The Speculator

John McCain is known for his black and white simplistic stance towards many issues, and Sarah Palin cloned him perfectly in the vice-presidential debates by saying if she had to carry on as president in the event of McCain’s demise she would continue to “get rid of the greed and the corruption on Wall Street and in Washington.”

Comments such as these which invoke holy war imagery in response to recent social and economic trends have endeared Sarah Palin to angry Americans, and especially to conservatives associated with the Republican right wing. They forget that self-interest is at the heart of capitalism and that “greed” in the housing market on which our economy is so heavily based is spread throughout all levels, including the consumer level.

Conservative commentator David Brooks follows the Republican Party and is perplexed that they selected Palin knowing she only appeals to a relatively small percentage of the population. Republicans are engaging in planned obsolescence.

…the Republican Party has become a small-town party, running against — as Sarah Palin did last night — against big cities, against the East Coast, to some extent, against newspaper readers.

I understand why they’re doing it, running against Washington. This is the way Republicans do populism. But in the long run, it’s poisonous and self-destructive. You cannot be a majority party in this country if the coasts don’t like you and people who read newspapers don’t like you.

And they have narrowed themselves. … And with Sarah Palin, short-term gain last night, but long-term turning people off. (David Brooks, Online News Hour,10/3/08)

It seems to me Joe Biden gave what could be considered pastoral advice to the Republican Party – actually it was grandfatherly advice to any listener — a few minutes after Sarah Palin’s holy war comments cited above, in his response to the last question about how to lead in Washington, about how to bring about a spirit of bipartisan cooperation.

Joe Biden shared what he had learned in the Senate, a principle he learned the hard way because he violated it first and then was taught by Mike Mansfield to see why the principle is important. Listen to this segment of the debate to hear Biden’s account. We only have space for the principle here.

This is the principle: Don’t question other people’s motives. Question their judgment.

Underlying this principle is the fact that each representative is sent to Congress because other people see something they like in those representatives. Biden left it up to us to meditate on the implications of this fact; but it does not take much time to realize that in a democracy each person must allow their opinion to be one among many. Our leaders should not see themselves as being at war with each other, but rather as representing people who elected them to work for the common good. They must then work with other community and business leaders on the same respectful basis to have any hope of enlisting their support and accomplishing anything worthwhile.

Without making any accusations, and in a gracious manner that admitted he was a sinner as much as any one else, Joe Biden shared this principle as he had received it.

By closing the vice-presidential debate on this note, I think Joe Biden achieved an intellectual triumph that no one has yet acknowledged.

In this one principle he undermined most of Sarah Palin’s appeal as John McCain’s running mate.

Most people recognize she is not yet ready for presidential level office. Her role is simply to draw right-wing voters to John McCain. She is a gamble for the Republican Party. And she is a gamble for the USA.

Joe Biden held up a mirror for the Republican Party to examine its own soul. The problem with all principles, however, is that it is much easier to hear them than to put them into practice.

David Brooks is one of my favorite columnists because of his thought-provoking social insights. He seems more a sociologist than a journalist. You could probably entitle a collection of his most important columns “Popular Sociology.”

On the Jim Lehrer News Hour, he has often expressed his fondness for John McCain, and now he has formalized his endorsement in a piece entitled The McCain I Know.

In it he attempts to demonstrate that although John McCain is not a sophisticated conceptual thinker, his long experience in the Senate forced him to take on issues one at a time in an inconsistent manner: “One day he’s a small-government Western conservative; the next he’s a Bull Moose progressive.”

Brooks argues that McCain has successfully established “a half-century of evidence” as a “good judge of character” and as “a serious man prone to serious things.”

David Brooks believes that if John McCain is elected “he will run the least partisan administration in recent times.” He believes that although he is not able to express himself well and is inconsistent, McCain will prove to be a man of character who will seek to work with a wide constituency.

The biggest problem with Brooks’ argument is its own internal incoherence — that is, since McCain is inconsistent, he cannot be counted on in any given circumstance. What Brooks therefore must actually mean is, experience teaches us we can usually count on McCain. That does not mean we can count on McCain for the big decisions! For example, David Brooks does not think Sarah Palin was a wise VP choice because she is not ready to step into the presidency — that is a major blunder. So even by Brooks’ own standards, McCain is not a dependable decision-maker.

The McCain David Brooks knows is a man of character who is not guided by thoughtful principles and who makes inconsistent decisions on a case by case basis.

The Obama I Know

We all have been so saturated by this presidential campaign that many of us feel we know these candidates and have images of them in our minds based on what we have read and seen over these months. I have written about Obama in several blog entries ( 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 ) .

For me, the Obama I know can be summarized in this sentence:

Obama is a leader with character who is guided by liberal beliefs, which include not imposing his will on those he leads, but rather seeking their participation in an inclusive democratic government.

What this means is that all people have to do is get involved and their voice will count and they will have an effect on the outcome of any given decision. This is what he has been encouraging: participatory democracy from the grassroots upwards as the only way to save our nation. It is not enough to leave leadership to Washington. But when Washington must be involved, it should hear from everybody!

In terms of staffing his administration, it might look very similar to McCain’s. In many ways Obama and McCain seem quite similar on many fronts. But on the interior they are quite different. Although they both appear to be men of sincere Christian faith and character, McCain is more volatile and temperamental, while Obama is more steady and thoughtful. The difference between the two men is that simple.

The biggest thing about being president is making decisions.

Whose temperament is better suited for the presidency?

Who made the best call on whether to go into the war in Iraq?

Who should be the next president if the one who is elected in 2008 dies in office?

Answering these questions will tell you a lot about which way you should vote in November

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