A common field one day. A field of honor forever.’ The story of United Flight 93. What would you have done?

Posted on September 12, 2011

‘ September 12, 2011 | Author: Jeffrey Lant | Posted in Dr. Jeffrey Lant’s Article Archive


By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
This is a story of pathos, sadness, tragedy, of lives cut short too soon. But most of all it is the story of everyday people, your neighbors, friends and colleagues, who, without warning or preparation , became heroes. It is a story that makes me proud to be an American… and should make you proud, too. And it all took place over the gentle farmland of Pennsylvania, which has known heroes before. But none like these…
An ordinary day.
Ten years ago, September 11, 2001 was an ordinary day for the passengers and crew of United Airlines’ scheduled morning transcontinental flight across the United States from Newark International Airport in Newark, New Jersey, to San Francisco International Airport in California. Or at least they thought it would be ordinary. And so they got up, got ready and went about their business thinking only of the usual things that distinguish everyday life… little knowing that, for each, they would never have the gift of an ordinary day ever again. Nor would the Great Republic they planned to traverse from sea to shining sea.
Everything, absolutely everything, was about to be different.
The imam of unimaginable hate, Osama bin Laden.
The evil genius behind the events of September 11, including the fate of Flight 93, was a man of profound, unfathomable hate. In his fetid brain arose the idea of inflicting massive pain on innocent people who had never done him any wrong. Acting as the vicegerent of his malevolent God, he degreed death, pain, mayhem, and a universal longing to know the answer to one insistent question, “Why?” It is a question that will reverberate down the corridors of human history, but we shall never really know…
Everything was normal, ordinary, expected… for the last time.
Seven crew members were there to do their jobs, Captain Jason Dahl, First Officer LeRoy Homer, Jr., and flight attendants Lorraine Bay, Sandra Bradshaw, Wanda Green, CeeCee Lyles, and Deborah Walsh.
Thirty three passengers did what passengers on early morning flights do, preparing for a long day of effortless travel that leaves you, upon arrival, exhausted.
But there were others on this flight, 4 agents of doom, 4 agents of bin Laden… misguided, zealous, reflecting the hate and purpose of their malicious, misdirected leader. And these 4 were so misguided and warped by the noisome message of that leader that they selected death with him… rather than life without. This selection made them dangerous… as the world was about to discover.
Late for eternity.
Just a few minutes before scheduled take-off time of 8 a.m. the doors closed on what was no longer an aircraft but a coffin soon to be air born. Airport congestion delayed take-off and delayed it again, until at 8:42 a.m. they at last ascended, to a destiny not even the hijackers could imagine. And so the last moments of normality ticked away for the people on Flight 93. But they were already gone for the people of America and the world. Flight 111 had already been commandeered… .Flight 175 was being hijacked…. Flight 77 was still climbing normally and would be hijacked in 9 minutes.
As the attacks began, air traffic officials began issuing warnings through the Aircraft Communication Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS). Ed Ballinger, the United flight dispatcher, began sending text cockpit warnings to United Airlines flights at 9:19 a.m., after he became aware of the second World Trade Center impact by Flight 175. At 9:22, after learning of the events at the World Trade Center, LeRoy Homer’s wife, Melody, had an ACARS message sent to her husband in the cockpit asking if he was okay.
But neither LeRoy Homer nor anyone else was okay… as the day now rushed forward from crisis to tragedy… At 9:24 a..m. Flight 93 received Ballinger’s ACARS warning, “Beware any cockpit intrusion — two a/c (aircraft) hit World Trade Center.” Flight 93 sent two more normal messages, the second at 9:27 a.m.
… But at 9:28 a.m. “normal” ended… and the high destiny of Flight 93 and all within her commenced. Flights 11 and 175 had already crashed into the World Trade Center; Flight 77 was within minutes of striking the Pentagon. And the passengers and crew of Flight 93 were on the threshold of eternity, soon to show the nation and the world what good people could do when circumstances required… as they did when the hijackers, at a time which cannot be determined, took control of the aircraft, turning it into a weapon of mass destruction.
Where were they taking Flight 93?
Osama bin Laden was a man who understood the power of symbols and so he directed his minions to attack targets of immense significance, the World Trade Center, the Pentagon… and either the Capitol or White House (just where is not precisely known). Either would have swelled not only the casualties but the psychic pain the nation would be forced to feel and deal with. And all that stood between bin Laden and the achievement of his objective was 40 ordinary people who had just lost control of the aircraft…
Imagine what these people were thinking as the pace of events forced them to make like-changing decisions at the fastest possible rate. They first probably thought that going along with what the hijackers wanted would be the most sensible and prudent course.
But as they learned from cell phone and other messages coming in from loved ones, they realized the hijackers weren’t interested in negotiation… They had a hideous mission to perform.
And this meant the passengers and crew were faced with a moral dilemma of the first order: to counter attack and seize the cockpit and the plane… or do nothing. Either way they had just moments to decide… and no prospect of opting out whatsoever.
They voted for action.
At this, the touchstone of their lives, these ordinary people cast in the most extraordinary event, did a simple thing that showed how far superior they were to the hijackers who had forced themselves upon them. Instead, they voted on what should be done and democratically decided upon action, by rushing their captors.
“Let’s roll.”
And so people who had perhaps never done an extraordinary deed in their lives or even wanted to made a decision out of their free will, to fight for their lives and to thwart bin Laden and his sinister schemes… even unto the cost of these lives.
Passenger Todd Beamer shouted the words which initiated the action, thrilling America with a quintessentially American phrase that made us proud, “Let’s roll!” And so they did, fighting for control of the aircraft, for their lives, and to stop the hijackers. At 10.03 a.m. when at 563 miles per hour at a 40 degree nose-dive, they crashed into the ground, not merely killing but obliterating plane and people alike, they achieved their objective and entered into the blessed pantheon of those who gave their lives for the good of others.
The newest national park, Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
September 10, 2011 former presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton along with 4,000 people gathered to recognize the valiant actions of the most ordinary people who, because it was needed, did the most extraordinary of deeds and achieved the most sublime fate, leaving us with a question that troubles and unsettles us, “What would you have done?”
Let us hope this, America’s newest national park, not only shows us what others did at such a moment but inspires and fortifies us for our own rendezvous with destiny, for in such a turbulent world as ours it could happen anytime at any place.
* * * * * About The Author
Howard Martell serious inquires only 757=962-2482
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Dr. Jeffrey Lant is also the author of 18 best-selling business books. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com Check out Chris Mentor Me ->  http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=ld8pbXWE

‘You always hurt the one you love,’ thoughts on same-sex domestic abuse and what must be done.

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author’s program note. In 1961 Clarence “Frogman” Henry breathed life into the old standard, “You Always Hurt the One You Love.” It was written in 1944 by Allan Roberts with music by Doris Fisher. Recorded first by The Mills Brothers it lasted 20 weeks on the Billboard magazine Best Seller chart. Over the years a bevy of top talent performed this tune which spoke to the pain that accompanies most personal relationships. We could all identify with the lyrics sung by Connie Francis, Fats Domino, The Impressions, Peggy Lee… and so many more. Even ex-Beatle Ringo Starr had a go at it in his 1970 album “Sentimental Journey.”
You’ll find this tune in all its manifestations in any search engine. Go find it now, make yourself comfortable and sing along, “You always hurt the one you love, The one you shouldn’t hurt at all.”
The domestic abuse you have hardly heard of.
This is the story of domestic abuse; where people who are supposed to be all-in- all to each other instead inflict grievous hurt on each other, acute bodily harm, terrible injuries, terrible pain, even death. It is a story that takes place every day and which goes largely unreported, unconsidered. It is the story of the abuse that does not speak its name, same-sex domestic abuse… and it is probably something you know little or even nothing about, even if you’re gay.
Basically if you’ve been following the development of gay liberation at all, you’ve seen the political wars where some jurisdictions grant folks with such orientation their basic rights (including the right to marry whomsoever they wish)… and the jurisdictions determined to block those rights and preserve marriage for some, keeping it from others. The photographs you see in the papers show, in the first place, happy gay wedding pictures as long-time couples joyously tie the knot… and the photos of zealous bigots enraged by a change which is inevitable.
The photos you don’t see, because they aren’t published are the photos of same-sex domestic abuse. And this is, to a considerable extent, because both those perpetrating the abuses… and the ones suffering them don’t want the publicity, embarrassment, and “shame” of having their sad and often dangerous stories publicized. And so abuses perpetrated, stay abuses undisclosed, unpunished, and unsolved.
And that is the reason I am writing this article; because that state of affairs is completely unacceptable.
The situation in Massachusetts, a bell weather state.
Massachusetts has the reputation of being one of a handful of socially advanced states. As a result matters buried elsewhere often come to enhanced public awareness here first. Thus, on September 5, 2011 the Boston Globe reported that since 2010 there have been seven killings as a result of domestic violence, a sharp increase from prior years when advocates reported one to three such homicides.
In August, 2011, a 47-year old man was accused of stabbing his boyfriend then burying his body beneath a porch in Winthrop. It went unheralded… and this is part of the problem.
“They’re gay, so what?”
Like it or not, many people, including police, prosecutors, and judges, lack the sensitivity and training to help gays, lesbians, and transgender individuals. Their attitudes can range from complete indifference to marked hostility, along the lines of “they’re just queers anyway so what does it matter? They just got what was coming to them.” Nice.
The consequences can be disastrous as lax officials, their minds clearly not on the matter at hand, fail to provide assistance. Who is the batterer? Who needs the help? Authorities go through the motions, but the end result is that the batterers go unpunished and victims suffer accordingly.
Police understanding and sensitivity would help.
Just a few years ago, police departments everywhere were charged with arresting gays and disrupting what was seen as a community menace. Since then laws have changed, but not necessarily attitudes. Thus, when advocates attempt to increase police empathy, they have found police attitudes unhelpful. But until police are more adept at dealing with same-sex domestic violence, batterers have the advantage… and they know it. Thus batterers are given a virtual carte blanche for heinous deeds by careless authorities. The solution to this problem begins with official recognition that there is a problem, then training authorities to help get it
Listen to advocates.
Boston specifically and Massachusetts generally are in the forefront of jurisdictions where same-sex domestic abuse assistance is available. Such assistance is available from the following organizations:
Fenway Health Violence Recovery Program
Gay Men’s Domestic Violence Project
The Network/LaRed
Safelink (Statewide Domestic Violence Hotline)
Jane Doe, Inc., Massachusetts Coalition Against Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence.
(For complete current contact details, go to any search engine.)
These organizations are a fountainhead of timely, specific, valuable information on identifying abusers and their victims (not always easy to do) as well as specific things police should be looking for. Here is just some of what they recommend:
* Don’t assume two same-sex people living together are just room mates. That assumption removes whatever benefits and protection exist.
* Look at how the residence is set up. Is there just one bedroom? One bed? If so, the residents are more likely to be a couple, whatever they may initially say.
* How are finances handled? If one person (often the batterer) controls finances and practical matters the residents are more likely to be in a same-sex domestic situation.
Police and courts need the assistance of advocates and specialized service organizations because both batterers and the people they batter lie about their situations; batterers because they are guilty, the battered because they rightly fear retribution for anything they may say or do.
Adding to the difficulties which exist in all domestic abuse matters is this: victims eschew the truth because they fear their sexual identity will be exposed if they report the outrage. Again, this leaves them vulnerable to batterers, who know this and use this fact to control and further hurt the victims. This difficult problem is readily apparent from the latest abuse statistics: Of the 2,326 domestic violence cases that are before Middlesex County prosecutors so far this year, only 50 of the victims reported they were gay. In Boston, advocates provided services to more than 4,000 victims, but only 73 of them identified themselves as gay.
Let’s be clear. This isn’t good enough, even in progressive jurisdictions. But let’s also recognize things are better now, particularly in those jurisdictions, than they were even a few short years ago.
Thus, in due course, “You always hurt the one you love” will be simply a catchy lyric belted out in her inimitable style by Connie Francis instead of a declaration of fact and harmful purpose.
* * * * *
About The Author
Howard Martell serious inquires only 757=962-2482
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Dr. Jeffrey Lant is also the author of 18 best-selling business books. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com Check out Chris Mentor Me ->  http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=ld8pbXWE

Summertime is over… and your lax summertime business habits should be over, too. Make sure they are!

Posted on September 7, 2011

1

September 7, 2011 | Author: Jeffrey Lant | Posted in Dr. Jeffrey Lant’s Article Archive

Lotte Lenya

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
The summer of 2011 ended (unofficially) in the United States on Labor Day, as it always does; this year it fell on September 5th. If you’re like me you jumped up on your desk and did your happy dance, delighted to see the back of the worst summer most of us can remember… distinguished as it was by wars, earthquakes, hurricanes, a punk economy that just refuses to get better, much less take off… oh, yes, and the visits of sundry relatives who would have made you happier by arriving later and leaving earlier. It was indeed a memorable summer… for all the wrong reasons.
Under the circumstances it’s not surprising you pulled the covers over your head more often than you’d like us to know and played possum with your responsibilities.
Now hear this: that was then, this is now and your lax summertime habits must now be filed under “good old days”, superceded at once and fully by the crackerjack habits which ought to distinguish your enterprise.
Fall counts the most!
For most businesses, the fourth quarter of the year is the most profitable. This means every day matters and you need to keep this objective in mind at all times. A famous 1938 song by Kurt Weill (lyrics by Maxwell Anderson) will assist, “September Song.” You ought to play it every day, since the haunting tune and classic words remind you that the days for profit are dwindling down, each one more precious at its end than the last.
Go to any search engine and find the rendition you like most. I prefer the version by Lotte Lenya. She knew Weill pretty well; at least, she married him twice so she probably got extra help.
Here are the adjustments and refinements you must make at once and completely if you expect to be one of the diminished number of business people making profits this year.
1) Adjust your offer. Offers are what make businesses money, and if you want increased sales this quarter, you’d better beef up your offer — at once.
Now hear this: everybody’s not broke! Everybody’s not unemployed! Everybody’s not about to lose their home through foreclosure, etc. It’s just there are far too many good people in these conditions, thereby reducing the number of people who are amply provisioned, have good jobs, fine homes with mortgages up to date, etc., the kinds of people who, as consumers, keep the economy rattling along.
As a result, you have fewer people in your prospect pool… and must work the smarter to motivate them to respond and ultimately buy the item in question that comes with the very best offer you have ever made.
Have you upgraded your autumn offer? If not, you’re still on summertime laxities and are heading for penury.
2) Increase your product line and retire the dogs.
If you didn’t spend the summer improving and augmenting your product line, then A) you are well and truly behind the eight ball and B) you don’t “get” the purpose of summer: it is to do the necessary work, especially in regards to beefing up your product line. In other words, summer is the antechamber to enhanced autumn profits.
One thing this entails is taking a good, careful look at products which are either marginally profitable, or just not profitable at all. These canines must be sent packing, to the old dogs home. Did you so scrutinize your product line in summer? Or were you either clueless, or just plain bone idle? Either way, you’ve got crucial work to attend to, and you’re already lagging.
3) Improve your prospect and customer follow-up procedures.
In summer when a business person says they will attend to the customer’s weighty matter “today”, “tomorrow,” or “next Thursday,” what they mean is they’ll get around to it when the staff isn’t minimized by seasonal vacations and after they themselves have had theirs. Prospects, influenced by the slower rhythms of the summer season, understand that today means “when we can get around to it” some unspecified tomorrow.
But, pray recall, you are not in the slow paced summer anymore. Thus if you want the sale and the profits, you’d better re-educate yourself on the proper meaning of the words you say. Thus, when you say to a customer, “I’ll get back to you on that,” you are in the process of losing a sale. You should instead say, “Ms. Smythe, I will get back to you tomorrow by end of business, 5 pm.” Then do it. One of the worst sins of summertime business folk is vagueness about what they will do for their customers and just when and how they will do it. This irritatingly cavalier approach to your business must not be allowed to creep into fall, although you may already be guilty.
4) Do a complete organizational review to see what you need and what you don’t.
As I said above, and here reiterate, summer is the handmaiden, the servant of autumn. Thus, when business wanes and the tempo diminishes from allegro to largo, you do not despair, but rather rejoice that you now have the time to review all procedures, all supplies, all machines and absolutely everything else you’ll need for the profitable fall you desire.
Did you so use the ambling days of summer to make sure everything you need for the profitable autumn of your imagining was in place? If not, shame on you… and get cracking on doing the necessary and ensuring you are the peak of organization, efficiency, procedures, the new and better in place, the outmoded and no longer useful trashed.
5) Spruce up your physical environment.
Does your office, your desk, your overall surroundings fit you like an old shoe? Charming. But have you considered what that shoe really looks like, battered, down at heel, worn looking indeed? Comfortable it may be… but the wrong image and inspiration altogether.
First impressions are crucial and should portray you at your best. As for second, third, fourth impressions, they are just first impressions to the nth degree. In short, the first impression must be brilliant… and every other impression, too.
Now look at your work space with its telltale signs of old coffee stains, well-worn carpets, scratched paint and chipped furniture. Is this really the image you wish to project… and do you actually think laboring within such an environment helps you achieve your objectives? An “old shoe” environment begets “old shoe” results. Think about it and make the necessary sprucing ups to the milieu in which you spend so much time and from whence your business successes emanate…
… and one more thing….
6) Set your specific, defined, measurable goals… then move like a bat out of Hell to achieve them.
Do you have objectives for the crucial fall quarter? Not just in your head but on paper, where you can consult, review, and adjust them?
Successful people are fanatics about getting objectives to be achieved by a given date… then going about the daily labor of achieving them. Like the physical environment improvements mentioned above, this is something you should have done during the comparable leisure of summer. Thus this swells the number of things you did not contemplate or do then… but which must be done now. It is a tax success demands… and which must now be paid by you and in full… or else.
And so it is well and truly time to bid farewell to Summer 2011 and get on with the thrilling business of ensuring you will end this year in prosperity, unlike so many who, failing to understand the work of summertime are now fated to diminished results this autumn, for you see as Lotte Lenya knew,
“When the Autumn weather turns the leaves to flame One hasn’t got time for the waiting game…”
* * * * *
About The Author
About the Author Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc. at
http://www.homeprofitcoach.com/?cp=rp7weCuw , providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based
businesses.To see Dr. Lant’s blog go to http://www.jeffreylantarticles.com Dr. Lant is happy to give all readers 50,000 free guaranteed visitors for attending his live webcast today. Visit Worldprofit for details

The hemorrhage at the U.S. Postal Service gets worse. Face it, the time for massive overhaul at this venerable institution is nigh.

Posted on September 8, 2011

September 8, 2011 | Author: Jeffrey Lant | Posted in Dr. Jeffrey Lant’s Article Archive

Benjamin Franklin by Jean-Baptiste Greuze

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s program note. If you were around in 1961 and were of a teen-age disposition, your trips to the soda shoppe were frequent and your search for The Sound was never-ending, punctuated as they were by gales of laughter, the hope for a class ring from that special someone bestowed during your special song; the someone you later you married only to discover he (or she) had feet of lead and no rhythm whatsoever.
One of your “finds” was The Marvelettes and you thought their catchy little tune, “Please Mr. Postman”, was to die for. Now Mr. Postman himself is on his last legs. I know he’d appreciate it if you sent him good wishes. Just don’t use email. It’s already killing him. You’ll find the song in any search engine. Please play it now and consider: it is a eulogy for an American institution.
Some postal history and perspective.
As human institutions go the creation and institutionalization of the post office is very recent history. And like so many great events of the time, it was born thanks to that patriot brainiac Benjamin Franklin who in 1775 became first Postmaster General of the United States. Franklin was after all the consummate communicator. A publisher, businessman, as well as polished diplomat and cunning revolutionary; he knew that the nation would never grow to its territorial greatness and full potential without the latest in communications.
And so, he helped organize what became in due course the pride of the democracy and necessary, too, where even the most humble could communicate and for prices which steadily decreased as the service — and the nation — grew. We were proud of our post office and knew how hard they worked to bring us the intelligence from the world beyond our gate and to live up to its charge:
“Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”
That was then… this is now…
September 6, 2011 Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe laid the stark situation of the postal service before a committee of United States senators. Such officials, of course, gave themselves the franking privilege long ago and thus having secured the right to unlimited free postage while in office, they have turned a blind eye and no intelligence whatsoever to the postal concerns of everyone else. Now these chickens are well and truly coming home to roost.
This passage from his alarming, lugubrious remarks pretty much sums up the state of the USPS: “I’m operating with a week’s worth of cash,” said this exasperated, at-his- wits-end descendant of the luckier Franklin. You could sense his irritation, frustration, incensed to a palpable degree. How had things gone so very wrong? The “culprits” are things we see and use every single day: the Internet, email, skype, text messaging and every other communications convenience we have all come to use daily. The USPS is now, sad to say, the whitest of elephants and Donahoe is the wake-master, presiding if not yet at its death bed, then at least at its prospective demise. The innocent days when “Please Mr. Postman” wowed the adolescent set and the USPS was the only game in town, now seem as far away as Ancient Rome.
But the USPS — and the government behind it– has been loathe to see the problem and do the sensible things to solve it, sooner, not later. And so good money has been thrown after bad and our elected poobahs procrastinate; it is something at which they excel.
USPS facts.
Item: The Postal Service’s weekly costs now exceed $1 billion dollars.
Item: USPS could post a $10 billion loss for its fiscal year.
Item: USPS needs a 90-day extension to pay billions of dollars in mandatory annual retirement payments due at the end of its fiscal year on September 30. Without this crucial extension, USPS will default on its obligations to retired employees.
In fairness to USPS and its string of (coming in hopeful, going out frustrated and embittered) postmasters general, the Postal Service has at least tried to advise Congress and stem the flood of red ink and lamentation. But Congress, ostrich-like here as elsewhere, has ignored the problem, buck passing with alacrity, while pleading reforms will take place “some day.” Thus the hapless saga of a once-great institution, crucial for the growth of the Great Republic, continues.
Item: The USPS missed the chance to profit from overnight mail and the fast package deliver services like UPS, Federal Express, and all the others. Here the USPS, arrogant in its mail delivery monopoly, muffed the chance to be a serious player in the very lucrative game of speedy delivery. Lord Acton famously wrote, “Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely,” as the USPS demonstrated in spades.
Item: USPS missed the growing import of the Internet, email etc. They looked at these innovative message carriers and dismissed them as pesky and irritating to be sure, but not dangerous to their centuries of hegemony.
Item: USPS, as both Internet and its chief application email grow apace, failed to read the handwriting so clearly on the (electronic) wall and so failed to produce a sensible strategic plan that would redefine its role in an electronic world and determine what specific changes would be necessary with a clear plan for all necessary changes.
Get the picture?
Here were people minding the USPS store whom Ben Franklin would have fired in a heartbeat, as obviously not up to either their jobs or exalted titles and plush perquisites.
What should this gang who couldn’t shoot straight, USPS and Congress, have done?
1) Saturday mail deliveries should have been abolished years ago. Canadians have lived quite well without them. This efficiency would not have meant the end of America and would have saved millions. P.S. If the postal carriers union had complained grievously at this sensible recommendation (and they most assuredly would had, being the insufferably coddled government employees they are), they could be honestly told that with the acute diminution of mail, it would be no strain to Monday’s carriers when they would be expected to carry Saturday’s mail, too.
2) The nation has had too many post offices for years. In part this is a hang-over from 19th century political realities. Newly elected presidents enjoyed the “spoils system” which allowed them to select members of their party for patronage as postmasters. This perquisite of the presidency was abolished in due course, but its memory lingered on, stinking to high heaven and padding the rolls of post offices without mail, or purpose. It goes unsaid that this would necessitate a comparable shrinking in the number of employees, with all its attendant savings. Of course senators and representatives will scream bloody murder, so let’s give the Postmaster General the right to keep some of these smaller post offices for whatever he deems a good reason… even if that becomes a modern manifestation of the venerable Spoils System.
3) Let the USPS get access to the hundreds of millions of dollars overpaid into federal retirement funds for decades. This abuse no doubt benefited the congressional proponents of “voodoo economics.” They could use these funds elsewhere while congratulating themselves on just how difficult it would be for USPS to reclaim them. Nice.
We need these and other sensible reforms… and we need them yesterday.
What we don’t need are the silly statements by the likes of Senator Joseph Lieberman (I-Connecticut) who issued this suggestion to improve the fortunes of USPS: “We should be writing more passionate letters to those we love,” or the bonehead suggestion of Senator Clare McCaskiill (D-Missouri).
She said, “I really think that there is a longing out there right now, especially in these uncertain times, for some of the things that have provided stability over the years.” She urges a national advertising campaign to get people to use letters! Senator, as Ben Franklin could have told you, the USPS at its finest was about cutting edge communications technology, never merely the letter, envelope, and stamp.
That’s why whenever Mr. Postman looks in his bag nowadays there’s no letter for The Marvelettes, never, ever. The message was delivered days ago… by email.
* * * * *
About The Author
About the Author Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc. at
http://www.homeprofitcoach.com/?cp=rp7weCuw , providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based
businesses.To see Dr. Lant’s blog go to http://www.jeffreylantarticles.com Dr. Lant is happy to give all readers 50,000 free guaranteed visitors for attending his live webcast today. Visit Worldprofit for details

9/11, closure, and an important new book by Professor Nancy Berns.

 ”The Praying Hands” by Albrecht

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s program note. This is a story about death and remembrance, one of the most difficult of subjects; universal reality for every human… but one we approach with the utmost diffidence, wanting to make the troubling matter which touches upon our own mortality short, clean,crisp, so that the experience is sanitized and efficient. We want to treat it as a management problem not as profound unsettling event. We want closure… and we want it as soon and as effortlessly as possible.
But death and remembrance do not work that way… it is not a management problem; it is about our own oblivion, and it must be treated with the high seriousness it deserves.
That’s why I have selected revered Mozart’s “Requiem Mass in D minor” (K. 626) for the musical accompaniment for today’s article. It is the precise sound needed to help you consider the matter of eternity, including your own. You will find it in any search engine. Allow yourself to be touched by this masterpiece unfinished at his death, which the Master left in 1791 for his encounter with God. It will help us with ours and help the loved ones who must deal, in due course, with our own passing.
How a new book by Professor Nancy Berns can help.
Drake University associate professor of sociology Nancy Berns has just published a work which may perhaps become seminal, offering as it does vital insights into the prevailing American way of grief, remembrance and the matter of “closure.” Her book is titled “Closure: The Rush to End Grief and What It Costs Us,” and it comes just as the nation faces another agonizing bout of remembrance on the never-must-be-forgotten events which fall under the name “9/11?.
Her subject is important, timely, and of the greatest significance to every one of us: is closure a desirable objective, or is it another illustration of our national disinclination to deal with subjects at once difficult, distasteful, and perhaps irresolvable? Let’s start with a definition of “closure,” “that which closes or shuts down.”
It’s easy to see why real everyday people want death and its aftermath to be an “over ASAP” matter. We live in a culture which not only values but obsessives over the need for youth, beauty and boundless health and which sees in age and the weight of enfeebling years the markers of debility, always measuring by how much is gone and how much may remain. Death thus becomes not just an event but the event which deprives us of everything… and gives the hot potato of your death and disposal to people who want to pass it on immediately and get back to life. For such people (for all they may have loved us) the concept of “closure” is absolutely essential because it gives them the right to forget and forget as fast as possible. This is especially true where the fatalities have been significant… as they can be in wars, natural disasters and traumatizing outrages like 9/11.
Images of 9/11
9/11 seared the national memory with images profound, haunting, horrifying, indelible. Each of us, all of us, have been bothered and afflicted by these images which in an instant altered our consciousness and diminished our securities. We close our eyes and will it otherwise but these images abide with us forever, the residue of carnage. We attempt to make sense of the senseless by creating statistics, for that is easier than remembering the victims, those blown to Kingdom Come mid-air and those on whom the debris and the bodies fell, eliminating lives in a cascade of unimaginable flames.
65 percent of the victims were between 31 and 50 years old.
76 percent of those killed were men.
64 percent of the dead were married.
72 percent had at least one dependent.
Nearly 39 percent made at least $100,000 a year.
Statistics give a kind of distance — and closure.
9/11 oppresses us, not merely because of the original event, but because we want to “move on”, into a world where the impact of this tragedy lessons and gives us peace… without guilt; closure, with finality.
Here’s where the deeper insights of Professor Berns come in.
She argues, and I think rightly, that closure is a concept born n our speed-driven culture. It is an appealing idea because it offers a definitive end to our suffering or grief and thereby offers an acceptable basis for starting a new life chapter where there is no sorrow, guilt, or anger. An invention of Gestalt psychology, this concept is now a cultural commonplace in every area of national life. But the fact that this notion is widely cited and believed does not make it real or true, merely convenient.
Thus we do a grave disservice to the dead, to ourselves, and to what we should rather do to reaffirm our humanity and gain the benefits that come from celebrating the dead… and letting them abide, much loved, never forgotten, as vital as our brain can make them and recall.
Thus, grief is not bad. It is not some set destination, to be concluded at a certain time and in a certain manner. It is not something that must necessarily end, or which by ending, brings peace and serenity.
Grief is not like an illness which can and should be ended with the right pill or prescription. It is highly personal and cannot be regulated, regimented, erased by rules or reason. And so it is difficult for all and most want an early exit, a strategy that does not soothe or lesson the pain. Thus the pain continues, to the growing frustration and irritation of others who, grieving differently or not grieving at all, have “moved on”.
Things were different 100 years ago.
Just a century ago, people grieved quite differently; no doubt in part because they had more time and the pace of life was leisurely compared to our own. When people died, at home more often than not, strands of hair would be carefully cut, then annotated in copperplate hand and dispatched to relatives and a few special friends who loved the deceased. Some would be placed in or made into keepsakes, brooches, lockets with pictures. No one rushed the matter of grief… and social mores dictated a liberal amount of time, how long and in what way black should be worn, and the degree of reserve and retirement from society. No one vexed you by telling you to “move on, get closure.”
And no one should say so today. As we age, the ranks of our dear departed increase until, at the last, they undoubtedly outnumber the living. But the dead remain with us, too, and should for to forget them is to diminish ourselves. The intensity of that grief will wane… but the fact and meaning of that grief cannot.
And so I’ll end on this personal note. I have before me a letter from my mother dated Monday, November 18, 1985 and begins “My very dear son….” I would recognize the careful writing anywhere. This is how it opens “your letter came Saturday and I’ve been answering it ever since and throwing away the pages. I would so like to hold you and comfort you and ‘make the world go away’”.
I no longer remember the incident which provoked this response, but in every word I see her… and feel her love. And so I grieve anew for her death… and rejoice again that she abides with me and so long as I remain she remains and must be grasped and treasured accordingly. There is pain in this course… but there is solace,too… and to give up the one is to lose the other. And that would never do.
Which is why we must not seek closure but rather understanding that grief is the way we keep our beloved and honored dead in our lives… world without end, for ever and ever… amen.
* * * * *
About The Author
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc. at http://www.homeprofitcoach.com/?cp=rp7weCuw , providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses.To see Dr. Lant’s blog go to http://www.jeffreylantarticles.com Dr. Lant is happy to give all readers 50,000 free guaranteed visitors for attending his live webcast today. Visit Worldprofit for details

Smart Tips For Your Personal And Business SuccessToday………. Are YOU a selfish communicator? (Probably yes.) Posted on September 10, 2011

Smart Tips For Your Personal And Business SuccessToday………. Are YOU a selfish communicator? (Probably yes.)

Posted on September 10, 2011

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s program note. Marvin Gaye and Kim Weston know “it takes two,babee, it takes two, me and you.” Their hit song on the subject — “It Takes Two “– was released in 1965. Sadly lots of others, maybe including YOU, don’t get it. That’swhy this article is so very necessary. You can find it in any search engine. Go now.Play it loud and proud. Then dig into this article with its relentless message,”it takes two.”More technology, less communicating.Do you spend your days chasing people who should be doing their bit to communicate with you, but aren’t? My average day consists of endless follow-up e-mails and phone calls to people who want something from me but are too lazy and arrogant to follow up themselves.I swear, there must be a published communications pecking order some where; themore times you force a person to follow up with you the higher you rise (and the moreannoying you become).The most incredible aspect of the problem is this: the more ways we humans haveto communicate with each other,the less real communication goes on. Hence this”in your face” list of things you need to do at once to become part of the solution…and leave your useless “communication” habits behind:
1) When someone contacts you, take the call whenever possible.A great many communication problems would be solved if you answered the person attempting to reach you at once and dealt with the matter at hand promptly, efficiently,thoroughly.
2) What to do if you don’t connect with the person you are trying to reach.Trying to reach someone but getting nowhere? Assume the person in question is acommunications prima donna. Assume, that is, the worst and take it upon yourself todo what the missing person won’t do: try again! Remember this, bad communicators areexpert at evading, “forgetting”, excusing, procrastinating. If the person you are tryingto reach is that way, nothing you can say will ever change their modus operandi;what you see is that you get. But you can use strategies which will smoke ‘em out and get a response.Try calling 6 times in a row. That’ll get their attention.If that fails and you’re dealing with a business, leave two messages; then call the CEO’s office and leave a detailed complaint. Remember, desperate times demand desperate measures. Don’t hesitate to be exigent. Remember, the bad habits of someone who should know better constitute excellent reasons for what you must do to getassistance.
3) If you cannot take all your calls and respond to all your email, etc as they come in, then designate a time sacrosanct to responding to everything then. Put this time on your answering machine, so people trying to get to you know; invite them, too, to return at that time for assistance.Be clear about what you will do and when you will do it. Then honor your word; thatalone will differentiate you from the selfish communicators who abound.
4) Stop being so arrogant.There are two great reasons why people become selfish communicators. The first(and lessor reason) is that these people quite simply don’t know what to do or that their behavior is affronting. This problem, of course, is the more easily dealt with.The alternative is far more difficult: that the selfish communicator is so arrogantthat he feels justified in ignoring you, frustrating you, insulting you, because heis so important, so desirable, so necessary to you and your life you’ll take anythinghe chooses to dish out:”Yes, Your Majesty.No, Your Majesty.Tell us how low to go, Your Majesty.Give us a kick if it please, Your Majesty.Give us a kick if you will, Your Majesty.Oh, that was good, Your Majesty.”So sings Mrs. Anna Leonowens, the “I” in Roger and Hammerstein’s 1956 film “The King and I” to the king of Siam, her spoiled employer. Such people are,of course, insufferable,acutely irritating, intolerable, but (when you need them) cannot be caste off as unendurable.Thus, you must find a way… or make one (mulling over the appropriate revenge to bedelivered later.)
5) Respond to EVERY email and phone message before you end your work day.Imagine you are dazed, bleeding, in shackles. Your captor looks you in the eye andsays, “You can escape this thrall if and only if you will contact all the folks who havetried to reach you today but have so far been unsuccessful.” What would you do,stay chained… or get on the computer and phone and steadily move towards your freedom?You’d get on with the job, wouldn’t you? Well, then, approach all your messages the same way. Until such time as you take care of each and every one appropriately andprofessionally, these messages own you… take note and get on with the job of freeing yourself!
6) Be conscious of your habits.For years, I have been informally studying all communicators. I want to know theanswers to questions like these: Are they aware of their particular communications habits? Are they untrained? Or just oblivious to the right ways to communicate formaximum effect? Do they care that they inconvenience the very people they should bemost careful of and considerate to? Better communications skills can only commence as you gradually scrutinize yourown habits. The sad truth is, you may be one of the communicators who approaches your work with your mind on anything other the business at hand. Your attitude can best be summed up as “dolce far niente”, “delicious idleness.” You do what is easiest and most convenient for you, without ever considering the inconvenience to the other party.Your own sweet idleness is far more important than the irritation, frustration, yes, rageyou manage to engender. You are a communicator out of “Mad” magazine, your motto”What me worry?”
7) And now a point of such significance that your failure to grasp it could easily result in bruised relationships, arguments, umbrage, and even (and justifiably) worse.Do not sit in front of a person and obsessively read your phone messages, thenhold up a single finger by which you mean “I’m sorry. I’ve got to take this call,” then blow your auditor off.I am awaiting with eagerness the first murder trial on this matter, where an otherwise calm and even-tempered individual facing that raised finger, gets up and shoves that phone where the sun don’t shine, only to face a jury of his peers. And they, knowing the feeling, having experienced the insolence…. let the angry auditor off without even awarning; what’s more they cheer him to the echo…. so flagrant the crime, so insulting the matter of sitting patiently while the clueless, arrogant communicator imposes…and aggravates.This situation happened to me the other day in a restaurant where I was with an insufferable communicator whom I have warned and warned again about his infuriating habits. Still the finger went up and the plea for “just a minute.” This time I didn’t hesitateor demur. I got up, emptied first the water glass and then the salad bowl on the miscreant and walked out without a word. The culprit’s been calling and calling… but I’m involved in a new project; finding out how long it is till Hell freezes over. I won’t take his call until then.
About the Author:
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Dr. Jeffrey Lant is also the author of 18 best-selling business books. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com Check out Chris Mentor Me ->  http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=ld8pbXWE

Up to $60 billion squandered in Iraq and Afghanistan says The Wartime Contracting Commission. It’s time for massive overhaul.

Posted on September 6, 2011

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s Program Note: Are you a tax-paying American? Then today’s article will not merely irritate or anger you; it will enrage you.
It is the story of stupidity, of waste, of fraud, of corruption — and of a government asleep at the switch; it’s all too frequent position.
There are three ways to approach this story:
1) you can ignore the facts and, ostrich-like, put your head in the sand and keep it there for the duration, or
2) you can say, “What can I do? I have no way to influence the people who need to be influenced to effect the necessary changes”, or
3) you can say, “I am mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore.”
I want you to know, I am very definitely in the third camp, and I want you in the third camp, too.
To get you in the right mood to tackle this problem, I’ve chosen one of the best “jump-up” songs ever, “You keep me hangin’ on,” by The Supremes (released in 1966). The lyrics are perfect for this article. As you read them, imagine you are uttering them — to the people in charge, the people frittering away your hard- earned money:
“Set me free, why don’t cha babe Get out my life, why don’t cha babe ‘Cause you don’t really love me You just keep me hangin’ on.”
In this tune, an exasperated Diana Ross says, “And there ain’t nothin’ I can do about it.”
But there is……
Start by going to any search engine to get this tune. Clear a space. Turn up the music… and get the necessary “in your face” attitude. Then dig in…
The facts.
The United States has lost billions of dollars to waste and fraud in Iraq and Afghanistan and stands to repeat that in future wars without big changes in how the government awards and manages contracts for battlefield support and reconstruction projects, independent investigators reported August 31, 2011.
The Wartime Contracting Commission urged Congress and the Obama administration to put in place its detailed recommendations to overhaul the contracting process and increase accountability. The commission suggested that the joint House-Senate debt reduction committee take a close look at their proposals.
The commission was adamant, failure to act now ensures continuing waste and fraud at the massive current levels. “What you’re asking for is more of the same”, said Dov Zakheim, a commission member and the Pentagon comptroller during President George W. Bush’s first term. “More waste. More fraud. More abuse.”
The bipartisan commission, created by Congress in 2008, estimated that at least $31 billion and as much as $60 billion has been lost in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade due to lax oversight of contractors, poor planning, infrequent competition, and corruption. “I personally believe that the number is much, much closer to $60 billion,” Zakheim said.
The commission’s recommendations.
The commission offered 15 recommendations including creating an inspector general to monitor war zone contracting and operations, appointing a senior government official to improve planning and coordination among federal agencies, and carefully monitoring contractor performance. Representative John Tierney (D-Massachusetts), top Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform national security subcommittee said the commission’s findings are alarming and that he’ll introduce legislation to create the inspector general’s post.
This is all fine as far as it goes, but it’s not good enough, not least because it won’t capture the attention of the American people and get them sufficiently interested to demand the necessary reforms, and demand them NOW!
What then is necessary?
Senator Harry Truman and his approach suggest a do-able solution.
All wars produce massive fraud, mismanagement and corruption, even “good” wars like World War II. And all wars require that every expenditure be reviewed. The man who did this in WWII was an obscure senator from Missouri, Harry Truman. Thanks to David McCullough’s magisterial biography, at hand as I write this, I am in a position to share Truman’s important work as chairman of the (Senate Special) Committee to Investigate the National Defense Program. It provides the necessary inspiration and specific steps we must take to solve this infuriating, debilitating problem and solve it now before we hemorrhage to death through mind-boggling selfishness, mismanagement, and stupidity.
Truman’s secret? Legs.
Harry Truman had no idea what he was getting into when he decided to see for himself what was wrong with the nation’s wartime contracting process. But he was a game fellow and knew the secret was understanding how the process worked, including where abuses were likely to occur. This meant getting out of Washington, to visit wartime facilities, meet the people, understand the procedures. And so facility managers woke up to discover an unexpected and unannounced Senator Truman at their door, pleasantly (but sternly) asking for admittance and cooperation. This is the kind of thing he found, this time at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri:
There “he found costly equipment and material lying about in the snow and rain ‘getting ruined, things that could never be used, would never be used…’ The contractor had no previous construction experience.’ And there were men, hundreds of men, just standing around collecting their pay, doing nothing’. Truman walked about this and other sites taking notes on what he saw and whatever people were willing to tell him.”
In due course, through one on-site visit after another and then informative Senate hearings showcasing the usual abuses, Truman captured the attention of America… and fueled by concerned, aggravated, irritated Americans he was able to effect dramatic changes and save millions of dollars needed elsewhere. They knew, Senator Truman knew, as we know — there is nothing Americans cannot accomplish together so long as we clearly understand the task and have an inspiring hard-working leader like Truman, willing to put shoe leather to pavement to achieve the goal. And by the way, if it hadn’t been for this work he would never have been selected by President Roosevelt for vice president in 1944 and thus would never have become president of the United States.
President Obama take note.
This vast effort needs an elected leader, a big man or woman with grit, determination, perseverance — and a smile, the better to put a human face on the task, work and achievement of the goal, no mere bureaucratic inspector general will do. We need leadership and we need it now, capiche?
And remember, Diana Ross and The Supremes are here to help us aggrieved taxpayers. We need all the help we can get!
“You’re just using me Go on, get out of my life And let me sleep at night ‘Cause you don’t really love me You just keep me hangin’ on…
Why don’t you be a man about it And set me free Now you don’t care a thing about me You’re just using me.”
Exactly.



 * * * * * About The Author
 Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc. at
http://www.homeprofitcoach.com/?cp=rp7weCuw , providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based
businesses.To see Dr. Lant’s blog go to http://www.jeffreylantarticles.com Dr. Lant is happy to give all readers 50,000 free guaranteed visitors for attending his live webcast today. Visit Worldprofit for details