I just wanted to share with you folks a quick hit from exiting Republican Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana, who was defeated in the Senate primary by Richard Mourdock. Mourdock lost in the general, after making controversial statements on rape. But he’s not the story here.
Senator Lugar gave a speech at the moderate Ripon Society ripping what he views as the issues with politics in the current day and age. However, his language smacked of double-speak, and when you actually take a look at what he said it’s more than a little discomforting:
“We’ve also seen special interest groups step forward and declare which of these potential candidates are potentially unacceptable because of a vote or a position that he or she may have taken in the past. This permanent, partisan gamesmanship has gotten out of hand.”
Let me translate that for you: people, especially people who form watchdog groups and single out dumb votes in a politician’s record, are what’s wrong with politics today. Stop judging our past votes and positions.
You’ll also recall that Republicans were up in arms when exiting Director of the Office of Management and Budget Peter Orszag made some curious remarks in a column in The New Republic. To wit?
“So what to do? To solve the serious problems facing our country, we need to minimize the harm from legislative inertia by relying more on automatic policies and depoliticized commissions for certain policy decisions. In other words, radical as it sounds, we need to counter the gridlock of our political institutions by making them a bit less democratic.”
So, let’s summarize. One side doesn’t like being judged on past positions and votes, while another side wants to push more decisions down to the faceless bureaucracy so elected officials don’t catch blame. Once the press hears about this maybe they’ll ask them to compromise and do both!
Which team do you vote for if you want the Government to be more accountable?
