Titillation

I'm so glad the latest bit of NBA tomfoolery has been getting the attention it deserves. I'd hate for America to focus on Bush's cabinet reshuffle, or the situation in Iran, or the grilled cheese Madonna. You know, serious news. Perhaps the most obnoxious reactions to the brawl came in the wake of the next day's South Carolina-Clemson football game, which likewise ended in fisticuffs. Said many, including Clemson coach Tommy Bowden, the Palmetto tussle was a direct result of the steady airing of the NBA to-do in the run-up to Saturday's game. I'm not sure which of that explanation's implications is more disturbing: that television really ought not cover news, especially when it includes violence, or that students in American colleges may be impelled to abandon their senses and engage in lawlessness after only twenty-four hours of exposure to the idiot box. But, I'm sure that millions of Americans are sitting at home, clucking their agreement and wagging their fingers at America's entertainment industry. According to a NYT/CBS poll released this week 70% of Americans are very or somewhat concerned about the corrosive effect of pop culture. It seems to me that this is an opportunity for a Bush Sister Souljah moment: stand up and say, "Look culture warriors, I'm not going to ride Nicole Sheridan for political points (strictly for fun). Rather, I think it's time we make morality part of the ownership society I keep talking about. You want your kids to be spared explicit sex and violence? How about doing some parenting?" It's time someone made the point, out loud, that it's very confusing for the right to want less government for everything, except for how we live our lives.
But Bush won't, and the depravity of pop culture will continue to be an issue in the same way that many other foolish issues continue to resonate with voters, like prayer in school, or evolution in text books, or flag-burning. Real issues are, frankly, too complicated for the American electorate, and so we spend our energy on emotional issues that really don't have a lot to do with the state of our nation. That's not necessarily a shot at the intellect of middle America, either. While commentaries on the average voter don't inspire a lot of confidence in the cognitive abilities of Joe and Jane Schmo, as an economist I recognize that it's fundamentally not in the interest of most voters to educate themselves about issues. Learning about, say, health care or tax policy takes a lot of effort and has limited to no benefits. An educated vote statistically doesn't matter and is in any case subject to free riding. Instead, voters do the rational thing and try to detect signals from their leaders that indicate whether the decisions those leaders make will be similar to what the voter would like. The areas where a voter is most likely to know as much as a candidate are heart or values issues, so the voters say, I know values, this guy talks about values in a way that resonates with me, so I trust him to make good decisions, regardless of how he discusses other issues. From an economist's perspective, it's a rational way to conduct oneself.
The problem is, or at least one of the problems is, that, like pop culture, politics tends to orient itself to what people want. Politicians, Bush in particular, Kerry not so much, know intuitively what works with voters, and therefore don't waste time on complicated or sensible policy items. As a result, most of the business of government goes on completely outside the realm of public discussion. It should come as no surprise to us that the Bush administration can act with such abandon and fear no public backlash.
The lesson of all this is that Democrats either have to forget about crafting carefully targeted policies and instead focus on channeling American vibes (recruiting another Bill Clinton would help), or they need to hope America shifts in a direction that where the vibes being channeled are more closely aligned to mainstream Democrat values. I hope to have some posts and analysis over the next month examining demographic shifts in America and what they mean for politics.
The concern is that, in the meantime, we may do some damage to our society. Fareed Zakaria writes today in the Post that over-zealous immigration directives are depriving America of new intellectual lifeblood. The aforementioned NYT/CBS poll notes that most Americans don't want abortion to be illegal, but Bush judges may challenge Roe Vs. Wade. The budget deficit threatens long-term economic damage (and the falling dollar echoes foreign concerns over the ability of the US to stay financially solvent). And god only knows how we'll resolve looming crises in Iran and North Korea.
Can we afford not to have public discussions about policy issues? Can we afford to forego even accountability for dangerous policy positions? At what point will the difficulties of the modern world displace the travails of Jessica Simpson's marriage in the public consciousness?