MARCH 7, FRIDAY

TRADITIONAL AMERICAN VALUES

In my discomfort over the last month I have slowly decided that MAGA people are good people who have values very different from mine, but not, however, much different from most other Americans.  I think that they honestly believe that they are protecting traditional American values and that they are truly trying to make American great again.  They want to make America great again but returning to America to the values that sustained it through almost 250 years, values that are central to their own identity as Americans.  I also believe that since these values are core to their identity there is no way that I can persuade them that their values are hurting themselves or others.  I am also not going to persuade them that my liberal values aren’t undermining their traditional American values.    Any arguments I make will demonstrate to them that I truly am a threat.

To me even the MAGA assumption that America is great, is number one, and Americans are entitled to privilege, is a big part of the pride that blinds Americans to their place in the world.

More than that I don’t see the current majority wins election is a very good way to bring about a change to liberal values.  True, Trump didn’t win a mandate, he had a very narrow victory in the popular vote.  Very likely, since his margin was so small some people will get fed up with him and in the midterms the Democrats will probably win the house.  And then we will stalemate for two years.  But even if the Democrats win the next electing by a narrow margin, it won’t resolve the polarization in the country.  We can’t afford to see-saw back and forth, lurching left and then right and left again.  That will simply, is simply, making us very unstable and only increasing polarization.  

The only solution it seems to me is to listen to each other’s fears and desires, to compromise, and to take a middle course, balancing the two side.  But I have no idea how to do this.

The basic problem as I see it is the enormous changes that are happening in the world with the advances in scientific knowledge and with the huge changes brought about by the computer in automation, changes in technogogy made much more rapid by the computer such as the Internet including global trade and transportation and communication.  These changes and the shrinking of the world and the flattening of the playing field have brought about changes globalizing cultural values leading to a an opening up to diversity which now threatens traditional American values.  The urban half of the country is liberalizing and the rural half is retreating to conservative values.

This rapid technical and social change is dislocating everyone, conservative and liberal, and it is very hard for anyone to know what is going on or how to deal with this rapid change.  And AI is only going to speed up and intensify change.

For this reason is is very hard to persuade anyone what to do next and certainly how to deal with change when we are so completely polarized.  

This is why I don’t see what an 87 year old, weak in the knees and softening in the brain with no clear understanding of what is going on and with no political power, me, is going to do very much of anything to bring a resolution to our polarization and scapegoating.

I don’t know how to adapt to a changing world and if I did no one would listen to me.  I don’t find anyone else with liberal values who agrees with me that MAGA people are good people understandably defending traditional American values.  All it seems that I can do is to talk to myself, which I am doing here and see if anyone agrees with me.  But at least, probably harmlessly, doing something which will make me feel better.