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Late in the session, I had an online exchange with Texas Monthly's Paul Burka regarding the fight over voter suppression/voter I.D. In the course of that argument, Burka mocked concerns over fundamental voting rights. "Principles, Schminciples," he said, leading TM's president, Evan Smith, to refer to his lead political writer as "Mr. Schminciple."
I bet Burka would like to take back that comment, betraying as it does the emptiness of a focus on process. Burka loves politics, as do I. But I love it because it's full of people and it's about people, whether they live or die or get an education or an opportunity to succeed. Burka loves the mechanics of politics. In Burka's world, end results, as measured by the lives of Texans, matter little so long as the proper form is followed.
Burka is not alone in his approach. Many experienced and inexperienced political journalists believe a focus on process guards against bias in their reporting. Also, Burka writes in good faith. I just disagree, and I think the issue at stake is a critical one.
Post-session, legislators are waiting breathlessly for TM's infamous Ten Best/Ten Worst list of legislators. While they wait, I wonder if they could answer the question, ten best and ten worst at what exactly?
I respect Burka's experience, and the online reporting of Burka and his colleague, Patricia Kilday Hart, was terrific. But over the years Burka has reduced the Ten Best/Ten Worst to a hollow ritual.
If Burka reported on the 10 best or worst surgeons in Texas, he wouldn't give much attention to the patients who lived or died. Instead, he'd hold forth on operating room technique. We'd learn who had scalpel envy, whose surgical team had the most panache.
Now, it's true that Burka will be especially kind to the surgeon with polished scalpels who is lucky enough to save a patient. And Burka's wrath will come down on bumbling fools who can recite the Hippocratic oath backwards but kill patient after patient with rusty saws.
It's in the non-obvious middle ground that Burka fails. The legislator who puts principle over process precisely because he or she is concerned about saving lives - that person scores low on the Burka scale. There's a particular group who also is uneasy around this kind of person - lobbyists. Lobbyists adore, how shall we put it, "flexibility of conscience."
It's the attachment to the ideals of process that leads to legislative cowardice and failure. It has proven impossible in Texas to fix public education, build roads, make college affordable, and get health care to kids. You know why? Because "process" is the last refuge of scoundrels.
Unsurprisingly, sacrificing principles to process gives an enormous advantage to the unprincipled.
The good news is that voters know all this in their guts, and that's one reason why Burka's Ten Best/Ten Worst makes little difference in campaigns. Sure, people have attacked their opponents unlucky enough to have the scarlet W for Worst sewed to their jacket. And the gold B for Best finds its away into the lucky winners' ads. It's like checking off a box, and voters aren't moved either way.
For voters, what's it really mean? Again, ten best or ten worst at what exactly?
Being best at the process that has led Texas into its current mess can't really be much to brag about. |
