INTENSITY OF GREED AS A PURPOSE FOR HIGH OFFICE

We have a variety of driving forces influencing our everyday life. We think of them as feelings and emotions without being clear about where innate feelings such has fear and hate mesh with reason. I believe kneejerk responses are both innate as well as being a hard-learned response from experience. Also, we have an intensity factor usually expressed with adjectives and adverbs in some cases even phrases. For example saying I was so frightened of falling that I feel nauseated from standing on a ladder. Although sometimes difficult to sort out from genuine innate feelings, we can add “intensity of purpose” as a reason for thinking the way we do. Of course, this comes to mind in a political year because that is what candidates do. It becomes impossible to sort out what can be conflicting purposes. They will say and do anything to have the people vote for them, but what is their purpose for wanting the people to elect them, which is where we have to fall back on the driving forces that so influence the candidates everyday activity. There are few things in life where “intensity of purpose” plays as big a part as it does for those vying for elected office. In a sense, elections turn us all into armchair psychologists while we try to understand the mental and emotional factors governing a candidacy but unfortunately, some candidates would require a psychiatrist to understand their motives. I am not just flippant with that last statement because it is undoubtedly true. I made a remark the other day about Mitt Romney’s 2008 campaign; I said, some candidates would take over the reins of government, bankrupt the country, and then sell off the assets. Of course, the reference was to the venture capital firm, Bain Capital. The response I receive from one reader chided me on my narrowness of thinking and contained a long and boring list of companies Bain took over and turned into moneymaking enterprises. My point in this blog is to rebut that thinking; Bain Capital exists for one purpose and one purpose only; the purpose of a venture capitalist is to make money. However, Bain Capital, with Romney at its head, had that purpose but had it with an intensity that is inappropriate in government. In truth, it is the complete antithesis of good government. We often hear candidates say things that are appropriate for business but inappropriate for the government. The most common one I hear is that “government is like a business.” No, it is not. Bain Capital did not are about people; it was intensely focused on profit at the expense of people. What I am pointing out is that to Bain Capital, employees were expendable. The media gave us the impression that Bain invariably would take the quick and easy street to profits. Almost every day, we hear in the news about some company overcome their greed and treat their employees fairly. Think about that; things we hear about in the news are serious things, not everyday happenings. I admit I have a bias because I know many businesses treat their employees fairly without making headlines. However, my point is the “business of government” is to treat the people fairly, the business of business is to make money, and the business of the voter is to select candidates who know the difference. I would point out that Donald Trump and Carly Fiorina, like Mitt Romney, does not know the difference, but like Romney, I fear Trump the most because he has demonstrated a demonstrated “intensity of purpose”. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated