IMPRESSIVE INTERVIEW

I just listened to a very impressive Blogging Heads.TV interview.

It was impressive in that you had two people with views that were not entirely meshed, but they weren't screaming at one another. One thought TARP wasn't as bad as some say, and the other thought the legislators were very irresponsible about it.

The beautiful thing about it was that it was a true dialogue. Each respected the other's opinion and seemed to really be looking for consensus in an area that they disagreed. It brought out the arguments that you hear on both sides (far right and centrist) in respectable discourse. There was no yelling and the interrupting was polite. I wish we could see more of this on network or cable news. I don't know why TV news programs think that's it's either helpful or entertaining to see pundits with talking points spar in their two windows. That's usually when I change the channel.

I think that the most reasonable Americans want to have a respectful debate. We want to find the real answers. We want common sense solutions that come not from a radical agenda but thoughtful reasoning, taking the best ideas from everyone. There is more common ground out there that anyone would imagine, if you look deeper into people's opinions.

For instance, in the above interview, they started being on opposite sides of a contentious topic, but in the end there was more common ground than not. It just took time to flush out the crossover. Both had their opinions, but neither had to be "right" at the expense of the other.