Tribalism Trumps Cash In Politics?

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The campaign is done, over, Nate Silver can go get drunk, and the formerly confident members of the Republican Party are asking “what happened?”  Also they’re asking “What the hell did all that money go for?”

Now I could go deep into some of my own theories about political groups, which are roughly that a lot of lobbying and political organizations are just lucrative fronts to part donors from cash.  But still there was a LOT of money sloshing around this election, and many is the time I hears someone predict it would break in the Republican’s favor.  Doesn’t look that way.

I think there is an issue that money can only buy so much, and it’s worse in a time of highly “tribal” political divisions, as explored by Salon.

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Adeptus Mechanicus Panicus

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You know, when you worry life will imitate a deliberately over-the top dark science fiction game, you get a little bit philosophical.

In my case, the game is the Warhammer 40K game world, a delightfully dark setting of a grim future where humans, aliens, and psychic creations war endlessly and sell miniatures.  The setting mixes dismal, horrific, heroic, and in some cases parodic elements mocking all of its own content.  It winks and nods at you about just how crazy it can be.

In this setting, humanity is largely ignorant, part of a far-flung feudal empire.  Technology is mostly controlled by a separate organization, really almost an “internal” or allied empire, the Adeptus Mechanicus.  The Adeptus Mechanicus have their own culture, their own religion, and humanity both depends on them, yet treats them as separate – which the Mechanicus seem fine with.  They’re busy seeking knowledge and worshipping the Machine God . . .  and at that point I could go on for pages of insane detail.  Just hit up the Lexicanium.

Now the idea of humans ever letting technology out of their hands, of a separate culture controlling technology, sounds all grim and dark and b-movieish.  Except I see a less, grim, less over-the top, less miniature driven parallel being a real possibility, which concerns me.

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Skill Portability: Representative Skills and Portability

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(9/17/2016 – These posts have been expanded in a book, Skill Portability: A Guide To Moving Skills Between Jobs)

So we’re discussing how you can port skills from job to job and career to career.  I use the acronym DARE to represent the different kinds of Skill Portability – Direct, Advantageous, Representative, and Enhancing.  I’ve already covered Direct and Advantageous, so it’s time to get to Representative.

There are some skills that really don’t matter to the job.  They may not even provide any advantages.  They could be irrelevant, they could be in your past, they could be from a previous career.

Think of the skills that you leave behind when you move up in the world.  Project Managers that were once Engineers no longer program.

Think of the skills that change when you switch professions.  That old software package you used at one publisher isn’t used at the new one.

Think of the skills that change with time.  Those computer language that no longer are the hip thing to write in, the database no one uses, the vendor long gone and bought out.

These skills and knowledges sound useless, left to the necropolis of past careers and past experiences, but they’re not useless it all.  They speak of what you did, of how you got where you are.  They tell stories of who you were and what you became, and the speak, in a way of what you may be.

In short, they’re Representative of who you are and of your career and life trajectory.  They speak of you – you just don’t use them anymore.

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