The ostrich is a big bird that has been around for millions of years. It developed habits that made it appear to bury its head in the sand. This prompted humans to weave a false story about the ostrich. In turn the false story spawned an erroneous metaphor about human beings.
The false story about the
ostrich is that it buries its head in the sand so as not to see a predator
that’s coming at it. The ostrich does that, says the story, because it believes
that when it does not see the predator, the predator disappears and ceases to
threaten it. But the truth is that the ostrich does not bury its head in the
sand in the first place. It is that human beings think it does because it
satisfies their imagination.
Despite the story being false,
however, it has spawned the metaphor about people “burying their heads in the
sand” to ignore a danger they are too lazy or too helpless to do something
about. Well, my friend, take this as a preamble to the review that follows
about an article that came under the title: “Heads in the Sand,” and the
subtitle: “Why We Fail to Foresee and Contain Catastrophe.” It was written by
Elke U. Weber, and published in the November/December issue of Foreign Affairs.
It must be noted for reference that the author of that article, is a professor
of psychology.
When you start reading Elke
Weber's long essay, you get the impression that he will eventually tell you how
people in power make good or bad decisions. These would be the kahunas who come
together, think collectively and decide on a range of issues in the
“boardrooms” of big corporations, the “situation rooms” of the political
elites, and the “war rooms” of the generals. Unfortunately, however, the writer
disappoints you.
What Elke Weber does past the
first two paragraphs, is that he quickly switches to discussing how ordinary
people respond to events in their mundane daily lives. It is only after writing
something like two dozen paragraphs that he makes a feeble attempt to connect
what he said in 2,700 words to the way that the political elite ought to make
decisions and be correct most of the time, as has been the case during the
tenure of Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany.
This is a shame when you
consider that the writer is an American living in America where the current
preoccupation is that “China is eating our lunch,” and that Russia has
cyber-invaded the most secretive of America's institutions at a time when it
was thought that America was light years ahead of Russia in cyberattacks and
cybersecurity. You would think, therefore, that Weber would have tried to show
the difference between the way that political decisions are made in the
American democracy, and the way they are made in what is called the autocracies.
The fact is that the areas of
the globe that used to be called First World, are the ones still hanging on to
the system of governance known as democracy. They do so without differentiating
between the old democracy and the new democracy. As to what was the Second
World –– once liberated from the clutches of Communism –– they adopted the way
of the First World, but found it wanting, began to discard it and looked for a
better way to govern themselves. They are now experimenting with other systems.
As to the Third World, each country is trying to invent the system that suits
it best.
So, the question is this:
Aside from the psychological considerations enumerated and discussed in detail
by professor Elke Weber –– as they apply to ordinary people in the course of
their mundane lives –– what is there that has allowed the Chinese and Russian
systems to prevail over the American democracy? You know what, my friend! You
should get ready to be surprised by the answer.
The answer is that they have
adopted the style that was developed for and has been successful in the
boardrooms of corporate America. The Chinese, the Russians and a few others
have adapted that system, and made it work in their boardrooms as well as their
situation rooms and their war rooms.
The main difference between
what they have and what America has, is that they brought into their political
situation rooms throughout the government the kind of protection that has
guaranteed the survival of America's corporations, whereas the American government
never duplicated that level of protection in its political rooms.
So, let it be known that
popular democracy no longer works in the political rooms whereas the
hierarchical chain of command has become the protective shield that works as
well as it does for China and Russia.
Still, America did well in the
past because it never came under a serious attack. Things have changed,
however, and the American system proved incapable of defending itself against
the new attacks.
Furthermore, America's democracy
has been altered not simply by the foreign attacks on it, but also the
tinkering that's done to it internally by a Fifth Column that’s trying to turn
America into a weapon in the hands of a worldwide Zionist regime which seeks to
use America to dominate the world. The old democracy has been strangled, and
the new democracy is a Zionist monster that devours the hands that feed it.
It is now obvious that
America’s salvation does not rest on purging the State Department of its
Arabists, but purging it of its disloyal Jews whether they claim dual loyalty
or singular loyalty to Israel and World Jewry.
Burying heads in the sand regarding the Zionist menace has become America’s one-way ticket to oblivion. Let’s hope those heads will come out soon to breathe the fresh air of freedom once again … or it will be game over for America.