Leadership II

 

Leader of the Pack

I felt so helpless, what could I do?
Remembering all the things we'd been through
In school, they all stop and stare
I can't hide the tears, but I don't care
I'll never forget him, the leader of the pack

What does it mean to be a leader?

Ironically Elizabeth II, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of Her other Realms and Territories Queen, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith is more of a republican than many US Republicans. The Queen is beloved by her Subjects, because she understands that she is a servant of her Subjects, and takes care to sign all of her correspondence to her subjects, “Your obedient servant”. The sovereign does not dominate their nation.  The sovereign serves their nation. Authoritarians dominate  their nation and then use that domination to rule the nation and may serve their own purposes, not the nation’s.  An authoritarian may act as if they are the sovereign, but they are not sovereigns if they are not servants.

The problem is that the leader of the pack is often determined by dominance, and that requires an individual, User Optimal, solution.  However, once that leadership position has been obtained, the position requires a group, System Optimal, Solution.  To become a leader may require dominance, but to be a leader requires service.  It is like many of us learned in Cub Scouts.

The Cub Scout follows Akela.
The Cub Scout helps the pack go.
The pack helps the Cub Scout grow.
The Cub Scout gives goodwill.

If the leader, helps himself more than he helps the pack, he is not Akela. Give goodwill.

Pro- Life

 

People

People
People who need people
Are the luckiest people in the world
We're children, needing other children
And yet letting a grown-up pride
Hide all the need inside
Acting more like children than children

Is a fetus people?

This is not just an idle question but is at the heart of the whole Roe v. Wade debate. I was raised a Catholic. As such I believe that life begins at conception and therefore a fetus is a life. But that does not mean a fetus is one of the People according to the US Constitution, and despite what the Supreme Court might have said, that makes all of the difference.

The US Constitution outlines how “We the People of the United States", strove  "to form a more perfect Union.”  It describes who are the People  in Article 1, Section 2.

“Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.”

“Other” persons were chattel slaves and slavery was of course abolished by the 13^th Amendment, so there are no longer "other" Persons. The language  goes on how to establish the counting of people.

The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct.

That law is the US Census. That law may classify the People by race, age, gender, nationality, citizenship, etc., but they are all still Persons. It does NOT enumerate fetuses as persons. (It also does not  enumerate Corporations as Persons, but that is another matter).

A fetus may be a life but is NOT constitutionally People. I personally do not have a problem with that. Ending a life is not just classified as Murder. It can be, and is, legally classified as Murder by various degrees, Voluntary Manslaughter, Involuntary Manslaughter, Execution, Suicide, Accident, or …Abortion. Abortion may be ending the life of a fetus but it can not legally be Murder unless the victim is a person. It might not legally be Murder if the fetus is a person, but it could be one of the other classifications. Abortion does not have to be listed as a right in the Constitution to be a right, if the “victim” is not People. The Court of Popular Opinion may think that think that O.J. Simpson is a Murderer, but a California Court found him legally Not Guilty of Murder. IMHO, the Supreme Court has confused its role with the Court of Popular Opinion.

Supermajority

 

Sunshine Superman

Superman or Green Lantern ain't got a-nothin' on me
I can make like a turtle and dive for your pearls in the sea, yeah
A you-you-you can just sit there a-thinking on your velvet throne
'Bout all the rainbows a-you can a-have for your own

We don’t need a Superman.  We need a supermajority.

The most important decisions of the United States constitutionally require a supermajority.  E.g.

“…The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds of the Members present…”

“…Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish its Members for disorderly Behaviour, and, with the Concurrence of two thirds, expel a Member…”

“….If after such Reconsideration two thirds of that House shall agree to pass the Bill, it shall be sent, together with the Objections, to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall become a Law…. 

“…Every Order, Resolution, or Vote to which the Concurrence of the Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary (except on a question of Adjournment) shall be presented to the President of the United States; and before the Same shall take Effect, shall be approved by him, or being disapproved by him, shall be repassed by two thirds of the Senate and House of Representatives, according to the Rules and Limitations prescribed in the Case of a Bill…”

“…A quorum for this Purpose (counting Electoral College votes) shall consist of a Member or Members from two thirds of the States, and a Majority of all the States shall be necessary to a Choice…”

 

“….He (the President) shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur;…

…The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress;…

14^th Amendment …No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability…

25th Amendment …If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office….

In other words, the most important decisions of the United States, according to its Constitution, require, not a simple majority but, a supermajority.  It boggles the mind that opinions of the Supreme Court are NOT considered to be important decisions that also should require a supermajority. It is the responsibility of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, not to try like Neville Chamberlin and appease a minority who have become a majority in one institution, but instead require that all Supreme Court decisions by HIS Supreme Court should be by a supermajority of the sitting justices.  Criminal juries require a unanimous finding.  Civil juries require a supermajority finding.  Should not the same be expected of the Supreme Court?

Wishes

 

What a Fool Believes

But what a fool believes he sees
No wise man has the power to reason away
What seems to be
Is always better than nothing
And nothing at all keeps sending him...

And, despite Larry David’s wishes as expressed in the FTX commercial,  fools can vote.

 Republican Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.) deleted a tweet Thursday that accused House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) of allowing CNN, or as Steube put it the “Communist News Network,” to build a TV set in Statuary Hall. CNN had actually used a green screen displaying that section of the U.S. Capitol.

https://www.wfla.com/news/politics/gop-lawmaker-deletes-tweet-blasting-cnn-for-full-tv-set-inside-capitol-that-was-actually-a-green-screen/

My son worked on the digital effects team that made the hologram where the dead Tupac Shukar appeared to be on stage with Snoop Dogg at Coachella in 2012. Without a trace of irony, a number of people wanted to be taken backstage to talk with Tupac. I would like to say that those people, and Rep. Steube, were just fooled by new technology and once they realized that there is this new technology, then they will no longer be fooled. However Hans Christian Andersen addressed the same thing in his story about the Emperor’s New Clothes in 1837. His story was an update of Spanish story from 1335 .  In these cases, no new technology was involved. 

The old adage “If wishes were horses, beggars would ride” applies. Just because you wish something were true, doesn’t mean that it is true. Be wise.

Ethics

 

(If Loving You Is Wrong) I Don't Want to Be Right

If loving you is wrong I don't wanna be right
If being right means being without you
I'd rather live a wrong doing life
Your mama and daddy say it's a shame
It's a downright disgrace
But long as I got you by my side
I don't care what your people say

Should you ever choose wrong?

“Two wrongs do not make a right.”

“The ends do not justify the means.”

If you believe in these positions, then the lesser of two evils is still evil and should not be chosen.  If you are confronted with a choice between two evils then the best choice is not choosing.

If Donald Trump is truly unfit to be President, as Bill Barr has said, but he would still vote for Trump as President rather than vote for a Democrat, who Bill Barr believes to be evil, then Bill Barr’s best choice is to make no choice at all, e.g. filling in a vote for Mickey Mouse or leaving the ballot  blank.  Yes, in the short term, Democrats might win the Presidency, but in the long term maybe Republicans might learn not to nominate Trump.

The Trolley Problem is a thought experiment in ethics about a fictional scenario in which an onlooker has the choice to save 5 people in danger of being hit by a trolley, by diverting the trolley to kill just 1 person. This was the basis of an episode in the last season of the NBC SitCom “The Good Place’.  In it eventually the truly ethical position was found to be not killing 5 persons or one person, but to destroy the trolley ( kill yourself).  That is how you remain good.  If you ever choose evil, even if it is the lesser of two evils, then you become evil.

A Long Time

 

A Change is Gonna Come

It's been too hard living
But I'm afraid to die
'Cause I don't know what's up there
Beyond the sky

It's been a long
A long time coming
But I know a change gonna come
Oh, yes it will 

Is 40 years too long? 

The lessons we earn from our parents may be those that they learned from their parents. Thus inbred actions that are not necessarily our fault, or our parent’s fault, but may be due to what our grandparents experienced. It is not just the sins of the fathers, but the sins of the grandfathers that are important

This means that what seems like a long time to us, is not so long at all. Saying that we as individuals are not actively racists, does not mean that our grandparents, whom we may not have even met, weren’t racists. My story. My paternal grandmother died in 1941, ten years before I was even born. My paternal grandfather died in 1950, the year before I was born. My father was born in 1925, after the Spanish Flu. My father’s mother and father, my paternal grandparents, lost two children to the Spanish Flu. They passed along to him a bias against common spaces and shared items, which I realize I have and has effected my actions. I realize now that it was because of his upbringing, which was affected by his parent’s experiences and attitudes.

An action against racism in society, and while you are a member of society, might still have nothing to do with you as an individual. You may not be racist. But that does not mean that your grandparents, or their grandparents, were not racist and that is why Critical, Race Theory, CRT, is taught (in GRADUATE SCHOOL!  Little children may not even realize that their parents were once little children to their grandparents, and this is why little children are NOT taught CRT)

This also has a bearing on, IMHO, the mistaken ruling by the Supreme Court on the Voting Rights Act, that actions of the states from 40 years ago are no longer relevant. Given in 2022, I am talking about actions that my paternal grandparents experienced in 1922, 40 years is a drop in the bucket. 40 years is long to me as an individual. 40 years is a brief period of time to states. Never mind asking African-Americans about slavery which ended in 1865. Ask an Armenian about the Turkish genocide, or an Irishman about the marches to celebrate the Battle of the Boyne. These things happened more than 40 years ago and still affect actions and attitudes today.

Bi-Partisan

 

As Time Goes By

This day and age we're living in
Gives cause for apprehension
With speed and new invention
And things like fourth dimension

Four dimensions? How about more than one.

Characterizing politics as liberal and conservative is probably TOO restrictive. It makes the assumption that politics is one dimensional when it is probably has at least one other dimension. A political position should be based on the type AND scale of government. We do not need bi‑partisanship. We need pan- partisanship.

This argument should sound familiar to people who remember the old Miller Lite beer commercial (“Less Filling/Tastes Great”) or the old Certs commercials ( “It’s a Candy Mint! It’s a Breath Mint! Its Two, Two, Two Mints in One.”). In the case of these commercials, people seem to accept that something can have more than one dimension.

		Filling
		Less	More
Taste	Great	Miller Lite	Not Miller Lite
	Not So Great	Not Miller Lite	Not Miller Lite

 

In political positions, the form of the government according to the Constitution is a lower case "r" "republic". As Benjamin Franklin famously described it ”a republic, if you can keep it.”   The Constitution does not specify the size of that government. There has always been a healthy debate between liberal and conservative positions as to the size and role of government.

		Size
		Limited	Big
Form	republican	Conservative	Liberal
	Authoritarian	Pseudo Conservative	Pseudo Liberal

 

A problem is that Authoritarians masquerading as Conservatives seem to have taken over the upper case "R", "Republican" Party. True Conservatives, such as Liz Cheney and Mitt Romney, must contend with Pseudo Conservatives who appear to be Authoritarians. And those are not just limited to Trump. While Pseudo Conservatives exist, Pseudo Liberals also exist. For example, Napoleon began as an officer in the French revolutionary army. Modern day Authoritarians such as Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin are big government, Authoritarian,  Pseudo Liberals.

The US Constitution describes a republican form of government. You can not be in the government if you are an Authoritarian unless you want to overthrow that Constitutional government. The Republican Party needs to decide if it supports this, lower case "r", "republic". If so, so it should eliminate Pseudo Conservative Authoritarians from the Republican Party, even if it means in doing so they will reduce their membership. If their argument is over the size and role, not the form of government, that needs to be clear.  The problem might not be owning the libs.  It might be eliminating pseudo conservatives.