A R C H I V E

Writing the Introductions for City Club’s Weekly Newsletter is the highlight of my week and one of the hardest things I do each week since English is not my native language. Writing a weekly 350-word essay is a process by which I try to research an important topic I do not fully understand, hoping to further my understanding by putting pen to paper and engaging our diverse and thoughtful membership to participate and offer opposing opinions and perspectives.

The recent debt-ceiling negotiation in Washington is one such topic, which to me was a political circus to distract the American public from the real problem: As a nation, we have more debt than the rest of the world combined. The $31.4 trillion that got all the attention in the recent debt ceiling debacle is small potatoes in the context of the additional ~$80 trillion of so-called unfunded liabilities representing Social Security, Medicare, and other programs.

Since no rational person can reasonably argue we could organically grow out of such a gargantuan debt with our $23.6 trillion GDP, the looming question comes down to what follows. What does history tell us?…

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United States Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy recently published a personal article in the New York Times calling attention to the public health crisis of loneliness, isolation, and lack of connection in our country. 

“When people are socially disconnected, their risk of anxiety and depression increases. So does their risk of heart disease (29 percent), dementia (50 percent), and stroke (32 percent). The increased risk of premature death associated with social disconnection is comparable to smoking daily — and maybe even greater than the risk associated with obesity.”

Loneliness, like depression, can chip away at our self-esteem and erode our identity. Having experienced my fair share of both, I feel compelled to wax philosophic on the topic, hoping to start a dialog to help erase the stigma associated with depression, and equating loneliness with being a friendless loser…

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“City Club is a safe place for passionate and caring people to discover our differences, find our common ground, and make the world a better place, while having fun.”

Eighteen years after its launch, City Club’s vision statement is still as fresh and robust as ever.

In a world where most major universities strive to isolate students rather than expose them to new ideas, where opposing views are judged, not on their merits, but summarily dismissed as inherently immoral, City Club strives to create a safe place where one is heard, not shamed; where discussion is honored and measured in the sense of a Jeffersonian dialogue, rather than being one marked by chaos.

Since our inception, City Club has expanded from the modest south portion of historic Highland’s basement to encompass the entire building and is now featuring delicious and healthy lunches that are the best value in town, gardens that provide shelter from the storm, and a safe place where members can unequivocally show up as their authentic selves…

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In my late-stage years, accomplishments count more than pipe dreams. A few stand out, such as the creation of City Club; the ten days I spent at the Bohemian Grove, reputedly more difficult to enter than Fort Knox; my recent Camino de Santiago pilgrimage walking 165-mile through Portugal and Spain; and the recent design and installation of Highland’s new Neapolitan central fountain, something I have coveted for over a decade.

Today, I am excited to share another bucket list item, which is our recent launch of Highland’s new Idea Lab, a long-time dream come true. Last Thursday evening fourteen presenters who we call “Ideators,” passionately shared their incredibly diverse ideas with over sixty interested potential “collaborators.” Thanks to the vision and hard work of members Todd Minnis and Matt Harder, and with Dustin’s able assistance, we are now positioned to support, nurture, help fund, and accelerate certain of these ideas to fruition.

The point is, instead of feeling frustrated and powerless in the face of the world’s many problems, or being envious of others who may be better positioned, we have adopted a philosophy that it is better to try and fail than to sit on the sidelines and complain….

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Americans fought a civil war to settle the slavery debate. Once again our country is being torn asunder, thereby inviting foreign adversaries like Russia, China, and Iran to challenge America’s global leadership.

Abortion is currently the most important and emotionally charged issue dividing us; the Right stands for an outright ban, and the Left stands for the mother’s right to choose throughout her term.

Gender and its definition is another divisive issue. The question is whether gender is established at birth, as the Right claims, or a personal choice and a state of mind, as the Left claims. Should boys be entitled to use the girl’s bathrooms and compete with them in sports?

While I can relate to both sides of the above issues, the issue that baffles me is the way we are divided between the rights of criminals, drug addicts, and the mentally ill on the one hand, versus the rights of victims and society at large…

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Letting go is hard to do. Our reptilian brains have evolved over three billion years predisposing us to accumulate, save, and survive at any cost.

Facing the end of life is perhaps the most difficult act of letting go, which is why it often constitutes our final chapter. In the interim, life provides plenty of opportunities to practice the art, wisdom, and pain of moving on, whether they be the loss of childhood innocence, dreams, and loves, along with everything else that besets us due to time, war, fires, floods, pandemics, and economic upheavals.

As the 71-year-old Thomas Jefferson explained to an even older John Adams, “Our machines have now been running for 70 or 80. years, and we must expect that, worn as they are, here a pivot, there a wheel, now a pinion, next a spring, will be giving away: and however we may tinker them up for a while, all will at length surcease motion.”…

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It's a jungle out there. Chaos reigns. Russia and Ukraine are fighting a bloody war. China has one eye on Taiwan and the other on America. A near-term war in the Middle East seems inevitable while global military spending hits $2.24 trillion. Inflation is eating us alive from the inside. Suicide and drug overdose stats are off the charts. More than half a million of our American brothers and sisters live and die on our streets.

Just when one is ready to give up all hope in America, a few rays of hope shine through, encouraging us to remember that America is less of a place and more of an ideal we strive to achieve. This shining city on the hill has attracted three bright, driven, and controversial immigrants to its shores to demonstrate that the promise of America is still alive and well. 

Today the South African-born Elon Musk’s Tesla is valued at more than all of the other car companies combined, making him one of the wealthiest men in the world. As a side gig, he buys the rarely profitable Twitter for double what it was then worth and proceeds to chop its headcount from 8,000 to 1,500, striving to build another behemoth company as a vehicle for a First Amendment fight. For fun, Elon builds large multi-billion dollar rockets only to watch the maiden flight blow up in less than four minutes, breaking out the champagne in celebration of “the success of our phase one rocket and the millions of pieces of data collected for analysis.” …

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Highland Institute for the Advancement of Humanity strives to understand the way humanity has evolved, hoping to help expedite this process. 

Throughout history, Master Teachers such as Moses, Jesus, and Buddha have guided us in the understanding and appreciation of law, love, and the mind. In addition, humanity has advanced and evolved through various cultural avatars in the areas of science, medicine, politics, and technology. My favorite examples are Leonardo da Vinci, George Washington, Mozart, Sir Isaac Newton, and Benjamin Franklin.

The Persian culture has also featured its own avatars, such as King Cyrus the Great, the poet Rumi, and Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Sīnā, otherwise known as Avicenna in Arabic, or simply Ibn Sīnā, whom I was named after. Since most folks can’t pronounce my name, let alone know its origins, I’ll share what I know.

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With global political unrest raging, especially in democracies such as Israel, France, Mexico, and America, this may be a good time to use Highland Institute’s Securus Locus perch to look at what’s going on. Since historically the Jews have been the canary in the mine, let’s take a critical look at Israel to indicate what lies ahead in America.

With an estimated global population of fifteen million, the Jews barely represent two-tenths-of-one percent of the world population. Yet, they exert an influence 100x their size, as measured by education, accumulated wealth, and the number of Nobel prizes.

Is.ra.el literally means he who struggles with god. Since its founding in 1948, Israel has fought, won, or survived six major wars. This David & Goliath story reflects the struggle of fewer than ten million Jews against 1.5 billion Muslims. Yet, today, at the pinnacle of its economic and military power in over two thousand years, Israel is tearing itself apart internally!…

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We think of Highland City Club as a complex multi-faceted community providing our diverse membership with a place to work, socialize, dine, entertain, and bear new ideas.

While City Club’s original members may have been older, wiser, more experienced, and financially well-off, our new members tend to be young, smart, and driven to launch a host of  new ideas awaiting merely the right kind of environment and support. View the club’s two membership levels in terms of creating the perfect synergetic environment for innovation.

We feel fortunate to apply the concept of AbraCadabra (I create as I speak), to the attraction of brilliant, creative, and experienced members like Todd Minnis, Matt Harder, and other such motivated members to launch a new idea lab with fundamental trust that if we build it, they will come…

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Nature demonstrates that everything is subject to cycles and duality is inherent throughout.  Every coin has two sides, summer turns into winter and the pendulum swings from kinetic to potential energy. Likewise, just as the ocean tides ebb and flow, everything is subject to expansion and contraction. 

Chaos might be defined as the transition from one state to another; neither a caterpillar nor a butterfly. The King is dead; long live the King is Shakspeare’s way of telling us that the only constant is change. As such, I posit that we need to be smart to thrive during times of expansion, and wise to survive during times of contraction. 

One need not be a philosopher to realize that once again our world is transitioning from nearly eighty years of relative peace, prosperity, and expansion, to one marked by chaos whether it is represented by the war in Ukraine, by high inflation threatening the meltdown of the global banking system, or by near civil wars in Israel and France. Meanwhile, Germany and Japan are arming, while China brokers a fake peace between Iran and Saudi Arabia to ensure it can buy plenty of cheap oil from both…

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Most of us know the magic word Abracadabra from Disney films wherein the hero opens a secret door, or lets a genie out of a bottle to grant it three wishes. In fact, this is a Hebrew word with Aramaic roots meaning “I will create as I speak.”

In the past, member Kevin Townley has extensively spoken about the power of the 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet, along with the Jewish belief that words have power, allowing us to create our reality by the words we use. A-Bara (I will create) Ke-Dab’ra (as I speak) is a personal reminder to monitor one’s speech and to watch out for what we wish.

Even the agnostics amongst us realize the power of prayer lies not in it’s communication with some higher power in the hope and expectation to create magic in our lives. Instead, the act of prayer is the vehicle through which words allow us to define and create the reality we seek to manifest…

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Spring in the Rockies is my favorite time of the year, and there is no better place to experience spring than in Highland’s gardens.

The combination of the harsh weather and the third year of the pandemic made this a tough winter, but by now that’s all behind us, and spring is ahead.

March 21 also happens to be the Persian New Year and City Club’s 18th anniversary. During this period we survived The Great Recession, The Great Resignation, a Global Pandemic, and still managed to renovate and convert the historic Highland School building from an office to a club, and grow our membership to ~300, hoping to grow it to ~1200…

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“I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!” is the immortal refrain yelled by anchorman Howard Beale in the 1976 film Network. Please take four minutes to watch this video before continuing to read.

When Tectonic societal forces clash, when revolutions and civil wars break out – when it finally gets so bad we just can’t take it anymore – we must turn around, look at ourselves, and ask why and how did we get to this point?

How did America, the land of law and order, become so lawless? How could the richest country in the world let so many of its citizens live unhoused? How could America, the land of compassion and philanthropy, let its mentally ill and drug addicts live and die on its streets? Why are we not dealing with the fact that 70,000 Americans annually die from the use of fentanyl? Why can’t we defeat inflation and stop the brutal war in Ukraine? Why does Islam treat its women like chattel?

There are three ways to exist in the world in which we live and will eventually die…

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The recent devastating earthquakes in Turkey and Syria were a timely reminder of the damage caused by continental drift when clashing tectonic plates create destructive forces hundreds of times more powerful than an atomic bomb. 

This analogy applies to our global political infrastructure as the clash of civilizations gives rise to the death of old empires and the birth of new ones. Innocent wartime casualties, societal effects of climate change, and significant technological disruptions are part and parcel of shifting power structures.

After 75 years of peace and prosperity, Russia, China, and Iran have challenged America’s global leadership. While the current flashpoint for this challenge is Ukraine, Taiwan represents the next potential powder keg ready to explode. 

With Iran supplying Russia drones for use in Ukraine, and given its near-term ability to build an atomic bomb to target Israel, it does not take a historian to realize Israel may soon be forced to preemptively bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities just like she did in Iraq and Syria. Having failed to bring Europe to its knees by shutting off the gas valves, Putin has become desperate in his attempt to stop the flow of oil from the middle east to the west, in the expectation it would damage the western economies by tripling the price of gas…

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Everywhere we look, there seem to be tents and makeshift shelters in our public spaces. The issue of homelessness is taking a greater toll on our psyche, dividing us between our desire to be our Brother’s Keeper, while striving to prevent the Tragedy of the Commons.

This is a complex problem because America’s growing population of the unhoused is made up of a toxic combination of the economically disadvantaged, the non-confirming Hobo, the mentally ill, the drug addict, and the outlaw.

As I write this note there are seven tents within 100 feet of my bedroom window, with nightly fights and screams, along with the occasional knife stabbings, clubbing, overdosing, rounded out by the random Meth Lab featuring an indoor gas tank with a protruding chimney…

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'tis our fast intent

To shake all cares and business from our age,

Conferring them on younger strengths, while we

Unburden'd crawl toward death. 

King Lear, Shakspear

George Washington is remembered as possibly the greatest figure in American history, not as much for his great achievements leading the Continental Army to victory over the British against unbelievable odds, but because he voluntarily gave up power, fearing that if he were to die in office, Americans would view the presidency as a lifetime appointment, like that of a king.

George Washington’s September 1796 Farewell Address to the nation, written with the assistance of Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, the principal authors of The Federalist Papers, is a must read for every American, young and old.

Unlike King Lear and George Washington, Donald Trump and Joe Biden do not appear to have gotten this message and are still fighting to hang on to power long after the wise would go from Age-ing to Sage-ing, from action to wisdom…

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“We dig our grave with our knives and forks.” French proverb

No one needs to be told the extent to which our lives have been upended over recent years with Covid-19, the war in Ukraine, and social upheaval. Technological innovations like lightning speed internet and cloud computing have dramatically changed the way we work, allowing roughly half of all office workers to avoid the daily commute, resulting in ~ a billion square feet of vacant office space.

But today I would like to draw your attention to changes in our food, nutrition, and eating habits with the consequent effects on our health, as I invite you to consider the following data points:..

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Like Aspen Colorado, Davos is a small ski town in the Swiss Alps that for the past 53 years has hosted the World Economic Forum, bringing together leaders from the business, political, academic and civil society sectors to discuss and collaborate on global issues.

Professor Klaus Schwab, the Founder of the World Economic Forum, is a visionary and a true global citizen, evidenced by the fact that this year the forum attracted dignitaries including the Presidents of the European Commission and European Parliament, the German Chancellor, as well as the President of the International Monetary Fund, heads of European and Japanese Central Banks, CEOs of global corporations, and other dignitaries wanting to see and be seen.

As a student of history, I believe everything is subject to cycles and, with that, posit that the world needs a new forum in a new place to discuss, debate, and advance the cause of human evolution. This belief is based on noting such hypocrisy as attendees flying private jets to rant about the dangers of global warming, or career diplomats and virtue-signaling limousine-liberals talking about the benefits of stakeholder capitalism…

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I am more of a reader than a watcher, but on a recent trip to LA to visit my family for the first time since the pandemic, I was forced to binge-watch an Israeli TV series on Netflix called Fauda.

Fauda in Arabic and Hebrew means Chaos. This 2015 award-winning series about a unit of undercover Israeli soldiers operating in Palestinian territories highlights the madness of the chaotic world we live in. The success of this series is due to its effective representation of the impossible position both the Israelis and the Palestinians currently find themselves in, where the lines between good and evil have blurred.

Last week I wrote about the perils of democracy and suggested that Israel is on the verge of civil war. A few members accused me of exaggeration and inquired why I thought this was the case. The story, acting, and cinematography of Fauda drives home this message…

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