As was demonstrated in
September 2008 as banks began to stop lending to each other even overnight,
trust is the foundation, or grundlagen,
of a market. The same is true in relationships between people. I would be
surprised were a marriage ever the same after even a contrite spouse has had an
extramarital affair. The same is true in politics; once the electorate has been
lied to, it is very hesitant to remove the asterisk next to the politician’s
name. The relevance of a politician’s extra-marital affair, such as the flowery
lapse of Gary Hart or the sordid stains of Bill Clinton, is that the people conclude
that they, like the wives, could be betrayed. Once established, a lack of trust
tends to spread like an invidious cancer until it has encompassed the entire
body politic. The shift is from justice to a lack of harmony on many levels.
Plato theorized that
justice is the harmony within the rational psyche and polis (city, or country)
as well as between the heavenly spheres (planets and stars)—the harmony between
the rational and the vibrations of the spheres being in sync, which is justice
itself. It follows that a person who lets his or her desires run rampant is in
line with a squalid or aggressive city, and that neither of these shares in the
musical/mathematic harmonious vibrations of and between the heavenly spheres.
Lack of trust at the personal, business, or civic level can be said to be a
symptom of the shift from the condition of harmony, and thus justice, to discord.
It follows that in a
republic or union thereof, it is vital to maintaining justice (as harmony) that
the electorate not be as sheep in taking in that which a politician claims
regarding what he or she “really believes.” Once a candidate has stupidly
lapsed in terms of trustworthiness, the electorate should be cognizant of the
conflict of interest in the candidate later dismissing the substance of his or
her real feelings or beliefs. In general, if a candidate’s statement is in line
with him or her getting elected, a due dose of salt should be taken with that
dish.
I have in mind Mitt
Romney’s statement at a closed-door fundraiser in September, 2012 that nearly
half of Americans don’t pay income taxes, view themselves as victims, and
refuse to take responsibility for their lives, wanting to live off entitlement
programs instead.
The full essay is at "Mitt Romney's Conflict of Interest: Campaigning for U.S. President."
