The Seven Principles of Dysfunctional Politicians

Like millions of people I've read and was deeply influenced by the book “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” written by Stephen Covey and I even attended a one-day seminar based on it.

I thought its principles were based on good common sense, ethics we could all live with, and if I focused on applying them, I would be more successful. It's also ironical that it came out of Utah, a conservative State in which senators and congressmen have been more obstructionists than most towards the current Obama Administration.

With this in mind, I wanted to re-write these 7 habits to illustrate the flawed principles largely used in Congress and that I feel are setting our country backwards...

Principle 1: Be Reactive 

See what's utterly wrong with whatever idea is offered and systematically offer an opposite course of action just to show that your way, no matter how foolish, is better.

Principle 2: Pick convenient issues
Don't worry about their relative importance in the great scheme of things, just choose any event and turn it to your advantage or adapt it to your agenda for the day. 

Principle 3: Avoid prioritizing 
If a small issue can be a treasure for argument, blow it out of proportion, make it bigger than life, place it front and center. It's all about what can be gained from a single, minute and trivial event or fact that counts.

Principle 4: Think Win-Lose 
Make certain to paint your opponent in the worst possible light. Feel good when you see him is on his knees. Never relinquish your “top dog” position, spare no effort to make people you don't like appear at their very worst.

Principle 5: Force your agenda 
Be dogmatic. Don't ever listen, scream louder even it it intimidates or if it antagonizes. The more people shoot and are unhappy, the more you will get the feeling that you made a difference and were accomplishing a lot.

Principle 6: Kill any good ideas in the egg 
Combine the evil of the naysayers in order to get what you want, even if you don't quite believe it. Show to all what's wrong with any idea you decide to fight. Oppose collective achievement and worship selfish or petty actions.

Principle 7: Let everything break-down
Just for the principle or to satisfy some dogma, fight an issue until it's killed. Make sure that no social program lasts too long, that freedom is for the sake of it and a minimalist government encourages inequality, lawlessness and individualism. Let just the very strong survive and the weak perish...