Free Muzzled by Juan Williams Page A

wars, several cultural revolutions, and the war on terror, robust political discourse in this country has fundamentally shaped and reshaped our lives.
    Perhaps the most singular characteristic of the United States’ brand of political discourse is its free-flowing, full-throated, even raucous nature. It is far from a polite exchange of ideas. Read through American history and the narrative is defined by debate that is loud, often harsh, straightforward, and frequently personal. The critical debates of the past have been spurred on by politicians who put their arguments, even the effectiveness of their speaking styles, without speechwriters or consultants, up for public judgment. Political careers grew from the power of winning debate. With the leadingpolitical lights in the game shining their insights and their words on these debates, other public figures, academics, and business and civic leaders found themselves drawn to the national conversation. Further urgency came from newspapers fanning the flames to increase sales.
    Despite the changing nature of the media, the basic recipe for the best of American political debate has not changed all that much since the nation’s founding. What has changed is our fear of political correctness. It has replaced the best that we have to offer—robust, honest debate—with hushed tones. Those silences are punctuated by a scatter shot of politically fragmented sound bites, usually from extreme and angry voices. The result is that the media makes more news out of fewer crumbs of competing points of view because the genuine substance of modern political debate is so meager, so hard to find. After the massacres at Columbine, Virginia Tech, Fort Hood, and Tucson, and daily reports on drive-by shootings, how can there not be a major debate over access to automatic weapons? The answer is that it is too risky—it is too politically incorrect—given the power of the NRA and gun lobby and the extreme fear on the Right that the Left’s ultimate goal is to ban all guns. The result, in combination with the rise of the twenty-four-hour news cycle, is a media feeding frenzy whenever any major political figure touches on the issue, because the media has so little to chew on. News programs are often reduced to speculation, provocative statements, and opinion masquerading as news because that’s all they have to work with. There are exceptions, like Representative Carolyn McCarthy of New York (whose husband was killed and son wounded in the Long Island Rail Road shooting of 1993), whohas introduced legislation aimed at reducing the ammunition capacity of gun clips. But it’s sad that people like her, who are willing to forcefully advance a position, are the exception and not the rule.
    Instead, the modern political dialectic has largely been reduced to winks and whispers. The Federalist Papers and the Lincoln/Douglas debates have been replaced by slogans and talking points and negative ads and, even worse, by warring Facebook posts and YouTube “gotcha” moments. Major politicians, guarded by cautious, highly paid advisers, avoid the risk of honest debate and, even more, the risk of agreeing when an ideological opponent makes a good point.
    It is no surprise that this current paradigm for political discourse results in extreme partisanship. There is a lot of money invested in keeping the ideological divide wide and deep.
    Direct-mail fund-raising aimed at people with single-issue concerns such as abortion or gun control came of age during the 1980s and 1990s, and it has continued to make a lot of people rich to this day. Newsletters, blogs, radio programs, conventions, and paid speeches shower big money on true believers and on the people holding political power. As Representative Gabrielle Giffords said before she was shot in the head by a crazed gunman, there is a lot of financial and political reward for being extreme and almost none for a politician willing to compromise. All the attention