June 17, 2005

John Spence, Ph.D.

Dear John,

During the wedding visit, I hope that you will give me a half-hour to review something which I mentioned on a previous visit. It is a project that I have worked for which I do not wish to be the spokesperson. A colleague, a graduate student or you might want the public credit.

Before summarizing it, I want to summarize my qualifications. I know that your opinion of me is lower than is objective reflecting how you think I have not been a good match for your sister. Despite bumps in the road, Cathy believes me. Academically, I did graduate from So. Illinois University which had a student body of 30,000 in two years cum laude. One semester I aced 24 hours. I completed a year of organic chemistry in two months. My graduate training was in the neuro-sciences, ABD. The cardiac surgeon who corrected Cathy's heart credited my documented proposal of having an inverted, reversed elliptical patch available as a back-up option to the standard circular occluder with a successful patch thus eliminating the need for a second open-heart procedure. Cathy's patch was a rarity, his first-ever patch from the pulmonary side because the mechanical valves precluded the standard arterial catherization.

My computer skills extend back to the mid-70's with personal computers almost 30 years old in the attic. In the mid-80's, among others, I wrote a program for Blue Cross/Blue Shield that earned me $250,000. I put it into one of my projects. (Resume available). Not so much now,  but the grapevine used to get me regular calls to manage information projects. In the 1980's, both the Democrats and Republicans approached me to join a think tank. (I did do better than the average independent when in 1998 I received a quarter of the votes in a run for the US Congress using the internet to campaign.)

In the US Navy, I scored the highest on the comprehensive final of electronic school which had a curriculum equal to a bachelors in electrical engineering. My performance posted me to a top-secret "floating Pentagon." Interestingly,Bob Woodward was on board as a CIA rep. Most people don't know that his father was on a first name basis with Prescott Bush and was one of about only two dozen people who knew the full meaning of the Manhattan Project--he knew about the Bomb before Harry Truman.  Roosevelts a-bomb czar over Oppenheimer, Groves and Prescott was Vannamar Bush. Daddy Woodward was one of the few people who had top secret clearance in both the Army and Navy in WWII. If one knows the involvement of Bob and Alfred Woodward in the intelligence community and their family ties to the Bush's, it should be no surprise that Bob Woodward has great "anonymous" sources. Mark Felt is the over-rated fall guy for the real Deep Throat.

One of my achievements is why I am not in the corporate, academic or bureaucratic world.  At the age of eight, my mother almost beat me to death because I complained about no food in the house. She was one of the original welfare queens who had eight kids in nine years by three men. In 1955, my grandmother and great grandmother did something that is no politically correct: they got a court order to sterilize my mother. Rather than kill my mother, which I contemplated, I decided to move out. At age eight, I started shining shoes 40-50 hours per week to support myself. While I was born and raised white trash, the obstacles over which I succeeded, including a speech impediment that kept me out of the US Naval Academy at age 19, prompt me to recognize few people as superior. Taken all together, my value system is different than that shop and drop crowd.

My values are based on having gone to college for an education, not a job. Early in high school, I decided to question and question how to lead a life in which I made fewer and fewer regrettable mistakes. I'd rather have a new idea than win a million dollar lottery. Your sister has allowed me an on-going sabbatical to explore some basic "truths." I know that you have never had a graduate student as smart and industrious as me. Do you want a finished research project without the hassle of  managing the research?

The truth which I offer gratis to you is one of several that I am about to launch as part of "Timism." (I also have an overview presentation of Timism.) This "truth" is additional perpectives on the impact of CO2 on weather. It is a web-segment with over 1000 academic, government and media documentations as well as integrated explanatory essays. I can set up one of my laptops with my LCD projector to show you a summary slideshow. If you are interested, you can navigate the website on the laptop to explore questions. If you are interested in working together to facilitate the conclusions, we can talk.

It goes without saying that this information is shared with the understanding that you don't share it with others. If you cannot give me this assurance then I will spend the time during the wedding visit working on other aspects of timism. If we did something together, I know that it would give not only Cathy but your parents great joy to see a successful joint achievement. Given the amount of work that I have put into the CO2 matrix project, I am not going to quit it if you are uninterested. There are many with the qualifications to speak for the project. If you are uninterested, I know that one day you will recognize that you missed a great opportunity.

So, if you see a period of boredom, let me know. I am going to set up the LCD at the folks for my own practice.

Sincerely,

Bob,

Cathy's husband