(Part)isanship and Congress

[_MeDotOrg]

Tonight I browsed the posts here, but it was a perfunctory and desultory effort. It’s beginning to seem like a perpetual political Punch and Judy Show. Sometimes it's entertaining, if you enjoy the casual cruelty of childhood.

Partisanship. The tidal force of politics. It ebbs and flows, but increasingly we live in a state of perpetual conflict. Ardent true believers spawn the creation of mirror image true believers, the better to do battle in a partisan donnybrook, resulting in a do-nothing congress.

If you drill down into the word partisan you get to the root: part. A section. A segment.

The word congress has an interesting etymology: it means ‘coming together’ It can meet ‘coming together to meet’ or ‘coming together to do battle’.

It is the conflict between the ‘part’ in partisanship’ and the ‘coming together’ in congress that defines the dissonance of our political system today: We are very good at being (part)isan. We are not very good at (if you’ll excuse the expression) having congress with each other’s ideas.

Not to be indelicate, but how do we get our parts, our sections, our segments to congress with each other? The whole notion of compromise, of give and take, necessary in the functioning of any diverse democracy, has fallen out of favor.

We are not just prisoners of our ideologies, but more importantly, we are prisoners of the dynamic created by our perpetual conflict, which makes it increasingly hard for people on either side to imagine a middle ground.

On the Great Seal of the United States are the words E pluribus unum: Out of many, one. It was the de facto motto of the United States, until “In God We Trust” was adopted in 1956. At the time the words E pluribus unum became part of our country’s seal, 65% of Americans were Northern Europeans, and 98% were Protestants.

What a daunting task is involved in E pluribus unum In the 21st Century United States! We are over 300 million far more ethnically, socially and religiously heterogeneous people than our Colonial founders. How do we find a common vision, a common purpose? Consider all of the obstacles that we face:

The widening gap between rich and poor and the shrinking middle class: The middle class helps define a common social fabric. The middle class has been shrinking since the 1980s. That is the real cautionary tale of the Weimar Republic: When the middle glass was destroyed, the political center could not hold.

Decreasing social mobility: The American Dream has always been predicated on the idea that if you work hard, you could make it to the top. Increasingly, our social strata are becoming calcified. It is increasingly difficult to raise yourself from the bottom to the top.

The proliferation of media outlets: Once upon a time, everyone got their news from the local Daily newspaper and the three (CBC/NBC/ABC) Television networks. Now everyone can now find news that is pre-filtered to fit their own preconceived notions. Everyone can find the purveyor of their own brand of ‘truth’. It’s much easier to filter out ‘the other side’ which is catered to by other outlets. (We used to have something called The Fairness Doctrine).

Gerrymandered Political Districts: The party in power loves to create ‘safe’ districts, to which I would add a simple observation: What’s good for the party is bad for democracy.

In gerrymandered districts, there is no need for candidates to move to the center in a general election. The spirit of compromise, which is needed to gain election in a district that is politically balanced, can be a detriment to getting elected in districts that are mostly red or mostly blue. The biggest challenge facing a Representative comes from ideological puritans within their own party, because the general election is a foregone conclusion.

It used to be when the campaign was over, there was a period of bi-partisanship. Now we appear locked in a ‘forever war’.

Obstructionism has become the Red Badge of Courage for getting re-elected.

We look at our political system and ask: why is it so dysfunctional? The reality is that it is not dysfunctional. It only appears dysfunctional because it does not benefit you and me. But In reality the system functions very well.

So if the system is functioning and you and I are not benefiting, as the cops say at the crime scene: Cui bono? Who benefits?

It functions very well for politicians whose careers are built on formenting conflict, not solving problems.

It functions well for the lobbyists, political consultants, and fundraisers, who see Citizens United as a financial mother lode.

It functions very well for hot talk radio and television personalities, who make millions out of fueling the conflict, and the media outlets who get to sell tons of advertising time before elections.

In short, there are rich and powerful interests who have a large stake in maintaining the political paralysis that grips our nation.

We cannot rely on our forefathers to solve our problems. If we are to be a great nation, we ourselves must be the builders. But we still can, in the words of our greatest President, listen to the 'better angels of our nature'.

[_Analytics]

In 1956, then-senator Lyndon Johnson said, "I am a free man, an American, a US Senator, and a Democrat, in that order."

He proved he walked the walk. After signing the Civil Rights Act on July 2, 1964, LBJ melancholically said in a private conversation, "we just delivered the South to the Republican Party for a long time to come." He knew that before he signed the bill, but he signed it anyway.

There is now a word that describes politicians who truly puts country before party: unelectable.

[_Brackite]

The widening gap between rich and poor and the shrinking middle class:

This is especially true in the liberal State of California.

California's poverty rate highest in U.S. by new federal measure

Explosive growth in CalPERS $100K pension club