WALKING THE BELLY OF THE BEAST:

I saw Bill Gates. A Cap Cop in front of him. A woman. Another woman behind him. And a big guy playing entourage back up. He does look a bit like Ernie from Sesame Street I think. He was waiting for people to rush him…. only thought in my mind was, Hey Louie… a republican rock star went by in the train. That is the way of the US Capitol. Nerds, geniuses et al are just that…. et als…..

COPYRIGHT REALITY CHECK: Beyond Wonks & Lobbyists

I was asked about Copyright Defense after posting my comment I filed with the Copyright Office in their Orphan Works solicitation period.

The writer asked…. “What I care about most is enforcing whatever laws they have in place – and not at my expense – since they are the wrong-doers. What good is a law if there is no enforcement of it, by anyone? The police and FBI catch people doing bad stuff all of the time. But, if we as artists are getting ripped off, what is our REAL recourse? Who do we go to? Why isn’t there an agency that can help artists get what they are due from the crooks out there using our designs to their benefit. Even if we get them to stop selling, how do we collect royalties on all of the money they made off of us. Why should we have to go to an attorney? Why doesn’t the same agency that we file our copyrights with take this into their own hands and do something???….”

I have become active in Congress in defense of my copyright. Why? I learned lawyers dont get “IT” from our point of view Gingrich sued by photographer – PATRICK GAVIN | POLITICO CLICK
http://www.politico.com/click/stories/…/gingrich_sued_by_photographer.html
I succeeded in getting a shout out for artists and photographers at the March 20 Orphan Works hearing on Capitol Hill. In all of my years covering the Hill and copyright issues, I NEVER covered a hearing advocating for 2D IP creators. I covered celebrity, rock stars, old stars, etc.
Our real recourse at this time isnt good. The value of the average persons claim is not respected. I filed a second comment adressing Small Claims.
The value of filing our copyrights? Well, we have been misled to thinking there is a value. The money has made the Copyright office the only profitable office in Congress hence the President is cramming more lawyers into that Department. Reality is we have no obligation to file a copyright mark until we file claim. Read my Comment. By virtue of creating the IP, it is protected. IF we want to file suit, there should be a middle road between filing fee and Expedited Fee pre filing suit.
How we collect is the problem. Right now, Copyright is a Federal Territory. Making it small claims is a thought….. that has BEEN ON THE TABLE SINCE 2006 at least. Dont be hopefilled. BUT I have taken on the wonks and lobbyists and lawyers who make a living going to meetings, writing notes, cashing checks… did I say cashing checks? Yes… alot of checks.
I am hitting back with reality check and common sense and no checks funding me. I wish there was. I am fighting for my copyright ownership. I was told I need to change a SCOTUS decision and laws. Working on it.

What can we do? Pass my comment forward. Follow me. Have people connect to me….

Insight Reality check. Lawyers have their own bottom lines to cover. They wont take on the average issue of theft IP. They WILL cover their backsides with a follow up letter and notice on statute, the perfunctory ‘you may have a case’, maybe a referral, maybe a good luck… The system is flawed MORESO in this world of technology. Dont you worry, I take every opportunity I can to tease legislators I know about the speed they facilitated pushing through technological advancements without knowing they facilitated their own worst enemies… IP that keeps everything forever.

BLUES BY THE BEACH Independent Film Producer Jack Baxter’s Reel Experience With A Bomb Murderer [archive]:

Soon after the Palestinian Authority re-aired its music video, removed from broadcast after the US Senate screened the footage encouraging children to die as Martyrs for Allah, two video projects debut in the same week. One is inciteful; the other is insightful. Both projects are being presented to the public days after Duke University hosts the Palestinian Solidarity Movement’s 4^th annual conference. PSM was launched in 2000 in support of the Intafada’s terror campaign on Israel a precedent to America’s  911.

MTV is airing the artist once again known as Prince’s music video featuring a teenage actress as a Palestinian child bomb murderess self-detonating amongst innocent bystanders. American film maker Jack Baxter screens his independent film “Blues By The Beach” at New York Hampton’s International Film Festival. Baxter narrowly escaped death 1½ years ago from a bomb murderer detonating in Tel Aviv where Baxter was filming.

Baxter’s movie addressing Israelis defying death by living normal lives in the face of terrorism is in the Festival’s category “The Abraham Award for Films of Conflict and Resolution.” It will probably never achieve the Golden Globe, a Clef D’ors, Emmy, or the financial success it deserves. Baxter, a struggling filmmaker happened to be in the wrong place at the right time. He brings a reality check to people who think they are impervious to unpredictable, increasing terrorist strikes contrasting Prince presenting a video promoting teen suicide and murder. The singer will probably glean Grammy and other nominations along with the reward of being a celebrity, immune from the US Senate.

1:00am the morning of Wednesday April 30, 2003, security guard Avi Taviv prevented two British Pakistani bomb murderers from entering Mike’s Place where Baxter and co-directors Detroit born Israeli Josh Faudem and Czechoslovakian Pavla Fleischer had been filming for two weeks. One bomb murderer detonated himself. The second ran away, remaining at large. Baxter, says, “It’s important people pay attention to the fact the bomb murderers were not Muslims from the Middle East. They, Asif Hanif and Omar Khan Sharif, were British.” Taviv, severely injured, is credited with saving the lives of many patrons. The three dead include French waitress, Dominique Hess, last filmed moments before the blast. Hess planned to return to France within the days after she was murdered.

Sagit Shir, singer for the band performing the night of the murders testifed at the Israeli government’s alternative Hague hearing after being refused entry to the to International Court of Justice along with 18 other victims and casualties of terrorism. Shir, staring through the blood red velvet curtains shielding the audience from Pro-Palestinians protesting Israel’s safety wall, said, “We used to joke no bomber would bother with Mike’s Place because it wasn’t famous enough.” Hanif’s self-detonation proved Shir wrong. Mike’s Place sits next to the US Embassy on Israel’s Mediterranean waterfront. Shir’s boyfriend, the band’s drummer is still wearing ¾ body pressure suits aiding to heal burns he suffered in the detonation. “You know,” said Baxter, “I recall seeing something strange before the blast but did not know what I was observing at the time. A group of Middle Eastern men, not Israelis, were smoking together outside the bar. And, they all got up. Walked away. I thought that was strange. Then, boom….”

The blast left Baxter in a coma. He awoke after three days, his left arm paralyzed. It has atrophied to one half the width of his right hand. His eardrums, typical of bomb murder victims, are ruptured. Baxter leans forward to listen, sometimes even for himself, twisting comically until he can hear people he speaks with, a human version of the cell phone television commercial repeating, “Can you hear me?” Talk too soft or with your back turned to him, he can’t. His left leg drags as he walks. Measuring over six feet, Baxter, visibly gaunt in comparison to home photos decorating the loft he shares with wife Fran Strauss-Baxter, appears taller. American doctors have not yet diagnosed the source of eruptions on his body.  They recently concluded they are caused by foreign organisms, undiagnosed as of yet. Tel Aviv’s Rabin Trauma Centre ER doctor Jeffrey Kashuk, speaking in Canada in March on the topic of medical terrorism said terrorists engage in chemical and biological warfare counting on the deadly projectiles Aids, Hepatitis C virus and SARS-like virus infected bone, blood  and other particles from bomb murderers will further injure their victims. Rabin Medical Centre is a leader in urban triage of terror attack sites including murder bombings. Baxter’s doctors determined early on, his skin eruptions were not caused by nail and metal bits exploded from vests the bombers wear. It was determined Baxter’s bomb murderer used plastic explosives more typical of Irish bombers.

One sense’s even if Baxter knew what is causing his bumps, he wouldn’t care. His film, wife and two oversized cats are most important to him. Fran flew to her husband’s side upon hearing of his attempted murder. A former girlfriend saw his misidentified photo, ¾ page tall in Westchester’s “The Journal News” claiming he was a wounded Israeli. Baxter includes the  clipping in his film’s press kit.

Baxter prefers talking about his new love. Israel. A Catholic, he is working on persuading Fran to move there from their Penn Station neighbourhood loft. Only another casualty of terrorism can understand why. Baxter has in Israel a solidarity he lacks in the US. Few in America understand daring death, surviving a horrific tragedy or losing loved, close ones or strangers from no reason other than hate. Baxter returned to Israel after coming back to New York. Interpreting his wife’s order to stay out of danger as not riding public buses, he took taxis to the battleground settlement of Hebron. And walked the streets of Tel Aviv late at night. Alone.

Baxter settles into his armchair for picture taking. He put on his “Mike’s Place” t-shirt, making sure the words can be seen by the camera. Closing his eyes for a moment, his left hand seems to be to be tapping in time to songs Baxter must have been listening to that ill fated night. Baxter recalls how, in a style Cecil B. De Mille would be proud of, he ordered 28 year old Josh Faudem, “Keep shooting.”  Faudem did.

Faudem’s father, mother and best friends from childhood gathered for beers and soda after screening “Blues” at Jerusalem’s Cinemathique. Newsman Ira Garshowitz says Faudem’s film has a chance to save lives in Israel. And outside. Garshowitz knows terrorism does not respect borders or cultures. It just murders. “How did they respond?” asked Baxter. “Did they laugh?” Yes. At all the right spots. And they wept. Every person in the room was seven degrees of separation from terrorism. Someone they once met at the mall. A colleague. A friend. A relative. Even a brother.

Baxter had travelled to Israel to film a documentary on Palestinian Muslim Arab leader Marwan Barghouti, the man he says launched Israel’s recent three year Intafada of terror. Upon discovering a woman was already filming “his” documentary, he went for a drink ending up at “Mike’s Place,” listening to blues by the beach and “Mike’s Place” owner, Gal Ganzman, in a life changing conversation. Ganzman, who rebuilt his establishment in time for Israel’s Memorial Day less than a week later, had suggested Baxter do a film on how Israelis have fun in the face of death, albeit, according Jerusalem cab driver Moti, “a bit nervously.” Unfunded, already in Israel, Baxter said, “Sure.”

And, for Israel, it is a good thing Baxter did.

Terrorism, old hat for Israel, is new for North America. With the timing of Prince’s video screening the same week as Baxter’s film, people may realize what is mischaracterized as an issue between Jews and Arabs, is in fact a battle between good and evil. Good people don’t murder. Bad people do. Baxter’s film shows audience and interviewers, the bomb murderers did not ask fellow Muslims to leave “Mike’s Place.” Nor did they warn non-jews to run for safety. They walked in, self-exploding, taking with them innocent people caught in their murderous perimeter.

Fleischer told the New York Sun, she had hoped “Blues By The Beach,” would be a happy piece on Israel. She said it “turned out to be quite different.” It is different. It shows the real Israel is not a war zone but a suburban urban life in a country rich in heritage attracting colorful characters like Hess, Faudem and Baxter.  And terrorists intent on murder.

Baxter is fundraising to get his film to Cannes. Everything he had was invested into this movie he nearly died for. “We’re living on food stamps,” he says.

Fran Baxter says her husband is a hero. No, Fran, Jack is a saint who aught to be rewarded. Press releases should be sent to every enforcement office, military base, high school, college, synagogue and church group, social event and memo board, advising this film is a must-see. ”Blues By The Beach” is reality entertainment showing what will hit America, again. Twin Towers, Target, a local restaurant, a bus. An independent film screening in the Hamptons or, even the location where Prince films his next music video. This jewel of a film brings home two points MPDC Lieutenant Jeffrey Herold, said, in an interview, “It is only a matter of time,” and “it is where we aren’t looking that it will happen,” as it did, Friday. Two bombers wearing backpacks, entered and shattered a tightly secured area of Iraq near the highly guarded US Embassy. Witnesses reported something similar to Baxter. They said it was strange. The two bomb murderers sat for some time sipping tea before self-detonating.

Baxter’s film deserves to be entered in and win every independent film festival in the world. It is an ambassadorial lesson worthy of receiving the Nobel Prize for explaining, in reel time, the Conflict in the Middle East, is a matter of life or death.  Almost Baxter’s. Next time, mine or yours.

                        

HEALING THE WORLD TIKKUN OLAM:

Can the world heal after atrocities go away only as their generation passes. The memory of insanity passing as cruelty remains as ceremonies. Sometimes the insanities are remembered through stabs made at Justice.

A Bill before Congress, the Holocaust Rail Justice Act, is an effort to facilitate claims against the Societe Nationale des Chemins de fer Francais, the SNCF, sponsored by Calolyn Maloney (D-NY), Ileana Ros Lehtinen (R-Fla) and in the Senate by Charles Schumer (D-NY). The Bill had yet to go for vote. Americans were transported on more than 72 SNCF trains that took them to months of misery. US pilot Donald Shearer was shot down over France. SNCF was France’s national state owned railroad. SNCF was paid by per kilometer per person to take them to concentration camps. The Nazis had decided there was no need to pay IBM for use of their Hollerith punch cards once people were loaded on to the trains to go to the camps. Tens of thousands died as a result. Shearer was taken to Buchenwald. Leo Bretholz, 21, was enroute to Auschwitz when he escaped with the request ‘he tell the story.’

While the Bill recalls the SNCF, another voice told the story. A survivor told his story on a world stage, 2013. Yad Vashem. President Obama could not ignore a man whose strength of a 7 year old, stayed with him as he aged to 95, standing alongside President Obama pushing for a two state solution- Jews to dice Israel with a generation of Arabs inspired by the descendants of the Grand Mufti who conspired with the Nazis.  

April 11, 1945, Gen. George S. Patton’s Third Army liberated the concentration camp. An hour later the Third Army’s VIII Corps, entered with Rabbi Schacter, the Jewish chaplain. Rabbi Schacter commandeered a jeep and driver and raced to Buchenwald. Smoke stung his eyes. Bodies were everywhere. The smell of burning flesh hung in the air. Months later Rabbi Schacter was still in Buchenwald, helping Jews settle, holding prayer services for survivors in the Nazi recreation hall.

Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau recalled Schacter name 65 years later. Lau was standing alongside President Obama at Israel’s Holocaust Memorial, Yad Vashem. Lau met Schacter, April 11 1945. Schacter found Lau, a boy then, hidden behind a mound of piled bodies near Little Camp, Kleine Lager, little Camp, a small camp within the camp. Schacter had just come from barracks filled with floor to ceiling plank bunks, filthy, piled with men as thin as rails cramped on them. IHR ZINT FREI rang hollow for them. SHALOM ALEICHEM YIDEN were hollow words. Peace Be With Them? Almost a joke. Schacter went barrack to barrack. People began to fall in behind him. And then he found Prisoner 17030. Lulek. Lule, a boy, thought Schacter was another enemy just like the Gestapo, SS or Wermacht. Rabbi Schacter’s crushed at the 7 year old boy who forgot how to laugh and made fun of Schacter crying at the slight child aged by war who told the Rabbi, “I’m older than you….” Rabbi Schacter sent to France and Switzerland and Palestine the 1000 children he found in Buchenwald. Eli Wiesel, a teen, was amongst the transported young survivors.

Rabbi Schacter shared with President Obama the question survivors kept asking him, ‘Does the world know what happened to us?’

There but for the grace of God went Schacter. Thinking, said Rabbi Schacter ‘If my own father had not caught the boat on time, I would have been there, too.’ ”Schacter’s father Pincus was a seventh-generation shochet, or ritual slaughterer. Schacter, a YU student, received his klaf, his rabbinic parchment, from Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik.He enlisted as an army Army in 1942. with Schacter’s help, Lulek learned to say kaddish for his parents, he told President Obama. Yes, that Nazi orphaned child had settled in Israel becoming Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau, the Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel from 1993 to 2003, chief rabbi of Tel Aviv, thanking the American people for delivering Buchenwald survivors “not from slavery to freedom, but from death to life.”

Heroes came in both genders. Male and women.

 

General Eisenhower had said, when he entered the camps “we want plenty of photos so no one can ever say this did not happen”. Iranda Sendler was born long before photos were popular. Irena died May 12 2008, in Warsaw Poland. Sendler knew ‘things.’ She got permission to work in the ghetto as a
Plumbing/Sewer specialist. Her ulterior motive was to smuggle children out which she did, over 2500- infants went out in her tool box. Larger kids were hauled out in burlap sacks. The dog in the back of her car barked when the

Irena kept a dog in the back that she trained to bark when the Nazi
soldiers let her in and out of the ghetto. She buried the childrens papers in a glass jar for safekeeping. When the Nazis caught her they broker her arms and legs. They beat her. After the war, she used the buried papers to reunite families. Most were gassed. Irina’s bravery did not earn her a Nobel Prize. She had been nominated in 2007. Al Gore won for Global Warming. Hot air was haute; gassed jews was naught. ACORNs community organizer won too, at a later date. Oh, better known as Barack Obama. Irina died : May 12, 2008, aged 98.

Varda’s parents barely spoke of the Holocaust. They said so little, it wasn’t until 60 years later she learned she lost a sister. Varda was 66. Her sister deid because her parents did not have food to feed her. Varda wears a diamond, given from her father to her mom, surviving in a bar of soap as Varda’s mom was sent from camp to camp. Varda’s sister dued November 1946. She was 1 month and 5 days old. Burial plot H-18-132. Germany. No more. Varda’s sister was relocated to Israel. Savta’s sister, still an infant, lives on the lips of the new generation, Varda’s grandchildren remembering children from a lost generation.

Tales of Heroism abound. There were many Schindlers risking their lives even though Roosevelt turned his back.

The Kraus, Gilbert and Eleanor, saved over 50 children. 1939. That was the year. Austria was run over by the Nazis. Comfort in their Philadelphia home meant nothing when the Kraus’ were hearing stories of European Jews suffering under the Nazi regime. A lot of community members talked. Gilbert and Eleanor conspired to do. Gilbert’s idea was to rescue 50 children using issued but unused US visas. Despite the odds, the Kraus’ did it. One of the Kraus’ rescued children remembered Eleanor for nothing less than her red nail polish. They had never seen red polish on a woman’s nails before. They had never been on a boat until their first time, enroute to America with the people who would raise them in place of their parents murdered during the Holocaust. 

The Kraus’ story lives on in an HBO Documentary their grand son in law made after hearing talk of them at family gatherings. They died in 1975 and 1989. Their rescue mission was 50 kids. The rescue mission, today, is of the Holocaust, from becoming an oblivion, a vortex in conscience.

THE HEALING PRAYER   Mi Shebeirach

May the Source of strength Who blessed the ones before us. Help us to find the courage. To make our lives a blessing. And let us say, Amen. Mi Shebeirach imoteinu. Mi shebeirach avoteinu. Blessed those in need of healing. With refuah shleiman, the renewal of body, the renewal of spirit. And let us say AMEN

BETWEEN MIDDLE MIDDLE MARKET GROWTH AND HOBBIT:

    Someone said it well, the best looking horse in the glue factory won but still lost. That was what happened with election 2012. Mitt Romney was the hoped for poster child for Private Equity. Problem was, even though Mitt wasn’t Private Equity when it came time for the chopping block, the industry didn’t see the enemy coming nor from all the directions they did.

    A single man cost a lot of people time, money and machinations in that the counsel he followed, inadequately served his needs let alone the needs of Middle Market, the orphan child of finance, sandwiched by its protagonists in between Venture Capitol and Hedge Fund, of  which it is neither. Middle Market is the space occupied by businesses with revenues of between $20 million and $1 billion.

     Private Equity people know who they are. They realized post Election 2013, other people don’t. And in a world where opinion is expressed with out vetting and shared in 4G seconds this is a problem. More correctly this is Private Equities problem.

    Deal making is a good word when it is hundreds of feet high on a theatre screen in the visage of a Mike Douglas playing Gordon Gecko. Or when it is two feet high on a home TV screen in the visage of Mark Cuban and his compadres on SHARK TANK. But on blogs, rants, tweets, FB, Pinterest, HuffPO, what is left of the WashTimes and other print, deal making is bad. That is if you believe what you are told. Most do. Middle Market is learning it has to move with the times, too.

    The battle is lost when you argue up against what people are saying to you. The battle becomes a shared hot tub when people just get in and relax. Listen and respond. Politics and Capitol Hill is a bit more like a snake pit or as some prefer the comparison to Aesops Fable of the Scorpion and the Fox. You really don’t know who to trust, does one? Political bedfellows are made through association. As is guilt. And through ‘gelt’, the jewish world for money. Reality check is politicians start their next run from the day they get in to office. Goals, hope fors, ambitions are often lost in round the clock events that for the first time in memorable history has rhetoric reaching a point few wonder if civility can be backed down to. And it is in this climate that ACG is stepping up to educate themselves and their fearless state and industry leaders on how dire their situation is- stuck between Venture Capitol and Hedge Fund and tethered to Mitt- the man who got them so wrong when everything could have been so right.

     ACG came to DC- to meet, to talk, to teach. Lesson One lost- wasn’t of their doing. It was of the doing of the US Chamber of Commerce. The intimate gathering was held in a building of history- the former home of the Secretary Daniel Webster. The actual meeting was held a closed door away from the library where the desk Daniel Webster used sits. What an amazing photo op missed to tweet out, to share, to socially network (with hashtags of course) in teaching moments to a world of others who would love to see this bit of history, but for lack of opportunity, most likely never will. Webster is famous for having said “God grant liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it” and “Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable!” came from the Hayne debate Daniel Webster was a nineteenth-century lawyer, representative, senator, Secretary of State, and one of the great orators in U.S. history.

     Webster was the spokesperson for the Portsmouth business community, who opposed the Jefferson administration’s trade restrictions with Great Britain and France. Webster denounced the trade embargo as well as the War of 1812  against Great Britain is what led to his election to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1812. Imagine, sitting so close to history aligned to the ACG goal of Midde Market growth and not being told their industry’s inspiration was impacted by a man whose desk was a closed door away.

     There is something about history. It repeats itself. Fear expressed by invited ACG speakers is, this time, may be the death spiral, the US as we know it, may not come back from. Leaders from dealmaking ecosystems came to DC to make a difference. The lesson, “if we feed them, they will come” addressing staffers was learned. There is one lesson better and better invested in to- with over 535 legislators on the Hill, including House and Senate, take the food to them, along with literature, one office and a time by a team of people trained to stay on point with a message bullet pointed down to 3 points, maybe 7, but 144 characters at best. Thus is the world of marketing ACG has decided to Re-brand within. Its not about the 50 who come to eat. Its about the 485 that didn’t, that need to be reached.

    But how does one say Private Equity in 144 characters to young people who think the bandwagon of giving everything you work hard for away so others don’t get motivated to “earn for themselves”? Simple- Facebook (8 letters), iPhone (6), iTunes (5), Android (7), why even Honey Boo Boo and Mamma June- reality TV(9). All of these kitch began with cash from somewhere. You got it, dude- Private Equity. That is how re-branding is done simply- not from paying big bucks to people who put too many words on a page for people to take time to read in a rapidly moving global marketplace. AND NO NO NO- don’t even think of doing a Trump like “Apprentice”. Been there done that too many times, one risks re-Mitt’ing themselves all over again- and how many slides back down the ladder can an industry of amazing men and women with vision and accomplishment, suffer before their image becomes more of the caricature Mitt Romney left them perceived as.

    Re-branding is simple. Know who you are. It starts there. Ten words on a page. Go. Now. If you cant describe yourself that simply and quickly how the b’gosh do you think the world you want to give great beginnings to, can do it either. Lunch on the Hill was a start. Meeting how many politicians out of how many? THIS is the industry that knows how to do the math…. you deserve better returns for the good you have given out to the world.

    People do want money. People who do want to succeed are seen all over the Home Shopping Networks, late night TV. What they need? A roadmap from outside the box. And the mantra… give a man to fish and he eats for today. Teach a man to fish, he eats for the rest of his life and feeds others, that is, hopefully, will be able to continue doing even under the weight of the current administration thumb crushing entrepreneurship.

    And that is where Private Equity starts- know the room you walk in to- research- relate to it and share. And remember the words- Ex Nihilo- out of nothing- that is how the world began, shaped from nothing into something that is pretty awesome when someone says, “I did this. You can to it too….” Hence a Brand will be born… ditch the word “private”. Toss the word “equity”. Lose the lingo “middle market” which echoes Middle Earth, Tolkein and Hobbits. Lean towards phrases like “Optimizing the heart & soul of Industry” or “The little Industries that Can & Do” (shades of The Little Engine That Could)…. And embrace your inner pocket protector. Inside every man, woman and child, is a entrepreneur waiting to happen….. that explained this way? Will Love Love Love Private Equity that teaches, making money is good. Its not about paying back, it is about paying it forward….

I LIT A CANDLE:

I stood at the stove and lit a candle.

I stood. I watched. The flame it moved left and right. I forgot I had the radio on. The President was on talking at the signing of the executive orders in the East Room. I used to be part of that staged performance grappling for that BEST spot as POTUS entered the room. As the cast filed in behind him. Todays cast of characters included children. Something sacrilegious about using kids for photo ops. I didn’t see his kids there. What happened to level playing fields. Sasha is closest in age. She should have stood with Dad.

I heard the cameras. I am sensitive to the clicks. Those were my buds. But there were so few cameras clicking not the usual volley of cameras clicking off like automatic rifles being shot. Restricted to pool, I guess. Yup. Transparency at your primest. Watch what I do, don’t listen to what I say has become the accepted norm of the current and it seems planned to stay in power administration. 

I looked at my candle flickering as POTUS said DO IT FOR THE KIDS a perfected MAD MEN pitch line for a marketing campaign. This time the campaign being marketed was the Democrats version of Animal Farms FOUR LEGS GOOD TWO LEGS BETTER. Sirens going by. Motorcycles. Judging by the length of the line POTUS was in motion.

My candle stands for something. It stands for someone, my brother. My candle was lit in his memory. He was murdered. Not by bullets but by a bomber on a bus. Are buses the next to be outlawed because they contributed to the death of a mass of 11? I thought about a mother and her family slaughtered in an Israeli border town with guns and knives. Are knives and Israel going to be outlawed next in a mass of 7? I thought about a pregnant woman her foetus cut out from her belly? Knives? Next?

My candle flickered. I watched. At what price the insanity. At what cost humanity. Don’t tell me about saving one life Mr. President. Get it right. The bible says saving one life is like saving the world. Think about the guns that saved lives. Where is the NRA and the Speaker with those stats to counter the abuse of tragedy for theater of activism?

How many guns saved lives? Tell me. I lit a candle. Someone. I am watching my candle flame flicker on the Yartzeit of my brother’s murder.

Maybe next candles will be outlawed too

MY TESTIMONY BEFORE THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA BUDGET COMMITTEE: A Local Solution To A National Problem In Defense Of The OTA Office of Tenant Advocacy

The Office of Tenant Advocacy, OTA, asked if I would testify at the DC Budget hearing contemplating reducing OTA’s budget. I said yes. I came to OTA after my landlords demanded my rent increase, twice within one month, five months after I became their tenant. I believe DC government’s goal for OTA should not be reducing OTA’s budget but giving OTA tools it needs to work effectively. 

I witnessed OTA staff expending precious time playing catch up on renter problems that existed long before I arrived in Washington- unlicensed landlords exploiting city residents and robbing city coffers. I figured out DC doesn’t know who a landlord is until a tenant, with landlord problems, walks through OTA’s door seeking help, leaving hundreds or thousands of landlords to exploit DC renters because the District has no  idea who these landlords are or where to find them.

In process, I learned a legal landlord must have a DC business license to rent in the District- be it a house, room, apartment, condo or couch. No  business license, no landlording; landlords can raise tenant’s rent, once in 12 months, if the increase is DCRA approved. No license, no rent increase; rents must be kept in a DC compliant security deposit escrow account.

DC must take two steps to reduce OTA workloads with speed bumps (1) at the time of the real estate transaction, when the dollar crosses the counter, make realtors responsible to identify to DC, the OTA, potential landlords, owners who may one day use their property for income; (2) implement a mandatory uniform lease for all District rentals, eliminating renter problems from leases not in compliance with DC law.

The District knows every property sold in the District is potential income producing taxable rental property. The District, to identify and reduce the number of  problem landlords must legislate, at the time of property sale, buyers signing a one sheet advisory “Notice of Potential Intention To Rent” the realtor then must file with the OTA, confirming the property owner was advised at the time of purchase if they rent their property after buying it, they must get a DC business license; keep their tenant’s security deposit in a DC compliant escrow account; and comply with DCRA process for approved rent increases, or be penalized for failure to do any of the above. Their Realtor, would be under severe penalty and stand to lose their Real Estate license if the Realtor failed to have this pre-cautionary “Potential Intention To Rent” signed off by the purchaser or not given to the OTA. Property sellers would sign a document stating, with a penalty of fines they did not rent out their property while owning it; had a business license, and paid all taxes on earned rental income. 

Property managers must be penalized harshly if accepting for management property rental agreements without a DC Business License Number; proof of DCRA rent increase approval numbers; and statement of where the security deposit is held.

Paramount to OTA budget reform is teaching DC tenants these rules a legal landlord must comply with. Place them where tenants go to find rentals: on newspaper and internet rental pages; pop ups when words like DC, rent, realtor are typed into Internet real estate sites, pagers and search engines ie Craigslist. The landlord’s Business license number and relevant DC renting codes, must be displayed on “For Rent” street signs where OTA inspectors can spot them driving by, easy to investigate for compliancy.                                              

With addressing tenant issues with landlords before problems begin by mitigating landlord/ tenant problems before they become a problem is the ultimate goal with bringing culpable “partners in crime” on board, making sure realtors risk losing their license if failing to provide a “Notice of Potential Intention To Rent” to landlords and proof of to renters, the needed second step is partnering with tax investigators able to immediately run on the landlord Recorder of Deeds along with tax compliancy, business license and other checks with the operating theorem being a person who is dodgy of the law in one area is usually dodgy of the law in other areas. If there is ever a partner for tenant advocacy agencies to bring on board the moment a landlord’s name crosses the tenant advocacy agencies desk, it is the IRS. While Elliot Ness and the FBI always get their man, it is the IRS and its crack investigators who not only get the man and the woman, they also get their money owed, or, in the alternative, the legal pound of flesh.  Not only will the OTA will work more effectively, at the same time, the IRS and a District’s Office of the Chief Financial Officer, will aid cities bottom lines by tracking unreported incomes from unlicensed landlords operating, in DC, and across the country.

DIALING THE DIGITAL RENTAL GOLDEN CALF AIRBnB:

There is a consistency in my life DESIGN and otherwise to be ahead of my time. I guess there is something to be said for consistency even when it comes to Testifying THREE YEARS before the DC City Council budget committee headed by Muriel Bowser as an advocate FOR the OTA Office of Tenant Advocacy to not have their budget cut. My experience was the OTA department was overworked and UNDER enforced. What good is having laws on the books if the laws are not enforced EVEN make that ESPECIALLY in DC.

THREE YEARS ago I laid out my professional evaluation of OTA effectiveness as learned through personal experience. LANDLORDS operate illegally because the simplest of conformances was not done- REQUIRING LANDLORDS TO PUBLISH THEIR BBL & DCRA license numbers on their lease OH and letting the renting constituency know these were DE FACTO not arbitrary. PUNISHABLE. CITABLE. But to the delight of the real estate community Builders Realtors Landlords not Tenants NOT enforced hence a boon of illegal landlords were getting away with operating under the radar costing the DISTRICT mega & much needed dollars. It took almost the same time for the office to hone in on my alert of SCAM rentals being offered on the Internet. Question was who would rent online in another country from someone they never met then send money expecting KEYS & comfort when they landed. That is why the phrase THERE IS A SUCKER BORN EVERY MINUTE has propulgated exponentially since the Internet morphed into warp speed.

AND THEN as the song says ALONG CAME in this case not Mary but Carrie who figured out the finger in the dyke to stem the flood of fiscal dollars out of local & federal government hands was to enforce the LICENSE NUMBERS in all and every ad Realtors Builders and Landlords are connected to Online in Print on Websites on Lawn signs Craigslist plus. Got to smile that it was Carrie who pointed out to the OTA at the OTA SUMMIT held at Galluadette earlier this year that the department had to set the example. Figures I saw the Department of Housing and Community Development’s web-based Apartment Finder had launched their E-HARMONY matching system for Landlords & Tenants SANS drop downs for BBL & RAD numbers required by DCRA law.

Fast forward a VC event or two and an awareness of SUCKER BEING BORN doubting becoming big business. AIRBnB http://www.airbnb.com was born more correctly founded in San Francisco CA August 2008 by Nathan Blecharczyk CTO & Co-Founder graduated Computer Science from Harvard then worked as a program manager at Microsoft, engineer at OPNET Technologies, and lead developer at Batiq. Nathan graduated with a degree in Computer Science from Harvard University. Co-Founder & CEO Brian Chesky takes pride in PUSHING THE STATUS QUO has stated his ambition is STAYING IN THE LINCOLN BEDROOM booked through AIRBnB. With offices now in London Paris Barcelona Sao Paulo Copenhagen Moscow Hamburg Berlin Milan & Singapore AIRBnB labelled “a trusted community marketplace for people to list, discover, and book unique accommodations around the world — online or from a mobile phone… an apartment for a night, a castle for a week, or a villa for a month” has become a FISCAL & REGULATORY nightmare for cities starving for dollars. “ Airbnb is the easiest way for people to monetize their extra space and showcase it to an audience of millions” is putting BRICK business on the edge of their FISCAL CLIFFS. How nice to be right AGAIN at how wrong things will go & grow EXPONENTIALLY in Internet days and times. Talk about timing and technology, there I was spot on time again this time the potential for fraud became a business model costing locales dearly needed tax dollars.

Potential renters search by Dates Availability and Property. Hosts upload PHOTOS naming a price JUST like the none existent tree decorated address that was not across the street from the HOOVER building down on C Street in DC. Hosts are message through the onsite messaging system in which Credit Card info is entered. Not everything is can be wrong considering AIRBnB metrics of over 600 million Social Connections booking 10 million nights from over 200K listings worldwide in 33K in 192 countries. Have people not learned enough from ONLINE DATING fraud where pictured Princes turn out to be wart covered lotharios.

Every single booking on Airbnb is covered by AIRBnB’s Host Guarantee – at no cost to the host. Airbnb partnered with Lloyd’s of London, one of the world’s most reputable names in insurance so “in the rare case when something goes wrong” hosts know “forces are conspiring to protect” them for damage up to $1 million dollars FOR ELIGIBLE COUNTRIES with PAYMENTS subject to Certain conditions Limitations & Exclusions found in AIRBnBs. TERMS AND CONDITIONS does not cover Cash Securities Collectibles Rare artwork Jewelry Pets Wear and tear & Personal liability. TERMS AND CONDITIONS only covers currently eligible Australia, Austria, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Puerto Rico, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom, and United States. Even in the land of virtuality there is always a way out for Insurers. Surprised? NOT. After all business is business even in a Virtual Dog world.

AIRBnB hosts pay 3% when their booking is successful. Transactions are handled through AIRBnB with payment options of Check Direct deposit or Paypal. AIRBnB sends a photographer at no cost to the host. Autopost listings can be sent in ONE click to Craigslist Facebook Twitter & Google traffic plus for anything that is translatable in to 7 languages for spaces that are rentable Castles Boats Cabins Homes Islands and apartments. HOSTS are advised there are advantages to connecting through FACEBOOK a no brainer in that all platforms is seems are being enjoined with the INTERNET user at disadvantage. RULES are the hosts responsibility to convey to their GUEST but as with all other adages some learn the hard way that RULES ARE MADE TO BE BROKEN even when it comes to Parties Noise Smoking Pets Co-op Board regulation or HOA plus example being the INAUGURATION. Something about green crossing a palm that makes Tenants take a risk to get $10K for a downtown flat for the week of PRESIDENTIAL INAUGURATIONS.

Homeowners see Inauguration Week as the perk of domiciling in the political capitol of the world hoping to make big bucks for anywhere from a night to a week even more made easier these days. There are more than AIRBnB brokering temporary rentals between strangers. Other sites are Homeway.com, Flipkey.com & Brbo.com that help line up waiting lists for owners who speculate their zipcode has equity when POTUS swears in. If only homeowners paid attention and set politics aside they would be renting out too during March For Life week which packs out more hotels then POTUS but not at the opportunistic rates of Inauguration week of $600 a night for a non de plus 2 bedroom. Key word? HOSTING not renting. Renting is under the domain of the Landlords & Tenants.

HOOTSUITE reported HALF OF AIRBnBs New York City listings are illegal citing half of the apartments listed on the site are illegal according to New York state law. NYC banned short term rentals May 2011. Thing is AIRBnB according to HOOTSUITE did not DISABLE LISTINGS THAT BREAK THE LAW nor WARN CONSUMERS New York City laws were being broken with fines starting at $1K even though New York City found value in using AIRBnB to host HURRICANE SANDY victims as guests for free. The New York Times reported one AIRBnB host faced fines exceeding $40K for hosting AIRBnB guests in his AIRBnB posted East Village apartment. AIRBnB has taken to arguing policy change on their public blog challenging New York State Senator Liz Krueger sponsored legislation making short term rentals illegal because corporate entities were making full time business out of short term rentals. AIRBnBs wants PROGRESSIVE laws so everyday guests can use AIRBnB consistently & fair the online rental middleman says pointing fingers at legislative bodies & city officials arguing its not always easy to know how a law on the books maybe upheld by the people responsible with law oversight.

AIRBnB does advise re regulations COVERING THEIR BACKSIDE for not ensuring in the case of the DISTRICT of COLUMBIA that matchmaking between HOSTS & GUESTS complies with District rules or vetting the guest overlooking the Presidential Inaugural route is really them & not an alias or other or ducking out being caught by a suspicious husband or wife.

Regulators and GC setting up policy for local AIRBnB matches should take a look https://www.airbnb.com/help/topic/hosting. The USER POLICY https://www.airbnb.com/terms starts out with a premise it seems AIRBnB is violating Local State Provincial National or other Laws or Regulation or any order of a court including without limitation Zoning restrictions & Tax regulations. LANDLORDS IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA have to be LICENSED. C’mon VINCE GRAY. In your effort to boost DC as a Tech Capitol of the East Coast don’t break your own laws at a time DC needs DOLLARS. Despite LIVING SOCIAL announcing their imminent firing thousands of employees the day after MAYOR GRAY dazzled DCs HACKATHON announcing $35 million over 5 years as glue keeping the slipping deal’r stuck in DC…. as a DIGITAL WORLD GOLDEN CALF

REFERENCE: A LOCAL SOLUTION TO A NATIONAL PROBLEM: IN DEFENSE OF THE OTA, Office of Tenant Advocacy

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LET CONGRESS HEAR FROM YOU. Contact Congressmen Fred Upton, Joe Barton and Ed Markey & Senators Rand Paul, Mark Warner to protect your Identity and Intellectual Property from theft and cyber stalking. Contact Senator Tim Scott to defend your rights as an Entrepreneur
CAPITOL HILL Switchboard (202) 224 3121
HOUSE: http://www.Markey.house.gov, http://www.Joebarton.house.gov,http://www.Upton.house.gov
SENATE: Senator Mark Warren http://www.warner.senate.gov Senator Rand Paul http://www.paul.senate.gov ENTREPRENEUR ADVOCATE [ the amazing ] Senator TIM SCOTT
And of course contact YOUR OWN Congressman & Senator & Parlimentarian

COMING TO A BUSINESS NEAR YOU:

The FRC Family Research Council sent out notice HOBBY LOBBY faces $1.3 million dollars per day for refusing to provide to employees the early abortion Morning After Pill coverage (known as PLAN B Mr. Speaker) as mandated by OBAMACARE. HOBBY LOBBY is a Christian family-owned American business. Already facing $10.4 million dollars in fines the HOBBY LOBBY fines can grow to topping a half a billion dollars. LIKE the Green Family at FRCs SUPPORT HOBBY LOBBY Facebook campaign page. Keep an eye on the irony President OBAMA is announcing Americas annual observance of NATIONAL RELIGIOUS FREEDOM DAY on January 16. The Greens stance while steeped in faith is a shot across the bow for ALL AMERICAN businesses especially in light of BANK OF AMERICAs step to freeze bank accounts of entrepreneurs BANK OF AMERICA objects to ie gunowners. BANK OF AMERICA froze the account of AMERICAN SPIRIT ARMS according to owner Joe Sirochman. OBAMA gave his acceptance speech a BANK OF AMERICA stadium in Charlotte North Carolina

I SWEAR ON THE BOOK OF MORMON:

The wild west of the Internet has unleashed a commerce tsunami of unauthorized, unlicensed, unregulated behaviours impacting Broadway performances economic stability in the worst of ways. Broadway show ticket prices are going higher and higher. Producers, investors, owners and union have caved to scalpers exploitation of consumer passion for Broadway shows. Scalped tickets are sold on the street and online. To no surprise, tickets are still being bought after all business profits on Demand = Fulfillment.

Rather than beat the scalpers by implementing viable roadblocks to stem the scalpers abusing the passion of show goers, the tactic Broadway took was to join scalpers in charging the sky high ticket prices audience was paying. After all, as in politics, consumers don’t boycott, they pay then complain.

The Book of Mormon is sold out years in advance. Specialty seat prices  top $477.00.  Regular seat ticketing prices start at $175 a ticket plus a $2 per ticket handling charge. The Book of Mormon fills the house every show. The Book of Mormon tickets are not on discount as are other Broadway shows for which last minute ticket buyers can purchase at TKTS in Duffys Square, for 80% or less off the seat price. Audience can buy SRO standing room only tickets for cheap. Audience can wait on the cancellations line or even enter their name in to a lottery drawing for tickets that aren’t cheaper than regular seats just another chance to get an available ticket or two per customer. A lucky someone might snag a ticket being given away for free from someone with a leftover ticket feeling in the holiday spirit.

Minimal steps have been taken to regulate violation of ticket sales from sources other than the theatres themselves despite there being printed on the back of a tickets “Tickets purchased from unauthorized sources may be counterfeit or otherwise invalid; such purchases are made at your own risk. This ticket may not been copied nor reproduced in any form. Management reserves the right to revoke any rights granted herein including without limitation, to eject any person whose conduct is deemed disorderly or for the protection of other patrons. RESALE PROTECTIONS: venues in NY: this ticket cannot be resold within 500 feet of the venue for this event. Venues in PA: this ticket may not be resold at a price exceeding the established price printed on the ticket plus 25% of the price of the ticket or the sum of five dollars whichever shall be more plus lawful taxes other than pursuant to section 2(c) of 2007 PA laws 32 or by ticket brokers duly licensed by a city of the first class as of June 1 2007. Other resale restrictions may apply to venues in other states.” The problem is not the warning but failure to enforce the policy. Scalpers violate the 500 feet Resale Protection by standing outside theatre doors. Scalpers are even brazen enough to enter theatre lobbies soliciting people standing on the Cancellation Line. 

The Eugene O’Neill theatre guest facilitator cautions buying tickets from scalpers, stubhub.com and similar sources because the ticket may be a fake. The Theatre industry facilitates scalpers by allowing purchasers of scalped tickets to SCAN the scalped ticket to vet its authenticity. No word if the scalper sticks around to hear from the scalped ticket purchaser to see if the paid for ticket is authentic.

Judge Judy presided on her TV show over the claim by three men seeking reimbursement of bogus tickets they bought from a scalper outside of a baseball game. The men sued the original ticket holder with whom they had no contact. They could not find the scalper. Somewhere between the owner and the reseller, the owner’s tickets were duplicated and sold multiple times.

There are two models theatre industry can implement theater tickets being scalped. Model 1 would impliment Resale Royalty Act initiated in California. The Resale Royalty Act provides Resale Benefits to the person who owns the copyright, providing them entitlements to proceeds from the “purchase as or not as contracted.” At issue is the willingness of show producers to invest a little bit more into the price of the show tickets. Model 2 is using design on to the ticket face of the event/shows copyright and Trademarked images placing the scalper, selling the ticket, in violation of unauthorized use of a Trademark. If the sale is online and interstate, the scalper might be in violation of RICO, wire act. This model works if venue owners are willing to pay for the design of tickets bearing the shows copyrighted name and logo. The ticket bearing the copyrighted images could become collectibles for theatre goers.

At fault? Consumers willing to pay the price of an event ticket at all cost. Consumers paid $48000 for a single 12  12 12 concert seat offered on Craigslist. No word on if any of that $48,000 money went to the Robin Hood Foundation to help the victims of Hurrican Sandy.

Bottom line, the failure of scalped ticket enforcement remains with Legislators failing to uphold original copyright  and IP Intellectual property law. Instead, legislators pandering to constituents, dilute the original intention of Copyright Law. Reselling of artwork, dance, etc without authorization is the same violation no different of the skill or discipline. Legislators are best served to define legal speed bumps that allow copyright holders to pursue unauthorized copyrights users easier in courts. Fair Usage as  a unauthorized users defense must be eliminated. Owning a copyright is owning a copyright. Using something that does not belong to you is stealing, one of the Ten Commandments legislators legislate under.

I swear on the Book of Mormon….