Shocks To The System

  In August, the family and I went on a week’s vacation at Seaside Heights, New Jersey. We had gone every other year or so, but after this week’s storm I don’t know if we’ll ever get to go there again. Super storm Sandy has obliterated the boardwalk and the amusement parks at either end of the boardwalk although it appears that like the row of stores facing the boardwalk is still intact. The boardwalk can always be rebuilt, but I can’t imagine that the amusement parks and boardwalk games business show enough profit to justify their re-creation instead of the owners taking their insurance money and selling their property.

Seaside Heights, New Jersey in August of this year.
Click Here to see what it looks like after Hurricane Sandy.

  As soon as I was old enough to drive I’ve been going to Seaside Heights and over 30 years seen the encroachment of mini gated communities in giant apartment complexes to within two blocks of the boardwalk and I’m sure that the ‘moneyed’ classes will use this opportunity to build even more valuable properties even closer to the beach. I could see Seaside Heights becoming like many of the other towns along the shore that discourage visitors by not having any food or amusements nearby and living off the property taxes from the expensive properties. To quote former Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before." And for some people that will mean semi-privatizing some of the shore that has suddenly become available.

  As shocking as it was to see one of my favorite places in the world obliterated, I received another shock when I looked at a reply email to the youth chess tournament I was running and noticed that I had mentioned that the tournament was free. Yes, FREE! A few weeks before every tournament I take the previous months email, change the dates and some other information, and send it out to my mailing list. My last month’s email was for the free National Chess Day tournament and I forgot to remove the word free when I copied the email.

  In ‘The Hustler’s Handbook’, Bill Veeck says that mistakes should not only be acknowledged, they should be celebrated! As an example, he talks about the time when as the owner/GM of the Cleveland Indians in the 1940’s he tried to trade his Hall of Fame manager and shortstop Lou Boudreau for half of the St. Louis Browns baseball team. The trade fell through, but not before the papers caught wind of the trade of Cleveland’s beloved boy manager. Instead of denying he had attempted to trade Boudreau, Veeck went to every baseball dinner in and around Cleveland that year and let the fans tell him what a fool he was and tell them that they had convinced him not to trade Boudreau after all.

  I had no need to do anything as drastic as what Veeck did, but since at least some of the people were expecting a free tournament I decided to ‘celebrate’ my mistake and make it a free tournament for everyone. I didn’t announce it or make a big deal out of it – I was just going to tell people the tournament was free if they tried to pay me.

  I had about 25 players as of Friday morning, but on Friday I got another 2 dozen signups. I needed to make more participation medals, so I got all my medals, labels, and ribbons in front of the TV and got to work. I turned the TV to the USA network expecting to see some reruns of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit but there was a Hurricane Sandy relief concert on instead. I made the medals listening to Billy Joel, Sting, and Bruce Springsteen (along with some other singers that I’m too old to know) and then the idea hit me that I could ask for donations at the tournament.

Sometimes all you have to do is ask!

  I put a note on the door mentioning that the tournament was free but I would be taking donations. Hardly anyone caught my email mistake and everyone seemed to want to contribute. When someone tried to give me money, I just pointed them to the cash box and let them put in what they wanted to. I was surprised when people told me they didn’t know I was from New Jersey but I forgot to ask if they thought I was from Iowa.

  I got another half dozen entries on Saturday and, aided greatly by the end of scholastic football and soccer, the 56 players was the most I’ve had since April. The players had a great time, but the tournament one of my most inept efforts at running a tournament. I had a player who wanted to play in the morning assigned to the afternoon tournament and had to give him a bye in the first round when I had everyone but him playing. Then in the afternoon I made a mistake entering the results and had all the players who had sat down and were ready to play stop until I could correct my mistake and re-pair the round. I’ve never run a perfect tournament, but these are the kind of mistakes that disrupt the playing experience and luckily I don’t make them very often.

  This tournament had me asking myself if I could have free tournaments and break even on donations. I might be crazy but I think it could work and at the same time help me solve some of the problems I’ve seen crop up in my tournament series since I’ve moved back indoors.

  $304 was raised and I’ll get it sent to the Salvation Army office closest to Seaside Heights this week. I wanted to get the accidental nature of how I came up with the idea for the donation written down while it was still fresh in my mind. I know in a few years (or maybe next week), I’ll remember this tournament as the time I had this great idea to donate the tournament proceeds to Hurricane Sandy relief.

See Food

What's more offensive? The frog legs themselves or the fact that they are a product of China yet the freezer holding them proclaims it contains 'Delectable seafood from Southern Louisiana'! Is there deception afoot or has China purchased Louisiana?

  Almost every Saturday I don’t have a chess tournament, I go on an expedition with Kathy to the Salvation Army Thrift Store, the Goodwill Store, and occasionally the Jonathan House thrift store that benefits an orphanage in Sierra Leone. Kathy looks for Christmas candles to add to her collection (700+ and counting) and I just poke around looking at the old books, movies, and music.

  The merchandise from the Goodwill comes to them in a big truck, but the Jonathon House and Salvation Army take donated merchandise from town and sell it in their stores. Every once in a while one of the stores will have a box of music or books that haven’t been put on their shelves yet. Last week I saw a big box of records at the Jonathon House. They were all country music records from the 1960’s and 1970’s. The first record was a Roy Clark album recorded live from the old Austin City Limits TV show (You may remember Roy Clark as one of the guitar playing jokesters on Hee-Haw) and right behind it were country music records from many of the stars of the time. Once at the Salvation Army I saw an entire box of records of easy listening music. Robert Goulet, Rosemary Clooney, Dean Martin, etc…

  Vinyl records are part of a long-ago past (although they are making a comeback of sorts). These records were likely dropped off by the family of someone who had died or had been committed to a nursing home. I often wonder what the owner of a box of 8-track tapes or records would think of them sitting on sale in a thrift store for pennies on the dollars. I have over a thousand records from my younger days and I can’t imagine giving them away even though I haven’t listened to any of them in at least ten years. Some of my records have collectible value (picture discs, 45 picture sleeves, etc.) and I even have the Rolling Stones album ‘Some Girls’ with the original cover that had to be replaced when they were sued by many of the celebrities who graced the original cover without permission. But the fact is anyone who wants my records probably just has to outlive me and then head to the nearest thrift store a few weeks later.

  In between going to the thrift stores we went to the Hy-Vee grocery store to pick up a birthday cake for Ben, who turned 17 on Saturday. After picking up the cake, we walked through the store and there was a freezer labeled as a ‘Cajun Fest’, containing all sorts of goodies from the Bayou. My curiosity was piqued and I wandered over to the freezer.

 
Alligator...eww

  The freezer had all sorts of odd meats. I saw breaded catfish, crawfish, catfish nuggets, alligator, and frog legs. I’m not much of a fish eater. The thought of eating catfish and crawfish doesn’t whet my appetite. The idea of reducing the alligator population appealed to me somewhat, but I didn’t enjoy the alligator dinner I had in July so passed on that. Besides, the alligator patty packages mentioned that the alligators were farm raised and having seen Planet of The Apes, I didn’t want to support the idea of some farm raising all these alligators who may escape and take over the world someday.

  That left the frog legs. Kathy had never seen frog legs in a supermarket meat case before and was completely disgusted by the sight of them. I had a plate of fried frog legs in Syracuse at a chess tournament almost 30 years ago and as I recall, they were fairly tasty. I’m no frog expert, but these looked to be very muscular frogs and the thought crossed my mind that they may have been genetically modified. I felt kind of sorry for the poor frogs. They had obviously grown to a healthy size only to be unceremoniously (Maybe there was a ceremony – I wasn’t there) chopped in half, skinned, and wrapped in plastic as part of a Cajun food display. Despite that, I was still thinking about getting the frog legs but then I saw the three magic words – PRODUCT OF CHINA. That did it for me. I decided to make a stand for truth, justice, and the American Way and passed on the frog legs. Shame on Hy-Vee for pitching Chinese frog legs in a freezer meant to celebrate Cajun foods from Southern Louisiana.

 
Frostbitten Strawberries!

  After we left the Hy-Vee, we made our way south to the Goodwill store and then headed back home, making our final stop at the Hy-Vee Drug Store. The store used to be called Drug Town, but I think they had to change the name when the new to town drug dealers would head there to restock.

  Not only is the Hy-Vee Drug Store a full service pharmacy, it also has a post office, sells lottery tickets, and sells regular food as well as close out food from the Hy-Vee supermarkets. Last year I wrote about how I got apple juice for $1.16 a gallon and 15 stick packs of Wrigley gum for 44 cents there. Every week when we get to the Hy-Vee Drug store, we walk around the store and I always make sure to see how much frost has accumulated on the ancient containers of frozen strawberries.

Paydirt!

  As we walked through the store, there was a big display of Chicken of the Sea Coastal Cuisine at the end of one aisle. It is a box with a sealed pouch of rice and a sealed pouch of Tuna mixed with one of four flavors (Tuna in a Teriyaki Sauce, Tuna in Tomato Herb Sauce, Tuna in a Ginger Sauce, and Tuna in a Light Pineapple Sauce). I’d purchased the Pineapple Sauce variety the week before and not only did it taste good, it only took two minutes to make, and best of all only cost a dollar!

  I love a bargain and at a dollar for each meal of 400 to 500 calories, this certainly qualified. I bought eight boxes of Coastal Cuisine, making sure to get some of every coastal flavor. Even though they are a ‘Product of Thailand’, they’re labeled as ‘Coastal Cuisine’ which at least sounds international and not pretending to be from the Bayou.

You don't have to take my word for how easy Chicken of the Sea Coastal Cuisine tastes or how easy it is to prepare. You can see for yourself!

Weekday Commercials

  My wife Kathy went to visit her father in South Carolina on Thursday for a couple of days. I arranged to work from home on Thursday so Daisy and Baxter wouldn’t be alone all day. I would have tried to work at home Friday as well, but on Friday mornings I coach the chess club at St. Francis in Des Moines. If I had missed even one meeting in the two plus years I’ve been helping with the club, I may have been tempted to skip the club. Ben was going to be home from school at 11 and that, along with my perfect attendance, made working at work on Friday a no-brainer.

  I’ve never liked working from home. I’d rather be at work when I’m working and be at home when I’m at home. Having said that, I save four gallons of gas and two hours of driving time every time I do work from home which are weighty advantages.

  I started work at seven in the morning. Daisy and Baxter were sleeping but I woke them up at nine when I took a break to take them for a short walk in the cold rain. I toweled them off and was back at work at 9:15. At noon it had stopped raining so I took Daisy and Baxter on a longer walk. When we got home, I cooked one of the pork chops Kathy had left for us and shared it with Daisy and Baxter while I watched the news on WGN-TV.

  Filled with pork chop tidbits, the dogs went back to sleep and I went back to work. I left the TV to listen to the news. After the news was over, WGN played reruns of ‘Walker, Texas Ranger’. I’ve seen the show before. If you are one of the people that believe Chuck Norris is some sort of superhuman semi-deity (like the people who patronize this web site) then Walker, Texas Ranger’ may be the best TV show ever made, but to me it’s a typical good guy – bad guy show, with the good guys riding horses and pickup trucks and using karate kicks to beat up the bad guys at the end. I wasn’t watching the show, but had it on as background noise.

  I didn’t pay too much attention to the three episodes of Walker, Texas Ranger. I was sure that the bad guys were all caught in the end and got a taste of Chuck Norris’s boot smacking into their faces and then falling down in slow motion. What did get my attention were the same 4 commercials that aired during the shows. The commercials were so different from the ones I see when I’m at home at night and on the weekends. They weren’t for beer, cars, insurance, food, or shampoo. These commercials were addressed to the products and services that people who don’t work during the day need.

  It would make sense to me that older Americans would be watching TV during the day and that accounted for the large number of ads for AARP supplemental health insurance. I didn’t realize that Medicare doesn’t pay for everything and that older Americans need to have protection for costly deductibles and out of pocket costs. I looked up the rates for some of these plans and they seem affordable enough. I’m old enough to join AARP but not old enough for Medicare, but it’s something to keep in mind.

  The next commercial that caught my attention was also aimed at older Americans, but for those with limited mobility. These ads are for The Scooter Store. I rarely see scooters in Marshalltown, but the portion of the Des Moines Skywalk where I work is right next to a senior center and there are old people zipping around in their scooters all the time. The commercials talks about how I could get a power chair or scooter at little or no cost to me. The people on the commercial are so happy with their newfound mobility I couldn’t help but feel a little jealous. I checked out the website most of the power chairs are priced between three and six thousand dollars with some used models going for less than two grand. I’m not old enough to get Medicare for my power chair, but I believe in being prepared. When the time comes I intend on getting a ‘Pride Mobility Jazzy Select Elite’, which at a low price of $3,699 provides a 15 mile range and a ‘reliable blend of power, performance and style’.

Left: A commercial from the Scooter Store. Right: I tried to find out who paid for these scooters, but the one man was going too fast and the other fellow wasn't talking...

  The next commercial was from a company named Binder and Binder. This company specializes in helping disabled people get disability benefits from the Social Security Administration. I always knew that it took years to get disability, but I didn’t realize that 80% of the initial applications are denied and review hearings take almost two years to complete (See it here). The website has all the Binder & Binder commercials and an enormous amount of information, but I couldn’t find out who pays Binder & Binder. I’m not planning on being disabled anytime soon, but I’m bookmarking the site just in case I become disabled and my television stops working.

  The fourth commercial didn't apply to me at all. It was a commercial from the Goldwater Law Firm that was on almost as much as the other three combined. The commercial is looking for women who are suffering complications from a transvaginal mesh implant to be represented in a defective medical device liability lawsuit. “The product liability lawyers at the Goldwater Law Firm can help you get the money you deserve.” Normally I would have tuned out this commercial, but I remember when I was on vacation last year, I saw a lot of commercials from the same law firm looking for people who were suffering from a rare form of lung cancer called Mesothelioma. I’m not suffering from any conditions at the moment, but I’ll make sure to keep their link handy just in case.

  With unemployment so high, I would have expected to see more commercials for technical institutes and colleges to cater to unemployed people, but the only commercials I saw catered to the old, disabled, or injured. I checked back with WGN on Saturday and didn’t see any commercials offering to handle my lawsuits, get my scooter, or supplement my Medicaid. Instead I saw commercials for fast food, car insurance, and yogurt with active cultures.

  I was glad to have had the chance to get such useful information on my rare weekday at home, but I wonder what happened to all the commercials aimed at the old, disabled, and injured people? Do they stop watching WGN on the weekends? This is a case of blatant discrimination and when I'm a member of one of these groups, I’ll be searching the Goldwater Law Firm’s web site to see if there’s a lawsuit for me as soon as I got done calling Binder and Binder to add emotional distress to my disability claim.

King Football

  I knew football has been the most popular sport in America for quite some time, but I hadn’t realized how far it has outstripped baseball until we went to the Applebee’s for dinner on Sunday night.

  There is no seat in the Marshalltown, Iowa Applebee’s in from which you can’t see at least one of the 2 dozen or so high definition televisions. We were seated in the table closest to the front door and there was a television 10 feet away from me that was tuned to NBC’s Sunday Night Football pregame show.

  I knew Game Six of the National League playoffs between the Cardinals and Giants was being played but when I looked around to find a TV that had the game on every set had the football pre-game show on. I know that the Applebee’s can have different stations on different TV’s but apparently no one at the Applebee’s wanted to see a playoff baseball game more than a football pregame show. I’d understand this if the baseball teams were from either coast but the game featured the St. Louis Cardinals, one of the 4 teams most popular among Iowans (along with the Cubs, Twins, and Royals).

  I didn’t ask anyone to change the station since I was just curious what the score was, but it got me thinking about how popular football is. I don’t watch nearly as much football as I used to, but I did see most of the Iowa State-Oklahoma State college game on Saturday afternoon, half of the Penn State-Iowa game on Saturday night, and on Sunday I watched a large part of the Jets-Patriots game.

  Football used to be the province of the weekend, with college games on Saturday and professional games on Sunday with a Monday Night game thrown in to allow the gamblers one last chance to break even for the weekend. Now there is hardly a day that doesn’t have some football on television. The NFL Network has a package of Thursday night pro games, while ESPN or FOX televise college games on almost all Thursdays and Friday nights and many Tuesday and Wednesdays.

  The football pre-game shows have become huge productions. NBC and ESPN have at least 6 talking heads apiece for their pro telecasts. It’s not enough to have all these broadcasters and ex-players sit behind desks and discuss the latest news or break down the upcoming game. They have to move around to a fake football field or a living room set while they continue to talk football in between the car and beer commercials. Then they move back behind their desks and continue talking. I can’t wait for some hotshot producer to decide that costume changes are needed for even more pre-game variety.

  I used to attribute the success of the NFL to the amount of money spend by people betting on the games. There is an estimated $50 million dollars bet in Nevada each week and millions and possibly billions more bet illegally. I’m not even counting the many football pick ‘em pools that are allow pools of co-workers that pool their money in-house and pick all the games without having to pay a cut to a gambling consortium. The NFL has strict rules forcing teams to provide standardized injury reports. It not only helps make sure that the opposing teams know who is going to play or not, but it provides a measure of assurance to the legions of gamblers that there is no inside information to be had and that their dollar aren’t at undue risk.

  If gambling was the initial impetus for pro football’s rise to the top of the sports heap, fantasy football has helped the game attain Tower of Babel status. In fantasy football, fans form leagues in which they pick virtual football teams. The players score points for their owner’s teams through statistical accomplishments. Fantasy football can give interest to even the most lopsided, dull game if a player in the game is on the roster of the fantasy team of a potential viewer (or their opponents). Fantasy football is generally played for money but the stakes can be as high or low as the participants wish. The real money in the billion dollar industry is made by the companies that dispense fantasy advice and provide league tracking in return for advertising eyeballs.

  Fantasy baseball came before fantasy football but has been overtaken in fantasy for many of the same reasons it has been overtaken in reality. Baseball teams play 6 days a week and each game takes between 3 and 6 hours to complete. To keep track of all the players and statistics for a fantasy baseball team is nearly a full time job. For a fan to watch all their favorite team’s games is at least a 20 hour commitment per week. It just doesn’t fit in with today’s busy life style and short attention spans. A fan can watch all 16 of their favorite football team’s games in around 60 hours over 4 months’ time. While managing fantasy football rosters can become a full time addiction, the statistics are easily understood and only get updated once a week. This allows amateur fans to feel like they can compete in their leagues against more experienced players.

  Football has never been as popular as the present time, but I see signs that the success of the sport may be sowing the seeds of its own downfall. The NFL is running out of product. It now has games on 5 networks (including its own NFL Network) 3 days a week. It puts on a regular season games once a year in London and has had exhibition games in Mexico, Japan, and Australia. Each team now gets a week off during the season which has expanded a 16 game schedule to 17 weeks of games. The league unsuccessfully tried to add 2 games to the schedule in the latest round of negotiations with the players union.

  Can the NFL continue its seemingly unstoppable growth? If the NFL has an untapped revenue stream, I don’t see it short of making the Super Bowl pay for view. There are new caps and sweatshirts to buy every year, each team has a day when they wear uniforms from seasons past that are available for purchase, most of the teams have brand new stadiums and games are on every TV network except ABC (which owns ESPN anyway).

  I think the NFL will soon make serious efforts to increase their inventory of games to sell to the public. I don’t know whether they will add more bye weeks to expand the schedule, add more teams, or just increase the schedule. There is money to be made and I doubt the NFL will be able to resist the temptation to dilute their product to get it. Will the NFL owners move too fast and dilute their product beyond recognition? I doubt it but there has been a large influx of new ownership in the NFL over the past 5 years. If a group of owners that have just paid a billion dollars or more for their teams decide to recoup their investment via expansion fees and increased television revenues for their games, the NFL could find itself a bloated shell of its current mighty self in short order.

A Great Debate

  In order to prepare for the third and final Presidential debate, both parties agreed to a secret rehearsal debate a few days ago in Marshalltown, Iowa. A crack team of impartial moderators were chosen and allowed to pick the questions to ask the debate participants:

 

  What does the New York Yankees collapse in the playoffs against Detroit mean to you?

  Governor Romney: The Yankees spend more money on their players than any other team and should win more than one World Series every ten years, but because of all their long-term guaranteed contracts they’ve become another casualty of the Democratic Party entitlement mentality. Let’s take Alex Rodriguez for example: He’s been hurt for each of the last 2 years, his production has plummeted, but since he is guaranteed 117 million dollars over the next 5 years he can spend his time during the baseball games flirting with girls (FACT CHECK) and there’s nothing his employer can do but grin and bear it. The more people are guaranteed, the less they seem to want to work for it and that’s the culture I intend to change when I’m in office.

  President Obama: That is my opponent’s world view in a nutshell: Just because the Yankees have more money than anyone else they should win every year. I say, why should the rich get all the rewards? What about the rest of us? If I’m reelected and my plan to have people like Alex Rodriguez, Warren Buffet, and yes Governor Romney pay their fair share goes through everyone will benefit, even the Yankees. A-Rod will have to start taking better care of himself and play better to make sure he gets some World Series checks to cash in order to keep his current standard of living.

 

  What do you think of schools in California, New Mexico, and Illinois banning Flaming Hot Cheetos? (BACKGROUND)

  President Obama: While I’m generally in favor of individual freedom when it comes to snack foods, there has to be some limitations. Let’s face it, now that the government has mandated that everyone have health insurance and will be paying the insurance for those who can’t, we as a people just can’t afford to have a bunch of school kids eating all these Cheetos and getting obese and having heart attacks. It’s just not in the national interest for this to happen.

  Governor Romney: This is just another case of government cracking down on American exceptionalism. Here is an American owned company that has created an American made product so successful that people just can’t get enough of them and the government wants to stop their success. What’s next? Banning iPods? It’s the right of any school district to not sell a product, but to confiscate Cheetos in schools is Un-American! What about all the good American jobs the people at Frito-Lay create by the sale of Cheetos? In Iowa, I met a man named Manny who delivers Cheetos to stores all across the Midwest and his wife works at a Cheetos plant making sure that the hoppers are full of red dye #5. They’re scared to death of losing their jobs from this intervention into the snack food freedom of the families of America and if I’m elected I’ll do everything in my power to help successful American companies succeed instead to handicapping them.

 

  When my owner take us out for our beef stick treats in the morning, his coffee costs a dollar for a 20 ounce cup. He says this works out to 6 dollars a gallon and at a dollar and a half per 20 ounce bottle Mountain Dew is 9 dollars a gallon. My question is why is everyone so concerned about gas costing 4 dollars a gallon when coffee and soda are so much more expensive?

  Governor Romney: First of all, Mountain Dew is only 2 or 3 dollars a gallon if you were to buy it 2 liters at a time. The reason that gasoline is so much cheaper than coffee is that with the emergence of the energy drink industry, there hasn’t been the impetus to discover new sources of coffee and so we just rely on the coffee supply from South America, while the entire world has been hard at work discovering new oil fields. Oil has been discovered off shore in Brazil, the tar sands of Canada, and in shale deposits in North Dakota, just to name a few. But our President is risking our economy by his giveaway of money for companies to make batteries for electric cars and other ‘green’ initiatives instead of letting the free market meet the demand for products people want (FACT CHECK).

  President Obama: Unlike the Governor, who doesn’t even drink coffee (FACT CHECK), I understand the dilemma of coffee drinkers everywhere and I have offered numerous initiatives to find new sources of coffee for the regular people of this country who like to drink coffee. But they have been constantly stonewalled by the Republican Congress. I am happy to report that thanks to my administration’s efforts to strengthen the economy, a Dunkin Donuts will be opening in Marshalltown very soon (FACT CHECK) so some progress is being made on that front.

  Governor Romney: I must inerrupt to mention that Dunkin' Donuts does NOT serve beef stick treats!

 

  If you suddenly found yourself and your family had no money, how would you survive?

  President Obama: If we found ourselves down on our luck, I hope the social programs the Democrats have been the champions of would still be intact so I could get unemployment and my children could get Pell grants for college and our health care would be provided for until I could get another government job.

  Governor Romney: I think we would do just fine. As a matter of fact, my wife was just telling me about an article she had read (FACT CHECK) about someone who didn’t buy clothes for a year. Of course, the fact that we don’t drink alcohol or smoke helps to keep our expenses down. And even if I lost 99.75 percent of my money I’d still be a millionaire!

 

 

  It’s time for final statements – Governor?

  Governor Romney: Thank you for moderating the debate. I just want to tell the American people that I’ve been a successful businessman and I know how to get things done and I am the right candidate to lead this country forward.

  President Obama: I also want to thank you for moderating the debate and also for the insightful questions.
  My opponent talks about how he is a successful businessman. Here is a man who was the son of the president of an automobile company, is 65 years old, and he’s worth 250 million dollars . I’m 15 years younger, have never held a job outside academia and government and I’m already worth 10 million. (FACT CHECK) I ask you – who is more successful and able to better lead the country forward?