Burris: Issues anyone?
The debates are coming. Any chance the issues will be met there?
By great issues I mean things like war, civil rights, how health insurance is provided and financed, economic depression and recession, how to protect
It's not as if monumental issues are not before us in 2020. And it's not as if both candidates have not taken stands on them. But these are not the matters
Instead,
In short, we are, so far, watching or participating in a campaign concerned with character and personalities, rather than issues.
Campaigns are always a mix of both, of course.
But they are usually predominantly one or the other.
And I don't think it's good for the country when what we get is primarily personality.
There are several reasons:
First, no one is so good that his or her character or personality alone qualifies him for high office.
This is the Kennedy and Obama delusion. You buy charisma and eloquence and, in the end, it will not be enough. A Kennedy needs an LBJ, with government know-how, to finish his dream. Maybe an Obama needs a Biden or a Trump needs a Pence.
Second, no one, save
Third, we don't learn much in a campaign of personalities. New ideas are not tested and no new consensus on anything is formed. There can be no mandate for reform, change, or experiment, and no force behind a positive program, because all people know is what they voted against.
Wouldn't you like to vote for something?
Aren't you tired of the President calling
I would love to see both
Think about the presidents since Hoover. The campaigns or presidencies based mostly on great issues and big ideas -- FDR, Truman, Johnson, and Reagan -- changed the country. The Kennedy and Obama presidencies, not so much. Eisenhower was a different case. He was a true conservative who wanted to give the country a period of rest, consolidation, and prosperity. And he did. So personality and character were a sound and sufficient basis for his presidency.
I recently read a review of a new biography of Henry Cabot Lodge II, an important senator and diplomat of the last century.
Lodge's life was defined by his movement from his grandfather's isolationism to his own brand of internationalism -- a big idea, a big issue.
Two things make politics high drama and history worth knowing: big personalities and big issues. I miss the big personalities, like Kennedy and Lodge. But what gives them their substance is issues -- the issues of their time. Lodge resigned from the
War, peace (
Next to how to save our planet, I suppose the greatest undebated issue in 2020 is trade and manufacturing. Is there any way to get Americans making things again -- things like suits and shoes and glass and steel?
Ask the folks in
And has
That would be a start.
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