Krugman praises the President's words from Tucson, as do commentators across the political spectrum. But we remain deeply divided as a nation, Krugman notes, and those divisions are not about the practical implementation of commonly shared ideas. Instead he sees them as about fundamental concepts of the role of government.
And the real challenge we face is not how to resolve our differences — something that won’t happen any time soon — but how to keep the expression of those differences within bounds.
Skipping ahead to his conclusion, he writes
It’s not enough to appeal to the better angels of our nature. We need to have leaders of both parties — or Mr. Obama alone if necessary — declare that both violence and any language hinting at the acceptability of violence are out of bounds. We all want reconciliation, but the road to that goal begins with an agreement that our differences will be settled by the rule of law.
There are good insights in his column, yet that very conclusion troubles me, as I will explain.
Krugman sees a fundamental divide between those who think government has a responsibility to amelioriate the worst effects of the kind of capitalism that existed before the New Deal, one he describes as "capitalism red in tooth and claw." The other sees as illegitimate any action of government that taxes the earnings (or wealth) of those that have it to benefit those that do not, seeing such taxation as theft.
That’s what lies behind the modern right’s fondness for violent rhetoric: many activists on the right really do see taxes and regulation as tyrannical impositions on their liberty.
Especially on health care, this might seem surprising, giving that what was passed is remarkably close both to Republican proposals for health care in earlier decades and what those in Massachusetts are receiving under the so-called Romney care passed by a leading Republican candidate for President last cycle and now. Krugman rightly notes
Today’s G.O.P. sees much of what the modern federal government does as illegitimate; today’s Democratic Party does not. When people talk about partisan differences, they often seem to be implying that these differences are petty, matters that could be resolved with a bit of good will. But what we’re talking about here is a fundamental disagreement about the proper role of government.
But even as Krugman writes that the degree of division is a relatively recent phenomenon, I would argue his perception is inaccurate on several points.
First, anyone reading political rhetoric about the 30s knows how vitriolically some on the right opposed what FDR was doing. In their minds, there was good reason those around Vanderbilt approached Smedley Butler with a proposal to overthrow Roosevelt. But also, as it was then so too today - that much of the opposition we see, however loud it may be, is fomented by (and now financed by) a much smaller proportion of the American public that takes advantage of fear and misunderstanding to try to manipulate our political discourse for their own financial and political benefit. After all, on health care in particular, for many among the strongest opponents to the reforms were people shouting that the government should keep its hands off their medicare.
Krugman tries to use disagreements over abortion to illustrate a different way to handle disputes. As we come close to the 38th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, he rightly notes that we are no closer to settling the disputes we have.
Yet we have, for the most part, managed to agree on certain ground rules in the abortion controversy: it’s acceptable to express your opinion and to criticize the other side, but it’s not acceptable either to engage in violence or to encourage others to do so.
It is here I begin to be concerned. First, resorting to violence is still a part of the opposition to abortion. And we have voices that advocate - on this issue - violence. After all, did not Glenn Beck constantly attack Dr. George Tiller before he was assassinated while serving in his church? Second, one reason some have toned back the rhetoric is that they have found other ways of imposing their views. We have a judicial system that has increasingly restricted the meaning and application of Roe. We have judges and justices looking for the occasion to roll back further, and even eliminate the rights Roe offered. We have those who are driven by concern for increasing their wealth willing to make common purpose with those driven by opposition on social issues to create majorities that create legislatures that pass stand-by bans of abortion - Virginia where I live has such a ban - or fund and pass initiatives that restrict various social rights, and use the funding of such initiatives to turn our voters otherwise not engaged in politics who will elect legislators at state and federal levels willing to gut the advances made in the New Deal and the Great Society, and to impose by law a view of human behavior that most reading the words I offer will find repellent.
A large portion of the American people - perhaps a majority - does not agree with either extreme: on social issues, on some economic issues. A politics that seeks to move them by fear may well be more effective than one which seeks to move them by appealing to their better natures. That has been a constant complaint of those on the left.
Krugman argues for the rule of law. Perhaps if his analysis of the status of the debate over abortion were one I agreed with I would not be so troubled to read words like these:
What we need now is an extension of those ground rules to the wider national debate.
Right now, each side in that debate passionately believes that the other side is wrong. And it’s all right for them to say that. What’s not acceptable is the kind of violence and eliminationist rhetoric encouraging violence that has become all too common these past two years.
I am 64. I remember the 60s. I remember those on the left who argued that it might be necessary to resort to violence to prevent greater violence. Despite the legislative achievements under LBJ we saw the rise of those in the African-American community whose frustration was so great that the imagery of violence - Black Panthers or Fruits of Islam, for example - began to have a broader appeal. We saw the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee go from the leadership of the likes of John Lewis to that of Stokely Carmichael, who warned people that they if they were shocked by his style of leadership they would be even more perturbed by that of his successor, H. Rap Brown. During that period SNCC kept the letters but changed its title, replacing Nonviolent to National to acknowledge that some of its leaders were willing to turn to violence.
I have another criticism of this particular column. I agree that the "eliminationist rhetoric" and the advocacy of violence has become far too acceptable. But that rhetoric and advocacy is one-sided, coming only from the right, not from the left.
The social and economic progress of the New Deal, the Great Society, the Civil Rights era came about because the nation was shocked. In the 1930s the entire nation was at risk, and even many of wealth and power who otherwise would have vigorously opposed FDR recognized that were the crises facing the nation not addressed we ran a real risk of the country coming apart, or - for some even worse - the rise of a meaningful communist movement in this nation that would threaten their wealth and position even more. It is perhaps accurate to say the the New Deal saved capitalism.
The Civil Rights Era and the Great Society came in a time when many Americans were first becoming aware of the shocking inequity that existed. Yes, documentaries like "Harvest of Shame" come a bit before, and the televised images of Little Rock and other events began while Eisenhower was president. Yet these images, this recognition, began to have a cumulative effect.
And for many in power, there was a recognition that our inequity was hurting us in the global competition for influence in the many new countries that we and our Soviet adversaries sought to influence. I think it is fair to say that concern extends back even before the massive increase in new nations in Africa in the late 1950s, that in part it begins to function to shape policy as early as Brown v Board in 1954.
What troubles me more about the framing that Krugman presents is that it is post Citizens United. Like many, I worry that the political landscape has been greatly tilted, and that if those seeking to manipulate the levers of government to protect their wealth continue to be willing to cynically manipulate the fears of some on other issues, to say that our disagreements will be settled by the rule of law when both legislative and judicial branches at state (Iowa Supreme Court, perhaps? Or if you prefer the previous recall of Chief Justice Rose Bird and others on the California Supreme Court) and national levels are being coopted by the combined powers of money and fear. And after all, as phrased such a commitment seems to exclude the notion of civil disobedience, which after all was labeled as violence by those who opposed the advances of civil rights.
Don't get me wrong. I am not an advocate of violence. I do not believe in destroying property to make a political point or to stop something I strongly oppose. That applies as equally to the Mathematics Building at the U of Wisconsin in the 60s as it does to abortion clinics in more recent times. I am of course shocked by the kind of slippery slope reasoning that advocates taking human life ostensibly in the name of saving human life. Somehow that kind of thinking bothers me as much as rhetoric remembered from the 50s, which in short form was "kill a commie for Christ."
I do NOT think most of the American people are on the extremes. I do not think the people as whole are as divided as this Krugman column portrays them. My reading of polling data is that when properly informed the majority of the American people tilt towards the progressive side on most of the issues that seemingly divide the nation.
But now, even a President with the rhetorical gifts of Barack Obama has few chances to break through the noise to call the American people together. Remember, on the average week more people will hear the words of a Beck or a Limbaugh than of an Obama.
We do not have an overarching common morality. Yet we do have this - most Americans want the country to work. Most Americans see a need for government to ameliorate the worst conditions facing people. That we sometimes seem irrevocably split is, in my opinion, very much a matter of fear, and of the manipulation of that fear for cynical purposes.
Roosevelt recognized this as well as anyone. "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
The opposite of fear is hope. The emphasis on hope, that things could be different, was a large part of the appeal Obama had for a strong majority of the American people only two plus years ago.
I think the way to overcome our divides requires us constantly to oppose hope to fear, to remind people that our government often provides us hope at the darkest moment.
This is in part a rhetorical battle. It is of course also a moral struggle, for if we give in to fear, if we abandon hope, we spiral down into a place of darkness where violence of deed as well as rhetoric can crush people, drive them out of participation in our politics to the point where only the cynical will remain, and the rule of law will be the imposition of selfishness.
I usually find myself in strong agreement with Krugman. This morning I find myself having to disagree, at least in part.
Where I do agree is this - that we still must attempt to find common ground with the vast majority of the American people, those willing to still hope, to believe that something better is possible for them and for all Americans.
I agree that the rhetoric of violence is out of place.
I would go further.
I believe the rhetoric of fear should also be out of place.
I believe manipulating people by fear is immoral. I think we should demand of both our government and our media that they recognize how much they are destroying the possibility of hope, of the American dream.
But then, I must be ridiculous. I teach rather than maximize my income. I persisting acting as if there is hope when so much of the evidence before me would argue otherwise. I insist that we have a moral responsibility to the lesser off in and around us.
That's me.
What about you?