Author’s Note: During my one week sabbatical I received messages that were caring,inquisitve and derisive. All were greatly appreciated. I am glad someone noticed.

Ah, the sounds of spring and another political campaign. I have decided to take Ted’s Head up to 30,000 feet. I live at Mile High but the airwaves are too crowded and the air a bit fetid in an intellectual way. I need to step back.

If you care to, join me. I need you to take off  your cloak of red or blue. We are going to look at our world in a rather dispassionate way. Kind of like a business problem and not a crusade. You see, on my week off I have been thinking about polarization and its implications.

Forget about which side you are on, realize that whoever gets elected there will 50% of the voting populace that didn’t like him. That’s a whole lot of millions who want to skewer the victor. Now if that just went away with time, all would be well. In reality as soon as the votes are in we spend the next two to four years using every machination we know to make sure he or she fails. Fun in chess but we are talking about our country.

How did this all come to be? Well it starts with the concept that if I am right, you are wrong. Fair enough. Like a good type A country we have amped this up to I am now good and you are evil. That is heavy duty.There is no in between. No compromise available. You are a jerk and even worse, your line of thinking will bring down the Republic as we know it. Now it is getting ugly.

We are talking about raw emotion. Cue in love and hate. Love gives you a warm and flighty feeling in your heart. It’s great. It is spring. The sky is blue and you have a strange but comfortable feeling in your soul. Things bounce off your back. Man this feels good.

Hate is something else. It is a visceral and raw feeling in your gut. Your temperature rises at the thought or sight. You are physically repulsed. The rage is building. You seek out kindred spirits to vent your wrath. Aha, let’s watch or listen to the talking heads of your particular persuasion and just grovel in the inflammatory. I don’t want it subtle. Let’s just bring those bastards down. This is not good.

Our particular two party system leaves no wiggle room. Overseas there are coalition governments. No one has a clear majority. They have got to work together. I am not advocating overthrow but we really have to figure out a different way to make this work. It is actually quite amazing to me that the pols think the hopes and dreams of 300 million plus people can be capsulated in two party platforms. I don’t think so.

I am an independent and if pushed I would call myself a moderate although I feel more comfortable with pragmatist. A local conservative talk show host who feels intellectually superior to most of  the world announced that the word moderate is not to be considered in the political lexicon. I rest my case.

So now we are looking down at this quandary from a distance. We have got severe but not insurmountable problems. They are right out there. We see them. Why don’t they? We get it. They have let their emotions and petty strivings for personal gain blind them. Is it me or do they really look foolish?

Our problems are social and economic. Unfortunately we have to address the material first. We have got a business to run. We have to make tough and sometimes surgical choices. Fourth quarter earnings suck. Production is down big time. But guidance is looking better. With some prudent thinking and a sense of cooperation we can get this thing going again. We need concessions from both labor and management. We have to think long term and not worry about the current share price.

Hmmm. this might not be easy. There is mistrust on the board. We have political creatures making economic decisions. Forget about reality. Let’s just look good. Play to the base. We really might want to replace the whole lot of them.

Once again it comes down to hate and love. The hate seems so deep rooted. As pure adrenalin it is much easier to maintain. It is so much easier to do than saying I might be willing to listen or God forbid not be 100%, AAA, right. Give in? Are you nuts? That would be Unamerican. Unfortunately that might be the case today.

We are landing now. Our destination is everyday. We can be refreshed and enlightened by the respite or we can get back to the samo samo. Somehow “I hate you” might feel better in the short run but it is really not a long term solution. Believe me I am one of the best at vitriol. But I have to change. You are all very smart people. Have I missed something?

As always

Ted The Great.

Factoids:

131 million people voted in the last election. That’s 63.6% of eligible voters. In theory 66 million of 330 million people elected the president.

If you were president of the company, would you present a budget  while hemorrhaging cash that didn’t mention entitlements? If you were the board would every one of you publicly refuse in any which way to raise taxes even with 1$ of taxes for every $10 of spending cuts.

Congress has an approval rating of under 10% but sitting members get returned every two years 98% of the time.

There are 20,500 nuclear warheads in the world. We own 8500 of  them.

Two more kids died in Ohio today. Please don’t tell me hate is not a crime.