A Broken Economy and Bipartisan Politics

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

I'm not really into political blogging (I leave that to Huffington Post), but I figured I would take a moment to address the apparent fetishism for bipartisanship in Washington today. At a time where the economy is truly suffering, the stock market is in the dumpster, people are losing jos, and companies are shutting down, I think it is crucial to push forward Obama's economic stimulus agenda and let go of this interest in appeasing as many bipartisan interests as possible.

An interesting editorial piece sums up the bipartisan effort:

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"Obama press conference shows bipartisanship overrated" by George Harris:

"In tonight's press conference, President Barack Obama emphasized the urgency of the stimulus package legislation on which the Senate voted today to end debate, essentially insuring passage tomorrow.

Sixty one Senators voted to end debate on the stimulus package, including three Republicans. Some critics point to the few Republican votes as a failure of the president to achieve bipartisanship despite considerable effort to include the opposition party in the development of the legislation.

But achieving bipartisanship is and always has been unnecessary to achieving a more civil tone in political debate, and President Obama has probably incorrectly implied that one is equivalent with the other in his choice of language about the issue.

It is unreasonable to expect that 75 or 80% of any group of people will ever agree on complicated issues such as taxation, abortion, education or the stimulus package.

Bipartisanship is not likely, expected, necessary or even desirable. Good debate reveals differences of opinions and brings clarity to positions about proposals."

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Obama warned that that failing to act right now "could turn a crisis into a catastrophe,” addressing head on the concerns about his approach to the bill (which Republicans have chosen to not support). Translation: Stop the foolishness and let's get this done.

I admire Obama's interest in pushing for bipartisanship - but let's be honest - people don't really care for the Republican agenda right now, so why bother appease it? Their agenda encouraged the mess this economy is in at the moment (the past eight years of Bush proves this point). Oddly enough, I think President Obama has had an uncanny ability to reach out and shake the Republican party's hand while simultaneously dismissing the party's goals as flawed, which Republicans have noticed and subsequently labeled as "arrogant."

Perhaps it is time for Democrats and Republicans to truly let go of their political agendas and figure out what is best for the American people - but the question remains: can this actually be done? And how much longer can this broken economy wait in line for its political healing potion?