Quote:
Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
That certainly is the way they have generally operated, but they just recognized and played the existing game.
We can't pin that one on Bush or the GOP. The polarization of America, and our political parties, is a trend that has been happening for a long time, as liberals/conservatives self-selected and sorted themselves out along party lines.
Politically, it has accelerated in the past 15 years or so, but the trend has its roots in the various social upheavals of the 1960s and 1970s. Thus, you don't see the liberal R's or conservative D's much anymore.
S_A_M
eta: To me, the remarkable part about the Bush administration strong and persistent "Fuck Congress" (and/or "Fuck the Judiciary") approach to governance.
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Politics in America have always been really partisan, and compared to the eighteenth and nineteenth century politics, today's partisan fighting is very tame.
However, I think a big sea change happened when the Southern conservatives moved to the Republican party. Before that changed the partys were much more mixed. There were very liberal Republicans and very conservative Democrats. During that time, for ideological soul mates to work with eachother, you needed "bipartisanship". But once that move was made the parties became much more ideoligical homogenized and now all the ideological "soul mates" are in the same party. Plus, since the partys are more homogenized they are a lot easier to lead. Therefore, when a party is in the majority it doesn't need votes from the other side very much. So the party in power doesn't really need much from the opposition, and the opposition doesn't want to help the party in power because they want to be in power. Therefore, no cooperation.
