My question is regarding political views as deal breakers for otherwise satisfying relationships and how that should be handled. I am in a relationship with a woman who is intelligent, witty, a great conversationalist, GGG, and generally one of the nicest people I have ever known. The sex is incredible. There is one problem POLITICS. Every political season leads to a drawing of the Maginot Line.

Well after another political season I find myself angry and frustrated with her position on recent election results. I understand that her position is a rational position that is arrived at from a different set of basic premises. However it is such an irritant for me and the diametrically opposed viewpoints make me question long term compatibility. I know she has been patiently waiting for marriage (we both recently finished professional training). We have been together for the last 6 years and each election has been more painful then the last. I dont want to present this to her as an ultimatum because she is completely entitled to her opinion. So I am going to end it. My only question is do I owe her the reason or should I just say I am not interested anymore and walk? The last month or so has been kind of strained as it is. If I tell her why, I fear that it would effectively be coercion to get her to change her position or at least the expression of those viewpoints.

Liberal + Conservative = Misery

My response after the jump...

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Dump her.

Yeah, yeah—James Carville and Mary Matalin. He's a Democrat! She's a Republican! They're married! To each other! And they're on TV! But Carville and Matalin's schtick only works on morons who think that either of those two has a conscience, much less a sincerely held political conviction. But in real life—when you're not being paid millions of dollars to play it up for the dolts and/or put up with your repulsive spouse's revolting political views—being with someone whose politics appall and offend you is unbearable. So dump her.

But tell her why. She has a right to know. And while she's unlikely to change her positions—and you shouldn't ask her to change her positions—being dumped on account of them may cause her to reassess them. And who knows? Paris was worth a mass for Henry IV, L+C=M, and your girlfriend may decide that you're worth a political epiphany.