{"id":69188,"date":"2017-07-13T10:33:13","date_gmt":"2017-07-13T16:33:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/too-many-of-us-have-a-vested-interest-in-division\/"},"modified":"2017-07-13T16:33:13","modified_gmt":"2017-07-13T16:33:13","slug":"too-many-of-us-have-a-vested-interest-in-division","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/too-many-of-us-have-a-vested-interest-in-division\/","title":{"rendered":"Too many of us have a vested interest in division"},"content":{"rendered":"
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du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Just 20 percent of Americans trust the government to \u201cdo the right thing just about always or most of the time.\u201d The comparable figures were 40 percent in 2000 and almost 80 percent in the early 1960s. There has been a long-term loss of trust.<\/p>\n

At the same time, as is well known, political polarization has soared. Republicans and Democrats increasingly harbor dire and even hateful views of each other.<\/p>\n

Among Republicans, 58 percent have a \u201cvery unfavorable\u201d view of Democrats, up from 21 percent in 1994, reports another Pew survey. Democrats\u2019 views of Republicans are nearly identical: 55 percent label Republicans as \u201cvery unfavorable,\u201d roughly a tripling since 1994\u2019s 17 percent. Poisonous politics strains personal friendships.<\/p>\n

Historians will argue for decades over what drained public confidence in government. Any short list would include the war in Vietnam, Watergate, double-digit inflation in the 1970s (13 percent in 1980), other economic failures (the 2008-09 financial crisis and 11 post-World War II recessions), the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the tendency of politicians to promise more than they can deliver.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, pinpointing responsibility for political polarization is easier. It\u2019s the \u201cpolitical class,\u201d including elected officials, political consultants, scholars and pundits (print, cable and digital). Too often, they abandon rhetorical self-restraint for inflammatory verbosity.<\/p>\n

Ironically, the people who are most politically engaged \u2013 the people who consider themselves most morally \u201cresponsible\u201d \u2013 pose the greatest threat to the political system, weakening its ability to compromise and condemning it to paralysis. The fringes of both parties have acquired political power, and to some extent, disenfranchised the larger and ideologically messier middle.<\/p>\n

By Pew\u2019s estimate, this messy middle \u2013 meaning that its members have a \u201croughly equal number of liberal and conservative positions\u201d \u2013 remained the largest bloc of Americans at about 40 percent of the total in 2014. Here is what Pew says about the anomalous position of people in the middle:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe majority do not have uniformly conservative or liberal views. Most do not see either party as a threat to the nation. And more believe their representatives in government should meet halfway to resolve contentious disputes rather than hold out for more of what they want.<\/p>\n

\u201cYet many of those in the center remain on the edges of the political playing field, relatively distant and disengaged, while the most ideologically oriented and politically rancorous Americans make their voices heard through greater participation in every stage of the political process\u201d (voting, contributing, volunteering).<\/p>\n

The stabilizing center of U.S. politics is marginalized. Its considerable power is dissipated and silently flows to activists of both parties, who increasingly define themselves by demonizing their opponents. Cooperation becomes harder, because the gulf between them becomes larger and the contempt of each for the other grows. The activists in both parties are the troublemakers, not all of them, but enough to matter.<\/p>\n

Of course, dissent is essential. Democracy without dissent is not democracy. But dissent should be disciplined. It should not indulge in fantasies that make partisans feel good but are profoundly misleading. This inevitable disillusion is wherae we are today.<\/p>\n

To take two familiar examples: The Republican promise to repeal and replace Obamacare while also reducing premiums and expanding coverage was never possible. It was make-believe.<\/p>\n

Similarly, the Democratic refusal to deal with the escalating costs of Medicare and Social Security is crushing other worthy government programs \u2013 a strange position for a pro-government party.<\/p>\n

By and large, Americans are optimists. We see ourselves as a \u201ccan do\u201d people who generally believe the future will be better than the past. But the fact that many Americans are having second thoughts about their society and its future is concerning.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s worrisome and not especially recognized is that many members of the political class \u2013 again, the pundits, journalists, scholars as well as elected officials, lobbyists, and activists \u2013 have a vested interest in the status quo of division. Who they\u2019re against defines who they are on both left and right. This protects elected officials against primary challenges by even greater ideological purists; it generates audiences and incomes for pundits; it makes activists feel morally superior.<\/p>\n

Who wants to give that up?<\/p>\n

Not surprisingly, the system has become self-perpetuating. It feeds on mutual recriminations. The Founders \u2013 who had deep disagreements, but compromised \u2013 would doubtlessly disapprove.<\/p>\n

Robert Samuelson is a columnist for The Washington Post. \u00a9 2017 The Washington Post Writers Group<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

du1-i-syn Just 20 percent of Americans trust the government to \u201cdo the right thing just about always or most of the time.\u201d The comparable figures were 40 percent in 2000 and almost 80 percent in the early 1960s. There has been a long-term loss of trust. At the same time, as is well known, political […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":69189,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[125],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-69188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-newsletter-opinion"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69188\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69188"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=69188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}