Monday, April 25, 2011

New MLF Web Site

The Move Lowell Forward Municipal PAC has updated its website.

And, yes, we have submitted a paper to the City Council, through the City Clerk, talking about our ideas for Renewed Economic Growth.  Gerry Nutter claims to have attached it to his blog post on it.  I am actually a little surprised that Gerry knows so little about us, given that he knows a number of us personnally.  Invite me to have hot chocolate with you, Gerry.

And, I am even more surprised that Mr Nutter has not suggested an alternative for us to all get together and express ourselves, given that we are such a diverse group in terms of our ideas at the State and National levels.  We couldn't possibly all be in the LRCC, nor could we all be part of GLAD.  Some of us are even Unenrolled.  What venue would Mr Nutter suggest?

But, so Mr Nutter knows about my background, I spent a year as the Chairman of the Budget Committee for United States Air Forces in Europe (USAFE), at the time an organization spread across Europe from England to Turkey and in active duty Air Force "head count" the size of Lowell, and that not counting the resident military dependents and other civilians.  And, we had lots of money issues, such as whether to build a second fire station at Ramstein AB, to cover the part time squadron areas or buy child care centers.  Showing our practical side, we went with Congress, which was buying child care centers that year.

I was also the Chief of the Strategy Division (J-5) on the Joint Staff.  Strategy is often described as matching Ends, Ways and Means.  Put another way, Strategy is about figuring how to use limited resources to achieve the desired aims.  While I don't have a PhD in finance, I did take an accounting course at UMass Lowell a few years back, because I was a Business Unit manager at Dynamics Research Corporation.  And, I don't have a PhD in Economics, but then Paul Krugman does and that may speak for itself.

In my humble opinion, while MLF may believe in Professional City Government, we are not against citizens, singly and together, having opinions on issues, especially when the have a direct impact on us.  If Mr Nutter runs for office I hope he will be open to the inputs of citizens, singly and in groups.

More than you wanted to know.  More than I wanted to know.  Now, on to the movie for class this week, Le goût des autres.  Just two more class periods to go, including the final.

Regards  —  Cliff

  Of which, perhaps, John McDonough will take note.  I need to practice with the password before I will be able to post to it.  Change is good, but change also sometimes means work.  Thus I say thanks to Lynne Lupien for all her hard work on this new version of our website.

3 comments:

  1. It is too bad that when someone is unable to discuss or debate the ideas that you propose, they resort to questioning your motives, and when that isn't enough they challenge your qualifications to speak on the matter. Rather than saying something about you, those tactics speak volumes about the critic.

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  2. Reciting your resume, .. again? George Anthes is going to tease you.

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  3. No doubt about George Anthes conducting a little pin cushion time over that.

    The thing is, a lot of us have interesting stories, stories we keep hidden from others and only reveal a little bit at a time.  I bet we would find there is a lot interesting about Mr Gerry Nutter, if he would only sit down over a cup of hot chocolate with us at a local Dunkin Donuts.  In the give and take of a mutual blogger profile story we could all learn a lot.  Sort of like Yogi Berra's "You can learn a lot from observing".

    Regards  —  Cliff

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Please be forthright, but please consider that this is not a barracks.