Ace notes that progressives and Republicans view the Republican base in the same way: as a bunch of ignorant children, to whit, who must not be reasoned with but told calming lies. He finds this infuriating, even though he himself shares many of the progressive positions that the elected officials are pursuing.
This is all true. The only reason the Republican party does as well with its base as it does is that it lies to them, whereas the Democratic party has largely stopped concealing its outright contempt for them. This is one reason I hope for a strong Jim Webb candidacy: among Democrats these days, he has a rare interest in the kind of men who built this country, and among politicians in general, an even rarer sincerity. He appreciates them, their cultures and their values.
Of the likely Republican candidates, the one who is far and away the most impressive in his sincerity and respect for traditional values is Dr. Ben Carson. Most of the press I've seen about his possible candidacy suggests that he is very widely respected as a human being and a neurosurgeon, though a political neophyte; The Weekly Standard goes further, and says that if he can pull off a primary victory, he'd be very hard to defeat in the general election.
If nominated, can Carson beat Hillary Clinton or another Democrat? Yes he can. Giles thinks Carson can win 25 percent to 40 percent of the black vote. Williams is doubtful. But Robinson, the draft-Ben leader, says he has “run the numbers” and found that Carson would easily win with 17 percent of the black vote in swing states. “At 17 percent, Hillary loses every swing state in the union, and the Roosevelt coalition is effectively destroyed.” That’s an outcome worth thinking about.Carson is barely a Republican, having only registered as one in November (having previously been an independent). But if you're tired of a Republican establishment that lies to you about everything, he may be just the guy for you. He's certainly honest and sincere, and he's led a virtuous life.
My only problem with Ben Carson is his disdain for the Second Amendment. But, I think he's got a healthy respect for the rule of law, and will abide by a Congress that protects Second Amendment rights. So I'm willing to give him a pass on that.
ReplyDeleteThere's another possibility here, though I know no one wants to hear it.
ReplyDeletePoliticians running for office for the first time are generally animated by theories and ideology and an inflated sense of their own important (particularly amusing in Congress where they're just one person among a horde and have very little chance of unilaterally passing or blocking a bill).
They get into office and find out the world isn't so simple as they thought it was and getting that whole loaf isn't going to happen. And they only have one vote out of either 100 or 400-something.
The best of them try to figure out how to get as much of the loaf as they possibly can, and they do this by negotiating away lower priority items for higher priority ones.
But voters (and bloggers) don't want to hear that. They want that whole loaf DAMMITALL!!! They were promised a whole loaf! And even if the whole loaf isn't there for the taking, they don't want to hear a bunch of defeatist talk about reality and partial loaves and one Congresscritter, one vote :p
I have heard many people online say that they don't actually want to hear the truth - they want politicians to tell them their beliefs are shared passionately.
And we wonder at the outcome?
Ben Carson seems like a fine fellow. I agree with him on many issues. The problem is, he has no experience with running an organization or getting people to go along with him on divisive issues.
ReplyDeleteOn the whole, I prefer Scott Walker. It wasn't easy getting a state legislature to go along with some radical policies, or surviving all the resulting re-election challenges. He has a knack for picking the fight he can win, one that will achieve the most change in the most necessary direction. I can afford to disagree with a guy like that about all kinds of issues, because I know the only issues it's important to agree on are the ones he'll make a priority. A real priority in negotiations and government, that is, not just a priority in his books and speeches.
Like Tex, I prefer Walker, for the same reasons.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I would vote for Carson in the general election over any Democrat.
Cass: But voters (and bloggers) don't want to hear that. They want that whole loaf DAMMITALL!!! They were promised a whole loaf! ...
Well, that's the problem. I agree with your assessment of what happens to young congresscritters, but they don't change their message after they realize the realities. They still promise the whole loaf, knowing they can't deliver.
Cass: I have heard many people online say that they don't actually want to hear the truth - they want politicians to tell them their beliefs are shared passionately.
You and I travel in utterly different circles online. A Venn diagram would be interesting; I suspect this blog, Ace, and Instapundit would form a tiny area of overlap.
The reason I say this again (I've said it in other threads) is, I've never read anyone who wanted to be lied to by politicians. I don't doubt for a moment that you have, but I haven't, and this repeated disjunction between your experience of what people say and mine is really weird for me.
That said, I probably don't read nearly as widely as you do, so that too is where some of the disjunction probably comes from.
ReplyDeleteTom, I'd also vote for Carson in a heartbeat if he were running against Hillary Clinton, obviously. It's hard to imagine a Republican about whom I wouldn't say that, frankly. I've never yet stayed home in a snit.
ReplyDeleteThe problem, I think, is that candidates who change their views once elected and are honest about it are voted out. There's a real penalty to being honest about your change of heart, because voters elected you to pursue a particular slate of policies: if you've ceased to believe in doing that wholeheartedly, they want someone else.
ReplyDeleteThe "DAMITALL" approach to describing this tendency is to fall prey to viewing these voters as irrational or child-like. But really, they're committed to their principles: they want a representative who will do whatever can be done to pursue those principles. If you aren't that guy anymore, thanks, but it's time we elect someone who is.
Tex, Jimbo is a big Walker fan.
Tom, I don't think I've ever heard anyone saying they want to be lied to openly.
ReplyDeleteBut they do say it's a deal killer if a pol won't affirm their beliefs passionately. OK, what does that mean, exactly? Does the politician only have to say, "We share these sacred beliefs?" [wiping away a solemn tear] Is that enough?
Or does he have to say, "We share these sacred beliefs and I'll go to the mat for them every.single.time, even if that means we walk away with nothing when we could have had something?" [pumping fist in the air]
Would you vote for someone like that? I wouldn't. I don't like theatrics. But I've seen bloggers and commenters say that's precisely what they do want :p Someone who make them feel, who can rouse the base.
I don't believe or trust politicians who say they'll never compromise. They're lying, but that seems to be what many folks want to hear nowadays - a pretty lie about a fantasy world that looks nothing like my hometown (Washington DC)
I think I commented somewhere else that many people don't do nuance well. And all of us are furiously angry. I know I am.
As for reading, I check Instapundit most days but wouldn't call myself "a reader". I have fundamental objections to several of the themes he flogs, so I scan for items that interest me and ignore most of the links.
I don't read Ace regularly either, though I think he's one of the smartest writers out there. I can't stomach some of the stuff I've seen there on occasion (not a fan, for instance, of talking about the First Lady using violent porn metaphors). Had someone done that to Laura Bush - and I'm sure it's happened - I'd be disgusted and I'm not any less disgusted to find that on what I'd like to think is the side of the angels :0
I know many guys ignore that stuff or don't even notice it in the first place, though oddly my husband has absolutely no use for it. He's about as far from being a prude as one can imagine (my sense of humor is notably off color, and he laughs at my jokes), but there's such a thing as time and place and he doesn't respect people who talk like that. It's just not necessary too much heat and not enough light.
The "DAMITALL" approach to describing this tendency is to fall prey to viewing these voters as irrational or child-like
ReplyDeleteSome voters ARE irrational or childlike, Grim. Others aren't.
Not a big fan of lumping everyone into the same bin.
Elections aren't really about substance because the vast majority of voters don't want substance. A small number of committed voters do. But they're outnumbered.
That affects candidate behavior. You have to get elected before you can try to change things, and pitching your sales talk to a group too small to elect you isn't a great way to get where you need to be.
Well, not in Congressional districts: gerrymandering means that representatives usually do have to pitch to the committed. There's some of that in statewide elections (even in Georgia), such as for the Senate or a Governorship. But if you're running in the Mighty 9th (R+27), your real competition is anyone who can get to the right of you. And if you're running in the 5th (D+32) you don't have any competition, because you're John Lewis and nobody need even bother to run until you die.
ReplyDeleteSo you pitch your sale to the committed, and then you go to DC and do what? Well, if you're going to be successful, you trade horses, you make deals, you sell out certain things in favor of other things... and then you come back home and claim you would never, ever do that.
After a while, I think this tendency means that successful Congressmen have betrayed their principles and lied about it so often that whatever honor they took with them to DC has been habituated out of them. You become what you practice, after all.
I think this tendency means that successful Congressmen have betrayed their principles and lied about it so often that whatever honor they took with them to DC has been habituated out of them. You become what you practice, after all.
ReplyDeleteThat's a spectacularly cynical view, but you're entitled to it. Of course you've never done the job, so it no doubt seems quite simple from the outside. I've never done the job either, but I doubt it's that simple at all.
Apparently, we should elect honest but unsuccessful (ineffective) men and women because we can thoroughly trust them never to accomplish anything (and if by some miracle they do, that merely proves they're not to be trusted :p). The rest of Congress will either slavishly fall in line behind them and vote the way they do, or inexplicably cease the way things have been done in Washington ... which is little different from the way things are done all over America every day because people rarely give up something for nothing.
How much sense does this make? What allows an "honest" pol to go to DC, never compromise on anything, and still accomplish things unilaterally in a group of 100 or 400+ other Congresscritters?
What allows a President who never offers anything of value to the other side to gain their cooperation?
"Elect me and we'll repeal ObamaCare." (without making any deals)
Truth? Or lie?
Weaknesses are often just strengths unchecked. Conservatives get all purist and furious because they actually have an ideology and some principles. It becomes a "where do you draw the line?" phenomenon. Here's why the numbers often don't add up. The purists sitting out an election are sometimes those who worked really hard for candidates or causes for a few years, but feel betrayed. Figure 25% (I just made that number up out of nothing) of the committed each election who are just not excited and sit out. Two years later, there is overlap, but it's a different 25%.
ReplyDeleteI've said what I think before, which is that we should enforce the 10th Amendment so that these powers devolve to states (and further to localities, as state constitutions permit). Failing that, we should dissolve the Union and form new, smaller Federal governments that align groups of states with agreements on basic questions of what justice entails, or what government should do.
ReplyDeleteThe problem is the concentration of power in the Federal government, which makes it impossible to achieve things without compromising your principles. You'll either succeed or fail in this structure. Failing gets nothing done, but success is corrupting.
The voters aren't doing anything wrong in insisting on electing someone who strongly believes as they do. They aren't wrong in rejecting someone who stops doing this. The system is wrong because it locates so much power in a place where we have so little common ground or agreement on how to proceed. That's what's driving this: we've got a structure whereby the only way to succeed in government is to behave in this way.
You can't have an honest and effective government where the people no longer agree about the most basic questions of justice or right. We need to devolve power to those levels where common values exist, so that you could have a government that is both effective and honest.
Cass,
ReplyDeleteAh, so it's your interpretation, based on what they say and how they act. That makes more sense to me. That also makes some of our past disagreements more understandable as well. Sometimes I am just too literal minded.
Ace of Spades offends me at times, and there've been times where I've had to take a month or so off from it, but there's enough variety and enough good thinking there that I go back.
Instapundit makes me roll my eyes sometimes, but he comes up with interesting stuff pretty often.
Both make me laugh, which is necessary given the overwhelmingly negative way I feel about the current state of the nation.
The problem is the concentration of power in the Federal government, which makes it impossible to achieve things without compromising your principles. You'll either succeed or fail in this structure. Failing gets nothing done, but success is corrupting.
ReplyDeleteYep.
In thinking about passion, my interpretation is that people often use passion as a gauge for commitment to doing everything one can to achieve what one promises.
ReplyDeleteI actually think everyone knows we will have to compromise. The issue is that there is a perception that Republican politicians frequently use that fact as an excuse to give away a LOT more than they must. Or, to put it another way, Republican politicians seem to actually agree with Democrats, and the real compromises they make are with the base: How little can I give Republican voters and still get re-elected?
In some sense, then, passion becomes a stand-in for sincerity. Maybe a better interpretation is that people believe it's difficult to lie passionately.
Another reason people want someone who can get people emotional about something (AKA, someone who can motivate potential voters) is that it seems like that's what you have to do to win elections, and they want someone who can win. So, it's political strategy.
I don't interpret either of these as wanting to be lied to, which is a fairly cynical interpretation.
Even though I've read bloggers and heard voters clamor for "No compromise!", my interpretation is actually that what most of us want is representatives who will do their absolute best to deliver on their promises.