[doonesbury]

I am happy to read to a piece which gives friendly fire to the left and the right. We need more of these.

My own tired example "half of the fraud" is fiscal management: one-half focus only on income (via raising taxes) and the others on cutting expenses. No successful family or company does fiscal management this way. It's both sides, and it's even deeper than that: usually we need to re-assess the priorities which underpin expenses and taxing strategies. And fix those too. Heck, the GOP has even given up on talking the talk. Not even that is around anymore.

Like other commenters here outrage isn't an answer. Yes, it's the present currency for talking heads on TV and crap talkers on the radio. Like a Woody Allen movie without the humor or intellect or pretense of trying, each side tries extract more outrage, more anger, and to guilt the other side into change. It's stupid. As one corporate owner put it (paraphrasing) Americans prefer to be entertained than to deal better with the truth. So we play into this.

Why outrage? Because we have no agency in the present. We gotta fix that.

MLK had two easy outs: give up beating a dead horse, and open a barber shop or preach. Or payback. He, thankfully, chose the middle course. The middle course in America will travel through both political parties re-examining their political planks, since without them, they are lobbying fodder.