TinyD Through The Decades

For those of you who can’t seem to understand why so many Americans are hesitant to trust our current president, here’s a look back at the decades that shaped our opinions.  Turns out he didn’t just appear out of nowhere on The Apprentice!

 

Trump in the 50s

Caught by neighbor tossing rocks at a toddler in a play pen.

First becomes a millionaire even though he won’t turn 14 until the end of the decade, he’s on the family business’s payroll to the tune of $250,000 per year.  This fairly common method of legal money laundering/tax evasion isn’t unique to the Trumps, but it does fly in the face of the “self-made” myth our trust fund baby president seems to like repeating.

https://www.politicalflare.com/2019/10/biographer-reveals-trump-was-a-vicious-bully-as-a-child-who-threw-rocks-at-babies/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6232985/Trumps-DADS-tax-returns-revealing-president-earning-200-000-year-aged-THREE.html  (see also The Economist, later in this thread)

 

Trump in the 60’s

Five-time draft dodger – again, not unique to the Trumps since many families with money attempted various forms of it, but a pattern is clearly starting to emerge. In fact, Joe Biden’s draft record includes 5 deferments as well (asthma as a teenager).  The difference is that Joe Biden doesn’t denigrate or belittle the sacrifices of our troops, and his own son paid the ultimate price serving our nation.

https://www.archives.gov/foia/donald-trump-selective-service-draft-card.html

https://www.insidesources.com/joe-bidens-draft-record-looks-a-lot-like-donald-trumps-do-democrats-care/

 

Trump in the 70’s

 

DOJ sues Trump Mgt. Co. for illegal, racist rent practices.  Trump counter-sues for $100 million,  (loses) settles with DOJ, agrees to provide Urban League with listings of all vacancies, and to offer every 5^thvacancy to minority applicants in any buildings with less than 10% minority occupancy …but does not admit guilt. TMC is defended by Roy Cohen, of McCarthyism and mafia notoriety. Cohen becomes firmly established as TMC lawyer over a 13-year period.

 

First marriage (Ivana).  Estimates of the cost of the wedding are tough to find, but the divorce settlement was $25 million.

 

 

Trump in the 1980s

Trump tells Rona Barrett the US should have invaded Iran, using US hostages as an excuse to take over the sovereign nation, to get oil and “respect.”  Also predicts a president with “no great brain, but a big smile” could get elected.  Says he wouldn’t ever run because it’s “too mean a business,” but he’d like to help select a president.

 

During a break in his affair with Marla Maples, Trump dates tennis player/model, Gabriela Sabatini, all while still married to Ivana.

 

Misrepresents his share of his family’s $200 million estimated worth in order to appear on 1982 Forbes List of wealthiest Americans, claiming to be worth $100 million.  Later investigation revealed Trump’s personal worth at the time may have been $5 million. (this, after receiving an estimated $413 million from his father)

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/02/us/politics/donald-trump-wealth-fred-trump.html

https://youtu.be/nAgJAxkALyc

https://money.cnn.com/2016/03/28/news/trump-apartment-tenants/index.html

 

In 1985, New York City brought a lawsuit against Trump for allegedly using tactics to force out tenants of 100 Central Park South, which he intended to demolish together with the building next door. After ten years in court, the two sides negotiated a deal allowing the building to stand as condominiums. 

https://www.nytimes.com/1985/03/09/opinion/new-york-doer-and-slumlord-both.html

https://www.nytimes.com/1998/03/26/nyregion/win-trump-no-tenants-battle-80-s-ends-with-glad-handing-all-around.html

 

In 1988, the Justice Department sued Trump for violating procedures related to public notifications when buying voting stock in a company related to his attempted takeovers of Holiday Corporation and Bally Manufacturing Corporation in 1986. On April 5, 1988, Trump agreed to pay $750,000 to settle the civil penalties of the antitrust lawsuit. 

https://apnews.com/54ea0dc590fc97d9e9e86c65336649a1

 

 

Trump in the1990s

Trump’s dad sends an attorney to buy $3.35 million worth of chips at Trump Castle Casino in order to prevent the casino from missing an interest payment on a bond and going into default.  The move to hide the loan was investigated resulting in a $30,000 fine, but successfully completing the loan.  Fred Trump was later licensed by New Jersey to be able to make loans to casinos.  Good thing, because Donald’s casinos would soon need more loans like this to avoid default.  

https://pressofatlanticcity.com/news/how-donald-trumps-father-once-bailed-out-his-casino/article_934cb836-2c1d-11e6-8a13-173759856fe0.html

 

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/trump-files-fred-trump-funneled-cash-donald-using-casino-chips/

 

 

Trump’s first bankruptcy (1991) as Trump Taj Mahal is unable to service its debt.  Forbes says this is the ONLY bankruptcy (of 5) involving Donald’s personal assets.  While there is some debate over that, it’s clear Donald doesn’t like to put his own skin in the game.

https://time.com/4343030/donald-trump-failures/

 

Trump, now long associated with Cohen, uses mafia connected construction firms to build Trump Plaza and Trump Tower, grossly overpaying for supplies like concrete (money laundering?) and cutting corners/breaking the law, while other firms in the city pleaded with the FBI to be freed of mafia control. 

 

According to a Newsweek source who asked not to be identified because his family is well-known in the construction business, the asbestos and concrete were dumped near abandoned docks in Brooklyn and other discrete places instead of prescribed sites farther away—saving time and money. The White House referred Newsweek to the Trump Organization, which did not respond to an inquiry.

"On paper," as one of several news accounts put it, the demolition workers were members of Local 95, a Genovese-controlled union. But in reality, they were undocumented workers from Poland and South Korea. Ronald Fino, son of a Buffalo, New York, Mafia capo, told Newsweek they were known as "the sneaker brigade" for "remov[ing] the asbestos illegally." (Through the years, Trump denied knowing about the illegal workers, but in 1998, after years of litigation, he quietly paid a total of $1.38 million "to settle the case, with $500,000 of it going to a union benefits fund and the rest to pay lawyers' fees and expenses," The New York Times revealed in 2017.)

https://www.newsweek.com/2019/01/18/donald-trump-mafia-connections-decades-later-linked-mob-1285771.html

 

Trump’s 2^nd bankruptcy. Trump Plaza Hotel, Trump lost his 49 percent stake in the luxury hotel to Citibank and five other lenders. In return Trump received more favorable terms on the remaining $550+ million owed to the lenders, and retain his position as “chief executive,” though he would not be paid and would not have a role in day-to-day operations.

 

Donald attempts to rewrite his father’s will in 1997, without Fred’s knowledge or consent, in order to use family business assets to get out of debt, attempts to name himself executor so he has full control of family assets.  Fails. Denies any of it ever happened.

https://www.businessinsider.com/nyt-trump-tried-change-fred-trump-will-2018-10?op=1

 

https://www.rawstory.com/2018/10/donald-trump-tried-scam-father-removed-executor-will-nyt-report/

 

Divorces Ivana in 1992, marries Marla Maples in 1992, divorces her in 1999, although he is rumored to have begun dating Melania in 1998.

https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-melania-stormy-daniels-affairs-marriages-timeline-2018-3?op=1#trump-wasnt-single-for-long-in-1998-he-met-model-melania-knauss-the-pair-married-in-january-2005-8

 

 

 

 

Trump in the 2000s  (this was a busy decade, so here’s just a sampling)

Trump pays $250,000 fine (3x the largest fine ever issued) for illegal lobbying trying to persuade NY Commission to deny a casino license for an Indian-run casino in the Catskills.

https://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/trump-250g-fine-lobbying-article-1.885295

https://nypost.com/2000/07/17/trump-probed-in-casino-lobbying-blitz/

 

In 2001, Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts Inc. consented to the US Securities and Exchange Commission's cease-and-desist order regarding fraudulent statements in the company’s reports, said the culprit had been dismissed, and that Trump had personally been unaware of the matter. 

https://www.sec.gov/news/headlines/trumphotels.htm

 

In 2003, Trump sued A LOCAL PUBLIC SCHOOL DISTRICT in Palos Verdes, CA, in order to get out of paying fees to the district per the terms of the lease he bought from the golf course’s previous owners.

https://www.kpbs.org/news/2017/oct/12/insults-lawsuits-and-broken-rules-how-trump-built/

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-trump-tries-to-lock-school-district-out-of-2003dec03-story.html

 

A failed 2004 Trump Organization/Bayrock Group venture defaulted on a $139 million loan in 2010. The failed project resulted in at least 10 lawsuits, including accusations of fraud from initial investors, some of which were still not settled in early 2016. 

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/election/article63879697.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/17/nyregion/17trump.html

http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/stateroundup/failed-donald-trump-tower-thrust-into-gop-campaign-for-presidency/2269121

 

In 2005, the German state attorney prosecuted Trump Deutschland and its partners for accounting fraud. This followed Trump suing the city of Stuttgart (losing,) and Trump’s German partner suing Trump for the return of a EUR 200 million pre-payment.  (oh, and he marries Melania)

https://www.dw.com/en/donald-trumps-castles-in-the-german-sky/a-36472081

https://www.newsweek.com/all-women-trump-has-dated-married-or-been-linked-sexually-783370

 

2008-Deutsche Bank attempts to collect $40 million Trump personally guaranteed against their $640 million loan for Trump International Hotel and Tower in Chicago. Rather than paying the debt, Trump sued Deutsche Bank for $3 billion for undermining the project and damage to his reputation. Deutsche Bank then filed suit to obtain the $40 million. The two parties settled in 2010 with Deutsche Bank extending the loan term by five years. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/05/business/05norris.html

https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/03/the-lawsuits-of-donald-trump/273819/

 

In 2008, Trump filed a $100 million lawsuit for alleged fraud and CIVIL RIGHTS VIOLATIONS![78] against the California city of Rancho Palos Verdes, over a landslide-prone golf course in the area, which was purchased by Trump in 2002 for $27 million.[78] 

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/dec/20/local/me-trump20

http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/technology/20110113/trump-loses-round-in-a-local-lawsuit (obtained from archive)

 

2009-Trump Ocean Resort Baja Mexico investors sue for the return of deposits for condos in the failed project, claiming Trump misrepresented his role in the project. After its failure Trump claimed he had been little more than a spokesperson for the entire venture, disavowing any financial responsibility. Trump settled with over a hundred investors in 2013. 

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2009-mar-07-fi-trump7-story.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/13/nyregion/feeling-deceived-over-homes-that-were-trump-in-name-only.html

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-mo-donald-trump-settles-baja-mexico-condo-resort-lawsuit-20131127-story.html

 

 

 

Trump in the 2010s

The Economist reports that Trump’s business performance since 1985 is “mediocre compared to the stock market and New York property values.”  Suggesting he’d be better off had he invested his estimated $100 million net worth in 1985 into a standard retirement account, which would be worth $6 billion in 2016.

https://www.economist.com/united-states/2016/02/20/from-the-tower-to-the-white-house

 

2011-Trump tells Good Morning America he’s skeptical of Obama’s birthplace, and that we shouldn’t dismiss such sceptics as “idiots.”  (his word, not mine) 

https://www.politico.com/story/2011/03/donald-trump-birther-051473

 

2012- Trump offers to donate $5 million to the charity of Obama’s choice if Obama will publish his college and passport application records.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/OTUS/donald-trump-fails-drop-bombshell-offers-cash-obama/story?id=17553670

 

2016-Trump finally concedes, “President Obama was born in the United States. Period.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2016/09/16/trump-president-obama-was-born-in-the-united-states-period.html

 

In 2018, the Trump Charitable Foundation agreed to shut down, facing a civil lawsuit by the New York attorney general that alleged "persistently illegal conduct" including self-dealing and funneling campaign contributions. Furthermore, it had never been properly certified in New York and did not submit to the annual audit that would have been required.  The foundation did give away $2.8 million during the 2000s, or about 1/3 of what Trump had promised. He stopped contributing to the fund in 2008, but continued to accept donor funds, at least once claiming them as his own by taking a tax deduction.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/11/08/trump-foundation-saga-troubled-charity-ends-2-million-judgment/2532798001/

 

…and you know the rest.

 

Luth,

Out.

 

Let’s Talk About Walls

Shortly after World War II, the Allies split up what was left of Germany into four zones, one controlled by each of the Allies who had participated:  US, UK, France, and the USSR, per the Potsdam Agreement.  The city of Berlin was also divided into these same four zones even though it was within the USSR’s zone of Germany.  Basically, the allies all raced to Berlin in order to be able to shape the way this new country (and influence how all of Europe) would be built after the war.

It’s interesting that the Soviets were the first to suggest walling any of these zones off, specifically Berlin.  In fact, they quickly constructed barriers and sent their military to enforce them leading to the Berlin Blockade in the hopes that preventing food and supplies from reaching the non-communists in West Berlin might cause them the rethink their occupation.  Of course, as history tells us, the blockade was easily defeated by the Berlin Airlift, further proving that walls can’t stop airplanes …or ladders …or anyone determined to seek freedom.

The Soviets were a bit embarrassed by the fact that many of their people decided to flee the Soviet zone of this new Germany.  They were probably a little embarrassed by the Berlin Airlift as well, so they decided to build a more formidable wall in Berlin to try to prevent their people from seeking freedom in the West.  In 1961, the Berlin Wall, as it was known for almost 30 years, was completed, to include a “death strip” down the middle, manned by machine gun towers and constantly patrolled.  This at least slowed their best and brightest from defecting to the west. (slowed, but it did not stop them)

Thirty years ago this year, (demolition began on June 13, 1990) that embarrassing failure of statesmanship finally fell.  Turns out the only folks who wanted it in the first place were socialist communists trying to inflate the benefits of a culture that has failed them to this day.

So, what did the Berlin Wall teach us?

1.     Only communists think walls will preserve their “treasured lifestyle”

2.     That “treasured lifestyle” was so great, thousands of people risked their lives to flee it before the wall was finished, (and more continued to do so after – see also “Brain drain”)

3.     Walls don’t work

4.     They’re a waste of time, money, effort, all of which distracts from the real work of nation building/growing

That concludes this holiday history lesson about walls.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Luth 

Out 

A religion I can get behind

Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

Look, are there parts of this religion that sound irrational, crazy even?  Yep!  That's how you know it's a real religion.

If I ever decide atheism, rational thought, being amazed at the wonders of the universe, curiosity, critical thinking skills, and my job, family, etc. aren't enough for me, then this might be the religion I try on for a while.

Until then,
Luth
Out

Credit Where Credit Is Due: Colorado Baker and Sincere Religious Beliefs

The US Supreme Court stopped short of establishing much of a precedent when they sided with Colorado Baker, Jack Phillips, who refused to bake a cake for a gay couple’s wedding. The basis, they said was that forcing Phillips to violate his “sincere religious beliefs” was an attack on his 1^st amendment rights.  What this means is that this case doesn’t exactly absolve all commercial operations from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation, since it did not rule that his refusal was a civil rights violation, but that’s what it meant for the original plaintiffs.

I am sincere when I recognize the court’s restraint in their narrowly defined decision, but I can’t help but wonder if, despite this restraint, they’ve still created a fairly broad, potentially dangerous precedent.  Their decision makes me wonder how one proves “sincere religious beliefs,” and thus how far those beliefs might extend when denying business to anyone else.  It also makes me wonder how they know just how sincere Mr. Phillips’s beliefs are.  Did they test him? 

Did they ask him if he would also apply biblical rules to straight couples? 

Here are a few I’d have asked about:

Does Mr. Phillips refuse to take orders from women, since 1 Timothy 12 tells us, “I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.”  And if you don’t like that one, how about, “They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says.” 1 Corinthians 14:34

If he takes orders from women (violating what we must assume are two of his “sincere religious beliefs” does he only do so when the woman’s husband or father is present, since, a woman’s vow is basically meaningless unless approved by her husband or father. Numbers 30:1-16

Does Mr. Phillips prohibit menstruating women from entering his bakery, or does he allow it to be unclean, as described by Leviticus 15: 19-31? (does the health department know?)  By the way, men sleeping with women is also “dirty” according to Revelation 14, since only the 144,000 men who had never been with a woman were given an early pass to the afterlife.  They were the “first fruits.”  Hmmm. Revelation doesn’t say they couldn’t be with other men.

Mr. Phillips clearly won’t violate his beliefs about gay couples, even though the bible NEVER actually mentions or prohibits them, but is he cool making a cake for a rapist as long as the rapist buys the woman from her father, thus making her is heterosexual wife/property like Deuteronomy 22:28-29 advises?  Will he bake a cake for a virgin woman taken as “spoils of war,” and the man who took her?  I’m sure they’re a lovely hetero couple. Numbers 31

What about a little earlier Deuteronomy…the part about how “used wives” should be stoned to death?  Surely he wouldn’t make a cake for any bride who can’t prove her virginity as these verses explain.

What about the dudes?  How does Mr. Phillips de-conflict the Leviticus advice to “not round the corners of your heads, nor mar the corners of your beards” with Paul’s suggestion that men “naturally” have short hair and women have long hair?  What, exactly, do Mr. Phillips “sincere religious beliefs” require of his patrons when it comes to hair care?  Is there a barber nearby Mr. Phillips might recommend?

Is there a dress code at this bakery?  (back to Deuteronomy and Leviticus…) Is it cool to wear clothes woven from two different materials or no?  Does Phillips have staff who check this at the door?  I’m only asking because I don’t want to piss him off.  I’m in a heterosexual marriage and all, but this stuff is tough to keep track of and I don’t want to attack his sincere religious beliefs.

Perhaps it would be easier for all of us, if Phillips’s sincere religious beliefs focused a little more on John 13:34, “as I have loved you, love each other,” because I’m pretty sure Jesus would’ve just baked the cake.  Mark 12:31 helps de-conflict everything: “love thy neighbor as thyself, there is no greater commandment.”  I’d bake a cake for my neighbor.  Mr. Phillips would not.  So how serious are those beliefs?

Luth

Out

The Death Penalty, again, really Arkansas?

                         

As Arkansas and Kansas battle each other to be the US sibling we most want to hide in the basement as company arrives, the rest of us should thank them for providing us with a picture of the end result of our collective national stupidity.  These conjoined twin states are fighting each other to be the poster child of amalgamated national dumb. (Wisconsin gets a little time off from this competition for now.) Kansas did it by proving (again, only at a state level) that trickle-down economics is a thinly veiled myth dreamed up to transfer wealth to the wealthy.  Arkansas did it by showing us what killing people (to prove that killing people is wrong) really looks like.

The beauty of Arkansas’s twisted desire to kill 8 people (to prove that killing people is wrong) was thwarted by their own (and the nation’s own) hypocrisy.  In spite of our love affair with guns and how precious they are, Arkansas will only shoot death row inmates as a last resort.  After all, it’s not the killing them (to show that killing is wrong) that’s the problem, that’s inhumane, or cruel and unusual, it’s just HOW we kill them that’s so horrible.  We Americans can’t stand the thought that someone we’ve condemned to death at our hands might experience a few moments of suffering before they actually expire.  What a bunch of pussies.   You can’t take my guns, but you also can’t shoot someone we say must die with them!

And then there are the pharmacy companies and THEIR moral limits.  That’s right, the folks who have made deadly-overdose-leading opiates their number one sellers.  The folks who marked up epipens 700%.  The folks who lobby to keep marijuana illegal while advertising addictive pain killing products directly to consumers with no medical or pharmacy degrees.  The folks who take tax funded grant money to “experiment” with “new uses” of their already highly profitable, market-cornering drugs.  The folks who take and take and take from US consumers, only to move manufacturing overseas to avoid taxes and fair labor and environmental responsibilities, but who enjoyed our stability and military protection while growing rich enough to put that whole dodgy deal together, but who couldn’t bear their civic responsibility when it cut into their cash flow… yeah, THOSE moral kingpins object to their drugs being used in capital punishment! 

I guess it’s OK to advertise and promote addictive drugs that ended up killing 50,000 Americans by overdose last year, but not to use their anesthetics to kill 8 convicted death row inmates.  Makes perfect sense.

So yeah, in a country who loves our guns, and loves believing in the myth of infallible justice, we won’t shoot death row inmates, and only when our Drug Lord Pharmacy CEOs express some misgiving, do we stop and think.  Hmmmm, maybe killing people isn’t the best way to demonstrate that killing people is wrong.

But here’s the bigger point:  if we’re gonna keep the death penalty as a humane option, then we should worry only about the speed with which it happens, not how we do it.  We’re willing to sacrifice anyone who breaks into our home by arming every man, woman, child without a background check, licensing, or even the most basic instruction in how to safely use, store, maintain firearms, but we’re not willing to shoot the people we condemn to death?

What a bunch of spoiled children who can’t think beyond the immediate results of our incompetent misinformed daydreams.  We’ve been so trained by the oversimplification media that we’ve forgotten how to actually think beyond something that sounds good when you first hear it.  We’ve forgotten that arguments continue to build out of premises, that one idea connects to the next, and that eventually a conclusion must arise out of the non-thinking haze.

So here we are in Arkansas, torn between a state trying to prove how committed to justice they are by racing to kill 8 humans, and the moral high ground of an industry that killed 50,000 people with ONE of their products last year, and who continues to hold our nation’s healthcare industry (and elected officials) hostage with their lobby money.

Here we are, a nation who still pretends we believe so much in our justice system’s output that we insist on a permanent sentence (8 of them in one week in Arkansas) while saying with our other face that we don’t trust our government to the point we’ll elect a clown in protest.

Here we are, a nation of gun nuts who lack the balls to use those guns to carry out the death penalty we all insist demonstrates our commitment to the sanctity of human life.

What a bunch of confused, frightened children we’ve grown up to become.

Luth,

Out

No wonder you don't trust government!

I’m always amazed at the capacity of humans to learn at any age.  All it takes is a little curiosity and humility – admitting there might still be something out there we don’t know.  Granted, this goes against some of what we’ve learned.  We could look foolish if we open ourselves to learning something new.  We could make ourselves vulnerable, subject to ridicule, or even danger, but hey, that’s how it works.

Of course I’m talking about myself, and something that just occurred to me recently as I try to remain a knowledgeable citizen of the world.

Here it is:  When people say they don’t trust the government is it because in their own narrow-mindedness they assume everyone (public servants and otherwise) is as greedy and self-centered as they are?  If so, I finally get it. No wonder they don’t trust government, or anyone else!

Now before you get your conservative panties bunched up, hear me out.  Let me start with “narrow-mindedness.” What I mean by this is an inability to acknowledge or understand the validity of any perspective beyond one’s own experience.  A good example might be Ohio Senator Rob Portman’s once anti-gay stance.  Because he wasn’t gay, and didn’t know anyone close to him who was gay, he couldn’t believe that someone else might be, that his God made someone that way, unless there was something wrong with them.  It was beyond the realm of his personal experience and so he was convinced that it was just wrong.  (either that or he was flat out lying in order to boost his VP chances)

Then his son came out.

Suddenly Senator Portman’s worldview was expanded. Now that he had some up close and personal experience with an actual gay person he was able to see that being gay isn’t some character flaw or choice any more than being born into a Republican household might (or might not) be! …or being born with different colored hair, or skin, or height, or weight, or gender or any other genetic result. Why couldn’t he see this before it was personal to him?  Because he was narrow-minded.  My assumption is that he still is, but he’s learning!

We’re all subject to such prejudices, and to a degree, they help keep us alive and safe, but we also have to constantly question them as we proceed through life or we risk being limited in our contributions and our own personal achievement and happiness.  Senator Portman was unwilling to question his former ideas about homosexuality until it became personal.  That’s what I mean by narrow-minded – the inability to see other’s beliefs, traits, characteristics, ideas, etc. as valid when they differ from our own personal experiences.  Again, we all face this kind of thinking.  It’s a survival instinct, but at some point, as adults, as we develop the ability to think rationally, we have to overcome them and challenge them in order to develop beyond a level of basic, caveman-like survival, and grow to fit into the modern world that exists around us today - where cavemen no longer exist, and where we move beyond basic survival in order to advance socially, technologically, financially, culturally, or in all ways that matter.  If you can’t get beyond the limitations of your own personal experience, you are doomed to never being any better (by any measurement) than you are right now.  THAT is the definition of a miserable life!

OK, so that’s the narrow-mindedness.  It’s important to start with that because, while it is inextricably associated with self-centeredness, particularly in the form of greed, it is a separate characteristic.  Greed, as a specific form of self-centeredness, is a whole other ballgame.  Greed has to do with getting mine, often at the expense of others.  Sure, there’s a lot lacking in that definition, but I’m trying to keep this explanation simple.  I could add that greed requires a lot of false zero-sum mythological economic thinking, probably resulting in the related lack of curiosity, and thus being satisfied with the simplest economic theory one has ever read and then misapplying it to far more complex real life situations simply because one cannot be bothered to apply rational thought to the more complex situation and thus sticks with what one knows – kind of like looking for the keys one dropped in the driveway in the living room because the light is better in there – but that won’t help keep it simple.  (here’s an example of that kind of ridiculous oversimplification:  )

In the meantime, dig into “Economics in One Lesson,” by Henry Hazlitt. It sounds like a snooze but it really is a page turner, and you can download it for free.  http://mikerowe.com/2016/08/otw-economicsinonelesson/

(note:  it’s NOT a page turner, and it contains fatal oversimplification errors almost from the very start, which is what makes it such a great example here)

Back to the point: greed sneaks into one’s world view like poison and then clouds one’s thinking at every turn thereafter.  Much like narrow-mindedness, there’s some value in limited doses of greed.  It too can be a survival instinct.  Charity begins at home.  You’re no good to anyone else if you don’t first take care of yourself, etc. and so on, but when one allows greed to taint all other decision making, that’s where the trouble starts. 

Like any other unquestioned dogma (yes, that’s redundant, but people misuse language so much in these “post-fact, post-knowledge” times I figured this post is a good place for otherwise unnecessary emphasis) greed prevents us from thinking rationally in other areas of thinking as well.  Once greed becomes one’s primary motivator, it can block out all possibility of win-win situations.  It actually fools us into thinking that if someone else wins, I must have lost.  We know this isn’t true, but that’s what too much greed does to our thought process.  (We’ve seen this with our president-elect on several occasions.  Those who seem to be able to have real discussions with him must first acknowledge that he is a “winner”…by a landslide…bigly, and only then will he listen to them regardless of their expertise, experience, education or value of their ideas.) 

Greed corrupts our thinking to the point that we assume everyone else is just as greedy as we are.  This false (in many cases, but not always) assumption thus creates competition with others where no competition actually exists.  Instead of being able to work together, greedy people automatically assume they are always competing for something.  Instead of considering the possibility of better results as a synthesis of combined thinking, cooperation, broad experiences and training coming together, greedy folks see only that they might not get all there is to have.  This is the zero-sum myth, especially when it comes to ideas.  (but also when it comes to wealth in most cases)

Like any other pattern of thinking, when you do it long enough it not only becomes habit forming, it becomes who you are.  What’s worse is that it combines with that narrow-mindedness and convinces you that everyone else is the same way.  You assume no one can be trusted because everyone thinks exactly like you do – everyone else, like you, is out to get theirs, and probably at your expense.  When you’re already susceptible to projecting ONLY your experiences onto others, you naturally assume everyone thinks the way you think.

As I mentioned, this just dawned on me.  How it took me half a decade on the planet to realize it seems rather baffling, but now it all makes sense.  Before this realization, I could never understand how anyone could be so suspicious and pessimistic about his fellow man.  My experience on this planet tells me otherwise. (“Trust, but verify,” a wise fellow one said) Sure, I’ve been burned before, (most often as a result of my own lazy thinking or actions) but for the most part, I’ve found common ground with just about everyone I’ve met in just about every corner of the planet.  It’s been my experience that we have more in common than contrast when it comes to other humans. We all need oxygen …and a nice, clean, private, preferably flushable toilet once in a while is really nice too!  It’s been my experience that two heads are better than one, not something to be feared.  I guess I have been guilty of assuming everyone would want the benefit of that, and so I have projected my thoughts too – that better solutions generally arise when you have as many perspectives and as much information as you can before making up your mind – is what it means to be a grown up. It still seems like a better way of doing anything, but now I understand why greedy, narrow-minded people think otherwise.

So now I understand what people mean when they say they are distrustful of government, or other humans in general.  It’s not that they don’t grasp the concept that in America, WE ARE “the government,” it’s that they simply assume the worst in anyone else, precisely because that’s how they see themselves, and thus they project their own misery, greed, narrow-mindedness onto others.  It also just occurred to me as I write this that the only solution for people who think like this is some sort of authoritarian dictatorship, but each one of them would have to be a dictator, so it would have to be anarchy, with each individual a sovereign entity, but that brings up issues of property rights, which would severely dampen the gathering of wealth, and that’s kind of at odds with the whole selfishness thing. (if there were no government, then how would we establish and record deeds? The real estate market would never work like that!)  I suppose the only way we can make them happy is if they find some surrogate whom they believe can represent their narrow-minded greed.  I guess we’ll see how that works out.

Luth
Out