By: Michael Session
mas63701@yahoo.com
January 07, 2004

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American Political Culture - All Politics Is Local Michael Session

In my subscription to India Cause newsletter I have received a good education in Indian culture and thought and moreover I feel and think I have made friends as well. Therefore, I would like to take this moment to return the favor in offering an introduction to American political culture.

To the extent I may cover material that you already know (i.e. insult your intelligence) please be patient.

All Politics Is Local! is the most important axiom of American politics. It is best illustrated by the following political anecdote:

“When Congressman William J. Hughes of New Jersey won his first election, back in 1974, he began holding ‘town meetings’ to keep in touch with the people at home. At the first such meeting, held in his home area of Salem County, the freshly minted legislator opened with a statement of his congressional duties. ‘I represent you at the federal level,’ he said. ‘I don’t take care of your potholes. I don’t pick up your trash.’

When it came time for questions, a woman in the first row raised her hand insistently. ‘Well, I want to tell you,’ she began, ‘they’re supposed to pick up my trash on Thursday afternoons and they never do and the dogs get into it.’ ‘You know, madam, as I indicated to you, I’m a FEDERAL LEGISLATOR,’ Hughes told her. ‘I work on the federal budget and national issues. And what you should do is contact either your mayor or your local commissioner of public works.’

Without a hint of sarcasm, the woman looked her hot new Congressman directly in the eye and said, ‘I didn’t want to start that HIGH.’

As the congressional anecdote illustrates, Americans care more about local issues than national ones and this is true all the more comparing local to international issues. American politics is local because Americans believe that power should flow from the bottom/the individual up to the government and not from the top/the federal level down to the people.

This understanding of American political culture has practical application for American Asian Indians and India Cause in general. Consistent with American political culture, the vast majority of government laws that make the policies and create programs that affect the issues the American people care about the most come from the state government and not the federal government. It is state governments that allocate the vast majority of funds for education, public safety and transportation. The point here is that the best and most effective way to connect with your fellow citizens @ large and influence our public institutions through the political process is first through local and regional channels regarding local issues.

A further illustration of the bottom up flow of American politics is my own effort. I’m currently consulting a state senator. The American Asian Indian community could benefit two-fold by supporting this regional emerging leader. The First fold is that American Asian Indians have local interests also. American Asian Indians passionately care about the education of their children, public safety, and driving to work just as much as any other citizen. A benefit of pursing your local interests in my client’s campaign is that, American Asian Indians could make tremendous progress in personally connecting with their fellow Americans because, as we know from American political culture it is state and local level issues that Americans care about the most passionately.

The second fold benefit to American Asian Indians involvement in local politics is @ the federal level. By applying energy on local issues, Asian Indians would be perceived by their federal representatives as fellow citizen activists engaging in their civic duty instead being perceived as “foreigners” lobbying for their non-American “alien” cause. Given the former perception, the voting public and your federal representative will be far more open to the international cause of India.

How To Get Involved?

If you have the offices, donate your office space for a phone bank. One of the most effect tools in turning out voters on Election Day and measuring the progress of a campaign is telemarketing. The national no call list only excludes commercial calls. It does not cover political speech.

Good political campaigns always need volunteers. Send volunteers to the phone banks, and rallies. You may volunteer to supervise the phone bank or literature distribution while your children participate.

Fundraisers are another means to get involved. Money, it is said, is the mother’s milk of American politics. It would be most effective to host a “coffee” spiced with Indian pastries at your residence to meet the candidate and discuss LOCAL issues of concern and of course come prepared for and expect the hat to be passed for contributions. Such fundraisers for state campaigns invariably attract personal from the offices of your federal representatives.

To complete my example, a fundraiser for my candidate receives the attention of the junior Federal/U.S. Senator’s office. During the fundraiser, you may discuss Indo-U.S. military cooperation with someone on his staff. Your conversation with the senate employee leads to a meeting with the senator himself.

So on the day you personally approach the U.S. Senator to discuss Indian issues, multiple layers of political connectivity insulate your cause: 1). The persuasiveness of your arguments and sub arguments, 2). A personal connection and political capital derived from your support for and involvement with local candidates (All Politics Is Local). Furthermore, when you/we persuade the junior senator he will lobby, in effect, for you with the senior U.S. Senator as it is a common practice for Senators of the same state to seek each other’s advice on issues of respective expertise.

This scenario of multiple layers of political connectivity makes for a dramatic contrast to the “Taliban” lobby. In contrast to your multiple layered approach, the “Taliban” lobby rushes directly into the Senator’s office with all the grace of a bull in a china shop. They offer the same brain dead arguments from the Old I’m sorry that’s Cold War regarding Pakistan’s “frontline” status now being applicable to the war against international terror. However, we, and your Senator, will, of course, already know they are not being as helpful as they need be in the war.

As a political consultant, I view the preservation and perpetuation of one's causes as being analogous to keeping warm in the winter. One is best insolated by dressing in multi layers of clothing instead of just wearing a single, large and fancy coat.

Caveats

There are some caveats to keep in mind when one involves oneself politically. It will not be easy. There will be awkward moments of meeting people from different social and economic backgrounds for the first time. Some people are simply not nice and some people are prejudice (including yourself). Above all, be nice and sociable with everyone, and tolerate those who you do not like for whatever reason and those who do not like you for whatever reason. Remember to keep your focus on your local, national and international cause.

Be willing to commit to the difficult task. For example, I’m consulting my candidate on how to win back a voting block that once supported his party in mass, but over the last thirty years have supported the other party in mass. My job will not be easy, but if I succeed, I will be associated with a heroic LOCAL cause and gain incalculable political capital within the party that I can expend in other areas. This same principle applies to you.

If you succeed in a heroic LOCAL cause (a winning campaign, home schooling) you will gain political capital to expend on the national level. But first things first-

ALL POLITICS IS LOCAL!!!

Michael Session