A Study in Buffoonery

An emailer wonders how this hilarous David Broder parody made it into today's Post. The special unintentional comedy prize goes to former Senator Alan Simpson for his observation that "No one wanted to see us embarrassed by being unable to come to consensus."

And there's the rub. The purpose of the commission is for a bipartisan political elite to try to avoid embarrassment.

12/6/06 12:30PM del.icio.us this incoming links

Comments

Are there ever any members of the 'Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party' on these sorts of commissions?

Posted by: otto on December 6, 2006 01:26 PM

And you gotta love Broder's closing line: "I hope Washington is listening."

Um, hello, Mr. Broder, you and your ilk are Washington. You live here, you work here, you eat here and you make cash by weighing in on the issues of the day. You've been doing it for decades. Your ability to feign impartiality and remove yourself from the DC playing field is increasingly disturbing and bizarre.

Posted by: fnook on December 6, 2006 01:35 PM

Otto, you mean dirty fu*king hippies?

Posted by: Gang of 500 Thug on December 6, 2006 01:38 PM

Seeing this quintessential Broder piece alongside Ruth Marcus today made me write letters about each, plus one to the ombudsman (so be warned: you will soon see changes at the Post).

Neither, tellingly, devotes a single word, literally, to the substance of the ISG or Social Security.

The moral and intellectual putrefaction of the Republic is complete and irreversible.

Posted by: brendan on December 6, 2006 01:39 PM

"I hope Washington is listening."

It has been all along.

If you are wrong about everything, but stick to your guns, eventually people will compromise with you. The longer you hold out, and the more seriously you screw things up, the more desperate they are to compromise with you.

Posted by: Njorl on December 6, 2006 01:41 PM

This is my favorite bit-
""This is a different generation of policymakers," said Panetta, who at 68 was one of the youngest members."

Yeah, that's some generational diversity.

Posted by: Mark Centz on December 6, 2006 01:56 PM

Why is David Broder David Broder? Is his curtsy to the powers that be anything special? Or is there only room for one David Broder in the world and he gets to be it until his decrepitude becomes awkward?

And was it always thus? Was Edward R. Murrow actually just David Broder with cigarettes? Sure, "Scotty" (gag) Reston was David Broder, but so was David Broder. The time travel twin paradox notwithstanding.

Posted by: Jeffrey Davis on December 6, 2006 02:00 PM

This is some weird WASP political kabuki about getting along at the dinner table, isn't it?

"NO, SON! YOU'RE NOT GAY! NOW PASS THE POTATOES!"

Posted by: MasonMcD on December 6, 2006 02:15 PM

MasonMcD, you are totally right. I'd never really thought about it that way before, but you are totally right, and that terrifies me.

Posted by: justin on December 6, 2006 02:19 PM

Matt, you've been using the "avoiding embarrassment" theme a lot lately, and I actually think you're a little too quick to deploy it. That is, the problem that requires diagnosing isn't that political actors have a strong incentive to avoid embarrassment, that's just part of what it means to have accountability. The problem is that their embarrassed about the wrong things. They're not embarrassed by their inability to solve their problems, but only by having to admit that they caused them in the first place. I don't know really have any ideas on how to solve this, just saying.

Posted by: washerdreyer on December 6, 2006 02:28 PM

Form trumping function. Concensus trumping consequences. Process trumping efficacy.

Oy.

Posted by: renska on December 6, 2006 04:20 PM

MasonMcD, justin:

So this is all those cold WASPS, huh?

Can we put this annoying ethnic stereotype to rest? I don't think New England preppies are the problem here.

Posted by: brendan on December 6, 2006 04:32 PM

Broder's lede:

Whatever the final impact of the Iraq Study Group report being issued today, for the 10 commission members this was an exhilarating experience, a demonstration of genuine bipartisanship that they hope will serve as an example to the broader political world.

Shorter Broder: Who cares about Iraq? The important thing is that the ISG had an exhilirating bipartisan experience.

Yep, Broder's degenerated into self-parody here.

Posted by: RT on December 6, 2006 04:37 PM

Mr. Yglesias,

What you fail to understand is that the process matters more than the outcome. America will survive only as long as the wise men of Washington engage in harmonious colloquies about the issues of the day. Why do you freedom hating, outcome oriented, policy dilettantes continue to focus on the negative (i.e., our dead soldiers)? Don’t you understand there are more important issues at hand, like preserving the clubby, insular, Beltway consensus built over countless dinners and cemented by bipartisan commissions?

Yours moderately…

Posted by: b on December 6, 2006 05:11 PM

Shorter Broder: circlejerks are fun!

Posted by: pseudonymous in nc on December 6, 2006 05:22 PM

Yup, the democrats helped create extreme partisanship, infact to even mention the attitude of the GOP since 1994 is treasonous.
What other President in history campaigned by accusing the opposition of treason and cowardice?
Lincoln didn't do that, and McClellan was a treasonous coward!
Is "Washington listening"? If he is,he's spinning in his grave.

Posted by: feckless on December 6, 2006 06:03 PM

One of these Broder is going to disintegrate in mid-pontification, and the TV audience will get to listen to him droning on and on, even as his body parts shelve off one by one and splatter on the floor.

Posted by: John Emerson on December 6, 2006 06:15 PM

Need to lay off of the "but there's the rub" phrase. Used in nearly every post today.

Otherwise...your post is, sadly, correct.

Posted by: Trent on December 6, 2006 09:27 PM

Senility was not only a requirement to serve in the Commission, but also to comment on its work.

By the way, commissions are usually empanelled not to avoid embarassment but to create false appearance of activity. "We are taking measures about taking measures to handle the problem even better than we have done it so far." There are exceptions, this one was not.

Posted by: piotr on December 7, 2006 01:31 PM

sohbet, chat, arkadaş

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