Keeping It Simple

Many of us make well intended New Year’s resolutions. Most of us somehow manage to never keep them.

Lose 20 pounds; save more money; read a good book every week. They all fall by the wayside as the daily grind takes over and we never find the time to accomplish those things that we swore on our sainted Grandmother’s grave we would.

For 2017, I’ve decided to save myself the frustration and not commit to a check list of promises.

My goal for the new year is to keep life simple. My hair is white enough. I’m not going to worry about the things I can’t control.

I can't worry too much about what Le Grande Orange does in Washington.  If I do, my hair will start falling out quicker than it already is.
 
I’m also not going to be so concerned about what other people think. I’ve been around long enough to have earned the right to be grumpy every now and then.

What I can do is be the best husband, father, grandfather, son, brother, employee, colleague and friend that I can.

I can control the amount and quality of the time I spend with my family and do the best job every day for the people who employee me. I can be generous when generosity is needed. I can appreciate the people I’m around and the opportunities I’ve been given.

We’re in the final days of a year filled with tragedy.  The phrases “you never know” and “there but for the grace of God…” have been uttered far too often.

We need a fresh start. The new year won’t be without its challenges and tragedies, but if we focus on the good, the positive and the possible it has to be better than the one we’re thankfully leaving behind.

Tilting at Windmills

We’re going to be subjected for decades to the slicing and dicing of this year’s election results in an attempt to explain how Donald Trump was victorious.
As I watched the tallies come in and saw states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin go to The Donald, I thought about a book published back in 2004 called “What’s the Matter with Kansas?” by political analyst and historian Thomas Frank.

The book focuses on the rise of political conservatism in the social and political landscape of Kansas, whose leaders support economic policies that do not benefit the majority of people in the state. Yet, these leaders continue to be re-elected based on their positions on "explosive" cultural issues such as abortion and gay marriage.

The most recent example is current Kansas Governor Sam Brownback, whose aggressive tax cuts have resulted in substantial budget deficits significantly impacting the state’s already lagging educational system, as well as other important services.  Yet, he was re-elected,

While there certainly was a healthy dose of economic frustration behind the Trump vote, it also reflected a variety of hot button cultural issues from immigration and the rights of those who are LGBT to gun control and the place and role of women in society.

What I wonder is how many people who supported Trump understand how much they were voting against themselves.

 So, I wonder if people in Kansas understood on Tuesday that they were voting for someone who is a vociferous climate change denier, because their state greatly benefits from the expanding renewable energy business, especially wind power.

Since 2001, 25 wind farms have been built in Kansas with six currently under construction representing in total more than 4,500MW in generating capacity. It has been suggested that for every 1,000MW, the cumulative economic benefit is about $1.08 billion dollars. To paraphrase our President-elect, that’s “huge!” 

I wonder if coal miners and steel workers in Pennsylvania and auto workers in Michigan realize that they voted for someone who has pledged -- and will have the Congressional support -- to repeal “Obamacare,” which contains a provision that forbids health insurance companies from denying coverage because of a pre-existing condition.

(I had an interesting conversation with my brother who lives in Michigan following the election. He said what befuddles him is the number of autoworkers who are now critical of the "bailout" that saved their industry and their jobs.)

With all the talk about creating more manufacturing jobs, I wonder if factory workers across the country, who supported Trump because he pledged to tear up a variety of trade agreements, understand that trade doesn't always equate to lost jobs. It can also open markets, so that there are jobs. (As long as you possess the skills needed to satisfy the demand.)

…and I wonder about all those voters -- especially in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania -- who either stayed home or didn’t cast a vote for President, because they didn’t “like” Hillary and/or found Trump impossible to support, are feeling today.

Not too good, I bet. This one's on them...

Post Script

This may be hard for some to read on the day after our stunning national vote, but election results sometimes have a funny way of being right.

Now that the 2016 political season is history, I can say this: it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing that I wasn’t elected Mayor of Attleboro in 1983. (See “Snatching Defeat from the Jaws of Victory”)

Looking back, I like to think that I would have been a good Mayor, but I can also see that I was young in a lot of ways, inexperienced and probably a bit too full of myself. I certainly had more than my share of critics, who would have liked nothing more than to see me fail and been eager to help me do so.

I hope I would have been a quick learner. In the days before the election, I had been talking to people with much more experience about joining my City Hall staff. I hope I would have listened to them.

In 1985, I was re-elected to the City Council having been selected to fill a vacancy several months earlier.  But now Mayor Reed, my opponent in 1983, lost her re-election bid to former Councilor Kai Shang, who had finished a distant fourth in the preliminary two years before.

Like our President-elect, no one in the political crowd took Shang’s candidacy seriously.

His claim to fame was two-fold. Shang shot the winning basket in the 1948 “Tech Tourney” giving Attleboro its first statewide hoop championship.

He was also involved in a long running feud with the City over the fate of his business/home.  Shang operated his family’s long established downtown laundry on property mapped out to be taken as part of the City’s redevelopment efforts. He and his family lived on the upper floors.  So, in addition to those who remembered his high school exploits, he also had the sympathy of many newer residents, who saw him as a small business owner being treated unfairly by the City.

Shang’s less than effective and often confusing public speaking style only added to his everyman image, which in many ways he was. But, it also served to mask the fact that he was a very successful businessman, who owned many pieces of valuable property across the City.

He was in marked contrast to Reed’s “high society ways.” As the only female Mayor in Massachusetts at the time, she was often involved in activities outside the City and even served as co-chair of John Kerry’s Senate Campaign. When word got around that she was being taken by helicopter to events, many in working class Attleboro were not impressed.

(Reed also inexplicably decided to go back to school after taking office and began attending nearby Wheaton College.)

When her term ended, Reed stepped away from politics. In in the height of irony, Shang began working at the new City Hall, built by Reed, and located directly across the street from where his family’s business and home had stood for decades. He was, in fact, a surprisingly effective Mayor for six years concerning himself with issues that impacted the average citizen.

Like Shang, there’s no predicting what will happen when Trump takes office.  But, the country survived the Presidencies of Andrew Johnson, Ulysses S. Grant, Warren Harding, and Herbert Hoover. (Though it took a world war for us to get out of the mess Hoover created.)

Here’s hoping that President Trump frequently surprises those of us who didn’t support him and at least occasionally disappoints those who did.

 

Bumper Stickers

I’m sure the bumper stickers have already been printed.
“She’s not my President”

“He’s not my President”

The first time I remember anything close that kind of message was in the Watergate Era when people from Massachusetts – the only state George McGovern carried – began sporting bumper stickers on their cars that said “Don’t’ blame me, I’m from Massachusetts.”

But I don’t recall people ever saying that Richard Nixon wasn’t their President. And no one suggested that Gerald Ford wasn’t, either.

Nixon was never a popular guy in Massachusetts dating back to when he and John Kennedy competed in 1960. But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t respected.

My Dad – a good Irish Catholic Democrat – worked at a downtown Boston hotel where Nixon made an appearance during the 1960 campaign.  My Dad shook Nixon’s hand and I’ll never forget how excited he was every time he would ask friends and family members to “shake the hand that shook Richard Nixon’s hand.”

My Dad never voted for Nixon, but he also never said that “he’s not my President.”

My guess is that the “not my President” sentiment became in vogue when Al Gore won the popular vote, but George W. Bush received enough Electoral College support to move into the White House.  The sentiment has gotten even louder these last eight years, sadly reflecting a society where not everyone believes that we’re equal.

The slurs and the insults that have been sent President Obama’s way might be a preview of what will be said if Hillary Clinton wins in November.  (Just imagine some of those bumper stickers…)

“Not my President” is just another example of our cafeteria approach to issues large and small. 

Boycott the NFL because Colin Kaepernick’s protest during the National Anthem is disrespectful of the flag. But, it’s ok for my favorite country artist to use the flag as a patch on his jeans.

It’s perfectly fine for some to say that American isn’t great.  But, if others did, Sean Hannity and friends would be apoplectic.

It seems that the difference isn’t what you’re doing or saying, it’s who you are that makes it acceptable or not.

Magician Penn Jillette, who has become known for his political musings as much as his Las Vegas stage show, says that “democracy without respect for individual rights sucks. It's just ganging up against the weird kid, and I'm always the weird kid.”

We seem to be losing is our willingness to agree to disagree.  We don’t all need to have the same views, that would be pretty boring. But we do need to start respecting other people’s ideas again, even if we don't understand why they think the way they do and couldn’t disagree with them more.

We all have the right to be wrong in someone else’s opinion.

 

 

 

 

 

Snatching Defeat from the Jaws of Victory

In 1983, at the age of 30, I came within 297 votes of being elected Mayor of Attleboro, Mass.

Known at the time as the Jewelry City, it was home to Balfour, Jostens and other companies whose names would be familiar to high school and college seniors as the makers of their class rings and publishers of their yearbooks.

It was also on the cutting edge of the technology business with Texas Instruments employing hundreds of local residents at their multi building campus.

The fact that I was even a contender for the job was surprising. I had moved to Attleboro a scant eight years before. But, as the City Hall reporter/evening talk show host for the area radio station, I became familiar with many of the community’s movers and shakers.  My name recognition in the broader community increased when I began teaching at the area’s only Catholic high school.  When the City Councilor for my Ward unexpectedly announced that he was not seeking re-election, it didn’t take much to convince me to put my name on the ballot.

After all, I was an Irish Catholic kid from Boston whose grandfather and uncles had long careers on the Fire Department. My Dad was active in civic organizations in the Allston/Brighton section of the City and had been approached about running for State Representative, but declined. So it was sort of a no-brainer.

The other candidate was a  former Councilor, who was said to have a relative on every corner. Somehow I won.

After being re-elected two years later, I backed the winning candidate for City Council President.  I found myself Chair of what was considered the “powerful” Finance Committee at a time when the incumbent Mayor’s popularity was waning as he struggled to implement the budget cutting Proposition 2 ½ law, while hanging on to his dream of building Attleboro’s first free standing City Hall.  At the time, City Hall was the rented second and third floors of a downtown bank.

When the Mayor decided not to run for re-election, the field was open and I jumped in portraying myself as an expert on City finances.

I finished first in a five person preliminary getting 28% of the vote. Coming in second was the Finance Chair of the School Committee, Brenda Reed, who was completing her first term. We would go head to head in November.

The fact that I would be the City’s youngest Mayor, if elected, and Brenda would be the first woman generated a lot of interested.  We slogged from Legion Hall to Elks Lodge in a blur of candidate’s nights.  We appeared on the first ever televised debate on local cable. The Boston media – which generally ignored Attleboro -- swooped in the weekend before the vote to interview us.

Election Day brought great weather and both our teams worked hard to bring out our supporters. In the end, I came up short. The difference was razor thin, only about 150 votes, if you think about it.  (If she got 150 less, and I got 150 more…)

It was in the days and weeks following the Election that it really hit home how every vote counts.

Reviewing the voter lists in the days following Election, I easily identified 150 people we were counting on who never made it to the polls.  For example, neighbors across the street, who we had down for five votes.

When their three children, who were attending college in Boston called to say that they were taking the train home to vote, Mom told them not to bother because “Hank’s got this.”  That was the prevailing opinion in many political circles prompting a friend to turn the cliché on its head and joke that I had “snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.”  

Dad got stuck in work; Mom was only one who actually voted. So five solid votes, melted into just one. There were dozens of other examples of people who, for a variety of reasons, never voted.  

In the next few weeks we’ll be hearing from candidates, civic leaders and clergy about the importance of voting. It’s easy to snicker and be dismissive.

But take it from someone who has lived it, your vote does make a difference.

Even if you think it doesn’t.  

 

 

 

 

To retire like David Ortiz

 

David Ortiz is having a record breaking final year playing for the Red Sox. Having announced his intention to retire at the end of this baseball season, every time he steps to the plate is an opportunity to set another mark for a player his age or for one in his retirement year.
With more than 100 RBIs; closing in 40 home runs and leading the league in a couple of offensive categories, he doesn’t seem like someone who should be retiring, even at age 40.

While he has given every indication that this is his final season, there are many who can't seem to accept it. You would think from their reaction that if not playing baseball, Ortiz is surely destined for rocking chair on the porch of a retirement home.

Just recently Red Sox President Sam Kennedy was asked on Sports Radio if he and team ownership had sat down with Ortiz and had “the talk.”

Kennedy was adamant that the Club is respecting Ortiz's wishes and gave no indication that Big Papi has ever suggested that he was thinking about changing his mind. In fact, Ortiz has said on several occasions that he wishes he hadn’t announced his retirement before the season began, because of all the additional obligations and expectations that have followed him as he makes his last appearances in ballparks around the country.

But the questions continue.

While I’m certainly older than Ortiz but nowhere near as financially secure, I can appreciate why he’s decided to call it a career.

- It’s a young man’s game. With one of the younger teams in baseball, Ortiz is clearly the old man amongst the kids. While it’s energizing to be around younger people in the workplace and elsewhere, I know from my own experience it can be challenging, as well.

- There’s too many miles on his tires. When he approaches the plate, Ortiz is often described as “walking on pillows” because of the physical issues he has with his feet. While he has never been the fastest player on the team, it’s pretty obvious when he’s out by a country mile attempting to stretch a single into a double that he has lost a step or two from his already glacier like pace.

- It’s too much work. The training; the roads trips; the time that it takes to get ready for a game. While baseball players are some of the most pampered athletes in the world, the grind over 162 games and more than six months has got to take its toll after all these years.  

- There are other things to do. I haven’t read or heard anything directly from Ortiz that indicates what he plans to do when his playing days conclude. But as one of the most beloved players in the game and blessed with enough money to be sure that his great, great, great grandkids will be financially secure, he can continue his philanthropic work, become an international ambassador for the game or even a team owner.

- It’s a chance to go out on top. This one I identify with the most. It’s a lock that the Sox will win the division and have as good a chance as any team to make it to the World Series. Given his ability to shine in the spotlight, Ortiz will most likely thrive in the playoffs and leave center stage with fans remembering his contributions, not his failings.

Far too often athletes– pick your sport – spend their last few years hanging on. If you have the cache of a Jeter, Ripken or Yazstremski you stay in the line up where fans can see on a daily basis how your skills have slipped.

Personally, I’m hoping to be more like Ortiz than Yaz and accept when its time to leave the game to the kids, even if I'm still at the top of mine.  There are other things I want to accomplish, too.  

 

A horse named False Hope

I’m trying to understand it, but I just don’t get the Donald Trump phenomenon.

It seems that reality gets turned on its head when it comes to Trump. What have long been considered the basics of successful campaigns – release your tax returns; don’t insult potential voters or your opponents based on their sex, race or religion; don’t threaten violence if you lose – just don’t seem to apply.

If he were any other candidate in any other year, we wouldn’t be talking about him less than two months from the election and contemplating the chance that he might win.

I get the frustration of some of his supporters. While local and state governments generally speaking seem to work just fine, the national government appears to be at a standstill.  A Supreme Court nominee hasn’t received the courtesy of a vote rejecting him. Legislators can’t agree on how to address gun violence, reflecting the divided view of their constituents.  Opinion in Washington is also split about immigration and those who have been living here illegally, which also reflects the mood of the country.

But, when you take your eyes off Congress and focus on what our national government does on a day-to-day basis, it’s still working.

Social Security checks are being mailed; emergency aid is going to communities hit by natural disasters, and taxes continue to be collected. The “gridlock” that dominates the headlines has everything to do with the politicians and not the actual functioning of government. 

There are many theories about why Trump has garnered so much support. They range from economics to an unrealistic fear of terrorism.

The New Yorker ran an interesting piece in August that suggested that Trump voters “feel that their privileged place in America is threatened by forces they don’t really understand.”  They live in culturally isolated areas and have little contact with people who are not like themselves.

Given that we can live, work, shop and find entertainment without venturing into a metropolitan area, it’s not surprising that many of our fellow Americans could have a somewhat limited view of the world and be concerned about what they see.

Their perspective on life in the big city; immigrants, and living in ethnically and culturally diverse communities is probably based more on cable news or "Law and Order" than actual experience. I’m going to guess that many believe that we’ve become a little too politically correct (We could lighten up a bit). They probably have little, if any, contact with people who are gay or transgendered and want to use the bathroom associated with their chosen sexual identity.  

And then along comes Donald Trump who talks about the good old days when you could punch somebody in the mouth and get away with it; who makes fun of people with disabilities, and promises to build a wall to keep out foreigners.

I guess I can see the attraction, but it seems like putting all your money on a horse named False Hope.

Mexico isn’t going to pay to build the wall. You’re not going to be able to deport the number of people Trump has talked about without massive police action that I suspect would make the majority of people shudder, even ardent immigration foes.  We can’t turn back the clock and make it acceptable to tell ethnic jokes again.  Folks who are LGBT aren’t going to return to the fringes of society.

If Trump backers are frustrated because people they have supported in the past haven't delivered on their promises, what will happen if he gets elected and inevitably lets them down, too?

I keep waiting for those who I put in the “they should know better” category to decide that enough is enough with Trump. Maybe his recent musings about what would happen if Hillary’s Secret Service protection was disarmed or his calling a press conference to make a major announcement only to attempt to use it to promote his new hotel will make them realize that the reasons they’re supporting him aren’t enough to trump the fact that he’s just not the kind of person we need as President.

I just hope enough of them come to their senses by November 8.  

Rookie Advice

The title of this blog is a tip of the cap to my first boss in the energy business, Paul Pinkham.

The phrase "Thought while shaving..." often appeared on the top of notes he would leave us with suggestions or ideas about a project we were working on or one he wanted us to take up.

It's ironic for me, because I've had a beard for 40 years and, as a result, don't have much time to think while shaving. I don't believe anyone in my family would recognize me without hair on my face. At this point, I'm not even sure my Mother or brothers would remember without looking at photos.

Since I was a rookie in the communications business, Paul had a great influence on my early career. Another one of his favorites phrases that I recall on a regular basis was: "Plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery."

I make a point to share that with all my staff and students and most seem ready to fall out of their chairs when hearing it. (Figuratively)

But, he didn't mean it literally.

It was his very effective way of saying "do the research." Before writing the quarterly financial statement; the yearly press release on preparing for winter, or even the CEO's letter in the Annual Report, look back and see what was done before. Check out what other utility companies were writing in similar situations. Then develop your own approach and message. He was giving us permission not to struggle.

(I suppose he could have said "don't reinvent the wheel," but that's not quite as memorable.)

I also admired Paul because as a life-long company employee, he worked his way up from selling appliances back when utilities owned stores to VP of Corporate Communications. His talent and experience, however, was not always appreciated by those who went through the revolving door of higher level senior management. But he was comfortable in his own skin and confident in his ability. Paul was always the last one standing when the latest hot shot senior VP moved on.

A quick shout out is also in order for another colleague of mine from those days, Bernie Mendillo, an accomplished author and playwright. I recently started receiving links on social media to Bernie's blog at this site and thought maybe this was an avenue for me, as well.

Time will tell...



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