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Our privacy is starting to be invaded and we can't get anything done. I'm happy with the fundraising but upset we don't have time to talk and meet with people.

Charity fundraisers are nothing new to me. In the past, I have taken part in ski races for hospitals, walks for breast cancer, and long distance bike rides for geriatric care.

There is a place and a time for philanthropy, and there is only so much money you can give away.

In this business, life is one long fund-raising effort.

In an era when party fundraising is badly tainted, dinners are a really good way of raising cash for campaigning. Lots of people giving very small amounts of money through ticket sales and raffle prizes: yes, it's much harder work than big donations, but I think it's a more democratic and transparent way of fundraising.

This fundraising is consuming us. It's impossible to overstate, I think, what it's doing to members and their ability to just focus on the job that they were elected to do. The collective concentration of the institution is being undermined every day by the need to fund-raise.

I only wish I had more time for fund raising.

A lot of charities spend a million dollars on a fundraiser to make $15,000. It's a social swirl. They do some great stuff and then - it's called mission drift. It becomes more about the parties.

Shouldn't you put the same amount of effort into your giving as you might for your for-profit investments? After all, philanthropy is an investment, and one in which lives - not profits - are at stake.