Time to Reset Our Progressive Moral Compass

Published on Saturday, July 30, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

Time to Reset Our Moral Compass

by Norman Mathews

Progressives are suffering from debilitating cognitive dissonance. Incapable of reconciling President Obama’s rhetoric with his actions, they have created an elaborate, but flimsy, structure of rationales to harmonize this dissonance. These rationales began shortly after Obama took office, with progressives blaming all those nasty triangulating, progress-by-tiny-increment advisers from the Clinton Administration, who were leading him astray from his principles. From the outset, the Administration supplied it’s own excuses for its failure to achieve audacious goals: “Change comes slowly” and “Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.” Then, despite control of the House and a sizable Democratic majority in the Senate, the party was deemed the problem, because it couldn’t keep its troops in line to get the 60 votes required to pass his agenda. This morphed into a much larger obstacle—the Republicans, following the 2010 landslide. In the recent debt-ceiling debate (and particularly with progressives’ denial that he would actually cut Social Security and Medicare) we’ve seen a rebirth of the meme: “He's playing chess while everyone else is playing checkers.” Numerous current articles indicate that we now face an epidemic of “he’s just not a competent negotiator” rationale.

In the 1930s, Dorothy Parker said, “Which is worse—the perpetrators of injustice or those who are blind to it?”Glenn Greenwald adroitly addressed this in his April 14, Salon.com article, “Why Do We Assume Obama’s Actually Trying to Enact a Progressive Agenda.” The crisis is now so threatening that a rational mind can no longer make such excuses credible. His supporters correctly maintain that he’s a man of extraordinary intelligence. They seem blissfully unaware that it is impossible to hold this belief concurrently with the notion that he is just not capable of learning the most basic negotiation skills, or that his advisers, who have been both hardened politicians and businessmen and who, after all, include a vice president who was a senator since 1972, are incapable of instructing him in these arts.

Let’s look at the argument that his advisers are preventing him from delivering on campaign promises. Name a manager any field who is not held ultimately responsible for hiring choices. Again, if we assume that the fault is with the advisers, we must concede that Obama was so politically ill informed or did such a poor job interviewing these people that he had no idea what they stood for—not to mention that he refused to fire them upon learning they were reading from a different play script. Further, we would have to entertain the absurd idea that he is powerless to override his appointees’ suggestions. Beyond that, we would have to acknowledge that not only did he make poor choices with his first appointments, but also that he chose badly the second time around, i.e. William Daley and Jeffrey Immelt.

We are long past the expiration date for denying that the Obama we now know— through his actions rather than his words —is anything other than the real Obama. We must come to grips with the fact that much of the rhetoric we heard during the campaign was fraudulent—or more charitably, that we heard only what we wanted to hear. How many ominous signals did we ignore during the campaign?

• The choice of Joe Lieberman as his mentor in the Senate. And his campaign on behalf of Lieberman over the anti-war candidate Ned Lamont.

• NAFTA. Obama professed to seeking changes in this trade law, but when he was about to give a speech in Ohio (a state devastated by NAFTA), Austin Goolsbee delivered a message to Michael Wilson, Canada’s Ambassador to the U.S., that his criticisms of the agreement should be considered campaign rhetoric, not to be taken too seriously.

• Reagan as hero: "I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not.”

• FISA. Though an Obama campaign statement declared, “Senator Obama is unequivocally opposed to retroactive immunity,” for telecom companies participating in Bush’s warrantless wiretappging, he still voted in the telecoms’ favor.

• Safety net. Politico pointed out before inauguration that Obama echoed “Bush’s claim of an entitlement ‘crisis’, warning of ‘red ink as far as the eye can see’ in Social Security and Medicare. Obama promised that those programs would be a ‘central part’ of his plan to reduce the federal deficit.”

Should liberals blame themselves, as so many are suggesting, for missing these red flags? How can we when so many were convinced of his sincerity? He is the most gifted orator in generations. He made us hear what he wanted us to hear. We so needed to find hope after eight dispiriting years under Bush that we had to believe—the alternative, that he was just another slick-talking politician, would have been nihilistic.

We must stop making excuses for him and stop blaming ourselves for blindly supporting him. Rather, our fault lies in not holding him accountable and pushing back firmly when early in his presidency it was clear that he was not putting up even an appearance of fighting for the changes he promised.

If memory serves, it was during a press conference in which he was defending himself against socialism charges that he astoundingly said: “In many places in the world, I would be considered a conservative.” This may be the most revealingly honest statement he has made, but it’s certainly not what his campaign was about.

By continuing to absolve him, we are unable to move forward with any progressive policies or to demonstrate to Congressional Democrats that we still hold firm beliefs in justice and fairness. The madness of the Republicans has lowered the bar to such an extent that Obama’s capitulations seem sensible by comparison. In the 1930s, Dorothy Parker said, “Which is worse—the perpetrators of injustice or those who are blind to it?” Friends complained about Bush’s war mongering and civil rights abuses, declaring, “Not in my name, do you do this.” Now Obama is expanding these wars (note the Administration’s drive to convince Iraqis to let our troops remain beyond the signed deadline—and remember, ending the Iraq war was central to his campaign). He also is accelerating civil rights abuses, yet I hear not a word of criticism from these same friends. Our silence is surely leading to the death of liberalism—and of hope. What sort of moral compass allows us to condemn actions by one administration only to be silent (complicit?) when our own candidate commits them?

We sit passively as Obama appears intent on proving that his hero, Ronald Reagan, was right: “Government IS the problem.” Progressives must not allow this to happen.

Norman Mathews is an award-winning composer and playwright. He has written for the concert stage and the musical theatre. He has been news editor for Dance Magazine and managing editor of Sylvia Porter's Personal Finance Magazine.

There is No Lesser Between Evils

Evilism: There Is No Lesser

The Left Can Pose Its Own Challenges to Ron Paul

by Kim Petersen / July 29th, 2011

At the beginning of his essay, “Ron Paul’s Challenge to the Left,” John Walsh writes, “On the question of war and empire, the Republican presidential candidates from Romney to Bachmann are clones of Obama, just as surely as Obama is a clone of Bush.” Hence the contention of my title, there is little substantive difference between the Republicans and Democrats; they are both corporate dominated and controlled parties. As futile as lesser evilism is, it is also futile to talk about there being a lesser evilism between the two utterly dominant political parties in the United States.¹

Walsh argues there is a difference: “Rep. Ron Paul (R, TX) the only contender who is a consistent, principled anti-interventionist, opposed to overseas Empire, and a staunch defender of our civil liberties so imperiled since 9/11.” His argument is that because Ron Paul is anti-war that the Left should embrace his candidature, and he views it as a challenge to the Left.²

Without a doubt, any president that would put an end to the imperialist wars being waged by the US would be light years better than a slew of corporate-backed warmongers that have long sat in the White House, including Obama. This means that a future president Paul, insofar as he would and could implement a policy of no wars, is far preferable to the irredeemable warmonger Barack Obama, who curries negligible favor among progressives.

Paul, however, carries a regressivist side with him that many progressives consider anathema. I consider Paul’s ideology as anti-human, basically every man and woman for his/her self.³ Under Paul, tough luck for those people that fall through the cracks.

Yet Walsh makes the case that Paul is the moral choice. However, based on Paul’s libertarian ideology (which he, arguably, does not always adhere to), the morality of a Paul presidency is open to criticism.

Walsh asks, “Is not the very first obligation of the Left above and beyond all else to stop the killing, done in our name and with our tax dollars? Is any other stance moral? And does not the Paul candidacy need to be seen in this light?”

The Paul candidacy needs to be seen in the light of all his stances and the morality of all those stances. Morality is not a unitary, single issue.

Thus, insofar as participating in rigged elections is a correct strategy, if there were a candidate who is anti-war and progressive on other issues, would not the moral choice be to vote for that candidate? For example, if Ralph Nader or Cynthia McKinney were to run again?

Nevertheless, should no progressivist candidate stand for the next presidential election, can one argue seriously that lesser evilism is a moral choice?

Obama is not a lesser evil. He is on par with any other Republican candidate — with one exception. Based on Paul’s anti-war stance, it appears that he is a lesser evil to Obama (or any other Republican candidate). Does that make Paul the best candidate to vote for?

Two quotations stand out well for me about the dangers of lesser evilism. Spanish Jesuit Baltasar Gracián warned: “Never open the door to a lesser evil, for other ones invariably slink in after it.”

Lesser evilism has pushed most parties to the Right. The lesson of lesson evilism is that if a party wants to grab a section of the Right, it appeals to with receptiveness to certain rightist issues, believing that it can hold onto whatever leftist base it has because there is no other viable alternative. The result worldwide has been a slide to the right among all prominent political parties. In the US, the Democrats have slid side-by-side with the Republicans; in Canada there is little to distinguish the Conservatives and the Liberals (and the so-called leftist New Democrats are hardly what I would call a part of the Left, at best right of center); in the United Kingdom, the Blairites shoved the Labour Party over toward the Conservatives (and the Liberal Democrats work hand-in-hand with the Conservatives to form a government); in Germany the Social Democratic Party slid to the Right under Gerhard Schröder; etc. What this rightward shift did is vanish, neuter, or marginalize a leftist electoral option. This phenomenon, occurring far and wide, has paved the way for neoliberalism — an extreme form of capitalism — that has caused the middle and lower socioeconomic classes to fall farther behind.

By sliding to the Right, only the corporatocracy wins. Lesser evilism in the form of a Ron Paul government might result in a roll back of the US military — admittedly a stupendous achievement. However, a rightward drift economically might fuel xenophobia, blaming outsiders for the problems caused by right-wing economic policy. This sentiment eases launching of wars against outsiders. Paul does appeal to a base that fears immigration. Moreover, the Tea Partiers, whose support Paul is courting, contradictorily call for reining in government but supporting militarism — a huge drain on the public purse.

Only by holding onto it principles and political goals will the Left, in the long-term, be able to realize its goals in government.

If lesser evilism opens the doors to other evils, then British preacher Charles Spurgeon opted correctly when he stated, “Of two evils, choose neither.”⁴

1. See Kim Petersen, “The Utter Futility of Lesser Evilism,” Dissident Voice, 24 May 2007. [↩]
2. Charles Davis earlier made the argument that Ron Paul is a lesser evil compared to Obama. “Ron Paul: A Lesser Evil?” Dissident Voice, 28 April 2011. [↩]
3. See Pham Binh, “Don’t Fall for Ron Paul,” Dissident Voice, 16 May 2011. [↩]
4. See Kim Petersen, “The Lesser-of-Two Evils,” Dissident Voice, 19 April 2004. [↩]

Kim Petersen is co-editor of Dissident Voice. He can be reached at: kim@dissidentvoice.org. Read other articles by Kim.

This article was posted on Friday, July 29th, 2011 at 8:02am and is filed under "Third" Party, Anti-war, Democracy, Elections.

Education, Ethics, and Equality

by Kim Petersen / July 18th, 2011

The most important human endeavor is the striving for morality in our actions. Our inner balance and even our very existence depend on it. Our morality in our actions can give beauty and dignity to life.

To make this a living force and bring it to clear consciousness is perhaps the foremost task of education.

– Albert Einstein¹

While at university, I was once required to write an essay on personal ethics to guide an educator. Of course ethics entailed respect for the rights of all humans, but mere respect for rights is insufficient.

Each person must decide on which principles they hold and abide by them as much as possible.

I propose the following as a simple basis for making decisions that have ethical consequences.

1) Respect that others abide by different principles. Therefore, before rendering any decision, the reasons held by others for or against any action must be heard and considered.

2) Principles must be open to scrutiny. If a superior conception of a principle exists, then an inferior principle must be abandoned.

3) Given that a principle is morally and logically sound, decisions should be rendered upon this principled basis.

4) Since mass participatory democracy is preferable to dictatorship, decision-making should be achieved, as much as possible, through a consensus.

As for my personal ethics, I hold that all humans must be not only regarded as endowed with equal rights but provided with equal conditions. The United States Declaration of Independence states that “all men are created equal.” This is factually inaccurate. We are all created unique, each person with his own strengths and weaknesses. From this mindset, how “we” value certain attributes determines how “we” view equality among humans. Society² values certain attributes more than others; consequently, individuals proficient in certain skills or possessing other attributes valued by society will be treated differently than individuals who do not possess society’s valued skills or attributes.

The phrase “all men are created equal” is obviously a platitude. It would have been much more honest to simply state that we are all different; nevertheless, we are all entitled to equal rights – and importantly, because it is not stated in the Declaration of Independence – equal conditions. (The Declaration of Independence undermines itself by referring to the Indigenous peoples of “America” as “merciless Indian Savages.” This is pertinent because it is a document held sacred by most Americans; and Americans and Canadians hold a similar — not identical — colonial origin and culture.)

That everyone is entitled to equal conditions is seldom stated as a principle in society. This is not surprising because it does not exist, and this is unsurprising because it thoroughly undermines all notions of equality in society. Canadian society is capitalist (with socialist elements). Theoretically, capitalist society is predicated on competition in the market, and current capitalist mythology holds that anyone with skills who works hard enough can make it to the top of society. There is a top and there is a bottom. That fact that there is a top of society, itself, refutes the notion of equality.

Yet, it is simple to demonstrate that equality of conditions is a sine qua non of a society where equality of rights exists. For example, very few people would argue that a 100-meter race where some runners start from positions far behind the start line is fair. It is axiomatic. Very few people would argue that a professional boxing match between a heavyweight and flyweight is fair.

Yet, many people — and most educators!! — think it is fair to grade children using identical parameters, despite the inequality of their conditions. In the education system, a child from a poor, single-parent family who is poorly fed, often going to school in the mornings with an empty stomach, and who must help out his parent will be assessed the same as a child from a wealthy, loving family where both parents are professionals and the shelves are filled with books and educational DVDs. Is this fair? I submit it is not, but the system requires educators grade regardless of conditions outside the classroom.

The obvious solution seems to recognize the inequality of conditions and reflect this in the assessment of students. Better would be to provide for equality of conditions.

Not only is a system of testing and grading unfair but it is inefficient, as study after study shows that cooperation is superior to competition in promoting achievement.

Cooperation is something that should be fostered in society. Therefore, the imposition of competitive grading should be eliminated and cooperative learning encouraged. It seems sufficient that students can decide upon their own goals and plan (with facilitation from a teacher/parent) their paths to their goals.

Yet education is fraught with authoritarianism, and one consequence of this authoritarianism is that learners are taught that it is normal in society to wield power over others, often without accountability to those the power is being wielded over.

Hence, a discussion of ethics in education is rendered moot because education (in the mainstream of the capitalist system) is flawed by an unethical foundation.

1. Albert Einstein: The Human Side, Helen Dukas and Barnesh Hoffman (Eds.), Princeton University Press, 1979: 83. The quotation continues: “The foundation of morality should not be made dependent on myth nor tied to any authority lest doubt about the myth or about the legitimacy of the authority imperil the foundation of sound judgment and action.” [↩]
2. Here I am not referring to the masses in society because society is not governed by the masses; society is a function of agendas set by owners of corporations and their political faces. [↩]

Kim Petersen is co-editor of Dissident Voice. He can be reached at: kim@dissidentvoice.org. Read other articles by Kim.

This article was posted on Monday, July 18th, 2011 at 8:01am and is filed under Education, Philosophy, Students.