I keep wondering – as do many Americans – when the two parties will learn to stop blowing up both sides of every issue. It is embarrassing. Right now, we are all suffering from the pundits on television and the politicians in D.C. moaning about Iran. Yes, Iran having a nuclear weapon is a terrible thing. Yes, the White House should be briefing the key leaders – both Republican and Democrat – on Capitol Hill. No, the Republican senators should not have wasted their time sending a letter to Iran that Iran’s lobbyists in the U.S. have told the Iranian leaders. Everyone knows that an Executive Agreement can and often does disappear the next time a new President becomes the Chief Executive. Really? Did the Senators actually think this was news to Iran? What was their goal in stating the obvious? They took the focus of the Iranian negotiations away from whether it is a good or bad deal and instead made the focus turn to something fairly trivial.

The flip side though is the Democrats that are whining all over the press that this letter is the end of the world and nothing like this has ever happened before have forgotten history. Jimmy Carter tried to get the U.N. to cabosh George H.W. Bush’s drive for a coalition against the invasion of Kuwait. Teddy Kennedy tried to undermine Reagan’s re-election by sending a message to the Soviet Union that he would come and give talking points to Andropov on how to attack Reagan’s policies. Nancy Pelosi went to Syria to meet with Bashir Assad to try to force the Bush Administration to open a dialogue with the Syrian President when the Administration had said publicly that they wouldn’t deal with Assad at all. And there are more. House and Senate elected officials have felt free to express their disagreement with whatever party is in the White House (even sometimes when it’s their own). All of those individuals that are on their high horses about Members of Congress contacting other governments should pipe down and read recent history.

It really is time for our elected leaders to stop postulating and enjoying hearing their own voices on both sides of the aisle and start working together to solve some very big issues. That’s why we elected them.