Check out a podcast I made with GovLoop, a website for government employees, in which I discuss the challenge we face in this country of overcoming partisanship. Take a listen and let me know what you think.
I have done some research on political partisanship, as well as some writing. I think political dysfunction in this country threatens our future. So it was nice to read this opening paragraph, in a relatively recent and wonderfully written article in Time magazine: Here’s a rainy-season parable about cooperation in American politics: In July 2012,…
Politics in the US is discouragingly partisan. National politics has become increasingly partisan since at least the late ’60s, when the passage of civil rights legislation influenced many conservative southern Democrats to join the Republican Party. Even state politics has become more partisan, where even famously nice people in Wisconsin have found themselves battling their neighbors across…
The always informative Jonathan Cohn at the New Republic recently wrote about an opinion poll that seems to show significant support for at least one part of The Affordable Care Act. It showed a majority not only of Democrats and independents, but also Republicans, supporting Medicaid expansion: Only one problem with that finding. Ask the…
I recently reread a very informative New Yorker article by Ryan Lizza, called the Obama memos. I have assigned the article to my undergraduate health policy class, to help them understand the political climate surrounding the passage of The Affordable Care Act. And that climate was one of severe polarization, which cut against Obama’s naïve…
We live in an era of strident partisanship, with elections often decided by candidates’ attitudes towards morally and emotionally charged issues like gun control or abortion. Each presidential election seems to hinge on some set of irresolvable moral and cultural divisions, leaving the winner with at best a tenuous majority, while a firmly ensconced and…
This Friday, John McCain and Barack Obama will presumably (John McCain willing) square off in the first presidential debate of the season. For people like you, interested enough in politics to be reading this post, the outcome of the debate is already largely determined — your favorite candidate will not only win the debate, but…