On Political Discourse

More and more we hear from the media that the political discourse in this country is nastier and more partisan than ever before. This is typically attributed to the awfulness of the Bush administration - God knows Bush deserved all the shrill hateful fervor directed toward him on websites such as MoveOn, DemocratUndreground, DailyKOS, and other completely partisan liberal hate sites. The message is that Americans' failures to communicate is the fault of Bush and Republicans.

Honestly, I don't mind sharing some of the blame with my liberal counterparts - this blog is my place to vent and I have made my positions more than obvious. I'm also not in denial that on many things politic I think I'm right, and that's true for most of us. The problem today is that people just cannot accept being wrong, and too often many out there have no interest in listening to the other side and risking challenging their worldview. In that regard I have the great fortune of being married to a wonderful woman with many opposing viewpoints who challenges me to refine my ideology every day.

I don't believe the level of vitriol has changed much - if you read transcripts from political encounters from a hundred or even two hundred years ago you'll find plenty of name-calling and incivility. What's changed is that despite what many would claim, Americans now expend a lot less effort educating themselves and will often take the first thing they read and form an opinion based off it. Add to that the traditional media is now in its death throes, and is selling out to specific ideologies just to sell copy instead of spending the time to provide accurate, diverse, and unbiased journalism.

That's a real shame, but it's also the nature of this changing world where information is in great supply and often unfiltered. More than ever, people need to shut up and absorb several sources before regurgitating anyone else's talking points.