Life by the spreadsheet.Two dimensional thinking in a three dimensional world will be the end of us.

The spreadsheet has become the rising god of the twenty-first century conservative. The worshippers of this religion in the banking world and in international commerce and trade adore it in their temples and churches, the high rises in polluted cities that they try to build bigger and taller than ever before without any regard to the environmental impact. After all, the environment is not part of the world of the spreadsheet. The spreadsheet god is as two-dimensional as any previous gods invented by man and just as fictional.

It ignores the fact that we live in a three dimensional world of flesh and blood, hot and cold, rain and wind, humidity and dryness. It is a living world of biological diversity of which we are a part and in which we are all born and die along with all of our fellow species. We do not inhabit the world of the spreadsheet, with its clean white background, and crisp bold black figures and statistics. Our world is much messier, muddier, bloodier, hotter, colder, wetter or drier. For the spreadsheet god, it doesn’t compute.

Yet, our aspiring leaders in the conservative right wing world want us to live on those pages. We do not need higher wages than the spreadsheet has deemed profitable. We do not need assistance when we are no longer able to work. Our children do not need an education if we can’t pay for it even though it is the spreadsheet god that benefits from an educated work force. We are just statistics on a sheet of paper or in this day and age, the computer screen. When we no longer are useful, we become expendable and disappear from the world of the spreadsheet. Out of sight and out of mind is the motto of the spreadsheet god. You won’t even be missed.

The spreadsheet god is only one of the pantheon in this two dimensional world. There is the playbook god. This god maps out strategies for winning whatever your game is. The players are moved around like so many pieces on a game board. There is no blood, or broken bones or strained muscles, concussions or lost fortunes on the playbook god’s turf, just winners and losers. The losers disappear much like those who must live by the spreadsheet once they are no longer useful.

There are other two dimensional gods, the poll god, the graph god and the map god. The map god is the war god. Just put out a map and decide what you want to conquer. Circle those places in red and proceed to launch an invasion and start a war. Of course the other gods come into play when the map god decides to launch a war. Of course, there is no blood, no maiming and injuries on the map. There is no rape, death, or utter destruction or radioactive residues on the map. It’s all neat and tidy when reduced to two dimensions.

The reason I wrote this is because I couldn’t really fathom the thinking of our conservative friends on the other side of the aisle. They seem to be hell bent on the destruction of our country and our planet it seems. They have been accused of living in a bubble but I couldn’t figure out what that bubble was until it came to me. They have reduced life to a world that only exists on a sheet of paper or computer screen, a two dimensional world that is nothing more than a work of fiction. Yet, they worship at this religion and will do so until they kill all of us and they don’t seem to understand that all of us includes them.

I'm just shaking my head at the nonsense coming from some of the right during this latest disaster. Thank heavens, at least Gov. Christie took off his political hat for a change. I just wonder if Boehner, McConnell and company are still going to be blocking and filibustering legislation that is sorely going to be needed to rebuild the eastern part of our country after this unseasonal hurricane, but most of all will they even admit that global climate change is a reality and do something about it?

Cleita