Go Girls

I watched Angela Braly’s testimony before Congress and could not help drawing the contrast to the testimony two years ago by the automobile CEO’s trying to explain their corporate jets in a similar setting.  Braly, CEO of WellPoint, a large health insurance company, was there to explain their recently announced rate increases.  She was polite but took a firm position defending her company.  When asked what her compensation was, she answered in detail explaining her salary, and all benefits, never looking at a note.  Her inquisitors, the congressional members, as usual looked foolish trying to be tough and get sound bites for the home town media.

I grew up in an age when the sexes were separated almost from birth.  After third grade and through college, I never had a class with a girl in it.  Now it is hard to find a single sex school or college.  My youngest daughter graduated two years ago from Washington & Lee University, which was all male until the 1980s.  Now I am told there are so many bright girls (sorry, I guess I should be saying women) that apply that the boys/men feel disadvantaged.

So when I see a bright attractive woman, there I got it right, dishing it back to some cranky old men, I say “Go Girls!”

Golfers, Gentlemen, and Pilots

I first met Russ Meyer 30 years ago when I was selling Cessna airplanes. Russ often gave me a ride to Wichita in a Citation when I was picking up a small Cessna to ferry back to Virginia. At one point he told me about his friend Arnold Palmer and how Arnold always bought the first of every new Citation model.

Russ met Arnold Palmer when he was a young lawyer at IMG, the powerhouse sports management firm. You can read more about this long Palmer/Meyer relationship in the February edition of Business Jet Traveler by clicking this link.

This is a great story, but what it doesn’t tell you is that Russ Meyer is a scratch golfer. Both of these men have been my heroes for years and I have dreamed of being on the golf course with them. That will never happen, but being in the cockpit with half the team has and is something I will never forget.

Note: I wrote about Russ Meyer in my Summer 2009 Newsletter when he was inducted into inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame along with Jimmy Stewart, and astronauts Ed White and Eileen Collins. Every living astronaut was there to honor Russ and the other inductees.