The Fate of Ideas in Washington
For all of the excitement of Mr. Obama’s victory, and all the rhetoric about change coming to the Capital, I remain skeptical. I’m not skeptical about Mr. Obama’s motives- I shore many of his stated goals- but rather that anything will get done about them. Washington remains the place many dreams go to die. Thousands of people here are dedicated to advancing an idea that they believe in their hearts to be right (there are few cartoon villains here, the kind who intentionally do something evil), and yet most of those ideas never advance, never amount to anything.
I’m not so much interested in why a good idea dies (partisan gridlock, etc.), nor what separates a good idea from the bad, but simply how one intellectually works in such an environment of uncertainty. The battle of ideas in all domains is uncertain- that’s why it’s a battle rather than a charade. It’s just that in academia it is fairly certain that if one works hard in a narrow, somewhat pedantic domain, one will be remembered as the best in the world at that little thing. There are indeed gradients in fame and status, but there is something reassuringly permanent about an academic paper with your name on top.
Politics in contrast is a game where most contestants’ ideas are losers, never to be enacted. Most of the idealists in DC (and I count myself in their number) will do nothing, simply because so many ideas (good and bad) die. To survive intellectually thus seems to require an intense attachment to a core set of ideas as morally right, a great dose of pragmatism to seize any opportunities that may arise to advance your idea, and a faith that somehow your actions will help your idea survive after you, whether commemorated by history or not.
I have begun to ask myself every day if my actions will help make my son’s world more verdant and peaceful and beautiful, with patches of wild nature left. Any day I can say yes is a good day, for I’ve helped the idea of conservation propagate a bit more.
