I originally wrote this on Facebook on October 13th, 2016. I recall what I felt strongly then and what I still feel strongly now: what happened on November 8th is not nearly as important what happened leading up to it. Our nation remains at a pivotal moment.
Rudy Giuliani said at this year's Republican Convention: "There is no next election. This is it." I disagree. It is, without a doubt, of profound significance who wins this upcoming presidential election. However, although predicting the future is dangerous game, I think we will look back at 2016 as not the end but the beginning of an exceptionally turbulent period in American history.
Since I have been old enough to follow American politics, I have witnessed a political system fueled primarily by animosity. Conventional wisdom about the value of winning undecided voters was replaced by an emphasis on mobilizing bases, accomplished by painting the opposition with absurd hyperbole. It turned out that it was much easier to sell the American public on hating an ideology rather than liking one. So election after election, fundraising pleas and voter mobilization was conducted by selling the idea that the opposition was going to destroy the country.
The strategy worked too well. Both parties ended up with a voter base that, above all, hated the other party. The number of supposed "independents" grew, but what those voters really represented was a class of voters who didn't really believe in one party's ideology, but who would NEVER consider voting for the other.For a time, the situation was stable, even in the face of plummeting approval of government. Particularly at the lower levels of government, the nomination was controlled by the party faithful. Nominate a candidate acceptable to the party elites, demonize the opponent (better yet, demonize the whole party of the opponent), get elected, rinse and repeat.
The Republican Party started to fracture first, with establishment favorites falling to "Tea Party" challengers, reaching a dramatic crescendo in 2014 when sitting House Majority Leader Eric Cantor lost the primary for Virginia's 7th district (the district I voted in for the first time in 2008, incidentally). But the party hung together by embracing rather than disavowing the upstart movement.
Then, in this election cycle, on both sides, we saw a presidential nomination process that did not look at all like what had come before. The Democratic Party elite had, before the nomination process even started, coalesced and unified behind a preferred candidate, a longtime party elder. It was, frankly, a startling and nearly unprecedented display of party unity. Then, even more shocking, despite the unwavering support of the party elite, a large number of actual voters fought desperately to nominate an unlikely candidate instead, and came much closer than I would have imagined to succeeding.
On the Republican side, the winner of the primary process espoused views that bore little resemblance to the historic ideals of the party. As they had before, the party largely moved to embrace the upstart nominee, even if they cringed while doing so. Granted, an unusual number of party leaders either expressed their disapproval or, even more strikingly, openly refused to endorse the nominee, but at least at first, the vast majority seemed to fall in line. Then, a month out from the election, in unprecedented numbers, officials in high office decided they had enough and abandoned the cause, in some cases announcing their disavowal of their party's nominee to a literal chorus of boos at their own rallies. And though the nominee was clearly wounded in the polls, the fact remains that he will most likely garner over 40% the vote (and still stands a non-negligible chance of winning the election) even though an astounding chunk of his own party's prominent elected officials have denounced him.And so, as we hurtle toward this very unprecedented election, this is where we stand: a huge chunk of voters are going to show up at the polls, not to vote for someone, but to vote against someone. Regardless of who wins, more citizens will view their president unfavorably rather than favorably. The party elite find themselves not with compliant voters but with bucking cannons that can scarcely be aimed in a general direction.I do not know what comes next, but I do think we are at a fork. I believe our democracy is fundamentally unstable. I believe, eventually, if the idea of government by the people is to survive, the people must unite to rebuild it. Unfortunately, the lesson I take from history is that a nation that cannot accept its present and cannot agree on its future is headed for an ugly era, even uglier than we have already seen. I suspect, for as remarkable and unsightly as our current state is, our politics are more likely to get worse, not better, over the short run.
I also believe that it is rare and unlikely for long term change to occur from the top down. For all the focus and fervor on the presidential candidates, enduring revolutions usually start on the ground, in local elections and immediate politics. The modern American populace is barely aware of elections for its federal Congressional representatives, to say nothing of its state legislature. If we hope to build a better future, then those are battlegrounds that matter.
I end with this: November 8th is coming. It will matter. But after that comes November 9th, and none of the underlying issues that lead us to this point will yet be resolved. I hope we will learn to be wiser than we are now. I hope we will learn that a representative government demands more of us than fury once every four years. I hope we devote ourselves to the constant work of building and maintaining our society. I hope that we come to recognize how little we know and how much we have to learn, and we keep our hearts and minds open to new ideas and viewpoints. I hope we are a very a different people than we have been to this point. And if we do fail to do better than we have, then I hope I am wrong about the consequences.
Rudy Giuliani said at this year's Republican Convention: "There is no next election. This is it." I disagree. It is, without a doubt, of profound significance who wins this upcoming presidential election. However, although predicting the future is dangerous game, I think we will look back at 2016 as not the end but the beginning of an exceptionally turbulent period in American history.
Since I have been old enough to follow American politics, I have witnessed a political system fueled primarily by animosity. Conventional wisdom about the value of winning undecided voters was replaced by an emphasis on mobilizing bases, accomplished by painting the opposition with absurd hyperbole. It turned out that it was much easier to sell the American public on hating an ideology rather than liking one. So election after election, fundraising pleas and voter mobilization was conducted by selling the idea that the opposition was going to destroy the country.
The strategy worked too well. Both parties ended up with a voter base that, above all, hated the other party. The number of supposed "independents" grew, but what those voters really represented was a class of voters who didn't really believe in one party's ideology, but who would NEVER consider voting for the other.For a time, the situation was stable, even in the face of plummeting approval of government. Particularly at the lower levels of government, the nomination was controlled by the party faithful. Nominate a candidate acceptable to the party elites, demonize the opponent (better yet, demonize the whole party of the opponent), get elected, rinse and repeat.
The Republican Party started to fracture first, with establishment favorites falling to "Tea Party" challengers, reaching a dramatic crescendo in 2014 when sitting House Majority Leader Eric Cantor lost the primary for Virginia's 7th district (the district I voted in for the first time in 2008, incidentally). But the party hung together by embracing rather than disavowing the upstart movement.
Then, in this election cycle, on both sides, we saw a presidential nomination process that did not look at all like what had come before. The Democratic Party elite had, before the nomination process even started, coalesced and unified behind a preferred candidate, a longtime party elder. It was, frankly, a startling and nearly unprecedented display of party unity. Then, even more shocking, despite the unwavering support of the party elite, a large number of actual voters fought desperately to nominate an unlikely candidate instead, and came much closer than I would have imagined to succeeding.
On the Republican side, the winner of the primary process espoused views that bore little resemblance to the historic ideals of the party. As they had before, the party largely moved to embrace the upstart nominee, even if they cringed while doing so. Granted, an unusual number of party leaders either expressed their disapproval or, even more strikingly, openly refused to endorse the nominee, but at least at first, the vast majority seemed to fall in line. Then, a month out from the election, in unprecedented numbers, officials in high office decided they had enough and abandoned the cause, in some cases announcing their disavowal of their party's nominee to a literal chorus of boos at their own rallies. And though the nominee was clearly wounded in the polls, the fact remains that he will most likely garner over 40% the vote (and still stands a non-negligible chance of winning the election) even though an astounding chunk of his own party's prominent elected officials have denounced him.And so, as we hurtle toward this very unprecedented election, this is where we stand: a huge chunk of voters are going to show up at the polls, not to vote for someone, but to vote against someone. Regardless of who wins, more citizens will view their president unfavorably rather than favorably. The party elite find themselves not with compliant voters but with bucking cannons that can scarcely be aimed in a general direction.I do not know what comes next, but I do think we are at a fork. I believe our democracy is fundamentally unstable. I believe, eventually, if the idea of government by the people is to survive, the people must unite to rebuild it. Unfortunately, the lesson I take from history is that a nation that cannot accept its present and cannot agree on its future is headed for an ugly era, even uglier than we have already seen. I suspect, for as remarkable and unsightly as our current state is, our politics are more likely to get worse, not better, over the short run.
I also believe that it is rare and unlikely for long term change to occur from the top down. For all the focus and fervor on the presidential candidates, enduring revolutions usually start on the ground, in local elections and immediate politics. The modern American populace is barely aware of elections for its federal Congressional representatives, to say nothing of its state legislature. If we hope to build a better future, then those are battlegrounds that matter.
I end with this: November 8th is coming. It will matter. But after that comes November 9th, and none of the underlying issues that lead us to this point will yet be resolved. I hope we will learn to be wiser than we are now. I hope we will learn that a representative government demands more of us than fury once every four years. I hope we devote ourselves to the constant work of building and maintaining our society. I hope that we come to recognize how little we know and how much we have to learn, and we keep our hearts and minds open to new ideas and viewpoints. I hope we are a very a different people than we have been to this point. And if we do fail to do better than we have, then I hope I am wrong about the consequences.
No comments:
Post a Comment