American Politics is Broken

[MrScorpio]

Last edited Wed Mar 21, 2012, 07:03 AM - Edit history (3)

Since American government operates under our two-party federal/legislative system instead of the parliamentarian system of government that most other Western Democracies operate under, it falls on those two parties to act as moderating forces on our body politic.

Ideally, The Democratic Party is not supposed to act as a far left political party, but as a CENTER LEFT party, as is the job of the Republicans to serve as the proper CENTER RIGHT party.

For our government to operate, in spite of which party holds power, it's actually the consensus of each side which is required for its proper functioning. Without this consensus, government is gridlocked. Gridlock is never a preferable state of affairs. It falls on democratic representation to guide the operation of our government, that's why we have ELECTIONS… To allow our government to operate under the consent of the governed.

Unfortunately, our system of government is not proceeding, either in the best interests of all the citizens, nor at their behest.

Although Democrats are doing their level best to continue to play by the rules, the Right Wing has coerced the Republican Party into giving up their responsibility as a proper moderating force.

The dependency on great wealth to affect the policies and laws in our country, which can traced back to alterations of the tax code going back thirty years, through to planned irregularities heaped onto the way votes are counted and up to the present scheme to repress the voting rights of vast segments of society has exacerbated the breaking of our political system.

The mainstream media induced meme of Mitt Romney representing the moderate element of the Republican Party is a false one. From the stances that he has taken on well established civil rights issues, economic realities and just plain old common sense, he has gone out of his way to appeal to the Right Wing forces that now rule Republican ideals. The impending exit of Senator Olympia Snowe is a clarion call, signaling the death of Republican moderation. She has seen the writing on the wall and has said as much.

Seeing all of this a person should ask, why would any decent thinking person vote Republican? The GOP is apparently at war against both decency and common sense in their quest to appeal to the worst aspects of American politics. A lot of people are asking this question: Women, minorities, moderates… People who aren't stupid, racist or so hateful of President Obama and the Democrats that they'd vote for a ham sandwich if it had an "R" next to its name.

The biggest problem is that there is a large segment of Americans who are not aware that the Republicans have all but abandoned their proper role as a moderating force on the political right. These people are not demanding that the GOP correct itself. Look at any gathering of the Republican base and you'll see madness reign supreme:

What is going on here?

I have no idea how we're going to have a proper general election this coming November if one side has abandoned any semblance of sanity, but I hope that the Republic survives the process.

The partisan side of me hopes that Democrats will win, not only the White House again, but also that the Far Right becomes marginalized and out of power in Congress and state and local offices. Perhaps this will give the Republicans to reset and come to their senses.

The American people are going to have to take this bull by the horns and rein it in, or you might as well spell the doom of the United States as a properly functioning society if this cancer in our body politic is allowed to kill the patient.

[Fishman33]

1. HISTORY HAS TAUGHT US...

There have been times during our history where groups have been even more divergent than we are now - the Civil war, the Revolution - we've had several more minor periods as well. Having 2 (or more) very contrasting philosophies of where our country needs to go is nothing new. In order to truly fix our disfunctional government, I believe we need major overhaul of the Constitution. Although the current constitution has got the right foundation, there's no way our founding fathers could have envisioned things as they are today - the level of greed throughout our government is shameful, and greed is what undermines our entire system.

Of course, there's virtually no support for such a drastic change within our current government. As such, I think we're left with no choice but to flex our voting muscle until the government listens to it's people. The strongest message we can send - vote out any incumbent. The one exception I could see with this approach would be to re-elect Obama...only because voting for Romney would be just as productive as voting for the ham sandwich.

Until both parties are willing to come back to the middle, our government will be disfunctional. And during these economically trying times, we really can't afford to pay a government to accomplish nothing. And the only stick we hold is our vote. So I say turn them all over - impose our own term limits - until we can finally trust our government again.

I realize there may be some good people being removed, but good people are sacrificed in every revolution. In the long run, when Congress realizes that we need real change in the way we do business, and that we won't settle for anything less than true change, we have to show them all that we mean business.