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We don’t have kids.  And I’m not sure why I care about these things.  I should plan to live a selfish life, do what benefits me for the next 30-40 years of my expected lifetime, and live it up.  I think most people will tell you I’m a liberal Democrat. But I have lots of Republican friends and family that express their ideas regularly and challenge my ideas.  I appreciate them, especially those that have thought things out carefully, and present good logical ideas.  Many of them are just plain hyped up hateful ignorant crap, that only cleverly mask themselves as good ideas.  Here, I’m trying to distill a short list of ideas that I hope we could agree on for our president, our leaders, even our citizens:  the people that will make the United States the greatest it can be.

We the People  of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Our People FIRST, this means everyone.  This does not mean Communism.  This means that industries that  produce jobs for everyone, export products to other countries, or products that compete with imports, they should be considered the top of the America-first list – the super stars. Industries that buy up companies, outsource jobs to reduce costs, send jobs to countries that don’t put people first (the ones that accept their people living in shanty-towns) are at the bottom of the list – the scum suckers.

Banks, for instance, should be interested in investing in super stars and avoid the scum suckers.  Otherwise they’re undermining their foundation – American industry.  And if the trickle-down effect doesn’t resolve this on its own, we should pass laws that require companies to report the jobs they outsource to other countries, and penalize them in one way or another if it’s not in the American people’s best interest.  That’s government intervening in free enterprise for the betterment of its people.

Organized labor has always been controversial, but there is a place for it.  Americans should throw out that negative opinion of Unions.  And Unions should posture themselves so we love them.  They have responsibility to create fair wages and protect employees from selfish employers.  But their members can’t hold employers hostage and stifle competition unfairly.  But most importantly they should become leaders in Americanism by creating a culture in their membership to make excellent and internationally competitive products, and hold their employers accountable to supporting that culture.  What if UAW had struck because GM was creating crappy cars in the 80′s and 90′s?   Maybe they should’ve pointed their finger at themselves?  Some might say Unions drove up labor costs to the point that GM had to make cars cheap.  Would Honda, Nissan and Toyota have market share if we had built really great cars at a competitive price?  No, we lost market share, allowed smaller companies like Hyundai, to gain a foothold.  I blame organized labor for not stepping in, and the assumption that Americans wouldn’t buy that “ching chang junk.”

Accept that the World is Different, so is business, so is competition.  After World War II, list the country that had the least attacks on it’s industry:  United States of America.  Every other country was bombed into oblivion.  Japan – devastated.  Europe – devastated.  Where would those countries get their industrial equipment, their cars and trucks, their everything?  Well, us of course.  Of course there were jobs in the 50′s, 60′s and 70′s!  It takes decades for countries to catch up from an unnatural disaster like world war.  It’s been decades, and other countries are producing good stuff, lots of it, and very efficiently.

And don’t think that the old outdated belief that other countries aren’t as innovative or creative.  Maybe they weren’t, but they’re becoming well-educated and they’re great problem solvers.  Don’t rely on this for our future.  We have to be MORE creative, more efficient, and better than them at what we do.

Give Preference to American Business, disadvantage others that don’t fit our fundamentals.  Since when do we have open trade with a Communist country that manipulates currency, commits human rights violations?  Remember Tiananmen Square?  It’s because we’re selfish, and our wants for cheap product are greater than our morals.  It’ll hurt to make even a slight change.  Is it worth it?

Why do we outsource jobs (programming, helpdesk, engineering, etc.) to countries like Pakistan (who shelters terrorists but ironically allows us to hunt them) while we have people on welfare? We have unemployed recent college graduates that can’t find jobs because “monotonous programming jobs” are outsourced to these kinds of countries.  Those monotonous jobs are how those recent graduates become the highly skilled 15 years from now.  When all Americans are well employed, then outsource jobs.  But until then, we just plain shouldn’t do it.  It’s not a smart strategic thing to do.

Invest in the next generation.  This means our kids have to be the best educated.  This doesn’t mean getting kids to college.  This means we teach and inspire kids to perform the jobs we need.  Strategically, what kinds of skills do we need 20 years from now to fuel the next generation of industry, intellect and even military weaponry?  We usually need more engineers, researchers and scientists, and fewer bankers, lawyers.  But, programs like No Child Left Behind threatens to produce a tremendous population of the uninspired – teachers and students.

And if kids aren’t right for college, they can do other important functions.  If we’re going to make great things, shouldn’t they have a career path towards doing those things?  I think of one example – machinists.  Our schools have decided it’s too dangerous for kids to operate machines.  They might get cut, or get burned, or they might put an eye out.  How else will many kids learn if we don’t teach them?  Maybe machine shop will inspire a kid to become a mechanical engineer, or appreciate math.  If we don’t teach them to fish, they’ll be a burden to society, and worse they won’t be a part of America becoming everything we can be.

Protect Intellectual Property.  I’m as guilty as anyone else.  I have a garage full of tools that were made in China.  Some are tools built by companies that have legitimate rights to manufacture their patented products in other countries.  Others, I’m sure, are patent violations that are pretty much overlooked.  Should another country simply be able to copy a product that an US inventor developed, produce it with near-slave-labor, then sell it all over the world and undercut the American gain?  I don’t think so.  But when you crank down the screws, Americans will have to feel the pain of higher priced products.  And it will have to be a unilateral strategy, meaning other countries have to agree on a protocol to deal with it.

Never sacrifice our greatest assets for short-term gain.  Most of these topics are weaving themselves together.  It’s not a coincidence.  Investment bankers that force offshoring intellect to make a short buck should be criminal, but certainly morally reprehensible.  It happens so often that we accept it as a norm.  Suddenly we’ve lost the asset of capacity to produce.  When times get tougher internationally, we have unemployed.

Environmental issues are the same.  NEVER should we allow a company to pollute our land, our water, the place we live, for a buck.  Maybe by polluting we make some money, maybe we make jobs, and maybe it lasts for 50 years.  Sounds good, but 50 years from now people have poisoned kids, uninhabitable space, lack of beautiful places to enjoy.  Making capitalists the stewards of the environment is worse than the fox guarding the hen house.  The fox eventually gets his fill and the problem can be quickly corrected.

Return the United States to an International Moral Leader.  How can we influence other countries to build fair trade, when none of them trust us?  When we execute our military power, we have to be absolutely justified.  Otherwise we’re just after the oil, or we’re settling a grudge, or some other selfish reasoning.

When you act, you’d better act with righteousness, and a purpose that will be historically evident.  And it had better be to protect people, humanity, and never for economic purpose or moral / cultural disagreement.

Keep America the Melting Pot – invite people into the country that we need, and make sure they feel welcome so they stay.  We should embrace other cultures, as long as they don’t violate our fundamental social basics (like treatment of women, tolerance of others.)  Too many times, Christians discriminate against Muslims, or Muslims don’t like Jews, or whatever.  Your religion will stand on its own – let people do their thing.  You will be discovered if you’re really that good.  Just don’t run off people we need.  We’ve been absorbing the greatest talent from all over the world for centuries – how do you think we had “the bomb” first?  Einstein wasn’t American-born.  But now, people are very portable.  A talented well-trained engineer or physicist can get tired of being mistreated by their neighbors, being treated like a terrorist, they send their resume’ somewhere else over the Internet, grab up their family, get on a plane, 24 hours and they’re teaching new and talented engineers at a college in their home country where people let them do their thing.  A hundred years ago, it was too hard to go back, even to visit family.  Not so anymore.

OK, I’m done venting for now.  This is V1.0.  I may come back and edit this.  I’m allowed to change my mind.

I was in NYC last week and stopped by when they were in Times Square, and saw them again in Zuccotti Park (twice from a tour bus.)  What these protesters have found is another plane of thinking – many Americans don’t even understand it.  Maybe it’s because they’re so brainwashed by the 1% that it’s hard to explain?  Or is it the labeling that they’re the fattest laziest dirtiest scum in our society?

Matt Lauer this morning, on the Today Show, sat there and criticized them for not having a message.  Many friends on Facebook don’t get it.  And that’s just the way huge business likes it.  Our tour bus guide even said it  ”What’s the message?”  I asked him “What kind of crazy signs were they carrying?”  He named a few about jobs, big bank bailouts, environment, so I told him that I guess they got their message across.

I’ll summarize the message this way:  ”Oppose the system of big corporations and the incredibly rich that selfishly exploits our democracy at the expense of the common person.”  (I won’t go into the multitude of ways this occurs.)

When our tour bus passed the protesters, the whole bus cheered, thumbs-up’ed, and the protesters cheered back!  It was an exciting interaction.  Our guide says that happens every time.  He explained the mix of people that ride the buses.  People ride from all over the country, every race, gender, age, political persuasion.  Heck, many of the riders were from all over the world.  And from the response of the riders, it reflects the sentiment of the 99%.

OWS protestors, if you’re reading this, I was one of those thumbs-up’s you got from the bus, and here’s another one!  You’re fighting the righteous fight – keep it up.  I’m hunting a credit union to move my investments to right now…

I work for a big corporation and I was a little reluctant to post this.  When I reflect on big corporations and the behaviors they exhibit – favoring the rich at the expense of the poor, I don’t believe they do it on purpose.  The CEO doesn’t wake up and think “how am I gonna screw the little people today?”  They simply have a job that requires them to make as much money for their shareholders (and themselves) as they possibly can.  And it appears to come across as selfish because it is.  And if they don’t, someone else will put them out of business.   If they don’t outsource jobs, the competition will, and it will give them an unfair advantage.

That’s where government comes in.  They have the power to break the vicious cycle.  I’m not talking about communism, as some in the Tea Party or other conservatives have suggested.  I’m talking about putting the reigns on a system that has run amok.  Pure capitalism will never work – it’s a divide by zero equation – the zero being greed.

But, can the government fix it?  Can Democracy prevail?  Can the people overcome a electoral cycle that’s funded with a bottomless bucket of money with the single intent of placing a candidate that will drive the stockholders’ bottom line, even if it turns out America quits making things (thanks to the worst decision the Supreme Court ever made)?  Can we stop the system that’s draining America of its intellectual capital?

So here’s my list of demands of America:

• Campaign financing reform – start by making all donations over a certain amount public information, eliminate PACs and Super PACs.  Now you can see who’s in who’s pocket.
• Incentivize companies to stop outsourcing American intellectual capital.  When we outsource “menial” or “tedious” jobs to another country, what we lose are entry-level jobs where our young people, blue or white collar, to learn the basics. Where will our experienced people come from?
• Make competition fair.  Corporate greed is driving American companies to find ways into that emerging consumer market.  At what expense?  Share their company secrets to do so?  China is so good at enforcing international patents, sharing shouldn’t be a problem, right?  Yeah, right.  They’ll steal our secrets, then turn around and clean our plow with cheap labor.

Yes, we want cheap products.  But, it needs to be fair.  Does China really provide businesses zero interest loans, while American small businesses ?  Our emerging technologies and industries (like solar) are in jeopardy.  And their industries are just short of ignoring environmental concerns.

• Get out of the Middle East wars.  Though this was a fantastic jobs stimulus plan conceived by our former President Cheney (and George W Bush co-pilot’ing) it’s still sucking up resources with no contribution to our total import/export position.  So maybe we developed some new technology in the process, but China will just steal it.  In the mean time, we have to pay back the $1 trillion for the next couple decades.
• Make the best stuff we can.  Make the best cars – ones that outlast the imports.  Make sure that anything coming from America is the best.  When you buy American made, it will be the best and your grandkids will still be using it (I have a garage full of very old tools and they work great!)  When we’ll buy our own stuff, the rest of the world will too!
• Fix unions.  First, stop allowing laws that bust unions – they fundamentally fight for American jobs.  Second, unions should take their responsibilities very seriously – they have to make sure workers are efficient, expert and are creating an excellent product.  This is a very very serious responsibility.
• Preserve our quality of living.  Take a look at the standard of living that other countries have.  Do they live in shanty-towns with open sewers?  Do ten people share a one-room apartment?  When we outsource, what we’re ultimately doing is lowering our standard of living towards theirs.
• Young people, get smart.  Other countries continue to learn, and they won’t stop trying until they get what you have (and maybe take it away.)  And I don’t mean book smart.  Learn a trade.  Read.  Work to understand things.  And use what you learn in innovative ways.  And work hard at it.

While I’m on my rant, let me remind Americans that the time is running out for us.  At the end of World War II, the only country that hadn’t had it’s industrial base bombed to oblivion was the United States.  That gave us an industrial advantage for decades – the world needed us to rebuild.  And they have rebuilt and are thriving.  As well, the myth of “Buy American because things from ching chang are junk” allowed us to let our guard down.  Our over-confidence has let us slip.  We have to recharge our base.

So, there you go. That’s what I had to say.  OWS protestors, when you’re huddled up under those tarps in the cold rain, when the police surround you and intimidate you, know that the country and the world is supporting you.  Keep up the good fight, work hard, get tough.  You’re the next generation of leaders that will make this country even better.

It’s been quite a while since I wrote an article about the death of Sharon Bayler. If you follow me on Facebook or you browse my Flickr page, you can probably figure out what I’ve been up to. But if you don’t, read more below to find out more.

Summary:
- Bike Walk Tennessee: advocacy will suck up every ounce of time you have.
- Work: I really should keep up my LinkedIn. Regardless, I’ve been very busy at work. I won’t be detailing it online, but I’ll share some general comments.
- Life: Yes, I’m married and it’s tough to maintain everything I have cooking, and keep the house up, spend quality time with my wife.
- Big Brothers: Me and Little Brother do find time to spend.
- Fun: Planning for RAGBRAI 2011!

You clicked for more (or you found this via Google or something)!  Wow, you must be bored, or you find me amusing.  You need help!

So I have been spending lots of time on advocacy.  Between being president of Bike Walk Tennessee, board member of Walk/Bike Nashville and advocacy chair for Harpeth Bike Club, I’ve been pretty busy.  Why do I do this?  Either a) I’m compelled to promote activites that I love, recognizing the benefits it brings me, and hope I can do my small part to make our state and community healthier.  Or b) Nature abhores a vacuum, someone needs to do it, and I’m being sucked in.  Or c) combined with b, I have trouble saying no and continuously over-commit.  Probably all the above. 

Advocacy is not for the faint of heart.  I’m finding that successful advocates need persistence and they need patience.  The community and the employees of beauracracies have plenty of both, plus an unhealthy dose of apathy that advocates generally don’t have.  Let me explain.  Most non-cycling citizens think that bicycling issues are not society’s problems – bicycles are merely toys  (I believe they don’t realize how addicted they are to their cars and how this will eventually be an economic crush every time the world oil market shifts.)  Second, bicyclists, who understand the benefits, generally only want to ride, until someone is run over.  But their enthusiasm towards advocacy is generally temporary.

A few weeks ago, Michael Montgomery was run over on Hwy 96 near Franklin, TN by a dump truck that swerved into the shoulder.  It’s all worth it when the cycling community is up in arms:  "HOW CAN THE DRIVER GET AWAY WITH THIS?!?!?  Let’s ride on the capitol!"  All the time I spend is worth it when I can do my part to direct soem of this energy towards something positive.  Interestingly, BWT has managed to introduce a bill several weeks before the accident to provide justice for the future Michael Montgomery’s, the John Daugherty’s, the Sharon Baylers, the Jay Westbrooks, etc.  Honestly, the timing around Michael’s misfortune is very good for the bill.  Those temorary advocates are doing great things.

One last thing on advocacy.  Recently, I took a week off from work, travelled to Washington DC for the National Bike Summit with 12 other folks from Tennessee.  What an amazing trip.  Our message?  Please don’t cut bike/ped funding.  DC’s theme?  Cut everything.  I could (and will) write a whole BLOG post about the trip, but I’ll say two things.  The best experience was with Jim Cooper.  He personally spent an hour with us, which is amazing.  The worst experience was with Marsha Blackburn, who had a conflict with a telephone call, and her staff didn’t even take notes about what we said.  Fincher, Corker and Alexander’s offices and staff were also very pleasant.  Fincher’s staff had lots of great questions and generated healthy discussion.  I did get to ride my bike around the capitol. 

Work – ah work.  We’re getting very busy at work.  Lots of changes.  Lots of new projects and customer demand.  Constant reinvention to meet needs.  And I’ve been travelling more than usual.  If I’m travelling, that probably means the folks that report to me are busy.  That’s a good thing.  We’re starting to work with customers that have never been on our systemsor network before.  Pretty cool stuff.  And it reminds me of when I used to sell computers at CST and Software City back in the early 90′s.

Life – sometimes the easiest and sometimes the hardest.  Everyone should avoid sharing their deepest personal business on the Internet.  I will say I’m worried about my Holly.  She’s getting gray feet and snout.  She has terrible arthritis in her knees.  Being my first pet as an adult and of course my best friend, it breaks my heart to see her in her golden years.  I guess I’m lucky that I’ll outlive her but it never feels that way when we outlive someone we love (even and sometimes especially our pets.)   Do dogs go to heaven?  If not, I want to go where they go.  By the way, Donna and I are days away from our 13th Anniversary! 

Big Brothers – over four years ago, I made the commitment to volunteer with Big Brothers as a big.  I was so worried at the time about what it would be like.  Now a’days, me and Little Brother are simply very good friends.  He lives 25 miles away now, so we don’t spend as much time together as original.  Recently Donna and I got an Xbox, and Little Brother and I play BFBC2 online together.  I gotta get him a microphone.

Finally, I’m anticipating my summer vacation to Iowa for the 4th time for RAGBRAI!  I’ve done the ride the first two times (2007 and 2009) with Pork Belly Ventures.  They’re a great service, a little expensive, but a great easy way for first-timers to enjoy the event.  In 2010, my buddy Matt and I used the Register’s baggage truck.  Though it’s super-cheap, sometimes the accommodations are a little primitive.  And, you have to compete for camping spots with folks like the STUPID Air Force RAGBRAI team.  My interaction with those guys was one of my worst RAGBRAI experiences.  Growing up in an Air Force town (Eglin) I couldn’t believe the lead guy’s behavior.  Anyhow, this year, we’re renting a van and doing the home stay thing.  I hope it works out.  No matter what, we’ll enjoy company with friends and the great experiences like no other.  I will miss Iowa Poet King Blackie who passed away this year.  I read his book this year, and I was looking forward to chatting about some of his theories.

That’s about it for now.  It’s a beautiful day in Nashville, Tennessee, USA.  Yard work is on the agenda, then more advocacy work tonight…

Today at Boppy’s funeral, we met many people, some Donna, Sonata and the rest of the family knew, others were from life before our crew.  We heard many stories.  From Mindi Mercer via email to Donna, This story was never verbalized since his death, but quite special and easy to share with you.

Pappy, You Will Be Missed

It was a little band room on the outer edge of a small middle school in rural Jackson County Tennessee, furnished with old metal folding chairs and even older music stands, and filled with students from fifth grade through high school, all of whom it took to make a roster for the band an entire county shared. There weren’t enough kids for the schools to each have their own. Still, when the new band director walked in, a little short and with full eyebrows, he seemed bigger than life in his tiny surroundings. His name? Fowler Stanton, but we all called him “Pappy”.

 We knew he’d been in the service, but it was his demeanor and passion for music that made it evident right away that his actual age belied the strength of heart and mind under that mop of silver hair. He didn’t seem to notice or care that we were just a rag tag bunch of kids from the middle of nowhere that knew nothing about what an actual band should look or sound like. He never seemed to consider that our options or potential were as limited as our experiences or funding. He just assumed we could do what we set out to, and then so did we.

None of us knew what we were doing. We were mostly just looking for something else to do in a town with very few options, but he didn’t care. He hauled us to band camp at nearby Tennessee Tech, his alma mater, anyway, and hauled our behinds out of bed at the most ungodly hours to march around the field and practice in various rooms around  campus all week. There were more than a few grumbles on our parts and a little astonishment that the schedule that was wearing our young selves out didn’t even seem to phase this man that was decades older than even our oldest members.

He wasn’t one to take any nonsense, but he hardly ruled his band like his  military background might imply. He was tough, but always fair, and he was interested in more than what we could do or be for the band itself. He wanted us carry the new found confidence and can do attitude he instilled into everything we did. Thankfully many of us did. He also didn’t put much stock in traditions, at least ones that no longer needed to apply, and made his decisions based only on a persons ability alone instead of their circumstances.

A few months after he came, he decided we would reorganize the positions within the band. There I was, as a 5th grader one of the youngest in the band, and so pretty low on the totem pole. As I held my own trumpet I looked up the row to the boy who was first trumpet and a high school senior. Even knowing how Pappy was, I thought surely even he wouldn’t elevate a lowly 5th grader to a position of authority, no matter how minor, over a senior in high school. He did though. Not only did he make me first trumpet, he made me leader of the brass section as well. He then proceeded to teach me the trombone, baritone, and french horn as well, and had me assist with beginning band even though my age would’ve placed me in that same category, regardless of ability, in most programs.

It may seem like a small thing, in a small place no one has heard of and most will likely never see, but it meant the world to me. From then on, I looked at every situation with a “Why not?” attitude that has opened so many doors in life. Every single day I use that “Who says I can’t?” lesson I learned so many years ago to chase my dreams, dreams I may not have had without him giving me faith that I could do anything I set my mind to, regardless of my situation or the status quo.

Obviously, I adored Pappy. He was like a surrogate grandfather, and so his good opinion held great weight with me. I will never forget the day I thought I had lost it. A few of us had been at school after hours doing something for the band, and we got bored and did something silly. It wasn’t horrendous, but it was irresponsible and immature, which is often the case with kids. As is also often the case with kids, we were clueless and were found out. He knew what we had done, but not who had done it. That afternoon, as he stood there in front of the entire group, letting us know that he knew and he was disappointed, I felt my stomach drop and then churn with that unbearable queasiness of guilt. I went home and cried myself to sleep that night, feeling just horrible. I had let him down after all he’d done and had violated the trust he had placed in me when no one else would’ve given me the chance to do half the things he knew I could do. I had to make things right.

The next day, I felt the dread of what I had to do all day long. The clock would alternate from flying and drawing me closer to the moment of truth, to moving like molasses and dragging out that awful feeling of not knowing. Likewise, my mind flipped from wanting to hurry up and get it over with to mentally trying to will time to slow down and put it off just a little longer. When the time finally came, band was over and everyone was gone from the band room. I walked up to Pappy, teary eyed and with a trembling lip, and muttered “It was me. I’m sorry.” while half holding my breath for his response. Then he did something I found remarkable at the time.

He didn’t yell, or grill me for the names of my cohorts, or even lecture me for letting him down. He said “It’s okay. Thank you for telling me the truth.” and patted my shoulder. He even smiled to let me know it would be alright. Looking back, I think he must’ve seen it on my face from the first that I was guilty. I think instead of forcing me to fess up then and there, he gave me a chance to do the right thing on my own. By doing that, he taught me a life lesson about stepping up and taking responsibility, and with his response, he taught me how to be gracious when someone else lets you down.

As you can see, while he might have been there to teach us to read music and to play the instrument of our choice, he taught us so much more. I’m ashamed to say I didn’t stick with playing, and that after he moved on to another school that I only wrote him one letter of thanks while in high school. I wish there had been many more. I will always be thankful, however, that the life lessons stuck, as did the love of music in all forms that he helped nurture.

In short, I will always be grateful that he walked into that little room and into all of our lives. Now that he has moved on to a better place, I can only marvel at the man and the vast number of people who were better for knowing him in his eighty-eight years on this earth. I think it is safe to say that while we have lost an angel, heaven has most assuredly gained one.