The Fox Top 10 For The First GOP Debate

[Gravekeeper]

So yes, these are just a few examples off the top of my head of how finding common ground can totally happen if D's and R's alike can just remember one basic and undeniable fact. D's and R's are political opponents, not enemies.

It'd be nice, but man. Political bias/hostility has actually outstripped racial bias/hostility in the US now. That's amazing and horrifying at the same time. Its gone beyond ideology at this point. It started around the 60s, but its been the last 20ish years or so where its just been in a death spiral. The Bush "You're with us or against us" years did it no favours. Then follow that up with the country's first black president.

Throw in a few decades of gerrymandering the shit out of everything and generally keeping people separate across political and economic lines and well -.-

[Tama]

At this point I'm willing for everyone to do just do a Reagan and elect an actor who's played a president. They can't do any worse.

I vote Harrison Ford or Chris Rock.

[Gravekeeper]

I vote Harrison Ford or Chris Rock.

Nah, Geena Davis. Make it historic. -.-

[Estil]

It'd be nice, but man. Political bias/hostility has actually outstripped racial bias/hostility in the US now. That's amazing and horrifying at the same time. Its gone beyond ideology at this point. It started around the 60s, but its been the last 20ish years or so where its just been in a death spiral. The Bush "You're with us or against us" years did it no favours. Then follow that up with the country's first black president.

Throw in a few decades of gerrymandering the shit out of everything and generally keeping people separate across political and economic lines and well -.-

You make political bias/hostility sound like it's only a recent thing. But the truth is it's always been around. Look up on Google/Wiki the term "yellow journalism" and the incident regarding a couple of fellows by the name of Preston Brooks and Charles Sumner. As much "political bias/hostility" as we may see today, it has sometimes in our history been FAR worse. Remember how Bush went out of his way regarding Obama's transition? Compare that to say, how well James Buchanan handled that same role to his successor.

And yes I have seen a map of how the Congressional districts are drawn up and yes some of them do look rather silly! So how do we fix that problem?

[s_stabeler]

You aren't entirely wrong, Estil, but the problem isn't how far apart the parties are politically- it is in how their differences are expressed. There is a significant-and vocal- minority of congressmen that will try to block legislation simply based on who the President is- and that is a problem, since Cloture ( basically forcing an end to a filibuster) takes 60% of the members of congress- and the Republican party as a whole don't seem to care enough to allow pieces of legislation to proceed to a vote.

That, and the Republican party seems to be fond of not compromising- or rather, believes that compromise is when their opponents give them everything they want. ( witness the childishness that was the Republicans sending the government into shutdown- and the only reason the country didn't default on the national debt is that it was less than a day between the payments being due and the republicans finally stopping being so childish- all because they wanted the ACA defunded. Note that this was because they couldn't get a repeal passed.)

[Gravekeeper]

You make political bias/hostility sound like it's only a recent thing.

The current political fracture between the general public is a recent thing though. I don't say anything on here unless I've researched it and I do recommend reading that pdf research paper, its interesting. Also scary. There is also this.

Yes, political hostility has always been around and the US has, historically, had some nasty bouts of it early in its history. But the current situation is both politicians and the general public with a dramatic increase in hostility and polarization happening in just the span of a few years.

We're also in the information age now. Its far easier for people with the same ideology to locate one another and group up. Then only consume media that supports their confirmation bias. Conversely, that confirmation bias is being actively reinforced by deliberate misinformation.

And yes I have seen a map of how the Congressional districts are drawn up and yes some of them do look rather silly! So how do we fix that problem?

The fixes for many of these problems are actually quite simple. But the approval for said fixes has to go through a group of people who are the entire problem to begin with. You currently have the most ineffectual congress in history with an opposition party that has brought more filibusters to the floor than at any other point in American history. So, honestly, fixing it is currently impossible with the petulant group of self serving children that were somehow elected.

With the state the US is in politically I don't think there's much you can do except wait for them to die off. The GOP is, at this point, quite literally dying off. They aren't making any gains in age, gender or race voting gaps. While their most reliable base is angry old white people.

Given enough time, the social conservative extreme of the GOP will die off. Both literally and figuratively. With the shrinking base, they will be forced to change their platform away from Wrong Side Of History(tm) issues like gay marriage if they want to have any hope of the White House.

And those are the kind of issues that are the heart of the matter. When Reagan brought in the religious right he kind of opened Pandora's Box. Its much easier to hate someone you disagree with if you literally believe they are affronts to your god. By repeatedly making social issues into wedge issues during elections the GOP has encouraged this sort of behaviour.

When the opposing viewpoints are "I think everyone should have equal rights" and "I think queers are going to burn in Hell" its hard to find compromise on basic political issues like taxes or foreign policy. -.-

[Hyena Dandy]

The current behavior isn't new, but it is new to most people here's lifetimes. The extreme edges of things got toned down a lot during the fifties to the nineties, and that data only goes back to the '60s. Then, there was a very distinct outside threat. You might be a Democrat, you might be a Republican, but you sure as hell weren't a Russian. It's easier to get along with your neighbor when you have someone ELSE staring you down. It's a lot easier to avoid making comparisons to totalitarian dictatorships when there's a major one looking over your shoulder, showing you what that REALLY would look like.

Meanwhile, in the '90s to the 2000s, politics change slowly. And while the division was beginning, it hadn't hit yet, since most of the guys in office were working on these bonds that had been formed when there was the 'bad' guy. At the moment, only 8 of the 100 US Senators had their seats in '90, though there were some who didn't who were in the house. What that means is that only those 8 could have formed any sort of bond when there was a 'Bad Guy' to compare ourselves too.

We are, unfortunately, more returning to a political status quo, after about a half-century of anomaly. But this is a new situation, and it's one that we now have something to compare to. Which means that we know conversations CAN happen. It IS possible for people to work together, but one important thing it'd take would be for politicians to stop rallying the base out of fear of the other side's base. It turns the enemy into monsters, and turns you into heroes. It's self-congratulating, but no-one wants to listen to monsters, or play nice with them. Which means that it quickly radicalizes the people who are simply sincerely, reasonably wrong, because they get someone yelling 'Monster!' at them, instead of debating and discussing a compromise and working together.

[Rapscallion]

Interesting point you raise. Common enemies bond otherwise hostile people, but with the cold war ending, the only apparent threat of late has been those enemies invented in the middle east. Of course, sabres are being rattled in China's direction now...

Rapscallion

[Hyena Dandy]

There's a big debate about them, over whether they are in fact a threat. Both for China and the Middle East. Everyone agrees Terrorists are bad, but what we don't agree on is whether they pose an existential threat to the United States, or whether they're not much more dangerous than, say, the Mafia or gangs. Dangerous, should get rid of, but not likely to destroy us.

The Soviet Union had the capability to destroy the United States, and both us and them made a political point to talk about how much we wanted to kill each-other, on account of how evil they were. ISIS could probably get its shit together and kill a lot of AMericans, but it can't kill America, and China hasn't made the type of statements the Soviets did. They may be an economic threat, but they aren't an existential one.

[s_stabeler]

there's also the fact that China has never shown any indication that they see America as an opponent on the world stage. ( what i mean by that is that the Soviet Union and the United States defined themselves on the world stage as in opposition to each other- you could either be an ally of the US, or an ally of the Soviet Union. China, on the other hand, doesn't define itself by opposition to the USA- or not on the global stage, anyway. ( China would prefer to be the dominant power in SE Asia, but they've never shown any inclination to extend there sphere of influence further than that. Oh, China wants to be a global power- but not in the same way the Soviet Union wanted to. (my read of tings is they want to be a global power WITH the US- in other words, to be a superpower, but not the ONLY superpower. The Soviet Union, and to a lesser extent the US, during the Cold War both wanted, really, to be the sole superpower.))

as you say, ISIS at least seems to have the desire to rule the world- I say seems as there has yet to be any actual ISIS attacks outside the Middle East, and the Caliphate they claim to be reestablishing never got further than turkey, IIRC- but lacks the ability. ( and is a LONG way from getting the ability- what a lot of maps of ISIS territory don't mention is thta a LOT of the territory ascribed to ISIS is actually under the control of groups that SUPPORT them, but aren't actually part of them- and some of those groups have been getting pissed off at ISIS recently. ISIS is only about 30,000 fighters strong at the MOST. While they can do a LOT of damage in Iraq and Syria where thye know thew territory, and have supporters, they would find it far more difficult to fight in Europe, let along the US.)