Marc Sussman is an investment professional for the past 30 years. He asks that you forgive him.

In 2005, for no apparent reason, he launched a radio show on the Air America network called the Money Message.

Please keep it under your hat that this individual has been allowed to join The Climate Project, Al Gore’s army that presents a Powerpoint for the ages.

“If they think the story of our environmental impact is An Inconvenient Truth, wait until they get a loada me.”

Observations from the Edge

If I have any talent of merit, it is that I can plagiarize with the best of them. Read on.

A lack of investment acumen has turned out to be a valuable asset - I can focus on what is real, leave the frustration to others trying to know what cannot be known.

We’re finding out that good ideas are less important than good intentions. Some very smart people have brought us to the brink.

Two days after the Fannie/Freddie revelation, the shot not heard round the world, financial shows were in party mode.

I realize that I‘ve got some attributes that are unconventional. If you want to know whether I’m a trusted advisor, take a look at my office plants now. They’re thriving. Its unlikely that I would allow anything less for my clients.

These are times of subjective value. There is really nothing that you can recommend on its investment merits alone. You begin to see that there is only one thing left that jumps off a client’s statement. We can fall back on purpose - we call it socially responsible investment. A Purpose Driven Portfolio.

Socially responsible investment needs the marketing department in a hurry. Money for its own sake is one-dimensional - the how much. SRI is three-dimensional - the whole enchilada.

I never realized why my pro-bono work has been transformative. Now I might want a maximum account limit, not a minimum account size.
About a year ago I spent an hour working with an amazing transit worker whose wife had left him. Her life had become unmanageable, and it was taking down her family.

He wanted to know how he could provide for his children, send them to college.
He is what we call a mensch ( a man among men ).

At the end of the hour, he looked at me and asked me - why was I doing this? I could not help but cry - that I could be a person of service was new. Now, discussions about money, huge one-dimensional money, are what makes me cry.

I see the energy revolution as the story of humanity as the Fifth Element. The wind, the sun, the earth, the water… and us.

I’ve heard pundits suggest that the Rocky Mountains were just big hills chock full of shale oil, complete with pop-top.

That Native Americans would want to build the most powerful wind farm in America could be viewed as the energy revolution at work - or it could be the single greatest act of forgiveness and generosity that I can conjure.

Stewardship doesn’t really go far enough. We could take the worlds resources, divide them by 6.7 billion. Fair is fair. The Ultimate Landlord doesn’t allow ownership.

Final note:

When we’re in imminent danger, (like now), its unlikely that we’ll call our investment advisor. We’ll probably pray.

The story of our environmental impact, is the story of the golden calf - if you don’t think so, talk to the Ultimate Landlord.

See how far you get.