NERO FIDDLES WHILE DIALOUGUE BURNS

So Obama's in, and full control has been handed to the Democrats. Regardless of what you think of this most recent election and how it turned out, there may be a greater issue out there we're not dealing with. I've never seen so many strawmen set up and beaten down, so many false arguments and hypothesis, so much spin and re-positioning. The networks, the newspapers, the web and conversations in the hallway over the water cooler - there's no more dialogue between the right and the left, the religious and the secular, ownership and employees, or any other groups. No, we would all rather set'em up and knock'em down. Let me tell you my position, and the position of my rivals - who needs them? Then you can clearly see that I'm in the right, right? If you go and actually drag the other guy into the conversation it's possible my arguments won't win the day, and we can't have any of that. On the campuses of academic institutions founded by our forefathers, unpopular speakers are shouted down. The thinnest examples of hand-picked evidence are presented as proof of this or that position on cable news networks every night of the week. And any other cable network, or host, who disagrees, is clearly in bed with the other side. See, they're partisan, but I'm not. Sad, what's become of free speech, open-minded debate, and lively dialouge. It seems to be the unnoticed corpse lying in the gutter of our time.