FISA reform and the honesty gap

Anonymous Liberal for Glenn Greenwald: FISA reform and the honesty gap


I've written previously that the Great Unmentionable in American politics, the elephant that is always in the room but must never be acknowledged, is the existence of what I'll call (for lack of a better term) an honesty gap between the left and the right. Or to put it slightly differently, it is simply not the case that partisans from each side of the aisle are equally willing to lie and mislead in pursuit of their political goals.

It is understandable why people insist that the right and left in this country are mirror images of each other. We do, after all, live in a country with only two major political parties, parties that have been fairly evenly matched historically and have enjoyed a similar degree of political success. This, combined with the American journalistic norms of objectivity and balance, naturally leads to a sort of symmetrical, yin and yang approach to covering politics. Nancy Pelosi is treated as the left-wing equivalent of Tom Delay. Al Franken is the left-wing equivalent of Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity. And the editorial position of the New York Times is the yin to the Wall Street Journal's yang.

For some reason, we are all supposed to pretend this is true, that the only real differences between the left and the right are ideological in nature. It's completely taboo to point out what every close observer of American politics knows, i.e., that the difference between the left and right is not just ideological but tactical. Put simply, there is a far greater willingness among right-wing partisans in this country to push the boundaries of honest discourse, to move beyond mere spin and into the realm of outright deception. Our political discourse is asymmetrical.

Just to be clear, I am not suggesting that there are no hacks or demagogues on the left or that all right-wing partisans are dishonest. I'm merely suggesting that, on balance, there is a real and significant difference in the tactics that right- and left-wing partisans are willing to employ to achieve their desired political ends.

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http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/10/23/right_and_left/index.html