A Center Movement

I just read Peggy Noonan’s opinion piece from Saturday's Wall Street Journal, “Will Virginia Teach Trump Fans a Lesson?”

As a lifelong Virginian, a conservative and a resident of a congressional district which was recently redrawn to remove me from a “safe” Republican district and to place me in an undeniably Democrat district, I live at Ground Zero of our current political crisis. I readily admit that I voted for Donald Trump. As with many Trump voters, my vote was as much a vote for what the President ostensibly stood for as it was a repudiation of his opponent, Hillary Clinton, as well as the radical policies her party represented.

  

You can go down the list of issues which matter politically and there is no choice which isn’t diametrically opposed to the other. To wit: pro abortion vs no abortion, multi-lateral trade deals vs no trade deals, wide open borders vs build a wall, sanctuary cities vs deportation, “Global Warming is going to drown everyone” vs “nothing has really changed for 30 years”, “Bill Clinton was just a cad” vs “Donald Trump is a pervert”, tax the rich (except for “our” rich) vs tax policy which favors growth, seize all guns vs unlimited gun ownership. The list never ends. There is no center ground in today’s politics. None.

But, life is not a flip of the coin. Not everyone is beautiful or ugly. Actions are not always good or evil. Beverage choice is not always Coke or Pepsi. We have evidence of what happens when religion is a binary choice. Look at Northern Ireland or the Middle East. Our body politic is degrading into a religious war which neither side will win. Donald Trump was the only one of the Republican candidates who truly saw the divide and he capitalized on it. Since his election, his opponents have engaged in “bump stock” journalism which has inundated his administration with 24/7/365 negativity from which no human can persevere. Trump has fought back in the only manner he knows, street-style. It is markedly unpresidential, which only causes his opponents to switch from bump stock to full auto. This can’t end well.

It is time for another party in this great nation. Will it start as a coalition or will it be a true new party? Note, I did not say third party, but a new party. This political revolution could begin in a legislature. It probably would not occur in the national House or Senate but it could occur in a place such as Virginia. The legislators from both parties who are not “mouth-breathers” could coalesce around a leader who denounces the Republican or Democrat label and takes up a new mantle such as the Movement Party. They could be called Movers and would strike a balance between the radical right and the radical left. Suddenly, the Governor would have to deal with a chamber of government which does not vote lockstep based upon the parenthetical letter behind his name. What a novel concept that would be.

Once this occurred in a state like Virginia, the movement would likely take off across the nation and would soon engulf the nation’s capital. House and Senate rules would need to change to allow unfettered debate without grinding the system to a halt. Minority positions would need a right to be heard but not veto power. This really wouldn’t be difficult to do once permission was given to our elected officials to proceed. Draining the swamp (and there truly is a swamp in DC) would be much easier as the Movers could easily see who in the bureaucracy was blocking progress toward agreed-upon goals.

In this case the center does not only hold, it prevails. It is time for that change.