failure of leadership

“. . . I learned to read carefully and not be satisfied with a rough understanding of the whole, and not to agree too quickly with those who have a lot to say about something.” —MARCUS AURELIUS, MEDITATIONS

I try maintain a roughly ten to one ratio in regards to my listening/speaking. Why do I feel it is important? I know that I do not know much. I know my scale in the universe. It reminds me to stay humble. I know that seeking knowledge is a growth/survival mechanism with a proven track record.

Which brings me to one of the problems I have with the current administration of the executive branch of the USA. As far as I can tell, Trump doesn’t appear to put much value on listening. Or on reality. He appears to be willfully ignoring what is actually happening in the world around him. Don’t take my word for it. Take his.

“This administration is running like a fine-tuned machine.” No Donald. Your administration so far is a slow motion train wreck. Your national security advisor lasted three weeks. That’s a new land speed administration failure record.

“Drugs are becoming cheaper than candy bars.” Not even close to reality.

“The leaks are real, but the news is fake.” Translation: Anything that makes me look bad is bad and should be discounted. Reality doesn’t matter, only I matter.

Trump seems to want to attack anyone who questions anything he says or does. He appears hell bent on ignoring the counsel of the very people he should be listening to the most. He turns governance into a circus ring. The new American president has a lot of say about everything, and most of it sounds astoundingly uninformed. The rest of it sounds like blatant, unashamed lying.

That is not leadership. It is the opposite. It is a recipe for failure.

Success or failure often hinge on one’s ability to quietly take in the universe around themselves and contemplate. Those of us who shout the loudest about how great we they are are usually compensating for a lack of understanding. An inability to hear others is dangerous, and perhaps even suicidal in the right context.

We are on a train being controlled by a deaf and blind conductor. I hope the tracks ahead are intact.

The political system in the United States is broken

I watched the first presidential debate of 2016 last night. Gross.

Why do I have to choose between a shady, back-room power deals career politician and a shady, back-room power deals career businessman? Both of them are liars. Both of them are flip-floppers. Both of them are power hungry. These are not qualities I can support in a leader.

Every logical fallacy I am aware of was at play in the debate last night. These two individuals are not the best choices to lead the United States for the next four years. We shouldn’t have to choose between two paragons of fail. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are not root causes. They are not the disease. They are the symptoms of a bigger problem.

The virus of the two-party system, where all opinions are slowly silenced until there are only two voices left. A system of decision making that offers only two choices is not healthy. The debate last night didn’t offer any real dialog about the problems average Americans face. It didn’t offer any real perspectives. That’s because, in the United States, minorities who aren’t bought are still silenced. That’s the real problem.

If you’re a socially progressive and fiscally conservative, like I am, there isn’t a real choice. If you believe politicians should be honest and responsible, you don’t have a real choice this election cycle. If you think government should operate transparently, always choosing to balance personal liberties with social infrastructure that demands personal responsibility, neither of these two is palatable.

They will both hoard power. They will both continue the vast, non-transparent, morally bankrupt security state we’ve been building since Sept. 11, 2001. We’ll keep using drones to extra-judicially murder those who, real or imagined, represent some sort of threat to this nation-state. All of our options will continue being boiled down into soundbites that lack any true substance. I can’t vote for that. I won’t vote for it. I don’t want to build a wall, and I don’t want to create more failed states like Libya and Syria in the name of the American people.

We owe it to ourselves to destroy the two-party system that offered up these two as our best hope for turning the ship before it collides with an iceberg named mediocrity.

I asked my girlfriend to register to vote. “It just feels like a waste of time,” she said. She’s right.

Until we manage to destroy the two-party system, this country is going to continue its downhill trajectory. It doesn’t matter which party wins in the upcoming election. The problem isn’t the candidates, it’s the system that offered them up as saviors.