Politics, Politic and Politicians

This will bring a whole bunch of ire from political type people. I am referring to the armchair quarterbacks of politics. The kitchen and water cooler pundits of all matters politics. Politics are so cool. Everyone can have a say unless they are in a room with folks with different political perspectives. Politic as opposed to politics or politician is worth a note.

We did a survey of about 20 diverse people about what they thought the definition of politics is. We did a survey of 5 internet dictionaries about a definition of politics. Our results can be summarized by “What a trip.” Really I dare you to type in / definition of politics / into your search engine and prepare to try and pick a definition. I like the ones suggesting an ‘art?’ For to be sure growing up in a family of 6 children politics is an art and politic is essential.

Are we having fun yet? Politics and fun? Yes politics are fun. Arguing and yelling and vitriolic behavior not so much fun and those are not politics. Those are venting and anger in most cases. If anger drives any part of our motivation to speak and act, we need to get into anger management classes real quick. Oops that is about 40% of vocal Americans or so I understand. We understand from anger management study that anger is internal and not external with few exceptions and there are some exceptions but if politics is one, get to those classes really quick.

TV type sports or children’s sports get real political real fast and anger flows in there. If you want to watch real fun politics put two “helicopter” soccer moms together. Yikes! Or how about two 30 something testosterone pumped little league dads in a small room. Just get out the popcorn and watch the show. Better than reality TV. Physical anger is not uncommon.

Smoking. That is a great one. I have been on both sides of this and stepping back it is hilarious. I think for about 2 years I smoked as defiant behavior. I think for two years I rallied against it as self-righteous.

Vaccines. What a vehement subjective implosion. 90% of people operate on this one, not out of anger but out of fear. Heck, if you make decisions based on fear you have issues. They should have fear management classes. Seems to me about as dangerous as anger. You know, our primeval fight or flight stuff. More like a reptile than an advanced mammal.

Now you are saying that the above is not politics. Just hold on and put that search term back into your search engine.

Politic. Put / definition of Politic / in that old search engine and it will blow your mind. It is like the exact opposite of how most view “politics”. Our research of about 20 people and 5 online definitions brought us to a serious conclusion; “What a trip”. (for some I should say that a trip in this case means an hallucination journey that blows your mind)

Politics are so interesting. I promise you that if you do those two searches you will lose half of your anger and fear.

Issues are not politic or politics. If you view an issue as a political one you again need some classes. Take a political science class at your local community college. You will be blown away by two things. First is the youthful exuberance of putting personal opinion above logic and the next will be that politics is not really what we think. A riot in Riyadh is not politics. A coup in Venezuela or Hong Kong is not politics. Those are government by fear and loathing that certainly is not politic.

Religion and Politics. That is a blast to watch. Oh I do not speak of the death and destruction here. That is pitiful and a blight on being human. In my case it is not politics it is evil and my only reaction other than donating time and money is prayer.

On the other hand politics and religion is backwards. I am not speaking of being spiritual. But religion is in fact politics. Good on those folks. In order to succeed in religion you must build beautiful places, convince people of your views and increase your population. Most religious stuff is at least built on a concept of love of some sort. But once again that anger and fear raises its ugly head and the “church’s” backbone of politics turns into negative. Which brings us to negative.

In the United States it is fairly well accepted that “winning” in politics is based on voting against something rather than for something. It took quite some time for that to sink in. And then I applied it to juries I had cajoled and board rooms I had roamed. Damn straight up that is a truth about our human condition. That was good to apply to me to change my perspective.

Personality. The drunkard. Us people sometimes discount wise advice and good suggestions because they lady who gave it to us drank too much. We tend to ignore good advice from people with Bi-Polar disorders. Some people even refuse to accept intelligent stuff from people because they are; old, young, dark, different sex or orientation. This is true, I once saw a man refuse good counsel from another man because the advisor was too fat.

If we were to oppose people because they have a particular personal issue we would need to do this: Sell our home. Fly to the Arctic and go to the middle of nowhere build shelter and live alone. (notice no dogsled as we would judge our dogs harshly for their personality and not performance)

To my knowledge many of the greats of our last 2 thousand years have been depressed or manic from time to time and liked the ladies too much and drank a great deal. Such are the politics of life.

Love. Now into politics and politic creeps this code by which many try to live. From Sitting Bear to Buddha to Christ to the Dalai Lama. One political rule stands true. And believe me these men were politicians. And let us not ignore Mother Theresa, Margaret Thatcher, and if you forget Evita you need a refresher.

These people loved so much those who they governed. Passion and caring is what I vote for. The opposite of love is apathy.

A quick aside. My country’s politicians running for office are awesome. The cream of the crop. Issues? They have plenty. And personal gain desire they have much of. Egos off the charts. But I live in the best of all best democracies. And so somehow and in some way these folks are doing a remarkable job. I pray for them every day.

So there I was and some folks were arguing about politics and one side screaming down another and I decided to step into the fray. I spoke of admiring these people and of raising them up and loving them for their service. Some yelled at me. Some shook their heads. But to a single one they heard my voice and considered it for just one moment.

I reckon all of my smarts makes me stupid. Fair enough. Maybe I should “fight” more for my convictions and tear down those with other ones. But I gave that careful consideration and decided not to. Now off to the politic of my home.