Playing well with others ...

I recently read an article in our local (online) newspaper by Mr. Dave McNeely that considers our recent political climate and the bad behavior of people in town hall meetings and the like

Why has our political discourse become so uncivil?

While the article was interesting, although I think differently than Mr. McNeely, I felt a need to share my opinion. That opinion follows:

Mr. McNeely,
I respect your opinion, and I can understand why you feel that way, but my ideas on this subject differ significantly from yours.

Playing well with others

While this is important, what one must realize is there is a key word used in that statement - with. In order to play with others, you must believe that they are with you. In today's political climate, the people involved are usually against each other, not with each other.

Opposition means what it says. They are on the other team. Our job is to make the other team lose. Conflict is inevitable, and since this is America, that conflict is usually spirited, boisterous and animated. It has always been that way, here, in America.

Without the essence of conflict, nothing can get done. There is a time for sitting and talking calmly, but the political process in America, when decisions are being made for millions or hundreds of millions of people, cannot be that time.

Today, almost every political process in this country is driven by diametrically opposing forces. When these forces meet, there is always conflict.

Be a student of history as well as philosophy. Americans have, for 233 years, used these conflicts to resolve their differences, both in the halls of congress and on the battlefield. If it were otherwise, this would still be a colony.

If we ever run out of political conflict, with its endemic shouting matches, we will cease to be a Representative Republic, and will instead be an autocracy, dictatorship, or nothing at all.