Is There Any Hope for an End to Hyper-Partisan Gridlock?

[shipperx]

There is no hope for the end of partisanship in general (and, I don't have a big problem with that), but maybe... possibly... hopefully there could be an end to intractable, obstinate, counter-productive gridlock.  I have this tiny glint of hope due to articles like this: Conservatives for Obama

A couple of quotes:

Mr Powell is now a four-star general in America’s most surprising new army: the Obamacons. The army includes other big names such as Susan Eisenhower, Dwight’s granddaughter, who introduced Mr Obama at the Democratic National Convention and Christopher Buckley, the son of the conservative icon William Buckley, who complains that he has not left the Republican Party: the Republican Party has left him. Chuck Hagel, a Republican senator from Nebraska and one-time bosom buddy of Mr McCain has also flirted heavily with the movement, though he has refrained from issuing an official endorsement. The biggest brigade in the Obamacon army consists of libertarians, furious with big-government conservatism...

Also:

The rise of the Obamacons is more than a reaction against Mr Bush’s remodelling of the Republican Party and Mr McCain’s desperation: there were plenty of disillusioned Republicans in 2004 who did not warm to John Kerry. It is also a positive verdict on Mr Obama. For many conservatives, Mr Obama embodies qualities that their party has abandoned: pragmatism, competence and respect for the head rather than the heart. Mr Obama’s calm and collected response to the turmoil on Wall Street contrasted sharply with Mr McCain’s grandstanding...A recent Washington Post-ABC poll shows him winning 22% of self-described conservatives, a higher proportion than any Democratic nominee since 1980.

Complete article here

 

Comments

[jerrymcl89.livejournal.com]

If Obama wins it will put an end to gridlock, since the Democrats will be able to govern unilaterally. Whether that also reduces partisanship will depend on whether Obama actually intends to follow through on his post-partisan rhetoric (my guess is, he mostly does), and whether he can control the aggreived liberals looking for a pound of flesh after eight years in the wilderness (my guess is, not so much).

[molliemole.livejournal.com]

Very good article. I'm baffled by people who describe Obama as wildly liberal, when he seem so very centrist to me. I'm awfully tired of extremes and extremist remarks.
I don't understand one part of the article though:
"In 1980 the rise of the neocons—liberal intellectuals who abandoned a spineless Democratic Party...." Neocons are intellectual former Democrats who abandoned liberalism? I didn't know that, and I'm not too sure it's true.

[jerrymcl89.livejournal.com]

Historically, many of the neocons (though certainly not all - guys like Cheney and Rumsfeld were part of the Nixon and Ford administrations) were Cold War Democrats. Several of them were aids to Henry "Scoop" Jackson, the pro-Vietnam War Democratic Senator. Jeane Kirkpatrick, who was Reagan's UN Ambassador, was also an ex-Democrat.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

In 1980 the rise of the neocons—liberal intellectuals who abandoned a spineless Democratic Party...." Neocons are intellectual former Democrats who abandoned liberalism? I didn't know that, and I'm not too sure it's true.

Yeah, I found that kind of baffling as well and am equally uncertain that the sentence came out correctly.

[wildrider.livejournal.com]

Barack Obama comes across as extremely Presidential to me; and, I think, to many others. (I even saw a blurb on the "Rednecks for Obama," which gave me both comfort and a giggle.) I think there are a lot of the hard-line conservatives who would, secretly, like to be proud of the Office again.