Partisanship

[Bob Of Burleson]

How Growing Partisanship
Is Splitting the U.S. in Two

By Eric Pianin,
The Fiscal Times

President Obama vowed to “turn the page on the ugly partisanship in Washington” during the 2008 campaign, but for the most part found it impossible to do – and is now trying to work around Congress and entrenched partisan gridlock by imposing policies through executive orders.

According to a revealing new study, the political deadlock is not just about Washington: It reflects the sharpest ideological divide within the American public perhaps at any time in recent history. Democrats and Republicans are more deeply divided along ideological lines – and partisan rage and antipathy runs much higher than at any time in the past two decades, the report by the Pew Research Center concludes.

While these trends have been manifest in national politics for years, they’ve also had a profound impact on everyday Americans. People with strong ideological views in both parties tend to socialize and befriend others who share their views – to the exclusion of anyone else. They often make decisions on where to live based on those ideological considerations, while hardliners on both sides routinely impugn the motives of those who disagree with them.

“The overall share of Americans who express consistently conservative or consistently liberal opinions has doubled over the past two decades from 10 percent to 21 percent,” the study said. “And ideological thinking is now much more closely aligned with partisanship than in the past. As a result, ideological overlap between the two parties has diminished.”

Alan Murray, president of the Pew Research Center, said today that the new poll shows that those on the ideological fringes of the left and right “are having an outsized” political impact, Politico reported.

“They do the voting in primaries, they do the contributions to campaigns, they’re the ones that contact members of Congress,” Murray said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” program.

- See more at: http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/ ... 7TcHn.dpuf

[ann jusko]

He's promoted class warfare, racial discord and has divided the American people as never before. Is this on purpose?

[GFB]

Yes

[BigTex]

Wasn't it Barack Obama who said Republicans were going to have to sit in the back of the bus?

[planosteve]

It was the "I'm a uniter, not a divider guy" that began the big split.

[kent]

Is locking the republicans out of debates on bills partisan? I'm sorry, the democrats are the most polarizing, non-compromising bunch in DC. Obama and his administration have split this country like never before, he would consider that a success.

[John In Austin]

And the idiot Republicans talk about reaching across the aisle. The only way I want to reach across the aisle is to break a Democrat's face.

[GFB]

And the idiot Republicans talk about reaching across the aisle. The only way I want to reach across the aisle is to break a Democrat's face.

..definitely leadership material!