A casual observer sees displays of stupidity in politics every day. But when the emotions in a crowd get out of control, we can have....
Mob Rule
The 20th century experienced much madness. One such gripped Nazi Germany during the 1930s.
Some resisted the devolution from a democracy with rule of law into a police state under a tyrant. But it was not enough to stop the escalation into World War II.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, German Lutheran pastor, theologian, and anti-Nazi dissident was one of the resistors. He was arrested as part of a failed plot to assassinate Hitler, imprisoned, and hung in April 1945, weeks before Germany surrendered to the Allies.
But he wrote of the evils of stupidity in his letters from prison while waiting execution:
Robert Graves wrote his historical novel, I, Claudius (1934) as an autobiographical memoir of the Roman Emperor Claudius (reign 41-54 A.D.)
The memoir spanned the time of Augustus Caesar, Tiberius, Caligula, and Claudius' succession to emperor after Caligula's assassination.
The novel is filled with political machinations, lust, and murders. Ironically when the Petronian Guard chooses Claudius as the new emperor, he doesn't want it. Yet, he soldiers on for 13 years until he's allegedly poisoned so Nero could succeed him.
In 1937, Robert Graves' book was to be made into an epic movie, I, Claudius, starringCharles Laughtonas the title role. But the serious injuries of one the irreplaceable actresses aborted the completion of the epic movie.
Some of the archives of this shelved film were recovered in the 1965 documentary, The Epic that Neve Was.
One of the greatest scenes:
I, Claudius vs The Senate
Charles Laughton gives this moving performance as he's presented to the Senate to succeed the murdered Caligula.
Ten years ago, movements from the left and the right, such as the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street , emerged from discontent of the power of the few over the values of the many.
The song below, I am America, reflect some the zeitgeist of the times as well as today:
We may have a sense of what politics is as we see it everyday, so it seems. But for grins, here's a definition: merriam-webster
Our elected government servants are politicians, hence they politick. Politics prevails in business, in the office, in commerce, in various organization, in personal relationships,....everywhere.
Often politics has a negative connotation. What comes with the territory is in the struggle for power. One way to get power and and stay in power is to manipulate the masses.
A proven tactic for that...
Fear
That's obvious to the casual observer watching the political ads during election season. The opponent and their cohorts are likened to the antichrist and their policies will surely usher in the Apocalypse.
Fables contain that ugly truth of human nature wrapped in a children's story for easy digestion. One such as
Chicken Little
Who hasn't heard the end of the world cry--
The sky is falling!
Here's a darker version of Chicken Little (1943), as shown below in this animation, as told by Disney, during World War II.
Foxy Loxy, through fear, discredits the wise with character assassinations and manipulates Chicken Little, certainly not the brightest bulb in the box. This useful idiot leads his barnyard denizens into the jaws of Foxy Loxy, who not only got Chicken Little, but all the fowls in the barnyard as well.
Yet, the fear tactic is timeless.
Other examples abound, such as in advertising -- hygiene, health, safety, etc... Bad things will happen as we obliviously go about our business. But we'll sell you the product to solve all your problems and assuage all your fears.
A more innocent version of this type of manipulation is found in the musical, The Music Man (1962), about a con man during the early 20th century.
Ya Got Trouble
After scoping our the sleepy town of River City, Iowa, Professor Harold Hill searches for an angle to exploit the denizens...using fear. Finding none, he creates one and demonizes the coming pool table.
That's Trouble in River City, with a capital T that rhymes with P and that stands for Pool.
Inciting the fear of moral degradation creeping into the town and its youth, the Professor offers the solution: A boy's band to channel the youth's energies and keep them from the immoral influence of the pool hall.
Then he sells the instruments and uniforms for this band. Yet he has plans all along to bilk these suckers of their money and skip town before delivering on his promises. (But the love of Marian the Librarian complicates his latest con. The Professor lingers, gets caught, and faces the music.)
Creating a problem, inciting fear, profiting from it. Nothing new for foxes to get their dinner or con artists to separate the naïve from their money.
Fear?
In the words of a politician's inaugural address in the dark days of the Great Depression:
David, the sweet psalmist of Israel, when he looked up at the dark night sky, wrote these words..
The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of His hands.
Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they reveal knowledge.
Psalm 19:1-2(NIV)
And David's son, Solomon, also expressed this proverb in his wisdom writings:
By wisdom the Lord laid the earth’s foundations,
by understanding He set the heavens in place;
by His knowledge the watery depths were divided,
and the clouds let drop the dew.
Proverbs 3:19-20(NIV)
In the late 20th century, Carl Sagan brought science and astronomy to the people in his series, Cosmos (1980). Before he slipped the surly bounds of earth, Sagan was moved by the photo of our home (above). Taken almost 4 billion miles away from Earth from Saturn. Known as...
The Pale Blue Dot
As the probe finished its primary mission, Carl Sagan had requested NASA to take one last picture of Earth as it was leaving the Solar System. That became the iconic photograph the Voyager 1 space probe had taken of Earth on February 14, 1990. A pale blue dot, the Earth's apparent size is less than a pixel among bands of sunlight.
Definitely awe struck, Sagan's tribute expressed a more humanist philosophy. As well as overwhelmed by our seemingly insignificance in the vast universe. All the politics of our short lifespans seem petty. Nothing. {reference: Carl Sagan gave us an incredible perspective on our planet }
Again, David has his words of the greatness of the universe and the smallness of humans and life on earth with the Divine perspective in mind.
Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is Your Name in all the earth!
You have set Your glory
in the heavens.
Through the praise of children and infants
You have established a stronghold against Your enemies,
to silence the foe and the avenger.
When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which You have set in place,
what is mankind that You are mindful of them,
human beings that You care for them?
You have made them a little lower than the angels
and crowned them with glory and honor.
You made them rulers over the works of Your hands;
You put everything under their feet:
all flocks and herds,
and the animals of the wild,
the birds in the sky,
and the fish in the sea,
all that swim the paths of the seas.
Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Psalm 8:1-9(NIV)
The Pale Blue Dot ... in Psalms and Proverbs.
It makes the Politics of the Earth pale in comparison to the vastness of space....
And beyond, the Greatness of our Creator.
But in His greatness, He cares for all His creatures and put mankind to care for the handiwork of His creation.
"It's a basic truth of the human condition that everybody lies.
The only variable is about what."
Indeed that's a proverb. And there's many like them.
Proverbs:
King David's son Solomon gave this nugget -
The lip of truth shall be established for ever: but a lying tongue is but for a moment.
Proverbs 12:19 (KJV)
But what about this moment? The politically expedient.
Politics:
We've seen this play out in the various types of media. Below is a clip that could be the playbook for many a politician from the old movie, A Guide for the Married Man (1967)
It is described as: A man gives his co-worker a series of lessons on how to cheat on one's wife without being caught.
Like who are going believe, me or your lying eyes as shown in this scene below:
And as our country is so divided and evil seems to be unleashed, a look at Psalms and Proverbs along side Politics can illuminate the Sign of the Times as well offer some hope for troubling days.
That slogan can be read that America is no longer great. But we want to be. Again.
And that was Donald Trump's slogan in the 2016 presidential campaign. And it was used before. In 1980. By Ronald Reagan. As shown on the button above.
Both campaigns were decades apart. But in some ways very similar. Both were successful. Both candidates won the White House.
The zeitgeist (spirit of the times), was pessimistic. Angry. Dispirited. As many Americans perceived their country was in a downward spin into the dustbin of history.
In 2016: A majority (up 70% to 80%, at times) believed the country was going in the wrong direction. [ Direction of Country polling ]
And during this zeitgeist, I remember getting email from a friend in 2012. It contained video link, described as The Most Honest Three and Half Minutes of Television
It still has been making the rounds in social media. And it comes to this conclusion...
America is not the greatest country in the world anymore
It begins, first of all, with the reporter, Jeff Daniel's character Will McAvoy establishing himself as a non-partisan journalist. Objective. Unbiased. A man we can trust. At least in this fictional world.
When asked why America is the greatest country in the world (after hearing the cliche answers of his colleagues), he hesitates. Reluctant to answer. But he has a cheerleader in the crowd encouraging him with flash cards.
And the drama builds. The answer is finally dragged out of him. Like pulling teeth. It's torture. He finally admits it:
America is not the greatest country in the world.
Then he peppers the audience with a bucket load of statistics to support this claim. Looking sad and even mourning his dismal conclusion. Yet offering a pearl of wisdom that recognizing the problem is the first step to solving it.
Here is the clip that had many of us (myself included) wringing our hands. Warning, some profanity:
Yep. Four years ago, I bought into this brutal honesty. Hook. Line. And sinker. I even blogged about it: AI (part 1) - American Ingenuity
Here are some points I made in that 2012 post:
The anchor seems to mourn for what we Americans used to be. And here are a few nibbles -
We stood up for what was right ... we reached for the stars ... acted like men ... we aspired to intelligence ... we didn't scare so easy ...
He ends his rant ...
First step in solving any problem is recognizing there is one. America is not the greatest country in the world anymore. ... Enough?
Then I heard a rebuttal to that scripted rant worth considering.
It's described as: A thorough slap down and rebuttal to Jeff Daniels' viral anti-America Newsroom scene, in which he claims that America is not the greatest country in the world.
Other countries with freedom? Saying other countries have freedom, does not make it so. Not when speech, religion, self-defense, moving between the classes, access to education, opportunity is curtailed or defined by the state.
Statistics? Easy to lie with statistics. Mislead. Compare apples to oranges.
But with freedom comes responsibility. In absence of an overbearing "Nanny State" comes the freedom to make wrong choices. And that has consequences, which are not good. And are reflected in some statistics that point that we can do better.
After one of the first Brexits, 240 years ago in 1776, the American colonies had their suspicions of rulers holding absolute power over them. Such as monarchs like King George III.
And rightly so. As historian and moralist, Lord Acton, is credited to offer his opinion:
So the Constitution was designed with checks and balances for our leaders. And that included a check for the chief executive. That is evident as the founders did not trust a popular vote to elect the president.
For 230 years, there has been many debates on this system as it has its flaws as seen below:
A popular vote seems to remedy the downside of the electoral college. But the system does have an upside in protecting the interests of the country as a whole.
Consider a popular vote for president.
The candidates would concentrate only on the big cities. New York City. Los Angeles. Denver. Seattle. Atlanta. Houston, Chicago. ... Those populations will largely will determine the elections.
Screw fly-over country. And the needs and concerns of the more rural areas will be overlooked for the denizens of big cities. And those differences can be poles apart.
Consider the electoral college.
As it is, fly-over country has more weight than the more populated states. Such as pointed out in Adam Ruins Everything, an electoral vote per capita in Wyoming is worth three times more than an electoral vote in California.
Having lived in California, I understand the feeling that my vote didn't count much. At least for president. We were totally written off as in the tank for the Democrats. And seen a waste of time and money to court our votes. Except candidates saw California as their cash cow and stopped by regularly to milk the billionaire donors for their campaigns...in swing states.
Currently, I reside in Wyoming. More muscle for my vote, right? But we're mostly written off as in the tank for the Republicans. And we are ignored anyway. Only 3 electoral votes at stake. Who cares about us?
