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A couple of months ago, Ramesh Ponnuru made a curious case in support of Mitt Romney. As Ponnuru argued, congressional Republicans "aren't going to change," they're not going to compromise, and they'll continue to make the nation ungovernable if President Obama wins. It's better, he said, to have Romney win so Washington can function under "unified Republican government."
In other words, GOP policymakers will simply never work constructively or cooperatively with Democrats, so if you want to avoid "gridlock," voters have no choice but to let Republicans control everything.
David Brooks makes a similar case in his column today. Republican lawmakers "still have more to fear from a primary challenge from the right than from a general election challenge from the left," so they'll continue to refuse to govern. If you want to "get big stuff done," Brooks concludes, you have no choice but to give Republicans power over the federal government.
It's rather remarkable to see the Ponnuru/Brooks thesis in print, as if this is somehow normal. The argument, in a nutshell, is that the politics of hostage strategies must be respected and rewarded, and that in an era of a radicalized Republican Party, Democrats should accept that they simply aren't allowed to govern, ever. They're free to work with Republicans, but that's it.
The argument is just astounding. Inflexible Republicans, allergic to compromise and obsessed with obstructionism, would rather destroy the government than work cooperatively with Democrats, ergo, don't elect Democrats. The hostage takers of American politics aren't fooling around, so it's better for everyone if they get their ransom.
Brooks added, however, that Romney will be a responsible moderate -- all of his campaign promises notwithstanding -- so there's no cause for alarm. And this reminds me of Brooks' interesting track record.
Exactly two years ago this week, the New York Times columnist assured the public that the Republican Congress wouldn't be that bad. On the contrary, Brooks said, the incoming Republican leaders would be "modest and cautious." They'd be "sober." They'd resist the urge to "overreach." The GOP's leaders, Brooks wrote at the time, are "prepared to take what they can get, even if it's not always what they would like."
The new Republicans may distrust government, but this will be a Republican class with enormous legislative experience. Tea Party hype notwithstanding, most leading G.O.P. candidates either served in state legislatures or previously in Washington. The No Compromise stalwarts like Senator Jim DeMint have a big megaphone but few actual followers within the Senate.
Over all, if it is won, a Republican House majority will be like a second marriage. Less ecstasy, more realism.
Two years later, Brooks' prediction looks ridiculous, if not literally laughable.
Nevertheless, he's certain a Romney administration and Republican lawmakers will be responsible, and the new Republican president with the far-right agenda would abandon everything he's promised voters and "govern as a center-right moderate."
Given Brooks' track record, his assurances are underwhelming.
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The modest, moderate, Burkean thoughtful intellectual would have a shade more credibility if each and every one of his columns, speeches and public musings did not always, 100% of the time, some lead ineluctably to the conclusion that the nation should be governed by extreme right wing ideologues.
You know, I've heard this argument before for a different set of circumstances. It goes like this: If you are being raped, don't fight it, just lie back and enjoy it!
"Modest and cautious"??? Really, who does Brooks think he is kidding?
Stop with the comparisons to Burke. Burke was a philosopher. Brooks can't even bake a cake. He seems to feel his function is to make cow pies look appetising through generous application of frosting.
He is simply a sycophant at court, but he will get no respect from the plutocracy because no one trusts a shill.
Brooks constantly invokes Burke and Hayek in his columns. Hence the Internet meme.
Legitimacy is not self conferred. Reality is negotiated, and the observer looks for common ground not in dispute. People like Hayes confer it when they mention Brooks in Burke's company, rather than that of Rove and Luntz.
Similarly, MSNBC pundits piling on during the first debate conferred legitimacy to the amazing set of lies Romney presented in his first debate. Like Brooks, he was simply obscuring the substance of his BS with generous dollops of chocolate frosting. Many centrists want to believe the best about both opponents in a debate, and the pundits gave centrists a pass to think that Romney had succeeded in presenting any legitimate rebuttal to the President's case that Romney's plan fails the arithmetic test.
Commenters like Schultz, Matthews and even Maddow conferred legitimacy to Romney's presentation, not Fox news.
These people are proof the South never learns anything. I think we should now admit we let those traitors off too easy in 1865.
Sure they'll govern responsibly. In addition, they'll continue their campaign to ensure that only party members can vote. What could possibly go wrong?
Sooooo The problem is that Republicans won't cooperate with anyone, and their answer is to elect MORE of them? Do they think that we're STOOPid? (I know--silly question...)
Exactly.
If we want to get big things done, get rid of the obstructionists. Get rid of the Republicans.
We don't run our nation under one-party rule just because the Congress Republican Kindergarten refuses to conduct themselves like mature adults. They were sent to Washington to represent the people who pay their salaries, not to represent the rich people who funded their campaigns and bought them in the process.
The Republicans will not work on anything they don't like anyway, climate change, AFFORDABLE health care, consumer protections, fair wages and workers rights, etc...etc...etc.
Vote out the spoiled brats, and put mature adults back in charge of the government. Then We the People might have a bit of respect for Congress again.
It's the political equivalent of a 3-year-old throwing a tantrum in the candy aisle at the grocery store - kicking, screaming, holding their breath, etc. to try to get their way. Of course, the proper course of action by the adult is to simply walk away and not give the child what he demands.
Voters - walk away from the Party of Tantrums. Maybe then they'll figure out that they can get more of what they want through cooperation instead of manipulation.
Either Brooks has never read Kipling or is betting that his readers haven't.
It's the absolute refusal to acknowledge the possibility of simply throwing out all the obstructionist Republicans, even as a strawman argument, that's the tell disclosing the (admittedly poorly) hidden agenda.
The last Democratic president to run against an obstructionist congress was Harry Truman (the do-nothing congress of 1948). Truman won, proving to the Democratic Party that running against the congress was not a winning strategy!
KJ @#3.2
While I agree with you, the kids of today would be stuffing their pockets and eating the candy as the adult walks away. Which is what the teapubs have been doing for the last 30 years.
So essentially the threat is that the gotp will destroy the economy if Mitt is not elected and will destroy the American dream if Mitt is elected. I felt forced to vote a straight party line D for the first time ever. No amount of partisanship can justify the tactics of obstruction that are currently threatening our country, and no amount of blind loyalty to race or party should ever put our future into the hands of extremists.
The logic is sound, though. Given the utter totalitarianism of today's GOP, nothing ever will get done as long as they do not control every lever of power in DC. Surrender is one answer to that, but so is resisting to the fullest. "Conservatives" are Daleks, and there's no percentage in surrendering to Daleks.
On August 24th, 410 A.D. the Visigoths sacked Rome.
As it turns out, that didn't work out so well for either party.
Brooks has always been ridiculous. He is similar to many phony moderates in the beltway, that just happen to repeatedly argue from the conservative position.
He is the beltway equivalent of our own Skip Hoffman here on Maddow blog. He pretends he's a moderate so his selling of the conservative line of BS will be more persuasive.
Here is a quote from Brooks on Meet the Press pushing the ubiquitous beltway meme that "Obama hasn't offered a second term vision".
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49557307/ns/meet_the_press-transcripts/t/october-john-kasich-scott-walker-john-hickenlooper-ej-dionne-rachel-maddow-carly-fiorina-david-brooks-chuck-todd/#.UI18qoa5yZY
He was never a moderate. Brooks was hired to be the "responsible" Republican voice at the Times. He proves the fact that all Republicans are scum. There are no "responsible Republicans" left.
So we should just vote in Republicans so that they can screw us over more effectively. NO WAY IN H-E-DOUBLE HOCKEY STICKS!
Brooks is an unmitigated ass. Why the NYT keeps him around, and NPR too, for that matter, when his only purpose is to produce weirdly twisted arguments for why the GOP is always right is beyond me.
First time I read one of his columns, I thought, "Hmm. How did a C- student get to write for the Times?" My opinion hasn't changed one whit, ever.
This is nothing but disingenuous wishful thinking on his part. He needs to justify why it would be plausibly better to have the GOP in control. The real problem with that argument is that it amounts to "It will be better this time" and willfully disregards the lessons of history.
We've seen it, GOP POTUS and Congress 2000-2006 and a disabled nation by 2008.
We've also seen it, in it's more virile Tea-Party version, the last two years in several red states.
Voting restrictions, abortion legislation, union-busting, etc.
If that's what one-party rule in DC would be like, I'd rather have the government limp along for another two years and see if more of the tea-party types get voted out (by moderates in the primaries or in the general}.
What moderates?
The massive disconnect here is the idea of "Overreach" it depends on how you define it.
It IS possible to overreach with regard to what you cut and how. It is a very popular idea that the Federal Government should be dismantled wholesale and everything dumped back on the states. The problem with this is that it not only does it disproportionally affect the poor but it also allowes for massive rollbacks in legislation regarding voting rights and civil liberties.
It is also possible to overreach on social issues and to try and bend America to a narrow "Moral" view that doesn't represent the population at large. The idea that the federal government would weigh in with legeslation covering things like abortion rights, birth control and gay marriage is obvious but that it would stop there is highly doubtfull.
The idea that the Tea Party will be either "Modest" Or "Cautious" in either of those areas would be laughable if it weren't abjectly terrifying
This is hilarious. Where do you think hostage politics originated?
http://thehill.com/homenews/house/63941-democrats-lock-republicans-out-of-committee-room
Should we go back to '94 and the Mexican standoff we had that brought everything to a grinding halt?
and If I were you I wouldn't go anywhere Near the disaster that was the Bush administration and the Republican majority.
We tried it your way and it nearly Destroyed the Country!
Sorry but Bush isn't solely responsible for the financial crash. I suggest you examine the Clinton era and Robert Rubin in particular.
Name me ONE republican congress in the last 150 years that has NOT ended in a finantial crash, fiscal crisis or economic disaster
One
I was about to type this whole historical argument, explaining how these tactics came about and that conservatives and their parties in general, uses them more. But then I thought, why, Shooter wouldn't understand it anyway, or even care.
Please don't feed the troll.
Because Shooter clearly doesn't read the articles that he links to or has serious reading comprehension problems
Nah, he's just sophisticated in the initial meaning of the term. As in: He engages in sophistry.
I had the same knee jerk reaction 2 years ago. Anything but gridlock... jobs, jobs, jobs right? So much has changed in 2 years. I hate the thought of where they'd take us, truly scary. And the general media has not done their JOB in pointing this out along with all the flip-flops and lies coming from the GOP and Romney camp. A huge injustice to the American people!
That clip of Trump with Letterman ragging on China taking American jobs as if Obama had something to do with it and pushing his Trump brand neck ties, ALL made in China, would have been a good start!!
Why is this "astounding" to you?!? They're fascists! They've been fascists since 1994! They've been closet fascists since 1942! Why on earth would would you ever expect fascists to be anything other than anti-democracy?!? They are what they repeatedly claim to be, and don't ever forget it.
It's a pretty easy decision, vote every republican out of office to force reason into the governmental process. They only have the congress because we voted them in.
One word: Gerrymandering
I totally agree. Gerrymandering is at the root of this evil. If the nation were simply divided into grids, say of one square mile, then you could simply lay the grid over the population and construct the districts with a LOT more symmetry and have more centrist representatives. Short of that, we are doomed.
I was thinking why not just use the current counties. And group to reach a certain number for districts. No sub dividing the counties, get as close to a specific resident count and that is it. Redistricting happens as counties grow, but always follow the same rules.
Every county is divided into townships, if you need a finer division. There are also plenty of ways to describe the "compactness" of a voting district, with would reduce gerrymandering as well.
The problem is, these matters are mostly left to the states. And when a party is in power they want to do the gerrymandering, not give it up to "fix" the rules, which the other party will simply rescind when they get in power anyway.
Who is the "we" Kemosabe?
There are also a number of ways to divide things up mechanically.
e.g. A geometric grid system could also include a numbering rule, with district #1 getting grinds 1 through n, #2 getting n+1 to m etc.
You can also reduce gerrymandering through the use of larger districts that elect multiple people.
In the book (and movie) "The Road", Cormac McCarthy never tells us what destroyed the world and made it such a bleak, uninhabitable place. I think I know. We elected a Republican President and Congress and they were able to do everything they promised.
The idea Brooks puts forward is pretty disgusting and yet I tend to agree with him. A newly minted Republican President will want to be seen 'getting things done' and there's no way Congressional Republicans will crash that party.
It reminds me of the standoff between Junior and Tony Soprano:Junior's sense of entitlement and belief that he should be the boss of the family gave way to an internal war that cost lives and money. Tony, looking at the situation in a pragmatic and objective way, concluded that giving junior what he wanted would not only mean a return to stability with serious financial rewards, it would give him valuable legal cover.
You may not like it, but what we have here is a Junior / Tony standoff.
Yes, but the things they want to get done will destroy all the reforms we've made in this country and take us back to the dark ages. The haves will be okay, but the have-nots, not so much.
Except "getting things done" will be Romney signing the legislation that comes to him from the Republican legislature.
Ha-ha. And Mafioso are going to be Mafioso, so we might as well get out of the way and let them do what they do best. And grifters are going to grift, and bullies are going to be bullies and a-holes in general are just going to go on being a-holes, so why get stressed and frustrated, just get out of the way and let them all, (and other inveterate jerks of all stripes), do what they want because they're NEVER GONNA CHANGE!
Well that makes sense. For sure. Brooks is as oily and egotistical as FUBARRomney. And his, (and Ponnuru's), take on this echoes FUBARRomney's. Just give it to him/them. Quit trying to make sense of it. Certainly don't expect to have a discussion about anything. Just give them the f'n keys and bow down and slowly shuffle backwards and then shut up forever.
Brooks and Ponnuru, wherever you both may be, kiss my ass.
Aren't there laws against sedition?
Not in the media courts of public opinion, not in the red states, not in the mindsets of "them, not us".
House Republican leadership failed their wealthiest of constituents by not compromising with Democratic leadership over their Bush tax cuts economic investment agenda by proposing that the top Bush tax rate remain on only what income their wealthiest of constituents ‘do’ invest. (Rather than what money sits in their personal savings accounts, doing nothing for the economy.) The GOP wanted to put all wealthy constituents’ financial interests in ‘all’ of their tax cut money in a campaign-game with their votes, losing it all, or winning it all, in the election.
The Obama Administration opted to sustain the Bush tax cut rate placed on people earning up to 250K for every person of every income level up to their first earned 250K. (The Democrats might as well have taken public credit for doing the Republican leaders compromising ‘for’ them.)
The biggest single reason the Republicans haven't done anything this last 4 years is their determination to make Obama a one term President. After his reelection that will no longer be a factor. We have a governmental train wreck coming. Sequestration is upon us and the Bush tax cuts are ending. A deal is in everybody's best interests. Just who do you want negotiating with the Ryan/Cantor congress--Obama or Romney? Obama's reelection is the best chance we have for real bipartisan change.
Of course, David Brooks can't say that because he hasn't been paid to understand the argument.
Republicans are more of a threat to the USA then Al-Queada ever could be.
They are home grown terrorists.
"Nevertheless, he's certain a Romney administration and Republican lawmakers will be responsible, and the new Republican president with the far-right agenda would abandon everything he's promised voters and "govern as a center-right moderate."
A Republican president AND a Republican congress? That's when "deficits don't matter"
Responsible, like Bush Administration responsible?
The proof isn't even old enough to be in history books yet, just how responsible a Republican POTUS coupled with a Republican Congress behave, and what happens to the people, the nation, the planet as a result.
We've seen the right's idea of responsible, this country barely survived it, and now with the help of the conservative propaganda juggernaut, voters have been convinced they really do want to take that GOP carnival ride again, because the first one couldn't quite bring Jesus back or something.
O.M.G.
When our children throw tantrums if they don't get their way, should we give in?
At what result?
Only in Upside-Down-Backwards World does Brooks' assertion seem the least bit reasonable.
Respect and reward the politics of hostage strategies? Never! No surrender! David Brooks is a terrible pundit.
I pledge allegiance to the Rich of the United States of America
and to the Free Market for which they stand,
one Profit under hand, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for none.