Hello anxious follower count of zero! Is today's empty classroom ready for the lesson plan?
Ha, I kid. I created this blog for myself after all, right?

So, tonight I read the FIRST HALF of the first chapter of John F. Kennedy's book Profiles in Courage about eight US Senators and the grace under pressure with which they endured (Ernest Hemingway's definition of courage). I'm only 11 pages in and have already fallen in love with JFK and even farther in love the US Government and couldn't help but stop myself and share a few thoughts I've had while reading through the first chapter:

• As Americans, We might be ~The People~, but we are so much more judgmental than we have the right to be. Kennedy made the point, "if American people more fully comprehended the terrible pressures which discourage acts of political courage, ...then they might be less critical of those who take the easier road- and more appreciative of those still able to follow the path of courage." This kind of hit home for me because I realized how much of an ignorant critic I've been in the past, and how I've failed to appreciate the good fight fought by certain politicians just because I didn't agree with what they were fighting for. So much of what we believe has been influenced by the opinions of those we've encountered thus far in our lives, and less on what our own actual educated stance on an issue is. This is one of the main reasons why lately I've been pushing myself to read as much as I can not only about the history of our nation, but about the basic facts of US and international current issues so that I can form my own opinion and then follow up with seeking further synonymous opinions and debating contrasting opinions (**where I learn just as much). 

• The first pressure JFK pointed out Senators face is their desire to be liked. Whaaaat?! Can you repeat that?? Senators are actual human beings with human feelings? Who knew. Who knew that they have a family to go home to, a career to sustain, and colleagues relying on their course of action, all of which rides on the decision to follow an independent course of action on an issue or to "go along." Compromise is a beautiful thing that Kennedy brought up. Having a "sense of things possible" explains that through compromise, you are given a sense of just how far you can push the actual outcome to meet the endpoint of your personal target. After all, "There are few, if any, issues where all the truth and all the right and all the angels are on one side."
• Senators basically live by the phrase "choose your battles" because you'll die early on in the war if your exhaust yourself through the first few fights you encounter. "..our influence ...and the extent to which we can accomplish our objectives...are dependent...on the esteem with which we are regarded.."To me this means, if you stand in the way of each individual person there will be no one left to stand with you. It's a give and take or you'll end up with nothing at all anywhere. 

• The second pressure Senators face is their desire to be re-elected. Double whaaat?! An employed individual actually wants to keep the job they love so much? This is unbelievable. Kennedy shed some light on the difference between this job and literally every other job that exists, which made me that much more anxious and excited (and anxious and scared) to work  hard to one day have this job. The majority of other occupations involve working towards individual progress whereas the political profession pursues national progress by the way of an individual. Senators sacrifice their private interests for the public interests they serve, along with their privacy in general which brings about my favorite phrase yet: The finality of decision. I'll let you taste the savory deliciousness of that with only one further comment to apply it to your non-office holding selves. As constituents, and everyday normal people, there are personal consequences we must face to every decision we make. As politicians, there are consequences everyone in the nation must face to every decision they make. (I now understand why Presidents walk out of the white house with grey hair and wrinkles they didn't bring in with them).

• The third pressure Senators face is the inconsistent demands and insatiable grievances of his constituency. There are two sides to every issue, and members of each side that Senators must represent. What a conundrum! Not only are they handed a honey-do list that never ends, but they must fulfill contradicting requests, all while trying to remain in office and still be liked and have friends at the end of the day. This leaves him with only one course of action that can only begin to be described as 'difficult' and 'soul-searching': "decide at which point and on which issue he will risk his career."

• If anyone has ever asked you, "What do politicians actually even do?" I'm not sure if you would have had an answer. No one's ever asked me so I've never encountered that problem. But if someone asks me now, I'll know just what to say! Wahoo! Here it is: they "engage in the fine art of conciliating, balancing and interpreting the forces, and the factions of public opinion, an art essential to keeping our nation united and enabling our Government to function." And for that, I have an inconceivable amount of respect. Political writer Frank Kent identified the most important single accomplishment for the politically ambitious: "the fine art of seeming to say something without doing so."A personal goal of mine I am in the makes of working out. I'll let you know when it's been successfully accomplished, grab a lifetime supply of water and non-expirable food like spam because it could be a while!