making policy-article 2 of 2 today

MAKING POLICY
( article 2 of 2 today )

Aesop over at Raconteur Report blogspot is a very good blogger ( rants never ending ) and it looks like a rather good medical professional ( he doesn't strike me as a braggart, so I'm going by his position and experience which seems substantial ). But what he is makes him unqualified for some things. You NEVER get a professional to make policy, unless that policy is his profession. A perfect example of that is a military General trying to make political decisions. Eisenhower and MacArthur were both high ranking military leaders and hence politicians ( but I submit to you that both were better at politics than war-unless you gauge success the Soviet way, with cannon fodder count ).

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But Eisenhower KNEW he was a politician, whereas MacArthur THOUGHT he was a General ( that is what his paycheck said, anyway ). The one knew there is a lot more to war and leading a country than just throwing around atom bombs, and the other only knew how to win a war ( again, according to his limited understanding. Remember, this was one of the douches that murdered the peaceful protesters for the war bonuses ) at any cost. When you are a hammer, everything looks like a nail. You need to set policy for hammers, not allow hammers to dictate policy.

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Look at the old TV show MASH. It has been a few decades since I watched an episode, but if memory serves Hawkeye was the hippie peacenik surgeon, and most of the comedy was with his foil the Major who was a military kiss ass. As a medical doctor, his contention that the war had to be stopped because it served no purpose, in order to do his job of saving lives. Should he have been making policy? Of course not! No matter how great of a doctor he was, he had no knowledge of foreign policy or other areas that were the purview of politicians.

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Politicians know how to do one thing, and that is how to allocate resources so as to continue the wealth pump that paid them. Business leaders are the same. Their job is not to make policy with wage parity to keep the peace, or to strengthen the national security with their industry or anything else. It is to make money. The only problem with business leaders is when you either do not regulate them or when you allow one in a political position. Politicians only screw things up when the wealth pump no longer strengthens the wealth pump, but those who hijacked it.

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You need generalists, Big Picture folks, to oversee the experts, or the system fails. Experts have tunnel vision. They have to, or they are not all that good at one thing. Just like you cannot blame men or women for a problem the other is better at solving, and both must work in harmony, so experts and policy makers. You cannot make a good policy without knowledge, but too much knowledge limited in scope is as worthless. Aesop is a great medical guy. He should stop right there. Yes, he listens to other experts, such as experienced war fighters for survival advice, but even then he is blinded by professionalism over generalists.

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And I don't mean to single out one voice, just that he is one I read daily ( which speaks highly of him, as my time is limited and I must triage my reading. I can intensely dislike someone and still value what they have to say. I value Aesop. I also find much about him worthy of disagreement ). A LOT of what the military does is dangerous to survivalists. You've heard the list before, so I won't rehash. They have valuable experiences to share, but little should be emulated.

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If you ONLY value the advice of professionals, you lack broader perspective. Whenever Aesop spouts off belittling anyone who wants to reopen the economy, because now he is on Aesop's turf and Aesop knows how to save lives and lifting the lock-down goes against that, my jaw drops in wonder. How, pray tell, is his beloved medical industry to survive without the larger surrounding economy supporting it? Medical is a BONUS. In resource scarcity, medical care is not guaranteed. I won't even get into his blindness to the flaws in the system, a barber telling everyone to get a haircut ( that is a widely shared flaw, so no need to get personal ).

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Just focusing on available resources, medical care is not always available. Even now, medical care is being withheld, surgeries needed for longer life but not immediately life threatening if withheld, are being denied because medicine isn't coming over from China. No amount of stacked Conex containers as emergency stockpiles are going to last you a year of normal use ( if we assume shortages began last year as many were not available here and instead were being used in China to combat Swine Ebola ). That solves the JIT problem, but not the trade and economic issues. It doesn't address the energy issues, as a lot of this is the indirect result of THAT triage, for decades now.

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Sometimes, to solve a problem, you cannot solve it perfectly. You must sacrifice perfection to gain system wide functioning. It doesn't matter if closing down the economy saves everyone. If you are starving or freezing to death while homeless, it doesn't matter if you survived a ten times the risk of the normal flu of dying “pandemic” before that. When you focus on winning the war against a virus, and ignore the trade war, or asymmetrical war on your empire, you still lose.

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This is not to disparage any expert ( although many times I call BS on their entire profession anyway-I still understand the drive, dedication and accomplishments of the practitioner ). It is to call into question focusing too much on specialists at the expense of the generalist. Of focusing wealth on ones chosen profession ( “why do I care if you lose your job while locked down? I'm still employed” ) and ignoring the rest of the system that delivers your wealth. The problem with tunnel vision.

( .Y. )

( today's related Amazon link click HERE )

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note: On Tubi, there is an EMP TV series.  Now, relax, Francis, and lower your expectations.  It is female-centric ( I think it is more a fundamentalist view, although I could be wrong-I've only watched two episodes.  Past the first opening scene of Strong Powerful Women Executives, I didn't get a sense of PC, and saw hints of traditionalism ) and it is a very slow burn.  The budget isn't minuscule,  yet noticeably lower ( with decent production ).  But I found myself enjoying it.  "Daily Bread"
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