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Jewish World Review
Oct. 17, 2008
18 Tishrei 5769
The Irrational Exuberance of November
By
Suzanne Fields
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
"Throw the bums out!" That's one of the most familiar campaign cries in
our history. It's even more effective than Herbert Hoover's slogan of "a
chicken in every pot and a car in every garage" and stirs the blood like
"Tippecanoe and Tyler, too" never could. Sometimes a little bum-throwing
makes sense. Sometimes it doesn't.
In just over three weeks we'll elect a president who, whether it turns
out that he's John McCain or Barack Obama, has crossed his heart and
hoped to die if he doesn't make good on his promise to throw out the
policies of an embattled president, if not that president himself.
"President Obama," if there is one, might even chase George and Laura
down Pennsylvania Ave., throwing sticks, stones and harsh words at the
moving van.
A lot of the rhetoric of any campaign is designed to encourage
foolishness, like expecting voters to believe everything they hear from
the platform. Voters often relish being unpredictable and make unlikely
choices. The political scientists and other academics who demand a
rational explanation of things for which there may be no rational
explanation often rail at "public ignorance" as the cause of not seeing
things as they think the public should. These wise men think all that's
important is "policy" and a candidate's ability to define undefined
presidential "doctrine," or to play a version of Trivial Pursuit, such
as identifying the middle initial of an assistant associate
undersecretary of state.
Larry Bartels, a professor of politics at Princeton, suggests in a
fascinating article in the Wilson Quarterly that the proper response to
such thinking is a mocking, "So what?" Voters usually get to the place
they want to go, and they choose how they get there.
"The political consequences of 'public ignorance' must be demonstrated,
not assumed," argues Prof. Bartels. "And that requires focusing not just
on what voters don't know, but on how what they don't know actually
affects how they vote. Do they manage to make sensible choices despite
being hazy about the details of politics and government? . If they do,
that's not stupid it's efficient." These political scientists might
make the common academic assumption that voters are always rational,
"but a half-century of [scientific analysis] provides plenty of grounds
for pessimism about voters' rationality."
Nothing annoys academics like the notion that faith in native common
sense trumps arcane argument, that voters will take a lot on faith if
they decide a candidate is likeable, down to earth and serious enough to
be trusted. Sometimes voters make choices that seem to be textbook cases
of irrationality, never more so, for example, than election results in
Arkansas in 1968. Voters there on a single day gave resounding victories
to George C. Wallace, a third-party segregationist candidate for
president; William Fulbright, a moderately conservative Democratic
incumbent U.S. senator; and Winthrop Rockefeller, a moderately liberal
Republican running for governor. They still talk about that one in
political-science seminars.
Sometimes voters just want to express unfocused anger, and take it out
on whoever is unlucky enough to be at hand. Like this year. George W.
Bush is not available as a target, so for some voters John McCain will
have to do.
There's a bizarre precedent of sorts. In the summer of 1916, killer
sharks repeatedly attacked swimmers along the New Jersey shore, killing
four of them over a period of weeks. The attacks were brazen, even for
hungry sharks. One shark even ventured up a freshwater stream to find a
victim. The attacks were unprecedented, and the tourist season was
ruined. Several hotels were all but forced into bankruptcy when
vacationers abandoned the shore by the thousands and didn't return.
Jersey residents demanded that Congress pass a law, or something, though
killer sharks are notorious for not obeying the law. So Jersey voters
took it out on a popular president, who had been the state's favorite
son from his term as governor and, before that, the president of
Princeton. Woodrow Wilson was re-elected president that November anyway,
though not with much help from voters in the towns along the Jersey
shore.
History is an unreliable guide for Messrs. McCain and Obama because
nobody can ever be sure where whimsy sometimes defined as
"irrationality" in college lecture halls will be aimed. Just as in
earlier election years, millions of voters will act on hunches and
guesses next month, on feelings held deep in the pit of the stomach.
Therein lies the secret to the great political success we call
democracy.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Comment on JWR contributor Suzanne Fields' column by clicking here.
Suzanne Fields Archives
© 2006, Creators Syndicate, Suzanne Fields
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