Thomas Richard Hood – 50th Reunion Essay

Thomas Richard Hood

123 Long Neck Point Road

Darien, Connecticut 06820

hoodtr@aol.com

203-339-1063

Spouse(s): Maren R. Hood (1973)

Child(ren): Philip Hood (1977); Richard Hood (1979); and Charles Hood (1983)

Grandchild(ren): Amelia Hood (2012); Logan Hood (2015); and Mason Hood (2015)

Education: University of Minnesota Law School, JD (1973); New York University School of Law, LLM in Taxation (1974)

Career: Tax Partner at Mayer Brown Law Firm (NYC office), 22 years until 2015 (last 3 years as Senior Counsel); Counselor to the IRS Commissioner, 3 years, until 1993; Tax Partner at Kutak Rock Law Firm (Omaha), 10 years, until 1990; Tax Associate at Cahill Gordon Law Firm (NYC) for 3 years

Avocations: Golf, Sailboat racing and cruising, Broadway Musicals, Classical Music at NY Philharmonic and Carnegie

College: Branford

I hereby submit my “essay” in the form of haiku-like questions, some whimsical, some not so whimsical:

How manipulatable by his granddaughters is a Yale class of 1969 alumnus who had no sisters and no daughters? If such a man, with a golf handicap of 20, works constantly on his game, how much lower can he reasonably expect to get his handicap before decrepitude? Why is such man’s wife willing to sail around the world with him only if the sailboat is big enough for a piano?

If a class of 1969 alumnus continues to buy books at a faster rate than he can read them, at what level of accumulation should he be required to seek counseling? 200? 500? How many members of the class of 1969 (including those who went on to medical school) not only know the only sure cure for the hiccups, but also the scientific explanation for it? In what circle of hell resides the shirt designer who invented those buttons on the side of shirt sleeves above the cuff?

If John Kennedy were writing Profiles in Courage today, could any US politician in the last quarter century qualify for possible inclusion? Given that the US has run up a still-climbing deficit of over $19 trillion largely due to the US dollar being the world’s currency, how far off can Vladimir Putin really be in claiming that the US is a parasite on the rest of the world? When the world’s most developed democracy is in such fiscal condition, isn’t democracy as a political system still just an experiment?

How can some assert that the US has a comparatively regressive tax system when half of all households pay no income tax and most of the supposedly more progressive European countries can sustain their liberal social spending mainly because of the value-added tax (an extremely effective revenue raiser)? Why did neither of the two major-party candidates in the recent presidential election ever even discuss the possibility of a US value-added tax and few US voters paid any attention to the minor party candidate who did discuss and advocate such a tax?

Given that over 50 years ago the number of known particles of matter was around 3 (proton, electron and neutron), the number is now at least 12 (quarks, muons, taus, neutrinos, leptons, etc), and yet we are told that as much as 80 percent of the universe is undetectable “dark matter,” how far since then has physics really progressed? Have any class of 1969 alumni read Irreducible Mind, a treatise by University of Virginia scientists who reflect on the abject absence of scientific progress in understanding the mysteries of the mind and consciousness (e.g., hypnosis, ESP, near death experiences, etc), and advocate a return to exploration of various models prevalent among philosophers of the 19th century?

Is it true, as stated by one eminent Yale alumnus and administrator, that the older a Yale alumnus gets, the bluer he or she gets? Can it be that the most important knowledge for one to acquire in his or her lifetime is self-knowledge? Can it be that the fact of mortality is less scary to accept with age?

Is Hamilton the greatest work in musical theater history, or is it merely one of a handful of the greatest (e.g., Oklahoma, Showboat, My Fair Lady, Phantom of the Opera)? For being prolific in the composition of profoundly transporting classical music, is any composer in the same league as Beethoven? Is there any more exciting jazz than the Benny Goodman Carnegie Hall Concert of 1938, or his small group jazz sessions with Billy Holiday? How many Yalies would admit that Cole Porter is only the second greatest individual composer/lyricist of the 20th century (behind Irving Berlin)? How musically transcendent is Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band?

If believers in God occasionally have moments of doubt, do agnostics occasionally have flashes of belief without proof?

Are there any occasions left when it is still acceptable to say “vive la difference”?

Being already on probation during freshman year for participation in the freshman riot and then accidentally hitting a campus policeman’s foot with a water balloon at the end of a Wright Hall water balloon fight, would I be writing these questions today if he hadn’t slipped and fallen on the water while trying to catch me?