How does the US stop being politically polarized?

[Mister Mets]

Even in '80 and '84, 40 percent of the country was Democratic. So some level of polarization is inevitable in a two party nation.

That said, with greater economic prosperity, there would likely be less polarization, especially with more money to go around. A major reason for current polarization is that you have two parties with irreconcilable visions on how to handle a fragile economy. Republicans prioritize cutting the deficit, while demanding that taxes stay low. Democrats want to preserve spending/ the safety net.

Another way polarization would be lessened is if controversial issues become settled. In that case, the arguments would be about narrower topics.

[izixs]

There is some wisdom in some of what's been said so far, but I think a few general things can be pointed to as possible ways to ease the 'polarization'. The problem first off is to define what that means. I'd propose that political polarization as it is reflected in our current politics is not so much about the electorates percentage divisions, but by the culture of those people. That basically there are at least two segments of the population that fundamentally don't trust each other and share only the most minimal commonalities as far as culture or ideological thought processes (or what ever drives their particular vote).

Option 1: Remove the Fox News partisanship engine - Yes, MSNBC has its own leanings, but most of that has come from the fact that there is now a market for obviously partisan news. This market only exists because Fox has been doing it since the late 90s. Until around mid last decade MSNBC was trying to be CNN lite and sucking at it because CNN is kind of terrible. Remove either Fox News entirely or de-partisanize it and the pressure for MSNBC to be the counter weight fades as suddenly folks of the liberal persuasion aren't as likely to feel they're not getting real news anywhere else. But this can't stop at just Fox. There's a universe of right wing media in this country that does the exact same thing as Fox News but with less effort put in to seem balanced to those not paying attention. If Fox is fixed, then the problem will persist until neutrality in general is restored to media beyond TV. (Yes, there was Air America, but its gone now so its not being the radio MSNBC any more.)

Option 2: Community Building/Community Mixing - A good deal of the polarization is geographically based. But not all of it. There are many areas that are very 'purple' and that swing about every election. As a culture, we could potentially make an effort to get to know our neighbors more and more. Over time, this might allow the polarized parts of the mixed regions to realize that the other side is made of real people who aren't crypto-fascists-baby-eaters and the like. Get that started and down the line the polarization begins to ease, at least in those spots. Thats where community mixing comes in. This social engineering is basically to encourage mass movements of people from one type of community to another. This could happen via a number of things, but the two most effective are economic collapse (aka, super depression where mass movements of people is common) or rapid economic expansion (aka, a number of folks find new opportunities and move somewhere new to attain them at a very very high rate). I'd prefer the later of course. But this mixing is very very much necessary in some areas of the country to relieve polarization in any meaningful time frame. A good example of it is North Carolina, where traditional southern folk are living with northern transplants thanks to the economic opportunities of the research triangle. As such NC has gone from a very right leaning state to a very swingy state where Republicans and Democrats can win. Its not finished of course, but its a start.

Option 3: Massive Education - And not just k-12 here, though that needs work here. Far to many people in this country lack basic civics and history education. We here on the forum are the exceptions by far, and that's including some of our trolls (but not, sigh, all of them). I don't know how it'd work, but increasing the general understanding of how the government works and what it can and can not do would probably drain some of the more crazy based polarization from the swamp as those easily persuaded to believe the crazies will have the tools necessary to go 'uh, that doesn't actually make any sense'.

Option 4: New Ideological Paradigm - Most of the current fights we're having today are the same fight we've been having since the 1930s (and the 1960s with the civil rights movement). That is our current alignment/ideological paradigm. That fight is what drives our politics. Those who stand with the ideas of the new deal (mostly Democrats) and those who wish to undermine it (mostly Republicans). Independent of your position on this fight, this fight is the key motivating factor for the party mechanisms that drive the polarization to continue. If we can as a society change the subject and focus on something else for even a little while (a little while being a decade or two), we'll probably be the better for it. This is of course more easily said than done (as are the rest of these). But these options are just the basic options. A more extensive plan would need to be built to bring them to fruition.

My suggestion for new ideological paradigm - rights of artificial life forms of human intelligence, space colonization, support for or against a world government (and not the conspiracy theory kind), and what to actually do about climate change (as opposed to let's do something about climate change vs a wizard is making it hot for reals j0 as it is now). But I tend towards sci-fi and that's just me.

[DC Al Fine]

@ izixis

1) I think the genie is out of the bottle here. There is clearly a market or highly partisan news. Unless you want to get into censorship, it's going to be very difficult to make FOX or MSNBC become neutral.

2) I can sort of see this working. However "purple" areas are relatively limited. I'll use Nashville as an example. The county with the downtown (blacks, students, etc.) voted 80% Obama in 2008, while the suburbs containing mostly white married couples voted between 60-75% for McCain. If you looked at Nashville as a whole, it would seem relatively purple, but people still isolate in their own ghettos, and for good reason. If I'm raising a family, I want a nice, quiet, safe neighbourhood, while the sort of white liberals who live downtown hate the suburbs and view it as conformist and boring.

3) Very good idea

4) This will take a long time to happen.

[All Along The Watchtower]

By commentators and pundits doing their part in putting an end to the myth that America is "polarized" in any meaningful way.

[old timey villain]

I hate to be the wet blanket, but I don't think it will ever happen. I mean, the whole point of political parties is to cobble together blocks of like minded interest groups who support a certain party based on the issues they care about and the policies they push for. That's the essence of politics and the core of polarization. You'll never be able to keep pro life Christian conservatives from voting for the more conservative candidate, and you'll never convince gay rights activists to not vote for the guy who is more liberal.

Maybe the bigger issue is regional polarization. But still, it's the same story, because different regions of the country tend to create groups of people who are politically like minded. We lament the fact that the south is so polarized, but you can't fight hundreds of years worth of religious conservatism and racial division that has naturally affected the area's politics.

I don't know what the alternative is. Would it be everyone waking up on election day and deciding last minute to vote for the candidate that seems nicer or better looking or more down to earth? In the end, how we evaluate those character attributes is colored by our party preference already. Even if regional polarization subsides, greater polarization based on income, race or religion will take its place.

[Blackacre]

Getting rid of Fox News.

^ In all seriousness this isn't a bad answer. Fixing how people get their information would be the biggest start.

Cough *MSNBC* Cough Cough

MSNBC brings facts to the table. Fox pulls things out of their ass.

No, they really don't... MSNBC is attempting to be Fox for liberals, and in the process has become even
ore hackish than them.

Hackishness doesn't equal misinformation and outright lying. Those are what FOX is good at.

I would think that their bias has reached a point where it could be categorized as misinformation.

One, MSNBC is a response to Fox. If Fox was destroyed, MSNBC would suffer a similar fate or become less partisan. Two, they don't make stuff up. They're biased, but they report and comment on facts that are legitimately there, unlike Fox. Three, they don't scream about the rest of the media being biased against them. They talk about the "beltway media" but that's specifically Fox and conservative radio, not CNN or NBC. Four, a lot of people who watch MSNBC also watch the Daily show and/or Colbert Report, shows whose viewers are better informed than anyone else.

[Beezer]

One step might be to just have independent redistricting. Since parties are allowed to choose their own voters, neither Republicans nor (to a lesser extent) Democrats have to worry about political opponents from across the aisle. If you're one of the many Republicans right now who has a safe seat, your only worry is that someone from the right will launch a primary challenge and there is no incentive to win over moderates anyway, since your district is only made up of Republicans.

[Donerail]

Getting rid of Fox News.

^ In all seriousness this isn't a bad answer. Fixing how people get their information would be the biggest start.

Cough *MSNBC* Cough Cough

MSNBC brings facts to the table. Fox pulls things out of their ass.

No, they really don't... MSNBC is attempting to be Fox for liberals, and in the process has become even
ore hackish than them.

Hackishness doesn't equal misinformation and outright lying. Those are what FOX is good at.

I would think that their bias has reached a point where it could be categorized as misinformation.

One, MSNBC is a response to Fox. If Fox was destroyed, MSNBC would suffer a similar fate or become less partisan. Two, they don't make stuff up. They're biased, but they report and comment on facts that are legitimately there, unlike Fox. Three, they don't scream about the rest of the media being biased against them. They talk about the "beltway media" but that's specifically Fox and conservative radio, not CNN or NBC. Four, a lot of people who watch MSNBC also watch the Daily show and/or Colbert Report, shows whose viewers are better informed than anyone else.

One, does that in any way negate the fact that they're horrendously biased? Yes, they're trying to be the left-wing FOX, and are just as accurate. Two, there's really no difference. They report on stuff in an extremely biased manner and exempt things that don't fix their narrative, exactly like FOX. Three, so what? Four, I'd be interested in seeing a source for that.

[Blackacre]

Getting rid of Fox News.

^ In all seriousness this isn't a bad answer. Fixing how people get their information would be the biggest start.

Cough *MSNBC* Cough Cough

MSNBC brings facts to the table. Fox pulls things out of their ass.

No, they really don't... MSNBC is attempting to be Fox for liberals, and in the process has become even
ore hackish than them.

Hackishness doesn't equal misinformation and outright lying. Those are what FOX is good at.

I would think that their bias has reached a point where it could be categorized as misinformation.

One, MSNBC is a response to Fox. If Fox was destroyed, MSNBC would suffer a similar fate or become less partisan. Two, they don't make stuff up. They're biased, but they report and comment on facts that are legitimately there, unlike Fox. Three, they don't scream about the rest of the media being biased against them. They talk about the "beltway media" but that's specifically Fox and conservative radio, not CNN or NBC. Four, a lot of people who watch MSNBC also watch the Daily show and/or Colbert Report, shows whose viewers are better informed than anyone else.

One, does that in any way negate the fact that they're horrendously biased? Yes, they're trying to be the left-wing FOX, and are just as accurate. Two, there's really no difference. They report on stuff in an extremely biased manner and exempt things that don't fix their narrative, exactly like FOX. Three, so what? Four, I'd be interested in seeing a source for that.

Modern (IE, post-2008) studies taken on misinformation has MSNBC on par with CNN and Public Broadcast (PBS, NPR) in terms of how well-informed its audience is, and thus how factually accurate it is. Fox News is in a league of its own in terms of being made of lies. MSNBC is several times better than Fox when it comes to the facts and not lying. (I'd love to post the study I derived the solution to, but I don't have enough posts. It was taken after the 2010 midterms, the first study taken in the wake of Citizens United) Equating the two is a case of false equivalency for the sake of it.

[pbrower2a]

Getting rid of Fox News.

^ In all seriousness this isn't a bad answer. Fixing how people get their information would be the biggest start.

Cough *MSNBC* Cough Cough

MSNBC brings facts to the table. Fox pulls things out of their ass.

No, they really don't... MSNBC is attempting to be Fox for liberals, and in the process has become even
ore hackish than them. See a new Pew Research report.

Hackishness doesn't equal misinformation and outright lying. Those are what FOX is good at.

I would think that their bias has reached a point where it could be categorized as misinformation.

Both FoX News and MSNBC are heavy on analysis, and both have undeniable bias. But at that FoX News is in a league of its own for propaganda in America. Maybe Soviet-era Pravda is a good comparison for FoX News. It is so d@mn manipulative.

MSNBC almost never gets its facts wrong. Unlike FoX it fact-checks. If it catches FoX News in error more often than does it catch itself on the air it is because it stops falsehoods from going on its cable feed, and FoX is more concerned with whether something pleases its audience than that it is right.

Rachel Maddow, Lawrence O'Donnell, and Ed Schultz don't pretend to be without bias. But they aren't political stooges of a political party. They have criticized Democrats for not going far enough.     

[Blackacre]

Getting rid of Fox News.

^ In all seriousness this isn't a bad answer. Fixing how people get their information would be the biggest start.

Cough *MSNBC* Cough Cough

MSNBC brings facts to the table. Fox pulls things out of their ass.

No, they really don't... MSNBC is attempting to be Fox for liberals, and in the process has become even
ore hackish than them.

Hackishness doesn't equal misinformation and outright lying. Those are what FOX is good at.

I would think that their bias has reached a point where it could be categorized as misinformation.

Both FoX News and MSNBC are heavy on analysis, and both have undeniable bias. But at that FoX News is in a league of its own for propaganda in America. Maybe Soviet-era Pravda is a good comparison for FoX News. It is so d@mn manipulative.

MSNBC almost never gets its facts wrong. Unlike FoX it fact-checks. If it catches FoX News in error more often than does it catch itself on the air it is because it stops falsehoods from going on its cable feed, and FoX is more concerned with whether something pleases its audience than that it is right.

Rachel Maddow, Lawrence O'Donnell, and Ed Schultz don't pretend to be without bias. But they aren't political stooges of a political party. They have criticized Democrats for not going far enough.     

...exactly. What he said. lol. (sweet sig, btw)

[muon2]

Getting rid of Fox News.

^ In all seriousness this isn't a bad answer. Fixing how people get their information would be the biggest start.

Cough *MSNBC* Cough Cough

In the elections of the 30's the four major radio networks dominated news output. After that, through the 80's, the big broadcast TV networks were America's main source of information. That's a long stretch with relatively few major news sources. In many ways the rise of cable and the internet have reset America back to the wide range of niche news sources (primarily newspapers) that were commonplace up until the era of radio. The partisanship today is not unlike that seen in the 1800's.

[Del Tachi]

How do we end legislative partisanship (which is driving a lot of our political polarization)?

Easy, lift the earmark ban. 

The promise of your state getting goodies has historically been one of the best bargaining techniques.