Bipartisanship Revisited

I have recently written about the Obama’s and the Liberals deliberate misdefining of the term “bipartisanship.” I’m revisiting the topic for the purpose of showing just how much this redefining of the term is based solely on political machinations.

Genuine bipartisanship, though, assumes an honest process of give-and-take, and that the quality of the compromise is measured by how well it serves some agreed-upon goal, whether better schools or lower deficits. This in turn assumes that the majority will be constrained – by an exacting press corps and ultimately an informed electorate – to negotiate in good faith. If these conditions do not hold – if nobody outside Washington is really paying attention to the substance of the bill, if the true costs of the tax cut are buried in phony accounting and understated by a trillion dollars or so – the majority party can begin every negotiation by asking 100 percent of what it wants, go on to concede 10 percent, and then accuse any member of the minority party who fails to support this “compromise” of being “obstructionist.” For the minority party in such circumstances, “bipartisanship” comes to mean getting chronically steamrolled, although individual senators may enjoy certain political rewards by consistently going along with the majority and hence gaining a reputation for being “moderate” or “centrist.”

— Senator Barack Obama
The Audacity of Hope, Chapter 4 – Politics, pg. 131

As a Senator from what was then the minority party Obama wrote about the realities and horrors of false bipartisanship. As the POTUS from what is now the majority party, Obama chooses to capitalize on exactly the behaviors and circumstances that he bemoaned just over two years ago.

Does any of what is happening today in America sound horribly similar to what Obama had previously seemed to abhor? Well, we were all warned by Obama himself.

Perhaps Americans should look more closely at President Obama’s earlier writings to determine what other harbingers of a dark future that they might contain. Demagogues do have a long history of putting their manifestos in writing after all…

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2 Responses to “Bipartisanship Revisited”

  1. A Bipartisan Rebuke | Reflections From a Murky Pond Says:

    […] Over the limited span of President Obama’s political career he has often spoken of bipartisanship. Yet, time and time again in rapid succession, American have seen the fruits of what President Obama defines as bipartisanship. […]

  2. Stupid, Brave, or Evil? | Reflections From a Murky Pond Says:

    […] self-centeredness and evil. If the Democrats are following President Obama’s twisted model of bipartisanship then their claims about seeking to reach out to the Republicans in order to craft sensible changes […]

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