In our large and diverse American culture, disagreements about core issues are inevitable. Democracy depends on our willingness to voice those differences and actually listen to those with whom we disagree. And it depends upon our confidence that our leaders will hear, pay attention to our arguments, and lead us to the compromises required.
EJ Dionne, a columnist for the Washington Post has written an insightful commentary on the importance of these debates and on the President’s role in them:
Given my social democratic leanings I would assert, for example, that equal opportunity—including the opportunity to participate fully in self-government—demands a far greater degree of economic security and equality than we currently enjoy. This is particularly true when it comes to access to health care, education, family time away from paid labor, and the chance to accumulate wealth.
You might push back and say that my proposals toward these ends impinge more than they should on individual freedom and require higher levels of taxation than you are willing to put up with. Or you might insist that I am focusing too much on economics and that promoting better personal values society-wide is more conducive to the nation's well-being than any of my programs for greater equity.
And, yes, we might quarrel about who has a right to join our political community and become part of our nation. …
Such debates can be bitter, but democracy's health depends on our ability to hold our passions against each other in check and to offer each other at least some benefits of the doubt.
In our disagreements, I must accept you as a “legitimate rival.” I must listen to you with respect. I must argue against what you are saying and not attack you personally. I must be willing at least to search for tolerable compromise. Without such debate our country succumbs to acrimony and distrust, subverting our democracy.
There can be no question that our capacity to debate freely and openly has taken a profound hit over the last thirty-five years. Our increasing polarization has made it very difficult to listen to one another. We have shut down debate, either literally (shouting down speakers) or figuratively (listening to and reading only those who agree with us). Compromise has too often become betrayal. We have poisoned our democracy.
Dionne again:
Which, alas, brings us yet again to President Trump, who (no matter how much we want to) cannot be avoided at this moment because he threatens the conditions under which democracy can flourish.
Our current debate is frustrating and not only because Trump doesn't understand what "mutual toleration" and "forbearance" even mean. By persistently making himself, his personality, his needs, his prejudices and his stability the central topics of our political conversation, Trump is blocking the public conversation we ought to be having about how to move forward.
[T]here should now be no doubt (even if this was clear long ago) that we have a blatant racist as our president. His reference to immigrants from "sh--hole countries" and his expressed preference for Norwegians over Haitians, Salvadorans and new arrivals from Africa makes this abundantly clear. Racist leaders do not help us reach mutual toleration. …
But notice also what Trump's outburst did to our capacity to govern ourselves and make progress. Democrats and Republicans sympathetic to the plight of the Dreamers [had] worked out an immigration compromise designed carefully to give Trump what he had said he needed.
There were many concessions by Democrats on border security, "chain migration" based on family re-unification, and the diversity visa lottery that Trump had criticized. GOP senators such as Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., bargained in good faith and were given ample reason by Trump to think they had hit his sweet spot.
Trump blew them away with a torrent of bigotry.
The President broke no laws. He attacked no specific constitutional protections and suggested no outright muzzling of the free press (though he has done each before).
But his complete domination of the news cycle with self-aggrandizement, bigotry, disrespect, lies and so on poisons the possibilities for us to talk to each other and preserve at least a thread which we can follow back to a truly democratic society.
