black friday indeed
I couldn’t manage the US. I know it. You know it. I couldn’t manage post-Brexit Britain as I wouldn’t have the patience and it’d end in tears. Again, you know it and I know it. So, it’s with disbelief that I look upon the current predicament faced by both countries.
As it turns out, there’s a bona-fide psychological theory, the Dunning-Kruger effect dontchaknow, that details incompetent people are so incompetent they don’t realise how incompetent they are. This isn’t just the usual over-confidence and exaggerated braggadocios nature that many of us exhibit, oh no, it’s way more scary: it’s the untalented feeling disproportionately talented because they’re so untalented to feel anything but supremely talented! It’s not simply that President-elect Trump doesn’t know how to govern, it’s that he doesn’t know he wouldn’t know how to govern. He thinks he can. Brilliantly. He’s out of his depth yet doesn’t know he’s out of his depth. And the same goes for the Farages, Goves, Mays & Johnsons of our own small world.
Yes, I realise this places me firmly-and-squarely back in my middle-class elitist bubble but at least I know when I’m in the sticky stuff.
Once upon a time the best the untalented could have wished for would have been determined by the ‘Peter Principal’ where the untalented employee was promoted to their point of obsolescence or ineffectual operation. And everyone was happy. Today however, there’s no ceiling, glass or otherwise, to prevent the rise of the untalented and future generations will undoubtedly refer to the current times as the Dunning-Kruger era. There’s a vast difference between those who know they’re winging it and those who don’t, and those who don’t are entirely certain they know everything, precisely because they don’t.
So, as well as being deluded, Mr Trump also continues to be hypocritical. Not content with apparently reneging upon virtually all his pre-election promises (for which I am eternally grateful) he’s now set his sights on Amazon boss, Jeff Bezos, for, and wait for this… tax avoidance! Amazon will almost certainly its biggest ever sales day today (Black Friday) but is The Donald the organisation’s biggest challenge?
In the most incredible of ‘pot calling kettle black’ scenarios, Trump has stated that Bezos runs his empire on the basis of off-setting profits & losses to avoid tax: “The Washington Post, which loses a fortune, is owned for purposes of keeping taxes down at his no-profit company, Amazon. The Washington Post scam is saving it.” No sh*t, Sherlock! Warning the company that when he became President “oh do they have problems, they are getting away with murder tax-wise” he remains apoplectic that the paper buys political influence, angrily denouncing “the whole system is rigged, whether it’s Hilary or Bezos.” By return, Bezos has kindly offered to reserve the President a seat on his space exploration rocket, Blue Origin!
Yes, of course Amazon are morally bankrupt for avoiding tax, but then so are the vast majority of global corporations, and the last person we need to be lectured by is a multi-billionaire who has, allegedly, not paid income tax for over eighteen years, steadfastly refusing to release any tax returns. Furthermore, with a succession of failures: Trump Shuttle Airlines, the casinos, an American football team, Trump Steaks, Trump Timeshares and Trump University, some $5bn of investors’ cash has been squandered and the National Journal has calculated that had he put his father’s money into a stock tracker fund, he’d now be worth twice his estimated fortune! That’s one untalented businessman.
