Presidents Only: New Employee Orientation

In order for a new employee to get off to a successful start they are usually required to attend "New Employee Orientation." This is necessary for several reasons. It first allows the new employee to understand what their role is and what opportunities are available for them within the company. It also allows for the organization to indoctrinate the new employee into the different cultures and history of the company. The new employee is usually given a handbook, benefit summary and code of conduct material.

Even the National Football League offers a rookie symposium to all newly drafted and free agent employees. The purpose is to make certain that their new crop of millionaire players learn how to make the right choices in business, money, conduct and women. The NFL even requires rookies to tour the Football Hall of Fame in Canton, OH to learn about the roots of the league and the players that came before them.

Then why does the President of the United States not attend a similar orientation or seminar. Mr. Obama has made several mistakes as the neophyte leader of the country. You would think that the President would have surrounded himself with adequate advisers that would be able to ward off these missteps early into his presidency since he is the "smartest person in the room." His latest flap was the snub of a long time ally, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Big "O" showed little interest in this visit, declined to do a joint press conference and extend the visiting leader a state dinner at the White House. A part of the President's duties include entertaining heads of state and ambassadors. I checked and the Prime Minister of Great Britain is a head of state as well as a longtime ally!

Better to Receive Than to Give!
The Big "O" made another mistake with the Prime Minister by presenting him with a gift of 25 DVD's of classic American movies. This is after Mr. Brown gave the President a pen holder that was crafted out of oak from the HMS Gannet, a naval vessel that served on anti-slavery missions off the coast of Africa. He was also presented with the framed commissioning papers of the HMS Resolute, the sister ship to the Gannet and a ship that was rescued by the U.S. and given to Queen Victoria. Obama also received the seven-volume biography of Winston Churchill. Mrs. Brown presented the First Children with outfits from Topshop, a British chain of clothing stores. She also gave them several books from British authors that have yet to be published in the United States. Mrs. Obama gave the Prime Minister's boys toy replicas of Marine One. Orientation classes on gift giving and reciprocity would have been ideal here. The DVD's may not even play in Great Britain as they were probably in NTSC format not the PAL fortmat for most of Europe. Even the smartest person in the room could gain some insight from new employee orientation.

I'm So Tired
Sources in the White House say that the Big "O" and his staff have been "overwhelmed" by the economic meltdown and that the president is not getting enough rest which is why he did not give Mr. Brown the time a visiting head of state would normally get. This is where that new employee orientation would have been useful. Mr. Obama would have been told that the job is 24/7, the worries are 24/7, the responsibilities are 24/7. He would have had the option to decide if this was a job that he truly wanted to do and would he be up for the challenge. Yet there was no orientation and less than 60 days into the new administration there is a sense that the president is already tired. Well partner you signed on for at least 4 years of this.

Even if his staffers did not know protocol there is always someone the new employee could have called upon for guidance. Mr. Obama has four predecessors that he could have called upon for help. I am sure that Slick Willie(Clinton) or Skippy(Carter) would have been eager to offer advice.

Aging Already!
We all know that when a president enters office he has a optimistic outlook and demeanor about himself. Years later they look ravaged and haggard. Does the new employee look tired already to you? The US News did a piece on the aging of presidents but what should concern most of you are the messianic comments of the readers as to why Big "O" will not age like previous presidents. I think his lifestyle of smoking and the stresses of the job will cause him to age more quickly than even he would have thought. But an orientation that included age enhanced photos of himself as well as pictures of previous Presidents, before and after serving, would have been worthwhile. Maybe he would have just said "this is too much to take and I respectfully tender my resignation. My health is more important than the job." Big "O" would do well to put the Blackberry down and get on the patch. Aging is a process but lifestyle and stress does accelerate it.


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Boycotting Barnes & Noble?

The beauty of the internet and the digital world is that we can get information at a moments notice. No longer are we confined to wait for the local nightly news to bring us what we need to know. With that, the dangerous side of the internet and the digital world is that we can get information at a moments notice. Erroneous or inflammatory information can be disseminated instantaneously. The current Barnes and Noble flap is what brings this to mind.

Below is a copy of an email that has been circulating and sent to my email inbox several times this week along with the picture of what the email is explaining. Some of you may have it already.

FW: Barnes & Noble - Racism???

Subject: Racism still exists obviously

Let us not be lulled into a sense of complacency, due to the recent political success of President Obama.

Racism still exists in this country. Like all things, nothing is perfect on this planet, in this world.

We have an obligation to be active on issues that simply cannot be ignored.

Along these lines we should all actively spread the word of how Barnes and Noble apparently feels about black people or at least our President.

Please forward this to as many people you think should be aware of this and would be offended by this.

Boycotting Barnes and Noble will show the economic effect of people who will not tolerate racism.

Barnes and Noble had this as their store front display in Coral Gables FL in the Miracle Mile Mall. I am totally disgusted and I think it is important that we all find a different place to buy our books. Obviously this is a place of extreme ignorance. How far have we really come? God bless.

Barnes & Noble does acknowledge that this event did occur, albeit not by their store staff but by a customer who was probably still upset over the election. I even go so far as to speculate that it was someone who got tired of the race baiting regarding the N.Y. Post editorial cartoon that depicted a dead monkey who had wrote the stimulus package. Barnes & Noble even expressed outrage over the character reference to the President. Liberals often have "knee-jerk" reactions to anything that "offends" them and often calls it racism. Racism can exist if you have been harmed by a "racist" act. So who was harmed by this display?

Many of the threads of emails that I received called for an immediate boycott of Barnes & Noble bookstores. "Knee-jerk" reaction. Please explain to me why Barnes & Noble should be penalized for something that they indicated was not of their doing and have issued an open apology for it. [Then why apologize? Because some of you will not let it go at all.] Please explain why any of the cashiers at the Barnes & Noble in Atlanta or any other city have to suffer because of something that occurred in Coral Gables, Florida.

How you ask? Let's say that the boycott is successful and it results in a 30% decline in total revenue for Barnes & Nobel as a company. Successful boycott you would say! Management's reaction is to pare down expenses to offset the resulting losses in sales. So the company starts to manage is biggest expense of operation; that is payroll. That is the human side of your supposed boycott. Now the company decides that it no longer needs to employee 45 people per store but will make do with only 25 - 30. So at max 15 people go to the unemployment lines and that is just the stores. But your boycott was successful. Now multiply that number by the 799 stores that Barnes & Noble operates plus add in the distribution centers and joila! Now you see the total human toll. The young worker that utilizes this job to pay his college tuition, the warehouse associate that feeds his family, the stock associate that supplements her income are now for the worse. But you were successful because of a book about monkeys.

In these "tough economic times" Barnes & Noble seems to performing well. You race baiters should do some thinking before sending email chains to your friends and relatives. Barnes & Noble just declared a quarterly cash dividend for it's stockholders, yet you seek to punish them. If you own 1000 shares of their stock you would see a $250 check coming your way by the end of March of this year. You may not own any Barnes & Noble stock outright but your 401K or mutual fund may as part of its mix. The Chairman of Barnes & Noble, Leonard Riggio, currently serves as the Finance Chairman of the Host Committee of the NAACP's Centenial Convention slated for New York City. His family is still helping to build homes for Hurricane Katrina victims (17,000 New Orleans evacuees are still living in hotels at taxpayer expense). If you want these things being done by this company to stop then go ahead with your boycott and I wish you all the best. By the way Barnes & Noble is not seeking any government bailout money and in my opinion tends to lean to the left for its political views. Conservative thought books are often hard to find and are not displayed as prominently as those of more liberal authors.

Barnes & Noble has not offended me and if the store associates were responsible for the display then I am still not offended because, I am not a Monkey neither is the President. Get over yourselves already. Every criticism of Obama is not racist.

That's my word! Post yours!

28th Amendment: Housing Is A Right!

Stuart Varney vs. ACORN

Bertha Lewis, Executive Director of the New York branch of ACORN. She obviously never read the Constitution and firmly believes in what she is espousing. Interesting conversation with Fox Business News, Stuart Varney.




Not my words but the words of ACORN. Post yours.

Pimp My Ride: Presidential Task Force On The Auto Industry

What if Chrysler and GM built a car and no one wanted to buy it? What if our federal government employees charged with overseeing their return to competitiveness refused to own it? Would you feel comfortable loaning them money as a part of a bailout?

The Big "O" formed a task force, Presidential Task Force On the Auto Industry, to tackle the process of monitoring Chrysler and GM and determining if they can get more of your money to stay in business. The task force will be co-chaired by Timothy "TurboTax" Geithner and Lawrence Summers, the White House National Economic Council Director. There are 6 other members on this task force along with 10 senior policy aides. There are two openings on the committee but they have not been named as they would be the secretaries of Labor and Commerce, who have not been appointed by the Big "O" yet. Initially the Big "O" promised that he would appoint a Car Czar to oversee the auto industry but that was scrapped in favor of a committee. You see Democrats believe in Mob Rule. Let's get a group of experts together and vote on how to run a company.

According to the Detroit News, both of these gentlemen own foreign automobiles. Geithner, a 2008 Acura TSX and Summers a 1995 Mazda Protege. Of the entire group, two do not own an automobile and only two own American models. Now you wonder why the automobile industry is in such dire straits. Americans always vote with their wallets. We want value, reliability and great looks in our cars. Yet Detroit automakers continue to lag behind their Japanese counterparts in providing these things. I am not saying that American automobiles are far less reliable but their is a perceived unreliability that goes back over 25 years on American cars.

Our Democratic controlled congress would have all corporate CEO's make a maximum wage of $500K but overlook the fact that the people chartered with oversight of bailout money to GM and Chrysler be allowed to own foreign vehicles. Because Obama believes in fairness then make these overseers divest themselves of their foreign automobile and buy a new Dodge Challenger or a Chevrolet Malibu. C'mon, its only fair. They get to tell Chrysler and GM how much and what they need to do but they don't support buying American. For them to drive foreign automobiles to work daily would be the same as a Coke employee bringing a Pepsi Cola to drink during their lunch break. I am not opposed to Americans owning foreign cars as this is a free market place, I am just putting the hypocrisy back at the Obama administration and the Democrats who think that they should always tell others what to do with their money.

Both Chrysler and General Motors presented their business plans to the White House as part of the terms of the agreement from December. Chrysler's plan consists of 177 pages (mostly fluff) little in the way of planing and GM's plan has a total of 117 pages which will include focusing on its core brands, GMC, Cadillac, Buick and Chevrolet. The Task Force on Auto Industry will have until the end of March to review and decide whether to grant further government aid to these failing behemoths or to structure a controlled bankruptcy filing.

Will these automakers survive? Not if they are not allowed to fail. They must fail in order to fix their cost structure and focus on efficient manufacturing and assembly of cars that Americans want to buy. Failure is an option and should be explored.

Car selling should be simple. Make what people want to buy. Price it where people are willing to pay(successful market research and branding). If they buy it make more of it and make improvements to it. If they don't buy it stop making it and mark it down to liquidate immediately. Automakers sometimes stay with a model too long before discontinuing it. I like what Detroit used to make. Maybe I will see more of these on the street really soon!



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It's Just A Game Folks!

Will someone please remind these "students" that basketball is just a game. There was no need for this all out brawl. The disturbing part is that early on you can see several young "ladies" enter into the fracas.

This fight broke out after a foul. It later spilled over into the stands with some spectators.




The Alabama High School Athletic Association acted swiftly and decisively. The final out come is that both teams forfeited the game and were eliminated from the playoffs. I am not sorry for either team. Someone could have been severely hurt or even killed.