This evening
Keith Olbermann presented his
interview with Former President Bill Clinton on
MSNBC's Countdown. It was wonderful to see Keith have the opportunity to ask questions from his distinctly realistic point of view (contrasted greatly with the
Chris Wallace interview on Fox Sunday). But then it's always a pleasure to listen to Bill Clinton's particular brand of pragmatism. I often have issues with the disciples of Clinton, those that rose to national prominence via his administration, but I've always felt that Clinton himself is an enduring source of wisdom and sense. It's always good to see him present this wisdom and sense... whether we are smart enough to learn from him or not is always up to us.
take a jump with me and see what i learned and how it can make a difference to the way we create unity in the progressive/liberal movement.
One of the questions Keith put to the former President was one that, though he was referring to the current administration's tactics of painting their opposition as disloyal, made me think of some of the more single minded kossacks i've encountered in the past few weeks. Here's the question Keith posed
OLBERMANN: This is not what we're supposed to be about and when we talk about rewriting the Geneva Conventions, or when we talk about demonizing dissent, or even putting just a bad face on dissent in this country, are we not getting closer to what the terrorists want us to change any way?
emphasis mine.
here's what the former president had to say on that topic...
CLINTON: Well, I think--let me at least put it in positive terms. I think that the terrorists have an ideology, right? With an ideology, you know the answer anyway, right? You have a dictated result, therefore, evidence, argument, old-fashioned standards of fact, all irrelevant. You know where you want to go, and if somebody disagrees with you, they are less human than you are, and they deserve to be a terrorist target.
Now, the way we play the game, at our best moments, is that we don't have an ideology with a predetermined outcome. We have philosophies. Dominantly, we have a conservative philosophy and a progressive philosophy, and it sort of tells kind of where we're likely to be, but we're all interested in evidence and argument and learning.
And the great test of America has always been, does it work? Are people better off if we do it or not? And we just keep growing and learning in that climate, always with one dominant conservative stream, one dominant progressive. And the debate and the tension and the learning has been great for us.
now here's a man with more than his share of reasons to hate the conservative movement with every fiber of his being. no one has more reasons to say "shut your f**king piehole" to the right... and yet he has the wisdom and the patience to see the longer view. he has the serenity to recognize that there are some people who just aren't worth arguing with... but that there are some, clear headed articulate folks on either side of any issue. and here's the interesting part to me, he recognizes that if you don't scream them down, if you open up to them and their concerns... you'll find more common ground than you might ever have expected. and, more importantly, you might find that you can arrive at solutions that advance your agenda. and thereby you might get some real good done for humanity.
here's a man who's realized that you can't steer the ship of state in a quick 90 degree turn. not a ship as big as america. with a ship that size you need to turn in 2 degree turns. it's a wonderfully realistic and, as i said, pragmatic view that is appalling to ideologues on either side of the fence. ideologues want severe course correction... whether it means capsizing the ship of state or not.
i don't know.
i just heard that and thought that all of those folks who's blood boils at the slightest hint of a "concern" might read what the democratic party's last best political mind had to say about how you deal with dissent and with inflexible ideologues.
have at it.