Fun & Games in Times of Famine

Fun & Games in Times of Famine

American politics is as engaging of a spectator sports as any other on the market. We often find ourselves watching our paid professionals performing their competitive tasks with no greater display of ability than we can muster in our imagination as our own sitting on the sidelines. But reality may impose on us its harsh reminders of our frailty and unwillingness to subject ourselves to the battering and frustration of the political arena. Most of us prefer the simplicity and modest investment involved in choosing our “home team” for whom to cheer (and groan) versus the actual bruising of body and soul our elected professional endure to entertain us.

Judging by results, we might easily be lead to conclude that our politicians perform for the love of the game more than the satisfaction of achievement. With only a hope (but no certain expectation) for a temporary naming as this year's (or biennial) champion, they do not hang their motivation on easily crushed dreams of a dynastic string of victories. But the simpler goal of “giving it a good fight” with smaller incremental successes and setbacks (and the steady paycheck) can draw many a hope-filled candidate to make a bid for the professional ranks.

Now, wait, you skeptics say. Government is serious business, not some frivolous sport.  Oh, really. For a week of practice and competition, 92 professional golfers divvy up $8 million at the Masters tournament; that is an average of $87,000 pay per player. With that same money, we pay 92 U.S. Senators for 26 weeks. Government service is definitely “minor league” amongst the sports for which the American public willingly opens its wallet.

But despite their minor status as professional entertainers, politicians know how to put on a show. Whether following the party script or ad-libbing, their powers of melodramatic hyperbole are always at the ready. Told that the opposition says we are doing well, the well-trained politician knows to explain all the ways we are on the verge of failure. While admitting their culpability for any failure to act to solve a problem, they can remember to describe the dozen more ways that it is somebody else's fault really.

The politically negotiated sequester of federal funds is a prime example of their collaborative mastery of the arts of suspense, tradegy, and comedy. While clearly both parties love our nation (the somewhat bewildered innocent in their shared drama), they clash over who is best for her future. Perhaps our biases in the audience might allow us to choose hero and villain, but the story often relies heavily on the narrator to make that distinction clear. Their epic battles define the action, but not the resolution. Nobody wins, but nobody truly loses either - they merely escape to return in the next sequel. And so it is with the debt-ceiling crisis turned sequester crisis. By mutual consent, the combatants scheduled the time and place for their next match and retreated in the belief that the other party would take the blame for the destruction left behind by their building-toppling struggle for cleanup by the stagehands.

There is seemingly no issue too trivial or too important to not be the object kicked about in their game. Their steadfast beliefs in the ubitious opportunity to perform and the possible reversal of any setback (or progress) are the signs of the heart of a true professional. We may sometimes become disheartened as we watch the Sisyphic lack of success, but we should applaud their dedication to the process over the product. The long-term entertainment is in the enjoyment of the game (or the job for those of us in the more mundane workaday world), not the momentary and infrequent hanging of the banner in the rafters. Banners and trophies feed our pride, the foremost of the deadly sins. Politics and politicians teach us how to find satisfaction in the patient flow of events without the elusive closure too often sought by the idealist. If it did not happen today, we learn, do not think its possibility is gone forever. Think now and see the small performances independent of their cumulative contribution to a future outcome. Admire the skill and artistry of the players around you, whether for comedy relief or vicarious sharing of the moment.