Being from southwest Virginia – or as Sarah Palin would call it, the ‘Real Virginia’ (sorry to all the northern Virginia readers) – has led me to be a sports purist. I have the freedom to cheer for whichever sports teams I want, since neither the state of Virginia nor its capital, Roanoke, has any teams. If you were to ask me who my favorite team was in, say, baseball, I’d tell you I’m a baseball fan before I’m a Red Sox fan. I’m all about wanting the game to be played the way it was meant to be played, and this is why I’m tired of all the talk about partisanship in Washington.

My initial reaction to the State of the Union address was that President Obama was being a little over-idealistic. The reason for his twinge of over-idealism is due to the part of his speech that followed – specifically, with his visit to the GOP House Issues Conference in Baltimore last Friday, which I thought was risky yet brilliant.

The theme that emerged was partisanship.

The reason I came away thinking that the State of the Union address was more like an overly optimistic fable instead of a harsh reality is because Washington will not be able to get anything done without this culture of ‘no’s’ that Obama eluded to in the address. Democrats and Republicans alike appear to be completely unwilling to make the proper concessions necessary to incite real change that will benefit America. Every minute argument that takes place on Capitol Hill is another minute away from helping a family in need.

Obama made sure to reiterate to the GOP members Friday that they are all elected officials – they represent their constituencies. Saying no to a proposal before it even gets talked about is not good long-term politics. Personal disagreements don’t translate well to the rest of the country.

Congress was designed to be slow and deliberative, not to enact any laws without deliberation. But what’s now slowing down Democrats and Republicans alike is a lack of deliberation.

They are not playing the game the way it was meant to be played.

While I agree with Obama that actually talking and compromising is the way to get things done in Washington, partisanship is no good if the parties aren’t unified. Obama’s swing to the center on health care is something that tried to appease Republicans, but somehow his own Democrats end up voting the other way. What good is an effort toward bipartisanship if the president of the United States, the leader of your party, is trying to compromise and you’re unwilling to do the same?

Obama’s team also needs to get its act together.

When David Axelrod, Obama’s top political adviser, goes on ‘Meet the Press’ and says, ‘I think the American people will punish any party who they believe is playing politics ahead of solving problems,’ that doesn’t imply that Obama’s top aides aren’t being consistent. Especially when House Minority Leader John Boehner, in the same segment on the same show, points out that states like Massachusetts, Virginia and New Jersey have sent clear messages through their elections of what the American people might truly want.

Republicans are also struggling with this lack of unity within the party. This entire intra-party struggle coupled with inter-party struggle has plagued Washington in its ability to compromise.

I think both Democrats and Republicans have valid ideas, but I think that now more than ever they need to heed to the needs of their constituents, to not act solely within their party but as delegates of the people.

Again, I think the president’s over-idealism in his State of the Union address was so because of the walls of partisanship. If we tear down these walls and make Washington not be so ‘Washington-like,’ as Obama put it, then we can see the change quicker. Now if only we could get that team in Roanoke.

David Kaplan is a sophomore broadcast journalism and political science major. His column appears weekly, and he can be reached at dhkaplan@syr.edu.

Published on February 2, 2010 at 12:00 pm