Talking Politics With Family

Some of my family members have some very definitive opinions when it comes to politics. I feel bad for my dad sometimes...he's a Republican in a family of Democrats. Needless to say, some of the conversations get pretty animated. My dad drove up to visit me for Thanksgiving. The turkey was cooking so I put out some snacks. The conversation immediately turned to politics. I'd like to say that we agreed to disagree but that wasn't always the case.

Part of the problem I think is that my dad is hooked on the cable news shows. He knows the names of all of the analysts and the politicians they talk about. To complicate matters, when he starts to make a point about something and forgets the name of the person who said it or who it was about, he can't continue until he remembers the name. I get my news from the internet in a more summarized format and I generally don't bother with everybody's name, just the big names in the news. I don't need to see an issue analyzed 12 different ways...just give me the bullet points.

Another problem is that I'm a tax consultant. That combined with my liberal views means that I can sometimes see the justification for tax increases that may not be popular with many people. I don't want my taxes to go up, but I can see the reason they have to.

The final problem is my dad's hearing. Sometimes he doesn't hear every word you say and things get a little heated when he disagrees with a point I was making when he didn't really hear all of what I was saying. It's funny to listen to him though because he's feels strongly about some issues. While waiting for the turkey to cook, we called some of the family members up in NY and he immediately turns the conversation to politics. I had to "shush" him several times because he started yelling. We come from a family that can joke about almost anything, even about someone's death, but sometimes it's hard to work in a joke to soften these discussions.

Republican or Democrat, we all hope that Obama can clean up the mess the outgoing administration created. He won't be perfect either but I think he will definitely be better. My dad might disagree with that.