Detailed Abstractions

In news that shouldn’t be necessary, but probably is, a Democratic group ran a focus group to see if racism was involved in the conservative opposition to President Obama’s policies (@Politico.com):

Racism is not a factor driving conservative opposition to President Barack Obama, according to the results of focus groups conducted by Democracy Corps, a Democratic organization, released on Friday….

It’s amazing they had to study that specifically as if studying the fact thirsty humans like water, but it’s a very good thing it was done and publicly reported.

Of course are this  is a political focus group, they continue:

…Nevertheless, members of the conservative base of the GOP said they believe the president is pursuing a “secret agenda” designed to push the country toward socialism.

“This is a pretty dominant view in the Republican Party,” said Democratic strategist James Carville, who worked on the report.

Rather than attributing their dislike of Obama to race, participants in the focus groups, which were a project of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, said that their disaffection was borne out of a sense that the president was orchestrating an effort to steer the country away from its “founding principles.”…

Notice how they seemingly conflate “socialism” with moving away from “founding principles”, but overall they are stating what most knew – the opposition is honestly and truly focused on ideas.

But it can’t stop there.  It goes on to say things like the GOP wants Mr. Obama to fail, which differs from Independents in that the GOP seems to have an ethical imperative to prevent the move away from the founding principles.   Because of this, the report states:

…“On virtually every point of discussion around President Obama and the major issues facing our country, these two audiences simply saw the world in fundamentally different ways — underscoring the extreme disconnect of the conservative Republican base voters,” the report’s authors wrote….

The idea there is an extreme disconnect is an interesting conclusion, but it’s not presented by any facts in the report. This doesn’t mean this conclusion is false, but from the data they are allowing us to see, it doesn’t prove it true.  In fact, over 1/2 the country is against the current health care reforms being pushed by the White House which seems to contradict their conclusion on at least one topic.

Additionally the comparison they are using between GOP voters and Independents seems week.  Not only do I need to understand more about the the specifics in relationship to answers & questions to properly analyze, but also need to understand what they define as “Independent” as self-described Independent voters aren’t a monolithic organization which can be easily used to make an easy comparison.

Not only that, but my understanding from political insiders, there aren’t near as many independent voters as there are people who tell us they are independent.  Most independents vote like everyone else.  They follow a pretty tight party line vote on their representatives because one party is closer to their beliefs than the other.   They might be more likely to switch, but they are almost as consistent as party members.

& honestly, being consistent shouldn’t be a true issue.  A true “independent” would seem to be a description of a wishy-washy kind of way of dealing with politics in general.  I’ll grant for those truly in this category, it’s much easier to watch the winds blow and point yourself in that appropriate direction than to honestly question the philosophical underpinnings of any administration or policy and stick to your beliefs, but it shouldn’t be held up as some standard of centric thought.

When talking to some of these people one gets the idea that they are simply conflict avoidant.  That some have a strange belief that having a specific philosophy only ends with a close-minded person incapable of compromise.

It’s the opposite though – having a philosophy doesn’t mean you have to be dogmatic in every single thing.  It does mean you have to work for logically consistent beliefs which agree with your values.  It also means, that if new facts are shown to prove one of your beliefs incorrect, you have to honestly rethink that position. & most importantly it means, you hold not only your opposition to those standards, but also your leaders.

With our society today however, it’s seems many of us are more comfortable simply saying “I’m for X and against Y, regardless of inconsistencies” than they are in doing the work required to build a true foundation of beliefs from which to work from.

What they miss, is that they have a philosophy by their very actions.  Observers will view others’ actions & decisions over time and can make true statements as to their basic set of beliefs, consistent or not.

The question therefore isn’t, what philosophy will I have, but will that philosophy be contained within a consistent framework based upon my values and views on morality, or will that philosophy only be based upon prevailing thoughts?

But I digress – there is still great news in the report.  The fact the Democratic leadership is learning what most of us already understood can only help current public debates.

As with any debate, negotiation, discussion, training… pretty much anything were one person or group is attempting to signal to other people or groups what they are looking for, it’s always important to ensure that any promises given verbally are also written.

Of course with legislation, the written part will be completed.  The important part then becomes – does the rhetoric match the bill?  IE – do the claims being given by leaders of both parties and the WH themselves match what is currently happening?

First, with current reports, I think it’s fairly safe to say that the bill as is will not be signed into law.  I’m not saying this because I believe the overall opposition to be effectively strong at this point, I say this because of the myriad of reports coming from current Congressional leadership and POTUS.

Through the President’s recent town hall meeting in Grand Junction Colorado, we heard great answers to difficult questions (read whole thing here).  When answering a question about the fact this debate seems to be dividing the country, Mr. Obama responded:

Well, look, let me — let me just — let me address this.  You know, health care is really hard.  I mean, this is not easy.  I’m a reasonably dedicated student to this issue….

…there is no perfect, painless silver bullet out there that solves every problem, gives everybody perfect health care for free. …

…What I can do is try to sort through what are all the options available, be realistic about where we’re going on health care, say to myself, if we keep on doing what we’re doing, we are in a world of hurt.  We can’t afford what we’re doing right now….

Which sounds great, so long as it’s not juxtaposed against the facts.  Republicans, and therefore bipartisanship, it not how the bill it progressing forward.  Indeed, in the House, Republicans were simply locked out of the debate itself.

Even with the President recently backing down from the public  health care option to attempt to work with the current opponents of his plan, his party is refusing to play nicely with others (here):

“I wonder if the White House truly understands the depth of anger they’ll face from the progressive side if they fail to pass health care reform with a strong public option,” Markos Moulitsas wrote on his liberal Web site, DailyKos.

“We haven’t [worked] the last four years to pass bank bailouts and give insurance companies everything they ever wanted,” he added. “If we wanted that, we’d be Republicans.”

With Howard Dean leading the charge (here):

Former Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean fired one of the clearest warning shots at hesitant Democratic lawmakers on Thursday, insisting that if the party was unable to produce a health care bill with a public plan, there would be electoral consequences.

“I do think there will be primaries as the result of all this, if the bill doesn’t pass with a public option,” Dean said, in a phone interview with the Huffington Post….

& others… here & here…

The problem of course with the whole argument, whether we end with a public option or a co-op type option which is run by the government (anyone know the difference?), is that they seem to presume only two options: public or no reform.

But even if their false dichotomy were true, I’m convinced there isn’t a politician alive, including those I agree with, who understand whether the bill will do what they think it will do.

Reporting from USA Today, they make mention of the 1200 page bill with all it’s quaint little additions like this:

“SEC. 1233. ADVANCE CARE PLANNING CONSULTATION. (a) Medicare. — (1) IN GENERAL. — Section 1861 of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1395x) is amended — (A) in subsection (s)(2) — (i) by striking ‘and’ at the end of subparagraph (DD); (ii) by adding ‘and’ at the end of subparagraph (EE); and (iii) adding at the end the following new subparagraph: ‘(FF) advance care planning consultation (as defined in subsection (hhh)(1) … “

Of course not all of the bill itself is as convoluted as this particular section,  but I think before continuing to argue about a public option, a co-op option, no reform, market reform, whatever…  it might be interesting if the press would just recite certain pieces of the current legislation and the ask all politicians, including POTUS – how does this section relate to your goals for health care reform and what exactly does it do?

Or when President Obama and other leaders claim that opponents are lying or being disingenuous (here):

What you can’t do — or you can, but you shouldn’t do — is start saying things like, we want to set up death panels to pull the plug on grandma.  I mean, come on.

We should ask him and his opponents the same basic question – please prove, through rational logic and a good reading of the current legislation, why you think this will or will not happen.

Of course, we can continue fighting amongst ourselves over the definition of socialistic health care or whether a co-op is indeed different from a public option, but if people are truly interested in reforming health care, it might be time to rethink that strategy.  Maybe instead, we should start by asking them to explain the legislation they are currently pushing.

Who knows – actually focusing on the issue at hand might actually help us start getting legislation written by our elected representatives instead of the current system where all bills are being written by lobbyists.