The Hidden Meaning of the 2016 Election
November 15th, 2016 // 7:43 am @ Oliver DeMille
The election is over. Now comes the truly important part.
And it depends on you, more than you realize.
1. The Two Nations in the U.S.
Forget everything you thought politics were about in America. The Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump revolution of 2015-2016 taught us something very important about our country. We sort of knew it already, but now the evidence is clear.
We are two nations. Not one nation, but two. Distinct. With different goals and dreams. With a different view of what is good and bad. And with almost opposite beliefs about what we want in the next four years, and beyond.
Regardless of how the media has portrayed things during the long months of the election, this great national division isn’t Red versus Blue states, Republicans versus Democrats, or whites versus minorities. It isn’t the same old battle between conservatives and liberals. Something new is afoot.
We are a nation divided. A nation split–fractured, in fact. In 2016 this division came to a head, but the election didn’t put an end to it. Not even close. We are a nation split between the political class, the elites, on one side, and the great mass of citizens on the other. But the differences between these two classes are significant. Specifically:
- The masses want to put the election behind them and get back to their daily lives. They hope the agents of change they elected will make things better, so they can focus on their families, jobs, and hobbies.
- The political class from both parties, Democrat and Republican, feels slapped in the face by the 2016 election. In every way they were put in their place by the voters. They’re not used to this. In fact, they’re used to sneering at the regular people in the nation, the people who live in rural towns and flyover states (the states “important” people fly over when they travel from one coast to the other). They’re used to laughing at the idea that the masses run this country. So now, with the fresh sting of the election driving them, they’re going to go to work every day to get their power back.
These are the Establishment of both parties, the elites in finance, academia, media, Hollywood, and lobbying. Many of them live in the Boston/New York/Washington D.C. corridor, and a lot of them live in the largest 100 U.S. cities that are home to the elites in each of the 50 states.
These Establishment members, the political class, care little for the struggles and challenges faced by the regular people. This group strategizes, debates, plans, and implements its policies, while routinely telling the masses to leave politics to the experts. “We’re the adults,” the elite class smugly tells the rest of us on any major issue of politics and policy. “Leave governance to us. Only we really understand what you need.”
The masses are, naturally, upset by this approach. But the problem is much deeper than the elites admit. The political class is now angry. The elites lost the battle in the recent election. But they are committed to win the long-term war.
Two Americas indeed.
2. The Political Class versus The People
The political class includes elected officials, federal government employees and bureaucrats, the media, academia, Wall Street, Hollywood, celebrity athletes, and anyone who lives in the elite, big-money bubble that insulates them from the daily struggles of the working class in this sputtering economy. This group benefits from the way Washington has done things for the past thirty years. They are wealthy and influential in the current system. They don’t want change. They are shocked by what happened on election night 2016.
They want higher taxes and even more regulation, a bigger Washington, bigger government, bigger programs, more bureaucracy.
This isn’t what the masses want.
But as mentioned, the masses see the election as over. They want to go back to work, hoping their newly elected leaders will fix things. In contrast, the political elite class is now ready to go to work winning back their power—to do whatever they can to block the revolution that put Trump into office, to do whatever they can to keep things the same in Washington and around the nation.
And the political class does this full time. For most of them, it is their job, their career, their work—and they’re at it 60-80 hours a week, day after day, month after month.
3. A New and Different Culture War
As part of this trend, more of the regular people will find themselves feeling less tolerance for celebrities, actors, singers, sports figures, news pundits, and professors trying to use their fame or authority to influence politics. The whole elite class is now considered suspect at a deeper level than ever before. “We’ll attend their movies and watch them play basketball,” the masses now say, “but we don’t care what they say about politics. They’re part of the Establishment. What could they possibly know about what’s best for me and my family?”
The elite class hardly knows what happened on election night. They are shocked. They loved their life of influence and prosperity. They struggle to believe that others don’t love what America has become as well. They don’t quite realize that much of America doesn’t like them anymore—that, in fact, lots of Americans see them as part of the problem. This is bewildering to them. They thought they were part of the “in crowd.” Now they discover they are seen as insiders by most Americans, but that this isn’t a compliment. It’s a term of derision.
On election night, one pundit on a major news channel told how he went to the gym during a break in election coverage and heard two men talking about politics. One of the men was elated that Trump was winning, and the second man asked him how he felt about a certain Trump policy. The first man quickly replied, “Who cares? At least Trump isn’t one of them.”
The reporter immediately grasped that the man wasn’t referring to Democrats as “them”. He was talking about politicians—from both parties. “One of them” meant anyone in the political class, be it Dole or Gore, McCain or Obama, Hillary or Jeb Bush, Romney, Rubio, Sanders, or Cruz. All of “them.” Then, later, it dawned on the reporter that he was one of the “them” too.
Imagine his surprise. Was it followed by feelings of defensiveness? Was he offended? Did he want to distance himself from the “them” crowd? It may have been the first time in his adult life that he felt like he was suddenly out of the popular clique and one the outcasts. “Them! Me? Wait…”
But how did a billionaire from New York City convince the nation that he wasn’t one of “them”? The answer is amazing. He did what pretty much nobody in the elite class ever does—in Boston, New York, Washington, L.A., or the smaller state-capital elite cliques around the nation. He did something very simple: he talked off-the-cuff, like the regular people. He made regrettable gaffes and misspoke from time to time – more like a high school football coach or a construction crew foreman than a polished banker, lawyer, or doctor. He called names, pointed fingers, talked back in bombastic tones and used colorful language. Nearly every time he went on TV or gave a speech he proved that he wasn’t one of “them.”
In fact, this very behavior made him one of the most despised presidential candidates ever—in the eyes of the political class. It made the college-educated embarrassed to support him, and it made Millennials loathe him as a virtually monolithic block. To the regular people, however, it did the opposite. It gave them hope. He acted like one of working class. Their response? “Who cares. At least he’s not one of them.” And they elected him.
This is a cultural war that most elites don’t understand. They are widely socialized in college, corporations, meetings, boardrooms and other air-conditioned settings where oxford collars and blue blazers are universal, and the elite code of manners is ubiquitous. Anyone who doesn’t meet their code of behavior is quickly ostracized, not out of malice but usually just for comfort. This becomes part of their culture, their ethos.
When elites (gently socialized in this way) encounter people dressed like workmen, speaking with a regional accent (any region), they too often make certain ingrained assumptions: “slow, hick, uneducated, inferior” or something similar. It’s not meant to be a bias—the political class works very hard to never show any bias, and in fact to avoid bias at all costs (or, at least, the politically incorrect biases). But it is a bias nonetheless.
It was, in fact, this very bias that made almost all newsrooms on every national network laugh at the preposterous thought of Donald Trump actually trying to run for president. His ball cap worn with a suit, his bluster, his pugilistic stance in every conversation. All of this communicated “unworthy, inferior, lower class” to the political elites. “Buffoon” they told each other.
What they missed, what they can still hardly even fathom, is that at the very same time millions of working-class Americans were taking notice and thinking that Trump might just be for real. Those ball caps with suits looked an awful lot like prosperity to them. The brash attitude and demeanor felt authentic and unrehearsed, and made them feel like “he’s one of us.” When he attacked the media, or lashed out at “the potential Trojan Horse” of Syrian refugees, or said mean things about opponents, the elites and college-educated saw crassness while much of the working masses saw unpracticed transparency. The masses may have been wrong about this on numerous occasions, but the elites didn’t even realize what was happening. They were oblivious, smugly sure that they were still the undisputed rulers of the nation.
In short, elites and the masses read the entire election very differently right from the beginning. Elites saw a national joke, and called him “Orange” and “clown”; the masses watched the same interviews and speeches and saw one of their own who had achieved success.
As an article in The Atlantic put it, elites didn’t take Donald Trump seriously, but they did take him literally; working people took him seriously but not literally. They didn’t see his extreme remarks as racist or misogynist, they just saw him as a villain on a reality TV show—the villain says extreme things, and this makes him/her the most popular character on the show (meaning: the villain seldom gets sent home; it would hurt ratings too much). They’d seen the same plot on Survivor, American Idol, The Bachelor, and yes, The Apprentice.
4-The Real Solution for America
But, to repeat, the masses now have a problem. The election is complete, and for the masses this means turning politics over to their newly-elected leaders and getting back to the things they really care about in life. What the working-class people of America don’t quite realize is that for the elite class the end of the election means putting their full-time work into making sure the election doesn’t change things very much at all. They want things to stay the same. They like the world where they are the elites, with special perks and higher pay than the rest of us.
They prefer ruling from the Capital while the masses work for them in the Little Towns and Villages (see the Hunger Games series). They don’t want this latest election to be a revolution, a movement, or bring about any serious change. And they don’t want the anti-Trump protests to bring about any real change either. They want exactly the opposite. And they’ll spend their full time days and evenings working toward this goal.
In other words, if you dislike Trump, don’t expect the protests (including those that will probably sweep the nation again at inauguration time) to bring any real change. The elites don’t want change. And if you like Trump and want him to fulfill his campaign promises and really change things, expect the elites to block as much change as possible. Repeal Obamacare? Trump has already started talking about keeping parts of it. Expect the elites to do much to tone down and water down Trump promises. Will a lot change? Not if the elite class can help it.
So what can the regular people do? First, we must admit that the right kind of leaders can do exactly two things to really help us: (1) get Washington appropriately out of the economy and out of peoples’ business, and (2) keep our nation safe. This bears repeating: the government is needed to keep our nation safe, and to change the regulations so this once again becomes a land of real economic opportunity. This is exactly what the recently-elected leaders have promised.
But that’s only the starting point. The rest of the work can’t be done by any elected official, any Senator or President, any Governor or Judge. It can only be done by the people themselves.
This is the hidden truth behind the election, and if we fail to grasp this one great principle, the elites will win their way because not much will actually change in Washington or around the nation. If the new leaders make our nation safer and free our economy from the crushing mountain of government red tape that has hampered small business success for the past thirty years, they will accomplish everything government can and should do well.
The rest is up to us. The American Dream has always been a two-fold reality:
- The government protects our national security and maintains a nation of economic, religious, and other freedoms. This is the “free” part of free enterprise.
- The people widely engage entrepreneurial ventures and voluntarily build millions of small businesses around the nation. This is the “enterprise” part of free enterprise. If a lot of people don’t take the initiative to fix their nation, one business at a time, the politicians will never make our nation great.
Freedom only works if the people—not the government—figure out what needs fixing and fix it, and what needs to be built and build it. If government is in charge of such things (beyond protecting us from attack and overregulation), then freedom is always diminished. To cite Hemingway, freedom is lost a little bit at a time, and then suddenly all at once.
We’ve been experiencing the loss of our freedoms “a little bit at a time” for decades. Now we need to change things before the “all at once” kicks in.
Again, the solution won’t come from politicians. That’s what happens in monarchy or aristocracy. For real, positive change to happen the right way, the free way, it has to come from the people. And this means entrepreneurship: building businesses. The term for this in our history is “The American Dream.”
Only a refocus on entrepreneurialism across the nation will actually make America great again. Nothing else will do it. Nothing else will even come close.
The 2016 election could turn out to be a positive step in this process, because this time the masses (hopefully) put leaders into power who actually see the importance of free enterprise. But, to repeat: The elite class wants to stop this approach at all costs—they really do want a few elites (them) to run the show. This keeps them in power, in wealth.
So, whatever you feel about the elections, one thing is certain: The rest of us have a vitally important job ahead. If we want to remain free, and to actually benefit from the possible changes that hopefully come from the election, we’ve got to figure out how to get the regular people in America to stop waiting for a fix from Washington, and also stop waiting for jobs and better employment to fix things for them, and instead get to work building the kind of nation we really want—in families, communities, and mostly in small entrepreneurial businesses.
We can do it. But “we the people” must do it, or it won’t get done. Whatever deregulations and increased encouragement to small business Washington can provide in the months and years ahead will be helpful, but the future doesn’t depend on elections. Elections can help, but real success depends on whether we as a people reboot the American Dream by engaging an Age of Entrepreneurial Small Businesses—and the impact such free enterprise culture always has on families, morality, communities, jobs, and prosperity for all.
This has always been the key to American greatness.
It still is, whether we realize it yet or not.
As goes small business entrepreneurialism, so goes America. And this doesn’t mean someone else needs to be entrepreneurial. This is about you, me, and any person who actually cares about our American future.
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“Attack Business, as Usual”
November 2nd, 2016 // 6:58 am @ Oliver DeMille
Washington’s Current Slump
(And the Solution)
Growing or Shrinking?
To pay for the national debt, including the unfunded mandates and entitlements ahead, “Uncle Sam needs more than $429,108.73 per person.”[i] To figure out how this directly impacts you, just write down how much you make a year—and multiply it by the number of years you plan to keep working. (Not a perfectly precise approach, but it will get us in the ballpark.) Then multiply $429,108 by the number of people in your family. Find the difference between the two numbers, and that’s how taxes will impact you in the years ahead.
For many Americans, the taxes in this reality are higher than the total amount of money they’ll make. Which is why politicians want to take most of it from the rich. But when they do, the wealthy find ways to move their businesses and savings abroad or into other financial vehicles—hurting jobs, investment, and making the economic struggles of average Americans even more difficult.
However we slice this, it’s a massive problem. It is already hurting almost all Americans (as seen in the Great Recession beginning in 2008, and growing ever since). Government stimulus, printing of inflationary money, and low gas prices have dampened how deeply we feel this problem right now—but these aren’t going to last forever. At some point the bubble will burst, and the economy is in for a tough time. All of us will be directly impacted.
But Washington hardly seems to notice. During elections most candidates promise real change, but it seldom materializes, at least not in positive ways. In fact, since 2008 we’ve seen a stubbornly sluggish economy. Washington puts out positive statistics each month, but most people aren’t feeling any kind of economic boom. And 90 days later Washington revises its past statistics—they are routinely much worse than originally announced.
Yet for some reason, the initial positive announcements make big headlines, while the revisions are usually buried in fine print. It’s almost as if the mainstream media is trying very hard to make the current Administration look as good as possible, and sway the election in their favor as well.
Safe and Secure
It may also be that Washington actually doesn’t notice how hard this economy is for most Americans. As “Phillip Longman recently noted in the Washington Monthly, the per capita income of Washington, D.C. in 1980 was 29 percent above the average for Americans as a whole; in 2013 that figure was 68 percent.”[ii] That’s 68 percent more! To put this in concrete terms, a person making $15 per hour would be compared to a person making $25 per hour. Or compare a person making $4000 per month to the 68% increase: $6720. Is it any wonder that Washington doesn’t feel the pinch quite so much as Joe American?
Compared to average Americans, Washington is doing a lot better. So why would they worry? For many in the nation’s capital, it must feel like time to fiddle, not worry that Rome is burning. Imagine how you’d be doing with 68 percent more money each month. (68% more of any amount seems fantastic. I’d be fiddling, too.)
Along with the struggling economy—largely a result of Washington’s increasing mountain of red tape that is choking American businesses—the U.S. is continuing to spend a lot of money on national security programs that aren’t working. “Since 9/11,” an investigation in The Atlantic reported, “the United States has spent $1 trillion to protect the homeland. The new security state is vast—and growing.” But “are we any safer?”[iii]
The experts answer that yes, we are a bit safer in some ways.[iv] But not even close to $1 trillion worth—and besides, we are less safe in a number of other ways.[v] Less safe, in fact, than we were when Bush won his second term or Obama was elected the first and second times. Specifically, Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are still around, Iraq is a mess, ISIS is growing, our privacy is dwindling (along with our spending power), and the threats from places like Russia, China, North Korea and Iran have actually increased, along with the growing dangers of cyber and other non-traditional attacks (chemical, biological, lone wolf, dirty bomb, etc.).
It seems the more we spend, the more vulnerable we are. Our lack of a coherent and widely-supported national grand strategy has made things significantly worse over the past decade.
As if this weren’t enough, we are also now facing a growing threat of serious economic conflict with China, which is buying up contracts and supply chains for natural resources around the world. Unlike U.S. firms that work largely on their own capital or that borrowed from banks or investors, all governed by boards and shareholders, Chinese firms are managed by a central government approach—even more controlling than British mercantilism in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Circling Closer
We’re right not to follow the Chinese model, since central controls undermine freedom. But the differences between our system and theirs skew the way economic statistics are reported, meaning that few Americans realize how bad our economic outlook really is. For example, in the latest Fortune 100 rankings of the biggest businesses in the world, the U.S. has 38 companies on the list, all of which are private.[vi] In contrast, China has 18 companies on the list; 16 of these are owned by the government.[vii] Combine the totals of these 16 businesses, and the Chinese government owns by far the biggest business in the world.[viii] Nobody else is even close.
Here’s another way to look at this: of the biggest 5 businesses in the world, one (Walmart) is a U.S. company and the next three are Chinese—all owned by the government in Beijing.[ix] The combined revenues of these three Chinese businesses are double that of Walmart, and over three times the revenue of the fifth biggest company in the world, Royal Dutch Shell oil.[x]
In comparison, Europe is home to 29 of the biggest 100 businesses in the world, 28 of which are private, while 1 is owned by the government of France.[xi] Furthermore, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore are home to a total of 11 of the 100, and all are privately owned.[xii] Together Russia, Brazil and Mexico are home to 4 of the world’s largest 100 businesses; 1 (in Russia) is private and the other 3 are government owned (one from each of these nations on the last list).[xiii]
In short, of the world’s biggest 100 businesses and largest producers of global wealth and prosperity, 20 are owned by a government, 16 of them by one single government: China. Yet Washington keeps hobbling American entrepreneurs and investors with increasing regulations that stifle our ability to compete. Yes, China’s economy has slowed a bit this year, but their growth is still way ahead of the United States—and their slowdown will likely mean they’re less willing to keep carrying our debt load (very bad news for our economy).
It’s time for Washington to take note of our gloomy economic outlook, addiction to government overspending and growing debt, and a very expensive and bureaucratic national security apparatus that is more hat than cattle—as the saying goes in Texas. For this vitally important change to happen, we’ve got to stop expecting so much from the White House and demand a lot more from Congress. Until this occurs, we will keep declining in an “attack business, as usual” approach to the economy.
Forward or Back
All this that I have described here is a recipe for major American decline. And it is our current path.
With all that said, I’m an optimist. I believe the best years for America and the world are still ahead. But how soon we initiate those “better years” largely depends on the Congressional elections in 2016. We need a Congress that will finally stand up for the American people (against the executive and judicial branches) and get serious about creating a truly free, booming economy.
We haven’t had such a Congress for decades—and we’ve been in decline ever since that trend started. Such forces of decline are now snowballing, meaning that the actions of the next Congress will largely determine America’s trajectory for the 21st century.
[i] Harry S. Dent, Boom & Bust, July 2016
[ii] Cited in The Atlantic, September 2016, p. 102
[iii] Steven Brill, “Are We Any Safer?” The Atlantic, September 2016
[iv] Ibid.
[v] See ibid.
[vi] See Fortune, August 1, 2016, 110-119
[vii] Ibid.
[viii] Ibid.
[ix] Ibid.
[x] Ibid.
[xi] Ibid.
[xii] Ibid.
[xiii] Ibid.
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How the Election Really Works
August 31st, 2016 // 1:24 pm @ Oliver DeMille
“Sometimes the wicked man undergoes a change for the better,
but the fool never does.” —Anatole France
Seen and Unseen
They’ve become part of our cultural “truth”. Yet both are myths. Lies, in fact:
“Perception is reality.”
“It’s just business.”
Indeed, these two popular sayings are usually voiced precisely to justify doing something wrong. Or mean-spirited. Or both. The truth is that reality is reality; perception seldom is—especially in the age of modern media. And “business” is never a valid excuse for being unprincipled, no matter what the media tries to tell us.
For example, in the 2016 movie remake of Tarzan, the bad guy (a social-climbing bureaucrat whose role is to represent his European king in Africa) kidnaps John Greystoke’s wife Jane, tries to “seduce” her through manipulation and threats, and kills those who try to defend her. Then he sets out to sell her to Greystoke’s enemies. Not a nice man.
Perhaps the most poignant scene in the movie comes after a dinner where Jane refuses his advances and then leaves the room. Once she has departed, the kidnapper notices that her silverware isn’t properly placed on the plate—so he quickly remedies the situation, showing that he has the perfect table manners of the European royalty.
The irony couldn’t be more striking. Such perfect table manners in a man who is a slaver, murderer, thief, racist, and would-be rapist. He has all the appearances of nobility, but no actual nobility. Perception and reality are, in his case, polar opposites. He is the worst kind of degenerate—the kind who hides his decadence behind carefully polished surface appearances. He is Iago. Wickham. Tartuffe.
In this man’s case, perception is the opposite of reality. And to him the phrase “it’s just business” means corruption and debauchery are not only acceptable, but preferable—and routine.
Love and Freedom
The French playwright Moliere (“France’s Shakespeare,” as some literary experts argue) captured this all-to-human flaw in his most famous play, Tartuffe. This classic contains an important warning for today: The way most people gullibly accept the influences of media in modern life is a serious problem.
If any institution sets out to make perception seem like reality, and to justify all manner of questionable things in the name of “it’s just business”, it is modern media. From aggressive paparazzi stalkers to “gotcha” bullying in the name of investigative reporting, to exposés and even seemingly credible reporting that play to an agenda, in spite of available evidence – today’s media has, in large part, abandoned its role as the conscience and “watchdog” of society and become part of the bigger problem. Indeed, much of media is a contemporary Iago, daily whispering the wrong things in the ears of citizens and voters. Sadly, many people seem as willing to listen as Othello or Orgon. Moliere summarized:
“People whose own conduct is the most questionable are always readiest to criticize the behavior of others.”
But Shakespeare and Moliere aren’t done with their scathing critique. In both Othello and Tartuffe, the power of the villains is based on pretending to be loyal, credible, dedicated to the truth, always genuinely helping the people. But appearances can be deceiving.
Not that anything is wrong with real faith, true commitment to what’s good and right. To the contrary. As Moliere wrote: “I have wit enough to distinguish truth from falsehood. And as I see no trait in life more great or valuable than to be truly devout, nor anything more noble, or more beautiful, than a sincere piety, so I think nothing more abominable than a pretended zeal…”
A few journalists get it right. They truly serve us all by doing things the right way. But the overall field of media is too often overrun with pretenders—like Iago, Tartuffe, and their peers—doing business instead of journalism, emphasizing headlines, ratings, and sales rather than what really matters. In Orwell’s famous Animal Farm, for example, the media icon is pig- aptly named “Squealer.”
The only solution to such media agendas is a populace made up of citizens who think for themselves. “Love requires a firmness of mind,” as Moliere assures us. The same is true of freedom.
Swaying Words
Too often, especially during elections, voters let media spin guide them. Like the character Orgon, deeply caught in the web of Tartuffe’s lies, tells Cleante—who has pointed out that Orgon should be wiser, not so easily swayed:
“Brother, your advice is the best in the world. It is very rational, and I highly value it. But you must not fret if I don’t follow it.”
Seriously? How often do we listen to Wickham’s silver tongue even when we know inside that something is wrong? Why do we let Willoughby, dashing Willoughby, sway our minds? A smile, a frown, or the seemingly-credible assurance of a popular Network Anchor. We swoon and follow.
Why?
“How strange these humans be! They choose the path of fools, though they know it lead to ruin … Emotion rules their ways.”
In the Moliere play The Would-Be Gentleman, the characters heatedly debate whether M. Jourdain is a good man and should be accepted into their society. Some criticize him; others praise him. But one comment sways a number of people. Dorante simply describes Jourdain as:
“A very polite man.”
This is the high art of media spin. Use exactly the right words to convey a certain impression—one that convinces, and lasts. Yet media commentary on candidates is far from objective. It is almost always steeped in some agenda.
Success and Rules
Best-selling author Neil Pasricha noted that in his industry, writing books, there are three types of success:
- knowing that your book is excellent and helpful to people
- selling lots of books
- getting lots of praise from book reviewers and critics
He then wrote: “Here’s the catch: It is impossible to have all three successes.” If you can get one, great. If you can get two, wonderful. But he’s never seen anyone get all three, largely because if you achieve any two of these, they will get in the way of the third.
The election process is similar. If a candidate gets lots of votes and knows he/she is truly trying to improve the nation, it’s almost impossible to also get the support of the political media. You can aim for two, but if you aim for all three you’ll likely weaken the ones that really matter.
For this reason, what the media says about elections is often (usually) off on election night. Marketing experts Ries and Trout made it one of their famous 22 Rules of effective marketing that whatever the media says, it is always wrong in some way—and wise people know it and look for it. They take media reports with a grain of salt. Always.
In elections, specifically, the forecasters are notoriously inaccurate. Why? They pay attention to others in the media, not the masses. Studies show that people answer surveys and polls differently than they vote, so studying the actual intentions of the masses before an election has proven very difficult.
Wisdom or Wisdom
Pasricha also noted that common wisdom is often confusing:
- Birds of a feather flock together vs. Opposites attract
- Nothing ventured/nothing gained vs. Better safe than sorry
- You get what you pay for vs. The best things in life are free
- Good things come to those who wait vs. The early bird gets the worm
- The pen is mightier than the sword vs. Actions speak louder than words
In short, we don’t really understand how elections actually work. Sure, if they’re fixed, or manipulated, or rigged—that’s one thing. But a truly free election is nearly always a surprise. Madison called every free election a “peaceful revolution.” Not truly predictable. We have to wait for the people to actually vote to know what they’re really thinking.
This will probably be even more the case in an election where the two candidates (Hillary and Trump) are so hated by so many people. A lot of voters won’t cast a vote for either. We won’t know…until we know.
In this election, perception isn’t reality. Not even close.
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The Meme Election
August 3rd, 2016 // 9:44 am @ Oliver DeMille
“Some Americans are actually using Facebook to choose the President?”
—Meme
Some articles are deeply serious, others are informational, and still others ask an important question or share valuable history or principles. This one is meant to be fun. But it also has an underlying reality that is worth considering.
For decades the daily political cartoon in newspapers was the pinnacle of political satire in America. Today memes, vines, and jokes on social media have taken its place, and studying these genres tells us a lot about where the American populace stands on top issues.
For example, investment advisor Charles Sizemore recently noted that now we have two of the most hated political candidates in history—Trump and Hillary. This is mirrored by a popular online joke that goes something like this:
Hillary and Trump are in a boat that is sinking in the middle of the ocean. Who gets saved?
Answer: America
Whether dark humor like this offends or causes laughter—as it does with divergent audiences—it usually only goes viral if it reflects something that resonates, one way or the other. To be frank: This election has much of America baffled. Just plain baffled.
“Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump?” a number of people are asking incredulously. “Really? Those are the only real choices?”
The nation is amazed.
History and Choices
Another meme features a picture of Donald Trump and the caption:
“I don’t always run for president, but when I do, I try to offend as many potential voters as possible.”
Or compare this:
“No matter who you vote for, this election will be historic:
First female president: Hillary Clinton
First Latino president: Marco Rubio
First Jewish president: Bernie Sanders
First Canadian president: Ted Cruz
Last president: Donald Trump”
Some people will laugh at the “Canadian” reference to Cruz. Others will shake their head and call the whole thing tasteless. But the words: “Last President: Donald Trump”? Priceless. Some will agree. Others will adamantly disagree. But it’s worth a laugh. And it communicates something that a lot of people worry about.
Sometimes a certain meme hits really close to home. For example, one says:
“If Bernie Sanders is elected president, he’ll be the first socialist president elected since 2008.”
Ouch.
Another meme shows Senator Clinton with a strong look on her face and the caption:
“Silly Americans. Laws are for poor people.”
A number of the jokes and memes are truly distasteful. Others are downright disgusting. Researching political memes brought me a number of laughs, but the really bad ones made me shake my head in shame for our nation. At least in the days of political cartoons an editor had to sign off. I like the freedom of our current model, but at times people take it too far.
Shocking Ourselves
Overall, I don’t know if the memes, vines, and online jokes help our political discourse—or hurt it. Probably some of both. But I do believe that a few of them cleverly capture the nation’s mood in ways we seldom find in the mainstream media. For example, consider the following two memes:
1-A small boy is pictured, about to poke a butter knife into an electrical socket. He’s clearly going to get shocked. The caption reads:
“Trump or Hillary? Top socket or bottom socket?”
A lot of people are feeling exactly this way right now.
2-Donald Trump is standing next to a huge wall on the border with Mexico, and the wall is lined with gold and stamped with a huge T. The caption reads:
“Think I can’t get Mexico to fund the wall? Well I got the media to fund my campaign!”
Indeed.
Some memes are both sad and funny, like a picture of Jeb Bush with the caption:
“ONE CHILD LEFT BEHIND”
Another meme shows Donald Trump dressed like Biff from Back to the Future, shoving Jeb Bush (dressed as Marty McFly’s teenage dad) into a high school locker. Compare this to a meme with a picture of Nixon. He says: “I deleted 18½ minutes of footage. Hillary Clinton deleted thousands of emails. Who’s the crook now?”
Form Where You’re Standing
I won’t even get into the political vines. They can waste a lot of time, and YouTube is full of the political good, the bad, and the ugly. In fact, on the topic of the election, there is a lot of truly ugly. The memes are typically much tamer. And, the more I compared the two, the memes are generally better—funnier, and more effective. (The funniest of the vines I came across is the Trump/Star Wars Emperor dialogue, with keywords: “Star Wars: Interrupting Trump”.)
The truth is that the political cartoon genre, the idea of political satire that uses one image to cut right to the core of the matter—and forces us to see truths that we may feel but haven’t yet clearly articulated—can be very insightful.
One more:
A picture of Star Wars characters carries the caption:
How you see your candidate (picture of Jedi master Obi-wan Kenobi)
How you see their candidate (picture of Darth Vader)
What they’re both really like (picture of Jar Jar Binks)
The kernel of truth in this simple meme is sobering.
With memes, such satire reaches more of the younger generations than the older. But they can teach us all. And over time, I suspect they’ll become more influential.
An important question right now: How will memes and vines impact future campaigns? And what will they evolve into?
By 2020 they could significantly increase in influence. In fact, since Kanye West has already announced his 2020 candidacy for the White House, maybe we’ll see the full election on a real-time streaming reality show app. Keeping Up With the Candidates. Something like this—or worse—is coming, no doubt.
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Are We Entering an Era of One-Term Presidents?
July 22nd, 2016 // 2:49 am @ Oliver DeMille
Loyalties and Addictions
Many nations, and the global market as a whole, are moving from the Loyal Economy to an On-Demand Economy. (See Klaus Schwab, The Fourth Industrial Revolution, 2016, 72) This is just what it sounds like. Our societal focus is increasingly on what we want–not what we need, should want, or have already agreed to.
This shift is impacting work, business, management, leadership, professions, and even families, churches and communities in massive ways. It has already taken a significant toll on relationships in our modern society. Indeed, almost no part of human life has remained untouched by this momentous change.
Just think of all the ways damage can be caused by a shift away from loyalty, and changed to whatever someone wants instead, and you’ve got a pretty good indication of the problem. For example, as a society we have historically been known for being loyal customers—we either love or hate the Yankees, Cowboys, Lakers, etc., and many people have traditionally been very passionate about Ford or Chevy, West Coast or East Coast, City or Farm, New York Times or Wall Street Journal, Prada or Gucci, and so on.
As for Republican and Democrat, these attachments were often multi-generational, and as zealously maintained as one’s religion. For a number of people, these labels (GOP or Democrat) defined “who they really were as people” more than any other feature.
But in the Digital Age we’re losing many of these connections. A lot of people now switch allegiance to sports team based on how the best clubs are playing this season, and we change “favorite” recording artists or television shows almost as often as we change our socks nowadays. We press “Like” one day, and don’t press it the next. Just follow the Twittersphere—changing loyalties is new a national hobby. Or addiction.
The Line
With the endless options of the Internet constantly streaming in front of us, it’s not surprising that many customers—most customers in fact—consistently try out new options. Why not? Maybe the next one will be better.
The same is true of many companies. It used to be that good employees were given numbered pins each year or decade—to show how long they’d been at the company. The ideal was once to work your whole life with one organization, move up the ranks a little or a lot, and retire in the same company and town where you started your first job. The whole company threw a party, and you were presented with a gold watch, an engraved silver pen, or another memento of your long-term loyalty.
Today few companies exhibit such loyalty. Some, in fact, routinely purge upper-level management in order to replace more expensive employees with cheaper, younger models who are decades from earning a pension. The laws have made it much easier to carry your retirement savings with you from company to company, and a lot of people are constantly on the lookout for a better job elsewhere. There are popular apps dedicated to this habit.
Given today’s technology, and the nimbleness big organizations must somehow try to exhibit in order to remain relevant, such changes aren’t surprising. In fact, they may simply be the new way of things, the new normal. The old is always being replaced with the new. This week. In fact, in the news cycle Monday’s “crises” and “tragedies” often go unmentioned by Thursday.
Thus it isn’t shocking that our political leanings are going through an era of upheaval as well. During modern periods of economic and cultural stability, a majority of voters stick with the parties. Whether you like this approach or not, it’s usually the reality. Such majorities may be “silent” most of the time, but on election day they vote like the experts knew they would. They toe the party line.
Parties or Menus
We have seen this kind of stability erode a great deal since 2006. The iconic memory of 9/11, followed by the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq or win the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan easily and quickly, threw the electorate for a loop, and the Great Recession that followed moved us decisively away from political stability—at least for a while. China, Russia, the Middle East, North Korea, fluctuating prices, an economy that never seems to recover, and so many other things contribute to a growing sense of chaos, and of things getting worse.
Indeed, elections seem to get crazier and crazier. Predictions by the top experts, and the masses of talking heads, are now routinely wrong.
This isn’t driven by a cycle, however, meaning that we can’t chalk it all up to “a phase” the nation is going through before it reverts back to its traditional, normal behaviors. Cycles and trends do sometimes explain things that happen, but this time something more is going on. The rise of nearly-ubiquitious digital mobility is still in its infancy, and it is quickly restructuring politics (along with marriage, family, community, education, career, business, the economy, etc.).
Voters are less and less likely to be Loyalty Voters, emotionally attached to one party that stands for their culture, their beliefs, their family traditions. Indeed, in a world where more and more people are routinely questioning their birth culture and family traditions, they’re not likely to let loyalties based on these things get in the way of change.
Specifically, we are entering a Pragmatic Era in politics, where people want on-demand government. They want a menu of options to choose from, not a political party and its bureaucracy. They don’t really want to choose between candidates. They want a little of what one candidate has, but without the rest of his ideas. They want some of what another candidate promotes, minus his personal views, or his stand on [fill in the blank…]. They like what they hear from one candidate on one day, but disagree with what she says the next.
Response Government
It’s not so much a targeted electorate where the candidates try to win over the biggest special interests—like it has been for the past two decades. What’s emerging now is, to repeat, a growing clamor for on-demand politics. Voters want to unbundle government. They want to be able to select “yes” items and “no” items from every candidate running for high office.
In other words, they want Washington to live in the Digital Age. They want to directly email—or, better still, text—presidential candidates and have an on-going dialogue with them, and then continue the dialogue after the president is elected.
“I liked your speech yesterday at Georgetown, except for the part on naval upgrading. What actually needs to happen is…”
Moreover, they want the President to answer their email.
“Thanks, Amy. I see your point. I’m meeting with the Joint Chiefs later today and I’m going to tell them your recommendation—and order them to do it. They really need it. Good thing you’re on our side and sent me that email.”
Today’s voters want the government to respond the way Amazon does. Immediately. In fact, they want to be able to sign up for the President’s Prime service—free answers within the hour, and nearly-immediate government implementation of whatever you tell the Oval Office to do.
“Get your policy implemented by Tuesday at 8 p.m., if you order it in the next 8 hours and 41 minutes. To get it by Monday at 8 p.m., pay an extra $3.99 and click here…”
As a result of this shift in voter expectations from their government (and the fact that government is still stuck in the 60s–or maybe the 70s–ways of doing things), hardly anyone is truly happy with any election anymore. Presidents Bush and Obama may well be the last loyalty-backed presidents. Indeed, barring a major military threat that unites the nation against a common enemy and brings back a loyalistic approach, most future presidents may well be one-termers.
That’s worth repeating. We may be entering an epoch of one-term presidencies. We’ve already seen the voters moving this way with their seeming schizophrenia in presidential versus Congressional elections. They routinely put one party’s candidate in the White House and simultaneously fill the Congress with the opposing party.
Solutions
Again, what the voters really want is a truly on-demand system, where they can elect national leaders and direct their actions issue by issue, “no” on this, “yes” on that—preferably with a click of their computer—er, smartphone. This is leading in the direction of more democracy, specifically a more democratic system built around online voting. And, honestly, most modern Americans see this idea as excellent, obvious, and overdue.
In response, I have two words:
- Federalist.
- Papers.
If you have studied them in depth, you know exactly what I mean.
But most people haven’t.
And that means we’re in for a wild political ride just ahead. It might contain a series of one-termer presidents (the nation swinging pendulum-like to and fro, then back again, over and over), a serious party shakeup with a new dominant national political party (or two), or it might be something even more surprising.
Whatever is coming, there is a widespread sense that it’s big. And we don’t even have Steve Jobs to walk out on a black stage in his black t-shirt and announce the future. If he were still around, he’d tell us to hold on to our hats, because this flight into the Era of populism, globalism, voter pragmatism, and digital-age on-demand revolution is just beginning. And the only thing we know for sure is that it’s going to get bumpy.
(Solution: It’s more important than ever for regular people to deeply study the core principles of freedom! The politicians and “experts” aren’t going to fix this for us—they’re the ones piloting the current chaos. For a beginning reading list of core freedom principles—and audios to go with each— join Black Belt in Freedom)
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