McCain's Washing Post Op-Ed

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/john-mccain-its-time-congress-returns-to-regular-order/2017/08/31/f62a3e0c-8cfb-11e7-8df5-c2e5cf46c1e2_story.html?utm_term=.0b4490bb0796

John McCain wrote a pretty good op-ed for the Washington Post. I read it and appreciate what he had to say. What I find amusing and even upsetting are the headlines that it generated.

CNN's headline was something like, 'McCain Calls Trump Poorly Informed and Impulsive.' McCain did say that, with qualifiers ("often" and "can be" respectively), and it is pretty true. I don't see it as a bombshell. In fact, I think that more and more everyday people are "often poorly informed and can be impulsive," so it doesn't seem odd to me to have someone like that in the White House. McCain is right that it is Congresses responsibility to try to balance that out.  I think that message can be widened to apply to almost everyone. We need to work to balance each other out, not beat each other. Congress with the President and people with each other.

Another headline called it a "fiery op-ed." Maybe I am tone def, but it didn't seem fiery to me. And if it was, the tone would go against the message. The message was one of working together and compromising because we need each other to make things work. Being fiery in tone would not exactly help that take place. But, the media does need to sensationalize things these days to get out attention. It is what they do now; they have moved beyond the naive and mundane vocation of informing people and making them think. If Congress did what McCain called for and the media covered it accurately, they wouldn't keep our attention: neither the politicians or the media.

The power to return to "regular order" in Congress is ultimately in the hands of those in Congress. The President and the media can do much to disrupt that or spin it, but the ultimate responsibility lies with them. And in everyday life the real power to return to regular order lies with each of us, not with the politicians or the media. Politicians, the government, the media, etc. can help if they take the right tone.  They can, and more often than not these days do, take a tone that makes it more difficult. However, they do not have the ultimate power in the matter; we as everyday people in our everyday lives and choices do.