Politics

Democracy is a farce... but not in the way you think.

Democracy is a farce. But not it the way you think I mean that. When most people hear "Democracy is a farce," they will assume I mean that normal everyday citizens do not have a voice. This is not what I mean. Plato described "Democracy" as what we would consider today "Populism." Every day people do have a voice, and therefore leadership is swayed by public opinion and mob rule. This is exactly where America is in 2025. Many people in foreign countries I have visited that are historically politically hostile to America (ex Nicaragua) tell me "We have nothing against the American people. It's the government we don't like." I try to exit those types of conversations and thank people for their one-sided graciousness, but my real opinion is that they are dead wrong. The American people are bad. Not all, but the majority, are hateful, ignorant, vindictive, violent, and entitled. And that's why they will again and again support foreign wars like Vietnam and Iraq. Another small minority are naive but well meaning exceptionalists, who believe the rest of humanity cannot survive without our charity. But of course not all Americans are a menace. In the words of DJT, "Some I assume, are good people."

The reality of democracy as a farce in that democracy assumes that people will vote based on their highest values, or even their best interests, and that like the "Invisible Hand" of capitalism, we will inevitably choose our best leaders to represent us, and that this in turn this will lead to excellent leadership. This is the farce I am referring to.

I just read that the most likely candidates for President in 2028 from the Democratic Party are Gavin Newsom, AOC, and Pete Buttijieg. If this is the case, they might as well not have an election. Newsom is mentally handicapped. AOC is a radical idealogue, with very limited real life experience. Pete Buttijeg is a strong, intelligent and dedicated public servant.. but not going to get elected.

The Lonely Center

It's ironic that the political center is the loneliest place to be in America. There is no "Party of Common Sense". There is no "common ground." Only extremes and extremists.

In order to fit in somewhere, you must either believe in the unlimited right to own and carry any type of lethal weapon wherever and whenever you please, or that not even the police should carry firearms, and that the military should not exist. There is no middle ground.

The common sense position is in the middle, and will always be somewhere in the middle. But in America, being in the center means being on the fringe. The idea that security and liberty are incompatible is not only wrong, it completely contrary to the second amendment itself, both in letter and intention. The second amendment is not about irresponsible lunacy. It is about duty, service, patriotism, and responsibility. But in America, such an historically accurate and practical opinion is political suicide.

Either you believe that black and brown people are unwelcome in America unless they erase all traces of their history and culture and/or accept permanent second class status; or you believe that national borders are a violation of human rights and that unchecked illegal immigration brings only benefits, and that our economy would not be able to survive without it. On this issue, many Americans support the common sense position, as do most immigrants. But Trump and many of Trump's supporters, like Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller, do not. And whether it be out of kind-hearted intentions or out of a misguided attempt to pander to immigrant voters, or even enlarge their base, Democrats do not support a common sense position either.

Extremism is easy in America. It's easy because it is devoid of responsibility. It's easy because it doesn't require critical thinking. It doesn't even require one to live in reality. But the real reason it is so easy is that it is perpetually encouraged by our polarized two-party system. With only two parties, it is impossible to form coalitions or find common ground. And in our current system it is nearly impossible for a centrist to win a primary election. And of course it is nearly impossible to change this system, because change would require support from elected officials who are beholden to the power of their parties.

The partisan extremists and special interest groups are the true enemy to democracy, and the true deep state. They are the true parasites of our society and the enemies of peace and progress.

Republicans are Cowards

...and so are Democrats

Feb 22nd. 2025

There has never been anyone so clearly unfit to hold public office as Kash Patel. He is unqualified, unsuitable, and a bold faced liar. Yet he was confirmed by 51 Republican senators. Most US senators are highly successful individuals outside of politics and are not stupid people. They know that he is unfit to serve. And they know, as does Kash Patel, that the word "we" includes the person speaking the word. But they voted to confirm him anyway because they are scared. They are cowards and sell-outs who are afraid that Kash and Trump will come after them if they don't.

Democrats are also cowards, which is why Trump is president. No Democrat had the guts to tell Biden he was too old to run again, much less to run against him. No one had the guts to protect our border. And no one had the guts to protect women's sports and women's spaces and to protect children from lunatic doctors.

And as for Tulsi and Bobby, I don't consider "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" very courageous. They are both truly disgraceful, and their tragic character arcs are just beginning. More disgraces will come.

The only politician with a backbone in this entire country is the Independent Bernie Sanders. He's not always right, but he never compromises his values or judgement. He will be remembered that way for generations.

When is enough enough? - Jan 22nd 2025

My favorite quote of all time is from Ronald Reagan. "Don't be afraid to see what you see."

Today I saw Elon Musk giving a "Heil Hitler" on inauguration day in front of the presidential seal.

And he knows exactly what he's doing, doing what he does best - trolling. When is enough enough? Donald Trump came to power by not being afraid to criticize his own party. Why does his party feel so afraid to criticize him or his entourage? And why would ANYONE not accept this blatantly intentional gesture for what it is?

The answer is that American politicians are afraid of their constituents. This is the fault of the 2-party system where anyone who does not pander to the nut-jobs will quickly lose in the primaries.

Author Michael Lewis on Elon Musk in the Trump Administration and D.O.G.E. - November 24th, 2024

I’d like to share my point of view on Elon Musk and the "Department of Government Efficiency. "

First of all, I can’t believe this is reality. Maybe it’s because as I’ve gotten older, I’ve seen so many things develop and I don’t just take for granted that they exist. I remember a different world. For people of my parents’ generation and earlier, it was an incredible new reality that we had a new world order that didn’t exist before, and there are things that don’t really change your daily life but when you think about them it kind of just blows your mind. For example putting a man on the moon, or the idea that there are 20,000 - and at one point there were 63,000 - nuclear warheads in the world, and that we are all just going about our daily lives as before except constantly just minutes away from total annihilation at the press of a button. Or the Kennedy and MLK assassinations. For me the fact that Donald Trump was the president was kind of like that. Not in a tragic way but it just hit me one day in 2017 or 2018, like “This is weird, and I can’t believe it’s reality.” Now that he’s going to be president a second time it’s not that big of a shock.

Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy forming a special government task force with a crypto dog meme name is just about as weird.

I work with Tesla the company on a daily basis and my first hand experience is that they make incredible products, but the company is highly dysfunctional. It’s almost the opposite of how I would like to see the government operate. It’s a complete tyranny, where entire divisions of people have been laid off because of the whims and moods of the CEO, only to be hired back a few weeks later. Customers are consistently treated like garbage. Hasty decisions, poor planning, and high turnover ensure that there are plenty of problems and never enough competent people to solve them. I don’t think that most Americans want our government to work like that, and whether they want it to work that way or not I don’t believe it’s correct or effective, or the foundation of a strong state or citizenry. It may be a great model for supercharging (npi) badly needed public infrastructure development, but I don’t think the "Tesla way" would be effective anywhere else in the government, outside of wartime production.

Michael Lewis, author of The Big Short and Moneyball recently gave a great interview exposing the ridiculousness of Elon and D.O.G.E. :

“It’s kind of insane to put Musk in charge of an organization right now. There may have been a time in his life where he was suited to managing other people, but I don’t… - he couldn’t manage anything now. He’s got a group of people underneath him at Tesla who do things for him, I assume and at SpaceX, and they probably - there's probably a story there that someone's going to dig out about how one day they did it, how they did it in spite of him rather than because of him kind of thing. He's completely self-absorbed. He seems to spend all his life on Twitter. It's destructive rather than constructive. It's dishonest over and over. It's just lie after lie after a lie. He's preening. He’s all the things that a bad manager is. The idea that person is going to go into this largely selfless enterprise called government and manage it - that's nuts! It's the kind of person who could - and it isn't and it isn't that government wouldn't benefit from some some input from the private sector - it's that running government is different from running business. It’s dumb to say we're going to turn this into a business, but you can't do it because you don't have the same incentives.

But you can learn from the management techniques in private business. The kind of person who's going to do that is like the quiet excellent manager of some company who doesn't pay himself too much and who is extremely aware of the value of the person six levels down from himself. That's the kind of person who's going to go in and be useful. When Donald Trump says ‘I’m going to make Elon Musk the head of government efficiency,’ who does that play to? It plays to all the people who know absolutely nothing about anything - about Elon Musk - about the government. It’s people who are kind of moving through life with a very very superficial understanding of the world around them ... and that's the Republican party right now.”

Elon Musk is a genius and he’s not a fraud. And I don’t think he’s evil or particularly greedy or self-serving either. But he has become so rich and successful and popular within his own tribe that he’s essentially lost the need to be humble enough to question his own ideas. He literally owns his own opinion factory, and he is beholden to no one. In an extreme sense this is basically like where Hitler’s character arc was after conquering Poland and France, and thus right before leading his nation to total disaster, destruction and complete military and moral humiliation, with half or more of the women of his nation being raped and the country split in two for the next 45 years. (And that’s what people should be really scared of when they say “Trump is like Hitler.” - not that he’s a racist going to commit crimes against humanity, but that he’s going to lead our country off a cliff).

I do believe Elon is generally a force for good in this world and that his mischievous side is mostly confined to trolling. But I want people to realize that this is the same guy who insisted to the world that a diver involved in rescuing a soccer team trapped in a cave in Thailand was a “child rapist” just because that man made fun of Elon's mini submarine.

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