Supercommittee a Super Joke

I have a great band title for the new Republican Party: "One Song Sally and the Half-Wits." Apparently, the more things change the more they stay the same. Republicans have just rejected the latest Democratic proposal after the Democrats did the same to the GOP proposal earlier this week: Slate. The difference? A mere one trillion dollars and, of course, those pesky taxes that Democrats want to increase at the top of the income ladder and Republicans hopes to bankrupt the government one tax cut at a time. Interestingly, there is another negotiation going on between two parties where greed appears to be at the center of it all -- the current NBA lockout talks. There the players and owners are only a mere six percent apart though, a three percent move from each side could solve the matter, although neither side appears to be budging yet. 

This begs an interesting question -- is there really debate in America anymore? And if not, why? The party of no has essentially created a negotiating environment in which, even when they are the minority party, they get some concessions or don't talk at all. There is no movement from their side of the aisle towards the middle. The same can be said of many of the most popular talk shows where one would be as likely to be surprised by the position of the hosts as the Cubs are of winning a World Series any time soon. Instead we hear the same tired old conversations over and over again. And these men are worth millions. So is there room for real debate and discussion any longer (beside by the tired, half awake Charlie Rose)? It appears that there is little and that not only are people more inured to their positions, but they take pride in their unwillingness to listen or think.

That has become the American past time really, hasn't it: say what you think, ignore any arguments or logic against it (even if it's pretty compelling) and if challenged just say it louder or walk away. What made this democracy great, as de Toqueville so eloquently wrote, was our ability to debate and engage in the public spirit -- our fundamental belief that we had a meaningful voice in the state of affairs of our communities, and even the country. Where has that gone in a world where there are two positions that are treated as polar opposites, even as they really aren't that different? Corporations rule the day and the power elites can sit back and laugh at a DC culture that is so dysfunctional it can't do anything to stop the upward transfer of wealth that has continued largely unabated since the early 80s. 

This leads to the last question: why? Is it popular and consumer cultures that extol the virtues of stupidity, ignorance and steadfast refusal to respect authority of any kind? Is it an education system that has become a laughing stock to the rest of the developed world? Is it the press themselves, who have cultivated a sense that shouting at each other and he said/she said is the appropriate register for political debate? Or is it technology and our current tendency to talk at rather than to each other? I would argue it is a compilation of all of these memes and that if we don't do something to change it we will be left in a quagmire of inactivity that essential not only maintains the status quo, but slowly dissolves our democracy and the future of our children and country. The call to arms today should simply be: think before you speak ... and after too.