By David K. Shipler
Imagine
a democratic country where voters ended a political campaign knowing more about
the difficult issues than they did at the beginning. Imagine the learning
experience of hearing presidential candidates seriously discussing how to curb
the wars in Europe and the Middle East, compete sensibly with China, retard climate
change, address the coming revolution of AI, open economic opportunity for the
impoverished, reduce racial discrimination, and gain control over immigration. Now
flip that upside down and you have the world’s supposed model of democracy, the
United States of America.
On the
tasks before us, we understand less and less. If we once believed we lived in a
free-market economy with prices set mainly by supply and demand, the campaign
has taught us to think that a president has all the power and so should get all
the blame—or credit—for our struggles or our prosperity, whichever happens to
occur during an administration.
If we ever
understood the limits of US control over global conflicts, we are now convinced
that an omnipotent president could stop Russia vs. Ukraine and Israel vs. Hamas
and Hezbollah.
If we
ever took the trouble to grasp the complex forces of desperation and hope that
drive immigrants from their violent homelands to ours, we can no longer be
bothered with anything but simplistic measures and instant cures.
Elections seem to dumb us down. Its practitioners filter out the nuance, contradictions, and history essential to forming smart policy. We retreat into our caves of certainty and disparage the “undecideds.”
