Helen Kearns Goodwin’s impressive profile of Lincoln’s unlikely cabinet, Team of Rivals,

is an invitation and a challenge.  Why, in the midst of a fracturing republic, divided

over a truly divisive issue, would a president assemble, by intention, so disparate a circle

of primary advisors?  It is reported their debate was boisterous and sharp-tongued,

 verging at times on fisticuffs.  Yet, from that unlikely and rowdy team

came collective wisdom to save a nation.

Polarities are inevitable: ironically both within us and among us.  It would be convenient if I were, and you were, a neat and tidy matrix of clearly definable qualities and characteristics.  I am this, but not that.  Gracious, not brusque; compassionate, not cruel; honest, not devious; trustworthy, not deceptive.  In reality “and” more clearly captures my reality than “not.”  My inclinations and behavior ebb and flow across a spectrum, a polarity if you will – I can be gracious and brusque; trustworthy and deceptive.  I am an inevitable “mixed bag.”  As a Cherokee elder said, teaching his grandchildren by a campfire – having confessed that good and evil like fierce animals, right and wrong, generosity and greed exist, indeed fight furiously within him – “I know which will win.”  “Which?” the children eagerly asked.  “The ones I feed,” he replied. As a Buddhist would say, teaching that every possible thought, feeling and behavior resides in your “seed storehouse” – “Be careful what you water.”  My polarities yield breadth and richness; lend color and texture; flexibility and creativity to the fullness of me.  But inner polarization leads to blind self-righteousness, exaggeration of my goodness, and a dangerous denial and repression of my “darker side,” then its projection onto others.  I am at risk, or even more disturbingly those I meet are at risk, when I lay undue claim to my “positive” traits and deny my “negative” ones. 

Polarities, inevitable within us, are also inevitable among us.  Expressed with dignity and respect, or, sometimes expressed in potentially fierce and assaultive ways.  This is nowhere more evident than on the political front.

Governmental process (Senate deliberation comes particularly to mind) is enlivened by rigorous debate and robust exchange – the broadest possible spectrum of ideology and opinion heartily articulated and advocated, seasoned by collegiality and mutual regard and a common quest for truth and wisdom – until consensus is reached.  Creative polarity.  But one can argue that the present Senate is at risk of being a failed institution, where creative polarity has become destructive polarization. 

• CREATIVE POLARITY:  Newt Gingrich and Rev. Al Sharpton (such an unlikely, yet promising duo) touring the country advocating for education reform, supporting the initiatives of Arne Duncan, Secretary of Education . . . Lindsay Graham, John Kerry and Joe Lieberman collaborating to craft an energy bill . . . Bill Clinton and George Bush partnering to advocate for Haiti in the midst of its devastation . . . Ken Starr, with clear Republican and conservative credentials, admonishing Liz Chaney for a political ad while defending the Obama Department of Justice . . . Representative John Barrasso (R/Wy), a physician, and Barack Obama have an exchange at the health care summit that could be written off by either side as “more of the same,” but which may offer a vivid snapshot of the real and heartfelt philosophical differences at play between Democrats and Republicans (with appreciation to an E. J. Dionne piece in the Washington Post)

• DESTRUCTIVE POLARIZATION:  One hundred and ninety-three bills passed by the House, many with broad bi-partisan support, have been sent to the Senate there to languish unaddressed . . . incessant misrepresentation, manipulation and downright distortion of facts from both sides in the health care debate . . . ad hominum attacks (name calling, demonizing)  that assault the person to obscure focus on the position . . . sloganizing that creates or heightens fear rather than illumining issues . . . choosing partisan political agendas above legislative urgencies . . . Senate caucuses voting thoroughly, consistently, unwaveringly along party lines.

Jesus might suggest: judge not, lest ye be judged . . . beware of spotting the splinter in your opponent’s eye while a log is lodged in your own . . . by the judgment you mete out will you be judged.  John Stuart Mill urges us to listen to those we are debating, lest we miss what truth they hold that’s lacking in your own point of view.  John Hegal urged hearty debate in his classroom, but suggested that it is only when thesis engages anti-thesis (each partial and incomplete) can synthesis emerge.