two points, in separate posts.
Re "politically unthinkable": you imply that thinking about what the political market might bear is craven or hidebound rather than sensible. My response is that it all depends on who one is.
If you're George W. Bush, then you have substantial freedom to try lots of different things. You may pay a price if they're not successful, but you might reap a gain if they are--and besides, what you do with your political capital is your business. So--if we're talking about the President, then yes, having the balls to try something beyond the usual fare because you think it will work is what you should do, and shunning such an option because it seems unusual or because it might not poll well the first day out is pathetic. This was perhaps Bill Clinton's gravest flaw in the policy arena, IMHO.
On the other hand, if you're anybody else, then considering the political feasibility of the options you recommend is not just not craven, it's mandatory. Why? Because "ought" implies "can." There are a million potential things to do in any situation, many of them optimal for achieving one set of goals or another. In the real world, however, multiple goals must be achieved simultaneously, and politicians almost never choose courses of action that really piss off really powerful constituencies. (Which is hardly surprising--because they got where they are, and hope to get to the next rung of the ladder, by pandering to such constituencies, not stiffing them. Such is the nature of democracy, for better or worse.) So for somebody junior or outside the system to say "we should do X," when X is something politically extremely costly, generally involves not "courageous honesty" or "creative outside-the-box thinking" so much as naivete. Moreover, if that's all one recommends, then the advice is pretty worthless, because it will not speak to the real choices that real decisionmakers confront.
How to solve this paradox? Simple. By walking through the following four steps, being explicit about each:
First, figure out the heart of the problem in question.
Second, figure out the ideal solution to the problem.
Third, figure out why that ideal solution is totally unworkable, given all the major constraints on key decisionmakers.
Fourth and finally, figure out if there is a solution that is substantially better than existing policy while still being somewhat feasible politically.
The idealists of the world focus on step two to the exclusion of all else; the Dick Morris' of the world do the same with step three. The advisers to princes, it seems to me, need to go all the way to four.
All that said, I liked both the Pollack and the Malley/Agha pieces and thought they were substantial contributions to public debate. Smart, knowledgeable people should indeed be pushing the envelope and recommending things they think will work better than whatever is currently being done. But if anyone wants to bet about whether most of those recommendations will ever make it into policy, just let me know.
Oh, and one final point: the problem usually isn't the careerists, the best of whom are more often than not the wisest, most knowledgeable, and longest suffering folk out there. It's more often the political leaders and the folks they run so scared of--that is, us.
tb@noblecynic.com |
