Why results matter

People hate Trump because he’s not an idealist, he’s a realist. The thing that matters most to the Donald is results. He’s also not a statesman, a healer, a bring-us-together guy, or much of a nice guy. He’s a sonavabitch. He probably secretly wants to be liked but he seems to be oblivious to constant, withering criticism levelled at him not just from true conservatives, all liberals, most mainstream media and a lot of the rest of the world. From the moment he announced he was running for President he was the target of attacks from just about every corner of the establishment. The attacks continued unabated up to and through the election process. The week before November 8th, 2016, the New York Times gave him about a 10% chance of winning. He was a clown. A pretender.  A homophobe. A racist. A xenophobe. It would be a disaster. A catastrophe. This was true by rule. It was an a’ priori truth. Nothing else mattered. He was wrong. He was opposed. He couldn’t win. In fact, even though he won, it’s still likely the Times would have not changed their prediction. In their opinion, he couldn’t win because he shouldn’t win. Hell, I believed it. I’ve shared before and I’ll share again, I voted for Hillary Clinton for lots of reasons. Part of it was reading columns written by people I trusted who considered him dangerous and well, he was. Then, I was amused beyond-what’s-proper when the clown won. Why? Part of the reason is it’s always fun to watch a pin jabbed into the big, over-inflated, self-righteous balloon called bi-coastal liberalism. The idea that a candidate can label “fly overs” as “deplorable” for their beliefs in God and guns is part of that bi-coastal prejudice. A prejudice for which they are proud. Seeing mainstream media look sick was kinda fun. They also can’t be wrong, (by rule of course) so watching them rationalise the whole thing was a scream. Because the left believes in “whatever means necessary.” I get it. They’re righteous. The far right is no less crazy, believe me. But something came out the day of the election. The New York Times printing that Trump had no better than a 10% chance of winning on the eve of the election he won, showed they were oblivious to results and reality. They knew, or should have known, it was a lot closer than 90/10. It just didn’t matter. They would oppose him on principle. The 4th estate was driven to distraction by a reality distortion field. It may not be fake news but it is distorted news. It is distorted by that reality distortion field which says "it doesn't matter what results may come, we believe in our principles and that's more important than any reality." Don't be surprised if fly over deplorables take notice but then the Times isn't aimed there, is it?

The main reason I get nervous over a’ priori (true by definition) “truths” is large bureaucracies are run by process. Government is a large bureaucracy. Process is it’s most important product. Results aren’t the issue. If the rule says lunatics will be released into society to reek havoc, it will be done. Right wing politicians believe in less government. Laissez faire capitalism rules. Standard Oil drives everybody else out of business. That’s not important. Less government is better. If African Americans are denied the vote in the south, or access to schools, well that’s okay because less government says, stand back and let it be. If welfare (ADC) over decades leads to generations of illegitimate children and absentee fathers and rampant crime, so be it. It’s the right thing to do. If the war in Vietnam costs millions of lives and is virtually unwinnable, so what? It’s what we do. Let’s keep it up. Process based decisions made by rule alone aren’t dangerous to the deciders. But they are still right by rule and wrong by result. Those who die or denied their rights by the result do kinda' notice however.

So?

Trump’s not interested in right or left rules? He wants to the know the bottom line? Yeah, I get that feeling. Pisses off the establishment? Yeah. Refuses to apologise for seeking economic independence? I got a kick out of Clinton when he was President because he knew what poverty was all about. A knowledge the Kennedys could never really assimilate because they were theoretical liberals. Bill knew what beanie-weenie tasted like. The results of policies of welfare, like ADC, just didn’t matter to theoretical liberals. It would be done forever because it was a’ priori truth. Bill knew what the RESULTS of long term welfare relief were. Bill was also a results oriented politician when it came to the economy and he made necessary changes not based on theory but on results. Obama was a a social idealist. Militarily he was results oriented. He served two terms.

The conservative establishment is rules based. The liberal establishment is rules based. The majority of the citizens of the United States are more interested in results than rules. You want to know who people are going to vote for in the next election? Some will lock step to the polls and vote for liberals or conservatives, no thought needed. By any means necessary. But most will wait and see and vote what they think is going to work for them. Not everything Trump will author will be the advantage of liberals or conservatives but if he authors enough policies that are to the advantage of most of the voters in the United States don’t be surprised if principles are less important than results. That shouldn’t surprise the New York Times but believe me it scares them to death.