The Key

In the military, and at other times in my life, I have shared with those who were experiencing heartbreak. Thank God, many young men have felt they can come to me and talk with me about problems because in many respects, I am a father figure.

A few years ago, a young man who had worked for me before graduating from the local university ten years previously, came to me suicidal and completely possessed. He had fallen desperately in love with a young woman in the community, and had lived very frugally in order to buy her a nice engagement ring. And, his frugality had extended into going into much debt on the mortgage for a home. Two months before the proposed wedding, she had handed him his engagement ring and after having shared his life, his ambitions, his very soul with her, she just walked away from the engagement. He said, “I have put everything I own at risk and now all she does is just walk away.” He was left heartbroken and disenchanted with women, the world, and everything around him.

In a long, active life, I have experienced the same type heartbreak twice. The meaner the man, the cheaper the cad, usually the crazier a woman is over him; the expression I have heard so many times, “He is so cute.” Cute is as cute does and he will not be so “cute” when he shows the depth of his character - when he runs around with some younger “cute” girl, or comes home addicted from some “cute” drug. Those of us who behave ourselves, who work hard, and make something of our lives, are never at the forefront of the husband market.

In hiring employees, my experience is that in spite of all the preliminaries, much time is still spent in local training. Yet, at any spillage, it is easy to just walk away and say, “find someone else for this job.” I am very much alone in this world – totally blind, 100% disabled, service connected veteran – living in a cocoon of absolute blackness since the Korean and Vietnam Wars. Even so, without one minute of rehabilitation by the VA or anyone else, I have learned to take care of myself, have traveled the world, and build up a multi-million dollar estate. Without family, it has been necessary for me to employ a trust to handle things in case of my debilitation or death. Four times, three banks and now a local trust firm have taken on the responsibility, well paid – now and later – thousands of dollars spent by me with lawyers to set up powers of attorney and other legal handles to manage everything at any time. You have all heard of the problems with banks. Believe me, you do not know a fraction of the problems when it comes to trust departments and estates.

One bank after 15 years (First Citizens) had become so completely disreputable that I moved everything to another bank (Wachovia). I was assured by the trust officers there that everything would be fine; my worries were over. In just a few month's time, all these employees, including the CEO of Wachovia, Mr. Ken Thompson, (from eastern North Carolina, Morehead Scholar from UNC-CH) were all gone. Even the Wachovia securities firm, in which I had a large portfolio, had shipped out the brokers handling my account. I was left with all of my trust and securities at a company where I knew no one, and, believe it or not, all acted totally irresponsible. Now you may think that there is some state or federal agency to oversee such blatant disregard for the public, particularly the disabled. Believe me, no such agency or regulators exist.

My CPA brought to my house a man who assured me that his trust company was the answer to my problems. (I cannot be the only person on God's earth faced with this dilemma.) He said, “We are set up to handle estates – both while you are alive and after your demise – and to make sure your Will provisions are honored.” He also said, “We would also like to manage your securities portfolio. Then, I made legal arrangements to transfer to them and they have made thousands of dollars off my accounts.” The man who was responsible for everything would come by my house once a month and discuss brokerage activity, since he well knew I could not see anything in writing that the company sent to me. Just two weeks ago, since I felt it would be in his interest to know about my tax obligations, I had him assist me in the writing of all property tax checks. My accountant sent him all confidential and crucial information pertaining to everything else. I give to God almost 50% of my earned income and he assisted me in the writing of checks for $28,000 to a local Christian college...because these scholarships will continue after my death, and I wanted him to understand the information fully...and, even he mailed all the checks.

Yesterday, for the fourth time, consecutively, he came to my house, handed me the key to my front door and told me that he had left the company and, in so many words, “Your estate and estate plans, including your power of attorney, your will, your living will, your portfolio - everything pertaining to your life, your privacy, your security..is all at the office.” The office where I do not know one individual. In other words, just as the engaged couple...she just gave him his ring and walked away when his entire life was being built around their future, this man had the gutless depravity, after churning my accounts in recent months, knowing all my private business, to just hand me my house keys – the only one to have such – and just walk away. Now this man calls himself a Christian (he liked to brag that his father was a Baptist minister) - I doubt if anyone else would give him that honor. I had said to him, at least a hundred times, “I am paying you for your integrity.”

We hear much about Madoff, Paulson, Skilling, and Lay, but these are just the big crooks. Greed has no boundaries. Integrity in business should apply to the small companies, as well as the large ones. Over the years, I have reported disreputable stock brokers and stock dealings to the NC Secretary of State (including the pictured worthless, limited partnerships, responsible for all financial activities of this type in NC – Elaine Marshall now running for the senate, since she has done nothing for the state) as well as the SEC, FTC, USJD and ADA in Washington. I truly believe most of these people are just paid to sleep. If your government and it's oversight agencies will allow a totally blind, disabled veteran, to be so victimized, God help the rest of you.

Character determines destination with corporations as well as with individuals. We are living in a time of deceit and total disobedience – not only to the laws of our land but in direct defiance of Almighty God. Greed is no respecter of persons. We only have the assurance of Almighty God that He keeps a perfect scorecard. In traveling the world (8 around the world trips, passport stamped in 157 countries), I was always amazed to see man's inhumanity to man. Empathy and shame have become forgotten words in most vocabularies of the business world. The end justifies the means, “Get yours any way you can.”