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The terms "left" and "right" in politics have never held a definition for any reasonable period of time, but rather have changed as quickly and fluidly as the political landscape itself. The notion of a "center" has also crept into the political dialog. It conjures up view of the normal curve from statistics where there is a big lump in the middle that tapers off towards the sides.
A lot of politicians have bought into the metaphor so thoroughly that they seem to earnestly believe that in order to win an election, the challenge is to "move to the center" and grab that big lump of votes there. The idea is repeated by the pundits often enough that it starts to sound reasonable, unless you try to think about what it means.
Many decisions required of those in high political office, especially executive office, are discrete. War is at the forefront of the national consciousness right now, and it makes the perfect example. Invade or don't. Occupy or don't. There is no middle ground, and the combination isn't a compromise, but a half-assed failure that serves neither side.
Winning the hearts and minds at home is no different. There are nurturing values, from which we get ideas like the living wage, safe working conditions, freedoms, Social Security, and so on. There are also values of stricture, from which we get ideas like military intervention, police enforcement, prohibitions, Social Darwinism, and so on.
Each person resonates with each set of values, and many others I don't have time to name besides. Between these values, however, is a chasm that appeals to no one.
At any given time, "left" and "right" tend to catch some bundle of the values above and grossly, roughly, poorly approximate which are more important to a preponderance of the electorate at the time.
The ideas of "moving to the center" tends to take one of two forms. Sometimes a politician on one side of the "left/right" association will take on a value that is associated with the other side. Other times a politician will try to average the proposals each sides has, ignoring the values behind them.
These naive policy compromises are morally bankrupt and drop into the chasms mentioned above. A proposal to make abortion sort-of legal won't make anyone happy. Politicians who attempt to compromise in this way just end up compromised.
A lot of politicians have bought into the metaphor so thoroughly that they seem to earnestly believe that in order to win an election, the challenge is to "move to the center" and grab that big lump of votes there. The idea is repeated by the pundits often enough that it starts to sound reasonable, unless you try to think about what it means.
Many decisions required of those in high political office, especially executive office, are discrete. War is at the forefront of the national consciousness right now, and it makes the perfect example. Invade or don't. Occupy or don't. There is no middle ground, and the combination isn't a compromise, but a half-assed failure that serves neither side.
Winning the hearts and minds at home is no different. There are nurturing values, from which we get ideas like the living wage, safe working conditions, freedoms, Social Security, and so on. There are also values of stricture, from which we get ideas like military intervention, police enforcement, prohibitions, Social Darwinism, and so on.
Each person resonates with each set of values, and many others I don't have time to name besides. Between these values, however, is a chasm that appeals to no one.
At any given time, "left" and "right" tend to catch some bundle of the values above and grossly, roughly, poorly approximate which are more important to a preponderance of the electorate at the time.
The ideas of "moving to the center" tends to take one of two forms. Sometimes a politician on one side of the "left/right" association will take on a value that is associated with the other side. Other times a politician will try to average the proposals each sides has, ignoring the values behind them.
These naive policy compromises are morally bankrupt and drop into the chasms mentioned above. A proposal to make abortion sort-of legal won't make anyone happy. Politicians who attempt to compromise in this way just end up compromised.
