The Mutual Codependency Problem

Descartes gave us the mind-body problem, our current political parties gave us this.

A few weeks ago, I mentioned the mind-body problem as discovered by Rene Descartes, the issue whether it is the mind, free of physical restraints, that is the real identity of the person or is the person defined by the physical body, completely dependent upon their DNA.

A conundrum, to be sure.

Someone I have never met in person but with whom it is highly likely I would count as a friend if we ever did, commented on my post today concerning the inability of the left to recognize the part they play in tragedies like the Covenant School shooting, and raised a brilliant point. In doing so, he raised another problem that, like Descartes’ mind-body problem, is another virtually impossible problem to resolve.

I’ll call it the mutual codependency problem.

My almost friend defines this conundrum this way:

“Most likely, we’ll continue to incompetently stagger our way towards federal fiscal insolvency and continue to not fix immigration laws/enforcement, Social Security, etc. I see little to no will from either Democrats or Republicans to actually solve problems—they all prefer to make noise and yell at each other instead.

The two main political parties will continue to be incoherent and co-dependent, and each president will be more of a failure than the last — because the federal government is too convoluted and overweight for anyone to lead. It is a monster with no head, on autopilot with no purpose beyond its own existence.”

It is like the old fable of the scorpion and the frog, where the scorpion convinces the frog to take him on his back and swim across the river – only to get halfway before the scorpion stings the frog. Spoiler alert, they both die. The moral is that some people are so concerned with defeating the other side, they will plot their enemy’s doom even at the cost of their own success.

Psychologists define codependency as “a dysfunctional relationship dynamic where one person assumes the role of ‘the giver,’ sacrificing their own needs and well-being for the sake of the other, ‘the taker.’”

So, one would assume that the giver is always the giver, and the taker is always the taker, but in this relationship, due to the periodic shifts in power, these positions alternate.

I chose to single out the codependency as the main issue, because were it not for the Democrat/GOP death pact, together they could slay the federal dragon with one killing stroke. That they won’t, provides us with convincing evidence of a taste for mutual destruction. MAD - mutually assured destruction – is a feature of modern politics, not a bug. The mere fact things exist that their very elimination would help the American people and the two parties can’t find a way to eliminate them is a shame.

I understand that both parties have differing agendas, but these days they seem to go out of their way to see that other party loses.

I happen to believe that the GOP has the better solutions, but we seem to find ways to lose elections we should win, lose momentum when we have some and to refuse to hold themselves or the Democrats accountable for outcomes.

I this really a codependency problem?

I think so, but a difficult one to solve if every time each party is the scorpion, neither can resist the scorpion’s nature to sting.

At the very least, it is a combination of two syndromes, battered spouse and a little touch of Stockholm.

The only answer to the Descartes mind-body problem is that it takes the mind and the body to make a person. The only answer to the mutual codependency problem is to realize that it takes Republican and Democrat to be American.

It may well take a cataclysmic event to make that happen but America must be a place where people agree on the destination, but argue over the best way to get there. Today, we can’t even agree on the destination.