I Did Not See It Coming

Driving around normally, there are times when for all the care and awareness there are things you just miss or do not see until late.  Experience tells you when this is more likely, the half light of early morning or evening, rain, patchy mist, busy conditions, dark clothed pedestrians, cyclists, motor cycles in the blind spot, trucks with far away number plates and those too close (the bumper stickers I call them) among others.

On another level, experience and history tells me that there are governments and many in public affairs, who may be educated, knowledgeable about many things, in the most senior positions and the rest who simply neither see nor understand what is coming and the effects it might have.

This may happen because the mindset they have, the job they are in and the ideas current at the time make them either blind to or unwilling to accept either events or information that are in conflict.  This is especially if there are notable unwelcome downsides.

As for those in any senior or professional position, if they discern something coming along that is bad news for others, especially those senior to them or on whom they depend, it can be very difficult.  If they warn, they can finish up being blamed for anything adverse or be shunned, sacked or singled out for some rough treatment.

In the world of politics, economics and government there are certainly a few things down the decades which I missed, did not fully understand or failed to recognise certain features that should have indicated that things were not going to plan or as they were supposed to be.

What can be especially difficult is that if it dawns on you that the people in charge and who are calling the shots simply do not know what they are talking about or do not have the relevant expertise to make an informed judgement.  I have met rather too many of these in the past. 

All too often they have blagged or blustered their way upwards and are determined both to be the deciders and will brook no questioning or opposition.  So they are just as likely to take us all down a lot faster than they took themselves up.  One feature is that they make promises impossible to fulfil but ensure others will take the blame.

Is all of this sounding very familiar and are names and current issues of one sort or another coming to mind?  One horror that comes to mind is whether any of our current crop of political leaders are competent to run any form of government or are even half aware of what is really going on or what might or must happen.

Another is given the nature of the media and its’ interests is whether the people that elect them are any better placed.  Worse is that many of the people who are elected and who they appoint to crucial offices are neither expert and too often with their own agendas, usually related to immediate financial interests.

So politically and internationally what is round the next corner, why apparently did nobody see it coming and was it the fault of those who predicted it?