CEO’s are raking in records bonuses while cutting more and more perks for employees.  Companies are running leaner than ever and hoarding massive amounts of cash.  Wall Street has a perception problem.  The average American who is being foreclosed on by Bank Of America doesn’t understand why BOFA and all their Wall Street buddies got bailed out but they only get a measly check for $2,000.  While the bailouts were done to prevent the world economy from collapsing and making unemployment snowball from 10% to 20%, most people don’t understand the complexity of the situation.

They shouldn’t have to though.

The situation Wall Street created is one of greed, power, and deception.  Somehow we’ve allowed our government to be bought.  Ironically the same guy Occupy Wall Street believes in was bought and paid for by Goldman Sachs lock stock n’ barrel.  All they needed was a red bow and he could have been opened on Christmas morning.  If that wasn’t enough they delivered another one of their most trusted lieutenants, Tim Geithner, to the White House as well.  They found out you could buy the presidency for $500 million dollars — how else do you explain a no-named junior senator beating established and well liked Hilary Clinton or John McCain?  $500 million is CHUMP CHANGE to Goldman Sachs, petty cash (see 2008 donor list).

America is for sale folks!  The entire country is on the auction block – and while the “99%” sit cross legged in a park sipping latte’s and playing on their iPhones, Goldman Sachs is picking it up for 20 cents on the dollar.  Goldman Sachs was at the front of the line creating all these creative financial risks.  They have influenced, negotiated, or instigated every absurdly risky financial services package in the last two decades (see Great American Bubble).

Why?  Money.  Lots and lots of money.

Wall Street has spent billions on phd engineers and mathematicians to create these things — and Goldman Sachs has ensured that they have done their bidding regardless of who they worked for.  Don’t believe me?  What business does a phd in electrical engineering have working for Goldman Sachs?  Goldman created all this bad paper, unloaded it to their competitors like Lehman, and then shorted their own bad bets all the way down.  The paper they couldn’t unload they sold to their customers, bought insurance on, and then shorted those too.  Did I mention that Hank Paulson, former Treasury Secretary, was CEO of Goldman Sachs during most of the ramp up to the decade we fondly refer to as the lost decade.

I’m Lutheran, I’m republican, I believe in capitalism, I believe in small government, I believe in supply side economics, I believe in America, and I believe that we’re not just the greatest country in the world, but the greatest country to ever exist.  The American machine is one of economic triumph, equal opportunity, and has produced the greatest global economic prosperity mankind has ever seen.  Every country in this world has benefited directly or indirectly from the success of America.

Some home we’ve forgotten that, and doing so has cost us dearly.  My generation, generation “X” is about to embark on 50 years of economic hardship that we have never seen.  Our generation had it all, parents who loved us, made good money, took care of us, and spoiled the crap out of us.  My generation is about to learn first hand the price we’ve paid for more or less sitting on our asses.  We deserve everything that has happened to us.  We have become brain washed, and completely forgotten what this country was founded on.  The principles, priorities, and values our forefathers laid out have long since been since abandoned.  We have replaced it with greed, debt, and indulgence.

Occupy wall street is missing the entire point.  Our fight isn’t with Wall Street, or successful business — our fight is with morality.  Goldman Sachs has been successful and done it legally.  They bought our politicians and our lobbyists (see Jack Abramoff).  They bought favorable regulations, and the regulators enforcing them (see SEC coverup).  They’ve done it legally, and to the letter of the law.

What have we done?  How have we responded?  We voted for them.  The first real presidential election Generation X could really turn out for was 2008.  Wall Street bought President Obama — who raised half a billion dollars during his run for president.  This time he wants to raise a billion dollars — yet we’re going to vote for him again?  If my generation refuses to see the audacity with spending a billion, or even half a billion dollars on a political campaign then we’re more doomed than I thought.  As my generation sits cross legged in a park singing kumbaya with rain sticks and bean bag chairs, Wall Street is looking down on them grinning (both literally and figuratively).  While my generation plays bongos and complains of wall street greed, they daunt the same Obama shirts that those sitting high above them wear as undershirts under their $500 sport shirts.

My generation is blind as bat.  We’re more concerned about free healthcare then we are about making enough money to ride the bus to the doctor.  We’re worried about the Government protecting us from corporations, but we keep voting for candidates they’ve bought!

It’s time Generation X eats a piece of humble pie.

My 27th birthday will be August and reflecting back on the state of affairs God has blessed me.  I have a wonderful, loving, beautiful wife who is cooking casserole for me downstairs while I sip 12 year old scotch in front of my computer.  When it comes to my career I have been extremely blessed in my ability to command success many times over.  The lord has blessed me with a roof over my head and put me in a position that I can share what he has given me with others.

In the end my life is the closest thing to perfection I could ever ask for.

Wasn’t always that way though.

Hindsight as I’ve grown up I realize that while people can be hurtful or mean with their words you can’t dwell on it.  You can’t let it effect you personally.  Unfortunately when I was 16 it didn’t matter how much my parents told me that, I couldn’t see it.  This afternoon Elizabeth came downstairs from working on her eBay business and wanted to watch a movie.  I picked Gung Ho — a classic Ron Howard film — she raised her eyebrow and told me to turn her pick, Cyberbully, on.  Since I made her watch parts of Casino Jack, or simply , rather refused to shut it off when she objected, I begrudgingly agreed.  The movie, an ABC Family film, was extremely difficult to watch at moments.  Parts of my teenage years started to flash back as I sat there watching in disbelief.  While its dramatized for television, kids really are this mean.

When I graduated from high school it was 2003.  The internet bubble came an went — with it came and lost fortunes but the internet was still a booming business.  MySpace and Facebook weren’t all the rage yet but would be shortly.  You figure the limited technical capacity teenagers had then and we cyber bullied each other, it can only have snowballed.  This is a real problem.  The harassment I personally experienced left scares.  I can only imagine the hurt I caused others at the time who fell victim to my own hurtful words.  For years I’ve struggled with my weight and for years I’ve struggled with the harassment of others both publicly and online.  Post high school going into the work force it stopped.  Sure friends will make a jab here or there in jest like any friend would do, but it certainly isn’t said with the intent of malice.

Briefly checking statistics online, I’ve found that cyberbullying has not decreased.  This is really no surprise to me.    In 2003 the worst you could really do is tear a person down on your website if you were skilled enough to know HTML, or harass them on IM.  The harassment was more isolated and not as public.

Not anymore

Every kid it has not just a cell phone, but a smart phone.  Every kid is running around high school or junior high with phones that their parents use as powerful business tools.  With these phones they can instantly take a photo, video, etc, and upload it to social media site.  They twitter it, and it ties to their Facebook, MySpace, Plaxo, Pinterest, and the list goes on.  10 of friends re-tweet it, and 10 more of their friends re-tweet — before you know it that embarrassing photo or video has 1000 views in less than 30 minutes.  If that wasn’t bad enough their are about 400 different chat services you can use and we’re extremely quick to give away any and all personal information online to anybody who asks.  OAuth technology is creating a single login tied to multiple systems making you much more susceptible to breach.  Parents had a hard enough time knowing what their kids were doing before the internet, but now it makes it almost impossible.

When I was a kid I use to fear the people I went to school with judging me, picking on me, making me feel bad about myself.

Now kids have to fear the entire internet.

Has social networking became the new tobacco industry?  For years the tobacco industry marketed to teens and rather successfully.  They got a lot of smokers.  I remember as a kid thinking Joe Camel looked so cool.  Joe Camel was probably the life of the party, right up till the throat, lung, mouth, and pancreatic cancer.  Social networking is heavily marketed to kids.  Why in the heck is a teenager allowed to be on twitter?  Would you encourage your kids to go talk to a stranger?  Why would you allow your kids to go on twitter and follow somebody who is a strange person?  Why the heck does anybody under 18 have a Facebook profile?  These social networking sites emphasize everything kids think are cool — photos, videos, and wasting time on the internet.  They go out of their way to make apps that kids will like and suck them in — what?  I am a free wheeling capitalist but even I say huh?

We need to stop this.  The internet isn’t going anyplace and neither is social networking.  We need to properly educate kids at an extremely early age what proper internet usage is.  I often wonder when I have kids who are teenagers will I allow them to use such things?  Guess only time will tell

You wouldn’t think buying a computer could de-stress your life but it can.  When I come home I frequently will end up in my office listening to iTunes reading my Kindle.  I find listening to music and reading is extremely soothing mentally.  It provides the perfect balance between intellectual stimulation and brain function.  You get soothed by the music and you drain the energy left in your brain by focusing and reading.

Recently I bought a Kindle and can’t seem to put it down.  It’s not because its not terribly interesting of a device — its an ereader.  Hardly what I would call worth getting excited over.  No, its because books, physical books, are daunting.  Recently I read the Steve Jobs biography — that is over 600 pages.  There is no way that I could have read that in hard back.  You can’t get comfortable, the lighting isn’t right, and you feel like you get nowhere when you read.  You read 25 pages but feel as though you accomplished nothing.  The Kindle fixes all that.

So anyways, back to my point…my life is much more stress free, and I find myself dealing with the daily stresses in a much more manageable fashion.  I find myself giving this to God more easily and that is a refreshing place to be.

On that note, I’m going to bed and fall asleep with my iPod in.

There is one problem though, they weren’t easy to use.

My career in IT started out, like most, as a service desk technician. Most users then had one computer at home, and one at the office. Most users complained about the computers being complicated and not working well. They complained that it wasn’t user friendly nor stable. Most people used a computer as a tool, not in a fun or friendly way that one would use a consumer device like a TV.

On the flip side of that you had Apple. Steve Job’s developed Apple with the philosophy of closed source applications — controlling the entire end user experience from hardware to software. Job’s philosophy lead to a much easier to use and much more stable product. It also made for an extremely small market share. Early on this philosophy didn’t bow well for the masses. If you want people to adopt something you need to make it cheap — something that Apple was far from. By the time I was working as a service desk tech, Apple was on life support. After the ousting of Steve Jobs, John Sculley went on to make years of poor decisions leaving Apple in shambles and a shadow of its former self. CEO’s were like a revolving door at Apple till eventually Steve was brought back in (after the NeXT merger).

The climate had changed significantly. The internet was the new thing and technology was now consumed by the masses. People were demanding more from their computers and Microsoft went on to make Windows 2000, and XP. Computers got faster and soon people had 2 computers in their house. Steve recognized that consumerism of the products was extremely critical — so he made them appealing to consumers.

The PC was dull and beige, so Apple made computers in colors. Most of us in the IT business laughed — but we were computer experts, we didn’t have issues with our computers. To us computers were powerful tools.

Steve was right.

At the height of the .com bubble Steve recognized that distribution of media over the internet was going to take place. It wasn’t long till people were downloading swarms of MP3s and movies. Steve managed to revolution the business with the iPod and iTunes. iTunes was the first completely legitimate music store online that actually made sense. There was no subscription, you didn’t have to buy a whole album, and it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out. The iPod was the same way. It was the first (and arguably only) mp3 player that made sense — and it held an unprecedented 1000 songs.

When Mac OS X shipped it improved the end user experience on a Mac, and would leave Microsoft shaking their head. Apple wasn’t going after the core of Microsoft business, the business market, they were simply eroding Microsoft’s consumer market. While end users used PC’s everyday at work, they never actually figured out how to use them. They were overwhelming and complicated. Apple filled that gap in their lives.

Under Steve’s direction Apple would go on to transform what we expected computers to look like, how they worked, and what they could do. They transformed the music industry taking a failing CD business and turning it into a multimillion dollar goldmine. They brought the same philosophy to cell phones. Those of us in business will tell you that the iPhone is not a business friendly phone, however, its the most powerful consumer phone on the market.

Consumers want products that are easy to use, simply work, and don’t take a PHD to use. Apple figured this out and excelled at it. I work in IT so there is nothing that irritates me more than Apple’s stupid rules and “Apple’s way or the highway” but the market place has changed. As more and more people adopt smart phones as consumers, not business people, they want phones that are easy to use — and stable.

When my wife’s laptop broke and needed to be replaced we looked at all these different sales. She just needed internet, email, and word processing. Something basic would work. As we looked at all the laptops they were slow, shipped with a bunch of crap she didn’t need and she turned to me and said “You know, I’d really like an iPad.” So begrudgingly I bought her an iPad. After using her iPad for a few months, she fell in love with it. Naturally when her contract was up on her phone she asked if she could get an iPhone since Verizon now had them. Again, I begrudgingly agreed. I tried to drive her to the Android powered phones like I had or stick with her tried and true Blackberry. While the Blackberry is extremely good at what it does — and I personally believe the only phone any executive should be using — its not consumer friendly. While the Android is like a carbon copy of the iPhone and available on hundreds of different hardware platforms, its not stable, its slow, and their apps by in large are garbage.

Now that Liz had both an iPad and an iPhone, I decided it made since to buy a Mac. We needed a new computer, and I wasn’t partial to Mac or PC. A Mac would be easier for her to use with her iPad and as a music teacher there was much more sophisticated software available for her to write music. So I bought a 27inch iMac — I could do my photos and videos, she could do her music, and it wasn’t a huge learning curve.

So that brings us to today. This weekend while standing at Verizon watching my mother-in-law (who barely knew how to use her old phone) and my brother-in-law who just graduated college both buy iPhones, my Droid X locked up for the last time. I had enough. I was tired of pulling the battery, I was tired of the apps that crashed, I was tired of listening to music and then have it just randomly reboot the phone. I was done. I gave Google enough rope to hang themselves.

So since they were out of stock on the 16gb black 4s where I was, I drove across town to the other Verizon store where they had just gotten more in stock. I marched in and told the sales rep “I want the 16gb 4s in black with a car charger, a screen protector, and that’s it.” He said “Ok, I can do that”

So now I write this on my iMac, with my two iPods and iPhone sitting in front of my on the desk.

I don’t miss my Android phone.

The point of this is to articulate a lesson. Microsoft, Apple, and Google are all extremely successful companies. They have brilliant people working at them, running them, and all create innovative products. Nobody can touch Microsoft’s business market with its extremely robust enterprise messaging, collaboration, and unified messaging products. Google has the market cornered on consumer consumption of search, email and with voice they have created a consumer based unified messaging platform that is among the best in its class.

Apple though figured out how reach consumers. The reality of it is while Google may get more customers due to volume of Android powered phones, and Microsoft will still dominate the work place, I suspect Apple will still win the hearts of consumers.

People like my father, my brother, my mother in law, my wife, and millions of other consumers have something in common. They want their phone, tablet, and computer to simply just work.

UPDATE: Since Mark was a whining pain in the ass below, it is worth noting that I made him suffer unbearably through the years. My relentless torment and ripping him down for drinking from the keg of glory that is Steve Jobs. You are most definitely older, and certainly wiser, at least in this subject. Though this will never happen again. Happy now?

As for me, I’m still working like crazy. I’m going to try and get a degree here pretty soon. Right now in my career a degree serves little purpose other than a check box on a resume. I’m working in middle management at a very large entertainment company — and it’s good to be back in management. I’m not a department head yet, just a resource manager, but it put me back where I thrive — as a supervisor. It’s not always easy, its not always nice, and its certainly not always fun, but I love every minute of it. My boss is fantastic, the team of people I get to work with are all wonderfully talented folk, and I work for the greatest company in the world.

I’m still overweight, and I’m still making excuses, but alas the wife isn’t going to put up with them much longer, I am going to have to address it. For a while I had been working with my close friend (who is a great financial planner) Bret Wims. He was walking with me 3 days, checking in with me on calorie counting, and Liz was cooking healthy meals…but when the time changed it sorta by a kibosh to that.

Shortly after Bret and I started walking though he did ask me to come sit in on some board meetings for the homeless services company he worked with. It’s a non-profit, and Bret was on their board of directors. After a few board meetings he asked me if it was something I would be interested in taking on, and so I serve on the board at Bridge To Home. Bridge To Home provides homeless services, shelter, job placement, etc, to people living in the Santa Clarita Valley and San Fernando Valley.

So moving on both my brothers decided to get married. Jared got engaged to his girlfriend Nikki, and Christopher (finally) asked Laura to marry him. To describe the contrast of my finding out, I didn’t know Jared was close to asking, nor asked till they updated their Facebook profiles — Where as I drove Christopher to see a jeweler and I was among the first phone calls after she said yes. God does indeed have sense of humor.

Weddings were abundant last year, ironically though the ones we cared about the most we ended up missing. Liz’s cousin Matt got married to a wonderful young woman named Francis. We took them to Disneyland last weekend, Francis’s first time, and they had a wonderful time. My beloved Uncle Rich was met with nuptials as well. He met a wonderful woman named Wendy whom he married this past November. For those of you that don’t remember, his wife, my beloved Aunt Pat, past away 3 years ago. Wendy is simply a delightful woman who lights up his life, home, and heart. He knows my aunt sent her to him, and knowing my aunt, I’m sure God is being kept well in check — oh, and he still cuts my hair every 4 weeks.

Our friends Desiree and Kent officially became homeowners last year! They bought a nice spread in Lake Elizabeth/Green Valley. They try to convince me to come over more, though I like to tease them and tell them I only go places with paved roads and indoor plumbing (just kidding guys).

Last year wasn’t met without tragedy though. My good friend, mentor, and teacher Allen Hall lost his beloved wife to a two year battle with brain cancer.

Liz and I took our first cruise together, and my first cruise ever. We went on a fabulous 7 day cruise to the Mexican Riviera on Disney Cruise Line. They have a boat that is docked on the west coast now, the Wonder. It was fantastic, truly magical experience. Our friends Eric and Elissa, who we have almost the same anniversary, were supposed to go with us, however, they decided to go off and have a kid — yes you read that right, Eric and Elissa are having a baby girl…that reminds me…I need to get Liz’s plane ticket for the baby shower!

All in all, God did some pretty amazing things last year. He was good to me, my friends, and family. Maybe we struck out a few times, or were asleep at bat, but for the most part he hit homes runs for our team, and what more could anybody ask.

Well to another day, good night blog.

I’ve decided I’d like to get a monogrammed cigar torch, and ash tray. They’re not terribly expensive and let’s face it, it would look pretty cool to had people a lighter with your name on it.

So as memorial day rapidly approaches I look forward to a little hop skip and a jump to Las Vegas. Liz and Christopher have been itchin’ to go so I agreed (not that it took much convincing). I’m not looking forward to the drive all that much, but Christopher is going to ride with Liz and I so the three of us well embark on said road trip.

Summer will be upon us soon, and Liz’s long term sub gig will be coming to an end. We will be back to a single income household. I for one am just so thankful for what the good lord has so generously blessed us with. There are lots of people struggling out there — our friends and family among them — so I’m extremely grateful the lord has blessed us.

Well this week will finish off with bible study tomorrow and the Newhall School District Trivia night Friday. Liz enlisted me to be on the team. I am supposed to be there at 6, wish me luck. This weekend is compassion weekend at church and I’m taking pictures of the patio being built at the SCV Winter Shelter. I’m going to head off to bed now, but I challenge each and every one of you reading my blog to do something this weekend for somebody else. Need more convincing? Watch the video…

This weekend I watched the new HBO Documentary, about Jerry Weintraub. I knew quite a bit about the man who was friends with Sinatra and called The Colonial everyday till he let him promote Elvis — but what I didn’t know was what the man himself was like. Growing up in the Bronx, Jerry has this larger than life personality who knows how to talk to people, is extremely good at getting what he wants, and doesn’t have much of a filter — he says whatever is on his mind and doesn’t really care. He’s respectful, he knows how to appropriately deliver the lines, but, he still speaks his mind.

As I watched the movie I couldn’t help but think to myself — I’m a lot like Jerry Weintraub. It’s rare that I take no for an answer, my wife would agree that I’m extremely adamant about getting what I want, and I tell you just like it is. Sometimes I think things are just in your blood. Since I do have that similar persona about me combined with my love for good scotch and classy attire most people think I’m from New York. Liz actually asked when we first started dating if I was from New York because she said I had this very New York style about me.

I was always a talker — my entire life my parents tried to get me to shut up and were never successful. At some point I figured out not just to keep talking, but how to talk. For whatever reason the lord blessed me this extremely helpful ability to read people like a book. Within 30 seconds I can size a person up and know exactly who I’m talking to and how to talk to them. It’s at that point I figure how to not stop talking till I get what I want. Sometimes I stretch the truth, something I skate around the issue, sometimes I never answer a question but you think I do…its a gift forsure…

As we stood at the beach I couldn’t help but play the last 10 years back in my head. The phone calls for a Windows install disk late at night, the burned up drill bits on the truck, the smashed ceilings we tried fixing, the chipped counter from the dishwasher, the missing tux coat, the cable pulling, the free oreo balls, the prime rib dinners at wood ranch, the late night coffee, the websites, the phones, and the college graduations…though all of those things are fond memories, the one that sticks out to me the most was at the funeral for Christopher’s grandfather. As we stood to the side I started to weep profusely like a kid after my speech. Rick reached out and put his arm around me pulling me tight and held me — he said “It’s OK big guy.”

In life you’re lucky to have one good friend, I’m fortunate to have quite a few, Rick being one of the best. His mom would be very proud of him, and she should be. I hope that in 10 more years will gather at the beach with our respective spouses and kids to lift up his Mom again.

“…And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” Matthew 28:20

Then the weekend ended on a perfect high note coming full circle right back here with Liz where she was greeted with Solvang fudge and a great big hug!

This coming weekend is Liz’s birthday with lots of wonderful things planned and today she is enjoying the day at Disneyland with her friend.

So the random pictures you see on the homepage that look like they were all professionally done — they are — and I must give the outstanding photography credit to my friend Lukas