There was an astonishingly good article in the Washington Post on December 31, written by a very establishment pair, one Democrat and one Republican.* They detailed four pretty good leadership values they think we should look for in candidates if we want things to work better, then ended with:
Democracy requires active engagement, mindfulness and tolerance. We can't expect our leaders to do their part if we don't do ours. We must retake control of our duty as Americans. The only way to turn the spiral around is for the individual American to make a commitment to vote in the coming year. If these resolutions for the New Year are to take root, there is only way: It is in our hands.
I agree, except for them narrowing it down to just voting — aargh! In response to a comment openly in favor of grid lock (hey, at least they were honest), I wrote:
Except somehow, the gridlock never seems to stop government support for crony capitalists, or cuts to programs that regular people depend on, or us sending young people to their death or dismemberment (usually in ways that come back to bite us)
If government isn't working, we need to replace the people in office who others who are serious about their work, open-minded, and willing to work with their constituents and those across the aisle, but also standing firm and clear on their principles. That requires a lot of difficult decisions, and they need to be willing to explain those to people.
If that's not enough, we need to replace the system altogether or at least major chunks of it.
Keeping the existing system around but not allowing it to function has been an unfolding disaster.
Any solution ultimately falls on us taking responsibility as citizens and applying some of our time and energy toward getting engaged. And I mean both inside the system - running better candidates, crafting legislation, etc. - and outside the system - learning & sharing information, talking with people and writing letters, and when necessary getting out on the streets (and innovating new systems on our own!). At every scale from local education and towns/cities, on up to the federal level (and in this global age with people in other countries as well).
I appreciate this unlikely pair calling people to get engaged, and Bernie Sanders for saying it daily on the campaign trail.
* I didn’t want to bias people by saying who they were at the start, but it was Tom Daschle and Trent Lott. And I really did think that the values they articulated were good, and that we need more of them within and between the two parties, and outside the two parties (where more people are nowadays).