A Blast From The Past

A few nights ago on one of the C-Span channels, I saw what, in political campaigning terms, could be called the 'good old days.' It was the second Presidential debate between then President Ronald Reagan and former Vice President Walter Mondale. This debate did epitomize the good old days.  It did so not necessarily because of the cast of characters; it did so because of how the debate was carried out. There was no mention of the size of someone's hands or what seedy things one of the candidates said or did in the past. And the debate made no mention of emails nor were the debate questions favorably leaked to a candidate.

Yes, some of the same stuff that was going on then still goes on today. There were American interventions that led to chaos and violence in 1984. Only then, the focus of American interventionism was more on Central America than on the Middle East despite the fact that the Middle East required a great deal of attention. However, we weren't trying to overthrow regimes in the Middle East back then like we were in Central America or like we do today. 

What made this presidential debate a blast from the past is that the debate focused on the issues. Those asking the questions asked specific questions about issues and policies. The debate participants tried to answer those questions in detail as best as possible. And the participants didn't interrupt each other. It was one way in which a presidential debate should be conducted. But a debate like that one could not be conducted the same way today.

What most qualifies today's presidential candidates from the two major parties is who each candidate is not. Hillary is not Trump and Trump is not Hillary. And so in the eyes of the party loyalists, that is all that is required for them to vote for their respective party's nominee. Thus, the loyalists from each  party will vote for the not-them candidate. Loyal Republicans will vote for the not-Hillary candidate and loyal Democrats will vote for the not-Trump candidate. In addition, many voters who call themselves independent will only vote for Hillary or for Trump. Such voters are not independent, they are bipolar.

Those of us who are disgusted with this year's presidential campaign might want to consider an ugly truth. Just as art reflects life, so too a nation's candidates reflect its people. These candidates just might be us minus their privileges and resources. And so if we want better candidates, we need to be better people. And just as better people would demand more from themselves, so too would such people demand more from their candidates other than being not-them candidates.

Our nation is really divided by multiple groups who feel they are superior to all other groups. And we are told that the solution to such division is to be united. But such rhetoric is really too vague to act on. So instead of saying that we should be united, I think we should work on sharing more with those who disagree with us. We need to share dialogues as well as power. The more we look at our democracy as  an arena of competition, the more the same-old, same-old continues. And the more the same-old, same-old continues, then the greater the probability that future elections will, if we are lucky, only be as bad as this year's presidential election.


 

The Inflexibility Of Some Conservatives Is Also Shared By Others

Mike Huckabee (click here for bio) has a few words for those Republicans who are considering not voting for the presumptive Republican nominee in an article on his blog (click here for the article). The gist of his words say "Shut up and support the  presumptive nominee." That nominee is Donald Trump and such is not good news to many Republicans.

Why is Huckabee throwing his support behind Trump? It isn't because of Trump's pro-life credentials. Neither is it because Trump's position on marriage or Israel. In fact, Huckabee does not provide a single positive quality for why anyone should support Trump in his article. His interview that accompanies the article does mention a couple of positive attributes but he has to stretch points to do so.

The main reason why Huckabee is supporting Donald Trump  is because Donald Trump is not Hillary Clinton. In another typical election where we will be asked to vote for the presidential candidates from the them and not them political parties, Huckabee wants his fellow conservatives to vote for the candidate from the not them party. He wants his fellow Republicans to support Trump whatever their misgivings are. In fact, Huckabee seems to be in denial of any significant reasons why some Republicans oppose Trump. And he claims that the 'Never Trump' movement is sham to provide employment for some consultants.

However, it is the misgivings that many Republicans have regarding Donald Trump that is the real issue. How can some Republicans support Trump when they have too many misgivings to support him? Huckabee has no answer for this question other than to say be loyal and stop the not them candidate. It is at this point that Huckabee and what will be many from the Republican Party have failed to answer the concerns of their fellow Republicans regardless of their support for Trump. 

The reason why the Republican establishment could not convince Trump supporters to vote for someone else was because they could not answer the concerns that his supporters had. His supporters consisted of anti-establishment conservatives who knew that their party had become part of the establishment his supporters hated. And because they would have to admit that the establishment, including themselves, had failed in order to get the ear of Trump supporters, they could not give his supporters a reason to vote for someone else  Trump's support had little to do with Trump's expertise in working the media or his savvy in speaking tot he people as Huckabee claims. Trump's support was a vote for the intramural not them candidate.

Huckabee's answer to conservatives who have too many problems with Trump to support him says "suck it up." That is because Huckabee's approach combines some authoritarianism--'the voters have spoken' in this case-- with a tribal appeal to loyalty to the Republican Party with the last resort appeal saying vote against the them candidate starring Hillary Clinton in 2016. Thus, there is no way that Huckabee's approach to the 2016 election can give a satisfactory answer to those conservatives opposing Trump. That is because Huckabee's approach provides no alternatives to Trump. And because he is unable to provide any alternatives to the concerns of conservatives who oppose Trump, he has shown that his own approach is inflexible.

Should we be surprised that Huckabee's approach to voting in the 2016 is inflexible? No, not with his reliance on authoritarian and tribal appeals. Such appeals are based on maintaining a rigidity in thinking. However, we should note that political conservatives will not hold a monopoly on inflexibility this election. It is likely that Sanders supporters will be given the same option that is being given to those conservatives opposing Trump. That option says that one must vote for Hillary in order to stop Trump.  And that option is no less based on authoritarian and tribal appeals than Huckabee's appeals are. Liberal leaders will be unable to provide any alternatives to those anti-establishment nonconservatives who find Hillary to be as objectionable as conservatives who oppose Trump find Trump to be.

In the end, our having fallen for these authoritarian and tribal appeals too many times in the past is the reason why we will be choosing between Trump and Hillary this year. It is because of our past inflexibility that we find ourselves limited to these two candidates. So in the end, Huckabee is not saying anything new to conservatives who oppose Trump that has not been said to liberals and conservatives in the past. The question is this: Will we find a way to be flexible by voting for the third party candidate who best represents us and our own concerns, or will we follow tradition and do the same old, same old was done in the past?