Is bipartisanship a dream?

[Turf1600]

No one gets along. No one works together. Politicians are guilty - their constituants are very guilty.

Solutions?

Change the names of the parties so that people must re-evaluate their stance? It's been a while since there was a prominent 3rd party. Is the population too complacent to re-align their values or even think about them?

We will not see progress with a flip flop party line president every 8 years.

Thoughts?

[joshh]

The system is broken.

1. Lobbying is made illegal.
2. Politicians can only use the public funding system.
3. All Political positions have term limits.
4. Fuck Unions!


Look at the choices we get for Politicians....you either vote in a liar or a liar.

[mrsleeve]

no its not a dream, but like josh said the system is broken.

1 we need statesmen not life long politicians
2 the parties need to get over them selves and stop trying to get revenge on each other as the pendlum of power swings back and forth.

3 see number 2, when that happens they will start to do what is right by the people in this country and maybe just maybe then things will get a little better.

4 education. these fuckers need to educate them selves on the history and founding of the nation and act accordingly. Lol funny though we have a our 2ed career intellectual, that has never had a real job of any kind for more than a few months and. This on seems to be destined to land right next to the 1st as the worst POTUS in history. Willsion and 0 seem to be cut from the same cloth and have the same agenda for this country, and thats not in any of our best interests

[pureaudio]

Term limits for all politicians and stop special projects for politicians in office. They should be doing the job they were voted in to do, not spend all of our tax money on their brother in law's cousin's business. Politicians don't not work together because of different opinions, they just want all the money to go to their own projects rather than someone else's. California is a perfect example of this, we are imploding as a state because every person in office here has to make sure that all the programs THEY feel are important are funded.

[Ryan Stewart]

A restructuring of congress would help too. In Europe its built so no one party can get considerable majority so they are always forced to form an alliance to get shit done. They still hate eachother but at least they have to act cordial in order to get someone to vote for their shit bill.

[dirtysix]

Even in proportional representation systems, bipartisanship is a rare occurrence. And when it does occur it tends to apply to social policies only. Legalizing prostitution/civil unions ect.

Coalitions form between a major party and minor parties to create a majority, not between major parties (a grand coalition).
The danger in it, is that minor parties can try to hold major parties to ransom over some obscure/fringe legislation that they see as important.

Democracy is a terrible form of government, but it's better than anything else.

[z31maniac]

Read the bills and comprehend them before they are passed?

[joshh]

Read the bills and comprehend them before they are passed?

What the hell is wrong with you, you're supposed to pass them then read them....DUH!!!

[Victell]

We get the government we deserve. If the closest we can come on differences of opinion is to not bring those differences up, then dont expect our elected officials to do any better.

[CorvallisBMW]

Read the bills and comprehend them before they are passed?

The problem is that the bills end up being 500+ pages long because of all the pork and special clauses in them. Everyone wants to add their 'fingerprint' to it so they can point at it during the next election and say 'Look what I did for you, my constituants'. There's no way every Congressman can read every 500+page bill, nothing would ever get done because they'd spend all day just reading. And don't forget the 1000+ page bills that pop up every month or so too.

Term limits and an end to lobbying would go a long way. I'd also like to see fixed public campaign funding system. Rather than the person who is the most charismatic or has the most friends raising the most moeney and winning, let's see who can be good with a set amount of moeny given to them. Want to know who will limit unnecessary and wasteful spending? Just see who spends their money the best during the campaign. If they can be efficient, productive and get results better than the other guy with the same resources, good for them. Kill 2 birds with one stone.

[Wiglaf]

I agree about the bills, they aways get porked out because everyone wants their piece of the pie just to pass it.

As to the OP, I have to agree with this. People are so biased right now it isn't even funny.. like if I say I voted democrat because I think this war is BS, just based on that you have a pre-conceived notion of where I stand on welfare, gun rights, etc. And you'd be wrong. And If we had more power to divide these issues up instead of it being a package deal, this would be a lot less of a mess.

The main thing is, and this goes beyond the system and straight into psychological stuff:

Everyone wants to make a difference, to do a good job. You wouldn't go into law if you don't care. And once you are in office, you probably feel motivated to pass laws. It's your job, right?! Wrong. The best ones spend most of their time stopping half-baked laws from being passed.

[z31maniac]

The problem is that the bills end up being 500+ pages long because of all the pork and special clauses in them. Everyone wants to add their 'fingerprint' to it so they can point at it during the next election and say 'Look what I did for you, my constituants'. There's no way every Congressman can read every 500+page bill, nothing would ever get done because they'd spend all day just reading. And don't forget the 1000+ page bills that pop up every month or so too.

Term limits and an end to lobbying would go a long way. I'd also like to see fixed public campaign funding system. Rather than the person who is the most charismatic or has the most friends raising the most moeney and winning, let's see who can be good with a set amount of moeny given to them. Want to know who will limit unnecessary and wasteful spending? Just see who spends their money the best during the campaign. If they can be efficient, productive and get results better than the other guy with the same resources, good for them. Kill 2 birds with one stone.

Excellent points.

If only we could do away with all the pork barrel spending.