I Cogitate
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The bipartisanship meme and how the mainstream pundits get it wrong
EVERYTHING is viewed as opportunity through the Bush-Rove political prism. EVERYTHING. The first question asked is always 'how can we benefit from this?' EVERYTHING is then fixed around such a strategy. Muzzling the Surgeon General and requiring him to mention George Bush's name a certain number of times per speech, the firing of U.S. Attorneys who didn't rush to fulfill the whims issued from the White House, it goes on and on with the worst being the politicalization of terror threats. There is nothing lower than that -- instilling fear in our citizenry for political gain. That's sub-human, another sickening contribution to the body politic by Bush-Rove.
Yet there are those so-called wise ol' pundits in D.C. and New York and a handful of gullible, short-sighted legislators who plead for some sort of return of political bipartisanship in Washington D.C., completely ignoring that FACT that one cannot develop a healthy relationship with an abuser who shows no inclination in changing his behavior.
As with the loony Christian right [and yes, this applies to religious facists of all dominations], there is no desire for accomodation. As Christopher Hedges put it in describing the the off-the-chart staunchest band of evangelicals: "....It does not want a dialogue. It cares nothing for rational thought and discussion..." It is exactly the same with George Bush. He wants to rule, not share power with the legislative and judicial branches of our government. To turn the other cheek to this behavior would be criminal. It must be confronted, not accomodated..
Here's a Booman Tribune post about bipartisanship, one that deserves far wider circulation.
How Bush Destroyed BipartisanshipGo here for the complete article.
BooMan
Sun Jun 10th, 2007 at 10:56:09 AM EST
John Broder discusses how Congress seems incapable of tackling the big problems, like immigration, health care, global warming, and pension entitlements.
"It sometimes seems that it takes a catastrophe to create consensus. The Great Depression, Pearl Harbor and Sept. 11 all shattered partisan divisions and led, at least for a time, to enhanced presidential power and a rush of bipartisan lawmaking (some of which political leaders later came to regret). Today, however, the partisan chasm in Washington is deeper than it has been in 100 years, according to some academic studies, as moderate blocs in both parties have all but vanished."Six years after the beginning of the Great Depression, FDR was riding high in the midst of creating a ruling coalition that would last nearly 60 years. Six years after Pearl Harbor, Truman enacted the National Security Act of 1947 that created the Cold War infrastructure that still remains largely unchanged sixty years later. Where are we six years after 9/11?
...Things never really improved. Bush continued in this vein, asking us to go on with our lives as normal, while he would enlist a minority of the country in the job of hunting down the folks that had committed the acts. This refusal to engage the entire country in the effort to avenge 9/11 had an insidious effect. Despite a tremendous amount of solidarity and good feeling in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, Bush's failure of leadership gradually eroded any bipartisanship, and any consensus on what our foreign policy should be. And it wasn't just the decision to go into Iraq...
...Bush, thereby, polarized the nation by refusing to allow Democrats to take equal responsibility or equal credit for the war on terrorism. He wouldn't let ordinary Americans participate, either. And he was just as dismissive of our traditional allies in NATO and the United Nations. In short, Bush was embarking on a new Cold War, but he wasn't bringing anyone but partisan Republicans and our armed forces along for the ride...
...Broder says that moderate blocs in both parties have all but vanished. This isn't really true. The Blue Dog coalition in Congress is significant. And the Senate remains extremely moderate in its ideology. Two things changed. First, the Republican Party lost its moderates (and had been for some time) through a combination of factors. These include the ascendancy of the religious right, the anti-tax pledge crowd, the gerrymandering of districts, the electoral strategies of Karl Rove, and the legislative strategies of Dennis Hastert and Tom DeLay (no legislation would be brought to a vote unless a majority of Republicans supported it).
Republican moderates were primaried, they were not recruited for new open seats, and they were rendered powerless in Congress.
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