Left, Right and Center - A Powerful Intelligence Tool.

Sorting Through "Extreme News" From Left, Right and Center - A Crucial Skill-Builder At Trend-Spotting and for Strategic Planning.

Author's Note: Every entrepreneur, and every single emerging enterprise requires management, market research, marketing, publicity, branding and a constant re-evaluation of potential future trends. If you are so biased that you deliberately exclude (adversely select against) "radical" or "extremist" publications which don't conform to your pre-existing views, you will merely be recycling your own brand of stupidity -- some call this "the kindling of circular intelligence."  Get outside the coffin of comfort and look at what extremist, activist and super-partisan organizations are up to.

The key is to be open to information which comes from any and all sources...to be able to detach yourself emotionally from the political or other agendas of their writers, publishers and promoters, and to gather intelligence which may be actionable.

Every leader, manager, marketing director, financial officer, planning officer, product or service developer must be as an objective Information Hound, to the greatest extent possible.

If you limit your total news intake, you limit your knowledge base, thinking, insight, intellectual growth, analytic ability and efficacy, and ability to survive and thrive. I can read the SPECTATOR, MOTHER JONES, THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR, BUZZFLASH BULLETIN and THE ROLLING STONE in one sitting. I can listen to NPR as well as a series of Sunday morning sermons, deluxe with sulfur and brimstone. I've watched Limbaugh and Bill Maher (but then again, I've also watched Dexter and Everyone Loves Raymond...) 

When it comes to the necessary job of futurism, more information is always better. Learn to expose your yourself to more input, while trusting that your character and judgment will not be hurt in the process. In fact, this testing will get you more in tune with who you truly are -- and that is a wonderful thing. - DC

---------------

Dear Readers:

Some interesting headlines and brief articles from some of the more "extreme" news sources (actually, in many cases these are more appropriately called conjecture sources) may prove to be a fountain of some useful information. Understand that in every article, there is a grain of truth (an initiating spark, fear, or observation which inspired the writer) and a large element of propaganda. The trick is to separate the elements of truth from the surrounding rhetoric. One of the means of doing this is by rudimentary correlative analysis....for example, if two politically opposed groups speak of the same subject and make similar observations about its implications, you might have unearthed a piece of truth.

If two adversaries agree on a common problem or a common trend -- it is invariably one worth watching. Finding these areas of informational intersection is one of a true intelligence analyst or Global Futurist's most important skills. I'll admit that sometimes it is a bit of a stomach-turner to read through the accusations, recriminations, bigotry and hate-speak. But the gold which you will pan from this stream of compost is still gold.

This is a great skill, and a great exercise. Use this analysis tool often, and your abilities to see through the smoke to the spark will increase appreciably.

Visit LEFT, RIGHT AND CENTER at: http://leftrightandcenterwidget.blogspot.com/ , and acquire the widget.

More Info + More sources + Rudimentary Correlative Analysis = Better planning for your life and your business.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle,

Vice Chairman
THE NATIONAL NETWORKER COMPANIES

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WALKING AWAY...

WALKING AWAY...

Dear Friends:

I have said it before: "Stop watering a dead tree."

Sometimes a limb is so badly infected that it cannot be repaired...it must be amputated. Sometimes something is so tragically broken that it no amount of effort, love or money can fix it...it must be scrapped and replaced.

When you cannot work within a system, sometimes you must work outside of the system --i.e., working on it instead of in it. And when you cannot win playing by somebody else's rules, sometimes you must make your own.

It takes time, but some special people arrive at a point in their comprehension of the way things are where they fully understand that the game is rigged, and that no matter what they do, they are slated to lose. It hurts to have been hustled or conned, but it downright kills you when you know that you are being hustled and that you are powerless to walk away. It erodes your self-esteem. It can embitter you.

When a socio-economic system is so inherently corrupt that it is cancerous, you can no longer work within its confines to reform it. You must pack your bags and leave, or perhaps, if you've the requisite courage (and artillery), you can get everyone else to clear out and play in somebody else's yard.

I frequently speak of the need for new beginnings, for fresh thoughts, for a clean slate. I frequently speak of the need to get people's attention - to shake them out of their hypnotic torpor. I frequently speak of collaboration and cooperation instead of confrontation and partisanship.

In my socio-economic model of the Global Interworked Cooperative Business Community as a new form of entity, I  do not see the need for stealing from others to enrich myself. I believe that if we work together, the inherent synergy produced will allow both of us to win, and to share in the prosperity. It saddens me to think that so many people have become brainwashed into believing that there are only winners and losers, and that winners can only become winners by stealing from the losers, leaving them to starve. We live in a time when people define morality to suit convenience.

I have come to understand how riots are incited and revolutions are born; how some people walk away from the trappings of "civilization" and disappear to live "off the grid."

I find it incredibly frightening, yet somehow encouraging, when a career politician walks away from the game because he becomes disgusted with its lies, rationalizations, destructiveness...its inertia and its hopelessness.

I salute US Senator Evan Bayh today for his taking decisive action instead of resorting to empty rhetoric. [cue drumroll]. He decided to say "no more."

Read this, brought to you by the Yahoo! News Blog:

Disillusioned Bayh advocates electoral “shock” to broken system

Tue Feb 16, 7:35 pm ET

In an interview on MSNBC this morning, newly retiring Sen. Evan Bayh declared the American political system "dysfunctional," riddled with "brain-dead partisanship" and permanent campaigning. Flatly denying any possibility that he'd seek the presidency or any other higher office, Bayh argued that the American people needed to deliver a "shock" to Congress by voting incumbents out en masse and replacing them with people interested in reforming the process and governing for the good of the people, rather than deep-pocketed special-interest groups.

Bayh's announcement stunned the American political world, as up until just last week he looked to be well on his way to an easy reelection for a third term in the Senate, and his senior staff was aggressively pursuing that goal.

But Bayh had apparently become increasingly frustrated in the Senate. In this morning's interview he noted that just two weeks ago, Republicans who had co-sponsored a bill with him to rein in the deficit turned around and voted against it for purely political reasons. He also stated repeatedly that members of his own party should be more willing to settle for a compromise rather than holding out for perfection.

"Sometimes half a loaf is better than none," Bayh insisted.
####

Bayh has taken a necessary first step -- acknowledging that something is just plain wrong, and walking away from it. But who will take the second step -- finding a better way for all of us? That remains to be seen... Pointing out a problem is helpful, but solving problems is what growth and progress are ultimately all about.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle

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TWITWITS

Dear Readers:

Twitter, the social medium of the masses, has certain inherent advantages and certain limitations.

On the asset side of the ledger:

1. It's free.

2. It's available to everyone.

3. Messages are limited to 140 characters, so there is no filibustering, monopolizing, or laborious waiting time for downloading.

4. It is a quick broadcast medium for anyone's use, either socially, commercially or politically.

5. It is a fine branding tool for achieving differentiation and name recognition through repetition.

On the liability side of the ledger:

1. It is difficult to express a thought clearly when you are limited to 140 characters. Posts are often misleading.

2. More than 1 in 5 tweets (Twitter posts) is either about Twitter-related devices and techniques, social media, or "get rich quick" business opportunities.

3. Tweeting is not truly engaging in a conversation -- it is a highly impersonal, public and overcrowded system of one-sided messaging. (Picture yelling in the middle of Grand Central Station during rush hour at Christmastime).

4. To gain and maintain brand identity or prominence on Twitter, you must post several times daily -- this can become quite a chore;

5. When you tweet, it becomes a part of the permanent archives of every search engine and data-mining device. There is no "erasing" or "eradicating" a tweet, once it has been posted.

Here's an excerpted article which demonstates that combining Twittering and political image-building, may not work out that well...

FROM YAHOO!

Print
Back to story

TMT: Too much Twitter?
2 hrs 11 mins ago

If the medium is the message, then what's the message when politicians use 140-character tweets to talk about their state's dire economic circumstances or ethics charges?
Yesterday, embattled Govs. Sarah Palin and Arnold Schwarzenegger addressed career-changing (or ending) issues facing them...on Twitter. Palin was responding to a new report on ethics charges against her, tweeting:

Re inaccurate story floating re:ethics violation/Legal Defense Fund;matter is still pending;new info was just requested even;no final report.

Palin's Twitter feed currently has more than 100,000 followers, including Gawker.com, which follows her every tweet, calling the soon-to-be former governor's feed "the best thing to ever happen on the internet." And not in a nice way.

No doubt even the most talented wordsmith must find it difficult to be eloquent and informative in 140 characters or less, but for politicians using a social-media tool to confront serious issues, they also run the risk of diminishing the importance of their message.

After negotiating a deal that will close the gap on California's jaw-dropping $26 billion deficit, Schwarzenegger posted a puzzling video message on his Twitter page. In it, the governor is wielding a huge knife, talking about selling state cars signed by the "celebrity governor." Even the governor's press secretary couldn't explain the knife.

From KABC:
"I don't know why he is holding a knife. The message is in what he is saying, not what he is holding in his hand."

L.A. residents were not impressed with Schwarzenegger's message, or the medium:
"To me it's not offensive. I think it's a little bit beneath him, but that's the governor," said Bob Barnes.

"He should be focusing on other things besides signing cars and holding a knife ... and being on Twitter," said Giovanni Matallana.

Ever since politicians jumped on the social-media bandwagon, critics have been questioning the wisdom of elected officials using Twitter on the job. In March, columnist Charlie Cook of the National Journal wrote that he has "yet to hear a single intelligent remark twittered by an elected official."

Bloggers at the Christian Science Monitor compiled a few examples of political tweets in a post entitled, "Politicians using Twitter: Morons or visionaries?"

Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., likes to tweet about golf and ballet camp:
Proud of Tom Watson's effort. So close....
Youngest daughter, dancing Lily all packed, ready to go to ballet camp in Vermont early in am.

Meanwhile, Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine., tweeted recently about taping an appearance on "The Colbert Report": "Takes a lot of make-up to do these things! (And Moxie, we even drank a little, or I did!)."

(Can't get enough of the moment-by-moment goings-on of D.C. movers and shakers? Not to worry: You can follow your favorite senator or congressman at Tweetcongress.com).

Moronic or visionary tweets aside, what about national security? In February, CQ Politics reported that Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich., broke a national security embargo when he tweeted the details of a secret congressional trip to Iraq: "Just landed in Baghdad."

From CQ Politics:

Not only did Hoekstra reveal the existence of the lawmakers’ trip, but included details about their itinerary in updates posted every few hours on his Twitter page.
Did we mention that Hoesktra is a ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee? Hoekstra's breach also happened to occur just months after the U.S. Army issued a report warning that Twitter was a "potential terrorist tool."

— Lili Ladaga

Yahoo! News bloggers compile the best news content from our providers and scour the Web for the most interesting news stories so you don't have to.

####

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle,

For THE NATIONAL NETWORKER

Published by THE NATIONAL NETWORKER Newsletter. All rights reserved. Subscribe Free - Click HERE.
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Political parties Networket the Public: EXPECTATION MANAGEMENT AND PERCEPTION - The Democrats must properly "Network" the American Public

Expectation Management and Perception

If the Democrats are to sustain their circumstantial advantage, they must acknowledge and apply some rudimentary behavioral psychology.

--From an Article Written By Douglas Castle for THE NATIONAL NETWORKER NEWSLETTER and originally published on June 14, 2009.

This article © 2009 by Douglas E. Castle and The National Networker : Reprinted with permission. This article has been substantially edited from its original form in order to fit the format of this reprinting. The author expresses his gratitude to Linked In for providing the networking and communications forum which made this article possible and to BUZZFLASH for kindling the spark which inspired its creation. The author is neither a Democrat nor a Republican and is not affiliated with any political party. ~

Preamble:

In any relationship of trust or responsibility, management of your counterpart’s or charges’ expectations is crucial. When networking (as every political administration has done with the American People en masse), you must be perceived as honorable, competent and consistent. President Barack Obama and the newly-installed Democratic party has an initial advantage, since the previous Republican administration is currently in a leadership vacuum and is greatly suffering from the public perception that its actions, or inactions, precipitated the current economic crisis. The Democrats have to rapidly upgrade their networking skills in order to keep and hold their influence and to sustain their circumstantial advantage.

A recent article in BUZZFLASH spoke of the decline of the G.O.P. But the deterioration of its reputation following the Bush administration, leadership issues and apparent blame for the precipitation of the current economic crisis are still not enough to keep the Democrats in the good graces of the increasingly wary American People, who are looking to the Democrats as their last hope for a restoration of a “normal” United States.

The G.O.P. badly mis-networked the populace. Despite this, the Democrats need to sharpen their leadership and public relations skills, especially in the areas of expectation management and perception, if they are to remain in power and reap the political rewards of having helped to solve a frighteningly real economic crisis – and a still unresolved crisis of confidence.

Please download this article (either for reading or for printing) in its entirety from http://twitlik.com/EXPECTATION .

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle

Some Key Terms: Networking the American Public, politics of perception, confidence, image-building, networking, Linked In, BuzzFlash, MediaFire, Articles by Douglas Castle, economic recession, TNNW, crisis of confidence.







__________________________________________________________
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globalism, CFR, NGO, UN, WTO, IMF, central bank, outsourcing, offshoring, capital markets, import, export, international trade, strategic alliances, e-commerce, entrepreneurship, social networking, banking, finance, trade, ventures, business, securities, stock exchanges, indexes, futurism, trends, citizen ambassadorship, enterprise, capitalism, international politics, commodities, prime rate, LIBOR, foreign currencies, foreign exchange, blogs, blogging, bloggers, aol, google, yahoo, msn, AP, news, media alerts, world government, world governments, international affairs, treaties, tariffs, trade restrictions, marketing, advertising, business development, arbitrage, obtaining capital, promotion, publicity, EU, NATO, military affairs, government regulation, trade restrictions, liquidity crisis, business opportunities, web-based businesses, communication, communications, technology, intelligence, embassies, consulates, business resources, Douglas Castle,The Internationalist Page, The Global Futurist, international politics, elections, time management, cyberspace, AI, energy, industry, productivity, Mixx, Digg, Technorati, Sphere, Facebook, YouTube, MySpace, LinkedIn, advertising, economics, strategy, management, cooperation, widgets, blidgets, links, incoterms, CCH, UCC, freight forwarding, custom house brokers, diversity, employment, culture, micro-loans, technological convergence, trends, financial planning, FOREX, futures, stock index, inflation, recession, sub-contracting, Department of Commerce, the next generation, amnesty, humanitarianism, foreign aid, philanthropy, charity, cooperation, peaceful cooexistence, a world without walls...
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IT'S NOT PERSONAL...OH YES IT IS. ALWAYS

The content which follows was originally published at DOUGLAS CASTLE, earlier today.

Any interaction between two or more persons is, by definition, personal. When someone makes a decsion or takes an action which he or she realizes will affect you, it is not only personal -- it is an exercise of free will and judgment on that other person's part.

When someone says to you (usually while in the process of causing you injury or loss), "This is nothing personal. This is business," he or she is rationalizing or trying to justify (to his or her own conscience) an action that is ethically reprehensible. And that action is always personal. Adding further traction to this fact is that people are so obsessed with making this ridiculous pronouncement.

When a damaging and surprising act of betrayal is imposed upon you, your tormentor will invariably cite the defense (if asked), "It was a business decision."

You cannot abdicate personal judgment and culpability when you are causing any other Human Being pain or loss. Whether invoking "business decision" or just remaining coldly silent and leaving you in the wake of staggering disillusionment, the other person has committed a personal act. And somewhere inside, that person is fully aware of this fact.

How about this? I was only following my orders.

I am ultimately responsible for what I do, and for what I consciously put into motion.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle

PRESS OUR BUTTONS!

OBAMA'S LOSS TRACED TO DOUGLAS CASTLE

Dear Readers:

I am an Internationalist, but I am (to the best of my knowledge) a U.S. citizen. I am simultaneously fascinated and thoroughly disgusted by the political process, which I am occasionally inclined to view in the same context, perhaps, as one takes a last look prior to flushing. My personal politics are quite simple, and you are welcome to examine them, as well as other parts of my anatomy (*kidding) by visiting THE INTERNATIONALIST PAGE. In fact, every Networker should make that blog a favorite. In fact, you might want to take the widget from that same blog and place it on your homepage, website or blog. The content is fascinating, increasingly relevant, and it will attract readership to your site (the "Mercenary Motive" is always most effective here).

Putting that aside, my middle daughter, sent me a video clip that was 1) a gentle endorsement of Barack Obama, and 2) a humorous persuasion piece to get us all out to vote. Politics notwithstanding, it represents brilliant marketing. Watch it and learn. I have.

http://www.cnnbcvideo.com/index.html?nid=NjgESsHE9l8YNSXFRUuILTgwMzQwNTk-&referred_by=13152853-CRuQKmx

Respectfully,

Douglas Castle,
Political Editor (despite my protests!)
THE NATIONAL NETWORKER

p.s. If you are not forwarding copies of these articles and posts to all of your new contacts and acquaintances, as well as to your colleagues, and inviting them to subscribe, you are neglecting one of the basics of effective networking: Continuous Contact. Oh, for shame!





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WHEN INSTITUTIONS FAIL, ENTREPRENEURS MUST PREVAIL!

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####

Dear Readers:

This is not an article. It is a recitation of simple folk wisdom. Repeat: "When institutions fail, individuals must prevail." It is a powerful mantra. These individuals are entrepreneurs, pioneers and builders. They are not willing victims, whiners and resigners to "fate."

Entrepreneurship, networking, and uniting people are a veritable holy trinity of skills needed for humans to whether the storm when their venerable, once-thought indomitable institutions fail them. If you have been reading THE NATIONAL NETWORKER, you already know this.

Please click on: THREE INVESTMENTS right now. Enjoy the non-article.

Faithfully,

Douglas Castle