Editorial: Compromise will be key to getting things done

After the electoral wave washed over him, a wobbly President Barack Obama proclaimed, “No one party will be able to dictate where we will go from here.”

And he is right.

John Boehner, who is likely to ascend to speaker of the House of Representatives, took to the stage at a raucous GOP celebration but refused to ride the wave. He noted that it wouldn’t be right to cheer when one in 10 Americans are out of work, the economy is limping along and Congress faces such daunting budget challenges.

And he is right.

Instead, Boehner said, members of Congress need to roll up their sleeves and get to work. But he must know, as Obama stated, that not much will get done if the partisan battles continue. Divided government doesn’t need to signal gridlock, even if that is the conventional wisdom wafting from inside the Beltway. It just means that to get anything done, there must be compromise.

In a speech last month at the American Enterprise Institute, Boehner signaled that this would be his approach if his party took power.

“A lot of scar tissue has been built up on both sides of the aisle,” Boehner said. “If there’s a more open process, and members are allowed to participate, guess what? It lets the steam out of the place.”

This is the message that politicians on all levels of government should take from this election and the past three or four. Americans are tired of the strong-arm tactics of the party in power and the obstructionism of the opposition. Unfortunately, the chief Election Day victims of this ongoing discord have been the moderates of both parties. Witness the fate of U.S. Rep. Walt Minnick in Idaho and state Sen. Chris Marr in Spokane. Before that, many moderates on the Republican side were dispatched in the primaries. That’s going to make it even more difficult to meet in the middle.

To take on the significant challenges of cutting spending and reducing the size of government, politicians must resist the temptation to act on their pent-up frustrations. The public expects solutions, not subpoenas, filibusters, government shutdowns and other political ploys designed to set the stage for the 2012 campaign.

The nation is hurting. The tentacles of the Great Recession and the effects of excessive government still have a tight hold. We must have strong leadership from legislators, governors, presidents and members of Congress. If any of them try to go it alone, the voters will be watching and they won’t be happy.

One firm lesson from the topsy-turvy elections of the past decade is that voters are not shy about kicking out the incumbents.

They want good-faith efforts.