Conservatives are often accused of being heartless and cruel to the suffering. According to most research, self-described conservatives donate more time and money to charity than do self-described liberals – they just don’t spend any time talking about it. Conservatism is about empowering the individual because all people are capable of reaching their potential and accomplishing great things. “Great things” doesn’t mean that everyone is capable of curing cancer or single-handedly advancing the productivity of society. “Great things” means doing something great at any level. Sometimes greatness is opening a restaurant by preparing food in a way that no…
Selfishness
People are selfish. But, being selfish, and aware of one’s own selfishness, is the key to a thriving society. When on an airplane, they tell you that if the oxygen masks come down, always put your own on before you help the person next to you. This is a great metaphor for life. Before we can be at all helpful or useful to others, we have to have our own house in order. People need to be grounded, satisfied with who they are and what they’re doing with their life before they can start helping others. People love to…
Do we still believe in winning?
I was having lunch with a friend last week when we started talking about Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign. Trump’s campaign is centered on casting events as competition that America is either going to win or lose. Economically, America is either going to beat China or lose to China. In the “war on terror,” we are either going to beat Islamofascists or lose to them. And so on… In our conversation, I asked my friend the question, “Do you think Americans still believe in winning?” What I meant was, are we still a nation of competitors who…
The world gets smaller, and more isolated
I recently attended a marketing conference. One of the main premises of the conference was that we’ve finally evolved to the ability to personalize marketing messages on a mass scale. The description went something like this: + We used to go to the butcher, and they’d know our name and have our order ready for us+ Then television happened and the world got smaller, so marketing started reaching for the masses with one, depersonalized message (TV, billboards, etc.)+ Now, the two have combined That’s right, with the amount of data we collect on everyone, their habits, their preferences, etc.,…
Driving while texting: Bad. With a live animal in your lap? Good.
While everyone’s concerned about people texting or talking on a cell phone while driving, I’ve never once heard anyone mention the safety issues around driving with a live animal on your lap. I’m not disputing the dangers of texting while driving. Things can happen quickly, and if you’re looking at your phone at the wrong second, it can change your life forever. But in Seattle, where people have more dogs than children, seeing drivers with pets in their lap is not an unusual site. (And if I had to guess, I’d say many of these people are the same…
Spatial relations
Part of being respectful of others is respecting their space. Most people do this, but I sometimes wonder if it’s regional. I’ve lived in many place in the US, and in places like the Midwest, people seem pretty aware of their surroundings. During my last visit to Up North, every time I walked, ran, or biked on the main roads, every car that passed moved over into the other lane to give me some space. It was similar living in other parts of the Midwest. Contrast that to my last time in the Pacific Northwest, where cars militantly drove…
Racismists run rampant
We’re all racist. You’re racist. I’m racist. Everyone is racist. Liberals know they’re racists, so that puts them at least kind of on the side of the victims of racism (or at least forgiveable). Conservatives are super obvious blatant racists. Everyone knows that. But what if it’s not racism? What if it’s racism fatigue? What if the people we consider racists are really racismists? Racismists are those who reflexively are just sick of accusations of racism that have no legitimate or coherent reason or evidence. They’re sick of all bad things that happen to any black people being blamed…
Imagine
Can you imagine 535 new congressmen in the nation’s capital? (Yes, I realize we only vote for one-third of the Senate at a time.) Instead of slowly bringing in new people who can be taught by the old how to grease each other’s palm and scratch each other’s back to entrench themselves in the system, you’d have 535 people who wouldn’t even know where their offices are. There’d be no existing relationships with lobbyists. No one would be well-versed in parliamentary rule. They’d probably have to rewrite the rules of the House and Senate. They’d look at the way…
Capitalists vs industrialists (or conservatives vs liberals)
I recently read an old Seth Godin post in which he made a distinction between capitalists and industrialists. Among other things, he said “Industrialists are not capitalists. Capitalists take risks. They see an opportunity, an unmet need, and then they bring resources to bear to solve the problem and make a profit. Industrialists seek stability instead. Industrialists work to take working systems and polish them, insulate them from risk, maximize productivity and extract the maximum amount of profit.” He went on to say “Industrialists don’t mind government regulations if they write them, don’t particularly like competition or creativity or…
Make sure you vote (like me)
I recently saw David Byrne in concert, and before the show started, I was routinely accosted by people trying to get me to register to vote. Later, in the middle of the show, he stopped to ask that we all vote. An hour ago, I was looking at a friend’s Facebook page, and she was reminding everyone of the upcoming primary voting deadline and advocating we vote. This whole “get out the vote” thing has always vexed me. When you tell everyone to go vote, are you assuming they’re all going to vote the way you want? If not,…