Insurance Salesman

That is what Uncle Bob is. Uncle Bob presumes that a lot people wonder, just what does Uncle Bob do?? Seems like a fair question.

More specifically Uncle Bob has a concentration in commercial insurance, business'. Bob has a specialty and is confident enough in his specialty and self to believe everyone needs it. This specialty is insurance programs for restaurants and to a lesser degree the lodging industry, hotels, etc. This takes Bob far and wide in order to make a decent wage. It often takes Bob to the Metro East area. This in turn also allows Uncle Bob to sneak away to Busch and watch his beloved Redbirds, but not on this day, there would be no sneaking away.

On this day, Uncle Bob had been referred to a hotel by another of his insureds. Having reviewed coverage's etc w/this new fellow, Bob did as he always does, taking a look around to make sure the hotel was up to Bob's standards, insurance-wise. It past muster and Bob was ready to go about his day. But wait, "Jack" also had another location, of crucial importance. It was however substantially West of STL.

What was Bob to do? That's a long drive even for Bob, whose wife loves to goto STL, but couldn't’t on this Day and whom he'd told he'd be home late afternoon on this Friday. Was Bob to presume that his hotel would be just like the hotel he was at, was the prospect correctly describing this other location? It would be much later when Bob got home, if he made the trip. What was Bob to do?

Bob did the right thing and followed his gut. And it was a good thing. While Jack is preparing to spend $200K on the renovations, Bob's not sure that is enough. As I drove around the parking lot observing, wondering just what is going on behind those closed doors,I passed a gentleman I took for a drunk or junkie. Turned out he was maintaince. As he gave me a tour of the facilities, going into separate rooms to make sure that they would pass a more thorough inspection, Bob couldn't help but wonder how this story would read in the papers. (As a side note, Bob gripped his keys in his hands in the manner we teach our daughters when they go off to school and head out to a dark parking lot...if you know what I mean.)

Bob inquired about the appearance that some guests might be residents for a week long, maybe a month at a time, contractors and such. "Oh" hobo Joe replied "some have been here for years". Witness relocation program, Bob is doubtful.

As I left and we shook hands, it crossed my mind, any chance that last tooth is gonna fall out on Bob's hand? Well thankfully no.

So, with this episode, you get an idea of Bob's work and his life, which shapes his views, and of course shapes Uncle Bob's Take. And that Take???

In the great words of Ronald Reagan..."Trust but Verify". Words we should all truly live by.

That You Uncle Bob??

You might have to click on the picture, but no boys and girls this is not Uncle Bob's off-site closet, u-store. Uncle Bob is into residential rentals. But Uncle Bob has been violated. Not as you'd assume, but as you you might imagine, identity theft. Someone out there is posing as Uncle Bob. No doubt a handsome rascal, but never the less he is not thee Uncle Bob . Uncle Bob found 3 charges on his debit account this week for over $400 to Apple. Anyone who knows Uncle Bob knows he's a Blackberry Man. In an attempt to find this false Bob, I have enlisted the help of O.J. Simpson, who has kindly stepped away from that other 'mystery' he's been trying to solve. Without question O.J. will cut the work in half.

I HOPE HE FAILS

The following is a piece that just broke on FOXNEWS...Not sure I have the right to copy/paste, but Obama can find me. Any casual observer knows that Rush Limbaugh has proclaimed that "he hopes Obama fails". As casual observers are by definition, casual, they have no clue to what Rush really said. I presume my readers are, casual.

He said, paraphrasing, that he hopes Obambi's redistribution policy's, socialist agenda, etal fails. It is not how this great Country was founded. And of course Rush has taken the arrows, as all pioneers do. This is a lesson, reaffirmation of what I say when I email, "you don't hear this on your local, biased local news". Rush is a target, so you hear about him and what he says, in sound bites, and out of context reporting because that makes Keith Obermann, Chris Matthews, Wolf Blitzed, your local news yocal,etc look good.

The point is the hypocrisy. Can you imagine that anyone other than Rush saying he hopes the President fails? You can't if you listen to ABC,NBC,CBS, MSNBC, etc.

So what am I talking about....

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, just minutes before learning of the terrorist attacks on America, Democratic strategist James Carville was hoping for President Bush to fail, telling a group of Washington reporters: "I certainly hope he doesn't succeed."

Carville was joined by Democratic pollster Stanley Greenberg, who seemed encouraged by a survey he had just completed that revealed public misgivings about the newly minted president.

"We rush into these focus groups with these doubts that people have about him, and I'm wanting them to turn against him," Greenberg admitted.

The pollster added with a chuckle of disbelief: "They don't want him to fail. I mean, they think it matters if the president of the United States fails."

Minutes later, as news of the terrorist attacks reached the hotel conference room where the Democrats were having breakfast with the reporters, Carville announced: "Disregard everything we just said! This changes everything!"

The press followed Carville's orders, never reporting his or Greenberg's desire for Bush to fail. The omission was understandable at first, as reporters were consumed with chronicling the new war on terror. But months and even years later, the mainstream media chose to never resurrect those controversial sentiments, voiced by the Democratic Party's top strategists, that Bush should fail.

That omission stands in stark contrast to the feeding frenzy that ensued when radio host Rush Limbaugh recently said he wanted President Obama to fail. The press devoted wall-to-wall coverage to the remark, suggesting that Limbaugh and, by extension, conservative Republicans, were unpatriotic.

"The most influential Republican in the United States today, Mr. Rush Limbaugh, said he did not want President Obama to succeed," Carville railed on CNN recently. "He is the daddy of this Republican Congress."

Limbaugh, a staunch conservative, emphasized that he is rooting for the failure of Obama's liberal policies.

"The difference between Carville and his ilk and me is that I care about what happens to my country," Limbaugh told Fox on Wednesday. "I am not saying what I say for political advantage. I oppose actions, such as Obama's socialist agenda, that hurt my country.

"I deal in principles, not polls," Limbaugh added. "Carville and people like him live and breathe political exploitation. This is all a game to them. It's not a game to me. I am concerned about the well-being and survival of our nation. When has Carville ever advocated anything that would benefit the country at the expense of his party?"

Carville told Politico that focusing on Limbaugh is a deliberate strategy aimed at undermining Republicans.

"The television cameras just can't stay away from him," he said. "Our strategy depends on him keeping talking, and I think we're going to succeed."

Greenberg added: "He's driving the Republican reluctance to deal with Obama, which Americans want."

In 2006, 51 percent of Democrats wanted Bush to fail, according to a FOX News/Opinion Dynamics poll.

Dissing American Investors and Foreign Leaders, Barry's Big Week

With his Domestic agenda in full effect the New Administration looked to Foreign Policy this week.

The Obamas, Barack and Michelle both, pretty much diplomatically botched the recent visit of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and his wife.

It is well understood that visiting diplomatic delegations come bearing gifts and gift giving is returned in like fashion by the host country. It is an ages old human practice in diplomacy after all. Usually the gifts are valuable, representative of the products of the nations involved or at least symbolic of the history of those nations.

For his part, PM Brown gave two symbolic gifts and one that expressed national pride. Brown came bearing a pen holder carved from the timbers of the sister ship of that which gave the wood to create the famous "Resolute Desk," the desk that has been in America's charge since 1880. He also gave Obama the framed commission for that famous ship, the HMS Resolute. His third gift was a seven-volume biography of one of England's greatest leaders, Winston Churchill.

So, what did President Obama give the British PM? 25 movies on DVD. Yeah, that's it. Brown gives a symbolic gift like the pen holder fashioned from a famous British warship and Obama responds by sending a staffer to WalMart to pick up a few quick movies. How thoughtful. Or not.

Not 100% sure that Obama was smart enough to know that DVDs made in America don't play on European DVD players. American DVDs are created in the "Region One" format while those in Europe play in "Region Two" format. A U.S. DVD just won't play on a machine made for the English market.

Not to be out done in tastelessness by her husband, Michelle got into the act, too. Mrs. Brown came bearing two outfits for the Obama girls from Topshop, one of Britain's trendiest and expensive women's wear retail outlets.
In return, Michelle apparently had a staffer run down to the White House gift shop and grab two toy Marine One helicopter models for the Brown's boys.

Class all the way, huh?

All of this is on top of the snub of the Brits that Obama tossed off immediately upon entering office. One of his first official acts was to summarily return to the Brits the generous gift of the most famous bust of Winston Churchill that has sat in the Oval Office since the attacks on 9/11.

Now, I thought that Obama was going to improve our relations with "the world" once he took office? So far, all he's done is tell our enemies he's their friend and carelessly wave off our actual friends.

Then Mrs. Clinton got into the act.

After promising to “push the reset button” on relations with Moscow, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton planned to present Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov with a light-hearted gift at their talks here Friday night to symbolize the Obama administration’s desire for a new beginning in the relationship.

It didn’t quite work out as she planned.

She handed him a palm-sized box wrapped with a bow. Lavrov opened it and pulled out the gift—a red plastic button on a black base with a Russian word “peregruzka” printed on top.

“We worked hard to get the right Russian word. Do you think we got it?” Clinton said as reporters, allowed in to observe the first few minutes of the meeting, watched.

“You got it wrong,” Lavrov said, to Clinton’s clear surprise. Instead of "reset," he said the word on the box meant “overcharge.”

Clinton and Lavrov guffawed. “We won’t let you do that to us,” she said.

Thank God we got the dunce Bush out of the White House.