Grading and politics

[dfrecore]

The New Left for ya : )  

There really isn't any sort of common ground.

Hey, you can only listen to Rush Limbaugh for so long before you get the idea that maybe Republicans aren't in the mood to compromise.  Hehe.

The best way to be is to be honest about your positions, fight for them and then be prepared to make a deal.  The ability to make the deal is what made Reagan great.  Maximize leverage and then cut the deal.

Note: The ten senators who met with Biden had this kind of situation.  They had a lot of leverage in negotiations with Biden.  Instead of $1.9 trillion, maybe they could have proposed a $1.5 trillion deal and legitimately put some limits on spending.  I think Biden would have taken that.  Instead, they proposed a ridiculous lowball $600 billion package.  That was never going to fly.  They either couldn't make that deal or didn't want to make that deal.

So let's say my husband and I want to buy a house.  We know we're not on the same page when it comes to price.  I want to buy something for $300k. He wants to look at $800k.  We sit down to talk and I say "I think $300k puts us in a better financial position.  A large payment will stress me out."  He says "I think $800k makes it so that we can stay here forever, no need to move later, we can afford it." I say "let's compromise and do $400k." He doesn't agree.

Now, who is right here, and who is wrong?  I'm going to say the answer to that is neither.  We both have valid points.  Was I wrong in choosing $300k?  No, and even though he feels like I'm WAY off base in terms of what we can afford, if he'd said "well, you're just not willing to compromise" I'd have been pretty pissed.  How in the world is ONE side at fault here?

Same with the Republicans thinking we don't need to spend $1.8 TRILLION dollars, and the Democrats thinking $60 BILLION is too low.  It's looking at it from different perspectives, and both sides have their reasons for thinking this way.  Saying that the Republicans just don't want to negotiate is ridiculous.  NEITHER side wanted to negotiate.