Lee Geiger

All right, you sons-of-bitches. You know how I feel.

George C. Scott (“Patton” 1970)

I was racking my brain about what to write this week. Tired of dispensing with my Jurassic views on sheltering-in-place, the wearing of masks, and the vagaries of foraging at the Moraga Safeway, I stumbled upon a worthwhile topic while listening to a podcast during a hike on the Lafayette Rim Trail. Not the brightest idea I’ve ever had since morning temperatures reached the mid-90’s by ten o’clock. But like a sinfully delicious bowl of chocolate marble ice cream waiting for me upon the removal of my boots, I savored the privilege of banging away at my keyboard and sharing my thoughts with such a loyal yet highly questionable following.

The podcast is called “GZero World with Ian Bremmer.” Mr. Bremmer is an American political scientist specializing in U.S. foreign policy, states in transition, and global political risk. He is also the president and founder of Eurasia Group, and he can be found sharing his insightful though somewhat disturbing thoughts on the topics of the day on many a talk show. On this particular episode, Mr. Bremmer flatly stated, “Take whatever you believed before the pandemic, run it through the filter of what you’ve just experience and witnessed over the last three months, and see if you feel the same way afterward.”

Brilliant.

On March 2, 2017 I wrote a post titled “What I Believe,” which summed up my views of the world based on my education and experiences. What follows is a 2020 modification of that post, supplanted with updates and revisions (which are highlighted in bold italics). I am certain that roughly 10% of my readers will, soon after reading this dribble, hit the “unsubscribe” button in an instinctive desire to never hear from me again. But such is life.

So, without further ado…here goes.

March 2, 2017

One of the few economic formulas I can recall from my undergraduate days at that conservative Petri dish known as Claremont Men’s (now McKenna) College went as follows: B=f(P,E), which states that behavior (B) is a function(f) of personality(P) and environment(E). With that as a backdrop, my cultural, societal, economic, and political views of the world are filtered through the following lenses:

1. I am 57 60 years old and was born when Eisenhower was calling the shots.
2. I have lived on the Left Coast of California (both NorCal and SoCal) most of my life, but I’ve also lived in Chicago, New York City, Atlanta, and enjoyed an Ivy League pit stop in Hanover, NH.
3. I have supported myself since high school.
4. I worked on a Wall Street trading desk for thirty years, not including time off for good behavior. Now I’m a director of marketing. So, there’s that.
5. I’ve done a bit of overseas travel, mainly in Europe.
6. I have been married to the same woman for over thirty years and have raised two adult sons.
7. Lastly, and I can’t emphasize this enough, I was educated upon the altar of Milton Friedman, a Nobel Prize winning economist. Uncle Miltie, a monetarist, once said, “If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in five years there would be a shortage of sand.”

As the great Jackie Gleason used to say, “And awaaay we go.”

First and foremost, I have one overriding principle that forms the foundation of my belief ecosystem:

• I believe every person has a story to tell.

And now, in no particular order, allow me to introduce to you the fundamental convictions that would compel me to climb up on a soapbox wearing nothing but a pair of cement shoes:

I believe…

• I am lucky blessed to call myself an American.
• America is in the middle of a Category 3 dumpster fire.

• The Godfather is the greatest movie ever made.
• Charmin Ultra Strong toilet paper should be considered as essential to one’s existence as bread and water.

• Today’s Republican Party leadership is dispassionate, shamefully spineless, and morally and ethically bankrupt. This is not the party I proudly supported for four decades.
• Ann Coulter spoke for me when, on May 24, 2020, the conservative media pundit, who authored a book published in 2016 titled “In Trump We Trust,” referred to President Donald J. Trump in a tweet as “the most disloyal actual retard that has ever set foot in the Oval office.” She continued her Twitter rant, calling Trump “a moron” and “a lout,” and who was incapable of “pretending to be” a “decent, compassionate human being.”

• Today’s Democratic Party leadership is elitist and unjustifiably arrogant.

• Neither major political party presently speaks for me.
• Netflix nailed it with “Money Heist” and “The Crown.”
• Ruffles potato chips should become a new food group.

• Paris is the finest city in the world.

• The French know how to live.
• Abstaining from drinking wine for a period of time doesn’t account for the fact that life is short.
• My homemade pasta recipe is worthy of being bottled and sold.

• In individual opportunity…every person should live where they want, marry whom they want, and worship what they want.

• In individual responsibility…every person should be held accountable for the choices they make in life.

• Two things make the United States the special place that it is: the rule of law, and constructive diversity. To keep the U.S. special, both must adapt and change with the times.
• Nothing soothes my nerves better than spending time in my own backyard.
• My next-door neighbors with the yappy little dog need to move. Or have bamboo shoots shoved under their fingernails when they leave their annoying white ball of fur outside unattended.

• Red wine produced in Napa Valley’s Stag’s Leap District is the nectar of the gods.

• Tuscany is the greatest place on the planet to savor wine.
• Sam Patti, my good friend and auction partner, is the best chef in the Bay Area. Impressive, especially when you consider he pimps lumber for a living.

• Bix on Gold Street is the best bar in San Francisco.
• San Francisco needs to enter municipal rehab.

• The economic principle of scarcity, that society has insufficient productive resources to fulfill all human wants and needs, is sacrosanct.

• The genesis of most issues can be boiled down to some aspect of scarcity.

• Divisive political climates are as much about economics as culture.
• Income inequality will lead to revolution.

• When people have no hope, they can be susceptible to every version of prejudice that can be conceived.
• Social media platforms have led to the moral corrosion of modern civilization.

• Barry Bonds, Pete Rose, and Roger Clemens and Tim Lincecum all should be elected to baseball’s Hall of Fame.
• Rush Limbaugh and Tiger Woods should return their Presidential Medals of Freedom.

• Richard Nixon was a flawed president but a great writer.
• I believe Lady Gaga and Jennifer Lopez should perform at every Super Bowl.

• Spring unofficially arrives on Thursday of the Masters.

• Fall unofficially arrives during Week One of the NFL regular season.
• “The Voice” is way more entertaining than “American Idol.”

• The federal government is enslaving future generations of Americans to massive debt.

• Ceaseless government deficit spending poses the greatest risk to the American way of life.
• The growing belief in Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) will bankrupt global economies.

• There is no such thing as a free lunch.
• I will never take “Happy Hour” for granted again.

• Milton Friedman’s “A Monetary History of the United States, 1867-1960” should be required reading of every elected official.
• A global pandemic is God’s way of reminding the world who’s in charge.
• You haven’t lived until you’ve tasted a Double-Double hamburger from In-N-Out Burger.
• My daugher-in-law, Caroline Kelley Geiger, has singlehandedly raised the family bar by a minimum of two standard deviations.
• My daughter-in-laws parents, Ann and Charles Kelley, are two of the finest people I’ve ever had the privilege to know.
• Women are, and have always been, the smarter and stronger sex.

• In everything Katherine Hepburn.
• The Hallmark Channel should come with a warning label attesting that people and places are not as pretty as they appear.

• The federal government’s right to legislate what an individual can and/or cannot do with their body is equivalent to an individual’s right to have unfettered access to America’s nuclear arsenal.

• Jim Valvano got it right when he said a day spent with laughter, tears and thought is a good day.
• Eggplant is overrated.

• Winning isn’t everything; but playing not to lose is worse.

• There is no more powerful narrative in American society than that of race.

• If I could share a meal with anyone from history, it would be Jackie Robinson. Maya Angelou.

• There is no place for the “n” word in a civilized society.

• Referring to someone as “African-American” makes as much sense as referring to me as “European-American.”

• I have a complicated relationship with political correctness.
• I have a complicated relationship with plexiglass.

• Seinfeld is the best television sit-com ever, with Cheers a close second.
• I’m going to really enjoy spending my retirement years with my neighborhood golfing/hiking band of brothers, The Moraga Mafia.

• Being a parent is the most rewarding life experience one can have.

• Humility is the quality I admire most in a person man.
• Courage is the quality I admire most in a woman.
• Empathy is a quality I admire in anybody.

• I am socially liberal and fiscally conservative.

• The political center is not devoid of ideology.
• I still have need for a passport.

• There is a need for a political party that embraces the economics of Milton Friedman, the foreign policy of Ronald Reagan, and the welfare policy of Franklin Roosevelt.

• Cutting carbohydrates, alcohol, and sweets from your diet is the best way to lose weight.
• Losing weight will be a perennial goal of mine.

• Voting for president of the United States based on a single issue is unwise stupid.

• The National Rifle Association doesn’t get it, and never will.

• If I were president of the United States, the first thing I would do is reverse the educational pay structure in America. Kindergarten teachers should be paid more than college professors.

• A little revolution now and then is a healthy thing, don’t you think?

• Fantasy Football should be a year-round sport.
• I’ve become pretty good at barbequing and smoking meats.

• Bandon Dunes is a better golf experience than Pebble Beach.

• God exists, but I am wary of organized religion.

• Accepting the Christian precept of forgiveness has reduced the stress in my life.

• You can never have too much gelato.
• You can never have too much of Sam Patti’s chocolate meringue pie.

• The political doctrine of “if you’re not with us, then you must be against us” is inane.

• You can’t shake hands with a fist.
• I will be cutting my hair less often.

• If everything is an outrage, then nothing is an outrage.

• Every golfer holding a valid AARP card should be given any putt inside of two feet. Especially if they’re my partner.

• Populism is equivalent to mob rule, where calm persuasion and evidence-based inquiry is sacrificed for purity of will.
• The Republican Party needs to be burned to the ground.

• If Americans want less social injustice, people need to cease labeling those who disagree with them as bigoted, sexist, and racist.

• People who only rely on facts spun from hyper-partisan political echo chambers such as Brietbart, Drudge, Daily Kos or Occupy Democrats, or rely on regurgitated bloviations from Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Rachel Maddow or Laurence O’Donnell, are people I’m not interested in discussing politics with.

• When it comes to assessing the truth, too many people today are looking for confirmation rather than information.
• American democracy won’t survive so long as the truth gets slapped back and forth like a hockey puck.

• There are too many self-indulgent award shows in Hollywood.

• People from Fruit Loop, California live in a bubble, as do people from Duck Dynasty, Mississippi.
• Moraga, California is a great place to raise a family. Or to retire to.

• Both major political parties deserve equal amounts of credit and blame for leading America to this point in history. In the 243 years of its existence, America has had 45 presidents and 116 meetings of Congress, and at no point in time did a single political party have all the answers nor deserve all the blame.

• When it comes to solving problems, it is better to sell than tell, and preferable to be sold than told.

• Technology and institutions will continue to evolve, but basic human emotions such as fear, greed and lust will forever dictate the course of history.
• The smartphone is the greatest invention of my generation.

• People who don’t appreciate history are doomed to repeat it.

• I could survive for the rest of my life eating nothing but Mexican food.

• The difference between a job and a career is twenty hours a week about attitude.
• When it comes to my role as a business dude, I’ve severely underperformed.
• When it comes to my role as a husband, my side of the ledger is woefully short.
• When it comes to my role as a parent, I’m super proud of the end product.
• When it comes to my role as a man, I can die tomorrow with no regrets.

• Money is a lousy way of keeping score.

• Animals have rights, too.
• I need a dog in my life.

• American democracy cannot survive the delegitimization of a free press.
• American democracy cannot survive the politicization and weaponization of the justice system.

• Attacks on the First Amendment by anyone elected to public office should be considered acts of terrorism or treason. Or both.

• My time spent at Caves Valley Golf Club is the closest I’ve ever been to heaven.
• Erik Keller is the best caddie at Caves Valley. And a better friend.

• The role of government is to assist and protect, not enable.

• When it comes to government, less is more.

• When it comes to taxes, more is less.

• When it comes to national defense, enough is enough.

• Law and Order is the best television drama ever made, with Breaking Bad a very close second.

• In my next life, I want to come back as Bob Segar.
• If I can grow my hair out long enough and learn how to play the guitar, I can be Bob Segar.

• Too many people in America have become too soft, too sensitive, and too easily offended, and spend too much time searching for any plausible reason to label themselves as victims.

• Political correctness, participation trophies, collegiate “safe places,” reality shows and social media are eating away at traditional American values.
• I believe being sixty isn’t as old as it used to be.

• I am quickly succumbing to “GET OFF MY LAWN” syndrome.
• I need to write another book before I die.

• Life is too short not to take a few walks on the wild side.

• Every person has taken some kind of walk on the wild side.

And now, just for emphasis, please allow me to repeat this one last time:

• I believe every person has a story to tell.

That’s a wrap, folks. I sincerely hope this post hasn’t offended anyone. If I did, I’m sorry. But not really.