We need more time for talk at the table

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Our civic club meets each week for lunch and business, people in commitment to make life better for the younger generations. There is time at the tables for conversation before we get to our pursuit, 20 or 30 minutes to learn of children or grandchildren, projects at home or the office, recent adventures abroad or in the neighborhood.
The other day a man discussed plans to haul his boat to Canada and the intricacies and delights of fishing there, something he does with friends every year. He was anxious about the fuel injectors he had ordered for his boat motor, whether they would arrive in time, and whether they would fit. He was to leave the next day. “We may be renting a boat,” he shrugged.
Now and then talk at the tables turns to politics. People here are of all types and stripes. Each may have a say or not, heads nod or shake, points are agreed, or not, positions tabled for further review; smiles and shrugs are exchanged, and we move on. The greater mission is to improve the circumstance of youngsters; we’ve always agreed to that.
Someone wonders: Can’t it be this way elsewhere, in Topeka, say, or Washington?
We suspect it could, if more of those at Capitols spent less time at the computer or with their palm screens and more time with each other at lunch, or dinner. The era’s great technology, “social media,” may not be so sociable. Far from uniting, or “connecting,” this medium seems to separate users into certain niches, to capsules that feed their own interests to the exclusion of others.’
In other times, Republicans and Democrats, conservative, moderate, liberal, could often be found together in Topeka at a table, talking all matter of whatnot, including serious politics. In better times, at the end of a day, Senate President Bud Burke and House Speaker Marvin Barkis, Republican and Democratic leaders, could be seen walking together down the Capitol’s great north stairway, chatting amiably as they headed for the door. There was never a rule, then, that adversaries could not be civil, or under-standing, or even friendly. This is rarely the case today.
In Washington, how often does Jerry Moran break bread with Chuck Schumer, or Dick Durbin, leading Democrats of the Senate?
For some odd reason, the taboo has been put on social intercourse in the halls of state and federal government. Palm screens inhibit rather than advance the exchange of ideas. Instead of a bazaar for interplay, technology’s opinion cells create a confederacy, states of pro-stridence and anti-compromise. There is little room for in-between, almost no room for agreement.
It’s hardly fertile ground for government, for compromise among leaders or for straight-news among the accredited media. All the news that’s fit to print has become all the news that fits our views.
How often, if ever, has Roger Marshall shared a meal with Nancy Pelosi or Steny Hoyer, the House Democratic leaders?
It’s no way to run a country, when there is no time for talk over coffee, or a meal.

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