In 2000, there was a debate in Harlem between Al Gore and Bill Bradley. Bradley had high profile endorsements from prominent black athletes like Bill Russell and Michael Jordan, but polls indicated that blacks the Congressional Black Caucus overwhelmingly supported the vice-president. Asked why this was the case, Bill Bradley replied that blacks the Caucus would support him if they had an opportunity to compare their records. Gore, sensing an opening, suggested that Bradley was calling blacks Caucus members stupid and ignorant (I’m paraphrasing from memory here’s the transcript). It was a very effective debating tactic, and Gore probably won the debate on that answer alone. But it’s a tactic more commonly used by Republicans, and Michael Gerson uses it in today’s Washington Post.
In this case, Gerson leapt on a comment that the president made at a Massachusetts fundraiser.
“Part of the reason that our politics seems so tough right now,” he recently told a group of Democratic donors in Massachusetts, “and facts and science and argument [do] not seem to be winning the day all the time is because we’re hard-wired not to always think clearly when we’re scared. And the country is scared.”
Let’s unpack those remarks.
What does the president mean when he says that the Republicans must think that Americans have amnesia? He means that they really do seem to have amnesia. The Republicans keep cutting taxes without cutting spending and running up staggering debts that they pass on to Democratic administrations. And then they turn around without any shame whatsoever and blame the debt on big spending Democrats and run campaigns based on stripping the federal government down to the bone. Why does it work? Because a lot of people are stupid and think with their lizard brains. Is that elitist to say? No. It’s just a factual observation that explains why the Republicans can get away with rank hypocrisy and the crassest kind of cynicism.
It’s not a good idea to call the electorate stupid, but only an idiot would take the Republicans’ arguments about the budget seriously for a microsecond. So, why are people taking them seriously? Gerson seems to know:
Obama views himself as the neocortical leader — the defender, not just of the stimulus package and health-care reform but also of cognitive reasoning. His critics rely on their lizard brains — the location of reptilian ritual and aggression. Some, presumably Democrats, rise above their evolutionary hard-wiring in times of social stress; others, sadly, do not.
Though there is plenty of competition, these are some of the most arrogant words ever uttered by an American president.
Actually, Gerson has exactly defined what’s going on, despite his effort at snark. Some of us, presumably Democrats, are quite capable of doing simple arithmetic and realizing that the Republicans are proposing to create a four trillion dollar hole in the federal budget by extending all of the Bush tax cuts at the very same time that they are promising to balance the budget, oppose any new tax hikes of any kind, preserve defense spending, and protect Medicare and Social Security. We have their historical record and we have their impossible promises, and we don’t need much more to dismiss them as a group as a bunch of lying demagogues. Then there are those who are persuaded by their bullshit. They’re stupid.
It may not make political sense to point this out, and Gerson, like Gore, knows that he can make some hay by calling the president a snob. It doesn’t mean that the president isn’t correct.
In defense of lizards, a lot of this is not lizard-brain thinking. It’s a special human brew of rank cynicism and magical thinking. Sure, the lizard brain might help protect the magical thinking, but lizards don’t think that the bush tax cuts are the only thing standing between us and our current economic calamity.
Gerson chose the lizard. I would have gone with crap-weasel.
I just think it’s tribalism, which could be another way of saying the same thing.
Fact is, most people don’t look at the issues and go “Ok, this is my party.” Most people choose a party, and then they adopt that party’s line of thinking.
As Tarheel says, people have mostly decided who they’re voting for, all that matters is getting our people to the polls. I don’t think that’s different in any other election. People who vote Republican all of the time (other than for JFK) will never change their vote unless someone like Sarah Palin was the nominee.
Sure, over time people change tribes, but that takes time.
Most people have decided who they are voting for is particular to this election.
The rest of the time about a third to a half of folks try their best to avoid voting for either Democrats or Republicans. But in the last weeks of the campaign, enough folks who see their civic duty as voting have to make that choice.
And party identities are shifting with the Tea Party folks in the mix. A number of more moderate Republicans will be voting Democratic for the first time, sitting out in hopes the GOP returns to sanity, or sitting out and changing their registration to independent after the election. It is the decision of these folks that determine whether the election is a blowout or a squeaker for either side. Which is why it is necessary to get as many Democratic votes banked as possible. If they break for Democrats, there are a lot of districts now not in play that will deliver surprising upsets. If they sit out, a lot of Democratic districts are suddenly safe. If they break for Republicans, it is a squeaker at best and a GOP blowout at worst.
Tribalism is a group thing not an individual one. When most of your personal network changes tribes, the pressure on you to follow is pretty strong. And the anticipation of that pressure is strong as well. Which is why conservatives are such asses about sending out ideological emails to all their friends and relatives. And keep pleading special unknown or inside information that the media is not telling you for the legitimacy of their nonsense.
Yes, there are alot of idiots out there, especially the ones who vote for the looney tunes currently running for office.
Then there’s folks like me. Unemployed, no unemployment insurance anymore, scared (terrified actually). We have nowhere to turn, nowhere to run. I would never vote rethuglican. Never-but plenty will because of the perceived failures of the past 2 years. And they’re not idiots.
Another thing no one talks about is Obama is still the president with veto power over any crazy ass bills the rethugs put up (if they win the majority). Now in normal times, I would be comfortable with this because they will not get a veto proof majority. But things are not normal. I worry that Obama will bend over backwards-even more that usual-and cave in and capitulate more than ever just to try and pass any legislation. And I’m real concerned about that legislation. And that of course will piss off the progressives even more leading up to 2012. He won’t have a base left by then. Or a country either come to think of it.
I’m not religious but I am praying to God that we can hold on to the majority. Perhaps the dems and Obama could get a spine and do some good in the next two years. The polls are encouraging. We’re coming from behind in a few races.
Look at the list of legislation that Obama got passed.
Tell me how he caved in etc.
Just because he doesn’t shout about the Repubs, he does manage to get things done.
I am so sorry about the unemployment.
I’ve been there and that fear is familiar.
I do hope that you come out of this well.
Off the top of my head—-
no public option to appease the ins. companies and big pharma WITH the mandate to force us to buy their crappy and EXPENSIVE product
very weak financial reform- so the banksters wouldn’t be mean to him
Gitmo still open-because the rethugs didn’t want them here on our soil
STILL spending billions a month in hellhole Afghanistan-because that’s what president Gates wants along with the defense industry
EFCA-dead
DADT-well we all know about that debacle still going on today
DOMA–?
Wall St. bailout with no strings attached and now they’re getting paid huge
Rendition still going on
I could go on and on. So no, I’m not happy at all but I still plan on voting to try and keep the crazies from getting the car keys back. Spineless as the dems are, we’re still better than the alternatives.
At the Apollo:
My memory was off slightly, but my point remains unchanged.
Cool that you found the transcript.
I can’t recall watching that debate (but that was before becoming a political junkie…).
It was Bradley’s last chance and he got his clock cleaned, mainly by that exchange.
Bradley entered the NH contest with more money and a slight margin in the polls that he only lost after losing the Iowa caucuses. He lost the NH contest by around 4,ooo votes and probably was behind by no more than a half dozen delegates (maybe 5 from Iowa and 1 from New Hampshire).
But you know what happened? McCain beat Bush in a stunning upset and the press proceeded to lavish all their attention on him, while ignoring Bradley. Compounding the problem was that the Republican race moved on to South Carolina and got quite ugly. But the Democrats had a month before the New York primary, so there was even less focus on the Dems. Basically, Bradley ceased to exist. And this Apollo Debate was his one chance to make himself relevant again. He also waited to announce Michael Jordan’s endorsement way too long.
In any case, that sequence was when I learned that CNN ruled my world.
McCain beat Bush in a stunning upset and the press proceeded to lavish all their attention on him, while ignoring Bradley.
New England didn’t like another New Englander .. shocking!! It happened again 8 years later. And what you mention secured Cranky McSame’s love affair with the TradMed.
Well, I remember Bradley’s coverage as a lot more substantial, at least in a couple of the big rags like the NYT and LAT, and rather consistently comparable in prominent page placement, all the way up to BB’s decision to withdraw. In fact, I thought both reporters covering for those papers were clearly trying to cheerlead for Dollar Bill.
Can’t recall CNN or Msnbc, but I seriously doubt if the relentlessly Gore-bashing Tweety on Msnbc was staying quiet or failing to take sides (presumably clearly for Bradley, unless otherwise shown).
But I do recall that when Bradley made his exit announcement, he handed out actual parting gifts to the assembled reporters who’d covered him. Special praise from Dollar went to Matea Gold of the LAT.
And, hey, not exactly a sharp job of moderating that debate by Bernie “I misspoke” Shaw.
Can we have a moratorium on saying “unpack” in this context? I find it highly irritating. Why not just say “examine” or “think” or “apply” or “define” or any of a dozen other words. This “unpacking” argh!
Anyhow, the basic rule is the electorate is actually are stupid. Govern and politic in a way that takes that into account. But you get no points for saying they’re stupid.
link
It doesn’t detract from your point to put it a different way. And it’s a ridiculous saying in any case.
Obama was being extremely kind. It’s not about being scared. FDR won a huge majority of a terrified, even despairing, electorate. I just listened to the Reid-Angle “debate” on CSpan. I’ve never met anyone nearly as stupid and ignorant as she is. It’s some kind of new phenomenon. Anyone voting for her (or her teabagger analogs elsewhere) is not acting out of fear. It’s some kind of intellectual or emotional disease, and it’s way past time to keep pretending that it’s just a matter of differing opinions.
The president is right.
The upshot is, if we’d just learn to lie better, and cheat more often, we’d have continued control of both Houses locked up. Because that’s what it would take.
How bad do we want it? How high a price is too high?
There are worse things, even now, than losing elections.