The Ways Modern Campaign Tactics Divide Us
Big changes that have made bad matters worse for voters
My former boss Mark Steenbergh, one of the most sophisticated politicians I’ve ever met, had several sayings about politics. “Politics is a game of addition, not of subtraction,” he would say. “If you have 51 percent, you’re winning.” This saying might seem folksy and almost superficial, but they revealed a deep understanding of politics. It’s not by accident he was elected mayor of Michigan’s third-largest city three times.
How Our Political System Divides Us
Steenbergh pointed to a few basic facts in those statements that politicians need to internalize. First is that you stick by your friends. Some call the people you relied upon to help get elected your “supporters,” or your “base.” The premise is reminiscent of another famous political saying popularized by former President Ronald Reagan, “dance with the one that brung you.”
The second truism revealed by Mark’s statements is that we live in a winner takes all system. Just look to the Electoral College for evidence of this reality. Trump won Michigan in the last election with just 47.5 percent of the vote, only 0.23 percent of the vote more than Hillary Clinton, a difference of just 10,704 votes out of 4,799,284 cast. Despite a…
