Serving as a Honda District Service Manager in the early eighties, I often whizzed through Madison, Wisconsin. Occasionally, I would stop at Zimbrick Honda.
John Zimbrick was legendary. In 1973, Zimbrick introduced Honda’s to its dealerships and established one of the most successful customer service departments in the country. If the customer didn’t have a ride for service, he would pay a local cab company to ferry his service customers. What the customers didn’t know was that Zimbrick would pay the drivers to report feedback, whether positive or negative. I once asked Zimbrick why he did that.
“Of course, I want our dealership to provide excellent value,” Zimbrick noted. “But, if my customers are going to talk, I want them talking about me.”
Therein lay the first reason Trump commuted Blagojevich. In essence, whether good or bad, Trump wants people talking about him. And only him. Trump is, above all, a marketer. He understands the power of repetition. He knows if you say it over and over and over, people eventually succumb to stupid.
Secondly, Trump is hell-bent on revenge. In the late 1990’s I attended a Karrass negotiation course. Midway through the second day, Dr. Chester L. Karrass mentioned something I remember to this day.
“When someone has got you by the balls, it’s a good time to piss on em.’”
When Democrats believed they had Trump by the balls only meant he was going to piss on them. It’s vintage Trump. He mimics Russian win-lose tactics. Like most autocrats, Trump is short-term (tactically) oriented, whereas Congressman and bureaucracies are long-term (strategically oriented). By overcoming impeachment, Trump wins once, and by commuting Blagojevich, he wins twice.
Lastly, once bitten, Trump is determined to revoke and overwrite any part of his predecessor’s legacy. In the television series Crime Story, Lt. Mike Torello, says to a bad guy:
“Hey, you. You hurt anybody else, when this is over, I’m gonna find what you love the most and I’m gonna kill it. Your mother, your father, your dog… don’t matter what it is, it’s dead.”
On prima facia value, there are subtle connections between Blagojevich and Trump. Blagojevich was an Apprentice contestant and was convicted by a ‘rule of law’ over Obama’s vacated Senate seat. Democrats believed in Obama. Obama believed in the rule of law. Yet, Lt. Mike Torello’s quote is like Trump’s way of saying he will kill anything you love, including the rule of law…and your dog.
Earth is filled with strong men pummeling democracy and fulfilling self-interest. Trump is just another autocrat.
From a spiritual perspective, our next president must end our current culture of corruption. Exclusively exercising decisions because one can doesn’t bode well for the everyday family living on Main Street. The Dali Lama noted that when Tibet was still free, Tibetans cultivated isolation, mistakenly thinking they could prolong peace and security. Consequently, they paid little attention to the changes taking place in the world around. Later, they learned the hard way that freedom is something to be shared and enjoyed in the company of others, not kept solely for oneself.
Democratization must reach to others across the world, where future generations will consider humanity as the most important achievement. And how can we ensure such democratization? By voting. We can only make a difference if each of us chooses to be the difference.