Liars in our midst

The president lied yesterday. Now, with the current President, this isn't an uncommon thing, but this time was utterly blatant. And you know why he can get away with that? Because nobody will call him on it. None of the press, none of the Democrats, nobody will stand up and say "George W. Bush lied." IF there's no punishment, no cost to lying, why wouldn't they?

It's the same reason we're at the point where torture can be an accepted practice, and the military can consider training Iraqi death squads. Because nobody pays for it. Nobody paid for it in the 80s when they did it. Nobody lost their jobs over Iran-Contra. Ronald Reagan? George Bush Sr? John Negroponte? Dick Cheney? Everybody got pardoned, and then it GOT DROPPED, and look where we are now. Convicted felon Admiral Poindexter in charge of a group dedicated to spying on Americans. Oliver North has a nationally syndicated talk show. Why do we let them do these things?

THAT is part of the problem liberals have, they're too ready to forgive and forget, or let other people use their own beliefs about tolerance against them. Yeah, tolerance is important, but the point of HAVING beliefs is that you think those are the right way to do things, if you don't stand up for them, what good are they? Tolerate people's right to believe unhelpful bullshit, but that doesn't mean you don't oppose them. For fuck's sake, the Republican leadership is immoral, corrupt, liars and hatemongers, CALL THEM ON IT. When George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, or any of the others lie, say so. When they try and appoint Alberto Gonzales, who tried to defend torture as policy and argued the president has complete power in wartime, the fucking Senate Democrats rolled over. Fuck that, guys. HE TRIED TO JUSTIFY TORTURE. If torture isn't far enough for the line in the sand that you won't cross, and will fight like mad for when somebody does, WHAT IS?

George W. Bush is a liar. And we need to make this clear to people.


[meta: politics]

The Fallacy of Virtue

There's a view of the world that's fairly popular in the US, that attributes all success to the virtue of the person who succeeds, and all failures to a person's vices and weakness. It's very attractive, because it lets you feel good about what you accomplish and lets you dismiss people who haven't as "lazy" or "weak". There's just one problem with this theory. It's not true.

Oh, it has some basis in truth, but it ignores outside influences, natural advantages, and plain dumb luck. It falls into the same trap as the whole idea of karma, where it defines anything that happens as something people "deserve", and so makes sure there's no reason to change it. But that's not how success works. People don't succeed just because they're good and hard working. Those things help, but it takes other factors, too. "It's not what you know, it's who you know," is a truism in many businesses. Age, connections, luck, sex, race, and many other things play into success. Does anybody really think a kid born on the streets has the same chance to become a CEO as a kid born to rich, well-connected parents? (And no, one or two counter-examples doesn't disprove it, we're talking general trends) Rich parents can give their kids better nutrition, better schooling, better training, access to more influential people, etc. These can be overcome, but it takes a combination of talent, hard work, and luck.

On the other side of things, somebody can be a good person, talented, work hard, and then something will happen beyond their control and wipe them out. Like Davan, in S*P, for example. Or, more realistically, the company can go out of business because of other people's actions (Enron being a good example here), the economy could hit the crapper, a car accident, house fire, sudden unexpected health emergency... Plenty of things can take away somebody's success, besides somebody better succeeding instead.

Maybe the most damaging part of this whole belief isn't the part where everybody thinks they can succeed if they try hard, that's generally a good thing, because then people do try hard. Even if most of them won't succeed, at least not how they hoped. No, what's really damaging is the association of virtue with success and wealth. So people end up automatically assuming successful people are good, and ones who aren't, aren't. More often than not successful people are good AT something that makes them money, that's completely separate from being good. Success neither requires nor creates virtue.

[meta: mindscribbles]