Three Kinds of Politicians

 

All politicians have their individual quirks, personalities, viewpoints, and priorities. Within that, we can sort politicians into roughly three categories. 

The first category, the pragmatists, approach politics as an art of problem solving and consensus building, aiming to accomplish effective governance. Pragmatists tend to focus their efforts on issues and in directions where an opportunity to build a working coalition exists. Pragmatic politics involves listening and adjusting positions; pragmatists change based not only on practical politics, but also in response to information and to logical arguments. Abraham Lincoln was, famously, a pragmatist in his approach to ending American slavery.

The second type of politician, the romantics, start with a specific goal or outlook, one they resist compromising. Romantic political orientation has its value where compromise is either ineffective or morally intolerable.  Winston Churchill was largely romantic in his implacable opposition to Nazi Germany. However, in most cases a romantic approach to politics ends with fireworks such as those produced by romantic conservatives in the American Congress, have who achieved periodic shutdowns of the American government but little in the way of legislation. 

The final type, the incendiary, is more common in social movements than in politics, but incendiary politicians do appear from time to time. Incendiary politicians are distinguished from romantics by their willingness to go outside the formal and informal limits of political discourse to achieve their goals. Andrew Jackson was an incendiary politician, most notably when he defied the US Supreme Court ruling on Indigenous rights to commit one of the worst acts of ethnic cleansing in American history. Donald Trump is, of course, cut from similar cloth.

All of which makes Rich Lowry's recent commentary in the New York Times downright interesting.

Mr. Lowry edits the National Review, a magazine that presents itself as the flagship of modern intellectual conservatism. In an essay intended to argue that Donald Trump can beat Vice President Harris on character, he writes:

She has jettisoned myriad positions since 2019 and 2020 without explanation because she is a shape-shifting opportunist who can and will change on almost anything when politically convenient. Even if what she’s saying is moderate or popular, she can’t be trusted to hold to it once she’s in office.

 Mr. Lowry has described a pragmatist who attempts to accomplish effective governance. Good politics in a democracy requires applying two tests to each policy proposal or position. First, a policy idea needs support from the public and the legislature. Second, a proposal has to align sufficiently with  actual conditions to work. A pragmatic politician will tailor their proposals in order to accomplish effective governance.

The American system of government, more than most other systems, contains multiple checks designed precisely to require pragmatism and flexibility in public officials. If Mr. Lowry thinks flexibility in a politician demonstrates a lack of character or trustworthiness, perhaps he should consider a quote by one of the greatest presidents of the United States: 

If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. - Abraham Lincoln

The first Republican president frequently termed slavery a moral issue and a blot on the United States Constitution. Yet Mr. Lincoln had the perspective to understand he needed to lead the American people to abolition a step a time, and that required, among other things, displaying his pragmatism in public statement. If Mr. Lowry now wishes to denounce behaviour completely in accord with the requirements of the United States constitution, and wholly within the American political tradition, what exactly, aside from Donald Trump's electoral viability, does he want to conserve? 

Mr. Lowry goes on:

She didn’t do more as vice president to secure the border or to address inflation because she didn’t care enough about the consequences for ordinary people.

Let's pretend this is not sheer fatuous boilerplate. Let's pretend inflation was and is not a worldwide phenomenon with clear origins in the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, neither of which Ms. Harris or Mr. Biden had the power to prevent. Let us ignore the actual successes of the administration in which Ms. Harris serves in bringing down inflation while continuing to grow the American economy. Let us simply focus on the actual office Ms. Harris holds, that of Vice President of the United States. The vice president has no authority over the economy. The only specific power the United State Constitution grants to a vice president is to break a tie in a senate vote. You can believe Kamala Harris does not care about ordinary people, or you can believe she hasn't done more than she has because she isn't actually the people's commissar (or the state commissar) for economic affairs.

This again raises the question of what Mr. Lowry wants to conserve. I would recommend the plain common sense of Gerald Ford, a Republican president at a time when Republican office holders valued modesty, dignity, and clear thinking: "A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have."

In attempting to make "character" a winning issue for the Trump campaign, Mr. Lowry has simply managed to highlight the qualities of modesty, flexibility, and pragmatism Kamala Harris has brought to the race. His own arguments show clearly the character Ms. Harris brings to this election fits both the American political tradition, and the constitutional constraints that shape it.