There's a promo on TV right now for a new sitcom that includes one of the characters saying something like this: "My girlfriend wanted a cat, and I didn't, so we compromised. We got a cat." That rather lame humor does illustrate a valuable point: Sometime there is no such thing as a compromise. There is no way to reconcile getting a cat or not getting a cat -- somebody has to give in. Sometimes there can be the illusion of a compromise -- getting a dog, for example. But that involves both parties believing they are getting something they are not -- that having the dog is the same as having a cat, that having a dog is the same thing as having no animal at all.
So, here comes Arnold Schwarzenegger, the latest in a long line of politicians calling for a "third way," something that would not be Democratic or Republican but, somehow, "all inclusive," for "all the people" instead of just those silly liberal and conservative partisans:
“I saw that people, not just in California, but across the nation, were hungry for a new kind of politics