evilOpinion: The Bank Bailout or The Return of Compromise.

If you've only been following politics for the last 7 or 8 years, you might not understand why I'm actually happy about what's happening right now. You might be asking yourself "Why are they having people talk about stuff instead of just making a bill and passing it like the President asked, I thought that's what Congress did."

It's okay, that's the way Bush has always gotten the Congress to work before. I mean seriously, there was more Congressional debate over the Mitchell Report for Major League Baseball then there was over most of the laws our government has passed in the last 8 years.

Yet now we see a glimmer of hope, a small ray of light that maybe, just maybe, someone handed out a bunch of new copies of the Constitution to the Senate and House, with that little "checks and balances" section highlighted for easy reference.

To be honest though, the loss of compromise wasn't just in Congress. Sometime around November of 2001 "compromise" became a dirty word. If you wanted something different then the president, well then you had clearly become Unamerican™ (pretty sure Fox News and the RNC owns that trademark, so I don't want to infringe).

It didn't end with the Amazing Race for Terrorists in Afghanistan either, when we attacked Baghdad anyone who thought that maybe we could have used a little more diplomacy first was clearly Unamerican™.

Heck, it was so successful for the party in power that pretty soon they (and many other Americans by extension) found it to be the greatest argument in the world. No longer did you need to come up with coherent statements of truth to back up or support your opinion (That's how debates used to be, believe it or not), now all you had to do was question your oppositions patriotism, or their heart, or their love of country.

Over the last twenty-five months most of the American people have begun to shake off this feeling, like men and women coming out of a fugue (at least judging by the recent polls). The members of Congress were a little slower, apparently confused by the elections of 2006. "They voted for those of us who opposed many of the things Bush did, and his favor-ability is dismal...but we can't oppose the President or else the American people will think we're weak and Unamerican™!" most of them said.

Finally now, after this tightrope walk on the edge of a second Great Depression, it seems that even the Democrats and Republicans in Congress have shaken off their fog. Republicans told the VP Dick "Vader" Cheney to take a hike with his attempts to rally (ie:threaten) them to his side, and someone finally pointed out that little job description most of the Democrats had forgotten; "to do the will of the people".

So now we have hearings, and talking, and questions, and I am thrilled. It's boring to watch, uninteresting to hear about 90% of the time, but I'm so happy to see it back. Because that means that Compromise has found it's way back into the halls of America's federal government.