If you read the article “Route 66″ published on May 14, then you know that these days my reality is split between two locations approximately 1700 miles apart. For the past 22 years, Karen and I raised two boys in Folsom California, but as of this month, our home is in Texas. Yes, we have started a new chapter as empty nesters. Well, partially-empty nesters. Our youngest son attends the University of North Texas. Currently, he’s living in a rental house with three other guys, but now that he’s seen the McMansion we bought, he and one of his roommates have decided to move in for the summer. Perhaps laying poolside beats getting a job. We’ll see. For now, however, it’s just Karen, two cats and myself. Sad to say that our dog Cooper didn’t live long enough to make the trip. We lost him in January. But life goes on and we been consumed with this relocation odyssey for the last six weeks. It’s an understatement to say that it’s been exhausting. There’s plenty to accumulate, box and move after three decades in Northern California.
So last night I took a break from all the lifting, unpacking, organizing and assembling to watch a video entitled “The Folsom High School Story”. It was something I produced last summer at the request of some good friends who serve as faculty. And although entertaining, this video was also a reminder of my deep connection with the Folsom community, particularly in the role of the high school’ s Music Booster president. It was a labor of love which forged relationships with most everyone on the school board, the Folsom City Council, and of course, the students and parents in the music program. This was all volunteer stuff, but it added significant meaning and dimension to my life, probably because it was all volunteer stuff. The mission of promoting music education helped redefine my place in the world.
What does any of this have to do with politics? In a word; everything. Stop to consider that our daily activities and pursuits are built around a network of family, friends and associates who have tremendous influence in our lives. Much of that influence is shaped by collective desires, interests, values and attitudes. Contrary to the popular myth of marching to our own drummer, which seems an appropriate metaphor, most of us care deeply what other people think.
And that’s the definition of politics.
It’s a system of continuous feedback designed to make incremental adjustments in our behavior and thought. It’s also a system that tends to form organizations and groups that, at times, tend to be at odds with other organizations and groups. Liberal versus Conservative comes to mind. How can people living in the same culture and under the same set of laws have such different views regarding fundamental concepts of freedom, self-reliance, personal accountability and self-determination?
Perhaps the answer is found in the concessions that we make in order to fit in with the friends we’ve chosen. What we express, or more importantly, what we don’t express, is often dictated by the forces that provide for our needs, whether they be economic, social, spiritual or even physical. One could make a case that this behavior is equally manifested in both conservative and liberal thinking, but I contend that it is much more prevalent among the latter.
Just watch the news. Do people such as Atty. Gen. Eric Holder or Secretary of State Hillary Clinton really believe half of what they say? Or are their contorted explanations and justifications simply a natural result of following a script written by influential associates. If our livelihood or self-esteem depended upon the support of someone like Barack Obama, how many rationalizations and compromises would we make each day? If ostracism were the cost of standing upon principle, while contradicting friends in high places, how many of us would pay that price? Before you answer, put yourself in the shoes of a liberal politician, bureaucrat or activist. Then decide whether or not you would bite the hand that feeds you. Many in the entertainment industry know this firsthand.
Make no mistake. The desire to please does not infer that truth, morality and even logic are relative. They are not. But rationalization can be a subtle and sometimes insidious behavior, particularly when used to satisfy a personal need at the expense of the truth and greater good. And we were all guilty of it, albeit some more than others.
So peer pressure and rationalization coupled with the desire to please and succeed might explain why the liberal and progressive talking heads on television can look into the camera and offer opinion that flies in the face of logic and fact. Perhaps that’s why Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke reassures Americans that inflation is not a threat, citing statistics from the Fed, but ignore the spiraling upward cost of energy and food. Rationalization may be the reason why Charlie Rangel can keep a straight face while proclaiming that George Bush is responsible for most of today’s $14.3 trillion national debt, even though spending and borrowing have increased exponentially under two years of Obama. And perhaps that’s why Hollywood can adopt and promote self-destructive, progressive views that are dramatically at odds with the majority of Americans, even though writers, producers, directors and studio executives are technically in the business of making money.
There are 12 step programs addressing gambling, drinking and even borrowing. Perhaps there should be another designed to help progressives. Because if peer pressure and rationalization equals liberalism, then independence and honest self-assessment equals conservatism.
Facebook
Twitter