I f you’ve been an occasional reader of this column or, more likely, someone who got lost looking for Sudoku, you’ll know this column served mostly as a counterweight to the progressivism that generally marks this space. Hence its name — I’m the guy in the metaphorical columnist room who spouts opinions no one wants to acknowledge but has to, since I’m a metaphorical elephant.
That wasn’t the original goal. Ideally, my column would bridge the gap between the legislature in Raleigh and the ivory towers of Chapel Hill. Drawing upon my time as a legislative intern, I was going to take readers through the legislative process like Schoolhouse Rock but with fewer cartoons and more Thom Tillis. The reality of state politics is every single bill, whether it’s a hot-button issue like voter ID or something so yawn-inducing as zoning laws, goes through a long, meandering legislative process that includes sub-committees, committees, multiple floor votes and two branches of government.
The problem was the General Assembly is no “House of Cards.” There’s nothing to spice up the dullness of sub-committee referrals to other sub-committees and certainly no Kevin Spacey with an awful Southern accent. I could tell you how one time I read a confidential memo regarding the legality of voter ID laws — yes, they’re legal according to Crawford v. Marion County Election Board and Democratic Party of Georgia v. Perdue — but then I’d lose my security clearance. The most underhanded dealing I saw was a legislator trying to buy votes for his Speaker campaign with Gumby’s pizza.
However, I still could’ve tried to bridge the gap between left and right here at UNC. That went out the window the moment I wrote the words “voter ID” without the words “backward” or “Jim Crow.” What’s followed in the months since has been a hearty and occasionally heated exchange of ideas — an outcome I didn’t foresee but nonetheless appreciate.
I’m probably not going to make you believe in voter ID. I likely didn’t convince you that the minimum wage shouldn’t be raised. However, I do hope I’ve proven to you Republicans can be reasonable, intellectual individuals who make political decisions based off a different set of values than Democrats, and these values aren’t necessarily better or worse.
For our political system to work, we must believe our opponents to be our equals, to be people with whom we may debate on a level playing field. When we put our political views on a pedestal as if they’re morally and intellectually superior, as I fear progressives are beginning to do with the likes of Moral Mondays, we lose the ability to debate and devolve into lecturing. Respect, even begrudging respect, is the prerequisite for the sort of constructive debate that this University, state and country needs.
I’ve greatly enjoyed this opportunity to earn your respect. It’s been fun, it’s been real fun, but as is the nature of politics, none of it was real.
