This item grows out of a recent study noting that in the US today few people have friends on the other side of the ideological fence.
It’s easy to imagine how that happens—there are just too many subjects to avoid! That raises the question of why all those topics are taboo. There are many reasons, but we deal here with one specific problem: distinguishing real issues from pretexts.
The problem is that while there are plenty of real policy issues where debate should be possible, they tend to be mixed-in with taboo topics where the policy positions are actually donor’s self-interested pretexts (“climate change is a discredited hoax”). Public debates can be (and often are) staged to discuss issues in the taboo category, but they never get very far. There’s not much to be discussed when the stated policy is not the point.
It’s not necessarily easy to figure out what’s real, and undoubtedly many people will disagree with the examples here. However the idea is to focus on a few issue areas where we as a country ought to be able to make progress if we can keep track of what is real and what isn’t.
We put issues in two categories: non-issues and real issues. Non-issues are issues only if donors (or other political considerations) force them to be. We owe it to the country to get past them. Real issues are the significant questions we need to solve.
- Climate change
As just noted, climate change is a poster child for pretexts. There is of course one primary reason this whole subject is partisan, and his name is Charles Koch. In addition to the false hoax claim, there is a continually-morphing litany of other misrepresentations. It used to be easier to be a skeptic. By now more than enough is known, so that ordinary risk analysis says the time has come to get serious.
Non-issues
Climate change is real.
Burning of fossil fuels is causing it.
The people working on it are not political hacks, but dedicated scientists faced with a hard problem.
Real issues
Risk assessment and what needs to happen now. Steps and timing.
Roles of government and the private sector, e.g. supporting the power companies.
How research, particularly energy research, can best support the private sector.
What infrastructure changes will be needed and when? Where will the jobs go?
Coordinating the whole effort.
It is worth pointing out that there are plenty of good, multi-year working-class jobs involved in dealing with climate change.
- Environmental policy and the EPA
What is frustrating about this topic is the extent to which the whole discussion of environmental regulation has gone on without specifics. Is it really possible to believe that all environmental regulation is bad? Even after the Flint disaster? It is not viable to have environmental regulation whipsawed back and forth between administrations.
Non-issues
Not all environmental regulation is bad.
Not all environmental regulation is bad for business.
Real issues
Agreed-upon standards for regulation. Work from the current list of Trump administration actions and responses. Criteria to avoid overreach by all sides.
What is an appropriate process to assure that both the public interest and businesses have a say?
Should there be compensation for consequences of new rules?
- Healthcare
Now that all the repeal and replace nightmares are out of our system, we really ought to be able to do something good about healthcare. This isn’t rocket science. Every other prosperous country has come up with something that works.
Non-issues
Obamacare works well enough to be a starting point. Sabotaging it helps no one.
The country needs a nationwide solution. Uniform treatment for all people is good.
Single-payer systems are used by most of the world and may have a role to play.
Real issues
Availability of plans
Cost of plans
Assuring participation and coverage
Addressing needs of businesses
Getting religion out of the debate
Controlling costs of the program
- Jobs
Thus far the whole treatment of jobs has been based on campaign slogans. The current tax cut plan is a case in point. The millions of affected people deserve better.
Non-issues
Decline of good, low-skill working class jobs.
Decline in workforce participation.
Decline of upward mobility in the US.
No silver bullet.
Real issues
What is and isn’t cured by growth.
Workable options for tariffs, subsidies, or other government actions on trade.
Long-standing issues with wage growth and inequality.
Role of education.
Role of government as an employer (e.g. infrastructure, climate projects).
Budget impact and tax plans.
Geographic coverage.
Protecting the next generation.
It would be nice to believe that the country is now ready to get down to work. On real issues some level of bipartisan cooperation could even be the norm.
on the outside 
I agree with your assessment that the core issue here is really one between “real issues” and issues that are “not real.” I think what this boils down to is that many people in our country have a serious and chronic problem in telling the difference between the two. One person has an opinion and strong feelings, and they feel that’s their reality. Others can separate out their personal opinions and feelings, which they might begin with, and look at objective data in an unbiased way, and then decide what they think. In much the same way as scientists test their hypotheses. “I think this is true, but let’s look further…”.
Those in the first category don’t really understand this concept of testing one’s ideas against reality. They don’t understand, or trust, the very concept of science. Science for them is just someone else’s opinion, one no better than their own. Much of the background and precedent for this lies in the phenomenon of religious faith. One believes, or doesn’t. Data, or science, has no credible voice.
I think the faith-based opinion comes down to narcissism, in the end. I believe what I choose or want to believe. And if I believe it, then I think it’s true. This is the way I think about it, so therefore it’s right and true.
I’d say there’s a great deal of overlap between conservatives and the religious right, and fundamentalists and religious believers on the right, and narcissism (a childish level of maturity). As one becomes more mature–if indeed one does become more mature (not all ever do)–one learns more sophisticated ways of thinking about these issues. One makes more distinctions. One considers more possibilities. Including the possibility that one’s religious faith is not true, that a god did not create the world in six days six thousand years ago, etc. And that maybe there are other more reasonable ways to look at these issues.
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