The (May 6) “Democratic Voices” column by Andrew Taban, “Beyond Blind Partisanship,” started out so well thought-out that it got my attention enough to read it to the end. I will say, though, that it was a “rough read” in that Mr. Taban kept vacillating between brilliant logic and melodramatic doom-and-gloom — that and blaming Republicans for … well, you name it. But the statement that inspired me to write this letter was this one: “Some will argue, ‘Democrats are the same or worse! But …’”
But what, Mr. Taban?
Republicans are bad people? To be fair, are Democrats bad people? I wonder how a Democrat would answer that question … or a Republican.
Stripping away the politics, are conservatives bad people? Are liberals bad people? Honestly, I see good things and bad things in both of them. Yes, conservatives have some good characteristics, but they also have some bad characteristics, and the same goes for liberals. Neither side has the complete solution, and that’s a fact. I also see that the more moderate they are the more reasonable they are. Conversely, the more radical they are the more unreasonable they are. It’s like sane vs. crazy. How each got to be that way is an entirely different story.
The single most important thing we were taught in political science class is that “crazies” tend to be more vocal, more active, and more “popular” than those who are “sane.” So, the crazies are usually running the show while the sane are watching, waiting, just taking it all in.
I concluded that Americans are neither bad nor are they good, rather some of them are crazy while the rest of them are sane, politics being “incidental.” Although Mr. Taban is correct in claiming that this goes “beyond blind partisanship,” in the end he stopped short of holding his own as accountable as he expects those on the other side to do, revealing his own partisanship. He almost had me.
Arthur Saginian
Santa Clarita
