The Assault on Reason

I've known for some time that the policies of the Bush administration are deeply flawed (thank you, Jon Stewart). However, I have to admit it has been a while since I've thought very deeply about the U.S. system of government--its Constitution, the intent of its founders, the rights of the individual, and the system of checks and balances. It seems every day you read a news story about another ethical violation of the Bush administration. But up to now I had never really connected the dots and thought about those stories in terms of the Constitution.

Leave it to Al Gore to put it all together in The Assault on Reason and show us just how outrageous the policies of this administration are. Gore explains in clear language why this administration's policies have violated the very core principles that this country was founded on. He explains in detail the administration's perpetuation of misinformation (including the selling of the Iraq war on false premises), obsession with secrecy, and drive for an ever more powerful executive branch. This is a president who has suspended the rights of habeas corpus for prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and has supported the use of torture.

However, The Assault on Reason is not simply a listing of the Bush administration's (many)wrongs. Gore's larger argument is that what is wrong with America is a decline in reason as the basis for in decision-making, and the Bush presidency is only a sympton of that. He sees the decline of print and the rise of TV as the major source of information and entertainment as a key factor in people's disengagement with the political system, as people feel a sense of powerlessness because of the one-way flow of information television provides. And televison plays on the emotions, rather than engaging people's reasoning abilities, and because of that PR experts, e.g. those in the Bush administration, are able to manipulate the population using fear-based tactics. People form opinions based on what they see on sound bites or 30-second television ads rather than reading about the issues.

This makes a lot of sense to me. While I don't think it explains everything that's wrong with society today, clearly the dominance of television is a big part of it (along with the failing educational system, but that's another story). People are just plain uninformed about government and politics. How can you possibly get a good grasp on current events from TV news? For example, I have never seen local TV news program explain candidates' positions on issues during an election in any level of detail. And these days even CNN isn't beyond ad nauseum coverage of celebrity "news".

This is not a fun book to read, but it's definitely an important book to read. The Assault on Reason should be required reading in high school history classes. I appreciated the fact that the book isn't based on petty politics or a personal vendetta against George W. Bush. This is a sober look at policies that violate the U.S. Constitution, and Gore expresses an appropriate level of anger that I think every single American should feel at the Bush adminstration's actions. We should all be marching in the streets about this stuff. But we're not.

Gore is optimistic that the rise of the Internet, as a two-way medium will spur people into political action and get them more involved in the issues. Honestly, I don't know if I am quite so optimistic. Sure, the Internet is definitely better than television as a way to obtain information and possibly get involved in politics. But isn't the Internet becoming more like regular television every day with the rise of YouTube? How do you get people to quit watching funny videos and start caring about political issues? I don't know the answer to that. But despite my lack of optimism about the Internet, Al Gore is still my hero and I am 100 percent convinced that if he were President right now there would be no need to write this book.