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I haven’t been writing about much in the
past several months. Can’t say that too many people have
written and said, "Boy, I miss your column!" Not that
I think or other people think that my writing is bad. (But maybe
that’s an illusion on my part, who knows?) It’s just that my
writing does not provoke an emotional reaction one way or the
other most of the time. I think it’s time to change that,
permanently.
However, my outlook on the political world
has altered significantly. I have left the Grand Old Party, and
I am an independent. I consider politics much, much less than I
used to, although as a recovering political junkie that’s a
relative concept. But when I do think about politics, it’s
without an ideological axe to grind.
What prompted all these changes? Well, lots
of reasons. For starters, teaching is my biggest priority right
now. It's more important than writing at the present time.
Nobody will miss my columns in the same way that my students may
miss having a committed teacher. Current events come up in
class, but you can only dig so deep into what’s happening in
the world. Moreover, I have no interest in shaping young minds
politically. They will make up their own minds someday, and
allowing students to decide issues for themselves is the best
thing.
September 11th influenced my
thinking about politics. The nation’s capitol is full of
public policy battles, but their outcome is preordained to occur
within a small ideological spectrum. Maybe a few billion will be
spent here instead of there, or someone will or will not get
nominated, or more importantly oil drilling will or will not
occur in the Arctic. These are important questions, but only up
to a point, and they are not life and death issues.
George Will once said that there is more
deeply felt passion in professional wrestling than there is in
politics. This statement assumes that the fix is in, and policy
is pretty much preordained. And come to think of it, that’s
how D.C. works. Like most Americans, I believe that my
participation does not affect how the government works. (This
may explain the drop in participating voters over a period of
decades.) People who think they can change the system by going
to D.C. are suffering from some profound illusions.
Now, this does not mean that new ideas and
political movements cannot have a profound impact on politics.
They can, and do. (Almost all of these movements originate from
outside D.C., which is a company town.) But these movements may
take decades to have their efforts bear fruit. Most people would
prefer the spotlight, and be with the "in" crowd, as
opposed to toiling in anonymity. But I would prefer the latter.
If I remained in the GOP, I would have
certain constraints that I would have to place on myself, out of
respect for the party that carries many of my political
aspirations. I would prefer the freedom from such restraints,
and I would like to be able to call things as I see them.
Another reason for leaving the GOP is that I
no longer feel any joy in being a spokesman for the conservative
movement, let alone a supporter of a bland Rockefeller
Republicanism. This movement, which has gone from a cultish
following in the 1950s to the political mainstream today, has a
lot of accomplishments under its belt, but who’s kidding who?
I’m not a cultural conservative, and I don’t think
conservative policies necessarily mean good government all the
time. They (the cultural warriors) wouldn’t want me there, so
why should I want to be with them?
But the biggest reason for leaving the GOP
nest has been my evolving rejection of American foreign policy,
and how it continues to be conducted. The age of the American
Empire is upon us, and will continue well into the next century,
but that does not mean we should accept this state of affairs
uncritically. America is a great country; unfortunately, some
other countries are worse off because of our involvement in
their military and economic affairs. (The International Monetary
Fund has destroyed countless economies, so big banks can buy
assets in those countries on the cheap.) Moreover, such
intervention does not benefit our citizenry for the most part,
but merely the privileged few right here at home. Blood should
not be shed for such campaigns.
This does not mean that current war in
Afghanistan is illegitimate. But I do believe that calling Iran
and North Korea part of the "axis of evil" is
counter-productive. The sanctions against Iraq need to be
lifted, now. The IMF, which constantly destroys developing
economies in order to serve a few large banks, needs to be
abolished or completely revamped.
It should be noted that the worst attacks on
American soil were carried out directly by only nineteen people,
by using civilian aircrafts. Increasing the military budget by
20% may make people feel good, but it will not make our country
safer. Moreover such build-ups only make it more likely for
further military campaigns to be launched abroad, which makes
attacks at home more likely, not less.
All of these views are outside of the
conventional wisdom, never mind the Republican establishment. It
is simply not tenable to belong to a group that holds such
divergent views on such important matters.
It’s worth noting the other people have
defected from the Republican Party in recently: Rep. Michael
Forbes, Senator James Jeffords, David Brock, and Patrick
Buchanan, to name a few. The former two are politicians who were
never really Republicans in the first place, and made the switch
out of expedience or egotism. Brock’s new book, Blinded
by the Right , is a juicy read to be sure, but the book
makes me wonder whether Brock was ever committed to the
conservative cause in the first place. To describe the entire
movement as retrograde and racist, as Brock did, is a caricature
at best.
Buchanan’s departure from the party is not
unlike mine in one respect: it was based on evolving political
differences. I do not share Buchanan’s views on Western
civilization, or the culture war, or many other things, but I
agree with him on this: the American
republic is becoming an empire . This has negative
consequences for most people in our country, and the world.
There may be very little to counteract this massive trend, but
it should be addressed and opposed at the very least.
If you, the reader, detect a radical
sensibility in some of these positions, you’re right. My
politics has become a hybrid between a libertarian-conservatism
and a radical critique of how the world works. There is a huge
chasm between these two views, and they can only be reconciled
on an issue-by issue basis. But they are not mutually exclusive
either. I can read and enjoy The Nation without subscribing to
what I consider to be its excesses.
Moreover, it is interesting to note that both
conservatives and leftists, while possessing diametrically
opposite values, often share a common thread. Both sides contain
a pessimistic view of people in power. One can argue that
governmental power is more dangerous than corporate power, but
both sides can agree that people who possess power often become
corrupted, then corrupting. I couldn’t agree more. One group I
could never appreciate again is the establishment liberal
position, which combines the worst mushy sentimentalism of the
left, while containing the power worship sometimes associated
with the right. The worst outcome for this country would be a
small class of wise men who would rule, ostensibly, to help
those who are less fortunate. This fits the Democrats perfectly,
but it doesn’t work that way.
H.L. Menchken subscribed this role to
journalists: "To afflict the comfortable, and to comfort
the afflicted." That’s a nice line, but there’s more to
writing than that. The best writing can provide clarity to the
noise that permeates events, and a dedicated journalist/writer
can sort out the wheat from the chaff. A character in Night
and Day by Tom Stoppard said, "No matter how imperfect
things are, if you've got a free press everything is
correctable, and without it everything is concealable."
So I’ll keep writing, although with a
different mission. Maybe my work will lead to different
opportunities, maybe I’ll have an impact on how readers
consider issues, maybe I’ll tilt at windmills and nothing
more. But I’ll write. And that’s enough for now.
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