Those Were The Days My Friend

They thought they'd never end.

Legend tell us that in the days of old, the Great Temple of Both Siderism was one of the seven wonders of the media world.  Hastily constructed on top of the ruins of the old Beltways "Competent Conservatives, Reactionary Liberals" paradigm, almost overnight the Great Temple of Both Siderism went from a shitty little safe house for Neocon hacks fleeing blowback from their Bush Administration proclamations to the sacred home of Beltway's dominant political faith.

But however bright and shiny if might have looked during its heyday, because it was tossed together by desperate men with all the care of a peak housing bubble McMansion, under the weight of the stomping madness of the GOP over the past 10 years, the fundamental, structural defects of the Great Temple of Both Siderism are now on display for all to see.  Crumbling stairs.   Load-bearing walls made of Funyuns and paper mache now swaybacked and moaning.  A roof with holes big enough to see the entire Milky Way.

And in the ruins that they built on top of other ruins, the desperate men still hold mass.  Still perform the rituals. Still say the holy words.  Still pretend that the elements cannot reach them.  Which is why Meet the Press did an extended, sermon on Mr. Jon Rauch's article in The Atlantic -- "How American Politics Went Insane" -- the centerpiece of which is this:

The Republicans’ noisy breakdown has been echoed eerily, albeit less loudly, on the Democratic side, where, after the early primaries, one of the two remaining contestants for the nomination was not, in any meaningful sense, a Democrat.

You see, the style book of the the Great Temple of Both Siderism permits the holy text to be written in one and only one font: Horserace Sans Serif. Which is ehy they really, really, really need every god damn story to be an abject object lesson in how Both Sides have let us down. Even when they have to flat out lie to bend their holy words into place:

Political disintegration plagues Congress, too.

And what makes this lie especially insulting is that it is a silly lie.  A stupid lie.  A lie that requires no more effort that a couple of mouse-clicks to debunk (from AlterNet):

Nancy Pelosi: The Most Effective Speaker of the House in History

As Nancy Pelosi hands off the Speaker’s gavel to John Boehner today, she also hands him a tough act to follow. Despite insistent attempts to malign her during her four years as Speaker of the House, the California congresswoman turns out to have been arguably the most effective person in that post in U.S. history. And it’s not just rah-rah Democrats saying so.

“We’re looking at an extraordinary set of accomplishments over a brief period of time,” said Norman Ornstein, resident scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “She ranks with the most consequential speakers, certainly in the last 75 years.”

Pelosi faced a House so divided along party lines that she couldn’t count on a single Republican vote for legislation–which means that she had to wrangle fellow Democrats to demonstrate a discipline and unity they have not been famous for. Out of that unity emerged a record of public policy triumphs unmatched since the Great Society legislation of the 1960s, according to University of Oklahoma political science professor Cindy Simon Rosenthal. “And much of it is because of her,” says Rosenthal.

...

See, when the party that believes (however imperfectly) in a vision of government beyond dynamiting the whole damn thing and letting oligarchs and theocrats rule by decree, are in charge, they tend to get a shit load done.

And when the party of witch-hunts and sedition and sabotage and shutdowns are in charge, we get witch-hunts and sedition and sabotage and shutdowns.

So why can't Mr. Rauch just tell this simple truth?

Because within the corporate media there is absolutely no market for that story.  Because if he does, Chuck Todd would never, ever butter him up and sit him down in front of a "Meet the Press" camera.

CHUCK TODD:  ...Well, the changes all sound good, but my next guest says the effort to create a more transparent democracy has in fact created chaos and given us the politics we see today. Jonathan Rauch is the author of the cover story in this month's Atlantic. It's a provocative piece called How American Politics Went Insane. And he joins us now. Mr. Rausch, good to see you, sir.

JONATHAN RAUCH:   It's great to be here, Chuck, thank you.

CHUCK TODD: It's probably the best summation of trying to explain how did we get here, right? It's the number-one question all of us get, which is how did we end up with Trump and Clinton, and how did we end up with this politics?...

Because the simple truth that most of our political problems are caused by a dangerously insane Republican party does not support the Beltway establishment's proposition that our political problems can only be fixed by returning to the good old days when the Beltway establishment ran the whole casino from behind closed doors:

CHUCK TODD: You know, it's interesting, in your piece, as you also write this, "Our most pressing political problem today is that the country abandoned the establishment, not the other way around." Obviously we've been hearing that word, whatever it meant, the "establishment." "I'm running against the establishment." "We don't like the establishment." And you're contending, no, the problem is the establishment's not working.

...

CHUCK TODD: Well, here's what I hope. I hope at least every elected official reads this. I think many Americans need to read it, but it's an important piece, it may become a seminal piece for all we know. Jonathan Rauch, congratulations. Thanks for coming on.

JONATHAN RAUCH: Thank you, Chuck.

Seminal?

Well I for one sure feel like "Meet the Press" just jizzed on me.

Which brings us around at last to the high priest of the Great Temple of Both Siderism, standing in the crumbling wreck of the pulpit of the temple. preaching the Good Word to no one but the choir:

Choosing Leaders: Clueless or Crazy

Isn't is a shame that all of our leaders suck.  All such terrible choices.  

Where oh where are the Great Men of old! And why oh why can't we find "a political Pope Francis-type figure"?

We probably need a political Pope Francis-type figure, who comes up from the bottom and understands life there, but who can still make the case for an open dynamic world, with free-flowing goods, ideas, capital and people. Until that figure emerges, we could be in for a set of serial leadership crises.

Actually, we have a leader right now who came from relatively humble circumstances.  Who worked for the betterment of the disadvantaged, rose to a position of great power and was elected with large margins twice.  Who faced some of  the worst foreign and domestic crises in a century, made some mistakes, offered compromise and conciliation at every turn and stayed remarkably calm and even-keeled through all of it.  

And for the last seven and a half years, your fucking party, Mr. Brooks, has dedicated itself openly and single-mindedly to slandering, delegitimatizing and destroying his ability to govern by any means necessary,  

See, Mr. Brooks, we don't need a "a political Pope Francis-type figure" to lead us.  

We need a political William Tecumseh Sherman-type figure to drive a stake through the heart of the Party of Jefferson Davis once and for all.