Policy vs Politics

Why do we hate politics?  Because we are too lazy and prideful to try to understand positions that challenge what we consider to be deeply-held beliefs.  The problem is that we attach non-political deeply-held beliefs (often religious or philosophical) to extreme political talking points. 

As the article below explains, people are extremely polarized when defending their political positions—but when it comes down the actual policy in practice, they become much more moderate.  I have been guilty of this myself, and the more I have been involved in policy as opposed to politics, the more I have realized that there is no easy answer to any issue.  There is no extreme libertarian viewpoint or extreme socialist viewpoint that can solve the extremely complex problems we face in today’s modern world. 

I have also come to realize that you don’t have to surrender your deeply-held religious and philosophical convictions to admit that you may be wrong on policy in action.  The purpose of policy is to help us all live together in the same society despite our differences.  That means we are going to have to compromise in order to find the policy that best meets the needs of everyone.  To me, that also means that my vote is a means to an end, not a reflection of my deeply held religious and philosophical beliefs.

My wish is that we could set politics aside and talk openly about policy without being offended or afraid to have our own assumptions challenged.  Imagine the problems we could solve together.  

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/21/opinion/sunday/why-partisans-cant-explain-their-views.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0

Pragmatic Idealism

The following is an essay I submitted for a contest.  Like this on Facebook at this link and I can win monies!

https://www.facebook.com/jerry.hale.54/posts/337845472959173?notif_t=like

As Americans, we pledge allegiance to the flag as a symbol of our loyalty to “liberty and justice for all.”  As citizens of Utah, we share values that make us very sensitive to government over-reach that treads on our liberty.  We often neglect, however, to recognize government’s role to ensure that justice for all goes hand-in-hand with liberty.  We often let our ideals cloud our judgment and impede pragmatic solutions.  

The moment a person, business, or organization takes actions that restrict the freedom to pursue happiness or obstruct the use of our property, the government is charged to take action.  As goes the saying attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes, “Your right to swing your arms ends just where the other man’s nose begins.”  This analogy can be extended even further to say that if the man’s nose were broken, it would affect not only his liberty and happiness, but that of those in his sphere of influence.  At some point in this analogy, liberty must be limited to resolve the conflict.  Public policy and governance deals with exactly that concept—deciding how much of whose liberty must be sacrificed in order to ensure the greatest liberty and justice for the population as a whole.

One example that is still fresh on our minds is health care.  Many conservatives and libertarians in Utah were up in arms when the Supreme Court ruled that we could be compelled to purchase insurance or face a tax.  And rightfully so, for many reasons.  But the predominant voice was in opposition to socialized health care and a government takeover.  The debate was full of patriotic defense of the Constitution, but it lacked a sincere discussion to seek solutions to the problems of our health care system.  

Gone are the days that we can sit on our porch with a shotgun to protect our family and property.  Gone are the days when individualism and hard work alone gives us the best chance for prosperity and security.  We are now too interdependent to ignore the plight of our neighbor—for even a truly self-interested person must recognize that no man is an island.  If your neighbor is diagnosed with a treatable cancer and their insurance denies them coverage, you may feel it is as sad story, but that it would be unjust to have the government force you to pay for their treatments.  But if untreated, the cancer patient will eventually end up in the emergency room and cost you thousands of dollars anyway, either through taxes or higher medical payments.  And now your neighbor is dead and his wife and children become a greater financial burden on society.  

Wouldn’t it be better if instead of arguing over whose political views were more constitutional, we discussed how we could implement specific and practical policies?  Using quotes from our Founding Fathers to argue ideology may be fun, but why don’t we do what the Founding Fathers actually did and sit down and deal with the conflict through compromise.  Find a common-ground solution and then go out and take action and make it work.

Even John Locke, the father of classical liberalism, felt that the sole right to defend our liberty in the “state of nature” was not enough.  In Utah we have an abundance of land and ample opportunity to build individual prosperity with less interference from government than many more urban parts of the country.  But with advancing technology, increasing population, and changing demographics we are going to be forced to find new solutions to these new problems.

This is not an endorsement of bigger government, but of smarter government.  This is not to say that we simply need to elect better officials so that our government can take better care of us.  It is to say that we need a stronger government for the people—by the people.  

As Robert Putnam put it, we need more “social capital.”  We need to be engaged in the solutions, not just the debates.  Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.  If we think that government is going too far, it means that we as a people are not going far enough.  Pragmatic Idealism does not mean being untrue to your strongly held ideals.  It means recognizing that just as the United States would have never had been a successful experiment without compromise, so too will we be unsuccessful in achieving liberty and justice for all if we are more loyal to our philosophies than we are to finding practical solutions.

In a sense

(a few thoughts and questions after contemplating Kyle's blog post)


What instruments are we born with to obtain knowledge?  What physiological capacities do we have at our disposal to observe and interpret data?  Sight. Sound. Smell. Touch. Taste.  Is that it?  Or is it possible there are other senses that we are not so easily attuned to because they are not necessary for individual physical survival or the perpetuation of our species?

If a man is born blind, he will rely more on his sense of hearing to determine truth.  If a man is born deaf, he will likewise see things we never see.  Or more correctly, he will observe and interpret things that our eyes see yet our minds ignore and fail to process.  So is it possible that if we hear but don’t understand and we see but do not perceive that there may be other senses that we can feel but do not learn from? 

 Is the truth learned from any single one of these five senses any more true than another?  Does seeing the sun give you truth that is any truer than feeling its heat on your skin?  Or the stars—they are too far away to observe through touch.  They must be learned only through one sense, sight.  Perhaps there are other truths in the universe that can only be learned through one sense.  If that is a spiritual sense, would it not be important to attune that sense to attain increased knowledge? 

Furthermore, is it possible that even a finely attuned sense can lose its potency if not maintained?  If muscles atrophy without use, it is not because the potential power of the muscles doesn’t exist.  The spiritual sense it requires faith, but faith is not enough.  It takes a lot of work.  One could be defiant toward the power of the sense of sight by closing his eyes, but to be defiant toward the spiritual sense only requires apathy.