If you have been following the rise of the Open Source Thesis this year as I have, you should feel better than I do this morning.
Because at the heart of that thesis is the idea of consensus.
Consensus is how engineering works. Consensus is an important aspect of science.
Consensus is often misunderstood to mean everyone agrees. It doesn’t mean that. Global warming, as a concept, is accepted by a consensus of scientists. Yet there are scientists outside the consensus. To scientists this does not mean that global warming is wrong. To politicians, on the other hand, it’s an excuse to say just that.
Consensus is a process word. In some ways it’s an un-American word. It was part of our political vocabulary only once before in our history, around the turn of the last century. Progressives, populists, and regular Republicans came to consensus agreements that moved progressive policies forward, but slowly.
It’s ba-ack.
Consensus, as a process, runs entirely counter to the way we’ve operated throughout the political memory of everyone now living. Consensus is not the same thing as the broad agreement found in the New Deal Thesis, putting aside differences for a larger goal. And it is completely foreign to the Nixon Thesis of Conflict, the age we’re now moving out of.
But consensus is tough for someone like me to digest as well. Consensus leaves room for what you might call trolls, people who are violently opposed to the change I seek, who very much want to pull things in another direction.
So consensus knocked me in the teeth most of last night. I covered the South for Voic.us
and I watched Democrats fail. Only four House members went down in the
entire region, and only one Senator (subject to recount). Southern
Republican Governors, and their cronies, triumphed nearly
across-the-board.
In a way this should not be surprising, because the South has always
trailed the rest of the nation in terms of political Theses. Back in
1966 Republicans were still tough to find in these parts, despite
everything. The South resisted Progressivism mightily. And when the
bloody shirt was waved, whose bloody face you think it was waved in
front of?
But for liberals last night was frustrating generally. Republicans
proved stubbornly difficult to dislodge. Margins were often wafer-thin.
And that — not the "change" message heralded by the 1966 or 1930 or even 1894 elections — was the message of the night.
Find a way to get along. Skirt along the knife edge between the
branches of government, and within the legislative branch, to find a
way forward. I think Joe Lieberman’s victory was at the heart of that
message. As bitter a pill as that was for liberals to swallow, the
message was clear.
Get along, now.
Going forward, don’t dismiss Barack Obama. So what if he has only been
in office for 2 years. Grover Cleveland had been a private citizen four
years before he won the Presidency, in 1884. Theodore Roosevelt was
younger when he came to power than Obama is now, and in civic affairs
nearly as untested. Abraham Lincoln was not even an officeholder.
But Obama, in his manner and in his speech, is a good representative of
the concept of consensus. Even his features are a consensus between
black and white — the thin lips, the thin nose, the round eyes, yet
the dark skin that gives those lips the appearance of always having
lipstick on them. Add the calm voice, the pat on the back for political
opponents, and you have a formidable concept, in terms of the new Open
Source Thesis.
Just a thought to start your morning with.
Consensus leaves room for what you might call trolls, people who are violently opposed to the change I seek, who very much want to pull things in another direction.
[censored]ing classic. And great example of global warming. If you’re vague enough, you can claim consensus, but there are several levels of that particular debate where varying levels of consensus and discord exist. To ignore that is to stick your fingers in your ears because you don’t like people arguing.
Yeah, the earth is in a warming trend right now. It was actually warmer around 1000 A.D. when medieval monks all drove around in their Hummers. But there is broad agreement about the current warming trend. Next, go to cause. Is it human induced? Many models suggest that. Some models suggest significant impact from solar cycles.
Next, go to effect. Is global warming desirable? The knee-jerk distopian reaction is “hell no” and the knee-jerk socialist reaction is “what about the people of Bangladesh and the small islands in the Pacific? Well, economists are beginning to weigh in as they should on issues of costs, and there is no consensus on whether the cost of governments doing something actually justify the benefits. Some are asking whether warming will lead to more arable land, which would feed people cheaper and far outweigh the costs of protecting Bangladesh with a Dutch style system of dykes.
Others are asking whether we can plant our way out of carbon deficit, with the likes of Al Gore planting a new national forest every time he flies across the country on his private jet. But more seriously, others have been asking if a small sea of surface plankton in the north Pacific couldn’t yield the kind of offset we need to mitigate man-made warming. Gregory Benford (a prof at my alma matre, UC Irvine) actually asked that a decade ago.
And of course, we have worthless pols like Tony Blaire and Arnold Swarzenegger. Governator 2 last night said he was going to “solve deh global warming” in his upcoming term. In reality, he will do absolutely nothing, take credit for absolutely everything, and feel like a hero when he’s done. If that’s what consensus is all about, then count me in!
Consensus leaves room for what you might call trolls, people who are violently opposed to the change I seek, who very much want to pull things in another direction.
[censored]ing classic. And great example of global warming. If you’re vague enough, you can claim consensus, but there are several levels of that particular debate where varying levels of consensus and discord exist. To ignore that is to stick your fingers in your ears because you don’t like people arguing.
Yeah, the earth is in a warming trend right now. It was actually warmer around 1000 A.D. when medieval monks all drove around in their Hummers. But there is broad agreement about the current warming trend. Next, go to cause. Is it human induced? Many models suggest that. Some models suggest significant impact from solar cycles.
Next, go to effect. Is global warming desirable? The knee-jerk distopian reaction is “hell no” and the knee-jerk socialist reaction is “what about the people of Bangladesh and the small islands in the Pacific? Well, economists are beginning to weigh in as they should on issues of costs, and there is no consensus on whether the cost of governments doing something actually justify the benefits. Some are asking whether warming will lead to more arable land, which would feed people cheaper and far outweigh the costs of protecting Bangladesh with a Dutch style system of dykes.
Others are asking whether we can plant our way out of carbon deficit, with the likes of Al Gore planting a new national forest every time he flies across the country on his private jet. But more seriously, others have been asking if a small sea of surface plankton in the north Pacific couldn’t yield the kind of offset we need to mitigate man-made warming. Gregory Benford (a prof at my alma matre, UC Irvine) actually asked that a decade ago.
And of course, we have worthless pols like Tony Blaire and Arnold Swarzenegger. Governator 2 last night said he was going to “solve deh global warming” in his upcoming term. In reality, he will do absolutely nothing, take credit for absolutely everything, and feel like a hero when he’s done. If that’s what consensus is all about, then count me in!
I think that what you refer to as Consensus is a concept informed not so much by generational assumptions as what happens when you combine 435 sociopolitical microclimates, overlay concerns about Iraq, corruption and social issues, and stir them.
On voic.us you do a superb job of articulating microclimates in the region you cover. I’d advocate applying the phenomena you explore there- demographic, racial, rural-suburban-exurban-urban divides, and taking those metrics nationwide.
If yo do so, you then get a math which shakes itself out in the numbers which we saw yesterday- and the resulting need for consensus.
The important thing to remember here is that national generational assumptions do not shift as do reeds on a shoreline when the winds change.
Each of these microclimates – some districts voted for pro-war candidates, others voted anti-NAFTA-has their own dynamics of shift- and when you add them up you get results that inform political realities for the next two or four years.
Finally, I do wish the South would get with it. I for one, though, am glad I live in a state that soundly rejected parental notification, reelected all 5 of our congresspeople (4 of whom are D) took back the State House (we also have the State Senate) and reelected our D Governor (whose five constitutional lieutenants are all D, too.
I think that what you refer to as Consensus is a concept informed not so much by generational assumptions as what happens when you combine 435 sociopolitical microclimates, overlay concerns about Iraq, corruption and social issues, and stir them.
On voic.us you do a superb job of articulating microclimates in the region you cover. I’d advocate applying the phenomena you explore there- demographic, racial, rural-suburban-exurban-urban divides, and taking those metrics nationwide.
If yo do so, you then get a math which shakes itself out in the numbers which we saw yesterday- and the resulting need for consensus.
The important thing to remember here is that national generational assumptions do not shift as do reeds on a shoreline when the winds change.
Each of these microclimates – some districts voted for pro-war candidates, others voted anti-NAFTA-has their own dynamics of shift- and when you add them up you get results that inform political realities for the next two or four years.
Finally, I do wish the South would get with it. I for one, though, am glad I live in a state that soundly rejected parental notification, reelected all 5 of our congresspeople (4 of whom are D) took back the State House (we also have the State Senate) and reelected our D Governor (whose five constitutional lieutenants are all D, too.