POST SCRIPTS

Twenty years ago a good friend of mine owned an auto parts store and a car dealership. He was in partnership with another man. Their business got into trouble when the partner was arrested for drugs. I loaned my friend $10k to keep his doors open and cover most of the excise tax owed to the state. This other partner being involved in drugs set off a whole string of nasty events and rumors. Of course it rightly landed the man in jail and unfortunately my friend who had done nothing wrong, wound up in bankruptcy.

I was given a used car from the car lot as payment for the 10k debt and so that part ended ok for me, but it also deepened my connection. There's more...about 4 months prior to all this hitting the fan, I had also bought a car through the lot and another car, after the arrest went down. Both were just deals that anyone else could have bought for the same price.

There is one more suspicious thing here, I owned a rental limo at this time as a part-time business and so did my friend. As a result, we shared space at his car lot to take reservations and we shared the cost of advertising. The guy who went down for the drugs was also a half owner of my friends limo, not mine, however the connection was made. That added another layer of connection. So, what do you think? Is this really bad or what?

If you connected all these dots you can make anything you want out of it. That opens up the possibility for a lot of speculation and rumors! At the time the rumors really did fly too, but after an intensive investigation no charges were ever filed against my friend and certainly none against me. I've done a number of much, much larger personal loans over the years to local individuals and local businesses, however they never generated any controversy. Most of the bigger loans were just short term "bridge" loans involving real estate.

Let me you give you this classic example of mud, I think I mentioned this one earlier, but it's worth repeating: When Assemblyman Bernie Richter was running against Lon Hatamyia., Hatamyia did this hit piece that came out in the 11th hour of the race. By carefully parsing his words he took a non-event where a transient urinating on the back wall of a building, became (and I am paraphrasing: "Bernie Richter was mentioned in a police report involving lewd behavior at a children's arcade business owned by him." Bernie called in to report the drunk...that's all. This is the kind of junk that keeps people from running for office. They don't want to suffer this kind of character assassination, and it's why Bernie always said, "If you run for office, your skin better be about an inch thick!" I believe it too! But, then ol Bernie was right about a lot of things.