What do all these people have in common? Not much you say? Read on and see if I have connected a few dots. I have known a lot of people over a long period of time and with all that observational data, I think that I have the right to draw some conclusions. Of all the successful business people who I have known, most of them have a very focused and bull headed nature. Like wise, I have known many people who tried, but who were not successful and most lacked the focus and hard headedness needed in business. I have also seen several people who were successful who did not know when to stop because of their bull headedness and eventually lost all they had gained. To make these observations, you have watched people over a long period of time, not just a few weeks or years. Now onto my blog.
First look at Jim Jones. He was the preacher from Northern California who took all his followers down to South America and eventually murdered all of them along with himself. You read all about it in the news. Jones was a good looking, good speaking White guy, like many preachers that you have known. Most of his followers were Black people from the Bay Area. His plan for them was to have all of them pool their welfare checks and go to a place where it would be cheap to live so that they could enjoy a higher quality of life. The story had a good ring to it, but there were problems. Jones got most of his "flock" or "sheep" down to South America, but got into financial trouble in a type of "Ponzi" scheme. When it looked to Jones like he would be exposed and possibly go to jail, rather than losing all that he had put together, he killed his followers and himself. That is the short story.
Now look at Hitler. He also had this big plan to help Germany with him on the top running things like Jim Jones. He was also a good speaker and was willing to do what ever it took to gain his vision. His plan started with the youngest Germans because he knew if he could poison their minds at an early age that he would have them for most of their lives. Sounds a little like the teacher's union here in the USA and "Head Start". For Hitler, the ends justified the means and that allowed him and his followers to do the most repugnant things to gain his vision. You know most of the rest of the story, but when Hitler saw that his plan had failed, he killed himself rather than face the fact that he was wrong. He was so bull headed in his belief that he would rather die and allow many of his followers to die rather than admitting that he had been wrong from the beginning.. Had he not had that bull headed attitude from the very beginning, he would have given up long ago like most normal people. To lead a bunch of "sheep" the leader has to think that they are "smarter" than the "sheep". Starting to sound familiar?
Now look at Allende. He was the President of Chile which has a government similar to that of the USA. I think that they are the second oldest democracy in the world, next to the USA. Allende had been in government for years and finally go hold of the reins of power. When he did, he started putting into affect all of his ideas, many with just the "telephone" and his "pen". Does that sound familiar? Allende only enforced the laws that he liked and ignored the others. He went around the congress and the courts. Allende tried to build a legacy of followers (sheep) by taking the wealth of people who did not vote for him and giving it to those who did vote for him. Once his followers got used to the handouts he knew that it would be difficult to take them back or cut them off. This was his long term plan and he worked on the principle that the ends justified the means too. It got so bad in Chile that the military decided to arrest Allende for violation of their constitution and put an end to what he was doing to the country. When they went to arrest Allende, rather than face the trial and the damage to his ego, Allende shot himself. I was not there the day he shot himself, but I had been there and listened to him address his "sheep" a few weeks before.
Notice that all three of these people were so bull headed about their vision of their world that all were willing to kill themselves rather than to have been exposed. Their egos were so big that they never compromised a single one of their ideas. I know that they must have all looked into the mirror and said to themselves that they were the smartest one in world. Why else would so may "sheep" be flocking to see and hear me speak. Why else would they cheer so loudly? It is like these three kept building a tower high and higher, but to do that the tower had to get narrower and narrower. There was no way down, only up so that is the way they kept pushing. They would take to heart expressions like, "if I can't get my way, I am willing to die trying".
Now to you. How many of you predicted that the three above would "die trying"? What was this vision in their heads that drove them? How did their bull headedness turn against them in the end? Why did they all buy into the idea that the ends justified the means? We all know that it takes a much different set of abilities to climb to the top of a mesa than it does to survive on the top of that flat mesa. You see it in business all the time, so why don't we see that in government. The ability to get elected is much different from the ability to manage the office of President. As the voters here in the USA, we have responded to those with the ability to get elected without any consideration of what it takes to manage a country of over 300 million. It is our fault that we now have Obama and is he just another Jim Jones, Hitler or Allende? Will Obama leave the mess that those three did?
I don't know how Obama will go out, but I can assure you that it will not be orderly like all of our Presidents in the past. I don't how long it is going to take to clean up the mess that he has created, but I am sure it will take several generations if it does ever get cleaned up. All of you will have the distinction of having the mess happen on your watch. How are you going to explain the mess to your children and grandchildren? Never thought about that did you?
