If the moron majority “like ’em,” they win – are we that superficial about superficial politicians?
“Like” and “looks” matter, “talent” is incidental
Mark Sandford, back from hiking off with a South American beauty, wins seat in US Congress. He’s a looker.
Will Justin Trudeau be Canada’s next Prime Minister? If looks and likability matter, he’s a shoe-in.
Democracy is just in alpha testing for the rich and famous
The political experiment called democracy, that began in Greece some 2,500 years ago, is still in the alpha testing stage, and even if Plato’s “philosopher-kings” got fairly elected back then, today, we know there are no philosophers or intellectual kings that get fairly elected. Unless, of course, they’re good looking and likable and born in an incubator of one of the rich and famous rat packs. Intellect, experience and character don’t matter, the only requisites to run for high office are any three of the following:
- Good looks
- Likability
- Family name
- Bags of money
- Master puppeteers
Getting elected is about charisma and money and money. Oh, and with the help of family connections and name recognition – Trudeau, Kennedy, Bush.
Somewhere in the recesses of our intellect is an adumbrated understanding that leadership requires unique talent and that liking someone who looks good has nothing to do with that. And yet, in politics, when it comes to picking winners, we are no better at it than when we’re betting at the horse track. We pick losers because they look good. Now that’s okay if we see life as a horse race and government as a barn full of self-interested, horse’s asses – there’s a metaphor for politics – but if we expect our best interests to be reasonably represented then we have to start electing some true thoroughbreds. And to do that we must disconnect our amygdala and tap a little deeper into our cerebral cortex? Until we do, our superficiality and stupidity will just keep picking superficial losers.
Who is Justin Trudeau? Is he like Justin Timberlake?
Justin Trudeau is the next lab rat to run in the political experiment called democracy. He’s a good trifecta bet. He’s got looks, likeability, money and name – that’s a superfecta – and he won the recent Liberal Party leadership with 80% of the votes because he was best liked. As one handler said, ““Our going-in assumption, and it’s basically what we built the entire strategy around, was that the more people get to know him, the more they are going to like him.” (Remember one of Mitt Romney’s flaws, enough people didn’t “like” him enough).
The backroom cabal aren’t stupid but they know the majority of the electorate is. Forty-one year old Trudeau has big hair, small experience, good genes, bad resume – he’s just a substitute drama teacher. Yikes! Some drama. My god, his father, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, had a law degree, a Master’s from Harvard, founded a political newspaper, Cité Libre, and was the Minister of Justice in the federal government before becoming Prime Minister. If he was alive, I think he’d send Justin to serve in Afghanistan or the UN or a YMCA camp – anything to learn a thing or two or three before trying to run a nation. But you can bet there’s a good chance that Canadians will elect this good lookin’, likable, genetically branded guy as the nation’s next Prime Minister. Hey, maybe the Americans will run his namesake, Justin Timberlake? Or Oprah or Ellen? Any of them could win in a landslide (look what too many thought of Sarah-too-empty-Palin). Because we’re still running on our “animal brain” – according to wise men like Friedrich Nietzsche and Charles Darwin – and the likes of Karl Rove and Dick Cheney know that’s how we decide who to vote for. And history has proven it, over and over again.
“People are the worst”
Coming 2026
My personal history is the stuff they write books about. And that's what I am doing. The working title, "Chains of My Father: Marry White."
"The ghostly image of the tragic mulatto trapped between two worlds." - Barack Obama
This perspicacious line from the Prologue of Barack Obama's "Dream from My Father" wrenched my aspiration into action. I started writing, furiously. Unlike Obama's perspective, my pain had been for the opposite reason: I was not seen by whites as a "tragic mulatto," rather I lived every day of my childhood hoping whites were not "searching my eyes for some telltale sign" that I WAS mulatto. This is my story.
It's historical fiction because I cannot find enough records to substantiate all facets of the story. I've combed the genealogy, traveled to my father and grandmothers' birthplace, walked the graveyards, searched the churches and ... well, all the facts aren't there. I have written three books based on the genealogy of other families but my ancestors emerged from a journey that left too few records – slavery.
My paternal, great grandmother was a "freed slave." My grandmother, Amelia, was born to a mixed race slave named Mary (we do not know her last name) and a white, French plantation owner, the Count de Poullain, in Grenada, West Indies. Amelia was raised in the "Big House" and in adulthood, in an attempt to escape her black heritage disowned her mother, telling her, "Get out and never come back." Amelia, as a mother of twelve children, enshrined into the family commandments, "Marry white." Many did, including my father. My mother was a lovely, white, Anglo-Saxon protestant born in England. They met in Canada where my dad studied and became a doctor.
It has taken five generations for the descendants of Mary to free themselves from the stigma of their black heritage but today my children embrace it. Unfortunately, the past 250 years have been a wasteland of bigotry, racism and bullying. But, on closer look, we see not only the brutality, fear, violence, and murder but also the self-respect, dignity, love, kindness, perseverance and indomitable spirit.
As of the spring of 2025, the depth of historic perspective and the sweeping inspiration of oppressed people has created a two-volume duology of which I have only arrived at the middle of the 19th century. 1840 is the year my great grandfather was born, the beginning of Volume II, and he's pushing me to make sure our story is published by the summer of 2026.
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