Cleaning House for Ridvan Elections
By John Taylor; 2008 March 19, 18
Differential, people. What do we have?
Well, there are a few candidates written here. There is ...
I am not interested in names. What goes on your ballots is none of our affair; it is confidential. You have heard of ethics, haven't you? What we can do here is list out the problems, the symptoms, the qualities we need for a differential diagnosis.
But if we do not mention personalities how will we know who to vote for?
I am not interested in who. What is what matters. If we draw a picture of what the patient needs to get well, that will be a big step to bringing out the virtues the leader will need.
That makes no sense. Names go down on the ballot and names are what you discuss. That is how you pick the right leader. Always have, always will. I do not see why we cannot talk about people if is a person we are voting for.
Okay, assume you are right. Let us say you get elected. The election is over. We talked names and rejected them all except yours. Now it is time to act. Tell me what your mandate is.
What do you mean, what is my mandate? My name turned up on more ballots than anybody else's. I won. That is my mandate.
Okay, I get it. Victory is in your hands. You are the best man, but where is the wedding? Do you feel like you are married?
What are you talking about? This is an election campaign, not a wedding.
Wrong. It is a marriage. Let me ask you this, if people know they already love one another, why do they need to get married?
To solemnize their bond?
To make it permanent?
To turn it into a sociological entity?
To make a family?
Yes, yes, yes and yes. But you are missing the point.
Okay, I think I know what you are getting at. You want us to say that a wedding mixes in the sacred, the social, the pair's ideals, hopes and dreams so that later on when they hate each other's guts they will not lightly throw away what they conjoined during that first two years when their nervous systems were swimming in endogenous opioid polypeptide compounds.
My, my, my, aren't we cynical?
It is what you always say, "Everybody lies."
I say that? Actually it is worse, we lie even when we tell the truth, and when we tell the truth it turns into a lie. But if we give a patient a scrip for a sugar pill and a real illness gets cured, then what does it matter what we thought?
Yeah. Call it the placebo-like nature of reality.
Exactly. Which is why we have election campaigns as well as weddings. The point is not whether your vote "counted" or was "wasted," or not. The main point of it all is the ceremony, the ritual, the combination of wills that make for belief, faith, something that will last beyond the endorphin high.
So the entirety of our votes is nothing more than a vote of confidence to the one who is chosen?
Well, what else will come out of that long, tedious campaign? Is a list of the names of people who happen not to be sitting in our seats going to help anybody do the work any better? Is a list of all the people they did not marry going to help a married couple get through hard times?
I agree with you, as far as it goes. The hopes, dreams, prayers and love that are expressed at the wedding. Love is what is all about, whether you feel it or not.
Yeah, well you would say that.
While you people are bickering we have a very sick body politic that is not going to get any better until we find the problem and cure it. So really, tell me what do we want the one we vote in to come away with from this election?
Hold on. Election campaigns do discuss issues. That has got to help.
It helps diddly. Everything changes.
Well, maybe a plebiscite is a good idea. It is the will of the people, after all. If names are so bad, why not just vote on issues directly? With modern information technology we could easily do it.
Oh, yeah. Show me an airline company that takes a vote among the passengers about anything.
How do they know sitting back in the back what do or which direction to take?
And who are we to say what things will be like five minutes from now? Anything we say now about the issues is obsolete before we shut our mouths. That is why we elect people, not issues.
Yes, things in the cockpit change too fast; there has to be a knowledgeable expert in the pilot's seat who can move fast as soon as unforeseen conditions change.
Absolutely. It does not matter how advanced the intercoms and autopilots are, there has to be a human sitting in the pilot's seat, and it has to be the best expert we can get. Taking a poll has its uses, but not about technical things.
You people are not here to agree with me, I want different ideas from you. If I want a mirror I will go into the bathroom. We are here to find a diagnosis, stat.
Okay, I think I know where you are taking us. You are saying that elections are not appointments, they should not work technical issues, and that an election should talk about things that last forever, like virtues and qualities and attitudes that are needed always but that are especially needed at this juncture of history.
Yeah, if we paint a lofty portrait the one we elect will feel he or she has to grow into the shoes of the ideal man of the hour, or woman of the day, or whatever.
Exactly. Now we are right where we were when we started. What is the situation and what virtues are going to be needed to address it, and not just virtues our leader is going to need, but since we are going to be doing most of the work, we need to go over our virtues too.
Yeah, it takes a village to raise a child.
Would you people stop agreeing? You are really starting to annoy me.
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