If you ask why our government is so poor at doing its job, why the nation is turning from order to chaos- most people will jump to their pet peeve issues. While that is normal reactive thinking, it's not analytical thinking, and it focuses on the symptoms we see instead of the cause, the reasons those symptoms exist. The symptoms are noisy and in our face, while the causes are quiet and behind the curtains. We need to recognize the causes and address them, and that in turn solves the symptoms. Anything else is a patch, like a band-aid.... not a cure. A tool of great importance in this is called RCA, or Root Cause Analysis. Not really difficult to understand, but rarely used by the average citizen, and it should be. Root Cause Analysis is not complicated, most people could use it. I believe that if we did, our ability to make the right political choices would increase dramatically, so I have decided to suggest it, and explain it. RCA is simply the process of mentally drilling down- past the symptoms in your face, to get to the basic cause that creates or allows them. Like a disease, the symptoms are what we feel and see; but they are not the cause, they are the products of the cause. This can be illustrated easily with the state of our media today- the system we use for information. Our perceptions, judgments, and reactions are all based on what we think is true, what we believe. If someone can control the information you see, they can control what you think, what you believe- and what you will do. That makes it the most powerful weapon of mass destruction in existence. In today's world, most of the information that shapes our perception is not first-hand observation, it is derived from media reports. Thus, what you think you know- is dependent not on reality, but on the second-hand source of the information you rely on. That means, your perception of reality can be manipulated. A standard of ethics known as the Hippocratic Oath has been the primary guide for physicians for centuries, it is the most widely known and used ethical standard today. Ethics are the tools that allow us to self-regulate and maintain course. They are the difference between the professional people who are dedicated to helping people and the quacks who are dedicated to using people. As the profession of medicine serves our physical health; the profession of journalism serves our social health. Once, there was a journalistic ethic as strong as the Hippocratic oath, which basically was- truth. It was adhered to by all respectable news people and platforms. Truth was the first duty of everyone involved- reporters, writers, publishers. That standard- is dead. We can no longer trust anything we think we know. Even some of what we physically see may not be accurately understood, because someone in the media will put a spin on it and tell you it doesn't mean what you think it means. In North Korea, there is no journalism, only controlled propaganda. The people in that nation live in poverty and fear of the rest of the world, despite the fact that half their countrymen next door in South Korea live in a thriving nation. What the North Koreans are allowed to know is controlled by their government. Our nation is struggling today with the same root cause that keeps the North Koreans in abject poverty- the absence of truth, of ethical journalism. That one element is the tool that allows unlimited wrongs to be hidden from us, and unlimited control over what we think to be in the hands of unscrupulous people who seek power over us. While we need to fix many things, I believe most of them are symptoms of rood causes, which are actually few in number and easier to address- provided we recognize them and don't allow the circus of symptoms to hide them from us, send us off chasing ghosts. Could we- any of us- make better decisions, sound decisions if we knew the truth? Of course we could. About everything. The biggest question is how to restore the ethics that make truth visible. Lack of it is the most important Root Cause we are faced with today. IF we can resolve that, we can change everything. It's possible. How would you resolve it?
