I just stumbled on the text of a commencement speech Pres. Obama gave Saturday at the of Michigan. I’ll confess, I was entranced. Couldn’t find a place to stop. Couldn’t find a small portion that captures the elegance of the whole arc. I’ll force myself to pick a few paragraphs for an excerpt below, but I hope you will read the whole thing and maybe ask someone you know who inhabits the other side of the political spectrum from yourself to do so also, and maybe discuss it afterward.
There’s not much in it that’s controversial (at least to these old eyes). Obama did throw a bit of soft soap into the water on the issue of the “big government” bogeyman. And he dropped a few hints that those “Constitutional conservatives” (please see my slightly snotty previous post) who believe that they are the only true descendants of the founding fathers may be reading history selectively.
But his main suggestion isn’t that righties should move left (not that he would mind) but that ideologues on both sides should cut down on the demonizing, open their minds, listen with more respect to one another’s facts and arguments and, well maybe hum a few bars of kumbaya. I’m not doing it justice. The whole thing was catnip for someone like me who worries too much about the power of confirmation bias. But I’ll just shut up and offer an excerpt plus a link to the whole speech. Excerpt:
“… We can’t expect to solve our problems if all we do is tear each other down. (Applause.) You can disagree with a certain policy without demonizing the person who espouses it. You can question somebody’s views and their judgment without questioning their motives or their patriotism. (Applause.) Throwing around phrases like “socialists” and “Soviet-style takeover” and “fascist” and “right-wing nut” — (laughter) — that may grab headlines, but it also has the effect of comparing our government, our political opponents, to authoritarian, even murderous regimes.
Now, we’ve seen this kind of politics in the past. It’s been practiced by both fringes of the ideological spectrum, by the left and the right, since our nation’s birth. But it’s starting to creep into the center of our discourse. And the problem with it is not the hurt feelings or the bruised egos of the public officials who are criticized. Remember, they signed up for it. Michelle always reminds me of that. (Laughter.) The problem is that this kind of vilification and over-the-top rhetoric closes the door to the possibility of compromise. It undermines democratic deliberation. It prevents learning — since, after all, why should we listen to a “fascist,” or a “socialist,” or a “right-wing nut,” or a left-wing nut”? (Laughter.)
It makes it nearly impossible for people who have legitimate but bridgeable differences to sit down at the same table and hash things out. It robs us of a rational and serious debate, the one we need to have about the very real and very big challenges facing this nation. It coarsens our culture, and at its worst, it can send signals to the most extreme elements of our society that perhaps violence is a justifiable response.
So what do we do? As I found out after a year in the White House, changing this type of politics is not easy. And part of what civility requires is that we recall the simple lesson most of us learned from our parents: Treat others as you would like to be treated, with courtesy and respect. (Applause.) But civility in this age also requires something more than just asking if we can’t just all get along.
Today’s 24/7 echo-chamber amplifies the most inflammatory soundbites louder and faster than ever before. And it’s also, however, given us unprecedented choice. Whereas most Americans used to get their news from the same three networks over dinner, or a few influential papers on Sunday morning, we now have the option to get our information from any number of blogs or websites or cable news shows. And this can have both a good and bad development for democracy. For if we choose only to expose ourselves to opinions and viewpoints that are in line with our own, studies suggest that we become more polarized, more set in our ways. That will only reinforce and even deepen the political divides in this country.
But if we choose to actively seek out information that challenges our assumptions and our beliefs, perhaps we can begin to understand where the people who disagree with us are coming from.
Now, this requires us to agree on a certain set of facts to debate from. That’s why we need a vibrant and thriving news business that is separate from opinion makers and talking heads. (Applause.) That’s why we need an educated citizenry that values hard evidence and not just assertion. (Applause.) As Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan famously once said, “Everybody is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.” (Laughter.)
Still, if you’re somebody who only reads the editorial page of The New York Times, try glancing at the page of The Wall Street Journal once in a while. If you’re a fan of Glenn Beck or Rush Limbaugh, try reading a few columns on the Huffington Post website. It may make your blood boil; your mind may not be changed. But the practice of listening to opposing views is essential for effective citizenship. (Applause.) It is essential for our democracy.”
And the full text (it’s worth the time, imho) is here.
Personally I like Obama much more when he flashes his street cred and uses more humor. An example from a number of weeks ago on the passage of health reform and all the critics. Somethin to the effect “Well you know we got people criticizing the health plan and says it hasn’t done much good. Well I say to them it’s only been in effect for a couple of weeks into a 4 year rollout You’re criticizing a little early wouldn’t you thunk.”
I don’t think listening to Rush Limbaugh makes people who disagree more “understanding” of his positions. It just makes them angrier.
The problem is not that there isn’t civil discussion. Its that it gets no attention. In fact, civil discussion is a threat to the media’s narrative which is mostly competing taunts and cliches. How interesting would the basketball/football/hockey game be if the announcers gave calm and reasonable descriptions?
Dan, if you read the whole speech, there’s a good dollop of Obama’s sly, self-deprecating humor.
Ross, you’re right, if we use Limbaugh as the example. Methinks listening respectfully to the other side works better if you read David Brooks. If you can’t find a conservative to listen to respectfully, that’s a problem. But reducing the other side to its biggest idiots is one of the way we reinforce the dialogue of the deaf.
The mistake which leads to president Obama’s overly optimistic attitude about the ability of those on the far right and the far left to ever to ever find acceptable middle-of-the-road compromises with him arises out of his failure to understand that those on the far fringes are, most often, not playing with a full deck of their original (God-given, if you will) personality attributes.
Those on the far right, especially if they are male, have had their ability to be tender and empathetic beaten (literally or figuratively) out of them, leaving them with an angry, hostile response whenever they’re presented with people who are unquestionably deserving of tenderness and compassion, and turning every disagreement into a “winner take all” pitched battle.
Some women on the right have had similar experiences, turning them into angry, hostile, anti-feminists. Others have had the ability to be assertive knocked out of them leaving them unable to demonstrate strength, with their only psychologically available option being to offer difficult, temperamental, violence-prone men more love and tenderness in this hopes that this will eventually change them into more loving human beings (which it never does).
Meanwhile, on the far left, some men have had the ability to demonstrate any behavior which might be taken as “harsh” or “mean” (no matter how positive and well-adjusted that response might be) beaten out of them (literally or figuratively) leading them to respond to any and every crisis with efforts to compromise and reach consensus, no matter how clear it might be to healthier people that those efforts will never be successful.
Some women on the far left have had similar experiences while others have had their ability to be tender and empathetic knocked out of them. These women are often on the opposite side of ideas from conservative men but use identical tactics, justifying themselves by believing they are saving the world (and all men) from “testosterone poisoning” while never acknowledging that they are doing to those men exactly what they have detested when it was being done to them. They label themselves feminists, but, in reality they could more accurately be called “anti-masculinists,” and may be either male or female.
It is these people on the fringes of both sides who, having had aspects of their personalities violently wrenched out of them, both on the left and the right, who are often dominating the political landscape these days, at least in part because of the media’s love for a good on air fight. NONE of them are capable of compromise.
I have worried that president Obama does not comprehend that many of the people with whom he’s trying to find mutual understanding and compromise, both on the far right and the far right are absolutely incapable of such understanding and compromise. Sadly, they have been elected by people who largely share their dysfunctions and thus seek to build the same world – a world which will never ask them to express the missing pieces of their personalities.
Dominated by the overwhelming desire to win everything for themselves, no matter what the costs to others (up to and including the destruction of the nation) these people are incapable of compromise, nor do they care if they fight fairly.
As we have seen with their “bait and switch” tactics on health care, the financial regulation package, the anti-pollution bill, and will soon see in the issue of immigration, they smile and seem to be listening and implying they MAY be willing to move your way a bit, while, all the while, reaching around your back, trying to discover where they might most effectively drive home the knife they’ve been hiding while waiting for their opportunity to bring you down.
Healing is possible for such people, but those most in need are often most reluctant to recognize that need since the change healing would bring would cause them to “lose face” in massive ways as they backed away from what they had formerly, stridently declared to be the only correct ways of understanding and acting in the world.
It is also true that these types of dysfunctions can be prevented though parenting which corrects the inappropriate behavior of children, educates them as to why it’s inappropriate, while at the same time reassures them of their worth and that they are loved even when they make mistakes and miss steps. Thus can we ensure that all children grow up whole and healthy, are able to consider the best information available and make the best decisions possible based on that information.
Until more of us have returned to this style of parenting which provides love AND limits in appropriate amounts, we will continue to deal with these dysfunctional folks, on the far right and the far left who cannot be trusted ever to seek to do the right things. They can only be opposed and their dirty, destructive, self-serving deeds exposed. Efforts to do anything else will only grant them greater power.
Thanks Eric on the followup. Would be interesting to hear on the radio too.
“But the practice of listening to opposing views is essential for effective citizenship.”
True enough but the practice of following through and doing what a majority of Americans elected you to do without watering down and trying to compromise with people who have proven time and time again that they are going to say no anyway
is essential for effective leadership.
Both are “essential for our democracy.”
Well, well. It was bound to happen sooner or later I guess, but P-Bo has said something I agree with.
I listen to much more leftist news than right, and I read leftist propaganda sites with relish each day. Not only is it instructive to put leftist talking points to the test, but I find it valuable to be able to correct right leaning pundits I catch engaging in the same sort of games I see on the left.
It can be difficult, and at times frustrating, to engage the other side of the spectrum. Here at Minnpost, for instance, I regularly read some really hate filled diatribes, liberally sprinkled with ad hominum insults directed at conservatives (including yours truly), while many comments I’ve offered, having been carefully constructed to be as civil as possible, evaporate into cyber heaven.
That being said, if you can’t bear to expose yourself to opposing ideologies, your grip on your own must be pretty tenuous. And if you can’t afford the time to rewrite a comment three or four times to get it past a lefty censor, well, you probably have a life 😉
video at the end of this story, for those who wish to experience the speech that way:
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/5/1/1279/68829
a bear exposing himself to other idealogues (sounds like someone is spending too much time in the woods) I didn’t know they wore pants.
What to do, then, about the Republican nominee for Governor of Minnesota, who declared “I don’t think you can call yourself a freedom-loving American and be a Democrat”?
Any conservative who considers himself to be fair-minded and not one of the radical wing-nuts ought to repudiate the man on this basis alone. I don’t expect to hear any of them actually do this.
I’m sorry, but it’s a little hard to be willing to listen to the Repub standard-bearer, when he has plainly declared that if he is elected, I will be disenfranchised on two counts – as a citizen who is not a Republican, and as a public employee – a class he has made clear he would like to see a lot less of.
No doubt there are many reasonable conservatives. The leadership are not among them.
Maybe if the GOPers would repudiate Gingrich’s 1996 GOPAC memo outlining the words and phrases that GOPers should use to define Democrats (traitors, sick, radical, lie, cheat, betray, anti-flag, anti-child, anti-family, etc.).
Trouble is, the GOP, far from repudiating it, continues to this day to follow Newt’s divisive advice.
And why not? They’ve won a ton of elections using this tactic.
I know this sounds like a “you first” argument, but what would you do if faced with political opponents who have successfully tilted the electorate by using such disgusting, slanderous smears?
Sitting back and taking the high road is for politicians who want to feel good about themselves rather than win elections.
I for one, am glad that the Democrats are slowly learning to not stand for this crap. And I applaud them for adopting tactics that fight back against these slanders, not by using equally vile slanders of their own, but by calling out the worst GOP offenders.
Lance (post #10) provides a perfect example of how current GOPers leaders are still channeling Newt, namely Tom Emmers saying “I don’t think you can call yourself a freedom-loving American and be a Democrat”
WTF? He’s calling Democrats un-American. Eric, I challenge you to name one mainstream Democrat who says equally vile things about GOPers.
No, GOPers are far, far more guilty of these tactics than Democrats.
Think back to the health care debates. Almost every attack by GOPers were ad hominem attacks that slammed the personal motives of health care reform supporters. (The S-word, anyone?)
The Democrats, thank goodness, successfully fought back, but their counter-arguments to the HCR opponents were substantive, not personal.
And finally (I have gone on and on, haven’t I?), consider that there is a best-selling book that call liberals traitors (it’s in the frickin’ title) — hint: It’s by neoconservative Ann Coulter.
How should Dems operate in such a hostile atmosphere? How should they face such hatred from the right?
By playing nice?
BZZZZZZZTTT!
Wrong answer. Try again.
” I challenge you to name one mainstream Democrat who says equally vile things about GOPers”
Softball time; no don’t get up, I got it.
“I F****** Hate those F****** mother******s.”
~ Senator* Al Franken
(It’s in his frickin’ book)
“Hi, I’m Al Franken; I hate you and you hate me”
~ Greeting Karl Rove while settling down in the Senate
Some folks seem to enjoy the role of provocateur and take it a bit too seriously in my opinion and both sides are guilty of it.
My opposition to the words “socialist”, “leftist”, “liberal”, etc. by the more right-minded of the commenters here is that we’re generally talking about relatively serious ideas, with the occasional bon mot tossed in for good measure.
This is the same dynamic that causes words like “leftist” (from another blog post) to become pejoratives. Intentionally using language that perhaps is more dramatic? Artistic? Certainly more inflammatory and angry.
I’m not looking for anyone to adopt the intellectual framework of “the other side”, as such, where “socialist” means “anywhere to the left of me” and “fascist” means “anywhere to the right of me”.
After all, aside from the odd haiku, none of us is here to write poetry or stretch the boundaries of the English language. At least I don’t think so.
Nice words from the Pres. Now, if he would only
a)practice what he preaches more; and
b)acknowledge that opposition to HIS ideas may — at least sometimes — have a genuine basis in conflicting principles. Compromise is NOT about how can we get you to see things OUR way. It’s about how we make room for your basic viewpoints in our proposals.
As for the prickly atmosphere of current national dialogue — in my view on both sides EQUALLY — some of us seniors see it as more a problem of the myopic vision of youth.
I remember the college years, when we knew everything, and black was black and white was white, and anyone with a smidgeon of intelligence would certainly agree with US.
As time goes by, however, and as life teaches its usual hard lessons, certitudes become less certain and relationships help us to see weight in the thoughts of those who disagree.
Some core values remain unchanged, but tolerance for those of a different mind increases, as one comes to understand how each of us has beliefs reinforced or challenged by individual life experience. Walking a while in the other person’s shoes acquires greater value.
Which is why, in my posts, I try to point out the things I see from my life perspective which lead me to my conclusions. Sometimes it seems that youthful college attitude gets in the way of my being heard. But it warms my heart when I read responses that suggest the message has penetrated.
Oh, and another lesson from a long life: Once you know you are a survivor, it becomes much easier to laugh at our human foibles, and to embrace continuing examples of how, as fellow members of the human race, we usually seem to muddle through: things usually come out all right in the end, despite the fears of those who love to predict imminent doom.
Waiting for the kids to grow up removes much of the need to blast away at their current behaviors, whether they are two year olds, commenters, political candidates or even presidents.
John, from your exalted point of view of advanced age ((which does not necessarily confer wisdom), I think you have overlooked the fact that Obama has consistently brought in, and listened to, various points of view. He is legendary for listening silently to everyone before making a decision. He has called meetings with Wall street executives, health care industry professionals. He even went into the belly of the beast and talked to Republican leaders, took questions, answered–and listened to others. He is known as the great pragmatist and has been vilified for his compromises.
So from my own great height of age (I am of retirement age), I think you have done something similar as those whom you criticize, most of all have not listened to others.
Ms. Martin seems right on target, regardless of her age. Having survived enough decades myself to qualify for Medicare, it’s been my observation that “bipartisanship,” while a worthy goal, is difficult to achieve, and impossible if the people you disagree with approach “compromise” from the standpoint of “Compromise means you have to change your views to suit mine.”
Leaving aside the truly lunatic fringe at both ends of the spectrum, and admitting that it’s practiced by both Democrats and Republicans, I’ve nonetheless seen far more of that sort of intransigence from the GOP than from the other side in recent years/decades. Agree with him or not, Obama has done far more listening to alternative and/or opposing views, even soliciting them on occasion, than his predecessor.
That sort of open-mindedness infuriates his supporters on occasion, including this one, but he has the admirable trait, in my view, of being enough of a pragmatist to actually want to solve problems and get things done. It obviously doesn’t always work, but at least the attempt is being made.
Few of today’s Republicans are, in my limited judgment, actual conservatives, with whom it’s possible to have a reasoned debate and difference of opinion, and for whom I’ve occasionally voted in the past. The current GOP candidate for Governor, recently endorsed by none other than Sarah Palin, strikes me as “Exhibit ‘A'” of this sad reactionary syndrome. Max Sparber does a pretty good job in today’s “Daily Glean” of illustrating the hollowness of much of the hyperbole emanating from “conservatives” nowadays. People who campaign for government office on a platform of “Get rid of government” are suffering, at the very least, from what educational psychologists generally label as “cognitive dissonance.”
Good ones, Tom!
Got any more?
Any smoking memos?
(#16) Ray Schoch says:
“bipartisanship,” while a worthy goal, is difficult to achieve, and impossible if the people you disagree with approach “compromise” from the standpoint of “Compromise means you have to change your views to suit mine.”
(#14) John E Iacono says:
“Compromise is NOT about how can we get you to see things OUR way. It’s about how we make room for your basic viewpoints in our proposals.”
Glad to hear you agree with me, Ray. Or do you?
Ginny,
Seems you didn’t hear me very well.
It might be helpful if you were to list the times when Obama actually changed anything substantive after his “listening” took place.
In the absence of such concrete results, I submit that while he may have SAID he wanted to hear, he was not ready to LISTEN. Much like many of his liberal brethren in congress and elsewhere.
In our country, we have a cure for that: elections.
John I: Obama listened so closely to his Chicago School blue-dog Dem. advisors (liberal in some ways but fiscally the children of Milton Friedman’s Chicago School economics) and to congressional Republicans and to the insurance and drug companies that he:
1) Dropped support for the public option HE CAMPAIGNED ON that would have offered lower-income persons an alternative to the confiscatory insurance industry’s practice of raising premiums & profits every year.
2) Told the drug companies not to worry that we would try to negotiate Medicare drug prices, thereby forgoing $80 billion/year in savings (when combining taxpayer dollars with seniors’ excess costs in premiums, co-pays, deductibles and doughnut hole purchases–see Dean Baker’s 2006 report at http://www.cepr.net).
3) Refusing to interfere when Max Baucus ran the development of the plan by letting industry lobbyists help write it and refused to allow the suggested amendments of more liberal members of his committee to be voted on by that committee.
Some of us were utterly and severely disappointed at his ability to not just listen to the views of people opposed to true reform, but to let them be incorporated in a bill that will therefore cost $5 trillion over 10 years instead of saving money.