but I think an even more important question is not how this occurs, but why it occurs. There is a reason why we are fighting this ideological war in the trenches: It is spurred on and directly benefits the ruling, monied classes in this country.
Think about the intractable issues that we are engaged in debating: Race, abortion, homosexuality. They are all emotionally charged issues with no "right" answer. I can have my opinion bolstered by facts and I may think mine arguments are stronger, but there is no objective litmus tests for these issues.
However, while we — lower and middle classes of all races and creeds — are arguing about all of this, we are missing the BIG PICTURE. They are creating a corporate-controlled oligarchy and privatizing all of which we once valued as public, land, airwaves, education, etc. They have drained the treasury and created a debtor nation that benefits those who already hold the wealth. They preach laissez-faire for big business but want to control what we do with are bodies and what we do in the bedroom. They contend ours is a land of opportunity, but more and more of us are going without adequate shelter and health care. These are but a few examples and I'm sure we could add much to this litany.
The bottom line is that I'm not really that different from my right-wing counterpart: We want a nice, safe place to live, food in our bellies, the dignity of work, opportunities for our children. What divides us is the notion of how to achieve these goals, a chasm fueled by ideologues on both sides of the aisle. And while we're fighting each other, the ruling class gains more power.
I have seen this power play in action, albeit on a much smaller scale. The community in which I work is about 50 percent Hispanic and 35 percent African-American, yet the power structure, including a mayor who has been re-elected eight times, is dominated by white men. Why is that? Because they throw out a few scraps from the table and while the Hispanics and African-Americans fight for them, they continue to dine at the banquet table.
I'll end with a passage from Orwell's 1984 that summarizes my comments:
If there was hope, it must lie in the proles, because only there in those swarming disregarded masses, 85 per cent of the population of Oceania, could the force to destroy the Party ever be generated. The Party could not be overthrown from within. ... But the proles, if only they could somehow become conscious of their own strength, would have no need to conspire. They needed only to rise up and shake themselves like a horse shaking off flies. If they chose they could blow the Party to pieces tomorrow morning. Surely sooner or later it must occur to them to do it? And yet-!
http://www.online-literature.com/view.php/1984/7?term=proles