Day 5: Perceived Smarts

Wish 5: Stop Political Arrogance

"Those of you who think you are intelligent are annoying to those of us who are."
-Anonymous

Why do many many of us think we're better than another group? What brings about this arrogance?

There's so much to talk about with this topic. Where to start? Where to start? I'll limit it to rotten politicians, okay?

Many politicians in almost all countries in the world are arrogant. They practice I-know-what's-good-for-you, based on what's-in-it-for-me. The technical term for this is bullshit.

Take for example a simple statement like: "The people demand better social security." Not only is it a sweeping statement, but also an obvious one. So, the purpose of saying so is political - for self-perpetuation. In his (or her) mind, it's not about sincere compassion, but how well he or she will be perceived by his/her constituents. Images of reelections dance in their heads.

A really bad form of political arrogance is when a politician and his party/colleagues/friends decide to do something for another group or country "for their own good." The word "meddling" is not in their vocabulary. We've seen this happen so many times in history. Someone always ends up getting hurt big time.

Then, sometimes, politicians will do a rotten thing. Like use public funds for their benefit or that of their friends. Again, in their mind, they think they are smarter than the rest of us. In very corrupt governments, the payments to keep silent go deep down the hierarchy. It costs not just the amount that was stolen, but also the maintenance of keep-them-happy funds, which also has to be stolen. Eventually, they are found out, and more money is needed to keep to the party line. Corruption is simply very expensive to maintain.

And when politicians are used to maintained corruption, they will go out of their way to stay in power.

People are not stupid. Many mechanisms in our world prove that people are more intelligent than the few arrogant leaders. The Stock Market is one mechanism. International trade is another mechanism. Commercial industries also have their mechanisms. Elections without cheating is also a good mechanism.

In most cases, these mechanisms provide us the best leaders that we deserve. I firmly believe that even if we elect the wrong person, that's the one we deserve. We won't make that mistake twice, unless we choose not to learn from our mistakes.

Finally, there are mechanisms for us, the crowds, to correct our mistakes. We use the courts, we use the press, and we use the streets. We voice out what we think went wrong. If in the meantime a political leader finds a way to quash that mechanism called Freedom of Speech, then doom is not far behind. Again, people get hurt big time.

Arrogant politicians have got one thing right: "I'm here and you're not." But the crowds also know one thing for sure: "...But not for long."