Problem solved. Because I use the gnome desktop the usb drive is mounted by gnome-volume-manager. So I installed gconf-editor. Once installed I navigated to /system/storage/default_options/vfat there is a key "mount_options". I added exec to the values and remounted my usb drive.
That took several hours of digging. Just needed to know where to look. Brian /* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
