The Integrity of Leadership

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I have repeated the previous editorial several times but Mr. Daschle appears not to be listening. Does he have that "not listening" attitude often?

Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle is calling for an independent commission to investigate what the U.S. government knew and what action it took prior to the September 11 terrorist attacks. 

There are certainly differences in political philosophy between Democrats and Republicans but this situation is not such a difference. This "call" for an investigation is not what it appears to be on the surface. My impression so far is that this "call" is Mr. Daschle looking for a doorway into information that he then can use to discredit the present administration.

Information misuse is a favorite ploy of those that seek power, status, and wealth. This example of information misuse might help if viewed as an analogy. Let's say there is someone who wants to see the details of your budget and cash flow but they have no legitimate reason for doing this. Let's say that their purpose is to find information that thereafter they can use to discredit you with whoever holds your mortgage. Perhaps their motivation is they want your house. To do so this they first have to get information they can misuse and generally that is done in a way not related to your house in any way. This is the devious character of such people. They rely on your honesty in order to do you in. And if you are not honest they figure that out too and use it to do you in. One way or another they are going to do you in or take advantage of your situation for personal gain. This might sound paranoid and it would be if all people operated their lives in honesty and integrity. But we all know that is not how many people operate their lives.

The point is that in every life, in every situation, there are aspects of error and inefficiency. But this is true of everyone even the most vigilant. Now those that exploit information for the purpose of destroying people with that information know this all too well. That is why it has become such a common behavior among politicians. Look hard enough into anyone's life and there will be some kind of information that can be used against them even if it is not incriminating. Information has that character. A lot of it can be misused. It can be twisted and taken out of context. There are no end of possibilities regarding how information can be misused by those wicked enough to want to behave in this way. Of course, this kind of conduct is not unlawful but it is unethical and in a way immoral. Jesus, if walking amongst us today, would not behave in such disgusting ways that lack integrity.

When Mr. Daschle is confronted with the honesty and integrity of the administration with respect to their behavior he dances very nicely about and explains something to the effect that "another" investigation is needed in the interests of national security. His problem, if he is this kind of information misuser, is to first get the information, any information, any way he can without exposing his secret agenda or incriminating himself. Now we don't know that Mr. Daschle is this kind of politician. But all we have to do it look at his conduct, his behavior, and see what that tells us. Has he been supportive and cooperative with the Bush Administration? Has he debated in a positive way the virtues of the Democratic philosophy and strategies in order to influence the Bush Administration and their Republican philosophy and strategies or has be avoided such debate and discussion towards appropriate compromises and has he adopted "blocking" behavior which has the effect of paralyzing the Bush Administration so it cannot complete the necessary work and results needed for social well being? These are the questions we have to ask ourselves when we look at all politicians and now Mr. Daschle as he tries to step into the public focus through this "call".

We don't give children guns because they will accidentally kill themselves. We don't give criminals guns because they will kill the innocent. Likewise, we don't divulge information to those that are not able to appreciate it and we don't give information to information misuser because we hurt ourself by so doing.

What Daschle fails to acknowledge is that the present administration is doing it's job effectively. Most Americans realize this. It's even obvious to me up here in Canada. For example, most Americans realized that Clinton was doing a relatively good job administratively but was compromising his administrative work and credibility by his personal life, his sexual obsessions. Mr. Bush has not compromised himself in this way and has put great effort into the administrative work.

Hind sight always brings the past into a clearer focus and Mr. Daschle being an intelligent individual most certainly knows this. He most probably also knows that both during the Clinton era and afterwards he never moved in terms of his Senate capacity or other administrative capacities to explore this issue of National Security the way he appears to suddenly want to explore it now. This makes me very suspicious.

"Witch hunting" has several definitions but the one I like best is "the frenzied search to discover something about someone so they can in some way be labelled as something they are not". It is something like the so called Dark Ages where people were trapped by the Political Church Administration into positions where they could be condemned, persecuted, and murdered for heresy which they did not commit.

Politicians are constantly trying to do this to one another at the public expense. In a tireless manner they pick and probe hoping beyond reasonable hope to discover an "ugly" that can be used to discredit their opponent. And here is the core of the matter - the word "opponent". Opposition as in political opposition should not be understood as "opposed to" no matter what and no matter how. Opposition should be a position adopted when working out political philosophies and balancing one against the other. Opposition should not mean or result in a destructive effort to shred the life out of a hard working and effective administration. The American model of democracy needs not to be explained. It is a powerful model and no one that calls themselves American should work against this model.

Both Democrats and Republicans should apply their different political philosophies against one another to build a strong America. Neither one should betray this electoral mandate of Government Decision Maker by acting in devious and deceitful ways to gain status as an individual by causing others to lose status. There are many in our society that practice this kind of behavior. They are everywhere. It is a downfall of our society. It has to do with personal integrity. Many lack this kind of integrity as they attempt to feed on the mistakes, misfortunes, and behavior of others towards the discredit of others in order to bring others down so they appear to be higher and better in some way. If they cannot do this honestly they get devious. The problem here is that they should not be acting in this manner at all as it is a socially destructive attitude coming from a socially warped and perverted conscience.

Mr. Daschle, I hope, will not reveal himself as someone who attempts to get ahead in life at the expense of others. If so he is betraying the trust of the electorate. For if he indeed is this kind of human then that makes him a predator that feeds on others and generally lowers the entire social well being. Democracy cannot flourish with this kind of behavior. Even business cannot flourish with this kind of behavior. The public must be able to trust those entrusted to act in their interests.

Mr. Daschle and Mr. Bush should both be doing their jobs in a way that enhances the social well being of Americans and the world in general. When personal gain or personal priorities become more important then the mandate as an elected government administrator has automatically expired.

The administration should be allowed to do its job. So far no significant difference has been expressed by Democrats or Republicans regarding the political philosophy and strategies of National Security. This is a shame. That is what they were elected to do, bring these difference to bear upon one another. The only concern I have heard is an administrative and organizational concern. There is a lot more to National Security than just administrative organization. If that is where the mind set is right now then America is in a big problem. This is the time for debate and negotiation regarding all aspects of National Security.

An investigation of past events is not how such political differences develop or find expression. It is through forward looking analysis, debate and negotiation that a better National Security process and administration will come about. The way to manage this is not by one party destroying the other or attempting to impede administrative effectiveness. The way to bring about resolution on issues involving different political philosophies is already established in the form and operations of the American Government and well known by all.

Therefore, I can only encourage Mr. Daschle to do what he was elected to do and let Mr. Bush do what he was elected to do regardless of personal aspirations. Remember, those in service to their country are to put their "service" ahead of their personal aspirations for wealth, status, and power.

So I will watch Mr. Daschle and Mr. Bush and try to discover who is really working for the interests of the American people. I will do this by watching each man very carefully and examining their on going behavior and remembering their past behavior.

Following is the Editorial that was repeated several times and goes another round this time.

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Everyone knows that as the situation around us changes we need to react and that involves applying a sense of judgement based on our assessment of the current situation taking into consideration trends and experience.

Those that do this well stand out as leaders.

When terrorists turned passenger jets into missiles in order to destroy the New York twin Trade Towers they achieved much more than they even dreamed about. Not even the engineers that designed these sky scrapers even considered such a purpose for a passenger jet. It took an evil mind to devise such a thing and therefore to most of us it was simply inconceivable.

Many buildings world wide have crashed to the ground because the eventuality of earthquakes at the time of their building seemed like a remote possibility. No one would construct a building today, anywhere in the world, without due consideration to this possibility. But this awareness is hind sight developed through painful experiences and changing environmental circumstances.

Hind sight is wonderful. We look back and often cannot understand why something was not obvious. But the simple fact is that we most often have to experience things directly before we start to appreciate how to plan into our thinking and behavior a proactive stance and thus preempt undesirable and anticipated possibilities.

But even then, life can be very complicated and busy and we are inevitably forced into compromises of time, attention, and effort with regard to just about everything. If an automobile was designed with regard to absolutely every possibility that presented itself as a safety issue then no one, not even Bill Gates, could afford to purchase it. In all things we appear to make compromises based on our assessment of the reality and how probable or improbable things appear to be. For example, automobiles are not designed to withstand a pounding from a meteor even if it is the size of a pebble. The eventuality of a meteorite shower is quite small but it is a possibility. If it suddenly starts to happen then the world would be ill equipped to deal with it. Houses and cars would be damaged and possibly put afire. Large buildings, forests, animals, people, airplanes, boats, you name it, would all be damaged or ruined. It would be a devastating situation with fuel depots blowing up, airplanes crashing, cars driving off the roads and so on.

So why don't we prepare for this eventuality? If this eventuality can be so devastating why don't we just figure on it happening along with a million other obscure possibilities? Because in our assessment we determine that the probability is small of such meteor showers. But if all of a sudden the situation changed and such a probability became high we would not even know that until we experienced the new situation. And in the light of such great devastation and based on hind sight there would be all kinds of people speaking about what we should have done to avoid the problem that crept up upon us all and forgetting how difficult it is to manage our decisions, planning, and behavior without hind sight.

Of course there are always those devious sorts that try to realize a gain out of someone else's problem. It is more than obvious, for example, that certain individuals are trying to embarrass the Bush administration for having done a good job in a very difficult situation. He just looks to good as a leader. They want to take him down but they have to do so in a way that does not give away their agenda. These kind of people are easy to understand and very predictable in their devious behavior. Mr. Bush appears to be a true leader and an outstanding citizen. He rose to the challenge and through his leadership America stood tall - very tall. We would do well to check out the humanitarian motivations of those that appear to be making some gain by creating a negative public reaction against leaders that have served them all so very well, before taking what these critical hypocrites say too seriously. They are only after the position of the one they would discredit. Where was their voice of wisdom and great understanding prior to that terrible event of sky scrapers falling into dust and debris.

Mr. Bush, President Bush, did well as a leader when terrorism launched itself on America. No President, no one in congress, no engineers or architects, nurses or plumbers, poor or rich, and even those that dare to criticize him, even dreamed of such a situation. Even the most brilliant of all - according to the Democrats - the highly moral Mr. Clinton did not even dream that such a situation would be experienced in American life. Jimmy Carter did not see it coming. No Democrats saw it coming. No Republicans saw it coming. Even those that prepared the investigative reports did not dream of the actual form that this terrorism would take. The Clinton administration was experiencing terrorism and it's growth. Where were these critics when all this terrorism was going on under the Clinton Administration? Why did they not have a crystal ball into which they could gaze and figure out in advance the evil that was growing upon them and upon us all? Because they are as "stupid" as the rest of us.

There is also a similar situation with Israel, Palestine, and the so called human rights groups. Israel's leadership is attempting to apply whatever wisdom it can come up with in order to deal with hatred and terrorism as it has developed around them. There is a clear parallel between Israel facing terrorism and the USA facing terrorism. If the USA can go and destroy terrorism then any nation should be able to do this. Terrorism must be destroyed. It is not an answer. It is not an alternative. It is pure hate. It is clear by listening to some of these human rights workers that they are prejudicial in their work and have lost objectivity and have no idea of the leadership nightmare that the leaders of Israel have to face with respect to this terrorism. Nor do they seem to care. These leaders are attempting to make decisions and plans to deal with situations of terror and they are bound to overlook some things and make mistakes. We are human. Humans make mistakes. To expect more is not realistic. The thing is, do we learn from our mistakes?

We should all stop, take a breath, and ask ourselves what we would do in similar situations if we did not know the outcome and problems that developed. That is precisely the issue. Mostly through experience from which comes hind sight do we develop appropriate wisdom to deal with unanticipated problems. This is true even in the field of engineering. Very true! Ask those engineers that worked on space craft, rockets, airplanes, and even cars and tires. From such has come the notion of "Murphy's Law", if it can go wrong it will. But even knowing this, our intellect and experience is never up to the chore of accurately determining the trade off between probable and improbable. Inevitably experience from which comes hind sight will teach us. But by then we have paid a price.

To paraphrase Jesus: "he that is without fault may cast the first stone". What we should be looking for from any failure is a way towards success. Remember the old adage: "Those that live in glass houses should not throw stones". We are in this world to help each other, to learn with each other, to build a world of peace. But there are among us many who would practice gain at our expense and who present themselves as one thing while being something all together different. Again Jesus warned us of wolves in sheep's clothing. What is important is not our perfection or imperfection, our successes and failures, but that we learn and grow and demonstrate an attitude in all we do of love and caring.

Agreements and resolutions affecting Israel and the Palestinians.

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Map of modern Israel