Yesterday in class when we discussed the current political situation today, I was struck by the similarities between the prince described by Machiavelli and the behaivor of politicians today. Machiavelli claims that the most important job the prince has is to maintain and expand the power of the principality. In order to do this, the leader must be clever, thoughtful, and decisive. Machiavelli places a lot of importance in the appearance that the prince has but not in how the prince actually is. I agree with him completely in this regard. Machiavellian thinkers focus on the person most prepared and appropriate for the position. This is not the way that voters in America view political races today. People today are more concerned with the personal lives of presidential candidates than I believe we should be. For me, it seems only logical to focus on the person who will make our country as powerful as possible, completely disregarding their personal lives aside. I realize that with the amount of media attention that focuses on the personal lives of the candidates it is near impossible to not count what the news stories are into your opinion. However, I find that there are far more important reasons to vote for or not vote for a candidate. For example, I am less interested in whether or not Mitt Romney appropriately payed his taxes every year of his life, but I am more interested in what his plans are for the next four years if he gets elected. I feel that all voters should approach the situation of voting in a manner that selects the best man or woman for the job instead of focusing on smaller issues such as handfishing in the case of Paul Ryan.
I believe that over the years, people have become less and less respectful of those who sit in high places of power such as the presidency. There is a lack of simple loyalty and decency towards those who leader our country nowadays and it really upsets me to see this. 50-60 years ago, if the President made a decision that you disagreed with, then you wouldn't make a huge deal out of it, you would simply talk to people near you who also felt that his choice was a foolsih one. However, today, this phenomenon has gotten out of hand. The First Amendment is a fantastic freedom given to us and it is very powerful. But, and I'm sure you've all heard this quote before, "with great power, comes great responsibility". With the internet, there are many people who no longer believe that the first amendment is a right given to us, not one that we automatically have. Instead of taking advantage of the opportunity to express ourselves, there are many people in this country who have abused this right. There is no longer a line which you cannot go past in terms of expressing oneself. Do you think that the media has allowed this change in society occur? Could the accessibility of information also be partly to blame for this change in respect towards the President? Does anyone completely disagree with me?
Paul, I agree that people have become much more critical of our Presidents, but I don't necessarily believe that it is in fact a bad thing. I think that, in a government such as ours, a critical electorate is much more conducive to progress than one who simply follows the President because he is the President. Holding a high office does not exempt you from your actions being critically judged.
ReplyDeleteI will agree though that people have been much more critical of petty things such as a grammatical error in a speech (Bush) or reliance on a teleprompter (Obama). One could argue though that the populace's distraction towards petty matters might actually be Machiavellian in the sense that the opposing side is turning the voters' attention to things they know are inconsequential, but still detract from a politician's public image.
I agree with Chandler that criticism of politicians isn't necessarily a bad thing. But I think the point Paul was trying to make is that things like the internet have opened the president up to criticisms that do not have anything to do with his ability to govern. I agree with Paul on that and agree that it's something negative. I think that it comes down to the fact that people believe what they want to believe. The internet has put all kinds of information out there. If people want to believe that the president is a bad person/leader and since there is so much information out today, people can jump on anything and justify to themselves or others, "I said X was bad. Here's an example of it." However, with all the information out there today, people can either go after a president on the issues or attack him in a more personal way and find something to support both attacks. If people are too lazy to learn about the issues or just unwilling to admit that they are uninformed, then it is much easier to use personal information to prove their point that a leader is bad. I think this, at least to some extent, plays a role in the heightened criticism of politicians' personal lives.
ReplyDeletePaul, though I agree with your sentiment that modern Americans focus less on a president's competency and more on features less relevant to their role, I disagree with the interpretation of Machiavelli you describe in saying American thinkers are unlike Machiavellian thinkers because we focus on background elements of our presidents. When Machiavelli implies that leaders should seem appealing though they may act differently, I think this means that if the leader or candidate is judged for past actions, this is a fault of the leader rather than the people; the leader is failing to conceal their apparent faults. A Machiavellian person, as I interpret, would be more focused on attaining his individual desires rather than those of the leader.
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