Stand firm against any partisan push
Partisanship in America has become a pollutant, if not a poison. Ideological mass on the far left and the far right threatens to rip our country right down the middle, where the strength of cooperation and compromise reside.
As if that national partisan pestilence weren’t enough, now there’s a movement to contaminate the most local levels of governance — city councils. This one is being pushed by some ardent Idaho Republicans, but if Democrats clutched the keys of power in this state, it could very well be they making the same political power play.
In city council campaigns, physical proximity makes it possible for voters to really get to know the people seeking to represent them. Many candidates are in fact already known quantities, having crossed paths with fellow community members through the school, church, civic and business activities of everyday life.
That’s not always the case with state and federal contestants, which is why the red or blue brand can be helpful as a guide or introduction at those levels. Maybe embracing an R or D is a decent tiebreaker when all other research has been exhausted. But depending on party affiliation to decide which candidates at any level are best prepared to carry out the duties of their positions? That’s intellectually lazy and civically dangerous.
The push to partisanize looks like a solution to a non-existent problem. Consider the many men and women serving now on city councils in Kootenai County. With very few exceptions, based on their council votes on strictly local issues, you wouldn’t know who’s a Republican, who’s a Democrat and who’s a political atheist. That’s a bad thing? It feels like a fresh breeze in the fetid swamp stagnating in today’s partisan miasma.
Rather than expand the us-vs.-them dynamic, we should be working to shrink it. Most of us couldn’t care less if our sheriff is a Republican or a Democrat, yet it’s a partisan election. Shouldn’t we instead determine who will best uphold the law while leading the dedicated men and women on the front lines of this life-and-death calling, and vote for the person on those merits?
And how about judicial positions in some states? Partisanship suggests membership in one club at the exclusion of others. Does that seem right for a job that requires strict impartiality?
No. The better, saner approach is to keep the few remaining fortresses against ideological invasion as partisan-proof as possible.
Even if that means you have to do a little more homework and think for yourself.