Bi-partisanship? I don't think so!

I had a really interesting conversation recently with a very good friend for whom I have much affection, and who thus shall remain nameless.  It took me quite a while to understand what it was about the conversation that confused me, but thanks to the inevitable 2:00 AM thinking pattern that I have, it finally surfaced.

We were discussing national politics – like what else these days?  We come from the same liberal corner, so that was not the problem.  What she said was that when she listens or reads what politicians say, both sides insist that they are correct and the other isn’t telling the truth.  She was confused as to what to believe, and that the media is no help because they all, except Faux News, do try to present both sides in a balanced way.  Which is the subject for a future blog.

What I found odd when I finally figured it out was, where is her memory?  She is a highly intelligent woman.  When I hear some politician sound off about how terrible the other side is, and how his/her side is trying to really work in a bi-partisan manner, my memory tells me that this isn’t really true.  For example, when Eric Cantor or John Boehner gets up and says that he wants bi-partisanship, it really upsets me because their idea of working in a bi-partisan manner is for the Democrats to do exactly what the Republicans want.  To those two, and many others, that would be working in a bi-partisan manner.  I find that actions speak a lot louder than words.

During this debt crisis fiasco, when the information kept surfacing that the Republicans had mostly all signed a pledge to Grover Norquist that they would under no circumstances raise taxes in any way, shape or form, this indicated to me that the Republicans either were lying about bi-partisanship, or they don’t or won’t understand the word ‘bi-partisan’.  Knowing that the Democrats wanted to close tax loop-holes and tax corporations and individuals who have a net income equaling $250,000 or more a year, sticking to that pledge to a Republican lobbyist is not my idea of bi-partisanship.

One needs to remember what has been said and done, by both sides, relate those words and actions to what is being said now to determine for oneself who is lying.  There is a pattern in these speeches of the Republicans, and that is a constant repetition of half-truths or out and out lies.  I keep going back to the infamous, “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it”.  Josef Goebbels, Nazi Propaganda Minister, 1933-1945