Right now Santos is in the news for his "embellishments" and seemingly inventing much of his knowledge, background and skills. You can read this article in the Guardian (It seems sort of a Left leaning paper but it has some benefits and some truth to it.). Read In Santos’s district, reactions to brazen lies remain mixed: ‘I might let him slide’ to freshen your memory.
I'm not going to bash Congressman Santos (Sorry I needed to edit) because there was some confusion and I'm unsure if he is a Congressman or not. 🤷 Santos is the symptom and not the root. This issue might be a persistent problem in our current politics where there are many people working diligently toward honest governance and an unfortunate too many people eating at the trough of tax payer dollars without pushing our nation forward.🐷
"Embellishments" Lead to Intentional Candidate/Election Confusion
We Americans/"Americans" (Someday we may be able to use one word again depending on the choices of our leaders) already have a hard time trying to figure out who is telling the truth, who is trying to help/harm our country, what values our political candidates hold, and what their qualifications might entail. Throw on top of that "embellishments" all over the political spectrum and no wonder we are really unsure of who we are and are not voting for (Leaving us only a blind party vote).
Its an issue of general integrity because we must have the best, brightest, and most thoughtful people in Congress as they are designing, building and sailing this American Ship. Dangerous waters should encourage excellence from our helmsman (Gender neutral term.) because our kids are learning from them and our future options rely on their choices today. (P.S. I know a great place in the U.P. Congress should consider building ships. Sorry...shameless plug for my community. No seriously...I feel no shame in helping my community. I guess multiple birds with one stone.).
Just like a job, if you over "embellish" on your resume you could get fired because of potential loss/miss use of shareholder value (In this case its the American people). I think there should be some punishments for those who intentionally mislead on the paperwork that got them elected. One could make a case that We The People should have accurate info to make informed decisions. (In a weird way we might have elected a fictional character to Congress. I didn't think it was possible but here we are!)
In many ways one could make a moral fraud case out of intentionally dishonest information that led to the procurement of illicit benefits from the American taxpayer (i.e. the little people we forget about once we got to the top.) It kind of makes you wonder how many other Congressman (Used as a gender neutral term.) lied on their documents and paperwork to get jobs and important committee work they may not have been qualified for (Politics seems like such a game. Hopefully they are not rolling the dice on our futures.)?
(Yikes! We may not want to dig into the resume question too deeply. It could open a can of worms. 😬 However if fate demands it, I would say what would be interesting is if we took the electronic version of everyone's resume at this screen shot moment {digital snap shot} and put them up for researchers and/or an ethics review committee. {We would probably want to ensure no one can go back post hoc edit them. Seems impossible right?} and then conducted a basic audit. We are not talking about small mistakes, or something from years ago, but present/recent "embellishments" that were obvious mistruths and would constitute a type of fraud. Would 1/3rd, 1/5th, 1/10th of resumes contain these major invented "embellishments"?)
We have examples of what happens in other places when people plagiarize and engage in "embellishments". Australian Labor Minister Resigns (Also why I encourage high integrity in higher education.)
What We Don't and Do Want to Happen
We need to change the culture of politics from "anything goes" to professional national management (When our decisions really have impact on the success of the nation and the ability to maintain the health of our democracy through being informed citizens.). I mean we should see some change if our democracy is more important than our politics (As an open question to my fellow Americans/"Americans". Do you think Congress will audit? There might be many reasons not to audit but it would be kind of telling right? Bi partisan committee, fact check resumes as a limited scope effort, punishments for actual embellishments and removal for gross "embellishments". We need the best and brightest at the top and not the most "connected". Sometimes we might need to make more room and correct an error. Perhaps 10% have some form of serious embellishment? We will probably never know. 🤔 Sorry, I sometimes go down these long strings of logic to see where they might end up. I digressed into a flight of fancy. 🙈🙉🙊💨 )
I believe most (likely over half) are doing the right thing and doing it the right way. They are working in a culture that accepts certain things that would be inappropriate in other environments. Saying that means that we also recognize there is room for improvement and a willingness to get everyone on the same page so as to improve our national prospects and ensure the torch of liberty continues to shine light on our democracy.
Life Quiz (Disclaimer. Not an actual quiz.)
Life Question: Based on your personal experience and background are you more likely to pick the A.) Fast Track side of the spectrum or B.) Slow track to success? side of the spectrum.
Fast Track (Option A):
-Embellish your resume.
-Press button blindly for party loyalty.
-Represent 5% of society.
-Self-enrich.
-Say yes to everything that will keep me in office.
-Doesn't understand policies and doesn't read them (Someone will tell me what to vote for.)
-Listen only to the rich and powerful to change policies for more donations and money.
-Support nepotism over merit. This comes with the responsibility to remove people in my party that act as the "voice of conscious". (Its a problem everywhere and not just the U.S. Its a dangerous problem and often leads to human atrocities that are judged by history as immoral.)
-Subjective values that apply differently to different people (i.e. will spend more time hating the other side and coming up with one line zingers then doing my job and solving problems.)
-Pretend I'm perfect and have no insight into my behavior. No need to learn new things.
Slow Track (Option E):
-List what you have actually accomplished so Americans can make informed decisions (I would love to hear more about their dreams, visons and goals. If they can inspire, I believe "Americans" + Americans will follow. Oh my! If we keep going on that route I will have to start writing the word Americans as a single unified entity. Oh my!).
-Will consider the full scope of stakeholders needs before voting (Even the ones that didn't vote for me.).
-Willing to give up self gain for national gain in alignment with responsibilities.
-Listen to the needs of the poor and remove road blocks to success (Developing our human capital fully and broadly).
-Take the time to understand polices (I don't need anyone to tell me what I should believe. I will listen to both sides but I have a responsibility to understand how I'm casting my vote.)
-Listen to both sides and take extra time listening to those I disagree with or don't understand so as to better understand their needs and in turn craft better policy.
-Encourage universal inclusion versus exclusionary and divisionary politics and outcomes.
-Regardless of background I want the right people in the right jobs so to ensure my nation is strong and viable. (I would support having someone from another party take an important role if they were more qualified. That is how important we should take our roles and likely the level of decision making needed for the next chapter in this American novel.)
-Holds universal values and applies them fairly to people regardless of race, religion, background or any other superficial smallest worth heuristic projected distortion that has already done serious harm to our country.
-Be humble and understand I still have many things to learn about myself and others.
(Maybe we should have Congress take this little self reflection quiz before they run for office next time. We might be able to make this a Likert scale where they have to select from A to E based on their personal values. A.) 'I'm selfish and in government for the wrong reasons' all the way over to E.) 'I care about ALL people and want my democracy to be healthy.' If we were to further rank their answers we should probably not vote for those leaning heavily to the Fast Track A and vote more for those closer to Slow Track B. At least that would be my suggestion. 🤷 )
(**That isn't a real study and its just for illustration purposes only.** The whole article is about getting people to think and make improvements to our national governance. A real study would need an actual validated instrument and go through many different trials before its considered to have utility.{ It likely has some construct validity that can be supported in others research though.💁} While we could develop a valid instrument with research, I bet in many cases the answer was decided a long long time ago. See Did They Pass the Marshmallow Test as kids? )
(Most are doing a great job but there is that minority of people who are creating a toxic environment for everyone else and detracts from the free flowing and free thinking environment leaders need to thrive {Thrive not just survive!}. We really have to wonder how and why some ever got into politics in the first place.)
"The creed of our democracy is that liberty is acquired and kept by men and women who are strong and self-reliant, and possessed of such wisdom as God gives mankind – men and women who are just, and understanding, and generous to others -- men and women who are capable of disciplining themselves. For they are the rulers and they must rule themselves.” Franklin D. Roosevelt
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