Moderate no longer dirty word
By John Griffin
One memory of my days on the editorial pages is of a radicalized veteran in the 1970s who came in to argue about issues of the day. Finally, he said in exasperation:
"You know what you are? You're just a moderate."
I then considered myself a quiet liberal, but in retrospect, he was right.
Add to that a comment from an activist woman friend who concluded one long discussion we had by saying: "A zealot you will never be."
This comes of mind now because it seems to me that moderation might be on the verge of edging back into style, even in this period when conservatives seem to dominate in national politics and most headlines focus on the far right-left and red-blue battles.
Some hopeful evidence I see:
Of course, those nominations were just a warm-up for battles over U.S. Supreme Court nominations. Still, it remains a ray of hope.
And Bush's likely home run appointment of the conservative but respected and seemingly reasonable Judge John Roberts to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the high court is being cast in the spirit of relative moderation — and thoughts that it could have been much worse.
So, what is a moderate these days you might ask?
Columnist Dionne put it in this context: "Politics these days is said to be dominated by ideological enthusiasts. Moderates are thought of as people who sit on the sidelines and decide which batch of true believers they can most easily live with."
While I appreciate the role of the political parties, I also feel they have become overly partisan clubs serving their special interests and often beholden to extremists. Moderates won't eclipse the parties, but they can stress a problem-solving approach above lock-step partisanship, as did those 14 senators.
For the more activist-minded, there is the thought offered by author John Avion, a former speechwriter for Rudy Giuliani, who writes that, far from being the death of dissent, centrism is itself dissent from outdated political extremisms. That still leaves room for moderates taking strong, reasonable stands where appropriate.
Now these rays of hope for more moderation and compromise may turn out to be a false dawn amid escalating partisan warfare in Washington.
The Bush people may be poor at governing, but they are usually skilled at tough political fighting. The divided Democrats are still a minority in search of stands more positive than being against Bush. The wars on terrorism and in Iraq and Afghanistan remain wild-card factors.
Here in Hawai'i, it seems the transit tax compromise was a plus for both Republican Gov. Linda Lingle and majority Democratic legislators. More of that might be good for everybody's election chances next year — but I suppose that's the moderate in me coming out again.
In any event, nobody's battle cry is likely to become: "Now is the time for all good people to stand up and compromise."
Still, it's good to see more recognition that moderation can help the yin of realism balance the yang of idealism. We need both — and we need good people willing to speak out for the middle.
