Some thoughts this early Thursday morning,
There was a lesson to be learned from this year‘s Academy Awards. Well, they were several lessons, but the one which most interests me at this juncture is that you never know what is going to happen at a given moment. Tens of millions of people sat in front of their TVs and had absolutely no idea, none at all whatsoever, that one of the audience would at a certain point rapidly stride onto the stage and strike a presenter. There were no Vegas odds to this effect, and it was the equivalent of being hit by lightning on a perfectly clear day whilst playing golf . And yet, we react to these almost-impossible-to-conceive-of incidents in fairly predictable fashion, as witnessed even here at DU, and then go about our business as usual which while being quite appropriate, is remarkable onto itself because we have spent a lifetime dealing with the unknown and unexpected and have a mechanism which allows us to deal and integrate it into our lives.
It is the same way in the business and political world. There were people going about their business on the chilly November day back in 1963 and in an instant, the president was dead. No one who woke up that morning, with the exception of a few individuals who were involved, had any concept of what would occur that afternoon. The firmament was disrupted for decades following this incident, some might say that we have never recovered as a civilization , but this untoward and completely unexpected event changed everything. I would submit that this is a possibility at any given instant in this political season. There are investigations ongoing, there are people interacting with each other, there are events which have yet to occur which may alter the shape and the entire path of history and one or more of these may occur at any time.
That’s why when I see idiots like Chuck Todd describe what is likely going to happen given previous experience I smile grimly to myself knowing that he has absolutely no idea what will or won’t happen, but that since it’s a safe bet to make the statements and will absolutely not be held accountable for being wrong about anything and everything, he can feel free to do so. Only a very few people know what is really going on with respect to the investigations of January 6, of the malfeasance and kleptocracy of the previous administration and even then, the ramifications of revelations, should they happen, is utterly unknown at this juncture.
Interestingly, from a perspective of academia and literature, this is why the Greeks developed their deus ex machina mechanism, because things occur which are metaphorically at the very least the hand of God and impossible to predict. The only thing we know is that we really don’t know anything at all. Those of us old enough to remember Watergate distinctly recall that in the late afternoon when the evening papers would publish their additions, it would be reported that something had been revealed which was a game changer and would require the reevaluation of all the other evidence which had been presented to that point. Of course, those of us watching will never ever forget the lunch break when the news came down that the witness following the recess would testify that there was a taping system in the Oval Office and the tapes were extant and available. At that instant, the ground shifted underneath the political and apolitical worlds.
I expect multiple occasions of this type and nature to occur during the next few months with regard to what was by far the most corrupt, amoral, and frankly antidemocratic administration in our historically short history. So hold onto your hat…it’s gonna be a ride.
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