Dangerous Convictions — Allen '67

By Tom Allen '67 The debt ceiling debacle of 2011 was clear evidence of the dangerous polarization of American politics.  Heedless of the warnings of economists, a majority of Republicans in the House refused to allow the Treasury to borrow enough money to pay for spending already ordered by Congress.  The government avoided a catastrophic default only by unprecedented legislative contortions. The debt ceiling fight also showed that the two parties simply don't understand each other.  In Dangerous Convictions, former six-term Democratic congressman Tom Allen of Maine explains how beneath the surface of our political debates, the incompatible worldviews of the two parties have turned Congress into a dysfunctional body.  "Years of listening to what seemed to me to be preposterous arguments in committee, on the House floor, or in private conversations," he writes, "changed my mind about our capacity to find bipartisan agreement on the most fundamental topics."  Likewise, most Republican m