No matter who wins this year’s Presidential election, there
will be ongoing partisan rhetoric coming from both sides in Congress, in the
media, and across the fruited plains.
If Mitt Romney wins, those on the left will blame alleged
voter suppression rather than blame Obama for not being able to defend his
record for the last four years and for not convincing voters of his future
plans.
If President Obama wins another four years in the White
House, those on the right will certainly blame biased media and liberal debate
moderators for their overwhelming efforts to focus attention on Romney trivia and
avoid making Obama’s record the centerpiece of the election.
The bigger question regardless of who wins is why has the
United States become so partisan and angry and when did this attitude become
set in concrete?
Was it the effect of the Great Depression in the 1930’s when
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt reacted by expanding and strengthening the
federal safety net while perfecting a populist agenda which would set the stage
for a divided country in the years ahead?
Was it President Richard Nixon in the 1970’s who tried to
evade and cover up illegal activities in his political campaign and almost caused
a constitutional crisis in our country?
Was it decades of Walter Cronkite on CBS and Chet Huntley on
NBC opining from the left while supposedly presenting the daily news facts as
America was still dealing with civil rights, the Vietnam War, and a bourgeoning
welfare state?
Was it the attempt by President Ronald Reagan in 1987 to
nominate Robert Bork to the Supreme Court which became the first time a court
pick became so divisive with organized partisan politics for and against him?
Or was it the Republican investigations of President Bill
Clinton in the 1990’s for his lying under oath about sexual misconduct and for
his questionable White Water real estate investments in Arkansas?
In my opinion, it was none of the above. Our country has
been partisan since the founding of our nation. The divisiveness began almost
immediately as arguments ensued as to the role of the new federal government
relative to the individual states. There
were the Federalists led by Alexander Hamilton and John Adams. And then there
were the Democratic-Republicans led by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison who
believed in states’ rights.
The election of 1800 between Adams and Jefferson became the
first ugly partisan campaign in our nation’s history with Jefferson allegedly
hiring a “hatchet man” to spread rumors about Adams. Jefferson won. Years later
the Federalist Party would fade away while the Democratic-Republican Party
would eventually morph into the Democratic Party of today. The Republican Party
would emerge again in the 1850’s with President Lincoln being its first victor
to the White House.
Flash forward to this recent Presidential election of 2012.
You had Obama’s campaign calling Romney a felon, for being responsible for the
death of the wife of a former Bain subsidiary employee, and for being a hater
of Big Bird and women. I found Obama’s campaign sad and pathetic and was not
surprised to see our Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz deep in it.
Likewise Republican operatives went to the gutter to keep public attention on
Obama’s relationship with his anti-American religious mentor Reverend Wright
and on his murky path to college and law school for which no transcripts have
ever been released.
Today, Americans cannot even come together to discuss the
tragic murder of an American Ambassador in Libya without spinning for or against
how President Obama handled it. And rather than working together to help the 28
million unemployed citizens, their fate has become a political hot potato based
on the weekly and monthly reports.
More concerning to me is reading social media like Twitter,
Facebook, and blogs on various news sites and seeing the vitriol between those
on the left and on the right. It is the 1% against the 99%, blacks versus
white, non-religious versus the religious, and even men versus women!
John Adams and Thomas Jefferson are probably turning in
their graves as they see the country which they risked their lives to help form
going down the path of social and economic destruction.
As Los Angeles riot victim Rodney King once said, “Can’t we
all just get along?”
