The country will survive this partisan battle, government will carry on, and Congess will do the people's business as it has throughout our history - or the people will replace them through the electorial process.
This discussion brought to mind a time from our not to distant past. The battles between Harry Truman's and the first Republican Congress in 25 years that came into power in 1946. Truman bitched for the next two years about a "do nothing" Congress...the Congress bitched about Truman and declared him a lame duck without a hope of being reelected. Partisanship was at a highly charged level. The press took sides and the bitching and moaning about the government extended out to pockets of people around the country, who had just come out of a long and costly war.
And in the summer of '48 leading up to the Presidential election:
Quote:
President Harry Truman was desperate. With fewer than four months remaining before election day, his public approval rating stood at only 36 percent. Two years earlier, Congress had come under Republican control for the first time in a quarter century. His opponent, New York Governor Thomas Dewey, seemed already to be planning his own move to the White House. In search of a bold political gesture, the president turned to the provision in the Constitution that allows the president "on extraordinary occasions" to convene one or both Houses of Congress.
...
On July 15, several weeks after the Republican-controlled Congress had adjourned for the year leaving much business unfinished, Truman took the unprecedented step of using his presidential nomination acceptance speech to call both houses back into session. ....In announcing the special session, he challenged the Republican majority to live up to the pledges of their own recently concluded convention to pass laws to ensure civil rights, extend Social Security coverage, and establish a national health-care program. "They can do this job in 15 days, if they want to do it." he challenged.
Republican senators reacted scornfully. To Michigan's Arthur Vandenberg, it sounded like "a last hysterical gasp of an expiring administration." Yet, Vandenberg and other senior Senate Republicans urged action on a few measures to solidify certain vital voting blocs. "No!" exclaimed Republican Policy Committee chairman Robert Taft of Ohio. "We're not going to give that fellow anything." Charging Truman with abuse of a presidential prerogative, Taft blocked all legislative action during the futile session. By doing this, Taft amplified Truman's case against the "Do-nothing Eightieth Congress" and contributed to his astounding November come-from-behind victory.
http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/...ay_Session.htm
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The point? Congress and the Executive Branch, when controlled by different parties, will bitch and moan about each other..legislative work may come to a temporary standstill...but the country survives and in this case, the following decade of the 50s, it blossomed and prospered like no other time in our history..and with a Congress and White House controlled by different parties throughout the decade.
Contrary to the opening statement in the OP...there is nothing drastically wrong with the country that cant be fixed within the framework of a governmental system that has worked successfully for two hundred years. For better or worse, partisanship is part of our democratic history. The actions of this President may be extreme and a greater threat to the Constituion (IMO) then any time in history...and as a result, the people elected a Congress to restore the proper oversight role, while carrying on important legislative business.
The country's survival is not at stake with this round of partisanship. Its not the first time and it wont be the last. Our best course of action, IMO, is for each of us to hold our elected representative accountable...and we can do that, on a personal level and through engaging and interacting with others in our own community, by being educated and involved.
Even if you dont agree with my conclusions, the Truman-"Do-Nothing" Congress battle was an interesting slice of political history!