Socrates Cafe Online, each Tue, Fri, Sat, 1st. Sun, 6:30 pm Denver MDT (303)861-1447 Socrates Cafe Dialogue Groups: Watch1 Lead1 Start1. Meeting ID and password emailed to members 30 minutes before each meeting. For free membership write JohnScottWren@gmail.com.

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

I've set up a blog where I'll be posting my thoughts about the 2010 Colorado Caucus:
http://coloroadocaucus.blogspot.com/

Hope you'll join in the conversation there!
I just posted this on Facebook:

John S Wren

John S Wren GETTING SERIOUS ABOUT CAUCUSES
Published on November 17, 2002. Despite having virtually no money to spend, John Wren helped lead the successful opposition to a well-funded Amendment 29, which would have abolished Colorado's caucus system. But victory was just the beginning, not the end, of his crusade. He's now embarking on an effort to improve the crippled system he played a part in rescuing. More power to him. In a letter to colleagues last week, he noted that caucus supporters ``seem to agree that the defeat of Amendment...
522 words, Rocky Mountain News (CO)

Click
for complete article

See More
nl.newsbank.com
| Contact Us | Site Map | Paid archives | Alerts | Electronic edition | Advertise | Subscribe to the paper | Today's Extras
20 minutes ago · · · Share
John S Wren
John S Wren
What needs to be done now to encourage the informed participation of newcomers in our Colorado Caucus? I'm going to post my thoughts this afternoon on http://www.JohnWren.com
17 minutes ago ·
John S Wren
John S Wren
The deadline for affiliating as GOP or Dem to vote in the March 16 caucus is January 19. Wouldn't you think we'd be seeing something about this in the newspapers or at least on the Secretary of State website?
15 minutes ago ·

Monday, December 14, 2009

From:  http://www.mindfulness.com/2007/06/25/fifty-years-ago-a-concept-called-tec-was-born/
Bob Nourse around the age of 50 lost the family business. He had his brother managed it until Mongomery Ward found another vendor. It was over quickly.

Jim Handy, later hired by Bob, recalled that “Bob found himself on a profound search personally (What am I really about?) and professionally (What do I do?)”

TEC (The Executive Committee)  remains the name used by several of the partners of Vistage which is the name in the US except for Michigan and Wisconsin (where Bob Nourse started TEC in 1957).

Vistage/TEC is the world’s largest CEO membership organization with over 14,000 members in 16 countries.
Lee Thayer speaks of the Vision having the man. This was most true in the case of Bob Nourse.

The following is excerpted from Robert Nourse’s typed autobiography and family history: History of the Nourse Family, Volume II. It speaks to the spirit behind an idea of one man that has continued to grow over the past 50 years.

Tuesday, December 08, 2009

I just posted this comment on an interesting discussion about an article in the Denver Post about Adam Smith and what he really meant, for the complete article and discussion click here: http://www.denverpost.com/allewis/ci_13930270

My rights end where your nose starts. Government's role is to protect us each from force, fraud, and harm individual actions do to a 3rd party. Big business, especially, needs oversight by government. But I go back to my original question: What do we do when big government has become just as much a problem as big business? Eisenhower warned us about the industrial/governmental alliance.

Our system of government demands informed and active citizens who think of the common good. Adam Smith never said there is an invisible hand in politics. The problem today, it seems to me, is with the grassroots. Too many people just wait for someone else to do the job, myself included. It's like the Pogo cartoon, "We have met the enemy and he is us."

First, we need to each be "all that we can be." Self-government demands ongoing self-directed learning. It would be a big improvement over what we have now if each citizen just read their local newspaper every day. It is vital that we each be in what 12-step programs call a "fit spiritual condition" in whatever way we each find helpful. There is to be no state religion, but all the political organizing in the world won't help us if we don't really trust in God, and not just give that foundation for personal freedom lip service such as printing it on our money.

Second, we need to be part of the solution through political action. Thomas Jefferson said we'd need a revolution every 20 years or so, and the founding fathers provided for a bloodless battle in the way we choose our candidates for elected public office at every election. The full flowering of that system is our Colorado Caucus. Affiliate with the party of your choice by January 19, and you can be part of the solution starting next spring. It's no accident, in my opinion, that Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations was published in 1776.

To find out more about how you can get involved with the political party of your choice (to me it's like playing touch football, it doesn't matter if you are a red or a blue), attend Denver Speakers Corner this Sunday or any Sunday at 4 pm in Denver Civic Center Park, where someone almost always uses their turn on the soap box to talk about our wonderful neighborhood Colorado Caucus and answers questions about how to get involved. http://meetup.com/Denver-Speakers-Corner

Monday, December 07, 2009

The difference between the inventor and the entrepreneur?

Two caveman were standing around the first fire. One shouts "Hurray, I discovered fire!" The other shouts "Hurray, I discovered insurance!"