Stealing from Myself

I'm required to blog weekly for my Ethics class, so usually those are short and not very interesting.  However, this is what I posted this week, and it's a little longer and better.  So I'm reposting it.

I don’t know if anyone else likes podcasts at all, or Slate.com, but if you like either, you should listen to their “Political Gabfest” podcast.  It’s one of my favourites.  Anyway, a point they’ve made several times on their show is that campaigns and primaries have the perverse effect of narrowing the field down to egomaniacs who either have extreme ideologies or are willing to lie and say they do for a while – either way, not a desirable candidate.

When I was reading the Warwick piece and got to the end bit about central ethical principles we should want to see public servants possess, I found myself thinking about that podcast and that particular point.  Campaigns and primaries do seem like a great way to weed out all five of those ethical principles.

-Public Orientation: you have to have money to run a campaign.  You have to say things that please interest groups to get money.  Having a general “public interest”, unfortunately, just won’t win you the money you need.

-Reflective choice: especially during primaries, there are just certain values we demand our candidates say, whether they actually believe them or not.  I’m thinking specifically of how Romney recently had to run away from his own health care policies.

-Veracity: fudging, stretching and otherwise distorting the truth is a fundamental part of campaigns.  While of course ideally a candidate should be able to present facts fully and honestly, I know from my own campaign work that omissions and distortions are presented to campaign staff as serving the higher good of election, and thus acceptable.  I’m sure they’re presented the same way to the candidate.

-Procedural Respect: especially in our current climate, you are not going to get elected saying that “Washington has its flaws, but the institutions are there for a reason so I’ll probably keep most of those in place.”

-Restraint of means: 1. Campaigns spend like crazy, and more money is always, always better; and 2. Campaigns are not won with small, reasonable promises.  They are won with big, sweeping, expensive promises of change.  Even promises to cut spending all over the place are not tempered and do not reflect a thoughtful restraint of means.