To Better Choices

It's distressing to watch the Republican Party--formerly the party of law and order, no less--denigrate the FBI, and root for economic recession.

What makes a great country fall prey to terrible choices? Is it a lack of credible facts? An unwillingness or inability to discern reality? Mass delusion? Obvious choices are not obvious to all, and that is certainly okay when the stakes are low and the choice is subjective, say between Hawaii or the Bahamas for vacation. But when you leave the realm of subjectivity and enter decision making in the world of high stakes, objective reality, getting it right becomes existentially important.

Some examples:

We have a great president who is a terrible candidate likely to run against a terrible ex-president who is a great candidate, and whose criminal indictments spur his followers to contribute more and more money to a self-proclaimed billionaire whose candidacy is looking more and more like a defense fund than a presidential campaign.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden has passed transformational bipartisan legislation that is actually moving us toward remediating climate change, rebuilding supply chains, on-shoring critical manufacturing, and finally rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure.

There is no “Biden Recession.”

Our economy is the envy of the entire—not just the Western—world. Inflation, is at a three year low of 3% (2% is the target). That’s lower than any other free country, and unemployment remains at a 60 year low. Biden has become the Rodney Dangerfield of presidents—he gets no respect, while his assumed competitor for the job shatters all norms and boundaries of legal, polite society, to the delight of millions.

Conservative columnist David Brooks thinks we’re in the throes of a national psychological breakdown regarding why Biden’s polling numbers are so bad when his presidency is going so well. Empirically, his performance numbers are off the chart, but his popular polls don’t reflect that reality.

The fundamental question remains, how long can a grifting reality television star infect the national conversation with his vile accusations, excuses, and lies—about everything—before our famously short national attention span finally moves us along to the serious issues that confront us, and demand that we make some hard choices? Is it that we’re suffering from decision stress and just can’t face the serious problems that confront us? It’s easier to amuse ourselves with silly distractions than contemplate real solutions to real problems like climate change or creeping authoritarianism.

It’s frustrating because the problems are visible but insoluble. Apparently, a lot of people are suffering from the Cassandra Syndrome, named for the Trojan princess of Greek mythology who could see the future, but was unable to change it.

Although we’re really early in the process, what with looming and pending indictments of the Former Guy, and questions about both of their ages, the unthinkable—a second Trump presidency—could happen. All it will take is a third party candidate from the No Labels movement to siphon off a few votes in a close election, and voila, he’s baaack!

And talk about terrible choices, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has more support than any potential Democratic or Republican challenger. The name and political pedigree notwithstanding, RFK Jr., formerly the smartest guy anybody knows, has gone completely around the bend with anti-vax nonsense and mounting conspiracy theories. Beyond the danger he represents to logical thinking, his is a sad story at the most personal level. His family has largely disclaimed him. His sister, Kerry, is mystified and can’t figure out what happened, and his wife, “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star Cheryl Hines, has had to publicly back away from her husband’s outlandish claims, making it clear that she does not share them.

And that’s just presidential politics.

At the Congressional level, gerrymandering has also left us with awful choices. Liz Cheney may have put it best when she said, “We’re electing idiots.” She is begging to see smart, nonpartisan candidates. People who will come to their statehouses and our national Capitol determined to legislate rather than investigate. Score settling—regardless of whether the slight is real or imagined—crowds out the necessary legislative activities of running a country. And by making so many districts uncompetitive, it’s no longer true that a candidate who can win a primary is too radical to win a general election.

When democracy and a 247 year old way of life anchored in the rule of law are on the line, we come to the sobering conclusion that all is not fun and games.

To add to the tumult, we’ve allowed climate change—the truly existential, as in human life on earth is threatened—to be politicized. Survival of the species is not a political game. It is no coincidence that we are enduring the hottest year ever. Choosing to mitigate greenhouse gasses that are making the planet too hot to inhabit seems an obvious choice, but not everything is obvious to all.

©2023 Jon Sinton