There was a Facebook post featuring a snippet of a video of an interview with Ruth Bader Ginsburg. In it she said an unnamed “great man” said the symbol of the U.S. isn’t the Bald Eagle, but the pendulum. Had to do with how political things swing between better and worse from various points of view. This suggests that political climes are better from one side’s point of view while being worse for the other. Then, the pendulum swings the other way and the positions reverse.

It reminded me of a game we set up for the kids in the church basement one time. We tied a piece of twine to a hook in the ceiling and tied the other end to a plastic bowling ball about eight inches in diameter. The string was long enough so that the ball almost touched the floor.

To play the game, you picked up the ball, backed up until you were holding it right in front of your face then let it go. The ball would swing in a wide arc away from you then back toward you as pendulums are wont to do. The object was not to flinch when the ball (the pendulum’s weight) swung back toward your face.

It was pretty interesting. Without outside interference, pendulums by their nature will swing in shorter and shorter arcs until all the energy is spent and they hang straight down, motionless, in a neutral position. No way would that first return swing ever hit you in the face. Even people who understood the physics behind this phenomenon found it difficult to stand still when it appeared the ball was about to smack them in the face. Everyone flinched until the people who tried it last saw what to expect.

But the analogy Ginsburg and her “great man” refer to really doesn’t apply to our political system. You see, the forces aren’t just gravity and the laws of physics. The forces are politicians who exert enough influence on the “pendulum” of political processes that it smacks us in the face time after time. And they know how to manipulate the game so they’re always protected from damage. In fact, both sides thrive on keeping the flawed system going.

In a perfect world, two political sides would follow the path proscribed by the pendulum. They’d start at the extremes and work toward the neutral, central, position. So, the pendulum is a very good example of how a common goal can be reached by negotiation and compromise.

Think of Ms. Ginsburg’s milieu, the Supreme Court. Every administration wants to populate the court with either “liberal” or “conservative” judges in an effort to keep that ol’ pendulum swinging. This protects the extreme positions and what they like to call “balance.” (Balance plus one, so MY SIDE always wins….) Why wouldn’t we want the nine best “moderate” judges on the court? Might stability rein instead of polarization?

I recently had the opportunity to hear presentations by District Attorney Rob Green and Public Defender John Parroccini. We are blessed to have these two working in our local criminal justice system.

If all you know about how their jobs play out is what you’ve seen on TV dramas, you’d expect polarization. (Same as in our political system….) But these two gentlemen see their jobs as two sides of the same coin. The D.A. wants to prosecute evildoers, but wants to be sure he has the right perp and all the evidence to make a solid case. The P.D. wants to be sure that the alleged perp has the best advice and a fair trial. Both want justice and both want to preserve safety in our community.

Certainly there are times when they disagree, but they adhere to Shakespeare’s advice: “Do as adversaries do in law, strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends.” For them, it’s not about personal gain, it’s about the common good. At least in this example, the pendulum starts with wide swings as crime, arrest, and punishment or exoneration play out, but it settles into stability as real public servants like we have “play the game.” State and Federal representatives should take a lesson from this. Why not “government” without “politics”?