Like this post???

I am Right and You are Wrong

Posted by Cody Heitschmidt --Went Live: Friday, April 11, 2008
I am Right and You are Wrong!!!

I have this theory that for anything in the world to be genuinely successful, there has to be compromise. The theory has an extension on it that states this: The vast majority of failures, wars, stalemates and unsuccessful anythings are caused by a lack of compromise. That lack of compromise stems from an "I am right and you are wrong" attitude.

The largest and most glaring example of this is our society today is the misuse and abuse of our 2 party political system here in the United States.

First a short bit about me:

I am a Republican. Sometimes I am not sure why, I got to be a Republican because my parents were. I stuck with being a Republican because I truly believe the least amount of Government possible is the best solution. I also truly believe the Federal Governments job is pretty much to protect us from Foreign enemies and maybe fix potholes on interstates and that's about all the influences they should have in my life. (Don't get allranty and ravey about that statement, I am not really extreme about anything, actually that's what this post is about). I really don't see the Republican party standing for those things near as much as Reagan did anymore, so I don't considered myself a very loyal Republican anymore. Second thing about me, I Love this Country with every single fiber of my being. Lot's of people have sacrificed and died to make it so I can get on this computer, think I am more important than I really am and preach at both of you reading this. If you don't stop and take the time to respect that fact for at least a little bit everyday of your life, you should. Just let the American Flag do it to you. When you see it blowing somewhere, just run this thought through your head... "Damn, a lot of people went through a lot of crap following that flag to keep me and my family and friends safe. Sorry I just about ran off in a wholenother direction. OK, so that's what I thought needed to be said about me before I go off on my "I am right and you are wrong" theory.

Let's go at it issue by issue. Randomly...

War in Iraq - all we do is bicker about the freaking thing. One side says "We gotta pull out everybody right now". Other side says "We may be there a hundred years"

We gotta pull out now is insane!!!! Say your neighbor was bed-ridden and somebody said the neighbor need their lawn mowed. You go over and mow the lawn and half way in your lawn mower starts the grass on fire and it's burning towards the house. Do you take your lawn mower and go home just because your mission to help this person is going bad? No you, call for help, suck it up fight the fire like hell. Then when the fire is put out and your are dirty and nasty and it's taken too long and it's cost more than you wanted and your eyebrows are burnt off, you finish mowing the damn lawn, cause it's the right thing to do. If anyone comments that I am lessening the seriousness of this war with this analogy, I will delete comment. It's an analogy and nobody in the world takes this war and it's causalities more seriously than I do.

We may be there a hundred years is just as Damn insane!!!! Make a damn list of things we need to get done. Hire the guy that does that UPS dry erase/whiteboard commercials to write the list on a dry-erase board for you. Show it to the whole damn world, ask the other side of the house to agree that we will all work together to get this list check off and then we will leave. Yes, the list has to be a little bit flexible. Butdamnitt tons more people would be on-board and push for completion intead of abandoning it, if we knew what the hell completion was.

Ok time to sprinkle Cody's plan in: what if both side were right and both sides were wrong.

One sentence solution to Iraq coming... Brace yourself cause it is the one sentence that will truly change most of the ridiculous shit we argue about everyday.

Compromise, one said says this is EXACTLY what we want to accomplish before we pull out, the 2 sides get 3 hours to haggle over that list. The other side says we will back you 100% in accomplishing those goals as soon as possible, but, you have to pull out when it's done.

Everyone working towards the same goal?!?!? Imagine that?

Ok, Let's really set off a gigantic crapstorm.

Abortion - All we do is bicker, literally all we do is bicker, nothing has really changed in how many years??

One side tries to make people who have had an abortion feel terrible and tries to guilt someone that is thinking about it into not doing it.

The other side tries to make people feel guilty for their religious beliefs and their convictions against abortion in an attempt to protect a Woman's rights.

What if both were right and both were wrong.

What if pro-lifers agreed that the best possible scenario is to drastically reduce the number of abortions that people want to have. Not guilt them, not abuse them, not picket them, not make baby signs on the highway. But actually provide resources, education, and support so we could reduce the number of possibilities for abortion. What if all the pro-life time and money went to that instead of overturning Roe v Wade which kinda looks like it will never happen.

What if pro-choicers agreed that the best possible scenario is to drastically reduce the number of abortions that people want to have. Not bash people that are against abortion, work with them to reduce them, pro-choicers aren't happen when one happens.

Compromise - one side says ok we are focus on reducing abortions not actually making it illegal. The other side says ok if you stop putting all your time and money towards making abortion illegal, we will stop putting all or time and money into fighting you and we will put it into working side-by-side with you to reduce the number of abortions.

Everyone working towards the same goal?!?!? Imagine that?

Immigration - quit arguing,

one said says ok the 12 million can stay if they get legal documents in 18 months (made up number, I am not educated enough), but we are gonna build a fence.

Other side says Ok we will help build a fence and we will work with you to get the 12 million legalized, but we gota work together to make legal immigration and work visas a fastrer more streamlined process so they don't have to jump the rivr and the new wall. Therefore less of a problem in the future.

Everyone working towards the same goal?!?!? Imagine that?


Gay Marriage -really who cares, that one is ridiculous. Let them get married. I don't think it's what marriage was really intended to be but it's none of my damn business. Folks that are really die-hard against it should see the Abortion stuff above and focus efforts on that.

Taxes - Fair tax is the only way. Wanna know why, because it's fair.

I got tired of typing, more to come on "I am right and you are wrong".
Labels:

6 comments to read/post yours:

  1. The problem with this is that you are smarter than you think you are. You get it, but all the people you are trying to change don't. These people are crazy.

    Kansas is full of crazy abortion people. You guys have a sign every 12 feet on every street or highway. I've never seen anything like it. I don't understand how people can invest so much time into something that is unsolveable.

    The Republican Party (politicians, not just registered repubs) is full of crazy war people. Bush was going to war before he bothered to make sure he won the election. It sure sounds like Cheney is worse, and I'm not sure anyone in that party will change that.

    Taxes are a joke. Everyone who decides how taxes work makes too much money to understand what it does to regular people. They all have big oil or big business or big ______ in their pockets, so of course they aren't going to get it right. Bill and Hillary made like $100 million in the last 5 years. Think she knows what it's like to pay a late fee on her cable bill because it was due on Wednesday and she didn't get a paycheck til Friday? McCain has a $56,000 a year military pension. (I'm not arguing that he doesn't deserve it, just talking taxes.) How would life be different for you if you had an extra $4500 a month in your pocket? I think Obama might at least remember what it was like to be middle-class. He hasn't been since he wrote his books, but before that, he was closer. Anyway, no one is changing taxes. The only politicians that want to are crazy when it comes to everything else on your list.

    Gay marriage... whatever. This whole argument is about a word. If the government was truly a separation of church and state, they would call it something else instead of a marriage license anyway. Marriage == religion.

    Anyway, my whole point is, those 5% on each end of these arguments who actually care so much that they will never budge on their opinions don't listen to reason. And that 10% of the population inundates the government with letters/emails/protests/putting out the olympic torch/whatever to try to get their way, while all the reasonable people get so disgusted with it that they just tune out. Any politician who was reasonable when they started isn't anymore by the time they get to Washington. So as soon as you figure out how to make crazy people reasonable (or at least make the stfu), you'll have this thing whipped. Good luck there.
    ReplyDelete
  2. Neither of our "two" political parties are interested in staying out of citizens' private lives. A lot of that has to do with the fact that we are generally not educated about the political process and the government has effectively been invited into our personal lives due to the overall apathy.

    We're a nation of consumers, but we're lazy consumers (I generalize because it is the majority). We take what's on cheap and easy offer, making us prey for greedy and power-hungry producers and the politicians who are at their monetary mercy. Can't run a decent campaign without Political Action Committees and big time campaign financing. Think either either party's candidates care who funds their campaigns? I don't.

    Compromise is a beautiful concept and it's not so hard to implement in everyday life. Your recommendation to at least begin to solve these issues--that is, to channel resources into education, can be applied to just about every one of our nation's (and our personal) ills. But infighting equals strife and strife equals more superficial platforms for politicians to base campaigns upon.

    It's easier for the common person care about one or two surface issues, like whether a candidate is pro-life or pro-choice or pro-war or anti-war (and let's face it--no chooses either for a good time) than it is to assess how the policy can actually be changed effectively. It's all a bunch of hyperbole (I think that's Latin for fast-talking bullshit). But we buy it because it's on sale.

    People are too busy trying to make sure they can make payments on the houses, cars and other material things they can't afford while making sure their kids have all of the things that will make them happy. Who has time to actually analyze the intricate weave of public, private, political and economical factors that make up the fabric of our lives?

    The only way that kind of compromise will ever work is if the value structure changes, and in this consumerist society? I say good luck. Unless we start to educate ourselves and our kids about how the system really works, we're screwed. But at least we have all kinds of fun stuff to watch on cable while our empire crumbles!
    ReplyDelete
  3. Nora,

    Reread the whole thing and your comment, you are agreeing with everything I said...
    And you are also one of them that needs to change, if you and Scott get past the pessimism and decide to help change than it will work. Insanely slowly but it will.

    WE DO NOT HAVE TO CHANGE VALUE STRUCTURES. We have to change attitudes about moderate compromise.

    We can never get the hard core pro-lifer to say " I am actually for abortion" I have living evidence that we can get them to say "I am willing to work with Pro-choicers with a common goal of less abortions!"

    I only have one example but its a step.

    Don't sit there and say it can't happen, I think I am getting to know you Nora, and let's actually change some shit!!!!

    Nora has a blog with Mitchell (LogicMaze Employee) at

    http://readswc.blogspot.com/
    ReplyDelete
  4. True story, Cody. Just having an opinion isn't enough. Ghandi said, "Be the change you want to see in the world."

    I'm really not a negative person, but looking at the issues we're facing as a nation is kind of like looking at a neighborhood after a tornado. You find yourself wondering, where the hell do I start?
    ReplyDelete
  5. Start here:

    Find one person that disagrees with you on any issue. I mena disagrees with you feverishly. And it's gotta be an issue we can make a difference on. Sit down with them and pitch the idea of finding a common goal and going after. Might be Abortion, might just be picking up trash on your street.

    There you go on more excuses.
    ReplyDelete
  6. Aw. That reminds me of my husband. Our neighborhood has grown a lot in the ten years he's lived in this house and what used to be a slow-moving side road has turned into a freaking speedway.

    He gets hot and bothered about it. To the point where he wakes up pissed off. What does he do? He writes letters and makes phone calls to as many people as possible. He had me write a letter to the local paper to complain, too. I was--and am-- proud of his activism.

    Then one day he sent out a "funny" (that is, offensive) email to his list. On that list was the mayor of the neighboring town. Oops. The lesson here is be careful who you send mass emails to. Actually, that was just a funny side story.

    The real point is, that's an example of something minor in the grand scheme of things that drove him nuts. Instead of just bitching like most people would (*cough* like me *cough*) he actually did something about it.

    Did anything change? No. Are we trying to get the hell out of this neighborhood before our son is able to walk into traffic? Yes. That doesn't matter, though. He did what a responsible citizen is supposed to do when they're not happy with how the public sphere interfered with the private sphere--he contacted local municipalities and the local media.

    (And he sent a bad picture to the mayor of Oak Forest on accident! Ha!)
    ReplyDelete

I love the discussion in the comments.. so... GO FOR IT!

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...