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How can centrists -- or those who are on the left or the right but still want to see respect and reasoned debate between the two sides -- fix the current situation in the U.S.? What can the common person in America do to put a stop to the extreme polarization affecting politics and media?

[JPA] The first thing Centrists need to do is stand up, speak out and fight back.  The extremes on both sides have been allowed to highjack political debate in the United States, exerting a disproportionate influence on our politics.  There is a moderate majority America - roughly 50 percent of American voters identify themselves as moderates, compared to just 20 percent who call themselves liberal and 30 percent who say they are conservative - but this majority is divided between two parties and their influence diminished too often by a lack of activism.  

Increasingly, centrists and independents are turning their alienation of the polarization of politics into action.  You see this in the proliferation of centrist websites and bloggers such as centristcoalition.org, centrists.org, themoderatevoice.com, radicalmiddle.org and theyellowline.blogspot.com - to name just a very few. Within the two parties, there are influential centrist organizations like the Democratic Leadership Council, the Republican Main Street Coalition and the Third Way. We need to start standing up and calling out extremists on both sides, exerting our true influence by organizing across party lines in a broad kind of centrist coalition that can help define the terms of political debate by identifying extremists and enabling people to mobilize against them, voting for the person rather than the party.  We are looking at moving forward with a centrist conference in New York this fall to give this growing movement greater cohesion.

On the policy level, I think it is essential that we fight for election reforms, beginning with redistricting reform, because it is the reform that guarantees all others.  Politicians have been able to rig the current system, resulting in a 99 percent reelection rate.  It used to be that voters picked their Congressmen, now Congressmen pick their voters.  This has directly led to the polarization in American politics because once in office, a candidate does not need to worry about a responsible challenge from a reasonable member of the opposition, but rather from a challenge by an extreme special interest in a close partisan primary.  Non-partisan redistricting would level the playing field allowing all candidates to have a fair shot and both parties to remain competitive.  There are currently redistricting reform underway in 11 different states including an Arnold Schwarzenegger-backed effort in California. Election reforms such as this are an important starting place to restore the influence the moderate majority in politics and to disempower the professional partisans and extremists on both sides.  

The rest of the world has looked on as the U.S. has spiraled down into a quagmire of politicians that won't cooperate with each other and media sources that cannot be trusted to speak the truth. Here in Canada, we are greatly affected by what goes on in the United States. But unlike Americans, who are empowered to change the system from within, we can only watch with a horrible feeling of helplessness. Do you think there is anything the international community can do to help the U.S. get back on track without hurting international relations? For instance, do documentaries like the CBC's recent attack on FOX News, Bill O'Reilly and Ann Coulter help things or hurt things (or are they even noticed)?

[JPA] In the current atmosphere, international comments about American politics is often seen as meddling and complaining instead of well-intentioned and constructive.  As the current polarization of American politics is driven by a narrow partisan definition of self-interest, too often we see that attitude infusing our international relations at the time when the world's sole superpower should be trying to build more unity of purpose among nations.  Documentaries like the CBC's on Anne Coulter do not generally filter into American households, but international citizens concerned could help slow the pendulum swing between the stereo-type of arrogant America and its angry detractors by standing up to anti-Americanism, arguing for more reasonable discourse and ultimately a more balanced approach to international politics.

How do you view the role of the media in democracy?

I think the media will serve the public better if they feel that it's in their own interest to do this, that they'll profit from doing it. And I think many of them could profit greatly from taking a different role.

According to the statistics here and here, in my country, Sweden, the number of TV sets is very roughly the same as the newspaper circulation, while in the United States the number of TV sets is very roughly four times as high as the newspaper circulation. If American newspapers should start selling like Swedish papers do, they'd see their market more than doubled.

And in the process the political discourse would gain considerable depth.

They should be able to do this. The media play a crucial role in democracy. For democracy to function properly the people must be vigilant, checking their government all the time. But you can't have all your millions and millions of people traveling to the White House, Congress and all other places to check everything. Instead you must have a few people doing the checking and then reporting to the rest.

That's the most important role and responsibility of the press.

When I mention this role of the media, Americans often say that no, the media don't have this role, instead there are institutions that provide checks and balances. That arrangement is certainly indispensable, but institutions can never replace the vigilance of the people.

The people must also keep the media in check. Every person contributes to this (or should contribute to this) by choosing which papers etc to buy, subscribe to etc.

TV and newspapers have different roles here. TV is by necessity shallow while newspapers analyse things in depth, since TV has soundbites where papers have whole articles. On TV you can get to know a politician's charisma, charm, friendliness, humour, quick intellect etc. In the newspaper you can find analyses, you can choose what to skip, skim or read in depth, you can read at your own pace and stop to think and then read on without losing information, you can cut out and keep material for reference. You end up with completely different information.

Many Americans say "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." Well, yes, it is! So don't stop there! What's the price of eternal vigilance? How is it paid? Are you willing to pay this price?

Considering that people have died for democracy, the price is ridiculously low. The price of eternal vigilance is a dollar a day and a few hours of your time every week, to support and read the paper or papers that you think do the best job of checking your government and defending your democracy.

Do you think this reasoning is valid? Do you think there's a chance that newspapers will take and get their rightful role? How do you view the role of the media in democracy?

[JPA] A free press is the essential check on the excesses of political power, but increasingly the news has been hijacked by partisan political interests.  We in danger of devolving back to the 19th century, where newspapers were owned by political parties.  While the Internet has dramatically increased the amount of free information available to the average person, the filtering mechanism many people are choosing is a form of self-segregation - reaching for news sources that confirm to their own political biases.  This devalues the idea of objective truth and creates the possibility of mutual incomprehension in a democracy, separate sets of facts sided by different political sides.  In response, we need to end the "split-scream" phenomena that has infused so much of cable news, where the screen is divided and two equally intolerant voices from the left and right shout at each other, providing much heat and very little light.  We need to restore the idea of the honest broker in politics, which is one thing that centrist commentators can do, hitting left and right and calling out those folks who would twist facts to serve their own ideological ends.  This is a critical time, in particular, for American media.  We need to regain our sense of balanced inquiry because at the moment, we are off center and it is having a toll on people's trust in the news.  One darkly funny example is not only do people trust traditional news organizations less, but even channels like C-SPAN, which offers unedited coverage of political events.  In other words, the political situation has gotten so distorted that many Americans are reluctant to believe what they see with their own eyes.

I'd like to frame this question in an example.  The lobbies that represent the pro-life and abortion rights causes are substantially influential.  They can control large amounts of money, as well as steer substantial blocks of votes toward their candidates.  Many people (likely a majority) have an opinion somewhere between those extremes:  that outlawing first trimester abortion is an excessive interference with a woman's body, but that by the third trimester the child is a viable life with a full set of rights that must be protected in a civil society.  No one, however, is going to join an organization that is simultaneously pro-life and pro-abortion.

It is easy to motivate people to donate money with absolute statements, but not with reasoned centrist viewpoints.  Without that base of support, there is no one to donate money, nor is there a block of votes to be had.  In order for a group to be influential, they need to deliver either money and/or votes.  How can a centrist caucus succeed in that environment?

To put it another way, the parties align themselves to a series of somewhat radical platform planks.  The voters generally only care about one or two positions.  They'll disregard the positions that they don't feel strongly about, even if they have a preference in order to vote for the party that reflects their strongest beliefs.  How can voters be trained to evaluate candidates on their entire platform, and not just on the issues that seem most important to that voter?

[JPA] The influence of special interest money is one of the key contributing factors to the corruption and polarization of American politics.  Money in politics is like water - it seeks its own level, but the instinct towards campaign finance reform is admirable.  It is not enough.  Seventy-two percent of Americans favor a complete ban on soft money; the same percent favor additional campaign finance reform legislation even after the long-delayed passage of the bipartisan McCain-Feingold legislation. We need to look at new ways to limit the disproportionate influence of special interest money on candidates. Perhaps part of the answer is not to penalize taxpayers with massive amounts of matching funds, but to require free airtime for candidates as a condition of giving out FCC licenses.  The bottom line is that the political elites on either side have learned to manipulate the current system and their influence gives the American people false choices between extremes rather than focusing on the broad policy positions we share.

Is there any key issue that can unite Americans anymore?  Somehow the unity generated by the 9/11 attacks has pretty much vanished, I think, and nothing seems to be on the horizon to replace it.  Fighting terrorism was an issue everybody could agree on until it degenerated into a color-coded no-win mess that has given us a 300+ billion war in Iraq, having nothing to do with either terrorism or WMDs, that Americans seem to be willing to tolerate indefinitely rather than protest.

[JPA] To begin with, the War on Terror should be a unifying issue in America.  When we were attacked, the United States was briefly united in our suffering and anger, but that moment of purposeful unity quickly faded under the weight of partisan politics as usual.  

Consequently, in the short term, I think the unifying issue in American politics can be the need for more unity in American politics itself.  At this time, we simply don't have the luxury to sub-divide ourselves into "us" versus "them".  In a very real sense there is only "us".  Terrorists don't stop to ask if an American is a Democrat or a Republican, Liberal or Conservative.  We need to refocus on the initial insights of our founding fathers who hoped that we would not obsess on our differences but instead on what we share as Americans.  George Washington said, "I was no party man myself, and the first wish of my heart was, if parties did exist, to reconcile them." Thomas Jefferson said "Every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle."

I think a broad centrist coalition can rally around the idea of less divisiveness in American politics by standing up across party lines to a candidate who reaches out and condemn the divide and conquer professional partisan on both sides in the name of the search for unified solutions to our common problems.  This will be a tough fight but a purposeful one which I believe can rally a vast majority of Americans. The message is the same as Independent Nation - that it is patriotic to stand up to extreme partisanship.

What do you think about Justice Sunday (http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/11477264.htm)?  Bill Frist, presidential wannabe - is his participation just routine political posturing, or does a Republican leader of his stature stating out loud that "the Democrats are against people of faith" open up a truly new level of polarization?

[JPA] I don't believe that any political party should be allowed to claim exclusive ownership of the Bible or the American flag.  America has always been a very religious country; it is one of our great strengths.  But using religion as a partisan weapon to score cheap political points and rally your troops is unwise and ultimately dangerous.  With the proliferation of intolerant Islamic terrorism, culminating in the attacks of 9/11, we've experienced what religious extremism can do to shatter peace in the world. I don't think we need to court those same forces here at home.  Religion, like race, must never be allowed to become a partisan issue in the United States.

One could argue that the best way to bring centrism back to American politics would be to create a new centrist party to represent the centrist views of what you say is the majority of the American population. It's hard to believe that would ever make a difference, however, in what is essentially a two-party system due to the election method (one ballot, one vote). Adopting something like the Condorcet election method would fix this, but neither the Republicans nor the Democrats would ever allow such a system without HUGE public pressure.

Do you think modifying the U.S. electoral system in this way would help heal the political divide between Republicans and Democrats in the U.S., or even render it inconsequential by giving more choices to voters? Do you think any major modification of the electoral system will EVER happen?

[JPA] Election reform is essential to restoring balance and reason discourse to American politics.  But as I mentioned in an earlier question, I believe the first order of business should be redistricting reform, leveling the playing field and addressing the insanity of gerrymandering which has made so many elections non-competitive and allowed political parties to virtually own districts.  With regard to the electoral college, it seems to me that had John Kerry won 60,000 more votes in Ohio in 2004, and then been elected President despite Bush winning the popular vote, we would have almost been guaranteed to have seen a bipartisan movement toward election reform, because the Republicans would have been burned in the same way the Democrats had been four years before.  But as the situation stands, the current system appears to work for the party in power, and consequently the objective incentive for a common sense electoral college reform has lost much of its political urgency.  But the need for fundamental election reform was the only clear mandate to come out of the 2000 election, and we need to keep fighting for it, in a variety of forms across party lines.  

I'd like to also point out that in the short run I'm not advocating the creation of a centrist third party.  Study of American history shows that third parties have rarely been successful and even Teddy Roosevelt in 1912 - who had already been President - capped out at 27 percent of the vote as the candidate of the Progressive Party.  Instead, I think centrists and independents need to stand up, make their presence felt and have one party genuinely reach out and try to realign American politics by addressing their concerns.  If they fail and prove captive of their most extreme special interests then it may be time for a centrist independent candidate to realign politics.

For some reason my questions have become very long and ranty. I'm sorry! I don't know how to change this.

I'm Swedish, and here we don't have split-scream shows, I don't know what that is. From articles on the Web I get the impression that people actually shout at each other rather than discuss, and that they aim to raise anger and exacerbate conflicts rather than clarify, explain and convince.

If I've understood this correctly, maybe this can explain some of the tragic difficulties in understanding between the United States and Europe. It may mean that certain tones and attitudes are okay on one side of the Atlantic while they're baffling and incomprehensible on the other side.

Before the Iraq war, when the Bush administration lost patience with the countries that opposed their view, Bush expressed their stance as "Either you're with us or you're against us."

Assuming shouts and anger in political discourse doesn't raise eyebrows over there, maybe Bush's wording is seen as acceptable. Perhaps it's even seen as a way to clearly and purposefully take a stand. But on my side of the Atlantic such a wording is weird and baffling, because it's an outrageous show of disrespect for your counterpart, and, what's even worse, outrageous disrespect for the democratic mindset.

Of course international relationships aren't democratic. Still, one does expect a democratic mindset in the relationships between democratic countries. Democracy is based on discussion rather than the strong enforcing their will on everyone else. When this is no longer possible you can lose your patience, you can say that the time for debate has run out and urgent action is indispensable, you can even force action -- but still the way you do it has to express interest in and concern for the democratic mindset.

And of course, in addition to that, it must also show some respect for your counterpart.

Considering how destructive the rift has been, and how unnecessary it seems, maybe Bush's wordings, and many other things, are seen in such different light on the two sides of the Atlantic that only highly specialised experts in diplomacy can bridge the gap.

What do you think about this analysis? What's your view on the rift between the US and Europe?

[JPA] Just as the political divide in the United States is exaggerated by the loud voices of activists on either side, the transatlantic rift needs to be combated with a sense of perspective.  Americans need to try and understand the roots of many Europeans' frustration with the attitudes underlying our foreign policy, but at the same time Europe needs to do enough soul searching to recognize that at the end of the day, western democracies are all fundamentally on the same side when it comes to the war on terror.  We need more reasoned discussion and less angry exaggeration.  Whenever anyone in the US or abroad compares President Bush to Hitler or Bin Laden they make a mockery of whatever legitimate point they were trying to make.  There is no moral equivalence between the tyranny of a terrorist state and a pluralistic democracy, however imperfect.  The left, in particular, does itself a great disservice when it naively pretends otherwise.  At the end of the day, we all need to take more of a responsibility for healing the transatlantic rift.  The United States needs its allies more than before, not less.  I'd like to think that most Americans and Europeans would be relieved by increasing the spirit of mutual respect and appreciation because at the end of the day western democracies are all on the same side in a larger struggle which may engulf the earth if we do not stand together, in a spirit of strength, cooperation, and mutual appreciation.

When Bush visited Germany in February I was stunned that a meeting was cancelled because President Bush (a democratically elected president!) didn't dare meet the general public without pre-screening their questions.

The reports claimed that this also happens in the United States. They said that Bush always gets to either pre-screen his questions or choose his reporters. Is this true?

Do all American politicians get to pre-screen their questions and choose their reporters?

If this is the case, do you think there's any chance that the media will get the courage to change this and submit politicians to real questioning? And is there any chance that the politicians will get the courage to publicly answer the unfiltered questions of the people that elected them?

[JPA] It is unfortunately true that in so-called town hall meetings with the current President the crowd and its questions are pre-screened to be friendly toward the administration.  It's important to note that these are not questions sessions from the media - which are unscripted - but chances for the President to visit his supporters in view of the television cameras.  Its supporters see nothing Orwellian in this, just an attempt to make sure that critics do not attempt to embarrass the president in the increasingly uncivil ideological turf battle.  The effect of all this is increased cynicism among critics and unanimity among supporters - ideological conformity increased on both sides. It's a symptom of the times we live in, but we need solutions, not excuses from the administration on this.

In your New York Sun article of November 5, 2004, you say that America is a much more conservative country than it is a liberal one. I think what you say is true but I would like to know why Americans are so conservative politically?

Why is there such a political divide in the US? or Perhaps why aren't the political centrists more in the forefront?

Do you believe that there can be a political party in power that would implement and balance fiscally conservative policies with socially responsible ones?

With extremism being the norm all around ie left wing governments rising to power throughout Latin America, terrorist groups very active in Iraq and throughout the middle east, religious right influences in the current US government, is it really a time for centrists? Can centrism be radical enough to stand up and be counted for? or does  the idea of centrism itself not allow for political action?

[JPA] I think that the times demand muscular centrism.  The center is under attack and that is why we must fight back - I think the reason we have seen the rise of conservative populism in the United States has to do with a consistent drumbeat of occasionally absurd cultural liberalism which threatens families and traditional values.  So even while these individuals may not be stereotypically conservative in their private lives, they have voted conservative as a check on uncontrolled liberalism in American culture.  This is something Democrats have not generally come to grips with or that artists have appreciated their influence in.  But it is precisely because most Americans are not far left or far right but in the center, that we must stand up and speak out to restore a sense a balance in politics rather than making people choose between what they perceive are the lesser of two evils - making essentially negative choices about their political affiliation.  Centrists can offer the nation a way to move not left or right but forward, and in that there is great hope and rebellious common sense.