HELLO 2024. I THINK WE’VE MET BEFORE
In the introduction to his hugely popular 1950s radio series “This I Believe”, CBS News broadcaster Edward R Murrow said:“We hardly need to be reminded that we are living in an age of confusion - a lot of us have traded in our beliefs for bitterness and cynicism or for a heavy package of despair or even a quivering portion of hysteria. Opinions can be picked up cheaply in the market place while such commodities as courage and fortitude and faith are in alarmingly short supply.”
The paragraph neatly sums up why 2024 may turn out to be a perfect fit for the French expression “plus ca change”, which is short for the expression “The more things change, the more they stay the same.”
On the face of it, that such sentiment should prevail in 2024 is not surprising, given that an assessment by the International Crisis Group warned the year “…begins with wars burning in Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine and peacemaking in crisis. Worldwide, diplomatic efforts to end fighting are failing. More leaders are pursuing their ends militarily. More believe they can get away with it.”
The good news is that 2024 also gives the world the best shot it’s had in a long time to counter that gloomy reality. In the next twelve months and to varying degrees, voters in more than 50 countries will get the chance to say how and by whom they wish to be led. The caveat – and isn’t there always one? – is that while democracy was intended to make us masters of our fate, we tend to “get what we pay for” in the form of who we elect. That’s in part because unless we pay attention, the advantage is with those inside the system.
The preferred tactic of the most discomfiting (to be kind) of today’s politicians and their handlers is to insult intelligence by discrediting reality to the point where the electorate accepts disorder as the norm.
Electioneering speeches, slogans and talking points are tailored more to what office-seekers believe their base and party supporters want to hear and will buy, than to what needs, can or ought to be delivered.
Working out whether a politician has more than a nodding acquaintance with truth, core-beliefs or principles, requires concern for the truth and the future.
Donald Trump’s lead in the polls (if they are to be believed) indicates neither of those matter to far too many. He has told tens of thousand of fact-checked lies, yet his supporters are willing to ignore them all. In spite of televised hearings, audits and inquiries that found no evidence of fraud in the 2020 U.S. elections, “more Americans question Biden’s victory than they did two years ago.”
THEY ARE NOT ALONE
An unwillingness, or inability to understand the point of 19th century French author Anatole France’s observation that “If fifty million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing” isn’t limited to the American public.
As much as I hold more than a few aspirants to power in contempt, one has to admit that given their attributes, it took them a lot of effort to rise to the very pinnacle of mediocrity.
Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was able to balance academic brilliance and bone-headed buffoonery without tipping the scales into anything useful either way.
Incumbent PM Rishi Sunak and a good number of his cabinet have contrived to use a first class education (nearly half of them are graduates of either Oxford or Cambridge) in such a way that no one would ever guess they attended the school of life, never mind revered institutions of learning.
The rank and file of legislative bodies have in the main measured up just as badly. An essential for good governance is an ability to find and navigate the middle ground, not pro forma dismissal of differing ideas. Instead, the New York Times “Opinion Video” concluded: “Sophomoric insults. Rudeness. Personal attacks. Cross talk. These have become defining features of American political debates these days.”
The description will be familiar to anyone who has observed parliamentary “debate” elsewhere.
How much better a democratic system and the populace it is supposed to serve would be if more “servants of the people” were humble and smart enough to be guided by this piece of wisdom from the late U.S. President Harry S. Truman” “It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.”
The essays broadcast on Murrow’s programme, which at its peak drew some 39-million listeners (the equivalent of 85-million in today’s U.S. population) concluded“.. by offering inspiration and hope for a troubling and worrisome period in time…”
They were broadcast without advertising. Transcripts were offered to local newspaper for free.
It’s a concept that would require a serious leap of faith on the part of mainstream media. But then, 2024 is a “Leap Year”, and it sure as hell could use a Murrow-like broadcast or two.
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