As the clock ticks down on debt ceiling negotiations, most of the country is pausing for Memorial Day weekend. The U.S. cannot default on its debt, and it won’t. We are simply witnessing another symptom of the catastrophe that is our broken U.S. Congress.
In an interview I did years ago with New York Times columnist David Brooks, he commented that, “It isn’t enough to be broken; you must be broken open in order to be transformed.”
Could this broken moment, highlighting the depth, breadth and degree of brokenness in Congress, actually present an opportunity for what is broken to be broken open and transformed?
A friend once shared with me a thought along these lines: The broken clouds release the rain to nourish the earth. The broken earth receives the seed. The broken seed grows to become grain. The broken grain becomes flour to make the bread. The broken bread nourishes the body.
Congress is broken. Can it be broken open so that transformational change can begin? I say it can if leaders will act greatly, with daring, hope and will. The question is how, and who would lead such a movement?
Let’s do the math and keep it simple. In the current negotiation scenarios, it is assumed that there are 100 Democrats who will not vote for whatever debt ceiling deal emerges because, broadly speaking, it cuts too much or doesn’t tax enough. And there are 100 Republicans who won’t vote for a compromise because it cuts too little or taxes too much.
This would imply that there are 118 Republicans and 100 Democrats willing to vote for the right deal.
Here is your broken-open moment.
If those 218 center-left and center-right representatives were to form a caucus, they would not only be able to ensure that the country reduces spending and doesn’t default on its debt, but also take charge of the entire chamber. Those 218 would comprise an effective majority that could elect a Speaker beholden to neither the far left nor the far right.
More importantly, they would actually be where most of their constituents are. An overwhelming majority of Americans, after all, believe that a debt ceiling increase should be bundled with spending reform.
A broken moment could become a broken-open movement to a different kind of politics.
Imagine the impact of such a new majority caucus. The numbers of representatives would swell swiftly beyond 218 in that new majority, and the two new minority parties (composed of Democrats and Republicans outside of that majority) would scramble to the fringes to figure out whom to yell at, who would still listen, and how they’ll continue to raise money. The iron-fisted stranglehold the two parties have had on the nation for generations would be broken, and our politics would be broken open.
The numbers add up and are congruent with a center-right to center-left nation. For far too long, the majority of Americans have felt they have lost their voice and simply have to vote for the lesser of the two evils. Many have disengaged entirely from the political process because they are exhausted and exasperated with the choices they are being served up by the two parties who offer all rage, no reason and few solutions.
A rejection of the false choice of far-left versus far-right politics could result in a new way — I would call it the American way.
Voters have been convinced by Republicans and Democrats for decades that every choice is a binary choice — red versus blue, us versus them, good versus evil, Democrat versus Republican.
Imagine what would happen if current Democrats and Republicans were to reject this premise. More people would reengage in the political process. More people would show up to town halls, and the silent majority would be silent no more.
If this broken moment were to become a transformational movement — a moment of innovation akin to the invention of Wi-Fi or the smart phone — it could propel the country out of its current morass of sharp political division and into a new era of civility and prosperity.
Who will lead a broken open moment to become a movement? Our country has needed and produced such leaders before. Many of them exhibited the very heroism we celebrate on Memorial Day.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. was one of our nation’s greatest orators and served on the U.S. Supreme Court. He was also a Civil War veteran. He spoke May 30, 1884, in Keene, N.H., on the why the young should care about Memorial Day.
Holmes began, “So to the indifferent inquirer who asks why Memorial Day is still kept up, we may answer, it celebrates and solemnly reaffirms from year to year a national act of enthusiasm and faith. It embodies in the most impressive form our belief that to act with enthusiasm and faith is the condition of acting greatly.”
The ability and determination to “act greatly,” with “enthusiasm and faith,” is what those 218 leaders in Congress would need.
Holmes concluded his tribute to those who had died while acting greatly, saying, “As I listen, the great chorus of life and joy begins again, and amid the awful orchestra of seen and unseen powers and destinies of good and evil our trumpets sound once more a note of daring, hope and will.”
The brokenness of Congress has finally broken open. The question this Memorial Day weekend is whether leaders will emerge from the center-right and center-left who are willing “to act greatly,” with “daring, hope and will”?
Acting greatly isn’t easy. Sometimes it requires a little bit of crazy. We can only hope that those 218 in Congress will indeed act greatly, so that the transformation from division to “a more perfect union” can begin once again.
Boyd Matheson is host of Inside Sources on KSL News Radio in Salt Lake City. He is also a former opinion editor at the Deseret News.