Westchester County Executive Ken Jenkins, with former US Senator Joe Manchin
Westchester County Executive Ken Jenkins posted the following: “I attended former U.S. Senator Joe Manchin’s book tour stop at Westchester Country Club, hosted by the Italian American Forum, and appreciated the chance to hear his perspective.”
“His book, Dead Center: In Defense of Common Sense, focuses on the importance of finding balance and working across differences, something that continues to matter in today’s political climate. It was a great opportunity for conversation and reflection with leaders from across the community.”
Jenkins simple comment is something we rarely hear anymore from our elected officials. Jenkins is a democrat, Manchin was a democrat, now an independent. Both have good ideas about how to make Westchester County, and the United States of America, a better place for all of us.
Manchin, a former US Senator from West Virginia, is promoting his new book as a way out of our hyper-partisan politics that 90% of us line up and take a side on.
Here are three thoughts from Manchin that all make sense to me:
“As we enter a new year, millions of Americans will be facing higher health care costs. This didn’t sneak up on us — we’ve been watching this disaster unfold for years. But in today’s hyper-partisan political climate, neither side wants to sit down and work out a compromise to fix the systemic issues with healthcare in our country. Americans are exasperated. Working people shouldn’t be bearing the cost of Congress’s unwillingness to compromise, and voters are getting tired of a political system that puts party politics over solutions that help the American people.
“I’ve seen firsthand the anger & tribalism that have infected our political system. If you’re saying, “There has to be a better way?” There is. Dead Center offers a path forward to governance based on what our American founders practiced: Common Sense.
“In the last presidential election, all we heard about was the seven battleground states, because 43 had been predetermined. All we’re hearing about now is 35 or 40 contested House seats, because the other 400 have been predetermined. The parties have gone completely crazy. It’s all about power to them, and they’ve lost sight of the purpose of being in elected public office — serving the people they represent.”
It’s OK to reach across the aisle and seek compromise. And if you can’t do that, at least listen to what the other party has to say.
