Abolish Politics: Response to Dignan et al

Dignan recently responded to Public Theologian's claim that Democrats held a moral high ground over Republicans. Here are my two cents.

Neither Democrats nor Republicans hold a moral high ground, and debates between the two parties are meaningless, since both support massive government spending. Democratic complaints about Republican cuts in domestic spending ignore the fact that said cuts are relatively small. Republicans' traditional claims of favoring small government are contradicted by the runaway spending (for both foreign and domestic "projects") that we have seen under Bush's watch. One of the most egregious abuses of the public purse is, of course, the Medicare prescription drug benefit, a financial boondoggle that Bush shamefully refuses to modify (or abolish).

The problem with partisan debates is that they do not deal with ideology but rather, with loyalty (to one's own party) and slander (against the other side). Truly robust political debate would involve philosophy, theology — in short, ideas. We should be talking in philosophical terms about how best to help the poor, whether war is ever justified (and if so, in what context), etc.

I appreciate Dignan's concerns about the harshness of contemporary political discourse, but the remedy is simple: eschew formal, partisan politics altogether. It is politics—the quest for power—that corrupts public life.