Robert Burns hit it right on the nose in his poem "The Mouse". Basically, it means that one can plan all one wants, to an extreme, and it all can turn to dust. The best laid plans often go amiss, or from the Yiddish proverb, "man plans and G-d laughs". These sayings, old as the hills, are as fresh and meaningful today as they were in their first appearances and adoptions into the lexicon of mankind.
Certainly, it is quite apropos for the times today. We all have known occasions when we were disappointed, when something anticipated and planned for just melted away before our eyes. We then become Monday morning quarterbacks trying to discern where, when and why things went asunder. At times these looks back into the past bear fruit applicable to future endeavors. Sometimes they do not. We simply have to blunder along doing the best we can.
These times of plans going awry can be quite frightening even if it is within one or two or three or some small groups of people. One never knows when that small pebble tossed into the works can have effect nor when. Certainly, when that pebble grown into a stone is heaved into the national and international arenas, the consequences can be overwhelming and frightening to an extreme. Too often our autopsies of those errant actions and policies do not satisfy our questioning and/or the truth remains hidden, buried beneath political needs and convenience. Welcome to America and the world circa 2026.
It is even a larger problem that we face because our supposed leaders have no plans with threads followed through to inevitable ends. The possibilities of these plans veering off track are neither deemed valid nor examined. There are no plans for all contingencies possible, not even a bit of outside the box thinking. The inevitable results are sure to arise, to implant deep seeds and roots of troubles galore. Yet we insist on repeating, apparently never learning from history, never learning from our errors.
Now think how much worse it is when those who are supposed to do the planning opt out of that responsibility or engage in a process that is absolutely insane, doomed to failure from the beginning, even as its dangerous inadequacies shout out loud and clear, warning "Here be danger" falling upon ears and minds deaf to these warning calls. Egos are too often overblown and exaggerated, turning stone walls to any and all that might offend the ego of the one who thinks of himself as a great man in his own mind. Worse is convincing others of that same fallacy, with reality and truth making its way to the surface too late to avoid the inevitable results.
Such is the situation in the world today, much of it being caused by policy makers who have lost their wits or buried them someplace unknown. They have ceded all authority and responsibility, transferred all their loyalty, assigned it not to their nation, not to their constituents, not even to their own once stated beliefs. Now all of that is handed over on bended knee to the one they fear. The one who epitomized and validated much of the worst thinking on both the Left and the Right.
There are no plans whole in their makeup. There are no plans which have been decided upon after deep and long consideration by groups of people and advisers who know of what they are supposed to do, who actually have knowledge in that field. While there might be a concern for one's political party, much of the planning would be nonpartisan, bearing good fruit for the people of the nation and of the world.
We seem to be impervious to understanding that concept. We ignore the reality that just as no man can be an island, neither can one nation. Certainly not in our times when economies and beliefs are shared and intertwined with great influence upon other countries of the world. Furthermore, with great harm resulting, we ignore the reality, the awful truth that when the person with the greatest power and influence creates havoc via a lack of thought, a dearth of planning, short and long term, the world dips out of its stable axis.
Others around the world are left bewildered and bewitched. The level of fear, of anomie and chaos among the world's population grows by leaps and bounds, exponentially with no end in sight nor any plans capable of dealing with the situation. How in fact is one able to plan safely, thoroughly, and successfully when trying to do so with a person clearly insane, deteriorated in both body and mind. Even more impossible when those facts are denied. When we are as foolish as those who saw the clothing of their naked emperor.
Trying to refuse reality or create in manner impossible bodes no good for all. At present, the one who is supposed to be the leader of the West, of the free nations, head of the nation who represents democracy, is that challenged being. There is neither sense nor consensus in his statements and policies. There is no continuity, no reasonable flow, no attention to the possibilities resulting from those policies, no hook upon which all can reasonably, with some assurance, hang their policies and maintain a world which functions with all sparkplugs working.
There is no cohesiveness within this administration. Not in its personnel, coming and going at warp speed. Appointees have little if any knowledge of what they are appointed to keep, maintain, and improve. There is a glaring absence of nonpartisan thinking, of benefit for the people. The raison d'etre appears to be either the weird thinking of the appointees and/or the crazed thinking or lack thereof, of the Master of the House, our own living Mad Hatter, DJT. A man who cherishes, even lives for, retribution and revenge upon those who oppose(d) him. No one is immune- not the office worker, nor the judges at all levels, nor members of the Senate and House, not even his own appointed personnel. Foreign leaders are open for abasement as well.
What makes me nauseous to the extreme is more than a policy or two, decisions which have led to an economy damaged, arrows at its heart coming from more than one bow. There is an innate unsteadiness within his makeup which is frightening to the extreme, for what he has already caused and for what he will foment for the future. His ego is one of the largest overblown ones, compatible with the egos of other misnamed leaders throughout history. This ego has led him to a clearly defined track with an end result of being crowned King, or made a Leader for Life, an eternal President unto death, and to pass all on to a member of his malfunctioning amoral children.
This ego is clearly up front within the corruption, the boasting of increases to his bottom line, as well as those of his immoral corrupt children. It is seen in his blatant disregard for the Constitution, for the philosophy of our Declaration, in his daring to compare himself to our greatest Presidents. In his abrogation and violation of so many laws, claiming immunity for all he has done or will do that can be deemed criminal to no penalty for his convicted felony.
Imagine -a convicted unrepentant felon as the President of this nation. What the Hell were we thinking?! Or were we not thinking?
So, what makes me the most nauseous is his rendering our traditions, our sacred and significant buildings of our past -worthless. Stamping his name on everything and the ugliness of his results and plans. Horrific, ugly as sin and representative of the lowest taste, a lack of culture, driven by ego. The White House. The Rose Garden. The JFK Center. PBI To DJT! His face to be chiseled on Mount Rushmore! His constant travel, on taxpayer dime, to his Winter Palace, where those who think like him applaud his every move there. Those who join him in arrogance, increasing their wealth to obscene levels. His face on a gold coin, his signature on new printed bills.
Not even dead yet, yet he assumes, no - demands- that all laws and traditions be ignored and his tawdry gaudy tastes and demands be rewarded and installed as he states. Even if it results in more shameful lowlife huckstering of his products from within the Oval Office, already debased, already with a shelf of his products. No amount of gold plating can hide the ugliness of himself and his administration. Lowlife and embarrassing.
On a more personal level, as one who detests lies, who came out of a Language Arts classroom, I shudder with horror. Lack of knowledge and application of the rules of grammar, of vocabulary and construction of sentences, of a sane coherent speech. His crude wording, the very elementary level of the writing. His inability to spell or use a classier level of language. The crass boasting of his greatness and the dearth of facts.
The lack of trust in him, for him, for he is as fickle as a child who must choose one flavor from among the many. The disaster he has laid upon this nation as its people forget we are all Americans, that we are a nation of immigrants, thankfully so, a nation which was proud, welcoming, helpful, and had good relations with its allies. We became a land which is just about eating its inhabitants, split at the seams, unable to grasp any longer the truth and separate the good from the bad.
Yesterday we knew that.
Today we have forgotten much that we knew.
Tomorrow remains conditional - its fate resting upon us.
Only us.
When we plan, we must do better.
We must allow for missteps and unanticipated events. Unless we do better than now, well, peruse some history books - ones based on facts.
We the People.
Remember that.
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