Civility in political dialogue
Thursday, October 02, 2008
In a recent interview with Christianity Today where he talked about his global PEACE Plan, Saddleback Church pastor Rick Warren commented on the recent Saddleback Civil Forum that brought Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain together to discuss issues of faith and politics. In the interview, Warren says that he was happy for the way that the two candidates were able to come together to demonstrate their potential leadership. And he says he was interested in trying to "out-think and out-love unbelievers."
This evening I watched almost all of the vice-presidential debate between Gov. Sarah Palin and Sen. Joe Biden. I watched the debate with an eye to how each v.p. candidate would characterize the other (and the other's running mate). Of course, the two pointed out the differences with their opponent's ticket - as they should have. But I also noticed that Biden complemented John McCain on a number of issues; it seemed clear that he respected McCain as his long-time Senate colleague. And I noticed that Palin complemented Biden personally on a number of issues, some of them for her own political points but others for seemingly altruistic reasons.
The current campaign - by both parties - has not won high marks for basic political civility. Do you think the debate tonight continued that, or do you think the two veep candidates showed restraint? Is this a superficial concern I'm raising, or does the tone of political discourse in the campaign have real importance for larger national politics?
[Postscript: The post-debate analysis amongst pundits last night seemed to suggest two main things: First, that Biden won the debate and demonstrated a greater knowledge of the policy issues at hand. And secondly, that Palin did a better job than expected, particularly in the wake of her less-than-stellar recent interviews. I agree with both those points, as does David Brooks of the NY Times in his column today.]
This evening I watched almost all of the vice-presidential debate between Gov. Sarah Palin and Sen. Joe Biden. I watched the debate with an eye to how each v.p. candidate would characterize the other (and the other's running mate). Of course, the two pointed out the differences with their opponent's ticket - as they should have. But I also noticed that Biden complemented John McCain on a number of issues; it seemed clear that he respected McCain as his long-time Senate colleague. And I noticed that Palin complemented Biden personally on a number of issues, some of them for her own political points but others for seemingly altruistic reasons.
The current campaign - by both parties - has not won high marks for basic political civility. Do you think the debate tonight continued that, or do you think the two veep candidates showed restraint? Is this a superficial concern I'm raising, or does the tone of political discourse in the campaign have real importance for larger national politics?
[Postscript: The post-debate analysis amongst pundits last night seemed to suggest two main things: First, that Biden won the debate and demonstrated a greater knowledge of the policy issues at hand. And secondly, that Palin did a better job than expected, particularly in the wake of her less-than-stellar recent interviews. I agree with both those points, as does David Brooks of the NY Times in his column today.]
Labels: Politics
posted by Andrew C. Thompson at 10:27 PM
3 Comments:
I think civility is overplayed if by civility one means a sort of general niceness. I think the use of passionate rhetoric about matters of deep and urgent concern is a good thing that should be restored in our common life. That said, the most important thing is not civility, but reasoned dialogue. So much of the presidential campaign has been co-opted by ridiculous theatrics that distract from important issues of public debate. I suspect this is because the population has become collectively dumber by spending so little time exercising powers of discursive argumentation and so much time finding ways to entertain itself. If by civility you mean that the theatrics that so characterize our common life shouldn't get in the way of the reasoned dialogue and debate on the issues, I think it's very important. But civility has very little value on its own if we're civilly talking about nothing of real importance, or if the the form of our engagement has become merely another type of theatrics. I fear that it already has.
civility = boring
The so-called civility in this so-called VP debate ended up being nothing more than ignoring the questions posed (which weren't great) in order to spout rehearsed answers.
I long for the good ole days - "Greetings beloved Nestorius, you new Judas..."
Ah, the 5th century...
i don't think there is a GenXer alive who is aware of his or her GenXer-ness, that trusts any of these candidates, except maybe a few skewing toward trust or at least hope in Obama.
It's so grim...Biden, a career politician. Palin - clearly the product of strategists who stirred and baked and hired focus groups. Is the American public that stupid? I guess maybe we are - dazzled by sex appeal and never a crummy incumbent to unseat. Rarely anyway. A few detached thoughts on a Friday night.
Oh, I should add: "My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness..."
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