Political observations
09/11/24 01:29
Pundits will be analyzing the 2024 US Presidential election for decades and I am not a political expert. Nonetheless, the election has been on my mind. Here are a few random observations I offer to those who are interested.
Truth exists. Facts are facts. Speaking a lie, even repeating it over and over again does not make the lie into a truth. Even though the candidate who won the election repeated it over and over, it remains true that the people of Springfield, Ohio, are not eating domestic pets. It can be independently verified from multiple sources. Immigrants come to the United States for a wide variety of reasons. Emptying prisons to export criminals is not one of them. There was a time when England exported criminals to the United States, but the Revolutionary War put an end to the practice in the US. England continued to export prisoners to Australia for years afterward. In a world with a record number of people and a record number of refugees, human migration will continue whether or not there is anti-immigration rhetoric. Mass deportations can be a factor in human migration, but it won’t change the fact that humans have always moved around the globe and will continue to do so as long as there are people on this planet. Increasing the rate of extraction and consumption of fossil fuels will not alter the reality that there is a limited supply of these materials and it will increase the rate of global climate change. Power is not the same as truth and there will always be a need for persons of integrity to speak truth to power.
Change is inevitable. No amount of promising a return to the past will stop change from occurring. Change can be painful. It can cause loss and grief. It can spawn nostalgia and longing. But change will occur whether or not people want change. In general, those who accept change and adapt are more successful and happier than those who resist and attempt to stop change. Using the word “again” in a campaign slogan may be a successful strategy in the short term, but it does not empower anyone to stop change. The flow of history will not be reversed. We will not return to some imagined and generally mis-remembered past.
Media is not what it used to be. Information and misinformation travel in new ways in each generation. News is no longer the province of three major television networks. Print newspapers are not the leading source of information. Misinformation has always existed in many different media and rapidly evolving social media systems have been especially effective at transmitting misinformation. Governments have a role in regulating the distribution of misinformation, but they are also capable of distributing propaganda. I believe that some political strategists failed to understand the dynamics of changing media such as the impact of podcasts in spreading misinformation. The strategies of truth telling need to be constantly examined in a rapidly changing world.
People are economy. Labor is a source of generating wealth. The economic success of a business and of a country is based on people. Counting only currency as wealth is a failure to understand economy. Proposed mass deportations will have a significant economic impact and that impact will radiate throughout the economy. Deporting service workers diminishes the number of construction jobs. Fewer people can result in more unemployment. The failure to understand and take account of the impact of people on the economy will not result in economic success. It may increase the wealth of those who are already wealthy, but it will not improve the economy of everyday citizens. Fewer janitors and cleaners drives up the price of healthcare. And healthcare is directly related to the lack of financial stability of middle and lower class citizens.
People are security. Focusing solely on technology and equipment may make military contractors more wealthy, but it is the strength, commitment, and sacrifice of the people who serve in the military that provide for the security of a nation. The wars in Vietnam and Afghanistan offered lessons in the simple fact that superior technology is not the only factor in war. The failure to learn those lessons decreases security for all people. Israel has the power to dominate its region and cause incredible suffering of those it deems to be enemies. But all of the military technology possessed by Israel is not increasing the security of its people. Learning to live with its neighbors will be required of Israel no matter how many Palestinians are killed.
Rhetoric is not reality. Refer to my first observation above.
Yellowstone is a fantasy television series. It is not the story of the part of Montana where I grew up and where our family owned property for generations before finally selling in the spring of 2023. In the television series, the renegade governor is a member of a multi-generational ranching family seeking to protect their ranch from developers. In real-life Montana the Governor is an outsider who happens to own several vacation properties, but didn’t even live in the state full time before he was elected. That is also true of the senator elect who did not grow up in Montana and who used money raised outside the state to defeat a true Montana rancher.
The 2024 Presidential election is not the end of American democracy. The rise of autocratic leadership is alarming and Project 2025 will lead to increased suffering for many in order to provide increased profit for very few, but it is part of a political cycle and not the end of the story. Autocrats do not last forever. Hitler was in power for just over eight years before his power was lost and he died by suicide. Despite what has been said, Trump is not Hitler and his story will not be the same. Fascists rise from time to time and injustice can prevail short term and cause great suffering, but it is not the whole story. American politics still has room for genuine public servants of integrity who are not motivated by the lust for power or the greed of a select minority.
Abraham Lincoln got it right in the Gettysburg Address: “It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us . . . that his nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
May his words continue to inspire new generations of leaders.
Truth exists. Facts are facts. Speaking a lie, even repeating it over and over again does not make the lie into a truth. Even though the candidate who won the election repeated it over and over, it remains true that the people of Springfield, Ohio, are not eating domestic pets. It can be independently verified from multiple sources. Immigrants come to the United States for a wide variety of reasons. Emptying prisons to export criminals is not one of them. There was a time when England exported criminals to the United States, but the Revolutionary War put an end to the practice in the US. England continued to export prisoners to Australia for years afterward. In a world with a record number of people and a record number of refugees, human migration will continue whether or not there is anti-immigration rhetoric. Mass deportations can be a factor in human migration, but it won’t change the fact that humans have always moved around the globe and will continue to do so as long as there are people on this planet. Increasing the rate of extraction and consumption of fossil fuels will not alter the reality that there is a limited supply of these materials and it will increase the rate of global climate change. Power is not the same as truth and there will always be a need for persons of integrity to speak truth to power.
Change is inevitable. No amount of promising a return to the past will stop change from occurring. Change can be painful. It can cause loss and grief. It can spawn nostalgia and longing. But change will occur whether or not people want change. In general, those who accept change and adapt are more successful and happier than those who resist and attempt to stop change. Using the word “again” in a campaign slogan may be a successful strategy in the short term, but it does not empower anyone to stop change. The flow of history will not be reversed. We will not return to some imagined and generally mis-remembered past.
Media is not what it used to be. Information and misinformation travel in new ways in each generation. News is no longer the province of three major television networks. Print newspapers are not the leading source of information. Misinformation has always existed in many different media and rapidly evolving social media systems have been especially effective at transmitting misinformation. Governments have a role in regulating the distribution of misinformation, but they are also capable of distributing propaganda. I believe that some political strategists failed to understand the dynamics of changing media such as the impact of podcasts in spreading misinformation. The strategies of truth telling need to be constantly examined in a rapidly changing world.
People are economy. Labor is a source of generating wealth. The economic success of a business and of a country is based on people. Counting only currency as wealth is a failure to understand economy. Proposed mass deportations will have a significant economic impact and that impact will radiate throughout the economy. Deporting service workers diminishes the number of construction jobs. Fewer people can result in more unemployment. The failure to understand and take account of the impact of people on the economy will not result in economic success. It may increase the wealth of those who are already wealthy, but it will not improve the economy of everyday citizens. Fewer janitors and cleaners drives up the price of healthcare. And healthcare is directly related to the lack of financial stability of middle and lower class citizens.
People are security. Focusing solely on technology and equipment may make military contractors more wealthy, but it is the strength, commitment, and sacrifice of the people who serve in the military that provide for the security of a nation. The wars in Vietnam and Afghanistan offered lessons in the simple fact that superior technology is not the only factor in war. The failure to learn those lessons decreases security for all people. Israel has the power to dominate its region and cause incredible suffering of those it deems to be enemies. But all of the military technology possessed by Israel is not increasing the security of its people. Learning to live with its neighbors will be required of Israel no matter how many Palestinians are killed.
Rhetoric is not reality. Refer to my first observation above.
Yellowstone is a fantasy television series. It is not the story of the part of Montana where I grew up and where our family owned property for generations before finally selling in the spring of 2023. In the television series, the renegade governor is a member of a multi-generational ranching family seeking to protect their ranch from developers. In real-life Montana the Governor is an outsider who happens to own several vacation properties, but didn’t even live in the state full time before he was elected. That is also true of the senator elect who did not grow up in Montana and who used money raised outside the state to defeat a true Montana rancher.
The 2024 Presidential election is not the end of American democracy. The rise of autocratic leadership is alarming and Project 2025 will lead to increased suffering for many in order to provide increased profit for very few, but it is part of a political cycle and not the end of the story. Autocrats do not last forever. Hitler was in power for just over eight years before his power was lost and he died by suicide. Despite what has been said, Trump is not Hitler and his story will not be the same. Fascists rise from time to time and injustice can prevail short term and cause great suffering, but it is not the whole story. American politics still has room for genuine public servants of integrity who are not motivated by the lust for power or the greed of a select minority.
Abraham Lincoln got it right in the Gettysburg Address: “It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us . . . that his nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
May his words continue to inspire new generations of leaders.
