Payback

The Bureau for Correction of Naval Records, on appeal, rationalized that they could ignore facts and law because (1) I had received a free education which overrides the constitution and laws of the United States, and (2) the Academy had falsified personnel records to cover up a crime. The BCNR had a distorted perception that my loyalty was to the Navy as opposed to the Constitution and laws of the United States and the taxpayers who funded my education at USNA - which one upperclassman described as getting a $60,000 education (1966 dollars) shoved up your ass a nickel at a time.

Since leaving the Academy I have given the taxpayers one of the highest returns on investments of any graduate in monetary terms. I cannot match the classmates who gave their lives. Some of the highlights...

For openers, I received Outstanding Volunteer Social Worker of the Year award in 1977 in Chicago for work with court appointed Minors in Need of Supervision.

In 1985 as a VP and manager for Merrill in Dallas I was introduced to my 5 year old daughter's best friend in church school who was one of 3 children and a single mother working as a waitress and living in a small one bedroom apartment in a rough neighborhood. Her bedroom was a 3x5 closet. I made the down payment and closing costs and guaranteed the loan including making late payments on a small house in a decent neighborhood in Phoenix, the mother's home town. Those children went on to lead productive lives.

I was subsequently invited to NYC as one of a team of consultants to analyze the real estate assets of one of the largest investment banking firms in NYC. In short, we put an end to some unsavory real estate practices.

I was engaged as a real estate consultant to analyze a $380 million dollar non-recourse affordable housing development in 1998 in NYC which had already received preliminary approval from HUD. My report detailed an exaggerated (a generous term) submission that would have resulted in non-recourse loan proceeds to the developer (the Trump Organization) in excess of $100 million higher than comparable, adjacent developments under construction while simultaneously shorting the program for the required proportion of affordable units on a square footage basis. HUD then cancelled the loan after reviewing my analysis saving taxpayers in excess of $100 million. Trump expressed anger in the NY Times at the final HUD rejection. It was the equivalent of a bank robbery that was 20 times the size of the infamous Lufthansa heist, but done with an attorney rather than a gun.

And since leaving the Academy I have engaged in countless charitable events for both our troops and less fortunate members of society.

Those are the highlights. And I do believe that the taxpayers have gotten their money's worth.