Don't Be a Hypocrite, Mr. President

It was just after Ronald Reagan's re-election in 1984, and the powerful chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, an Illinois Democrat, was working quietly with the White House on a tax cut bill. Rostenkowski asked the president not to criticize the legislation while the sausage was being made. "If you start talking about this bill, it will fall apart," he said to Reagan. "And Reagan kept his word," Rosty recalled, "for two years."

During those two years, Reagan invited congressional Democrats to the White House for cocktails "every month or two—usually when Nancy [Reagan] was away," Rostenkowski recalled. "You and I can write some history," he said to Reagan one night over a gin. That history is now recalled as the 1986 tax reform bill. "It's so sad now," he said, looking back. "These people [in Washington] are so angry they don't even talk to each other." I found that story in a 2004 interview of Rostenkowski, from the U.S. News archives.

It's from the archives, all right. It seems like ancient history now, from some place other than Washington. It's hard to imagine the president working behind the scenes for two years with leaders of the other party. I wonder what guys like Rostenkowski and Reagan would say about things these days. Take President Obama's recent address to Congress on healthcare reform. "If you come to me with a serious set of proposals, I will be there to listen," he said. "My door is always open. But know this: I will not waste time with those who have made the calculation that it's better politics to kill this plan than improve it. I will not stand by while the special interests use the same old tactics to keep things exactly the way they are. If you misrepresent what's in the plan, we will call you out."

Obama then went on to accuse those opposed to his healthcare reform package of purposely spreading "lies" and using "scare tactics." But then the president himself deployed the ultimate scare tactic, saying that "more people will die as a result" if his plan does not pass. As the level of tension in the room seemed to rise, and as the speech got more and more partisan, Rep. Joe Wilson, a Republican from South Carolina, aimed his now famous "You lie!" at the president.

Really, what happened that night was that Obama said he would not negotiate with people operating in bad faith and in the next breath argued that all those opposing him were operating in bad faith—liars using scare tactics who will have blood on their hands when sick people die. He said the door was open just before he slammed it in critics' faces.

Commentators on the left, notably Maureen Dowd of the New York Times and Hendrik Hertzberg of the New Yorker, followed up with accusations that critics of the president's healthcare initiative—not just Wilson—are "racist." This was after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had accused citizens protesting at town hall meetings earlier this summer of being "un-American" and "carrying swastikas." Then, former President Jimmy Carter said that animosity toward the president was "based on the fact that he is a black man." I'm all for fighting hard for what you believe in, but this is over the line. The healthcare discussion isn't about race or patriotism or fascism. To most people, it's about cutting costs.

Some—including the president—blame the 24-7 cable news culture for stoking the fires with the constant coverage of screaming town hall participants and the talking heads provoking one another. In one recent 24-hour news cycle, you could watch endless replays of Wilson, Serena Williams, and Kanye West all having ugly public outbursts. It was one tantrum after another on one channel after another, interspersed with Viagra ads.

Maybe it would help if no one watched these shows anymore, so the cable networks would have to find new programming and new ad revenues. Maybe the network bookers should invite the few moderates in Congress to appear more regularly. Maybe more states should hold open primaries so that independents can bring more votes to moderate candidates. Maybe more independents will go to the polls. Maybe there should be a third party, on the center-right, as I hear so many people suggesting lately. Maybe people should work passionately to get their proposals enacted without impugning their opponents' characters. And maybe people who oppose them should do so without screaming and yelling.

On 60 Minutes recently, the president said that one of the things he's trying to figure out is how to make sure that "civility is interesting." There's a whole crowd of us who still think civility is interesting, and we miss it.

"The truth of the matter is that there has been a coarsening of our political dialogue that I've been running against since I got into politics," Obama said. "I still remember in the speech that I gave announcing that I was running for president. I said, 'We can disagree without being disagreeable.' And I think that the vast majority of the American people, that's exactly what they want. They want people to be polite; they want people to listen to each other. They want people to engage in serious, vigorous debate and passionate debate. But they want to make sure that it doesn't get personal. That people's motives aren't questioned."

You can't have it both ways. Threatening that more people will die as a result of a "No" vote on healthcare is not serious debate. It's corrosive hyperbole. Saying people are lying is questioning their motives in a deeply personal way. You can't lament a coarsening of the political dialogue and then be silent when people use words like racist and swastikas.

What happened to disagreeing without getting disagreeable?

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