Pragmatically Yours…

Kevin Richert bemoans the decline of the pragmatists, which he insists is different than moderates, writing:

A moderate takes a middle-of-the-road philosophical view of the issues. A pragmatist takes a results-oriented view of the process. A pragmatist can be moderate, or conservative, or liberal. The unifying thread is a willingness to make a deal, to give some ground in order to get back something of equal or greater value.

 I think there are many people who fit that definition of pragmatism.  The problem for many of us isn’t that we’re not willing to compromise to reach agreement. Rather, it is the fact that either: 1) the goals aren’t that worthy or 2) the deal isn’t that good.

Many leftist goals are assumed to be good such as increasing public transit availability and more wilderness land. But what if you don’t feel like an empty bus running out to Kuna and back will do any more to help the environment and quality of life in the Treasure Valley than the empty bus running down Vista Avenue. It’s a faith based thing with transit, and I’m not part of the bus religion, or the rail religion that holds these transit methods up as panacea.

And what of the White Clouds Wilderness Bill that Kevin Richert mentions in hsi blog post? If you don’t believe the state needs any more wilderness, as we already have 4.5 million acres locked up by the Feds, the goal of increasing the wilderness in Idaho isn’t an appealing one.

However, you might compromise to get more land opened to multiple use. There are 464,000 acres in the White Clouds bill. To get more multiple use, you might agree to let 10% of the area go. Of course, further compromise might lead the figure higher.

However, the deal that Kevin Richert touts as so fair gives Wilderness 332,775 acres and multiple use gets 131, 616.  That is the type of deal that Kevin Richert and the Greens would love. Even beyond the acreage, the people who oppose the bill will be worst off if the bill passes than if it wasn’t.

There’s nothing pragmatic about giving your opponents a 3-for-1 deal. There’s nothing pragmatic about passing a bill, that you could just as easily kill, which weakens your own position (though less than it would if your opponents had god-like dictatorial power.) Kevin Richert seems to think that “sucker” and “pragmatic conservative” are synonyms.