Politics as usual

It looks as though we will soon be experiencing the natural turn of events of political campaigns that none of us enjoy. That turn is the campaign commercials, interviews, and stories that begin to take a negative bent. I find it amazing how candidates can work together on delicate issues within their party, as well as across the isle, yet find ways of negating some of that work or results as they try to degrade the opposing candidate(s). This comes from the breeding of fear that our politicians have come to learn as to be an integral part of human nature and decision making. If you recall, I have discussed numerous times the book "Mobs, Messiahs, and Markets" by Bonner. This book explains the process of fear, mob mentality, how it can grow exponentially, and how it directly affects decision making on a mass scale. It is proven that people will begin to change their own individual thought out decisions and go against their beliefs to a new belief structure simply based on "the norm".

People fear fear, as Franklin D Roosevelt said, "...We have nothing to fear but fear itself." This should be the line, and perhaps the only line we should begin to remember. It is the fear that begins to cloud our decision making. It is fear that begins to cloud our belief systems. It is fear that begins to blind us from truth. If we allow the fear based decisions to enter and take over through a mass belief structure, rather than our own investigated and thought out decisions, we will find ourselves in situations we did not originally desire to be in.

Most people today do not take the time to find their own answers. They wait for the press to feed them the fodder of a mass campaign of ideas in order to sway the public to the ideals held by the corporate parent company of the network delivering the information. There used to be a time when the press was not biased in their views, but those days are long gone. Yes we do still have a few reporters who come forward and give us less filtered information, but even with the most respected news institutions you will find a pattern of opinions and views to which their readers begin to be comfortable with. As an example, Fox News tends to take a right winged slant on issues, while the NY Times tends to stay on the left side of things. Most people do not recognize this as a pattern. If we don't try to find these patterns with the various institutions we will continue to go down the same path. It is time we become independent thinkers, weed through the maze of institutional information. People need to take a bit more time to research some of these important decisions for themselves.

As politicians might spit out negative information, with a simple google search, one might find this information to be incorrect or not the whole story. This web of lies or deception in order to confuse and breed fear of your decisions is what the purpose for those type of ads are for. It is that fear based mentality that campaign organizers rely on when they begin this process we are about to enter.

I ask of you to tread lightly as we enter this new campaign arena of negativity. Take a bit of time to sift through the information when you find yourself beginning to switch your decisions or ideas.