So… has anyone else but me noticed that our whole economic system is about to take a massive dump because our politics are so partisan that no one can do anything to fix it? A few weeks ago I watched in awestruck amazement as the highly-touted Congressional Super Committee proved itself anything but “super,” completely failing at its assigned task when members of the ridiculously-polarized political parties stubbornly refused to reach a compromise on spending IN ORDER TO SAVE THE COUNTRY.
That’s right, folks— our congress is now apparently so top-loaded with gutless chickenshits terrified of making ANY concession to their opponents (lest they be called out and lambasted for it in the next election) that we must endure watching them spew nonsensical political jibber-jabber for the C-SPAN cameras in a lame attempt to keep their ponderous asses in cushy Washington seats on our (the tax payers) dime while they accomplish nothing.
IT’S THEIR JOB to compromise. That’s why we have more than one political party… so differing opinions and agendas can be represented during such negotiations. Compromise is an essential part of how our system works. But lately the attack media (on both sides) has gotten so vicious portraying any form of political concession as party cowardice that no one in Washington dares extend a friendly hand across the center aisle anymore. And guess what happens? Our whole political process grinds to a shuddering halt.
It puts the whole system out of whack and gives way too much power to Special Interest Groups, the back-room wheeler dealers who manipulate our government by lobbying, threatening, cajoling, harrassing, and bribing our politicians into going along with programs designed to benefit one particular group of people— often at the expense of the rest of us. With Congress locked up tight, a lot of the biggest corporate lobbies are having a field day throwing their weight around in the shadow of our functionally destabilized government. It was they who sought the reckless spate of de-regulation that opened the door to the ridiculous excesses that crashed our banking system, and now they have the audacity to blame that disaster on the very politicians and public watchdogs who fought AGAINST that deregulation and tried to stem the tide before everything collapsed.
I also think it’s time for We The People to stop paying so much attention to the hyper-inflammatory screeds of quasi-caricatured professional pundits like Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter, Keith Olbermann, Arianna Huffington and the rest, and come to grips with the concept that the whole point of any political exercise is to reach some sort of agreement so life (and the business of government) can go on. The radio loud mouths and televised talking heads are going to keep right on stirring the pot and tossing barbs at one another because it gets them ratings and pays their salaries. But taken too far it’s no different than watching Springer— such interaction caters to, and encourages, an irrational bully mentality.
The reason Ann Coulter wears a little black cocktail dress for television appearances at 8 AM in the morning is because IT IS HER COSTUME. No different than Elvira Mistress of the Dark, who also wears a slinky black dress when portraying her character. Like Rush Limbaugh, Chris Matthews, and other similar political vaudevillians of the airwaves, her brand of extremity can only exist in the absence of the FCC’s long-repealed “Fairness Doctrine”— in a partisan environment that needs allow no fair or balanced rebuttal to whatever bile they choose to spew.
Granted, sometimes it’s an interesting and outrageously entertaining act. But I wouldn’t book any of them on the nightclub circuit, unless they admit what they do is entertainment rather than news. And their act would need a catchy name. How about The Aristocrats?