A house divided against itself cannot stand.” I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other. — 1858

My Take – Politically, our situation in this country has many similarities to what it had in 1858.   The southern slave states held roughly 50% of the votes in Congress and the electoral college votes for president, with the non-slave Northern states holding the other roughly 50%. The stalemate made a victory of any kind by either side look like the thing that would pull down the Republic, and the invective on both sides only grew stronger as the elections grew closer.  In our day, national elections are won based on only a few thousand votes in a few key districts, with everything else pretty much being cut right down the middle.  The two sides are making nice in the middle of the political soccer pitch, but the wings of the parties are becoming more strident and militant, and all it takes is the right spark at the right time for all this to blow up.

We cannot stay this way.  Getting even normal business like a federal budget is being put on hold in order to score political points, and this is an untenable situation.  Both major parties are to blame for how we got here and for the fact that little to nothing is being done to get out of this morasse.  I’m not saying that we are moving toward a shooting war between the red and the blue, but we cannot stay where we are.  We will either choose to become a socialistic nanny state where those who choose to work are squeezed for every possible dollar to pay for those who ch0ose not to, or we can force our country to stand upright and get on with business as a nation of workers, not thieves.