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Wednesday, January 11, 2006
# Posted 11:23 PM by Ariel David Adesnik
I'm hardly the first to make this point, but it's a good one nonetheless. And yesterday morning, the Post's columnists did it yet again. Compare George Will writing about the Abramoff scandal to David Broder writing about the same subject. Here's Will: Before evolution produced creatures of our perfection, there was a three-ton dinosaur, the stegosaurus, so neurologically sluggish that when its tail was injured, significant time elapsed before news of the trauma meandered up its long spine to its walnut-size brain. This primitive beast, not the dignified elephant, should be the symbol of House Republicans...Now here's Broder: If Tom DeLay was blind to the perils of mixing money and politics, business and government, he was true to the tradition of his state, where the long-dominant Democratic Party plumbed all possible permutations of that intimate connection.I don't know if they read the WaPo way up there in Manhattan, but if they do, some of the long-time columnists on the island might be interested to know that parroting the party line is not actually in their job description. (2) opinions -- Add your opinion
Comments:
Will's blowing hot air. He attempts to claim that corruption is inherent to liberalism - because it favors interest-group politics - as a way of saying "we're bad, but they're inherently bad." That's not "surprising" or "contrarian" at all. Indeed, the counter-argument is just as persuasive, i.e., that pro-business, pro-corporate conservativism makes it very difficult to draw the line between corrupt 'favors' and ideology.
There's a simpler argument: total control of government breeds arrogance and corruption. Happened to the Dems, happened to the Republicans. Happens in most U.S. states subject to long-running one-party rule.
Hi Dan! I'm not saying that being unpredictable and challenging means throwing all of your ideological baggage overboard. Rather, it's just being open-minded enough to hold your own to account for their behavior instead of writing yet another column about "Rummy" or about tax cuts for the rich.
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