This Op-Ed is inspired by my reading of a previous Op-Ed, "Many Asking What Happened" by Adam Jerome, so I will start with my thanks for giving me the idea for writing this.

Adam's Op-Ed discussed the different reactions from the right and from the left to the release Scott McClellan's book. To get the full effect, one should read Adam's article. It provided a good distillation of how the two sides see McClellan, his motives and his credibility completely differently, based on party lines. My initial reaction (which I posted as a comment) was this:

It seems to me that what you describe is a sort of "half-full or half-empty" situation, where Republicans are skeptical of McClellan's claims and see him as self-serving, while Democrats are embracing him as a patriotic whistle-blower. Just like the optimist that sees the glass half-full and the pessimist that sees the exact same glass half-empty, our biases and dispositions (based on ideology, social or cultural influences, life experience, etc etc) often cause us to see what we want to see, and cause different people to draw radically different conclusions when examining the exact same information.

Writing that comment immediately brought me back to an Op-Ed that I wrote last week, "Character Assassination and the Death of Free Speech." In that Op-Ed I described my perception of how our public figures (and perhaps, because of this tone in our national discourse, anyone) are in constant risk of character assassination anytime they attempt to speak their mind. The two examples I mentioned were Hillary's RFK assassination comments last week, and Obama's "bitter" comments a month or two ago. In one instance, a candidate was answering a reporter's question about the length of a primary season, in another, a candidate was answering a citizen's question about the political concerns of rural citizens. In both instances, pundits and politicians alike immediately denounced the candidates' statements, blowing them out of proportion and jumping to extreme conclusions from them. Instead of considering the candidates' statements calmly and respectfully, instead of sincerely attempting to discern what the candidates meant to say, commentators rushed to discredit the candidates as people, jumping to conclusions about their very character, and denouncing them as heartless and hostile towards others.

The conclusion that I took from this is that this kind of discrediting of political opponents through character assassination is dangerous for our democracy because it stifles free speech. I figured that politicians, being rational actors, calculated the probability and the potential harm to their campaigns, of being skewered in such as way by pundits and politicians, if they say too much, or are too honest and candid about "hard truths." Thus, I figured that this might be a big reason why politicians typically say as little as possible (usually despite talking for a long time), and never go beyond vague rhetoric that can only hint at what their views are and what their policies would be. I concluded that this amounted to a sort of silencing of the candidates, a partial death of free speech in this country, and thus a danger to our democracy and the vitality of our nation.

But this tone of character assassination, most frequently used to discredit political opponents is not restricted to the realm of political contests. Indeed, pundits and politicians often use such tactics to discredit the views of anyone on the opposite side of the political spectrum, that would speak their mind from their perspective. And what we watch on television can easily set the tone for our everyday interactions.

It is good to feel passionate about one's views and one's politics, but it is not good if we, like those on television, feel that the only way to stay true to our ideas and beliefs is to discredit as ignorant or ideological, or demonize as heartless or self-serving, anyone with a potentially different perspective, with the attitude that any other response is conceding defeat. If we let ourselves get sucked in by such an attitude, we run the risk of behaving in the same way as pundits and politicians that seem to harbor a willful blindness to differing perspectives, that refuse to acknowledge and refuse to attempt to overcome their own biases, and refuse to consider the validity of opposing viewpoints.

If we get caught up in this, we too might develop a sub-conscious, knee-jerk instinct to dismiss someone in our life or our day-to-day interactions, who comes from an opposing political perspective, as some kind of lunatic fringer, someone who we could only talk to in a screaming match, or not at all. Often people will choose the latter, perhaps partly out of fear that whatever they say, whether centrist, or slightly right leaning or slightly left leaning or whatever, will be immediately blown out of proportion by those who are not on the exact same point in the political spectrum, to the point where anything you say has the potential to make you into that same heartless and hostile, anti-social and anti-American, out of touch outcast that pundits and politicians constantly make out of one another throughout our national discourse.

And if we start to behave like this, if we live in a society like this, then, in the same way that candidates can be silenced for fear of character assassination, we too will be silenced from speaking our mind.

And in this way, the national discourse on television and mass media interacts with our national discourse in our day-to-day lives. But I don't think it's possible to underestimate how closely together these two are tied, and how some seem to purposely tie them closer together, to bring the same hostile discourse engaged in by the pundits and politicians, to the people - to us in our everyday lives.

In terms of the national media discourse, last week it was Hillary, this week it's Scott McClellan. What is going on with McClellan is scary in the way that it illustrates the overlap between media discourse and discourse among ordinary American citizens, and the tendency to forego any serious discussion and instead engage in character attacks. First and foremost came the personal attacks on a public figure. "He doesn't sound like himself." In other words, this means - he is lying. Because he is lying, he can't be trusted, and he must be pursuing his own selfish motives. But then came a more generalized attack, an attack leveled at ordinary American citizens. I am talking about how Karl Rove said that McClellan sounded like a "left-wing blogger." To me, this is an attack on the American People, on a people whose national identity embraces the right to free speech and the right to speak one's mind freely and without intimidation, without fear that one will be penalized for doing so. We may agree that some types of speech, such as hateful speech, should not by worthy of such a right. But to insult someone and demonize them by equating them with a "left-wing blogger" and to implicitly demonize anyone with "left-wing" opinions that choses to speak their mind in a public forum, is to demonize and thus to attempt to silence vast numbers of ordinary Americans (since anyone who is not right or center will often get characterized as "left wing") that are well-within their rights. To attempt to silence these ordinary Americans that simply wish to speak their mind is to attempt to strip them of one of the fundamental liberties that define our nation and that provide the basis for our patriotism and our national pride.

If we are to maintain that national pride, if we are to be patriots, if we are to have any concern for the greater good, We must be constantly aware of such threats. We must expose them where they exists and we must constantly guard against them. We can start by refusing to get caught up in the games played by the pundits and politicians, of discrediting and demonizing others for political gain and personal satisfaction. Instead, we can be open-minded towards the perspectives of others, seeking knowledge and illumination by considering the opinions of other people with views and experiences that are different from ours. We can also be honest with ourselves, and make a constant effort to be aware of our own biases, and try as best we can (for we can maybe never fully be free of them since they are so ingrained in our subconscious and our personalities) not to let them make our decisions for us, without a careful consideration of the facts. In other words, we can try to overcome our biases and be careful not to jump to conclusions or knee-jerk reactions, but instead try to get both sides of the story - always being open-minded towards the perspectives of others. Unlike the politicians and pundits, we can refrain from dismissing opposing viewpoints outright, refrain from setting up straw-men and attacking the (often caricatured and exaggerated) views and character of others. Instead, we can recognize that opposing views are often no more biased and ideological (and therefore no less valid) than our own.

If we refuse hostility and instead offer openness and respect to those on the other side of the political, aisle, we make it possible for people to be willing to talk to others and to share different perspectives - something that seems like it is going out of style as individual web sites, news shows, and even networks seem to have become echo chambers of people with the same views speaking only to each other.

And I think only then, only when we stop isolating ourselves into camps of like-minded people that don't talk to one another, only when we feel comfortable to speak to those with differing views and perspectives from ours, can we truly begin to have a complete understanding of the important issues and challenges facing us today, and only then can we begin to find solutions.