{"id":103,"date":"2003-10-25T03:33:00","date_gmt":"2003-10-25T03:33:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/3500years.com\/zsallia\/?p=103"},"modified":"2003-10-25T03:33:00","modified_gmt":"2003-10-25T03:33:00","slug":"breaking-promises","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/2003\/10\/25\/breaking-promises\/","title":{"rendered":"Breaking Promises"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am so terribly sorry<\/strong>. I did promise no more politics until the new year, but that persnickety Dean Esmay <\/a>has been posting things <\/a>that make me <\/a>go “hmmm.” So, with that said:<\/p>\n

These assorted assertions regarding lying to the public and the reflexive disdain for the current President are unusual only if one fails to take in to account the unique nature of the approaching election season. Consider: this is the first election in three decades or so where you have both a state of war and an incumbent seeking reelection without even token opposition within his own party. Throw in the spectre of the Florida fiasco and we have set the stage for an interesting (i.e. contentious and divisive) election. Add to that the unprecedented access to broad audiences that until recently were essentially denied to the extremist fringes and it becomes certain that a circus is in the offing.<\/p>\n

It seems to me that in the long run this process of extreme rhetoric could conceivably transform itself in to a positive outcome. Let us be honest and admit that the fanatics on both sides of the spectrum have become essentially interchangeable. This was not always so easy to discern as the fringes were so effectively marginalized in the past- they made their voices heard at the political rallies and in the caucuses, but otherwise held no firm political power. The information age has made the sound-byting of the outrageous profitable for the media companies and the political entities seemed to be content to allow the hot-heads to take to the airwaves in excoriating their opponents, assuming that the old dynamic was still in play and that their words would not have any method of sticking to the eventual nominee or his party. In doing this the parties both exposed their ugly underbellies to the light of day and could now be forced to deal with their Anti-American, Anti-Constitutional and Anti-democratic elements by either openly embracing them and admitting that their causes were concomitant with their own, or by openly marginalizing them.<\/p>\n

It seems to me that the conservatives got a head start on this process and have been slowly isolating the worst actors on the religious right from the centres of power. They still have their problems, and by no means have overcome them; however, with the advent of the war those close to the President have had the opportunity to make an even bolder move to increase this separation, the current anti-abortion legislation notwithstanding. There are those who see the upcoming procedural ban as the “nose of the camel” and fail to understand that while a majority of their countrymen support the ideal of a woman’s right to choose, they also see the need for some sort of line to be drawn and they look to the government and the courts to draw it. Taken in that light this current affront to leftist sensibilities becomes nothing more than another small step in the completely American process of defining a consensus that both sides will eventually be forced to live with and within.<\/p>\n

The liberals in this nation are facing a far more acute problem; however, the benefit of the acute is that it can often be dealt with swiftly. Whereas the conservatives are incrementally marginalizing their fanatics, the left may yet be able to excise theirs in a single political season. Unfortunately, the cost of taking advantage of this opportunity is likely a humiliating defeat in 2004. The danger is that the more rational elements of the left might fail to see that opportunity and act upon it in which case they are doomed to the political outlands until either the economy once again succumbs to the business cycle or the conservatives egregiously overstep themselves. One of the necessary elements of a recovery is to stop fearing the defection of the Greens and their ilk. Those fanatics have already left the party <\/strong><\/em>and will continue to field candidates who theoretically sap strength from the Democratic candidates. The Democrats are not capable of placating that faction without thoroughly alienating the centrist voters they need to win the Presidency. By attempting to straddle the fence they achieve the worst of all possible outcomes, hence their current sorry state. The same logic applies to the other fringe groups that have been categorized by commentators on the right as the “victim movements”, or some such. The left in the presumptive form of the Democratic Party must find a way to separate themselves from these factions and return rhetorical control of the political argument to more reality-based hands, or else must face the unpleasant prospect of a long stretch in the wilderness likely ending in the dissolution of the extant party structure in favor of something more workable.<\/p>\n

I understand that the above seems particularly harsh in regards to the left whilst affording the conservatives somewhat of a pass; however, both analyses have bearing upon their opposite numbers. The fanatics still exist within the power structure of the Republican Party and there is no guarantee that this gradual marginalization will continue. One of the requisite factors for success in this endeavor is a resurgent and credible force on the left, shorn of its fanatic fringe elements and capable of bringing a coherent and believable message to the voters. The same is true of the Democratic Party: one of the reasons it faces such dire straights is that for some time the Republicans were essentially no threat. The lack of a credible political opponent let the poison of factionalism and fanaticism scar the soul of a great and majestic institution. Had the right been unable to articulate a message that resonated with the bulk of the voting population the left would still be ensconced in the throne room, and the rot would have continued to spread.<\/p>\n

The thrust of all this is nothing new: in America the left and the right need each other to survive. The American people need both to be viable, honest and trustworthy. Both parties must abandon the deplorable practice of assuming that their own failures are the result of trickery on their opponents’ part. And finally, both parties must learn to trust the people.<\/p>\n

That final requirement is likely to be the most difficult. Throughout the extraordinarily brief history of this nation the various iterations of the political opposites have harbored a foundational distrust of the voters. This was not always so blatant, particularly when the vote was restricted to male property owners, but it has always been thus. This distrust of the voters has been the driving force behind the various manifestations of the parties that sought to shape the course of the American Experiment. This is the paradigm which must come to an end, for failing that this interesting experiment in self-rule could very well collapse, and what replaces it is doubtful to be to anyone’s liking.<\/p>\n

Follow-up<\/em>: Dean Esmay replies<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am so terribly sorry. I did promise no more politics until the new year, but that persnickety Dean Esmay has been posting things that make me go “hmmm.” So, with that said: These assorted assertions regarding lying to the public and the reflexive disdain for the current President are unusual only if one fails […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-103","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaeddy.com\/3500years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}