The Exhausted Middle

It’s easy to get upset while watching the news. How do you watch it?

To me, it seems the news is no longer about informing people of local or world events in a way that helps us understand the world we live in. Instead, it feels more like theater — acting and performance. Support your candidate at all costs. Never admit when you’re wrong. Believe the country is better off simply because the person you support is in charge. And be upset whenever the world doesn’t share your view.

I was recently reading a book where the author described three groups: the right, the left, and the exhausted middle. I belong to the exhausted middle. Both the right and the left, in my eyes, often fail to operate in the real world. Most of us don’t get to pick and choose who we work for, or who we serve, based on shared views. Public servants, especially, are supposed to serve all their constituents — not just those who voted for them.

Imagine a movie theater where the ushers only cleaned one set of bathrooms because they didn’t agree with the other group of people using the others. The uncleaned bathrooms would quickly become a mess. And if the leaders of that theater allowed it, they wouldn’t be good leaders at all. Leadership requires responsibility, and that responsibility doesn’t stop at those who agree with you.

What happened to persuasion? Today, politicians on both sides spend their energy drawing maps to guarantee more seats instead of trusting in the strength of their ideas. This is disheartening. Elections should be won through vision, persuasion, and trust — not manipulation of districts.

And to the electorate: don’t vote based solely on party ideology, unseen and untested. The nonsense will end when we stop celebrating blame, yelling, and hyperbole as if they are marks of good leadership.

What would our political climate look like if persuasion, responsibility, and service once again became the foundation of leadership?