What can we agree on?
“We” as in all four-sides of the Ideologically Balanced Table™.
The world is a lot more complicated then right and wrong or right and left. Lots of pundits tell us to get out of our echo chambers, but seriously, the other echo chambers are even noisier.
We’re drowning in other people’s opinions on public policy, awash in the spin-cycle of recycled ideologies, a soggy mess of cherry-picked ideas and whitewashed facts mixed in with dark fears.
I don’t know about you but I’m tired of these RIFTS in our society: Rumor, Innuendo, Fake new, Trash talk, and Spin. Add the endless Gossiping, and you get GRIFTS which is what I feel has been done to me after listening to all these disorganized rants (valid or not).
I get it. People have points of view they want to share. But where can you go to get the whole picture so you can make up your own mind? Ask your own questions? Reflect on the facts? Review all the Ideas great and small? Get creative. Vote your Approval or Disapproval?
Where’s that at?
Let’s be honest, no one has the time to independently study every aspect of a public policy puzzle and solve it themselves. And if you think you have indeed found a clever solution—will a vast supermajority of people agree with you? Maybe, if you can convince them. However, getting the messaging correct is on you. Everyone in the process needs to be humble enough to listen.
Let’s hit the pause button for a moment.
My take is that there are four main political ideologies. How any society, anywhere, relates to each other with regard to their time and their money. Somehow in the USA we’ve let the two parties tell us otherwise. It’s us v them, pick sides, and when more and more people get fed up and start checking-out the screaming just gets louder and louder.
When you don’t have enough time to study a public policy, you probably have a bias for one of the four-sides of the Ideologically Balanced Table™, and until you’re convinced otherwise that’s how you approach any puzzle. We’re hardwired that way, it saves our blood sugar for other more important things than thinking too hard or too much. It’s a survival mechanism.
Just answer two questions to determine your bias, your initial knee-jerk reaction to any political conversation. Be honest: would your friends say you sound more like, “We spend too much” or “We don’t invest enough”? The second question is would your friends say you sound more like, “There should be a law” or “Don’t tell me what to do”?
If you said, “We spend too much” then we’ll call that T for Thrift. If you said, “We don’t invest enough” we’ll call that A for Abundance. If you usually say, “There should be a law” that’s G for Governance. If you usually say, “Don’t tell me what to do” that’s C for Commerce. You may have noticed the four initials are ACGT which is how human DNA is expressed. The four base pairs are AC, AG, TC, TG: this is how our Public Policy 4.0 DNA is expressed. Which are you?
No side is correct or incorrect all the time. How could it be otherwise? There is a time to spend and a time to save. There is a time for freedom (me) and a time for community (we). These are the four-sides of our political selves; AC, AG, TC, TG and when either has the best answer to a public policy puzzle we can’t go around hating ourselves and our neighbors because we didn’t get our usual way? That’s childish and just plain wrong.
So, what’s the goal of the Politics 4.0 Games? Let’s find out what the 4.0 sides of the table can agree on first—instead of never-ever getting there. And not just something nearing consensus or vast supermajority support, but also with a majority of each of the four-sides. This isn’t three wolves and a sheep voting on what’s for dinner, this is four wolves running in a pack, no longer so sheepish that they can’t take back some public policy leadership from a seriously dysfuntional system.
I’m not suggesting that all public policy puzzles can be solved this way, a lot of politics is just everyday sausage-making management. What I am suggesting is the Idea Leaderboard—those solutions with vast supermajority support and a majority on each of the four sides of the table—is the public policy leadership that’s rare in our politics, today.
Politics 4.0’s Idea Leaderboard will read more like the sports page or a restaurant menu than a gossip column. If you’re tired of being in the cheap seats of public policy discourse, why not join us on the field of ideas?
If you’ve got public policy game we want you on our team. It’s us v the puzzle. We can solve this. Are you arrogantly humble enough to insist on listening to the other-sides before making up your mind? Can you rework your messaging to convince the other sides of your brilliance? Will you not quit when the going gets tough and you’re not making headway?
You got public policy game?
Contact
jon at virtualcommittees dot com
