Asks The Moderate Voice, a moderate-liberal blog: “As President Barack Obama?s administration recovers from its latest rebuff in its efforts to foster bipartisanship, one underlying theme in emerging commentary is: Is Obama naive in trying to foster …

I was just pointing out that compromise doesn't even mean doing that- because it rarely makes sense to split the difference. Instead, pragmatic centrists realize that you sort of take 100% of some ideas from one side and 100% of ideas from the other side on a different point, if you can find a way to do that so that the blend could actually work.

As for 2010, I'm skeptical that the economy will be rebounding by then so if I look at it politically, I think the GOP is right in opposing this legislation. I wouldn't want them to make that choice just on that basis though, and in this case I think that their political interest and the country's best interest were both represented by the no votes.

If middle-class voters get the idea that the GOP isn't working as hard to bail them out as they were to bail out corporate bigwigs and Wall Street financiers, they will reap the fruits of their own obstruction in 2010.

Remember the dustup over Homeland Security? Cleland voted no over the union issues. Should he have met the GOP halfway and agreed to have half union employees in the newly formed HS Dept and half non union?

Should the Dems who opposed the NSA wiretaps have said that it's OK to tap without a warrant on odd numbered days?

I give him props for at least going this far- but now it is becoming apparent that we have a victor inherits the spoils political system, and that one man may not be able to bridge the gap between diametrically opposed agendas.

I can't imagine any serious questions about his executive skills even arising yet.

It could happen, of course.

But at this point, conservatives are banging against reality when they pat themselves on the backs for predicting anything.

See, I really don't have a problem with Presidents carrying a big stick. They are the POTUS. The Big Cheese. Head Honcho. The De Facto Boss Man. If they have a vision and want to roll with it, go for it. But remain bipartisan in tone. Don't disrespect the opposition party. Don't treat them like the bad seed. Listen to them. But ultimately the President is the President. They have the final say. Most people criticized former President Bush for calling himself THE DECIDER. He was telling the stone honest truth. President Obama is THE DECIDER now.

And I pull back from my bipartisanship utopia view. LOL!

All of this is pretty much politics as it's been played for decades, and most of the comments coming from the left now are echoes of those coming from the right in 2001-2006 (and vice versa of course). I do agree things are more polarized than ever, there are less centrists as time goes by, and that makes the prospects of true cooperation dim for now.

Again, the center is not holding.

And again, I think if people would consider that the 'bad faith' that we believe we see is really just politicians being politicians- on both sides of the aisle- then I think that centrists could go back to being centrists again.

Sabato’s Crystal Ball: The False Hope of Bipartisanship
http://themoderatevoice.com/26429/sabatos-cryst…

Heh-heh.

Yes, I will happily take you up on your bargain, Sil. I fully concede the GOP is being as partisan and stupid now as the Democrats were during the Bush ascendency.

Actually, I think CStanley calls this one right: “our political class believes that their own interests and the country's interests are completely one in the same”

I have noticed a lot of agreement on this theme here at TMV lately. I note Elrod's comment on Pelosi's partisanship the other day, making much the same point as CStanley . . . though Elrod, of course, is of a different political perspective.

But then…where does everyone go from here?

And most of us can clearly see that phenomenon happening when the political side that we don't identify with is engaging in it. That's why a lot of Republicans didn't find it outrageous when our politicians were implying or outright stating that the Dems were rooting against the US during wartime, and it's why the reverse is now true when people who identify with the liberal side more (even if they're nominally independents) feel that the GOP opposition to the Democratic proposals for the economic crisis are unconscionably self motivated.

As voters (and as the ones who suffer when the two sides can't reconcile at all) we'd be better served to acknowledging this problem as a general principle, not just when the other guys do it.

Tell ya what. You present your case and I'll present mine. I'll be willing to admit democrats were/are? on board trying to bring down our nation for either stupidity, short-sightedness or just pure greed if you'll be willing to concede that republicans are doing the same..

eh??…; )

Gee, whodathunkit? It's not like anyone stopped to wonder whether his inexperience in taking the helm during several simultaneous world crises of unprecedented proportion might be a problem.

Sil said: “And now, Obama left with the mess they made struggles to save our very nation.”

Hmmm…Sil, did you notice in the LA Times yesterday, the Obama Administration officially discounting the infamous NIE Estimate?

Acknowledging they have not received new intelligence different from Bush…the Obama Administration now sees the NIE Estimate as inaccurate (probably misinterpreted by illiterate wingnuts).

The NIE Estimate was a political tool …. employed by Democrats and liberals in the intelligence community … to undermine the Bush administration's options with respect to Iran's nuclear program.

Now, overnight, it is discounted. It served its purpose. At the time of its release, Bush's critics here at TMV used it to ridicule and mock Bush's belief that Iran was working on a nuclear device.

How can you say . . . with a straight face . . . that the Democrats want to save the United States from Bush and Republicans?
The Democrats did everything in their power to undermine a Republican President in a time of war for their political ends.

Rockefeller and Durbin were widely believed to have violated their oaths and leaked intelligence to the media for political purposes.
When McCarthy — with her years of Democratic and media connections — was fired from the CIA, suddenly the flood of leaks stopped from there.

The GOP is playing the Democratic game . . . death of a presidency by a thousand cuts. Sure Obama has high poll numbers. So did Bush.

The Democrats (with the exception of Pelosi, who is at least honest in her partisanship) are all for bipartisanship and changing the tone…after their years of bitter partisanship brought them to power.

The one, truly bi-partisan aspect of Washington is that BOTH parties insist on 'my way or the highway', and spend as much time blaming and demonizing the other side as possible.

Pelosi, Reid, Murtha, Emanuel, et. al. as examples of Democratic bi-partisanship leadership? Please.

The long answer requires a look at republicans and republicans (both kinds)..

Bushco strove like the half-witted madmen they are to install their puppet regime in Iraq. And then plunged our economy into a depression as a result of that expensive, blundering and stupid prostitution of our national values: democracy and freedom…which was the exact opposite of what they set out to install in Iraq.

Funny thing is…

Iraq actually picked up on the democracy and freedom part in spite of Bushco's best efforts to keep that from happening. So when China came along and offered more money for the oil, they sold to the highest bidder. Surely the GOP can understand that line of thinking..?

Oh what a tangled web they wove when for oil and money they had strove.

And now, Obama left with the mess they made struggles to save our very nation. And the GOP DARES to stand and criticize him, and worse, are actually impeding top economic advisor's advice to restore our economy (our national security).

Al Qaida could not hope for a better ally. Maybe Bin Laden is renting a condo from Rush Limbaugh. Why wouldn't I be surprised to find that out?

Is going into collosal debt (and implied subserviance therefore) to communist China is A-OK for our nation? I do not think so.. I suppose the crony GOP cluster thinks that's OK since the gargantuan screw-up of their beloved leadership put us in a position to have to subjegate ourselves to a communist nation. Better than admitting they're wrong and going to trial for it..

That's the essence of what's going on. We as a nation of hundreds of millions are being asked to implode from within rather than try our handful of war criminals. We all are lining up to perish, America itself, to keep a handful of sheisters from going to jail. How will prosecuting them save us? By dismantling the cronies of the GOP just in time to keep them from filibustering , fighting and impeding us into oblivion at the direction of their as-yet unthroned maestro Rush-Limbaugh. You expose the dark nasty secrets of the GOP and their base will run away, they will lose their power and we will regain our nation. A new GOP can then be born from those ashes, returning to their old value system of loving America and all she stands for….instead of trying to destroy her for personal gain.

Those who laud themselves as defenders of “our nation's values” who now call themselves “republicans” are actually some of the worst worst worst traitors this nation has ever seen. The best thing real actual republicans could do for their party is take out the trash. And what Obama refuses to realize, or knows and is playing down, is that he's dealing with a small group of mostly men who have sworn an oath to the Gods of profit and who could care less about the fate or our nation as long as they have fat Swiss bank accounts and holdings abroad where they can flee to if the going gets really rough over here. In other words, organized crime.