Issue #9
May 2002
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Pygmy Leadership for a Pygmy Electorate by Gert Innsry We are living through one of the most perilous and complex periods of recent history, and we are doing it by and large without political leadership. At the present moment, no major country in the world has a world-class figure at the helm. In contrast with the WWII era, a period filled with political giants (some good, some evil), or the Civil Rights era here in the US, with Martin Luther King, Lyndon Johnson and other inspirational political figures, or the ending of apartheid in South Africa, a peaceful resolution made possible by the vision and intelligence of Nelson Mandela, all of the current world leaders are pygmies.
Why is this? What confluence of conditions has given us Bush, Sharon, Arafat, Vajpayee, Musharaf, Chirac, Berlusconi and Pope John Paul II? Why have we no Democrats or Republicans of stature in the House and Senate? Why have we no governors of the stature of Herbert Lehman, Franklin Roosevelt or even Thomas Dewey? Why are our appointed officials (possibly excepting Colin Powell) so inept and characterless? Where are our Churchills rallying the world against the Nazis, our DeGauls digging France out of the Algerian quagmire, even our Bismarks ordering Europe or Marshalls rebuilding a devastated (and defeated) Europe? Is it us, the electorate that's at fault?
I think so. In every country, we seem to be searching for the center, however off-kilter that center may be. Democrats are afraid to stand up for what they believe in (assuming they believe in anything except getting elected). Any hint by the Republicans that a Democrat is left of center is that Democrat's cue to abandon progressive positions. Republicans have redefined their center to exclude political moderates, but practice blandness so as not to get painted as extremists.
We have given our political leaders the following mandate: don't raise taxes, don't cut programs, don't spoil the economy. Don't, don't, don't. Only the extreme right says Do, and their do is really don't in disguise. Where are the citizens saying do build affordable housing, do provide adequate medical care, do protect the environment, do increase employment (and, just as important, do insist that employment carry with it a living wage). In the few cases in which we say do loud enough (do improve education), we simultaneously say don't (but don't increase teachers' salaries, don't hire more so class size can be decreased, don't build more schools or repair the existing buildings). Without the public saying do in a loud voice, Congress can only hear the dos that come from the wealthy seeking tax cuts, the large corporations seeking privileges and (ironically) protection from competition, the mining, timber and ranching interests that want access to public lands without paying their fare share in fees and in protection of the environment.
In the absence of true statesmen, the people must lead, here and abroad. If there is no one of stature to give direction to progress, we must provide our own direction. That will require hard work on our part, and requires us to stop believing in the tooth fairy, as in "we don't have to do anything; the power of the free market will make it all happen automatically". Clap if you believe our markets are free.
Yes, things are changing more quickly than is comfortable. Yes, we are confused about where we stand and where we are going. Yes, we pine for simpler times (that never were). But no, we really do have to behave like grown-ups, and figure out what we want, and ask for it. If you don't ask, you don't get.
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