The Benefits of Just Saying No
Every time I wish our government were more effective, I remember exactly what we're up against. Quoth James Poulos at Forbes:
The claim that anti-intellectual Republicans are sabotaging government and willfully crippling our national functions is so vein-popping and so plausible that some forget it is only half of the wonkocracy’s argument in its own favor. The second, and most important, half, of course, is that without Republican obstruction, the wonkocrats would lead us unimpeded into a new Golden Age.
The beliefs behind this audacious wager are even more presumptuous than they first appear. Initially, it seems reasonable to suggest that, relative to doing nothing, our biggest problems would be better addressed by letting our smartest experts direct our activity toward a solution. On closer inspection, however, that’s not the way the wonkocracy is apt to let a policy conversation develop. Rather than a free-ranging exercise in constant, pragmatic self-revision, the wonkocracy tends to celebrate and enforce policy consensus — the kind that “transcends partisan divides” and “gets beyond politics” — achieved as swiftly as possible and focused as strictly as possible
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