Write About Now

I’d like to propose a new political party.

“Conservatives” are generally against abortion and for the death penalty. Liberals are often for abortion and against the death penalty. Yes, these are generalizations, but I’m a politician now.

What’s interesting are the many issues concerned with living life, not just entering it and leaving it: conserving the environment, ending slavery and trafficking, reducing poverty, improving health care, controlling access to guns, and others. Although many of these are also considered “liberal,” sincere thinkers in both parties feel strongly about these issues.

In fact, Gallup reports the number of moderates is growing. In weekly surveys since January 2007, more people identified themselves as “Independents” (instead of Republicans or Democrats) 71% of the time.

Many Americans feel the current red and blue polarities in this country, which are becoming more polarized all the time, do not offer the flexibility for a world of blended colors. I believe science has proven babies are alive before they leave the womb and should be protected, but I’d like to see us take better care of the planet they’re inheriting. I think it’s a crime that 20,000 people die each year because they can’t afford medical care and that every developed country in the world except the US takes care of its own citizens (T.R. Reid), but I also think a government-created solution has risks.

As much as we might prefer it, complex social, cultural and political issues are not adequately addressed by pat answers from the red or the blue (or, ahem, hyperbolic sound bites about “death panels.”) It’s time for a Purple Party.