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Severe Outflow by R. Edwards

On Trust

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Recent events and discussions with others indicate that I ought to explain something for the sake of helping others to understand. I’ll point to this piece when needed in the future, in order to be time-efficient and avoid redundancy.

Growing up in the inner city, I learned early and almost innately the meaning of “watch your back” — trust must be earned, not just given. Mostly I still think that way. Been there, done that, seen it all…I’ve witnessed too much betrayal, dishonesty and backstabbing, too many mind games and control tactics and manipulation attempts in multiple settings (including being targeted with all of the above in an important past relationship), and it reinforces the notion.

This is not a cynical or bitter existence either. My trust wall is so automatic anymore that I give it little conscious thought. In fact, I live a quite happy life in a great marriage with one of the very few people on Earth whom I ever have had reason to trust completely and unconditionally. She is so genuine and real that I trust her far more than I trust myself (again, simply because I have seen too much). That’s rare, and a blessing.

I also trust my Lord unconditionally and without reservation; after all, God is perfect, all-knowing, and all-caring. He has guided me through many tough situations after thoughtful and deliberate prayer (which does work…best if your expectations aren’t selfish or short-term in nature). What I do not trust is our broken and sinful world, and most people in it. I love my fellow people fundamentally as humans, and have helped and will help strangers in need as I see appropriate situationally. However, strangers’ and acquaintances’ intentions and motivations being largely unknown, and human nature being inherently sinful, trust is another story. Want me to trust you? Well, I used to live in Missouri, so “show me” that you are trustworthy. It can be done and takes three things: time, authenticity and integrity. [Notice I did not say “perfection”, for that is impossible in a human. However, my standards are very high.] Simple, but not easy!

The positive to this level of understanding of people is that I don’t get taken advantage of; I can effortlessly spot a scam or detect shysters, call them out without inhibition, and alert others who are more gullible to prevent their being taken for fools by such people and situations. It serves one quite well in many situations (personal investment, choosing charity, scam avoidance, BS detection, advising friends, etc.). This has prevented a lot of trouble, both for self and others. In those regards I am blessed.

The flip side: Outside of a very few trusted friends and colleagues, people generally are kept at arm’s length or longer, and in specific compartments or ladder levels of trust. This is just who I am. I fully admit this, and you just have to deal with it, if you want my friendship or favor. I am quite secure in my own skin, and don’t need any particular relationship to validate my well-being or self-respect. Therefore: if investing in earning my trust is too much trouble for you: not my problem…see ya! [One other thing you need to know is I am brutally honest, which you can see readily by reading previous BLOG entries going back a decade.]

See, I have to conscientiously, actively force myself to trust, to take risks in people, in any sort of relationship (personal or professional). Again, it’s not cynical or bitter at all…it just is. This is a different perspective of origin than most, but I’m completely at peace with it. If you are too, we’ll get along fine on whatever level of balance we shall reach.

This also ties in with my personal Facebook policy, which is part (but not all) of what motivates this entry. I post personal things there at times, though I am very measured and deliberate about what, and am careful not to reveal too much. My Facebook wall is not a democracy; what happens there is entirely on my terms, and at my discretion. Even still, I only accept “friend” requests from people I already know or who come highly recommended by mutual friends. If I ignore a request, it’s nothing personal against the requester. I just don’t know you well enough…simple as that.

Backlash to a Backlash to a Backlash…

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For those who have been exiled in wilderness tents for the past two weeks, Republicans won big victories in Congressional “mid-term” elections this cycle and already are starting to assert themselves accordingly. A virtual mirror image of this phenomenon happened in 2006. Neither pendulum swing was an isolated event; tracking of national partisan results for President and Congress since the late 1800s shows that power is fleeting for either side.

Given such a track record, neither party should get too smug after a big election win, because as history has shown (over and over and over), that winning side hallucinates a massive mandate that doesn’t really exist, assumes too much of the electorate supports all of its favorite policies, abuses its power, then suffers a “shocking” defeat when the inevitable blowback occurs against its behavior the previous few years. That begs the question, why do these swings always seem so shocking when they are inevitable?

Partly, the surprise at such swings comes from shortsightedness and ignorance, both by politicians and the public. After all, we live in an era of flavor-of-the-year fads and ten-second attention spans, combined with an utterly wretched academic knowledge of history and civics among most of the populace. The tawdry misadventures of Justin Beiber and the Kardashian women are more important than the national debt or Middle East policy for far too many people, and that’s just pathetic! Part of the problem is that each hapless-ignoramus vote, from some schlub or ditz who can’t even name the three branches of government, counts the same as each vote from those of us who can name every member of the Supreme Court and who actually study the issues.

Politicians of both–yes, both–sides pander shamelessly to that ignorance, and the fear that they can fuel as a result. Those evil bad guys are going to take away your welfare check (left), religious freedom (right), bedroom behavior (left), guns (right), clean air (left), kids’ education (both), privacy (both), money (both)! And there are just enough nuggets of worst-case scenario truth and slippery-slope potential in such fear-mongering to make it somewhat believable. Don’t think this isn’t by design either; elections have proven to be won that way for generations. The Republicrat monolith that spawned NSA domestic spying and quantitative easing (corporate welfare if there ever was) then plays both leftists, and conservatives like me, for the sucker, because of a lack of alternatives.

Does this mean a continual mandate for compromise? Perhaps, on some issues that are not binary and where compromise is possible–usually economic ones where budgeting lines can be drawn in between partisan preferences. Both sides have a history of offering profuse lip service to compromise until it means they actually have to give up something. For example, compromise can be done on social squabbles like so-called “gay marriage”–and here’s how. Civil unions are a middle ground between zero recognition and full advocacy. The middle is always best, right?–or so the few true centrists claim. [I obviously do not agree, and neither do my mirror images on the left.] However, the left flatly refuses to compromise on that issue, revealing itself as hypocritical when complaining that the right refuses to compromise on any issue. And so the no-recognition and full-“marriage” sides dig in because neither want to accept that middle solution.

[As an aside, yes, I put “gay marriage” in quotes deliberately and without apology, because marriage by definition cannot be anything but man-woman; yet somehow I am just centrist enough on this specific issue to support legal recognition of civil unions for those who are seeking benefits related thereto. In fact, there is a very solid Libertarian argument, rooted in a literal reading of the Constitution, for no Federal involvement or recognition of any sort of marriage.]

Speaking of Republicrats: Secondarily, but importantly, we have no large, self-sustaining, third-party choices; as such, the electorate keeps being presented with a ceaseless somewhat-right R vs. far-left D target when what it often claims to want is the middle. I’m not sure a third party is much of a solution, however, because for every Tea Party that might rise up, so might a Green Party, and the republican democracy gets even more fragmented and fractious. As has happened in Europe, the Greens would siphon off votes for prevailing leftist party. The Tea Party (where I most closely fit) would siphon conservatives from Republican ranks. The Libertarians would siphon both. Good luck getting a majority on much of anything under that model, outside the occasional Green-Democrat or Tea-Republican coalition, and what does that yield? The same stinking dichotomy we have now anyway!

Personally, I tend not to advocate the middle ground most of the time. I am staunchly conservative and freely state this, with no reservation. Calling me a “right winger” is not just a compliment but a badge of honor. I won’t even pretend to be centrist on most matters, because I am not pretentious. I freely admit that I don’t want compromise on a lot of issues–because it only means taking this nation halfway to hell instead of all the way. If middle-road compromise is always the best solution, all the time, no exceptions, then…I am part of the problem, and moreover, am glad of it. [Now you be honest and ask yourself, is the middle unfailingly the best path, every time, all the time?] If more of my left-wing friends would quit falsely claiming to be centrists and compromise-seeking, and instead, be brutally honest and admit a mirror image of my own unwillingness to yield on many issues, we’d at least understand each other better in our endless disparity! We won’t agree anyway, so what’s the point of play-acting like we ever could?

That said, I also admit that compromise (as malodorous and “sellout” as it seems to me in many cases) is a time-honored part of solving some problems facing this country. It can be beneficial in the net to make compromises that neither side fully likes, on some (not all) issues. There sometimes is merit to the old adage that you’re doing something right if you manage to enrage both sides.

However, there often is no middle ground on more contentious, generally yes/no topics like abortion legality, a choice of starting military action in a specific conflict area, or Federal funding for (abortion, birth control, condoms, or any other private-bedroom issue). When the left controls the presidency and Congress simultaneously, a slew of edicts and even laws flow forth favoring their side. Ditto with the right. Then the pendulum swings with the electorate, disgusted with absolute power, voting in enough of the opposite side to stop the bleeding.

Therein lies the Founders’ pure genius in setting up this representative democratic-republican system (lower-case “d” and “r”): the voters get to tell the side that has gotten cocky and overly self-assured in power: “Enough! Stop it!” This means a halting to what one side or the other deems as “progress” and the invariable sore-loser whining by that side (which I fully admit to as a conservative ’06 and ’08, even as leftists refuse to admit now and in ’04). Yet the system works. Sometimes the car of “progress” need to stop, lest it drives us over a cliff.

In the most recent midterm elections, that “Enough, stop it!” message was directed at a Democrat-ruled Senate and administration whose actions (including those carried over from previous Rs and then made worse, like NSA/FBI snooping and the growing national debt) overflowed with arrogance, hubris, and contempt for the rule of law. I hold that much of the voters’ emplacement of Republicans in 2014, and of Democrats in 2006, was not out of a mandate for the favored party’s platforms (proactive voting), but instead a backlash (reactive voting), in order to check and balance the runaway presumptuousness and abuses of the other side.

Pendulums that are constantly pushed will continue to swing. And so it will be, back and forth, this and that, Republican and Democrat, tick, tock, tick, tock. Despite highly dubious predictions by Democrats, there will be another Republican President who, at some point, partly overlaps an R-dominant Congress. Those Rs will go overboard and compel a Democrat President and Congress, who will desperately do everything they can to push that agenda as far as possible before the next backlash throws them out. And so forth, and so on…

To deny this is to deny historic truth. Since complaints without solutions are worthless, what’s my solution? I advocate complete elimination of all partisan elections. No Rs, Ds, or other letters after any candidate’s name. Let every election be decided solely on the basis of issues, not letters or parties. This ideal forces politicians to be accountable not to parties but to voters (and unfortunately, lobbyists…something we can’t prohibit constitutionally under freedom of speech and association). At least this does remove rigid party-platform politics and the problem of a candidate being stuck at the mercy of his/her national party’s platform and money machine.

Is a party-free politic realistic? Not any time soon, but I see no realistic solutions…none. As such, we’re stuck with partisanship and division, like it or not. Get used to it. Deal with it. We’ve had to for two centuries.

The lesson is simple, the truth independent of liberalism or conservatism as ideals. Human nature is that power corrupts. This ain’t changing, at least not before the Second Coming. The pendulum will not stop, and each side will swap out control of government at irregular intervals until the very implosion of society and government itself.

The Myth of the Goodness of Humanity

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I’ve often heard of the “goodness of humanity”, as if this is congenital and dominant in our natures. Really? I say that’s a bunch of Utopian crap–a delusional, insular, Pollyanna, head-in-sand worldview that ignores blatantly obvious reality.

There’s a reason toddlers in the sandbox take more than give. We have to learn civilized behavior. Some never do, at least to legal or tolerable levels; the rest of us learn, but choose to ignore the lessons when convenient.

It’s this simple: If humanity were fundamentally good, we wouldn’t have to be taught how to behave! We would just be benevolent, kind and loving, instinctively. Alternatively, if we need to be taught specific methods to express that “innate goodness”, individuals wouldn’t revert to barbaric, selfish, greedy, violent, shortsighted, lazy basis that resides in us all.

My temptation here is to call our behavior animalistic, but that does great injustice to most animals I’ve known. Are there good people? You bet, but fundamentally, we as a civilization suck at morals and ethics.

Furthermore, if humanity fundamentally were good, if we truly lived the ethics of excellence, service, integrity, self-restraint, and delayed gratification, then these things would not happen:

Ruminate on those a bit. Read, then re-read. Let those sink in. Then consider that it’s just a tiny, tiny fraction of the real world, and just over the last few months of time. Most crimes, for example, are never prosecuted; most bad deeds by friends, neighbors, co-workers, relatives never make headlines. It can be depressing if you let it. I choose not to, because we have free choice in both our behavior and our attitudes.

The purpose of this is not to offer specific solutions to all of humanity’s problems. That’s too large of an endeavor, obviously, just by the tip-of-iceberg sampling represented above. I’ve offered some solutions throughout the history of this BLOG, and periodically will propose more…but never could cover them all. No, instead, the point of this entry is simple and straightforward–to hit you with reality and reject the notion that “human nature” is basically good. What you do with that reality is, of course, your choice.

Can people do good and great things in spite of their fundamental self-centeredness? Absolutely! Indeed, most of us do. For example, many of us who are parents sacrifice time, money, and effort for our kids because we love them and care about their well-being. Our soldiers, sailors and airmen enlisted voluntarily and make great sacrifice to serve our country. Individually, we’re there for our best friends, and so on. Unless you are sociopathic, you can and have done some commendable good for people. This is not an indictment of the right things you or I have done–but instead, an acknowledgment of the evil around us (and to at least a small extent, in all of us).

Most folks lead double lives, balancing their sinful and generous sides–sometimes within the same minute. Have you ever abused anyone, anytime, verbally or physically, for any reason? Then you acted with deliberate malice toward another. Have you used addicting substances, then told a child or friend not to? Then you hold a double standard. Have you advocated a sociopolitical position beneficial to your self-interest but detrimental in some way to others (taxpayers)? Then you are putting self above country. Have you criticized greedy bankers and/or governmental profligacy while racking up discretionary credit-card debts or otherwise mismanaging your own personal finances? Then you’re just spouting cheap, hollow talk and not living according to your own rules.

Have you told a “little white lie” or pretended not to be displeased, just to spare someone “hurt feelings”? Then you have committed dishonesty, regardless of the motivation. Maybe you rationalize that lie as the lesser of two evils. Well, guess what: even the lesser of evils is still evil! To me, relativism doesn’t excuse wrongdoing. I’m sure many of the people involved in those events above similarly would rationalize, if on grander scales. “I only beat up one little wimp for his money…I could have killed him instead!”

History has countless examples of greatness over evil. Some people have performed tremendously beneficial and good acts, regardless of their imperfections. Famously benevolent figures such as Lincoln, M.L. King, and Mother Teresa–all of whom would freely admit they were far from pure even in their uncommon service to others–come to most folks’ minds straightaway. Obviously, for us Christians, Jesus represents the ultimate example of this, as the only sin-free human, knowing he was eternally blessed but nonetheless laying his physical life on the line in an agonizing manner for the sake of all who wish to experience the ultimate glory of God, eternally. That’s a free choice, of course.

Free will is what we have. Most of us (including yours truly) have done some dumb things with that, just not dumb enough to have been killed or jailed. Those whose deeds led to the headlines above took it to egregious extremes and did not get away.

Let me be clear on this: I am far from perfect. I don’t hold others to higher standards for behavior or effort than myself. That’s the essence of the Golden Rule, remember? However, nobody is harder on me than I am; and my standards are high. I demand excellence and integrity from myself first, then from others, knowing perfection isn’t possible and I sometimes screw up and fail to deliver the goods sufficiently.

When I call out somebody–or society at large–remember, it is rooted in the very same expectations I have for myself…nothing more. It is most certainly not “passing judgment”, it is demanding high standards and holding people accountable. If you don’t know the difference, learn the difference. Accountability is the enforcement arm of integrity. In oneself, accountability is known as “conscience”.

Make a mistake? Okay, we all do sometimes. Do something about it! Get up, dust off, admit and atone for the error, then learn from it so you will not choose to make it happen again. [And yes, mistakes are chosen!] Don’t act like you’re entitled. Humble yourself in genuine remorse before those you’ve wronged (most of all, before God, if you are religious, as nothing is hidden from Him).

Finally, consider again that if everybody were to demand excellence, service, integrity, self-restraint and delayed gratification from themselves, then much of humanity’s problems would be minimal, and the headlines above would not happen! The only thing holding civilization together is the collective mass of still-imperfect individuals who do have such expectations, first of self, then of their children, friends, and associates. That mass seems to be shrinking in influence…

Reality is that humanity is and will remain fundamentally selfish, and as such, the greatest and only eternal answer is outside ourselves. In the face of the pervasive wrongness all around, and sometimes within, there is hope…and it’s not in our own natures.