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There are two threads going on this subject so I'm kind of lumping all of my responses together here.
I agree with pan that the partisan polarization in this country is tearing it apart. Where we would probably diverge is in our opinion of how it is perpetuated. I tend to think it's twofold.
1. heightened party loyalty makes it easier for politicians to run campaigns and get elected
because,
2. heightened party loyalty makes it easier for the people to follow politics because they can essentially be told what to like and not to like based on information that is rubber-stamped and funneled to them
I'll probably get in trouble for saying it, but many, many people in this country are just plain lazy when it comes to thinking about 'important issues.' That's why you have so many republicans still making the 'Obama + healthcare reform = Obama's socialist healthcare reform' regardless of how much the legislation was gutted under republican pressure. Thanks to this phenomenon of hard-wired political thinking, the viral word 'socialism' is now indelibly imprinted on the Obama presidency. Democrats do it, too, but not as skillfully as the republicans - they are the masters of this kind of viral thought dissemination.
And, since I suspect that most of this wave of violence and mischief is probably based on that kind of 'infected' thinking (taken to an extreme) in my mind they seem like stupidity of nightmarishly comic proportions - like coyote's quest to 'get' the roadrunner. This is not revolution, it is temper tantrums.
Wow, I held back a lot of 'viral' metaphors, but really, when you think about it there are a lot of similarities that can be made. It's kind of freaking me out, lol. Must write down.
---------- Post added at 08:34 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:32 AM ----------
Also, even though I would have liked the bill to be stronger, I am very pleased that it passed. It's only natural for a change of this magnitude to upset a proportion of the population, but given 30-40 years, which is only a blink of an eye in the evolution of a society, the right to healthcare will seem as natural as many of the other rights and benefits we take for granted in this country...I liked the bit that shauk posted (can't remember which thread it was in).
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Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce
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