More Pragmatic Idealism
It is often thought that the best political strategy is to “tell people what they want to hear.” Essentially, you should lie to voters in order to get elected, because it is pragmatic and necessary in the dirty political game. While I agree that in the short-run the best political and social (maintaining and accumulating friendships) strategy is lying and manipulating and catering to desires, over a long-run game composed of multiple iterations it is self-destructive and a poor game strategy. In the short-run, Spitzer, Blagojevich, the Clintons, George Ryan, Enron Executives and countless others, perform well, but in the long-run their strategy causes their demise. Abraham Lincoln once said, “If you once forfeit the confidence of your fellow citizens, you can never regain their respect and esteem.”
The problem for the American voters is the pernicious cycle of short-run manipulation artists being replaced by short-run manipulation artists. Short-run manipulation artists are more likely to be elected in the short-run game than long-run truth tellers, which is the source of this pernicious cycle and the lack of long-run truth tellers in the political world.
The good news is that the advent of the Internet and the quick flow of information minimizes the career duration of the short-run manipulators. Short-run manipulators are successful in the short-run because the public has not yet learned that they liars. Consider that the University of Illinois awarded Eliot Spitzer the Ethics in Government Award in 2004. Objectively, we do not yet know whether Barack Obama is a short-run manipulator or a long-run truth teller, there is evidence for both opinions. I personally feel there is great room for skepticism of Obama’s genuine character, especially given that his chief economic adviser told the Canadians that Obama was lying to voters about wishing to renegotiate terms of NAFTA.
Where does this leave us? The best political and social strategy is long-run truth telling. While a long-run truth teller may have difficulty in the first iteration of his political or social game, he will dominate those scenes in the long-run by the accumulated force of his credibility among friends and voters. I have not always been honest with friends, but I hope that I have changed with age and that if I ever enter the political arena that it will be as a devout pragmatic idealist through the avenue of long-run truth telling.
Relatedly, here is a Daily Illini column that I wrote back in August of 2006:
The Speech of the Unknown Statesman
The political season will soon bring waves of political speeches. They will nearly all be fraudulent, disingenuous and overflowing with lies. Of all the national politicians, I can only say with confidence that I have full faith in two of them: Senators John McCain and Russ Feingold. That is disgusting.
How refreshing would it be if a candidate didn’t treat voters as idiots to be duped into electing a Potemkin politician? Here is what I believe would be at the core of a speech from an honest and sincere politician. I beg for his future existence:
“The American Revolution is not complete. The War, the Declaration and the Constitution formally took back power from the elite and returned it to its rightful owner: you. But informally and covertly, that power has been maintained and centralized.
Every year politicians get up here and make the same drab, sterile partisan speeches. They tell you that they’re from the middle class when their parents attended Harvard. They speak to you with rehearsed integrity and calculated honesty. They have the cold ability to stare into your eyes and lie to you. They tell you to trust them.
I tell you the opposite.
Do not trust me. Force me to earn your trust. Investigate, debate and dig into my life and my beliefs. I am going to stand on this stage for a long time and allow you to ask whatever questions you’d like, free from censorship. I know, I know, my political advisors are about to kill themselves right now. They warned me not to make this speech, they told me to abide by the conventional wisdom. But I don’t want to just win this election; I want to change the entire political game.
During my campaign, even if my radical tactics result in a loss, I would like to reinvigorate the idea that politicians are supposed to serve. They are supposed to rise above the overwhelming and innate desires of greed. Can we not find in this country of 300 million just 100 honest and good people to fill the Senate? I meet good people everyday, so why are they not in the Senate? Precisely because they are good people and tend to be too honest to win elections. They lack pragmatism.
I am going to edit that rule of the game. I am going to make the pragmatic political step the one of integrity. I can only do this with your help, with your spirit. Along with me, I would like for you to all demand, not hope for, honesty and integrity from your officials. Then we will have accomplished the pragmatic task of aligning the interest of the candidate in getting elected with the interest of the voters in electing a genuine person.
Ironically, the Internet and blogs have made the completion of our distant Revolution possible. Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison, Paine, Henry and many others had visions of American freedom. Let’s jointly reincarnate the spirit of the Revolution and enact their vision of genuine liberty.”
Comment by Karen Pierce on 13 April 2008 at 1:28 pm:
Billy,
If Obama and McCain were to follow your advice, what would their speeches on health care, Iraq, the economy, and climate change be?
Comment by tet on 13 April 2008 at 4:32 pm:
I’ve always held that as a favorite piece of yours, Billy Joe. It stands the test of time well.
Tom
Comment by Katie on 13 April 2008 at 5:32 pm:
Billy-
There’s a fine line between being dishonest and catering to a specific audience. A non-substantive example that comes to mind is the twang politicians develop whenever they head south.
Based on your theory of pragmatic idealism, where do you think that line should be drawn?
Comment by segen on 14 April 2008 at 12:59 am:
Do you think appointed officials suffer the same problems as elected officials? If not, do we have a problem with first-past-the-post and presidential system?
Would the US be better served with a parliamentary system (with a prime minister elected within the parliament) and with proportional representation?
Comment by Diogenes the Dog on 14 April 2008 at 8:00 am:
Quick point of clarification:
On the Obama-NAFTA question, it was, in fact, later revealed to be the Clinton campaign that told the Canadian government not to worry about the political posturing on NAFTA. This was then misreported by CTV Washington bureau chief Tom Clark as being from the Obama campaign. A memo was later leaked regarding a meeting with Obama advisor Austan Goolsbee and Canadian officials written by Joseph de Mora. De Mora’s notes on the meeting summarized the statements by Goolsbee saying Obama’s NAFTA statements, “should be viewed as more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans.” Both the embassy and the Obama camp denied that this was accurate.
The story was printed in Canada’s Globe and Mail, and can be read here. While the Obama camp does not leave this smelling of roses, it is remarkable that the Clinton campaign does not smell off sewage after telling Canada not to worry about Clinton’s NAFTA rhetoric and then pivoting to denounce Obama for engaging in political double-talk.
Comment by thetodd on 17 April 2008 at 1:06 am:
I love to think about human relationships from a game theory perspective.
At first, I thought I’d have a lot to say about this post, but as I read on, I found I had less and less to add. I think that is a good sign that this was a well thought out and written post.
I would like to add one thing. Some forms of dishonesty have a much stronger psychological impact than others. For instance, an intentional failure to disclose unfavorable truths generally has much less impact than a lie even though the practical outcomes are often the same.
The “dating game” illustrates this well - most people hide a lot of unfavorable information about themselves on early dates that they know the other person would want to know about, but they tend not to tell lies that will be uncovered as the relationship progresses. The idea is to get the other person to like you enough that they won’t leave you once they inevitably discover your faults.
Perhaps our ideal politician’s path , then, should be to first avoid saying too much of substance (but not technically lying), get a lot of people to like him, and only then become more open.