Sure, democracy is great, U.S. voters seem to be saying. But is it as great as cheap gas?
An American could get downright dispirited about democracy these days, and polls suggest most of us have.
The question is what we plan to do about it: Vote in droves to preserve our ability to, you know, vote? Or risk it all for dubious promises of discount gas and groceries?
A majority of Californians, 52%, rate our democracy dysfunctional, according to a new poll by the Public Policy Institute of California. Worse, our assessment seems to deteriorate as we take the trouble to participate: 60% of the state’s likely voters are disillusioned about self-rule.
Americans in general are similarly dissatisfied with our system, according to a recent poll by the Associated Press and the University of Chicago. A New York Times-Siena College poll, meanwhile, found that a remarkable 71% of registered voters agree that “American democracy is currently under threat.” That means the survey found broader agreement on the danger to democracy than on the fact that said democracy produced Joe Biden’s presidency two years ago.
Opinion
The direst polls for democracy, however, are the ones suggesting we’re poised to hand over one or both chambers of Congress to Republicans, the party that brought the legislative branch under assault in the name of overturning an election — an attack echoed last week by the Bay Area man who tried to hunt down House Speaker Nancy Pelosi with a hammer.
Surrendering even part of the government to a faction that is at best uninterested in and at worst hostile to democracy does not bode well for the system. Moreover, in nearly every state, Republicans who deny the results of the 2020 election are running not just for Congress but also for top state offices with authority over elections, including governor and secretary of state.
A more or less democratic election — albeit with all the usual caveats about gerrymandering, the non-representational Senate and vote suppression — is a funny way to give up on democracy. And yet that’s what we appear to be on the verge of doing.
If there is any consolation here for government by the people and its enthusiasts, it’s that Americans don’t really have anything against democracy. It’s more that we’re just not that into it. It’s not you, democracy; it’s us.
Despite the Times respondents’ striking consensus about the peril to democracy, only a small fraction of them — 7% — considered that danger “the most important issue facing the country today.” This base of die-hard democracy fans was dwarfed by the number citing inflation and other economic issues, which nearly half of voters identified as their top concerns.
The cost of living and other economic challenges were also the issues most prominently volunteered by respondents to a recent NBC News poll asking what message they intend to send with their votes. When democracy was one of several issues named on a list of possible priorities, it fared better, with 30% considering threats to the system one of our two most pressing problems. But more than twice as many — nearly two-thirds of those polled — said inflation and the economy are more urgent.
Anyone struggling to buy enough gas to get to work or enough food for his or her family — as opposed to, say, grousing about the supposedly exorbitant cost of crudités, as one U.S. Senate candidate infamously did — shouldn’t be blamed for finding that more pressing than any abstract form of government. What’s really abstract, however, is the relationship between any given congressman and inflation, a global phenomenon that, for domestic purposes, is the province of the Federal Reserve. Republicans put in charge of Congress and state election offices will have far more power to undo democracy than to untangle global supply chains.
If we had a remotely realistic sense of what our politicians can and can’t achieve, the contest between inflation and democracy wouldn’t be one. In that light, a vote for cheap gas is just a vote for more violence.
