Gang green: Bowdoin divest must improve message

Kicking the can: Electile dysfunction: campaigns need civility

Spring is in the air. Brunswick, Maine is finally melting. Ivies is right around the corner. This morning, I heard birds chirping outside my window, and I suspect that the first buds will appear on the Quad’s trees any day now.
And, because it’s an election year, there are absolutely hilarious ads from primary candidates surfacing, either viciously targeting incumbents or sprinting ahead in a race to the ideological bottom.
In today’s environment of political polarization and competitive primaries, candidates bring out the rhetorical big guns in primary races, attacking their opponents for being too conciliatory or not ideologically pure enough. In order to cater to the ideological elements that make up a significant percentage of primary voters, candidates swing far to the extremes of their party. The impractically ideological rhetoric in primary campaigns can have dangerous implications for policy when weird candidates advance through the election system and eventually become elected officials.
“When The Moment is Right” is a new ad released in opposition to John Boehner by J.D. Winteregg, a primary challenger. The ad prescribes Winteregg as a remedy for “electile dysfunction,” or rather the condition of having a Boehner for 23 years. Winteregg childishly reduces Boehner’s name to its phonetic pronunciation and condemns the Speaker of the House for activities such as playing golf with the president, which is supposedly indicative of Boehner being too comfortable in Washington and not being able “to get the job done.”
Another gem, this one from Montana, depicts a Republican Candidate for the House of Representatives shooting down a drone allegedly belonging to the US government. Entitled “Rifle Shot,” the ad demonstrates to viewers exactly what Matt Rosendale thinks about government surveillance.
Not only does the ad focus on an issue that does not exist—the government does not routinely deploy drones to spy on American citizens—but it also advocates violent remedies to the make-believe problem. To Rosendale, any influence by Washington is a huge problem, and he literally opens fire on the problems he perceives.
Sensational campaign ads are hardly anything new. “Daisy,” perhaps the most famous campaign ad ever (it’s universally known among people who study that sort of thing), appears to promise nuclear Armageddon if Barry Goldwater rather than Lyndon Johnson is elected president. That ad was aired during the halcyon days affectionately referred to as the “golden age” of American politics—days when polarization was at a minimum.
Ads fire up the electorate and may not be completely representative of the political situation; they appeal to base emotions such as fear, hate, or frustration and often do so quite crudely.Campaign ads are designed to educate the public about candidates, sway undecided voters, and pump up a candidate’s core electorate. As public opinion, especially that of voters who participate in primary elections, becomes increasingly polarized, rhetoric in those races gets fierier and candidates’ positions and promises get more extreme.
This is especially true in primary elections. Those who vote in primaries tend to be party elites and those at ideological extremes. Joe Six-Pack does not generally vote in the primaries. The more candidates rely on rhetoric and base emotions to sell their positions, the more present such rhetoric and emotion becomes in everyday political discourse.
I don’t want to argue for civility as a virtue. Obviously, the defining feature of these ads is vitriolic and often rude rhetoric, but a lack of civility is a symptom, not a problem in and of itself. It’s a symptom that feeds back into and perpetuates the original problem of polarization, but politeness is not inherently a virtue in politics, a realm where remaining silent can result in disastrous consequences.
While ads such as Rosendale’s and Winteregg’s may just be pure political calculation to win votes, they legitimize an environment in which lawmakers can hate each other, engage in ad hominem attacks, and imply violent action against things with which they disagree.Shooting drones while seated on a four-wheeler with grain silos in the background may win votes from a vocal minority, but bringing such imagery to an already gridlocked and dysfunctional legislative environment does little to improve America’s outlook.

Kicking the can: Arguing against Alito: Why expert opinion should be respected in court

It seems that whenever summer begins and I no longer have a bi-weekly soapbox to shout from, those in lofty positions of power start doing really stupid things. While I’m certain that the publication schedule of college newspapers is exogenous to the occurrence of ridiculous actions from public officials, I can’t help but take personal offense and assume that the culprits are saving their antics for late May to spite me and my loyal readers, which include and are probably limited to my mother, my girlfriend and Will Ossoff ’15. Now that the Orient will publish my drivel again, I’d like to go back to the beginning of the summer, and a certain Supreme Court case—Hall v. Florida.
Freddie Lee Hall was convicted of a particularly vicious murder in 1978 and summarily sentenced to death. Although a trial judge had found “substantial evidence” that Hall had “been mentally retarded his entire life,” Hall was kept on death row thanks to a Florida law that used a so-called “bright-line” test for determining whether or not a defendant is mentally disabled. Under the law, if a defendant scores above a 70 on an IQ test, he or she is deemed intellectually competent and eligible for the death penalty, with no more questions asked. Hall scored in the low 70s, deeming him intellectually competent by the bright-line test, which led him to appeal the test. Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority, agreed with Hall, noting that “[i]ntellectual disability is a condition, not a number.”
The unsettling element of this decision was not the outcome, but rather the margin and the dissent. Justice Samuel Alito filed a strong dissent to the five-justice majority decrying the Court’s reliance on “the positions adopted by private professional organizations…most notably the American Psychiatric Association.” In other words, according to Alito, Florida can kill whoever Florida wants, regardless of constitutional limitations to the cruel and unusual practice of executing the mentally handicapped.
Alito argues that the bright-line test is sufficient to dodge the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment and that the opinions of professionals should have no place in coloring the judicial process. This is especially ironic given that the IQ standard specifically relies upon an examination administered by professionals.
Alito will accept the IQ measurement but will not accept that the measurement can be flawed or that, as Justice Kennedy pointed out, “[a]n individual’s score is best understood as a range of scores on either side of the recorded score.” Instead, Alito would seek to affirm the right of states to capriciously execute its citizens, even if doctors have said that those citizens are medically unable to be full members of society and ultimately accountable for their actions.
In cases of law and justice, Alito writes, “what counts are…the standards of the American people—not the standards of professional associations, which at best represent the views of a small professional elite.” After all, who cares what educated people, trained to identify mental illness, have to say about a potentially mentally ill defendant? The views of the lynch mob should not take precedence over the informed opinions of highly educated professionals. In fact, a key tenet of our system of government is that the majority doesn’t always get what it wants. James Madison argued that “an interested and overbearing majority” could trample the rights of the few. Of course, he was speaking to the principles of government as a whole, but this philosophy that the less powerful must be protected in a just, inclusive government can extend to this situation. The state, governed by the majority, wanted to kill Hall. But Hall, with the help of those whose job it is to know what they’re talking about, pointed out why it would be unjust to put him to death and ultimately prevented it from happening.
To dismiss the views of professionals is to misunderstand why we have them in the first place. Professionals inform the public in all matters ranging from personal health, finance, how computers work and politics. If we did not care what learned people had to say, we would still think that the Earth is flat and that leeches can cure diseases. Eschewing the views of professionals when we do not agree is easy but it is also dangerous. The views of professionals reflect our society’s best understanding of the fields they represent, and that understanding should not be compromised by vindictive urges or a base idea that things should be different. As a civilized society, we must not simply kill those who have done wrong, especially when it is possible that they cannot fully grasp the weight of their actions. Justice Kennedy and the majority understood this and gave due deference to people who know what they’re talking about. Rather than applying leeches to our ailments until the life blood is drained from society, we must ask the right questions of the right people to arrive at a just and practical conclusion.

Kicking the can

Gang green: Bowdoin divest must improve message

This piece represents the opinion of the author:

May 2, 2014

When deciding the path for our country to take, democratic principles as we now interpret them dictate that we defer to the will of the people. Political elites know that to enact policies, one must generally have the people on your side. Good ideas and potentially sympathetic groups come in all kinds of packages, and often it is the delivery rather than the idea that is important in the public eye. Bad ideas can be very persuasive when presented well, and good ideas can be presented terribly and correspondingly fail to gain traction. The political battle becomes less about who can produce the most convincing idea than who can field the best PR team.

At their inceptions, the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street were considered comparable movements for Republicans and Democrats respectively. They were the grassroots of the extreme wing of their parties coming together and working for change. There is one obvious and notable difference between the two parties, however: the Tea Party still exists and OWS does not.

The Tea Party started by expressing itself in living rooms and had respectable people wearing ties at its helm. It developed a compelling message of personal freedom and responsibility and made its way into the hearts of many Americans. The Tea Party, as I’m sure you all remember, was at first the “Taxed Enough Already” party that complained mostly about having to pay for things like roads and schools. I’m not really any more a fan of OWS ideology—they missed the bull’s eye by the same amount that the Tea Party did—but they did a much worse job of selling their image. Sexual assaults, drugs, and homeless people do not a great political point make.

Previously a nicely polished movement with wide appeal, the Tea Party eventually turned into a conservative race to the bottom that has become a nightmare for Republican Party elites. In 2010 Republican candidates were able to ride the Tea Party wave into office, but now they are having massive branding problems because of the Todd Akins and Richard Mourdocks of this world. If that’s not current enough for you, there’s also Lindsay Graham’s challenger, Det Bowers, a pastor who views women’s love of their children as the leading cause of their husbands’ cheating. The Republican elite cannot rein in the growing number of weird candidates running in Republican primaries, and it is hurting their image nationwide. At least some, like Jeb Bush, have realized that they cannot look like their economic policy was developed by a coked-up Ayn Rand, or have their social agenda resemble the Westboro Baptist Church with more guns.

Opponents of fracking have done a truly fantastic job of packaging their viewpoints, while supporters have been hard-pressed to come up with arguments that are compelling in the public sphere. Stories of flammable tap water and general ecological devastation are powerful, as is the voice of Middlebury’s Bill McKibben, the charismatic and passionate environmental activist who might as well lead the movement.

Fear is a powerful political tool, and the opponents of fracking have harnessed it masterfully to the detriment of better ideas. For instance, regulation or a clear establishment of accountability would perhaps be preferable in a utilitarian sense to an outright ban. But images of fire coming from a faucet drown out meek cries of “regulate!” In lieu of good PR from a more centrist side—somwhere between “no way in hell” and “drill, baby, drill”—those with the best story, if not the best ideas, have won out.

Perhaps the only well-known and talked-about political movement here at Bowdoin is the campaign for divestment of fossil fuels. The idea has taken hold at many schools, several of which are actively considering it. Bowdoin’s divestment movement is much less successful. Students tend to roll their eyes at the mention of it.

I’ve heard general Bowdoin apathy blamed, but I propose another reason: really, really bad relations with the campus. Building a slum on the quad (happened last year, sorry first years), circulating petitions that many students have called misleading, and a general “you’re with us or you’re killing the world” vibe don’t really result in making friends.

Part of having a persuasive message is knowing your audience, and many students here tend to be unreceptive to showy or preachy movements.

The secret to electoral or policy success is not necessarily a good idea. People are more convinced by a well-articulated message than a coherent idea. Most people often won’t look past a gilded exterior to a bad idea on the inside, and it is even harder to ignore really bad delivery to embrace a good idea.

The importance of branding and messaging cannot be underscored enough for political entrepreneurs, and citizens should strive to evaluate messages beyond the initial glitz. In our democratic marketplace of ideas, it is the skilled promoter rather than the skilled idea-maker who is rewarded most.

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