Will partisanship be our downfall?

[no fat chicks]

Was listening to commen sense with dan carlin podcast today and he talks about how struggles from within can cause a huge problem for great empires.

With all the fear mongering we have seen from both left and right as of late in the public space with Glenn Becks and MSNBCs does anyone here make a conscious effort to not be sucked in by it all?

I know we have our consistently divisive members who won't agree to a shred of reason if it's coming from across the way, cough cough *the one formerly known as atheist. But for the rest of you is this a problem you worry about?

CLIFFS
partisanship bad
Commen sense podcast with dan carlin raises interesting points
Do you try and empathize with the other "side" or do you embrace tribalism?

 

[sloppypie]

bi partisanship is often good. we want our elected officials to work together and compromise in order to develop solutions to our problems.

if anything, the last 10 years our congress has been so shit stainingly awful because it's been so partisan, and it's mostly due to republicans. when you elect assholes like ted cruz, james inhoaf, mitch mcconnell, and the slew of rejects that literally take joy in bringing government to a halt, then you look like a fucking retard bitching that congress doesn't get anything done. well no shit, what were you expecting?

and republicans celebrate this bullshit. ted cruz shut the government down, and became the runner up to a presidential nomination. mitch mcconnell is STILL blocking garland's nomination to the supreme court, and we've been going with 8 justices for months now.

and a lot of it has to do with the media being so fucking awful and not holding them accountable for anything. that's what happens when an entity like CNN is so worried about their ratings that they spend all their time and energy collecting the nut juice dripping from trump's sack and forgot that they are fucking journalists, not TMZ.

if republicans want to be proud of being assholes, then go ahead. just shut your fucking mouths when it comes to government "not getting it done" because you are the primary reason that's the fucking case.

 

[no fat chicks]

bi partisanship is often good. we want our elected officials to work together and compromise in order to develop solutions to our problems.

if anything, the last 10 years our congress has been so shit stainingly awful because it's been so partisan, and it's mostly due to republicans. when you elect assholes like ted cruz, james inhoaf, mitch mcconnell, and the slew of rejects that literally take joy in bringing government to a halt, then you look like a fucking retard bitching that congress doesn't get anything done. well no shit, what were you expecting?

and republicans celebrate this bullshit. ted cruz shut the government down, and became the runner up to a presidential nomination. mitch mcconnell is STILL blocking garland's nomination to the supreme court, and we've been going with 8 justices for months now.

and a lot of it has to do with the media being so fucking awful and not holding them accountable for anything. that's what happens when an entity like CNN is so worried about their ratings that they spend all their time and energy collecting the nut juice dripping from trump's sack and forgot that they are fucking journalists, not TMZ.

if republicans want to be proud of being assholes, then go ahead. just shut your fucking mouths when it comes to government "not getting it done" because you are the primary reason that's the fucking case.

Lol yea sorry I meant partisan not bi. My bad

 

[Jack V Savage]

I mean, I think that if policymakers all followed my instructions and people were less partisan, policy would improve dramatically, but other people disagreeing with me and exercising their powers as citizens to influence policy is preventing that from happening. So in that sense, partisanship=bad.

Really, the problem isn't that people disagree as much as that the winners of elections have a fuck of a time actually doing what they were elected to do. It would be better if the president came from the party with the majority in Congress (and if Congress were more democratic).

 

[Awesomesauce]

This is a really complicated issue. I don't think you can break it down to cooperation issues solely. The reality is that life is harder now and will continue to get harder for the foreseeable future. But thats far more about environmental circumstances then it is about politics. People have a tendency to look back while ignoring the functional realities that drive much of the decision making.

The fact is that the vast majority of political decision are complete no brainers, they don't require a great deal of thought unless you're a complete tool.

While partisanship and angry rhetoric are on the rise, was it politicians that destroyed the once abundant fisheries across the Americas? Nope, that was over-fishing. Was it politicians that caused a dramatic rise in the need for food and energy? Nope, that was environmental limits being reached in many areas. Did politicians cause global warming? antibiotic resistant viruses? Shortages in natural resources?

Politicians didn't make the world a harder place to live in, that just happened on its own. Politicians are often blamed for not fixing everything regardless of how unreasonable that may be.

Having said all that, modern politics are either far more corrupt then they have ever been or we are simply becoming far more aware of it then ever before. The brazen and shitty attitudes of many politicians in the modern west is a direct reflection of the quickly forming aristocracy. Social mobility has been falling dramatically for some time and the general effects of increasing competitiveness combined with increasing wealth disparity means that more and more people every generation are simply falling behind in a way that can't realistically be made up regardless of attitude or hard work.

 

[panamaican]

No, partisanship is fine.

When we see it in our nation at the Congressional level, we have to remember that people are electing these people because they agree with them. We' re going through a particularly tumultuous time in society where old social norms are gradually being replaced by new ones.

While this isn't a particularly divisive event in normal times, currently it's coming with a change in demographics as well. Power and imagery are gradually shifting to a more diverse group of people and some members of the majority view this change as a threat to their place in the social order (the election of Barack Obama really should be seen as a catalyst for this - he being the physical manifestation of that change, emboldening some, infuriating others).

That will lead to very dug in sides as the relinquishment of power is never easily done. Our partisanship represents that. On the other hand, it's not going to be a violent transition so eventually partisanship will soften as power settles into new hands.

 

[spin]

Eh, It won't be our downfall.


We were so partisan once we had a civil war. Yet the country survived.

 

[Ice That Jaw]

Rooting out the widespread corruption and kickbacks is higher on my list.


About partisanship, it works because each extreme side offers something the other doesn't. Abortion, Immigration, Gun control, etc. It's all out or all in.

 

[elmo_1968]

Rooting out the widespread corruption and kickbacks is higher on my list.


About partisanship, it works because each extreme side offers something the other doesn't. Abortion, Immigration, Gun control, etc. It's all out or all in.

The all out or all in is the problem IMO. Not very long ago you could find members of both parties on either side of those issues. Now there is very little overlap btw the parties. So you are probably going to align w/ the party that matches your set of opinions and never have any reason to vote for the other.

I think partisanship is a huge threat to our country. Read a newspaper for very long and you will see countries that just ran out of centrists and then the country falls apart. If that doesn't sound so bad, think about what happens when we no longer have functioning currency, roads, ports, law enforcement and try to imagine how long you'd live.