Contrasting Mushroom Hunting & the Hillary Campaign

For those who are not familiar with the art of mushroom hunting It might be helpful to understand what is necessary to be successful. First you must have a mind set that no matter how badly you want to find mushrooms the desire doesn´t necessarily lead to their discovery and your success. Second although perseverance is helpful there are times when hunting will never be productive. Third you must learn the conditions under which they are most likely to be discovered and to learn what to look for. Without these principles in mind you may never find enough mushrooms to have in the lingo of mushroom hunters, a mess.

Contrast this with the campaign Hillary Clinton has run and is running. First Hillary is acting like that if she wants this nomination badly enough that is sufficient for her to acquire it. This mind set indicates her subjective philosophy that doesn´t focus on the availability of the nomination but primarily on her inner desire to be president. Why else would she defy the reality of the numbers and invent scenarios that are so remote as to be impossible? A mushroom hunter looks for what is there not what he wishes were there. When he doesn´t find what he is looking for he moves on. Hillary continues to search for the nomination although the season is over and there is no nomination to seek. This indicates a priority on the desire rather than the facts. You cannot pick what isn´t there and you cannot be nominated if you don´t have the delegates.

This mindset has been evident from the beginning of our introduction of Hillary. From the raucous speech at Wellesley College to the travel gate episode to the denial of the Monica episode et.al. and the invention of her "experience. She had no actual experience that corresponds to being president but since she wanted the job she touted experience as a qualification. Wishing didn´t make it so just as fabricating the Bosnia arrival didn´t change until the reality of the video exposed the fabrication for what it was. A mushroom hunter may tell you he has found a ton of mushrooms but seeing is believing and if you don´t have the evidence to back up your claim you had better hope there is not contrary evidence to negate it.

Part of the experience claim was" ready on day one". To do what? Even with a presidential honeymoon period Congress doesn´t just jump up and do the President´s bidding. Issue decrees? Respond to terrorists attacks? Lower gas prices? The implication is "ready for anything. Well, she certainly isn´t demonstrating she is ready to face the reality of her position in the race for the nomination. Again she is posturing that she is more than she can demonstrate. She was not ready to confront her husband and she was not ready to introduce a health care agenda that was acceptable and she was not ready to answer the question posed about the Elliot Spitzer and the driving licenses. There is no one that can enter any new job with no experience and be ready on day one. There are protocols to learn, advisors to appoint, and unless you want to alienate your employees, listen to their concerns.

Another thing about mushroom hunting is going back to the same place every year may or may not be productive. The same is true of running a campaign with outdated methods and ideas. It has always been curious to me how all we heard from Bill Clinton was building a bridge to the twenty-first century and now his wife talks about going back to the nineties. Shouldn´t a transition that touts experience have some continuity? The realty is if you will play any role to pander to the voters consistency and continuity are of little concern. When looking for mushrooms you may discover the mushrooms you are finding are too old and the season is over. You can go on looking but the search will be useless. What you find will not be edible and if you should eat them you will only get ill. In a campaign where you will be judged on how you intend to spend the taxpayer´s money you should set a good example by managing your own finances prudently. Running up debt, not paying your vendors, and using up all your personal funds just because you think wanting the presidency should make it happen does not give the taxpayer/voter a sense of financial security. Running a lost cause into the ground can only be based on a wish for things to be other than how they are. A gambler bucks the odds and piles up greater losses when he ignores the odds against him. Eventually he seeks out Gamblers Anonymous if he wants help with his obsession. What do we have to deal with the obsession of a politician that refuses to quit when the race is impossible to win? The obsessive mushroom hunter knows when to quit. When the prize is no longer to be found it is time to quit looking.

Hillary began with a false premise that has led her to the predicament she finds herself in. She chose wishes and desires over the judgement of her mind and she did so quite publicly. Early in her career she was asked if she was familiar with Ayn Rand and she replied, she had read her in her youth but had outgrown her! Really. Since Ayn Rand created Objectivism which teaches the primacy of existence over consciousness or facts versus wishes, how do you "outgrow´ this fundamental truth? You can certainly deny it which Hillary did, but not without consequences. Reality is still there whether you choose to see it or not. All the wishes and desires that you can muster up will not change reality. You can wish as hard as you want but if the mushrooms aren´t there wishing will not make them appear. Nor will it make delegates or voters appear.

For all we have seen from Hillary is her wish to rule. She has not prepared herself in that she doesn´t understand the limited nature of government and its proper role in society and if she does she certainly shows no evidence of such knowledge. She views it as the ultimate instrument to make her desires come true and nobody can tell her differently or stand in her way ( except the voters ).. Can you imagine what the country would look like with Hillary´s approach to founding the United States?

We are seeing the end of the picking season both nominating and morel mushrooms. The distinction I see is the same one I saw during an Olympic ice staking competition. There was a skater whose ambition was to win a gold medal and there was a skater who wanted to do her very best personal performance. The skater won the competition who wanted to do her personal best recognizing that If her personal best was good enough to win a gold that would be wonderful but if there was a better skater who had a better personal best that she could accept. The girl who wanted only the gold medal was naturally disappointed but she ignored that her personal best was not necessarily the best that day. Her focus was not on what she could do but on what she could win. This is what we have seen in Hillary. She wants the office and has not a clue what she will do if she were to get it. More government is not affordable and there has been nothing offered by Hillary how inflation would be curtailed, how foreign policy would reflect the interests of the United States and how experience for her husband´s administration can be different from hers but the same when recalling it as a credential.

The next time you decide to conduct a campaign remember there are many things that are applicable from the principles of mushroom hunting. Keep you eyes open and forget about wishing. It is your observation skills, not your emotional desire that will fill a sack. Recognize when the season is over and be sensible enough to quit. Take what you find and do your best. It isn´t important that you get more than the other guy if that is all that you are after. People are looking for your best not whether you can better your opponent.