HI SAM

Caveat emptor

(Let the Buyer Beware)

When I was in high school, one of the big, exciting things that happened was a brand new Montgomery Wards was opening up in the neighborhood. This was huge. As far as after school employment went, the selection had been somewhat scarce. However, with this very large new department store opening up just walking distance from the school, opportunities would soon abound.

I started working there when I was just 16. My first job was split between the stock room, the dock and the Paint Department. It was good work, with not too many hours so it did not interfere with after school activities and school work. Besides being a good source of extra money, it was the social outlet that was really special. Some days it seemed as if half the high school was employed there. It was a great time to be alive.

One day the manager of the Paint Department asked me if I wanted to do some part time selling in addition to my stock duties. Heck yes I did! This was a good chance to learn how to interact with the buying public. I had to wear a tie, was given a "tally card", and also an odd looking 3 X 5 note card called a HI SAM. The HI SAM card, as explained to me, stood for "Have I Sold Additional Merchandise". It was an opportunity when someone bought a gallon of paint to try and sell them a paint brush as well; a tie with a shirt; salt with water softener. In other words, it was how to boost sales by selling on the margin. The thought was it could increase sales and the customer would barely know he or she had just bought something unintended.

One day an elderly gentleman came in to buy some paint. After I mixed up his paint, I tried to sell him a set of three tynex nylon paint brushes. He declined my offer as he preferred to use natural brushes and said he had plenty. I implored him to reconsider. "Sir, this is three brushes for barely more than one natural brush would cost". He looked at me and put his hand on my shoulder. "Son, nothing is a bargain if you don't need it". Ouch. Sale lost, but lesson learned. I never forgot customer exchange many years ago at a Montgomery Wards.

I think about the old HI SAM method of getting extra stuff every time I see a bill come out of either the House or Senate. The last two bills are excellent examples. The Super Storm Sandy Bill had more pork stuffed in it than a slaughter house. It was a $60B bill that should have cost half that much. It did have some honest relief components for people in need - however the desire to HI SAM the bill was just too much. The Fiscal Cliff Bill was the same way. A bill which should have been no more than 10 pages, turned out to be over 150, loaded with pork and tax credits. Yes, that bill was HI SAMed also. Just like I was taught many years ago, it is easy to add something unintended onto a sale if you do it the right way. The big difference between the way Montgomery Wards did it and the way bills in Washington grow is this - at Wards we tried to add things that made sense. What is added onto most bills in Washington have nothing to do with the bill itself. They are just earmarks and riders.

The next time you hear a bill is coming out of committee and getting ready for a vote, go online and look at it. Has it been HI SAMed? Is there all kinds of crap in there which shouldn't be? Who put it in there? We need accountability! No more earmarks, no more riders, no more "unintended purchases"! Most of all, we all need to remember the sage advice given to a young man in 1966 - "Son, nothing is a bargain if you don't need it".

Buyer's Remorse

 

 

"Regrets, I've had a few..."

 

I Did It My Way

Frank Sinatra

 

 

Here it comes. We all knew it was coming. The whining, the complaining, the bitching, the moaning. The funny part is the chorus of complaints concern something which was not a tax increase after all. In fact, this phony baloney 2% cut of of employee contributed FICA was not a tax cut. It did nothing except make our sagging Social Security fund weaker. So putting it back to where it SHOULD have been all the time was no big shakes. Don't worry folks, there will be more to come in the near future which is much more gut wrenching.

The "Charlatan in Chief" is very similar to the one we had in the nineties. After telling the nation the economy was screwed up due to Bush (Sr.), President Clinton promised EVERYONE in the middle class a tax cut. Whoops. Once he got into office and found out there was not enough tea in China to pay for everything promised, he confessed to the middle class that he was "mistaken". Mr. Clinton said, "I tried as hard as I could, but things were so screwed up due to Bush, that I just can't give the middle class a tax cut". Sound familiar? We are about to see Act II to this melodrama starring the current inhabitant of the White House.

We did get President Obama's wish however. We were able to raise the top rate on those lazy, coupon cutting, silver spoon, one percenters. Yes, we got their tax rate up to almost 40%, just like in the good old Clinton days. It was perfect - it gave us enough extra money to run the Federal Government for almost a week. The rest of the masses were able to keep their Bush era tax rates - for now. Even though they have been called "permanent", nothing in Washington is permanent when a new Congress is sworn in. With the upcoming debt discussions looming, the tax rates of the middle class are truly "low fruit on the tree".

Not to sound like a soothsayer, I will still give my prediction as to what I think is going to happen in the next two months. First, even though the Fiscal Cliff deal was signed, sealed and delivered, the next frontal assault will soon take place. All deductions for the top one or two percenters will be looked at for elimination or reduction. When that does not work, "rich" will be redefined down to $50K and the sharp knives will be out for just about everyones taxes. Rates, deductions, and even 401K accounts will be looked upon as "booty" by the Progressive Left. A cry of pain will go up by millions upon millions of disillusioned Obama voters, but it will be too late. The fix is in, and we are all going to pay for it.

The cries of agony will even grow louder when the poor, unsuspecting throngs see many prized government programs cut by sequester or otherwise. They will have to pay more for less. Welcome to our new world. We will have tens of thousands of new regulations which will make things much more expensive; we will start to have inflation due to the current "QE forever" policy of the Fed; and we will have a health care system with sky high premiums which itself might be on life support due to the ObamaCare "fix".

Much talk as of late has centered around the "low information voter". Symptoms of this voter are ignorance, math dyslexia, and an addiction to kool aid and snake oil. Rather than listen to truth tellers, our under informed masses swoon over the smooth talker from Chicago. "If we can just get those evil rich folks to pay a little bit more, everything will be fine. Our best days will be ahead of us". No they are not Mr. President. Tell the truth. We are in deep, deep trouble and if we don't fix our debt issue, it will fix us.

I don't have buyer's remorse because I did not vote for the President. I do however, have remorse for our country. My heart aches that our youth are so uneducated or mis-educated they cannot see through this flimsy facade. They along with the rest of us are driving towards a brick wall at 100mph and nobody seems to know how to slow down or turn the wheel. We need to break out of our funk, admit we were hoodwinked, and fix this problem. Failure to do so will only result in our failure as a nation. And that, will be a cause of true remorse.
 

Superstar

Ever since I was a wee lad, I have loved football. In fact, prior to 1961, I was a hard core Packer fan. After all, who would not have been back then? The great Vince Lombardi as head coach, historic Bart Starr as quarterback, the most colorful Paul Horning as running back, the robotic Boyd Dowler as receiver, and Fuzzy Thurston on the line. There were more, many more that made this team fun to watch. I was fine being a Packer fan - they were our next door neighbor and they were very, very good. Then in 1961, something happened - Minnesota was awarded an expansion team, and the Minnesota Vikings were born.

It did not take me long to wean my loyalty off the green and gold and onto this new bunch of rag tag players. Like most expansion teams, they were not very good. However, in the first game out of the shoot, they beat the Monsters of the Midway! Yes, they showed from the start they could play in cold and spartan surroundings, and play with the best of them. The local fan base grew to love these Purple People Eaters in very short order.

The years past and the team legends grew. After Norm left, we had a new coach named Bud who along with his steel grey eyes, changed the nature of our club. We had a young, skinny quarterback named Fran who would run 20 yards to gain 5. It was great. Fran left to go to New York for a while and we had some Canadian named Joe who only threw "ruptured ducks". But Joe knew how to win. He led the Vikings to their first Super Bowl in 1969 against the Chiefs. The Vikes lost, but in eight years they had gone from a starter club to playing in the big dance. The years continued to go by and Fran came back, we had Chuck "44" Foreman, Bill "Boom Boom" Brown, Randy Moss, Chris Carter, "Two Minute" Tommy and a host of others. We made it to the big dance four times, only to walk away jilted. It has been frustrating as well as fun, and the journey continues.

With all the talent, all the personalities we have had on this bunch of purple warriors, possibly the biggest superstar is playing for us right now. Yes, Adrian Peterson is a true superstar - in fact, almost super human. In a world filled with prima donnas, there is someone who is so special, yet so humble. He is a young man who is not all "inked up", does not have hair hanging a foot below his helmet, and prays before every game. In short, he is someone who not only can play for Coach Leslie today, but also the very strict Bud Grant of yesterday.

None of us could forget last season when Adrian suffered what should have been a career ending injury. After the hit, his leg looked like something made out of a pipe cleaner rather than flesh and bone. I for one, thought it was over. Too bad - so much promise. However, Adrian did not think that. He wanted to know how soon he could go under the knife and then start rehab. He made a decision to come back this season and come back he did. Not only come back, but he rushed within nine short yards of setting the all time record. And he did it in the most humble of ways.

In a world short of true heroes, I believe we have one in our own number 28. Yes, he can play football as well. To me a hero in not what he can do on the field, but more so what happens off the field. What a role model! Who would not want their son to grow up to be like Adrian? Humble, giving, and very, very good. We are blessed in our long legacy of fine players to have maybe the best of the best in our midst right now. The season is over, Adrian got us to the playoffs, but with this young man, I believe the thrills are just beginning.

20 B4 60

 

 

"Lost time is never found again"

Benjamin Franklin

 

 

Many years ago, in another time, at another place, I was very fortunate to have been working at the right job during the right era. Quite simply, I was working as a contractor for the Defense Department during the presidency of Ronald Wilson Reagan. We had just come off four years of malaise and national floundering under Jimmy Carter. Our Navy was in such poor shape that ships were only able to put to sea if other ships were "cannibalized" for parts. President Reagan campaigned on a robust 600 ship Navy, and he was good to his word.

 

At the company I was employed with during the 1980's, things became very busy. I had mostly Navy Programs, however, as we were short staffed, I also picked up some Army, Air Force and NASA programs as well. We sold a product which many major contractors either wanted or were mandated to use as part of their product solution. Most days I received at least one solicitation or invitation for bid from another company or the government. It was nuts.

 

One day, I was at wit's end. I went into the office of the man who was in charge of the Navy programs. He was an absolute workaholic. Not only a workaholic, but a happy one to boot. If he worked 60, 70 or ever 80 hours a week, that was fine with him. He was in his sweet spot. I told him this - "I am fully maxed out. I cannot take one more program, not one more minute of work. I have no band with left". He put his pen down and looked at me. He said "There is always more time that you can use. For example, there is always 20 minutes before 60 Minutes on Sunday night." I was stunned. I expected to get a wee bit of sympathy, a small measure of concern. Nope. Twenty minutes before 60 Minutes on Sunday night. I walked out of his office with a dark cloud hanging over my head.

 

Walking back to my office, it hit me. He was right. My time management, as good as I thought it was, was not good enough. I needed to find "pockets of time" where I could squeeze more in. I wrote down in my daily planner "20 B4 60". That became my motto, my creed. Every time I thought I had run out of time, I would think of "20 B4 60" and look for one additional pocket of time. It worked for me not only at that company, but every company I was at until I retired.

 

One of the truly profound thoughts I had years ago was the importance of balance. People I knew which really seemed on top of their games and enjoyed it, had good balance in their lives. Step one to good balance was time management - finding the pockets of time to fit everything from work, to home to self into your day. Without proper time management the balance would suffer leading to stress and reduced or sub-par productivity.

 

I often think back on the man who gave me the advise on my time management. He might have just offered a flip answer or something he profoundly believed in. In any event, it changed my work life helped me to balance a high octane job, kids, house and a 40 mile commute. For that, I will always be grateful.

 

 

 

Shades of Grey

 

"Shades of grey wherever I go
The more I find out the less that I know
Black and white is how it should be
But shades of grey are the colors I see"

Shades of Grey

Billy Joel

First off - relax. This is not going to be about something sexy or salacious like that racy novel which recently came out. No, this is going to be about moral relativism and how it is affecting our lives, our country. What was once clear cut, now is "maybe" or "we will see". Absolute "yes or no" are now drifting into our historical lexicon. This brave new world we created in the sixties is now coming home to roost, like an unwelcomed house guest.

What is it about absolutes that we don't like? We see it in our schools, we see it in our politics. We don't like kids to keep score in games because the losing team might feel sad. Test scores in college have become hyper-inflated because we want to make sure every one feels good about what they have learned (or not learned). We pass kids forward in school (social promotion) even though they failed to learn the grade they were in. We have come to detest the expressed or implied authority defined in any governing document, including our Constitution and/or Bible.

If we could time warp someone who was living in our country in 1950 to present day, I dare say that person would be shocked. The change in culture would be mind numbing. What was the norm back then is for the most part, the abnormal now. Why don't we see it? Simple - we have been frogs boiling in the water. The changes have come slowly and constantly. Small, incremental changes. However, today some are becoming embolden enough to take a bigger bite. For example, on New Years Eve an editorial in the New York Times (one of the nation's largest newspapers) said it was time to scrap the Constitution. This comes on the heals of a Supreme Court Justices going overseas, and telling a developing country they should look for a governing document to emulate other than our Constitution. This was a good example of many on the left who HATE our Constitution for what it stands for - rules and order, black and white.

As we press forward into the new year, our national math is also suffering from shades of grey. At one time, a budget, be it a family budget or a national budget, was absolute. Not any more. Smoke em' if you got em'. If it feels good, spend it. Not our problem, let the next generation fix it. As boiling frogs, we have gone from having a national budget which is sacrosanct, to one which is often breached, to not having one at all. Want to spend some money on algae reproducing? Print more money or borrow from China. We can spend on anything, no matter how mundane or ridiculous. Unlike our parents, who taught us the value of money and how to properly manage it, we are showing our kids that life is like a party which never ends. No day of reckoning. Borrow, spend, print, borrow, spend, print.

In the upcoming months we will all hear much about our national priorities as well as our founding documents. We will endeavor once again to re-write and re-define the Second Amendment to our Constitution. Rather than researching the historical nature on WHY we have that in our founding document, we will re-define it as a hunting amendment. There are some who even want the Second Amendment removed entirely - not needed anymore. The Supreme Court will continue to lean further left and the power reserved in that branch of our government will continue to grow. As frogs in boiling water, we have seen powers which should be reserved for the Legislative branch slowly leach over to the Judicial.

Our vision needs to be sharp. The numerous shades of grey can dull our senses. When things were black and white, the differences between the two were easy to discern. However, in our brave new world of incrementalism, only the shapest of vision can detect the ever changing, and growing, shades of grey.
 

Well Played Mr. President!

"Last night, old man, you did it!
You did it! You did it! You said that you would do it,
And indeed you did. I thought that you would rue it;
I doubted you'd do it. But now I must admit it
That succeed you did. You should get a medal"

You Did It!

My Fair Lady

Bravo, Mr. President! Well done! Well played! Kudos! Bravo Zulu! Last night you managed to cobble a coalition of the unwilling, and together, in the wee hours on the morning, you managed to once again snatch defeat from the jaws of victory! You played those hapless Republicans like a violin once again. Poor Mitch - he was the one you really worked over. Somehow, whether it was drug induced or not, he agreed to go from a ratio of spending cuts to revenue increases (which you promised you would do in the run up to the last election) of 3.5 to 1, to a bill which had a whopping ratio of 1 to 41! How did you do it? Not only did you screw Mitch right into the ground, but you left him smiling after the assault!

There is only one very small, very minute problem with your happy dance - nothing was fixed. In fact, the projected debt grew again last night - by over $3T dollars. Don't worry about it - the lemmings on Wall Street are going to send the market up like a roman candle this morning once it opens. You see, in our "day trading" mentality, we don't care about the future if it goes beyond this quarter, or even this month. That is a problem for another day. Speaking of which, how is that new debt limit coming? Oh yea - that stinky dropping is coming up and it is just over the horizon.

Was the deal all bad? Nope - not a bit. To FINALLY make most of the previously "hated" Bush tax cuts permanent was a good thing. Even better, was we finally were able to do something we should have done years ago. Fix that damn AMT thing. Now that is behind us unless a future Congress unravels part of this "permanent" fix. Other than that, the bill was a total loser. Did NOTHING to fix or even slow down the run away debt issue. Stay tuned on that one.

To quote our former nemesis, Saddam Hussein, in less than two months we are going to be enjoined in the "Mother of all battles". It is going to be ugly. Nasty. Surprise, surprise - the sequester was not addressed. In fact, it was kicked down the street. Wow - we never did that before! But, the day of reckoning will soon be upon us. Not only dealing with the sequester (by the way, I don't have a CLUE how that will work!) but also raising or not raising the debt ceiling once again.

The only thing that will keep this from being a political Armageddon will be the tag teaming of Barry and Biden to work over Mitch once again. We could end up with another plate of pablum and a promise to "take care of this most important issue" at a later date. Right now it is gun control and immigration that is burning a hole in Barry. He wants to be on these as soon as yesterday. Debts and debt limits are as exciting to him as watching paint dry.

So once again Mr. President, nice job. The old saying use to be "fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me". No more. You have managed to fool us time and time again and we keep coming back for more. Thank you sir, for starting the new year off on the right foot. I will now send my kids the bill for what we all signed up to last night.

To Boldly Go...

"There are old pilots, there are bold pilots, however, there are very few old, bold pilots"

I have said this before, but I think it bears repeating. I am a sucker for boldness. Bold ideas, bold talk, bold actions. I am drawn to boldness like a moth to a flame. Boldness is one of those virtues which made America great. For example, in September of 1962, then President Kennedy said the following during a speech at Rice Stadium:

We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.

It turns out this one small segment of a half hour speech is regarded by historians as one of the most significant examples of presidential leadership and vision we have had since the beginning of our republic. We had absolutely no clue how this was going to be done. We had none of the technology needed, and about zero experience in putting someone in orbit, much less to the moon. However, the boldness of this speech intoxicated the imagination of a nation. We came under the vision, bought into it, in July 1969, we did it.

It was the boldness of the Captains of Industry which allowed them to forge a new manufacturing economy out of a mostly agrarian economy; it was the boldness of our leaders and generals which allowed us to defeat a superior and cunning force during World War II; it was the boldness of Apple Computer to become a world leader and innovator by taking on the monolithic duo of IBM and Microsoft for market share when most other companies were acquiescing to the PC and Windows world. Finally, it was the boldness of our Founding Fathers which allowed them to come up with a document so simple, yet so profound, it has been the inspiration of people all over this planet who desire to live free.

As we forge ahead into the new year, we are once again looking for bold thinkers. Thinkers who can look at the landscape, find the right path, and lead us to a better tomorrow. Bold thinkers who can take bold thoughts and turn them into bold action. Bold thinkers who are not afraid to tell the truth and not be influenced by polls and trends. For years, we have had more than our share of charlatans and sellers of snake oil. We crave the real McCoy. We need someone not to tell us we are going to the moon - this time something even better, even bolder. We may not have a clue on how we will do it, but just like in July of 1969, we will figure it out.

Captain Kirk told us at the start of every Star Trek episode that "Space was the final frontier", and that we would "boldly go where nobody has ever gone before". To that I say Captain Kirk was mostly right. Space is a final frontier. However, with the proper vision and as well as American boldness, we will also explore many undiscovered frontiers on this planet as well.