Sen. Ben Sasse says country headed toward a "deeper, darker tribal place"

CBS News ^ | October 16, 2018 | Emily Tillett

[Pollard]

>> I think politics are important but they’re not the first thing, they’re certainly not the only thing <<

God & Country

That makes it the second thing

[Deplorable American1776]

Been Sasse, you had time to write a book on the TAXPAYERS dime??

[lizma2]

I understand your frustration about voters fraud.

Live in the peoples Republican of Maryland that has been gerrymandered into always being a hell hole. Every time I bring up voter fraud whether at local or state level I’m meet with the deer in the headlights look. I DON’T GET IT!

Bongino lost here by a thin margin in a district that had previous was won by Bush 1.0.

Worked at the Repub table at the last election including early voting days. Closer we got to the last day the more Repubs were coming to the our table and saying “They told me I voted already”

I brought this up at the last Repub meeting I went to and was told ...if that happens send them to election precinct judge. I said I have either been a table worker or election judge for over 25 years and have never heard this. Why aren’t you education our parties worker. Deer in the head lights. UGH!!!!

[Interesting Times]

“Tribalism” is absolutely synonymous with “Identity politics.”

[smvoice]

You are exactly right.
We are ONE ELECTION away from the NEW WORLD ORDER. And I’m NOT talking about 2020.
I’m talking about 2 WEEKS from now

[unread]

""We don't listen all that well in Washington. I'm one of eight people out of 100 in the Senate who's never been a politician before, so I'm new to this place, but politicians talk more than we listen. We should listen more than we talk."

Lawyers...they won't shut the yaps long enough to learn anything worth knowing...Too darn many lawyers in Washington..
Have you noticed how great its been since we sent a businessman to Washington... WOW..! What a difference A'..??
We need to do a LOT more of that...

[unread]

"What’s he talking about? Kenya?"

Someone once said, "If you want to know the future of America, look to South Africa."

[rollo tomasi]

"Like a muddied spring or a polluted fountain is a righteous man who gives way before the wicked - Proverbs 25:26

[x]

So the mob violence is going to save us from becoming tribal?????

Should we follow the dims? This guy is nuts.

How do you get that out of the article?

I guess not reading can work wonders?

[Valin]

Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse On The Rise Of The Mob In Politics in America
http://www.hughhewitt.com/nebraska-senator-ben-sasse-on-the-rise-of-the-mob-in-politics-in-americ/

Audio
http://www.hughhewitt.com/wp-content/uploads/10-22hhs-sasse.mp3

(Snip)

HH: I’m sure you read David Brooks’ column, The Rich White Civil War last week based on the Hidden Tribe study. And it is in fact not a problem of the center. It is a problem of the extremes on left and right that they constantly want to catapult abuse at each other. But it is also one that is powered by anonymity. And I’m wondering, Senator Sasse, what do you think of anonymous comments and the tenor they bring to our politics?

BS: Yeah, great flags on both points. So first of all, I think that the study you’re referring to, Hidden Tribes, is great. Every, your listeners should go read it. David Brooks’ piece in the New York Times early last week was one of the best summaries of it. And one of the things that he says that’s so brilliant is when you take a, parts of these demographers and social scientists tried to look at America and figure out where are we on politics, and so often we just think of it as right versus left. But there is another dimension which is intensity of thinking that politics should crowd out the rest of life. I’m the second or third-most conservative voter in the U.S. Senate. But I’m a huge skeptic of the idea that you can put politics at the center of your life and actually live well and love your neighbor well. And what Brooks flagged was two of the seven tribes that are identified in that study, Hidden Tribes, two of the seven that are most politically addicted are the 8% on the far left that pay constant attention to politics. They’re rich and white, and the 6% on the far right that pay constant attention to politics. They’re rich and white. And 86% of America is saying go away. You people are weird. Politics is a means to an end so that I can coach Little League and live in my local community. And this idea that politics should crowd everything else out, it’s wrong. It’s never been an American idea. And right now, a huge part of what we’re going through is that 14% telling the 86% you’re weird that you want live in community. The 86% are right.

HH: One of the things I greatly admired about President George W. Bush was his graciousness and the fact that he was so obviously and earnestly a Christian. Earlier today, I quoted C.S. Lewis. I’m sure you’re familiar with this, Senator. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, art, civilizations, these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat, that it is in mortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit. And mortal horrors are everlasting splendors. This does mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play, but our merriment must be of that kind. And it is, in fact, the merriest kind which exist between people who have from the outset taken each other seriously. No flippancy, so superiority, no presumption. When the United States, end of quote, Senator Sasse. When the United States was a churchgoing place, with if not denominational agreement, at least a general agreement on the dignity of the individual, I think it was safer place.

BS: Yeah, I agree. And what a hearty Amen to that Lewis quote, first of all. So much of what we’re doing in life is consuming in shorter and shorter hot takes right now. And that means we have less and less wisdom. I mean, there is, actually, lots of data showing Americans are reading significantly less than 30 years ago. If everybody were reading Lewis like that, or even Lion, The Witch And the Wardrobe, or The Weight of Glory and other essays, there is so much weight there that starts from that assumption of Imago Dei, sort of the Judeo-Christian tradition, the assumption that people are created in the image of God. And they have dignity. Human souls are immortal. And so if you treat people like that, it means that even if I differ with somebody on policy, there’s lots of legislative priorities and policies that you’re going to differ with your neighbors about. That doesn’t change the fact that they’re a human worthy of dignity, created in God’s image, and descendant of a line before them, and maybe the parent of a line that’s coming after them. And if my neighbor four doors down and I differ completely on this, in my view, the stupidity of a $15 dollar minimum wage and all the economic destruction that will cause, that doesn’t change the fact that we’re going to root for the Huskers together, and I’m going to sweep their kid up in my driveway if she skins her knee falling off the bike. Like it is just not that…go ahead.
(Snip)