created and so we will continue in this recession, created during the Bush years and now being supercharged in the Obama years .

When you have Democrats in Congress that are so gung ho to get even for some of the dumb things Bush and Cheney did that they are determined to get their pound of flesh by ruining the lives of so many Americans we have reached a sad state. And this is coming from someone (me) who is solidly behind the well thought out and doable programs that will give all of us not just universal access through a government/private industry program that was put forth a couple of years ago. So my anger is not at the idea of fixing our health care industry-we must fix it. My anger is in doing it the wrong way because you are mad at the past Administration and deciding to make a small group of Americans pay for over half of it.

And I think they are doing it (to make the point again) because they are still angry with Bush and because they never read or understood Economics for Dummies (if there is such a book) or took a basic Macro economics class.

Okay. Probably the only political posting by me this year.

As you can tell, the knife didn't slip today during the surgery. I still have a fire in my belly, especially on this topic.

LET'S HOPE THE KNIFE DOESN'T SLIP

In 7 and a half hours I have to go into the hospital for Hernia surgery. I'm warning you in advance that if my words sound like my voice is higher on my next post, you will know I should not have gone to Wal Mart to get my Doctor. He is going to be doing the surgery in a rather risky neighborhood.



So, as I walked out of Goldberg's Deli earlier today where I went to have a nice sandwich since I won't be eating for a while, I was thinking what a beautiful day in Atlanta it was and a bird pooped right on my head. I freaked out, got in the car, came home and immediately ran up and took a shower. How inconsiderate of this bird-here I am getting ready to have surgery and a bird poops on my head. I was not happy.


Hopefully I will be back Blogging (or at least reading your Blogs) by next Wednesday. In the meantime, PLEASE do me a favor.


Go to Andrea's Blog and vote for Finn! It starts tomorrow (Friday) and I can't vote for him as I will be on the operating table. But you can be my proxy-all of you! Vote away!

QUESTION: HOW DOES ONE CELEBRATE THE 4TH OF JULY WITH A HERNIA

Answer-go get your youngest Grandson, get your photo taken with him and then go to a neighborhood parade. It is amazing. Suddenly, you just feel so much better.

I hope all of you in the USA that read this Blog had a wonderful holiday today. Despite our challenges, we have a wonderful country.

I also know that there are many of you in other countries that read my Blog and I don't want to be insensitive and "American Centric". I know all of you are equally and appropriately proud of your country and you also have holdiays to celebrate your country's history.

What I've learned through years of international travel is that all of us share in common so much more than the small differences between us. One of the great things about the Internet is that is allows us to learn about each other and realize that we are really not very different.

We all love our families, care deeply about our friends and are proud of our countries. I appreciate all of you, whether you are from India, Asia, Europe, South America, Africa, Australia or all the other places. It makes me happy when I look at the map of the world on my Blog to see all of the indicators showing you have paid this Blog a visit.

But I am not happy that on May 11th, the service that tracks all of my visitors dropped 9,129 of your visits off of the map so that it now only shows the ones since that date.

However, despite the irritant of losing the record on-line of all your visits (I have it off-line), thank you for taking the time to read my ramblings. I wish I could meet each and every one of you. In the end, we are all citizens of the same planet.

So to evey one, regardless of whether you are celebrating with us as Americans today, I say Happy 4th of July.

REFLECTIONS ON MY DAD FOR FATHER'S DAY

Today is Father's Day. I am blessed because we are at our home in Florida with Grover, Cris, Landon, Wes, Andrea, Lee & Finn. We are going to have breakfast where we will eat bacon until it comes out of our ears this morning because the three Dads here all love bacon.

We are then going to go to the beach, as we did yesterday, to play in the pure white sand of America's most beautiful beaches and go a little ways out in the warm water of the Gulf holding hands with one of the boys. I wrote "a little ways out" because yesterday when we were at the beach there were sharks about 30 to 40 yards offshore and you have not seen people exit the water as fast as everyone did yesterday when the sharks appeared.

We will build a sand castle while we bake in the torrid and humid 105 degree heat index weather we are having here and when we can't take it any longer, we will drive 3 minutes back to our home and all pile in our pool, perhaps with a break to eat some of the home made ice cream we made yesterday.

It will be a wonderful day to be together and for me, having so many of my family with me will be the best Fathers’ Day present of all. And my thoughts will be about how lucky I am to have this chance today for us to be here in Destin together.

But my thoughts will also be with my Dad, who I lost so many years ago. Over the last year, as I have watched my Mom continue on her erratic and painful journey to life's end, I have found myself thinking more and more about my Dad.

I always say I am a lot like my Mom and there is no doubt that this is true in many, many ways. But yesterday, as I was mixing up the batch of home made ice cream, I thought about how my Dad would always make home made ice cream when we went to see him. I have an ice cream freezer because Grover remembers fondly when he was a little tyke like his boys are now and we would go to see my parents at the motel in Kingman, Arizona, so far away and such a long time ago. One of the first things my Dad would do would be to make home made ice cream and so Grover bought me this ice cream freezer a couple of years ago so I could do that when we are all together and whenever I do it, I have strong feelings that the spirit of my Dad is at my side while I am preparing it.

My Dad loved to garden and even late in his life he would always have a few tomato plants and some other things on his patio. This time of year I go out on the balcony overlooking our back yard in Atlanta every day I am in town and just visit with the tomatoes, lettuce, arugula, peppers, kitchen herbs and other plants I am growing. Just being out there with them invariably makes me think of my Dad.

My Dad was an accountant and so he was good with numbers and he had a ledger (this was way before spreadsheets) for everything. I remember he could tell you what the weather was like every day going back many years and what day he planted his various plants so he could refer to it in the following years.

I also find accounting and numbers in business easy to understand and I am anal about the amount of "ledgers" I keep, even though they are now on a laptop. I have my calendars showing what I did every day since 1977. Yes, that's right, 1977.

If I want to remember the name of a restaurant we've eaten at in Istanbul on two different trips, I can go either to a spreadsheet named "Eats" and find it or I can go to my spreadsheet where I keep a reconciliation of my Amex bill from 1995 and look it up. By the way, it is called S Restaurant and is in the Bebek neighborhood.

And so on this Father's Day Pop (I called him Pop), I realize that although my personality and outlook on life is like Mom, I am who I am because of who both of you and when I think about it, I realize that as I have described above, I am like you in many ways that I never thought of before. And I am proud that I am.

If you were with us today you would be so proud. You so loved Cathy and everything about her and she has not changed a bit. You would look at her as you sat here in Destin and see that she is every bit the wonderful woman today that she was when you were still with us.

Your namesake Grover is now a numbers guy like you with a successful career and you would be so proud of him.

You would look at your granddaughter Andrea and be so happy that she is a great Mom like her Mom and that she has her Mom's values which you so admired in Cathy.

You would be so happy when you would meet our daughter in law Cris and our son in law Lee. We are so blessed to have them in our family. And of course, it would be the three little guys here today that you would enjoy the most-Landon, Wes and Finn. You would watch them running around playing together on the beach and you would just smile at the legacy you left us.

Wes, playing yesterday on the beach

Fearless Landon playing yesterday in the shark infested water

Finn, modeling yesterday at the beach

You would be so happy to learn that Gustavo and his wife Dorte and their twins are doing well in Copenhagen and so glad to know that they have become part of our family also.

In closing, I remember so well back in 1951 when you and Mom took me to the white sand beaches of the Panhandle of Florida. You so loved how beautiful the sand was and talked about it for years afterwards.

So now, 58 years later as we celebrate Father's Day on those same white beaches that you took me to and that you loved so much, I will be celebrating you and all you did to make me who I am today. And I thought that if you have good internet access up there, you would enjoy these photos of the legacy you left us.

Two of my boys with me (it is impossible to get all of them to sit still at one time)


The first photo below was taken a year ago and we just had them developed. Obviously the kids have grown a lot since then. The second photo was taken three weeks ago in Copenhagen (that is Dorte's brother in the top left corner) at the twins baptism.

Happy Father’s Day Pop. I miss you so much.

I HAVE A NEW TITLE

As I've said before, I never watch TV. But today, someone else in the house had Tivo'd an episode of some reality show in Costa Rica (I don't know the name) and they have this wretched woman on there named Janice Dickinson. She has more whines than Bordeaux. She was having this major pity party and making a total fool out of herself.

Here is what happened. My hernia was killing me. I walked into the bedroom and lay ** (note below) on the bed. I put an ice pack on my groin (not as exciting as it sounds). The TV was on. I had no way of escaping.

This woman kept carrying on that she is a Supermodel when she looks older than I am and has more plastic in her face than I have in my wallet. She reaffirmed all the reasons why I don't watch TV.

Whenever they would show her name on the screen, it would show her title. As in "Janice Dickinson, Supermodel". I don't think that is something that you are designated by some august organizing body like when you become a Bishop of the LDS church or a Knight of the Round Table. I think it is what she wants to be called and so she has everyone call her that.

So I have decided what I want to be called. From now on, I am Grover Thomas, SD (Super Deity).

When I went to write this intensely interesting and important to humanity Blog, I couldn't remember her last name (I tried to block out all memory of her) so I searched on our Internet (it is ours you know-it isn't Pluto's or Mars') and found her name. I then searched on the words "Susan Dickinson, Supermodel" and found a link titled "Janice Dickinson: "My life of sex, drugs and plastic surgery" The title explained many things and confirmed my incredibly good judgment.

I chose not to open the link and learn more about her.

Thank you for listening.

Grover Thomas, SD

** For those of you that think my grammar was wrong when I said "I lay on the bed", I gotcha. That is the right way to say it.

I have decided I need to improve my grammar and I ain't kidding about that.

I always have trouble between “lay and lie”. So, before typing the words "I lay" (since I would have normally typed "I lied", I looked it up, also on our internet (yours and mine).

I found a site with the title "Learn the Difference Between Lay and Lie". You can find it here and I hope that not too many of you go to the site at once and crash our internet.

The author of the explanation is actually quite funny. Or at least as funny as you can be with Grammar. If you want to learn (as I did) when to use lay and when to use lie, this is a good site to go to as you can smile as you learn. The author talks about dating his/her English professor. I never wanted to date my teachers as they were all nuns.

With that I will close. I cannot believe I am 200 emails behind and I decided to go off on Janice who I have never heard of before today (and hopefully never will again).

VISITING MOM

After returning to Atlanta Sunday afternoon from The Spiritual Massage in Jacksonville (a truly wonderful experience), I went home, changed suitcases and caught a late night flight to Phoenix.

Monday morning, I went to see Mom, for the first time since we had told her goodbye forever as she was dying in Hospice at the end of March. I wrote about it here. Then, just because it was meant to be, she bounced back which I shared with everyone here and now I was going to see her again in the nursing home where she was now living since Hospice effectively kicked her out as she did so much better.

I walked in and couldn’t believe it. While still frail, since going off her 37 day hunger strike she has gone from 70 pounds to 85 pounds. But physically she is still weak and confined to her bed but mentally she has recovered back to the point she was at a year and a half ago when she was still living independently.

Since Hospice kicked her out for getting better she has moved into a nursing home in Phoenix. She is in the end room which is dark and depressing until Mom is there which always brightens up any room. She has an old beat up TV someone from Hopsice gave her that only gets one or two channels and they are very snowy but she says it keeps her company even though she can't hear it.

She was happy to see me and I hugged her and told her “I didn’t think I was ever going to see you again when I last left you”. She laughed and said “You and me both but here I am, although I don’t know why. I am still ready to move on”.

I told her that I had told her goodbye forever four different times and I wasn't going to do it again when I left this time. She said "I agree. It's just too hard on both of us" and laughed again as she always does.

We spent a wonderful day together. Unlike last time when I was limited to 3 or 4 minute visits before she would drift off asleep, this time she was wide awake almost all day. She was completely awake, completely aware of everything, had some of her sense of humor back and had none of the confusion or drowsiness of the last 9 months or so. Mom was acting the way I remember her for the last 15 years and that was very special. In fact, during the entire day she took only two short half hour naps.

She wanted to see photos of her great grandkids and I had some to show her of all of them. She wanted to get up to date on everyone in our family and out of the blue she said "Has Alice had her baby yet?"

I asked her why she thought she was not confused or drowsy and her reply was classic for Mom. She said "It was all those damn drugs they were giving me to keep me alive. I stopped taking all of them. And I feel so much better and since I'm not taking them anymore maybe I can leave pretty quick as it is pretty boring here."

And then, in the middle of that conversation, she said "Do you think Judge Judy has had some work done on her eyes?" (as she pointed to the snowy TV). "I think she has."

The rest of the day went like that. Just one nice moment after another with Mom and when it came time to go I said "Well, I will see you next time." since I told her I wasn't going to go through another forever farewell. She laughed and said "Yes. I will see you on your next visit." and I walked out with a smile on my face and she was laughing and there wasn't a tear in sight.

SPENDING TIME WITH A TRANCE-MEDIUM

I know this will sound a little weird to those of you that don't know me well and sound very normal for those of you that do know me. Cathy, Cris and I are at a 2 and a half day event in Jacksonville Beach with about 12 other people to participate in something called Spiritual Massage.

It is being put on by a woman from Brazil named Maria Lucia Sauer who is a Trance-Medium and one of the nicest and gentlest people I have ever met. She does many things, including channeling to and communicating with our ancestors.

It is a combination of working with our energy flows, meditation, going on a shamanic journey thru drumming to find the power animal that we all have within us, a singing meditation to open your hearts and an incredible and unbelievable experience called Spiritual Massage that for an hour, as you lie on a massage table, you are taken to an altered state mostly from your partner releasing the excess energy we all have in our bodies. This is done not from massage in its traditional form, since very little touching is used but rather through some sweeping motions and lying on of the hands to release the energy.

On Thursday night, when the instructor learned I have a hernia, she put me on a table and the entire group participated in a 40 minute spiritual massage on me and for the first time in ten years or so I slept that night like a baby, without waking up and without pain for nearly 8 hours and I never sleep for more than 5 hours at a time. It was like an out of body experience for me. I've had no pain from my hernia since then.

We will spend all day today on these types of things and then when it is over we are going over to our dearest friends, Mike and Jan Newton to spend the night with them and fly back to Atlanta tomorrow. Cris will then get the boys (who are staying this weekend with Andrea and Lee) and they will fly back to DC tomorrow afternoon and tomorrow night I am flying to Phoenix to see my Mom on Monday. Being here at this retreat has helped prepare me for the emotion surrounding my visit with her.

Now, for our friends who are reading this you are likely saying "Sure, this sounds like something he would do. But how in the world did he get Cris and Cathy to go with him?"

Well, we all decided together a year ago to do this and they are enjoying it as much as I am. It is just so powerful and next year it will be in DC so we will be able to go there and attend it again.

IT’S MY BIRTHDAY & I’M BUMMED OUT ABOUT IT.

MY FIRST DAY AT HOME AFTER MY BIRTH

Today I turn 65. Holy shit. That is old. I am really having a hard time with it. I sent my Mom two photos today. The first one was a photo of her with me on my first birthday. The second one is of me sitting in the chair in my family room this morning. Somewhere in between those two photos 64 years disappeared.

MOM AND ME ON MAY 31, 1945

ME IN ATLANTA TODAY-I EVEN LOOK OLD

I’m so bothered by this birthday that I decided not to go to the Buddhist Monastery I go to some Sundays to meditate as I thought I might start crying in the middle of it and it would freak people out.

No wonder I have a damn hernia.

My life, SO FAR (I’m nowhere done yet), has been wonderful. I have so much to be thankful for. Just a few things I’ve thought about the last few days as this day approached.

1. I have the energy of a 40 year old, the drive of a 30 year old and a schedule just a little easier than Obama’s. I clearly don't act my age. But I am my age.
2. Other than having colon cancer when I was young I've been healthy as a horse all my life. The hernia doesn’t count.
3. I married the greatest wife in the world. I had to marry her because she refused to go out with me at first and I do well when I have a challenge and a goal. I realize every day how lucky I am to have her support.
4. My parents were the best. I was always close to them mainly because they put up with all my shenanigans. I miss my Dad tremendously and as readers, you know what I am going through emotionally with my wonderful Mom, my inspiration.
5. My brother is 8 years younger than me so we didn’t hang out together as kids but over the years we have grown closer and closer. He and his wifes loving care for my Mom knows no limits.
6. I have kids that I am proud of and we have spent time together in some of the craziest parts of the world. I am full of so many good memories of my children.
7. And then there are my grandkids. Anyone that reads this knows how I feel about them.
8. I have so many good friends all over the country. Five years ago when I turned 60, 55 of these friends and our family went to Spain for my birthday party for 3 straight days and nights. We turned around and did it again 3 years later for Cathy’s birthday. That’s the kind of friends I have.
9. This issue is sensitive and has to be explained right. I don’t like to say that I am “proud” of what I have done as so many have done so much more. It is a sensistive issue as I always worry about the ability of power to corrupt people. Since I have had the opportunity to have a lot of power in the corporate world, I always worried about the risk of it corrupting me and me abusing it. So I am nervous talking about any poart of my career success.

But I do feel proud of what I achieved with the help of so many others (with #1 being Cathy).

To understand why I am proud, one has to understand where I started. Below is a photo of me and my friends taken when I was about 21. I’m the skinny one with the pool stick in my hand. I had no college, had a lousy GPA in high school and was working as a pool hustler. When I would periodically go broke I sold used cars. One half of the people in the photo are deceased (from drugs, prison, alcohol, & Vietnam) so I think I’m pretty lucky to have ended up where I am today.

STANDING LEFT TO RIGHT: ZEKE, ME, KIT, LARRY,BONANZA JIM, JUG, SALTY
SEATED LEFT TO RIGHT: BIG GEORGE, BERTHA, PUNCHIE (I SWEAR I'M NOT MAKING UP NAMES)

10. One of the cool things about the photo above has to do with my friend Salty. Like me, he didn't go to college out of high school. Rather, after he married his wonderful wife Mary, and they had their first two kids he went back to school, worked his tail off studying while supporting a growing family and became a schoolteacher and coach. I have so much admiration for him for what he did and how he dedicated his life to helping our young people become productive adults. He sent me the nicest Happy Birthday email today. Salty is a friend that I have known longer than anyone (even my wife) other than my parents and brother as we went to part of elementary school and high school together.

11. Thirteen years after that photo was taken it was 1978 and I was a Senior VP of a nationwide company and a freshman in College at 34 years of age. That is what getting married and settling down did for me.
12. Nine years later at the end of 1987 I had both my Bachelors and MBA and was made CEO of an insurance company for the first time. Yes, it does sound like I’m boasting. I am not trying to boast and apologize if it comes out that way. Rather, I’m trying to show how fortunate I have been to be blessed with working with good people and for having a family that supported me. I put a photo below from when I got my undergraduate degree. As you can see, I haven't changed at all.


12. I know I made a positive difference in some people’s lives. At the same time, as a CEO for so long, I had to make many difficult decisions on reductions in staff, outsourcing, performance problems and other complex issues that it haunts me to know that my decision impacted some people negatively even though it was right for the organization.
13. I’m often asked when I will retire. It is always awkward. I need to learn to tell the truth which is probably never. I want to continue until I drop over some day doing things that help others such as my work as Chairman of Freedom from Hunger. I realize how blessed we have been and we are trying hard to give back to those less fortunate.
14. An example of how much I am in denial about my age is AARP. They started soliciting me when I was 48 since you can become a member when you turn 50. They have spent probably $30,000 on postage sending me crap and they don’t understand that I will never join their organization even if I can buy a car for 75% off as I will never think of myself as a member of that group. I simply throw everything they send in the trash as I always think it doesn't apply to me.
15. I could have (most would say I should have) applied for Medicare and Social Security a couple of months ago. We certainly have paid a ton in taxes to contribute toward it (and thanks to our new Administration we are going to be paying even more) but it ain’t gonna happen. I may end up years from now changing my mind about this but for now, I believe the day I have to apply for Medicare or Social Security it will mean I am really old and I will just take one of those Cyanide pills the spies carry around.

In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not doing well with this birthday. But, I know what my Mom would tell me. She would say “Get over it. You are only as old as you feel and act and you neither feel nor act 65. Go out and have a party, continue helping and teaching others, be good to your family and enjoy life. Stop whining and start laughing.

Okay Mom. That’s what I am going to do. Starting as soon as I post this.

PS-ADDENDUM TO ABOVE

Three hours after posting this my sister-in-law Judie called me and said that she was with my Mom and that Mom wanted to wish me a Happy Birthday. So I talked to her for about two minutes. She was very weak and not feeling well but she said she wanted to wish me a Happy Birthday.

It was a hard but wonderful end to the day.