I offer a new frame that, I think, will give the Left a stronger handle on the cultural war being fought for the soul of our Republic: Reason vs Faith.
50 years ago, both parties could lay a plausible claim to be the champions of Reason. But now the changes in the Republican party have clearly shown it to be the party of Faith, offering voters an unambiguous moral compass. Rationalism and secularism have failed to address spiritual needs, and people all over the world -- not just in the USA -- are longing for some firmer emotional, psychological, and spiritual grounding than our ever-more urban, ever-more impersonal society offers. The Republicans have found the key to that yearning and exploited it effectively.
But in the process they have cast Reason aside, and that is the flag we can rally around. If we offer voters a clear choice between Reason and Faith, we can save our civilization.
Rationalism is amoral -- it leaves the matter of personal values to the individual, and provides no moral compass. Generations of philosophers have struggled to provided an absolute rational basis for ethics, and perhaps some have succeeded -- I can't tell because despite my extensive education and reading, I can't understand their arguments. But from the point of view of most people, rationalism offers no moral foundation. So they turn to Faith. There's nothing wrong with this -- we need some foundation on which to build our value system. The problem comes when people reject Rationalism.
The Schiavo case clearly exemplifies the rejection of Rationalism. Every rational analysis clearly demonstrates that the woman died long ago, and that we are now merely keeping the meat from rotting. Yet huge numbers of Americans refuse to accept the best judgment of medical experts. Their faith tells them that a miracle will save Terri Schiavo.
The same rejection of Rationalism underlies the Creationists and ID people; the global warming deniers; the opponents of flouridation; anti-(gay marriage) advocates; the believers in the tie between al-qaeda and Saddam -- and on and on. No amount of logic can reach these people, because they have already rejected logic in their hearts even though they pay lip service to it in public. This is about values, not facts, and as far as they are concerned, that's the end of the story.
We on the Left bear some guilt for this dangerous situation. Our first sin has been a failure to assert values. Consider the Ward Churchill imbroglio. Here's a man who used Reason to concoct a patently preposterous hypothesis. I very much doubt that anybody here on dKos would embrace his claim that the victims of the 9/11 tragedy deserved their fate or were 'little Eichmanns'. Yet look how the Left and Right rushed into this tempest-in-a-teapot. The Right asserted values: this man's claims are heinous. They're correct, and everybody knows it. The Left responded by insisting on his rights as a tenured academic -- dodging the values issue entirely. After a quickly muttered acknowledgement that they didn't agree with Churchill, they loudly proclaimed his immunity. The impression we give the world is that we can't even see a moral outrage when it's black and white. Before you jump to the false conclusion that I agree with the Right that Churchill should be terminated -- don't! Go back and re-read what I wrote, and hew to the line of logic. We on the Left should have been just as loud in our condemnations of Churchill's intellectual crime. We could still have defended his tenure on the grounds of academic freedom, but we didn't have to compromise on the moral depravity of Mr. Churchill's claims. By doing so, we handed the values issue to the Right.
Our second sin has been our own willingness to compromise Rationalism when it yielded inconvenient results. Too many times we have engaged in intellectually intricate and ultimately dishonest arguments to support beliefs that we, for other reasons, came to hold dear. I offer the Left's rejection of nuclear power as a prime example. Our deep (and entirely rational) aversion to nuclear weapons coupled with our suspicion of Big Corporations led us to reject this technology despite an abundance of rational argument in support of it. The science said it is safe, but we didn't believe the science because we didn't WANT to believe the science. Once we started treating Reason in so cavalier a fashion, we weakened its grip on the American soul, opening the door for the barbarians of Faith to charge through.
A third factor, not of our making, has contributed to the decline of Rationalism in our society: the lowering of educational standards. Education is the wellspring of Rationalism; as it has withered in our society, so too has the strength of our Rationalism.
I therefore propose that the Left re-orient itself around Rationalism. Make it clear that we are the party of Reason, that we believe in science and technology and the judicial process and education. To do this, however, we must make some painful concessions. We must disassociate ourselves from those elements of the Left that embrace fundamentally anti-rational positions. If the scientists discover some gene that proves that imperialism is a Good Thing, we'll just have to take a deep gulp and go along with it. We know that won't happen, but we can't champion Reason if we aren't willing to live by it. Don't worry -- Reason is on our side on most of the issues: environmentalism, global warming, evolution, Schiavo, and many other issues.
There are some issues, however, where our beliefs are not well-supported by Reason. Nuclear power is one. Globalization is another -- so far, the hard facts seem to show that globalization is overall a beneficial development. There's still plenty of room for debate and there are some aspects of globalization that are most definitely NOT beneficial -- but knee-jerk opposition to globalization does not further the cause of Rationalism. Our opposition to genetically modified foods is another example. Until the science supports us, our opposition only weakens us.
Re-aligning the Democratic party along these lines will surely be painful, as some factions within the party will get squeezed out -- but our appeal to the public will be broader. More important, this re-alignment correctly addresses the real cultural chasm within our society, and gives voters a clearer choice. This is a battle we can win. And if we lose it, our civilization will surely collapse.