Entrepreneurship Party Introduction Speech
“The men and women that hold high places must be the first to start to mold a new reality closer to the heart” Neal Peart
The Entrepreneurship Party was founded on the simple principle that by helping people form and grow businesses as entrepreneurs you provide the economic foundation for all the other things a great and strong nation wishes to support.
The real tragedy of this current recession is not necessarily the financial losses on our bank statement and retirement accounts that we have all experienced, but the real tragedy is the loss of human potential. Too many people now are not energized to do the most with their lives.
One of the basic underlying beliefs of our party is that when you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, when you have the opportunity to start or join a business that follows your passion, all your thoughts break their bonds; your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction and you find yourself in a new, great and wonderful World. Dormant forces, faculties and talents become alive, and you discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be.
- More than anything else our party is about unleashing the massive under utilized human energy that is sitting dormant right now. Luckily for us we are not alone. There has been a movement starting for sometime. A movement of Everyday People (song plays here). Millions and millions of people are standing up for their best lives. So many people are refusing to play the victim and instead choosing to play victor. So many people are going deep within themselves to visit and conquer their fears. Hearts are opening right across this globe, and people are reclaiming the brilliant and wonderful parts of themselves that they lost as they grew up and became adults. It’s an extraordinary time to be alive. The whole World is becoming a better place to be. Actually, there’s never been a better time to be a human being.
One of the top human regrets is that you reach your last day with the brilliant song that your life was meant to be still silent within you. You reach your last day understanding that you missed the opportunity to catch the true joy of achievement because you bought into the lie that you had to be resigned to mediocrity.
It breaks my heart to think of all the people out there that have so much potential. That have so much inside of them but have succumbed to negativity and paralyzing fear.
Every year I live I am more convinced that the waste of life lies in the love we have not given, the powers we have not used, the selfish prudence that will risk nothing, and which, shirking pain, missed happiness as well.
I am so proud of the progress of our great country. We truly live in the greatest nation on Earth. We are so very lucky. In John Kennedy’s time less than 6% of American businesses were owned by women. Today we are approaching the significant milestone that nearly 50% of private businesses are owned by women. Women are forming new businesses at a faster rate than men. The reason that this is happening with women is the same reason entrepreneurship is growing across the board. Entrepreneurial small enterprises are unquestionably the engine of job creation and innovation in our country. Women are forming businesses in great numbers because doing so gives them a chance to follow their heart. To build a business doing something they love to do. It also provides greater opportunity to manage their schedules. To balance family and work. To work from home or from anywhere when necessary and workable. Isn’t this the FREEDOM that our forefathers spoke and wrote about so many years ago. There has never been a better time to be alive.
A vote for The Entrepreneurship Party platform or for E endorsed candidates is a vote for empowering women and minorities. A vote for empowering ALL people to be the best they can be. To live their most productive and happy lives possible.
A job of a leader is to unleash the power of the human spirit to be a force of good in the World. Our party is dedicated to this basic leadership principle.
Do not live your life as a timid soul, my friend. Get into the arena, forget about the critics, and play big with the gifts of your days. Life is short and the years will slip away very quickly, like grains of sand passing through your fingers. There is but one failure in life and that is the failure to try.
We are not only going to inspire people to lift themselves up off the ground to lead better lives but we are going to implement practical real innovations that make forming a business and growing an entrepreneurial business more easy than ever before.
People talk about the economy in very complicated terms many of which even the most advanced economists do not understand themselves. Well we approach things from a common sense point of view. We hope to lead a process of moving people away from thinking in terms of chaotic complexity to elegant simplicity. The way of looking at our economy is one example.
The economy is people trading goods and services. People are people. People have needs, wants and desires and there is always an entrepreneur, another person, out there ready, willing and able to supply the goods and services to meet those needs, wants and desires. All the other stuff. Banks, stock markets, accountants, lawyers, bureaucrats they are not the economy. They are only tools or in many cases obstacles to people who simply want to trade between themselves. I need my house painted. You would like some good wine. I make wine. You paint. You trade and both come away happier. The currency and all the other stuff are not the trade itself, not the real economy, the real economy is two people trading goods and or services with each other. Not so complicated when you break it down to those simple terms. Luckily for the our optimistic outlook on the potential for future economic growth we can count on one thing that is reliable. That is human nature. Human nature to have multiple needs, wants and desires has not changed much at all from the economic boom times of the late 1990’s. People are basically the same. All the potential for economic growth is basically the same. What is missing right now? Confidence. Consumer confidence and investor confidence. People started feeling bad and started to allow fear to lead them and in many ways that self created the recession we are in today. We believe that this loss of confidence was far more responsible for our economic downturn than anything done by Enron, banks, mortgage companies or Goldman Sachs.
The great news is that we can change that now. We can unleash positive energy. We can build confidence up with our leadership.
We have entered the era of the entrepreneur. Better yet the age of Social Entrepreneurship otherwise known as Conscious Capitalism. A trend of compassionate, generous, humanitarian action is spreading. Never has there been a better time to be alive.
Entrepreneurs are at the heart of the economy, pumping innovation through the system. Large bureaucracies, on the other hand, whether they belong to big corporations or government, are more like cholesterol – inhibiting the circulation of new products. Innovation most often is the result of unplanned trial-and-error learning that takes place among new enterprises. Failure is the greatest prompt to spur changes which result in innovative breakthroughs. Organized large scale government sponsored research and development efforts administered by large bureaucracies rarely create new breakthrough innovations. The Wright Brothers were two bicycle mechanics working in isolation.
To give a country it’s heart back. To rekindle the spirit of “us.” To provide a clear sense of common purpose. This is perhaps an insurmountable challenge in today’s environment of polarization and cutting harsh criticism and blame flying in all directions. But we are going to try. We are going to try because the American people deserve, need and crave inspirational leadership. We hope to make your spine tingle with our enthusiasm and idealism. Our goal is to make you more proud than ever to be an American and to reestablish America as the shining beacon of hope for all of mankind.
We want to establish a trust so that every single American truly believes we have their interest in mind. That their problems are understood. That their point of view is heard and considered and given full and fair weight in all decisions. In short we want ALL Americans to believe in the depths of their soul – that we care for them and we have love and compassion for them and their struggles. The struggle and suffering of any American is a heavy weight in the heart of any and all of the leaders of our party. We are a common ground party that seeks to serve the best we can ALL Americans. We are a party of “Everyday People.”
We would like to introduce to you The Entrepreneurship Party. The “E” Party. Focused on the big 5 priorities of promoting Entrepreneurship, Exports, Environment, Education for life and Efficiency and Excellence in the Delivery of Government Services. You can also call us the Executive Party if you wish because we initially are focused only on backing candidates for the executive positions of Governor and President. We believe the best Government, just like the best businesses, is a Government where the executive carefully weighs the considerations of the left and the right when making all decisions with the intent to make the best decision for all. We must weigh in all executive decisions not only the effect that the decision may have on job creation and economic growth but also on how it may affect the less advantaged in our population, the elderly, the sick, the minorities, the poor. Our party will give great weight to both sides in every decision as great executives always do. A third party founded on the principle of non-polarization. A party embracing with good spirit the best teachings of the Republican Party and the Democratic Party. We have the business sense of the Republican party and the compassion of the Democratic party. We are in many ways a political alliance of small businessman, ranchers and farmers with peace and love spiritual compassionate forces. A very modern California political alliance. We call our plan the Kindheart Lionheart plan. Kindheart standing for compassion. Lionheart for courage, strength and economic growth. The buzz words of our party are; Character, Caring, Class and Grace, Compassion, Courage, Courtesy, Determination, Forgiveness, Gratitude, Hard Work, Humility, Integrity, Opportunity, Optimism, Patience, Perseverance, Respect, Responsibility, Strength, Teaching-By-Example, Tolerance, Trust, Unity and vision.
Our vision?
A nation of energized entrepreneurs exporting and creating jobs!
People empowered to follow their dreams. To do what they love to do. We thus will gain as a society the great advantage of all unleashing all that great human energy that now is bottled up, to help grow our economy.
Entrepreneurs with good business plans can raise essential investment capital from investors within weeks with a simple 8 page form at minimal cost. In California we envision the California Stock Exchange based in San Francisco and cyberspace run by Charles Schwab Co. Anyone can invest in a California start up or small business via the internet. Small investments are encouraged. Red tape is eliminated. Middle men are eliminated. No accountants, lawyers, government bureaucrats involved or in the way.
1000X increase in microloan and microcredit facilities to finance start up and small businesses.
Super incentives for angel investors to invest in their neighbors companies.
Reduction of tax, regulatory, insurance, bureaucracy and legal cost burdens and delays for small businesses.
1000X increase assistance in helping entrepreneurs reach customers in the 96% of the world’s population that lives outside the USA. Expansion of the federal Export-Import Loan guarantee program which utilizes nearly no real dollars just a back up guarantee on paper only to private banks that is rarely if ever used. The federal program has a 97% success repayment rate. This program finances qualified buyers to buy U.S. made goods which creates jobs! Every $50,000 in exports creates a new job in the USA!
In California we hope to start www.eBuyCalifornia.com and www.eTheCaliforniaStore.com administered by EBay, Google, Yahoo, Facebook and Bing that serves to match foreign buyers with California sellers with financing options. Anyone anywhere that wants to buy anything can access this site easily to link with sellers from California. Designed to further promote exports!
A marketplace where consumers have the information to reward companies that do things right. Firms that treat their employees well and are good citizens of their communities and respect the environment.
We believe the future is social entrepreneurship otherwise known as conscious capitalism. We believe that this model is more sustainable with less up and down cycles. Doing well by doing good will become the norm instead of the exception. We believe this model of economics will help America remain the respected world leader for centuries to come.
We envision it will be understood clearly by modern day business leaders that being radically helpful to others is the best business model there is to sustain growth.
We envision education for life for all. Anything you learn from any source, in any form, at any place, at any time is eligible to qualify for college credit.
Every TV, computer, phone and video game console becomes a University satellite campus. Every library becomes a center of learning. Better yet every HOME becomes a center of education.
Learning is made to be a joy not a burden. Every student is given an identification card with their stated passion focus. Teachers are encouraged to design daily course work and homework around a student’s passion interest area.
We believe that teaching coping skills may be more important than any other course of study. The question isn’t whether students will face challenges in their life, especially their adult life. They certainly will. The key is what they will do with these difficulties. How will they handle themselves. If they are knocked down will they have the mental tools to get back up.
We believe in the simple principle of paying young students $2 each for each full book read and reported on in detail. Studies have shown that this works to increase reading comprehension by better than 30%. We could not make a better investment in our future than this one.
It is our belief that entrepreneurship education should begin in kindergarten and should be continued past graduate school throughout all of adulthood. Every library should become an entrepreneur’s resource center. An economic development center. A jobs creation and retraining center!
We believe protecting our environment ought to be second nature. Our lives depend on being able to breathe clean air and to drink healthy water. Our precious natural resources needed to be protected.
We believe when you come to a city center you park your internal combustion car at the outskirts and switch to electric carts (GO PODS) that are delivered like we received grocery carts at food markets now. We check them out travel a bit and check them back to a station where the next person that comes along is able to use it. This reduces congestion, parking issues and will significantly reduce pollution. It does not require much of an infrastructure investment at all. We foresee hiring Apple Computer to help us design the modernized Go-Pod car system which eventually will interlink with easy on-off access trains that connect cities. To begin we will keep it simple. Electric golf cart type vehicles in city limits where the speed limit is 35mph and under.
We envision great expansion of clean energy bus transit like we have in my hometown of Santa Monica, California. This requires little infrastructure change. What we need here most is enthusiastic inspiring leadership that encourages people to ride buses to reduce traffic congestion and pollution. Our party plans to provide that leadership.
We believe in healthy foods and healthy lifestyles.
We wish to promote in numerous ways sustainable farming practices and where possible and practical organic farming methods.
Regarding healthcare we envision a new emphasis on prevention. We advocate the use of “barefoot doctors” that work through existing outlets such as health clubs and even in neighborhoods door to door promoting healthy living practices.
We envision a healthcare marketplace where innovation improves care and reduces costs. Where free market checks and balances drive costs down and quality up.
We strongly support and believe in stem cell research, especially adult stem cell research.
If we are going to have one focus point on improving healthcare it should be eliminated the costs and obstacles to getting innovations to the healthcare marketplace. If we do this one thing we can count on investment to flow in this direction and for thousands of entrepreneurs to thus be working night and day to out perform each other in bringing the best innovations to improve care and reduce cost. Right now government is the problem in healthcare not the solution
We need to reduce legal and insurance expenses across the board in all forms for all.
Regarding government. We believe all social laws should be moved to the local city level. You choose what is right for you. Communities are already developing in this manner. It makes sense to go with the stream. If you want to have high taxes and high services, gay marriages and marijuana clinics you may choose one community and if you want low taxes and conservative social laws you may choose another. This is what democracy was supposed to be about right? It is silly now where we will pass a social law in D.C. and Sacramento and expect to have it fit in every city in the nation. We learned long ago by observing the Soviet Union that centralized elite group planning by a few isolated individuals hundreds or thousands of miles away, does not work. The Journey song Anyway You Want It applies here. On a city by city level. Where YOU live level. It is now “Anyway you want it that’s the way you get it”
We believe in reducing defense spending. Do we really need 50,000 troops in Germany? Right now our defense spending equals the total of the next 25 countries combined. It seems we could still be safe if we had the defense spending of just the next 12 countries in the world combined instead of 25. We believe we should get out of Afghanistan and Iraq as soon as possible. We believe in supporting our troops. We believe in investing in modern technology especially modern advanced aircraft. We just believe there is room to cut without reducing safety.
Regarding government, we do not believe a great nation takes the music instruments away from our kids and cancels their sports programs and physical education. We do not believe a great nation cancels the pensions of their fire fighters and policemen that have risked their lives all their working lives to protect us. We do not believe a great nation lets our schools, roads, bridges and airports decay from neglect. We do not believe that a great nation fails in honoring our elderly, our disabled, and our veterans that have returned from war.
We do believe in reducing bureaucracy and un-compassionate expenses related to government. We strongly believe the private sector and small enterprises in particular should be used to deliver every public service that can possibly be jobbed out to the private sector. The cry from every government office suite should be “prove it cannot be subcontracted out to a more efficient more customer service oriented private company”!
We believe the great benefit of making economic growth and exports the focal point is that you CAN have lower tax rates by percent of income yet higher revenues for spending on all compassionate causes when you do it right. We had in the late 1990’s. We can do it again this time even better!
Our vision is a nation of people excited to be alive. A healthy nation. A people grateful and proud to be part of the greatest country on earth. People energized to start and build businesses following their dreams and passions. Doing good things to help people and getting rewarded for it. We believe there has never been a better time to be alive!
We suggest as a basic principle of our party that being great at business, being a great entrepreneur, and thus leading our way out of the doldrums of this recession, is all about a glorious focus on people. Believing in them. Engaging them. Bonding with them. Serving them. And celebrating them. If you’re really serious about helping us win and overcoming this recession, join us in becoming a walking, talking, living, breathing hub radiating positive energy, excellence and kindness to every person.
Thank you for your continued support! Let’s electrify the rest of the nation and the world with our love, generosity, compassion and excitement!
I’ll leave you with a quote from Margaret Mead “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” These are such words of truth.
Goodnight everyone.
Please Click Play to Listen to Our Intro Speech
Credits: Selected paragraphs of this speech are adapted from language found in the following books by Ronald Brownstein and Robin Sharma. These books may be purchased at www.kindheartlionheart.com