PASSOVER HEALTHCARE & THE AMERICAN WAY

Foreword by Stan Lerner: a lot of people have asked me to write about healthcare legislation and while there is much to be said, I thought it best to focus on the core issue, which has little to do with healthcare.

Passover (which is observed this week) is the Jewish holiday that celebrates the exodus of the Jewish people from slavery in Egypt. Muslims, Christians, and of course Jews are all well versed in the account of the Great Prophet Moses confronting the Pharaoh Ramesses and demanding that God’s people be released from their bondage. It took ten plagues and ultimately the parting of the Red Sea and the drowning of Pharaoh’s army to achieve this freedom for the Jewish people. Subsequently, the story of Passover has been recounted by Jews for thousands of years over a dinner called a Passover Seder—a commandment from God.

So how is this relevant to an American in the year 2010? A question certainly worth asking. And why am I writing about it? A question I am asking myself. The answer is FREEDOM. Let me explain:

Over the course of the last week it was not possible to turn on one’s television set and watch the national news without hearing story after story focused on the new healthcare laws. If you supported the legislation that was passed you are for a still larger presence of the government in your life. If you did not support the legislation that was passed you are opposed to a still greater presence of the government in your life. I was astounded by the endless array of discussions that focused on every other possible aspect of this legislation, intentional or not, this did our country an incredible disservice. Of course every American would like every American to receive the best possible healthcare, the question is at what cost—and I do not inquire this in any way with respect to money. America and Americans do not, and should not value money more than FREEDOM!

The word Seder means (in Hebrew) order. So Jews celebrate their freedom from slavery by having a dinner called order. Puzzling? Continue reading PASSOVER HEALTHCARE & THE AMERICAN WAY

THE DAILY BREW BREWS UP A NEW PARTNERSHIP

Foreword by Stan Lerner: the following article will appear in the next edition of the Montebello Spotlight. For those of you not familiar, Montebello, which means beautiful hills in Italian, is a suburb of Los Angeles about eight miles east of Downtown or just east of East LA. And Montebello is also my hometown, the place where I dreamed many of the dreams I’ve been so blessed to pursue—I’ve always had dreams about returning to the place of my youth and doing business there. The following article is about that. My business savvy friends may want to pay particular attention to this little piece, as the last two places I took an interest in, Palm Springs and Downtown LA, fifteen years ago, went on to do pretty well.

THE ARTICLE

The Daily Brew, located at the corner of Montebello Blvd. and Cleveland Ave, has brewed up a dynamic new partnership. Having recently celebrated its one-year-anniversary as the neighborhood’s local coffee house The Daily Brew, founded by Veronica Diaz, is now officially The Daily Brew LLC, which is owned and operated by Miss Diaz and new partner Stan Lerner.

Mr. Lerner, is best known as an award winning author of books, movies, Las Vegas shows and blogs (He owns downtownster.com), but among the world of business elite he has also earned a reputation as a master business plan writer and turn-around specialist. And yes, he is born and raised in Montebello. “I’ve been blessed in my life to be able to pursue many of my dreams, but the one that’s been on my list longer than I would have liked it to be is the opportunity to come back to my hometown and build a company—a Montebello based company,” Lerner said. “It’s funny because I was a Daily Brew customer, I’d come have a coffee and do some work on my computer whenever I was visiting my home in Montebello, so when the opportunity presented itself I didn’t have to think about it at all—I just said, ‘Let’s do this.’”

Since the formation of the new partnership The Daily Brew has been aggressively implementing a new Best In Class Mission Statement. Lerner, who has owned successful restaurants in the past, has a passion for food and has always enjoyed creating new dishes for both his and his friend’s restaurants. Continue reading THE DAILY BREW BREWS UP A NEW PARTNERSHIP

“Explorers”

So I got this little heads up from Marie Bobin who runs the Jules Verne space over at 7th and Fig. I plan on writing a whole blog about this lovely girl, great space and fantastic program for the community. But in the meantime go check out what they’re doing on Thursdays for lunchtime.

“Bring your Lunch and come to our free lunchtime screening of “EXPLORERS: From the Titanic to the Moon”
visit: www.julesverne.org for more details”

More to come…

SAINT PATRICK’S DAY LA LIVE 2010

I’m tough, but I’m fair!!! Last year the first of several blogs that I posted, which were critical of AEG LA Live, dealt with AEG LA Live’s not doing anything for Saint Patrick’s Day—meaning they should have done a free event for the community to partake in. This year, AEG LA Live did do an event for the community to enjoy. And while downtownster will call out bad corporate citizens when necessary, no matter how rich and powerful they may be, downtownster / Stan Lerner is much happier giving props to companies and the people that run them when they do the right thing. AEG LA Live did the right thing this year by hosting an event for the community in their plaza.

For the sake of a little journalism, and I’m no journalist, let me tell you a little about the event. This is necessary because the chances are, like most of downtown, you weren’t there. Which is a clever way of saying that the event was not particularly well attended. In fact, I would venture to say that there were more real journalists and news crews at this event than attendees. Neither the community, which didn’t turn out, or AEG LA LIVE should be ashamed of this—it was the first year and its going to take some doing to get things right between the community and AEG, I strongly encourage both to make the effort.

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Because I am an activist on behalf of the community I will begin by putting the onus on AEG LA Live—do more events for the community and do them better. The 2010 Saint Patrick’s Day event had some of the essentials.

Continue reading SAINT PATRICK’S DAY LA LIVE 2010

THE WANDERING JEW

So I had intended to drive up to Missoula Montana, where my blog Road To Nowhere had left off, and continue my journey of self-discovery and storytelling from all over this great country of ours. But I have paved many paths with intentions that quite often differ from my deeds. I’m back in LA now, I wrote nothing about my trip from the road, although I did write about smashwords / ebooks and the Los Angeles Book Festival…Maybe we should explore a different voice as I now reflect on my most recent expedition. Perhaps sentences, which are short stories unto themselves—a marathon of sprints, if you will. Yes, a marathon of sprints, because isn’t that how one might best describe a robust life.

As I have done so often in the past I departed from my home in my hometown of Montebello. Round midnight the black beast (a 1996 Suburban) beckoned to me from the curb, “Come it is time to go.”

Sunrise breakfast at a diner a half hour south of Pebble Beach, the owner was nice, his business was failing—neglectful ways.

Stopped at Pebble Beach, the U.S Open was about to open, but I wasn’t so impressed by any of it at all.

I drove through the mountains, there was a blizzard, I passed the Donner Pass, poor people had to eat each other, I thought to myself.

The bright lights of Reno made me smile, I had never been there before and I felt like staying. I’ll go back to Reno one day…

I slept at a friend’s house a few miles outside of Boise Idaho, Eagle Idaho I believe it’s called, I hadn’t seen her in twenty-three years—she’s married to a nice guy and has two kids.

The drive from Eagle to Missoula was a wondrous; winter snowscape that wound along the Little Salmon River amongst many rivers and I never for a moment stopped wishing that everyone could one day see such beauty!

Missoula Montana is one of my favorite places, so I stayed for a while. Most people would and should experience all there is to do outdoors there—I sat at Break Espresso and wrote, chatted with Matt the barista, he’s the type that will never fully trust someone like me, but that aside he’s going to be a big success one day. I met a girl named Emma, I feel really good about her because something about her made me feel good about my day. I met a girl named Kelsi who I love because she needs me to. And I mean love in the Godly sense.

I caught wind of a story about a company in North Carolina that had been embezzled by its employees. Continue reading THE WANDERING JEW