The Responsibility Deficit

By DAVID BROOKS
NYT

One of the oddities of the current moment is that the country wants a radical change in government but not a radical change in policy.

On the one hand, voters are completely disgusted with Washington. On the other hand, they have not changed their fundamental views on the issues. There has been some shift to the right over the past two years, but the policy landscape looks mostly the way it did over the last few decades. We’re still a closely divided nation; it’s just that we’re angrier about it.

The result is that over the next two years we’ll probably see gridlock on stilts. The energized Republicans will try to reduce the size of government, but they won’t be able to get their bills past President Obama. The surviving Democrats will try to expand government programs, but they will run smack into a closely divided Senate and possibly a Republican-controlled House.

Unable to do anything in the short term, both parties will devote their energies to nothing but campaign gestures for 2012. The rhetoric will fly. Childishness will mount. Public nausea will hit an all-time high.

(More here.)