Either/Or

When the subject of politics arises, rarely is there a time when we can say that simple, binary, either/or positions tend to yield better results than a thoughtful, nuanced approach.

That being said, when a political topic moves from future speculation to reams of proven facts gained over time, the likelihood that a binary decision is the right one also tends to move from the realm of art, to the science of hard data. For example, over the last thirty years, it's been quite solidly proven that trickle-down economics doesn't work.

Politics is the art of compromise. It's a truism that is both simple, and yet, seems to be often forgotten these days, especially by those who claim they're leading the Republican party.

We say that not because we don't think there aren't leaders or wise thinkers who label themselves as Republicans. Rather, those individuals who seem to be directing the efforts of the Republican Party currently can't seem to listen to anyone but themselves.

Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin - one of these self-appointed leaders - displayed a perfect example of that this week.

Rep. Ryan is holding a series of town hall meetings for his constituents this week across his home state. At one such event, Rep. Ryan was confronted by a constituent who described himself as a "lifelong conservative". This constituent wanted to know - in the face of massive and growing income inequality, and with such large fiscal pressures on governments of all sizes, why Ryan continues to fight to keep the Bush Tax Cuts for the Rich, the same ones that President Obama aims to see eliminated.

Frankly, Ryan couldn't answer the man acceptably, in large part we believe, because Mr. Ryan chose to be obtuse, not because Mr. Ryan doesn't know the answer.

Conversely, many other Republican leaders seem to have forgotten the binary rules they insisted were immutable facts during the health care insurance reform debates last year, regarding polls and what the American people think. Thankfully, writer and journalist Steve Benen pointed out the hypocrisy on that issue already.

In short, Mr. Benen points out that Republicans said, according to the polls they chose to read, that the American people didn't want health insurance reform - so Republican leaders insisted it should not happen. Although many polls and statistics taken before reform was passed did not agree with the GOP claims, for the sake of their argument, we'll agree with them on the polls they cherry-picked.

Now, when looking at the polling on how Americans want to fix the nation's budget problems, Americans OVERWHELMINGLY, in every poll we've seen, by WIDE margins, oppose massive cuts to entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare. Instead, they want the wealthy and corporations to pay more taxes. They also want the rich and big corporations to actually PAY those taxes, not play paperwork games with numbers.

As Mr. Benen points out, the Republican Party leadership has now painted themselves into one of those rare, binary, either/or political corners, that will require them to make a hard choice. Either the GOP leaders truly want to listen to what the American people want. Or they don't, and they were lying when they fought those health insurance reform battles.

There is more than one reason that politics is the ART of compromise. Art requires nuance, after all.

Rarely is it as simple as "Us" and "Them".