Ideology vs. Outcomes

In a column about the difficulties the Republicans find themselves in, Mike Rosen asserts:

Two-thirds of voters may reliably support either Republican or Democratic candidates, but the other third goes either way. Most of them have no loyalty to parties, coalitions or philosophies. They just want nice outcomes and they want them now! And it's they who decide elections. When the party in power can't deliver, they try the other party.

To make sure we fully understand what regard he holds these members of the electorate, Rosen later refers to them as “discontented, gullible swing voters.”

But I have to ask, what’s so wrong with caring more about outcomes than ideology? Most Americans just want a functioning government that manages the economy well, that provides reliable services and that keeps us safe. Does it really matter if those ends are achieved through big government liberalism or small government conservativism? To a lot of people, it doesn’t.

Ideologues believe their way is the only acceptable way. If they fail, it’s a matter of internal corruption (we’re not conservative/liberal enough!) or external perfidy (the conservatives/liberals are deceiving the voters!). Somehow this is supposed to be a wiser approach than simply voting for whoever has the idea that seems most likely to work right now.

There’s room for ideology in politics. In fact, it’s essential to the development of grand ideas. However, there’s just as much room for (and legitimacy to) voting based on which candidate or party will most competently manage the government. Sneering at swing-voters for not “getting it” is just puerile. If that’s the best conservatives like Rosen can do then they are headed for quite the defeat.

It's About Neo-Fascism not Liberal Fascism

Jonah Goldberg, author of the provocative new book Liberal Fascism is upset at how his book has been received. He believes most critics are missing his main point which is:

[T]o the extent that fascism of any kind will come to America, it will do so in the guise of something "progressive." Indeed, American progressives, particularly before Hitler arrived on the scene in the 1930s, were openly sympathetic to Italian fascism. This isn't to say they copied it (or the fascism of Soviet Russia), as many claim. But rather that the ideas that gave birth to and fueled American progressivism -- philosophical pragmatism, Bismarckian "top-down socialism," Marxism, eugenics and more -- share common intellectual sources and impulses with those that gave us both socialism and fascism.

Mainly Goldberg just seems pissed off that “fascism” has come to be applied nearly exclusively to politicians and ideas on the right/Republican side of the spectrum. He wants to show that the roots of fascism can be traced to leftist ideology. Great. Fine. Except, as Callimachus at Done With Mirrors points out in an excellent essay on the subject, Goldberg’s whole premise rests on a faulty notion of the political spectrum and lacks a workable definition of fascism.

The political alignment of the mid-20th century called fascism was primarily a reaction to communism. Unsurprisingly, the two most prominent targets of communists, capitalists and religious figures, made up the initial fascists. What transformed fascism from a reactionary position into a political movement was the addition of other more complex concepts and urges involving cults of personality and notions of cultural purity.

In Italy, a hubristic nationalism took hold. In Germany, anti-Semitism and Aryan primacy became prominent. Both nations also undertook expansionist agendas which had as much to do with Europe’s historical power struggles as with the fascist ideology. These aspects, more so than the anti-communist base of fascism, are why “fascist” became synonymous with evil. The tag ultimately became associated with the political right because fascism was erroneously seen as the opposite of communism.

The problem with all this is, the words fascist and fascism have lost any clear definition. Those on the left hurl it at those on the right most often to mean “policies which suppress individual freedom for the advancement of the military/industrial/religious complex.” Fascism has come to be associated with anything that helps the powerful stay in power or even anything that helps the Republicans win elections.

However, if we strip fascism of historical context and see it as an action rather than an ideology, we could give it a contemporary meaning such as: any political policy which suppresses personal liberty in order to achieve a higher cultural, nationalistic or societal goal. Neither liberalism nor conservativism as practiced in America are inherently suppressive. However, I could easily identify neo-fascist elements on both sides from hate-speech laws to warrantless wiretapping, from gun control to abortion restrictions.

In this definition, fascist does not have to mean evil or even wrong – but it is still worthy of great suspicion. A fascist policy is one that restrains the liberty of the individual. Whether that restraint is acceptable is a case-by-case debate. But the more a nation suppresses individual liberty the more fascist it becomes so that, ultimately, fascism would be nothing more than an intellectually complex justification for authoritarianism.

A truly fascinating book might examine the historical context of fascism and then explore how the neo-fascist elements of our society are affecting our concepts and practice of freedom. One could get a lot of licks in at both the right and the left. Unfortunately, Goldberg seems more inclined to focus exclusively on delegitimizing the left. He shouldn’t wonder why he’s received such a harsh reaction. The book is positioned as an attack piece and whatever honest scholarship certainly exists is washed away by the book’s overall presumption that liberalism is to blame for a historically destructive ideology.

There’s a lot of good reasons to discuss fascism in both a historical and contemporary context. Goldberg’s book doesn’t seem up to the task but maybe it’ll still spur some great debates.

Katrina and a Burden Not Shared

Two years after Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans is far from recovered. The reasons for this are long and twisted and blame—where blame is due—can be spread far. But there is one failing I want to focus on, because it may just be the biggest failing of all: our collapsing sense of shared burden.

After the hurricane hit, I was outraged at how many conservatives turned the blame away from the government and onto the people who had stayed behind – even as those people were still suffering. The cold-heartedness was sickening. If a man who cannot swim jumps into a river, is the moral response to lecture him from the shore about his decision-making? Or do you jump in to save him? Apparently, the answer is unclear to many.

And that is the conservative contribution to our collapsing sense of shared burden – this belief that anyone who does not pull themselves up by their own bootstraps is unworthy of compassion. We witnessed it in the immediate aftermath and we’ve seen it again and again in the less-than-robust rebuilding efforts. I may have a fair number of rightward opinions but I do not consider myself a “conservative” primarily because I cannot abide by the ideology’s coldhearted strain.

Unfortunately, it’s too easy to look at the pain still gripping New Orleans and blame the whole mess on conservatives. Too many liberals now exist in a cold, us-against-them mindset that breeds contempt for their fellow Americans while inflating their own sense of righteousness. Liberals may be better positioned to show compassion towards New Orleans but how can they marshal the will of the people when they think so little of so many in this nation?

These are sweeping judgments, sure, but the truth is in there. I believe each of us as individuals has the desire to help our fellow men and women. But we are ineffective as individuals. What we need is a national movement. But national movements cannot spring from the two ideological strains currently in power. Both care far more about themselves than about those outside their fold.

Now some might argue we’ve never much had a sense of shared burden – I imagine black Americans do not see the neglect after Katrina as deviating from any previous trends. But the idea of a shared burden is, I believe, a cornerstone of a civil and democratic society. If we cannot rise up and heal our fellow citizens in their times of crisis then what point is there to being an indivisible nation?

I have faith that New Orleans will revive—that the spirit of individuals and small groups will triumph. But I despair that we have not done more, faster. This was an opportunity for us to remind ourselves of what grand achievements we are capable. We failed—and that’s in no small part because our leaders failed to marshal us.

Are Wedge Issues a Result of Our Prosperity?

There’s a new Census Bureau report out that measures everything from television ownership to how safe we Americans feel in our homes. The news? Exceedingly good.

The vast number of Americans not only have numerous conveniences (98.8% have a television, 84.7% have a washing machine, 84.6% have air conditioning, 63.1% have a computer) but a great number of us feel pretty safe (92.8% of us feel safe in our homes). Across regions and income levels and ethnicities, Americans have a greater sense of wellbeing now than they did when the study was last conducted in 1992.

Is this why so-called wedge issues play so well these days? Think about it. If most of us are living a pretty good life, what do we want our government to change? We’re not focused on getting food on the table or even getting a television set in our living room. So we focus on more abstract pursuits—matters of morality and culture and what kind of nation we wish to be.

As divisive as abortion or gay marriage may be, they are matters only a well-fed nation would take up passionately. Even the protests over the Iraq war, as deadly serious as that conflict is, are only possible because most of us don’t have to worry about issues closer to home. After all, without a draft or even so much as a wartime tax increase, the Iraq war does not affect many of us on a personal level. Protest of that war is primarily a matter of morality. The anti-war crowd, just like the anti-abortion crowd, wants America to adopt a different ethical course.

This isn’t to say there aren’t closer-to-home issues that need addressing. Our dysfunctional healthcare system weighs heavily on us all. Our convoluted tax code is a national nightmare. Our educational system is not adequately geared for the challenges of the future. But those are deeply complex matters that ignite more headaches than they do anger. There is no simplicity there. No “marriage is between a man and a woman” or “no blood for oil” rhetoric that’s available.

The fact that we as a people are so well off is something to be celebrated. And the fact that we are using our free time to pursue issues of national character and morality is not a bad thing. But eventually we need marshal our collective energies to do more than bicker in blacks and whites. We need some time spent tackling those deeply grey problems.

A nation this well off is certainly capable of anything.

"Liberal vs. Conservative" Misstates the Conflict

In response to Dennis Sander’s call for a conservative Euston Manifesto, Callimachus declares that there cannot be such a manifesto because there are no conservatives. We are all liberals now.

I completely agree that liberalism is the vastly dominant ideology of America and the rest of the West. George Bush, for all the spite he generates from the left, is a liberal. After all, only a liberal would believe so completely in mankind’s inalienable right to freedom. Only a liberal would try so forcefully to change the world.

Liberalism is the American philosophy. We yearn for change. Yes, there is and has always been an element of “let’s keep it the way it’s always been,” but from the loyalists to the segregationists, those people have continually ended up on the losing side of history. So, yes, Callimachus is right, we’re all pretty much liberals in the grand definition of liberalism.

But I think Callimachus is mistaken when he says the dichotomy has collapsed and, to paraphrase, we’re all just factions of the same philosophy fighting it out in the mud pits. The dichotomy is not and hasn’t for a long time been liberal vs. conservative. The dichotomy is collectivist vs. individualist. And that conflict is alive and well.

Why is there an odd convergence of rhetoric between many Western liberals and radical Islamists? Well, for one, both ideologies are fundamentally collectivist, believing in the community as superior to the individual. How about the American Right and Evangelical Christians? Both are fundamentally individualistic, whether it’s focusing on one’s personal relationship with God over community ritual or focusing on the free market over government control.

As with all labeling attempts, it’s impossible to put any one person 100% into any one category. But I think we are very much in a period where those who primarily desire a collectivist culture (whether that culture is based on Islam or socialist-tinged democracy) are facing off with those who primarily desire an individualistic culture.

One could easily argue that multi-culturalism is a modern addition to collectivist theory, a natural extension of the belief that we’re all better off the more we shun hierarchy and incorporate our whole community into one equal group. And one could also argue that much of the War on Terror is a product of the individualistic desire to place the protection of one’s own interests and livelihood above all other concerns.

Sure, you could pick this viewpoint apart, but there is truth at the bottom. I could go on and on with examples of collectivism on the left versus individualism on the right. But this is a blog post and brevity must be served.

I will conclude with the thought that there need not be such intense conflict in this dichotomy. Both collectivism and individualism have much to offer. Perhaps the struggle of our times is to find a way to balance the two without, in the process, sacrificing our greater liberal principles.

Red vs. Blue Divide Not as Clear as Many Think

One of the reasons Democrats lost power in 1994 was that they lost the South. Now it appears that Republicans have just as completely lost New England. You would think that in a very mobile, highly connected society such as modern America, regional political divides would not be so sharp. And, you know what? They aren’t. It’s a mirage.

If you actually look at the maps and data from this election you’ll see a lot of red and blue mingling. If there’s any clear divide, it’s between urban areas and rural areas. But even that division is misleading. Delve into the specific votes from state-to-state and county-to-county and even the bluest blue states and the redest red states reveal there is much less than 100% unanimity. In fact, in even the least competitive districts, it’s unusual for a candidate to win with more than 70-75% of the vote. That’s a huge advantage to be sure, but 25% dissent is still very meaningful.

Furthermore, if you look at the key competitive races this year, the winners very rarely tallied more than 55%-60% of the vote. Clearly, the sharp divisions we think we see are actually statistical illusions created by our winner-takes-all, two-party system.

The media latches onto the simplistic analysis of blue vs. red because, well, the media trades in the unsophisticated and feeds on conflict. Politicians in turn exploit the blue vs. red because it provides them an easy us vs. them narrative. And we the people buy into it because we’re human and have a natural attraction to easy-to-understand patterns with clear divides.

I know I’m not making a new observation here—but I think it’s one that needs to be reinforced after the recent election. We shifted from a Republican Congress to a Democratic Congress not because of a tidal shift in public opinion but because just about 10-15% of us changed our minds. That’s a small percentage of the populous and Democrats should not mistake their win as anything more than a very cautious, narrow mandate – the identical kind of cautious, narrow mandate President Bush mistook for a sweeping validation of his agenda. And you see where Bush’s misreading of the electorate has gotten him.

Both parties and all us pundits (amateur and overpaid alike) should try harder to recognize the complexity within American political opinion. We need to avoid such simplistic storylines as “Democrats own New England” or “Republicans own the South.” Even if those analyses appear true, they’re actually quite inaccurate. The political divides in this nation are far more complex and individualistic than they once were and it’s unhelpful to pretend otherwise.

The Blogosphere Could be in for a Change

The blogosphere has never existed in a time of divided government. In this on-line world’s short history, the Republicans have always controlled Congress and the Presidency. Now things will be different. And how will the blogosphere react?

I’m sure partisanship will be just as strident as ever, but some attitudes will naturally change. Let’s start on the left. The impotent anger so often seen in many blogs now has an outlet. Their party has real power and the bloggers can no longer just criticize. They will have to defend important decisions Democrats make. They will have to explain why certain objectives cannot be reached and why some goals are not important enough for the Democrats to even try to achieve. The answer can no longer be that it’s all the Republican’s fault. Their side will have responsibility for failure too.

Some left bloggers will no doubt take to the changed landscape well. I actually expect Daily Kos to surprise us and become a more sophisticated site. The site leaders learned a lot about politics this last election cycle and they are heavily invested in the Democrats, so I can see the site shifting away from the “Bush lied!” mode of communication and becoming more politically and culturally mainstream.

Other sites will likely be unable to adjust or will simply ignore the Democrats’ success, choosing to continue blaming Bush for every ill. Others I expect will show their true colors, revealing themselves to be not just anti-Republican sites but true radicals who will not be appeased by the Democratic agenda.

All said, I expect the left blogosphere to divide between Democrat partisan sites, true far-left sites and sites where people want to do little more than scream.

On the right, this election should end much of the dripping superiority so often evident in conservative blogs. The Democrats proved they aren’t irrelevant and the right can no longer pretend it has possession of all true and good American ideals. Well, they can still pretend and I imagine a few will, acting like this Democratic Congress is just a bizarre little hiccup in the inevitable 1000-year reign of the right.

However, many other sites will splinter apart as each tries to push the Republican party in their preferred direction—whether that be neocon, theocon, pro-business, anti-immigration or what have you. For the most part, the rightwing blogs have been unified in their defense of the Republican Party. Now, while I still expect partisanship, I also expect more independence. Six years of Republican dominance has suppressed a lot of dissent within the party. Much more of that dissent will now be heard.

As for the center? Well, there aren’t many of us and most of us are small fish. Divided government should suit us well. As long as we don’t start thinking the center is more important or powerful than it really is, we should be fine and, hopefully, more relevant.

I really don’t expect sweeping change in the blogosphere. Nor do I expect immediate change. But I do think this on-line world of ours will be a more diverse and sophisticated place – at least until the 2008 election sends everyone scurrying back to their tribe.

The Lefties Are Going to Have to Make Room for the Centrists

Bull Moose’s triumphalism over the Lieberman win is well worth the read. I’m with the Moose. It does my heart good to see the leftwing blogosphere embarrassed by Ned Lamont’s loss. All they succeeded in doing was making their hated foe Joe Lieberman more independent and potentially more powerful. Now that the Senate looks to be so closely divided, Lieberman will often cast decisive votes.

Good work leftwing. Well done. Nothing demonstrates political wisdom and sanity quite like focusing a great deal of your effort and money on taking down a member of your own party.

But, as annoying as was the Ned Lamont campaign, it probably helped the Democrats. The leftwing was so engaged in that race that they didn’t have the manpower or resources to go out and screw up the chances of other Democrats. Lamont was the pretty shiny object that distracted the lefties just enough to allow the more mature members of the Democratic party to stage an historic victory.

Am I too harsh? Too cruel to the Daily Kos’ of America? Maybe. But I won’t be letting up. The Republicans lost not just because of Iraq or a few scandals but because they abandoned much of the center. They thought they could win by just appealing to a narrow base. They were wrong and I don’t want the Democrats to make the same mistake.

The leftwing deserves a voice in the coalition. They just shouldn’t command total control. Those of us in the middle would be wise to make sure Democrats are hearing our voices too. After all, it was independents, not the liberal base, who swung this election for the Democrats.

Olbermann is Not the Cure (The Debate Continues)

When I wrote about Keith Olbermann’s recent commentary concerning the Bush administration, I received a lot of “yeah, but” reaction (I also received some “you’re an idiot” reactions, but I expected that given I was criticizing one of the left’s beloved pundits). What was interesting was how many people were of the opinion that, sure, Olbermann can be over-the-top but that was ok because 1) he isn’t nearly as bad as Limbaugh or O’Reilly and/or 2) his attacks are necessary to restore the balance of things.

As for the first rationale, it matters little to me that Limbaugh and O’Reilly have been far more outrageous than has Olbermann. That’s a matter of degree not kind. I’ve never much gone for the “at least we’re not as bad as our enemy” defense. If something’s wrong, it’s wrong regardless of degree. Sure, Olbermann hasn’t walked down the path as far as has Limbaugh, but he’s still walking the path—and that’s what I criticize.

As for the second rationale, emulating the worst qualities of your opponent is not restoring the balance of things. That’s just dragging us deeper. Yes, politics is a nasty business and those who are uncomfortable getting their hands dirty shouldn’t play the game. But there’s a difference between playing politics and putting on the kinds of performances Olbermann put on in the clip I referenced.

He’s not trying to do the hard work of maintaining support for his side by harshly calling a foul a foul (although he calls a lot of fouls). Nor is he attempting to swing votes by doing the dirty work of smearing his opponents with half-truths and innuendo (although he does smear). What he’s doing is preaching directly and only to the proverbial choir.

Anyone who is not on the left would be completely turned off by Olbermann’s rant because it’s so over-the-top. He has no intention to change minds through either truth or trickery. His intent is to increase the outrage among those who are already angry. Just the way Limbaugh and O’Reilly do. These guys don’t add to the debate. They’re focused primarily on strengthening their side by keeping the anger burning. After all, angry people don’t base their opinions on considered thought or empirical evidence. They base their opinions and votes on raw emotion. And emotionally charged bases make it easy for the parties to eschew substance and ignore the rest of us.

A lot of people are upset at the Bush administration. They should be. I know I am. But fighting back doesn’t mean increasing the anger. There is only so much outrage a democracy can contain. Simply being a good little citizen and voting is not a very satisfactory outlet when you’re overly angry. People want to do more. But when it comes to “doing more,” angry people rarely help the situation.

Now, I’m not opposed to anger—that’s a normal human emotion. The problem comes when that anger is inflamed. These pundits exploit people’s anger to boost the intensity of their party’s side. No one’s mind is changed. No one is informed of newly relevant facts or given newly useful insights. They are simply given new reasons to become angrier.

In his rant, Olbermann may seem to be giving voice to the people (I’m sure Limbaugh’s listeners argue the same) but what I see is a guy turning up the heat at a time when we’re already overheated. There are more useful ways to fight back. There are ways to win converts rather than just energize those already on your side.

Forgive me if my opinion seems naïve or “amateurish” (as one person claimed). But Olbermann’s rants are not the cure. They’re just the same poison in a different vein.

The Left's Limbaugh

A surprising number of people have sent me links to this Keith Olbermann commentary that is one part defense of John Kerry and four parts skewering of President Bush. I suppose the fascination with this video is Olbermann’s seething outrage and rhetorical gymnastics. No one who sent this to me quite knew what to make of it, but they all kind of wanted to like it.

I will say up front that I don’t like Olbermann, just as I don’t like Bill O’Reilly or Rush Limbaugh (Olbermann's inverted doppelgangers on the right). At their best, they are harmless windbags, but at their worst they are the band leaders of partisan spite and anger. These newsmen/pundits are the manufacturers of outrage, the knives dividing America.

This commentary by Olbermann, which has a few good points, is rotten at its core. In about eleven minutes of commentary, Olbermann manages to touch upon every failing of the Bush administration and make them sound like a coordinated, well-executed attempt to destroy the Republic. He speaks quickly and plays loose with logic. In the moment, it all sounds splendidly rousing—as if it someone is finally putting into words all that is bothersome with the Bush presidency.

But the speech is ultimately hollow, hung upon careless hyperbole and overwrought angst. It is, like so much of what these newsmen/pundits say, fast food oratory—tasty but unfilling and unhealthy to ingest. Because, really, Olbermann doesn’t have a point outside of the basic “Bush is a lying incompetent” refrain repeated ad nauseam by his critics. The rest is window dressing meant to incite rather than inform.

And that’s the problem. Olbermann incites and then signs off, leaving sympathetic listeners filled with outrage but possessing no outlet. He doesn’t ask anything of his viewers except for them to be angry. And where does this anger go? Hard to know. But it is rare that anger is well-focused. And rarer still that it helps heal rifts or solve problems.

I’m sure there are those who are glad Olbermann is around—he really is the first leftwinger who can match the oratorical skills of the Limbaugh’s and O’Reilly’s. But he also matches their self-indulgence, their hubris, their false outrage and their divisiveness. Americans listen to these guys because they appear to be speaking a beautiful truth. But they are merely modern day sirens luring us onto the rocks.