Solutions?

I Got Yer Solutions Right Here

DO YOU WANT SOLUTIONS? I’ve got some.

During my Knight-Wallace Fellowship at the University of Michigan, I was able to study with, read, and interview leading scholars on democracy, national security, social media, political polling, and American social breakdown.

In these grim times, I don’t want anyone to lose hope. So here are their suggestions, collated for the preface of my (new/forthcoming) book:

We need increasing participation in elections, creating a strong populist-progressive party on the left, but also a functional and responsible conservative one on the right. This should be done without turning political parties back into the closed, smoke-filled rooms of Chicago in ‘68, and while doing this, we should also resurrect local news media, and broaden the voices of our existing media without compromising fact-based objectivity or free speech. And also we must shore up voting rights, replace the electoral college, shrink the primary season, pack the courts, and build cross-cutting coalitions among people who despise each other.

The Republican Party should be rebuilt, but also the Democratic Party, with stronger control of candidate selection, but also wider grass roots power, and total message discipline but also “big tent” approaches to incorporating moderates and dissenters.

It would help to have a more effective presidency, but also an independent and forceful congress, one that passes legislation with a simple majority that can’t be blocked by filibusters. And maybe we need four political parties, instead of two—or at least two bigger party organizations that can incorporate diverse wings, and new movements. And then engender compromise among them.

I’d also like a unicorn that shits strawberry ice cream.

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In other words, there is no easy solution. Nothing is monocausal. All the answers require tradeoffs and impossible compromises. Most are foreclosed to us by current realities.

So comment please: what answers work, or don’t?