We are in a strange environment where nothing feels as it was.
Because it isn’t as it was.
I have contracted in companies where the boss was a hands-on micromanager and every failure was blamed on whoever was closest. Never the real culprit. Never the micromanaging boss. It was never their fault.
Sound familiar?
When decisions are made with a sense of satisfaction, a score settled, a grievance answered, to the person making them it feels like justice.
The action itself can seem small. A policy change. A funding cut. A shift in priorities framed as strength or loyalty. Something done not just because it is believed to be right, but because it answers a need to get even. To punish an enemy.
A stone dropped into still water.
At first nothing dramatic happens. Just a small disturbance. A ripple that feels contained, manageable, even insignificant.
But ripples don’t stay where they begin.
They move outward, quietly, steadily, touching places far removed from the original decision. People who were never part of the argument. Communities that had no voice in the conflict. Families who don’t follow the headlines closely but live with the outcomes.
A clinic closes earlier than it should.
A farmer faces one more season with less support.
A family sits at a table trying to make numbers work that no longer do.
None of them were in the room when the decision was made.
None of them were the target.
But they feel the result all the same.
This is the danger of governance driven by grievance rather than responsibility. The intent may be narrow, focused on winning, punishing, proving a point, but the consequences are not.
They spread.
Leadership isn’t measured by the force of the initial action or the satisfaction it brings in the moment. It’s measured by how far those ripples travel and who they reach when they arrive.
Our government is being run by a micromanager governing out of grievance, without care or foresight for the damage the ripples of his decisions are creating.
The Ripple Effect, The Cost of Donny the Toddler’s Revenge
We are in a strange environment where nothing feels as it was.
Because it isn’t as it was.
I have contracted in companies where the boss was a hands-on micromanager and every failure was blamed on whoever was closest. Never the real culprit. Never the micromanaging boss. It was never their fault.
Sound familiar?
When decisions are made with a sense of satisfaction, a score settled, a grievance answered, to the person making them it feels like justice.
The action itself can seem small. A policy change. A funding cut. A shift in priorities framed as strength or loyalty. Something done not just because it is believed to be right, but because it answers a need to get even. To punish an enemy.
A stone dropped into still water.
At first nothing dramatic happens. Just a small disturbance. A ripple that feels contained, manageable, even insignificant.
But ripples don’t stay where they begin.
They move outward, quietly, steadily, touching places far removed from the original decision. People who were never part of the argument. Communities that had no voice in the conflict. Families who don’t follow the headlines closely but live with the outcomes.
A clinic closes earlier than it should.
A farmer faces one more season with less support.
A family sits at a table trying to make numbers work that no longer do.
None of them were in the room when the decision was made.
None of them were the target.
But they feel the result all the same.
This is the danger of governance driven by grievance rather than responsibility. The intent may be narrow, focused on winning, punishing, proving a point, but the consequences are not.
They spread.
Leadership isn’t measured by the force of the initial action or the satisfaction it brings in the moment. It’s measured by how far those ripples travel and who they reach when they arrive.
Our government is being run by a micromanager governing out of grievance, without care or foresight for the damage the ripples of his decisions are creating.
Sometimes a ripple becomes a tsunami.
Who is going to clean up the carnage?
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