Surveying The Terrain - Election 2016

For the duration of 2015, I purposefully chose to avoid writing about the upcoming 2016 presidential election. Not that there was any lack of something to write about. Quite the contrary, the absurdist theater we have been presented thus far invites plenty of comment, and much comment has already been made. Public interest in the individual campaigns is remarkably high this far in advance of November’s election day. But after six months of rising and falling, jousting for position, fairly inane “debates,” and histrionic attention-getting efforts, the true selection process of voting now begins to draw near. And so also begins the time for more serious observation of this year’s version of our quadrennial civic spectacle.

The Democratic nomination race has been a more typical unfolding. Five candidates started; three remain, one of whom has already overly extended his time in the minor spotlight. To the surprise of many, Bernie Sanders has made it a legitimate competition. Then again, Democrats have always loved their “knight in shining armor” underdog candidate who, in the end, inevitably loses. But Bernie has thankfully spotlighted some genuine economic issues that have needed serious discussion. In the process, he has rightly held Hillary Clinton accountable for her positions and given her campaign machine a needed test drive. In the end, Hillary is still on track to win the nomination, barring some major mishap. Unfortunately, she brings a lot of old baggage and too-canned persona with her, with a large segment of Americans preset against anything she says or does. A general election win is not a given.

The contrasting Republican campaign is in near-chaos. The party that prides itself on election discipline and early consensus has displayed neither, as the normal political rules have been annihilated. A mind-boggling 17 candidates announced for the race. Five have already left, including two former governors (Perry, Pataki), plus two sitting governors (Walker, Jindal) and a U.S. senator (Graham). The remaining twelve candidates include two former governors (Huckabee, Gilmore) and a former senator (Santorum), Huckabee and Santorum being retread candidates from 2012. All three of these should retire soon from the dimming spotlight given the public’s lack of interest in their campaigns. That would leave nine candidates remaining who still believe they can win.

Of these nine, they divide themselves into two camps: the insider “establishment” candidates, all with elected experience, trying to run more traditional campaigns; the “outsider” candidates who are willing to say any negative nonsensical thing against other people, or the government they seek to head, that will get them attention. The establishment candidates (Christy, Kasich, Bush, Rubio) are all clustered at the bottom of the opinion polls, running flat-footed against the tidal wave of the outsiders. Rand Paul, also at the bottom, goes his own quixotic way living in his own political bubble, consistently ignored and generating surprisingly little excitement. Clearly, political and governing experience is not an attraction in this election year. For the outsiders, Donald Trump has been the dominate storyline and poll getter given his willingness to say anything, insult everyone, and bully his competition.  (More on this in a future posting.) The rest of the outsider pack (Cruz, Carson, Fiorina) have shifted their poll numbers up and down and traded positions over the months. But as a group, these outsiders have consistently captured 60-70% of Republican polling. There is no denying the mood of the Republican Party rank-and-file members today. Meanwhile, the Republican National Committee and many large donors sit on the sidelines scratching their heads in disbelief, frozen in place.

Media coverage has been an unsurprising disappointment yet again. In this age of the 24x7 cable news beast that must be fed, TV executives are happy to present anything that keeps viewers tuning in and their networks in business. Hence politics and election contests have become full-blown entertainment packages. For instance, political debates of highly mixed quality and professionalism are presented as sporting events complete with their own dramatic titles and theme music – “who will win / who won?” Poll standings 18 months before the election are used to make hard decisions about candidate exposure and media share. Hence campaign strategy focuses little on substantive discussion in favor of what outrageous or combative statement can be made that will top the next news cycle. The job of our free press is supposed to be to present the candidates fairly to us so that we can learn about them and their perspectives, and then to hold them accountable for the loose talk they inevitably say. Instead, the media’s singular focus on the “horse race” has turned them into deciders, not informers. We are the worse off for that.

Concurrently, not-so-social media will be in full bloom during this campaign. Twitter, Facebook and the like will be primary direct mail venues versus traditional mailings and even TV ads. In addition, unofficial armies of opinionated citizens will do their own surrogate campaigning on behalf of their favorites. All of these digital bytes will rain down personal opinions and share candidate “mistakes” in viral nanoseconds. However, it is all likely to be for naught, as most social media sharing is from the “likeminded already convinced” to the “closed mind already made up.” Social media makes many frustrated commentators feel better in the moment, but it changes very few minds.

The truth is, our problem is not with our candidates, as divisive and lacking as they may often be. Our problem is that we have lost a shared consensus about what America is or should be. And without such consensus, politicians will continue to simply pander to our divisions while offering no real unifying ideas for the future. The real question before us is, what does being a citizen of America truly mean? Do we have any agreement about our core values; our commitments to, and expectations of, each other; our willingness to leave each other alone when warranted; or our appropriate role in world events? Instead of talking about any one candidate or another, we need to be answering these most substantive and fundamental questions facing America that our sloganeering candidates are avoiding.

Actions and decisions flow out of principles. We need fresh, open and thoughtful discussions about our principles rather than continuing to yell back and forth about such things as building walls, whom to bomb, whom to limit guns to, whom to let enter the country, who’s funding to cut, who’s taxes to raise, and what our governments should or should not be doing. Future posts planned for this blog will hopefully encourage and inform such discussions.

©  2016   Randy Bell                www.ThoughtsFromTheMountain.blogspot.com