December 7, 2014 (73 years after the Day that will live in
Infamy)
We are all incredulous spectators to the dismal theatrics
playing year after year in Washington D.C. sowing more and more mistrust and
disgust in the minds of the American people. But where is the backlash? The
public sector of this nation has become an abject failure (in sharp contrast
with the private sector, which, time and again, bails out the global economy when the rest of the world sputters or regresses). Do we need any proof?
·
The National Debt just passed the $18 Trillion
threshold and is now larger than the size of our economy
·
A comprehensive immigration reform remains
illusory
·
Our infrastructure is fragile and at best
outdated, at worst crumbling
·
We have not won a war since World War II
o
Not in Korea
o
Not in Vietnam
o
Not in Iraq
o
Not in Afghanistan
o
Not the war on poverty
o
Not the war on drugs
o
Not the war on terror
(We should not start a war that we have no intent of winning or simply cannot win.)
(We should not start a war that we have no intent of winning or simply cannot win.)
·
We have not funded Social Security and Medicare
for future generations
·
We have done nothing about tax reform
·
We have done nothing to turn back the increase
in inequality within our society.
This failure of government is not a partisan phenomenon.
Control of the White House and the Congress has not determined success or
failure in governance. Failure can therefore not be laid at the doorstep of
either the Democrats or the Republicans. It defies logic to assume that the
failure of the federal government to address the challenges America is facing,
is more than marginally the result of incompetence or malign intent of our
elected officials and it makes sense, therefore, to look for the cause of the
malaise in the system, i.e. the complex of rules and conditions that define
American politics of today.
I evaluate the flaws in the American political system in my
recently published book “NEITHER HERE NOR THERE, A First Generation Immigrant
in Search of American Exceptionalism.” Alexis de Tocqueville coined the phrase
“American Exceptionalism” because he was in awe of the capacity of the American
people to govern their affairs during and following the Revolutionary War,
which he termed exceptional. He would be sorely disappointed if he were around
today to see how things have developed!
The systematic flaws that I see in our governance model and that
I address in detail in my book fall into four categories:
1.
The money influence in politics
2.
The two party system
3.
The election system (frequency, term length and
limits, financing, districting and primaries)
4.
The lack of a national strategic agenda
To effect change in any of these four areas will require a
herculean effort. After all, change generally only gets embraced when the pain
of living with the status quo exceeds the pain inflicted by change. This
explains that, while virtually nobody is happy with the status quo, we appear
paralyzed to do something about it. The pain caused by the gross under
performance of our public sector simply has not crossed the threshold level,
but we may be closing in on a tipping point. The 2014 mid-term elections
brought about an earthquake size shift in power from the Democrats to the
Republicans, but it does not appear to have triggered a Congressional resolve
to start fixing problems. The people seem to have no confidence in the
political system, given that only a third of eligible voters went to the
polling stations.
It would be a mistake, though, to give up on hope for a turn
for the better. The American people have an uncanny capacity to step back from
the brink before they allow things to get out of hand. And, as Nelson Mandela
said: “It always seems impossible until it is done.” We can only hope that it
will not take a national disaster to galvanize our politicians into action, but
the likelihood is that it will require some shock to the system to get things
off dead center. The most benign, democratic and American shock to the system
could come from the emergence of a centrist third party. A January 2014 Gallup
poll found that 42% of the voting eligible population considers itself
“Independent” versus 31% Democrat and 25% Republican. For sure these
Independents represent a wide spectrum of political beliefs, some at the
extreme ends of the political spectrum, and maybe only half of them would feel
at home in a centrist third party, but a centrist third party could easily draw
in moderate Democrats and Republicans. In fact, the surest way to establish a
viable third party would be for these moderates in the existing two parties to
take the initiative to abandon their ideologically entrenched parties, find
each other in the middle and create a new party that is dedicated to govern
from the center and on the basis of a clear national strategic agenda. Such
party would then become an attractive draw for many Independents. It would
probably push the Democrats more to the left (where they want to go anyway) and
the Republicans more to the right (where the Tea Party is guiding them).
The jolt received from such shock to the arrogance, inertia
and complacency of Democratic and Republican Parties might just be enough to
break the logjam and get Washington working again for the people of America. It
might just be enough to get our politicians to address the other flaws in the
system as well. It might just be what the American political system needs to
deliver on its promises.
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