Obama’s Nobel: What a Bummer!
Our beleaguered rookie president can’t seem to catch a break: endless snags in the healthcare debate… the hornets’ nest in Afghanistan… the aftershocks of last fall’s economic meltdown… a presidential to-do list that grows each day without any check-marks to ease the pain. And now this: a premature Nobel Peace Prize.
For most of us, a Nobel Peace Prize would take the sting out of a grueling day at work. “Sure, I had to sit through another endless PowerPoint presentation by the marketing VP, and my boss slashed our departmental budget by 12%, but at least I won the Nobel Peace Prize.” I’m sure you can relate.
No such consolation for Obama. Now the right can hoot about the wild wave of Obamamania — no, make it an Obamagasm — that has rippled across the heaving, fatuously smitten souls of white Euroliberals. (And the Nobel Peace Prize committee represents some of the world’s choicest examples of white Euroliberalism. Norway, after all, is just about the whitest liberal nation on earth, second perhaps only to its neighbor Sweden, which doles out the other Nobels.)
Meanwhile, Obama’s American compatriots on the left are begrudging him the Prize because 1) their man still hasn’t actually accomplished anything in the realm of world peace, and 2) they know that Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Co. can milk this cow until the next election. The Prize has essentially granted all wingnut conservatives the inalienable right to snicker at the spectacle of worldwide Obama-worship, reducing a complex and gifted statesman to the laughable status of “Magic Negro” — that weirdly indispensable prop in Hollywood films of the past twenty or thirty years. (You know… modest but supernaturally gifted black man uses his powers to save grateful white protagonist.)
Obama doesn’t need any more grief from the right or the left. I’m sure he’s already weary of playing Magic Negro to a fawning Europe. He doesn’t want to be dismissed as an affirmative action Nobel laureate, the coddled recipient of honors he hadn’t earned. (He undoubtedly suspected that he was capable of winning the prize on his own merits, given another two or three years in office.) He doesn’t want the award simply because he’s the UnBush, either.
But the Nobel is his, and it will stick to him like flypaper for the rest of his presidency. Taliban fighters agitating in Afghanistan? Al-Qaeda insurgents pouring into Pakistan? Nuclear clouds swirling around Iran or North Korea? Obama will be sitting in the Oval Office, gazing at the golden glow radiating from his medal, and fretting fitfully. Peace, peace, peace, the medal whispers to him. Get lost, he wants to answer. But can he? Will he? Should he?
Tough spot for a rookie. I don’t envy him.
Take Our First-Ever Opinion Poll!
Yesterday I made an intriguing discovery: I can create opinion surveys here at The New Moderate! I can create them easily and post them instantly. You can participate in them (anonymously, of course) and see the results at the click of a button.
I have to tip my hat to the folks at PollDaddy, who offer this software free to all WordPress bloggers. At least I’m assuming it’s free.
Our first poll is entitled “What’s the most dangerous influence in the U.S. today?” I’ve offered a generous supply of multiple-choice selections, but you’re free to fill in your own favorite bugaboo.
To find the poll, go to the far right column (that’s the location, not the political orientation) and scroll down to just below the CONTACT information. Under the headline “TAKE OUR POLL,” click on the small print and you’re all set.
Given the sluggish traffic on this site, it might take several weeks for the votes to pile up. But you’re welcome to keep coming back and checking in on the results. (You’re allowed only one vote, though.) I’ll add a new poll every month or so to keep things interesting.
Corporatism and Communism: Too Close for Comfort?
Today I actually agreed with the opinions expressed in an article at HuffingtonPost. Don’t worry; I’m not abandoning the moderate ship, small and leaky as it is. Check the article, then see my response below.
I’m a staunch moderate and I applaud this article.
When I worked in the corporate world, I was shocked by the similarities between corporatism and communism: the disdain for individualists, the excessive regard for “team players” (comrades) who follow orders, the Orwellian notion that some team members are “more equal” than others, and of course, the dictatorship of unelected executives.
In other words, here was an ostensibly capitalist enterprise fostering the kind of soul-numbing collectivist values you’d find in the U.S.S.R.
The U.S. has become a plutocracy. Maybe it always was. The triumph of corporatism has smothered most of what was good about free enterprise: the George Baileys have lost out to the Mr. Potters; we’re all living in Potterville now.
How did so many Americans buy into this strangely un-American system? Well, the money was good.
You don’t have to be a leftist to fume about American corporatism. The system needs reforming ASAP: at the very least we need to put ordinary employees on the corporate boards, establish pay ratio limits and stop rewarding executives who make bad decisions. I don’t think the government should be running the companies directly (I’m not that far to the left), but we need to make them accountable to a central board comparable to the Fed.
Then the hard work begins: reforming the culture of corporatism from inside.
Rick Bayan
Founder-Editor
The New Moderate
Blame It on Chicago
Much ado (overmuch, in fact) the past few days about the International Olympic Committee spurning Chicago as the site of the 2016 Summer Olympics. I really hate to add to the surplus verbiage already spilled on the subject, but here goes…
Right-wingers, of course, are using the incident to seize a rare opportunity by the scruff of the neck: for these battered ideologues, the rejection of Chicago is a clear signal that Obama, for all his talk about restoring the stature of the U.S. in the world, has fallen flat on his sunny face. I mean, if he can’t even persuade the IOC to favor his hometown with an athletic contest, how will he ever prevail in Afghanistan or save the U.S. economy?
Meanwhile, the left is shouting back and blaming the fiasco on anti-Obama rabble-rousers who rooted against Chicago. (Imagine conservatives hoping that an American city would lose! And it’s not even a blue-state coastal city! Racists, all of them!)
I have a better idea. Let’s compare cities. Chicago vs. Rio de Janeiro. The brownish-gray, big-shouldered, bustling metropolis on Lake Michigan… vs. the gorgeous samba-swaying playground situated amid soaring emerald-green slopes and crescent-shaped beaches. The city of Al Capone, Mrs. O’Leary’s cow, the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre and a lot of very tall, undistinguished buildings… vs. the sultry, sensory, heart-stopping urban paradise that brought us “The Girl from Ipanema.”
If you had to choose an Olympic site, which city would call to you? No-brainer, says I.
As the late Senator Lloyd Bentsen might have put it: I know Rio. I’ve seen Rio. Rio is a favorite city of mine. Chicago, you’re no Rio.
Advice for the Thinking Moderate
Do moderates really need to think? Can’t we just examine the opinions of the extremists and take the average?
Afraid not. There’s more to being a moderate than dwelling in the middle. The midpoint has its charms, but we moderates could use a little more imagination, fire and gusto if we want to see our ideas prevail. That’s right — we need ideas, too. And the more original, the better.
Example: Both right-wing and left-wing groups depend heavily on lobbying, the unsavory practice of allowing special interests to fund the campaigns and pet projects of senators and congressmen in exchange for “favors.” The lobbyists fill a politician’s pockets, and they expect said politician to push their agendas in return. In other words, our elected representatives can be bought — and believe it or not, it’s all perfectly legal.
Where does a conscientious thinking moderate stand on lobbying? There’s no middle ground here, because the left and right seem to be in perfect agreement that lobbying is a politically (and financially) useful practice. We moderates can’t simply “take the average” on this issue and walk away. We need to stand up, stick our heads out of our cozy foxholes and denounce the practice of paid lobbying until somebody listens… until it becomes unacceptable and eventually illegal for private interests to play puppeteer with the representatives of the people.
What will it take for American moderates to grow into their destined role as outspoken champions of impartiality and fair play? Our republic and its ideals are being frittered away by a combination of partisanship, corruption and inertia. Thinking moderates everywhere need to renounce their traditional role as quiet and dispassionate onlookers. We’ve been too polite. We need to let ourselves get angry now and then, to awaken our inner Patrick Henrys (are you down there, Patrick?) and let fly a good resounding salvo in defense of our beliefs.
Come on, moderates, let’s find our voice!
Bayan’s Field Guide to the Middle
After my elaborate dissections of the right and left, you knew it had to come to this. Fortunately or not, describing the center of our political spectrum is a relatively simple affair. But at least for now, it’s not an especially inspiring one.
Apathetic moderates. The vast majority of our tribe (and just possibly the majority of Americans) can claim membership in this backward and nondescript class. They have their comfortable homes and families and their decent jobs; they grumble occasionally about taxes and the stock market and wonder aloud whether their school district is better or worse than XYZ Township’s school district. They watch their favorite TV shows, yawn and drift off to sleep.
Closet moderates. They tend to socialize primarily with liberals or primarily with conservatives (in case you haven’t noticed, sociopolitical self-segregation is a way of life in the U.S. today). They’ll instinctively disagree with many of their friends’ extremist pronouncements, but they’d rather not disrupt any dinner parties with their reasonable (and unacceptably unorthodox) viewpoints. So they say nothing.
“Column A/Column B” moderates. “Say again?,” you ask. Simple: they’re people who might describe themselves as social liberals but fiscal conservatives… or socially conservative but left of center on matters economic (especially after the recent depredations of Wall Street). In other words, they take independent stands on individual issues — but when you average it all out, they stand with us. I respect Column A/Column B moderates for their nondogmatic thinking, but it remains to be seen if they’d join a moderate movement.
Concerned moderates. They read the news, discuss politics with their friends and vote their conscience. They’re alarmed by the political polarization of American society, but there’s really nothing they can do about it… so why have a stroke?
Radical moderates. An oxymoron no longer! Some of us refuse to tolerate the continuing domination of American politics by left-wing and right-wing extremists; their chronically slanted arguments are driving us to unprecedented levels of political exasperation. We’d just like to hear the truth for a change: the unslanted, unvarnished, 24-carat truth. In fact, we demand it.
We demand to hear the truth from our elected representatives, not the scripts dictated by lobbyists with bottomless pockets. We demand to hear the truth from journalists, pundits, bloggers and their fans, not the self-congratulatory partisan smackdowns of the despised opposition. We demand a new level of cooperation between our two entrenched political parties, because we’re sick of the petty bickering and perpetual stalemates that get nothing accomplished. (How much longer can we wait until Congress enacts a healthcare reform bill — any bill — that keeps us from losing what’s left of our fortunes if we have the temerity to get seriously ill?)
If the partisans continue to favor their own special interests over the welfare of the general public, we moderates — all of us — will have to rouse ourselves from our slumber. We’ll have to become radicals for the good of the country. Yes, moderates can be revolutionaries. (I submit George Washington and Benjamin Franklin as Exhibit A and Exhibit B.) We would ignite our moderate revolution (a bloodless one, naturally, because, well… we’re moderates) by lighting a fire under the mass of apathetic moderates, voicing our opinions in public forums like this one, pressing for the triumph of common sense, and enlisting the support of moderate-leaning liberals and conservatives who, until now, have had nowhere else to go. Populism is gaining ground at an almost alarming pace, and we need to make sure that it finds a safe outlet in our sensible philosophy.
In the end, we moderates must create a long-overdue political party of our own, one that would shun the special interests of right-wing plutocracy and left-wing identity politics in favor of unity and genuine justice for all. It’s time for Mr. Smith — hundreds of Mr. Smiths, brimming with fresh ideas and good will — to go to Washington and prevail over the corrupt political hacks who have dominated that town for longer than most of us can remember. Maybe those Mr. Smiths need to descend on Wall Street, too.
Can we start a moderate revolution — or even a vocal moderate movement? It’s up you. First we need to hear from you. (Radical moderates need to speak up in the time-honored manner of radical leftists and conservatives.) The problem with being a moderate is that we’re simply not used to hearing our own voices in public. Maybe it’s time for us to clear our throats and give it a try.
Where the Left and Right Join Hands
It would be pleasant, and a bit of a hoot, to imagine our hardened lefties and right-wingers holding hands, swaying in unison and singing Kumbaya. Impossible, you say? Downright silly? Well, yes and no. In the unexpectedly polarized Age of Obama — with its noisy town-hall rants, radio demagogues and fiery online diatribes — such an overripe expression of sociopolitical harmony seems to be out of the question. And yet…
I’ve noticed some striking similarities between certain sectors of the left and right. Of course, you won’t see a HuffPost blogger from San Francisco cozying up to the nearest Wall Street Journal columnist anytime soon. But down in the less exalted regions of our populace, where the money flows less freely and virtuous Americans fret about their futures, a strange and forbidden sort of union seems to be taking shape. It hasn’t happened yet, and it might scare the pants off our more elite commentators if it does. But the vibrations are starting to resound across our suffering republic, and some of us are picking them up on our internal radio receivers.
I’m talking about grassroots populism, a movement that has bubbled up to the surface from the masses of downcast, angry, alienated citizens across the political spectrum — ordinary Americans who want their country (and money) back. This movement is revolutionary, it’s unprecedented in my lifetime, and the elites can no longer ignore it.
Right-wing populists and left-wing populists don’t agree on everything, naturally. You can still find them raging against their own separate and irreconcilable hobgoblins (right-wing populists hate illegal immigrants, left-wing populists hate racism). But their anger merges and swirls like a newly spawned tornado around some important common issues.
The populists from both camps agree that the federal government is spending us into oblivion, racking up debts that even our most brilliant yuppie grandchildren won’t be able to repay. They agree that our elected representatives are essentially puppets operated by the lobbyists who fund their campaigns. And they’ve concluded that our economic system has been rigged, like some great sinister casino, so that the house wins every time. Countless billions of our money to bail out the very banks that decimated our life savings! Eight-figure bonuses for evil investment bankers who masterminded the crapshoot!
Frank Rich, the generally doctrinaire liberal columnist for The New York Times, recently observed that American politics is no longer about the struggle of right versus left, but of ordinary Americans against the elite. Right-wing preachers like Sean Hannity can no longer convince their congregation to support Wall Street, while President Obama can’t seem to persuade his base that his colossal expenditures will halt the Great Recession.
The sages of our public commentariat still prefer to organize our body politic as if they were setting up an orchestra: liberals and socialists over on the left, conservatives on the right, and moderates like us in (where else?) the middle. I confess to the same habit, and I also confess that I’m finding it less and less applicable to our peculiar time and place.
I never thought I’d catch myself agreeing with Frank Rich about anything, but maybe a Great Recession makes for strange political bedfellows. Very strange. (Good night, Frank. Turn out the light, will you?)
Still Waiting…
… for somebody to read “Bayan’s Field Guide to the Left” before I write my next piece. If a post pops up on the blogosphere and nobody reads it, does it still make a sound? Alas, no. Where are all the moderates?
Bayan’s Field Guide to the Left
If you’re wondering why our astute and personable president can’t even unite his own party, look no further than this mindboggling mosaic portrait of the left. As Charles de Gaulle once quipped about France, “How can anyone govern a nation that has two hundred and forty-six different kinds of cheese?” America can boast almost that many varieties of left-wingers, and most of them have their own ideas about society and government. Have a look if you dare…
(PC warning: This post may contain blatant stereotypes.)
The Upper Left
The Hollywood left. Fabulously rich, famous and well-connected, they visibly espouse progressive causes and frequently collect Third-World children to affirm their status at the top of the pecking order. Bible-believing conservatives need not apply.
The liberal establishment. Respectable “right-thinking” genteel lefties who thrive and proliferate in the mainstream media and the nonprofit sector. Word of advice: never dispute their beliefs to their faces unless you don’t mind being excommunicated.
Upscale progressives. Affluent, well-educated, Chardonnay-sipping bourgeois liberals who employ nannies and send their kids to private schools. Liberalism for them is primarily a class identifier, useful for selecting the sort of people they’d like to invite to their dinner parties.
Traditional Jewish liberals. It used to go without saying that American Jews stood at least a few inches left of center, but it’s no longer a given (see Neoconservatives in “Bayan’s Field Guide to the Right”). Traditional Jewish liberalism still espouses humane values, sympathy for the underdog , patronage of the arts and collective animosity toward the late Richard M. Nixon.
Bourgeois bohemians. Dubbed “Bobos” by columnist-pundit David Brooks, these pseudo-lefties are essentially shaggy yuppies. Their “liberalism” is a lifestyle choice more than a political philosophy; they dig blues musicians, Tibetan cuisine, hole-in-the-knee jeans, goat-cheese pizza, food co-ops and other crunchy alternatives to the McMansion culture. Harmless and amusing.
Leftist academics and intellectuals. We can thank them (or damn them) for inventing political correctness. These aging ’60s radicals and their ideological progeny can still be found at the campus barricades, guarding the academy against the intolerable heresies of conservatives and moderates.
The Mid-Tier Left
Folk lefties. A polyglot patchwork of vintage hippies, underground journalists, vegans, New Agers, pot smokers, folk musicians, yoga instructors, crystal gazers, organic food buffs and elderly former Reds. Generally mellow, funky and too wrapped up in their subcultures to cause trouble.
The Upper Midwest left. A peculiar geographic concentration of Middle American liberals with ancestral ties to the labor and socialist movements of the early 20th century. Think of Michael Moore or, in its milder form, “A Prairie Home Companion.”
Mainstream Democrats. Marginally left of center, though not enough to distinguish them from moderate Republicans (except by their lifelong voting patterns and their affection for anyone named Kennedy or Clinton).
Funky capitalists. They own the coffee bars, cozy BYO restaurants, vintage clothing shops, independent bookstores, used record shops, tattoo parlors and other colorful manifestations of hip downtown culture.
Bohemian progressives. They patronize the above. Mostly young, college-educated, geeky (in a cool way) and at least outwardly indifferent to money.
The gay community. Predominantly left of center (especially the lesbians), at least until their right to marry becomes universal. Then it’s anyone’s guess.
Feminists. Militantly pro-choice, frequently anti-male and perpetually angry. Nothing in common with the right, except for the “angry” part.
Educated African Americans. Generally (and somewhat ironically) to the left of impoverished blacks, despite the advantages conferred by Affirmative Action. Why? Unlike poor blacks, many of them have experienced racism (whether real or perceived) as they’ve attempted to cross over into the middle class. Most have developed a missionary zeal for helping their people. And never underestimate the enticements of the left’s “cool” factor.
Environmental activists. They view the world through green-colored glasses and expect the rest of us to do the same. Well-intentioned fanatics.
Community activists. Empowering poor people to fight The Man, whether he needs to be fought or not.
Socialists. They’d spare us from envying the very rich by eliminating the very rich. (Thank you, I think.) On the plus side, they’d also eliminate the very poor. Their philosophy of government: the bigger the better. (Yes, size counts.)
Diehard Reds. A once-thriving movement reduced to a vanishing species, at least in America. You can almost hear them muttering, “That bastard Stalin ruined it for us!”
Secular humanists. Liberal euphemism for atheists. Their theology in a nutshell: “In the beginning man created God.”
Militant atheists. Not content to reject God, they enjoy ridiculing those who don’t.
The Lower Left
Poor blacks and Hispanics. Generally too uneducated and alienated to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, they subsist on perks and promises issued by the left.
Other aggrieved minorities. Native Americans, Gray Panthers, the handicapped, sufferers of little-known maladies, and other specialized groups whose collective grievances garner less press attention than they’d like.
Downwardly mobile whites. Casualties of downsizing, outsourcing and the Great Recession. What distinguishes them from the Angry White People on the right is their burning hatred for the fat-cat plutocrats who got them into this fine mess.
Labor. What’s left of it is still left of center.
Radical Muslims. They’d literally die to see America brought to its knees.
Anarchists. Where the far left joins the far right, way in the back where nobody can see them.
Bayan’s Field Guide to the Right
We passionate moderates are like the Light Brigade charging headlong into the valley of death: cannon to the right of us, cannon to the left of us. We’re flanked by open hostility on both sides, and we love the mad dash through the crossfire.
But it helps if we know a little about our opponents. Just who are these immoderate souls who make our lives so challenging? Let me start with the right. (I promise equal time for the left in my next installment.)
The American right consists of upper, middle and lower divisions, different as silk , cotton and burlap — yet strangely united by a common ideology.
The Upper Right
Old-money conservatives. Think of George Bush the Elder, who was actually a borderline moderate — but you get the picture. Privately schooled, groomed for the ruling class, bent on perpetuating their privilege in an understated but insistent manner. Generally upright, clubby and benign. Overwhelmingly Protestant and Anglo-Saxon. A declining influence, reduced in numbers but still formidable.
New-money conservatives. Smart, aggressive, often weasely and therefore hugely successful in business. (Think Gordon Gekko of “Greed is good” fame.) They made their own fortunes, ethically or not, and they’re intent on doing whatever they can to secure their hard-won socioeconomic status. The general idea is to flaunt that status as visibly as possible in the form of luxury cars, flashy jewelry, second homes, oversize boats, and rear-window decals from top-tier colleges.
Conservative intellectuals. A fascinating sub-caste subdivided into three distinct sub-sub castes. Paleoconservatives (e.g., William F. Buckley, Pat Buchanan, Joe Sobran, Peggy Noonan) tend toward Catholicism, small government and traditional social values. Neoconservatives (e.g., Bill Kristol, Charles Krauthammer, Norman Podhoretz) are social moderates who favor a hawkish foreign policy in general and a vigilant defense of Israel in particular. Classical Liberals, despite the L-word in their now-archaic label, are rationalists who believe in responsible individualism, civil liberties, free enterprise and the free marketplace of ideas. Columnist and pundit George Will is a stellar example of the breed. Conservative intellectuals aren’t especially preoccupied with money or social status, though their pundits score handsomely on the talking-head circuit.
Libertarians. A hybrid species characterized by capitalist zeal and freewheeling amorality. Generally contemptuous of society’s losers. Think Ayn Rand or Ted Turner.
The Middle-Tier Right
(Note: You could also call this sector “the Reasonable Right.” In fact, it seems a shame to consider them right-wingers at all. Of all conservatives, they’re the closest to us.)
Mainstream churchgoers. They’re virtuous folk who embrace traditional beliefs and values without feeling the need to force them down your throat. They can be Protestant, Catholic or anything else, but they don’t believe they own an exclusive ticket to heaven.
Middle-class capitalists. They won’t make the Forbes List, but they work hard, grow their businesses, suffer setbacks and still believe in the American dream. (Think of George Bailey from “It’s a Wonderful Life.”) They own most of the shops, restaurants and services that make your community a more vibrant place.
The Lower Right
Angry white people. Ordinary, put-upon taxpayers who have bottled up their resentments for decades and now find themselves boiling over at the likes of illegal immigrants, minority victimologists, government spending, creeping statism and Barack Obama. Increasingly susceptible to the hectoring of conservative demagogues like Messrs. Limbaugh and Beck. Sub-groups include gun nuts, tax rebels, xenophobes, right-wing populists, tea-baggers, town-hall shouters, “birthers” and the usual assortment of conspiracy buffs.
The Religious Right. The staunch cultural rear-guard of contemporary America, bound to an inerrant Good Book and terrified of cultural change. An amalgam of Bible Belt Protestant fundamentalists and working-class Catholics, profoundly distrustful of intellectuals and the avant garde. Openly despised by the educated left, and who deny them the PC protection granted to “favored” minority groups.
White supremacists. The slimy underbelly of the right: skinheads, neo-Nazis, KKKers, militant survivalists and other scary creatures who crawl out from under the rocks. We don’t know what to do with them, and they won’t go away.
THE NEW MODERATE 