A Facebook conversation with a friend of a friend.

October 2016

(I fixed some grammar, for both of us)

ME:  Let’s be honest, neither Hillary or Trump is defendable. They are both variations of Leftist Big Government leaders, they just have different suitors and entitlement recipients. I’m just happy that in this circus of deplorable candidates I can honestly sit back somewhat satisfied that there isn’t a conservative among them.

E: Hear hear Taylor. As a liberal (the L word! Yes, I will own up to it), I desperately want the GOP to send informed, experienced, Conservative policy makers and leaders to oppose and balance whomever “my side” sends. I respected (but often disagreed with) Reagan and Bush Sr. I would not have much feared a McCain or Romney administration (minus Palin. Sorry, she was too nuts for me). But Trump is no conservative and he’s no president. To allege that he’s qualified, simply in opposition to and out of rabid hatred for Hillary, is wrong.

ME:  For me, it is all about the Limited and Proper Role of Government in relation to our “Created or Natural” rights. These supersede the Government.

Big Business requires a Big Government and Big is never enough, sadly. Eventually, we will sell our unalienable-ness for a Government that becomes the Grantor and not Protect of our rights and freedoms.

E: What’s the remedy?

ME:  The Left uses POWER to do “the right things”
While this seems well intentioned, it is a bad precedent. It is the most effective for sure.

I much prefer a Government willing to ask whether they have the AUTHORITY to do a thing, even a good thing, and restrain themselves when the answer is no. Then challenge the citizenry to pick up the mantle.

I govern my kids this same way. I don’t micro-manage, deem, or decide everything for them. I do my best to equip them, challenge them and then get out of their way. Do they fail, is it less efficient, does it take longer, YES, but it makes them better, capable and healthy independents.

Big Governments sets themselves up to be needed, required and then demands sacrifice and allegiance. Just like bad CEOs or leaders. Do a comparative of Leader vs Manager, any LinkedIn meme will do. 🙂

E: Our environment is so politicized and polarized, neither “side” wants to be the chump who trusts the actual system to work. It’s no longer about what’s right and proper, what’s reasonable and sustainable (witness the tone of the above “debate”) It’s about winning at all costs, scoring points… and the good of the people, process, democracy, and constitution be damned.

ME:  This is why I deplore the Strongman (Woodrow Wilson, FDR, Trump) concept of President. These types suck the very heart out of our need to be successful. Like parents who coddle their kids, and at 30 they still live at home, we are becoming wards of a governing body that was originally supposed to JUST take care of some community functions.

The political class has created a system that disallows a normal person from participation.

Socialism or leftism is the wrong direction as the perceived fix for a bad system. It is not a remaking or a better version. This is a myth.

I understand why it’s attractive. If I were an alien and brand new to this world, I’d likely agree. They created a system of theft and a belief that theft is the game so it becomes okay to take using the ends to justify the means.

The individual is sacrificed for the group as we’ve devolved into prescribed tribes. A black man is not allowed to think certain ways without being labeled. As though his skin color somehow manages his mind. A Government’s goal is to continue to exist. At all costs. We are constantly pushed into dependency after dependency. Hell, I legally can’t get solar panels that DON’T feed the grid. You CAN’T collect RAINWATER in Seattle.

The problem is, you vote against tyranny from the politicians you don’t trust and vote for tyranny from the politicians you do trust. I do the opposite. In the end, we both have twice the tyranny.  🙁

I regret ever supporting the Patriot Act. And Obama puts on steroids. How the hell did that even happen? We argue past facts and ignore what’s actually happening at any given moment.

E: YES

ME:  It makes me sad, we equip those who seek power over us and champion how they stick it to the other guy. Never once wondering how this might come back on us.

E: If we support anyone else, it just makes “our side” “weak” versus “their side” It’s so broken

ME:  Correct!
The government has convinced us to fight for money and pushed the notion of a Zero Sum Game.

E: Careful you don’t turn into a Bernie Bro now… 😉

ME:  We argue “Income Tax” and the non-incomed super wealthily pit the poor against the middle and upper classes. The underclass is totally broken and possibly unfixable and we vote to stay safe enough, least they revolt.

E: Where is this debate in the national conversation??

ME:  Each party offers it’s carrots and promises of a better tomorrow if only we’d give them a little more time, a little more money, a little more of our freedoms. I was in a small Republican think tank for a while. I desperately tried to get them to consider a rebrand. it truly breaks my heart.

E: As soon as McCain picked Palin, I was like, uh oh, bad precedent

ME:  Our real battle is up and down, not right and left, the politics “we see” is all reality tv show. Hell, Kennedy beat Nixon because he was attractive. In the end, I believe more government isn’t the answer. More power isn’t either.

E: My life partner is a registered Republican. He’s voted Republican in every election except 2008 (Palin, again. Neither of us could go there). We actually have these intelligent discussions. It’s sickening how it plays out, not just as theater but as farce, at the expense of real lives and real quality of life.

ME:  Freedom is messy, inefficient, ugly, and full of bad decisions and unfortunate consequences.

E: No it isn’t! Vote for Brand A and everything will be exactly how you want it, with no sacrifices or compromises!

ME:  LOL!!
All the intentions, laws, oversight, centralization, federal programs can do is keep the trains on time and create a nice facade. At the expense of our maturity, the expense of the minority communities, and the expense of real civilized adulthood.

We are coddled and micromanaged into childish rants and expectations we vote for our piece of the stolen pie. Race issues can’t be solved because POWER stands at the Zenith.

The only solutions is a turn at the helm, not independence or personal authority because government fills that role. We are forever under the thumb of uncaring parents, who best use us as props and pit brother against brother so we don’t rise up and overthrow those sons of bitches.

E: I was just going to ask: how do you think race issues can be solved then? Minorities are oppressed and suffering, and govt steps in to push us toward fairness and equality, but how else to do it? I don’t think civil rights can be left to majority vote or human nature.

ME:  Crazy story, we went to an all Nigerian church for two years. My family the only whites. They loved us like no church ever has. My kids got to be the minorities.  My daughter’s Sunday school teacher’s daughter founded BLM. wild huh?

I believe the Left’s foundational notion of Equality of Outcome (while noble) is literally our biggest problem.

E: Great example. THAT ^ ^ ^ is how we solve race issues

ME:  And why race can’t be solved at the moment.

E: When we see each other as people. Which means ordinary social interaction

ME:  I do not believe race exists.

E: I actually understand that ^

ME:  but the way the Left defines racism makes it unsolvable.

E: Well to be fair, the left describes it in terms of immutable absolutes because racism often works that way even though race is actually a false construct. Tell that to someone who is a little bit brown, and suddenly his life is less than mine, in practice… Or in my case, friends argue whether I’m “white.” Friends of color claim me as “beige.” Because my ancestors are Jewish

ME:  If Racism is defined as Power + Prejudice = Racism (which is what I was told)

E: I think that’s a good definition. Which is why “reverse racism” is a very dumb term. Where there’s no power, there can be no “ism”. That’s just prejudice. Prejudice plays a big part in racism, but it’s not the same thing

ME:  Opposed to a belief that a race dictates on a genetic level higher and lower humans species, which is the original definition. You’re equation is unsolvable.

E: Yeah, no, BLM folks have taught me that’s not the definition. The system is the definition. The system needs power with its prejudice to be racist

ME:  A Racist believes in a generic superiority of some sort. That’s what Nationalism is. System racism is also an unsolvable conundrum, for the same reason. But, knowing skin color and hair color are the same genetic differences is a relatively easy fix. There is not such thing as race.

E: Well it’s ultimately all an excuse for power and money

ME:  duh!
LOL

E: ha, ok, but it’s not duh to everyone…

ME:  That’s my whole point. Every lie, every diversion, every pitting is an ever increasing government desire for more money and power.

E: There’s fascinating history on how political and financial elites, after the end of slavery, created racism to keep poor whites at war with someone other than themselves.

ME:  Again it’s not a battle of right and left, but one that is up and down, divide and conquer is a fantastic strategy.

E: It’s been working for 150 years

ME:  Maybe since Cain and Abel. 🙂

The Government is like the fireman/arsonist who sets fires he can easily put out in order to be the hero. And keep his job necessary. There is nothing harder to kill in Government than a program that used to be great.

E: lol

It’s been fun exchanging ideas with you. May we infect everybody else with open-mindedness…

ME:  So I default to smaller less power government. If for no other reason than to slow them down. It’s has been fun. 🙂

One day we should unpack the difference between “Equality of Outcome” and “Equality of Opportunity” and how each deals with Cosmic injustice. That’s my cliffhanger. 🙂

E: Good, well, my partner accuses me of being a “closet Republican” on that issue. To which I take offense — who said Republicans have a monopoly on logic and common sense? 🙂

ME:  Parties are just shells. Give it 100 years and they’ll be reversed.

“The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected.“ – G.K. Chesterton

Thus we have two great types — the advanced person who rushes us into ruin, and the retrospective person who admires the ruins and that quote is over 100 years old and British. LOL!!

…sadly we don’t learn much…

E:  Oh my god so brilliant.

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