Day 84 – Real Leadership

*The two other people in the photo are unnamed and as far as we know are currently residing in El Salvador.

Sunday,April 13, 2025

We were watching the Dave Letterman interview show last night. His guest was Caitlin Clark. I never cared for Letterman on the Tonight Show because his brand of humor was to make fun of people and that is really putting them down, but on this show he doesn’t do that. He’s a pretty good interviewer.

The show cuts between various scenes of he and Caitlin doing things. He’s interviewing her in an auditorium setting. They go duckpin bowling. She’s very competitive. He said to her that she has to win. She responded that she wants to win. At one point they are tossing grapes into a glass at the end of the table. She’s winning.. He tosses a grape and it lands on the rim cutting the grape halfway through. “That never happens!” exclaims Dave. “Doesn’t count,” says Caitlin.

In one scene Dave is interviewing her coach from Iowa, Lisa Bluder. “What were some of the things she had to learn?” asked Dave.

“Clock management,”responded Bluder, “ and how to be a leader.” 

Caitlin talked about that in the auditorium interview. She and Bluder both acknowledged that a leader makes everyone around them better. 

And I thought about Donald Trump, has anyone said they were better for being around him?

I’ve heard Mark Cuban say a good business person makes those around him richer. Well, I guess Trump has done that with actions by those around him becoming wealthier by trading on insider information. Not only is the White House a showroom for cars; it’s now a pump and dump stock shop.

I know there’s a book out about Trump entitled, “Everything Trump Touches Turns to Garbage.” or some title akin to that. But making those around him better? No. Never heard that one. Making people grovel. Making them turn on their own principles – yes. Getting them to talk about having sex with someone other than their spouse while their spouse is secretly listening so he can have revenge sex – yes. It’s a kind of making them less. I win because I put you one down. winning by cheating? Yes. Winning by merit? No. I mean have you ever seen a Trump golf match televised? You see him riding around in a golf cart, but never actually hitting a ball. Those who have played with him say he cheats. How did he win golf tournaments you ask? Essentially, no one else was in them. He’s admitted as much. If he buys a golf course he creates a tournament and plays the course. No one else is signed up, because no one else heard  about it. He wins.

I’m not sure I’m completely correct on how he wins tournaments. In checking I found that he has won previous championships where “No one saw him play.” That’s more like it.

I for one would like to see a televised match between him and dear leader Un as in Kim J. (Okay I ghettoed up the North Korean leader’s name.) In a museum in NK there’s an exhibit which display’s Un’s father’s round of golf where he got three holes in one. Remarkable? Not really. Imagine that game? Who would you root for? USA! USA! NK! NK all the way! 

Yeah. Nevermind.

BTW I have it on good authority that Heard Island does get inhabited by humans every once i awhile. They are HAM radio operators who set up a station so that their fellow HAMs (?) can get a hit and record it in their books. To my knowledge, they paid no tariffs to the penguins. That situation may change in my ongoing negotiations with the White House. McDonald Island? Yeah. They ain’t playing ball. No hits. No news. Nothing. They are nasty penguins over there.