COMPROMISE, it is at the system of government

[nadinbrzezinski]

we live under. You do not have a majority ramming things. When it works you have COALITIONS, never getting 100% what it wants. This is the reality. It requires a system where partisans see the other side as esteemed colleagues that at times you go and get a drink with after work. That is how the system works.

Or at least it is how it works when there is compromise. It has broken down once before, in this massive way. That other time was before the civil war. At that time partisans saw the other side as ENEMIES, as the OTHER, as somebody to be eliminated. We all know how that ended. Hell. some people think it was a time full of honor and glory where armies met in the field and fought with honor. (There is Andersonville Prison and a few other hellholes on both sides that bely that myth).

Look folks we are now in the midst of a constitutional crisis. We are in the midst of the greatest crisis since the civil war. Yes things were bad in the sixties, but the Federal government still worked. Yes, we had the great depression, and yet, the Federal Government still worked.

Right now what you are watching is the last remnants of a federal government failing. That is what you are watching.

It is a view to behold, don't get me wrong. but if this does not not give you shivers, I should recommend Bruce Catton's first volume. The echoes are here.. and we are here.

By the way this is also about the social contract. If the RW wins, the social contract will look like Somalia (ok that is exaggeration, but like Mexico quite possibly).. that is what is at stake.

Oh and yes these RADICALS want to destroy the current social contract. I keep recommending the Fourth Turning... we are at one of those critical points in history.

Suffice it to say... I suspect the crisis will continue well past after default, so the damage will be done anyway.

[Ozymanithrax]

When the government that is designed to require compromise...

reaches a point where no compromise is possible, the government has ceased to function in any meaningful way.

It may look OK right now, but if it doesn't change this is what is called a failed state.

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. Yep and DU is burping

BURP

[Ozymanithrax]

1. Self delete... double click

[noise]

3. Layers of manipulation

A bunch of right wing garbage (i.e. the birth certificate obsession) got the tea party movement started. The same propaganda fooled the left as they rallied to support the President against the ring wing echo chamber and their stupid socialist/communist talking points.

If you get past all the propaganda one notes there is an austerity agenda being implemented.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. Actually this goes well beyond the shock doctrine

that is the facile answer. This is the kind of environment that leads to something else, and something ugly.

[no_hypocrisy]

5. It's much more insidious than described.

You have a small interest controlling the will of the majority. They try to control policy by telling the majority how to vote. They try to control how many of our votes are invalidated or not cast at all. They try to select OUR candidates.

My elderly uncle told me all this a decade ago and it sounded fantastic, the rantings of a frustrated old man. Shit, he was right.

[nadinbrzezinski]

6. Of course, and it has led to the California budget problem

on a national scale. My BIL and I have talked about this, and how this minority (it is minorities who start civil wars) is driving the country off the damn cliff