Sleep Joe v Pussy Grabber
We flatter ourselves that we know and/or understand the folks who have been elected to represent us. In the end; they become caricatures based, usually, on our prejudices and expectations. Still the idea that we know them persists. This is a very human frailty. We are at heart a tribal species and research shows us that, at most, we “connect” with about 150 people. On the very personal level this number is much smaller with family, close relatives and friends and work-related members dominating.
The Rule of 150 was coined by British Anthropologist, Robin Dunbar, and is defined as the “suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships and thus numbers larger than this generally require more restrictive rules, laws, and enforced norms …
This is fine until we get to, “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. '' In the USA and the UK to give two examples with many millions of voters required to give consent to be governed this inevitably leads to a disconnect between the governed and the governors.
We therefore fall back on our prejudices, our shared values, our history, our ethnicity, our religious beliefs and many other fallible sources of context to make our choices about who is to be elected. This in itself is not a problem. The problem comes when we revert to our tribal past to make judgements about how well, or no, the elected leaders are doing. We revert to the tribal past so that we can use what is familiar to us from our own experience to judge the leader’s performance by direct evidence. He did this. He said this. He usurped my property, my mate, or my gods. He is so bad that we need to leave the group and start over. Not only is he a bad guy, but he is a bad guy because I know him. He’s in my circle. I have first hand experience of his bad behaviour or bad judgements; so I vote with my feet and leave and that’s how, in a very large part, we came to populate the entire planet.
Problem here is easy to define. We don’t know Joe Biden, Donald Trump, Boris Johnson or, even say, Vlad Putin, so we have to judge them by what we see or perceive to see what they do and say.
What tools do we have to overcome the inherent disconnect between the voters and the elected? In the past we relied on the media - chiefly the print media - to provide us with details of the policies a government might follow. Nowadays the media has proliferated into realms our political leaders could have once only dreamed of. The media is the message has now become the media is the only message. And the message is almost always about character.
In the 1980’s I was fond of what I called the next-door neighbour test. Imagine the house next door was sold to (in those days) Margaret Thatcher. Can you imagine living next to Maggie? You’re in your garden and there she is looking over at your undies on the washing line and tut-tut ing! Nightmare! (incidentally, in those days despite the fact that she won a slew of elections you could never find anyone who would admit to voting for her) So who passes the Maggie Test today? Joe Biden? Not likely. Vlad the Putin – never. Bonking Boris? He wins in and landslide. He’s inviting you round for drinks or he’s in the local pub buying everybody a drink! Boris wins hands down.
The transition of news from print, television and radio to digital spaces has caused huge disruptions in the traditional news industry, especially the print news industry. It is also reflected in the ways individual Americans say they are getting their news. A large majority of Americans get news at least sometimes from digital devices, according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted Aug. 31-Sept. 7, 2020.
The days of FDR’s fireside chats and the Presidential news conference are largely gone.
Even the “great communicator” Ronald Reagan would find it difficult today. Poor old Tricky Dick lost the 1960 election, chiefly because the voters judged him hot, sweaty and flustered at the debate with Kennedy.
This transition is not in itself a bad thing. A multiplicity of news from a variety of sources could be a good thing, but only if John Q Public is diligent enough to evaluate not just the news but also the source. There is little evidence that this is happening. The result is folks see something on their news feed and just accept it, particularly if it reinforces their prejudices.
Personally, if I see that a “story” is from Fox News, or the New York Times I tend to gloss over it, admittedly for completely different reasons, but gloss nevertheless. I regret that most folks are not so discerning. Even more worrying is the tendency for folks to stick to the media outlet that most agrees with their already-formed prejudices. This is bad for democracy.
A fairly simple example:
The claim: Thomas Jefferson said giving to those who are not willing to work endangers democracy
A Dec. 16 post to the Facebook page for Save Southern Heritage and History includes a statement about democracy allegedly written by Founding Father Thomas Jefferson.
"The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not," says the quote, which is credited to the nation's third president in a meme.
Save Southern Heritage and History is a society and cultural website that also posts conservative news and patriotic memes, according to its Facebook profile page.
USA TODAY reached out to the group for comment.
The statement has recent origins and has not been found in Jefferson's catalog of writings.
I’m sure that “quotations” from liberal sources which purport to “prove” that GW Bush was/is a racist or that Trump supported Vlad the Putin through thick and thin could also be easily found.
We have, as a society, lost the art of critical thinking. We are not questioning either our leaders or our news sources. We are allowing falsehoods to profligate with impunity.
More recently from CNN
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/16/politics/fact-check-dale-top-15-donald-trump-lies/index.html
Lest we think that only one party/individual can play fast and loose with the truth:
So, what are we to take from the lack of trustworthiness in our political leaders?
Some folks may conclude that voting is just a waste of time. Some may conclude that all politicians are alike and completely untrustworthy. Some may be moved to grab a banner and march for their chosen person/cause. Some may conclude that only violence is able to effect real change and grab a gun!
I found this from Neil Fleming, whoever he is?
Do British people view the USA as a legendary country?
Absolutely. There’s lots of things you excel at and are world leaders among developed nations.
Your lack of healthcare, dreadful employment laws, endemic racism, lack of gun control, lack of social care, regular mass shootings, lunatic creationists, conspiracy nuts, lack of paid vacation time, expecting people to work for tips rather than a decent wage. Out of control trigger- happy police. Ludicrously jingoistic warmongering attitudes. A fear of anything mildly liberal. Terrible food standards. The death penalty. An utterly corrupt political system.
And all the gun toting, right wing, bible thumping republicans who think all of the above is acceptable.
This theme is not just historical: It was reported on 5 April that Matteo Salvini, leader of Italy’s League Party (formerly the Northern League) and the country’s controversial deputy prime minister, has invited leaders of other European radical right parties to a conference in Milan, scheduled for 8 April. Salvini’s aim, according to the Guardian, is to create a bloc of right-wing populists which extends beyond the Europe of Nations and Freedom group in the European Parliament. With 36 seats, ENF is the smallest grouping in the parliament and Salvini is clearly aiming to create something grander.
What are his chances of success? Perhaps his biggest prize would be to attract Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s far-right prime minister, who has (still) not been ejected from the centre-right European People’s Party grouping in the European Parliament, despite having been censored for his attempts to push Hungary in an authoritarian direction (or as he styles it, ‘illiberal democracy’).
Although Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has confirmed it is sending a representative, Marine Le Pen of France’s National Front has said she will not be attending. Le Pen herself hosted a similar meeting in Nice in 2018, at which Geert Wilders from the Dutch Party for Freedom and several other influential radical right speakers were present, an event which indicated how hard it has been to create a pan-European radical right bloc.
Glorifying the nation
This should not surprise us. At the root of radical right ideology is a glorification of the nation, a narrative of exceptionalism and superiority that inevitably puts like-minded nationalists from different countries at odds with one another. It is one thing to drive across a European border to a secret location to attend a blood and honour gig; creating a fully collaborative pan-European radical right quite another challenge.
As David Barnes recently wrote, narratives of European civilization have been both common and hard to sustain; Oswald Mosley’s post-World War II argument in favour of ‘Europe – A Nation’, which shares many similarities with today’s anti-immigrant discourses promoted by the likes of Salvini, found few takers, despite the fact that a notion of Europe having a homogeneous racial and cultural background was widely held across the continent’s radical right movements.
Besides, in today’s Europe, when some radical right leaders such as Salvini praise the Russians and share the Kremlin’s desire to destabilise the European Union, others, such as Poland’s Jarosław Kaczyński and the Law and Justice Party – despite sharing Salvini’s aim to break the ‘Germany-France axis’ in Europe – come from a very different perspective, that of Poland’s traditional suspicion of Russia.
And where some, such as Geert Wilders and, to some extent, his new rival Thierry Baudet of the Forum for Democracy – whose penchant for highfalutin verbiage has already become notorious – talk of defending European freedom in the face of a supposed Islamist advance, others, such as Orbán and Le Pen, are more socially conservative.
Even if Europe’s radical right leaders share certain fundamental ideas, however, such as a belief in the need to defend the ‘white race’, a hatred of Islam, a desire to stop immigration, and a basic ultra-nationalist position, it is hard to see how the clash of nationalisms that conferences such as Salvini’s will expose can survive the experience.
Indeed, we have been here before. During the interwar period, attempts to create a ‘fascist international’ were set in motion on several occasions. Historians who have recently conducted research into ‘transnational fascism’ – such as Federico Finchelstein, Aristotle Kallis or Arnd Bauerkämper – have shown the extent to which fascist ideas and personnel criss-crossed the continent of Europe and beyond (to the Americas, for example), so that fascist ideology and practice were often shared.
Examples might be fascist aesthetics, racial ideology, or training camps. Fascist leaders such as Mosley or Coreneliu Codreanu were inspired by and devoted to Mussolini. And Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany established an uneasy alliance. But the analysis can only take us so far, before it becomes clear that such collaborations might have been set in motion but could not be sustained, as the different groups with their rival nationalisms ran aground on the rocks of mutual suspicion.
Finding alternative idea-mongers in Europe is less easy. Traditional left wing parties in the UK and on the continent are, despite the fear generated by conservatives, are definitely in retreat. More right-wing parties are on the up.
Take, for example, Bonking Boris and the British Conservative Party. Despite the left-wing rant from Neil Fleming, the UK public like Boris and his policies. The voted for him in droves at the last election and in spite of his recent problems with Party-gate they still generally support his government. This may change with the resolution of the Ukraine conflict, but there are no guarantees.
It is interesting to note that many political leaders have managed to survive scandals. Ronnie Reagan springs to mind. When push comes to shove it seems the voters will forgive peccadilloes and poor judgement calls far easier than the commentariat.
Perhaps the most glaring obfuscation here is the old adage: I hate to be an I Told You So. Actually, we all love to be an I told you so. We are never happier than when we are sure that we have the inside track on our fellow man, have the winning combination at the gambling tables, have all the answers whilst others are scrabbling around in the dark, have cracked the code whilst others are just dim-witted morons.
I conclusion: the incessant labelling as either right or left wing ideas and policies has very little effect on the average voter. It does tend to consolidate the support for leaders who need a secure base from which to launch a bid for political power. It encourages a volume of poor thinking from both sides. It adds nothing to political debate. It encourages the kind of mental agility that Dr Paul Joseph Goebbels would have been very proud of indeed.
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