Politics = Relationships
Its as simple as that. If you want to be effective in politics then building relationships is paramount.
Effective relationships are built on trust.
Having a relationship with someone is not necessarily a friendship.
But a relationship means we respect and honor the other person as a fellow human.
The ability to work with others, expressly in partisan politics where working across the aisle is the norm, success is dependent upon relationships and trust.
In practice;
You and I can be 180 degrees apart politically, but we still have more in common than we don’t. With a relationship built on trust, we can build on the issues we agree on and get to a place where we can negotiate the issues we disagree on.