President Obama recently announced an ambitious plan for a new system of high-speed rail service that would run on 10 corridors across the United States, connecting many population centers. The planned routes would have the potential to change the way large numbers of people travel, much like the construction of the interstate highway system did a half-century ago. High-speed rail is defined as a rail line that reaches at least 90 miles per hour. There is currently only one such line operating in the U.S., Amtrak’s Acela Express, which runs between Boston and Washington.

For state and regional association executives and sports-event organizers concerned about the ease with which people can travel to meetings and events and for destinations that have suffered reductions in air service, high-speed rail may be a godsend. For more information on the proposed high-speed rail routes, visit www.fra.dot.gov.

A final reminder: The July issue of Association News and SportsTravel will include a special section titled Why Meetings Matter: Everybody Wins When Groups Travel. Produced in conjunction with Destination Marketing Association International, this special section will be distributed at numerous industry events during the coming year. For more information or to advertise in this special section, please e-mail me or call us toll-free at (877) 577-3700.

Tim Schneider
Schneider Publishing Company

I spent almost 40 years in the association management and trade show business. It was an exciting, stimulating adventure. There were, of course, some ups and downs, but all in all it was a great fulfilling ride.

Do I have any regrets? Yes, I do, but only two. First, I regret that I did not continue some kind of regular exercise program. You know the story: I was always too busy. Even though I constantly lectured people that there were 168 hours in a week and if you broke it down there was time to do anything you really wanted to do, I did not follow my own advice.

There were those middle years when I was still full of energy and woke up at four or five in the morning and started to jog. It lasted for a while and then I got “busy.”

A little further along I played some tennis, but just playing once a week with no additional program to say in shape wasn’t very effective.

Then, in my later years, I said, “I’ll really do it when I retire.” I have tried but quite honestly I’ve developed too many handicaps and you can’t, at this late date, get in the kind of shape you always thought you could.

My wife had a very long and active career in the apparel industry—no easy gig. At the same time she made the time to swim a mile four or five days a week. In semi-retirement, she added weight training and other aerobic exercises and cut back on swimming. The difference in her conditioning and physical shape has been overwhelming.

The other regret was that in looking back I think I short-changed my family somewhat. Yes, work was my first priority, but like the exercise program I was always too busy for, I didn’t set aside regular time with the family. It doesn’t even take days or weeks. It can be simple things like spending some time alone with each child—going to breakfast, seeing a movie, visiting a museum, anything.

There is another idea that I believe has a lot of merit: family night. Any night will do. Everyone comes home for dinner and spends the evening together, playing games and talking—no TV.

It’s a pretty good life when all you can come up with are two regrets.

What do you think?

I know you’re busy, stretched in a dozen different directions, but don’t let this amazing time of historical transformation pass you. Regardless of your political affiliation or leanings you need to absorb the impact that we are living in probably the most transformative time in American politics and government.

Think about what has happened in the last two years. This kind of change was unimaginable just a few years ago.

It all started with the presidential election, a uniquely historic event in a number of ways that will affect politics for many years to come. It’s not important who you voted for or if you voted at all. I don’t believe we have ever had an election like it. Consider the extraordinary moments:

• Hillary Clinton was an absolute shoe-in up until the winter of 2007/08

• John McCain was written off as a primary candidate in the summer of 2007 and again as a presidential candidate in the summer of 2008
• Barack Obama was not only the first electable African-American candidate, but also:
  • He came from nowhere with little experience and no strong party backing and captured the imagination and fervor of an exploding electoral base

  • He ran what I believe was the most effective campaign we have ever witnessed by utilizing the Internet to its fullest and by preaching the mantra of “change” that you could interpret any way you wanted
  • The campaign talked only in generalities with very few specifics. It worked unlike most campaigns in my lifetime. We probably knew less about how he might govern than any other elected president
• Then there was Sarah Palin. Talk about coming out of the blue. Forget whether you agree with her politics or her qualifications, she electrified the sinking campaign of John McCain and energized a huge supportive base of support like no one else who has ever popped up on the horizon

What an election cycle—wow!

Now we have finished the traditional first 100 days and it has been nothing like the first 100 days we have ever seen before. It’s unbelievable. Think about it:

• Obama is still campaigning. He is everywhere, every day, preaching his message with his convincing personality. Again and again we hear plans sketched in broad generalities with few or no specifics.

  There have been three “press conferences” in the first 100 days—More than any previous president has held. But they have not been press conferences as we have ever seen before. They have been carefully orchestrated opportunities for the president to expand. Each conference has had 13 questions from pre-selected correspondents in about 45 minutes. In other “press conferences” there probably would have been 30 or more questions in 45 minutes in what would have seemed a lot more like a free for all.

• The Obama White House has sketched out the most far-reaching significant programs to transform education, energy and health insurance. They have come with requests for huge funding without a real plan.

  In effect they have said to Congress, pass our funding requests and then you write a plan. Without the pressing economic crisis they probably could not have gotten away with this approach. The have cleverly portrayed these proposals as a way to help our long-term economic growth.

• The administration addressed the current economic crisis in the housing debacle, the moribund banking industry and the big three auto makers, and their approach has been pretty much the same: Propose broad principles of reform, throw a ton of money at it (the “Disneyland Solution”) and work out the details later.

  Obama’s Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, has said what appears to be the guiding principle of this administration so far, “never let the opportunity of a crisis pass you by.”

• In the process of all of this activity our president has taken on the presence of a rock star and created more adulation in the U.S. and all over the world than we have ever seen or probably ever will again. It is magical and it has served him well.

You may or may not agree with all this administration is trying to do, but it is transformative. As Katy Kay of the BBC said, “They are rearranging the furniture of government.”

We are witnesses to the most amazing period of historical transformation in our history. Don’t be too busy to let it pass you by.

What do you think?