Action and Reaction
Be Careful of the Precedent You Set
Recent events in our politics are unnerving. Politics is a rough sport, and Americans are used to that. But recent events seem different. Darker, and more menacing. More divisive. How did we get here, and what can we do to get out of this mess?
As usual, and in keeping with my reason for writing Fuel for the Free Mind, I will discuss this through the lens of freedom, the defining value of our republic. If your immediate response to reading the first paragraph of this post was a visceral recall of where you stand on President Trump, the ICE escapades, or on seizing/buying Greenland, let me ask you to set aside your Trump Derangement Syndrome or your MAGA cheerleading (depending on your perspective) and imagine yourself in charge of the political environment your grandchildren will inherit. You don’t know whether they will be R’s, D’s, I’s, Libertarians, Communists, or something that doesn’t exist yet. But you want them to live in a healthy political environment where they will be free to follow their conscience and express their beliefs. It’s not just an exercise of imagination, because all of us, collectively, are responsible for just that.
Now that our minds are focused on the future, how do we get there? Conquer (whatever that means) the “enemy” and then… What? If your side were vanquished in the political arena, would you just go away? Would your ideas die? Of course not! You would look for an opportunity to regroup and persevere. That is the nature of ideas, and politics is the battle of ideas about how society should function. A politics that doesn’t allow for the battle of ideas is a dystopian mess, and you don’t have to look far to see examples. Imagining your grandchildren as contrary thinkers should help you understand the importance of a functioning and peaceful political process.
Fortunately, our system was built to accommodate that battle of ideas. The founders worried about “faction” (what today we call political parties) so they built a constitutional republic capable of withstanding and accommodating the battle of political factions. It did this through the various mechanisms you will often find discussed here: separation of powers, checks and balances, federalism…
Is our political environment today an example of a raucous but functioning market of ideas, or is it outside what our system was designed for? Are we seeing danger signals about the health of our republic, or just another swing of the political pendulum, soon to be corrected by the democratic process? I don’t know. Nobody does. We have certainly seen times of political strife such as this and come through it with our system intact. The late 1960s come to mind.
But optimist that I am, there is one element of the politics of the past 25 years that deeply concerns me. It is the tendency of each administration, regardless of party, to take the previous administration’s excesses as a new baseline and build on them. A perpetual Congressional authorization for the use of force under George W. Bush wanders far from its original scope, and now the idea that Congress should participate in decision-making about the use of military force can’t get more than a handful of Republic votes. Obama’s “I’ve got a phone and a pen” becomes Biden’s “The Supreme Court tried to block me from relieving student debt. But they didn’t stop me… I’m going to keep going.” Lawfare by Democrats against Trump becomes Trump’s use of lawfare not just against political opponents but as a policy tool.
Maybe this is the normal pendulum swinging, and it just looks worse up close. Maybe a return to healthier politics is right around the corner. But remember, Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 because he knew he had lost the support of his party and would not survive an impeachment vote. His crime? A political spying scandal and coverup. Can you imagine either party impeaching a President of their party today, for just about anything? To torture the pendulum analogy just a bit more, are we in danger of turning the grandfather clock over on its side, so the pendulum is incapable of swinging back?
Our system of government ultimately depends on us. What can we do to nurture the political system we want for our grandchildren? First, we must reject the politics of “whatabout.” If your thoughts, comments, or justifications for something done or said by someone begin with “whatabout when Biden (or Trump, or whomever) …” then you are on the wrong track. If you can’t justify it without pointing to the other party’s abuse of power, don’t try to justify it and don’t support it. Second, don’t let them take your vote for granted. Yes, I know that this is a hard sell if you really, really don’t like the other party’s candidate. But as I wrote in a previous Substack, the purpose of a vote is to state your preference. Voting for someone whose values do not reflect yours does not express your preference. Vote for a third-party candidate, withhold a vote for that office, or write in a name. Finally, as I wrote recently, writing a letter to a political officeholder may be the most direct form of democracy short of voting. Use it.
One final thought: the usual justification for violating checks and balances is that “Congress is gridlocked, so it’s the only way to get anything done.” Rember that, if the objective is (as it should be) to allow citizens the maximum amount of freedom consistent with order, safety, and freedom from force, gridlock is a good thing. If you can’t get a Congressional majority to vote for your proposal, then you don’t have a consensus and you need to do more work in the arena of persuasion.