Rants Vs. Discourse

Are Republican congressional leaders Buddhist tire-salesmen, clearing their inventory of values by self-immolation? Are Democrat congressional leaders infected by Palestinian irredentism to recapture territory through any means no matter how self-destructive or of the nation’s security?

I said this to a correspondent late last night, in my severe annoyance at yesterday’s hysterical MSM reporting of the overblown instant reactions to the NSA collecting anonymous phone numbers to aid tracing of potential terrorist calls. She said that would be a great lead to a column blast but I demurred because, while flamboyant language that would catch attention, this language – as PO’d as I felt last night -- led to a rant rather than reasonable discourse.

I offered that rants, at best or worst depending on one’s objective, appeal to those most already engaged but fail to bridge gaps of understanding, and most often reflect badly on the ranter and his future ability to be taken seriously by those on the fence or even initially of different attitudes.

There are many elements that go into a rant, any one or few of which may be found in more relational discourse: flamboyant and flaming language, extended analogy, bits of disparate data or less-credible opinions, strings of imputed conspiracy and bad faith among opponents, opposing straw-horse or weakest points stressed, and one-sided arguments that ignore or disrespect differing views of some validity. What distinguishes a rant is that they’re all or almost all there, often including the kitchen sink, and to the exclusion or demonization of any differing view.

Between rant and discourse are the lawyerly arts of focus on one or two points that undermine opponent’s or reinforce their side’s arguments or credibility. The extent to which factual information is presented, or undermined, however, determines the impact of the lawyerly approach. The best attorneys, however, are conciliators who – not necessarily compromising – seek to mesh the contending priorities into more of a win-win.

For example, few would argue that both New York Times and Washington Post editorials lean liberal. Because they veer less into rant, fewer conservatives’ hackles are raised by those in the Washington Post.

Similar failures of discourse, really a partisan rant, seep into what’s presented as straight news coverage. The New York Times’ news service today spread across the country’s newspaper pages that the “Senate OKs tax cuts, mainly for the wealthiest.” Prominent is a bar chart showing those earning greater amounts reap more of the “tax cut” (actually continuation of current tax levels). Entirely missing is that, according to the latest report from the Congressional Joint Economic Committee, those earning less that $20,000 do not pay federal income tax, and “the top half of taxpayers, ranked by income, pay more than 96.5 percent of federal individual income taxes while the bottom half accounts for less than 3.5 percent.”

This is not quality journalism, and neither is purposeful undermining of national security for partisan advantage.

The shrinking readership and viewers of major media, especially coupled with the rapid growth of eyes following alternatives to get a more complete perspective and information, is the most direct evidence of the cumulative recognition of increasing numbers of Americans that rants are not sufficient to their information needs. This morning’s ABC-Washington Post poll, that “found that 63 percent of Americans said they found the NSA program to be an acceptable way to investigate terrorism,” is another indicator that yesterday’s ranting hysteria across the major media was seen as such by most Americans.

Rants may self-satisfy runaway emotions among the ranter and his close friends, but are not the basis for unifying a majority or preserving individual and collective sanity and safety.