Qorvis Communications

I am a Qorvis MSLGROUP transplant from Boston and like all other Bostonians, I was thrilled for Marathon Monday. It is a day that always makes me reflect back on my childhood when my family would plant ourselves on Beacon Street, order subs and set up a table to pass out water to the thousands of runners going by.

This Marathon Monday was different. As I was in a meeting, I heard my co-worker say “There was an explosion at the finish line of the Boston Marathon.”

My heart dropped.

It is hard to admit that Sen. Rand Paul, a darling of the Tea Party, had something important to say when he held the Senate floor in a 13-hour filibuster demanding to know whether the federal government had the authority to direct a drone strike to kill an American citizen on American soil without benefit of trial.

It would be fun if a president stood before the Joint Session of Congress and announced, “The State of the Union is terrible!” That, of course, isn’t what happens. Presidents declare to Congress and the nation that “the State of the Union is strong!” and then go on to assert all the things that need to be accomplished.

“I see the coolest [stuff] in the ad industry,” was a recent quote from Brain Grazer in FORTUNE Magazine to explain why he and Ron Howard want to move beyond Hollywood blockbusters and venture into the world of advertising. I felt it was one of the worst—and scarily one of the most common—reasons to get into the agency world.

Do I fault Grazer? Absolutely not.

On Jan. 31, 2013, I attended the Secretary of Defense nomination hearing of former Sen. Chuck Hagel. Lines were out the doors for security check-ins at the Dirksen Senate building. The hearing room was packed to the limit, with every chair full by 9 a.m. and many people standing along the sides by the time it started a half hour later.