Politics and peanut butter

Have you made any purchases lately? Perhaps a big purchase such as a new car. Or a small one such as a jar of peanut butter.

So why did you buy that Ford Fusion or that 16.3-ounce jar of Skippy? Probably for a host of positive factors: price, appeal, convenience, past experience, a catchy ad, etc. Perhaps the family dog has always enjoyed a dab of Skippy as a treat.

It’s unlikely that negative advertising dictated your choice. Ford Motors did not earn your business by alleging that Chevrolets are death traps. Skippy didn’t win you over by warning you that rat turds are ground into every jar of Peter Pan.

Wouldn’t it be nice if our political parties followed the free market model in selling their product? And if the media operated more like Consumer Reports than as part of a marketing team bent on disparaging “the other side.”

Imagine a world in which presidential candidates Trump and Biden emphasized what they will accomplish if and when elected rather than engaged in daily personal attacks. A world in which the media presented the news objectively and evaluated the candidates impartially instead of serving as guerrilla forces. In such a world, citizens might have a reasonably good chance of making informed voting decisions. Decisions based on rational factors rather than on fear, hatred and partisan politics.

Let’s look at a recent event. I ask you to be bigger than our “leaders” and to put aside your politics for as long as it takes you to read the rest of this essay since I do not intend it as a partisan statement.

For my entire life, the Middle East has been a cauldron of bitterness and battle. Since the creation of the Jewish state, Israel, in 1948, eight recognized wars have involved Israel, the Palestinians and the surrounding Arab nations. The fear that allied superpowers might get involved has loomed ominously. Generations of Palestinian children have spent their youth in joyless refugee camps while generations of Israeli children have grown up with the eerie wail of daily sirens warning them to seek shelter from incoming rockets. Millions of lives have been stunted and destroyed. Millions of dreams have been stillborn.

On Sept. 14, President Trump joined the leaders of Israel, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates in signing the Abraham Accords. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said that the signing “heralds a new dawn of peace.” The UAE foreign minister said that the agreements signal “a change that will send hope around the world.” Hope! A glimmer of light against the pervading darkness.

Sadly, American political leaders shun any light, however healing, that might bring credit to a political foe. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi immediately labeled the Accords a “distraction.” Trump’s endgame, she assured the public, was not to broker peace but to take attention away from the coronavirus. By this way of thinking, the Israeli and Arab leaders were either duped by Trump or complicit in his effort to distract. How else to interpret their hopeful words? In Pelosi’s narrow mind, everything is viewed through the prism of partisan politics. Negative messaging is her stock in trade. Mind you, she is not unique. Nor is this narrow-mindedness an illness of just one political party. And it infects the public as surely as does the coronavirus.

We citizens might hope that a vibrant free press would elevate itself and us above petty partisanship. Unfortunately, the Associated Press, which feeds national and international news stories to newspapers throughout the country, fails miserably. The first “news” story fed by AP to Daily Messenger readers cautioned that the “optics” of the Accords far exceed the substance. The headline, more befitting an editorial than a straight news story, warns against too much positivity: “Mideast deals tout ‘peace’ where there never was war.” We can only speculate what the headline might be had Trump’s predecessor brokered a similar deal.

On the following day, the AP dispatch deemed it necessary to include the vital information that attendees at the signing ceremony “did not practice social distancing and most guests didn’t wear masks.” The ceremony was described as “stagecraft.” Readers would not learn anything about a relevant Palestinian Authority resolution that had been introduced to the Arab League, but they would get the reporter’s assessment that “Trump’s political backers are looking to boost his standing as a statesman … before the election.” Or is that Pelosi’s assessment? Hard to tell, isn’t it? By the way, I would be equally critical of a purported “news story” that shilled for Trump at the expense of objective reporting. If you find an AP story that does so, please point it out in a letter to this newspaper.

If our political parties choose to engage in an ever intensifying mud-slinging contest, and if our major media outlets opt to take sides, where does that leave the voter? Perhaps it leaves you trusting auto ads more than campaign ads. Finding more honesty in Skippy labels than in political news stories. And realizing what a compliment it would be to either Biden or Trump were a voter to say: “He’s full of peanut butter.”

Joe Nacca of Canandaigua is a frequent Daily Messenger contributor.