It is not too early to begin thinking about the next presidential election. Senator Mitch McConnell is absolutely correct that the most important task confronting conservatives is to see that Barack Obama is not re-elected. As long as he is in office, he will prevent the imperative reforms needed to return us to prosperity and freedom.
It is, of course, important that groups like the tea party hold Republican feet to the fire. Efforts, even if not immediately successful, must be made to control the budget and dismantle ObamaCare. Excuses should not be tolerated, even if compromises are occasionally required.
But with regard to the next president, it is crucial that those who want responsible change, themselves be responsible. Too many of those who are disturbed by Obama have an unfortunate tendency to be almost as idealistic as he is. And make no mistake, it is his idealism that is among his greatest faults.
One of my previous books is called The Limits of Idealism. In it, I made the point that idealism is for the very young. In their inexperience and romanticism, they imagine that the world can become what is not possible. They, for instance, champion a complete equality that is neither feasible nor potentially beneficial.
Adults must learn the lesson of Clint Eastwood’s Harry Callahan. They, like Dirty Harry, must be aware that “a man’s got to know his limitations.” Despite its implicit sexism and personal orientation, this is advice that should apply to society as a whole. The world—including its political systems—are replete with limitations.
Dreams are good things, but if detached from reality, they have a way of leading us over a cliff. Our aspirations must therefore be tempered by what we learn is doable. Even when what we would like turns out to be fantasy, we need the courage and reasonableness to accept what we can attain.
Which brings me back to the impending presidential election. Sarah Palin is in many ways an admirable and much maligned person. Despite her detractors, she is intelligent and fairly well informed. Moreover, she cleverly and energetically expresses many of the opinions of those eager to dismantle the Obama legacy.
Unfortunately, former governor Palin has a serious drawback. She is egregiously inexperienced. Much like Obama himself, she has not been seasoned in the realities of governance. Having spent very little time in high office, much like him, she is not familiar with what can be done, or how it should be done.
What is needed is someone more like Ronald Reagan and not like Barry Goldwater. Goldwater was not the madman he was made out to be, and he very articulately expressed the views of many conservatives. But he was an idealist. Not for him the gradual improvements of the meliorist, but rather the broad strokes of the radical reformer.
Some thought Reagan was made from the same clay, but they were wrong. Although a very consequential president, he rarely went beyond what was practical. That meant he often settled for half a loaf, because he knew this was all he could get.
Reagan learned these lessons running a trade union and serving two terms as governor of California. In both capacities, he was successful. In both, he also learned the tools of his eventual trade. Reagan could give a stem-winder of a speech, but he also knew how to be an effective administrator.
Palin, and others of her idealistic ilk, also know how to be inspirational. This, of course, includes Obama, who in recent days has reconfirmed his rhetorical eminence. But being presidential means knowing how to do more than sound presidential. It entails pragmatic skills and knowledge grounded social facts.
It is for this reason that conservative activists must be careful. The Republicans have a strong bench that boasts many experienced leaders. It is from these that their eventual candidate should be chosen. Mere flash should not be the criteria. What is needed is substance. Given the magnitude of the problems we face, we need someone with the expertise and the gravitas to implement changes that work; changes that do more than merely sound good.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Sunday, January 23, 2011
The Legacy of C. Wright Mills
Not long ago, a student in one of my classes told me he had discovered C. Wright Mills. So enraptured was he by Mills’ theories as recorded in The Power Elite, that he recommended them to me. He was therefore a little deflated when I told him that I had read Mills and considered him an economic illiterate. I could also have added I thought him “a dangerous political illiterate” as well.
As it happened, I had recently read an intellectual biography of Mills written by Irving Lewis Horowitz. Sympathetic to his subject, Horowitz portrayed Mills as well meaning, but habitually given to confronting authority. In his early years, tolerated by his professors because they recognized his potential, he later came to be despised by colleagues whose work he regularly dismissed as inadequate.
One of the things the biography made clear is that Mills was an academic innocent. Almost completely bereft of direct experience in the world, he nevertheless felt entitled to write books that characterized the social universe in bold and apparently authoritative stokes.
How far this was from reality was confirmed by his judgment of the Castro regime in Cuba. While it was still new and untested—but after it had already executed many so-called counter-revolutionaries without a trial—he, on the basis of a few interviews with some of Castro’s cronies, decided that the Cuban Revolution was the wave of the future.
Ironically he, in print, boasted of the enormous economic achievements of the communists, based on the claims of Cuban officials that their citizens had already multiplied agricultural output thanks to their revolutionary ardor. What made this assertion particularly strange was that the island nation would eventually become an economic basket case, largely sustained by aid from the Soviet Union.
In any event, Mills was no less shy in evaluating the government of the United States. He decided that the country was ruled by a tripartite arrangement wherein politicians, military officers, and business leaders governed for their own advantage. These parties were described as forming an iron triangle from which ordinary citizens were excluded.
How absurd this was, was later revealed by the dramatic turnover in all of the players he cited. In Mills time one of the participants was U.S. Steel. It was a huge corporation that was presumed to be eternal. But where is this company now? It has been done in by foreign competition and the advent of plastics and other metals such as aluminum.
And how about the military officers who were theoretically so powerful that they dictated American foreign policy and domestic budgets. The individual officers have long since retired, but more than that, the military was not able to prevent its subsequent downsizing. Nor was it able to get all of the weapons it sought.
And as for the politicians, they really do get rotated by the electoral process. Sometimes Democrats are up, but at other times it is the Republicans. Some say these are interchangeable; nonetheless the advent of Barack Obama would argue otherwise. People complain of the vitriolic language endemic to contemporary politics, yet that is because the parties disagree. The one wants to expand government, while the other is intent on contracting it.
Mills was wrong—not only because times have changed, but because he was essentially addicted to conspiracy theories. This is a common failing of those who do not have direct experience with the operations of power. The poor, in particular, are wont to assume that a small band of individuals manipulate events from behind the scenes. But this is not true. Nor given human nature, could it be.
I am reminded of what Harry Truman said of Dwight Eisenhower. Just before he turned over the presidency to his successor, he observed that Ike was in more trouble than he realized. Ike, he opined, would give order as he did while a general and expect tit to be obeyed as formerly. The presidency, however, was different. He would give orders and nothing would happen. Then he would not know what to do.
But Truman too was wrong. Even though he had been an officer during the First World War, he was mistaken if he believed that military orders are always obeyed with alacrity. Human nature is such that people often do as they please—even in the military. People are not automatons. If they are able to, they assert what control they can over their own lives.
This means that no conspiracy, grand or small, can be as effective as the uninitiated imagine. Actual bosses know their power is circumscribed. Most also know that they cannot give preemptory orders; that their subordinates require some wiggle room. If they do not provide it, they can expect overt, and/or covert, insubordination.
The scary fact, the really scary fact, is not that conspiracies control the world. No, it is that no one is in charge. Some people have more power than others, but no one (or group) is so powerful as to determine everything that gets done. In the real world, not even children are reflexive pawns. Just ask their parents.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
As it happened, I had recently read an intellectual biography of Mills written by Irving Lewis Horowitz. Sympathetic to his subject, Horowitz portrayed Mills as well meaning, but habitually given to confronting authority. In his early years, tolerated by his professors because they recognized his potential, he later came to be despised by colleagues whose work he regularly dismissed as inadequate.
One of the things the biography made clear is that Mills was an academic innocent. Almost completely bereft of direct experience in the world, he nevertheless felt entitled to write books that characterized the social universe in bold and apparently authoritative stokes.
How far this was from reality was confirmed by his judgment of the Castro regime in Cuba. While it was still new and untested—but after it had already executed many so-called counter-revolutionaries without a trial—he, on the basis of a few interviews with some of Castro’s cronies, decided that the Cuban Revolution was the wave of the future.
Ironically he, in print, boasted of the enormous economic achievements of the communists, based on the claims of Cuban officials that their citizens had already multiplied agricultural output thanks to their revolutionary ardor. What made this assertion particularly strange was that the island nation would eventually become an economic basket case, largely sustained by aid from the Soviet Union.
In any event, Mills was no less shy in evaluating the government of the United States. He decided that the country was ruled by a tripartite arrangement wherein politicians, military officers, and business leaders governed for their own advantage. These parties were described as forming an iron triangle from which ordinary citizens were excluded.
How absurd this was, was later revealed by the dramatic turnover in all of the players he cited. In Mills time one of the participants was U.S. Steel. It was a huge corporation that was presumed to be eternal. But where is this company now? It has been done in by foreign competition and the advent of plastics and other metals such as aluminum.
And how about the military officers who were theoretically so powerful that they dictated American foreign policy and domestic budgets. The individual officers have long since retired, but more than that, the military was not able to prevent its subsequent downsizing. Nor was it able to get all of the weapons it sought.
And as for the politicians, they really do get rotated by the electoral process. Sometimes Democrats are up, but at other times it is the Republicans. Some say these are interchangeable; nonetheless the advent of Barack Obama would argue otherwise. People complain of the vitriolic language endemic to contemporary politics, yet that is because the parties disagree. The one wants to expand government, while the other is intent on contracting it.
Mills was wrong—not only because times have changed, but because he was essentially addicted to conspiracy theories. This is a common failing of those who do not have direct experience with the operations of power. The poor, in particular, are wont to assume that a small band of individuals manipulate events from behind the scenes. But this is not true. Nor given human nature, could it be.
I am reminded of what Harry Truman said of Dwight Eisenhower. Just before he turned over the presidency to his successor, he observed that Ike was in more trouble than he realized. Ike, he opined, would give order as he did while a general and expect tit to be obeyed as formerly. The presidency, however, was different. He would give orders and nothing would happen. Then he would not know what to do.
But Truman too was wrong. Even though he had been an officer during the First World War, he was mistaken if he believed that military orders are always obeyed with alacrity. Human nature is such that people often do as they please—even in the military. People are not automatons. If they are able to, they assert what control they can over their own lives.
This means that no conspiracy, grand or small, can be as effective as the uninitiated imagine. Actual bosses know their power is circumscribed. Most also know that they cannot give preemptory orders; that their subordinates require some wiggle room. If they do not provide it, they can expect overt, and/or covert, insubordination.
The scary fact, the really scary fact, is not that conspiracies control the world. No, it is that no one is in charge. Some people have more power than others, but no one (or group) is so powerful as to determine everything that gets done. In the real world, not even children are reflexive pawns. Just ask their parents.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Sex and the Young Adult
Sometimes the world is not as we would prefer. Sometimes the facts lead to unwelcome conclusions. I have recently found this to be the case with respect to my attitudes toward premarital sex.
Let me explain. I am not a child. I came to maturity many decades ago. My views of sexuality were consequently shaped in very different times from today. Indeed, my ideal of demure femininity was Doris Day. No; not the Doris who succumbed to the charms of Rock Hudson, but the squeaky pure one courted by Gorgon MacCrae.
Nevertheless, I am a college professor and as such I do research. Recently this has concerned marriage and dating. Much to my surprise, the ways these are managed nowadays differ considerably from what was once the case.
To be more precise, men and women are marrying much later than previously. As of now, the average for women is twenty-six and for men twenty-eight. No longer are couples meeting in high school or even college. No longer are they finding a first love while still in school and then making a match that lasts a lifetime.
Everyone knows that divorce has become common, but not everyone realizes that individuals who wait until their respective careers are well underway are currently forming the strongest unions.
This means that men and women are marrying over a decade after they achieve sexual maturity. This implies that if the Doris Day model were followed, people would have to exercise iron-will for a very long time if they were to be sexually innocent when they finally tied the knot.
As might be expected, this is not what is happening. Almost everyone, male and female, has some experience with coitus before this is officially condoned. If anything, those who remain completely abstinent until their late-twenties are today considered deviant. They are certainly not the norm.
Mind you, promiscuity remains a problem. People who play musical beds in a manner suggested by the media are scarcely good candidates for stable matrimonial bonds. Those who treat intercourse as if it were the same as a handshake do not make reliable partners for committed relationships.
This puts us in a quandary. If marriage is a good thing—and I am certain it is—and if sexual exploration is virtually inevitable before marriage, how do we keep the sex act sufficiently valued so that it is not indiscriminately indulged in?
The good news is that most people cherish marital fidelity. They also tend to disparage sleeping around. In particular, despite an increasing tolerance of pre-marital sex, women who have too many partners continue to be regarded as “sluts.” Like it or not, there remains a “double standard.”
But why shouldn’t there be. Freud has been reviled for asserting that “anatomy is destiny,” but he was right. Women become pregnant; men don’t. As a result, women have more to lose if they are careless in bestowing their favors.
So where does this leave us? For one thing is makes efforts to promote complete abstinence problematic. These may serve to delay sexual activity, but cannot stop it. They may help to limit the number of partners, but will not reduce them to zero.
In other words, whatever our personal preferences, premarital sex must be accepted as a fact of life. If we are to be realistic, we need to encourage the young to delay sexuality and then to indulge in it with circumspection. They have to be taught that sex is a potent form of human interaction and therefore should not be taken lightly.
Most especially, unprotected sex that results in unwanted pregnancies must be kept to a minimum. Whatever the hormonal drives of young adults, these must not be allowed to produce misery in children who do not ask to be born.
Times may have changed, but free love continues to be a contradiction is terms. If love is interpreted as sex—as it frequently is—then broad freedom cannot be confused with irresponsibility. There must still be limits to when and with whom.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Let me explain. I am not a child. I came to maturity many decades ago. My views of sexuality were consequently shaped in very different times from today. Indeed, my ideal of demure femininity was Doris Day. No; not the Doris who succumbed to the charms of Rock Hudson, but the squeaky pure one courted by Gorgon MacCrae.
Nevertheless, I am a college professor and as such I do research. Recently this has concerned marriage and dating. Much to my surprise, the ways these are managed nowadays differ considerably from what was once the case.
To be more precise, men and women are marrying much later than previously. As of now, the average for women is twenty-six and for men twenty-eight. No longer are couples meeting in high school or even college. No longer are they finding a first love while still in school and then making a match that lasts a lifetime.
Everyone knows that divorce has become common, but not everyone realizes that individuals who wait until their respective careers are well underway are currently forming the strongest unions.
This means that men and women are marrying over a decade after they achieve sexual maturity. This implies that if the Doris Day model were followed, people would have to exercise iron-will for a very long time if they were to be sexually innocent when they finally tied the knot.
As might be expected, this is not what is happening. Almost everyone, male and female, has some experience with coitus before this is officially condoned. If anything, those who remain completely abstinent until their late-twenties are today considered deviant. They are certainly not the norm.
Mind you, promiscuity remains a problem. People who play musical beds in a manner suggested by the media are scarcely good candidates for stable matrimonial bonds. Those who treat intercourse as if it were the same as a handshake do not make reliable partners for committed relationships.
This puts us in a quandary. If marriage is a good thing—and I am certain it is—and if sexual exploration is virtually inevitable before marriage, how do we keep the sex act sufficiently valued so that it is not indiscriminately indulged in?
The good news is that most people cherish marital fidelity. They also tend to disparage sleeping around. In particular, despite an increasing tolerance of pre-marital sex, women who have too many partners continue to be regarded as “sluts.” Like it or not, there remains a “double standard.”
But why shouldn’t there be. Freud has been reviled for asserting that “anatomy is destiny,” but he was right. Women become pregnant; men don’t. As a result, women have more to lose if they are careless in bestowing their favors.
So where does this leave us? For one thing is makes efforts to promote complete abstinence problematic. These may serve to delay sexual activity, but cannot stop it. They may help to limit the number of partners, but will not reduce them to zero.
In other words, whatever our personal preferences, premarital sex must be accepted as a fact of life. If we are to be realistic, we need to encourage the young to delay sexuality and then to indulge in it with circumspection. They have to be taught that sex is a potent form of human interaction and therefore should not be taken lightly.
Most especially, unprotected sex that results in unwanted pregnancies must be kept to a minimum. Whatever the hormonal drives of young adults, these must not be allowed to produce misery in children who do not ask to be born.
Times may have changed, but free love continues to be a contradiction is terms. If love is interpreted as sex—as it frequently is—then broad freedom cannot be confused with irresponsibility. There must still be limits to when and with whom.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
