Insidious Wisdom and Creeping Villagerism

 

Over at Whiskey Fire, flory catches the WashingComPost columnist Harold Meyerson letting his equivalence flag fly:

Read that penultimate sentence again: {filibusters} became routine in the past few years, as the minority party in the Senate -- the Democrats until 2006, and the Republicans since. Egad! Gasp! Horrors! Filibusters are a bipartisan problem in the Senate! Except when they're not: In the 2007-08 session of Congress, Republicans forced 112 cloture votes, nearly doubling the Democrats' record when they were in the minority. I don't know where Harry learned his math, but when I observe a phenomenon that is twice as common in one group as it is another I DON'T FUCKING ASSUME EQUIVALENCE BETWEEN THE GROUPS.

 

She's taken some heat from WF commenters who think that the relentless awfulness of our media may have her starting at shadows. I have to disagree with them. I think flory is on to something here. Meyerson does seem to be omitting some fairly important facets of the argument, though this may be a result of Meyerson having internalized so much Villager wisdom that it is supplanting his common sense, rather than outright bad faith.

First, to respond to the WF commenters, I would note that not only does Meyerson imply an equivalence which the number of filibusters mounted by the GOP shows to be false, he also neglects to talk about how the process of the filibuster itself has changed, from the "Mr. Smith goes to Washington" stereotype to one now where hardly any effort need be expended at all on the behalf of the those employing the tactic for it to work. The ease with which new filibusters are mounted and the lack of efforts on behalf of Harry Reid to counteract them are apparently not important enough for Meyerson to include in the piece.

Myerson does make a few good points about the difficulties facing those advocating reform, but he seems unwilling to go beyond proximate causes in explaining how this situation arose: He talks about Democrats not rallying their troops, but he says that it's because health insurance reform isn't a sexy enough cause to pull millions into the streets. Then says that the administration (I'm guessing he means the OfA arm) and the unions haven't mobilized their people, though gives no reason for their inaction. Meyerson should know that even the most popular causes need leaders able to mobilize supporters to, you know, support them.

Now, look at his analysis of the Grand Ol' Poop strategy:

The right, by contrast, seems perpetually fired up, and not just on health care. At a town meeting last month, Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.) was booed and heckled when he wouldn't concur with a noisy "birther" who argued that President Obama had been born in Kenya. [...].

 

He mentions that the beliefs shouted by the disruptive old crank at the event are held to more by the GOP than the populace as a whole, but nowhere does he mention Freedom Worx, or the money that went into busing these ignorati to all the townhall meetings. In fact, he refuses to notice the astroturf nature of the protests altogether.

Look here:

When future historians look back at this passage in our nation's history, I suspect they'll conclude that this Obama-isn't-American nuttiness refracted the insecurities and, in some cases, the hatred that a portion of conservative white America felt about having a black president and about the transformation of what many thought of as their white nation into a genuinely multiracial republic. But whatever the reason, a mobilized minority is making a very plausible play to thwart a demobilized majority.

 

Again, he's right in that a lot of anger directed at Obama can be chalked up to racism, but why is that anger finding its outlet at "healthcare reform" meetings where the focus is supposed to be on local pols?

If we remember back to the 90s, the thugs who stopped healthcare reform focused their efforts on Hillary -- following her from stop to stop and trying to make it seem so dangerous for her as to get the events cancelled* -- but it was not aimed at the local (in state and DC) politicians.

HM hasn't shown that racism is behind the protests, and he doesn't mention astroturf at all. Instead these angry GOPers are going all shouty-crackers for "whatever reason".

So, alongside what flory mentioned, Meyerson gives no room to discuss how the filibuster has changed, and how it is being employed today. He also says that the democrats aren't rallying their folks, but doesn't say why. Then he writes that the thugs are all excited to break sh!t, (and they are!)  but he pointedly forgets to mention all the wingnut-welfare money it takes to keep them that way, and to make use of them.

Look, I agree that Myerson is not the worst of them by far, but at the least, he seems to be suffering from creeping-villagerism.

 

 

*Thugs who were provided transportation, slogans and signs by the same rightwing nutlog groups trying to stop reform today, somehow this bit of history seems to have gone by Myerson.

Comments

[wolfetone]

Sorry, but this is way off mark. First, in order for Meyerson to address every point you're asking for he'd need 3500 words. Second, your examples don't quite back up your claim of "creeping-vallagerism."

The first example you show (after the excerpt from WhiskeyFire) isn't, as you tagged it, "analysis," rather it is straight reporting, which is something that is all-too-often lacking in columns these days. Meyerson doesn't offer an explanation, he is just relaying the facts.

In the second example, Meyerson suggests a plausible explanation for some of the outrageous behavior followed by a bit of hedging--that'd be the words you bolded--about the motiviation, in essence admitting that he does not have the answer, which is pretty much the opposite of how the "villagers" operate.

Listen, if Meyerson is a "villager" or nearly one, then what of the beloved Krugman? And how far are we from castigating Conason or Alterman? Would Molly Ivins make the cut? Go ahead and criticize Dionne for being one of them (though he's really a bit too smart to be lumped in) but save your fire for people who really deserve it. We don't need to start purging people right now.

[¡El Gato Negro!]

But Meyerson isn't supposed to be doing straight reporting, his column is on the OpEd page for a purpose: To provide analysis.

And how many fucking words does it take to say "astroturf"? A sentence or two at the most, I'd say. Again, he offers racism as a proximate cause, but offers no reason why the racism is expressed through opposition to a health insurance reform bill, rather than, say, any of the other dozen ways in which the wingnuts get their Klan on.

And you know, "creeping villiagerism" is my attempt to be nice. You're right, I don't have a lot of evidence that this is what's wrong with his column, but the alternatives are worse, so I guess I should have said that I hope that's all it is. I was trying to offer the idea that perhaps he is letting "commonly accepted wisdom" stand in for some things which he should fucking well know better.

Also, I love the Krug, but have you ever read any of his pre 9-11 stuff? He's a huuuuge free-marketeer (or at least he was, back before Goldman-Sachs et al went all Lord of the Flies on our economy.) Why the fuck do you think he got the Times spot in the first place?

I'm not suggesting we "purge" anyone, but if you have an OpEd column in one of the most sought after spots in publishing, doesn't it seem like you could check your assumptions a little*, before you go mistaking fake astroturf populism for the real thing?

The tone of my reply may make it hard for you to tell, but I'm actually happy you commented.

Gracías.

*Something I think Krugman does quite a bit, having read him regularly for a number of years, so yes, he's a villager, but it seems like he takes steps to be in the village, not of it.

[wolfetone]

You know, I think the trouble is that Meyerson didn't write the column that you (and flory, apparently) wanted him to.

His statement about filibusters is factually accurate and by including the fact that they more then doubled under the Republican majority supports his argument that the right has kicked itself into overdrive. I don't read anywhere in there that he's claiming that there is any sort of populism behind the rightwing backlash over healthcare reform. Rather, Meyerson pretty clearly lays out the case that there is a loud, active minority battling the majority, many of whom aren't fighting back with the same level of ferocity.

Almost certainly some of this is astroturfing, but that's not wholly proven and Meyerson is obviously leaving that alone until it is. In the meantime, he points out that the Dems and their allies aren't as active. It's really as simple as that.

Not to assume too much, but you'd do yourself a favor if you took some time to read Meyerson's past columns. He's as much of a "villager" as Bernie Sanders is one of Washington's political elite.

(BTW--This is, I think, the first time I've visited your blog. I know I've seen your comments at other places and I usually think they're astute. The other posts I took the time to read are good as well. I just think that on this you're digging in when you might want to climb out of the hole and take a look at the surroundings.)

[¡El Gato Negro!]

Thank you for your response.

I'd have to say we must continue to disagree about the extent to which the townhall disruptions are astroturfed, Rachel Maddow, Crooks&Liars, FDL and DKos have all written/talked substantively about the Scaife/Olin/Koch money flowing into groups like Freedom Worx and Americans for Prosperity and through them to our little brownshirt brigades. As to the loudmouths showing up on their own, when "Friar Rush" Limbaugh announces the time and place of a meetup in Florida which consequently is stormed by teabaggers, it's not too much of a stretch to see a relationship which approaches pretty closely to causation. How much actual "democratic participation" would that meeting have recieved if Rush hadn't gone all Radio Free Rawanda on it?

And again, and possibly I have not stated it clearly, I'm not saying that Meyerson is in cahoots with the GOP, just that he may not be looking at the whole picture. I have read his columns on and off, going back to about just after the 2008 election, and like I said, he is not the worst of the lot at the WaPo by a wide margin. So, even though I will concede and give him the benefit of the doubt for why he chose not to include this information (Perhaps it's nothing, I myself only heard about Freedom Worx and the false populism of the townhall disruptions only a few days ago. Perhaps Meyerson wrote his column before then.) I maintain that this column would benefit by taking some space to delineate the nature and history of those backing the protesters, and I remain curious as to why he has not done so. It could simply be that he has allowed some village common wisdom to seep into his consciousness unnoticed. I caught myself using conservative buzzwords just the other day, so I'm not immune. It's just the kind of thing one should watch out for, especially if one writes columns for a huge daily paper.

Again, gracías.

[¡El Gato Negro!]

Here's Rachel Maddow talking about all the groups involved in the "recess rallies",
I swiped the link from Brendan Skwire, but it goes to a Maddow vid.

Many, many more pipples should know about this aspect of the anti-reform protests.