What is the temperature of the water?

Everyone knows how good it is to jump into a cool pool of water on a hot day. And many times the water is actually not the cool. It is just your perception that it is cool because it is cooler than the air temperature. You jump in and it takes a few seconds to get “use to it”. You perceive it as cool. 

Now realistically the water could be cool and you know this because you do not get used to it immediately. In fact, sometimes the water can be cool enough that even in 90-degree heat outside the water stays cool on your body and you get cold. 

You are left with deciding if the water is actually cold or just appears cold. Of course, facts help. If someone tells you the water temperature is 60 degrees on this 90-degree day you will state with confidence that the water is cold. Or is it?

When the air temperature has been in the 30′s or 40′s how does 60-degree water feel? Is it warm? 

Or why is it when the outside temperature is 100 + and the water temperature is in the 80′s or higher that when you step out of the water and a breeze hits you, it feels cold. You stand there thinking, its a hundred friggin degrees out here, why am I cold? 

And the obvious thought is this is all about perception. How does a person perceive the world around them and the answer is yes. 

And this same perception exists in people evaluating other people’s political leanings. A very liberal person will say someone who exhibits moderate traits is conservative. And like the 60-degree water and the 90-degree air temperature, there is still some perception involved. Facts exist and are accounted for, but not always completely accepted in a person’s perception. 

And this has gone on since the dawn of political thinking. People interpret other people’s beliefs based on their temperature. 

As you know I call myself an independent conservative, how you perceive me as a conservative is based on how liberal or conservative you tend to be. And since I incorporate some liberal thinking you may not think of me as a conservative, but throw in some facts and it is more confusing. Some people may say I am classically liberal meaning my roots are from a different era where what I believe was very liberal for the time. I stress my conservative nature by saying I want to conserve those values, hence I am conservative in the United States because I want to conserve the values of the Constitution and our founding fathers. I also value the traditional family, hard work, belief in a higher being or creator and other beliefs that align with what some call the American ethic or more self-centered American exceptionalism.

My concern is right now the perception carries much more weight for a society to be healthy. Perception will always exist, but when a whole country or society is dominated by it and facts aren’t considered anymore then there is concern for the future of that country or society. Are we that far along? Has Trump turned normal hard-working people into a society that has no true idea of the temperature of the water and only perceives it to be what they feel without any regard to the actual temperature and how that should feel?

To me, we have reached this extreme perception and little on the facts tipping point. And I believe that both sides of the proverbial aisle perceive the water is a much different temperature than their air temperature. The discourse and animosity spoke daily display this paradigm. My hope is that I have stepped out of warm water into warmer air and the only reason I am feeling this coldness is because it is a breeze hitting my skin and that will die and the real temperature will be felt and things will normalize to at least some historical averages.

Cheers

It’s almost the election year so let’s talk campaign reform

And the space between the title and me typing is about as much as you are going to get from the people in office. You will hear some ideas from the people running against the incumbents, yet the incumbents will focus on other issues. Yes, you will hear about how great is the economy or about a coming recession or how the other side is the bad guy, we are the good guys.

You will hear much lip service, but nothing substantive about healthcare, social security, tax reform, balancing the budget, and maybe some talk about education or protecting the consumer or middle class.  Everyone will tell you how great is the country, but the other side is the enemy and is out to destroy the country. 

Yes, the voting will be real partisan this year which in the end means our robber baron election system will continue, incumbents, will stay in office and rack up millions in campaign donations for them to abuse and occasionally someone gets caught.  And on this note, I was talking about the two Congressmen who were caught with my youngest and the quote was “..the whole thing honestly isn’t surprising” and “it’s the basic politician scandal”. No surprise, no shock, no indignation, nothing...just a raw acceptance of the fact our politicians are crooks and we cannot even begin to expect anything better. And this is my youngest child. 

So why even talk about campaign reform. First off, we need it. Second, we should expect more from the people we elect to represent us. People are so jaded though I am not sure we can get what we need. Just in case though, here are some simple ideas to get started.

Citizens United has to go. We need transparency in who is actually donating money to candidates. If the last few years have taught us anything is PACs are an antithesis to democracy or representative government. I believe people can give to candidates of their choice, yet it must be open. Some people always want to limit the amount of donations and I am for that, however, it is hard to pick some random number for the limit. Also, the Citizens United decision opens the door to foreign money pouring across our borders in all sorts of disguises. Maybe we should build a wall around campaign bank accounts.

Second and I have also mentioned this before. We need to shorten the campaign season. This constant campaigning, raising money, etc.. is counterproductive to a truly representative government.  

The two above creates a contradictory problem. People spend so much time raising money so they can spend it all campaigning all the time. Yes, I exaggerate a bit, we do have years where the campaign noise is minimal. Overall we are subjected to this barrage of information about how much each candidate raises for their war chest and then they go spend half of it so they can hoard the rest till next time. Shorter election seasons and serious limits on how much people can donate will help some.

The real reform has to come from us. We need to turn the duopoly of the Republicans and Democrats on its head. They are so ingrained we cannot get realistic or productive public policy. Our politics are stagnant. This duopoly has no fresh ideas; they are stuck with appeasing their base; they cannot respond to a changing world, and to say the least, they reach new lows after every election. The hatred is endemic. There is no respect for each other. The pretentious left hides it better, the alt-right Republicans wear it on their sleeves. So if we want change, we the average American, the rank and file party member, the independent need to make the real change. Real reform is us, waking up and recruiting new leaders from amongst us to replace the party machinery at the national level. 

Overall you can create numerous policy statements, spout all sorts of ideas to reform our elections, but until you change the people you will not obtain real reform. There is no motivation for the people in office to change the rules of the game when it continues to allow them to win over and over again.

So.........................say it..............................say it.....................................

We need new parties.

Cheers