Friday, June 21, 2019

Rough Primaries Are Fine

A blogger I admire, commenting on the reaction to Biden’s defense of old-time segregationists, wrote: “this is already turning into a very ugly primary race.” Four points.

1. Primaries are always ugly. Politics ain’t beanbag—and we have that cliche because every primary season, those with long memories have to point it out anew.

2. Primaries should be tough. Look, you want to face a candidate from the other party, where it’s going to get a whole lot uglier, you better be ready for bare-knuckle politics. We might have a lovely fantasy where elections are decided by logic and fair play, but it’s just a fantasy—those elections don’t exist in the wild. 

3. Ugly primaries do not damage the eventual winner. I mean, Donald Trump is our President.

4. The quest for”civility” is only ever pursued by those who already hold comfortable power. For those who are marginalized, disempowered, or worse, “civility” is a way of stifling their voice, minimizing their emotion.

In this of all elections, we have to give up the idea that the next 18 months are going to be anything other than the ugliest of our political lives.

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