Political Wankery (the latest debate and the “Oh SNAP!” nihilism of our public discourse)

While Anderson Cooper does his vacuous deer-in-headlights-who-cares-about-people routine, Keith Olbermann (who’s show Countdown is actually very good), approaches yesterday’s debate with the same dreary cynicism as his mischievous mentor, the meat-headed Tom Sawyer of politics, Chris Mathews. The debate was “9 to 6,” says Olbermann, who unlike most political sports analogists knows something about sports: three field goals for Obama and two for Clinton. What pundits mean when they say “touchdown” or something similar, is an “Oh SNAP!” tabloid-making moment. It’s little schoolyard comebacks like “there you go again” that win points. It’s all there is. Adam Nagourney speculates that Clinton failed to produce a “ground-moving moment,” as if voters are just searching for and dumb enough to be moved some clever “Oh SNAP!” line.

And in the same vein, all the pundits weigh in (more summary here): it was a boring tie. To Mathew Yglesias, “the whole thing seems tedious.” To Joe Klein, who could not hold an independent-minded opinion if it had nailed itself to his forehead and who can’t even keep up with this week’s punditry fad, Obama wins “by not losing,” but not on “substance.” To Todd Beaton, Obama didn’t “project confidence.” To MissLaura, it was Hillary’s body language that was at issue. To Newsweek, Obama is a “brand” (he that line of thought has never been tried before!–everything is a brand!). Ariel Alexovitch equates “aggressive” and “strong.” Patrick Healy and Jeff Zeleny, like most pundits, assume everything must be a strategy: “front-runner’s strategy of nonconfrontation” and talk of “even tones.”

here is a word for all of these sighing Madam Bovaries of the political world, these political deconstructionists. They are nihilists. And because nihilism dominates our public discourse, Obama is incommensurable with it. He is a mystery. Here our the nihilistic premises that underly everything the political class in the United States has to say today:

• Nothing is significant beyond the question of whether it titillates us, whether it is fuel for our wankery. Everything is a matter of appearances, fashion, style. Nothing is about the signified, for there is no such thing as the signified. We skate lightly over the surface of things, and there is nothing underneath beyond self-interested motives.
• All is Will-to-Power. Therefore all motives are attributable not to sincere belief but to strategy. Everyone’s intentions are transparent. We live in a war of all against all. We are sophisticated because we are cynics who see that beneath the appearances to see that there is … nothing … except will-to-power.
• Yawn. When we are not stimulated by the appearances or by conflict, we quickly get bored.

Let’s take one case from the debate to further illustrate this point. Russert, for whom being a “tough” questioner means trying to create “Oh SNAP!” moments, tries to imply that Obama is guilty by association, that he is an ant-semitic black militant, because he hasn’t sought out every high-profile supporter, vetted their positions, and then issued an acceptance or rejection statement.

Clinton’s “meaning of is is” response to this–”reject” vs. “denounce”–is just another example of her cynicism. Obama’s response is about as classy and devastating a smackdown as any thinking person could ever hope for: “But if the word ‘reject’ Senator Clinton feels is stronger than the word ‘denounce,’ then I’m happy to concede the point, and I would reject and denounce.” Clinton’s oblivious response “good” misses the fact that “I concede the point” is a way of saying “you’re an idiot for lawyering this distinction” with ironic magnanimity. Far too subtle for her, and for today’s pundits, who must simply marinate in the drool of their own open-mouthed confusion when reading Oscar Wilde or anything similar (Roger Simon of The Politico wonders if it means “lacks an instinct for the jugular,” and Andrew Sullivan thinks it’s “Weak, weak, weak.”) Of course, they would probably laugh in derision at the thought that such subtleties have anything to do with public discourse in the first place, and would probably initiate this line of analysis: is Obama too witty to be president, and for the voters (meaning “us pundits”)? Too intelligent? Too classy?

There is a clear implication to talk of jugulars and football scores: nothing of substance matters to a debate. “Politics is a fashion shoe, or an Oscars red carpet,” they imply. “We are here to make catty, superficial remarks about whether politicians can score points by making catty, superficial remarks. We are here to enforce the fashion of the times, the conventional wisdom, with our own obsequious pandering to what we think our audiences want to hear–and this is precisely what we are looking for in a politician.”

Obama is a mystery to this cynicism, but Clinton is a lacuna. Because she fights her fight precisely according to their expectations. Clinton sighs just like them–they about the lack of “Oh SNAP!” moments, her because her “Oh SNAP!” attempts don’t work. That Clinton shares their cynicism is clear. When asked about her obviously opportunistic vacillation in tone, Clinton responds that “this is a contested campaign.” The implication here is that it was indeed a game, and that that’s just politics. It never occurs to her–or the pundits–that her authenticity might be question just for having outbursts as a kind of political ploy.

How can voters be so unsophisticated as not to share this cynicism? To honor this experience?

The nihilism goes deeper, of course, than the search for these gotcha moments. Take the analysis of the otherwise intelligent Andrew Sullivan. We merely need to look at his language: “Obama’s push-back on the war was strong.” Not, “Obama is right about the war.” The pundit must characterize, signifier, not referent, in order to looking so naive as to believe there are referents at all. (In Sullivan’s case, it is certainly an unconscious adherence to today’s style, and not a consistent approach, but I’ll continue to pick on him anyway). Pundits must frame the debate only in terms of the expected result when applied as a cattle prod to the ruminative masses: “I agree more with her than him. But he cleaned up. In Ohio, this is a big deal.” I’m not saying that speculating about how an argument will be received in Ohio is off limits. I’m saying this kind of analysis–the analysis of the marketing executive–as almost all there is today. Who won the debate? Whoever pandered the best. Whichever Sheltie did the best herding job. There is no talk about one candidates arguments actually inducing some sort of spontaneous rational reaction in the minds of their audience. About them creating new convictions. About them being leaders of any kind.

That’s not only a shame, it’s a form of stupidity, the kind of thing that makes Obama incommensurable with their form of reasoning–a rhetorical absurdity, a UFO sighting, a singularity, a rockstar. Whatever he is, he must be irrational. Today it not clever mindlessness that is irrational but substance. No wants to know whether one candidate is better when it comes to a) policies b) decision-making ability c) authenticity of character. They want to know not whether Clinton’s sense of victimhood is something we really want in a president, but whether Clinton “flubbed” a line. Not whether she fails as a person, but whether she fails as an actress.

So ironically these horserace analysts don’t even know how to handicap the race. They cannot see that Clinton is consistently vague on her policy explanations and Obama thoughtful and specific. Here I venture into partisan grounds of course, since I am a “Hillary-hater” and Obama-maniac. I might say that this partisanship is an extension of my thoughts about nihilism, but one might question my gut sense about what is authentic and what is fake. On the other hand, I find it indisputable as to who was more thoughtful a debater. Whose language is more indicative of having a serious grasp of issues and their nuances. Who actually thinks about what he says when he gives answers. Who believes what he says, is who he is. Who does not feel flustered when under pressure. Who is not driven towards political conciliation to the convential wisdom (the Iraq war is one example). Who would be a better decision maker.

I’d like to do one blow-by-blow analysis (yes, of actual debate content!) that I think bears this out. Let’s do the entire healthcare exchange in yesteday’s debate:

1. When first asked about healthcare, Clinton resopnds that Obama has distorted her position on the mandate (no explanation of why and how the mandate would be enforced); healthcare reform is a passion of hers, and she’s met suffering families; debates should be good and use accurate information.
2. Obama responds into detail about what a mandate means, why it might be a bad idea (penalties in Massachusetts as an example), the fact that she has not provided specifics on mandates and affordability subsidies, how he conceivable could be wrong about that approach, but this difference has nothing to do with the desire to provide universal healthcare. And it doesn’t.
3. Clinton responds with verbiage about the importance of the issue to her, how his attacks are unfair and Republican-like and Truman-unlike, how it “goes to the heart of whether or not this country will finally do what is right.” She makes the point that Obama has a mandate for children, meant to imply that … the mandate must be universal (a logical fallacy). She goes on to say that she’s work on this for many years. She makes one substantive point about insurance cherry picking.
4. Obama responds that while it is fair for Clinton to argue that a mandate might be superior, it is unfair to say that he is not trying to provide universal healthcare. And that her lack of information about subsidies and penalties are a problem. He responds to the cherry picking point by noting that insurance companies would be happy to have a mandate that forces people to purchase from them.
5. Clinton re-raises her logical fallacy–the mandate on children. Now this means, bizarrely, that “there’s no difference.” She then claims that parents getting sick is bad for children, implicitly conceding Obama’s theory that a mandate on children is necessary because children depend on their parents and cannot act on their own behalf. She then compares a lack of a mandate to voluntary social security and medicare. She makes a point about the mechanisms of signing people up. She claims her plan will make insurance more affordable. Experts agree with her.
6. Obama claims that his plan is better at controlling costs, that experts agree with him. That a mandate for children is premised in its greater affordability; that a mandate for adults is premised in the uncertainty about affordability for all adults. He reminds the audience that the plans are virtually the same in every other regard. That the debate is not about the intention to achieve universal healthcare but the means. Medicare incidentally is voluntary, and an example that illustrates that when affordable, people will purchase healthcare voluntarily.
7. Clinton makes a point about young people not purchasing and so driving up costs
8. Obama points out that young people are covered until the age of 25 under their parents’ plans

Clinton spends a great deal of time trying to direct the debate away from the details of plans and too:

• The unfairness of Obama’s attacks
• The idea that Obama has no intention of providing universal healthcare, rather than that he just differs on the means, and the betrayal of democratic values
• Her passion about the issue and compassion for the suffering
• Her logical fallacy concerning the mandate for children

Clinton’s rhetoric is a tangle of logical fallacy and ad-hominem. Obama consistently shows a willingness to debate the actual substance of the plans. Her substantive points–about coverage and costs–are always vague, and consistently countered by Obama. She never talks about how the mandate will be enforced. Obama provides the one past-performance example, Massachusetts. Neither candidate gets into the nitty gritty of plans–why one will cut more costs than the other, for instance. But there is a clear tension that explains this fact–Clinton’s pulling the debate in the direction of meta-narrative (Obama’s unfairness, lack of commitment to universal healthcare; her victimhood, passion, compassion); and Obama’s unsuccessful attempts to bring it back to substance (and specificity, e.g. Massachusetts).

There are a few things that this exchange illustrates, without any doubt:

1. That Obama is far better spoken and has a greater grasp of substance than Clinton
2. That Clinton has some serious problems with her character–that she is intellectually dishonest, that she is narcissistic (in her attempts to define the issue in terms of her own victimhood), and that she is more interested in turning the debate towards logically flawed ad hominem political rhetoric than discussing details (in other words, that she is much more interested in winning)
3. That Obama is much calmer under pressure than Clinton, that he is far more decent in his approach to politics, far more self-aware, and that he is far less narcissistic and power hungry (notably, Obama makes the unheard of admission that there’s vanity and ambition in politics)

I’m afraid I have little patience for people who cannot sus out these differences. If this is not a clear slam-dunk for Obama on what counts, then nothing is.

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