Neither can handle the phrase "It Depends". Both want one shoe fits all approaches in a complicated world. They find something that works in one situation or simply sounds good and then want to apply it everywhere without any verification of wide scale effectiveness. Sound bite dogma rules. What works in one situation doesn't always work in a different situation. While adding funding to a program may help to a certain point, a surplus of funds simply facilitates waste. Even a wasteful program probably is doing some good and does not deserve complete elimination. Politics is a series of social experiments. It is too bad so little scientific analysis of the results are done.

The main problem with our system today is that we have lost sight of the concept of balance so important to the founding fathers. They were keenly aware that power corrupts and worked hard to provide a system of checks and balances. Both parties seem to be working hard to have their way and only their way driven by the extremists at both ends disregarding what the majority of Americans actually want. Time after time the public has shown a preference for balance by shifting the balance of power as each side gets too cocky in pushing its extremist agenda. There's a damn good reason Americans have tended to split parties in power between the Presidency and one or more branches of Congress. Most of us don't buy all off what either party is selling.

Regards,
Mark