by admin | Jun 17, 2007 |
I’ve been uncomfortable ever since rhetoric started flying over the current immigration issue. My discomfort is caused in part because, for the most part, it is a discussion about exclusion. Who gets in and who doesn’t, and what do you do with the ones that are in, but shouldn’t be. It’s intellectually trite to admit that we’re immigrants all, but it’s a fact. The only differences are when did we or our ancestors come and what was our cultural flavor when we got here. A history of immigration is a bifurcated story. On the one hand, we have the story of the rejects, downtrodden and oppressed of other countries prospering under the mantle of...
by admin | Jun 13, 2007 |
About once every three or four years I stumble in to The City (as in New York City) on a Sunday in advance of Monday meetings only to be greeted by an ominous warning from my driver, “I don’t know how we’re going to get to your hotel, the Puerto Ricans have taken over the city”. Translated, that means the city will be packed with revelers of all stripes enjoying the annual Puerto Rican Day Parade…. up 5th Avenue from 46th to 86th. This may not seem like such a big deal to you uninitiated, but let me assure you that several hundred thousand parade marchers and watchers, not to mention thousands of the city’s finest trying to control the crowds make for...
by admin | May 25, 2007 |
I was asked to speak at a Memorial Day celebration in the small town near our ranch. I guess they had gotten the word that I was an easy mark when there was a podium and a microphone involved. For reasons unclear to me at the time, I had a hard time deciding whether or not to accept. I’m sure they weren’t looking for much. A few words in memory of those members of America’s military who had sacrificed in our behalf and in celebration of those who still served. No jokes, no pithy stories. Just a few words to make people feel a little better. Before making my decision, I spent more than a little time trying to figure out what I would say and how I would say...
by admin | May 19, 2007 |
These words uttered by General Douglas McArthur as he left Corregidor for Australia in 1941 shaped his place in history as well as the strategy of the Pacific Command and his own behavior for the next three years. It also pretty much sums up what most Americans know about the Republic of the Philippines today. I first visited Manila almost exactly twenty years ago as I was surveying possible new locations to plant the my company’s flag in Asia. My mind was pretty much made up as I left the doors of the worst airport I’d seen in Asia and entered what Dante might have called the gates of hell. It surely had the same climatic conditions, and the sights,...
