Politics needs psychology right now. The choice of the next President and Congress can destroy or advance human civilization, given the power of this government at home and abroad. To choose leaders, American citizens need direct and confirmed knowledge of the psychology of real political judgments.
It is ironic that the public's current political despair could actually wake up their rational attention. But that is a tough challenge to the candidates and journalists. Evidence is clear that public opinion these days is a downer; a majority of citizens rate Washington, D.C., as a rotten town--a government failing to govern right. That negative evaluation and resulting fear is not a fantasy. In fact, we face real probabilities of heavy horrors: war, depression, disease. crime, ignorance, and anarchy. The greatest psychological danger this year is apathy, washed into our brains by propaganda selling placidity--gentling the citizens into looking up at the stars rather than down at the snakes. Politics is full of trouble? Okay, some say, to hell with it; just let some quiet master sweep worry into his closet so we can forget about it.
But fear can generate action. This year, angered citizens may wake up and pay attention to the campaign for President--or even for Congress. Given democracy as consent of the governed, citizens should dutifully anticipate next November 3rd as a time for their country's top choice, and thus feel the responsibility to develop their decisions rationally. A good place to start is with the news: read about the candidates, watch them, listen to talk about current politics while driving to work. Try hard.
News about Presidential candidates is being reported by smart and ambitious journalists, many of whom recognize the challenge to make reality interesting. Unlike professors, journalists have to lure the attention of citizens voluntarily, rather than assigning students to study for a test. Journalists can do that luring wrong.
Yet news about the candidates can also be complex and hard to understand. The candidates themselves tend to talk bureaucratically. Reporters often search for fresh varieties. Too often that hope for surprise generates obscure warps and sparks the reader can't catch. For example, in political debates on the news (which are not real debates), candidates address one another and the highly informed questioner with a language they already understand, but which the citizen/watchers do not. No wonder then that candidates have to shift from news complexity to advertising simplicity, since ads are designed to register in the minds of average lookers. And no wonder that journalists themselves pick up news from the ads. Given the mind of the citizen, the science of the ad-maker, and the speed of the news worker, a heavy temptation reaches forth: simplification.
Confused voters may naturally lapse over into the morals they do understand. What does "deficit" mean? The citizen probably does not know. What does "adultery" mean? The citizen does know. Therefore morals can replace politics, with voters leaning onto the simpler question of virtue rather than the harder question of policy. The malady is failure to concentrate on how the candidate's morals-or lack there-of-relate to the candidate's potential governing, not potential sanctity.
There really are moral problems relevant to ruling. Back in the early 1970s, for instance, a senator spoke straight to Richard Nixon:
All of us, Mr. President, whether we're in politics or not, have weaknesses. For some, it's drinking. For others, it's gambling. For still others, it's women. None of these weaknesses applies to you. Your weakness is credibility.
True--and relevant. Nixon's credibility was a political disaster. But should Winston Churchill have been defeated because he drank brandy? Should Nixon have defeated Kennedy because Kennedy warped into afternoon athletic adultery? Would the best reason for rejecting Harding have been that he liked gambling? None of the above. But as former Vice President Walter Mondale points out these days:
Character is a legitimate political issue, especially in a President. We have had Presidents with personal problems that seriously diminished their public judgment and power to govern effectively. We should learn about these problems before they are elected, not afterward. But the campaign is actually neglecting the qualities of character that relate most directly to the capacity to govern.
Presidential character does not mean simple morals. The focus should be on major morals--morals for political power affecting millions of humans. The challenge is to find out the personal qualities which will shape the White House operation--a particular, distinctive job, the results of which are significant. Therefore the lapse over into simple, ordinary, familiar morals is a psychological mistake for the citizen, who naturally hungers for political simplicity.
Tags:
american citizens,
anarchy,
brains,
despair,
downer,
hard news,
human civilization,
journalists,
judgments,
negative evaluation,
placidity,
Presidential candidates,
probabilities,
professors,
propaganda,
public opinion,
top choice
