What does Bipartisanship look like?

This question leaves me scratching my head in the same manner an eighth grader taking a quantum mechanics exam.  What does bipartisanship look like? What does bipartisanship even mean?  Are there actually people out there who are willing to make compromises for the good of our country?  It is all very befuddling.

Fortunately, my man David Brooks from the Times has some insight.  Actually, what he has is some good old fashion American protest.  Brooks rightly points out that neither party has all the answers to our country's conundrum.  As much as I find myself rabidly supporting Democrats, I'll be the first to say that they often have unsustainable ideas about our future.  In fact the reason my support is so rabid is not because I agree with everything that Democrats have to say so much as I disagree with most of what Republicans have to say.  Democrats, for all their flaws, at least have a vision of America in the future.  As Brooks points out, Democrats offer us light rail and solar panels.  Silly perhaps, but at least Democrats are thinking ahead.  Republicans, as Brooks contrasts, have "taken a pragmatic policy proposal from 1980 and sanctified it as their core purity test for 2012."  One party looking forward, one offering nothing new.

But that is only an explanation of my rationale.  I'm not going to use this post to bash Republicans, but rather, like Brooks, to try and find some common ground. I'm going to attempt to figure out what bipartisanship could look like and how we can draw ideas from both parties to solve some of our problems.

Let's start with the deficit which isn't as big of a deal as it is made out to be but is nonetheless an issue that must be addressed.  Republicans want cuts, Democrats want taxes, and somewhere in the Senate there is a lonely group of 5 Senators from both parties who understand that in order to fix the budget we need to have both.  Democrats have to face some realities about entitlement reform. Obamacare is a step towards fixing these problems, but we cannot continue to make unsustainable entitlement commitments.  Republicans have to face some realities about taxes; we can't reduce the deficit by making cuts alone, and even if we could we would have to cut so drastically that millions of Americans would be harmed.  Tax rates are historically low and Republicans are largely to blame for the current as they took the unprecedented step of lowering taxes during two wars.  We have to find some common ground on the issue of taxing and spending.

But the deficit is secondary in nature to the economy.  After all if we can put people back to work and grow the economy, we can cut into the deficit somewhat without raising tax rates.  It would therefore make sense to focus on reducing unemployment.  After all, the welfare of Americans is the primary concern of all politicians right?  So how about finding some common ground on fixing unemployment such as limiting welfare and unemployment benefits and using the money to reinvest in education or job training?  After all, we cannot afford to give away money forever, but we should not expect people with little education and few skills to be able to support themselves.  How about cutting wisely in order to invest wisely?

Democrats and Republicans may never fully agree on social issues (which in my opinion is why the Republican party already has one foot out the door) but surely they can find common ground on economic and fiscal issues.  This is going to take some hard bargaining and perhaps even some tough to swallow compromising by both sides, but we need to take serious steps to fix our nation's economy and both sides do have ideas to bring to the table.

Bipartisanship is difficult while ideological purity and demagoguery are easy. Compromising on the other hand is difficult because it involves giving up some of what you believe in and some of what you think is best.  I believe Democrats have more good ideas but I don't think the Republican party is devoid of them and I sincerely hope - on behalf of all rational and intelligent Americans who are worried about our country's future - that the two sides can each come to the table armed only with their good ideas and a resolve to make America better.