NWM POTUS

The election is still a long (too long) way away, but if it were held today either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama would be elected President of the United States. Much attention has understandably been focused on what such an event would say about Americans’ willingness to vote for for a non-White Male (although in business NWMs have been succeeding for years, because businesses have to answer to someone, customers and investors). But I think the short-term effect on tribal tensions would actually be quite toxic.

Upon election a President Clinton or Obama would go through the usual tribulations of any president. He would suffer legislative setbacks, be outmaneuvered by the opposition, be mocked by talk-show hosts, and otherwise take it on the chin in the manner we expect of a free society. But while most of the opposition would be motivated by ordinary politics, it would be miscast by the president’s supporters (and perhaps by the president herself) as motivated by racism or sexism. Even if the charge were false, as it would be most of the time, it would be politically expedient to motivate the base by casting it as true.

And so race relations or charges that America is unfair to women would get worse before they got better. It is even possible that they could get worse for years, as people politically separate into tribal camps, voting only for their own kind because the other tribes are so mean to them. That is no reason not to vote for such a candidate – we can’t elect white males forever just because the first NWM or his supporters will cynically use his NWM status for political advantage – but the increase in tensions that will occur is another marker of the difference between politics and the market – one relies on manufacturing conflict, the other on achieving cooperation.