• THE FAMILY-BUSINESS SUCCESSION LAYER OF ESTATE PLANNING IS FAR MORE COMPLICATED than most business owners contemplate, involving several sets of stakeholders with different expectations: owners, family, family-owners, family-staff, staff-owners, and key managerial staff. Two-thirds of family-owned businesses never make it into the 2^nd generation (and 85% are gone by the 3^rd) for reasons starting with failure to consider complicated and critical factors including: (1) timelines and “every possible iteration of failure you can think of – like divorce, death, mental incapacity”; (2) keeping outside parties from capacity to micromanage business operations; (3) the emotional reactions and ongoing interactions stemming from normal interpersonal conflicts of family members. DCG have decades of experience dealing with this tricky area. Call for courtesy consultation in the process before your reality check bounces!   [BLOOMBERG BUSINESSWEEK – Apr 25, 16]

• TROUBLE SLEEPING IN A DIFFERENT BED WHEN TRAVELLING is a common problem known as “first night effect.” Newest research at Brown University found the reason is that our “left hemisphere brain remains awake to process information detected in the surrounding environment… something of a neurological night-watchman: to wake people up when they hear noises when sleeping in an unfamiliar place – even one with a comfy king-size bed, Jacuzzi, deluxe minibar and a distinct lack of predators.” By the second night, if a person stays in the same room, they ‘tend to sleep more soundly,” so for first-night help, many travelers rely on Ambien – a short-acting medication which, in 5mg dosage, “works quickly, usually within 15 minutes… with a slight muscle-relaxant property… has a short half-life of two to three hours,” and with generally negligible “next morning impairment,” according to Wikipedia. [THE ECONOMIST – Apr 23, 16]

• THE AVERAGE AMERICAN NOW SPENDS “AROUND 10 HOURS DAILY consuming one form of entertainment or another (TV, radio, smartphone, computer internet)… and young people are the most ‘plugged in’… being relentlessly pounded with ‘values’ directly opposed to those America was founded on.” A Harvard University survey found over half those under age 30 do not support capitalism; a thousand-person Frank Luntz poll found 58% “believed socialism to be the more compassionate political system” (ergo the Bernie Sanders phenomenon) with half attributing ‘greed’ as being the “root of America’s problem.” Reality is that media-promoted entertainment combined with our failing educational system – from kindergarten thru college now having become “indoctrination centers for the progressive movement – we are losing an entire generation of young people” becoming more liberal when it comes to economics, politics and social values without understanding (or caring) how socialism has destroyed every nation which embraced it. (Most recent is Venezuela which currently has “no diapers, car parts, aspirin… and is experiencing the chaos of unbridled inflation”). Meanwhile, political focus is predominantly on personalities and/or religious beliefs, versus perspective on policies which will indeed determine the culture of our future.   [ZEROHEDGE – April 28, 16]

• LAST WEEK MAY HAVE SIGNALED “THE LAST PERIOD OF BRITAIN AS THE HOME OF FREE PEOPLE WHO WILLINGLY CHOSE THEIR OWN DESTRUCTION… by electing a new mayor with close ties to jihadis, Islamic supremacists & Jew-haters… who has been censured repeatedly by British media regulators for extremism – all evident selling points for appealing to an increasingly Muslim electorate within the population and growing… These are days of triumph for Islamic imperialists and Sharia enforcers across the U.K… with London buses (the same ones bombed in July 2005 attacks) set to carry ads proclaiming ‘the Glory of Allah’… At the same time, many Jews (including the Chief Rabbi of London) were prohibited from voting by a suspicious and never-explained ‘error’ at the area’s polling stations… It’s a cautionary tale: While America sleeps, the Left and its Islamic supremacist allies are working hard to render the 1st Amendment a dead letter… essentially soft sharia enforcement: the prohibition of any criticism of Islam and of anything offensive to Islam & Muslim sensibilities.”  [BREITBART.COM – May 10, 16]   “America’s newest form of intolerance is Fascism pretending to be manners” according to George Carlin [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkhUivqzWv0 ] 

• POLITICAL CORRECTNESS NUTCASE OF THE MONTH: A right-wing extremist who killed 77 people won his suit against the Norwegian State for “inhumane breach of his rights… and degrading treatment, including isolation from other inmates and inadequate consideration of his mental impact during the killing spree.” Rules of the ‘European Convention on Human Rights,’ allowed a Nazi salute “to publicize his extremist ideology,” and the Court ruled that his solitary confinement (albeit a 3-room suite with windows, treadmill & TV) “could easily magnify his loneliness” so must be eased, then awarded $40,000 for legal costs.   [CNN.COM – Apr 20, 16]  

• THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK: The newest Israeli crowd-control device for violent protesters (far more effective than rubber bullets) is ‘skunk spray’ – an organic, non-toxic, foul-smelling mist which disperses mobs quickly and lingers for many weeks to discourage return behavior. [ https://www.youtube.com/embed/H4_XZE3r3oU?rel=0 ]   A great solution to current violent political protest mobs on either side.