Politics has never been much of a thing to me. Reading about Presidents and American history has always been important, but contemporary politics just never pulled me in much. Until this fall, of course. Probably like a lot of people.
So then I spent a lot of time thinking about the differences of parties and people and such. Which led to long thoughts. Oftentimes unpleasant, and winding ideas. Which gets tiring.
Then you read a zinger that just sums it all up. Like this, from here:
“The difference between Republicans and Democrats is that Republicans believe people are fundamentally bad, while Democrats see people as fundamentally good."
Sounds about right. From that one thought you can pull down nearly all policies and points-of-views. You can see why collaboration is hard. And you begin to understand the outlook of someone different than you in a helpful way.
What's also great about that particular line is that it doesn't place higher importance toward either direction. Neither can be proved wholly right. Or wholly wrong. They just are.