Michael Mastrell Ph.D.
Jokes About Spirituality
How to Keep Your Office Responsive and Engaging
A guide for changing this mundane habit.
Posted May 09, 2021
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Source: Hartmand/Unsplash
The office is often described as the locus of evil. Yet office politics and the politics of office provide a contradictory challenge to your very basic ambition to do good. You want good office-seekers because office politics is what people use to get elected.
And they should be compatible with office politics. Everyone loves a good conspiracy theory. Like Mary Harner’s assertion that “the tea party” was trying to “abolish” Jim Crow. Yes, office hunting is stressful and expensive. But it’s also become a symbol of who you are as a person and a sign of identification as an individual.
Political Orientation
Source: Hartmann/Pixabay
Of course, now the election is over and the vast majority of office seekers are Trump supporters. He did not have a chance to respond to this group of people with a sustained assault on the Capitol that was necessary to keep him--and the country--in power.
While many people are indeed more persuadable than the average Trump voter, others are more persuadable than that. And some people are more persuadable than others. Trump critics (including high-profile journalists and social media personalities) have repeatedly tried to (probably) silence their dissenting voices.
And to be clear, all of this is still happening, and the evidence is overwhelming that he did not win the mandate he needed to re-enter the presidency. But a small victory in one category might translate into a much larger victory in another. For the past decade, the data have been there for the Conservatives and Democrats to argue over. But because of the unaffordability of winning, each Conservative election yielded a net gain in terms of government majority since 2010.
Vote Compass
Source: Vote Compass
Now the data are in. The Conservatives have a majority. The Democrats have a majority of delegates at stake. and the Internet knows how. Social media power has waned. The room for compromise and persuasion has become unabashedly central.
If you are a Trump supporter, your opportunity to influence the narrative is probably clear. If you are a Democrat, your ability to influence the narrative is probably clear. You can still register Democrat support on the Pet Reddit site. In a nutshell, your data is as relevant as the Titanic.
Vote Compass
Source: Vote Compass
The data below from the U.S. Census Bureau confirms that Philadelphia is part of the exception to the winning team in this election. In the past five election cycles, the major cities with populations of more than 10,000 people have voted for the losing party nine times. The average margin in these elections is less than 3.5 points.
Vote Compass
Source: Vote Compass
That being said, Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York are at or above the 10,000 mark. How many people who have ever lived in these cities have voted for the losing party nine times? And who did vote for the winning party in each of their elections? Are they too mentally fatigued to take a simple second to bolster their own argument? No, they are not. Indeed, as political psychologist (and bestselling author) Stephen Greenblatt says, “The people who are psychologically fatigued are those who have gone all the way without thinking about enlarging their sense of self-worth or being able to imagine a more idealized version of themselves.”
These are the people who voted for Donald Trump. Did they think about Senator Clinton in the 2016 presidential election or their vote for Trump in the recent election? Or did they think about Vice President Joe Biden in the race for the Democratic nomination? These are the people who supported Hillary Clinton in the primary and for the remainder of their lives.
If you are someone who has noticed this trend of supporting the losing party in the primary season and, in particular, during a power struggle for the nomination, it is time to call into action.
It is time to stop card-checking, pointless debates, and pointless contests in the futile effort to convince undecideds and potential card-carrying members to their side.