Reflections on the Election


Statue of Liberty
Credit: Celso Flores

America will shortly limp across the finish line of the 2016 general election. This has been an unprecedented campaign season, and no matter whom you support, no matter whether you are an American or a concerned friend of America abroad, I am sure you will not say that it went well or that it reflected well on America.

This election has reminded me that the great political psychologists of the past, including “our wise and pious ancestors” (to use a phrase from the Massachusetts Constitution, there applied to the Puritans, to describe the Founding Fathers) knew much about the problems that could beset a democracy or a democratic republic, and that there really is nothing new under the sun. Go down to your cellar and find the box of paperbacks you saved from college, and re-read Book 9 of Plato’s Republic, on the psychology of the tyrannical man and how he develops from democratic man, and reflect. Re-read Madison’s Federalist No. 10 on the danger of demagoguery and the need to have institutions to check demagogic tendencies. Be a little more daring and dig out your copy of Marx’s Eighteenth Brumaire from the box of books that you’re not really supposed to look at once you’re out of grad school and think about political leaders appealing to the down-and-out lumpenproletariat but coming to power to advance the interests of big business rather than workers or the middle class. And when you think about the institutional machinery of one our two political parties falling into line behind a candidate that most people in that party thought and said was unacceptable before he was nominated, think about—well, I do not want to violate Godwin’s Law! But Hannah Arendt has something to tell us, too.

Washington Monument at sunset
וְאֵ֥ין כָּל־חָדָ֖שׁ תַּ֥חַת הַשָּֽׁמֶשׁ
Credit: dbking

So I think there’s nothing new under the sun and that there’s a lot that we can learn from the past about our present predicament. But there’s a lot that is new about our times—problems that need new answers. To me, one challenge we face is the irresponsibility of our news media. I’m not just talking about Breitbart and other purveyors of nonsense that voters believe. I’m talking about the supposedly elite press that on the one hand treats political news like entertainment news and, on the other hand, has difficulty saying “this is true” and “this is false” when saying so might lead to “unbalanced” coverage. I don’t entirely blame the press, since the situation the press faced in this election was unprecedented. Still, there were few if any profiles in courage in the mainstream media this year. Nor were there many profiles in courage among leading Republicans who spoke out very strongly about Mr. Trump’s unacceptability and then endorsed him. Democrats have lessons to learn, too. Now that they have looked “unacceptable” in the face, they should treat future opponents, the Mitt Romneys or George Bushes of 2020, less apocalyptically.

I think we also need to deal with the very concerning news, late in the campaign, that factions within the FBI, our national domestic law enforcement and intelligence agency, were intervening politically in the election by selective leaks. Obviously the laws meant to prevent this kind of thing didn’t work this year. We need a housecleaning to make sure that in the future our civil servants do not abuse their power in this way. Of course, we also need to make it clear to foreign powers—I’m looking at you, Russia—that interference in our electoral process is unacceptable. Last, in my opinion we need to strengthen party infrastructure and party discipline, including by means such as so-called “superdelegates,” so that there is less chance that a major party is hijacked by an unacceptable, non-mainstream candidate. The movement towards open primaries and the like is a mistake, in my view. On the other hand (and perhaps at odds with my last comment), we should try to find ways to use the parties to drive American politics towards the center even as our increasing geographic segregation along party lines drives candidates towards the extremes—perhaps by rolling back what seemed like sensible good-government reforms at the time and renewing the age-old practices of earmarks and logrolling, which used to grease the wheels of bipartisan cooperation in Congress.

George Washington
Don’t let me down, America!

This is not a political blog and I am not going to make any political endorsements or tell you how I voted (yes, I voted early—the psychic strain was too much to bear!) If you’re an American citizen, be sure to vote today if you haven’t already and express your political will in this most important election. And let’s hope for the best!


11 responses to “Reflections on the Election”

  1. Bill Tierney

    You citations are well noted. I will admit that Trump is a risk, but Hillary is a sure thing. She will do the bidding of her masters and bring us even further into a neofeudalist hell hole. All your books warn of her. Trump’s only crime is calling out the criminals on top for who they are. For the moment, they are fighting back with a narrative, which knee-jerk Democrats and those compromised by the establishment find appealing. As for the FBI, the patriots are attempting to expose the Luciferians, including Hillary. Comey says it wasn’t “intentional.” Your a lawyer, and you buy such idiocy? Doesn’t say much about your critical thinking skills. Off to the polls. BTW, this has been a spectacular election.

    1. “She will do the bidding of her masters …”

      “As for the FBI, the patriots are attempting to expose the Luciferians, including Hillary.”

      Bill, I’m afraid you’re a victim of the dark and dangerous passions that Trump has sought, maybe successfully, to awaken: see my prior post on the subject.

  2. Peter Lynn

    Watching from across the pond one wonders how it came down to a choice between two such poor candidates. Trump must have alienated so many people with his spiteful rhetoric, but still he is in the running. Hilary is flawed, and I can’t help but speculate on where America would be if the infinitely more credible Bernie Sanders had emerged as the Democrat candidate.

    1. Well, at 10:30 p.m. on this very distressing election night I don’t think I ought to try to say anything useful or meaningful, since it seems apparent that I knew less about the country than I thought I did.

      1. Sarah

        I weep for you, Mr Folkman. I really do.

        1. Please call me Ted! 🙂

          I will have thoughts about the election later today or tomorrow. My first thought, though, is that when an election is over, whatever happened in the past, it’s important to give the winner a clean slate and a chance. So I will try to judge the President-elect by what he says and does now, not what he said or did then.

          1. Sarah

            I’m sorry, but I can’t. I do not live in America so perhaps it doesn’t matter anyway.

            His performance as president can not erase his actions that have implicitly condoned hate, racism, sexism and discrimination even if he is not one of them.

            People may chalk it up to much needed change in policy or to invigorate a stagnant economy or the ridding of a corrupt political system which (let’s face it) is not working. But at the root of it all, the western world utilizes democracy and the social systems that it has in place in order to allow for everyone to enjoy the same freedoms. The motive goes to the root of protecting basic, fundamental human rights for all (politics, policy and economics aside).

            As far as I’m concerned he has already failed humanity and America on this through his reckless actions.

    2. Sarah

      Completely agree with you Peter. The irony is deafening.

  3. Peter Lynn

    Never throughout the campaign did I believe that Trump would actually prevail. This is bad not just for America – we will all feel the impact.

  4. […] tone of my first reflections on the 2016 general election, written before voting began, was hopelessly smug and made unwarranted assumptions. I assumed that […]

  5. […] tone of my first reflections on the 2016 general election, written before voting began, was hopelessly smug and made unwarranted assumptions. I assumed that […]

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