Cleveland Edition
Perhaps against my better judgement this posting and next week’s posting will draw from the events, emotions and the intellectual content of the conventions of our two parties. I approach this self directed assignment with “fear and trembling”. I was taught in college to avoid “plagiarism” as I would avoid the plague or any other communicable, uniformly fatal infection. Indeed as I wrote “fear and trembling” I wondered if the phrase was an acceptable cliche available in the public domain without attribution or whether some other writer needed to be acknowledged. I was greatly relieved to learn that its origin is in St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians as translated in the King James version of the Bible published in 1610. I assume that I can use the phrase without attribution. Properly attributing the work of others takes a lot of energy and I suspect that what we identify as plagiarism is often legitimate human error or just intellectual sloppiness. I am willing to pass on any error that Melania Trump and Meredith McIver, Ms. Trump’s ghost writer, made.
Who could have predicted that the first big surprise of the convention would be a controversy over what is plagiarism? The pointless resistance of Senator Cruz’s supporters was not a surprise. Beyond the initial distraction about Ms. Trump’s speech, I find it sad that much of the proceedings revolved around various definitions of lying, deceit, false claims, and what may or may not be acceptable variations of “the truth”. The issue of truthfulness was explored on each of the nights even though the “theme” for each night was different.
Night One was “Make America Safe” and was remarkable for Rudy Giuliani’s passionate call for changes that would protect the homeland from terrorists and Chris Christie’s mock prosecution of Hillary Clinton. Night Two was “Make America Work” and the election of the ticket. Night Three was “Make America First” and was remarkable for Ted Cruz’s lack of endorsement of Mr. Trump and the acceptance speech of VP nominee, Governor Mike Pence of Indiana. The theme of the final night was “Make America Whole” and the candidate again reminded us of the importance of truthfulness and experienced leadership in a speech that lasted over 70 minutes and mentioned healthcare only twice: once to say the ACA will be repealed and replaced and once to say that the care of veterans will improve.
Mr. Trump’s dystopian view of America seemed at variance with the experience of most of the commentators. His thesis seemed to be that we were all quite vulnerable to a series of national disasters that were virtually unavoidable unless he was elected president. He and he alone had the experience, skill and ability to save America. Hillary Clinton was cast as the originator or the perpetuator of all that threatened to push us into the abyss. At the end of his speech that theme was underlined as balloons fell from on high accompanied by the pirated use of the Rolling Stones’ anthem saying that we may not get what we want but we will get what we need.
We have only heard half of the argument. The Democrats have their turn at bat next week. The whole conversation in front of the faithful is for the benefit of the undecided. It seems likely that in the end many will remain confused and bewildered about what assertions to believe and whom to trust.
On the first night when safety in America was the theme most speakers referred to the events in Benghazi as evidence that America was not safe and that Hillary Clinton could not be trusted to make us safe. I would have appreciated a much more in depth discussion of the question of safety. The threat of ISIS, fear of immigrants and for some hard to explain reason the “Black Lives Matter” movement account for some of that feeling. I am also sure that our lack of safety is more complex. If the election is the beginning of a solution process, as a voter I would like to know more of the plan than that it includes a wall. Shootings by terrorists and bombings are dramatic but many more Americans die of medical errors, drug overdoses and mental instability associated with firearms than from the subversive activities of immigrants. I will not feel safer behind a wall.
Most of the speeches were delivered by obscure celebrities, family members or politicians who were rationalizing their alignment with this very controversial candidate. Using “safety” as an example in the speeches I heard, there was little evidence that there had been an in depth search for the potential solutions. There was no consideration or discussion of the social origins of our vulnerability to violence. There was no reference to the lack of safety in poorly managed complex systems, deteriorating infrastructure, and neglected social services. If one believes that complex problems are not amenable to simple solutions, there were many unanswered questions that emerged following the rhetoric on all four nights.
Usually there is a process that seeks alignment between the candidate and the platform. That relationship has changed in recent years. The primaries have moved most of the process of candidate selection to the long winter months before the conventions. Still, platforms should be important to voters as they are choosing a president since the power of the executive to implement programs through appointments to agencies and the courts creates much of the “operating system” that drives the agenda that should flow from the platform.
The final platform that was approved going into this convention should be of interest to us all. What does it say about healthcare at a high level? What does it say about reproductive rights? I have been amazed by the lack of discussion of the substantive issues that face us in healthcare. You may say, “Well the Platform committee was quite willing to copy and paste Paul Ryan’s new proposal for legislation to replace the ACA”. I would like to hear someone, perhaps Ryan himself, explain his proposal since it is a major part of the platform’s healthcare plank. I have been to Ryan’s website. I read his program and listened to his YouTube presentations. I read what knowledgeable people say it does and does not do. I have real questions that need answers. If I am going to give my vote to someone who will sign the bill for the law that will replace the ACA, I need to know more.
There was plenty of time to tell me what I needed to know if the complaints about Benghazi and Hillary Clinton’s culpability had been made once and the remaining time invested in educating me, a willing listener, to a new idea that I should consider. I resent that there was no respectful attempt to appeal to my realistic desire to hear a substantive presentation for an alternative strategy for providing universal affordable coverage for all Americans which is what Paul Ryan’s proposal calls for. I would be a fool not to pay attention to a proposal that claims that it will:
…provide all Americans with health care that is accessible, affordable, and sustainable…
And that:
provides every American with the freedom to pick a plan that best fits his or her unique health care needs…
That combination of assertions that may not be the Triple Aim, but it is very interesting. It is at least as pertinent to my future and probably to my overall safety than the question of whether or not Secretary Clinton compromised the security of classified documents. If there was a desire to convince me that I should trust the problem solving ability of a Republican lead executive branch, a good start would have been to give me a new set of ideas to consider as an alternative to the most import social legislation of this young century. They missed a big opportunity by wasting their time trying to convince me that they were a more reliable source of truth than the Democrats. I doubt that there is a statistically significant difference in truthfulness between the two parties.
Voters may be like “buyers” in a market who are listening to sales pitches. Caveat emptor applies because both sides agree that collectively we will be stuck for a very long time with the ramifications of the outcome of our decision process in November. The next president will appoint several new justices to the Supreme Court. There are no enforceable warranties or guarantees in politics. The authors of the empty and disingenuous rhetoric of politics are often able to avoid accountability through the complexity of our system of government.
So as the election season goes forward from the conventions, I expect to hear plenty of false claims of accomplishments, misrepresentation of facts, denials of responsibility, unfounded assertions about the possible “when I am elected”, and continuous character assassination of the opponent. I hope that I can hear or read more in depth analysis of proposed solutions, but I am not holding my breath. A person with a short memory or someone who is not a student of history may argue that the political climate has never been this dreadful before, but if he were alive I am certain that Yogi Berra would say this is “deja vu all over again”. All of this is justified in the mind of one conservative writer by using another well worn cliche, politics is a full contact sport. I think it is a reality that we must all accept as being a manifestation of human nature that we will not grow beyond by November 8, 2016. As voters we will probably need to dig for the answers we need.
I do not know how non Christians feel about the frequent references by speakers at the political conventions to the importance of Christ like behavior in our social interactions. I fear that the dichotomy between the teachings of Christ and the words spoken and actions advocated in this impassioned denunciations of those with a different viewpoint breeds cynicism in those from other cultures. This last week Fr. Richard Rohr, a Franciscan priest in New Mexico whose daily email I frequently read, was discussing “The Spirituality of Imperfection”. He quoted from the “Sermon on The Mount”, Matthew 5:43-48. In the passage we are urged to love, not hate, our enemies. Father Rohr’s analysis of this departure from conventional thinking has a point that has political significance.
The real moral goals of the Gospel–loving enemies, caring for the powerless, overlooking personal offenses, living simply, eschewing riches–can only be achieved through surrender and participation. These have often been ignored or minimized, even though they were clearly Jesus’ major points.
I am going to interpret “surrender” as suggesting that we give up the idea that we (as members of one particular party) have sole possession of the truth and “participation” as the suggestion that by the process of respectful discourse (with those who are our “enemies”,i.e. members of another party, social class or ethnicity), we can achieve what we all say we really want which is a just society that offers everyone the opportunity for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
I am not naive. I know that there is a disconnect between what we say we believe and what we are actually able to pull off in real life, but I do believe that respectful dialog about solutions to shared problems is sorely missing in our political process. I wish that the two parties could “love” one another. I could vote for a genuine effort to “Make America Whole Again” if I could hear rhetoric that was both respectful in regard to all the diverse populations that call America home. Global warming is a problem for both the just and the unjust. Next week the Democrats will have their chance to show that they are willing to use their opportunity to find a different voice.
