Congress Is The Core Of U.S.
There is so
much talk of what is causing the divisive nature of American politics and the
extreme partisanship of the American public. What is the root cause? What
causes families to separate themselves from each other? What allows enemy
foreign governments to so easily manipulate our temperament? What allows our
politicians and President to divide us rather than unite us? What causes the
gridlock that prevents finding constructive solutions to complex problems? What
causes the tribalism and polarization of our public? What allows us to question
facts and truth? What allows us to distrust the news media? What allows us to
undermine the basic fundamentals of our democracy and our history of the
greatest nation in the world? What allows our now great advances in social
media to be used against the common good? What allows us to demean and demonize
various segments of our population? What allows obvious lies to be understood
as truths?
Is there
any common thread to all of these questions? YES! The answer is our Congress.
It may seem overly simplistic to cast this blame, but it is real. Congress sets
the tone for our political discourse. Congress is the mechanism that is
supposed to provide a “check and balance” on our political direction.
Over the
last couple of decades, at the same time as our differences as a public have
sharpened about the direction of the country, we have allowed political decision
making to evolve to a point where even a one vote margin may determine our
direction. We have allowed the one institution that is supposed to provide a
“check and balance” to devolve into a useless entity, mired in gridlock, and no
longer capable of performing its critical role to develop the legislation we
need or to check the actions of the other two branches of government – the
Executive and Judicial.
It should
be clear that we are a divided country in terms of our beliefs about our future
and what needs to be done to address our problems and issues. As the past
couple of decades have revealed our differences are real, they are passionate
and emotional. Yet we have refused to address the fact that our political
infrastructure, which may have worked in the past, is no longer capable of
addressing the issues, problems and political realities of the 21st
century.
How
difficult is it to understand that a particular party (Democrats or
Republicans), that maintains complete control of the Congress, House and/or
Senate, by the very narrowest of numerical margins is not going to reflect the will
of the country? How difficult is it to understand that whatever solutions
derived by such a system, or action or lack of action by such a system, will be
controversial or unacceptable to half or nearly half of the country?
For
whatever reason we have allowed ourselves as a nation to accept the fact that
this is the way we make decision – the way we govern; the way we solve
problems. It is wrong. We know it is wrong. We know that it produces one-sided solutions
or results. Yet, we continue on this path.
Our
Founders, who created the greatest democracy in the world; what has been the
gold standard of governing; warned us about the problems, they even said “evils”
of political parties. At the same time they realized that parties are part of
our DNA as a people. But, somehow they
trusted that we would see through the flaws and overcome the obvious. For nearly
two hundred years we have managed to somehow make the system work with a
respect for facts, truth, decency, moral responsibility, faith, international
leadership and patriotism. We are now in a new era and faced head on with the
reality that it no longer works.
The
solution is obvious – the Congressional system must change if we are ever to
restore our founding principles of governing and restore our image and reputation
as the greatest governing democracy in the world.
The solution
is recognition that governing must reflect and incorporate the views and
beliefs of all of the people and not just half of the people. We can’t govern
the greatest nation in the world based on the beliefs of just half of its
population. We need leadership that recognizes our history and understands that
governing by half of the country is not governing the nation as a whole.
I believe
the public at large understands that solutions and problem solving are not
one-sided and demand cooperation, compromise and decorum in leadership. Solutions
and decisions must be made with recognition of facts and truth. Radicals on
both sides do not understand this phenomenon. They believe that their ideas are
the only ideas and they reject any sort of compromise. They seek division, perpetuate
hate, misinformation, lies and even acts of violence to advance their position.
Congress
can change its rules. Congress can develop a new system of “shared power” that
reflects the will of the public and provides a new direction of leadership for
our country.
We need to
focus the criticism of our current governmental dysfunction, tribalism and
radicalism where it belongs – Congress. We are much better than this and can
change our course to a governing structure that can again be the model for
governing that democracies of the world can respect and emulate.
I have
written extensively about the concept of “Shared Legislative Power” (SLP). The
underpinnings include: a strict adherence to a revised “regular order” process with
bills and decisions moving through subcommittees and committees with equally balanced
party representation, expert testimony, public input and with co-chairs and
non-biased staff. This process is currently utilized by the House and Senate
Ethics Committees and has been used, with success, by the Federal and
individual state governments on rare occasions when the membership was divided
equally. Following evolution through this revised regular order process, bills
and decision, would proceed to the Floor for votes of the full membership, unencumbered
by arcane rules that are designed to arbitrarily control and limit what bills
and decisions are considered.
Admittedly,
many procedural details would need to be addressed and it would involve a “game
changing” revision to the existing legislative procedures in the House and
Senate. Critics argue that it would result in complete gridlock; however, the limited
experience in the past has proven otherwise with startling positive results
involving cooperation, compromise, true bipartisanship, camaraderie and
goodwill among members.
·
Slow Learners:
Save Democracy; Heed The Warnings (https://goo.gl/Qczn7a)
September 3, 2018
·
SLP: The Only Hope
For "Country Over Party" (https://goo.gl/GSLfgh) May
21, 2018)
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#BetterGovmt
#PartyOverCountry
#CountryOverParty
#ReformCongress
#Congress
#GOP
#DEMS
