Rhetoric of Bipartisanship Meets the Snarky Reality

President Barack Obama attempted to close his State of the Union speech with a call for bipartisanship and “a better politics” that would appeal to Americans’ desire for action from Washington and “debates worthy of this body and worthy of this country.” He did say all that. But his call for Republicans to work with him was derailed by an unscripted moment that threw the cold water of reality on Mr. Obama’s lofty rhetoric.
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The Record Number of Independent Voters and the GOP Congress

Data from 15 separate Gallup telephone polls conducted throughout 2014 confirm that the share of Americans identifying as political independents has climbed to a record 43%. The obvious reason is that Americans’ trust in government is the lowest Gallup has ever measured, and most people say government dysfunction is one of the nation’s biggest problems. Voters’ misgivings have caused Gallup to predict that the number of independents will climb even higher in 2015. There is certainly a disconnect between what people say they want from their government and what they are getting.
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Mario Cuomo: Direct, Unapologetic Liberal

Mario Cuomo, the former New York governor who died Thursday at the age of 82, was an unabashed, unapologetic liberal who wore his heart and his political philosophy on his sleeve. He wasn’t afraid to say that a lot of what was going on in this country was unfair; that there were two Americas and two sets of rules for each of them. In his most famous speech, at the 1984 Democratic convention, he disavowed “nice but vague rhetoric,” the politician’s stock and trade, to tell what he believed were some important, tough truths about the U.S. He closed that speech with a dozen sentences that began – “we believe.”
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