New York to St. Croix

Oscar Hidalgo for The New York Times - Walt Frazier has owned property in Christiansted on St. Croix since 1979, and spends his days supervising projects there.

It is difficult to pinpoint the exact time that Walt Frazier’s stylish alter ego known as Clyde more or less ceased to exist. But it might have been the September day in 1989 when Hurricane Hugo threatened to do away with both. Mr. Frazier, a Hall of Fame player for the New York Knicks basketball team, was relaxing on the living room sofa with a girlfriend, watching football on television, when the first terrifying winds tore the awnings off his vacation home on St. Croix. The television went dark. The large picture windows blew out. Mr. Frazier and his girlfriend scurried for the bathroom, where they spent the next 12 hours, cowering and praying.


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From renowned hedonist to home-building horticulturist, he described the personal gain as priceless. “I remember Dave DeBusschere and the other guys on the team used to say that I would have the toughest transition to make going into retirement because of being Clyde and coming down from all that,” Mr. Frazier said, recalling the days when his wide-brim hats and flashy suits inspired comparisons to the Warren Beatty character in the 1967 film “Bonnie and Clyde.”

“It didn’t happen right away, and it wasn’t easy,” he added. “But I was fed up with New York and that scene, the nightclubs and the cars. I didn’t want to vegetate as Clyde. I was searching for something. I didn’t know what it was until I came here.”

Even Clyde got tired of New York; something to think about. Old #10. How I remember that team.

Oscar Hidalgo for The New York Times - Entrance room to the Main House, his residence
Playmaker’s Paradise

“I began to sense there was something for me to do here, and then I realized doing all this work was what was going to keep me young,” said Mr. Frazier, who will celebrate his 65th birthday next month and remains fit and youthful looking, despite thinning hair. “I look back now and I can see that I was going through a metamorphosis, a change for the better.”


As part of his repudiation of the nightclubbing Clyde, he changed his lifestyle. The lifelong city dweller became a nature lover. He learned to sail, bought a boat and became a licensed captain. And he found the garden calling to him many mornings at sunrise.



Patricia James, who is his girlfriend and helps him manage the property and rental business, said the style fits all occasions. “We’ll be going out to dinner, I’ll have a dress on and I’ll say to him, ‘You’re not going to change?’ ” Ms. James said. A self-described perfectionist, he is not easy to work for, she said, and Mr. Frazier agreed, noting that he once fired his son, whom he had hired to manage the property during his absences.

 Fired his own son? Now, that's a tough taskmaster.

Pothead Hedge Funder

‘Throw Away the Blackberry and Enjoy Life’ Andrew Lehde has quit the hedge fund business. In a letter sent to clients, and released, or at least available, to the public, he states his views quite clearly.

I was in this game for the money.

No mincing words.

The low hanging fruit, i.e. idiots whose parents paid for prep school, Yale, and then the Harvard MBA, was there for the taking. All of this behavior supporting the Aristocracy, only ended up making it easier for me to find people stupid enough to take the other side of my trades. God bless America.

I will no longer manage money for other people or institutions. I have enough of my own wealth to manage. Some people, who think they have arrived at a reasonable estimate of my net worth, might be surprised that I would call it quits with such a small war chest. That is fine; I am content with my rewards. Moreover, I will let others try to amass nine, ten or eleven figure net worths. Meanwhile, their lives suck.

That's to the point.

So this is it. With all due respect, I am dropping out. Please do not expect any type of reply to
emails or voicemails within normal time frames or at all. I have no interest in any deals in which anyone would like me to participate. I am content sitting on the sidelines and waiting. After all, sitting and waiting is how we made money from the subprime debacle.

Geez. New York Magazine points out his fund had an 870% return last year. Nice. But ...

On the issue of the U.S. Government, I would like to make a modest proposal. First, I point out the obvious flaws, whereby legislation was repeatedly brought forth to Congress over the past eight years, which would have reigned in the predatory lending practices of now mostly defunct institutions. These institutions regularly filled the coffers of both parties in return for voting down all of this legislation designed to protect the common citizen.

George Soros, a man of staggering wealth, has stated that he would like to be remembered as a philosopher. My suggestion is that this great man start and sponsor a forum for great minds to come together to create a new system of government that truly represents the common man’s interest, while at the same time creating rewards great enough to attract the best and brightest minds to serve in government roles without having to rely on corruption to further their interests or lifestyles.

hemp has been used for at least 5,000 years for cloth and food, as well as just about everything that is produced from petroleum products. Hemp is not marijuana and vice versa. Hemp is the male plant and it grows like a weed, hence the slang term. The original American flag was made of hemp fiber and our Constitution was printed on paper made of hemp. It was used as recently as World War II by the U.S. Government, and then promptly made illegal after the war was won.

Please people, let’s stop the rhetoric and start thinking about how we can truly become self-sufficient.

Do You Have a Retirement Parachute?

A continuing focus for me: retirement funds. This year has been tough already.

Neither your employer nor the mutual-fund company that manages your money is required to note that, if you're not covered by a defined-benefit plan, your 401(k) should equal at least 10 times your salary right before retirement. If you're earning $100,000 at age 65, a $1 million nest egg isn't a windfall; it's a necessity. Even more improbably, a 65-year-old making $40,000 a year ought to have accumulated $400,000.

Improbably? For many, I suppose.

Adding to the pain of near-empty nest eggs is the fact that the income taxes on the portion of salary contributed are postponed until retirement – when folks can least afford to pay them.

A final reckoning: pay taxes when retired.

If pension-less taxpayers are obligated to foot the bill for generous public-sector pensions, the employers who escaped from their obligations to provide "voluntary" pension plans should bear responsibility for their employees. We need federal legislation to shift the burden of financing pensions back to the employer, where it belongs.

Excellent point. When I was with MetLife in the 1990s, it began to do away with defined benefits in retirement, and moved to defined contribution plans.

The pension paternalism favored by the Democrats has failed because pension regulations make the requirements so onerous that few companies want to start or continue a defined-benefit plan. On the other hand, the Republicans' tax-break approach to retirement savings has failed because people haven't responded to savings incentives.

Australia has managed to create a compact between employers and employees. We should be able to do at least as well.