Hot-Button Issues

Wedge issues evoke such passion and draw so much media attention that they generate a tunnel vision effect - blocking the view of giant moral issues looming in the background, like poverty and environmental degradation. Besides the tunnel vision effect, hot-button issues of course have a demonizing effect:  people often believe not merely that the other side has the poorer moral argument, but that the other side is morally bankrupt.

Democratic leaders must be vigilant to contend with both the demonization effect and the tunnel vision effect.

1. Defuse the demonization.

It is always to their advantage when politicians show how their policy positions derive from basic ethical principles. The object isn't to "win" a moral argument - it is to show that neither side lacks a moral argument. This will certainly have no effect on single-issue voters. But there are many voters who will support a politician - even if they strongly disagree on some issue - if they believe the politician's positions are based on decent, deeply held principles.

For example, it is helpful for politicians who support Roe v. Wade to say not simply that they support it, but to say why they believe Roe was morally correct. Good court decisions are not divorced from moral principles; they are derived from moral principles. Politicians can remind voters of these principles: before Roe, women did have access to safe abortions, but access depended on their social class. Women who did not have the means to pay for a safe medical procedure or to travel to a place where abortion was safe and legal, faced the shame and extreme danger of back-alley or self-inflicted abortions. It is a fundamental principle of fairness and compassion that access to safe medical care should not be determined by your social class or where you happen to live; safe medical care should be available to everyone. And believing in the principle of personal liberty that denies government the power to force abortions or to ban them absolutely, does not make one blind to moral concerns about the fetus. Having a good moral compass means feeling the tug of conflicting moral interests. The Roe decision itself recognizes and tries to balance these conflicting interests by protecting a woman's autonomy rights in the earlier stages of pregnancy and her health throughout pregnancy, while safeguarding the state's right to prohibit abortions which are not medically compelling during the late stages of pregnancy, out of concern for the mature fetus.

2. Broaden the discussion of moral issues.

It is extremely helpful when Democrats speak persistently and persuasively about critical moral issues beyond the scope of hot-button issues. Not only does this focus attention on issues such as poverty, but it can help put an end to the absurd idea that only one party is concerned about moral values.

When participating in debates on wedge issues, Democrats can remind their opponents and the media of the universe of moral issues that exists outside the popular debating topics. For example, in a debate about whether our public schools' science curricula should include religion-based theories of natural history alongside theories based on the scientific method, a Democrat weighing in on this issue could also take a few moments to remind the audience of more critical issues affecting children, such as the fact that America still has over five million children living in households with incomes less than half of the poverty line (link), or the fact that in Haiti - just a 2-hour plane trip from Miami - poverty is still so bad that 1 in 8 children dies before reaching age 5 - the worst child mortality rate in the Western Hemisphere (link, link). Unlike some other challenges, child mortality is an evil where the success of efforts to combat it can readily be seen and measured. And it is an enemy we know how to beat:  after decades of true progress in reducing child mortality in much of the world, the knowledge of how to succeed exists; but succeeding in places where poverty is worst and most tenacious depends on world leaders like America vigorously applying the knowledge and the resources and the diplomacy to get the job done. Americans are a compassionate people, and our compassion requires us to continually ask the question: Is America doing its best to battle extreme poverty? And given the critical problems in America and elsewhere due to poverty and the great potential that exists to overcome poverty, is it not a moral responsibility of our media and our leaders to focus much more attention on this issue - at least as much attention as they focus on the hot-button issues?