Up, Down and Around Our Town

We certainly do live in interesting times.  Just when you think there aren't any more surprises, up pops a couple just to keep us honest.  Imagine the possibility that Yankee $25M a year man - A-Rod is a steroids user.  Amazing.  Just to compete with those who are perhaps as good.  Just makes you wonder about the ego of those ingesting those chemicals and how much more money they could be actually worth.  Consider the possibilities.

$500,000 for top paid executives who are on the Federal dole.  Imagine that.  Let's see, bring a company to the brink of bankruptcy, get your name in the paper as being in great need of Federal Funds for the continuation of the company and when those funds arrive, pay them out in large bonuses to the boys in the band.   The President has the audacity of not to hope, but to prey.  And prey he did.  A half-mil should tide those poor overpaid folks for awhile.  Or, they could do without the governmental (and blantantly socialistic) handout and let the market decide.  Ah, the home in Boca - we just got it decorated.

Then there's Rod.  Do we need a last name?  He has a funny last name and a funnier haircut.  Seems that even after he has been run from office, he wants all to know that he was unfairly treated.  That his "play for pay" was just a sham and that should be praised for free bus service for the elderly.  Delusional.  Interesting.  We tolerate this garbage and tend to, thanks to 24 hour news services that have 30 minutes of real news, to perpetuate even the most blatant views.  Must be the Zen of politics.  I never got to that chapter.

Funnier even.  Having had the joy of holding Management classes for the past 3 years, it is interesting to talk about the words accountability and productivity in the same sentence.  At least that's what the book states.  So, we teach it.  With a straight face, I might add.  Then we open the Wall Street Journal and find out that perhaps that theory might not hold a lot of contemporary water.  I wonder what the students might be thinking.   I know that they have picked up a few cynical nuggets as we interact, but I wonder if they grasp the potential conflict that is being taught as they wait their turn to get into the business world.  Interesting to say the least.

Then there's the entry point.  On the very day that the President was touting his New Deal at Caterpillar, the President of Caterpillar announced that there would probably be more layoffs before the stimulus package would kick in.  Interesting.  Invite the new President to extoll his stimulus package and then have one of the leading industrialists sort of rain on that parade.  Only in America.  Perhaps only in Illinois.

Yet, we travail on and on.  Millions of jobs have been lost, the ability to save a dime has been placed on hold and the audacity of hope has been backburnered.  Our elected officials bounced right back into their Red/Blue chairs and we barely got it passed.  The money will roll, no doubt about that; the real question is will the jobs ensue?   Now that's a quandry.  What if our trillions of dollars don't get this thing turned around?  Another one of those interesting thoughts.

Back to the classroom.  In a capitalistic world and a profit-driven country, one has to actually make something that someone else will purchase to get the merry-go-round turn.  When people stop buying things, the wheels slows and will ultimately stop.  Never mind that there are people who wish to be productive who are now collecting unemployment because those with greed on their mind subverted the system.  Follow the money.  That's a credo that simply never gets old.

Yes, it is tough to grow up.  I heard a wonderful analogy last week.  It centered around the capacity of those who lead and those who are in charge.   The latter seems to get a lot of the ink, but the need for true leadership seems to be in short supply.  It begs the question; which do we want and when do we want it?  Perhaps paying one's taxes is a good start. 

Or, would we rather stay plugged into our iPods, cellphones and other technological marvels and act like the lemmings that we are becoming OR do we perhaps want to strive for some leadership that will stem the tide of doubt and layoffs.  It's housing and jobs.  It's that simple.  It doesn't take a newly minted President to figure that one out.   The real question is whether or not we will just get someone in charge or perhaps see the emergence of a leader.   We'll all be the judge.

Meanwhile, we'll download, plug-in, zone out and hope that it all goes away.  Or maybe not. Should make for a nice spring.  It will make me wonder how the $25M cheater will melt under the pressure of the new Yankee Stadium crowd.  After all, even with his chemical enhancing, he has, at best, been Mr. May. Productivity - what you produce and what it costs to produce.  Such remains the key to many questions yet to be answered.

What doesn't remain is the intense grin, smile and laughter generated when a fuzzy Valentine was placed in the tiny hand of my hero.  Now that's production.  Plus, her brother continues to be somewhat of a comedian and leader in his own right.   It's a nice combination.  It's real and genuine.  It feels good.  Perhaps feeling good isn't such a bad thing.

I'll get back to my Royko references in a week.  Just so I can bath in the rhetoric that is flying faster than we can catch.  Or, when the thaw gets here for real and we can do other things.  Cabin fever.  It does get to you.

Till next week and comments are always welcomed.  I remain, as always......