Brodergate
I promise not to make a habit out of defending leftist journalists, but I have seen our administration throw so many people under the bus in it’s short time in power that it is quite simply amazing. I can also say in all honesty that I don’t consider all leftists to be toxic to the point where I cannot engage them in polite conversation. David Broder has had a remarkable career that includes winning a Pulitzer prize. Because he seeks bi-partisan answers to questions (doesn’t our President??) he is vilified by the left and all of his previous accomplishments mean nothing.
Who thinks that this is unfair? Ryan Gibb, writing in the Huffington Post (where else?) lays out the left’s case against Broder by quoting Jim Manely, senior communications adivser for HarryReid “David Broder simply doesn’t understand the way that today’s Senate operates” Manley continues by stating that “the longtime Washington Post columnist’s charge that Reid pales in comparison to former Senate leaders misunderstands the way the contemporary Senate works.”
“It’s all fine and dandy to pine for the golden days of yesteryear, when politics was practiced differently, but that’s not the reality we’re dealing with,” Manley told HuffPost. “What David fails to understand is that Republican leadership in both the House and the Senate are being pulled along by the so-called birthers, the Tea Party movement and other far right fringe groups that are completely at odds with the views David claims to hold.”
The Senate Republican leadership is Pulled along by Birthers, the Tea Party Movement and other far right fringe groups? That’s an interesting statement with very little to bear it out (at least in so far as the birther accusation is concerned). Birther tends to be a new label that the left uses to attack not only sitting Republicans, but potential Republican candidates. To say that the birther movement is pulling along anybody is to place far more credence in the movement than what is warranted, something like the truither movement is treated as a serious threat when very few people actually take it seriously, and no one takes ‘them’ seriously.
The Tea Party movement is somewhat different, but what does the Tea Party Movement symbolize? That American’s don’t like the current health care bill? Surprise, Surprise, read the polls.
But Manley and other’s are concerned that Broder does not see the GOP properly and that “David might be one of the worst examples, but he highlights a myopic, inside-the-belt phenomenon that is at odds with the views of many Americans,” said Manley. There’s even a term for such thinking: Broderism.”
Why yes Mr. Manley, Broderism is a term that is defined as “Broderism,” named after Washington Post columnist David Broder, is a word invented by left-wing bloggers to express contempt for bipartisanship and political centrism among elected officials. A quick Google search for “Broderism” turns up lots of left-wing blogs and websites, but no right-wing ones and few moderate ones. Basically, if someone uses the word “Broderism,” you can expect that they hate Senator Joe Lieberman. Variants: “Broderism,” “High Broderism,” and “Higher Broderism. (posted on blogs.jparson.net). Well yeah Manley, who doesn’t hate Bipartisanship, it’s just something that politicians like Reid are supposed to say they like (as in this mornings health care debates where he asked for bipartisanship about 50 times).
“That’s an interesting argument and certainly there are differences between the people now and the people then and the environment that was there,” Broder told HuffPost. “But if that’s their effort to explain why Senator Reid has chosen the tactics that he’s chosen, that doesn’t strike me as an adequate explanation.”
Manley had specific gripes about Broder’s health care column, in which he cited deficit hawks to make the case that the Democratic Senate bill might not reduce costs.
Manley said that Broder’s column was discussed by “puzzled” Democrats in the Senate cloakroom. “No one could understand it,” said Manley. “We had the self-described gold standard of analysis – the CBO – highlighting that the bill reduces the deficit. And David utterly failed to acknowledge that was the case.” My guess is that maybe Broder is not as big a fan of Vodoo Math as Reid and Manley are. Sure the bill reduces the deficit, but that is by starting to take the taxes ut over the next four years, while paying no benifits, while not counting the 250 Billion or so being set aside to payout to the Doctor’s to make up for curring payments and all the other fiscal trickery that goes into making this bill ’seem’ budget neutral. Here’s my thing. The Health Care bill proponents will tell you that 45,000 people a year die from lack of health care (up from the 18,000 a year figure that was used prior to the healthcare debate heating up this year). So if the bill does not take effect for 4 more years, the Democrats are willing to sacrifice 180,000 lives in the interest of budget neutrality????? This seems rather harsh.
Apparently Broder’s biggest sin is in hoping that cooler heads can previal in this and other debates happening or due to happen on the Hill. Is it too late for bipartisanship? Should those wanting bipartisan participation (like Broder) be harrassed and ridiculted by those who only preach ‘bipartisanship’ from in front of the C-Span cameras and laugh at the very thought of it when those cameras are off?
What truly disturbs me about Brodergate isn’t the fact that the left is so willing to attack a well respected, well traveled and well spoken journalist like Broder, it is just that they are willing to do so to anyone who dares to disagree with them.