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Shallowness of our National Conversation

America’s national conversation has gone astray.  Abandoning rational standards of discourse, evidence and facts, inflammatory statements go unchallenged by legislators and pundits intimidated by a media hierarchy that discourages journalistic standards because those plutocrats of information have become participants in, rather than reporters of, public affairs. The citizenry has taken to shouting bumper-sticker slogans at each other.

Perhaps no issue more openly illustrates this point than the NFL “take a knee” controversy. While an extraordinary level of attention has been paid to those engaging in the practice and President Trump’s response to it, little attention has been paid to questioning whether the underlying premise of the rather sophomoric gesture is accurate.  If the purpose of the action was to focus attention on the question of racism, the move has been a failure. The discussion has been all about the theatrics.

Mathew Walther, writing in the liberal publication The Week notes that “Outrage has become our national pastime. The only thing that could possibly make American political discourse in 2017 dumber would be if someone … decided to insist that President Trump’s comments about pro football were…actual grounds for his impeachment. To suggest that this … deserves formal censure and removal from office because he borrowed a typical boomer complaint about sports culture from the dowager empress of American liberalism [Hillary Clinton] would also be nothing short of sublime… In that sense, we all owe Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) a debt of gratitude for making this a reality … Green stood on the floor of the House of Representatives and announced that next week he intends to ‘call for the impeachment of the president of the United States of America’ and force a vote on the question…Green does not, of course, actually believe this … And that’s the problem. None of our conversations actually have anything to do with the things they are ostensibly about.”

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The actions of many of our elected officials is juvenile, at best. In 2016, A number of House Democrats staged a sit-in on the floor of Congress, after losing a legislative battle.  Rather than retool their message and try again, they engaged in an Animal House-style collective temper tantrum.  In New York City, City Council Members kneeled down in support of football players who rather than use their significant fortunes and access to publicity on their own time to address the things that concern them, childishly disrespected the National Anthem. Many of those same Council Members who supposedly are concerned about racial equality, meanwhile, consistently oppose real solutions, such as charter schools and lower taxes for small businesses and struggling families, that really could produce results.

America’s faulty education system, along with our touchy-feely culture, shares a good portion of the blame. The hard-driving, sometimes rough-edged heroes of prior generations who explored a new world, drove out an overbearing monarch, settled the West, built the world’s most dynamic economy and beat enemies in two world wars are no longer in vogue. Both academics and Hollywood producers, to say nothing of political activists, will work overtime to find personal faults with those who actually accomplished something.  In their eyes, it would have been better if those champions had stayed home and spent their days getting in touch with their feelings.