By John Y. Brown III, on Tue Oct 29, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET You know that feeling early in the morning …..that sinking feeling that something isn’t quiet right?
That something isn’t working….something feels worrisome and troublesome….but you just can’t put your finger on exactly what it is?
And then you rack your brain to pinpoint the cause of the general disease you are feeling…
 You try to figure out the reason for this vague sense of impending doom. And you realize that these discomforting and disquieting feeling you are experiencing stem from the realization that “you” are are again–for another day–still involved in your life.
And just aren’t sure how to say to yourself…. to politely suggest that you, just, ahem, you know…kind of…try to…..well…. lie low today in your own life and not screw things up again?
And you wish you could slink out door without yourself noticing and wanting to tag along?
You know that feeling?
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It is important to make the most of each day….and hope to have at least one life moment each day that is worthy of the highlight reel.
Why?
Think about it. What if we get to the end of our lives and it’s our time and up rolls our life’s highlights before our eyes…..you know, those flashes of our the precious, thrilling, sacred and fabulous moments from our life….and what if instead of lasting for the usual 30 seconds, ours only lasts for, say, 17 seconds? And then stops.
Well, I’d be really ticked and spend my last 13 seconds wishing I’d done more exciting stuff when I was younger.
By Michael Steele, on Tue Oct 29, 2013 at 10:00 AM ET With so many of the civil rights battles behind us, and the satisfaction that comes from the success of African-Americans in business, politics, sports and entertainment, it is no surprise that the assault upon the integrity and historic purpose of our nation’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) has been little noticed by mainstream media and, more sadly, the black community itself.
Not only do our HBCUs stand as a testament to the challenges that lie in the future but they are an important reminder of the proud history of African-American education in America and its unlimited potential.
Across America, HBCUs are giving African-Americans the tools and the knowledge they need to fully participate in our society, to build a solid economic foundation on which to raise their families and their businesses, and to become leaders of the future.
However, many of those tools had begun to be stripped away and much of that foundation began to crumble under the weight of neglect and institutional bias. Maryland HBCUs (Bowie State University, Coppin State University, Morgan State University and University of Maryland Eastern Shore) were treated no differently.
In October 1999, the State of Maryland and the United States Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights (OCR), entered into a partnership for the purposes of improving the educational opportunities for African Americans in Maryland’s public institutions of higher education and of ensuring compliance with the state’s obligations under federal law. The partnership agreement set forth the commitments that the state and OCR anticipated would bring Maryland into full compliance with its obligation under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
 But as the partnership agreement expired in December 2005, it was very clear that while the state had met the letter of the law under Title VI (and its agreement with OCR); embracing the spirit of such agreements would be another matter. In practice, Maryland’s HBCUs had to deal with the growing reality of “duplication of specialized programs” whereby certain resources (e.g. laboratories and libraries) or academic programs (e.g. MBA) were duplicated at predominantly white institutions, resulting in HBCU students having to go to those institutions to access them.
As Lt. Governor of Maryland, I became acutely aware of the failure of so many to do just a little to help our state’s HBCUs. But the supposed innocuousness of program duplication only masked the knife cutting away the ability to improve access to these fine institutions and to create opportunities for them to compete with the state’s majority white institutions.
Read the rest of…
Michael Steele: Why HBCUs are Hanging by a Thread
By Jason Grill, on Mon Oct 28, 2013 at 1:30 PM ET From the Kansas City Business-Journal:
 A Kansas City company is hoping a Kickstarter campaign can help it launch a new line of socks, designed with the business executive in mind.
In fact, co-founder and “sockpreneur”Jason Grill says as pants get shorter and as the tie becomes less popular, socks are the new statement piece to complement men’s business suits.
It’s a growing industry. For the 12 months ending in April, socks brought in $4.22 billion — a 5.6 percent increase over the previous year.
Sock 101 emerged from the idea that quality socks could be more affordable. Currently, the startup sells socks for $7 a pair online and is selling its products through a number of local retailers.
Sock 101 also has the “Sock of the Month Club” — a subscription-based model — which companies have used as monthly client gifts.
It’s working so far. According to Grill, the business launched about a year ago without taking on any investors and is already profitable.
Now, he is trying to add “team socks” to the mix with an addition of seven new pairs whose colors represent a handful of sports teams.
It’s also dipping its toes into custom socks for companies, complete with logo. Some of the Kickstarter funding will go toward creating a tool on Sock 101’s website where users can create their own customized pair.
Sock 101 has almost reached its goal of raising $25,000 through the crowdfunding website. It’s got less than $3,000 left to raise before the campaign ends Oct. 31. Although it’s sold about 3,000 pairs of socks so far, if the company hits its Kickstarter goal, it will have to manufacture more than 2,100.
A number of prominent Kansas Citians are already wearing them, from Mayor Sly James toUMB Bank President and COO Peter deSilva to Sporting Kansas City player Aurelien Collin.
Click here for the full piece.
By John Y. Brown III, on Mon Oct 28, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET The older I get the more I realize that the most important purpose of longevity isn’t being given the opportunity to accomplish more so I may want less —but rather being given the opportunity to forgive more so that I might judge less.
Life experience disappointingly fails to provide us with a growing insight into how uniquely superior we are to others.
And instead instructs us about how very …similar we are to those around us –and how capable we are of doing ourselves the things we fear the most and disdain most loudly.
This awareness is usually diverted before it arrives and we write it off as something foreign and separate from us.
If we can instead embrace these seemingly unsavory parts of ourselves and learn from them we are then able to replace shame with wisdom –and judgment with understanding.
And anxiety with joy.
By Artur Davis, on Mon Oct 28, 2013 at 10:00 AM ET There was every reason to think that Jeff Greenfield’s alternative history of John F. Kennedy surviving Dallas would be one of the most compelling of the hundred or so commemoratives about the late president’s legacy during this 50th anniversary of his death. Greenfield’s last venture into political counter-factual, his 2011 Then Everything Changed (three novellas that sketch a Cuban Missile Crisis that turned into a short war, a Robert Kennedy victory in 1968 and a 1980 election that made Gary Hart President), is just a few shades away from brilliant and never ceases to be briskly entertaining. There is also a finely tuned precision in each scenario that captures just how much of history hinges on narrow moments, and how one altered tide rearranges careers and social structures alike.
Somehow, all of the gifts on display in Greenfield’s prior effort fail to strike gold a second time. His If Kennedy Lived seems oddly un-ambitious: the surprises are too unimaginative, the turns too predictable, and there is the unmistakable feel of a 2000 word magazine piece that was stretched into the more lucrative territory of a book. The earlier work seemed more inventive and poignant; the sequel appears burdened by the low expectation politics of the dismal three years since the original.
For example, Then Everything Changed is typically credited for its navigation between two points of historical determinism—one emphasizing the nuances of personalities and tactics, the other favoring elements like the country’s social and ideological mood. Therefore, war or peace in Cuba are linked to the finer points of Lyndon Johnson’s insecurities while two hundred pages later, a plausible path is sketched for how a certain kind of political tide could have carried a vessel as imperfect as Gary Hart to the presidency. There is cleverness in letting the reader see the extremes of both perspectives and inviting internal argument over which seems more predictive.
 If Kennedy Lived seems to wage the same debate over historical causality but to lean much more heavily toward the version that regards even the most talented figures as relatively incidental characters. The result is eight years of Kennedy that mimic the imperfections of his less glamorous succesors. In Greenfield’s account, we get the following ambivalent outcomes: a secret bargain that trades a Civil Rights Act for southern congressional hawks blessing a negotiated end to the Vietnam War, the misuse of regulatory power to smash a newspaper that was digging into Kennedy’s dirty sexual laundry, and a profile of domestic achievement that is respectable but not breathtaking. There is a sustained but uneven economic prosperity; a vague, short on substance campaign for more civic responsibility; a Voting Rights Act but a tepid assault on poverty; no urban riots but a rising sense of cultural polarization.
Read the rest of…
Artur Davis: A JFK Fantasy that Doesn’t Inspire
By John Y. Brown III, on Fri Oct 25, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET The impotance of planning and execution.
About 19 1/2 months ago on a Sunday afternoon I thought to myself, “It would be a good idea to clean out my clothes closet later today.”
I have thought about that a lot every Sunday since then.
And today I executed my plan flawlessly in under 40 minutes.
19 1/2 months later.
Which led me to create an important formula for business and personal planning.
Planning + Execution = Results ÷ 19 1/2
By John Y. Brown III, on Thu Oct 24, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET
An important PSA (public service announcent)
It has been nearly three years since my unfortunate incident at Speedway where I was so absent-minded I left the gas pump in the gas tank and tried to pull away before the pump pulled out loudly and flapped around. No gas sprayed but it created a hard to explain spectacle before the manager kindly waived me away in a manner that said “Just please go to Thorton’s next time you need to fill up.”
And yet three long years later –without incident–every time I get gas I relive this fear as I start to pull away.
Call it PTSDFLGPIGTADO (Post traumatic stress disorder from leaving gas pump in gas tank and driving off).
It is real. And, frankly, the acronym sounds even worse than I expected.
So, please, when you get gas, replace the gas pump before driving off. For the station owner. And for your own mental health.
By John Y. Brown III, on Wed Oct 23, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET The American Basketball Association was in some ways more about what it means to be an American than it was about basketball. It had nothing to do with Associations. That was just an unfortunate name borrowed by copying the NBA’s final initial. But it had everything to do with thinking the unthinkable. And then trying the impossible. Just because we can. And not caring what others said or did.
Thanks to David Vance and my mother for forwarding this video clip to me just now.
Put it this way. This is an HBO special for “dreamers.” Make that “Dreamers” with a capital “D.”
Not for the keepers of the status quo ante….or defenders of the way things have always been done. And certainly not for those threatened by those who dare to ask, “Is there a better way?” –and greet such impudence with sneers and nervous laughter.
It’s not for any of them. (Watch Red Auerbach late in the show try to dismiss the ABA as a curious asterisk in basketball history and failed misadventure propped up briefly due only to the presence of Dr J….As another well-quoted dreamer would say, “The lady doth protest too much.”)
And yet….and yet….
No professional sports experiment I can think of is a greater reflection of the entrepreneurial mind and (more important) entrepreneurial spirit than the creation of the American Basketball Association. It is –was–a uniquely American experiment. If there had been a movie about the ABA it would have been a mirror image of Tucker: The Man and His Dream. But there wasn’t. But there is this archived HBO special.
And because history is written by the victors, in the lofty chambers of those who retell basketball history from on high, the ABA was merely something of a curious asterisk to the NBA.
But for those of us who lived closer to it and had no vested interest in rewriting basketball history and, yes, were ourselves cast under the spell of the ABA dreamers, well….we know better. We not only dreamed but saw and believed and eventually knew. We learned as a matter of course as an ABA fan that the impossible was possible. And even for a few moments could be sublime. And that has never left us.
And although we still have no vested interest in rewriting basketball history, we know that no other basketball innovation changed the game more (and for the better) than did a little dream that germinated in a few small cities like Louisville, KY nearly 50 years ago.
We won’t ever get the respect we deserve. History doesn’t work like that. But we have something even better. The memories of some of the greatest basketball ever played on our planet–and played with creative abandon because, as Bob Costas said, “We had nothing to lose.” And today we can take quiet pride in seeing the stodgy long shadow of tradition of the NBA has been replaced by the sunlight of what we know was someone else’s impossible dream. And we saw it first. And proudly cheered it along.
Long Shots (improved) from Arie in t Veld on Vimeo.
By Artur Davis, on Wed Oct 23, 2013 at 10:00 AM ET In one rosy scenario, the self destructive streak of Ted Cruz and House Republicans burns out without a default, with Barack Obama incurring his share of the national disgust, and with the public’s frustration over the Affordable Care Act eventually cancelling out memories of the shutdown itself. And in that same optimal place, Republicans absorb their lessons with something like the synthesis that Ross Douthat writes about in his Sunday column:
“..Republicans need to seek a kind of integration, which embraces the positive aspects of the new populism—its hostility to K Street and Wall Street, its relative openness to policy innovation, its desire to speak on behalf of Middle America and the middle class—while tempering its [nihilistic] streak with prudence, realism, and savoir-fare.”
As good as Douthat has been in outlining during the last few weeks why the shutdown strategy is painfully flawed, from even a right-leaning perspective, he is engaging in his own bit of wishful thinking about the lines of a Republican comeback and its worth taking some space to say why. First, as I suggested in my last column, the shutdown is best understood not as some bridge too far from the populism he describes but a pretty natural outgrowth of it. The reality is that the right’s populism has had a consistent unifying principle since the spring of 2009: it is that the federal government is posing an unprecedented threat to liberty, and that it presents an existential danger to a particular ideal of American society. That apocalyptic claim has played out in any number of contexts, from suspicions about Barack Obama’s citizenship, to cries of socialized medicine, to the painting of liberalism as a subversive scheme. It’s not the sort of rhetorical tendency that distinguishes between programs based on their relative effectiveness or which weeds out obtainable goals from unrealistic ones. It’s absolutely a worldview that has made any approach to Obamacare other than all out obstruction or resistance seem like unprincipled softness.
Is there a middle class friendly legislative vision waiting to burst of all that anti government zeal? Not so far at the grassroots level, and not inside the rarified air of various conservative conferences. And as Bobby Jindal’s swift fade from prominence since last winter, and Marco Rubio’s slippage from “can’t miss” status to the mid tier of 2016 contenders indicate, the more potent currency in conservative settings has not been an appeal to more policy creativity or substantive rebranding on issues like immigration, but the fundamentalism offered by Rand Paul and Ted Cruz: and as Douthat himself has pointed out, their message is either decidedly vague on details (Cruz) or a rehash of conventional top heavy tax cut plans that shortchange the middle class (Paul).
The “integration” between populism and reform that Douthat pines for is not a fantasy: the conservative populism of the Obama era has opened a window to the alienation downscale whites felt through the last decade of American politics, when Bush Republicans seemed indifferent to wage stagnation and Obama Democrats seemed incapable of reversing the erosion of working class security. But the right’s most conspicuous rising stars have expended virtually no capital on building or selling any type of actual policy framework to activists: even a conservative with an authentic record of engaging topics like inner city poverty and educational inequality, Ben Carson, has seen fit to downplay that history in favor of diatribes equating slavery with Obamacare.
I’ve written that the populist right’s tilt toward radicalism isn’t likely to be self-correcting and requires a much more forceful counter-argument from the center right. And unlike Douthat, I have become skeptical that it is a simple matter of a candidate with “movement credibility” combining the right’s passions with a more tenable market oriented reform vision. The more plausible fact may well be that a reform vision is temperamentally and substantively at odds with right wing populism’s intense distrust of public institutions. Breaking through that tension might not be a pipe dream, but it is hard to imagine without a sustained case about what public (and conservative) purposes can legitimately be accomplished through government.
And without question, the kind of accommodation and outreach that builds coalitions is discredited when conflict has been over-dramatized into a clash between freedom and darker impulses. Is the antidote what Douthat describes as declaring war on the GOP base? Not at all, but given the base’s demonstrated inability to strengthen the party’s electability, there is a distinct need to challenge that base’s grip on the meaning of conservatism and its monopoly on defining legitimacy within the party. I’ve come to the mindset that the challenge will require more toughness than politeness.
By Jason Atkinson, on Wed Oct 23, 2013 at 8:30 AM ET
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