BOISE — There’s a scene in Tracy Kidder’s book, “Mountains Beyond Mountains,” regarding the Voodoo culture of Haiti that applies quite well to the Idaho Legislature.
The book is about Paul Farmer, an American doctor who died just a few weeks ago at the age of 62.
When he was 24 and still in medical school, Farmer started volunteering at remote villages in Haiti. He subsequently co-founded Partners in Health, an organization that builds hospitals and provides health care education and training in some of the world’s poorest regions.
While working in Haiti, Farmer, a man of science, was struck by the prevalence of local superstitions. He saw these superstitions as a hindrance, something that might keep people from embracing modern health practices.
An encounter with one woman caused him to reconsider that view.
As I recall the scene, he chided the woman for hanging on to certain Voodoo beliefs, even as she professed to be a Christian. Rather than admit her guilt, though, she chided Farmer right back, asking him, “Are you incapable of holding complexities in your mind?”
In other words, she was well aware of the inconsistencies in her own beliefs. So what? That didn’t keep her from finding value in them.
Spend much time at the Idaho Statehouse and you’ll encounter similar attitudes. Flip-flopping is high art around here. Lawmakers who argue one position today can argue a diametrically opposite position tomorrow.
Like Farmer, I used to be bothered by this. I saw it as hypocritical.
But that’s a misuse of the term. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary defines hypocrisy as “feigning to be what one is not or to believe what one does not.” The word comes from the Greek “hypokrites,” meaning a stage actor, someone who plays a part.
That suggests an element of pretense that doesn’t fit what I see here.
When lawmakers argue different sides of an issue on one bill versus another, they’re being sincere. They’re telling you what they really believe. It just seems inconsistent because their beliefs don’t always seem to agree with one another.
Individual liberty, for example, sounds great when you’re pushing back against federal mandates, but it’s something else entirely when people start doing things you don’t like.
That might sound like Voodoo politics, but the reality is that legislators, like all of us, hold complexities in their minds. The issues they deal with aren’t always simple; what strikes them as critical about one bill might not seem as important when it comes to another.
However you describe this intellectual flexibility, there’s been plenty of it going around this session.
Ironically, much of it came from the far right.
The group that prides itself on its defense of liberty spent much of the 2022 session auditioning to be Idaho’s chaperone. Hanky panky on the part of parents, librarians, voters, city councils or business owners — no transgression escaped their eagle eyes. Not even things that never actually happened.
“If it’s not broke, why are we trying to fix it? As far as I know, there have been no issues with ballot box stuffing. I guess that’s the issue we’re worried about,” said Owyhee County Clerk Angela Barkell, when testifying against Rep. Priscilla Giddings’ bill to ban the use of ballot drop boxes.
Yes, but that doesn’t mean it can’t happen.
“My concern is for people who cheat,” said Rep. Heather Scott. “I don’t see anything (in state law) that would stop me or anyone else from designing our own box, making it look really official, dropping it off in an area, collecting ballots and then making the box disappear. Nothing in code protects us (from) dishonest people.”
Now there are some true champions of liberty, passing laws to protect us from the figments of their minds.
To be clear, while I’m happy to poke fun at the flexible logic that’s occasionally on display here, I’m not sure anyone can avoid a few flip-flops when voting on bills. The issues are too diverse, the consequences too far-reaching.
And as we’ve seen repeatedly this session, rigid thinking doesn’t suffice to address it all — even for those who claim the mantle of ideological purity.
