Clear as Black and White

** Note added at bottom - March 6, 2012

This will begin as an extension of the previous post but will reach to the ugliest evils of ignorance.

THINK about this!

Years ago I heard someone say, "You don't know what you don't know."

Now there's a genius line.  That's what I snarkily thought at the moment, but the expression has stuck with me for probably forty years or more.  And it is actually rather profound.  The easily tossed out comment sounds silly and pointless to repeat.  But the meaning is enormous.  And overlooked.

Extreme case: a man said he was going to become an inventor.  When asked what kind of things he might invent, he said he planned to write to the U.S. Patent Office and obtain a list of all the things that had not yet been invented; then he could choose.  A brilliant example of ignorance!

There are millions of matters in life about which I know nothing.  If asked about any one of them, typically I am honest and simply admit I don't know.  After a previously unheard-of matter is discussed with me and I find it interesting enough to study further, I can then say "Yes, I know about that."  I can also then form an opinion about the matter, can decide whether I agree with what others are saying about it or whether it should consume any more of my time.

This life-long desire to know has driven me to read a lot and to ask questions when I felt someone might help to educate me.  Far from perfect in this pursuit of knowledge, I have some experiences seared into my memory of the times I piped up without knowing whereof I spoke.  We've all heard others do this and we disrespect them for it.  Most of us can recall making noises that revealed our ignorance.  Trouble is, we sometimes pick up ideas or misinformation by hearing what others think, and their opinions may be completely faulty.  Opinions are quickly set in minds and repeated with abandon, even if the individual speaking out is still in ignorance.  

Someone who is a close enough acquaintance I almost consider him a friend, actually spoke out recently at a dinner party, with several other acquaintances present, and said, "Obama has sure made a mess of things."  And several of the other more-or-less friends around the table jovially agreed with him and expressed hope that our sitting president would be beaten in the next election.

As much as I try to remain neutral, as much as I repudiate confrontation, there are times a person of integrity is required to step into the fray.  The void in intelliget conversation must at times be bridged by anyone who can speak clearly about simple facts.  That doesn't mean I assume it's up to me; I don't actually look for chances to be the voice of reason.  Truth be told, I prefer to extricate myself from such situations without comment, maintaining my neutrality.  This time, while sitting at a dinner table, still early in the meal, a gracious exit was not reasonably easy to pull off.  Therefore, I spoke up.  My response to these people was kept as calm as possible, even though I typically flare a little in the face of ignorance being flaunted as fact or logic.

My approach was as brief as practical, essentially kept to three (compound) questions:  1.) Did the destruction of the U.S. economy happen overnight or did it take the eight years of the previous administration?  2.) Were the policies that led to economic destruction put upon us by President Obama or were they well ensconced during the failed administration that catered to Wall Street?  And 3.) How many years would it take any one of us to dig us all out of the pit into which our country was forced by those failed policies? 

Later I inserted the quick last question to the group who all seemed to be spouting the typical ignorant thought that we needed somebody - just anybody - to beat Obama in the next election.  My question, which could not be answered, was, "Who do you see on the political horizon who can solve our economic woes at all, even if given two terms to do it?"

The dinner conversation topic got changed.

As I often point out, I am a political Independent.  My lack of confidence in any political party and usually, any politician, is profound.  To look today at a Romney, a Gingrich, a Blah-Blah-Blah or any of the several inept pretenders to the presidency, is profoundly frightening.  Frightening because who knows what can happen?  It was a confused and obviously disturbed electorate (plus a Supreme Court ruling) that placed an ignorant and destructive man into the high office in 2000, and it was a completely unconscious or masochistic electorate that allowed him to return in 2004 after we all could see the clear evidence that he was destroying our nation's integrity.  These same (well-meaning, perhaps) fellow citizens are the people who will go to the polls in 2012, and the dangers that lurk there are the cause of my discomfort.

Even if you are a fan of Fox News, you surely can't be missing the unbelievable display of incompetence on the part the many candidates.  Not one of them shows any capacity to govern, and not one of them will stand up against big money and corporate greed.  Their own personal greed is no doubt involved.  In fact, all photos of the Republican candidates should be shown with $ symbols for eyes; that appears to be the guiding force for all.  (Perhaps not for Ron Paul; his guiding force is a bit unclear.)  Yet some people whom I know personally would rather see another ignoramus in the highest office of our land, even if it means he will be another puppet of Wall Street.  If you are in the upper reaches of the 99% and are not yet feeling as beaten down as most of us, just keep flattering the rich and electing their puppets.  Eventually, when our democracy is completely gone, you may awake to the fact that you were as meaningless to the super rich as are the rest of us.  Would it not be better for yourself and all of us to wake up sooner?

And when we are finally a Plutocracy in fact, there will be no voting.  99% of us won't count.

Hopefully you will take time to THINK before voting for just anybody in order to unseat Obama.  At the very least, we have today an intelligent man at our helm.  And by all appearances, he cares about helping the people at least as much as helping himself.  Whether he can steer us as a country, while having to struggle with a recalcitrant congress at every step, to finally attain a new state of national integrity and economic prosperity is anybody's guess.  Only time will tell, and the time may not be given him because of the ever-present ignorance.

And something else: racism.  That's right, I strongly suspect racism is at the deep-seated core of many of the criticisms of our president.  I personally hear the small (sometimes blatant) tones of residual racial prejudice right here in my own neighborhood.  People can vehemently deny that anti-black sentiments play any part in their criticisms of our president, but I am not convinced.  I wonder whether many people know themselves deeply.  A man who slips while talking with me about the changes in our community, spilling a revelation of his fear that blacks are going to take over, is not a man who can look at our mixed-race chief executive and squelch a desire for an all-white replacement.  Perhaps it's unconscious on their part, but it's clear that racism is being practiced among my neighbors.  (I'm confident this small community is a tiny microcosm of our national society.)  Even a few of those who might have voted three years ago for Obama (maybe only because they were more anti-Palin or more prejudiced against females than against someone of mixed race), are now hopeful that some white guy can step in and solve our problems.  Fat chance!  It was despicable white guys who ran us into the ditch, and it will take more than a simple new white face in the White House to help us recover.  I maintain my support for intelligence as the key to any possible recovery.

Please don't point to Herman Cain as some kind of proof I am wrong about the racism.  His was never a candidacy to be taken seriously by anyone other than the powerful tycoons behind his bid, apparently seeing him as the ultimate in simple puppetry.  Even with this ugly prospect, I half hoped the zany, fractured GOP would nominate him.  At least I could have been less concerned about a potential defeat of Obama.  A man who couldn't speak to anything outside of his narrow business experience would never(!) have a chance to push aside an incumbant who is ten times more intelligent and only half as black!  The (!) is evidence that even as I write this, I cannot shake my fear of the ignorance!

The biggest concern about the racism factor is that it can be completely subliminal.  Many folks who believe themselves to be utterly unaffected by race in any matter can suddenly find no reason for a tug in one direction as opposed to another, unless the ugly old twinge of racial discrimination might be at the root of the question.  I often check myself to see whether any of my own motives are colored by color.  An interesting article by Dafna Linzer published in The Washington Post and in the online news commentary, ProPublica, shows that racial overtones had crept into the process of presidential pardons.  Officials claimed total surprise at the findings and could not see how the numbers could have shown such a disparity.  No one mentioned subliminal racism as a cause, but it almost certainly was.  Short of being in our DNA, racism is about as deeply entrenched in our subconscious as any human tendency outside of survival and sex drives.

Please, when it comes to elections, check your own racism quotient just to be sure of your own motives; and please don't cast an ignorant vote for another incompetent candidate who will take us closer to our demise.

And following this post, we will avoid the subject of politics for a while.  After all, Christmas is coming!

** Update NOTE:  Mar. 6, 2012  -  A study just completed announced today that black students are three times more likely than their white peers to be suspended or expelled.  Probably just a meaningless coincidence!  The news of this came at the very same time as the news that a Colorado court has ruled that students may carry guns on campus.  Our nation is so advanced and our citizens all socially aware; we are so totally healthy in our practices.  And racism no longer exists!  Aren't we grand?!