I’m going to go ahead and say it. I don’t get it. I don’t get the fascination with this guy.
Before the hand-wringers start trying to shift the debate to unity in the general election, of course I would support him against Trump. That’s not a question, and that’s not what this diary is about. This diary is one of absolute confusion at the other diary about the Meet the Press interview where Buttigieg is praised for saying very little of substance. I am going to use the exact same quotes as the other diary and ask what I think are more important questions than how he handled Chuck Todd.
I will ask: What does this candidate actually believe? What do his answers demonstrate that he stands for? Are his fans really looking for a Republican or a Democrat? I am deeply confused by the response I am seeing on this site.
Let’s begin.
Regarding ICE. Here is what Buttigieg had to say:
So we have worked very hard to be a welcoming city because the current immigration policies are just wrong. People who are really important parts of our community are being torn apart from their families. And this is not making us safer. It is not making us stronger. Now, when it comes to ICE, I don't care what the agency in charge of our immigration and border enforcement is called. I care what it does. And as long as you have an agency, even if you get rid of ICE and called it something else, being ordered to tear families apart from one another or being ordered to make it harder to get on a path to citizenship, you're going to continue to have heartbreaking stories that are not helping anybody.
So let’s break this down. He is saying
1) South Bend is welcoming. Ok, I don’t know what that looks like, but cool.
2) He’s against family separation. Well, duh, I would hope every Democrat would be against that. Most Americans are against that. Trump had to back off of separations because they were so unpopular and the ACLU is forcing the government to reunite families. This isn’t much when it comes to talking about ICE and immigration policy. Additionally, it’s VERY concerning if the family separation policy is the only thing he’s willing to speak about. Where is the discussion about Trump ending TPS for many immigrants, about the Muslim ban, about Trump talking about ending asylum, about ICE’s repeated abuses of detainees, about ICE refusing to follow the law regarding asylum claims? The eye opening aspect of this quote is what he DOESN’T say, not what he did say.
3) He’s against making it harder to get on a path to citizenship? OK, again, this statement is so unbelievably vague that I don’t see what the point is.
The major takeaway here is that he isn’t giving many details regarding his stance on immigration and ICE. He’s willing to embrace a stance that everyone already believes. That isn’t particularly inspiring.
On to the next quote:
Yeah. I think, look, America is a capitalist society. But it's got to be democratic capitalism. And that part's really important. And it's slipping away from us. In other words, when capitalism comes into tension with democracy, which is more important to you? I believe democracy is more important. And when you have capitalism capturing democracy, when you have the kind of regulatory capture, where powerful corporations are able to arrange the rules for their benefit, that's not real capitalism.
And it continues . . .
If you want to see what happens when you have capitalism without democracy, you can see it very clearly in Russia. It turns into crony capitalism. And that turns into oligarchy. So I know the temptation, especially for the commentariat is to kind of align everybody as dots on a spectrum, but that's not how most voters think. I mean, think of the number of voters just mathematically in St. Joe County, Indiana who mostly voted for Obama and Trump and Mike Pence and me. So there's a lot more to this than an ideological analysis, especially with the ideology in our country so scrambled. Having a president who doesn't even have an ideology, just a style, undertaking a hostile takeover of the Republican Party. While the Democratic Party has only been able to explain its ideological commitments by comparing itself to the Republicans for the better part of my lifetime.
So he’s a capitalist. Well OK, we live in a capitalist country. That’s not particularly surprising. He’s against capitalism that allows corporations to arrange rules for their benefit. OK, good! But what do you mean? It’s great to talk about democracy and a lack of regulation, but WHAT regulations do you support? What do you want to regulate? I find it interesting that he speaks of Trump not having an ideology but a style, but I would argue that Trump actually has a clearer economic policy than Buttigieg is sharing here. Trump’s plan is America first. He blows up trade deals and cuts taxes for the rich. He doesn’t want restraints on corporations. From this interview I have very little sense of what Buttigieg believes. I will admit that I haven’t looked at his website to see if there are answers there, but that is not my point in this diary. My point is that I do not understand the praise he is receiving for saying basically nothing in interviews. There is very little here.
On religion:
Well, it's something that really frustrates me because the hypocrisy is unbelievable. Here, you have somebody who not only acts in a way that is not consistent with anything that I hear in scripture or in church, where it's about lifting up the least among us and taking care of strangers, which is another word for immigrants. And making sure that you're focusing your effort on the poor. But also personally, how you're supposed to conduct yourself. Not chest thumping look-at-me-ism, but humbling yourself before others. Foot washing is one of the central images in the New Testament. And we see the diametric opposite of that in this presidency. I think there was perhaps a cynical process where he decided to, for example, begin to pretend to be pro-life and govern accordingly. Which was good enough to bring many Evangelicals over to his side. But even on the version of Christianity that you hear from the religious right, which is about sexual ethics, I can't believe that somebody who was caught writing hush money checks to adult film actresses is somebody they should be lifting up as the kind of person you want to be leading this nation.
OK, yes. There is a ton of hypocrisy in evangelical support of Trump. Look, I understand why this speaks to Democrats, but friends, that is not the question we should be asking ourselves. Do we REALLY think that reason is going to somehow win over evangelical Trump voters? Trump supporters are very clear about the fact that they will not waiver from supporting him. I think that fact is reflected in his constant poll numbers. This is not an election where our goal should be picking at the support among Trump supporters. This is an election where we need to get Democrats out and to the polls. I don’t know what this conversation about evangelicals does to achieve that. Even if we are looking purely at electability, he is speaking to the (church) choir (sorry I couldn’t help it). I don’t know how this helps our party.
On to abortion:
So as someone who's pro-choice but who has many friends and even supporters who view this issue very differently than I do, I think it begins by having some measure of good faith. And understanding that people arrive at their convictions on this often from a deeply felt and sincerely held place.
and . . .
But in my view, this is a question that is almost unknowable. This is a moral question that's not going to be settled by science. And so the best way for it to be settled in practice is by the person who actually faces the choice. And when a woman is facing this decision in her life, I think in terms of somebody besides her who can most be useful in that, the answer to that would be a doctor. Not a male government official imposing his interpretation of his religion.
Are we REALLY at a point in the Democratic Party where being pro choice is even a question? How is this even an issue??? SMDH.
Finally, the Second Amendment:
I don't think it has to because we've already decided within the framework of the Second Amendment that we're going to draw a line somewhere, right? “Shall not be infringed" clearly doesn't mean that you're entitled to a nuclear weapon. I mean, somewhere in between a slingshot and a nuclear weapon, we're going to draw a line about what makes sense. In the same way that my right to free speech doesn't include yelling "Fire" in a crowded theater, in the same way that, as one Supreme Court justice said, "My right to swing my fist ends where somebody else's nose begins." There are common sense limits that a thinking society can live by, while making sure that we honor the lifestyle of sporting, which is where so many family bonds are created. And they're just a deep part of our tradition. And the idea that people should be equipped to defend themselves if they need to.
“Somewhere between a slinghot and a nuclear weapon”
“what makes sense”
Really? In this era, with so many awful shootings. With Parkland and what just happened in New Zealand, and on and on and on. This is all he has to say? I don’t understand the appeal. I don’t understand the praise he received in the other diary for these exact same quotes.
Let’s be bold and elect a Democrat who actually stands for something meaningful. It could be Bernie, it could be Warren, Harris, Castro, Klobuchar, or even Biden. All of them offer more than this in every interview I’ve ever seen. We can do much better.