If It’s Needed at Home, Why Not Nationally?

Aug. 24, 2025

My wife and I face the daily flow of decisions that come of sharing a life together.  A good many are trivial, a few demand more attention.  Frequently we are on the same wavelength, although we have been known to have a squabble or two.

These little flare-ups are a reality of life.  The important thing is how we handle them.

For a number of reasons, it shouldn’t be hard for us.  We go back a long way.  We share the same basic values.  We spend a lot of time together.  Our sources of information aren’t exactly the same but overlap.  We trust that the other has our collective best interests at heart.  We have a lot of experience dealing with each other.

Two weeks ago I wrote about those who monopolize a conversation with a one-sided viewpoint.   Perhaps some marriages operate on much the same dynamic, with one partner or the other dominating.  Not us, we’d end up in divorce court.

Even with all the advantages we have going for us, we still have to conduct a dialogue about each issue that comes along.  Sometimes these discussions come easily, sometimes they are more difficult.  Regardless, the one and only way we can find some accommodation that is satisfactory to both of us is through an exchange of views.  I need to know what she’s thinking.  She needs to know what I’m thinking.

We have two major motivations for working together:

• We each have a stake in the outcome, and therefore should have a say in the matter. Our forefathers protested taxation without representation.  On the home front, representation is a given.  But it means nothing unless meaningful participation comes with it.
• Two heads are better than one. My friend Bill Barr contends that the beauty of polarity management, which you have been reading about here, is that incorporating both sides produces an outcome that is superior to what either side could or would have produced on its own.  The same is true on the home front.

My wife and I aren’t special in this regard, I’d guess most couples favor dialogue over monologue.  The point is to draw a comparison between that and how the country is operating.

The country enjoys few if any of the advantages that we do as a couple.  On the plus side, the nation has a long and rich history.   Other than that, not much.  We the people are spread far and wide, not just in location but in experiences.  Our shared values come into conflict.  Our sources of information provide us with different perspectives and even different facts.  Our spotty record of dealing with each other, once exemplified by bipartisan leadership in Congress, is currently at an ebb.  All the trendlines are in the wrong direction.

In the face of all of these shortcomings, we should be working overtime to exchange views.  My wife and I must do that, even knowing each other as well as we do, if we hope to get anything accomplished.  As for the country, knowing each other as poorly as we do, it ought to be mandatory.

Instead, we have conned ourselves into believing it’s not necessary to inquire into, much less incorporate, other perspectives.  As a direct result, we have fallen into the dangerous position of having the side in power dictate the course of action. Donald Trump has taken this to new extremes but both parties are guilty.  This direction is as damaging for the country as it is for a marriage:

• Everyone has a stake in the outcome, and yet half of the country effectively has no say. Their elected representatives are powerless.  That’s representation without participation.  We are challenged to define the intention of democracy.  Is it that everyone has a voice?  Or is it that winner take all?
• Rather than putting our heads together in the hope of coming up with lasting solutions, we sub-optimize by accepting the untempered wish list of one side or the other.

Not everyone, but most of us recognize deep in our hearts that we need to work together.  In full disclosure, it is a curiosity that in the most recent nationwide public opinion survey conducted by Our Common Purpose, the number who said our representatives should find middle ground rather than fight it out was down to 65 percent.  Down to 65 percent?  It had been running at 70 percent or more in previous polls.  It’s too early to tell if this is just a blip or we have slipped a little.

A common thread in the comments made by respondents to various of the polls has been the need to listen to each other.  We wish it, we just can’t seem to deliver it.

Dialogue versus monologue should be simple enough.   National issues are a lot more complicated than choosing what color to paint the bathroom but both need to begin with asking the other party “what do you think?,” actively listening to the answer, and hoping the question is then reciprocated with “what about you?”

No question, it takes two to tango.  By virtue of our marriage certificate, my wife and I are the designated participants in discussions about domestic matters.  It’s a shame that in politics,  partners are not similarly designated.   Absent that, lodged as we are in our respective bubbles, it is hard to track down those of the other persuasion who are 1) willing to participate, 2) prepared to share sources of information, and 3) capable of exchanging thoughts in reasonable fashion.

That does not excuse us at the local level from actively seeking discussion partners.  At the national level we have to scale up with some more institutionalized approach.

We are not going to have meaningful progress unless and until we begin exchanging views.  Dialogue, not monologue, should be our aim at the kitchen table, over the neighbor’s fence, and across the breadth of the land.  Without that, all we have to look forward to is more of the same.

— Richard Gilman