Forgiving our collective foolishness...

I'm wiped out...

I have a national qualifying forensics tournament that I committed to judging this weekend...it will be a weekend of grading and IEP's and getting my brakes changed and finances and cleaning and other kinds of stuff after that (actually I have to get the brakes changed before I head down to Wichita)...

But...at some point...I also got a get a beer in there, somewhere:):)...

Because this week has been insane...

I don't just mean that it's been busy...but it's surely been that...

I mean insane...I mean people lost in stubborn irrationality about what they can get done by demanding, bullying, pressuring, and otherwise undermining their's and my ability to get the work done...

And I'm finding that the only way to tolerate this persistent stupidity...

Is to have that beer...and to just keep forgiving what stubborn dumbasses we are around this issue until we figure out what people are so resistant to admit on it...that they're wrong...that there really is a limit to what you can bully to get your way...so they have to learn how to choose battles better and differently...and if they're really thinking about it...to use the least possible necessary aggression...so that the pushing things too hard doesn't slow you down too much...which it does, as a rule (is there any other lesson to take from our dealings with Iran, right now?..."Hey Iran, stop developing nukes"..."Hey U.S., fuck off"..."Hey Iran, stop developing nukes or we'll really put the pressure on you"..."Hey U.S., watch us pursue nukes faster and more persistently in the face of your pressure, you morons"..."Hey Iran, now we're really going to put the pressure on"..."Hey U.S., now we're going to get far bolder in our open pursuit of a nuclear weapons programs and even declare ourselves a member of the nuclear club before we are")...

I mean how fuckin' obvious does it have to become?...are Americans going to pay $10/gallon a gas before they figure out what a fool-hardy path it is to bully our way through every issue?...

"We really could have gotten so much more done in North Korea if South Korea hadn't gotten in the way with all that diplomatic nonsense" dumbasses in the Administration who advocate this approach must be saying, these days...even as South Korean totally saves our ass on the nuclear issue, because we're just too stubborn to see our failure...

Bullying your way through an issue is something that must be done as little as possible...and even then, it only works temporarily...

And...eventually...your credibility is undermined...

You have to really live in a world of self-delusion, I think, to somehow think that I'm not a really pretty damn good teacher...

Or just really stubborn...

And the latter means that if the district were to let me go...then you just become one more footnote in my books and discussions of how irrational bureaucracy is in dealing with important decisions based on substance...rather than based on institutional inertia...

The latter suffocates itself, eventually, without fresh air from people like me...to help people see how they keep tripping over the same goddamn mistakes...

But...at some point...you got to finally see the mistake...you can't just keep fighting me, mindlessly, on it...

And not seeing a mistake doesn't mean that you're not making it...

It means that you'll keep making the same mistake...

And I'll be moseying my way along...waiting for you to finally catch up:):):)...

But probably helping someone else...on some other team...

I've got stuff to do before the end of the day:):):)...

Have a good weekend, everyone:):)...

Love,
Ben