Abandonning reason

I am glad that today's protestors are carrying the American flag rather than the Mexican flag. I am sad that, yet again, Congress has failed to pass any legislation.

I fear that the modern world has simply given up on discourse.

IMHO, the imagined gap between Conservative and Liberal is a non-issue. The real scary issue is the underlying conflict between those who believe we should solve our nation's problems through rational discourse and those who reject discourse and who seek power by manipulating crowds and emotions.

Both Republicans and Democrats seem to have abandonned discourse. The very fact that this immigration debate has been driven by symbolic gestures (minutemen, protests and flag waving wars) are signs that we are systematically abandonning reason in discourse.

BTW: The fact that Congress abandons the debate on immigration reform over a non-issue like the number of amendments to a bill is as absurd at the Congressional tradition of loading all bills with hundreds of pork barrel projects.