The Art of the Possible

November 27, 2020 (811 words)

Politics, as we know, is not about identifying the right thing to do, which is a basic concept parents impart to their young children. Instead it’s about recognizing what you can actually get done. This pragmatic approach has defined the career of President-elect Biden, a long-time “institutionalist” who has always believed in making deals with the other side.

So early November reports of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren being tapped for an important role in the new Biden administration were pre-mature, to say the least. Both these veteran Senators have radically different political DNA than does our incoming President, since both are well known as advocating for large scale change in some of our big institutions.

Mr. Biden may have been forced to tack leftward during the Democrat primary by his more progressive opponents. With the election finally in the bag he is once again sounding a soothing, can’t-go-wrong message of wanting to heal the nation and restore the heart of America, etc. The particulars, as always, are open to discussion.

And the obstacles are formidable. With Republicans still holding a majority in the Senate, a Sanders or Warren appointment would have trouble gaining approval. No sense expending precious political capital on a contentious confirmation hearing right out of the gate.

In addition to the Republicans’ innate obstructionism there is another obvious reason Mr. Biden is steering clear of picking a strident ideologue for a key cabinet post. A notable portion of the electorate – some 70 million strong – is already convinced the country has just fallen into the hands of godless Socialists intent on destroying our cherished way of life.

Many of the folks who hold this view – that we’ve taken a dire turn for the worst, with a Democrat having been elected President – are good people who are using a Cliff Notes version of history as a guide. One might even call it a comic book version of history.

They are often earnest believers who mistakenly infer a Christian motivation to “conservative” politics in general, and to the idea of “free market economics” in particular. This, by the way, is a relatively recent development, having sprung up in the last half century.

How do we legislate for the common good in such an environment? Well, we can all keep doing the very same things we are currently doing, and hope for the best. Idealistic liberals can keep by-passing their most eloquent and principled spokespeople in the interests of pragmatism. And conscientious conservatives can keep indulging their taste for fairy tales, with their talk of “markets that are free but operate with restraint.”

(Editor’s Note: A free market that operates with restraint is a contradiction in terms.)

The way market capitalism has been allowed to flourish outside a moral framework – that is, apart from any restraint – has achieved the desired result. Fortunes have been made. Along the way many have been brought out of poverty, and society’s standard of living has undeniably improved.

But the rising tide has not been enough to lift all boats. In fact, the newly-minted winners are still vastly outnumbered by a sea of ship-wrecked losers.

Trying to confront this inequity trips up my dear friends the conservatives, and reveals their willingness to let the clever and advantaged run roughshod over the rank and file, under the noble-sounding guise of economic freedom

It seems these friends of mine have adopted certain characteristics long associated with the Protestant Reformation and its sequel, the Enlightenment. Such as celebrating rugged individualism, and playing by one’s own rules. The irony is conservatives whose mission in life is to “preserve tradition” are today caught up in preserving the wrong one.

The lack of historical context is what prompts any discussion of an economic recalibration to be dismissed by conservatives as “socialist.” It certainly doesn’t help that the liberals suggesting the reset are unable or unwilling to describe the proposed restoration for what it truly is – a long overdue attempt to bring Gospel precepts to bear on an economic system (capitalism) and a way of life (the American Experiment in pluralism) that wears its disdain for the old order like a badge of honor.

I happen to agree with people like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren who advocate for large scale change in some of our big institutions. If only our hallowed secular principle insisting on the separation of Church and state was not standing in the way, preventing us from adopting effective solutions to our most pressing social problems.

Until then we will no doubt continue to entertain ourselves by engaging in the same old familiar (and sophomoric) debate, pitting the free market against big government. This easy dance keeps us from an authentic encounter with the pervasive injustice we all know in our heart of hearts has yet to be properly addressed.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
November 27, 2020

President Boring

November 25, 2020 (309 words)

After a four-year roller coaster ride with Donald Trump at the wheel, a notable portion of the American electorate – some 80 million strong – has decided Sleepy Joe Biden as President may not be such a bad idea, after all.

Why the poor man would even want such a stressful job in the first place is beyond me. I guess high office has its own, irresistible appeal for the political junkie. This would seem to go double for the geriatric set (Mr. Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Mitch McConnell, et al) who – let’s face it – has earned the right to sleep in, and take their time reading the morning papers over a second cup of coffee.

One good thing that can be said about these geezers is they will always think before they act. If only because they lack the energy required to get up and actually do something.

Don’t laugh. It’s a proven fact the brain functions better once testosterone stops coursing through the veins, and physical prowess fades. The trick is maintaining this improved level of mental acuity as we continue to age. It’s what we should all be working on, rather than worrying about our golf game.

As for the President-elect’s staff choices and cabinet appointments, any good management team consists of a generational cross-section, since each group brings value to the table. You want some young blood to drive things, some seasoned pros to direct traffic, and a few gray eminences sprinkled in there for good measure to make sure the objective remains an honorable one.

The transfer of presidential power is now underway, despite Mr. Trump’s obstinate refusal to cooperate in the process. It won’t be long before we’ll all get to see what old familiar Joe Biden, after angling for the top spot most of his adult life, has left in the tank.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
November 25, 2020

Heart and Mind

November 23, 2020 (30 words)

It’s all very well to have your heart in the right place. As long as your head is along for the ride, and is willing to work out the details.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
November 23, 2020

Trashing Democrats

November 18, 2020 (877 words)

The problem with trashing Democrats as thoroughly as social conservatives do is it leaves us with only one viable political alternative: Republicans.

You may be prepared to hang your hat on that particular hook, but not me.

It’s sad when a practicing Catholic who takes the faith seriously endorses Republican fiscal policy – whether enthusiastically or by default. It’s even more disturbing when a good Christian soldier embraces a concept like “economic freedom,” which, as the Church has always held, is inherently immoral.

Most Catholics who confidently identify as “conservative” are so busy denigrating the Democrats’ decision to go rogue on sexual morality fifty years ago, they have completely forgotten the Republicans (and before that, the Whigs) have been rogue on economic morality since our Founding.

And speaking of history, believers who consider themselves defenders of the faith intent on cultural restoration are openly nostalgic when it comes to our Founders. They invariably refer to these towering figures as Christian gentlemen. They also have a corresponding belief our nation is Christian at its core. These are both heartwarming notions that do not hold up to further scrutiny.

In the interest of clarity, we should stop playing this superficial parlor game in which Democrats are always despicable and Republicans unfailing praiseworthy. Finding our way out of the wilderness is not a simple case of assigning good guys and bad guys from the readily available options. Neither it as simple as choosing to align oneself with the “right side of history” or deciding to “conserve tradition” – not when what’s being conserved is an underlying rebellion against the virtue of obedience.

All of which is merely to say it’s the entire American Experiment in pluralism we should be evaluating. Anyone who possesses even a passing acquaintance with Catholic thought should easily recognize the fault lines.

One such individual is David Wemhoff, a lawyer based in South Bend, IN, who observes: “The American system of social organization, which is Liberalism, (is) condemned by Catholicism.” (Mr. Wemhoff has published a magnum opus that parses our awkward national paradigm in great detail.)

In pointing out how Liberalism has failed, it should be quickly added “conservativism” has not succeeded. “Liberalism” in this broad sense does not refer to our conventional understanding of the liberal/progressive persuasion. Rather it is a handy synonym for “liberal democracy,” a hallowed concept praised by both liberals and conservatives throughout the West.

You may have noticed how frequently the “values of liberal democracy” are reverently cited as our crowning achievement. And I admit those values do sound swell, at least on the face of it. But a liberal democracy operates on the principles of classical liberalism, which in turn is based on the complete emancipation of the individual from all previously held authority, custom, and tradition.

What fills the void left by an emancipation that dispenses with authority, custom, and tradition? Why, it’s “the rule of law.” Because this phrase is so neat and tidy as it rolls of the tongue, we are inclined to skip over the obvious: The rule of law effectively replaces the rule of God. And morality gets tossed to the side of the road, having been downgraded to nothing more than a nebulous “social construct.”

This may explain why Catholicism has never been especially keen on either “Liberalism” or “liberal democracy.”

For purposes of record, one might say Christ officially stopped being King when our Declaration of Independence was signed. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say our momentous Founding was the last nail in the coffin. Pius XI tried to rehabilitate the idea that societies as well as individuals owe Christ obligations as King, with a papal encyclical on this very subject in 1925. But his work made nary a dent.

To sum up, then, our cultural woes can all be traced to the pursuit of individual liberty, with liberals and conservatives being equally culpable. This rootless emancipation, this selfish notion of freedom, allows everyone to decide for themselves what is right, and what is wrong. Such recklessness is applied to both public (economic) behavior and private (sexual) behavior.

Elevating individual conscience above all other considerations means we needn’t worry about an objective moral order that must be obeyed to avoid disastrous consequences. The ideology of Liberalism – and it’s popular political manifestation, liberal democracy – boils down to a repudiation of everything that animated the lives of the saints, and fired the imagination of every doctor of the Church who put pen to paper.

Any American wishing to behave as a Catholic should not spend their time grappling with the familiar (and comforting) liberal/conservative dialectic that dominates our discourse. Better to focus one’s attention on how the last five hundred years – all of modernity – has led us hopelessly astray.

What complicates the picture is that “economic freedom” is undeniably responsible for the dramatic increase in material well-being so many have experienced since 1800 or so. In hindsight this remarkable improvement in our standard of living looks suspiciously like the modern-day equivalent of selling one’s soul for thirty pieces of silver.

When all is said and done, part of me envies the ability of social conservatives to focus their ire on Democrats. Ah, if only it were that easy.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
November 18, 2020

Let Him Go

November 8, 2020 (135 words)

And now a word of praise for those veteran actors and actresses – like Kevin Costner, Diane Lane, and Lesley Manville – lucky enough to find good material they can really grab hold off, even this late in their careers.

Praise also for the team of largely unknown filmmakers who create these worlds we can immerse ourselves in for a couple of hours. Each is an artist in their own right, though most will never become a household name. Their anonymous artistry lies in capturing the unobtrusive detail.

Everything they put on the screen registers effortlessly as we sit there in the dark. And then it all resonates with us long after we leave the theater.

The new feature film Let Him Go is one of those. A job well done, all the way around.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
November 8, 2020

A Pendulum of Political Despair

November 7, 2020 (796 words)

This morning the presidential election was officially called for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. The incumbent had an early lead in many crucial states once the polls closed on November 3. But that lead was subsequently erased after mail-in and other early voting ballots were allowed to be tallied.

As this process slowly and deliberately unfolded over the last few days it gave us all a chance to prepare for the inevitable. Now that we know for sure who won, the media has wasted no time in telling us what it all means.

For the record, I could have lived with either candidate as President for the next four years. Both men are flawed as politicians, and both our major party platforms leave a lot to be desired.

So I can’t really join the jubilant celebrations that have spontaneously erupted in many of our nation’s largest cities. Nor can I commiserate with my fellow suburbanites and the legion of rural folks who feel their beloved country has been stolen out from under them by socialist forces.

What does concern me is the deep divide between big cities and the rest of the country, as evidenced by the electoral map. And I am concerned about the constant search for political heroes and villains we all let ourselves get caught up in.

Donald Trump, may he rest in peace, was not quite the nefarious interloper his harshest critics made him out to be. But neither was he anywhere near the embodiment of a bold and principled statesman his most enthusiast supporters tried to conjure out of thin air.

The man had a few good instincts, which he rode to an unprecedented and thoroughly unexpected victory. During his one and only term, though, the renegade hero never really developed a proper feel for the job, did he? Which I guess demonstrates the old adage “fake it till you make it” is not fool-proof.

This experiment of watching a political neophyte attempt to lead the world’s largest and most successful liberal democracy has been a disjointed and messy affair, to say the least. One major irritant has been President Trump’s habit of dabbling in a constant flow of off-hand tweets and verbal faux pas. Many were immediately interpreted as highly offensive, becoming self-inflicted wounds that could have easily been avoided. But he stubbornly refused to take counsel from more experienced advisors.

As has been duly noted, Mr. Trump apparently lacks even a semblance of impulse-control, which is sort of a pre-requisite for being a responsible adult, let alone leader of the free world. Why would anyone in high office gleefully unfurl a continual barrage of broad-stroke comments that serve no constructive purpose?

While every election in contentious by nature, this one seemed especially so. It will be difficult to pick up the pieces and unite the country, as President-elect Biden has vowed to do. The “messiness” of our out-going commander-in-chief still appeals to a large swatch of this country’s electorate. Donald Trump may have proven to be a less-than-ideal messenger. But the liberal king-makers who have just ascended to power would do well to heed the basic message. Not least on the subject of foreign entanglements that are proving to be less than advantageous.

Living up to the bright promise of being a President for “all the people” is no easy task, as the forty-five previous occupants of the White House could no doubt attest. Particularly when the country seems stuck on a pendulum of political despair.

Many residents of the twenty-three red states are convinced in their bones Democrats only want to burden hard-working people with onerous taxes, and give that money away to the lazy and shiftless in the form of government hand-outs. While the vast majorities who live in the twenty-two blue states are tired of being left behind as Wall Street and the “paper economy” continues to prosper. They have been crushed by a free-wheeling economic system that favors the clever and the advantaged, but does little to protect the interests of the rank-and-file.

One way out of this political despair would be for our most successful citizens to call on their better nature. This could come in the form of no longer sitting back and waiting for “trickle down” to solve everything. If you don’t like big government programs that attempt to address social injustice by implementing confiscatory taxes, then take the bull by the horns and balance the scales yourself.

We won’t need a federally-mandated minimum wage, to examine just one aspect of the dreaded “socialist” Democrat agenda, if our major corporations and international conglomerates and private-equity success stories would start basing more of their compensation policies on distributive justice, instead of focusing so much of their attention on executive pay and investor return.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
November 7, 2020