Stephen Grover Cleveland [22nd and 24th President] was a man who knew how to say “no.” During his two terms in office he issued more than six hundred vetoes, four hundred and thirteen of them in his first term alone. This was more than the combined vetoes of all the twenty-one Presidents before him and more than any other President except Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Cleveland was quite proud of his record… [Presidential Temperament]
Continue reading For the Good of My Country
Thomas Jefferson, [Architect Rational,] served two terms as President, and like Washington before him decided that two terms of its “splendid misery” were quite enough for any man. He was eager to return to a life of study and to have his old friend, the gentle and scholarly James Madison, [Architect Rational,] succeed him in the White House. There was little opposition to his choice and “Little Jemmy” Madison, who stood about five feet, five inches tall and weighed in the neighborhood of 100 pounds, won the presidential election of 1808 handily, and was sworn into office in early 1809. Though he was pleased to have become President, Madison intensely disliked the ceremony and celebration that attended his inauguration. He was quick to announce to a friend his reaction to the gala inaugural ball: he would rather be in bed.
Another quiet, privacy-loving Engineer Rational had taken the helm of the ship of state. [Presidential Temperament]
You’re Hired. You’re Fired. That’s business.
You’re Fired! It was Donald Trump‘s phrase, he tried to trademark it. But it is the old, tried, and true random way: Neo-Darwinism (but do not blame Darwin for he understood his views better than that).
No, how about Margulian Darwinism?
You’re hired, and your salary is a one time gift, of ~30 billion dollars give or take some billions, no strings attached, but Metaperson tethered.
Are we on the SAME PAGE? Not likely.
I remember the exact moment and place. As we talked, Karel had made the gesture of flicking his finger at an imaginary glass globe in his hand that would crack into a million pieces:
“It would just take a small Ping — the whole thing could shatter and fall apart” he said.
I thought, yes, just like the edge-of-chaos/order: a phase transition.
Soon it happened. Few, if any, but Karel could have imagined it happening — and so soon.
He knew the system well: as a kid, he had been prevented to pursue what he was good at — mathematics — for the powers of Czechoslovkia wouldn’t let him go to school, because his father had escaped from the Soviet bloc, leaving Karel and his mother to suffer the consequences. Karel knew what it is like not to trust anybody outside his immediate family — not say what everybody knew but could not say — the Soviet system was a human prison: Private Truths, Public Lies. Karel did get out in 1978 by Jimmy Carter’s diplomatic initiative with Alexander Dubček’s short regime. Only a few could escape from the system.
Karel obtained his PhD in Mathematics from Stanford University a couple years later after our talk. 
Nobody really thought it would happen. The Iron Curtain seemed still solid in 1988. The Soviet system had lasted for more than 75 years. The Soviet Union was one of the two superpowers: a military and nuclear super power. Rebellions had failed before: Hungary and Czechoslovakia, otherwise subversive acts had to keep a low profile.
I have often reflected that the causes of success or failure of men depend upon their … character, and [are] not a matter of choice. – Niccolo Machiavelli
He was there, tall and imposing, and upright with his natural grace and nobility. In front of the his men, he naturally commanded attention, his speech had seemingly come to close.
But now he hesitated. He stopped. This was unusual for him.
They knew him so well. They had followed him, through thick and thin, for years. But they were angry. They wanted to revolt. They hadn’t been paid; they had listen to his prepared speech; they had heard similar excuses before. Most of them still not convinced. He knew this.
He was at loss to what to do.
In a last desperate act, he pulled a letter from his pocket. Something was wrong, however.
He tried to read the letter, stumbling with his words, then, hopelessly staring at it.
He hestitated again. He, again, reach to a pocket, pulling out a pair of eyeglasses.
“Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray, but almost blind, in the service of my country.”
Most had never seen these eyeglasses, something only General George Washington intimates had ever seen him wear. Humbled and embarrassed, many of the officers were now in tears. For, if the speech had not already destroyed the revolt, this act assured its demise. Washington left the meeting. The officers unanimously voted to wait for their overdue wages, and they would not “retire to some unsettled country” and leave Congress without an army.
“On other occasions he had been supported by the exertions of the army and the countenance of his friends,” said Captain Samuel Shaw, “but in this he stood single and alone.”
With that George Washington continued lead and help found the United States of America.
Leading Naturally.
The point of this story is that George Washington, could not help himself, but be himself, and be leader even at his weakest moment. His officers followed the man, George Washington, because of who he was. Continue reading Be Himself
“There is the danger of the single story.” — Chimamanda Adichie
But no one could accuse Maya of a single story: she is a natural storyteller… And a Word Warrior.
According to his own conscience.
Which was against his country’s norms at the time.
“You want to know about my motivation, don’t you? Well. It is the kind of sentiments anyone would have when he actually sees refugees face to face, begging with tears in their eyes. He just cannot help but sympathize with them. Among the refugees were the elderly and women. They were so desperate that they went so far as to kiss my shoes, Yes, I actually witnessed such scenes with my own eyes. Also, I felt at that time, that the Japanese government did not have any uniform opinion in Tokyo. Some Japanese military leaders were just scared because of the pressure from the Nazis; while other officials in the Home Ministry were simply ambivalent.
People in Tokyo were not united. I felt it silly to deal with them. So, I made up my mind not to wait for their reply. I knew that somebody would surely complain about me in the future. But, I myself thought this would be the right thing to do. There is nothing wrong in saving many people’s lives….The spirit of humanity, philanthropy…neighborly friendship…with this spirit, I ventured to do what I did, confronting this most difficult situation—and because of this reason, I went ahead with redoubled courage.”
Yes, There is the banality of evil.
And, Yes, he probably did pay for his life-saving kindness. He had a tough life, but the approximately 20,000 descendents of the individuals who he helped are glad that he did the right thing, in his own mind.
Others could not, and more importantly, did not do the same. But, it was a natural thing, FOR HIM. It’s called personality: Character AND Temperament, two sides of the same coin. You cannot separate them. It is a whole.
They were too much alike. They were contenders. Strategic Contenders. Not contending with each other. Their ideas were similar, and they questioned the “authorities”: where ever or whom ever, they may be. Their enemies were the same: mediocrity — the banal, the unquestioning conformity. For they were exceptional.
Brilliant. Sui generis.
That is the problem. They couldn’t have been friends. Even though both were combating the elite Intellectual Mob Totalitarians.
And the herd majority.
They had seen it with their own eyes: the systems that demanded conformity: Nazi Germany and Soviet Union.
And there were those who fully embraced that conformity and propagated it, without thinking, because it is to their short-term advantage to travel with the herd.
Nothing is more obstinate than a fashionable consensus.
— Margaret Thatcher
They both had fled to America as emigrants. They found those in the elite establishment in their new country would not like or ignored of much of what they had to say — at least, in the beginning… Continue reading They Couldn’t Have Been Friends
You can’t find where his corporeal body is buried. And it certainly isn’t buried in Russia. He, personally, never stepped a foot in the Rus’ lands.
History is Baroque!
— Will and Ariel Durant
But what about his Zeitgeist?
Yesterday and Today?
“If we curse the past, if we blank it out of our memory as my father did, nothing will get better.
Our history is both cursed and magnificent. Just like the history of any state or people.
It is fitting Russia, the tragedies;
these contradictory strands of history are woven so tightly together.
— Boris Yeltzin
Zeitgeist (Zeit –Time, geist –Ghost)
It’s a tale of Black Gold.
Ah, but what kind of Black Gold are we talking about?
The Black Gold of the Earth: that Good Earth: Land and Power of Mother Russia.
The Black Gold of the Earth: that Good Earth: Oil and Gold of Mother Russia.
BUT SURELY.
“You don’t choose your passion, your passion chooses you.”
— Jeff Bezos
Passion requires Temperament
— David M Keirsey
He said to her: “If you’re offered a seat on a rocket ship, you don’t ask what seat. You just get on.”
When companies grow quickly, there are more things to do than there are people to do them. When companies grow more slowly or stop growing, there is less to do and too many people to be doing them. Politics and stagnation set in, and everyone falters.
When debating her next career move, Sheryl Sandberg made a spreadsheet comparing the roles and responsibilities that would come with each position and company she was considering. Google was on her list (a relatively unknown company in 2001), and ranked lower than all of the other options in categories like security, salary and responsibilities, but when Sandberg presented her dilemma to Eric Schmidt, Google’s CEO at the time, he managed to change her mind with this simple piece of advice:
“[Eric] covered my spreadsheet with his hand and told me not to be an idiot (also a great piece of advice). Then he explained that only one criterion mattered when picking a job—fast growth. When companies grow quickly, there are more things to do than there are people to do them. When companies grow more slowly or stop growing, there is less to do and too many people to be doing them. Politics and stagnation set in, and everyone falters. He told me, “If you’re offered a seat on a rocket ship, you don’t ask what seat. You just get on.”
Sandberg made up her mind that instant and joined Google, which as we all know was one of the fastest flying rocket ships ever created, to date.
