Forging Consensus – A Lesson from Two Maestros
T. Boone Pickens
Memorial account for T. Boone Pickens, 1928-2019. This account is now being maintained by TBP Foundation team members.
Once upon a time, elected officials worked together to tackle our country’s problems. Those were the days. Tom Daschle and Trent Lott sat down with me and discussed their new book, Crisis Point: Why We Must – and How We Can – Overcome our Broken Politics in Washington and Across America. Here are five insights of theirs on American politics today:
1. Building consensus works! Tom and Trent both served as Senate Majority Leaders. Each knew the value of reaching across the aisle. And guess what happened: Congress passed three balanced budgets during their tenures.
2. The biggest obstacle to building consensus? The airplane! Tom and Trent both agree that members jet off so often that they don’t get to know one another. Neither do their families. That sort of cross-pollination is crucial to the success of any organization.
3. The press used to be a referee. Now it’s a participant. Remember when the press reported the news? Not a bad idea, right? Now the press is the news with different news outlets advocating for and against specific candidates.
4. The Democrats and the Republicans better take a close look at what is happening in the primaries. Voters are not only paying attention to outsiders like Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, but millions of them are voting for these two. Why? Because politics as usual isn’t cutting it.
5. Last but not least … let’s move Election Day to Saturday. We all need to exercise our right to vote, but weekdays make it difficult. Let’s change the way America votes.
Fitzgerald Trucking, Inc. and Co-Owner of C8 Truck & Trailer Sales.
8 年Respectfully I disagree. They are referring to the time when the Democrat agenda was furthered with increased taxes and increased spending. This was done with the help from Republicans. We need to roll back regulations and taxes and the professional politicians are now claiming that their system is broken.
Robotic Trading Specialist
8 年Saturday for voting -GREAT idea!
WEF says AI Makes Elections Obsolete - Cheat as much as possible meanwhile to be linked in the most catastrophic version of central planning in history!
8 年I love that someone determining our fate feels the obligation to provide their insight into how we attained terminal velocity. I disagree with the priority placed on airplanes in 2. Lunch, or lack thereof is what I sense is the root cause of much of the antisocial behavior in the ruling class. Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neil tried to have an informal lunch every Friday. Likewise Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich. Although they had quite contentious issues to deal with, they reached consensus on a number of challenging issues. In recent years, this has not only been absent totally, but there have been extremely of such informal get togethers outside the WH with Dems. In contrast there's been dozens of meetings with potus with individuals who do not have the legislative influence and are often quite controversial. The net effect of this is the feeling of aloofness, distance, and a number of other aspects that contribute to the gridlock and antisocial mood in DC. This tends to trickle down to state and local governments as well. I suspected that this situation was due to the Sequestration, or the obsession with the national debt obviously. I wrote the WH, committing to pay for a monthly lunch myself, and didn't need a receipt....
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8 年Excellent video