Just as it has been for the past 7 or so year, I continue to get business proposals for new ways to alter the NBA in-game experience.  Without fail the proposal starts out with some form of “Today, everyone has a smartphone and can’t disconnect from their phone” Then I get the meat of the pitch which is some derivative of stats, Jumbotron pictures, fantasy games, gamification apps, instagram pics, social sharing, etc, etc.

They all seem to forget what business the NBA is in.

In order to understand why I hate these proposals you have to understand first what the Mavs sell. The NBA does not sell basketball !

Think back to the first professional sporting event you ever went to. It was probably a parent taking you to the game. What do you remember ? Do you remember the score ? A home run ? A jump shot ? A pass play ? Or do you remember who you were with ? I remember being with my dad at a Pirates game. My dad and my uncle at a Steeler’s game. Think about your fondest memories at a sporting event. Again, what do you remember ? Hanging with your buddies ? A first date ? A last date ? How you felt after the team won or loss ? A business partner or customer ? Or the score ? I’m guessing its not the score.

We in the sports business don’t sell the game, we sell unique, emotional experiences.We are not in the business of selling basketball. We are in the business of selling fun. We are in the business of letting you escape. We are experiential entertainment. We are in the business of giving you a chance to create shared experiences. I say it to our people at the Mavs at all time, I want a Mavs game to be more like a great wedding than anything else.

You know the wedding I’m talking about. The one where everyone is up dancing, smiling , cheering, laughing. The one where Grandma Ethel has her annual vodka gimlet and is singing “old town road” at the top of her lungs.  The one where the whole place still does the Macarena while laughing so hard they are crying. The one where everyone sings out loud to every song and you hug the cousin you haven’t seen in 10 years and hope you don’t see for another 10. It doesn’t matter if half the room doesn’t believe the couple will still be married at the end of the year. It matters if everyone in the place is having a great time. It matters if its the type of wedding that everyone in the room wished or wishes their wedding was or will be like this one. It matters that you leave the reception and your hands hurt from clapping , your mouth hurts from smiling so much and your throat is sore because you were laughing , singing and hollering so much. That’s a great wedding.

That’s how I want a Mavs game to be.

I want it to be very participatory. I want it to be very social. I want it to be very inclusive. I want it to be memorable. I want it to be so much fun people talk about it to their friends and can’t wait to go back. I want every parent to get tears in their eyes when they see their kids jumping up and down whether the score is 2 to 0. or 120 to 84. When they are chanting Lets Go Mavs . When they are dancing and trying to get on the jumbotron.

I want the guy on the date knowing that the longest he will have to talk is during halftime and then after the game, and until the next date, he can talk about the game itself and not have all the pressure of trying to think of something to say while his date can be relieved that she can enjoy the game without him talking. Or vice versa of course. I want everyone coming to a Mavs game to be able to find their own personal attachment to that night. I know I can’t control what happens on the court every game, but I can do my very best to make sure that no matter what the score, we have done all we can to make the fan experience like a great wedding.

IMHO, that means eliminating as many of the “look down” moments in the game as I possibly can. Once you sit in your seat, the only time I want you to look down is to pick up the soda or beer you set down under your seat and maybe to check your phone to see if you got a text from the sitter or your buddy about where to meet after the game.

I want you always looking up. Looking at the game and the entertainment in the arena. You can’t cheer if you aren’t watching. It’s my job to give you something other than the game to look up at.

It may be looking at the fun videos we put on the big screen to entertain you.

We are going to try everything and anything we can think of to make it fun and memorable. Just as a DJ responds to the energy and attitude at a Wedding in real-time and tries to choose the right song or activity to keep the fun and energy up, we try to do the same thing at a Mavs game. We recognize that what makes our games unique is that like a wedding, Grandma Ethel can be sitting next to a goth looking 16 year old she has never met before, and if both are watching when the Mavs hit a shot right as the 24 second buzzer sounds, they can high 5 each other like they are best friends. That if Grandma Ethel is chanting defense and being a key 6th man for her Mavs, the 16 year old will feel better about cupping his black nailed hands together to do the same. That if we put a fun video up on the big screen, they both might just sing along

Video and music are two simple components of what we do.

Part of what separates going to a game from watching at home is the energy.  The energy should start to build as you walk up to the American Airlines Center. It should build further as you see other excited fans inside.  It should grow with the introduction video.  We have continued to use Eminence Front as our intro video because we want everyone who has ever gone to a Mavs home game to have a common link. We want them to know the game is about to start and Eminence Front reminds them its time to take their energy to another level

I can’t think of a bigger mistake then trying to integrate smartphones just because you can. The last thing I want is someone looking down at their phone to see a replay. The last thing I want is someone thinking that its a good idea to disconnect from the unique elements of a game to look at replays or update their fantasy standings, their bets or concentrate on trying to predict what will happen next in the game. If there is a good reason to show this information, we can show it on the many screens in the arena.

There is a huge value to everyone collectively holding their breath during a replay, or responding to a great play or a missed call and then spontaneously reacting to what they see. We want people cheering or booing or chanting at the top of their lungs. We want everyone so intently watching the game they all simultaneously react to what just happened.

You lose that if people are looking down at their handhelds.  The fan experience is about looking up, not looking down. If you let them look down, they might as well stay at home, the screen is always going to be better there.

As in every business you have to always ask yourself what your product is and the best way to deliver it. In the NBA our product is fun, unique experiences and energy. The last thing we need to do is encourage our customers to stare at their phones.

Sports is the only place in life where we encourage you to yell and scream at the top of your lungs and clap for the good guys.  That is who we are. We have to do everything possible to encourage more of it !

There was a lot of discussion about player movement this off-season.  Although the Mavs didn’t get every player we wanted, we got most of them and I’m thrilled that we added Seth, Delon and Boban in Free Agency.  We will be a much better team in a conference and league that will be wide open this year.

Back to the topic of this post – What Makes the NBA Special  ?

The answer is short and to the point: The NBA is a talent driven league.

Look at your favorite teams in every other sport. If your favorite NFL team lined up all 53 players in front of you, how many could you name by sight ? If your favorite MLB or NHL team lined up their entire rosters in front of you, how many could you name by sight ? If you saw a list of players, how many of the names would you be able to recognize ?

Now think of the roster of your favorite NBA team. You may not know them all by sight, but there is a very good chance you will know all the names on the opening night roster and if you happen to see one at the grocery store, there is a great chance you will recognize them and say hi.

That’s what makes the NBA different from the other professional sports in this country.  The NFL is about the NFL, it is a league driven sport. Baseball and hockey are a mix of being league and talent driven. There are stars in both that are recognized locally, but have minimal recognition nationally.

The NBA is a talent driven league.  NBA stars are not just recognizable locally, they are recognized globally.

They are recognized not just because of who they are on the court, but they are also stars off the court.

The NBA more than any other league has been the beneficiary of social media. Our players have been smart enough to not only recognize the value of having a large presence on Social Media, but the value of being influencers and using the influence to become incredible marketers, business-people and most importantly, impactful in their communities and in social conversations nationally.

Which brings us back to Free Agency.  Some feel that the player movement we have seen, particularly players asking to be traded or leaving teams that have the ability to pay them more money is a problem. I don’t. I think it is exactly what we should expect and it reflects what is happening in the job market across industries in our country.

No longer do college students graduate in search of a career where they expect to spend their entire adult lives working for a single company.  Just the thought is crazy.  I tell college graduates to look for a job where they get to learn about themselves, the business world, adulting and what they love to do and can be good at it.  That their first job is just that, their first job. There will be many more.

This reality has changed what it is like to be an employer.  In the past the default was that the best  employees would want a long career with their employers, because that is what you did. You kept your job as long as you could . No longer. Now the onus is on employers to keep their best employees happy.

Your best of the best will be impactful not only within the company, but via social media and other online platforms, visible as the best in their industry. It is important to give them reasons to want to stay. Great employees are effectively always free agents with the ability to move anywhere.

Why should it be any different for the NBA ?

Mobility is the power that comes with being great at your job, whether its in the NBA or any other industry. If you are one of the best, you will have the ability to decide where you want to work

NBA teams are going to have to work harder than we ever have to give our players a reason to want to stay with their teams.  For some players the best choice will be to stay with one team their entire careers. For others, they will choose to move. Some that move will sign short-term deals, other longer. Each player will do what they think is best

This may not make everyone happy, and of course there is always room for improvement, no system is perfect,  but I think there are net benefits to the NBA.

Movement made and broke a super team.  It took us from having one team with arguably 4 superstars to no team with obviously more than 2. It took us from 2 teams that are big national ticket sales and TV draws to arguably 4 and possibly more.

Most importantly, the global impact of our players keeps interest in the NBA fresh and renewed with every season.  The NBA is exciting because our players are exciting.

Nothing wrong with that.

The problem legislators are facing in their attempts to “Repeal and Replace” or even modify Obamacare in a manner that will make their constituents happy is that they can’t answer one very important question-

“Who takes less ?”

The stakeholders in Obamacare are the Insurance Companies, Health Care Providers and Consumers.

Will Insurance Companies be willing to take lower profits ?

Will Health Care Providers be willing to charge less for the services they are providing or take less reimbursement ?

Will Consumers have to accept fewer services and lesser quality of care ?

No stakeholder is willing to take less. Which is why it will be near impossible to “fix Obamacare” in a way that makes consumers, also known as voters, insurers and healthcare providers happy.

Politicians can deflect and promote the benefits of a free market, but the free market shows itself every day in the profits of insurers and healthcare providers. I have yet to see a single public company in these spaces make an announcement that they are willing to or expect to take less because of changes to Obamacare. Have you ?

So what should happen ?

There are 2 risks that every single citizen of the United States shares:

1. We all can lose the genetic lottery and find ourselves getting seriously ill or worse. 

2. We all can lose the “wrong place, wrong time” lottery and find ourselves facing a significant or life threatening injury.

We all can take steps to reduce those risks, but it is literally impossible to eliminate them. On any given morning, every single person can wake up, feel a little off and soon come to find they are sick. 

At any given moment we can be in the wrong place and something catastrophic happens. A car. A bus. A baseball bat. A knife. A bullet.  etc.  All of the sudden our loved ones are praying for us.

Today, we deal with those fears by doing our own versions of risk management.  Most of us try to get a job that offers health insurance. Even if its a job we don’t like, we realize that if we lose in either of these lotteries we won’t be able to afford the health care we need.

Some of us do our best to afford the least expensive health care insurance with high deductibles and lie to ourselves that we will be able to save enough to cover the deductible or we can keep enough open on our credit cards to survive a disaster. Unfortunately,when disaster hits, we rarely have enough.

Some of us, like I did in my 20s feel invincible and think it won’t happen to us. Until it does.

Which leads to my suggestion.

Not one single person in this country is immune to losing the Genetic or Randomness of Life Lottery. Not one. Doesn’t matter if you are rich, poor, white, black or whatever religion you are, if any. We all have close to the same odds of getting ill or being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

It’s time we recognize these facts and deal with them accordingly.

Whether its Medicaid or a new program, every single person in this country should be covered 100pct for chronic physical or mental illness and for any life threatening injury.  

The premiums that we are paying to insurance companies as individuals or as company coverage for these significant risks would go from the insurance companies to the IRS. Only the cost of covering the what’s left would continue being paid to the insurance companies.

It would not be hard to do the math. Every insurance company does this analysis already. The government does this analysis already. We all would end up paying  more in taxes, but less in insurance and healthcare costs over time.

There would be no mandates. There would be no individual penalties.  No Tax Credits. No subsidies. No Offsets or deductions for buying higher end insurance. This will be single payer (yes i know its a dirty phrase in this country) for chronic physical or mental illness and for any life threatening injury.

Everything not covered by the above can be covered by insurance sold on the Free Market, managed by the states, sold across state lines, without government interference.

There will be unique opportunities for insurance companies to innovate knowing they wont have to face the most expensive healthcare problems and they can have the cushion of knowing that illnesses and injuries that they covered that transition to those covered by Single Payer Advanced will be reimbursed.

We all share the same risks, we all can share the costs of our greatest risks.

The  peace of mind this would bring to every family would make our country stronger. I know with certainty it won’t reduce innovation in healthcare. Technology is going to continue to boom and change our future.

There is something for everyone to hate in this. It doesn’t cover as wide a range of healthcare options as Obamacare, but it covers everyone. Immediately. No paperwork required. It is more humane, cost effective and fair than what the Republicans have proposed so far.

Which means everyone can rip it to pieces. Which is exactly what I want everyone to try to do in the comments so we can see how to make the concept better

PS – On the issue of drug prices, I would include an MFN for pricing for this government pricing.  Whatever the best price is you give to anyone, you have to give to this program.

thanks

m

If it was me spending the money, I would take 100 billion of the proposed $ 1 Trillion dollars in infrastructure investment and invest it in Robotics.

I would invest it in the companies that do R&D, software, and design for robots and every other facet of the Robotics Industry.

Unfortunately, none of the companies that actually make the robotics are based here in the USA. That’s a problem that needs to be solved.  We need to help develop domestic companies much like we did the electric car and wind and solar industries.  Even if it means trying to help pick winners.

We have to win the robotics race.  We are not even close right now.

A new report says China is spending far more on Robotics than we are. China, Korea, EU are offering billions in credits to support their robotics industry.  We spend about $100mm . That ain’t gonna work.

The good news, if there is any,  is that according to the report China is only spending $ 3B dollars a year on robotics.   We need to quickly pass them by.

Why is this so important ?  Because technological change always accelerates. It never stagnates over time. Which means we are going to face the fact that if nothing in the States changes, we will find ourselves dependent on other countries for almost everything that can and will be manufactured in a quickly approaching future.

We have to face the fact that countries are going to lose jobs to robotics.  The only question that needs to be answered is which country will create and own the best robotic technology and have the infrastructure necessary to enable it.

Right now it’s not the USA and that needs to change.

Our “infrastructure” spending should look forwards, not backwards so that we can be the robotics hub of the world.

When it comes to reporting the news,  a presidential campaign and election is obviously news, the MSM (Main Stream Media) takes everything literally  and seriously. That is the definition of reporting isn’t it ?

There are 10s of millions of voters who probably preferred  to consume literal information from MSM sources they trust and processed it before they decided which Presidential candidate they  voted for.

There are 10s of millions of voters who probably preferred to consume other, non MSM sources of information.  It’s not that they don’t want literal information. It’s that they don’t trust traditional reporting sources, aka, MSM, aka Main Stream Media.

I don’t know how or why they developed this distrust of the MSM. But they certainly did and still do. They not only distrust the MSM, they seem to feel strongly that the MSM is controlled by forces that are intentionally trying to discredit the things they believe strongly in.

Who do they trust for their information ? Pretty much anyone and any outlet that recognizes and reveals the impurity of MSM outlets and reinforces the purity of their beliefs. It can be a neighbor, friend, relative, talk show host, website or information source, real or otherwise. It certainly was all the people who were at the rallys. You talk about creating a word of mouth network of support.  The rallys certainly succeeded there.

For the MSM literals, its “us vs them”, for the MSM haters , its “us vs them”

In this election there were more MSM “literals”, but the Trump campaign was a lot smarter and able to rally the MSM haters and turn them into Trump believers and voters in the states they needed them.

President Elect Trump won not because the media failed at their job or didn’t recognize something.  Donald Trump won precisely because the MSM did their job exactly as they expected they would and they used it to their advantage.

Every chance Donald got he would say things that his campaign knew would get the MSM all riled up. They knew exactly what they were doing. The more the media and people like me criticized Donald, the more it played right into their hands.  We were the bad guys. We didn’t get it.  We represented everything they wanted to change. We were the forces behind the corrupt media. The elites. The establishment. The suckers getting paid off by George Soros and foreign corrupt interests.

I was dumb enough to think I would be able to talk people out of voting for Donald Trump by detailing what I thought were his weaknesses. The Trump campaign had to be laughing at me and thanking me at the same time.  I approached my choice of candidates by consuming information literally.  That was my hammer and I tried to use it to make everything else look like a nail. I obviously was wrong.

Where Donald Trump was challenged, it wasn’t because of something he said on the campaign trail. It was something he said or did years ago. When there was hard evidence, it created question marks for even his staunchest supporters.  But for every hit he took, he was able to communicate to his followers that his opponent was far far worse than he ever could be.

She was a threat to their lives, their livelihood, their country.  It was clear to his supporters that he understood them and she was a threat. It was an easy choice to make. They both had issues. He could learn from his. She was a lying traitor that couldn’t be trusted and neither could anyone who supported her.  She would never be able to wash that off and be trusted and neither could the elites or special interests that wanted to help her take away his supporter’s liberties.

So here we are. We are going through a transition after which Donald Trump will be our President. Have I changed my mind about him ? Not yet. I’m willing to give him a chance. But I still don’t trust his temperament.  His tweets are risky in so many ways. That still concerns me. Bigly.

But he will be our President and I want him to succeed. But that isn’t the end of the story.  Recent history is repeating itself . As we speak.

The Trump team is once again brilliantly using MSM to their advantage.  They know that MSM will continue to be literal in their reporting, and the Trump transition team is grateful for it.

In looking at his actual and proposed appointments,  every one in the MSM, everyone who consumes their literal information from the MSM is freaking the fuck out.

Once again his voters are taking him seriously, but not literally. After all, he hasn’t taken office yet. How in the world does the MSM even know what is going to happen ? It’s just more confirmation that the MSM doesn’t get it. They don’t get us.  They are still out to get him and make him look bad. And when the MSM makes our President look bad, they make all of us that voted for him look bad. Which in turn makes his support from his voters even stronger.

When his transition team picked Flynn, Bannon, Sessions, they knew exactly how the MSM would react. They knew every single past issue each faced would surface.  From tweets to not being confirmed to breitbart news.  They could have picked any number of qualified candidates that didn’t carry that “baggage”.  But they chose them precisely because they had that baggage and of course because they were loyal to President Elect Trump.

Every bit of their histories  was  going to be taken literally and reported literally by the MSM.  And like in the campaign, I’m pretty sure that his supporters won’t care, a minority of his supporters will think of those issues as  positives,  and the Trump team will continue to be thankful for the MSM doing their jobs exactly how they expected them to.

It’s the perfect long-term setup for the new President and all those around him.  No matter what he does in office, unless it is demonstrably and verifiably dangerous to their way of life, the MSM media reporting on his Presidency is always going to be a plot against him.

They trust President Trump far, far more than they could ever trust anything the MSM says about him.  And they trust all the non MSM sources of information that again, unless there is something disastrous and undeniable, will say and write positive things about his Presidency.  What doesn’t work and isn’t disastrous is the fault of his predecessor and the establishment who continue to fill the swamp of DC and fight his every move. In fact, I would guess that they use all the negative articles during the transition as a way to convince those who didn’t vote for Trump, but may have been on the fence,as support for why they should support their new President.

The MSM doing their job is going to make President Donald Trump stronger than he was the day he was elected.

A couple more guesses and presumptions from my personal swamp:

1: My guess is that all the meetings with non-supporters are` “kiss the ring and kiss my ass meetings” and not true job interviews. Yes, there will be an exception or two. Or at least ones that look like they are a hiring of someone who didn’t support President Elect Trump’s campaign. But the reality of the situation is that it’s not about hiring those folks.  They give the President Elect and his organization the chance to say “see, I was open minded. I talked to everyone. Whether I agreed with them or not. But even when  you try to  take the establishment out of the Swamp, you can’t take the swamp out of the establishment.

More importantly, they give President Elect Trump the satisfaction of watching those like me who campaigned vocally against him, bend over,  and kiss his ring.  Touche’ President Elect Trump. Touche’

2:  As I said, I am very, very nervous about what he might say or tweet.  But I do have some confidence that like everyone before him, the office will change him. The non stop onslaught of challenges will focus him. He won’t have the time, energy or inclination to tweet simply because he is too busy. That is my hope.

3: I do understand the fear the uncertainty is causing minorities. They are rightfully terrified. I know I would be. My suggestion is to use the fear so many are feeling as a way to raise money for groups that protect those minorities.  Hopefully those funds and groups won’t be necessary and the fears will end up unfounded.

4: In supporting Sec Clinton, there were policies of hers I agreed with and policies I disagreed with. The same will apply to what appears to be his expected policies.  Socially, there is plenty I disagree vehemently with the far right about. I’m not yet convinced that all of our President Elect’s NY Values are gone. We will see.

Economically, there are positives in his plan to borrow at hopefully what will still be effectively less than 0 percent interest.  I think if they can take this approach rather than an infrastructure bank, it will pay off nicely in growth for the economy. I also believe that reducing corporate income taxes is good. But I’m a believer that they should be closer  to the 22 – 25pct range. That makes us globally competitive and hopefully allows for more re-investment by companies.

Finally I hope he takes a page from Sec Clinton’s small business agenda.  All the paperwork required, along with the many different fees that every different level of local government charges a new company, makes starting a business too difficult and stupidly expensive.  All of which combined to crush the incentive for an individual to start their own business.

If you are good at a trade, its ridiculously expensive to go out on your own. Every start up should be as easy as starting up a lemonade stand and cheap, if not free. Sec Clinton proposed that federal funds be used to buy out the many local, county and state fees that crushed small startups and to work to unify and simplify the paperwork required. Hopefully the Trump administration will take a close look at this.

5: I’m tired. So apologize for the typos and whatever else.  I’ll circle back tomorrow and fix the many grammatical and spelling errors I’m sure I left behind

6. Feel free to hate on me in the comments. I learn from the thought out disagreements and improve my temper from the over the top hate.

On May 20th, 2015 I was in New York City.  Like I love to do on a nice day, I took a long walk through the city. When I say long, I mean long.  From Columbus Circle down to the Alphabet Streets and back.  My step count was through the roof :).

I got back to my apartment, showered and soon after I had a headache. I rarely get headaches so I thought maybe it was dirt and grime and whatever that had accumulated on my contacts. Took them out. I was tired. So I went to bed. Expecting to feel better in the morning after a good nights sleep

May 21st, 2015. I woke up dizzy.

My initial reaction was that I had a form of Vertigo.

I had experienced Vertigo multiple times before.  Once when I was staying in Manhattan Beach, I woke up with Vertigo, thought we were in the middle of an earth quake and rushed to alert my neighbors. All of whom made it clear that there was no earthquake. There hadn’t been an earthquake. And maybe I had too much to drink the night before

My most recent Vertigo experience was a good 10 years ago and with a trip to the doctor I was given a few pages with a series of head movement exercises.  By the next day I was fine. It was  as if nothing had happened.

So on May 21st, 2015 my expectation was that all would be fine shortly. I did my exercises. Unfortunately they didn’t work. At the end of the day I was still was what is easiest to describe as being dizzy, but it was far more than that.

My brain was in a fog, I felt hungover. i felt some nausea,  without having had a drink. My face and ears felt full. I can’t fully describe it  or give justice to just how off I felt.  My balance was fine. My body below the neck was fine. I never felt better. But inside my head something was definitely wrong.

I headed back to Dallas still believing it was Vertigo related and I was just missing something.

I visited my doctor who suggested I get more electrolytes and see if that helped. It did a tiny bit, but not much. After which I started “the rounds”

He sent me for an MRI of my head, nothing. My neck. Nothing. An MRA. Nothing. All of which was obviously good news at the highest level. It didn’t appear to be anything life threatening.

Then I made the rounds to Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) doctors. Nothing. I was in tip top shape. Then my doctor suggested I visit a Neurologist. She immediately concluded that it was not physical and was completely stress related and that I should  see a Psychiatrist, but first here is some Klonopin for you to take to help you.

That made me even worse. I would take dizzy and nauseas over how the klonopin made me feel any day and I knew it wasn’t a psychological issue. So I got off of those meds quickly.

Then I found another Dr who had more experience in treating Dizziness and related issues. To his credit, he pushed me to do the full battery of tests  that are normal for these types of issues, but unfortunately it was now the second week of June and I had to head to LA to start shooting Shark Tank in a couple days.  I don’t remember how we got to it. but he suggested Valium.

Boom. It worked. Mostly.

I was no longer dizzy. I actually felt alright. When I took 9mg of Valium. The problem of course is that I always wanted to lay down and take a nap.

But it got me through the first shooting pod of Season 7 of Shark Tank. So when you are watching, if you notice I look really, really relaxed and maybe a little tired or sleepy, now you know why.

While the Valium certainly helped, it became obvious to me that taking 9mg of Valium a day was no way to go through life. So I began trying to reduce my dosage. I got it so that within a couple weeks I could take half a mg in the morning and half in the afternoon and get to an acceptable state.  I also found that the busier I kept myself, the less I thought about it and the better I felt.

Of course the doctors were sure at that point that if valium worked (as did drinking. Drunk felt like every drunk night before it ), that it must be stress.  It wasn’t

I would be lying if I didn’t say that I was concerned as my family headed off to Southern California for a vacation.  I didn’t want to drive with my family in the car.  Every terrible possibility I could conjure in my head as a problem, I did. I read everything and anything that I could about dizziness. Unfortunately, dizziness is a symptom for almost everything. I found nothing.

I was miserable.  Valium was not a solution. Not a way I wanted to go through life.

Then I stumbled onto a website, http://www.dizziland.com . It claimed to cure 95% of patients who come in with dizziness.  I was desperate. It was a 30 minute drive from where we were vacationing, so I made an appointment . It was for first week of August.

Dr. Mango and his crew put me through about 5 hours of tests. From what I understand they were traditional, for the most part.  I got spun, turned, twisted, ballooned and then they put me in a dark room, strapped me in to a chair and asked me to use a joy stick to demonstrate that I could align a red line absolutely vertical, and absolutely horizontal.

My vertical was no problem. Horizontal ? I was convinced I was laying the line down so it was absolutely flat.  As it turns out I wasn’t close. I was off 38pct.  That was good.

The audiologist, Dr Pearce, told me that was the information they needed. She was confident she could get me back to normal. When I asked what caused the problem.  There was no answer. It could be an inner ear infection or something else.  But she was fairly certain that an Otolith in my vestibular system had been damaged.

The way she explained it, and Im paraphrasing , I was dizzy because my eyes, the otolith in my vestibular system and brain were out of whack.  My damaged otolith was telling my brain I was falling or off balance, but my eyes was saying everything was normal. So my brain was confused and working overtime , resulting in all the problems I was experiencing.

Obviously I was thrilled. But getting back to normal wasn’t a quick process. Below is a video I asked to do for Dizziland to tell people who were experiencing what I was experiencing that there was hope.

What you can’t really see is that I’m in front of what is called an Epley Chair.

If you watch the video below, you will see the spinning chair. For my case, the chair was in a dark enclosure.

Dr. Mango had created the special enclosure for the chair, but more importantly, he created a protocol of videos that would be projected against the walls.  While I watched the videos there were cameras looking at my eyes, measuring the response of my eyes . It was a solution that he had integrated and it was working.

In the dark room,  the protocol would sometimes show star like objects projected against the walls of the room. Sometimes I would be still. Sometimes I would be moving.  Sometimes they would be slow,  sometimes they would be faster.  All in all I would be in the chair about an hour. Every day.

I was making progress.  But my time in Southern California was coming to an end. I had to get back to Dallas. Which was a problem because my brain really benefited from daily treatment.

There were not chairs available to me in Dallas.  There were only 20 in the entire country.  Almost all in Veteran’s Hospitals where they were used to treat servicemen and women who had suffered various types of head trauma resulting in dizziness. The closest to me was in San Antonio and it did not run the protocol Dr Mango had created.

I literally was desperate.

I was making progress. I was getting closer and closer. So I looked into buying my own chair and enclosure and hiring one of Dr Mango’s audiologists to move to Dallas to start a Dizziland branded office in Dallas.  It would help not only me, but also others who could benefit from the same therapy.

It was September going into October at this point and I was at what I would call about 60pct. But unless I could just go back out to Southern California and stay until i was fixed, I was going to have to wait several months to put all this together.

To try to mitigate the problem and buy time, the Docs gave me videos to watch on a laptop screen in the dark.  It didn’t help. I wasn’t getting better and on some days it was much worse.

Then it hit me.

Why not put the videos on my phone and look at them in the Samsung VR set I had bought just to try to learn more about VR

Bingo.

I started using Dr Mango’s protocol in the Samsung VR Glasses every morning and every night and started making progress nearly every day. Day after day, night after night I was in my bedroom or a hotel room with my Goggles on watching white boxes on a black background scroll past my eyes. My doctors had me standing sometimes. Laying down sometimes. Standing on a pillow in the morning, rolling side to side while watching at night.

By November I was 75pct, by December 90pct.  By the end of January and in to February I had days where I felt completely normal.  I was able to reduce my use of the googles to every 3rd day. Then every week.

Today, I use them for maintenance every couple of weeks just to play it safe, but I’m back to normal and happy.

Virtual Reality along with Dr Mango,  his protocol and some amazing Audiologists in Dr Pearce and Dr Nava gave me my brain back. I can’t thank them enough

VR worked so well, Dr Mango and I are now patenting the entire protocol and program and he is already testing it with great results with some of his other patients.  Hopefully it can have the same impact on others that it had on me.

“In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.“

In the current case facing Apple, the terrorists who had possession of the phone are deceased. However, in one of the next times Apple is called upon to open up a phone to enable access, chances are good that the person in possession of a phone during an illegal and possibly heinous act will be alive, be an American citizen and demand “to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence”

In the event Apple loses the current case to the FBI, setting a precedent that they can be compelled to unlock phones for the FBI and other government agencies,  each and every defendant in such cases will have the assistance of counsel for their defense. What do you expect every defense lawyer to do in order to protect their client who has had a phone opened ?

Once the phone is “cracked” by Apple or any device or Operating System developer, whatever is found by the FBI or whatever government agency is involved, is going to be labeled “planted” or false evidence.  The defendants lawyer is going to scream as loud as they can that whatever was found was not originated by their client. That Apple, in cahoots with the government agency, modified their software to not only unlock the phone, but to also write to the device everything the government agency needs to gain a conviction.  Pictures. Texts. Logs. Files. Videos. All originated and/or imported by the code in order to gain a conviction.

The best way to disprove this allegation by the defense attorney ?

Line by line publication of the code used to open it.  Reviewed by who knows how qualified and how many “experts” who will pass judgement based upon who paid them. Possibly a line by line presentation of the code to a jury of the defendant’s peers.  

Yes, the FBI and Apple would do everything possible to try to stop this presentation, but what if they can not ?

Which is exactly why Apple must win the current case against the FBI.  There is a near ZERO chance that the code created by Apple to break into their phones can stay private under current laws.

I also want to address the notion that we let the police or government agents  into our homes or that we allow some of our digital data to be acquired using warrants and subpoenas.  The difference is in the ability for a defense attorney to be able to determine whether or not physical or digital evidence is false evidence.

With physical evidence, there are always risks of planted evidence, but the processes are in place to contest that evidence.

With digital evidence as direct data, the best, if not only way to prove that the code was not written to plant digital evidence is by showing the code. Which is exactly why I think this Apple vs the FBI case is nothing like any of the current search and seizure examples being given in the media.

In those examples, the software that creates, collects or aggregates that data can be presented to an open court without risk.

Want to see the devices, code and databases that collect, process and store your Easy Pass driving data ?  No problem. Seeing the process doesn’t open a door for you to hack into it and change it.  A defense attorney can question the credibility or accuracy of that data and no one else except Easy Pass users are impacted or care. The same concept can be applied to the phone meta data about us that is collected by the phone companies, our social media footprint, whatever.  We may not like it. In fact we may hate it, but reviewing and questioning the process or the data doesn’t create risk if that specific code or process is presented in court.

If Apple, or any digital device or Operating System provider has to write code that breaks into their own phones and then present that code in open court to prove that the code is clean and has not planted digital evidence, then the door is wide open for bad actors to do as they please to our devices. No one can play whack a mole with code fast enough to keep them out.

All that said, there is a possibly better option if we only had lawmakers who cared more about solutions than grandstanding.  We have 3 Senators running for President and not one has moved a fingernail to even begin to deal with this issue let alone find a solution. That is sad in and of itself.

What should they propose ? As I wrote in a previous blog post, lawmakers should be working very quickly to write and get passed a law that limits the scope of what Apple must respond to.  Here is what I suggested:

“A company can only be compelled to remove any type of security or encryption from a smartphone or tablet,  and only a smartphone or tablet,  under the following circumstances:

1. There has been an event, with casualties, that has been declared an Act of Terrorism
2. There is reason to believe that the smartphone was possessed by a participant in the Act of Terrorism.
3. The smartphone must have been on premise during the event.
4. The  terrorist who was in possession of the smartphone or tablet must be deceased.

It would seem to me that if such a law could be proposed and passed, then the All Writs Act, currently at the heart of the Apple vs FBI dispute would no longer apply.  By eliminating the All Writs Act as a catch all then we significantly flatten out the slippery slope.  I’m not saying we will completely eliminate all privacy issues. We won’t. I’m not saying there isn’t risk of unintended consequences. There always are when we ask politicians to fix complex problems.

More importantly, passing this law or something similar gives both Apple and the FBI a means to resolve the dilemma they face.  Apple could comply with at least the hope that the circumstances under which they will be forced to create software to open a device is strictly limited in scope.

As always, this is my opinion. I’m not an attorney, so I welcome all constructive criticism and feedback so i can become smarter about the subject at hand.  You can reach me to discuss 1 on 1 on the Cyber Dust app under user name Blogmaverick

And as far as the rest of the world knowing those items, we are blessed by  “security via obscurity” . No one gives a shit about us. They don’t even know we exist. So no one asks us to share those secrets.

But what about our government ? As law abiding citizens who just go to work and live our every day lives, what could we possibly have to hide from our government ?

If as law abiding citizens 99pct of us have nothing to hide, why do we need all the protections from government that our constitution provides ? 

Why not just let the police come in to our homes any time they would like?  What do we have to hide ?

Why not let the government confiscate our phones or computers for a day or two ?  What do we have to hide  ?

Why not let the government monitor what we say or do ? What do we have to hide ?

Why do the innocent need attorney client privilege ? What do you have to hide  ?

Fortunately our constitution at least tries to  protect us from these types of government intrusions in to our lives.  But what about when it comes from others ?

The question is extremely  dangerous when coming from a public official or someone running for an office. It is being asked  for no other reasons than to intimidate and to throw the subject’s privacy out the door and open them up to public scrutiny.

I can’t think of anything worse I want to hear coming from someone that holds a public office or is a current Presidential candidate than “What do you have to hide ” ?

Unless of course its –  “Look I did it, I have nothing to hide. Why don’t you do the same thing ? What do you have to hide” ? That is worse.

So when I hear candidates ask that another make public their tax returns, it scares me.

What’s next ? What if one candidate decided to turn over all their emails ? We have seen Mrs Clinton’s for a period.  Why wouldn’t a candidate who was careful about what they wrote in their emails publish all of theirs and offered the “I did it, why won’t you ? What do you have to hide ? ” to the other candidates ? Or here are my detailed medical records and every medication I take. “What do you have to hide ” ?  Or better yet, here is my search history and every website I have looked at over the last 4 years.   “What do you have to hide ”

What do you mean you deleted them ? What are you a ……… (Fill in the blank any way you want )

It doesn’t matter if producing tax returns has become a “tradition”. It is a poor one that should not be part of the electoral process. The irony of course is that it is coming from candidates who have gone on continuous tirades about their love of and ability to interpret our Constitution.

When I hear Senator Cruz alleging Trump’s possible “mob connections”  being reveled by his tax returns, it scares me. A lot

It should scare you as well.  When the people running for the most important office in the world start trying to intimidate other candidates with “What do you have to hide”, the electoral process takes a significant hit. 

Will future candidates be dissuaded from running because they don’t want people to know how little they donated to charity ? Or will they be embarrassed by making too much or too little ? Or maybe it’s something else that is disclosed that none of us expected and might be considered embarrassing , but is completely reasonable ?

And if the question comes from a candidate that ends up becoming President, how can we trust they won’t use the same phrase again to intimidate one of us ? Or a future opposition candidate ?

So my suggestion to Donald Trump is to not be intimidated. Stand up for all of us and every future Presidential candidate and not provide your tax returns . You get audited every year like I do. If there is anything wrong it was the job of the IRS to find it, not the other candidates, the media or any of us.

And finally.  I have no idea if my tax returns are more or less complicated than Donald Trump’s.  I truly don’t know what is on my tax returns.  The people that work for me know and understand that I don’t like to pay taxes, but I’m not against it either. I truly believe that its patriotic to pay taxes.  So I tell them to be very conservative in making choices. But what I do hate is how much of that money is wasted on bureaucratic overhead.  But that is a blog post for another day.

For me, the days before my taxes are due go something like this: all my tax returns from what seems like all 50 states and all the federal forms are lined up around a long , long, long dining room table in my house. The signature pages are tabbed. Then I spend the better part of 45 minutes signing them till my hand cramps.

Do I read any of them ? Not a one.  I have to trust the big tax accounting firm I hire to get it right.

I have absolutely nothing to hide,  and if I ever run for President you will have to take my word for it and I hope every candidate for office says the exact same thing.

Read my words: My taxes are none of your business.