The phrase is mine, of course. President Obama wouldn’t, and couldn’t, use it. But in his recent, candid interview in Rolling Stone magazine (http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/17390/209395), President Obama very cogently captured the essence of the dilemma: The current divide between a Democratic Party primarily (though not universally), and in its leadership, characterized by a sincere desire to get it right, to pass the laws which best serve the interests of the American people, against a Republican Party primarily (though not universally), and in its leadership, characterized by a cynical willingness to act in ways which purposely harm the American people in order to be able to blame it on the Democrats who are currently in power, and win an electoral victory this year as a result.
There are two groups to be strongly rebuked in this narrative: The Republican Party, which has demonstrated its single-minded commitment to acquiring and retaining power, in order to serve the interests of the wealthiest Americans and continue the historically record-breaking concentration of American wealth into fewer and fewer hands (http://coloradoconfluence.com/?p=548); and the majority of the populace itself, which allowed itself to be a puppet on these bastards’ strings, blaming the president and the Democrats in Congress for the Republican obstructionism designed to accomplish exactly that end, at the expense of the American people themselves.
It’s time to side decisively with reasonable people of goodwill, in whatever political party they are found, with whatever ideological predispositions they may have. And it’s time to relegate these cynical enemies of the public interest, most resoundingly exemplified by the current Republican leadership and their fellow-travelers, to the dustbin of history, once and for all.
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Some recent on-line interactions, and many that came before, have brought home the importance of addressing the role that anger plays in political discourse. There are many dimensions to the problem (and I do see it as a problem), involving both empathy and narcissism, fragile egos and legitimate concerns.
First, a disclaimer: I do not consider myself either immune to or innocent of the expression of anger in political discourse. This is not one of those political divides with some people on one side and some on the other, but rather one in which aspects of each of us can be found on either side of the divide, with some individuals more to one side than the other.
This is not a problem that belongs exclusively to one ideological camp or another: Within the last week, I’ve been angrily lambasted by two ideologues, one on the left and one on the right, cascades of enraged pejoratives issuing forth from each, each upset with me for disputing their respective highly combative certainties. The problem, as I repeatedly tried to tell them both, isn’t the ideology, but the attitude. It may be that the attitude correlates more strongly with one ideology or another, but that is not the relevant point; rather, the attitude, wherever it occurs, is toxic, and far more of an obstruction to progress than the substance of any particular ideology.
Still, there are legitimate questions involved: Is anger ever useful? Does it ever serve an indispensible political or social function, motivating people who would otherwise be unable to motivate themselves, or disincentivizing behaviors that are on the wrong side of such reactions? If so, to what extent and under what circumstances? Is anger ever the best possible reaction? Or is it sometimes the best attainable reaction, even if not the best imaginable? Or is it simply dysfunctional, in all circumstances?
A moderate, reasonable poster on a Facebook thread where the angry left-wing ideologue tried to convince Democrats not to vote for Democratic candidates in protest of their not being pure enough for him, gently praised his anger, while opposing his call to inaction. She viewed his anger as a productive, motivating force, putting the feet of the powerful to the fire. This may be the case sometimes, but I think it is grossly exaggerated, and more often an excuse for engaging in something for the most part dysfunctional.
First, we exaggerate the degree to which our public officials are “the other,” serving their own interests at our expense. While there is certainly some of that, I think it is far more often the case that our public officials are sincerely dedicated to some view of what produces the greatest public good, and are passionately working in service to that agenda. More often than not, public service involves accepting a salary well below one’s earning potential (though there are arguably much larger long-term financial benefits), and certainly far more public scrutiny and constraint of personal liberty and personal space than adheres to work in the private sector, or in lower-profile positions. Some of this is off-set by the honor involved, by the prestige conferred, but being an elected official is not an unambiguous boon for those who successfully pursue that path.
Second, the ideological certainties that spark inter- or intra-partisan public anger with elected officials, on average, are wrong more often than they are right (I am not including anger over alleged ethical breaches, which is not the issue here). If we assume, generously, that in interpartisan disputes, one side is on balance wrong and one side is on balance right in any given instance (it may often be the case that both sides are on balance wrong, though it is almost impossible for both sides to be on balance right), then the split between false certainties and justified outrage would be about 50-50. But the intraparty ideological disputes reduce the portion of those who are “right” into some balance of those who are right and those who are wrong once again, leaving significantly more than 50% of the individual instances of angry certainty in the wrong on the substance of the matter (even disregarding the disutility of the form, in those instances in which individuals are in the right on the substance of the matter).
So, if we all employ righteous anger on behalf of those positions we are each absolutely certain are the right positions to advocate, more righteous anger, on average, is being deployed on behalf of positions erroneously held than on behalf of well-founded ones. The Czech author Milan Kundera, in The Unbearable Lightness of Being, captured both this, and the more general dysfunctionality of anger even when right, by putting in the mouth of his main character, observing an angry protest in Paris, “Don’t they understand that the raised fists are the problem?”
I’ve argued in another post (The Foundational Progressive Agenda: http://coloradoconfluence.com/?p=317) that humility is the necessary cure for this defect in our discourse: We have to each strive to recognize, especially in matters that are contested by large segments of our society, that, in any given instance, what we are certain is true may not be, and that by each admitting that, we open up greater opportunities to approach, together, understandings that are closer to the truth.
The perennial counterargument to this, of course, is “but they’re not willing to do this, so by doing so unilaterally, we only weaken ourselves.” I don’t believe that this is accurate (of course, I may be wrong! :)); I believe that those who argue with the most reason, goodwill, and humility are, in the long-run, the most attractive to the persuadable majority, and provide the best and most useful contrast to the unmovable ideological zealots who have almost always dominated public discourse.
What anger does is to divide and entrench us, to divert more of our energies to non-productive conflict and away from productive efforts to serve human needs. The inevitable conflict over how best to govern ourselves, in general and particular, serves us best when it is least rancorous, and most rational. The commitment to striving to be reasonable, humble people of goodwill is the cornerstone of such constructive public discourse. Anger, both within and without, is our common enemy.
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(The following was originally written as a Facebook post in response to one of the typically overwrought, implacable demands for some sort of a purist rejection of our current Democratic leadership, due to its failure to satisfy the writer’s view of what they needed to be doing):
The most important principle in politics is “don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” or even of the least bad. Politics is the art of the possible, and the pursuit of the best attainable arrangements, all things considered. Every decision by every individual should be measured by its effect.
The reality we are dealing with includes not only what we each identify as what should be, but also what everyone else identifies as what should be, and what can be accomplished within the context of that distribution of values, beliefs, and opinions, including to what extent they can be moved and changed.
It’s also critical to remember that, in a complex and subtle world, designing the best policies and making the best decisions on pending legislation is an information intensive activity, necessitating not only a sophisticated understanding of the complex systems involved (the articulation of human social institutional, technological, and natural systems), but also of the details of what is happening on the ground. A great piece of legislation, for instance, often becomes a Trojan Horse for a horrible rider, and a smart legislator has to weigh the benefits of the great bill against the costs of the horrible rider. A lot of the armchair quarterbacking that goes on is oblivious to this dimension of the challenge, and many such dimensions exist.
We accomplish the most, and progress the most robustly, when we gravitate toward a pragmatic realism, cultivating a calm belief that it is possible for human beings to govern themselves wisely, in service to human welfare, and keeping all involved (including the electorate) focused on how best to do so. We accomplish the least (and do the most to undermine any and all positive efforts that are being made) when we gravitate to conflicting poles, insisting that our own faction’s vision is the only acceptable one, and that nothing else will do. It fails both on pragmatic grounds (it paralyzes our ability to progress) and on realism grounds (there is more genius in the humility of the many than in the hubris of the few).
There are political goals more fundamental than advancing the policies of the moment. Those goals require cultivating, each in ourselves and all of us together, certain qualities that improve our collective ability to design and implement the best policies in any moment.
One such quality, as I’ve already suggested, is humility. We serve a truly progressive agenda best when we each strive to recognize that what we individually believe to be true may or may not be, that our own certainties may be mistaken, that our own conclusions may be incorrect. This breeds two positive behaviors: 1) It motivates us each to keep learning, to keep examining, to keep absorbing information and recognizing that we never know or understand enough; and 2) it improves our ability to work in productive concert with those who have sincere and legitimate disagreements with us. The second is most useful when the ultimate ends are less disputed than the means for achieving them, as is often (though not always) the case.
Aligning the ultimate ends is best served by striving to be people of goodwill, driven by empathy more than by mutual indifference. Not everyone is willing to agree that that is a laudable goal, but most are. Some will argue that it is a laudable goal, but not the proper purview of government, which is fine, because it provides a foundation of agreement about the ends within which to debate what the most effective means are, a foundation that works as long as we cultivate the other necessary qualities as well (humility and reason).
As I just said, the third quality is striving to be reasonable. Many believe that they are doing so, but few are. An important first step is to recognize how our minds really work, by thinking in frames and narratives which may or may not serve the cause of reason in any given instance. Being aware of this helps us to coopt the reality in service to the ideal, of guiding our frames and narratives in service to reason.
These three qualities (striving to be humble, striving to be empathetic, and striving to be reasonable), together, comprise a deeper political goal, that of creating the most robust and fertile cognitive and cultural context for social and political progress.
I think we serve ourselves best by prioritizing our commitment to this “deep structural political goal” above all of the other more ephemeral and superficial (though often critically important) goals which depend upon it. Doing so serves our long-term ability both to advance those immediate political goals most effectively, and to ensure that they are the right goals to advance before doing so.
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