Tag Archives: GOP

Failure is More Important than Success (Politically Speaking)

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I have empathized with Mitt Romney (and with the GOP) in the recent electoral defeat. I can’t help but feel sorry for Romney even though I liked him less and less as the election campaign progressed. But, he was and is still a human being and I know this defeat is excruciatingly painful for him.

I hope he will find the courage…and Grace…to learn from this experience. And I mean “learn” as a human being as “human being-ness” is more important than politics. Romney has a soul as do we all are and his time on this earth is for the purpose of refining this soul and allowing its Source to find the fullest expression. I hope that he can use this loss…this “failure”… for that purpose.

Here is one of my favorite poems by Eugene Mayo about the experience of loss, presented as “failure”:

Failure is more important than success
Because it brings intelligence
To light the bony
Structure of the universe.

When we “fail”…when we fall on our asses…we have an opportunity to learn from the experience. “Intelligence” has an opportunity to flash into our heart and life. This “intelligence” is not merely cognitive but is intrinsically spiritual and from it great wisdom can flow and everyone can benefit.

Jacques Lacan once noted that nothing of any value comes into this world without loss. He was utilizing object-relations theory to develop the notion that Jesus had in mind when He advised that we find our life only when we lose it.

But it is painful. And that is what the image of the Cross is about.

A Thought about Mormonism

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The current issue of The New Yorker has an article on Mormonism entitled “The Birth and Evolution of Mormonism” by Adam Gopnik. This article provides a very good historical summary of Mormonism and its efforts to adapt over the past two centuries to a culture that has always looked askance at it.

It would be easy for a Southern-born Redneck like me to be real critical of Mormonism. But I’m not much more critical this “ism” than I am with all the rest of ‘em. AND, all of us are knee-deep in some “ism” or another, whether we like it or not. I guess I’m a social scientist at heart and enjoy reading someone’s thoughtful account of a religious expression, especially one that is so prominent in our country at present moment.

It is easy to see the lunacy of Mormonism. (I’m tempted here to trot out a few of my favorites, but will leave that selection to your devices!) But it is not so easy to see the lunacy of our own belief system and believe me, it is there.

 

Social Awkwardness & the GOP

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One of my favorite vignettes from The Simpsons TV show is Mr. Burns attempting to curry favor with his rank-and-file employees. His role in the show is that of the mega-billionaire owner of the local nuclear power plant and thus his arrogance and obnoxiousness is stretched to the max by the writers. But in this scene he has decided that he needed to be seen as “one of the boys” at the plant and so he sidles up to a small group of workers. Social banter is underway and Burns seizes the moment to offer an overture, “Hey, how ‘bout that local sports team, eh?”

Romney is socially awkward and stumbles in this social arena so often that I actually fill sorry for him. (I really liked that bit about “even the trees are the right height!”) The press just pillories him and I’m sure his party leaders just grimace every time he speaks publicly. But, heck, there is nothing wrong with being socially awkward! And I can live with that if he happens to persevere and when the nomination and election. It takes tremendous courage to trot yourself out every day, know that you have a problem of this sorts…and continue to show up. I admit it, I would just want to run to a corner of the playground and cry.

Ronald Laing once wrote extensively about social interactions and taught that to function socially…at least in an adroit manner…one had to offer a “tenable performance.” For, even though one might not be ostracized to the same degree as with sociopathy, maladroit performances make people, i.e. the “social body,” uncomfortable. And those who cannot muster a “tenable performance” might not be imprisoned or executed, but they will have a real problem is achieving the heights of Romney. How he has done it so far I can’t really explain. Other than perhaps money.

Narcissim and arrogance of GOP

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Newt Gingrich recently declared that his nomination for the GOP nomination was certain. I’m just appalled at his brazen arrogance but that kind of chutzpa has a definite place in the contemporary Republican party. We all have flashes of narcissism in which we are too sure of ourselves but usually we self-monitor and do not announce our childish whim, realizing that we appear arrogant and over-confident. We have the whim but on some level we immediately pause and say to ourselves, “Now how would this sound to others?”

There is another example from a GOP debate in September. Health care for the indigent was being discussed and Ron Paul was asked about the issue. Wolf Blitzer posed the question to Paul, “What do you tell a guy who is sick, goes into a coma and doesn’t have health insurance? Who pays for his coverage? Are you saying society should just let him die?” Immediately someone from the Tea Party audience yelled, “Yeah” and that was immediately followed by another “yeah” and then thunderous applause. The candidates were silent for a moment, realizing that the crowd response was really awkward.

Now, I would think that the Tea Party crowd would have realized just how awkward it would appear to applaud and cheer for the hypothetical death of another human being. But “self-monitoring” is not their strong suit and they burst into applause. It was kind of like an earlier debate when the crowd cheered that Rick Perry’s state, Texas, was “leading the league” in executions.