The Road Not Taken - "Norquist is the Zelig of Republican catastrophe" (David Brooks)

[jefferson_dem]

The Road Not Taken
By DAVID BROOKS

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But it’s much more likely that Republicans will come to regret this missed opportunity. So let us pause to identify the people who decided not to seize the chance to usher in the largest cut in the size of government in American history. They fall into a few categories:

The Beltway Bandits. American conservatism now has a rich network of Washington interest groups adept at arousing elderly donors and attracting rich lobbying contracts. For example, Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform has been instrumental in every recent G.O.P. setback. He was a Newt Gingrich strategist in the 1990s, a major Jack Abramoff companion in the 2000s and he enforced the no-compromise orthodoxy that binds the party today.

Norquist is the Zelig of Republican catastrophe. His method is always the same. He enforces rigid ultimatums that make governance, or even thinking, impossible.

The Big Government Blowhards. The talk-radio jocks are not in the business of promoting conservative governance. They are in the business of building an audience by stroking the pleasure centers of their listeners.

They mostly give pseudo Crispin’s Day speeches to battalions of the like-minded from the safety of the conservative ghetto. To keep audience share, they need to portray politics as a cataclysmic, Manichaean struggle. A series of compromises that steadily advance conservative aims would muddy their story lines and be death to their ratings.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/19/opinion/19brooks.html?_r=1&src=tptw

[babylonsister]

1. Scathing! nt

[annabanana]

2. He DOES always seem to "be there" doesn't he?. . rec. . .n/t

[Tesha]

3. this is Brooks?

the NY Times Brooks?
who constantly used to play kiss-kiss with the right?

Holy Smokes!

[n2doc]

4. Bobo woke up!

Maybe Krugman got to him.

[apnu]

7. LOL! (nt)

[struggle4progress]

5. That is: Brooks shares Norquist's ideals but is concerned Grover is not sufficiently pragmatic

Grover's style would be to storm the village, draw and quarter its inhabitants, and torch their huts

Brooks finds this insufficiently genteel and worries it will arouse opposition: he would rather surround the place, slowly cut off the water and drive away the livestock and ruin the crops -- and then perhaps, as the starving plague-stricken villagers straggle away, they can be smothered, one by one, with comfy silk pillows

[Jim Lane]

8. An excellent metaphor!

Brooks hasn't had some kind of epiphany. He's still in favor of "promoting conservative governance" through a "series of compromises that steadily advance conservative aims".

Another point that's notable is Brooks's recognition that the compromises offered by Obama do indeed advance conservative aims.

[BlueMTexpat]

9. Outstandingly descriptive and on point! nt

[Inuca]

6. Saw Norquist on hardball last night

he seemed to be from a different planet. Tweety was pretty good at forcing him to show how abhorent he truly is.

[Jakes Progress]

10. gomer norquist is the most unAmerican citizen in the US.

He had done more to destroy American ideals than anyone in the world. Stalin couldn't, on his best day, hope to derail the American way of life nearly as effectively as gomer has.

[Tarheel_Dem]

11. Let's be honest, the same could be said of talk radio/tv/blogosphere on both sides.

It's not ideology that drives them, but playing on the rigid ideologies of others. One need look no further than Arianna Huffington.

[Mimosa]

12. K&R Brooks is on the money.

Jefferson Dem, you're on a roll lately. Thanks for the informative, thought-provoking topics. :D

[Mimosa]

13. BTW, sounds like tweety read the article.

Watching MSNBC now.