As a general rule, I don’t comment on the media’s foibles on Twitter but this is truly offensive, and dangerous and thus merits some discussion. Thread: nytimes.com/2020/01/23/opi…
1/ I won an election. I'm on the ballot in 2020. By rights, that makes me a politician. But the idea that politicians highest ambition is to win elections is dangerous and totally at odds with the democracy our founders envisioned.
2/ When we talk about public service in this country - whether our military, our firefighters, our teachers, our diplomats, etc. we rightly praise them for their patriotism and sacrifice.
3/ We also rightly recognize that they chose to pursue careers that placed public service ahead of the sorts of things (financial reward, an unexamined private life, etc.) that might otherwise be available to them.
4/ But what about those jobs that are elected? You can be a career EPA scientist by traditional job application, but you can't serve on the Science Committee in Congress, overseeing the EPA's budget and mandate without winning an election.
5/ I am in Congress because I am desperately concerned about climate change. I worked to address it as a scientist, then an engineer, then an entrepreneur, now in Congress.
6/ I did not run because I have long aspired to be elected. And I'm not unique in this regard! Many (most?) of my colleagues are in this line of work because they care about things bigger than themselves, and believe passionately in defending the beauty of our democracy.
7/ Which is exactly as our founders intended.
8/ But when journalists suggest that the process of elections supercedes our patriotism or other larger ambitions, it reinforces a believe that elected public service is venal and appointed public service is noble. This is fundamentally anti-democratic, and dangerous.
9/ Do we have to think about how to win our next election? Of course. And in the private sector, I had to think about how to secure and maintain the support of my board, and my coworkers, and my boss. These are all "political", but that doesn't make them ignoble.
10/ Keep this in mind: for most members of Congress, leaving public service would allow them with the opportunity to increase their salary, spend more time with their family and not have to watch out for opposition trackers every time they shop for groceries.
11/ I don't raise that to ask for your sympathy. To the contrary - I love this job! But the idea that one would sacrifice morals and higher ambition to hold this job is an amazingly naive view of our political system.
12/ Are there elected officials who have hit their career peak, who could never get a better job than the one they're in right now? You bet they are. And they are a problem. But they are in the minority.
13/ So if you want to criticize the politician who's moral compass seems to shift with electoral wins, who stands for nothing other than winning the next election, have at it. Those approaches do in fact cheapen our democracy. But do not generalize those exceptions to us all.
14/ Edmund Burke said it best: "Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays instead of serving you if he sacrifices it to your opinion."
15/ That informs many of us. Most of us. The best of us. Demand it of all of us. It is how democracy survives and thrives. But do not assume it's absence. /fin
