As I work around the corner from the Washington Post offices in DC, I took the liberty of purchasing a copy of Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson's fabulous Off Center and leaving a copy for David Broder at the Post's mailroom this past Friday.

I have met Broder, spoken with him 2 or 3 times over the past 10 years or so, and emailed him a few times, receiving brief replies in a couple of cases. With the book I enclosed the following note:

David:

If you agree with the authors I hope you will communicate some of what they document in future columns.

If you do not agree I hope you will publicly give your views.

My own view is that in order for the voters to hold elected officials accountable in a democracy, they need to know what is going on.

If the runaway train that is Republican party domination of our federal government with a far right-wing agenda is going to be stopped it is going to be as a result of the voters tossing out them out and putting the Democrats in.

You've been quite clear about your disdain for the Democratic party as an institution and re your personal distaste for its last two presidential nominees. Somehow Illinoisians and Michiganders got over any such personal dislike in the last two presidential elections.

Your preferred way—entailing a return to moderation—is most likely to occur only if the Democrats are returned to power. Pierson and Hacker note that the Republican party is much farther off center to the right than the Democratic Party is off center to the left.

The real loser of late has been our democracy. I am saddened that some with large megaphones--you among them--don't seem to see it that way, or, if they do, are unwilling to say so. The US public isn't stupid. It simply does not have important “inside” information it needs to understand the degree of contempt the governing party's decisions show for its values and preferences.

As these authors document, the consequences of those decisions have frequently and dishonestly been masked or delayed so that those to come will have to clean up the messes.

I hope that, as we approach another "accountability moment", in the tradition of Walter Lippmann you can help inform the public in this regard, as Hacker and Pierson have done.

Regards,

*******************

Josh wrote about Broder's column Sunday (sorry, no free link to it available), giving his thoughts on the Rise of the Independents he foresees. Josh wrote about it at:

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/009940.php

My initial thoughts on Broder's Sunday column (I may follow up with an edited version of them to Broder):

There are so many things that he just does not get. To take a couple of big ones:

1) He does not understand that the intensity of fury towards Lieberman is *not* on account of Democrats and bloggers being a bunch of peaceniks intend on revenge against all Democrats who voted to authorize the war.

If that were true, then there would be similar reactions against Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, and many other Democrats who voted for the war authorization. And John Kerry never would have gotten the Democratic nomination for President: Howard Dean would have. I saw an article in the paper on how Washington state Dem. Senator Maria Cantwell has been given a free pass on her record on the war by Democrats, for all of the usual pragmatic reasons.

No, Lieberman is singled out because he has gratuitously and sanctimoniously sought to elevate his personal standing by taking one cheap shot after another at his own party. Instead of it being framed as a disagreement with members of his own party, to Lieberman, his fellow Democrats who have a different point of view than he does are aiding and abetting the enemy. They are "soft on terrorism" (the recent big-deal intel report just out says what Iraq war critics have been saying for a long time now: the war in Iraq has made us less safe in the war on terror. Josh is pressing readers to call their MCs to get the report released to the public--no reason it can't be as they would just redact the parts that identify "sources and methods" of intel.), blah blah blah.

If you disagree with Joe Lieberman you are a danger to your country.

2) Broder sees evidence of, as he put it, the "same people acting differently" of late. Lots of Dems and Reps opposing their party leaders.

This is particularly the case on the Republican side of the aisle lately as members up for re-election scramble to see who can most eloquently deny ever knowing Bush. It's called "Reading the Polls".

Evidently it doesn't occur to Broder to wonder where these people *were* over the past 5 years when Bush and their fellow Republicans were doing all of the things that are now, finally, leading to all the disgust with Bush!

John "I was for the ruinous Bush tax cuts before I was for them" McCain is trying to have it both ways as he seeks the Republican nomination. Which is his choice to make--politicians do that all the time. But shame on us if we fall for it. Or mistake his conduct for leadership or heroism.

3) Broder sees the blogosphere as being out to enforce ideological purity on their own party because of the Lieberman primary challenge. Hah. See (1) above. And if he bothered to review the Pierson and Hacker book he would be reminded of the myriad of ways in which the Republican leadership in Congress has sought to bring to heel any caucus member even thinking of breaking rank in any case where it mattered to the outcome of the vote. Broder over the years has not wet his pants once over the years at this show of "party discipline" on the Republican side of the aisle; to the contrary, he seems to admire it. One major reason he disses Democrats is because Democratic leaders in Congress over the years have been nowhere near as effective in doing so on the Democratic side of the aisle as the Republicans have been.

So when Democrats, even just bloggers, try to discipline a truly wayward party member (Lieberman) they are enforcers of ideological purity.

When the Republicans break the kneecaps of members who even think about taking a position different from what the leadership wants, Broder sees a self-respecting well-oiled political juggernaut at work, one that is able to govern effectively because it keeps its troops in line.