Back during the primaries, everyone kept formally admitting that it was wrong to engage in the form of inference "candidate X lost group A in a primary, and therefore he's likely to lose group A in a general election against candidate Y of the other party" but I often got the sense listening to and reading pundits that they didn't really believe that.
Hell, I wish "everyone formally admitted" that the (primaries= general election) inference was bogus. In fact, TalkLeft's Big Tent Democrat DIDN'T see the logical problem with the inference even at the very end of the primary season. He kept hammering out posts about why "demography is political destiny", and why everyone else were ostriches but he was Paul Revere... etc. [Btw, I think he actually means demographics, not "demography" but in either case he's wrong.] There's no such thing as "destiny" in politics, that's one of the few redeeming things about it. People say the winners were "destined" to win and the losers were "destined" to lose, but only after the results are in.
Saying "demographics is political destiny" is like saying "physics and geometry are billiards tournament destiny". It sounds impressive, but it's only mostly true. And it's "mostly true" in a superficial way that is often wrong when it matters most. "Surprises" occur in politics. Many of them are unpleasant. For example, was demographics "destiny" for Ray Nagin in 2002? What about 2006? Didn't strategy play a wee bit of a role in those contests.
Here, I'm just going to be lazy and cut and paste a draft I wrote on 1/10/08. For whatever reason, I never reworked and published it. Looking over it, it's still a bit rough, but I believe the general points apply.
as written on 1/10/08:
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These days, successful presidential political campaigning is comparable to playing a marathon game of speed chess on a tilted game board with changing colors, trapdoors, and moving clown pieces. The "contest" is watched from the outside and judged in slow motion, and the stakes couldn't be higher. Despite billions of dollars, and millions of hours being poured into the contest, it's not entirely rigged. Surprises are possible.
But it is beyond absurd.
Campaigns are in the business of playing the absurd, theatrical, amoral game. Hunter S. Thompson's model of viewing such a "process" through a (drug-induced) surreal lens is one of the most profoundly revealing insights into modern American politics... ever. I'm serious. Nothing is more essentially accurate. The modern political game is surreal, always more than you think. And it has been for a long time.
Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi recognized this fundamental truth recently (h/t dotcalm):
the media has done its best to turn a once-promising race into an idiotic exchange of Nerf-insults, delivered at rah-rah campaign events utterly indistinguishable from scholastic pep rallies. "If there's policy in this race," one veteran campaign reporter tells me with a sad laugh, "I haven't noticed it."
And while it's tempting to blame the candidates, deep in my black journalist's heart I know it isn't all their fault.
We did this. The press. America tried to give us a real race, and we turned it into a bag of shit, just in the nick of time.
Taibbi recognizes that campaigning candidates are playing the absurd game, they're not creating it. Candidates are not blameless, but they are not the ones who will lead the way in de-absurdifying the process.
Are we still living in the "pretend place" where campaigns are viewed as contests of competing policy menus, from which discerning voters choose? Apparently, yes, we are.
Do you really think that's how most voters choose their candidates? By intellect? No. Most go on gut "feel", which is informed by (often trivial) narratives. They choose candidates intuitively. "Hope" and "Fear" still rule the day, and fear usually has the upper hand. Voters respond when candidates show an understanding of their circumstances and problems-- the demonstration of that understanding is the key; the specific policy proposal connected to that demonstration of understanding (in other words, the proposed "solution" to the problem) is almost beside the point. A detailed policy argument means nothing to most voters until it connects with them emotionally. Some voters say they like "specifics", but they don't. They actually like the fact that the candidate gave them specifics, rather than the specifics themselves. When a voter
A. I like candidate Hezekiah, he gave me specifics about my immigration question.
B. What were the implications of those 'specifics'?
A. I haven't the foggiest idea, but candidate Hezekiah obviously thinks I'm smart, and that made me feel good, so I nodded as he talked specifics until he rhetorically circled back to his campaign mantra "Fortress America for Prosperity".
Similarly, the media operates on stories and narratives that strike emotion-- that's what sells-- not policy distinctions and fact-checking.
Bill Clinton connected his wonkery to voters with empathy, that's how he won elections.
And Gore didn't lose because of a flawed policy platform. And Bush didn't win in 2004 because of his policies. Obama didn't win Iowa because of policy strength, nor did Edwards lose Iowa (after campaigning there for four years) because of policy weakness. Hillary didn't win New Hampshire because of policy.
But oyster, it shouldn't be like this. Policy should be more important than trivia fueled narratives pimped by biased media.
Yeah, no kidding.
I mean, I heartily agree. But if we want to fundamentally change the game, and make it less absurd, we shouldn't wait until an election year to do so. The exact wrong way to do it is blaming the candidates who are currently playing the game. They're hopelessly inside it right now. Expecting them to heroically alter the structure of the game right now is beyond naive. It would be like asking them to purposely lose. It almost assuredly won't work. Instead, such fundamental change will require years of effective activism working to change the primary process, the media coverage, the money involved, and persuading Americans to change their attitudes about how candidates should be judged. Doing all that will take a while. But don't think it will occur this cycle. This cycle was already "lost" many years ago, despite whatever Taibbi thinks suddenly happened to a "once promising race".
In the meantime, there is an absurd race for the Presidency. The stakes are rather high, too.
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Labels: Misc
