To: God ๐ฝ
Re: State of the World ๐บ
You have asked for the regular ๐ฏ ย year update on the World ๐.
First, some background. As you probably remember, this World ๐บ was originally a start up which was pulled together by a small team over six pretty intense days. And while it started off well with light ๐ก ย on the first day, and the oceans ๐ , stars โจ in the sky and the animals came together, the lack of adequate preparation and the rushed timetable showed towards the end on the sixth day when the introduction of people ๐ซ got messy.
And it is also now clear that declaring it “good” on that sixth day was an example of over promising and under delivering. This over promising (ie telling lies) was to bedevil the World from that day (see more on politicians (esp Trump on “crowd size”) below).
Also, in retrospect, the seventh day was too early to rest. ๐ด
Adam was appointed as the first CEO. He had been absolutely confident that he could do the job and said so.
Eve, who as things turned out would have been a much better choice, was more cautious in her presentation to the Angels. And missed out – therefore becoming the first in a long line of women working for less capable men.
Allowing men to run things has been an ongoing problem for the World project.
There have been a few successes with Elizabeth I, Victoria, Catherine the Great and Margaret Thatcher.
And over the last 30 years, some real changes have been implemented. That said, we accept that 6,000 years is too long (we are sticking with the 6,000 years for now because of the likely election of Judge Roy Moore in Alabama – and because 4.5 billion years looks even worse in assessing the failure to get things sorted here on Earth).
Moving onto the report for the ๐ฏ years to 2017.
The standard template for this regular centennial reporting – since AD 1 when we abandoned the Ten Commandments as a test of centennial performance – has referred to the Seven Deadly Sins.
The Ten Commandments were seen as too proscriptive with insufficient flexibility – they were seen as “hard targets” which we failed – and none of the Angels was getting a short term or long term bonus. Attempts in 1929 and 1945 to reset the base line for measuring bonuses was rejected as opportunistic.
The Archangel therefore argued for the Seven Deadly Sins. These SDS were seen as more a guide than a set of specific rules ?.
Proxy advisers (all from Hell – the fallen angels – and Judge Roy Moore – a very big Ten Commandments guy) continue to see the SDS as too soft and too “general”.
There is another and more recent, and more serious, problem with the “Seven Sins Index” 7๏ธโฃโ ๏ธ๐ ๐๐
As you know, the Seven Deadly Sins are:
Lust
Gluttony
Greed
Sloth
Wrath
Envy
Pride
You obviously see my problem!!!
With Donald Trump becoming President of the United States, we are now looking at a total failure in all seven categories โ.
Worst result ever – even Hitler didn’t fail Gluttony and Sloth!
For the overall score, we weight the Seven Deadly Sins based on GDP. This worked well with Roosevelt, Truman and Eisenhower (well a couple of small wobbles on lust). Their good scores managed to balance Hitler and Stalin – who as we reported in the 50 year interim report were off the charts on wrath.
And Pride is a perpetual problem with politicians (fortunately, telling lies is not a SDS – another reason SDS was adopted by politicians).
As you can imagine, very bad scores on Lust with John Kennedy and Bill Clinton also nearly set things off the rails again. Although, I would point out that in historical terms, their scores were still fairly low, especially when compared to all those Kings, Khans, Sultans and Potentates with harems etc. (Jimmy Carter later caused issues – but it was ruled that just lusting in your heart doesn’t count – this happens a lot).
In recent years, Putin is also scoring badly on Lust with that ballet dancer – although like Trump he also scores poorly across the board and is a close overall second to Trump (Greed really pushes up his score).
Kim Jong-un is terrible on wrath (and gluttony), but as North Korea has no GDP, it is not a problem.
In Australia, while simple members of parliament don’t count for much, it has still been a relief that Clive Palmer has left politics. Prime Minister Turnbull’s Chinese herb ? tea diet was a useful leveller on the Australian gluttony result.
Envy scores have flatlined after we excluded lawyers – and everyone else – from looking at bankers’ salaries. And Hugh Hefner’s death will cause a dip in both lust AND envy.
As noted above, we are finally making changes in who we appoint to run the world.
There are still setbacks. Theresa May has been a disappointment (not good – but it has also been a really bad 100 years overall for Team GB). Angela Merkel continues to run the successful German subsidiary (it has been an up and down 100 years for them (although the Thousand Year Reich was fortunately finished in twelve) but they are finishing strongly).
Unfortunately, Hillary Clinton’s loss shows the old system will be hard to shake.
But the signs are good and I expect to be able to report a better result in 2117.
๐๐บ
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