Why are people declaring an ideology and not accepting anything else?

I recently saw the Slate forum (http://fray.slate.msn.com/?id=3936&tp=Cagle) and the responses to an anti-Moore cartoon. Liberals accused the writer of not watching the film and “the obvious truths in it”, some called him a “Christian, because only Christians are so self-delusional”, and others accused him of “lacking evidence” (remember, this is a political cartoon). What on earth is it about American politics that makes people behave this way!?
– Why do democrats accuse Republicans of being fascists who conceal the truth?
– Why is Bush considered a moron, an idiot, ect . . . Isn’t it possible to acknowledge that he has a different point of view, which others (myself included on most if not all issues) may consider wrong?
– Why do Republicans accuse Democrats of flip-flopping on issues?

What it comes down to is this: why are we running this democracy along party lines?! Why is it not possible to handle things issue by issue?? Why do we subscribe to these caricatures of Democrats and Republicans that simply aren't true?

Wow, that felt good.

"why are we running this democracy along party lines?!

Actually, it doesn't run well along party lines. Democracy just gets railroaded, and then run off the rails into a ditch. But we accede to this out of apathy, until the dysfunction reaches crisis, which is likely to happen relatively soon for all overgrown "democracies".

"Why is it not possible to handle things issue by issue??

This has until now been a problem of communications technology. We are about to witness a historical nexus far more profound than the advent of the printing press. We are about to experience tele-awareness, tele-participation, growth of understanding, integration, and co-operation like has never occured before on international, supernational, then post-national scales.

" Why do we subscribe to these caricatures of Democrats and Republicans that simply aren't true?"

Kindergarten mudslinging; power cliques; unimaginative conformity; and similar behavior that must be called out, if we are going to mature as a human community beyond this societal childishness. And mature we will, because the alternative is extinction, and most of us like living.

I just realized that my entire post can be summerized in Sir Winston Churchill's quote:

"The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average vote."

The average voter is becoming a lot more savvy even than Sir Winston today, because we are becoming better informed, willingly or otherwise. Remember, this was the man who pioneered chemical warfare, and aerial attacks on civilians. Take a guess where he did so. Or if you don't know, you can find out in 15 seconds. In Winston's day, the "average voter" could never access such information. This change is accelerating, the imperative to pay attention while the winds of change are blowing is increasing, and the facility to do so is exploding with possibility. We're in for a wild ride just ahead. Ignorance is putting up a fight, but it is going to lose.

I agree that the technology is changing, but is human nature willing to change with it? Remember, on the net anything is a 'fact'. Not five minute ago i found someone had rewritten a Langston Hughes poem for the sake of attempting to discredit Kerry's campaign. Also, traditional sources like the news are becomeing intentionaly biased, almost as though the news was a product to shop for. I think what this mostly comes down to is human nature. Example irrelivant to politics: Many people i know are educated about the Holocaust and other genocides, but still feel that the Sudan is a waste of time and genuinely don't care if millions of people die. To conclude: is the average voter really becomeing more savvy, or more opinionated, or perhaps not changed at all, because ignorance is part of human nature?

PS Didn't the Germans at Guarca in the Spanish Civil War pioneer aerial attacks on civilians? That happened long before Churchill was Prime Minister.

To bad voter apathy is so high.
I beleive in the recent canadian elections less than 61.2 per cent
http://www.cbc.ca/story/election/national/2004/06/29/elxnturnout040629.html
and prospects for the upcoming american election are worse.
So the people who are voting are more savvy...

In the first past the post system (which both America & canada use):
If there are three partis, the winning party wins my 34%, that's 34% of the 61.2% of the people who actually voted, Which is really less than 34% of the total population. So that means that 66% of people who voted did not want the elected candidate to win.

So really even if said candidate does win, they were not REALLY elected "By the people for the people" as most people didn't even want them anyways.

a population of 1 million with the above numbers.
208080 people elected the candidate (20.808%)
435600 people did not. (43.56)
340000 did not vote (34%)

So really 775600 people did not vote for the person who gained power. That's 77.56%
Is that fair democracy?

Churchill successfully advocated the use of chemical weapons on "unruly" Kurdish civilians, along with the aerial strafing of civilians all over Iraq in the 1920s. Britain pioneered modern, mechanized chemical attacks on civilian population centers.

Why don't you spend 10 minutes online, and see if you can verify or debunk what I have just written. Then, imagine lacking that knowledge and information power, and instead hearing the same thing from me, face to face in London in 1926- then hop on your penny-farthing and try and find out if what I say is true: There is a profound change happening to humanity, and it's picking up speed.

There are fast-improving ways for anyone with internet access to ascertain whether an assertion is true or a fabrication. This is only the beginning. This does not mean we will all soon become omniscient sages- But we will all (those of us with eventually universal access) move a surprisingly long way in that direction at a much faster accelerating pace than most people have stopped to contemplate.

Powerful interests got the first crack at the industrial and information revolutions. A lot of political and physical battle lines were drawn in accordance with the means and resources of production and knowledge. That is all going to change with the decentralization of these means. As a result, all organizations, including governments, will be compelled to become extremely responsive to the public's real needs, or be ignored. The "Ride of Paul Revere" in the future will flash around the world in a millisecond, and billions of people will be able to instantly take titanic collective economic and political action. It will no longer be a fun planet to take a heedless power trip on, because it will be a simple matter for vast numbers of highly-informed people to to recognize achievement, non-performance, and reward or ignore accordingly. Also, everyone will be dabbling in a little bit of everything that captures their interest, and there will be no opportunity for a segregated ruling class. Why not? Because a resounding majority will clearly see that such a state of affairs is dangerous, unappealing, and unacceptable. These times will seem very primitive from that future.

You're younger than me, and if you're careful, I expect you'll live to see this. In the mean time, pay attention. Vote.