Mind Boggling
by David Benzion · 12/01/2005 12:05 amOn Purim, Jewish media outlets have a tradition of playfully writing satirical articles, ala "The Onion" or an April Fool’s Day prank.
But I don’t know how anyone will ever write a more mind-boggling headline then that on the front-page of today’s Jerusalem Post:
Strange days indeed.
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From an editorial by John P. Avlon:
Link to the piece:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,177221,00.html
I don’t know whether to call it strange days or a predictable move to the center.
#1) Mike:
Nice piece. An honest, blunt assessment of current American politics.
I’m hopeful that the shift represents that we’re finally swinging back towards the middle.
It has got to be the prunes. I know I get real jittery when I eat to many prunes.
Willie,
I share your hope.
Willie #2 "I’m hopeful that the shift represents that we’re finally swinging back towards the middle." Ah yes the land of the middle. The land where there is no black and white. The middle, that gray zone where the so called independants live. The middle, that mythical Utopia, that if only the politicians would govern from the there would be no problems in the land. The middle is the place where there is no right or wrong, hot or cold, no one takes a stand on anything. NO THANKYOU
I’d rather an extremist on either side of the line. At the very least I know where they stand and can prepare my life around them. Flame away, but I’d rather a full blown liberal Hillary Clinton or a full blown conservative in Newt Gingrich as president than McCain who wants to straddle the fence.
Here is a little quote for you that fits hoe I feel about the "middle".
"I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth."
Forsaken by God because of non-willingness to be an extremist politically? I guess none of us can really know the will of God, but I interpret the above to be pertinent to prayer, not politics.
Pray with passion? Yes.
Govern with passion? Yes, but if your passion is in the center, then act accordingly.
Mike Martin The quote in context of my post: It has been my expirience that those who govern "from the middle" stand for nothing. They go in the directions of the winds of the polls. They try to please everyone and that is not realistic. They are wishy washy and indecisve. As I said even I can tolerate Hillary because I know where she stands. She is moving to the middle right now before the elections. If she is elected she will swing so far left she will be in danger of going over the top. I can prepare that.
Squawk,
I absolutely see your point, and in no way meant my post as a flaming. I guess what is meant by the term “center” or “middle” needs clearer definition. If the definition resulted in a greater number of Americans being rallied around a central purpose (such as the war on terror), then excellent. If it results in someone saying one thing to get elected and then acting contrarily, then terrible.
Even being the two-time Bush voter I am, I have to admit that he has failed to rally Americans. He is a terrible communicator. Many feel that he does not represent them (on both the left and right). Perhaps he is an example of the failure of the center (I don’t know, honestly).
On the other hand, how would an extremist rally the American people around a common cause? Is it too late for common ground? Have we gone so far down the road that we are doomed to an us vs. them mentality in our own country? Tricky questions, those.
Mike Martin
“Govern with passion? Yes, but if your passion is in the center, then act accordingly.”
Passion in the center? What is that? Jimmy Carter tried that govern from the middle junk and when the time came that the rubber hits the road he made a mess of it. Remember the Iran hostage crisis.
Sqauwk,
Jimmy Carter was clearly not capable of rallying the American people for a common purpose. But I sincerely doubt that either Ward Churchill or Pat Robertson could either. I doubt either of them would govern from the center, agreed?
Mike Martin
I know you are not flaming me.
We agree on President Bush and his lack of communication. Even CEOs of large corporations let their underlings know what is going on with the company.
I do not believe in the us versus them mentality. I think I have more than illustrated that this strong libertarian can live with a liberal in the presidency because I know where they stand. It is very much a person responsibility thing with me. As I have said if I know where the leader is going I can adjust accordingly.
darnit shoulda been “personal responsibility”
Yeah, I misspelled your name, too (#10). I think we need to take more personal responsibility for our spelling abilities!
At any rate, I do prefer a known evil to guesswork. On that we certainly agree.
Let me illustrate in another way.
Look at Israel today. I love that country as if it were my own. The problems they are expiriencing today are because the recent leaders have tried to govern from the middle. Sharon has tried to please the people of Israel while trying to placate the screed from the world.
Look at what has happened. Over and over again Israel has given concessions to appease the PLO at the behest of the US and the world. They have received nothing in return but hollow promises of peace.
Now the EU is going to push even harder on Israel to split Jerusalem. This will be a disaster for Israel. Yet the EU has been emboldened to do this because they have seen Israel follow the lead of others (the United States in particular) that do not have their best welfare in mind. Wishy washy middle of the road leaders in Israel have brought this danger upon the people. No thanks I don’t want a mmiddle of the road president.
When you drive down the middle of the road you will get hit by on coming traffic.
One more small note that I believe.
So goes the destiny of Israel so goes the destiny of the United States.
“SHA-ALU SHALOM YIRUSHALAYIM”.
Squawk:
What I meant be governing from the middle is putting America first, rather than party or philosophy. I’ve always felt like there are probably 20% hard-core, socially conservative voters, 20% hard-core socially liberal voters and 60% “moderates”. Moderates get a bad name because people label them as “standing for nothing”, when the fact is that they seem to have a greater propensity for picking and choosing items they support from the individual parties-only not swallowing hook, line and sinker-than the committed 40%.
Just an example: polls consistently affirm that most Americans support Roe v. Wade, yet also support parental notification and tighter regulations of abortion. Whither should they go? Neither the Democratic nor Republican platforms are inclusive in this regard. This is where “moderation” must come into play.
OK, definitely an effective illustration. Is appeasement synonymous with governing from the middle? Most cases have probably proven that to be true, but I guess I’d like to hold some hope (naively?) that it doesn’t always have to be that way.
Willy
I loathe answering questions with a question, but I need to know something here. Are you really comfortable with a leader (that is what a president is) that governs by polls?
Mike Martin
In my mind appeasement is part and parcel of governing from the middle. In my mind if a leader governs by the polls then he is a sheep in the flock rather than the leader.
Don’t lose hope, sometimes hope is all we have in the long run.
Appeasement as a foreign policy has nothing to do with being a moderate. It is entirely possible to be a moderate and believe in a strong national defense. I like the example in #16. I consider myself a moderate, not because I don’t stand for anything, but because on some issues I agree with the republican party and on some issues I agree with the democratic party. Guys like Rudy Guiliani and McCain have popularity not because they are wusses like Jimmy Carter who try to appeal to “the middle” or stick their finger in the air to find out what is opular before acting. They are popular because they aren’t afraid to take a stand on certain issues independent of the platform of the party they belong to even if it means taking on other members of their party. I don’t agree with all of the issues on which either of those guys have chosen to speak out against their party, but I admire both of them for having the cajones to do so.
Being a Republican doesn’t mean one has to agree with every single policy of the Republican party. However, as a party, the Republicans are dangerously close to making a huge mistake if they start using single issues as a litmus test for candidates. Guiliani for example would have wide appeal in areas where Republicans traditionally have not been successful, and nobody believes he would be weak on crime, terror, or national defense. Yet he could probably never get the nomination due to his pro-choice beliefs. Many Republicans would rather pass up a chance with a very electable candidate like Guiliani, even if it means that somebody like Hillary gets elected, simply because on a single issue they don’t agree with him. It is on issues like abortion, the environment, and other social issues that the Republican and Democratic parties both seem to reach out to the extreme ends of the political spectrum and leave those of us in the middle wondering which side is least likely to throw us under the bus if elected.
Perhaps the perception of oneself as being “in the center” is just that.
For example:
If someone drives faster than me on the freeway, then they’re a reckless idiot.
If someone drives slower than me on the freeway, then they’re a hopeless nincompoop.
That’s probably an overly simplistic example, but you get the idea. My way is the best way, and the sooner you realize it, the sooner we’ll start to get along with each other.
When I hear that someone is a moderate or in the middle in the government I hear a man that governs by the polls and that is an anathema to me. I want a leader that states their princibles, stands on them and governs by them. Obviously I vote for those that I agree with but I can live with a leader as extreme as Hillary because I know where they stand.
I am going to regret this.
McCain’s temper tantrums give me pause as to how good a leader he may be. The FACT that he has compalined about those that criticized him and then enacted legislation to silence his critcs ala McCain/Feingold scares me as bad as Hillary getting into power.
#20)
Well said.
#18)Squawk: not governs according to the polls, but brings the polls along with him. I have no problem with a president that sets an agenda and then forcefully, if need be, pulls the public along for the ride. Mr. Bush has failed to do that with Iraq.
One of Mr. Bush’s major weaknesses is that he is absolutely horrible at consensus building. In the case of the war in Iraq, the consensus Mr. Bush has failed to build has been one with the American public.
I think being “in the middle” politically is very similar to the concept of “average temperature” in Houston during the winter months. Due to the passage of fronts and subsequent warm spells, most days the high temperature is either 55 or 75, but the weather man will tell us each night that we are either 10 degrees above or 10 degrees below our “average temperature” of 65, when in fact very few days are actually 65 (exact numbers were made up from thin air and inserted for example purposes and are not intended to start a discussion of Houston’s weather).
If you were to look at a variety of political issues and and plot where you stand to the left or to the right along a line based on how firmly you believe in that issue (using right as positive numbers and left as negative numbers with the middle being zero), then calculated an average value to represent your beliefs, you would probably find that most of us probably fall pretty close to the middle. That doesn’t mean that we are weak in our beliefs or believe in nothing any more than Houston having an “average temperature” of 65 degrees in winter means that most days the temperature is 65.
There is a reason that most other democratic governments have a dozen or more of parties represented in their legislative bodies. It is simply impossible for two parties to adequately represent the myriad beliefs of 280 million people. Having only two parties is causing our population to become polarized. Even the way we describe regions is reflecting it. We live in blue states and red states. It has little to do with what people in those states actually believe on any one issue, and everything to do with which party managed to fool the majority of the voters into voting for them. So those of us who don’t totally agree with either party are often described as “moderates” or “independents”, which each party trying to find a way to reach out to us, while at the same time trying not to alienate their “base”. Zell Miller is often described as a moderate democrat. Does that make him wishy washy? Does he represent his electorate with his finger in the breeze? ABSOLUTELY NOT! Have you ever heard the man speak about national defense or the war on terror? It just means he doesn’t agree with his party on some issues. To take this back to the discussion of Sharon, for him, leaving his party allows him to “reach out” to the people out there who support his ideas and plans, but couldn’t find a way to agree with the Likud party on a host of other issues. Giving support to Sharon meant compromising too many things to those people if they had to support Likud to do it. Now that he is not a part of Likud, he can get support from a variety of people without them having to give up on other issues they truly believe in. That is hardly a wishy washy way to govern, and it is what “governing from the middle” should be all about. Unfortunately, when people like Hillary do it, it is typically just a publicity stunt.
Squawk,
I agree with your pause concerning McCain. How about Guiliani?
I felt that I didn’t have cause for pause with GWB, but now realize that I did (for the reason that Willie states in #23 among others). I can live with either a person whose views I know or don’t know, but I’ll bitch and moan either way… I freely admit it.
Once again squawk, your idea of a “moderate” is off. Being in the middle of trying to govern from it doesn’t mean you have to put your finger in the breeze on every issue. It simply means that you can work with positions from both sides of the spectrum. What if Bush went out and said he wanted to put tight caps on particulate emissions from coal fired power plants, then gave a federal tax exemption to moneys spent to upgrade ANY emissions control equipment (not just that necessary to cut particulate emission) and loosened the red-tape required to modify the permits so that the upgrade process could be streamlined and wouldn’t create such a headache for the plants? Would that be a “conservative” or a “liberal”? Well lets break it down…cutting the emissions would definately put him to the left of center in trying to help the environment and public health. Giving a tax break to the companies and loosening the red tape for permit ammendments would be pro-business and certainly “conservative”. So is it conservative or liberal? Really its both…and neither. It is “in the middle”. Is it “popular”? Maybe…the 20% who believe in trees over humans would say no…giving tax cuts and loosening permit requirements would infuriate them. The 20% who think the plants should spew whatever they want and let the animals suffer think the emissions caps are a horrible idea. So that leaves 60% or so who would have to decide if they could live with the compromise between environmental protection and business incentives. It is a “moderate” proposal that would represent “governing from the middle”. Yet it is neither “wishy washy” or weak and ineffective.
26) as is your God-given right!
Whoops! That should have been
#25)
I have no qualms about Mr. McCain. I’ll be enthusiatically supporting his 2008 bid to any and all that will listen (or that I can outrun)!.
Make no mistake about your’s truly. I have a litmus test for who I vote for. I want to see a politician that has litmus test for everything. That way I know before I vote how they are going to govern before I vote for them.
Mike Martin
As to Rudy see #30. I’d vote for Rudy fior that rereason.
Willy
I will tell you like I told Sarge when he said I would vote for MsCain to keep Hillary out. I will not vote for Ms. Clinton.
I will never vote for McCain
Crap I cna’t spell today.
FWIW, I wasn’t saying McCain is a great guy…or that I support him on every issue (McCain/Feingold infuriated me also), but he is an example of a “moderate” who isn’t weak or wishywashy when it comes to taking a stand on an issue he believes in (right or wrong).
Bill F Never said you said McCain was a great guy. McCain is a self centered opportunist that will say and do whatever he perceives to advance his own political ambitions. Ummm yeah that is a moderate middle of the roader by my definition. He lost favor with the MSM during the elections. He lost favor because the MSM knew he could not beat Bush. When I compare and contrast what the man said during the primaries and today he becomes very wishy washy. One time Republicrat, the next time Democan and then at other times who knows what. BTW President Bush is not the perfect Republicrat either. He is a globalist. Thus the problems with the borders. His move on the borders that we have seen lately, while welcome in my eyes, is posturing the Republican party for 2006.
Bill F,
You analysis of idependent thinking is quite persuasive. However, I believe the label ‘moderate’ is forever tainted.
Squawk,
So you are saying that in a Clinton vs. McCain race you would “sit out”?
The mispelling disease is catching…
I agree that the label is tainted by people who know better, but continue to pretend that there is nothing in the middle. Jim Hightower wrote a book titled something to the effect of “There is nothing in the middle of the road except yellow lines and dead armadillos”. He was right to some degree in that he meant that you have to decide how you feel about any issue facing you, therefore you will be on one side or the other of every issue. However, I think he is just as much a party hack as Rush Limbaugh is, and Limbaugh is constantly trying “herd” “moderates” back into the Republican fold by calling “moderates” spineless and an assortment of other choice names. I think of each of them as a bull elk on either side of a river with a cow in the middle of the river. They are both trying to lure (or force) the cow back into their herd on their side of the river. The cow doesn’t particularly want to stand in the middle of the river either, but she isn’t sure she really wants to be in either of the herds either. The cow is today’s “moderate”. She doesn’t like everything about either herd she is in and isn’t sure either herd is really where she wants to be, and the leaders of both herds are standing on the shore calling her an idiot for standing in the cold water while offering nothing in the way of incentive for her to “compromise” and join her party. The only difference is that in politics if you are an “independent”, your candidate just gets trounced with no hope of ever being elected. In the elk world, the independent is quickly attacked and eaten by wolves. (Unless you are in a red state, and then the wolves get killed by ranchers and the elk overpopulate the national parks and cause all sorts of calamity to the natural environment the park was created to preserve)
shannon
#35
Yes, I’d skip that box.
Bill F,
Excellent posts here today. I must humbly admit that you’ve articulated my thoughts better than I myself am capable of doing. I’d vote for you if it was an option.
Bill F
I have no problem with so called moderate or middle of the road voters. My problem is with so called moderate politicians. Fence sitting politicians have never demonstrated to me any consistency in anything. A moderate politician is a coward to me because they will not state nor stand by their personal convictions.
Sigh I’m outta here for a while, I have “OBSCENE WINDFALL PROFITS” to make.
I think you are making the mistake of believing that today’s typical “moderate” politician has something in common with all other vertebrate animals. Guys like Jeffords or most of the “gang of 14″ who claim to be “moderates” are actually just “spineless” liars who ride whichever side of an issue gives them the best shot at increasing their personal power. There are plenty of moderate voters who stand very firmly for their convictions, but a “true” moderate politician can’t get elected these days because they typically will fail the litmus tests necessary to get the nomination of either party. The only “true” moderate politicians you see these days are either guys like Zell Miller who have been there so long and have made such a name for themselves that the party apparatus can’t touch them in a primary or guys like Giuliani who were extremely successful in a less partisan but very public role such as the mayor of a large city.
If I tried to run for office of any kind in Texas, I would have no chance of getting elected because I am too interested in the environment and not hardcore enough on abortion to please the republican party “base”, and I am too pro-business/free market, anti-tax, and too anti-entitlement to ever please the demcoratic party “base”. Since it is the “base” that turns out for primary elections, nobody with views that differ from the base on the litmus test issues can get past the primaries unless they lie and mislead voters about who they are and what they stand for.
So a “true” moderate can’t get elected without lying about who he or she is, and if he or she does get elected by doing that, then the “base” is immediately dissapointed because the “rock solid conservative/liberal” that they elected suddenly turns out to be one of those “spineless” moderates who won’t follow the party platform. Face it, most voters are moderates, meaning that we all have issues that we are passionately conservative or liberal about, but in the end, a huge portion of almost any electorate would find that their views average out to a position somewhere in between the platforms of the two major parties. Every election is simply a competition for who can drag the masses kicking and screaming onto their side of the middle. While 40% will typically vote for one party or the other no matter what, with 20% undecided, surveys of public opinions on a variety of issues typically show that the majority public opinion typically falls more towards the middle than either party would ever want to admit.
For example, if asked about protecting or improving environmental quality, a huge percentage of americans would say that is an important issue for government to address (thus favoring the democratic party position). However, a huge percentage would also say that deregulation of business and removing useless red-tape created by antiquated modes of environmental regulation are also good things for the government to do (thus favoring the republican party position). So on one issue (the environment), huge majorities would agree with the democratic party platform (protect the environment) and the republican party platform (remove unnecessary obstacles and streamline environmental regulations). So where is “the middle” there? Public opinion straddles the territory staked out by the two parties. So is there a compromise that can be made in the middle that would satisfy both sides and lead to a cleaner environment and a smaller regulatory burden for businesses? Absolutely. So is it a poll-driven wishy washy weak-spined candidate who advocates such a compromise? No, it is a realist who understands that iron-clad lockstep agreement with either party’s platform isn’t what is best for the country. And it is also a candidate who can’t get elected in today’s political climate
Bill F
I am not talking about voters. I want politicians to take a stand on the issues just like you did above. If they fall in the middle ground of agreeing with Republicans on one issue and Democrats on another then so be it. There is not a politician alive that is going to fit in my perfect litmus test. I am tired of the pure political vacillations I have seen from the likes of McCain and the Clintons.
I could vote for Lieberman, Rudy or Zell Miller. They have been consistent in their voting and “politics” for the most part. Their words and actions have been pretty steady. I have seen Lieberman drop his drawers on a couple of occasions but on the whole he has voted his conscience.
I am one of those that believe his president when he says no new taxes. I expect that. Imagine my anger at Bush #1 when he raised taxes. I voted for him twice but I was still pissed. If the man had come forward and said to the American public that he believed we needed to raise taxes then I would have been disappointed but I can live with honesty whether I agree or not.
On a side note concerning voters. I skeptical of these so called “undecideds” that say they don’t know who they are going to vote for until they get in the booth. From the first week or so of the silly season every candidate has pretty much defined their position. I cannot believe they do not have any idea who they are going to vote for a week out from e-day. What the hell are they gonna do flip a coin once they get behind the curtain? I’d bet if you surveyed the voting history of these so called moderate undecideds you would find a consistency in party votes.
The “undecideds” are very different than the “independents”. The undecideds are the ones who simply haven’t bothered to put any effort into informing themselves enough to form an opinion. They are the same people who wait for ten minutes in the line at the drive thru and then when it is their turn to order they ask the cashier to wait while they decide what they want. The undecideds are the ladies who wait in line for ten minutes at the grocery store and then when the cashier tells them what the total is, they start digging through their purse to find their checkbook.
I am with you on Zell, Rudy, and Lieberman, but what I was trying to say is that somebody like them without their reputation and name recognition can’t get elected these days. I point blank asked Owen one time if he could vote for a pro-choice republican if that candidate otherwise stood soundly for everything else Owen believed in, and he said no. It is people like that that prevent more “moderates” like Zell, Rudy, and Lieberman from being elected. If we have become a “one-issue” party, why not rename the party to actually reflect that so at least people will know what they are voting for. We should just have the “pro-life party” vs. the “pro-choice party”. As it is, naming them the “Republican” and “Democratic” parties is kind of like China calling themselves a “people’s republic”. If the party is going to only elect candidates who have a pro-life position, regardless of whether they otherwise believe in tax and spend policies or an activist judiciary, we should name the party accordingly. The fact is that the two main parties in America have staked out fairly distant ends of the political spectrum with the “litmus issues” they use to identify who they will nominate for office or even for judicial appointments. So for those of us who find ourselves falling somewhere in between in our beliefs, it is extremely rare that we can find a Rudy, Zell, or Liberman that we get a chance to vote for.
I think the real answer to the polarization of politics in America is to make it illegal to list a party affiliation next to a candidates name on a ballot and to remove the party-line vote option from the ballot. If people can’t inform themselves enough about a given race to at least learn who the candidates are, then they have no business voting in the election.
Thank God for the fact that majority of the population is somewhat moderate, not extreme right nor extreme left. Extremism , be it political or others is never healthy.
Future presidential candidates will do well running from middle, because being only in the center they can look at issues objectively.
President is the leader of the entire population not just those who elected him.
You can get lot accomplished by being a moderate leader.
#45 depends on how you define ‘extremism’. Your typical conservative is defined as ‘extreme’ by the Left, and I guarantee that the Left is more extreme than the Right, because the ENTIRE political spectrum has moved to the left in the past 20 years.