Tag Archives: Politics

Solutions Trump Systems

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How do we get things done? If our vaunted systems are in various stages of failure and even collapse, then it’s time we found a new way or perhaps, considered some of the old ways that are tested and true, but somehow, we’ve forgotten them—mainly because they aren’t sexy and don’t require a Ph.D. to implement. Sometimes I call it looking “back to the future.”

If we’ve reached the outer limits of growth—and I believe that we have—then what is our way forward? Economic development and a growth at all costs mentality will only take you so far. Look around at the great unwinding of the past 40 years and know that we haven’t been able to grow our way out of our troubles. Continue reading →

Becoming excellent

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Excellence

Let me make an observation. Excellence isn’t something that most of us strive for.  It seems that good enough is close enough. Perfunctory is too often the norm. It infects our work culture, our politics, our interpersonal relations, and our communities.

We expect excellence from everybody else though, don’t we?

What if we chose to pursue excellence in our own lives? Would it make a difference? Continue reading →

The day after (the day after)

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Jubilant first family after victory declared.

Phew! We managed to make it through another “silly season.” For the uninitiated, silly season is that period—one that occurs every four years—when a host of surrogates of the well-connected perform a kabuki dance called “running for president.”  

We begin with a crowded field initially, whittling it down to two front-running candidates and a host of others that are lucky to garner one percent of the total vote, combined. These would be the host of third parties, also known as a losing proposition in America without something like instant-runoff voting in place. Continue reading →

Everything is local

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We’ve been in a two decade state of denial about fixing our problems at home, focused on the global because somehow, we thought (convinced by tools like Thomas Friedman) that we lived in a flat world of olive trees, and we could all drive a Lexus.

With the implosion of the global financial realm, people that pay attention to things are now recognizing that taking care of our home turf might be the best approach–think, back to the future! Continue reading →