Navigating a Whackadoodle World: Episode 30, or Why is Everything so Dysfunctional?
A Whackadoodle lesson about Cause and Effect, in which my student tortures me with questions that are hard to answer.
Click here if you would like to view Navigating a Whackadoodle World’s Table of Contents
“I know something you don’t know,” she teased as she unpacked her books.
“I bet you know a lot of things that I don’t know,” I teased back.
“Aren’t you gonna ask me?”
“Why do I need to ask you about something if I already know that you want to tell me about it?”
“You’re no fun.”
“Okay fine,” I sighed. “What do you know that I don’t know?”
Her eyes twinkled. “I know what will cause you to keep cycling through the rules. Get it? Guidepost one is about cause and effect. I know what will cause you to give me the effect I want.”
“And that is?”
“If I ask you a question about what causes something, you will have to talk about cause and effect, and we will have started a third cycle through the rules.”
“Guideposts,” I corrected.
“Guideposts then,” she rolled her eyes. “But what do you think of my theory?”
“I think you’re probably right. It’s hard to resist a question.”
“Good,” she grinned. “So I want to talk about what causes Congress to be so dysfunctional.”
That got me to sit up straighter. “You aren’t pulling your punches today are you?”
“No, I’m serious. I don’t get why Congress can’t even agree to keep the Government funded, or pick its own Speaker. I don’t get why the House keeps trying to pass bills that they know the Senate won’t approve, and the President would veto anyway.”
“In other words, why has it become dysfunctional?”
“Yeah,” she crossed her arms and waited for my response.
“Let’s take a walk,” I suggested. “Walking helps me think.”
We headed down to the bay, and we had just reached the small access road when I finally conceived a possible answer. “What do you know about compromise?” I asked at last.
“Compromise?” she sounded surprised.
“Yeah, compromise, the settlement of a dispute by each side making concessions.”
“I know it’s something I hate to do, but sometimes have to.”
“And why do you sometimes have to?”
“Because if I don’t, the argument never ends.”
“I think it might be the same thing in Congress.”
“You mean that they have forgotten how to compromise?”
“I think that there are some members of Congress who feel that compromise makes them look weak to their constituents, so they refuse to compromise. It’s either my way, or the highway, and nothing in between. If the Government won’t give me what I want, who needs it?”
“Hum.” she consider my answer as we settle down on the bay wall to dangle our feet in the water. It was a clear day and sunlight flecked on the surface of the water.
“Congress was designed for compromise,” I continued. “You can seldom get a majority to agree on anything unless you are at least willing to compromise.” I tossed a rock into the water. “Consider what happened with the previous Speaker. He kept the government open for another forty-five days with a compromise. The following week, he was voted out because of that compromise. He had been working with the enemy. He had failed to keep his promises. He could not be trusted.” I shook my head, then added. “It’s hard enough to compromise with a friend, but when one side consider the other side an enemy…” I didn’t finish the sentence. I didn’t need to.
“Is compromise what they mean by bipartisan?” she asked suddenly.
“Bipartisanship is when the parties agree on something,” I told her. “That agreement unusually requires cooperation, communication and compromise.”
“So I guess the next question is, why have they forgotten how to compromise?”
“I don’t think they have forgotten how to compromise. I think they have forgotten its value. Besides, they don’t want to get punished by their constituents when they attempt a compromise.”
“But what causes that?”
“Too many things to go into here,” I suggested.
“That’s a cop out.”
“Fine,” I tossed another rock into the water and counted the ripples it left behind. “Perhaps it’s the way we talk about each other. How can you compromise with someone bent on destroying your way of life?”
“So we end up butting heads,” she concluded. “Seems as likely a cause as any other.”
“It also has to do with how we talk to each other,” I added. “I can unfriend you as easily as friend you, so be carful not to offend me. No need to talk things through and really get to understand our different points of view—our different beliefs, needs, fears, and concerns.”
“Yeah,” she snickered. “I’ve noticed that the Internet is not the best place to have a controversial discussion.”
“Of course,” I added thoughtfully. “It also might be a lack of synergy.”
“Synergy?”
“Yes synergy— the interaction or cooperation of two or more organizations, substances, or other agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects.”
“You’re gonna have to explain that better.”
“Stephen Covey made synergy his 7th Habit of Highly Effective People. He talks about it as a combination of trust and cooperation, as well as courage and consideration. He says that compromise is not the best we can do in human interactions. When we have the courage to stand up for our beliefs, and the consideration to care about other’s beliefs; we can leave behind the whole ‘I have to win, so you have to lose’ paradigm, and start looking for solutions where we can both win. Solutions we develop together. Solutions even better than the ones we’d come up with alone. He also says that the whole process requires a great deal of trust and cooperation. Something sorely lacking in Congress these days.”
“And elsewhere,” she sighed.
“However,” I added stretching. “Since we are dealing with the Power of Cause and Effect, we must also ask ourselves, ‘How do my actions contribute to the problem, or can I help find a solution?’”
“Yeah, yeah,” and she began to quote me. “A problem is only a problem if I can do something about it. Everything else is a fact of life, so I’d best get over it.”
“So is there something you can do?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I’m gonna have to think about it. I suppose at the very least, I can make sure that I am not contributing to the smack talk.”
“Maybe you could even contribute some healing talk,” I offered. “I mean, at the very least.”
“Sure,” she conceded. “At the very least.”
IMO, there are enough people in congress who don’t want a solution to mess everything up. They want to destroy the government so they can install there strong man. They don’t believe in democracy. They want control.