Been thinking about Lessig and his focus on corruption. Also have been thinking about just why things are the way they are today.

Divisive politics. This is key.

Just got done talking to my totally GOP loyal family from the South. (not their fault --it happens down there ok?)

For the first time ever, they are not gonna vote GOP this time around. These are 30 year Republicans, who asked me why I unregistered a few years ago. At that time, there was considerable discussion, largely fear based and largely vote against ones own interest based.

They are pet issue people. Value voters, in other words.

It's no longer worth it today. Their price has been met. (sweet, and about time)

They are considering all options. The safe bet, rock star (if there is one) clearly is Thompson. I can say he's got the 20 percenters down cold, if he wants them. But they didn't say no to Edwards. Can't stand Obama because of the Muslim thing. That one meme is gonna be too difficult for him to shake. Obama is cooked.

Edwards is viable and that shocked me, coming from these folks, who are largely 20 percenters. (very well educated too --go figure)

A viewing of Sicko, and some very frank discussion about the serious implications the "unitary executive" has for all of us and how that contradicts our traditional American values, and suddenly we reach a point where some stuff became clear.

Being divided, electing divisive people in the hopes of getting some pet issues legislated comes at a very significant cost. (finally!)

Entrusting private entities is not a one stop solution. Without either healthy regulation, or competition, it's a magic money machine with our interests out the window. Sicko underscores that and the parallels for other areas is easily discussed.

Best talking point for their side: Thompson has little dirty laundry. Interesting, but useless where the core matters of us being divided to marginalize our discourse and therefore our votes.

Was a great talk today. We talked about what it is to be Americans first. We are sharply divided on many things --the usual leftie, rightie things. But, we are now unified on the damage done by this administrations attempt to concentrate the power in the executive.

They expressed significant concerns over the implications of this, should the GOP not fare too well this next cycle. (rightfully so)

We agreed on the Americans first, conservative / liberal / other second. We also saw some solid agreement on the idea that perhaps core ideas are non-partisan afterall.

The dilemma of not voting GOP remains unresolved. I scored some nice points with this:

Getting hosed by the GOP means losses in terms of not only dollars, but core freedoms and expectations. That nothing else matters bit is really starting to hit home.

(for those folks reading at home, that means you don't matter. Think about it.)

Getting hosed by the Democrats is a nicer experience, generally speaking, as they at least give some consideration to keeping more people happy more of the time.

Of course, this is all still problematic. I floated out the redefinition of what being American means, the dividing of us, and the ongoing push-pull that's gonna be with us until we set boundaries bit and it packed quite a punch.

It's far nicer to be discussing some issue under a framework provided by a solid and trustworthy process, than it is right now. The lack of accountability and oversight does us harm, no matter what. This is what we do as beings, we know this, our founders know this, we have things in place to prevent this.

Surrendering those is never worth it.

We found agreement on this matter, and it is encouraging.

They made the point of where does it all end? Advanced the idea of perhaps only voting for new blood GOP, that perhaps might have learned something about boundaries and being divisive.

I'm open to that.

Not a bad conversation, all in all. This is the first time we have been able to talk politics without it getting messy. I've you guys here to thank for that --at least in part.

The time we spend here is worth it, if only to gain perspective and advance to greater discussions more quickly. Practice makes perfect!

Just thought I would share in the hopes a similar conversation might happen between others. It's common ground we all really need.