It’s all politics?

6th November 2020

Welcome back and I hope that you had something of a restful and relaxing half term break. As I discussed, prior to the break, it had and has been a terrifically challenging eight or nine weeks of work; on top of all the personal and educational challenges that you would otherwise typically face. Woven into this will be the very personal circumstances that you will all be suffering, as a consequence of the current crisis and, as I write, the new lockdown condition conditions. I wish you and your families the very best for now and for the coming weeks and months.

I guess I cannot let this week pass without commenting, to some degree, on the US elections. It has been a rather chaotic, dramatic and yet compelling week. To those of us who live this side of the Atlantic we may look upon the election process and the behaviour of some of those individuals involved in that process with bemusement and find it all very strange/depressing/intriguing* (delete as appropriate).

As I write, there is no clear winner but it looks like that Joe Biden is inching his way to the presidency. Something about Aesop’s fable about the hair and tortoise comes to mind.

What is clear to me is that honesty and integrity do win out. There have been significant number of people and politicians on both sides of the political divide who have, despite the intense pressure which is being applied by some of the political elite and some of the media, held onto what they know to be true and what they believe is important, about the American constitution and democracy in the states. Whoever we are and whatever we do we have nothing if we do not retain our personal integrity. It’s my belief that we must all be true to ourselves and whatever pressures are applied to us and however expedient it might be to take the shortcut or agree with the falsehood we must all be able to sleep at night. And to do that we must all act and behave with honesty and integrity.

I really do hope that the American people have chosen truth over falsehood. I truly wish that they have chosen hope over hate. That they will look for unity over division. And that a belief in the true principles which should remain the bedrock of democracy.

The events over the ‘pond’ do have an impact upon us all. We know that there are a lot of global and local political consequences to that election result. We also know that the messages it sends to individuals on how we all should behave are immense.

I really do hope that by the time we return on Monday morning things are significantly clearer in the United States and that we all as individuals can rest easy knowing that they (the American people) and we will always do the right thing – not just what is right for the individual but what is right for us as a community, society, country and interdependent global community of humane (not just human) beings.

‘Whatever you are, be a good one.’

‘Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?’

‘I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to
succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have.’

Abraham Lincoln (16^th President of the United States of America)

 

Whatever you are up to have a socially distant and lockdown secure great weekend.