"I am not the first president to take up this cause, but I am determined to be the last.”
The words are those of President Barack Obama speaking to Congress on health care reform on September 9, 2009. They contain the secret of his appeal—and the cause of his first-year failure.
His appeal from the first has been to be beyond ordinary politics. Ordinary politics is partisan politics, and to be beyond it is to be nonpartisan or, as sophisticates say, postpartisan. Obama has the cool of a nonpartisan, quite unlike the late Edward Kennedy, who was a paragon of partisan heat and sweat. But beyond politics is not just a mood, it’s a place and a situation. Obama’s aspiration, the goal of his politics, is to put the country in a situation that no longer requires parties, when at last partisan rhetoric has accomplished its task, advocacy is inapt, sympathy and zeal are no longer needed, and postpartisan cool is correct.
Postpartisan cool is not, however, the mere sign of an intellectual fad such as postmodern relativism. One can see Obama’s aspiration in the first Democratic president, Thomas Jefferson, who founded not only the Democratic party but also the idea of party government in America. After forming the first publicly avowed party against the Federalists, he proceeded to announce in his first Inaugural Address that “we are all Republicans, we are all Federalists.” “Republicans” meant Democratic-Republicans, later Democrats. Yet the best word to describe Obama is progressive, for -nonpartisanship in politics is inherent in the idea of progress.
A good read.....
1 comment:
The founding fathers set up this country in hopes that it WOULD be partisan. The idea of the constitution was to have checks and balances and free speech. This would, and should, lead to partisanship.
The most brilliant result of the constitution is that it creates a magnet for all countrymen who see themselves as this nation's righteous tyrants. Upon their arrival in Washington these would-be tyrants are surprised to find themselves as part of the world's largest committee, comprised of hundreds of other would-be tyrants; each with similar aspirations of power.
Like any committee, there is very much talk and very little action. In a committee of would-be tyrants, the less action the better. The constitution has the evil men in this country fighting each other rather than fighting the citizens. THAT is the true beauty of the constitutional design.
We are only in trouble when all of government is on the same page. Washington Democrats were crowing last year that finally government is no longer divided. This was a moment of great danger for all citizens. But make no mistake; there would be no difference between a 100% republican government and a 100% democrat government. It has been shown that either case would lead to the same undesirable result; bigger government. A coordinated, activist government under these parties has given us entitlement and court systems that are causing the country to crack under its own weight. A good government is a strongly divided partisan government.
We should be careful about asking for the return of republican control. What we really should be asking for is the return of citizen control. Only if republicans can prove they would give the country back to the citizens should we give them our vote.
Until that day, it is important to understand...PARTISANSHIP IS GOOD! The party of NO is a GOOD party! And a government that gets nothing done is a GOOD government.
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