The intelligent approach to politics will see all the parties involved and work toward solutions that work for the benefit of all the affected parties.
Each force in politics has the core of legitimacy. Each force in politics is also capable of being both right and wrong. Both business and labor are legitimate interests; so are men and women; so are the public sector and the private sector. And all of the above are capable of doing the right thing as much as they are capable of doing the wrong thing. The rational approach is to recognize the legitimacy of all these interests as well as their capacity for wrongdoing and to work within a framework that maximizes the benefits and minimizes the flaws.
It makes no sense to side with a political interest at the expense of all others. Doing that empowers wrongdoing by the interest in which one is involved while preventing other interests from accomplishing what they stand to accomplish, including good things. A man who sides with the fathers' movement, or a woman who is a misandrist, abets wrongdoings on the part of the interest of which one is a part while suppressing or abusing the other side. There is no excuse for that error. Both men and women are capable of being both right and wrong; and the rational solution is to see where each can do right and encourage it, while confronting the wrongs which each does.
Both men and women will always exist, and both are legitimate political forces. That does not however mean that either the men or the women are always right. Anything human is capable of choice; and anything capable of choice is capable of wrong choice. This is the case with both men and women. And the rational person will see these potentials and work with that reality.
It is critically important to recognize the legitimacy of the political interests. Both business and labor are vitally important. It is also important to recognize that, as legitimate as they are, the political interests are capable of wrongdoing; and neither giving everything to business nor giving everything to labor results in benefit for the rest of the world. Both business corruption and labor making wrongful demands are real problems, and both must be checked for consistently. Anything human is capable of both right and wrong. There are no sacred cows. Not everything that business wants is the right thing to want, and it is important to prevent ENRON, WorldCom and other kinds of corporate scandals from re-occurring, just as much as it is necessary to stand up to those in the labor community who want to stop international trade.
Politics stands to learn things from psychology. The better minds in psychology look at the core of legitimacy in people's strivings, then work with that reality to make arrangements that work for all parties involved. With political interests, there is legitimacy to all parties; and all parties are capable of both right things and wrong things. Recognizing the legitimacy of the interests involved and then negotiating solutions with other parties involved will result in benefit achieved for everyone. And that should be the ultimate goal of all political action.