A good idea is a good idea.

We often prejudge what the “other” will say before they’ve even said it. Solutions, debates, and suggestions from religious figures in the Muslim world are often discarded before they are even considered, because the Western mind has difficulty seeing Islam as providing anything positive to the world’s social ills.

Likewise, in our own domestic debates, we tend to discount what the “right” or the “left” (depending on our own political leaning) has to say, because we’re so used to the extremists, reactionaries, and flat-out morons trying to tell everyone who doesn’t think like them that they’re wrong (see: Rush Limbaugh and Keith Olbermann).

So in the interest of listening to the “other” – and promoting tolerance (I think a key feature of “progress”) – here’s a special Guest Voice: Bob Peters, a regular commenter on A World of Progress.

Bob’s views do not necessarily represent my own, nor those of AWOP. However, in this specific essay, they do coincide with my own personal views.

The Death of Bipartisanship

by Bob Peters

Every time Webster’s puts out a new dictionary, they add new words. Recent examples: blog, WiFi, and, my favorite, bada-bing. Did you know they also remove irrelevant words? Recent casualties: olid – (foul-smelling), fubsy (Squat), and vilipend (to treat with contempt.)

May I suggest adding another word to the “remove” list?

Bipartisanship.

Why? While everyone knows what bipartisanship is, it has too many meanings to be effective. To Democrats, bipartisanship means getting Republicans to vote with them, and for Republicans it means Democrats voting for Republican ideas. The importance of bipartisanship is in direct relation to who’s in charge. If your party is in the minority, bipartisanship is very important. If you have control, especially if you have control of Congress AND the White House…not so much.

And what better example than the recent treatment of Sarah Palin, both during the election and following her recent resignation statement? To supporters of feminism – regardless of political affiliation – it must raise the question of whether political partisanship is more important than increasing the number of female elected officials in government. In other words, what’s takes priority – female leadership or party politics? To put a bipartisanship spin on it, the same situation occurred when conservatives who lobby for a stronger female presence in government (yes, they exist) attacked Hillary.

In both cases, what’s more important: advancing female leadership, or advancing a political ideology? Both were ideal opportunities for bipartisanship – crossing political lines to support a key aspect of feminist ideology: female leadership. Very few on either side of the aisle took that opportunity.

Now, I’m not naive enough to think that Sarah Palin could draw a strong support of feminist liberals, just as I feel that Hillary Clinton is unlikely to draw strong conservative support, even if those conservatives also identify themselves as feminists. The truth is, there is more to a candidate than his or her gender, and their position on other issues – such as Palin’s position on abortion – will likely trump the gender card. What did surprise me during the election, and again most recently following Palin’s resignation, was the way liberal feminists treated Palin. Not only were her politics and her affiliations attacked, which is fair game in politics, but her ability to be a both a mother and an elected official was questioned, and she was chastised for daring to try to have a career while parenting a special needs child and “allowing” her teenage daughter to get pregnant.

Dare I say that if the right had used the same arguments against a Democratic female candidate, we would see an unprecedented sell-out of pitch forks and torches at the Home Depot. (Though to be fair, it was unprecedented watching the pillars of family values on the right defending teenage pregnancy.)

In other words, bipartisanship is dead. And I say “good riddance”. AWOP Contributor Wil Robinson said to me “Government without negotiation and compromise isn’t government – it’s totalitarianism.” I agree, but I think that bipartisanship as it exists today is more deal-making than real compromise.

And bipartisanship as it exists today needs to die a quick death, only to (hopefully) be reborn as a truly effective concept. Hey, I can dream.

But what’s so wrong with partisanship? The Democrats currently in charge earned that position – shouldn’t they be able to do things they way they see fit? Take health care reform. If the Democrats were able to put together the exact bill they wanted – without the compromises they felt necessary to get Republican support – wouldn’t it be a better bill? If you’re a liberal, you’d probably say yes; a conservative, probably no. And the same thing holds true for a health care reform bill totally put together by Republicans: most conservatives would feel it was a stronger bill than any “bipartisanship” bill. So in reality, a bipartisanship bill will probably be a weaker bill than either side really wants.

The other upside (or downside) of partisanship is that truly partisan legislation is owned by the party putting it in play. That party is held responsible for the success or failure of that legislation. No more “Well, the bill wasn’t as effective as we wanted because we had to water it down to get it passed.” Nope – you wrote it, you passed it, and you own it. If a politician truly feels that their ideology is correct, here’s their chance to prove it. And if they are the party in power – and want to remain in power – they really need to consider what effects their legislation will have on all Americans, not just a special interest group.

Personally, I don’t feel that true, effective bipartisanship will exist until we have a multi-party political system, one where NO particular party has a majority. In other words, probably not in my lifetime.

Of course horse-trading – or more appropriate, vote-trading – needs to happen to get things done. But in an era where it’s hard to tell the Republicans from the Democrats, I long for the days of passionate, emotional debate, gridlock and filibusters, when we knew exactly where our politicians stood.

Too often today, our debates are based more on the (R) or (D) after our names rather than the actual merits of the issue being debated. I’m a conservative, so naturally I can’t be counted upon to have anything intelligent or reasonable to say regarding global warming, abortion or gay rights. And to “my side”, liberals can’t have anything intelligent to add to the debate on national security or fiscal responsibility.

Of course that’s not true. Just because we hold differing opinions on some things doesn’t mean that there is no reason to tune out the “other” side. It’s that kind of thinking that has led to the word “bipartisanship” no longer having any particular meaning or power. Is that the course we want to use to advance society? I doubt it, and hopefully that is something we can all agree on.

–Bob Peters