Ezra Klein: Politics is not here to please you

[babylonsister]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/05/03/politics-is-not-here-to-please-you/


Politics is not here to please you

Posted by Ezra Klein on May 3, 2013 at 10:32 am

snip//

We’re not going to figure out a way to de-polarize the parties. Whenever you think of the irenic Washington of the ’50s and ’60s, think about Strom Thurmond, one of the most ideologically conservative members of Congress, serving as a Democrat. The de-polarized parties of the mid-20th century were a historic aberration that had more to do with race scrambling our politics than anything else. They’re not coming back, and nor should they come back. The most conservative members of Congress shouldn’t be in the Democratic Party, and nor should liberals be in the Republican Party. Voters deserve a choice between two distinct political coalitions.

But that means the work of repairing American politics is the work of understanding what tweaks and reforms are needed for the American political system to withstand this new world of polarized political parties. That’s going to be a lengthy and difficult project, and many political fights in the coming decades will, on some level or another, be about it.

But that work is made harder by pundits who continue to falsely promise that the glowing briefcase of president leadership can fix what ails us. Telling the American people that the only thing missing is the president being more awesome promises them the easy way out. It says that all they need to do to fix our politics is get inspired by a new presidential candidate and then cast a hopeful vote for him or her at the polls. That’s terrifically convenient, because that also happens to be the part of American politics that voters most enjoy participating in and that media most enjoys covering. (It’s also convenient for the media, as Greg Sargent writes, because it keeps them from having to take sides in ongoing policy debates, but that’s a slightly different issue.)

But since the problem in American politics is not presidential leadership, telling them that the president — whether this one or a new one — can fix it traps voters in an endless cycle of inspiration and disillusionment. They vote for presidents expecting them to be “uniters,’ expecting them to “change Washington,” and then they’re bitterly disappointed when their heroes fail. But on this score, presidents are going to continue to fail because they can’t possibly succeed.

It’s not waving the white flag to say that the president can’t fix Washington. It’s waving the white flag to resist other explanations because they’re too depressing, or because the work they imply is too hard, or the fight they require will take too long. If the first step towards political recovery is admitting we have a problem, surely the second step is admitting what the problem actually is.

[Sekhmets Daughter]

1. Ezra Klein is brilliant...

This is exactly what is wrong with our system and how we perceive our politics!

[Vincardog]

2. What the problem actually is, is the economic system CAPITALISM. It has corrupted every system

is has touched.
Our Production System
Our Religious System (It has become its' own religion)
Every one of Our Social systems.


There has to be a better way.

Lets' find it before it kills us all.

[Shivering Jemmy]

3. No.

The problem is that humans like power.

When capitalism is the dominant system, its levers are used by some people to increase their power.

When communism is the dominant system, its levers are used by some people to increase their power.

When hybrids of socialism and capitalismare the cominant system its levers are used by some people to increase their power.

Change humans to fix the problem.

[Vincardog]

5. That is one opinion. Good luck changing human nature.

[redqueen]

4. K&R

[Blue_Tires]

6. But politics bends over backwards to please the NRA, big oil, bankers, big pharm, etc. etc...

that is the problem...

[msongs]

7. campaign as a democrat, govern like a republican, that is a problem as well nt