The health reform votes in the Senate this week showed Democrats unwavering in the march to adopt a far-reaching overhaul of the healthcare system over united Republican opposition. The votes also marked something else: the culmination of more than a generation of partisan polarization of the American political system, and a precipitous decline in collegiality and collaboration in governing that seemed to move in inverse proportion to a rising influence of lobbying, money, the 24-hour news cycle, and hostilities on talk shows and in the blogosphere. Many senators said the current vitriol was unlike anything they had seen.
