Politics with a grain of salt

For anyone who isn't really into those introspective posts, then you may want to skip this one.  I don't even know if it can be called introspective though, so you might want to read on.

This is the Parliament, and where
I walk into work every day.

Yesterday I was walking to work, and I looked at this place and realized that I was working at one of the largest political machines in the world, and how incredibly privileged I was to work there.  It was an amazing feeling.  I can't believe that I got this opportunity, and despite some of the challenges that I have been facing, it really has been a great experience.  Right after I had that wave of gratitude wash over me, I took this picture to sort of commemorate that feeling:
Today was the State of the Union for the European Union.  The Commission, Council,  and the Parliament all met to talk about whatever people thought was important.  As we were watching it, the assistant who is in the office with me started to make remarks about it.  I won't tell you which side, but they were distinctly motivated from one perspective.  As I was listening to this, I realized that I started to do the exact same thing.  He was making sarcastic comments about specific members of Parliament, and rather quickly I started to do so as well.  When I left for lunch, I was trying to figure out why exactly I was doing that.  I consider myself a rather open person when it comes to political opinions, and I pride myself on the fact that I see both sides.  Today however, I just started bashing specific people without actually listening to what they were saying.  I realized that after having been surrounded by these extremely specific political biases in the office where I am working, they had influenced me to the point where I only saw their point of view, and that blinded me to other ideas.  Thankfully I have a wonderful mother who enjoys politics and with whom I could have a good political discussion.  I also met Michael Palomaki for lunch, and we talked about stuff.   They helped me recenter my feelings on politics and my political basis.  All of this reinforced that I need to make sure to try to see both points of view, or at least take everything with a grain of salt.  If I do that, then there is far more that can be accomplished.  If I do not, then any chance that I may have to learn from others of a different viewpoint will be lost.