What do you do when an oil industry giant, on whom you have depended for sixteen years to provide your company’s largest plant with natural gas, suddenly tries to use federal legislation as a way to increase its price by more than ten times over what the contract calls for?

As DODGING THE BULLET recounts, you pull together a coalition of companies in the same bind as yours. And if your opponent has used the personal attorney to a powerful U.S. Senate figure to help draft the legislation that would abrogate their contract with you, you respond by hiring the best-known lobbying law firm in Washington and working side-by-side with them every step of the way. And you soon realize that the battle will involve a series of ups and downs.

The story unfolds in 1983-84, a time when fax machines were in their infancy and there were no personal computers, cell phones, iPads or any of the other communications shortcuts we depend on so much today. The lobbying involved old-fashioned shoe leather, face-to-face meetings with members of Congress and their staff, and countless phone calls and strategy sessions. DODGING THE BULLET puts you right in the middle of the fray and shows you what high-level lobbying is really like, and what it is not.

For anyone interested in knowing the ins and outs of Congress and the rules of lawmaking, this book is a must read.

What do you do when an oil industry giant, on whom you have depended for sixteen years to provide your company’s largest plant with natural gas, suddenly tries to use federal legislation as a way to increase its price by more than ten times over what the contract calls for?

As DODGING THE BULLET recounts, you pull together a coalition of companies in the same bind as yours. And if your opponent has used the personal attorney to a powerful U.S. Senate figure to help draft the legislation that would abrogate their contract with you, you respond by hiring the best-known lobbying law firm in Washington and working side-by-side with them every step of the way. And you soon realize that the battle will involve a series of ups and downs.

The story unfolds in 1983-84, a time when fax machines were in their infancy and there were no personal computers, cell phones, iPads or any of the other communications shortcuts we depend on so much today. The lobbying involved old-fashioned shoe leather, face-to-face meetings with members of Congress and their staff, and countless phone calls and strategy sessions. DODGING THE BULLET puts you right in the middle of the fray and shows you what high-level lobbying is really like, and what it is not.

For anyone interested in knowing the ins and outs of Congress and the rules of lawmaking, this book is a must read.

What do you do when an oil industry giant, on whom you have depended for sixteen years to provide your company’s largest plant with natural gas, suddenly tries to use federal legislation as a way to increase its price by more than ten times over what the contract calls for?

As DODGING THE BULLET recounts, you pull together a coalition of companies in the same bind as yours. And if your opponent has used the personal attorney to a powerful U.S. Senate figure to help draft the legislation that would abrogate their contract with you, you respond by hiring the best-known lobbying law firm in Washington and working side-by-side with them every step of the way. And you soon realize that the battle will involve a series of ups and downs.

The story unfolds in 1983-84, a time when fax machines were in their infancy and there were no personal computers, cell phones, iPads or any of the other communications shortcuts we depend on so much today. The lobbying involved old-fashioned shoe leather, face-to-face meetings with members of Congress and their staff, and countless phone calls and strategy sessions. DODGING THE BULLET puts you right in the middle of the fray and shows you what high-level lobbying is really like, and what it is not.

For anyone interested in knowing the ins and outs of Congress and the rules of lawmaking, this book is a must read.

¡Y pensábamos que éramos los más arrechos!: como hacernos ricos o ahogarnos en el petróleo es una afrenta explosiva que desafía la esencia y la responsabilidad de la sociedad venezolana. Un controversial paseo por la Venezuela que muchos no se molestan en ver, bien sea porque no ofrece ninguna ganancia política o porque resulta dolorosa, bochornosa y difícil de procesar.

Cuenta la historia de un capitalismo fallido y sus consecuencias, la inherente ineficiencia y mediocridad criolla; revelando la mentalidad conservadora que arropa la mente y los corazones de los venezolanos. Un llamado crítico en un mar de ovejas ideológicas que van desde la extrema izquierda hasta la extrema derecha, idolatrando individualidades, en vez de brindar proyectos concretos de desarrollo.

Vásquez engloba cada consejo en su libro, desafiando cualquier ideología establecida. El libro posee una mentalidad abierta y flexible, mientras exhibe un estilo y análisis maleducado, burlista y vulgar; hacia típicos puntos de vistas observados diariamente en el discurso político contemporáneo venezolano.

Sin limitarse a pura crítica, el autor incluye una abundante variedad de soluciones, combinando el uso de innumerables hechos concretos y estadísticas frías. Capítulos de lectura esencial, incluyen: Marx como un crítico anti-venezolano de Bolívar, sorprendentes revelaciones sobre la pobreza en el imperio norteamericano, Japón, Francia y Alemania, la “fuga de cerebros” tanto de países subdesarrollados como de naciones desarrolladas, las verdaderas razones detrás del éxito popular del dictador bielorruso Aleksandr Lukashenko, la discusión sobre la educación y las libertades sexuales en Venezuela, así como la predisposición que posee el venezolano promedio a ser cochino y a “chulearse” al Estado, en vez de convertirse en una fuerza productiva a tono con otras economías, no solamente de naciones industrializadas, pero también economías emergentes, que salieron de la pobreza ejecutando medidas económicas y sociales no convencionales, en un mundo rápidamente globalizado.

After you read the book you’ll know why I’m dedicating my book to every Jew in the world, past and present! Thank you , thank you, thank you from the bottom of my heart! Sincerely, to Israel with love because of Romans 11:15, 25 and 28, 31, and 32! (Both Romans and Hebrews were tenderly written to Jews first!)

 The idea for Crimson & Gold came to me one morning as I stood praying in my living room. My eyes fell on a small replica of the Wailing Wall I’d purchased while in Jerusalem.

Artistic leanings had led me to “doctor up” the little icon several months earlier.

& n b s p ; & nbsp;          Suddenly, the story line for this very book and movie ran through my mind. It so surprised me I recall saying out loud, “Oh, my Lord! What a story!”

& n b s p ; & nbsp;          Four American Jews go to < s t 1 : c o u n t r y-region>Israel for different reasons, yet they’re all searching for similar answers.

& n b s p ; & nbsp;          Two of them have very serious issues to overcome while the other two have had their problems solved in < s t 1 : c o u n t r y - region>America.

Eventually, the four strangers meet at the Wailing Wall where friendships begin, dreams are realized, dark pasts uncovered, love develops and eventually all problems are solved.

Their common ambition is to change the world for the better.

My four protagonists meet one the antagonists also from the States.

His plan to change the world negatively is antithetical to the plans of the heroes.

Love, hate, jealousy, personal triumph, soul discovery, intrigue, passion, and the miraculous are played out between Jerusalem, Joppa and Telaviv!

Very delicate issues are handled tastefully and moral issues the world has long debated are solved!

Questions which have gone unanswered for centuries are answered in this novel!

The intent to murder and finally murder is committed.

A murder in < s t 1 : c o u n t r y -region>America is linked across the ocean to < s t 1 : c o u n t r y - r e g ion>Israel.

This love story is very different with values and morals foreign to today’s society!

It’s a love story reminiscent of the 1950’s though no time line is given.

It will linger in your mind long after the book is finished.

The end of the book leaves the door open for the impending sequel!

Descendents of George Andrew and Viola May (Fowler) Moore have been blessed with a rich heritage.  As generations have come and gone, some of that heritage was passed down, but much of it has been lost.  This book is an effort to preserve some measure of the heritage that still remains so that future generations can understand and appreciate the roots from which their lives were formed.

 Introduction for “The Trigger”

by Dr. Tim Dosemagen

For decades, even the not so prescient had predicted the inevitability of a clash between the rising power that was < s t 1 : c o u n t r y-region>China, and the undisputed reigning champion of the 20^th Century, the United States.

But nobody expects World Wars, and certainly, nobody would have predicted this fight. The Americans still thought like champions. In the back of the typical American’s mind, East-Asia was the weakest division in the league, at least militarily. How things had changed. From a post-World War Two high tide, with American power and influence following on the magical drawing forces of the implosion of the Imperial Japanese Empire, the Chinese Civil War, and the failures of the European Powers to re-establish former colonies throughout the region, the tides of history were due to turn, and slowly, they did.

Militarily, the disastrous < s t 1 : c o u n t r y -region>Vietnam capitulation permanently removed < s t 1 : c o u n try-region>U.S. forces from the Southeast-Asian mainland. Then, < s t 1 : c o u n t r y-region>Taiwan completely weaned herself from direct < s t 1 : c o u n try-region>U.S. foreign aid, repossessing its < s t 1 : c o u n try-region>U.S. bases, bidding American forces a final farewell. On the Japanese archipelago, Okinawa was returned to Japan by the United States, as the oyabun-koyabun (older-younger brother) relationship between these two former enemies grew less one-sided, and at American urging, the Japanese Self-Defense Forces once again returned to the business of power projection, as befits the world’s second strongest economy. Finally, humbled by the force of nature itself, < s t 1 : c o u n try-region>U.S. forces withdrew from The Philippines with a salute from an angry Mt. Pinatubo. The powerful post-World War II U.S. Navy, even briefly rebuilt during the Reagan years, was a 200 ship shadow of its former self. South Korea, with its 30,000 < s t 1 : c o u n try-region>U.S. troops, and < s t 1 : c o u n t r y-region>Japan, with its significant U.S. Navy bases, were all that remained of the vast former 20^th Century East Asian holdings of the < s t 1 : c o u n try-region>U.S. military.

Economically, from the Korean Armistice in the mid-1950s, to the year 2010, East-Asia witnessed the rise of the world’s number two economy in Japan, its number three economy in China, its 11^th largest economy in South Korea, and the major colonies of the region, the formerly Dutch Taiwan, East-Asia’s Boardwalk, with the world’s largest holdings of cash reserves, and the British Park Place of the region, and Trojan Horse of Chinese political reform, Hong Kong. In just half a century, the combined economies of the region, benefiting from international trade and American investment, grew to roughly equal the world’s largest economy, all the while investing in < s t 1 : c o u n try-region>U.S. issued debt, amassing wealth.

At the end of World War Two, East Asia sorely needed the < s t 1 : c o u n t ry-region>U.S.; by 2010, the < s t 1 : c o u n try-region>U.S. could not survive as a major power without East Asia.  In The Trigger, Dr. Tim Dosemagen poses the scenario of what might happen if a rising < s t 1 : c o u n t ry-region>China wanted to move the pace of change along too quickly.

In PILGRIMS OF ANOTHER SORT, the past marries the present.  Simon, the narrator, taps into the challenges of the historic Puritans of 1620 by lifting out a modern-day "Pilgrim" event - a highly competitive and rugged game of touch football - known as The Turkey Bowl.

Without fail, in Lawrence, Kansas, this game has been played on Thanksgiving Day for 35 straight years.  In 1971 three guys began meeting after their abundant Thanksgiving meal to toss the football.  Each year a few more joined in on the fun, and teams were formed.  The momentum continues to grow.

What makes this Thanksgiving Holiday Bowl game so unique?  Why are men in their 40's and 50's throwing down the gauntlet at the feet of hopeful young upstarts and placing their years of Turkey Bowl wisdom against unbridled energy?  The answer is TRADITION.

Everyone gathers at Johnny's Tavern the night before to "initiate" new "Pilgrims" and hear any announcements regarding the next day's Bowl Game. As Simon points out, these PILGRIMS OF ANOTHER SORT are engaged in the power of choice, which is the theme throughout the book.  Turkey Bowlers negotiate postponement of family travels and holiday meals, risk injury on the field of play, flow with the ever-changing rules of the game and vote for the most valuable players after the final whistle is blown.

The Pilgrims of 1620 and the modern day "Pilgrims" have weathered the storms, each in their own way.  One group found a rock called Plymouth.   Another continues to find a frozen tundra called a football field.  The game is exciting, but the life lessons are clearly bigger than the game itself.