Remember when I railed against moderates earlier? Well, it still bothers me to the point where I turned it into an op-ed. Mostly because I had to. Et nunc, vobis do putata me de eis in media:

On Friday, Senator Bill Frist reversed his position on stem cell research, breaking ranks with the President and with the well-oiled Republican political machine. Some called his move courageous, but most see it for the brazenly political calculation that it truly was.
On the other side of the aisle, Senator Hillary Clinton has been so successful in smoothing out her partisan edges as to garner praise from Thomas Donnelly of the American Enterprise Institute, a neoconservative think tank. Criticism of the former first lady has largely been about her recent centrist leanings—as opposed to her actual ideas—with those on the left mourning her alliances with Newt Gingrich and those on the right refusing to let people forget her partisan past.
Ever since Senator Clinton’s husband turned 6 years of political gridlock into a highly regarded presidency by moving sharply toward the center, politicians in both parties of the aisle have become convinced that the middle is the way to go. For all the Red-state/Blue-state partisan chatter in Washington, blander is better when it comes down to the race for the White House. Last year, both President Bush and Senator Kerry cited the late Ronald Reagan (hardly a champion of inoffensive moderation) as an inspiration. This move, which at the time served only to give Ralph Nader fuel for another jeremiad, also seemed to turn off the voting public: less than two-thirds of eligible voters showed up last year, despite an overwhelming get-out-the-vote campaign from both parties. Despite the hype about the youth vote, less than half of voters between ages 18 and 24 came to the polls in November. So if centrism is what the people want, why don’t the people seem to want it?
The problem is that, once again, Washington has fallen out of touch with the average voter. The rise of ultraconservative radio stations and think tanks, not to mention corresponding liberal institutions like ANSWER and MoveOn, is a direct result of the populace being turned off by mediocre, moderate politicians. Fundamentalists of all political ideologies have been complaining about the Democrats and Republicans looking the same for years, but it’s never been truer.
The vast majority of Americans hold political beliefs, and yet almost half of them can’t seem to get up off their couch and vote. Politicians, like movie producers and pop musicians, have come to believe that offending the fewest people possible is the guaranteed path to success. Politicians have become like cars, devoid of sharp edges and able to withstand impacts from any angle, and the people are bored.
This is not to encourage a Dean-DeLay match-up in 2008. Blind ideology is no more the answer than bland centrism. America needs politicians who take risks, who are occasionally out of their rigorously prescribed comfort zones, who ask and answer difficult questions and put forth difficult ideas. The less the average American cares about who’s running for president, the more the race will be determined by those who care too much. And that’s the ultimate paradox, beyond Republicans supporting stem cells or Hillary getting complimented by neocons: ultimately, centrist politics only lead to the further partisan splintering of America.


Woo!


-sam