Comments

Congrats, POLICY COMMENT: since we both worked in D.C. [State for me] - policies TODAY SEEM so POLITICALLY DRIVEN - it is understandable why the USA wades through world affairs with mixed results - doesn't it seem evem more so ... with characters like billionaire George Soros jumping into the fray?!

Posted by Sean at June 9, 2005 10:23 AM

Welcome back Tom

I visited South Africa two years ago for one month - it was wonderful.

One day I drove along the motorway past on my left a massive modern shopping mall just outside Cape Town - it was mega affluence - at the same point on my right were townships full of thousands of poor folks living in their paltry homes that had no electricity .... just to make a wonderful scene absolutely complete a plane filled with more affluent western tourists was above on its descent into Cape Town airport ... all these three scenes were in my vision at the same moment and if anything sums up South Africa to me that was it.

If I were creative enough or talented enough to be an artist I would paint that scene and call it faith hope and charity or something more creative.

I would work in South Africa tomorrow - it is a miracle what is happening there since Mr. Mandela’s release

God bless South Africa in my view.

Posted by Trevor Gay at June 9, 2005 10:35 AM

I watched the hearings by Rep John Conyers concerning election fraud and inequities of the elections on C span and I believe there is reasonable doubt about the validity of the elections. Thus we may not be our policy. I know whacky conspiracy stuff. However you can read the pdf at his web site.

Posted by Gary Fox at June 9, 2005 1:34 PM

What a beautiful life, Tom! it must be wonderful to be in so many different places day after day.

I hope you keep enjoying every moment as in your first speech.

Posted by felix gerena at June 9, 2005 3:19 PM

Tom, I look forward to hearing more about the trip. I agree with you that in traveling you find that others love Americans as a people group - but do take issue with some of the policies. I hear that often.

Sean - agreed..especially on the Soros issue. I addressed that on my blog about a month ago. There's a guy who, for all his money and influence...really doesn't get some really obvious things that he should have a crystal clear understanding of.

Posted by Tony May / Mayday Media at June 9, 2005 3:54 PM

Tom, you need to finish your whirlwind with a trip to the Boston commons on Saturday to see some excellent examples of personal branding :)

Posted by ACE at June 9, 2005 5:57 PM

Tom,
People like you inspire me more than you think you do!!

Posted by Paradox Valley at June 10, 2005 1:59 AM

Tom - after that schedule what you must do is 'put your feet up' and relax a while ... do some reading .... try this ....

John Cleese plays the part of a hotel owner in Torquay, England in a famous TV sitcom called 'Fawlty Towers' - please forgive the English patronising language but we think it is funny over here!!!

To Tom Peters and all my American friends - now probably ex-friends!!! please accept the following letter from my wonderful inspirational Englishman colleague Basil Fawlty ....

John Cleese's Letter to the USA

To the citizens of the United States of America, in light of your failure to elect a competent President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II resumes monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy.

Your new prime minister (The Right Honourable Tony Blair, MP for the 97.8% of you who have, until now, been unaware there's a world outside your borders) will appoint a Minister for America. Congress and the Senate are disbanded. A questionnaire circulated next year will determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid your transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

1. Look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Check "aluminium" in the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you pronounce it. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' and 'neighbour'. Likewise you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters. Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up "vocabulary."

Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up "interspersed." There will be no more 'bleeps' in the Jerry Springer show. If you're not old enough to cope with bad language then you should not have chat shows.

2. There is no such thing as "U.S. English." We'll let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u'.

3. You should learn to distinguish English and Australian accents. It really isn't that hard. English accents are not limited to cockney, upper-class twit or Mancunian (Daphne in Frasier). Scottish dramas such as 'Taggart' will no longer be broadcast with subtitles.You must learn that there is no such place as Devonshire in England. The name of the county is "Devon." If you persist in calling it Devonshire, all American States will become "shires" e.g. Texasshire Floridashire, Louisianashire.

4. You should relearn your original national anthem, "God Save The Queen", but only after fully carrying out task 1.

5. You should stop playing American "football." There's only one kind of football. What you call American "football" is not a very good game. The 2.1% of you aware there is a world outside your borders may have noticed no one else plays "American" football. You should instead play proper football. Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls.

Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American "football", but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies).

You should stop playing baseball. It's not reasonable to host an event called the 'World Series' for a game which is not played outside of America. Instead of baseball, you will be allowed to play a girls' game called "rounders," which is baseball without fancy team stripe, oversized gloves, collector cards or hotdogs.

6. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry guns, or anything more dangerous in public than a vegetable peeler. Because you are not sensible enough to handle potentially dangerous items, you need a permit to carry a vegetable peeler.

7. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 2nd will be a new national holiday. It will be called "Indecisive Day."

8. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean. All road intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left. At the same time, you will go metric without the benefit of conversion tables. Roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

9. Learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips. Fries aren't French, they're Belgian though 97.8% of you (including the guy who discovered fries while in Europe) are not aware of a country called Belgium. Potato chips are properly called "crisps." Real chips are thick cut and fried in animal fat. The traditional accompaniment to chips is beer which should be served warm and flat.

10. The cold tasteless stuff you call beer is actually lager. Only proper British Bitter will be referred to as "beer." Substances once known as "American Beer" will henceforth be referred to as "Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine," except for the product of the American Budweiser company which will be called "Weak Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine." This will allow true Budweiser (as manufactured for the last 1000 years in Pilsen, Czech Republic) to be sold without risk of confusion.

11. The UK will harmonise petrol prices (or "Gasoline," as you will be permitted to keep calling it) for those of the former USA, adopting UK petrol prices (roughly $6/US gallon, get used to it).

12. Learn to resolve personal issues without guns, lawyers or therapists. That you need many lawyers and therapists shows you're not adult enough to be independent. If you're not adult enough to sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist, you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.

13. Please tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us crazy.

14. Tax collectors from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all revenues due (backdated to 1776).

Thank you for your co-operation.

• John Cleese
  [Basil Fawlty, Fawlty Towers, Torquay, Devon, England]

Posted by Trevor Gay at June 10, 2005 3:32 AM

Fabulous Trevor = the UK leads the world in entertainment, Monty Python to the Beatles to le Rolling Stones. Plus we need the UK and Tony to lead the EU - tighter ties perhaps with eastern EU given the low IQ twins of Schroeder / Chirac.

The sun never sets on the Empire - and the Empire did most of it in taking the 3rd world into the 20th century.

Posted by Sean at June 10, 2005 6:05 AM

Fabulous Trevor = the UK leads the world in entertainment, Monty Python to the Beatles to le Rolling Stones. Plus we need the UK and Tony to lead the EU - tighter ties perhaps with eastern EU given the low IQ twins of Schroeder / Chirac.

The sun never sets on the Empire - and the Empire did most of it in taking the 3rd world into the 20th century.

Posted by Sean at June 10, 2005 6:06 AM

Trevor, go to yesterday's New York Times on line (free membership). There is a fabulous Op-ed on AIDS; dateline Capetown; while the battle is far from won, there are some very good things stirring--from more awareness to far greater drug availability to innovative clinics.

Posted by tom peters at June 10, 2005 6:24 AM

Trevor, I attended a seminar years ago, "one of those" where we were asked at one point who we'd most like to be/have been. Needless to say, Jesus, Mother Theresa and the like topped the charts. When it came my turn, without batting an eye, I answered, "John Cleese." (Or for that matter, any of the initial Monty Python gang.)So irreverant/politically incorrect! Such imaginative use of multi-media in pre-computer days! Well, so very, very whacky! Did you read/look at their wonderful, enormous "sort of" autobiography a couple of years ago?

buy viagra no prescription australia Posted by tom peters at June 10, 2005 6:29 AM

Trevor, that was hilarious! I too love Fawlty Towers and John Cleese. To do the thing properly though, it might be worth adding a couple more to the list if America is to become truly anglified:

1. From now on, all Americans will be required when travelling on the continent to demand FISH & CHIPS! loudly in whatever fancy restaurant they happen to be in (particularly in France 'cause they love that sort of thing).

2. In becoming true football fans in switching to soccer, all American men between the ages of 12 and 54 will have to paint their faces in garish colors (while waving the Swiss flag proudly!), and end each match in a bloodbath, no matter what the outcome. If this bloodbath should occur abroad, say in Greece, they should prepare for an extended period of familial separation in a dank prison cell with no access to lawyers for at least a year and a half. The usual refrain: "You can't do this to me. I'm an American!" will cease to be valid and all former American citizens will be forced to contact the British Consul who, of course, will prove remarkably difficult to get a hold of, especially during that whole greyish 3 hour lunch period!

3. Henceforth, all Americans will be required to meekly wait in line for outrageous periods of time for no apparent reason. Calls to "speak to the manager" will no longer be heeded and will earn plenty of "Mmm's" and sniffs from everyone else waiting meekly in line for no apparent reason.

4. American meteorologists will have to learn to speak far more vaguely about the weather - no more precise predictions and graphs detailing local conditions. Less of "Tomorrow, 12:05pm, thunderstorm, corner of Church and Main" and much more of "Possibly tomorrow sometime perhaps in the afternoon, we could expect some rain which might be quite heavy at times in many southern areas." free viagra sample pack

5. And of course how can we forget taxes! Americans don't understand taxation the way the English do who appreciate on a very deep and meaningful level that it's much more of an Art than a science. Boy are they in for a shock!

Posted by Noel Guinane at June 10, 2005 7:03 AM

Monty Python is iconic over here - the web site is well woth a visit...

Some highlishts from the home page as follows:

'A few words from someone... Haven't you got anything better to do than hang around here spending your earned money, you worthless piece of crap! -The Pythons'

viagra with no prescription

'Coming soon – 2 for the price of 1'

'Buy something or piss off'

'Ye olde Archive – all the crap we couldn’t fit anywhere else'

Wonderful wonderful wonderful .... I dodn't know us Brits were so funny!!! - my sides hurt - take a look at the Python site;

http://www.pythonline.com/

Warm regards from beautiful Solihull, england brand viagra without prescription

Trevor

Posted by Trevor Gay at June 10, 2005 7:07 AM

PS ... Noel ... can I add Number 6?

6 All American schools will from this day on teach the truth about Britain dispelling the long held belief of Americans that the entire 60 million population of Britain lives in London

Posted by Trevor Gay at June 10, 2005 7:22 AM

Or suburbs of London, like Glasgow!

Posted by Noel Guinane at June 10, 2005 7:33 AM

This is turning out to be one of the funniest Fridays in a long time!!! :-)

Thanks all - wonderful

Posted by Trevor Gay at June 10, 2005 7:52 AM

And the international business language is English - not American-english ... may be Mandarin by 2030 - except India may tip the scale to English :>) ...

Posted by Sean at June 10, 2005 7:55 AM

Sean, UN says primary language on the Web will be Chinese, not English (or American English, as the case may be), by ... not 2030 ... but 2007!

Posted by tom peters at June 10, 2005 8:41 AM

Trevor, I know Guiness is Irish but...BRILLIANT!

Posted by Andrew Hayden at June 10, 2005 9:59 AM

Dr. T - and the UN says oil for food is a perfect free enterprise endeavor - easy to manage :<( ...

Posted by Sean at June 10, 2005 10:14 AM

FUNNY FUNNY FUNNY!!

If I could mention...
'The NBA title is not the World Championship'. If anything, Argentina won the Olympics Gold medal in basketball.

Ironic that India is expected to be a major factor in keeping the balance in the language war on the web - considering Britain ruled India for 100 years and left its people with all but the pride of the English language!!

Posted by Paradox Valley at June 10, 2005 11:50 AM

viagra mg Please be advised the 1st blog item is restricting flow of ideas perhaps, so I recommend this in an amateur Python spirit:

PLEASE PULL THe 1st blog itme FROM THE CENTER COLUMN - PERHAPS A TAB PLACEMENT IN THE RIGHT COLUMN FOR EASY ORDERING - AND MAKE it the subject of a new This Week's Poll. Something like: The 4 new books by Dr. Tom prove to all:
*He is a genius who should be adored/worshiped and made a "Sir" by UK royalty.
*His publisher is ripping him off man - this proves they make him dance like a puppet on a string.
*"New books"?! This is a 3rd rate plagerized rehash - Tom is a total sellout to the almighty dollar - this proves he is probably the real "Deep Throat", who knows what he'll do next!
*The books make an adequate Frisbee - especially if you have a jumping Whippet dog that you can entertain friends with.
*Egads - Tom must be channelling Hunter Thompson - too bad - he used to be such a nice Maryland boy.

Posted

Posted by Sean at June 10, 2005 12:05 PM

I meant '..nothing but the pride of the English language'.

Posted by Paradox Valley at June 10, 2005 3:39 PM

Andrew, you're right - it is brilliant.

buy pfizer viagra online with no prescription

It's also spelled 'G-U-I-N-N-E-S-S'!

Posted by Noel Guinane at June 12, 2005 2:57 AM

Tom,
you're an animal...you had your very own Tour de Tom! Armstrong is only doing 3,000 miles in 23 days! sample viagra for free

Posted by Dee Rambeau at July 5, 2005 11:10 AM