Why Do the Dems and Reps Keep Biting Their Own Asses?
Nick Gillespie | September 9, 2007, 10:04am
Over at Politico, occasional reason contributor and self-professed "libertarian Democrat" Terry Michael raises a question worth pondering:
The Party of God, we are shocked to learn, seems to have a libido. And, equally amazing, the Party of Reform apparently covets a little mammon on occasion.
When will self-righteous Republicans and holier-than-thou Democrats learn that hypocrisy, not sex and greed, is the original sin for which voters, and certainly cynical journalists, hold them accountable?
The anti-gay, pro-"family values" party, held captive by its Southern-based, evangelical wing, is repeatedly embarrassed when its David Vitters and Larry Craigs exhibit interest in 'hos and 'mos (translation for Beltway types: "whores" and "homosexuals.")
Likewise, the party of campaign finance "reform," intellectually imprisoned by the Washington ethics industry and its handmaidens in the ivory towers of liberal editorial pages, is caught with its Progressive Era pants down when a big pile of hot Jacksons ends up in William Jefferson's freezer, or when a financial supporter facing a felony indictment ends up on Hillary Clinton's donor list.
Michael suggests that each party whittles down the plank in its eye, if only out of self-interest:
So beware you Republican and Democratic candidates, whenever the phrases "family values" or "special interests" find their way into your talking points. Prepare to cover your behinds, because those words will come back to bite you in the bottom when one of your own is found to value an interest in sex and greed.
Whole thing here.
Stevo Darkly | September 10, 2007, 12:55am | #
I think I understand the guys who are tired of hearing the word "hypocrisy" bandied about. Because the concept of hypocrisy can allow the unprincipled to beat the principled over the head with their own sense of decency, in a kind of sneaky underhanded judo to which the unprincipled are immune. It's like exchanging hostages with someone who cares nothing about anyone's life but his own. The good guys can't win.
And usually the people who make the biggest deal about hypocrisy are the least principled. The stricter your own personal code of conduct, the harder it is to live up to it.
Any discussion of hypocrisy makes me think of this passage from
The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson. It takes place roughly 100 years from now, in an era when Victorianism has made a bit of a come-back, in response to the rampant moral squalor of the preceding era (i.e., our own): {repost from an earlier H&R thread]
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"Mr. Hackworth," Finkle-McGraw said after the pleasantries had petered out, speaking in a new tone of voice, a the-meeting-will-come-to-order sort of voice, "please favour me with your opinion of hypocrisy."
"Excuse me. Hypocrisy, Your Grace?"
"Yes. You know."
"It's a vice, I suppose."
"A little one or a big one? Think carefully-much hinges upon the answer."
"I suppose that depends upon the particular circumstances." ...
"You know, when I was a young man, hypocrisy was deemed the worst of vices," Finkle-McGraw said. "It was all because of moral relativism. You see, in that sort of a climate, you are not allowed to criticise others -- after all, if there is no absolute right and wrong, then what grounds is there for criticism? ...
"Now, this led to a good deal of general frustration, for people are naturally censorious and love nothing better than to criticise others' shortcomings. And so it was that they seized on hypocrisy and elevated it from a ubiquitous peccadillo into the monarch of all vices. For, you see, even if there is no right and wrong, you can find grounds to criticise another person by contrasting what he has espoused with what he has actually done. In this case, you are not making any judgment whatsoever as to the correctness of his views or the morality of his behaviour -- you are merely pointing out that he has said one thing and done another. Virtually all political discourse in the days of my youth was devoted to the ferreting out of hypocrisy.
"You wouldn't believe the things they said about the original Victorians. Calling someone a Victorian in those days was almost like calling them a fascist or a Nazi."
Both Hackworth and Major Napier were dumbfounded. "Your Grace!" Napier exdaimed. "I was naturally aware that their moral stance was radically different from ours -- but I am astonished to be informed that they actually condemned the first Victorians."
"Of course they did," Finkle-McGraw said.
"Because the first Victorians were hypocrites," Hackworth said, getting it. ...
"Because they were hypocrites," Finkle-McGraw said, after igniting his calabash and shooting a few tremendous fountains of smoke into the air, "the Victorians were despised in the late twentieth century. Many of the persons who held such opinions were, of course, guilty of the most nefandous conduct themselves, and yet saw no paradox in holding such views because they were not hypocrites themselves -- they took no moral stances and lived by none."
"So they were morally superior to the Victorians --" Major Napier said, still a bit snowed under.
"-- even though -- in fact, because -- they had no morals at all." There was a moment of silent, bewildered head-shaking around the copper table.
"We take a somewhat different view of hypocrisy," Finkle-McGraw continued. "In the late-twentieth-century Weltanschauung, a hypocrite was someone who espoused high moral views as part of a planned campaign of deception -- he never held these beliefs sincerely and routinely violated them in privacy. Of course, most hypocrites are not like that. Most of the time it's a spirit-is-willing, flesh-is-weak sort of thing."
"That we occasionally violate our own stated moral code," Major Napier said, working it through, "does not imply that we are insincere in espousing that code."
"Of course not," Finkle-McGraw said. "It's perfectly obvious, really. No one ever said that it was easy to hew to a strict code of conduct. Really, the difficulties involved -- the missteps we make along the way -- are what make it interesting. The internal, and eternal, struggle, between our base impulses and the rigorous demands of our own moral system is quintessentially human. It is how we conduct ourselves in that struggle that determines how we may in time be judged by a higher power." All three men were quiet for a few moments, chewing mouthfuls of beer or smoke, pondering the matter.
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Now, having said all that, it's not the sin of hypocrisy itself that makes a man a stinker. It's taking this private little struggle between principles and the flesh, when the rights of no unwilling parties are being violated, and making it a matter for the policeman.
It's channeling your own guilt into punishing others for the same victimless frailties.
This is wrong and there should be a name for it, but it's not exactly "hypocrisy."
