It’s often said that campaigning for office and governing are two very different skills. Campaigning is a team sport and is all about winning. Governing is more like being the referee for all teams. Or maybe a referee with some known biases.
Navigating the obligation to campaign and govern feels very much like what we all do every day of our lives. We have a tribal instinct that leads us to align ourselves with a team and compete, and we have a secondary instinct that leads us to pursue peace and harmony. It’s the human condition.
When we are under stress, we compete harder. We fight more fiercely. When we feel like we’re losing, we sometimes turn on our teammates. If we can’t beat the enemy, maybe we can beat another faction of our tribe. At least that gives us the satisfaction we seek.
I personally like myself better when I’m peacemaking, when I’m finding common ground, making the machine of government function better, and getting projects completed. I’ve shared that satisfaction in a lot of these weekly letters, because reminders that it’s possible fuel our resistance to the anti-government and anti-community forces that seek to divide us every day.
An example is what I saw at yesterday’s Chestnut Hill Cove stream restoration ribbon cutting. Runoff from the massive new warehouses on Solley Road just south of the Brandon Shores Power Plant had moved a huge volume of sediment into nearby Nabbs Creek, the Patapsco River, and the Chesapeake Bay.
Chestnut Hill Cove HOA President and Watershed Stewards Academy Master Steward Gary Gakenheimer, mobilized his neighbors and connected with the County’s Watershed Protection and Restoration Bureau at DPW, Chesapeake Rivers Alliance, Maryland DNR, Chesapeake Bay Trust, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Underwood & Associates, The Resilience Authority, and BGE (it’s under a power line), to create step pools to slow the water, spread it out, and allow it to soak into the water table.
It’s an extraordinary example of what’s possible when human beings set aside their differences and cooperate to achieve a common goal. “I don’t know how they got there,” said Gary, “but I’ve seen minnows in those step pools.” Water clarity in Nabbs Creek has improved, and underwater grasses, crabs, fish, and oxygen are back. Life is restored.
Relationships are hard. Conflict is easy. We all have buttons that somebody knows how to push - buttons that switch us into conflict mode. Our family members can be pretty good at pushing our buttons, but so can politicians and their campaign consultants.
My political opponent in 2018 told voters that a Latino gang would be set loose in their neighborhoods if I was elected. I told voters that my opponent would let real estate developers pave over the county if he was re-elected. Both of us really just wanted to govern effectively and make life better for the people we serve, but campaign consultants told us that if we wanted to win, we’d need to push people’s buttons.
Lately I’ve been on a statewide tour of 24 counties as chair of the Maryland Democratic Party. We’re asking people what they want in a political party, and how to build it. I wish we could attract a more politically diverse audience, but it’s mostly Democrats who attend, and there’s a mix of fear, anger, and motivation in the rooms. People want consistent messaging, which nobody has the power to enforce and would bore everyone to tears if it happened. They also want their elected leaders to fight fiercely.
I get that. When the opponent actually is breaking all the traditional rules of engagement and dismantling the parts of government that we can’t live without, we are in a fight for survival. But the second we win again, people will want effective government, peace, cooperation, and results. If they’re not getting that from one party, they switch to the other.
I feel pretty good about the people who’ve been elected in Maryland and Anne Arundel County in the last couple of elections. They get what it takes to govern well, and they’ve been willing to make hard decisions to produce long-term results for the common good, even when those decisions open the door to political attacks.
But I worry about the impact of the crises we face today. It could fool us into falling for candidates who only know how to land a punch. That would not serve anyone well.
So let’s keep electing peace-makers and results-producers, wherever we can find them, and let’s keep cultivating those skills in ourselves. The punch is a last resort, and sometimes it’s better to have it delivered by the folks whose job it is to throw punches.
Until next week…