Welcome to Brutally Truthful.
While this blog represents my ideas of truth, it may not be your truth. Please feel free to comment if you disagree or agree with any of my content. I would also love to know your opinions on truth and am open to writing about suggested topics. Either way, thanks for reading!
Brutally (Adverb) - Savage, Coarse, Demanding
Truthful (Adj.) - Corresponding with reality
We will explore the seldom seen realm of being completely honest. I was intrigued by the movie "The Invention of Lying." It was amazing to see what everyday life would possibly be like if we had no choice but to only tell the truth. I realized that while our lives force us to twist the truth for a plethora of reasons, sometimes being completely honest could solve more problems and gain more trust…even if on the surface it seems that it will cause more harm. I plan on writing on many different topics from business, politics (which most of the time are the same thing), to entertainment and anything that could use a healthy dose of truth. I'd like to talk a bit about the last political elections here in California. Two of the things that really got my attention were the Governor's race between Meg Whitman and Jerry Brown as well as the vote to legalize Marijuana. Both of these races I truly believe could have swayed in another direction if the directing parties would have just thrown some truth into their strategies.
First, the Governor's race between Meg Whitman and Jerry Brown. I'd like to make it clear that I don't have any strong feelings either way on who won and have no ulterior motives in the context of this discussion. Politics has become such a joke that it seems at times we are voting on a high school class president that is promising off-campus lunches. These races seem to be more about trashing the opponent than telling the people what you are going to do to help solve the problems for the everyman. The main issue I believe demonstrates my point was Meg Whitman's decision of not voting in any elections. I think this was the one point the advisors on her staff could have really used to their advantage. I would have advised her to simply state that she didn't vote because there were no candidates that moved her to vote. There were only choices between career politicians and, even though in the last election, Arnold Schwarzenegger promised that he was not bought or a career politician, no one gained her trust and provided a reason to get out and vote. I would have said, "I didn't vote because there wasn't a candidate like myself that is a self-made business person that knows how to deal with real world problems that every person and business owners encounter. I feel these career politicians will tell you anything they think the voters want to hear and have no intention of following through on the promises made and that is why I didn't go out to vote for a false promise of a better state." Instead, she said that it was a mistake and she apologized for it making her seem irresponsible. She was trying to get the voters out that were sick of the politics as usual and she was the person to change it. She is the only one that knows her reason for not voting but I think she would have gotten a lot more trust and respect for owning her decision instead of trying to backpedal out of it. If you've made a decision to do something that may not be popular, own it and tell the world why you took that road. With politics especially, all the world wants is someone that will be upfront, honest and own their decisions whether they are popular or not. I've found that even if someone disagrees with you, they will respect you for being upfront and honest and you may sway some your way simply for gaining their trust. Meg Whitman spent millions of her own money paying people to spin the truth about her employing an illegal worker. She could have saved so much money by just telling the truth. And I'm still not sure how her personal employee had anything to do with her ability to run the state. I think she would have had a much better result if she simple said that she went through all the right channels to make sure everything was legal and left it at that with a bold statement of truth. Instead of feeding into the story and trying to spin the story, just make the statement and let it go. That would have taken all the power away from her opponent from using it against her.
The other issue that got my attention was Prop 19. The initiative was to legalize marijuana for personal use. Arguments for both sides went exactly as I thought they would. The people for it would argue that it could solve the financial crisis by creating tax revenue and getting petty criminals out of jail who are sucking down thousands of taxpayer dollars everyday. Those opposed to it argued that it is a "gateway drug" that would lead our youth to the grave and give rise to the drug cartels and violence surrounding the drug trade. On this issue, however, I have a very clear stance. While I did partake when I was younger, I do not smoke marijuana anymore but I am wholeheartedly behind it's decriminalization. I think that the people who oppose the legalization need to get a healthy dose of the truth of this matter. One of the biggest issues they poured into the minds of voters is that the violence that surrounds the drug trade would escalate if it was legalized. The truth is, the violence and drug cartels only exist BECAUSE it is illegal. If it were legal, the cartels would be out of business and there would be no need for the violence because you could get marijuana legally.
My point is perfectly illustrated by prohibition and I believe the Prop. 19 supporters could have used this historical example and may have swayed the decision. In those days, it was very common occurrence to have violence and gang turf wars over the illegal distribution of alcohol. The best way to describe the correlation between the two is an excerpt from wikipedia about prohibition:
"Although alcohol consumption did decline, there was a dramatic rise in organized crime in the larger cities, which now had a cash crop that was in high demand. Prohibition became increasingly unpopular during the Great Depression, as the repeal movement, led by conservative Democrats and Catholics, emphasized that repeal would generate enormous sums of much needed tax revenue, and weaken the base of organized crime."
To those that oppose Prop. 19: the truth is that anyone that wants to get weed will get weed, whether it is legal or not. By keeping it illegal, we are allowing the drug cartels to continue to thrive and we as a community are just leaving money on the table that we could be collecting in taxes.
And in my opinion, that's the Brutal Truth!
