And this was common workplace discussion!? This seems like a disaster waiting to happen. I don’t know why you’d want to introduce the divisiveness of politics to your workplace.
It must be US culture there: everywhere I've worked (in France) arguing about politics was always ok. Even fun when you get people of differing views who can explain how they came to those so you can debate. Things must be boring when you have to limit yourself to safe subjects.
Interesting. When your company is big enough, the intranet becomes a community that mirrors the Internet in general...