Back In My Day: Civilized War – Horses

Yeah, you are probably thinking Goober’s finally lost his mind or has moved to the farm (I wish). Horses are the theme for today’s chapter, just probably not in the way you think. I will focus on four phrases/proverbs and then get to the riders in the current story.

Secular and Biblical Proverbs – Commonality

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.

This paraphrase of this original proverb going back to the 12th or the 16th century (John Heywood) depending on your historical beliefs, is a principle of our reality on earth. I imagine God thinks His version of it every nano second of every day and has since mankind was created. If we are honest with ourselves, we know it applies to us during many moments and periods of our lives. Scripture reveals throughout from Genesis to Revelation the principle of God providing everything needed for the people with their responses being to grumble and/or reject Him

Never look a gift horse in the mouth.

This one appears to go back to at least 400 AD and was also popularized in the 16th century by John Heywood’s book. For the Christian it leads to recalling The Parable of the Great Banquet found in Luke 14:15-24 among other parables and stories. God gave us all past, present future, Hebrew and Gentile; a great, open invitation to join Him in eternity. The gift horse was Jesus. Mankind needs to quit looking for excuses to not accept the gift such as the potential for bad teeth and diseased gums in the horse’s mouth. Accept the gift, doofus, join the party. Quit trying to find faults with the Secretariat Son of God to assuage your selfish choices.

Who wishes to travel far spares the steed.

The author Jean Baptiste Racine from the 17th century was attributed this phrase from one of his works. This one is simple to understand, yet, rarely practiced by those who destructively use others for personal purposes and gain. Adequate rest, meditation and nutrition are common themes throughout the Bible. The references are numerous. Jesus knew that the listeners who surrounded Him must be fed and cared for by the disciples. Feeding the masses and seeking rest for recovery was required. Fishes and loaves – look at the parables along with all of the other relevant passages. Even Jesus had to retreat from the crushing needs of the people He came to serve. He needed rest, nourishment and solitude to communicate with the Father. So do all of us. All of which many of us tend to avoid like a plague and will run on a treadmill until we fall dead to avoid it.

You are not a real horse rider until you have fallen off seven times.

A common expression with no known source, however, it is clearly a phrase that either originates from or aligns with Proverbs 24:16. “For though a righteous man falls seven times, he rises again.” What do we see here if Jesus is our horse for this example?

First, the rider needs to understand the horse and they then act in unison with each other, otherwise the horse will not let the rider climb or stay on its back. A sense of trust must be first developed with each other just like our relationship with Jesus. Second, even a good rider, a righteous man or woman, falls at times. In our example that implies the rider has to learn how and why the horse does what it does to enable them to ride for full effectiveness. It takes time, experience, and persistence with a yielded heart and mind to comprehend the full meaning behind the words and actions of Jesus and His disciples. Third, in the Bible the number seven signifies completion, perfection, exoneration, healing and fulfillment of promises. When a rider or believer falls seven times it does not mean sin or failure wins because each fall should teach the rider or believer something that leads to standing up, dusting oneself off, mounting up and trying again. The number seven is not to be taken literally for the number of falls allowed as it is simply representative of the principle of trying again after each failure. Finally, it is not until you have experienced the bumps, bruises and broken bones (figurative and literal) from riding the horse and falling many times that you will have become a real horse rider, or for this example, an effective disciple of Jesus.

CSB – The Horse

The overall CSB story during our time there has been explained from start to finish. The ownership violated every proverb from above. As a result their horse died.

The CSB Riders

The SCO: He had been with me in the industry for 14 years, starting as loan closer and underwriter, primarily for my financing requests. We shared many personal and occupational related successes and a few failures throughout our time together. However, during the last year of my employment I realized the Peter Principle had been fulfilled with him. He had reached his maximum point of competency and had even become an obstruction to the completion and implementation of the new operations platform as he felt, unjustifiably, it might usurp some of his authority and value. He saw the owners were clearly targeting me and so he quietly aligned with Judas, the Contractor and the Chairman. He was job scared, not fully realizing the owners had no ability to handle credit administration duties and the history of the loan customers in an operation that large without him. See the Senior Attorney section that follows to understand how far he was willing to go to protect his role.

He became the manager for the line of business at the regional bank that acquired the remnants of our operation. That lasted about a decade as the operation dwindled over time into a caretaker role. He was hired as a mid level credit officer by our former NSM. A place and role he will likely retain until retirement.

The NSM: He was my first production officer hire when I became the Eastern US Region Manager for Imperial Bank. He was already known as a future star in the industry, living and working out of the Carolinas. He was about twenty years younger than me and originally from the Boston area before moving to North Carolina after college in Virginia. He was married and starting a family with ambitious goals for his career, a strong work ethic and deal making mind. I assured him early in his employment with us that I saw a path to him taking my job. As a result, he stayed, gave his best efforts, was successful and took that job when we joined CSB. I arranged for him to have a seat on the industry’s trade association Board, which he has remained on for 16+ years.

He left CSB within a year of my termination and took a regional sales manager role in the industry with Wells Fargo for a year. That led to him being named the executive leader of the line of business for top 20 (in asset size) SunTrust Bank. He was there a half dozen years until they underwent a couple of large mergers and acquisitions that led to their renaming as Truist Bank, at which time he chose to get off the treadmill and become an executive officer with a specialty bank with a national outreach where he has remained for the past 7+ years.

The Division Senior Attorney: She came into our operation to handle all of the loan closings during our first full year of operations. Young, highly intelligent, talented and motivated to succeed; she built a legal and loan closing operation that was the envy of the industry in a manner that many larger banks adopted. Unfortunately, she and her podiatrist husband whom she met growing up and later married; had a high flying, fire and ice relationship that led them to…

She was raised well and knew better. Her parents were friends and we all went to church together until she graduated from high school and left for college. The big money and allure of the lifestyle led to personal and marital excesses.

After my departure from CSB, Judas and The SCO tried to pressure her to do unethical and probably illegal documentation regarding loan pools and some problem loan workouts. She called me for my opinion, during which I agreed with her position. She refused their request and left soon after, which is when she again contacted me to start a similar lending operation with some investors in Nashville. When that did not work, she opened her own small law practice. During this period her marriage finished falling apart and she had a son to take care of as a single mom. She took a job as a closing attorney for a large international resorts operation with a big local presence where she remains today. She and her drugged out ex stayed embroiled in a child custody tug of war. Not long ago he had his medical license suspended and was recently charged with writing fraudulent prescriptions in collusion with supposed patients (fellow addicts). He disappeared with warrants issued for his arrest. He was unwilling to accept his fall from grace and committed suicide in an area park a little over a month ago.

Judas: As discussed in the previous chapter of the story he moved on after he led the ownership into destruction. When we first met he was the lead loan buyer for the dominant southeastern U. S. regional investment banking firm of Morgan Keegan in Memphis. He was very competent and aggressive in his role and proved to be innovative with my 504 program hybrid loan development. Morgan Keegan had sold out to Regions Financial (Bank) in Birmingham, which led to Judas’ ill-fated move to Bear Stearns. Unfortunately, he thought more highly of himself than he could deliver as was demonstrated for CSB. He returned to his original loan buying role and is apparently employed by Raymond James Financial today.

Judas was married to a former junior attorney who worked for her family’s law firm that represented Mary Winker, the alleged abused wife of the pastor she killed with a shotgun as he laid in bed asleep. The original reports,

https://abcnews.go.com/GMA/LegalCenter/story?id=2667042&page=1

https://www.foxnews.com/story/preachers-wife-on-stand-for-murder-husband-forced-me-to-have-sex-refused-divorce

The one below is probably closer to the truth based on the comments Judas made to me about it when we worked together.

https://christiancourier.com/articles/a-footnote-on-the-mary-winkler-case

If he was truthful, he said his wife told him the firm was creative with her defense. They presented a story of physical and sexual abuse that included alleged fantasies of the pastor. In other words they likely fabricated at least some of the allegations against her murdered husband because the judge allowed them room to do so. How is a dead man supposed to defend himself and his reputation?

I pray Judas truly did turn from his past ways and reconcile his heart with Jesus.

The Chairman: He continued in his role for a few years before departing as discussed. He had other businesses that were operated by his son and presumably retired with his sweet wife to their home in TN and condo in FL. At least he exited the situation. He became very unsure of himself and banking operations with the death of his other, troubled son in a tragic car accident early in our employment as well as the death of his long time confidant, friend and financial authority; the bank’s outside CPA (a good man) from cancer during our time there.

The Attorney: I never got a handle on him. He was not forthcoming with information personally or occupationally. He was the right hand man of the person who follows. Which is probably why I never figured him out completely. In the last two years of operation he pushed to slow our operation down, which would have been wise. However, he also demanded more profit, to squeeze it dry like his The RIch Man boss. The other two owners wanted more loan growth to go with profits and they had controlling interest. The bank and division were caught betwixt and between, destined for failure with The Great Recession looming.

The Rich Man: One of the cogs in the GOP establishment’s wheel in TN is who I call The Rich Man. His official story,

This one gives a better personal history.

https://www.tnledger.com/editorial/Article.aspx?id=113032

The Rich Man is obsessed with controlling the public narrative about his life and activities. The other owners told me he frequently had news stories killed and/or retractions made to go with social media control in more current times. I had heard of him from my connections at the University of Tennessee, but only that he was a prominent businessman and donator to the school. When I met him as discussed previously in the initial discussions about joining CSB, he came across as having good business sense and authoritative, but not as astute as he wanted to portray in small business finance. He used the classic “he who has the money makes the rules” approach. He wanted you to know he was the boss and made the rules.

Due to his education and background in accounting he was totally focused on expenses and expense controls. He made it a point of telling me that he knew exactly how much it cost to give a glass of ice tea to a resident in one his nursing homes. Seriously, that is what he said. When a businessman or woman laser focuses on expenses at a micro level while having an exploratory business opportunity discussion with people he/she has never met previously, well, a question of a possible bad fit is a valid concern. Which is why The Chairman, The Contractor and The Attorney let me know quickly that they owned the controlling interest of the bank without The Rich Man and would act without his consent if necessary. Which is what happened. The Rich Man did not vote against our arrangement, he just did not support it. It was clear the other three were tired of being totally under his thumb.

The truth is The Rich Man has lived a conflicted life. He divorced his first wife, but left her well heeled financially as she remained in the home palace in their native rural area. He wanted more, including a slimmer body courtesy of a gastric bypass that eventually led to trophy wife #2 from the ranks of the nursing home chain he formerly owned. He was then able to navigate his way around the major markets using while her abilities in the social scenes of the elites.

When the three other owners bought him out of CSB ownership beginning in late 2005 going into 2006, all of us were very content with the decision. The Rich Man used philanthropy to do good things for people as well as providing college academic scholarships for many students from his native area. However, with each such endeavor or check given to any worthy charitable purpose, there had to be press there to cover it. Public image was important to him.

If you have followed this series, there is a distinct resemblance to the life journey path of Pete DeBusk relating to emphasis on education, career accomplishments and politics minus the health and marital issues of The Rich Man.

The Contractor

I could not help but like the guy. He was a big mess. A chain smoking bloated chunk of a man who possessed a good quality of truly listening to what you had to say even if he did not agree. His morals were loose despite having a devoted wife, a son in the construction business and a daughter with daddy’s rich girl syndrome heading up the HR department of the bank. However, nothing was as it appeared with him and his business dealings in all of the many businesses he had owned through the years that included the bank, construction company, real estate development, convenience stores, motels, truck stops as well as other businesses that at one time in his past included an interest in a seedy strip club off an interstate exit. Undoubtedly there were probably many more that I have no idea about. I have zero doubts he maintained the official books for the tax man and lenders with another set for all of his business associations. He literally flew high with an older, private jet hangared at a regional airport in rural nowhere TN. The Rich Man arranged for that airport to be funded and built through his political connections despite no demonstrated need for same in that region at the time. Flew in that jet to a meeting once with the SCO. Once was enough.

As the major bank shareholder I made it a point to remain cordial with him and tried to accomplish what he wanted done as long as it did not cross any lines. However, he did cross those lines with the SCO on loan requests he referred for our division to handle for some of his business associates who were “questionable” in terms of credit worthiness. It also became much worse after I was gone. He would apply pressure, to which the SCO would resist if he saw that a loan approval could lead to it being a career limiting move for him if audited by examiners. To his credit, The Contractor never attempted to strong arm me. I would answer his questions directly and truthfully while not getting too close personally. However, we did have a couple of faith based short discussions over lunch during which I learned he grew up in a devout Pentecostal family, whose faith he rejected as soon as he became of age to do so. He admitted his personal faith did not extend very far. I planted a few seeds and left it up to the Lord to take it from there.

In the end it was he who approved my exit parachute and stayed in touch the most during the years that followed. When the Chairman bailed, followed by the young President, the Contractor took over both positions despite having lung cancer that killed him in 2012. My hope is that he had reconciled to the faith in his later days and heard positive things that he may have. A caretaker Chairman CEO finished the remaining time of the bank as an entity before the FDIC stepped in to close it down.

None of the CSB horse riders realized I had a quiet supporter within their headquarters even after I was gone. She was a devout Christian and a senior officer in the holding company corporation and bank who knew the real goals of what I tried to accomplish there that had nothing to do with making money. She is the one who made sure I received my contracted compensation along with occasional updates about the riders. I will be forever grateful for her efforts.

Conclusion

There are major life lessons here for folks. Probably the biggest is you reap what you sow. Your personal motivations, desires, words and actions will display the condition of your head, heart and soul. There are consequences in response. Galatians 6:7-8, Luke 6:38. 2 Corinthians 9:6, and Proverbs 22:8 all explain the principle well.

I will finish this next time. It will be a time to discuss wasted opportunities, politics, faith and subversive elements operating within CSB as in most organizations that were exposed during this part of the story. It is good for us to know the truth. What we do with it is up to us.