[Sailormon6]

Originally Posted by wind_magic

Obvious points such as, 1) Congress actually does the business of congress (not the President),

But the President has the power to veto Congressional action if he doesn't agree with it, and he has a bully pulpit, to fire up the electorate and put pressure on Congress to make concessions to his way of thinking.

2) That it's a pipe dream that Lieberman would get picked by McCain, etc ... well, the best I can say about that is that I had hopes I could be given the benefit of the doubt so that I wouldn't have to post 5 pages but instead could just post the one paragraph, but I should have known this was Sailnet and that wasn't going to happen.

If it takes 5 pages to explain your thinking, maybe your reasoning is too convoluted. Maybe you're starting from the conclusion that you desire, and are rationalizing your way to that conclusion.

But on the substance of what was said, that the Republicans wouldn't get behind McCain Lieberman, I actually disagree with that a little bit. McCain Lieberman could be trust brokers as President/VP, because I really think they could get past differences and agree on some key things that really could get support from everyone. Again I said it's a mistake to think I like this combination because they are "moderate", that's untrue, I don't see it as a compromise position between two dualistic extremes, that is only how Democrats and Republicans see it because they always look at each other as "the enemy". I, instead, see McCain Lieberman as a solid platform that can put forth some actual solid plans that could be put into action.

Democrats and Republicans who have never seen politics from the inside often believe that they are enemies, but the pros, such as the leaders of each party in Congress and the President, size each other up as either people who "you can do business with," and people who you can't. Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill were friendly with each other, and could do political business with each other. John McCain has demonstrated an ability to do business with Democrats. Whether you agree or not, President Bush has been extraordinarily successful in doing business with the Democrats. He persuaded them to agree with the Afghan war, and the Iraq war, and he successfully fought off the effort to pull out prematurely or to set a date for a pullout, he persuaded them to continue funding it, he persuaded them to allow the surge, he persuaded them to enact and re-enact the Patriot Act with the provisions that he regarded as most crucial, and he got many other concessions from them earlier in his Presidency, such as No Child Left Behind. In spite of all the flaming rhetoric that the Democrats have hurled at President Bush and his policies, the Democrats have continued to provide enough votes in Congress to support him and his most important policies whenever they were put to a vote in Congress.

If you really want to understand what the Democrats and Republicans are actually doing, ignore the rhetoric and examine their actual votes in Congress.

Think of it from the opposite point of view - say Obama wins, for example. WTF is Obama/Biden going to propose that enough moderate Republicans and Democrat's are both going to support to do anybody any good ? I mean, seriously. Obama could tell Republicans that he wants to eat at Wendy's and Republicans would fight and say no they want to go to Subway. Can Obama Biden actually propose ANYTHING that Republicans are going to support ? Hell no. And you Democrats out there, are you going to support ANYTHING that Romney supports ? McCain Lieberman could put together real plans that could leave all the special interests sitting outside shivering in the cold.

Regardless of whether Obama or McCain is elected, the Democrats and Republicans will continue hurling flaming rhetoric at each other, while "doing business" as they generally believe is required in the best interests of the nation. That's the way politics really works.