Former Iowa Congressman talks of reclaiming a 'pragmatic, centrist-oriented society' Idaho Statesman Leach was appointed National Endowment for the Humanities chairman by President Barack Obama, whom he endorsed because he wanted change in foreign policy. Leach talked with the Statesman on Thursday about polarization, world politics, the financial crisis and the lessons of wrestling. A: To call a public figure in America a 'fascist' implies that they can be identified with Hitler, which is preposterous. ... If we can't think of someone as a leader even though we might disagree with him on a host of issues, that's terrifying for society. Q: You have said that candidates often win by "tearing down rather than uplifting." What are theprospects for effective governance after the November election? A: It doesn't matter in one sense whether the Republican Party controls or the Democratic Party controls, as long as whoever comes to Washington is willing to work with the other side. ... If polarization is so stark that you can never find a common ground, we're going to have a very hard time with the possibility of government shutdowns and whatever that can follow. Q: You co-authored the 1999 law that repealed restrictions on investment banks, commercial banks and insurance companies. Were those a mistake? A: The regulatory format under Gramm-Leach-Bliley had more regulations attached than before. What occurred in the years basically under the Bush administration but also beginning in the late Clinton administration, was a decision to take regulations themselves off a whole host of activities. It was the reduction of leverage ratios that caused the great over-leveraging that occurred in American banking at its biggest level. If you go to laws that really mattered, where Congress was totally complicit with the bad regulation that occurred, it goes back to 1993 and the laws that apply to the regulation of the housing industry, particularly Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Q: You have said lawmakers of both parties "increasingly reflect principally the philosophical edges" and crowd out what you call a "pragmatic, centrist-oriented society." How can centrists regain influence? A: This is one of the great problems in American society and one of the most overlooked aspects of our politics. If you want to have a more centrist orientation to a society, you've got to get much bigger, much more active participation in the primary process. Presidential candidates try to scoot to the center in the general. In legislatures, there's no scoot. If they move to the center, they will be challenged in a primary and are likely to lose their position based on a primary vote, not a general election vote. American politics is caught in the crossfire ... suggesting that compromise, efforts to seek common ground, are somehow giving up principle, and maybe are immoral, in the eyes of some. Q: You have raised concerns new media promotes extremism. Should anonymous bloggers be required to identify themselves? A: It's awfully hard to intrude on the American system and the right to be anonymous. On the other hand, people should take anonymous commentary with a great grain of salt. You have a self-selected direction of news reporting that some of the media do in order to attract audiences. And so for the first time in modern times, a normal person can go through the day and only be subjected to views that they largely held in advance. Q: You have called "secession" the most shocking word of all the angry rhetoric and asked whether we will continue to "perceive ourselves as belonging to a single American community with all its variety." How will this play out? A: If you look at American history ... you find that there is a great deal of concern or apprehension about the extremes, and that America's always historically been centrist-oriented. But today that may be breaking down. It looks like increasingly people are lining up on one side or the other and they're, in effect, forming camps where the great American middle is at least proportionately very poorly represented in legislative bodies, particularly in Congress. Q: You coined the moniker "Jefferson the Curious" at a speech at the University of Virginia. With states cutting funding for public and higher education, is Jefferson's legacy at risk? A: Everyone views Jefferson from their own perspective. Progressives consider him the great progressive; conservatives consider him the great conservative. He studied all of the religions in the world and he came to the conclusion that what mattered most was not where these religions differed but where they conjoined. ... This is one of the most tolerant perspectives conceivable. ... To form a union when one state was Catholic, another was Puritan, another was Anglican, another was Dutch Reformed - you had to come up with a position on whether we should establish a national church. And wisely, our founders didn't. Now we have to deal with the issue of how we look at the issue of tolerance, both within our society, and, increasingly, outside our society because the world is shrinking to such an extent we become neighbors with people at very far distances. Q: And as for disinvestment in education? A: Partly because of the cost, partly because of competitive claims on American public life, suddenly the public universities in America are being cut back dramatically from where they were 20, 25 years ago. I was told today, a university president was saying more students were lost at his university due to debt than bad grades. And that is one of the real challenges of our time: How we can afford a good university and public education at the post-secondary level? Q: You have strongly supported the United Nations. Why do we still need it? A: If you didn't have a U.N., you'd probably have to move to create something of a like kind, and it's very unlikely the world community would ever allow us to maintain a veto, which we currently have. Beyond that, the U.N. is a convenient place, and a helpful place often, to let the world express its views. One of the issues in the world is how we lead it and whether we're going to lead it in conjunction with others or whether we're going to be isolated from everybody else. I, for one, think the case for leadership overwhelms the case for isolation. Q: You endorsed Obama, largely because you said major change was necessary in foreign policy. After 16 months, how do you assess his performance, particularly in the Muslim world? A: His speech in Cairo was one of the great speeches of an American president. And I want to stress this, because a lot of people that feel we have a president of another party, we might not appreciate that. But when a president of the United States in the middle of the Muslim world stands up and he says he wants to emphasize greater communications between peoples of the great faiths of the world and emphasize what is similar, not what is dissimilar; and then suggest that one of the great challenges is to get the youth of America to communicate with the youth of Egypt - I think these are very uplifting concepts that reflect respect rather than antagonism. You cannot assess any presidency before it's fully unfurled. But there is a process under way in which it looks as though we will be largely able to pull out our troops from Iraq, and I think that is a major plus. We have some challenges in Afghanistan that the whole country understands. Hopefully, we'll be in that kind of a position in a few years there as well. Q: You were a champion wrestler and are a member of the International Wrestling Hall of Fame. Are there lessons from sport that apply to politics? A: Sports has a higher ethic at the moment than politics. There's no good coach anywhere in the world that doesn't teach the kids to respect the opponent. When games are played, when wrestling matches occur, there are rules that apply. Obviously, one of two sides is going to win, and one of two sides is not going to. But both sides in a way are winners if they play the game the right way. I consider the circle on the wrestling mat to be the most equalitarian circle in the world. You go out onto a mat, and some kids are tougher kids, but other kids are cleverer than the tough ones. Wrestling is a combination of dedication, of training, of the mind as well as the body. And it's not exactly like weight-lifting; that is, the strongest kid is not the one that always prevails. It's the one that learns how to play the sport the right way, and, in a physical sense, how to use some of the strengths of your opponent to your advantage. There are strategic lessons as well as rules lessons that I think people inpolitics can learn a great deal from sport. Dan Popkey: 377-6438 http://www.idahostatesman.com/2010/06/06/1219921/reclaiming-a-pragmatic-centrist.html |