Democracy is a conversation.
It's a dialogue that includes politicians, interest groups, parties, journalists, lobbyists, pollsters, letter-writers, campaign contributors, protestors and voters. It's an ongoing negotiation about how our priorities and our values should translate into public policy. Right now, many of us find the conversation pretty frustrating. We are bored with the manipulative rhetoric that insults our intelligence. We are angry about the cynical sacrifice of principle to political expediency.