Cadets and bankruptcy

[HockeyDad]

1 hour ago, Jeff Ream said:

i dont see any glamorizing anything. i see a lot of brutal honesty pointing out well documented flaws that led to legal action

I see comparisons to a tragic Shakespearean figure or a Greek tragedy to be glamorizing.  Maybe that’s just me. I see a snake oil salesman who finally got caught. 

[garfield]

My screen name, almost as old as DCP, is in honor of the corps.  Their performances consistently ranked the corps in top positions with me, with only a few exceptional years.  The alumni I know are at the same time crushed and unsurprised.

The G7

Thank GOD for the O-13 (the Other 13), led by a big, affable, and tenacious Italian corps director in Jersey and his friends, who had the ball-bearings to fight back in the most creative of ways to derail the DCI coup and takeover.  My appreciation of their corps' performances aside, I would appreciate a word from the humble-pie-stuffed mouths of the other six corps of the notorious group who held the G7 document and its (half) creator above their heads like a proverbial Will Smith at the Spartacus opener.  At this time, poignantly, the rest of the activity's "leaders" would show considerable humility, direction of focus, and unity if they were to proclaim to be ever vigilant against the potential damage from a too-powerful ego.  That Sparta-Hop's has now been all but killed leaves the door open for a new concerted effort to root out the rot and pledge activity-wide to DFTK.  His involvement and his corps' demise permit the survivors to build anew on top of the foundational bones of the old, just the same as in Spartacus' Rome.  

My hunch is that DCI is next (see below) and, when it itself becomes part of the rubble foundation of the drum corps' history, the remaining leadership of the activity will want the trust and patience of the fans while they rebuild the "show producer" function of DCI, the organization.  They'll go a long way toward earning that trust, IMO, if those remaining corps now become the real nails in the Cadets/Hop coffin by pledging to never again let such hubris by one or two beguile others into a coup mentality.

DCI's "deep pockets"

DCI has $12mm in the bank?  Seriously?  I haven't paid much attention in recent years but, back when I was active pre-2021, I don't remember accounting for a single year where DCI has a 5-digit balance in the bank.  In fact, their ultimate stated goal for years was to build a $500m cushion in their budget; to the best of my memory, they never attained that goal.  So, where'd this cash come from?  Ahh... Covid Cash.  I remember the talk at the time:  DCI needed funds to keep a tour operation going even though there were no shows to pay in to keep it going.  Huh?  So, DCI needed to sustain itself when it had no job to do for two, frightful summers?  So they took gratuitous tax dollars, got it.  So many thieves, IMO.  The corps created DCI to promote shows so, if the corps couldn't perform shows, what was DCI needed to do?  I understand paying a staff or two to maintain relationships, etc was important but, otherwise, it should have been shut down and stripped to the bones, 50th anniversary or not.  This kind of financial foolishness is exactly of the type that has the activity as a whole but a few coffin nails away from demise.  I can kind-of justify the corps themselves taking free taxpayer stimulus (kind of: no tour = few expenses) but I've felt from first hearing it that DCI was gaming the Covid system to the detriment of taxpayers and it smelled as bad as socks at the end of the season.

The irony is that by taking the money and finally getting their "cushion" (about one year's tour expenses) DCI has made themselves a target in a deep-pockets lawsuit looking to reimburse attorneys for expenses (and hoped-for payday) if not for restitution to the actual victims.  Karma, truly.  It makes me chuckle that their cushion could be so short-lived and the remaining corps will be right back in the same position of having to fund a tour company to organize their shows even while they claim every dollar is needed to design, write, teach, and perform them.  Their reliance on "someone else" accomplishing the cushion goal might well leave them in exactly the same position of having no cushion at all in DCI.  

Again, on bended knee, they should swear an oath to the Jacobs-idol to never again let the ramblings of a known lunatic drive their decisions or egos.  It never ends well.

Insurance to Cover

Ream has made the apt point twice now and it can't be skipped (because, I'll say it: if Jeff and a few others spotted it, you know the sharp insurance company attorneys will, too): the event at the center of THIS case happened at a non-sanctioned, non-sponsored event where a group of like-minded corps participants gathered for fun.  It wasn't a "company event", reportedly.  Liability insurance covers the insured's events, not casual gatherings where attendance was optional and spontaneous.  Estoppel laws would prevent overlapping liability and, obviously, insuring against the antics of 128 high-school aged knuckleheads while on official corps business is hard (and expensive) enough.  I've watched enough insurance scam YT videos to think that, in all likelihood, DCI's liability insurance didn't apply and, instead, it's the accused's personal liability insurance (if any) that would protect an accused while not on "company business", not the coverage provided to the company for when he/she was on company business.  EDIT:  If DCI's liability coverage won't pay for litigation or damage settlements, then that $12mm bank balance has a target on it.

So, I see the Wiley-Coyote-eyed attorneys focused in on DCI's bank balance and smelling blood.  I won't be at all surprised to see the next marching shoe to drop being DCI's "cushion" significantly eaten up by defense and settlement costs.

In a double irony way, if I'm right and, if DCI survives the attack, it will be left penniless, wholly dependent on the gate revenue produced by the remaining corps performing shows with no financial cushion against calamity. IOW, exactly as it's been for mostly every year of DCI's existence prior to the pandemic pennies from heaven.  It will again be left up to the leadership of performing corps to craft the new DCI into the image it needs and wants to produce a tour.

Let's hope they keep the G7 debacle, and my hoped-for humility, front and center of their minds as they do.

Lastly, to Cadets2000, your disgust and exasperation at the whole is just like that which drove me away from active participation a few years ago.  Let it happen.  It's OK to walk away and even fashionable now to proactively stop buying products from companies whose actions turn your stomach.  As a very good friend of mine said as I was headed out the door, "There are other things" that will fill the hole left by finally calling the spade and walking away.  You'll broaden by the action more than the feeling of the loss of something precious.  I, and many others, can attest to it.  And, at the same time, don't cancel your DCP account but, instead, reduce your drum corps habit down to a few times a year to check in and see if anything has changed (in drum corps if not in DCP).  One never knows: three-peats happen, (We Are) The Future wins and, sometimes, Angels defeat the Demons after the bloody battle.  It's worth checking in now and then.

Edited April 5 by garfield

[jwillis35]

23 minutes ago, HockeyDad said:

I see comparisons to a tragic Shakespearean figure or a Greek tragedy to be glamorizing.  Maybe that’s just me. I see a snake oil salesman who finally got caught. 

I agree and I think that's how most of us viewed him. 

[Jeff Ream]

26 minutes ago, kdaddy said:

A DCP/RAMD user criticized GH way back in 2002 for adding the "under god" portion in the show. We all saw what it was - a ploy to get fans to cheer after the ballad. But the user took it a step further, saying that "GH does not believe in god, he's a <X>." I can't remember what the X was, but it might have been one of the self religions like Landmark.

And I assume the Landmark teachings are the basis for the 2007 show.

This is straying off the topic of Cadets + Bankruptcy, but I guess it's more evidence of the bizarre personality that went of the rails in so many ways. 

so Landmark taught you that magical things happened when you touched your trumpet?

 

after the hash marks were repainted of course

[Jeff Ream]

30 minutes ago, HockeyDad said:

I see comparisons to a tragic Shakespearean figure or a Greek tragedy to be glamorizing.  Maybe that’s just me. I see a snake oil salesman who finally got caught. 

i dont see anyone giving him a pass though.

[HockeyDad]

6 minutes ago, Jeff Ream said:

so Landmark taught you that magical things happened when you touched your trumpet?

 

Interesting word choice. So many possible responses. 

[HockeyDad]

1 minute ago, Jeff Ream said:

i dont see anyone giving him a pass though.

Quit moving the goal posts on me. First you said you don’t see anyone glamorizing. Now you say you don’t see anyone giving him a pass. You’re killing me. 

[Jeff Ream]

25 minutes ago, garfield said:

My screen name, almost as old as DCP, is in honor of the corps.  Their performances consistently ranked the corps in top positions with me, with only a few exceptional years.  The alumni I know are at the same time crushed and unsurprised.

The G7

Thank GOD for the O-13 (the Other 13), led by a big, affable, and tenacious Italian corps director in Jersey and his friends, who had the ball-bearings to fight back in the most creative of ways to derail the DCI coup and takeover.  My appreciation of their corps' performances aside, I would appreciate a word from the humble-pie-stuffed mouths of the other six corps of the notorious group who held the G7 document and its (half) creator above their heads like a proverbial Will Smith at the Spartacus opener.  At this time, poignantly, the rest of the activity's "leaders" would show considerable humility, direction of focus, and unity if they were to proclaim to be ever vigilant against the potential damage from a too-powerful ego.  That Sparta-Hop's has now been all but killed leaves the door open for a new concerted effort to root out the rot and pledge activity-wide to DFTK.  His involvement and his corps' demise permit the survivors to build anew on top of the foundational bones of the old, just the same as in Spartacus' Rome.  

My hunch is that DCI is next (see below) and, when it itself becomes part of the rubble foundation of the drum corps' history, the remaining leadership of the activity will want the trust and patience of the fans while they rebuild the "show producer" function of DCI, the organization.  They'll go a long way toward earning that trust, IMO, if those remaining corps now become the real nails in the Cadets/Hop coffin by pledging to never again let such hubris by one or two beguile others into a coup mentality.

DCI's "deep pockets"

DCI has $12mm in the bank?  Seriously?  I haven't paid much attention in recent years but, back when I was active pre-2021, I don't remember accounting for a single year where DCI has a 5-digit balance in the bank.  In fact, their ultimate stated goal for years was to build a $500m cushion in their budget; to the best of my memory, they never attained that goal.  So, where'd this cash come from?  Ahh... Covid Cash.  I remember the talk at the time:  DCI needed funds to keep a tour operation going even though there were no shows to pay in to keep it going.  Huh?  So, DCI needed to sustain itself when it had no job to do for two, frightful summers?  So they took gratuitous tax dollars, got it.  So many thieves, IMO.  The corps created DCI to promote shows so, if the corps couldn't perform shows, what was DCI needed to do?  I understand paying a staff or two to maintain relationships, etc was important but, otherwise, it should have been shut down and stripped to the bones, 50th anniversary or not.  This kind of financial foolishness is exactly of the type that has the activity as a whole but a few coffin nails away from demise.  I can kind-of justify the corps themselves taking free taxpayer stimulus (kind of: no tour = few expenses) but I've felt from first hearing it that DCI was gaming the Covid system to the detriment of taxpayers and it smelled as bad as socks at the end of the season.

The irony is that by taking the money and finally getting their "cushion" (about one year's tour expenses) DCI has made themselves a target in a deep-pockets lawsuit looking to reimburse attorneys for expenses (and hoped-for payday) if not for restitution to the actual victims.  Karma, truly.  It makes me chuckle that their cushion could be so short-lived and the remaining corps will be right back in the same position of having to fund a tour company to organize their shows even while they claim every dollar is needed to design, write, teach, and perform them.  Their reliance on "someone else" accomplishing the cushion goal might well leave them in exactly the same position of having no cushion at all in DCI.  

Again, on bended knee, they should swear an oath to the Jacobs-idol to never again let the ramblings of a known lunatic drive their decisions or egos.  It never ends well.

Insurance to Cover

Reem has made the apt point twice now and it can't be skipped (because, I'll say it: if Jeff and a few others spotted it, you know the sharp insurance company attorneys will, too): the event at the center of THIS case happened at a non-sanctioned, non-sponsored event where a group of like-minded corps participants gathered for fun.  It wasn't a "company event", reportedly.  Liability insurance covers the insured's events, not casual gatherings where attendance was optional and spontaneous.  Estoppel laws would prevent overlapping liability and, obviously, insuring against the antics of 128 high-school aged knuckleheads while on official corps business is hard (and expensive) enough.  I've watched enough insurance scam YT videos to think that, in all likelihood, the corps' liability insurance didn't apply and, instead, it's the accused's personal liability insurance (if any) that would protect an accused while not on "company business", not the coverage provided to the company for when he/she was on company business.

So, I see the Wiley-Coyote-eyed attorneys focused in on DCI's bank balance and smelling blood.  I won't be at all surprised to see the next marching shoe to drop being DCI's "cushion" significantly eaten up by defense and settlement costs.

In a double irony way, if I'm right and, if DCI survives the attack, it will be left penniless, wholly dependent on the gate revenue produced by the remaining corps performing shows with no financial cushion against calamity. IOW, exactly as it's been for mostly every year of DCI's existence prior to the pandemic pennies from heaven.  It will again be left up to the leadership of performing corps to craft the new DCI into the image it needs and wants to produce a tour.

Let's hope they keep the G7 debacle, and my hoped-for humility, front and center of their minds as they do.

Lastly, to Cadets2000, your disgust and exasperation at the whole is just like that which drove me away from active participation a few years ago.  Let it happen.  It's OK to walk away and even fashionable now to proactively stop buying products from companies whose actions turn your stomach.  As a very good friend of mine said as I was headed out the door, "There are other things" that will fill the hole left by finally calling the spade and walking away.  You'll broaden by the action more than the feeling of the loss of something precious.  I, and many others, can attest to it.  And, at the same time, don't cancel your DCP account but, instead, reduce your drum corps habit down to a few times a year to check in and see if anything has changed (in drum corps if not in DCP).  One never knows: three-peats happen, (We Are) The Future wins and, sometimes, Angels defeat the Demons after the bloody battle.  It's worth checking in now and then.

for clarification only one season without shows happened. 21 was a short tour plus Indy and no super regionals, but there were shows and money did come in for 2021

[JimF-LowBari]

34 minutes ago, HockeyDad said:

I see comparisons to a tragic Shakespearean figure or a Greek tragedy to be glamorizing.  Maybe that’s just me. I see a snake oil salesman who finally got caught. 

Thinking more like Gotterdammerung where the head burned down everything around him. And this final mess could have occurred during the GH trial and publicity 

[Jeff Ream]

3 minutes ago, HockeyDad said:

Interesting word choice. So many possible responses. 

i often sevre them up and see how people go from there. you caught on to my trick.

Edited April 4 by Jeff Ream