Average Americans are sick and tired of politics, but politics has unnecessarily invaded every aspect of our lives. So, it’s essentially impossible to avoid politics, because it affects us each personally perhaps more than ever before. More specifically, the raging hyper-partisanship of politics has rendered our process of governing generally ineffective and quite tedious. Most people certainly have some political leanings from relative indifference to moderate positions to intense devotion, but the masses want results not endless bickering about who’s right.

Contrary to the prevailing political narrative, most Americans are fair and open minded. The people only really care about who’s right if they produce positive results, but our elected officials are trapped in that hopeless echo chamber in Washington that only allows success if it’s ascribed solely to one side or the other. They play a zero-sum game where your opponents can never get credit, have a good idea, or achieve victory.

This situation is understandable because moderate Democrats are utterly ignored if not ostracized, so the only Democrats heard are the extreme leftist voices shouting down any dissent. Republicans are routinely accused of extremism, but that is only to excuse the leftist radicalism that has hijacked the Democrat Party. The media craves extremism because it sensationalizes politics like a UFC fight, and therefore increases their ratings and relevance.

The effect is the parties are so polarized that bipartisanship is virtually impossible. And the media has absolutely forfeited their duty and role of calling balls and strikes. Each side has their media outlets that categorically call the other side wrong on everything, so the people are deprived of genuinely objective analysis. The result is every issue or problem devolves into a food fight of accusations and insults without any palpable results.

Hurricane Ian wreaked havoc on several states and millions of people. The only issue at hand is everyone working together to render aid to those damaged and suffering. Americans are compassionate and generous, so many are personally contributing or helping those in need. That’s not the story for the Democrat media complex. For them it’s about assessing blame for a natural disaster with the sole cynical intent to injure their political opponents. Even before landfall, the media accused Florida Governor Ron DeSantis of failing to protect Florida.

Hurricanes are a fact of life for the southeastern United States; some years there are few storms and others there are many. There is no evidence that storms are more intense or plentiful, but that matters not to media and political hacks. For them, every weather event is another sign of climate change, so talking heads breathlessly blame “climate change deniers” for every act of God insinuating we can prevent hurricanes. It’s absurd and tiresome because their goals are not to resolve anything but rather to simply harm their political opponents. Americans know better and only want the government to respond with aid not demagoguery.

This hyper-partisan nonsense permeates every issue. Border security and sensible immigration is not racist or xenophobic; it’s about protecting Americans and not exploiting illegal migrants. Keeping biological boys and men masquerading as transgender girls and women out of female sports is not bigoted; it’s about maintaining female sports as fair and viable for girls and women. Why should female athletes lose their right to compete fairly to a tiny minority of misfits? Americans want fairness not silly progressive notions of wokeness.

Abortion is another issue that evades objectivity by the Democrat Media Complex. Most Americans including many pro-abortion supporters do not support gruesome late term abortions, but the press and pundits only cast this issue as depriving women of their rights. Abortion has been returned to states where some will prohibit all abortions and some will subsidize abortions to the moment of birth, but many states will find a compromise to protect the innocent lives of the unborn and preserve the rights of women in rare cases of rape, incest, and the life of the mother. Again, the media precludes the nuances of this moral debate and only fuels the fire of a binary fight to inflame the people.

The American body politic is not overwhelmingly Democrat or Republican. Americans are thoughtful and want fairness, not endless battling solely to destroy the opposition and divide the people. Americans love football and want their teams to win, but they don’t want the teams to just brawl – they want a good game where the better team prevails. So is it with politics, they want a healthy debate, positive actions, and then an objective assessment of the results.

Our Constitutional Republic is more resilient than the pundits claim, and Americans are more steadfast in their traditional values than the press portrays. The United States is still a strong moral nation with a hearty people who cherish freedom. The media paints a bleak picture of utter division and too many politicians crow that their politics is the only answer. Americans intuitively know there is more to life than raw politics, so they will punish those that demagogue the issues and their opponents. Look for a huge course correction in the impending midterm elections. America is not dead!

“Blessed are those who act justly, who always do what is right” (Psalm 106:3).

Pete Riehm is the host of Common Sense Radio heard 8 pm every Thursday on FMTalk106.5 or streaming at fmtalk1065.com. Email him at peteriehm@bellsouth.net or on MEWE @PeteRiehm or read all his columns at http://www.renewamerica.com/.