Budget Debate: A Difference of Type, Not of Degree, Part 1

About 99 percent of the commentary that I see regarding Minnesota's budget impasse and the national debt ceiling debate misses the mark because it misunderstands the nature of the dispute:  most commentators assume that the difference between the parties is one of degree.  In fact, the difference between liberals and conservatives on the budget issue is one of type.

Using the yardstick analogy, a difference of degree would go as follows:  Republicans are at the 15-inch mark, Democrats are at the 21-inch mark, why can't we just agree on 18 inches and be done with it.

Based on this false premise, we then have a cavalcade of commentary, trying and failing to understand why this "gap" cannot be bridged.  There are almost as many explanations of the impasse as there are of why the Roman Empire fell (and many of the explanations are the same across both).

One example, the "increasing polarization" theory, goes something like this:  Republicans use to be at the 17-inch mark and Democrats at the 19-inch mark, so compromise was easier when everyone was so close.  Now those Tea-Partiers have move the mark to the 12-inch line, so the distance is too far to cover and stalemate results.

I think the conventional wisdom is wrong.  The yardstick analogy does not apply because the parties are not on the same yardstick, if even on the same plane.

Republicans think that they are already on the 36th inch of the yardstick:  any more movement higher will cause us to fall off the edge into Greece or Portugal.  Any movement lower takes them away from the edge and improves safety.

Democrats believe that there is no edge:  there is no yardstick, in fact, they sit on a line of infinite length, which only improves as you move higher.  To quibble about where one is along the line is to argue an absurdity.  Any movement lower makes you worse off, so moving higher is the only logical outcome.

Thus we have impasse:  one side thinks any further movement invites catastrophe, the other believes that not moving higher is insane, only good things lay in that direction.  Both can't be correct.  There is no logical compromise.  One side cannot settle for half a catastrophe and other side cannot settle for anything less than always getting better.  On one side the abyss, on the other side nirvana.  How can compromise result?

Only one side can be right so only one side can win.