Category: Transpartisan Notes

To ONLY be used with the Standard Weekly Transpartisan Notes. This category sorts Transpartisan Notes into their own section.

The Transpartisan Matrix and an Open Seat on the Supreme Court

Transpartisan Note #132

by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner

New York Times writer, Bret Stephens, in his op-ed An Open Letter to Mitt Romney shares his argument for why Lindsey Graham is wrong to rush the appointment of a nominee for the Supreme Court and why Senator Romney should stand firm in light of the pressure he is receiving from his party. Despite the fact that Romney is supporting a vote, there is a lot to learn from this letter; from the response of the National Review; and from Romney’s own response.

One of Stephens’ most interesting points is to look at the hypocrisy of the Republican argument:

This, however, raises a philosophical consideration. If a central conservative complaint about the federal judiciary is that it has arrogated too many powers that ought to be in the hands of the people, how can conservatives justify entrenching their power in the courts in the expectation that they’re unlikely to win at the polls?

Now you have a Republican Party that seeks to advance its notions of judicial modesty and democratic accountability by the most immodest means imaginable, all in order to lock in conservative control over the least democratic branch of government. Wouldn’t the better Republican way be to try to win more elections with better candidates?

However, the National Review counters by pointing out:

Stephens believes that because conservatives think the Supreme Court should be less powerful, they should decline to confirm justices who share that belief, and cede the Court to people happy to use it as a kind of super legislature. It’s an entirely illogical argument, and one that I wish I could say was surprising to see in the paper of record.

In his article about Senator Romney’s response, Burgess Everett, explains that:

Because the president’s party controls the Senate this time around, Romney said it was reasonable for the GOP to move forward in considering Trump’s nominee in 2020.

“It wasn’t unfair because it was consistent with history. It was consistent with precedent, it was consistent with the Constitution,” Romney told reporters. “That the Merrick Garland decision was unfair, and so therefore it has to be made up by doing something which also wouldn’t make a lot of sense — which is saying to President Trump you can’t get your nominee, either — that just doesn’t follow.”

In Stephens’ letter, observe the way that freedom and order arguments (from our Transpartisan Matrix) are presented from both the left and the right.  Note the manner in which personal pragmatic desires are juxtaposed against “the good of the country.” Note that similar analysis is made for both left and right positions.  All of this from a conservative writer.  Note that the argument shifts from the left/right transactional horizontal spectrum toward the vertical order/freedom integration axis on both the left and the right.

Now let’s look at the Conservative National Review deconstruction of Stephen’s letter, as well as Romney’s response. Let us know if you see the Matrix and, whether you do or do not, share your comments and questions below.

(Photo by Gage Skidmore.)

Building a Broad Cross-Party Coalition

On September 9th, Representative Jamie Raskin hosted, with one of his Republican predecessors from Maryland’s 8th District, former Rep. Connie Morella (R-MD), an online event dedicated to building a broad cross-party coalition to “defend our democracy”. Joining them were Republican Member of Congress and good friend, former Oklahoma Rep. Mickey Edwards (R-OK) and the 2018 Republican candidate for Raskin’s seat, John Walsh.

Raskin’s former opponent’s inclusion was notable for, as a Republican, Walsh not only endorsed Representative Raskin this year, he also endorsed his parties’ opponents in the presidential election, Joe Biden & Kamala Harris, saying in true transpartisan fashion…

“It is an honor to join with other current and former Republicans in endorsing Jamie Raskin for Congress and Joe Biden/Kamala Harris for President and Vice President. At this juncture in our history, I believe only the Democratic Party offers a vision of hope, equality and unity and the commitment to the necessary reforms and programs to move us forward together… I stand today in support of Jamie Raskin and Joe Biden/Kamala Harris. I will vote for people who will fight for each and every one of us and will not pit us against each other.”

We urge you to get the full measure of this very valuable transpartisan event by watching/listening to all 38 minutes of it.

In announcing this event, Representative Raskin shared some notable quotes…

Thomas Jefferson, founder of today’s “Democratic party and third President of the United States, said at his first Inaugural: “We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists.” Lincoln said at his first Inaugural: “We are not enemies but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break, our bonds of affection.”

…pointing to the modern need, especially in this time of tumult, of forging new bonds of affection as we unite with transpartisan purpose to save democracy and our country.

You can also watch the video on YouTube at www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rrv-92urO5s.

A Strategic Revolt

Transpartisan Note #130

by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner

New York Times writer, Ross Douthat, in his op-ed The Revolt of the Republican Strategists continues to flirt with the Transpartisan Matrix.  In this article eviscerating It Was All a Lie: How the Republican Party Became Donald Trump, the new book by Stuart Stevens (longtime Republican operative and chief strategist for Mitt Romney’s losing 2012 campaign for the presidency), he makes this arresting statement quoting Stevens:

“Being against ‘out-of-control federal spending,’ a phrase I must have used in a hundred ads, is a catechism of the Republican faith. But no one really believes in it any more than communicants believe they are actually eating and drinking the body and blood of Christ.”

Douthat continues saying:

Except that in point of fact, many communicants at a Catholic Mass [which Douthat often writes about being] do believe that they are actually eating and drinking the body and blood of Christ. And this is particularly true among the conservative Catholics whose votes were essential to the Republican politicians Stuart Stevens tried to get elected president.

We suggest that the voters Douthat identifies here tend to occupy the Order Right quadrant of the Transpartisan Matrix. They form an essential part of the core transpartisan constituency.  They embrace order through tradition. What people believe matters.

At its best, politics tend to avoid fights over “belief” and seeks the best practical input from people with the widest range of faiths.  Empowering diversity of beliefs forms one strand of American Exceptionalism. Fights over beliefs drain energy from efforts to find solutions.

Check out Douthat’s article.  Find the matrix.

Joe Biden’s Historic Chance

Transpartisan Note #129

shared by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner

The Transpartisan Review has received some significant responses following its articles about TTR advisor Bill Shireman’s In This Together Initiative. As a nation, the United States appears to be  moving forward to address a wide range of local, national, and global problems, many of which stretch back for decades and even centuries. As the nation asserts itself – and its confining structures shatter – hundreds of thousands of free-market democracy advocates add their voice to the call for a more perfect union. We plan to publish communications that come to us offering next steps from a transpartisan perspective. This is our first.

Joe Biden’s Historic Chance

by Julian and Angela Gresser

If poll numbers are any indication of probability, it is likely that Joe Biden will become the next President. If so, his challenges are daunting. The country is severely and tragically divided by partisan rivalry, disparities of wealth and privilege (insider trading, even within the Congress), racial turmoil, and a cruel, inequitable delivery of justice. We have not seen such national outrage, shame, and grief in a long while.

Despite these challenges Mr. Biden has an unprecedented opportunity to reset the course of this country and lead us to safer shores. What if he has the courage to make a bold and novel decision beginning with the selection of his running mate? Instead of a familiar name, a politically correct candidate, or someone the Democrat Party leaders urge him to appoint, what if he were to choose the most qualified partner on the ticket, Democrat or Republican—for example, Tammy Duckworth, Susan Rice, and yes, even Nikki Haley? Beyond that, what if members of his Cabinet were also selected, and indeed all other significant appointments were made without the required political affiliation, connections, privilege, bias, or influence? Instead, what if his new administration gives highest priority to character, experience, capability, sound judgement, imagination, and wisdom? Perhaps most critical should be a proven ability to work together as a team in the service of all the people to heal the wounds of this nation and salvage its future. What a historic legacy.

Actually, this 21st vision of government precisely embodies the original spirit of the Founding Fathers. Most important, it responds to the yearning of the great majority of our fellow citizens for a restorative and wholesome change. As a strategy, this trans-partisan proposal should appeal to Republicans and Democrats alike, to elderly and younger voters, as well as independents.

We implore you, Mr. Biden, be courageous and ask yourself, “Why not?”

© Copyright, July 2020. Julian and Angela Gresser, All Rights Reserved.

About the Authors

Julian Gresser is Of Counsel to Swankin & Turner, Washington DC. He is the author of eight books in English and Japanese, has been twice Visiting Mitsubishi Professor at the Harvard Law School, and an advisor to the U.S. State Department (serving as an senior advisor to Richard Holbrooke on Japanese affairs), World Bank, European Commission, Republic of Korea, and the People’s Republic of China on environmental and industrial policies.

Angela Gresser is a retired designer, instructor of sustainable design and architecture, and writer.

(Photo by Gage Skidmore.)

COVID-19 is Our Common Enemy

Transpartisan Note #128

shared by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner

On July 15th, USA Today published COVID-19 is Our Common Enemy co-authored by two members of The Transpartisan Review advisory board, Joan Blades and Ralph Benko. It points the way to our thinking of how a transpartisan approach to Covid-19 (and the many other issues that make up our current domestic “deep crisis”) might uncover novel solutions and bring more people, like Joan and Ralph, together. You can read the full article on the USA Today website.

Why the political left and right should unite to save lives.

The resurgence of the coronavirus has thrust the pandemic back to the fore of our national consciousness. Living vs. making a living? A false dichotomy. We don’t believe that these values to be mutually exclusive. Both are possible, both necessary. And we need each other to figure out how to make both happen.

Political heresy? No.

The pandemic represents what folklore holds as the Chinese character for crisis: a “dangerous opportunity.” As supply-side economist Paul Romer first observed, “a crisis is a terrible thing to waste.” The surface tension between maintaining both physical and fiscal health points to a deeper underlying crisis. It offers a path out of both the surface and the deep crisis.

What deep crisis? Prof. Daniel Dellaposta observed recently in the American Sociological Review, “The structure of U.S. opinion has shifted in ways suggesting troubling implications for proponents of political and social pluralism.” Only a threat of the complexity and magnitude of the pandemic is powerful enough to bring hereditary enemies, like us, together. One of us is the cofounder of MoveOn.org, the other the co-founder of TheCapitalistLeague.com.

I, Ralph, the conservative Republican, recognize my adversary Joan’s authentic compassion in holding that without a coordinated response, including government action, to flatten the curve she would have reasonable grounds to fear waves of infections that could overwhelm our medical personnel and capacity, intensifying both loss of life and economic devastation. This is a counsel of practical compassion. Not tyranny.

I, Joan, the progressive Democrat, recognize my adversary Ralph’s heartfelt concern that an overbearing, “one-size-fits-all,” quarantine can produce an unacceptable level of economic agony, especially among members of the working class. Not everyone has sufficient resources, nor is the government capable of indefinitely funding an economy many times larger than the resources it can responsibly command. This is a counsel of practical compassion. Not callousness.

Let’s See Each Other As Allies

Our survival appears at stake. Thus, to paraphrase a wise insight of second wave feminism: the political becomes personal. The political class now politically weaponizes everything. Democrats vilify Republicans as taking reckless life-and-death risks by premature openings. Republicans demonize Democrats for inflicting unwarranted and possibly catastrophic damage to our ability to subsist economically.

So let’s experiment with seeing one another as allies facing a mutual enemy, the novel coronavirus. Our respectively hated and feared political leaders really are not the primary enemy. (Yes, assuredly we will slug that out Nov.)

The primary enemy is the virus. It confronted (and confronts) our leaders, left and right, with huge unknowns. Of course, people are entitled to their political opinions. That said, common humanity calls for us to tone down the contempt. “Kill the ump” style heckling is better suited to baseball than it is to a truly mortal threat.

Physical and fiscal health are not antithetical. To get both will require greater trust and trustworthiness in government, in media, in our communities and in what Ben Franklin, during the Constitutional Convention, called “the virtue and spirit of the common people.” And, yes, trust in the good faith in our political opponents.

That the left and right disagree is neither novel nor interesting. The interesting thing is that we represent proof-of-concept that both sides can show respect for one another and are willing to work together against a common foe.

Pandemic Isn’t About Politics

So, are we going to keep politically weaponizing the pandemic (as we have weaponized practically everything else)? We will remain passionate foes on many issues. The pandemic is fundamentally different. It is a common enemy and a mortal one.

There are judgment calls about priorities and what measures to take. That said, neither of us knows anyone who does not believe in the importance of protecting both lives and livelihoods. We must, and can, work together. American independence was predicated on the self-evident truth that foremost among our unalienable rights are both life and liberty. Governments are instituted to protect these rights. We demand both values be fully honored. This is not paradoxical.

We’ve gotten out of the habit of working together even where we agree. That is the deeper existential crisis the pandemic brings to light. That said, the pandemic is so epic that it compels cooperation. Knowing that we are on the “same team,” we can pull America out of the wreckage of lives and livelihood the pandemic has wrought.

Rediscovering that there are areas in which we can fruitfully cooperate, perhaps our cooperation in the face of the pandemic could transform the future of politics.

Read the full article on the USA Today website.

Joan Blades is a co-founder of MoveOn and Living Room Conversations. Ralph Benko is co-author of “The Capitalist Manifesto,” chairman and co-founder of The Capitalist League and founder of The Prosperity Caucus. He served as a deputy general counsel in the Reagan White House.

Transpartisan Protest: Police Respond

Transpartisan Note #127

shared by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner

Elliot Ackerman contributing writer for the New York Times wrote in a June 4, 2020 opinion piece:

“In Flint, Mich., last week, Sheriff Christopher R. Swanson captured national attention when he made an impassioned statement of support to demonstrators and asked what he could do to help. They chanted for Mr. Swanson and his officers to “walk with us” in protest. They did.”

“In cities across the country — New York, Savannah, Ga., Coral Gables, Fla., Santa Cruz, Calif., and elsewhere — groups of police officers took the opportunity to march, kneel or otherwise express the conviction they shared with the protesters, that brutality should have no place in policing. More examples are being documented at #WalkWithUs on Twitter.”

Local America speaks with many voices.

Other examples of #WalkWithUs:

(Feature image shared by NYTimes on Twitter.)

“We Are Better Than This”

Transpartisan Note #126

shared by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner

On Wednesday, June 03, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter adding his voice to the sentiments shared by past leaders by releasing a statement expressing his “great sorrow and disappointment” at having to repeat a declaration he made during his 1971 inaugural, gubernatorial address: “the time for racial discrimination is over.”

With deep respect to those involved and those affected, we share his thoughtful and important message with our readers…

Jimmy Carter’s June 03, 2020 message:

Rosalynn and I are pained by the tragic racial injustices and consequent backlash across our nation in recent weeks. Our hearts are with the victims’ families and all who feel hopeless in the face of pervasive racial discrimination and outright cruelty. We all must shine a spotlight on the immorality of racial discrimination. But violence, whether spontaneous or consciously incited, is not a solution.

As a white male of the South, I know all too well the impact of segregation and injustice to African Americans. As a politician, I felt a responsibility to bring equity to my state and our country. In my 1971 inaugural address as Georgia’s governor, I said: “The time for racial discrimination is over.” With great sorrow and disappointment, I repeat those words today, nearly five decades later. Dehumanizing people debases us all; humanity is beautifully and almost infinitely diverse. The bonds of our common humanity must overcome the divisiveness of our fears and prejudices.

Since leaving the White House in 1981, Rosalynn and I have strived to advance human rights in countries around the world. In this quest, we have seen that silence can be as deadly as violence. People of power, privilege, and moral conscience must stand up and say “no more” to a racially discriminatory police and justice system, immoral economic disparities between whites and blacks, and government actions that undermine our unified democracy. We are responsible for creating a world of peace and equality for ourselves and future generations.

We need a government as good as its people, and we are better than this.

www.cartercenter.org/news/pr/2020/statement-060320.html

(Photo from the Carter Presidential Library.)

“A Consistent, Courageous & Creative Effort”

Transpartisan Note #125

shared by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner

On Tuesday, June 02, former U.S. President George W. Bush released a statement expressing his, and his wife Laura’s, “anguish” at the “injustice and fear” witnessed in our cities’ streets – calling on “America to examine our tragic failures”.

With deep respect to those involved and those affected, we share his thoughtful and important message with our readers…

George W. Bush’s June 02, 2020 message:

Laura and I are anguished by the brutal suffocation of George Floyd and disturbed by the injustice and fear that suffocate our country. Yet we have resisted the urge to speak out, because this is not the time for us to lecture. It is time for us to listen. It is time for America to examine our tragic failures – and as we do, we will also see some of our redeeming strengths.

It remains a shocking failure that many African Americans, especially young African American men, are harassed and threatened in their own country. It is a strength when protesters, protected by responsible law enforcement, march for a better future. This tragedy — in a long series of similar tragedies — raises a long overdue question: How do we end systemic racism in our society? The only way to see ourselves in a true light is to listen to the voices of so many who are hurting and grieving. Those who set out to silence those voices do not understand the meaning of America — or how it becomes a better place.

America’s greatest challenge has long been to unite people of very different backgrounds into a single nation of justice and opportunity. The doctrine and habits of racial superiority, which once nearly split our country, still threaten our Union. The answers to American problems are found by living up to American ideals — to the fundamental truth that all human beings are created equal and endowed by God with certain rights. We have often underestimated how radical that quest really is, and how our cherished principles challenge systems of intended or assumed injustice. The heroes of America — from Frederick Douglass, to Harriet Tubman, to Abraham Lincoln, to Martin Luther King, Jr. — are heroes of unity. Their calling has never been for the fainthearted. They often revealed the nation’s disturbing bigotry and exploitation — stains on our character sometimes difficult for the American majority to examine. We can only see the reality of America’s need by seeing it through the eyes of the threatened, oppressed, and disenfranchised.

That is exactly where we now stand. Many doubt the justice of our country, and with good reason. Black people see the repeated violation of their rights without an urgent and adequate response from American institutions. We know that lasting justice will only come by peaceful means. Looting is not liberation, and destruction is not progress. But we also know that lasting peace in our communities requires truly equal justice. The rule of law ultimately depends on the fairness and legitimacy of the legal system. And achieving justice for all is the duty of all.

This will require a consistent, courageous, and creative effort. We serve our neighbors best when we try to understand their experience. We love our neighbors as ourselves when we treat them as equals, in both protection and compassion. There is a better way — the way of empathy, and shared commitment, and bold action, and a peace rooted in justice. I am confident that together, Americans will choose the better way.

www.bushcenter.org/about-the-center/newsroom/press-releases/2020/06/statement-by-president-george-w-bush.html

(Photo from the Wikimedia Commons.)

Transpartisan Pandemic

Anomalies in the Coronavirus Pandemic Debate

Transpartisan Note #124

by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner

To mask or not to mask, that is the question.  The current public debate on the Coronavirus Pandemic features two conflicting narratives: 1) Minimize infections to prevent as many deaths as possible; 2) Let infections spread to build “herd immunity”.  This narratives-clash makes it difficult to know how to think about the virus – how to fight it. How we might manage our concerns about it. What ‘public policy’ makes the most sense.

The two narratives, now politicized into partisan cudgels, run in absolutely opposite directions.  Before summarizing the clash we note that there appears to be significant agreement (hope) that when (if) we discover a vaccine the problem ends.

President Trump says we will have a vaccine by the end of the year. Public health experts widely agree that this is extremely optimistic. The polio vaccine took five years from recognition of need to creation. Any serious strategy on the Pandemic must move forward without counting on a vaccine anytime soon.

Experts suggest a second intervention – a quick test for infection – might be nearly as effective as a vaccine.  Such test might largely overcome the major impediment to re-opening major industries, like sports venues, airlines, restaurants, etc.

If everyone seeking to enter a restaurant, airplane, or ball game is tested, the argument goes, and only those testing negative for the virus are admitted, the problem vanishes in those industries.  The discriminatory potential in this approach looms ominously.

The political tension in the conflicting narratives becomes obvious in the current environment. Minimize infections – close, wear a mask. Free access to the virus, build herd immunity – open, no mask. In current polls 80% of the public supports a managed opening – back to work with masks?

The partisans appear something like this:

    1. Minimizing infections. This is the dominant narrative on, e.g., CNN.  The touchstone of success is the focus on minimizing the deaths caused by the virus.
    2. ‘Herd immunity’. This approach is based on the widely-accepted theory that infected people build up antibodies to fight the virus. In the covid-19 pandemic, it is best known as the Swedish solution – voluntary lockdown. [1]

So, we have two narratives, one to minimize infections to maximize prevention of individual deaths from the virus and the other to increase infections so that we can more quickly reach the 70% infected that some projections estimate will allow herd immunity to solve the problem.

David L. Katz founding director of the Yale-Griffin Prevention Research Center, entered the national debate with a third way in a March 20 New York Times Op-ed “Is Our Fight Against Coronavirus Worse Than the Disease?” He argued the U.S. should adopt a milder strategy than total lockdown to preserve the economy while stopping deaths from COVID-19. Katz sparked opposition from current Yale University epidemiologists – some of whom were quick to refute what they saw as his suggestion that the US lockdown was an overreaction to the pandemic.

Katz and others propose that serious research focus on who is dying from the virus.  Vulnerable people include the elderly, people with serious health issues, and people with high blood pressure (one study shows 75% of deaths in this group).  The proposal here is to protect these vulnerable groups and open the economy for less vulnerable populations.  This proposal moves closer to a controlled opening strategy favored in polls by 80% of the public.

Our point here is less about what is the “right” policy than to suggest a more transpartisan way of thinking about the problem. To imagine any controlled opening  strategy will require less pious certainty and more pragmatic honesty about the public policy trade-offs of death and disability between mortality created by the virus and mortality created by a closed economy.

While doctors committed to the Hippocratic Oath protect every life as sacred, many policies favor ‘efficiency’ and work to reduce the resulting increase in deaths.  Highway speed is an example.  No one seriously advocates reducing speed limits to 20 miles-an-hour even though it would enormously reduce traffic deaths.  Still over the last fifty years public policy has helped reduce auto accident deaths from 5.21 per hundred million miles driven in 1968 to 1.22 in 2018—a more than 75% reduction. [2]

We have no proposed “right” answer to the pandemic.  We do suggest a form of thinking about an issue that integrates clashing narratives rather than forcing people to choose sides. A controlled opening may mean targeted pragmatic policy that risks lives from the virus in order to save lives from a dead economy.

One integration might be to wear a mask, go to work. Could it even mean choosing to go to a ball game once in a while?

This note suggests a form for thinking about the pandemic problem, or any problem, in a transpartisan way. Another important part of the issue lies in changing the language we use to discuss the trade-offs.  We will address this language issue in another Note.

[1] Herd immunity is discussed in Is Herd Immunity Our Best Weapon Against COVID-19?

[2] Car Crash Death from the National Safety Council