Negotiation, The Myth of Bi-Partsianship

When it was announced that the leaders of the West Bank Palestinians and Israel were going to start meeting bi-weekly, I'm quite sure many people took heart. Regional leaders and experts have been saying for years that the problem in the middle east is not Iraq, it's Palestine, or rather the lack of a free Palestinian state. Than with the equally shocking news out of Northern Ireland yesterday, regarding the meeting between Adams and Paisley, one could believe that anything is possible. Anything, it seems, except civility and co-operation between Democrats and Republicans in our national legislature.

What makes for progressive and meaningful agreements is not total capitalization by one side or another, but the true negotiations of all issues and a compromise that all parties can live with. It's a long and painfully slow process and certainly has been highlighted as a flaw in the democratic process. Reacting with anger and vengeance is always easier on the emotions, but rarely does anything but allow for short term gratification.

On the other hand, in a recent interview on NPR and expert said, "You should always talk to your enemies, but if they are dedicated to your destruction and elimination, it's hard to take anything they say seriously." Competition for the hearts and minds of the audience is one thing, genocide is something else.

Our problem is that current day politicians are looking at politics as war rather than the deliberation process that it should be. I listened to an interview with former House Leader, Tom "The Hammer" Delay, in which he fortified his reputation as a tough and unyielding legislator by repeating his intentions of the past. His creed was to seek no negotiation, rather he sought to secure capitulation. He was very successful for a long time by whipping his troops into order and requiring loyalty to the extent that he ran candidates against his own party members if they didn't toe the line.

You can and do make a lot of enemies that way and he did. His lack of familiarity with power and seemingly easy access to it caused him to cut corners. His opponents used those lapses of judgement against him. The lesson learned here is that power, justice and peace gained by the use of a force can and usually will backfire. General George Washington famously turned the harden heart of his enemies troops by treating his prisoners of war as well as he treated his own men.

However, the bottom line in any negotiation is both parties to an agreement need to want an agreement and have to be willing to meet somewhere in the middle. If like Mr. Delay you term compromise as capitulation than you have no negotiation room. And if you refuse to talk to the other side than the only recourse is continuing and probably escalating conflict.

At the present time, we have a environment in Washington that is in transitional. Republicans have suffered a severe blow in the recent election, with their loss of a majority in both houses and the dwindling lack of support for the administration. I don' t think they realize at this point or refuse to recognize how this War is hurting them. Either they are living in a state of denial that the current strategy in Iraq will save the day or look enough like success that they can claim victory. Or they are still in the Delay don't admit defeat, no compromise and insist on capitalization mode.

The Democrats are so lacking in confidence, they can't seem to get their wagons in a circle much less launch a counter attack. While I realize their left wing wants immediate withdrawal from Iraq, the rest of the country is not convinced that is the right thing to do. What they have to do is propose a reasonable settlement that insists that Bush negotiate with all the parties in this fight. If he doesn't, and I would bet he won't, he will fail and hang himself with his own rope. In this effort he will do more harm and likely take the rest of the Republican party with him.

In this likely event, the Democrats should concentrate on domestic issues and prepare the country for their agenda when they take the White House in 2008.