Problems with Politics?

          Rather listen than read? 

           When Donald Trump first became the president of the United States I was sitting in a hotel bar having dinner the night before I flew to Texas. My first reaction was to flag my server down and have her bring me another bourbon on the rocks and to make it a double. My second reaction was to promise myself to pay more attention to politics because in that moment politics became more personally real than ever before. I’ll admit before that day I’d give little thought to politics and its effects on my city, state and country. I was the living embodiment of the bystander effect. I justified myself in trusting enough people would care to pay attention, so I didn’t have to. The one election I did vote for I scaled my vote by how trust worthy the names sounded on the ballot. I’m not proud of the ignorant and naive person I was, but the night of Trump’s election changed everything. I’ll give Trump credit for sparking a fire in me to try and understand where I fit politically and to sharpen my own understanding of the whole system. I thought about how many people where out there like me. I wondered how many people haven’t paid any attention to the state of American politics who consume what others are saying on nothing but face value with no additional input or effort. The though was mildly terrifying, but with the help of some liquid courage I channeled the fear I felt and redirected it into a passion for beginning my journey into understanding American politics. Fast forward 2 years later and what I’ve found in a nut shell is the theory of democracy is sound, but our countries’ practice of it is a shit show.

  The basic theory of American democracy is for the people by the people in the form of an elected Republic. The governed vote to decide the governing, and that process is done through elections. Elections are designed for the governed to learn the stance of those who seek to govern and for a decision to be made based on a majority vote. Every four years we have a main election and a mid-term election at the half way point of a four-year term. These periods are for the governed to review the governing and to replace or keep depending on their performance gauged by another collective vote. On the surface democracy does seem to be the fairest system of governing, but once I started to really invest thought in the theory of democracy, I realized for the system to truly be fair there would need to be some assumptions and underlying principles implied. First implication of fairness I found was every single “of age” citizen in a democratic country needs to vote. It isn’t fair unless everyone has a say, but our “right to vote” comes with conditions which need to be met depending on the state you reside in. These conditions although providing means to categorize and prevent voter fraud also provides ample opportunity for the system to be manipulated. North Dakota for example requires a physical address in order to register to vote which has led to suppressing voters in the Native American community. Georgia is another example with allegations of Brian Kemp putting holds on roughly 53,000 voter registration applications due to Georgia’s exact match law. I can understand conditions of registering to gain better accuracy of voters on a state and county level. I can understand limiting voting rights for those who are incarcerated or being without the mental capacity to process ideas to vote, but in order to successfully be for the people by the people we shouldn’t be blocking those who are able. Especially when it comes to the federal level. Where is the logic of denying someone their federal vote due to not having a home address or having a minor error on an application form? Some Americans may not have an address, but they still are governed citizens who should always have a voice. Where’s the ethics of blocking voters in a system that should have as many informed votes as possible? How does one make a better system? That is the million dollar question, but a common acknowledgment of the problem and conversations to work towards a remedy seems a solid beginning step in answering it.

  The next implication is everyone who is voting needs to be provided an unbiased understanding of the people and ideas of whom and what they’re voting for. The ideas I’ve seen our often distorted on both sides to fit party agendas. Immigration is a prime example. When it comes to immigration reform I hear extremely bias rhetoric of ideas. “Criminals are going to come into the country and steal our jobs and commit all sorts of crimes, so we should build a wall around the country”. This isn’t how immigration reform to build a wall should be presented. The idea should be presented as building a wall to provide better control of who comes in and out of the country in order to maintain national security; feeling that criminals are going to flood into the country is a bias digestion of this idea. The governed digest the ideas, create opinions and then vote. Any other information provided on the topic by those who seek to govern should be factual statements while working towards maintaining the least amount of subjectivity possible. The biggest attack on unbiased ideas are the concept of political parties themselves. Our current political situation speaks volumes. Political parties’ breeds tribalism which increases competition. Competition shouldn’t play any role in politics because instead of allowing ideas to speak for themselves and to have a fair vote from the governed. The goal no longer becomes about the idea or what is best for Americans, but morphs into winning and beating the other party. Competition between parties have led to smear campaigning, gerrymandering, extreme tribalism and polarization. An example is looking at what happened in the midterm election with Heidi Heitkamp in North Dakota. She started by campaigning with her ideas of focusing on Trumps trade war and how it will affect the farmers in the state. Then came the Kavanaugh hearing. Voters stopped worrying about her local ideas and polices and focused on wanting to know if she was for or against Kavanaugh’s confirmation. Why? Well, this is a great question because we should be voting on the merit of her policies and ideas, but tribalism and partisanship stepped in and it became a situation of are you with us or against us.

           Loyalty is a virus in a democratic system because loyalty trumps fairness. Loyalty distorts reason. Another issue with fairness in ideas has to do with advertisement. Is it fair that someone wins because they had a larger marketing budget provided by outside interests in the form of campaign contributions? Is it fair to spend millions of dollars on ads slandering an opponent? The amount of effort involved for wanting to win is toxic. Voting on popularity shouldn’t be a part of the system. Trying to win by slandering an opponent shouldn’t be a part of the system. The mid-term elections have felt like a big UFC fight between Democrats and Republicans and I half expected to have to buy a pay per view package and watch the election outcomes on ESPN hosted by Joe Rogan. Leaders should be chosen by their ideas, policies and their passion towards them and how that passion spreads, not because all they want to do is win and will do anything within their realm of power to do so. Winning should be a byproduct from the governing valuing ideas of those who seek to govern. The last implication is the governed needs to understand the ideas they are voting on. In order for the power to actually be for the people by the people, the people must be educated. Critical thinking, reasoning, logic and how to navigate emotions should all be taught. Education should be valued about everything else, because misinformation, ignorance, naive realism, and manipulation are all dangers in having the governed elect the governing in the form of bad ideas masquerading as good ones. Just look at the confusing measure rhetoric on the ballets. Full of double negative sentences which are extremely miss leading. Education should be valued above all. Education is the defense against bad ideas. Education is the tool to hone skills of understanding and reasoning making sure we as a collective are confident and strong in our decision making. Education is the only defense to ignorance. In my public education I was never taught about the importance of voting. My government class in high school just covered the branches and how they work. Never was I told how important understanding information and voting was and still is. I never grasped that through voting the people do get some of the power, but it seems we in American don’t value teaching that to Americans. According to National Priorities Projects 54% ($598.5 billion) of all federal discretionary spending went to the military. Another study from Peter G. Peterson Foundation posted on May 7, 2018 states the U.S. spends more on defense than the next seven countries combined (China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, India, France, U.K. and Japan). Although I’m not discrediting defense is important, I don’t think that it should take priority in our budget as it currently does and has. When 94% of teachers use their own money to buy school supplies for their classrooms that is a problem. When an average public-school teacher makes a faction of what they should that is a problem. When the average student loan borrower owes roughly $37,000 only tells me something is wrong with our value of education.

           I’ll be the first to tell you that I’m not an expert, but I am someone who values life and thinks every person should be able to find their sense of happiness. In my two years and counting digesting and understanding American politics I believe a system by the people for the people shouldn’t be this confusing, toxic competitive mess it has become. We as a country are unhappy and choose to judge those working towards achieving their happiness and they in turn are retaliating which is causing a wider and wider divide. We’re further moving away to what a democracy should be or am I the only one? 

Work cited

https://web.stanford.edu/~ldiamond/iraq/WhaIsDemocracy012004.htm

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/midterms-2018/midterm-elections-explained-what-are-us-when-2018-trump-date-vote-a8531836.html

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/native-americans-fighting-back-against-north-dakota-voter-id-law-n926326

https://www.iheart.com/podcast/326-the-daily-28076606/episode/the-dilemma-for-red-state-democrats-29967242/

https://www.nationalpriorities.org/campaigns/military-spending-united-states/

https://www.pgpf.org/chart-archive/0053_defense-comparison

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/16/us/teachers-school-supplies.html

https://www1.salary.com/Public-School-Teacher-Salary.html

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/15/heres-how-much-the-average-student-loan-borrower-owes-when-they-graduate.html