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Far from D.C., gridlock roots

Districts, such as in Ohio, where flexibility seems likely hit impasses.

In this photo taken March 25, 2013, Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Ohio, uses a chart to talk about the U.S. budget deficit during a town hall meeting with constituents in Montgomery, Ohio. Here in the Cincinnati suburbs, where people tend to be polite, one finds seeds of the bitter partisanship that gnaws at Washington, 500 miles away. If any Republican House members might be open to compromise with President Barack Obama and Democratic lawmakers, Chabot would seem near the top. Yet he toes an unyielding conservative line on virtually every big issue. (AP Photo/Al Behrman)
In this photo taken March 25, 2013, Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Ohio, uses a chart to talk about the U.S. budget deficit during a town hall meeting with constituents in Montgomery, Ohio. Here in the Cincinnati suburbs, where people tend to be polite, one finds seeds of the bitter partisanship that gnaws at Washington, 500 miles away. If any Republican House members might be open to compromise with President Barack Obama and Democratic lawmakers, Chabot would seem near the top. Yet he toes an unyielding conservative line on virtually every big issue. (AP Photo/Al Behrman)Read moreAP

MONTGOMERY, Ohio - Here in Cincinnati's suburbs, where people tend to be polite, one finds seeds of the bitter partisanship that gnaws at Washington, 500 miles away.

If any Republican House members might be open to compromise with President Obama and Democratic lawmakers, Rep. Steve Chabot would seem near the top of the list. He comes from an area so politically competitive that he lost his seat in 2008 to a Democrat, then won a rematch two years later. His new, redrawn district is safer, but Mitt Romney's 5-point margin over Obama was hardly a landslide.

Moreover, Chabot readily acknowledges that political compromise is the only way to accomplish anything in a democratic society as divided as the United States.

Yet Chabot toes an unyielding conservative line on virtually every big issue before Congress. He opposes any new taxes, even if they might lead to Democratic concessions on spending for Medicare and Social Security. He sees no need for new gun laws, including broader background checks on buyers.

He wants to overturn President Obama's health-care overhaul despite the president's reelection and the Supreme Court's decision upholding the law. He would like to balance the federal budget in four years without new taxes, an improbable feat that would require extraordinary spending cuts far beyond those now triggering complaints.

Chabot, a former teacher and lawyer who has spent most of his career in politics, fits comfortably and quietly in the House GOP caucus. Outwardly, he's one of its more accommodating, measured members, rejecting the notion that compromise is cowardly or foolish.

"We have divided government in our country," Chabot recently told 75 constituents at one of two town hall meetings he held on a snowy Monday. "Neither side can pass anything on its own. You have to work with the other side."

But Democrats say Chabot and his colleagues have strange notions of compromise, especially on the tax-and-spend issues that preoccupy Congress.

Obama has repeatedly said he cannot begin to rein in costly entitlement programs dear to liberals such as Medicare and Social Security without Republicans agreeing to new taxes, chiefly on the rich. That's a non-starter for Chabot.

"I think we're already overtaxed," he told the gathering here. If anything, taxes should be cut, he said.

Whether it's because of his strategy or not, Chabot, 60, says he has never had a Republican primary challenger in his congressional career, which began in 1994.

Some might argue that Chabot's popularity with GOP primary voters would free him to edge toward the political center, in search of independent voters who can prove crucial in November general elections.

But Chabot, unfailingly polite and soft-spoken, stuck to positions embraced by his fierier, take-no-prisoners colleagues.

One woman said she supports "responsible gun ownership" and "sensible gun laws." She said she supports background checks on all gun buyers, and restrictions on military-style weapons.

Chabot offered the same reply he gave later to a woman who said the only difference between a free person and a slave "is a gun." He's unlikely to support any new gun laws, Chabot said, because criminals would ignore them, and there are already enough laws on the books.