> The US actually tried to impeach a president for lying about a sexual encounter with a White House intern yet does not seem to care much about a president who despite teaching Constitutional Law (G.W. Bush was not even a lawyer) does not appear to know his primary responsibility as president - to protect and defend the Constitution - and proceeds to violate the sworn oath of allegiance he took (twice) after being elected and reelected.
I believe that this is actually literally true: people do care more about the former than the latter. And I think the reasoning is the same psychological flaw that leads to bikeshed[1] arguments.
The executive branch manipulating the interpretation of laws to undermine the checks and balances of the Constitution is too huge, complex, and nebulous of an issue for the average voter to understand or know how to feel on. So many of us just sort of assume that other, smarter people will figure out how to fix the problem for us.
Meanwhile, we can all relate to and easily come to a moral judgement when it comes to infidelity in a marriage and lying about it in court. We can imagine ourselves in that situation and have a clear picture of what the right thing to do is.
With this whole privacy issue, it isn't even clear who the actors are in the story. We all know something bad is going down, but who is doing bad things and why, who is doing good to combat it, and what as citizens should we do to improve the situation? It's huge and overwhelming.
I believe that this is actually literally true: people do care more about the former than the latter. And I think the reasoning is the same psychological flaw that leads to bikeshed[1] arguments.
The executive branch manipulating the interpretation of laws to undermine the checks and balances of the Constitution is too huge, complex, and nebulous of an issue for the average voter to understand or know how to feel on. So many of us just sort of assume that other, smarter people will figure out how to fix the problem for us.
Meanwhile, we can all relate to and easily come to a moral judgement when it comes to infidelity in a marriage and lying about it in court. We can imagine ourselves in that situation and have a clear picture of what the right thing to do is.
With this whole privacy issue, it isn't even clear who the actors are in the story. We all know something bad is going down, but who is doing bad things and why, who is doing good to combat it, and what as citizens should we do to improve the situation? It's huge and overwhelming.
[1]: http://bikeshed.com/