Members of Congress are going to cross the aisles and sit together in a show of bipartisanship for the State of the Union Speech. It’s nice and probably ought to happen all the time. It’s political theater, of course, as is the whole State of the Union Speech, but it is theater, demonstrating national unity and resolve at times when we most need it, be it war or national crisis.
This Congress has a penchant for political theater anyway, such as the reading of the Constitution at the beginning of the current session of the House. Tonight’s gesture will only be as meaningful as whatever follows on it. Is it followed by Civility and a willingness to put the nation first, or is followed by business as usual. The nature of politics in the American system is adversarial. In a two party system someone wins and someone loses and it is as simple that. The key is to choose battles and to compromise when necessary, and to always act with civility in accordance with the gravitas of legislating national policy on behalf of the constituents who put you in office.

Elected representatives should not be afraid of confrontation and they should be willing to fight. I am often frustrated with Congressional liberals for giving in to easily. I want them to stand up for their principles and the interests of their constituents. It is the pure partisanship and ideological votes that must end. The Parties have a political agenda, but few of us go to the polls on election day and vote a straight party ballot regardless of the candidates. In fact, independent or undeclared voters are approximately 1/3 of the electorate nationally, 40% or more in some key areas.
Let’s consider the Health Care Legislation that passed last year as an example. I was one of those that would have liked to see an even more progressive law, including the public option, for example. What we got was a more conservative bill that works entirely through private insurers. Nonetheless it is a landmark piece of legislation that provides immediate benefits and once and for all establishes the principle that no American will go without access to health care. As a people we took it upon ourselves to ensure that no one in this country with its facilities and services that often attract people from other parts of the world, dies because they lack access to those services. Republicans helped draft the legislation in committees and in negotiations.
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It is shocking when the Senate Minority leader says his party’s main goal for the new legislative session is simply to defeat the President in 2012, not any policy agenda. It ought to be shocking, though we are so jaded it no longer is, when politicians and public figures completely reversed a stance on an issue simply because they have now come into or gone out to our power.
On my examples and those of Republicans misbehaving, but of course this is not purely a Republican phenomena. These are simply the most recent examples that come to mind. In general the Republicans are infinitely better with party discipline and with coordinating their message, but it does cut both ways. In the legislative session that just closed the Democrats took advantage of the same outdated parliamentary tactics that they had so vociferously denounced when the Republicans used them, this time leaving the Republicans to cry foul!
As mentioned a two party system is confrontational by nature. The parties cannot seek to form coalitions with other parties and they cannot form coalitions in order to pursue particular legislative agenda in cooperation with allies. American parties have only one other party to deal with, big tents though they may be. This leads to an excessively partisan and confrontational system, especially in election time. It also leads elected representatives to too often put the interests of their constituents behind the interests of their party. Worse still they put the interest of the country behind that of their party. I think some even convince themselves that their party that, be it the Democrats or the Republicans is America and it’s best interest are those of the nation. A grand illusion, indeed!