Word: grieder
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...campus-politico route--when the bitter truth about Reaganomics became clear. This cynicism, and a powerful sense of betrayal--reflected in the language of treachery ("The Trojan Horse," "opportunism," "Piranhas") with which he described the Reagan initiative to Greider--ultimately made him frustrated enough to spill his guts to Grieder in their Weekly breakfast meetings...
...HAVING DEFINED the problem, Grieder sees a hopeful side to the "anarchy" that reigns in Washington. He finds it quite "reassuring" that politicians don't have all the answers, and that they're often impotent in the face of a legislative process they don't really control. For if they don't, really control. For if they don't, he concludes there must be plenty of holes left in the democratic systems--room for activist citizens to move in and play a powerful role in shaping public policy...
...Grieder's vision, the key to mobilizing this new activism lies in revitalizing the media. If competent non-politicians are to move towards involvement, them newspaper reporters must stop selling both their inaccurate version of the political process rationality and their superficial emphasis on the shock value of news. Instead, the media--through a more analytical approach to reporting--should educate the public about the often chaotic workings of the political system. Given a chance to think about political news, rather than just to react to it, people will take advantage of the system's openness to citizen participation...
There are problems with this constructive and upbeat vision, to be sure. It's not clear from Grieder's formulation how a new wave of media-inspired citizen activists will be any different from the old wave (Nader's Raiders, say, or even the Moral Majority) which has ossified into plain old special interest group politics. Grieder also doesn't assess the practical likelihood of the "reinvention" of news reporting, a revolution that seems unlikely given the growing economic constraints on newspapers and the inherent time limitations of network news shows. Still Grieder rightly observes, "American democracy is in trouble...
...their jobs with a sense of the limitations of political compromise, expecting to develop not only ideas for change but also strategic thoughtful ways to make them work, they stand an even chance of avoiding David Stockman's frustrated decline into cynicism. And if they are animated by William Grieder's strong faith in the progressive potential of the democratic process, they may do even better than that...