America She’s a Great Country

Kudos and congratulations to TD friend Michael Jaliman, who scored an unexpected, yet decisive victory in the Democratic primary for the Congressional seat in New York’s 19th Congressional District. Shameless political plug to follow; you’ll see why in context.
Mike beat the candidate of the establishment Democratic Party up there (Putnam County and parts of Dutchess, Orange, Rockland, and upper Westchester Counties), and appears to have done so by over 20 percentage points in a race with a high turnout for this kind of primary (the winner gets to face five-term incumbent Republican Sue Kelly!).
Your talking dog is pleased that it was none other than he (pause for shudders about referring to self in third person) who had originally suggested this run for Mike. He was, literally, pondering what to do with the rest of his life. He has an interesting background that includes being a staunch anti-Vietnam War activist as student body president at the U. of Wisconsin, and later, got an M.B.A. from Harvard (Mike tells me the President’s intellectual acumen would have made him stand out at the Harvard Business School, and not in a good way). Mike has been a management consultant for major consultancies, giant corporations, and governmental organizations, and has lots of good public spirited stuff in there too.
Like your TD, Mike has a 9-11 connection himself: he was lucky to have not beein in his office (he was a management consultant to a Japanese bank) on the 49th floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center (which I got to watch explode from 100 yards or so away at 100 Church Street). Twenty people from his company were killed that day; for a few days, I actually thought Mike was one of them.
Anyway, earlier this year, your talking dog suggested, “Well, you could always run for Congress.” Little did I expect the call a few days later that County Democratic leaders had encouraged him to run as well, and a campaign was born. The rest may become the stuff of political legend. We’ll see if Mike can take his maverick style (social liberal, fiscal conservative, foreign policy expert) all the way to an upset victory for the (traditionally Republican) Congressional seat.
America, she’s a great country.