The Price of Politics - Would the US fall over the fiscal cliff ?

In the current atmosphere of the 2016 presidential elections, the tension between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party is extremely high, there is almost no sign of any civility between these 2 opposing parties. Politics is a total gridlock, the public impression of Congress is at an all time low and people want some kind of change.
The hostilities between the 2 parties is something that has been there for many years (nay, decades). However, there has been cooperation between the parties, there has been compromise. Previous Presidents have worked with Congress controlled by the opposition parties and managed to get new laws and bills passed. However, the 2010 rise of the Tea Party movement and the election of a set of new representatives in both the House of Representatives and in the Senate is pushing a move towards fiscally responsible principles. Overall, the Republican Party has been seen to be more fiscally conservative, with the concept of keeping 'giveaways' in check, and there has been a large section of the population who believe that if they can keep their finances in check, why can't the federal Government, a Government which they believe has gone out of control.




And who is to be blamed for fiscal irresponsibility ? Why, the current President, Barack Obama under whose policies the overall debt of the US has ballooned, where there is no control of the finances of the Government and the Government itself seeks to expand rather than trying to keep control of itself. On the other side, the Democrats and the President believe that the 2008-2009 financial disaster was something that could put the US into a deep recession which would be very painful, and there was a need to try to rise out of this morass, if this required suspending some of the measures of trying to put a hard check on rising finances. So there was Government support for major financial entities whose collapse could hurt sentiment and the economy, and all of this money had to increase the debt.
By the time of the entry of the Tea Party representatives, there was a push to not let this wasteful increase of finances keep on going on, somebody needs to push to prevent any further increase of the debt. As a result, by mid 2011, there was a hard line that was being reached. The US had reached a limit about how much the debt of the US could be, and Congress needed to increase the debt ceiling. And this was just one of the battles that were being fought between the 2 opposing parties. There was almost no compromise between the opposing parties, since there was a clash of ideologies. What hung in the balance was the fiscal condition of the US, and indeed the world, since if the debt ceiling was not raised, there was the danger of a worldwide loss of confidence in the US economy and the Government. The other main battle was about the healthcare law called Obamacare, and it was tagged in almost every bill that was making its way through Congress. The dispute showcased a high amount of rigidity at the highest political level, and reading this makes for horrific reading - how can the people elected to work for the betterment of the US and its citizenry be so unwilling to work with each other to resolve crisis ? Get an insight into the people involved in all these discussions through this book.

Political commentary: A history of the US Republican Party

In the charged political atmosphere of the United States as of today, there is a clear divergence between the 2 political parties - the Democratic and the Republican Party. Supporters of either party criticize the prevalent policies and trends of each party - the Democratic party is seen as a liberal party which is more supportive of minorities and more supportive of give-aways to the poor; the Republican party is seen as more conservative, more trying to attempt financial balancing, representing the white old section of the country which somehow feels that the country is moving away from the principles that have been in vogue for the past century. Supporters of either party feel that the other party is being irrational and not representing the best for the future of the country.
However, it would surprise a lot of people if they heard about history, about how the party have changed their spots over the years. How would people feel if they realized that the Republican Party was the party to which Lincoln belonged, and how the Democratic party was the one representing the south and on the losing end of the Civil War. It was the Democratic Party that was called the party of traitors, trying to break the union and fighting to support slavery. It is this history of the Republican Party that is sought to be explained in this book, first released in 2003, and then re-published in 2014.




The book covers the entire history of the Republican Party, its more than 150 years history and covers the response of the Party to the election of Barack Obama, and the weak candidates that the party set against him. One caveat is that the book is written by a person (Lewis L. Gould) who identified himself to have liberal leanings and hence is a supporter of the Democratic Party. So, the book seeks to be objective and tries to present the history of the party, covering the various twists of the evolution of the party into its current form.
One major chapter in this transformation was the period of the 1950's-1960's, or even more specifically the 1960's when the Civil Rights movement was at its peak, and where the Democratic Presidents brought in the various acts to ensure the total removal of segregation, a step which the party also realized that meant that the Democratic Party had lost the support of the south for a generation, a gap that was quickly taken up by the Republican Party. At a time of rapid change in society, the Republican Party was able to take on the mantle of appealing to people who sought stability and the values that they had seen in their young times, and who valued conservatism. The book is certainly worth reading, for a supporter and even for those who don't understand why the Republican Party is what it is.