I have always been interested in politics. In a much younger life, I was actually going to follow my dream and ego and become senior senator from California. That ambition was cut short on the realization that a foreigner, lack of funds, and the anathema of being played by someone else’s strings did not lead to a senate seat.

Nonetheless, much of my life – such as being in Argentina on a crucial election in its history – was being “in the right place” for potential historical events.

I was similarly in Warsaw, Poland, in June, 2003, only a few days before that country voted to join the European Union. At the same time, NATO had chosen to move some of its operations to Poland, and President Bush paid an official visit. People constantly asked me whether I was a member of George Bush’s team, since he had arrived just days after my flight. Nothing could have been further from the truth with the beginnings of the war in Iraq just a few months earlier! I strictly went to Poland that summer to relax, teach a few classes, and see historic places like Krakow. It ended up being a fascinating election!

In November, 1992, I was in Little Rock, Arkansas at the Capital Hotel to watch Bill Clinton and wife Hillary revel in his victory. Nearly a year earlier, when I had barely moved to the southern town and knew little about Bill Clinton other than that he was a minor governor of a minor state, I was outside Arkansas’ historic state house when the candidate first made his announcement. Again, seeing, and later meeting the candidate and President were fortunate, but not by design. The invitation to the Presidential Ball in Washington after Clinton’s formal Inauguration came about through friends both in Arkansas and New York and California.

I was also in Munich, Germany in July,1990 on business. As luck would have it, one of the greatest celebrations was held in Berlin during my sojourn, the concert and celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Although I was far in the south of Germany and could not take the time to travel to Berlin, the celebration was transmitted across the world, and people everywhere joined in the spirit of nearly half a million people physically