Thursday Thoughts for July 9, 2020

Since this is the first Thursday after the 4th of July, this article is about civility and how to improve political campaigns in our nation.  For years, I have believed the greatest threat to our wonderful country -- to the very independence we just celebrated -- is ourselves. What’s the old saying? “We have met the enemy and it is us.” We have been too successful for too long and have forgotten that we are at our best when we work together.  Our current political leadership at all levels believes the best way to succeed is to attack or blame someone else.  This is terrible.  But what is even worse is that we, as citizens, reward them by electing and reelecting them.  I have been hoping that eventually we would say enough is enough and have the pendulum swing back to being positive, collaborating and compromising.  Unfortunately, I am still waiting.  In fact, many of our elected officials view collaboration and compromise as profanity.  Since I am still a positive person, here is a list of key problems with some recommended actions to improve this situation.

Problems:

1. Negative ads are the norm because they work

I hate negative ads.  When I was running, I refused to produce them.  Almost every political advisor pushes negative ads because the research shows they are effective at influencing voters into disliking a candidate.  Most of these ads have little accuracy.  Usually something is found in a candidate’s past that is then taken out of context and morphed into some terrible thing that they supposedly did.  Currently, I am disgusted with how both our presidential candidates are running ads about the other being a pawn of the Chinese.  We have major issues with China; but I don’t believe either candidate puts the national interests of China ahead of our nation’s interests.

2. Money has become too important in campaigns

Billions of dollars are being spent on campaigns, PACs, SuperPACs, etc.  The vast majority of these dollars are devoted to TV ads, primarily the negative type mentioned above.  Our system is out of control.  Stopping this spending is not simple.  The Supreme Court in Citizens United opened up a huge faucet for money to flow.  I am not criticizing the Court since it is not a simple question of how to balance free speech and appropriate campaign-related spending.  We currently have a very complicated system with terms such as “hard money,” “soft money,” and “dark money.” These rules will make your head spin and tend to have little meaningful value. We as citizens need to solve this problem.    

3. Gerrymandered electoral districts are a major polarizer  

Most electoral districts are reapportioned every ten years in a fashion that biases them toward one of the two political parties.  Who wins the primary is likely to win the general election.  Thus, the real contest is who wins the primary.  Given that primary voters tend to be the more partisan base than the people in the middle, candidates tend to run farther to the Left or Right.  The net result is that we end up with too many elected officials who believe their future is tied to a smaller number of highly partisan and polarized voters vs. representing all of their citizens.

Recommendations:

1. Stop watching negative political TV ads

The negative ads supported by huge amounts of money are not going to stop on their own. Sometimes the media will talk about how terrible they are, but every election cycle they reap the reward from the ever-increasing cost of advertising.  The simplest way to stop these ads is to stop watching them.  The money will stop when the funders see that there is no benefit to the ads.  Please sign me up for a national movement that commits to stop watching.  Not watching these ads will not only send the right message, it will improve the quality of your life.

2. Bring back moderated town halls.

Given the challenges of in-person events, people may wonder how these can happen but we could do the town halls virtually.  Put them all online or on cable TV in addition to having audiences whenever it is safe and appropriate.  This was my favorite political forum since you had to answer real questions from real people in an unscripted fashion.  Most politicians hate going off-script.  Giving a speech is low risk compared to having to share how you think about an issue. “Debates” aren’t the answer since they have become little more than an opportunity for candidates to spout memorized negative rhetoric about their opponents rather than actually answering any questions.

One reason that town halls have declined is that the new normal in this uncivil world is to have them taken over by disruptors.  Disrupting a town hall is not right.  Occasionally, this problem would happen at my events.  Quite often, the people causing trouble by yelling things or asking inappropriate questions were from the campaigns of people running against me or groups supporting them.  Thus, the reason for why these should be moderated town halls.  Nonpartisan civic groups should step up to host these events.  For example, in the old days, we always heard about the good work from the League of Women Voters.

3. Care about qualifications and experience

Qualifications and experience really matter after someone takes office.  I seldom see this topic discussed anymore.  There is a big difference between being a candidate and a person governing.  In the 2016 and 2020 presidential primary seasons, both parties had clear differences on how qualified the candidates were and it didn’t seem to matter.  In both cases, I believe the best qualified candidates were the governors.  Obviously, I am biased.  But there were good people running who had actual experience being the head of a large governmental entity vs. many other candidates who had little to no experience running an organization.  The President runs the world’s largest organization.  It would be good if we spent more time looking at a candidate’s abilities.  I would add that having someone who could honestly talk about both their successes and failures would be a plus.

4. Vote for a positive vision for the future

We should aspire to elect leaders who present a positive vision of how we can all be better off together. A candidate wins by getting a majority of the voters to elect them.  A leader governs by working to better the lives of all citizens.  Wouldn’t it be great to say you are voting for someone because of what they stand for and where they want to take us vs. voting for someone because you disliked them less than the other candidate?  We have far too many politicians who have made their career by being against things.  Being negative is simple. Governing is much harder because you need to accomplish results instead of simply stopping things.  This is why we should celebrate compromise. I viewed it as a big win to get 50% to 80% of what I wanted since it was positive progress. It is part of what Relentless Positive Action is about!

I hope we reach a point where we can find ways to work together so we all benefit.  Our current path is a very dangerous one for us and future generations. 

I want to end on a positive note.  During my time as governor, I saw more bipartisan or nonpartisan legislation going on than I ever heard about in the news or the public dialogue.  So I had our team keep track of what percentage of legislation passed with a majority of both parties in each chamber supporting it.  I found the percentage very encouraging.  It typically ran in the high 80% to low 90% range.  Let’s all work to make all of our activities bipartisan or nonpartisan and publicly celebrate this progress together.

Finally, please let me know if you are willing to join me in the no-negative-ads effort!  

Remember, Relentless Positive Action in your life will help you and others. So, I wish you RPA every day!