Famed author and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin who has given us so many great movie and television stories coined the phrase, "decisions are made by those who show up", in an episode of The West Wing. In a world with so many distractions and so many conflicting sources of information and misinformation the concept of showing up is critically important. Many of us I fear, have come to believe that just having a casual, passing familiarity with the events that touch our lives is enough. We tend to let the post on Facebook or the news alert on our cell phone be our touch-point in the hectic, over stimulating culture we live in. We find ourselves rushing from one place to another to drop off the kids, or attend that meeting, make it to that charity event, arrange to do that overtime, or squeeze in a few moments for ourselves for a workout or read a few pages for pleasure. In the rush to make it to those things we forget how vitally important it is to be there, not just get there. That experience makes Aaron Sorkin's prophetic and pragmatic line all the more important. So often, when important things are at stake- only those who show up decide.
Those words rang jarringly true very last week when this country held an election. Decisions were made by those who showed up. The problem with that election was that only about one in three voters showed up. Naturally the victors crowed that that they had won a great victory. They claimed the result of the election provided a clear message that their side was right. As I go though the rest of this essay I'm going to be discussing some the issues and factors concerning that election. I'm going to be mentioning some FACTS and some OPINIONS. For emphasis I'm going clearly label them as one or the other by using capital letters. I do this because the confusion between FACTS and OPINIONS played a big role in the last election.
Let me start by saying that, in my OPINION, the Republicans did not win. If they won (as they now boast) I'm unable to find anything they won on. In FACT, there was no Republican national vision for the country. In FACT, there was no cohesive group putting forth an agenda for the future. In FACT, there was no Republican candidate with a clear plan for Health Care, the Economy, the VA problems, Wages, Immigration Policy, Trade Policy, Foreign Policy, Military Policy, Tax Policy, Farm Policy, Transportation Policy, or any other major area of government endeavor. If I've missed any of those facts, please enlighten me.What I saw, was in FACT, Republicans just saying that the President was a bad President- even when the FACTS don't support that position. In my OPINION, the real winners were apathy and discontent. If Republicans insist it was a victory, then it is surely a hallow victory devoid any promise for the country. It is true that Republicans will get their seats in the next Congress and control the House and the Senate- but let's not call it a huge mandate for them when two out of three voters decided to sit this one out.
The FACT that only one third of the electorate showed up ought to be a matter of great concern to all of us, regardless of the outcome. The rate of voter turnout in the last mid-term was the lowest in the US since 1942. That is something to worry about- and something to investigate. I'm repeating some OPINIONS I've head elsewhere, but I have to agree that we have two electorates in this country. There is the electorate that comes out for Presidential year elections that is much broader, more diverse and actually more representative of the country; and, we have the mid-term electorate that is older, whiter, and wealthier than the Presidential year electorate. In FACT, the mid-term electorate is not representative of the country as a whole, so it would be proper to be careful about drawing big conclusions from the results. That may explain why the Democrats have won five of the last six popular votes in Presidential contests. It certainly explains why the Republicans have won the last two mid-terms but can't win the Presidency. The mid-terms are notorious for failing to attract the attention of young people, single women, and racial minorities. Of course they are also notorious for costing the Party in charge of the White House seats in the Congress.
The question to think about is why we have two electorates. It would seem obvious to most that the general electorate ought to know that failing to support their choices in the mid-terms spells defeat or failure for the policies they supported in the general election- but it seems they don't. In my OPINION there are three major factors that contribute heavily to this disturbing and exasperating situation. The first factor is the a general lack of information about how government actually works in this country. My generation was the last generation to be taught civics in school- and mind you that was in the '60s. Our failure to insist on teaching children the basic rules that we use to govern this country is a major failing that has resulted in an uninformed electorate. The unprecedented rise in the power of the executive branch (and the media attention it garners) combined with real ignorance of our system of checks and balances in government has left far too many people without a basic understanding of the role of the Congress. Without that understanding, and an appreciation for its significance in our lives far too many people simply don't know why it is important to vote in the mid-terms.
The second factor is a media that has failed to do its duty to rightly inform the public. Today's news media has given in to the same politics as the political parties they cover. They have succumbed to pandering politicians instead of challenging them to provide the public with truth. This change began to take place some years ago when news organizations allowed themselves to be controlled by the advertising departments of their networks. Instead of fearlessly and independently pursuing truth, they ruthlessly pursued revenue. If you watch any of the Sunday morning shows you will undoubtedly see politicians appear and say the most outrageous things, only to have the host say thank you, and move on to the next question. A good example would be the issue of climate change. Naturally, some Republican will come on one of those shows and say the science isn't settled. Well, in FACT it is. There are about 1% of climate scientists who question man-made climate change, but that doesn't come close to the 99% who have the data to say we are heading for a disaster. But the dutiful moderator will just let them say it without questioning the assertion at all. The temptation is great to operate that way. If they don't, if they actually challenge a politician the odds of getting other guests on that program in the future goes down tremendously. The quest for ratings and revenue has created a generation of reporters who are little more that willing mouthpieces for politicians, no matter what they say. The result is an electorate without adequate information and an electorate that has no trust in media to provide real information- which contributes to voter apathy. How often have heard someone say, "I don't trust any of them- they all lie, might as well stay home". Our press is responsible for that.
The third factor is the general lack of confidence in government. Think again of the Presidential year electorate- the one that is more diverse, more representative of the country. You might refer to that group as the middle class and the lower income class. That group may have just given up on believing there is a reason to vote when it's about the system (Congress) and not about the leader (President). Our Congress has not done one thing to seriously deal with wealth inequality or fair wages since 1980 which explains why working Americans have not advanced in personal income in the last 30 years while the wealthiest have become incredibly wealthy. Our Congress has done nothing to solve the immigration problem leaving 12 million people in limbo while falsely blaming them for causing every problem we have in this country. The Congress has done nothing to create wage equality for women. This Congress has done nothing to generate new industries that hold a promise for young people. Instead we have seen a Supreme Court tell us that the almighty corporations with all their wealth, power, and influence are people with human rights; Republican led state legislators erode the right to vote, make draconian heath related decisions for women; and purposely refuse the engage in the ACA for political reasons resulting in more people not getting health care. If you are a young person, a racial minority, a single woman, a poor person, or anyone in the middle class- you had nothing to vote for in this last mid-term election.
I believe there was a great deal to vote for, but the money and the media conspired to convince the Democrats not to make that case- to their own detriment. In the process they left Americans with nothing to believe in either. I believe that in spite of the Republican claims, they have nothing to be proud of in gaining this victory. This mid-term election is symptom of a number of maladies plaguing the country. Unfortunately I only see more trouble ahead as a result of this election. In my OPINION the Republicans will undoubtedly get the wrong message and believe this victory means they are right and they have a mandate- instead of trying to learn something from the two thirds who didn't even show up.
The rest of us will learn some things. We will learn that gridlock is absolutely guaranteed for the next two years. The Republican "spirit of cooperation" only lasted one day following the election- then it was back to threatening the President. The Republicans will ask the President to respect the results of the mid-term and agree to their agenda, though I recall no such sentiment from the Republicans when Mr. Obama won his elections. I heard nothing from Republicans about respecting the vote of the people in 2008 or 2012- in FACT they took those elections as a call to arms against this President. The rest of us will also learn the importance of having one party in power in Congress when it comes to Committee chairmanships and how the Congressional agenda is managed. Because of this election the new Chairman of the Senate Environment Committee is a person who believes it is God's world and man shouldn't do anything about the global climate crisis, as just one example. We will learn about how Federal Judgeship's will be stalled. And we will learn that Congress will spend its time and our money doing nothing but investigating the White House while continuing to fail to provide needed legislation on any number of fronts. We may also learn that these Republicans will forget valuable lessons from the past and my even try to impeach President Obama, not because of "high crimes or misdemeanors"- but because our politics have sunken to that level. A civics lesson here or there might have been helpful for this electorate.
Finally we will learn that no matter what your political stripe, decisions are made by those who show up- so show up! All of us have a responsibility to cast an informed vote and to encourage others to vote- even shame them into it if necessary. It is critical that all of us who have the hard won right to vote, exercise that right because there are consequences if we don't. We have a responsibility to expect our schools to teach young people about our system of government so we have informed voters- not those who are taught by the corporate or social media. We have a responsibility to expect more from the press than just mouthing the talking points provided by the politicians and their corporate masters. In other words we must all be involved and be willing to show up for every election, big or small- because that allows all of us to decide how things are done.
Thanks for looking in.
Sunday, November 16, 2014
Sunday, November 2, 2014
"....Fear Itself"
I try to live by the notion that I should approach issues or problems from a position of rational thought. I try to apply reason and observation to the world around me as I search for ways to make sense of things. But, my observations of world events and the our collective response to the issues of the day doesn't square well with a rational approach. The title of this essay is "...Fear Itself", which is of course, is a reference to the famous phrase Franklin D. Roosevelt used in his first inaugural address to the nation as he was about to embark on fixing the greatest financial calamity our country had ever known. He told the country, "the only thing we have to fear- is fear itself". Of course there were many things to fear besides fear itself, but there was a strong message for disheartened Americans in his words. He was telling the country to have hope and not give in to fear. He became an inspiration to his fellow Americans and our greatest President.
I wish we lived in a time when we could find inspiration in words like those again. Instead we live in a time when fear is purposefully being foisted upon us for political gain. Fear is always close to it's natural partner- blame. I don't believe I have ever seen a time in the course my life when the politics of fear and blame have been so blatantly in play as they are today. Examine any issue and you will find politicians who are all too ready to turn away from rational thought or scientific facts and revert to the tactics of fear and blame, not as a last resort, but as the weapon of first choice to win our political favor. We are very near another mid-term election to return a Congress that has grievously failed us for the last six years. And in spite of their continuous failure they refuse to face their own failure, and stubbornly cling to the politics of fear and blame.
It would be polite and much less challenging to the rational mind to shrug our shoulders and say, "both parties are at fault". It is somehow soothing to cast all the players as the hapless, talentless, buffoons caught in the "system" in Washington D.C. It would be easier to just say, it's the "culture" of Washington that's to blame. But that would not be intellectually honest. I believe that an honest appraisal of why government isn't working today rests almost entirely with the Republican Party. They have made it their stock and trade to use fear and blame to render the government unworkable, ineffective, and in many ways-useless. It should come as no surprise though. They vowed to do just that when President Obama took office and they have been true to their word.
Let's examine a few of the bigger issues of the day and apply a bit of rational thought to the problems in contrast to the Republican messaging. Start with ISIL, the latest in a line of Muslim boogieman we are told to fear. We find ourselves seemingly caught in a never-ending war stance in the Middle East. ISIL is a natural outgrowth of our actions there. The much smarter of the Presidents Bush knew when it was time to get out. After reclaiming Kuwait and crippling Saddam he got out. He did not dismantled an entire country leaving a huge void in a country where we were not wanted and that we could not hold. The younger President Bush was not nearly so wise. He used the ultimate fear and blame scenario. Following the horrific and shocking events of 9-11 he capitalized on the fear and uncertainty of those events to fulfill an agenda that was unconnected to the events of 9-11. He started the wrong war in the wrong country and destabilized the entire region. It only makes sense that a group like ISIL would emerge. Rather than look at the actual reasons for the mess, the Republican party has somehow decided that President Obama is entirely at fault for withdrawing our troops in Iraq and not going to war in Syria. Remember that we elected this President on the promise he would not prolong war in that part of the world. Let's not forget that we did not want the US in any more wars there. That was the case right up to the time two American journalists were beheaded. When those images hit the Internet and the news shows, the fear and blame game went into high gear. Suddenly these beheadings became the battle cry for more war and an excuse to stop examining policy decisions. My rational side tells me that we are just reacting with emotion and fear. My rational side says that we didn't get so indignant when Assad killed a hundred thousand people in Syria. My rational side says we don't really care that our friends the Saudi royal family conducts weekly public beheadings; so maybe we should question why these horrible things are enough to send us back into war now. Our rational selves won't go there because we have succumbed to the Republican fear and blame machine that will use any issue to make President Obama look bad and be blamed, no matter how inconsistent or disconnected those reactions are to reality.
When an intruder made it over the fence and into the White House the fear and blame crowd in the Republican Party immediately held Congressional hearings. Congress was indignant that this President could be so lax as to manage the Secret Service so poorly. It was fairly transparent that that their indignation wasn't over concern for the Obama family, as much as it was another opportunity to be critical of the President. My rational mind knows the Secret Service should not be toyed with for political reasons- so my rational mind asks why we didn't blame President Reagan for his mismanagement of the Secret Service when they allowed him to be shot. But the politics of fear and blame knows no bounds when it comes to this President. The Republicans will even politicize the Secret Service to spread fear and blame, though it has never been done before.
The crisis de jour is the Ebola scare. No other (non-crisis) crisis more symbolizes the politics of fear and blame more than this one. Yes, the world has a real problem Ebola that needs to be addressed rationally using our best scientific reasoning and experience at disease control- and in spite of all the panic we are actually doing so. But listen to the politics being thrown around by the Republican party in Congress and on the campaign trail. We saw the Ebola crisis building in Africa for several months. There was no political will in the country or the Congress to anything about it. We have known about doctors and other health care workers contracting the illness for some time. But when one person from Liberia came here, became ill and died the fear and blame apparatus went into high gear- not because the science of this illness told us this was cause for panic, but because the know-nothing Republican politicians saw another opportunity to use this issue to spread fear and blame a month before a mid-term election.
Our medical technology is the most capable one in the world. And let's face facts- in a country of nearly 320 million people; one death (a visitor from west Africa) and two other domestic infections (where the two sick people are now completely well) should not be a reason to go into full-blown panic. But the fear mongers saw their chance and they took it. They ignored the science and spun incredibly wild scenarios wherein the entire country would be infected in weeks. And it only followed that this would all be the fault of a President who played golf while personally failing to be at every airport testing every traveler for Ebola. They forgot that President Reagan had over twenty thousand deaths occur before he would even acknowledged the AIDS epidemic. They forget that over 13 thousand Americans die from gun violence every year but our Congress will do nothing about it- and in fact have blocked us from having a Surgeon General because the nominee dared to say 13 thousand deaths is a health issue. According to the Republican party two sick (heroic) nurses is an emergency- but 13 thousand dead every year is not. The lengths that these fear mongers will go to literally lay everything at the feet of this President and ignore their own hypocrisy challenges all reasonable thought.
I know most of us have heard the fear mongers suggesting the most far-fetched theories about Ebola. Last week I heard Republican Congressional candidates suggesting that ISIL terrorists would purposely become infected with Ebola, slip over our borders and mass infect America. They got a twofer- ISIL irrational panic AND Ebola irrational panic in one convenient package. Every medical expert in the world has told us that you cannot contract this terrible disease unless you are in direct contact with a person's bodily fluids when they are actively displaying serious symptoms; yet just the other day in an effort to spread the fear Republican Peter King of New York said, "we don't know how it is transmitted." Yes we do! But, we have allowed the fear-spreading politicians and a willing corporate press to continue spreading lies. The motives are obvious and they fly in the face of well settled issues in the medical community.
There are things we need to fear. Unfortunately the real threats to our security, and our national needs are being completely neglected by a Republican led House of Representatives and Senate Republicans that will apply the filibuster for everything. The Republican party has decided to do nothing and they have set the record (quite literally) for doing nothing. Immigration reform: nothing. Climate Change: nothing. Income inequality: nothing. A Republican health care policy: nothing. Long-term Unemployment relief: nothing. A Jobs Bill; nothing. Women's wage inequality: nothing. Women's health care: nothing. Even while many of our allied countries met in Parliament to debated a response to ISIL, our Congress went on vacation with no debate, no nothing. (By the way, while they get face time on the news complaining about the all the crisis in the world, they are still on a two-and-a-half month long vacation) The Republican party has made an art form of sitting on the sidelines and obstructing progress while at the same time offering nothing to the American people but complaints about a President they had no intention of working with from day one. If any of us behaved that way in our workplaces we would be fired in a heartbeat.
Next week this country will go to the polls to elect the House of Representatives and one third of the Senate. Most polls suggest the Republicans will hold the House and probably win control of the Senate. My rational mind asks why? What has this Party done except get in the way of progress, attempt to limit access to health care, hinder people of color and in poverty from voting, actively stunt the economy, ignore science and medical experts, shut down the government, neglect their jobs, and generally create dysfunction in government? Republicans in Congress have a 72% unfavorable rating. Congress as a whole has a 9% approval rating. With those well-deserved numbers my rational mind cannot understand why Republicans can expect to win next week- but it looks like they will. The only thing that makes sense to me is that they want us to vote out of fear- and most who will turn out will ablige them. The very thing FDR asked us to reject is the actual game plan for the Republicans. My only hope is that people come out in large numbers and speak up for the kind of government they really want. My hope is that they will use real judgment and rational thinking in making important decisions and not be swayed by the fear mongers and the know-nothings who prey on fear. We can be better and smarted than to give in to fear itself.
Thanks for looking in.
I wish we lived in a time when we could find inspiration in words like those again. Instead we live in a time when fear is purposefully being foisted upon us for political gain. Fear is always close to it's natural partner- blame. I don't believe I have ever seen a time in the course my life when the politics of fear and blame have been so blatantly in play as they are today. Examine any issue and you will find politicians who are all too ready to turn away from rational thought or scientific facts and revert to the tactics of fear and blame, not as a last resort, but as the weapon of first choice to win our political favor. We are very near another mid-term election to return a Congress that has grievously failed us for the last six years. And in spite of their continuous failure they refuse to face their own failure, and stubbornly cling to the politics of fear and blame.
It would be polite and much less challenging to the rational mind to shrug our shoulders and say, "both parties are at fault". It is somehow soothing to cast all the players as the hapless, talentless, buffoons caught in the "system" in Washington D.C. It would be easier to just say, it's the "culture" of Washington that's to blame. But that would not be intellectually honest. I believe that an honest appraisal of why government isn't working today rests almost entirely with the Republican Party. They have made it their stock and trade to use fear and blame to render the government unworkable, ineffective, and in many ways-useless. It should come as no surprise though. They vowed to do just that when President Obama took office and they have been true to their word.
Let's examine a few of the bigger issues of the day and apply a bit of rational thought to the problems in contrast to the Republican messaging. Start with ISIL, the latest in a line of Muslim boogieman we are told to fear. We find ourselves seemingly caught in a never-ending war stance in the Middle East. ISIL is a natural outgrowth of our actions there. The much smarter of the Presidents Bush knew when it was time to get out. After reclaiming Kuwait and crippling Saddam he got out. He did not dismantled an entire country leaving a huge void in a country where we were not wanted and that we could not hold. The younger President Bush was not nearly so wise. He used the ultimate fear and blame scenario. Following the horrific and shocking events of 9-11 he capitalized on the fear and uncertainty of those events to fulfill an agenda that was unconnected to the events of 9-11. He started the wrong war in the wrong country and destabilized the entire region. It only makes sense that a group like ISIL would emerge. Rather than look at the actual reasons for the mess, the Republican party has somehow decided that President Obama is entirely at fault for withdrawing our troops in Iraq and not going to war in Syria. Remember that we elected this President on the promise he would not prolong war in that part of the world. Let's not forget that we did not want the US in any more wars there. That was the case right up to the time two American journalists were beheaded. When those images hit the Internet and the news shows, the fear and blame game went into high gear. Suddenly these beheadings became the battle cry for more war and an excuse to stop examining policy decisions. My rational side tells me that we are just reacting with emotion and fear. My rational side says that we didn't get so indignant when Assad killed a hundred thousand people in Syria. My rational side says we don't really care that our friends the Saudi royal family conducts weekly public beheadings; so maybe we should question why these horrible things are enough to send us back into war now. Our rational selves won't go there because we have succumbed to the Republican fear and blame machine that will use any issue to make President Obama look bad and be blamed, no matter how inconsistent or disconnected those reactions are to reality.
When an intruder made it over the fence and into the White House the fear and blame crowd in the Republican Party immediately held Congressional hearings. Congress was indignant that this President could be so lax as to manage the Secret Service so poorly. It was fairly transparent that that their indignation wasn't over concern for the Obama family, as much as it was another opportunity to be critical of the President. My rational mind knows the Secret Service should not be toyed with for political reasons- so my rational mind asks why we didn't blame President Reagan for his mismanagement of the Secret Service when they allowed him to be shot. But the politics of fear and blame knows no bounds when it comes to this President. The Republicans will even politicize the Secret Service to spread fear and blame, though it has never been done before.
The crisis de jour is the Ebola scare. No other (non-crisis) crisis more symbolizes the politics of fear and blame more than this one. Yes, the world has a real problem Ebola that needs to be addressed rationally using our best scientific reasoning and experience at disease control- and in spite of all the panic we are actually doing so. But listen to the politics being thrown around by the Republican party in Congress and on the campaign trail. We saw the Ebola crisis building in Africa for several months. There was no political will in the country or the Congress to anything about it. We have known about doctors and other health care workers contracting the illness for some time. But when one person from Liberia came here, became ill and died the fear and blame apparatus went into high gear- not because the science of this illness told us this was cause for panic, but because the know-nothing Republican politicians saw another opportunity to use this issue to spread fear and blame a month before a mid-term election.
Our medical technology is the most capable one in the world. And let's face facts- in a country of nearly 320 million people; one death (a visitor from west Africa) and two other domestic infections (where the two sick people are now completely well) should not be a reason to go into full-blown panic. But the fear mongers saw their chance and they took it. They ignored the science and spun incredibly wild scenarios wherein the entire country would be infected in weeks. And it only followed that this would all be the fault of a President who played golf while personally failing to be at every airport testing every traveler for Ebola. They forgot that President Reagan had over twenty thousand deaths occur before he would even acknowledged the AIDS epidemic. They forget that over 13 thousand Americans die from gun violence every year but our Congress will do nothing about it- and in fact have blocked us from having a Surgeon General because the nominee dared to say 13 thousand deaths is a health issue. According to the Republican party two sick (heroic) nurses is an emergency- but 13 thousand dead every year is not. The lengths that these fear mongers will go to literally lay everything at the feet of this President and ignore their own hypocrisy challenges all reasonable thought.
I know most of us have heard the fear mongers suggesting the most far-fetched theories about Ebola. Last week I heard Republican Congressional candidates suggesting that ISIL terrorists would purposely become infected with Ebola, slip over our borders and mass infect America. They got a twofer- ISIL irrational panic AND Ebola irrational panic in one convenient package. Every medical expert in the world has told us that you cannot contract this terrible disease unless you are in direct contact with a person's bodily fluids when they are actively displaying serious symptoms; yet just the other day in an effort to spread the fear Republican Peter King of New York said, "we don't know how it is transmitted." Yes we do! But, we have allowed the fear-spreading politicians and a willing corporate press to continue spreading lies. The motives are obvious and they fly in the face of well settled issues in the medical community.
There are things we need to fear. Unfortunately the real threats to our security, and our national needs are being completely neglected by a Republican led House of Representatives and Senate Republicans that will apply the filibuster for everything. The Republican party has decided to do nothing and they have set the record (quite literally) for doing nothing. Immigration reform: nothing. Climate Change: nothing. Income inequality: nothing. A Republican health care policy: nothing. Long-term Unemployment relief: nothing. A Jobs Bill; nothing. Women's wage inequality: nothing. Women's health care: nothing. Even while many of our allied countries met in Parliament to debated a response to ISIL, our Congress went on vacation with no debate, no nothing. (By the way, while they get face time on the news complaining about the all the crisis in the world, they are still on a two-and-a-half month long vacation) The Republican party has made an art form of sitting on the sidelines and obstructing progress while at the same time offering nothing to the American people but complaints about a President they had no intention of working with from day one. If any of us behaved that way in our workplaces we would be fired in a heartbeat.
Next week this country will go to the polls to elect the House of Representatives and one third of the Senate. Most polls suggest the Republicans will hold the House and probably win control of the Senate. My rational mind asks why? What has this Party done except get in the way of progress, attempt to limit access to health care, hinder people of color and in poverty from voting, actively stunt the economy, ignore science and medical experts, shut down the government, neglect their jobs, and generally create dysfunction in government? Republicans in Congress have a 72% unfavorable rating. Congress as a whole has a 9% approval rating. With those well-deserved numbers my rational mind cannot understand why Republicans can expect to win next week- but it looks like they will. The only thing that makes sense to me is that they want us to vote out of fear- and most who will turn out will ablige them. The very thing FDR asked us to reject is the actual game plan for the Republicans. My only hope is that people come out in large numbers and speak up for the kind of government they really want. My hope is that they will use real judgment and rational thinking in making important decisions and not be swayed by the fear mongers and the know-nothings who prey on fear. We can be better and smarted than to give in to fear itself.
Thanks for looking in.
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