“It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.”

– Winston Churchill

“The less people know about how sausages and laws are made, the better they’ll sleep at night.”

– Attributed (with many variations) to Prussian Prime Minister Otto Von Bismarck

These quotations come to mind in the aftermath of the contentious debt ceiling debate in Washington and the shockingly large protests by 150,000 Israelis in Jerusalem over high costs of housing, health care and quality of education. In one nation, the new political voices on the far right have almost thrown the nation into crisis, while in the other, those left of the mainstream political channels have a chance to make a constructive difference.

Congress, over the ideological objections of obstinate Tea Party devotees, voted early this week on measures to avoid shutting down and to allow an increase in the federal debt ceiling, a procedure that was pro forma up until now. The deal, balanced exclusively by reducing cost and not one iota by increasing revenue, showed the utter inflexibility of the ultra-conservative branch of the Republican party, in contrast to its more moderate cousins.

While the nation can breathe sighs of relief – for the United States of America to go into default on obligations, thus diminishing its credit rating, would have been a disaster – the ultimate resolution had little to do with good, effective government. The debate was large on intransigence, small on sense (severe budget cuts have rarely, if ever, proved a short-term benefit to our national economy) and painfully vacuous on compassion for the millions of families and individuals eviscerated by the Great Recession.

As the recent debates in the halls of Congress and at the White House droned on, one could be reminded of the lyric in the popular musical “1776” about the First Continental Congress in a steaming hot Philadelphia: “We piddle, twiddle (now we could say Twitter) and resolve. Not one damn thing do we solve!”

But in fact in both the founding days and today our leaders did accomplish agreements. The Declaration of Independence and subsequently, the Constitution, forged agreements which have served this nation in good stead for almost a quarter of a millennium.

To be sure, the debt ceiling agreement is abominably more imperfect than and hardly comparable to the decisions of the late 18th century. But even in this instance, despite the chokehold on new revenues, those left of center actually received some provisions consistent with their worldview – almost a trillion dollars in defense reductions over a decade, and delayed budget cuts that mostly don’t kick in until 2013-2014.

In Israel, the vagaries of democracy meanwhile have reared their head in different style. Prime Minister Benjamin (Bibi) Netanyahu’s security-focused administration faced a suddenly re-energized progressive left as the playing field shifted to domestic issues. In the aftermath of the protests, Netanyahu – whose center-right/far-right coalition has enjoyed support on issues of national security, such as the proposed unilateral declaration for Palestine in the United Nations – is facing a real challenge from the center and left.

The nation’s crazy-quilt parliamentary system, in which smaller factions command Knesset seats, has often caused prime ministers to play political Twister. Indeed, Bibi’s current coalition includes members of his own nationalist Likud Party, the leftist Labor Party and the ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu Party of Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.

But coping with the current domestic crisis, writes Amir Oren this week in Haaretz, will require involvement of a different and more grassroots sort:

“The various forms of political maneuvering – primaries, vote contractors, a quarter of the MKs in the cabinet – have been worn down like their leaders. Trust has been lost, not only of the current government, but of government as a whole. For the protest to be decisive, nearly all the protesters must vote in the next elections (the average national rate of participation is two-thirds). And they need battle-scarred but down-to-earth leaders, experienced but not patronizing.”

The United States of America and the Jewish State of Israel share common values and a commitment to enduring democracy. The United States has dodged a bullet with the approval of the debt ceiling package which carries through the election of 2012, but may have as a consequence caused problems that will cause additional pain for Main Street America. Israel is being forced to cope with the housing, health care and educational concerns voiced on the street, and the governing coalition, to survive, may have to let these domestic issues share a place at the talking table alongside security concerns.

Such is the imperfection of democracy. It is not conventionally pretty. But in its own way, when it works, even contentiously, it remains comparatively beautiful.