I think there are a few very broad lessons we Americans can learn from the rapid fall of the Afghan government over the last few days.

1. Any enterprise is in trouble when it is not informed by the boots on the ground.

The view from those doing the work on the ground is necessarily different from the more lofty view of those in charge. But when…

All of us humans, both individually and collectively, have to strike some reasonable balance between doing what we’ve done before (safe but boring) and trying something new (exciting but risky).

And when considering these two alternatives, of course, doing what we’ve done before generally wins. Because we know that what’s…

Sometimes I find myself making good headway through a book, only to be suddenly stopped in my tracks by a particular insight that suggests an entirely new way of thinking about a problem.

And then on certain inspired occasions I find my thoughts ricocheting from one such idea to another…

I’ve been making the case lately that the Republican Party is in decline, and needs to reinvent itself.

But perhaps something even more radical is needed.

For when we look at the current state of our two-party system in the US, nothing about it makes any sense.

Here in Seattle…

I recently wrote a piece offering Some Hard-Won Wisdom Concerning Cults. And I’ve written a couple of pieces recently questioning the direction of the current Republican Party. (See “The Decline of the Republican Party — First Gradually and then Suddenly” and “Where, Exactly, Are the Republicans Headed?”.)

And so, today…

As someone who once belonged to an organization later determined to be a cult, I can tell you that the warning signs are not always obvious.

The members of the group I belonged to weren’t living inside a walled compound, or even residing together at all. We weren’t hiding in…

Let’s first establish a little context.

• In our 2016 presidential election, almost 3 million more people voted for Hillary Clinton than for Donald Trump. Nonetheless, due to peculiarities associated with our Electoral College, Trump was elected as our president, fair and square.
• In our 2020 presidential election, roughly 7 million…

I was reading recently about a couple of different situations involving traits of both leadership and followership.

First, there was the statement by Liz Cheney that “The 2020 presidential election was not stolen,” contradicting recent statements from Donald Trump, setting up a battle for Republican Party leadership, and prompting a…