When your debate partner declares victory and goes home, I guess. My right-wing fellow blogger, Goat, of Goats Barnyard invited me to a debate, in a way, and so I obliged him here. His response was simply to say that what I was written was full of falsehoods, said "America is rising" (to which I replied that I have no idea what that particular sentence means), and went on his way. I like a good exchange of views - even a heated verbal donnybrook, but apparently this was not to be one of those times.
When I titled the previous post linked above "Sort of", I was being serious, because I can hardly sum up either what I believe politically or its sources in a short (?) blog post. Indeed, I could write post after post after post - and invoke all sorts of names, from James Madison to Richard Rorty to Reinhold Niebuhr to Godfrey Hodgson - as sources, but all of this would still not exhaust what it is I profess to consider my political views and their roots. I could write about my socialist/pacifist grandfather, who served for a time as the political director for the AFL-CIO for the state of Ohio; I could write about my father's role as a teacher's union negotiator in our local school district. I could write about walking away from a gay rights march in Washington, DC in disgust at the blatant racial and class blindness I perceived. I could write about my utter frustration as the 1990's unfolded and lunatics like Newt Gingrich were taken seriously by so many in the political and journalistic class. I could write about books I have read, discussions I have had, significant friends, acquaintances, and others in my life who have pushed and nudged me this direction and that, sometimes in directions I never thought I would go.
I could also beg off the whole affair, as I know my political views are constantly changing, as I encounter each day, each day's challenges, each day's idiocy, each day's events. What I profess as my political views will no doubt look very different in twenty years than they do now - precisely because my life is open to all sorts of possibilities, and I recognize that nothing, not life, not history, stands still.
There is much more I could say, but one thing I will say. Even though the post below is a nice summary of the relationship between various philosophical views of politics, and my own preference for viewing politics and nation-states as participants in an on-going process, where improvisation counts much more than having a pre-formed plan ready in one's head, I want it to be clear that just because I can quote different philosophers doesn't mean I adhere to what they teach. Indeed, I find most philosophers from the past remarkable historical artifacts, and that about sums up their relevance to our current situation. What I believe more than anything else is that the Constitution of the United States is the most remarkable single political document ever written, and it is to that we must return time and again to ground ourselves in what makes us uniquely American. It is not blood or faith or social creed; it is a simple, clear document that sets forth what it means to be American. The fact that the Constitution allows for amendment shows that, even at its founding, the country knew about improvisation. Madison, Hamilton, Jay - they were our first political jazz performers.
I know I may have muddied the waters even more than usual with this particular post, but I just wanted to make sure that, just because Goat thinks I am wrong doesn't mean I am giving up the debate.
