A Goofy Foot in Mouth

Today is Election Day and while this post has been in my thoughts for months or even years, sitting here in the dark of the early morning, I feel now is the time to finally write it out.

I am no longer a Republican.

I am still a conservative. And I believe in the principles of a smaller and nimbler government, strong national defense, internationalism and the importance of American leadership in the world, capitalism and free trade, individual self reliance, the Bill of Rights, and most importantly, the democratic norms of separation of powers that is the genius of our Constitution.

Many of these things no longer align with the party of Lincoln, Reagan, Peggy Noonan, William F Buckley, George Will, David Brooks, Condi Rice, Liz Cheney, both Bush’s, John McCain, Mitt Romney, John Kasich, Adam Kinzinger, Elizabeth Dole, Christine Todd Whitman, Bill Weld, and hundreds of my other political heroes. The modern Republican Party is not conservatism. It’s Trumpism and I can’t get on board with the politics of division, hate, strongman fascism, egocentric misogynistic braggadocio, and non-sensical arguments based on fringe conspiracy thinking anti-science. It’s just not for me.

For a while I thought the rational part of the party would push back and purge Trumpism from the party. But the culmination of JD “he’s America’s Hitler” Vance now embracing Trumpism to out-Trump Trump, I realize there may never be a place for me in the party again. The takeover is complete.

The only thing I wonder is what will happen with those of us who stayed and tried to stay true. Even Nikki Haley tried to straddle the line and hold her nose to embrace Trump. Are there any of us who believe in country over party, the rule of law in the executive branch (sans the Supreme Court obviously) and the purity of logic- left to take back the party? I doubt it. Somehow the transactional need to unapologetically get what you want as more important than the true notion of compromise and “family values” (aka character) has taken hold and won the day.

I’ve voted mostly party line Democrat for last few elections. Including my absentee ballot last week. Not because I believe in all of what the party stands for (some good, some ok, some anathema to my truth) but instead because I feel my moral stance against Trumpism necessitates a counterbalance that I hope will be perceived by posterity as a bright spot on this blemish of the fabric of American History. This isn’t who we are. The alluring cult of personality that is Donald Trump could someday be redirected back to a place of love and respect from an equally inspiring person shouting positivity.

There’s no one out there today like that. Some of my heroes above are trying, but they just can’t break through. It used to be my dream to try to inspire the world to desire the “shining city upon a hill” and illuminate a path to get there. But the dark side won. And for now…

Josh:out

A few years ago I wrote a post about Effort Based Compensation.  The point was that if I ever got to the place with TheMissionZone that I could actually create a comp program, I’d want to award not only results, but effort.  How else do you reward risk taking regardless of the outcome?  You reward the effort.  I love the idea and think it could be a great way to encourage loyalty and commitment to an organization. 

Largely in your job and even in relationships, effort counts for almost nothing.  Let’s say you bust your ass on a project and it doesn’t pan out, think you’ll still get your full bonus? Nope.  I’ve come to learn that our personal relationships most often work this way too.  Make a big effort to plan a date night and it goes south: You’re not connected. Grand gestures that turn out to not be as important as you think they are: Zero effect.  See the thing with relationships is that unless the other person feels the outcome of your effort, it doesn’t seem genuine.  Trying is great, but not only do you have to try at the right things, but you’ve got to try in a way that makes the other person feel like they are the special beneficiary of that trying.  Cook a fancy meal, but your partner doesn’t care all that much about food: I really don’t care that you tried, don’t you remember I’m trying to cut calories?  Even trying to connect physically when it doesn’t seem genuine can just feel like going through the motions.  Do some people still appreciate it?  Of course, I’m just trying to make the point of effort vs a felt realization of that effort.

Which leads me to Crossfit, often describing itself as a ‘community.’ I was first exposed to Crossfit culture during the 20x event and I’ve been with Breathe for a year. In the gym we form relationships and bonds. We talk and get together outside of the gym for social events. Competitions are a party atmosphere. After every workout we fist-bump each other for completing the trial. I seriously crave the app-based fist-bumps after I post my numbers. We call each other a “FAAAAMMMM”ily and we are humble, honest and vulnerable with each other. Razzing is safe and fun. I manufactured a fake rivalry, and now everyone is in on it. I watched the number one shit talker get shit on by his wife. One of the most focused competitors has the softest voice as a coach. I share a birthday and a silly laugh with another coach. A loud guy makes fun of my ridiculous faces when I put up heavy weight. Everyone works with me on my form in a critical yet helpful way. I am free to be confident enough in my manhood to celebrate the fact that there are at least 6 women that can do lifts with more weight than me. I frickin love all of it.

Juxtapose this to old-school gyms where I always felt subconscious about not putting enough weight on a bar. I always had a spotter if I needed it and got a “good job” after a set.  But no one was invested in my work. It just doesn’t happen that way. Everyone does something different, so there is no shared purpose to bond over the outcome of your time in the gym.

Here’s where it gets cool. At Breathe we’ve got this tight-nit community and we don’t focus on what’s on the bar, but rather the process you go through to complete a workout. No one cares what you scaled to, as long as you put in the work. We grind out the same movements, the same mission.  We celebrate the execution of effort. 

What is special for me, is that I have relationships that value my effort. In return I value it in everyone who shows up and puts out. I don’t care if you deadlift 600 lbs or start by adding 5lb plates, drop that fucking thing on the mat after each rep and be proud of it. Ring the bell if it’s a PR. You put in the effort, you did the same movement. Stand tall. Crossfit is a relationship that values the effort you put into a single shared activity.

One of these days I’ll get a muscle-up. And all my friends will cheer and shout when I am over that damn bar, even the ones who string them together like it’s no big thing. Because in the end, we all worked the same, they just happen to accomplish more than me. It feels good to know that my effort counts and has just as much value no matter what my score was. 

And that’s why I will go back to get some more.  Full Send!

A week ago I saw a Twitter account that changed its name to “Slava Ukraini”. I assumed this was some support for the Ukrainian people but wanted to know the translation. It means “Glory to Ukraine”. We have a team chat and I had to share this little bit of trivia. Got the smiley from Slava, because he and I have always had a great relationship, joking about Russian/US cultural stuff. A long time ago I told him about my heritage and while he laughed it off (because it doesn’t change anything about me) it was nice to share the bond.

At about 10pm last night I wrote a peer review of Slava for evaluation season coming up over the next few weeks. Last. Night. We got word that he passed away early this morning.

I met Slava about 10 years ago. We interviewed him for an analyst position. I liked him right away and told DW that we needed to hire him. At the time I was architecting this profitability project “AM” and Slava was going to help me out. He was a natural and took to it. When I left the team, Slava took over the program and some enhancements dubbed “AM2.0”. I was invited to the rollout party a few months later. I admit, there was a little jealousy at the credit he got. But I was happy and proud that we made it work successfully.

Slava was this super proud Russian. He loved the idea of restoring the national pride that was Soviet. We had many positive conversations about Russian life, what college/school was like, family, etc. It was fun and enlightening to hear his take on life in Russia and share stories from my youth. He was younger than me, but wise beyond his years. I have made some bad hiring calls over the years. Not Slava.

When I heard he was coming back to the team, I was confused. Slava had joined another part of the firm, and his career was moving strong. Customer facing stuff. I came back during Covid and he joined shortly after. Because of Covid we were all Zoom. Slava didn’t turn on his camera. I had heard that he was sick and while we all work crazy hours at this level, our team was more flexible, so it was a good fit for him to come back. We had a 1:1 about a year and half ago and he finally turned on his camera. We talked about the cancer, his diagnosis, the treatment, family. I’m glad that he opened up to me. He then stepped into a peer squad lead role doing AI/ML. He was excited about this stuff and part of the reason he came back. We shared a lot of interactions with certain people and it was fun to have side conversations about them. Slava was such a fun guy to talk to.

Up until the teams chat last week, we knew Slava had been out a lot. A few months ago he had a big surgery in NY and he was taking calls from the hospital because he was “bored out of my mind.” Nothing says Russian fortitude like that. I didn’t realize things had turned. Selfishly, I wish I had the chance to say goodbye, but I’m glad he ignored work and hopefully spent more time with friends, family, his wife and kids.

Dosvidaniya my good friend.

I first heard the term “bush league” while playing in our street hockey league. CMac was in net and got pushed out of the crease by one of the other team’s offense, and then they scored. The ref was a little green and didn’t call it. We were all pissed and that’s when CMac told them, “Guys come on, that was total bush league.”

Everyone wants to watch a competition that plays out between competitors with honor. You don’t punch low, chop block or blind hit a skater in the neutral zone. But recently, somehow it became ok to play only to win in political competition. Win for the sake of winning, regardless of how you do it, without honor. Ted Cruz, a supposed man of principle, fawning over the person who insulted his wife and father. Mitch McConell and the Merrick Garland nomination while green lighting Amy Coney Barrett. Lyndsey “hold the tape” Graham. Anyone who criticized Obama for executive orders but salutes Trump’s useless paperwork. The threats about Biden’s cabinet appointments but ok with Rex Tillerson, Ben Carson and Ryan Zinke? Trump’s fanning the flames of any conspiracy theory just in case random anecdotes later help him sew distrust of whatever criticizes him. Like anyone in government who disagrees and then gets angry tweeted resulting in death threats from the lemmings that blindly follow @RealDonaldTrump. Are we still two weeks and sitting in a bigger swamp away from this alleged health care plan that defies the laws of economics? 306 is a “landslide” called by the press at 2am in 2016, but now the flipside is “fraud”?

Yes these moves are playing within the technical rules, but that doesn’t make it right. It will alienate the future generations of potential Republicans. No one wants to play for THAT team.

The reason we call it political “sport” is because we want a level playing field like the sports we turn to for entertainment. A fair game offers anyone an equal shot, your skill governs success, not the skill of your lawyer. It’s why perpetuating systems that promote racist results are abhorrent even if they are ‘legal’. It’s why it is wrong to call a woman “bossy” when a man would be labeled “assertive” or a “she’s a bitch” when he is “strong.” It’s why we called out Obama when he supported Louis Farrakhan and yet the GOP doesn’t flinch when the POTUS recognizes that there are “very fine people” for chanting “Jews will not replace us.”

The bible uses the word “zachor” or “remember” over 200 times. Remember the Sabbath. Remember the covenant with God. Remember the exodus from Egypt. We should remember when people say that you should “grab them by the pussy” when you are attracted to someone even if “she was married”. We remember these things because they are important. We remember when teams win on a technicality, when someone manipulates the rules to win, despite being the worse team. We remember.

Years ago our Ultimate frisbee team made it to the playoffs and was playing against a very tough team. One of our players, “T”, made one of his patented amazing diving catches for a score over his defender. He jumped up, spiked the disk and did a dance. In the moment we thought it was funny. But it was inappropriate and he almost instantly felt bad, reminding us that’s not how we play the game. On the next play, he sought out the competitor, apologized, shook his hand and noted that it was wrong. He did the same at the end of the game. He made amends for getting swept up in the moment. While that one action was disrespectful, he made up for it by being humble. I would go to battle with that guy any day. I remember his honor.

I’m not sure what is going to happen with the GOP over the next few years. I hope we find our way back to the ideals of Conservatism that argue ideas and principles rather than cultivating hate and trickery just so “We’re going to win so much, you’re going to be so sick and tired of winning.” That’s not winning. That’s not leading. That’s not making the world better with better ideas. That’s braggadocio, and it punctuates the fact that nothing was actually accomplished other than leaving 250k people “dying in the streets” because you never really understood healthcare.

People get caught up in the moment of competition. Emotions run hot. You do things in the moment even though we know they are wrong. That’s ok. The strength of humanity is the ability to control the reptile mind and remember what we did, evaluate it and correct ourselves. I can’t quite understand the person that hears the Trump dog whistle of hate and thinks that their own frustrations with the world are represented by that overt contempt for human decency. But I know there are many in these 70 million Americans that truly aren’t so easily swept up by the conman. Where did your morals go when your ears perked up and the adrenaline spiked? Is it time for some introspection?

I remember my friend “T” and his begging forgiveness for a momentary lack of humility. I was proud that our team showed that composure. I love Ultimate because it is a game of honor where we call our own fouls. We sometimes call ourselves for borderline fouls just to make sure the opponent feels we are playing fair. “Spirit of the game.” I hope that the last 4 years were just a momentary lack of judgment and morality. If you were one of those people, that’s ok. Take some time and think back on what you agreed was a good course of action in the moment and then decide if & how you want to make amends. Does anyone really want a child separated from their parent fleeing oppression when that is exactly why the Pilgrims sought out the New World? If you still think that’s ok, no problem. I remember. Many will remember. There may be a point where this party no longer represents a Conservatism that is dear to my soul. I hope that never happens, I hope we come back to normalcy.

But if we don’t, I remember. And I would much rather play for the team with honor, even if it means I lose a few calls or even games. When I meet my maker, I will be proud of how I played the game. Would you?

Trump isn’t responsible for Covid. Neither is China. Nature is responsible. No matter what China or the US or the world did, some gene was going to randomly mutate and ravage humanity. Evolution is inevitable.

But Trump IS responsible for our response or lack thereof. On any measure, it has been a colossal failure. Comparing your success to what would have happened if you had done nothing, is an admission of failure. If you suck so bad that the only thing worse is doing absolutely nothing, then you prove the point that you are nearly worthless. Every time Trump compares our current outrageous death count to how many people would have died if he had done nothing…yeah think about that for a second.

Every president will face an unknown challenge. Unknown unknowns. The mark of a leader is how they might handle a no win scenario. It’s why all Starfleet captains face the Kobayashi Maru. You can’t ask their plan for something unknown, you assess their potential response in the face of uncertainty. Trump has shown that his character is woefully lacking to lead the country. Bob Woodward’s book makes the point about trust abundantly clear. Trump admitted to always minimizing bad and exaggerating good. That’s what marketing people do and why no one believes the claims they hear in a tv commercial. Yet somehow people believe Trump when he tweets and says those same ridiculous claims? 9 out of 10 skin care professionals think that Trump’s makeup use has turned him permanently orange.

If Trump took the Kobayashi Maru he would walk off the bridge and start tweeting, “Rigged!” Every challenge we see his same inability to accept responsibility, to learn, to grow, to embrace the complexity. His character is lacking, and when Covid came along and tested it, he failed. Now people are literally “dying in the streets” (the one thing he said his health plan- did he release it yet? – would prevent) and we still don’t have a strategy. You’ve got to Dominate! Meadows- No we are not going to control the virus. Don’t let it control your life. Don’t shut down businesses. But masks are silly. States do what they want. But schools must open up when I say. It’s a complete lack of anything resembling vision and no one should trust anything he says. His leadership is absent.

I just finished reading Colin Powell’s book. It Worked for Me. In it he details needing to negotiate a simple spat between Spanish and Moroccan claims over a tiny island (Perejil) and an ‘invasion’ by Spain. After some back and forth negotiation he finally drafts an agreement between the two sides. But they can’t get the document to Morocco in time for the King to review and sign it. On a phone call, Powell has to convince the King to agree to the terms unseen, to believe that the United States Secretary of State would be trusted to act in Morocco’s best interest. The King’s response, “Mr Secretary, I approve. We Trust America.”

Try for a second to imagine someone actually trusting the word of Donald Trump. We want our leaders to have that kind of gravitas with the rest of the world. Picture a foreign leader agreeing to a deal based on Trump’s word. Impossible. He says “believe me” so often because he constantly has to remind the listener that they should actually listen to what he is saying. Something will again happen in the next 4 years that no one can foresee. Something to test the mettle of this country. That is when we will need a leader with integrity. Do we really want to rely on Trump’s absence of character to act in our best interest after the current disaster?

You can only evaluate a leader in an unknown circumstance by evaluating his/her character. It matters.

If you have been around Crossfit or any military training, no doubt you have heard of the poem Invictus.  It’s not the most elegant poem ever written and I’m sure Dr. Burger would have some more academically critical commentary as to why.  It’s a simple poem with straightforward imagery. I like its simplicity.

About 6-7 years ago I got into a kick to organize my life. It started by formalizing my list system. I have lists for everything, including daily checklists. For the past 4 years I have recited Invictus daily, out loud.  Sure I miss it here and there, but it’s on my checklist, so I’m usually on top of it.  Each day I take a second to think about what part is most meaningful to me and take stock in that feeling. I am no poet nor an expert in creative writing, but I thought it would be interesting to break down each section and how it can relate to my emotional state.

Bill Barr and Donald Trump started months ago citing the “potential” for voter fraud with mail-in voting. Since then, the language has changed to indicating that the election will be a “disaster” and mail in voting “will lead” to not being able to trust the election results. Trump is the master of playing telephone with his language over time; it just evolves from something outlandish to becoming a statement of “alternative facts” the basis of which is without rational thought.

The trick is to start with something factual. There absolutely IS potential for fraud in the way he described originally. The Russians or Chinese could send armies of clandestine agents to steal ballots out of mailboxes and vote for us. Sure that is possible and there is a potential future for that outcome. It is also possible that there are alien bodies at Area 51. It’s possible that Trump is actually an Edgar suit ala Men In Black and a cockroach alien has taken over his body. It’s possible that my neighbor is going to bomb my house. Statistically, almost anything you can dream up is “possible.” That is the nature of probability and the inherent uncertainty about the future. Despite our worst fears, it is possible we could elect a failed businessman, reality TV star, misogynist who was recorded advocating for sexually assaulting women. Oops. It’s possible that he could appoint an incompetent purse designer as a senior white house advisor. It’s possible that I am going to win a $350m lottery.

There are lots of things that are possible. Walking around considering them as probable, is a completely different thing. It’s possible that Luxembourg could invade the US and over-run our military. The thing is, that is so improbable, that it would be completely irrational and irresponsible to even consider it. While a military strategist might cite it, they wouldn’t spend time, money, resources or brain cells planning around this scenario.

Intelligent people weight their attention on things that have a high probability. Citing anecdotal evidence of something that happened (a dead person receiving a ballot) as proof of something being probable, is insane. Social Security and Medicare pay billions of dollars of fraudulent claims every year (aka “waste, fraud and abuse”). But those isolated and wholesale improbable anecdotes don’t lead to a statistical pattern necessitating that we cancel the entirety of Social Security and Medicare. You work those fringe problems until they become statistically insignificant. Every election and every single government program has some sort of fraud. But every single study shows that while election fraud is possible, it is improbable. You are more likely to get struck by lightening than have your ballot stolen by a Chinese agent or dumped in the river.

The point here is that a conspiracy theory wacko can dream up anything they want and then tie anecdotal stories together to ‘prove’ that it is possible. If I write a document and hand it to two friends asking them to read aloud, “Donald Trump likes molesting little boys” then I get to say in an interview, without lying, “People say that Donald Trump likes molesting little boys.” That doesn’t make it true. It only intimates that some anecdote reinforces the improbable possibility. If you want to believe it, then you certainly have that right. There is no law against being a completely gullible moron who is so mentally corruptible that you could get suckered into believing anything. Like believing a guy who lost his inheritance and now has to sell mail order steaks is gonna be a great leader of the (already) great America.

I actually don’t have my original birth certificate. I have a notarized photocopy from the Baltimore County government. You could say that it is possible that it is a fake and that I was born in Kenya. Anything is possible. Think about THAT possibility next time you re-share some conspiracy theory crackpot stupidity.

I don’t know what this football season is going to look like. But I’ve seen hundreds of memes about how bad 2020 is turning out to be. It makes me think that the universe owes us some payback in 2021. Which got me to thinking about what happens when referees make bad calls on the field. There is always an expectation of fairness that at some point they will make an offsetting call for the other team to even things out.

It’s not always exactly equal. A missed PI call on a 45 yard passing play that would have been a touchdown, cannot be balanced by a an overly generous encroachment call on 1st and 10. A player that takes a dive inside the 18 drawing a PK, can’t be offset by a generous yellow card on an open field tackle. Missing the catcher tag the runner as he slides into home, can’t be offset by a larger strike zone the following inning.

We have come to expect fairness. Balance. We know that people make mistakes. You can’t fix something that happened; History can’t be rewritten. But we have come to expect that there will be inevitable balance. That’s what we want in sports. A level playing field that gives every team the opportunity to succeed. If something tilts the balance, we expect it to tilt the opposite way with equivalence.

And so I turn to the recent public discourse about Black Lives Matter, George Floyd, Systemic Racism, the relative inequities in society for people who happen to have skin with a little more color than me. Just before George Floyd’s murder, I started listening to the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas. I figured if the President didn’t know who he was, I needed to educate myself. I remember listening to the first chapter and the description of a whipping of a woman. “The louder she screamed, the harder he whipped. And where the blood ran fastest, there he whipped longest. He would whip her to make her scream and whip her to make her hush.” I listened to that section and a lot more description about this person’s inhumane treatment of humans. I remember exactly where I was on my run when this part came up. I had to stop the Audible player. I stopped running. I choked up and my heart beat faster than it should for running that pace.

I couldn’t come back to the book for a few weeks. But after George Floyd’s death, I knew that I had to subject myself to the reality of what this country I love, had done and continues to do to its citizens.

I imagine what it must have been like to be a New Orleans Saints fan on Jan 20, 2019. A blown call that seems to have no recourse. Even the defender admitted he did it to save a touchdown in the final two minutes of the game. How could the refs equal that out? It’s a game, not even real life, and we don’t have an answer.

But I can’t possibly imagine what it is like to be Black in America. Racism is still real. I don’t agree with the idea of direct reparations payments because it would seem to only balance the scale for descendants of slaves and not the vast majority of people today that are subject to racism and an unfair playing field because of the color of their skin. I do agree with programs that specifically tilt the scales back in the favor of Blacks who are unfairly burdened with playing the game of life with the debt of 200 years of slavery and continued systemic racism. Low income housing grants, a few years of Affirmative Action and other relatively small programs, don’t seem to even come close to balancing that equation. We need more of them.

In the last minute of the Saints game or even overtime, if the refs tried to offset the missed call by penalizing the Rams, there is almost no scenario that could make the team or fans feel compensated. Let’s say they tried. After Brees is hit and throws the pick, a late flag for something like illegal hands to the face on a D-Lineman is intended to make up for the missed call, giving the Saints the ball back. How would that individual lineman feel for a blown call against him? That moment is not fair. Would it feel fair for the Rams in the totality of the game? Does that call balance the missed PI?

These things never exactly equate. For Black America, this country has made efforts since the 60’s to offset hundreds of years of inequity. But we’re not even close. And sure, at an individual level, some white person might feel that extra funding for an inner city mostly black school or neighborhood might seem a little unfair. But stop for a second and try to envision that program in the larger arc of history. Can you still make that argument? Does it feel ‘right’?

I love sports metaphors and applying them to life. Those of us who enjoy sports know how critical it is to have a level playing field, rules and fairness. We should expect no less in life. We should expect no less from businesses, schools and government. Yes, I think rewarding someone with lesser skills goes against the fabric of competition and basic economic theory that I hold dear. But I will advocate strongly for increased and enhanced education, community programs and spending, small business financing and access to capital to build the skills and economic stature of Black America to get to the point where there never has to be a question about fairness at an individual level.

I don’t like the idea of penalizing players on the field to try to create balance. Nothing is solved in the moment. The solution always works better when it is systemic rather than anecdotal. Like better instant replay. Or in this case, creating systems that enhance a ‘team’s’ ability to play within the rules. Does that seem fair to a team not getting that same benefit right now? Yes. The TEAM is more than the players on the field right now. It takes with it the history of the franchise and all the years of competition by players who came before them. We take that legacy with us. Own it, own up to it. Make it a better legacy for the franchise.

Go Team.