Motley Moose – Archive

Since 2008 – Progress Through Politics

The Wonderful World Of Politics

The first thing I noticed this morning when I ended my one-week voluntary vacation from politics is that the world didn’t end this past week. In fact, it seems to be spinning around just as it has for billions of years. What a relief.

One week ago, the Left was in extreme disarray. With the loss of Ted Kennedy’s senate seat, health care reform seemed dead. The president seemed to be on the ropes. Many on the Left, led by the firebaggers and PUMA crowd, were ready to start calling for impeachment. One short year into President Obama’s administration and the Left seemed ready to throw in the towel. Oh, woe is me.

I don’t want to give the wrong impression here. The Left had plenty of reasons to lament. I was feeling pretty down myself. But that’s not why I decided to take a vacation from politics. I decided to take a vacation because I could sense that I had lost perspective.

One thing I’ve learned in the nearly half-century that I’ve been following politics is that the political game is filled with ups and downs. Think of the high Democrats were on with the election of JFK in 1960 then think of the down they were on in November, 1963. Think of how high the progressive movement was flying in early 1968 with the campaign of Bobby Kennedy and then think of the plunge into despair that began with his assassination in June and Nixon’s triumph in November of that year. Nothing I’ve seen in the last 40 years can compare with the dramatic swings in mood caused by the events of the 60’s. Nothing, not even Reagan’s ascendancy, comes close.

Now, here we are in a new century with a new president and we are fighting many of the same battles that have been ongoing in this country since its birth. The Founders warned of the creeping power of corporations, as did Lincoln 80 years later. So did Teddy Roosevelt and FDR. Yet, here we are still fighting to keep them from polluting the political process. Teddy Roosevelt started the debate about universal health care and social security nearly 100 years ago. Progress has been made, but the process moves on. Progressives are fighting to expand on the gains made on both of those policies while conservatives, despite their dissembling on these issues, are fighting to kill both initiatives.

I think the phrase my fellow piscator, Alphonse Karr, wrote 160 years ago sums up politics better than any other saying. “plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” – generally translated as “The more things change, the more they stay the same.”

As I said in the beginning of this diary, one week ago, Democrats were in disarray. Now, after a strong SOTU address and the performance of President Obama at the GOP caucus retreat and Dems are flying high. One thing I’m sure of, it won’t last. The more things change…

So here I am, refreshed and revived after one short vacation (with occasional slips) from politics and ready for more. The next 9 months should prove interesting. There will be bitter defeats to swallow, blows to be taken, victories to be celebrated, and all with the knowledge of more battles to come. Welcome to the wonderful world of politics.


Categories: Uncategorized.

/ 22 Comments

22 comments

  1. Peter Jukes

    I particularly treasured this

    Think of how high the progressive movement was flying in early 1968 with the campaign of Bobby Kennedy and then think of the plunge into despair that began with his assassination in June and Nixon’s triumph in November of that year. Nothing I’ve seen in the last 40 years can compare with the dramatic swings in mood caused by the events of the 60’s. Nothing, not even Reagan’s ascendancy, comes close.

    Like you, as I get older, I find history more and more important. We have been worse places before. Things were different then. They will change again in the future. And this is one the gifts of age.

    The bitterness against Obama last week was particularly acute in the young – those who played a very important part in his election, and who are also impatient and want things done in a hurry. I remember what it was like – the balloon of optimism rising, the catastrophic deflations of despair. The young have a vision and enthusiasm which we cannot match. They will change the world again. But having no personal experience of defeat, they are also too quickly liable to defeatism, or even worse, a kind of iconoclastic anger that seeks (especially through populistic dissatisfaction) to reduce everything to rubble.

    I think this happened in Left Blogistan over 2009, and Obama  has fortunately nipped it on the bud. It was toxic. As the Bible says

    Hope deferreth maketh the heart sick

    The only thing I would disagree with is the vague suggestion that these ups and downs are cyclical. I don’t think they are – I think they are progressive. The US has since the assassinations of 63 and 68 only just begun to rediscover it’s political (rather than economic) optimism, and a belief that, as well as individually, we can collectively change our fate.

    This is a new phenomenon, and nothing to do with socialism per se, and only tangentially related to government action. It’s to do with a collective response to threats from terror, war, global change, economic or climatic. Obama exemplifies it’s principle pragmatism perfectly.

    But it often takes older voices to remind us, we’ve been in worse places before.  

  2. Jjc2008

    Like you I have taken pretty much a voluntary break, but much longer.  

    I do remember the sadness of 1963 and the despair of 1968.

    I think it was worse for me in 1968 because I was old enough to understand the implications.

    I was so totally bummed in 1980 by the election of 1980 that I did believe it was over for people like me (progressive/liberal/female) to ever have a real say in change.

    I am happy Obama is still out there fighting. Disappointed in some of his choices.  But that’s not new.  Old enough to understand I don’t always understand and/or agree with any politician’s choices.

    2008 was hard for me as a woman.  At my age, I understand my chances of seeing a female president is slim.  Don’t know that Hillary would be any more successful at this point than Obama.  I am guessing she would be about in the same boat, and taking an even worse beating than the charismatic President Obama.  Can’t imagine her taking on the republicans in the way he did at that Q & A.   So I am not one saying “See…if only.”  I just know now I will probably never know how a woman would do.

    But I have to say, my enthusiasm to debate, to do much, is waning.  I sometimes feel like the battle against a male dominated, right wing corporate structure, is too formidable.  I know the battle must be waged, but I am ready to leave that battle to the young.

    I do believe some of you here and elsewhere in the blogosphere will carry on the battle diligently. I do believe our founding fathers meant for the battles for change to be difficult.  I do hope Obama continues to inspire young people to fight these battles.

    I will continue to listen, to read and learn and contribute when I can.

  3. Jjc2008

    Hillary….

    I think she would have developed the discipline to control….but it wouldn’t matter.  If she tried to use humor like Obama did, she would have been mocked (not that the republicans don’t mock Obama because they do…I am talking about the press….and not just Fox).

    I think the (so called liberal) press still would have a hard time not bringing Bill into everything with stuff like (I wonder what Bill is thinking or what Bill told her to say…did he coach her?)

    I could just hear Chris Matthews saying those things;  or Harwood, or Olberman.

    Somehow men (I am sure the exceptions post here..8}) cannot believe that a woman would handle the debate themselves without Mr. Husband coming to her rescue. I think most automatically feel HE should rescue HER.  

    Perhaps, what we will need is an unmarried female to run…so no one could make assumptions about where she gets her ideas or who should protect her from the jerks.  

Comments are closed.