choosing which end to crack the egg

It's weird. There are some things here in Australia that are literally the opposite of the same things in America, and if there's a logical reason for it, I don't know it. 

In America, the democrats and the left are called liberal, but in Australia, the liberal party is the more right wing alternative. And then there are the colors that represent the different sides: red and blue. In Australia, red represents the left and blue represents the right, and that's also the color coding followed by pretty much every other country except the US, where conservatives are red and progressives are blue. 

In the post-war era - like 50's 60's 70's - I don't think there was much of a difference or a need for a difference between the left and the right. There was a consensus about what were the best policies. But in recent decades, things have become intensely polarized. 

It's problematic because the different factions define themselves in opposition to each other, and there is no common ground. Watch MSNBC, CNN, The Majority Report, The Young Turks, and watch FOX, SKY, The Daily Wire. You'll notice that they spend a lot of time critiquing each other, they take diametrically opposed positions and there's a whole system of narratives that underlies their respective discussions. The narratives of the left are completely different and incompatible with the narratives of the right. 

Personally, I think both sides get some things right and some things wrong.