Popularity Contest

Last August I finally graduated with a Master of Business Administration degree after four years of night school. In a way it made me feel like a modern Francis Bacon. If you remember, he was a great scholar of Shakespeare's time, perhaps the last who strived to know all there is to know, back when most thought all the greatest books were written by ancient Greeks. Probably those books would add up to less than a gig of ASCII text these days. But anyway, like him, I like knowing a little bit about everything. I'm a real Renaissance kind of guy now--a former long-haired hippie with a knack for database programming, a penchant for philosophy, a degree in business and who still spins some mean tunes at the local coffee house a couple times a month.

My reason for getting the MBA wasn't as lofty as Francis Bacon's pure pursuit of knowledge though. I really don't have much aloha for business, I just wanted to get my ticket punched and move up to a better salary. But I did learn an awful lot about running a company, especially in the final class of the program where we put it all together and ran a mock business in competition with other groups.

The professor stressed that if we wanted to be successful in business we should study the great national leaders and generals of history. Even more than that, Niccolo Machiavelli's The Prince was required reading. He exhorted us to use military tactics as we competed against our classmates' businesses, to choose our allies carefully and be prepared to remove those who would oppose us. "Leadership is not a popularity contest!" he said. Wait a minute. My professor must be mistaken about that, because that's exactly what the recent Presidential campaign felt like--a high school popularity contest.

Don't get me wrong, there was plenty of substance to this race. If you like tapioca and oatmeal. Just think of the many memorable scenes from this year's race. Al kissing Tipper. Dubya kissing Oprah. Remember the second softball game, sorry, Presidential Debate where the two candidates agreed with each other 40 times. Literally! "I support the death penalty." "Desert Storm, what a fun time." "Social Security, wouldn't touch it." "Big government is bad." "Prescription drugs are too expensive." "I won't take your guns." Someone went back and counted all these agreements. Not me. I love watching debates but even I was hard pressed to stay awake. These guys were so rehearsed and so careful not to make a gaff that all their passion was smoothed away. And then there was that wonderful sound the Friday before the election. You remember don't you? That noise made by all the Republican blinders simultaneously snapping into place when Bush's drunk driving conviction was revealed? Sounded like a thunderclap to me. Heard it again when the two other convictions were revealed. Haven't heard a sound like that since Clinton said, "I did not have sexual relations with that woman!" But of course that time it came from a different direction. I could ask why the mainstream media didn't find that out after 18 months of investigating Dubya, but I cared more about what he might do as President, not his past misdemeanors.

That DUI comedy wasn't enough of course. In the final week of the campaign Bush and Gore were both on TV getting grilled by that incisive political kingmaker, Jay Leno (again!). Seriously, it was one of the weirdest moments I've ever seen, Jay cracking jokes about keeping the band's marijuana from the Secret Service detail and then playing nudge-nudge with his little styrofoam questions to the candidates. And to top it off there was the candidates' dual clowning on that Saturday Night Live special, as if the race were for First Comedian.

So is it any wonder it turned into a close race? Maybe calling it a high school popularity contest is being too kind.

I wish there was a better way to pick a leader. If somehow the Electoral College were really that, a kind of highbrow convention that would gather to decide the best person for the job, someone who really deserved to be President, someone who could lead and yes, perhaps wasn't already seeking the post. Instead of voting directly for a national figure, you'd vote for a prominent local figure to make an intelligent choice. It could be anyone with a good grasp of politics, management and recognized smarts instead of some sort of ambitious power-junkie who's read his Niccolo and is willing to say anything to live in the White House.

Of course that won't work though, prominent local figures are usually politicians already and they'd vote a party line all over again. Maybe it'd work if we require the Electors to be average Joes and Josephines who've never been in politics-hmm, but then we'd probably get O.J. Juror Syndrome again or worse, bribery. According to Arianna Huffington the federal election this year cost at least $1.56 BILLION. You don't think that would buy a few electors? Nope, toss this old Electoral College system out, it's never gonna work.

So much for a back door for my candidacy in 2004. Probably Nader's in the same boat. I can't see him taking lessons from The Prince; he may never be pragmatic enough to gain a plurality in a nation of 250 million selfish special interests. Idealism is a tough sell.

As I am writing this the Presidential contest is still too close to call, but I feel confident that the winner will arrive in Washington in an airplane named The Spirit of Machiavelli. Bottom line? This election has been very dissatisfying, but at least we don't have violent coups and conquerings every four years. Most of human history has been littered with bodies because of great leaders' ambitions and we should be thankful our imperfect system is this benign. The worst we will get is plenty of opinion-mongering from the pundits and varying degrees of bad government.

Anyway it's time for me to go back into the Closet and find where the heck I stashed my MBA shingle. It's somewhere under all the provisions I've stocked in there. I was thinking of hiding out until the next election, but I've realized that since Big Money won, my MBA ought to make me fit just fine in the new regime. I know, I sound like a sellout. Well, at least I'm not an attorney! Anyway, thanks for reading and until the next month the Closet is closed.


(C) 2000 - Rusty Pipes