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Q: Why are there only two serious political parties?
A: Think of any athletic contest. There are two categories: winners and losers. Here in the USA, the former are called “Republicans,” and the latter are called “Democrats.” Fun fact: in North Dakota, it’s actually considered hate speech to call someone a Democrat.

Q: Speaking of parties, why are the Republicans sometimes referred to as “the GOP?”
A: It’s an acronym for “Grumpy Old People.” Have you ever seen a video feed from their party conventions?

Q: Who or what determines the order in which states hold their primaries? Where are the states that the rest of the world likes? California? New York? Some of these early states are made up, right?
A: The order is determined each year by a complex formula which takes into account each state’s population, per capita obesity, and its contestant’s placement in last year’s Miss America Pageant.

Q: What is a caucus?
A: I’d rather not talk about it. It’s kinda an adult conversation. Ask your father when you’re older.

Q: Why are some state contests called “straw polls?”
A: In the first case, it’s in honor of the famed “Straw Man” protest strategy. In 1980, a bunch of farmers banded together and threw the Iowa caucuses to a scarecrow. The GOP was mortified, and decided to conduct an arm wrestling contest to supersede the caucus results. As you no doubt remember, it was won by a handsome, strapping lad named Ronald.

Q: Ok, but why are others called “beauty contests?”
A: The beauty contests are primaries where states ask voters to evaluate candidates’ hairstyles and sartorial sense in addition to casting traditional ballots. These states adopted this voting model in response to Richard Nixon’s years in office.

Q: What happens in the event of a tie in one of the primaries?
A: Rules differ from state to state. In Texas, there’s an arcane process entitled “The Wearing of the Boots,” where the candidates go head-to-head to see who can fit into the smallest pair of rattlesnake cowboy boots without complaining. In Maine, the electoral “logjam” is resolved by a race through an actual logjam. Candidates canoe through a river crowded with lumber to settle the contest. Finally, in Kentucky, the winning candidate is the one who conclusively demonstrates that he or she knows less about Canada than his or her rivals.

Q: “His or her?” Whatever happened to that Palin woman who seemed so promising back in 2008?
A: Who?

Q: You know, that Alaskan with the extraordinary intercontinental vision?
A: Doesn’t ring a bell. Never heard of her.

Q: Is it really true that one of the major American political parties dismisses the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change?
A: Ha! No! Don’t be ridiculous. Back in the 1990s, a number of prominent Republicans were serious about addressing climate change. They’ve just been staging an elaborate performance art piece in the years since (Bill Clinton dared them to in 2000).

Q: What are the minimum requirements to be an American candidate for president?
A: The Constitution requires that all candidates be fluent in English and one of our regional dialects. These aren’t just a legal requirement—they’re good political strategy. Just as politicians in the UK need working knowledge of Welsh, Cornish, and so forth, American politicians need to be capable of speaking either Texan, Midwestern, Pacificano, New Dutch, or one of the others.

Q: What’s the difference between “Real America” and the rest?
A: “Real America” consists of Native American reservations, certain parts of New York City, and Gary, Indiana. The rest is the illusory bit.

Q: Who eventually casts these so-called “electoral votes?”
A: The members of last year’s World-Series-winning baseball team.

Q: This all seems unduly complicated. Why not have a national plebiscite to nominate candidates?
A: Shut up, socialist.

“Must we not remind those who are weak and defrauded and despised that God will avenge the cruelties from which they suffer, but will also not hear the cruel resentment which corrupts their hearts?  Must we not say to the rich and secure classes of society that their vaunted devotion to the laws and structures of society which guarantees their privileges is tainted with self-interest?…Against those who make the state sacrosanct, we must insist that the state is always tempted to set its majesty in rebellious opposition to the divine majesty.  To those who fear the extension of the state for the regulation of modern economic life, we must point out that their fears are frequently prompted not by a concern for justice but by a jealous desire to maintain their own power.”**

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** Reinhold Niebuhr, “The Christian Witness in the Social and National Order,” in The Essential Reinhold Niebuhr: Selected essays and addresses, ed. Robert McAfee Brown (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1987), 98–9.

Listen, for a moment (have some scotch and aspirin ready), to rhetoric from the GOP’s presidential field. After God (and His son), no one comes in for more frequent and positive mention than St. Reagan.** They love him to distraction, to a degree beyond questions of degree. They will forgive him his sins against conservative orthodoxy—indeed, they deny the existence of such sins. You probably know all this, but here’s why it matters: Reagan is the ideological rallying point for American conservatism (as I’ve written before).

Why don’t progressives think this way? Candidates Obama, Clinton, and Edwards never had to explain their ideological relationship to FDR, LBJ, or any prior leftist president. Obama was the only one of the three who frequently leaned upon a prior political figure for inspiration—and in his case, it was Abraham Lincoln.

Why don’t leftists spend more time talking about their ideological (and intellectual, and political) ancestors? Why don’t they remind voters that progressive heroes fought for women’s suffrage, civil rights for all Americans, the establishment of basic social programs, the direct election of senators, and much, much more? Why not rally around FDR?

Why not? There are downsides. Indeed, the Republican Party is in crisis because their base is holding the leadership captive to Reagan-inspired orthodoxy. Party ideological organization is not a political summum bonum.

That acknowledged, though, the American Left doesn’t suffer from being too clear. Its problem is quite the opposite. While progressives are forward-looking by definition, there’s no intrinsic reason that they can’t celebrate and defend their past heroes. Not only would this give them something like a rhetorical and ideological rallying point, it would remind Americans of the worth of big leftists successes that are currently under conservative attack (Medicare, Social Security, etc).

So…what’s FDR’s 11th Commandment gonna be?

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**He even has his own COMMANDMENT! Holy be his name.

Right! That’s because the New Deal and resulting regulatory apparatus that sustained the fair, prosperous American economy were still in place. We eliminated them, and now we’re reaping the rewards. If our problems harken back to the bad old pre-regulation days, it’s hardly the fault of the guy trying to restore pieces of the system that worked.

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UPDATE—Or, pithier still, the message should be: Right! Why don’t we try the domestic policies that solved the Great Depression once again?

Rod Dreher responds, and gets a bunch of fascinating responses in the comments section. Take a look!

John Dewey

I was rereading John Dewey’s “Democracy is Radical” last week in preparation for a lecture, and the opening lines are haunting me:

There is comparatively little difference among the groups at the left as to the social ends to be reached. There is a great deal of difference as to the means by which these ends should be reached and by which they can be reached.

He goes on to contrast various Marxist and National Socialist projects with democratically-minded leftists in the United States.

Obviously internal contrasts within the post-USSR Left are somewhat less dramatic. The number of Americans who believe that class conflict or national cultural purification are paths to a better future is at an all-time low. Most leftists are securely invested in democratic institutions and procedures. All serious leftists are so committed.

But if we think about this in terms of policy, rather than political systems, the picture is murkier. Do most American leftists agree on “the social ends“ they’d like to pursue? Is there anything like a common consensus on just what sort of world modern liberals/progressives/other leftists/etc are trying to enact?

The answer is pretty clearly no. Indeed, the lack of terminological consensus is indicative of the problem. The Left, broadly understood, consists of all of the following: 1) liberals who aim at a restoration of broad tolerance for lifestyle choices ranging from drugs to sex to art and more, 2) progressives who believe that it is our duty to build a fairer and better political community than the one we currently have, 3) a crowd of others who are defined by nothing so much as their inchoate frustration with the country’s general direction. There’s certainly some overlap between these groups’ various objectives, but it’s difficult to see it as anything more than incidental.

I’ve asked before. I’ll ask again: If you’re a leftist (of any type), why do you believe what you do? What are your justifications for being a liberal, or a progressive, or a social democrat, or whatever such thing?

It’s not enough to say, for example, “I’m a progressive because I want to make sure that all women have access to contraception.” That’s a lateral move—stating a policy preference isn’t a compelling way to convince anyone to share your preference, let alone become a leftist. It’s akin to saying, “I’m a vegetarian because I want to stop the eating of animals!” It begs the questions we’re really asking: Why should all women have access to contraception? Why should we stop eating animals? Why should I, or anyone, share your mind or join your cause? Do you have a reason?

Leftists need a more coherent, well-defined account of the constellation of social ends they’d like to pursue, but they also need to work on stronger reasons why anyone ought to join them in pursuing these. They need some better rhetorical material. If the Left could articulate a compelling view of how our political community ought to look, they’d be well on their way.

They need a publicly-presentable view of the Ideal, what Walt Whitman described in his “Song of the Universal.” Here’s a few representative lines:

Over the mountain-growths disease and sorrow,
An uncaught bird is ever hovering, hovering,
High in the purer, happier air.

From imperfection’s murkiest cloud,
Darts always forth one ray of perfect light,
One flash of heaven’s glory.

To fashion’s, custom’s discord,
To the mad Babel-din, the deafening orgies,
Soothing each lull a strain is heard, just heard,
From some far shore the final chorus sounding.

O the blest eyes, the happy hearts,
That see, that know the guiding thread so fine,
Along the mighty labyrinth.

In this messy, dissatisfying world, this imperfect, cloudy place, we need a “guiding thread” to indicate the way forth. We need a view of the possible—the Ideal—to cleave through the chaos of the actual.

In other words, the Left needs to project a view of the world as they would remake it. Their conservative opponents have long since constructed theirs, and they’ve been selling it for years. That’s why so many Americans can be easily convinced that tax cuts pay for themselves, or that wars are free, or that our relatively paltry foreign aid budget is the primary cause of our fiscal troubles. Though there’s little nothing in the way of empirical evidence to sustain any of these claims, they’ve been offered a crisp moral vision that unites all of them in clear, obvious terms. Still, part of the reason that the conservative moral vision for the country holds such sway because it’s unopposed on the field of public discourse.

So, leftists…what do you believe?

Photo Courtesy of Julie Sterling Photography

Here he is—thanks to Julie Sterling! Someone call Gerber and start contract negotiations.

Romney, speaking after he won the Nevada caucus on Saturday, said that even though the official unemployment rate fell to 8.3 per cent, … ‘the real unemployment rate is over 15 per cent. … [H]e’s been trying to take a bow for 8.3 per cent unemployment. Not so fast, Mr. President. … We welcome any good news on the jobs front, but it is thanks to the innovation of the American people in the private sector, not to you.’ … Romney’s comments are a hint of how he would campaign … if … the unemployment rate continues to fall: with a twofold attack that the official figures do not reflect the true scope of joblessness and that any improvement is despite, not because of, the president.

You don’t need to (nearly) have a PhD in Government to know that counterfactual arguments don’t usually work very well. It’s intuitive. Look at the arguments, side-by-side:

A: Since I’ve been in charge, we’ve had 23 straight months of job growth.

B: Even though things are getting better, they would be even better if you weren’t in charge.

Argument A is much stronger than Argument B, because it draws from the actual reality we inhabit, not a projected alternative. If the jobs numbers continue to improve, American morale will go with it. Take a look at Chrysler’s Super Bowl ad for a zeitgeist pulse check.

Funny thing is, this is the first time in months (years, really), the President isn’t stuck with the counterfactual. He’s spent most of the last three years arguing that the economy was less bad than it would have been without the stimulus bill, et al. That didn’t get much traction, since many Americans were facing a still dire economic situation. Until recently, his core message took the same structure as Romney’s current message. If the election had been in November 2011, Romney might well have been unbeatable, because the economy still looked weak. The President would have been stuck with the counterfactual.

But the election isn’t for nine months yet. By November, Romney’s attempt to build an alternate reality where the economy would be better without Obama will likely be an even worse fit. Guess what—the poll numbers are starting to show it already.**

There’s another side to this, by the way. If the jobs numbers continue to improve, Romney’s going to be making the “America is still weak” case against the president’s “We’re roaring back” argument. That’s right. The GOP frontrunner/presumptive candidate will be the one convincing Americans that they need a change in leadership, that their success depends on different leadership. The Democrat will be the one wrapping himself in big (grandiose, even) American dreams. Obama will be proclaiming that it’s “Morning Again in America,” while Romney tries to convince voters that the dawn depends on him. Obama gets to play Reagan. Romney gets to play the GOP’s caricature of a generic Democratic Party candidate. Wild.

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**With all relevant cautions, of course, about taking cross-section poll numbers like this too seriously at this distance from the election, etc, etc. I’m only using it as a small piece of corroborating evidence, obviously.

You are not stuck in traffic. You ARE traffic.