Following developments in the Republican presidential nominating contest the instability of the race is stark. Every political contest involves flawed candidates: how could it be otherwise? But often the public develops a firm sense of the perspective of the candidates and chooses to join a team. As primary campaigns are waged on a state-by-state basis, it is expected that in some realms one candidate will do better than another, but psychiatric mood swings are something else. We saw the politics of allegiance in the competition between Barack and Hillary (and the wormy love apple: imagine our blue dress politics in an Edwards presidency!). In the states of the industrial Midwest, home to Reagan Democrats, Hillary posted strong numbers; Obama was more successful in states not so hard hit by industrial decline, states with a rainbow electorate, and those open to a new type of politics. Soon one knew the metrics of the race, even if the outcome was uncertain. But the Republican campaign upends these rules as voter preferences lurch wildly. This is a campaign year that reminds us of voters’ cultural fickleness – their political ADD. They are watching a reality television show and so are we (Jeff Goldfarb describes his pained reaction in “The Republican Reality Show”). If one is not newly tickled, one turns away. Media narratives set our politics.

We have gazed at candidates, quasi-candidates, and proto-candidates – Herman Cain, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich, and The Donald – dance with the stars. Can parties fire their voters? Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty could have had his turn had he the internal fortitude or cockeyed optimism to recognize that to be dismissed in August might lead to be crowned a year later. If politics were based on a comparison and conflict of ideas, this would be inconceivable.

But American politics has become, as Jeffrey Goldfarb emphasizes, a reality show – adore it, dismiss it, or despise it, but depend on it. Voters demand diversion; they want bread and circuses, at least circuses. Around the scrum are kibitzers, now Sarah Palin and Donald Trump, who, after deciding to disengage, demand that attention be paid. Palin seems committed to pursuing Rush Limbaugh’s 2008 “Operation Chaos,” designed to prolong the Democrats’ primary contest and undercut the eventual nominee. In her case, the fleeting Governor undercuts what is ostensibly her own party as she tells her admirers to vote for Newt to continue debate, and, presumably, her role in it. Our rogue muffin, a mildly progressive governor of a mildly libertarian state, has assumed her role as a mistress of ceremonies of the grand guignol of tabloid politics.

At this moment, after the Florida presidential primary, Mitt Romney seems to have surmounted Newt’s second surge, despite Sarah Palin’s counter-cultural rap to “rage against the machine” by voting for the former speaker. Images, even those of the heavy metal left, are to be plucked by anyone plucky enough to do so. No doubt twists and turns will continue in this drama on the road to Tampa, as voters get bored with the pragmatic lassitude of Mitt, a man who would be Ike or at least Bush 41. Perhaps Ron and Rand Paul will galvanize voters to throw the TSA off the island, raging against those airport scanners and the bureaucratic touch that follows. More plausibly, we might discover that the sad illness of Rick Santorum’s special needs young daughter Bella, now hospitalized in Philadelphia (from the effects of the genetic disorder Trisomy 18), will provide sufficient weepy pathos to propel his candidacy among an electorate weaned on Love Story.

But what if Mitt triumphs? Mitt as nominee poses challenges for an ADD electorate that demands the frisson of thrills and the flutter of delight. Elections in which a President is on the ballot can be referendums or choices. The incumbent hopes that the voters will see the contest as a choice. The challenger, particularly in parlous economic times, hopes for a judgment of the sitting leader. Despite his deep pockets, if Romney is the Republican nominee, Obama will provide the only electricity in the room. He will be the Ozzy Osborne, Paris Hilton, and Kim Kardashian of October. Perhaps Mitt Romney will find it difficult to energize his base, but Barack Obama will achieve that for him. With Newt on the ballot, the choice will be stark, but with tame, vague Mitt, the election might be a referendum. Our ADD electorate will have to determine the narrative of the moment on that first Tuesday in November. On that day will the president be imagined a Greek naïf, an acolyte of Fidel, or the Great Leader of the resurgent East? Or is being an American Idol enough?

On Friday, I intended to use some posts from the past to illuminate the political events of the week, but found myself writing about more private problems, about the human condition and my own incapacity in understanding it. Today, I return to more familiar terrain, thinking about the changing American political landscape.

Viewing the Republican presidential debate in Iowa on Thursday, I was reminded why the 2012 election is so important. What the Republicans propose on the economy, on American identity and principles is strikingly different from President Obama’s promise and performance. Day to day, it has seemed that Obama is losing his focus. But I am convinced that he is accomplishing a lot and that the alternative is stark. In April, I presented my guide for judging his Presidency. I think it still applies.

Trying to figure out the stakes in an election requires understanding the issues, and judgment of Obama’s leadership and the Republican alternatives, but also, and perhaps more importantly, it requires an understanding of imagination. Governor Paul LePage of Maine gave clear expression of the right-wing imagination when he ordered the removal of murals celebrating labor at the Maine department of labor – not fair and balanced. These murals are not even particularly provocative. Images of the banned murals were presented in a post by Vince Carducci.

Cultural works that don’t depict a specific worldview offend the Tea Party imagination. And work that can’t be supported through the market, following Tea Party wisdom, is without real value. The cultural and market fundamentalism present a major civilizational challenge.

While this challenge must be met rationally, politics isn’t and shouldn’t be only about reason. Feelings, along with imagination, also are of telling import, as James Jasper explored in a post last Spring.

I feel strongly about the Tea Party, as the Tea Partiers feel strongly about their commitments. I know this is important. How the emotions will affect political choice will play a big role in the coming elections. How is it that public personalities that I find so repulsive are actually attractive to my fellow citizens? I can more easily accept my policy differences with Tim Pawlenty than I can listen to Michele Bachmann or Rick Perry. I hope the majority of my compatriots feel the same way, but I worry about this arena of feelings. It is one thing to recognize that feelings matter. Its quite another for them to run wild, as in the xenophobic birther movement.

Mine is not always a reasonable response, I admit, and I try to fight against this. I have been looking for conservative thinkers and public figures to respect, without much success. I have sought out conservative contributors to our discussions and hope for more success in this regard. I think that there is an underlying serious debate about the public good occurring in American politics, but I am perplexed how ideological certainty and willful ignorance of facts seems to be the price of admission into Republican presidential politics. Not one of the Republican presidential hopefuls would agree to reduce the deficit if it included minimal tax cuts. This indicates that they are either ignoring hard budgetary realities or that their ideological project is to radically reduce the role of the state, far beyond the expectations of the general public.

The Republicans have included the extreme right into their mainstream ranks. As a committed partisan, I believe that this will lead to Obama’s reelection and a more Democratic Congress. I also hope that as a result a more reasonable opposition emerges. As an analyst of politics and the human comedy, I fear that my partisan self may be mistaken. Fictoids have power. True belief can be convincing. Calm deliberate leadership can look weak, and the economy is stagnating, thanks to global forces, but also to American politics gone wild. Reason, imagination and feelings may be destructively interacting.

I am allergic to political gatherings. You are not likely to discover me at movement rallies, rubber-chicken circuit banquets, or victory parties (more commonly weep-in-your-drink defeatathons). I treasure the quietude of the old voting booths where one could think one’s civic thoughts while surrounded by worn fabric. I enjoyed the experience so much that I annually decided to change at least one intended vote just because that choice would mean that casting a ballot was an act of deliberation.

Still, nineteen years ago on a bright September afternoon, I made my way to the train station in Norcross, Georgia, near where I resided at the time. That day Al Gore was coming to town. I no longer recall whether Gore was riding a whistle-stop train or merely using the station as a nostalgic background. Given Atlanta’s transportation mess, I imagine it was the latter. The idea of rearranging my schedule to hear Senator Gore declaim might seem an act of perversity, or at least desperation.

But it was not. It was lovely and sweet and purposive, not only because of the flags and the band and National gemeinschaft and Southern gemutlichkeit. Without yelling, Al Gore was eloquent, passionate and true. At least true enough for campaign purposes. I left persuaded that the order of the Democrats’ 1992 ticket should be reversed. I voted standing on my head.

I tell this tale because of current discussions of Indiana’s Mitch Daniels and Minnesota’s Timothy James Pawlenty, both of whom being regarded as a bit wonkish and “Gorish.” Apparently Daniels homelife was slightly Gothic, and he decided that he could miss the attentions of Perez Hilton, Gail Collins, Larry Flynt, and Matt Drudge, but T-Paw has decided to make a go of it. It is too early to trek to a local rail station, if there are any stations left, but from what I have heard, T-Paw is, despite his nickname, a serious man.

The web is filled with accounts questioning whether one so measured can be measured as presidential timber. In competition with Donald Trump, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Herman Cain, and Michele Bachmann – not to mention a certain raging rogue elephant with fire in her belly – seriousness, modesty, and respect is a virtue in the public sphere. Presidential Obama, of whom some liberals despair, seemingly unwilling to rise to the heavens or sink to the mud, also seems rhetorically appealing.

I have previously written with some warmth of a lusty, rugged, prickly political discourse which does not always observe kindly civility. But there should be a distinction between those who critique and those who wish to lead, a division between fire and nice. And even these so-called boring candidates are not above throwing a few good jabs amidst all the clarity. Certainly Gore did on that afternoon, and so too do Governor Pawlenty and President Obama. Some red meat is healthy for a rhetorical meal, just as long as one abjures the political equivalent of a Paleo-diet (all raw moose). I call for a candidate with a core of commitment to public debate and to political process. Yes, a candidate who is passionate about values and goals, but also one who recognizes that one’s opponents are similarly and properly passionate.

And so without any endorsement, I am glad that good-ol’-worn-sock Tim Pawlenty is running for president. I am glad that he has a vision, however imperfect it might be, just as the same could be said for the pre-Clintonized Al Gore. Many reasons might be adduced as to why a Vice-President will never be the President. Failures have many fathers, but I have long felt that part of what doomed the Gore candidacy was that by 2000 he lost sight of the willingness to take us seriously and to speak in themes that made us consider, not just proposing bubba-Redux.

We will be blessed, if, as the Republican nominating process heats up, it doesn’t incinerate those candidates whose quieter, clever, wiser voices we need, even if, in the end, we determine that the incumbent has the edge. Let us hope for an election in which our decision will not be certain until we close the curtain of the musty, old voting booth.