On Politics

Politics.

It's not something that we want to talk about with everyone.

As a matter of fact, it's usually something we only talk about with people we are convinced will agree with us.

For me, there have only been a very few people from the opposing camp that I've been able to enjoyably talk politics with.  And I had the pleasure of reconnecting briefly with one of those people last night.

I attended a wedding of two former co-workers from a job I left about seven years ago. I was looking forward to seeing everyone after such a long time, and our conversations were fairly predictable:

"What's new?"

"Kids grown/new job/cancer/short hair. What's new with you?"

"Kids born/same job/boy that sucks/hair rocks."

But there was one co-worker with whom the conversation took a very predictably unpredictable turn. This is the guy I always used to talk politics with. We were, and always will be, totally on different sides of the spectrum. We would shake our heads with despair verging on total frustration that an otherwise respectable and rational human being could have such whacked out ideas. And we always parted friends.

Friends who were, perhaps, a bit more enlightened than when we started.

I was pondering this as I rode my bike today and realized that I really don't talk politics with people I know I will disagree with that much. Or. Ever. I frankly don't know that many Republicans. I mean, I don't get them at all. But then, as I rode, I realized that I don't actually agree wholeheartedly with all the Democrat agendas either.  I've known for a long time that I'm socially liberal and fiscally conservative. I don't want the government telling me how to run my sex life or how to spend my money. Because of this, I don't really belong in either camp.

Still, for all their protestations that they want to keep government out of our lives, the Republicans seem to want to legislate a whole lot of social issues. And for all their protestations that they want to keep government spending down, the Republicans seem to want to spend a lot on wars that we really shouldn't be in, for a lot longer than we shouldn't be in them.

For policy issues, therefore, I tend towards the liberal. But mainly, it's not about policy... at least not when I really think about it honestly.  It's really about who I like, who my friends are, and who feels like my tribe. And my tribe is filled with women, and gay people, and African-Americans, and a lot of other groups who tend to be better taken care of by Democratic policies and who are, in fact, Democrats themselves.

But... then I meet someone whom I honestly like, with whom I can have a serious heart to heart conversation about many things. And that person is as perplexed with the way I see the world as I am with his vision. And when we talk about things, it turns out that we agree on a whole lot of the same fundamental principals, even if where we take the logic differs radically.

For example, I think we both believe that there are core values that need to be held in far more esteem than we are currently seeing in the political landscape.  Values such as respect. And integrity. And honesty.

I think we both are heartsick at the direction the country is taking.  I went into his office the day after the 2004 election and asked him, begged him, pleaded with him to tell me what the country was thinking after re-electing George W Bush. And he is having the same thoughts about the current president. I don't agree with his concerns, of course, but I can sure understand being baffled by beliefs obviously held by a great many people who don't agree with me.

Just the ability to talk with respect to people on the other side seems to be something that is shockingly impossible these days. We don't commingle with "them." We sit in our clusters and shake our heads together, clucking about how terrible "they" are, but we never ever talk to each other.

I think we are terrified at what would happen if we did. I fear that our anger is so entrenched, our cynicism so deep, and our bitterness so corrosive, that we just can't even open our mouths to converse with kindness and respect any more.  Maybe we never could, but right now it feels impossible.

What would happen if we were somehow suddenly forced to talk to people on the other side of the aisle, and that we were able to do so with a sincere interest in what they had to say and where they were truly coming from? We would not have to agree. We would not have to sing Kumbaya. We would not have to do anything other than just listen with an open heart, and speak with an equally open heart. It seems impossible. But what strange and wonderful things could come of it.

I know that's a pipe dream, but I was deeply grateful for that conversation last night. No, I am not going to wake up suddenly a conservative Republican. But I did wake up a much more thoughtful liberal Democrat. One who pondered all day the possibility that we all may be much more similar, when you get right down to it, than our outward differences would indicate.