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TOM FITZGERALD led a Huckleberry Finn childhood on the St. Lawrence River before undertaking formal studies in physics, mathematics, law, industrial management, and English. He has served as a door-to-door salesman of home-study courses, a vocational counselor for adults and children with developmental disabilities, a stockbroker, the assistant to the president of a large health-care corporation, a lobbyist, a technical writer, a corporate manager, a substitute teacher, and a writing instructor.
Tom served as a Navy UDT/SEAL during the Vietnam era, and has swum several long distances, including across the eastern end of Lake Ontario. Once also an avid runner, Tom ran the Boston Marathon three times before a fall on black ice abruptly ended a life-long addiction to endorphins. Tom and his wife of 45 years, a marriage and family therapist, have three grown sons and three grandsons. They live in New England.
(1 comments) SHARE Thursday, March 1, 2012 "Dear Mister Obama"
We live in a cynical and divided nation. This essay posits a reason for Mister Obama's failure as a "Yes We Can' change-agent, and suggests what he must do -- what he must be -- if he (or his successor) is to bring a nation of South-Going Zaks (red states) and North-Going Zaks (blue states) into common cause.