This Is Just The Falsest Of False Equivalences
If I had to choose one word to sum up the current election cycle, it would be “exhaustion.” And this, even with Joe Biden not running anymore.
I don’t think I’ve ever spoken to so many people who are burnt out on politics, who see progress or dialogue as more or less impossible, who have gotten lost in a world of “fake news” and “lived experiences” that they’re suspicious of the notion that anything is true.
Worst of all, they’re so exasperated with their political options that they can’t see the difference between them anymore. So in my article, Just To Be Clear, Do You Guys Want Political Anarchy Or Not?, I pointed out that while there is plenty of criticism to go around in politics, some criticism is more hypocritical than others.
Chris seemed equally exhausted with both options.
Chris:
The problem is both sides are wrong and all of us contribute. Our angry Tweets, belittling comments on FB, mocking family members and friends who disagree, and censoring those with different beliefs all add to the problem.
The irony is that those who hate Trump the most act just like him.
And this makes people very angry to hear this.
I am not voting for either of them. I will vote but for the president.
Steve QJ:
Come on now. I'm not arguing that the political rhetoric on both sides isn't awful and unproductive at times. Of course it is (although, as I said to somebody else here, it's horrifying that people are willing to make decisions about who should be the next leader of the free world based on mean comments on FB). I've pointed out several times how dishonest some of the criticism of Trump is. I find it especially infuriating precisely because it makes it easier for Trump to call all criticism "fake news."
But this is just the falsest of false equivalences.
You cannot name a single person in the Democratic Party who "acts just like Trump." Trump's central appeal, especially to his most zealous fans, is how far from the political and democratic norms he is.
I don't think there's a single Democrat who would have sat by for eight hoursas their supporters attacked the Capitol. There hasn't been a single Democrat president who refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power or lied for four years about having an election "stolen" from him. There hasn't been a single Democrat who called up a secretary of state and pressured him to "find him some votes." There hasn't been a single Democrat who praised Vladimir Putin while undermining his own intelligence agencies or who mocked a disabled reporter or even just who refused to release their tax returns.
Of course, almost all Republicans have been able to meet these fairly low bars too. And lots of Democrats have fallen at other hurdles. But the brand of political exhaustion that just puts all of this in a "neither side is perfect" barrel and equates them is a serious problem.
Chris:
I always appreciate and welcome your thoughts. I wish I was sitting across from you enjoying a coffee and discussion.
I understand fully your point. And I will not vote for Trump. But the moral equivalence argument is relative and I would bet my list of priorities would overlap with yours but in a different order.
Taking it out of politics for a moment. I believe egregious murderers, rapists and drug dealers should be put to death. (There is more to this but let's leave it at that). But half of the US disagrees with me. For some, this is a top priority and a deal breaker. They would see a candidate who supports it as morally bankrupt.
When I step away from the noise, add up the morality and ethics of both candidates, they are equally bankrupt in my eyes. I would hold up the killing of 40K people in Gaza as one point. The selling of weapons to Israel to kill innocents as another. Being bought by corporate and lobbyists as another. I can go on.
But the Democrats support censorship and removal of freedom of speech. This is the biggest issue for me and we saw what they did the last few years. This is indefensible for me and why I left the party. Ironically, I feel Trump is better on this issue.
It will be an interesting November.
As Tony Morrison once said, “The function, the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work.”
But this doesn’t just apply to racism. Traditional media, and especially social media, are designed to distract. To keep us tuned in so they can sell our attention to advertisers. To keep us tuning in with spin and drama and outright nonsense, to overwhelm us with noise until we give up and believe whatever makes us feel safe or smart or that our hatred of the other side is justified.
Because when you do this, everything suddenly becomes simple.
You don’t have to figure out the factors that affect the economy or wade through pages of economic policy to figure out who’s responsible for what, just uncritically blame the people on “their side.”
You don’t have to ask whether Ukraine is bad or Putin is good or whether immigrants are eating cats, just uncritically believe the people on “your side.”.
And even when your side gets utterly insane, even when they’re implying that Jews are using space lasers to create hurricanes or that COVID is a Democrat hoax or even when they start paraphrasing Hitler at campaign rallies, you can shrug your shoulders and say, “well, the other side is just as bad.”
It’s not my job to tell you who's worse or who to support, but wherever you stand, the options are not the same. Please, don’t let exhaustion convince you that they are.
A few years back - or possibly longer, now - Richard Ford wrote in the LRB a delightfully scathing analysis of the selection of candidates for President. In it, he point out that we demand more demonstrated competence of someone hired to mow our lawn than we do of our candidates for POTUS. Paraphrasing, "we would at least require that the applicant for the job knows how to operate the lawn mower."
I voted for a third party in each of the last two elections. I left the Republican party because they nominated Trump. That said, on balance I approved of his policy choices while he was president. I just don't like his demeanor. I think he's an asshole. I am a conservative. I voted against him a second time in 2020.
Jan 6 was awful and Trump should have intervened immediately, but if that had been a protest AGAINST Trump it would have been labeled "mostly peaceful" by the media. It has been called insurrection by liberals and the media. If so it was the weakest insurrection ever. Don't they know that "those people" have all the guns? They must have just forgotten them at the insurrection. They still repeat the lie that police officers were killed. No, they were not.
While you correctly point out many of Trump's flaws, you did not mention the significant flaws on the other side, much of it in the media. While they are not candidates, the media is clearly in the bag for the Democrats and needs to be held to account.
When have the Republicans ever conducted a year's long disinformation campaign to show that their opponent was a Russian agent? The Steele dossier was garbage, and the press ran with it long after it was shown to be.
The Democrats influenced the suppression of the New York Post story about Hunter's laptop. I don't care what Hunter does, but there appears to be significant information there that points to Joe's involvement in influence peddling. This was sold as "Russian disinformation". Hunter later sued because it violated his privacy. It is clear that they knew from the start that they were lying.
"Very fine people." Trump did say those words, but in the same breath said that it applied only to peaceful protestors that wanted the civil war statues to remain. He disavowed and condemned the racists in clear language. It's an obvious lie to say otherwise. The sitting President has repeated this lie often. So has the sitting Vice-President.
While Trump made much noise about "Lock her up!" he did not use the power of his office to pursue Hillary to do just that. The Democrats have. Much is made about 34 "felonies". Even a brief inquiry into this shows that those "felonies" were misdemeanors that have been conflated into felonies. The statute of limitations had expired. The judge, no fan of Mr. Trump, lifted it. No other citizen of the US would have faced this prosecution. Sadly, it was a show trial. There is no chance for that conviction to stand.
If you are having a hard time imagining which democrat would sit on his/her hands for 8 hours while a "mostly peaceful" protest raged not far away, you should consider Tim Walz and his reaction to the not so peaceful protests in Minnesota. More than 1,500 buildings were damaged, destroyed, or looted in the Twin Cities area. Some structures were completely burned down, including businesses, offices, and housing units. Two deaths were directly related to these riots.
Is the other side as bad as Trump? In some ways, no. In some ways, worse. I don't agree that it is a false equivalency.