Absurdity of Partisan Politcs

Trying to express the absurdity of partisan politics is more challenging than I thought.
    Political extremists are permanently entrenched. Congress is comfortably divided into two irreconcilable camps, sniping at each other while jockeying for power. The media is heavily invested, with so-called experts chomping at the bit to get noticed or sell their latest book.
    Meanwhile, the majority of people hold onto their personal opinions, wishing that extremists would go away, members of Congress would do their proper job, and the media would just grow up.
    The absurdity is blatantly on display. You can see it Smell it. Taste its never-ending hypocrisy. The trouble is, it's hard to imagine anything different. How do you break through this never-ending drone and reveal the farce for what it is?
    All of a sudden, completely unexpected, inspiration nearly hit me in the head!
    Visiting a local bookstore, I was struck by the titles of two books that summed up everything:

The first was called: American Fascism, The Christian Right and the War on America. A lot of liberals would like that one.

The second: Liberal Fascism, with a large smiley face on the cover, sporting a Hitler mustache. I could see conservatives nodding with agreement.

Both liberals and conservatives, in the views of these authors, see each other as harbingers of fascism! This was not careful, sensible writing relecting honest scholarship. It was the effort of ideologues trying to exploit political outrage in order to sell books — at the expense of sanity.
    Absurd? Of course it is. Here we find market-driven, literary support of sher negativity and nonsense adding to the coffers of uninspired, mediocre panderers, who dare to pose as experts.
    They tell us we live in a divided America: red states, blue states; bleeding heart liberals and throwback conservatives. Each side points to the other as a threat to civilization. If you don't listen carefully, they sound so similar that it's hard to tell which side is talking. It's just one rant after the other, with most of it not making any sense at all.
    Or worse. It makes a little sense when they appeal to something we hold dear, and then we don't listen to the other side.
    This would be funny if it didn't throw our governmental system into a tail-spin, and our culturalal reality along with it. Our government "of the people" was supposed to be based on reason, good will, and the kind of patriotism that includes everyone — not lies, fear-mongering and empty promises.
    The trouble is, unless we live like a recluse, with neither radio nor television, we buy into this insanity to some extent. We like the "sensible" way one position is talked about, and hate the "sneaky nonsense" of the other.
    We don't hear about common sense compromise that might bow in respect to everyone's freedom. That would be too.. what? "American?"
    It's time we see the obvious, as painful as it might be. When two positions are purposely set against each other in politics, they usually represent two sides of the same coin! That we are urged to hate one and follow the other only leads to anger and distrust.
    Is that what we really want?
    Let's say that I believe in uninhibited gun ownership, and you don't. I'm sitting here admiring my firearms collection, while you sit at home, hundreds of miles away, watching TV. We both lead decent lives, are good to our spouses and kids, and have no idea the other person exists. If we were neighbors, we might be friends.
    Now, there are people who make a lot of money whose job it is to make you and me hate each other, when our lives don't even intersect. So what if a New England suburbanite sees the world differently than the fellow down South who travels with a gun rack. What's wrong with that? Why should either impose his regional values on the other, when both are just fine for where they live? It runs up against the sense of fairness and decency that we all share when given a moment to think about it.
    We may imagine potential threats in each other's positions. I won't like the idea of you wanting to take my guns away, or disturbing what I see are my constitutional rights. You certainly don't like the idea of me coming into your house and shooting you for some reason. But where do we get these ideas? Who's pushing them on us as we go about our daily lives unaware of one another?
    We probably started out with a "live and let live" attitude that didn't think about different regional opinions at all. Then came politicians who want to make a name for themselves. They know how easy it is to get extremists fired up, and make themselves look like champions of freedom instead of champions of discord. They also know that their lapdog media, also feeding on contention, is more than ready to push the entire fiasco to the limit.
    Who else is seen every night fostering a powerful distrust within our nation?
    Many politicians, and most of the media, forge their identity and success on stirring anger and division. Listen to television talks-shows objectively for just one evening, not taking sides, and you'll see the absurdity for what it is. You and I are just pawns to them. The last thing in the world they want is for us to think for ourselves and get along. They've gone so far as to push the sacred right of freedom of religion into the arena by making its chief safeguard, the separation of church and state, contested by the very God-fearing people it was designed to protect!
    (While we're at it, doesn't it bite your ankle when one of those activist preachers gets caught in sexual scandal after fleecing their flocks for millions of dollars? Do we really need Vaudeville charlatans to help us turn our faces toward God?)
    Make no mistake. We have a very real enemy here, but it's not the one we've been told to distrust. It's not people in other regions, or free thought, or different regional values. It's not education.
    It's usually that smiling face that wants your vote and will say and do anything to get it. Or the face on television who is trying to make a reputation or sell a book. Think about it. In the midst of all the chaos of political bickering, they are the only common denominators. It's to their own personal profit to define problems in the worst light possible, and even invent them as well. Think about it. Gay people weren't clamoring to get married before politicians made it an issue and tried to change the constitution about it.
    We're Americans. We hold democracy true because we know we can live together as a single people of similar ideals and diverse backgrounds. Our strength and moral compass is based on those ideals. We are not the ones profiting from artificial discord. But we know who is.
    We need to elect leaders who support the principles that first drew our nation together, and who reject political shenanigans. We need to shut off our television sets as soon as the feeding frenzy starts so our opinions aren't influenced by what the media itself calls "spin." We then need to speak out and let people know how united we are against demagoguery and internal interference.
    Only by freeing ourselves from political, media and sometimes religious manipulators can we ever reclaim the real purity of America. Why? Because America isn't about those who want to ruin it. It's about those who want freedom and democracy to work as it was intended.
    We are the ones who make it work, or it doesn't work at all.

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