Individual Entry: The State of Discourse
« Looking at their faces | Main | Books 2008/11/03 »

If you read this blog, PLEASE sign in to my guest book on frappr. No personally identifying information is needed, so this is risk-free. Just provide a name (even a nickname), your zip code, and any statement you want to make ("hi" is sufficient).

If you want to know more about me, click here.

October 31, 2008

Observations : The State of Discourse

sigh

I had to bite my cyber-tongue this week reading a post on a blog I follow. It was a very political post on a normally non-political blog explaining why the foundations of the United States would shatter if Obama gets elected (or something along those lines). The statement that really caught my ire was in the midst of the author echoing the current McCain sound-bite about Obama being for redistribution of wealth, the author states how Obama is "for socialism not democracy" – as if those were mutually exclusive terms. I started to compose in my mind an explanation of how socialism is an economic system while democracy was political power system and that there is nothing to prevent someone from supporting both ideas. Fortunately I took a quick look at the existing comments and the author's replies and realized that he wasn't interested in hearing other opinions, so I didn't bother.

I wrote this post on my own blog instead.

The bottom line is that I am beyond disappointment in what passes for political discourse these days, particularly from Republicans (Obama, in my opinion, has done a bit better staying focused on issues, but only a bit). The thing is that there are real issues here which can be discussed and debated in front of the electorate - the candidates just aren't doing it.

Take the issue of "redistribution of wealth". The reality is we already have a progressive tax code. Those with higher incomes already get taxed more than those with less, so there is a graph you can plot that shows how much tax you pay for a given level of income. Both candidates want to change that curve. McCain wants to move the whole line down, while Obama wants to change the angle so it is lower at lower incomes and higher at higher incomes. Neither of these approaches represent a fundamental change in the nature of our country, despite the rhetoric.

What's more, some of that income is already being used to assist those at the bottom of the income scale, so America already practices "redistribution of wealth" (taxing the "rich" and giving to the "poor"). In addition, the recent bail-outs of major corporations also represent taking money from a bunch of people and giving it to a small subset of them – another "redistribution of wealth", although one which would appear to tax the middle class and give to the rich (perhaps with good reasons, but a redistribution nonetheless).

My point is that which approach is best between McCain and Obama is a quite reasonable question. Historically, have across the board tax cuts resulted in stronger economies where everyone's boats (even the middle class and poor) have been elevated by the rising tide? If you lower tax rates on higher income, has that in fact resulted in increased investments which resulted in higher incomes for everyone? Conversely, when we have raised the tax rate on higher incomes, has that historically caused downturns in the economy which caused the incomes of lower and middle class workers to decline? What about when we have lowered the tax rates for middle and lower income workers? Has that historically resulted in increased consumer spending which has driven the economy to grow? Or has the money just been spent on cheap imported goods and therefore taken out of our economy?

While I have some ideas on what the answers to these questions are (and therefore whose economic plan will actually be better for the country), I could be convinced to change my mind with more and better data. I would love to hear both parties make the case from hard data as to which approach is better.

But instead I get things like "Obama is a Socialist", "Obama is running for 'Redistributor in Chief'". McCain talks about how he's the one to reach across the aisle and do things in a bipartisan way; but he seems to be the one who is doing most of the name calling which, in my experience, does not lend itself to cooperation.

And the economy is not the only area where there could be serious discussion. On a variety of topics, the two candidates have made proposals that are at some level reasonable (there is at least some reason to think that they might work). So where are the people making the case why one side will be more effective than the others? Instead both sides seem to be going for an emotional response from the electorate.

I know. American voters are not intellectuals and have the attention span of a 2 year old. Emotions are the only way to connect to most of them. The candidates are only doing what works. I shouldn't expect more.

It is all very frustrating.

I do at least give credit to Obama that he occasionally tries to take the high road. I haven't seen much of that from the Republicans this year. Very disappointing from a party I called my own when I was younger.

Posted by Steven at October 31, 2008 05:00 AM

Comments

Posted by: janbergs at October 31, 2008 01:29 PM

Post a comment

Name:

Email Address:

URL:
Remember Me? YesNo

Comments: (you may use HTML tags for style)