The partisan divide - who owns it?

One can reasonably argue that the partisan divide belongs to the two parties. The Democratic and Republican parties have had all the power all of the time for a long time. The ideological differences are stark and deep. That raises a few questions.

One is whether the differences of opinion, or views of reality, have been there all along but the fights played out more quietly in the past. Another is whether the partisan divide is good, bad or indifferent. Arguably, differences are good if it tends to generate better and more efficient government and policies. Its not so good if it mostly goes the other way. At the moment, it feels like we are in the latter mode, i.e., mostly going the other way or heading south.

Maybe one good thing is that the divide represents an opportunity for people to more clearly see the failure of the two parties, which might generate some serious interest in a new political party. Its hard to imagine everyone being happy with the discord and attendant blizzard of spin that invariably accompanies strongly held partisan political opinions these days. That ought to get at least some folks to start looking elsewhere for satisfaction.

Who owns it?

For me, a more interesting question is who, if anyone, is responsible for our current state of affairs. One commentator (don't recall who) recently put much of the blame for our current state of hard core partisan divisiveness and attack mode politics on folks like Newt Gingrich and his ilk. After all, Newt was the bomb-throwing, take-no-prisoners partisan when he was House speaker. Two party politics has been polarized since at least then. To me, it seems that there's a bit longer history than that. Things got hard core partisan in U.S. politics as long ago as the 1700s, if I am not mistaken.

It seems natural to heap the credit, if you like politics this way, or blame if you don't, on the two parties. I don't think its that simple. As I see it, there are five major players in how we got here - each gets some of the credit or blame.

The big five

One and two: First and most important are the two parties. The Democratic and Republican parties are special interests with great power and resources. They are masters of spin, deception and self-delusion. Their hard core partisans have much power and devoutly worship their respective political and/or religious ideologies. They see reality through the distorting lens of those sacrosanct beliefs.

That not only hurts America because it stifles creating thinking, it makes the partisan divide easy to see and tends to push people to one or the other side of the divide. It masks the fact that both sides can be wrong and that there are potential solutions that neither side seriously and properly considers. That tends to keep political power concentrated with the two parties - no one wants to risk going with a third party, given the allegedly stupendous "risk" of the other side gaining power if "our" side becomes fragmented. Its brilliant tactics and it works.

The third: Another major player is special interest money. It is always present, ruthless and powerful. Politicians clearly understand that no money means no election. Period. Special interests are called that for a reason - they are there to defend and advance their own interests.

The assertion that special interests usually act in their own interest with little regard for the public interest isn't a criticism. It is a neutral statement of fact. There is no reason to expect anything else. To a large extent, government is there to protect the public interest, not special interests. The business of business is business, not protecting the public interest. That's just common sense and the way the world works.

That can be good, bad or indifferent to the larger public interest. But, that is usually of little or no concern for most special interests. Those interests include the Democratic and Republican parties, corporations and many wealthy individuals. Money coming from the public into political party coffers is much less influential than money coming from wealthy special interests. In other words, we have private and public sector special interests buying influence from special interests who happen to be political parties in power. Creepy.

Anyway, if you can accept the reality that special interests operate in their own self-interest, it shouldn't be too hard to see that the public interest could be short changed more often than not. Could that maybe be part of how and why we are where we are today?

Fourth: The fourth estate, the press is also a player. From one point of view, they are there to mostly look out for the public interest. They use their resource to look for wrong-doers in government and the business community. Many members of the press truly believes that is their main mission. They get Pulitzer prizes for exposing corruption and evil. Right?

But, on second thought, why should they look out for the public interest? We have a capitalist system. It is competitive and media outlets have to generate profits or go out of business. The way they generate money is by selling ads. Who buys those ads? Special interests who are interested in advancing their own interest. See any potential issues there?

Has it ever been the case that a wealthy individual or entity has come along and bought media outlets that advocate for the interests or the wealthy individual or entity?

Fifth: We live in a democracy and if we don't like our politicians, we can vote them out of power. Ultimately, it is up to voters to pierce the veil of spin and try to see reality for what it is. Admittedly, that is very hard and time consuming. The spinners are intelligent, very sophisticated and have vast resources at their disposal to obfuscate everything. Most average people don't have the interest and/or time to pierce the veil for most issues. That includes me. Nonetheless, average voters are part of the story (myself included).

Who gets the credit (or blame)?

After careful consideration the following seems like a reasonable and defensible assessment of credit:

Republican party: . . . . . . . . . .  25% (divisive, deceptive ideologues)
Democratic party: . . . . . . . . . .  25% (clueless, leaderless, inept ideologues)
Wealthy special interests: . . . .  20% (money never, ever sleeps)
The public: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  20% (deceived, distracted, disengaged & self-centered)The press: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10% (out manned, out gunned, co-opted & distracted)

Differences of 5% don't mean much - maybe the public gets 25% 

of the credit and some of the others get less. This isn't precise science.

Others will, of course, see this differently. Especially Democrats, Republicans and special interests.