The dialog of, the conversations we are attempting to have in this country have gotten so acrimonious, and so far from any kind of compromise that it is a wonder we are not even worse off than we already are.
People are so full of their own positions, no matter what other information or new data becomes available, that it seems making progress on almost anything has become impossible.
I believe it stems at least in part from the "leaders," in our political system having stated at the very start of the Obama presidency that they were going to purposefully stop all governing and focus all their energy solely on thwarting anyone who attempts to govern under the Obama presidency. This was the one promise that the Republican party actually delivered on. They have gone all out in thwarting any attempts to govern, which has always included the ability and willingness to compromise.
As an aside, I think it is amazing and commendable just how much President Obama and the Democrats have been able to accomplish despite these foot dragging imbeciles on the right who have been bent on the complete destruction of our civilization over what amounts to sour grapes from the very start of his administration.
But also, it has pushed all dialog to only the extreme edges of acceptable outcomes and created a failure from any angle because the current system requires actual debate as well as a willingness to at least hear what the opposition is talking about in order to make any proposal palatable to both sides of the issue. It requires an understanding of the fact that it is quite possible that no one side always gets everything perfect. That sometimes the other guys come up with some pretty good ideas and when they do, it is a good thing to support it even though it is coming from the opposition.
If we refuse to even allow someone opposed to our views to state their reasoning as to why they are in opposition, the only things we will be able to institute will be those things that are completely opposed by one side rather than the things that we have worked together to make less offensive to all.
Look to how far our once admirable dialog has fallen. And look to how many issues that the American public is in clear favor of that just will not even be heard under this harmful new unbend-able UN-compromising positioning and posturing.
When people watch a Michelle Bachmann shouting over and constantly, purposefully interrupting Bernie Sanders on the television in what is labeled a "debate," they should be outraged at once for all that they have lost. They have lost the ability to have reasoned dialog. They have lost the ability to even hear what the arguments are from both sides. They have had their choices removed and replaced with only a decision over branding which usually ends up being the choice of whatever you may have thought of yourself as before any "debate," occurred.
This preposterous "debate," was not a debate at all. It was one man trying to work under the rules of the current system being thwarted at every level by a woman who has a careless, reckless disregard for our American democracy and our ability to decide what we really believe will work based on facts surrounding the issue. She was willing to and did break every rule of debate, not to mention basic and common decency in order to censor information that would make her look foolish. And the "moderator," allowed it without comment or concern. He should be ashamed. He is like the host who, while his dog is humping a guests leg, pretends nothing like that is happening and instead asks the guest how he is enjoying the party.
So successful have these people imagined this new concept of the interchangeability of facts and truth with opinions and deceit that they are now simply ruling out facts if the facts do not agree with what they have previously decided to be the truth. And many are actually being well rewarded for this obviously destructive and harmful behavior as if they were handing out some kind of new miracle cure wonder drug.
Let's start calling this phenomena what it is: Evil.
What I saw in this television show was evil. It was showing clearly in less than ten minutes the disturbing modus operandi of the triumph of evil over good. Evil was attempting to disallow any facts that may have shown that her position was evil from being heard. Knowing that those already under the sway of evil watched the same show and thought they saw her being righteous and putting evil in its place. Knowing that good requires the ability to see both sides before deciding, and evil tends to pre-decide whether facts support its position or not. Is this not the apex of evil?
My sincere apologies and gratitude to Leslie Salzillo who originally posted it in this post.
It nudged me over the edge into writing a diary on it for being one of those things that seems to be coming so often as to be regular and ordinary and yet should be so completely outrageous that we never could conceive of seeing it without howling at the blatant evil it represents.
Folks, I am convinced that this kind of stuff in large part is what is killing the good old USA, and I am just as sick and tired of it as a person can get. If we let these scumbags get their way, the ideals and the real purposes that made us the greatest nation-state ever in the history of the world will be gone from the world forever. Don't let it happen.
There are more of us than there are of them. We just need to get organized and stop letting them dictate their obscene, greed filled agenda to the rest of us.