“It’s complicated.”
Whether hearing that two-word phrase from a friend or relative trying to avoid talking about a toxic relationship or a paid consultant hired by the county board to solve the housing crisis, it always offends my senses. “It’s complicated” is just an easy way to avoid the pain of accountability for whatever situation the speaker means to obscure. Whatever the problem, uttering “it’s complicated” is a way to demean others and avoid real solutions. Because real solutions are hard–not because solutions are complicated, but because real solutions upset someone’s apple cart.
Bringing real solutions to our communities’ problems isn’t complicated—it’s just hard. For example, clearing snow requires shoveling; it’s basic and clear, but it takes effort. The difficulty lies not in the complexity, but in the hard work we must do to reach solutions.
Of course, no one is offended by your hard work with the snow shovel. Usually, you can bet that someone will be impacted and offended when solutions to real problems hit home. But that doesn’t mean living with a problem because its solution troubles someone else, yet that is what we do.
When our little family first relocated to Cook County in 1995, two public policy issues at the forefront were hindering growth. The lack of safe, adequate, and affordable housing and the lack of enough workers to fill available jobs. Both issues were front and center when we came back in 2017.
The reality, of course, is that sometimes, problems can’t be resolved. Citizens in rural communities, like a 5,000-person county with a tourist-based economy, surrounded by an inland sea and Canada to the north, can’t have everything that a larger community with a diverse economic base can have. It takes a certain amount of wisdom from lived experience to accept that reality.
Two other factors contribute to our inability to really solve problems, smothered by the blanket of “It’s complicated.” Perfection and Whataboutism.
If a proposed solution doesn’t cure every problem, we dismiss it as “too complex to implement.”
We avoid positive progress because it’s not the unattainable “perfect solution.” And as our communities define and debate problems, solutions are dismissed when someone pipes up, “What about…?” Whataboutism often pits one town or demographic against another. If a solution helps permanent residents, seasonal property owners, and business owners cry, “What about us?” Momentum toward a solution stops, the problem simmers on the back burner for a year or two, and will flare up again when officials say, “We tried that once, and it didn’t work. It’s complicated.”
As my mom used to say, “Common sense just isn’t common anymore.” Problems are easy to identify, like when you see half a foot of snow on the porch. The solution, shoveling, just needs to be done. Simple, but hard work. It’s not complicated.
On a broader scale, think about how many times you’ve heard that term limits would make Congress more effective, if not more efficient, by limiting how long an individual can serve. I can think of many reasons that’s not the best solution to Congress’s problems. A less draconian solution might just be mandatory retirement age limits. Commercial airline pilots must retire at 65.
Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley, 92, has served in the US Senate for 51 years. He’s filed paperwork to run for reelection in 2028. If he wins, he’ll be 100 at the end of the next term. He’s got more than 20 years on me, and I can tell you I’d be fairly useless in Congress.
The current Congress is one of the oldest in American history. Almost a quarter of the combined House and Senate membership is 70 or older. There are 33 Senators and 84 House members my age or older.
Mandatory retirement is a simple solution that would require hard work. Whatabout our favorites, like Bernie Sanders or Chuck Grassley? None of them will go quietly, of course, but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t.
Let’s try an easier one. Partisan gerrymandering is the practice of redrawing electoral district boundaries to give one political party or group an unfair advantage over others. This has led to only about 10% of House districts being considered true election “battlegrounds.” Take gerrymandering away from partisan hacks, and create simpler districts with a 50/50 split of voters. Come to think of it, you wouldn’t need mandatory retirement if we, the people, were allowed to select our representatives.
Kills two birds with one simple stone.
The shovel is leaning against the porch. We don’t need a consultant to tell us how to move snow with it; we just need to pick it up and shovel.
