[munk-a]

As someone on the D side of things I'm generally in the same camp as you opinion-wise but not all republicans are pray-away-the-gay crazy - that may be Pence's particular brand but Romney ended up legalizing civil unions while governor of MA. Partisan politics like to paint things as black and white but they're a lot more grey than that.

Similarly R-side folks might believe that all D-folks are Trotskyists while that's a rather rare stance to have - certainly the D-side is more towards interventionalism - but nobody with serious power on the D end of things (not even bernie) is advocating for a planned economy.

I feel very strongly about moving towards proportional representation for the house over FPTP slotting. I think the extremism in the current political climate is largely fueled by this us vs. them choice - get us better representation so we can all see that Trotskyists pull one or two house reps nation-wide and slice off of the Dems at large... And watch the white-supremists and westboro baptist church folks get kicked out of the GOP at large and end up with a seat or two themselves. These are fringe groups[1]...

Our current voting system allows negative campaign ads to be just as effective as positive ones - knocking your opponent down 3 pts is the same as raising yourself 3 pts... but it's far easier to craft negative campaign ads so the electorate is constantly submerged in hateful vitriol. We need election reform so we can stop viewing each other as the enemy.

1. Please note, the current administration has actually started embracing these groups more, but this is a new development and should be a clear signal that the country is in trouble.