More bad news for Newt

Joe Nocera writes a column for the New York Times, usually about the political scene. On 9/6/11 he wrote about "The Last Moderate," Jim Copper, who is a Blue Dog Democrat from Tennessee.

Nacera describes Cooper as the conscience of the House,

". . . a lonely voice for civility in this ugly era. He remembers when 'compromise' was not a dirty word and politicians put country ahead of party. And he's not afraid to talk about it. 'We've gone from Brigadoon to Lord of the Flies,' he likes to say."

Nacera talked with him in an interview about how the climate has changed in the House since he was first elected in 1982.

"To Cooper, the true villain is not the Tea Party; it's Newt Gingrich. In the 1980s, when Tip O'Neill was speaker of the House, "Congress was functional. . . . Committees worked. Tip saw his role as speaker of the whole House, not just the Democrats. "'Gingrich was a new kind of speaker: deeply partisan and startlingly power-hungry. His first move was to get rid of the Democratic Study Group, which analyzed bills, and which was so trusted that Republicans as well as Democrats relied on it. . . . "'This was [Gingrich's] way of preventing us from knowing what we were voting on. Today, the ignorance around here is staggering. Nobody has any idea what they're voting on. . . . We no longer search for the best ideas or the best policies. . . . Too many people here are willing to deliberately harm the country for partisan gain. That is borderline treason. "'This is not collegial body anymore. It is more like gang behavior. . . . That is what Congress has become.'"

And we can thank Newt for that. Too bad we can't call it treason and hang him for it. And some fools actually think he would be a good president to solve the country's ills.

Snake oil and shiny mirrors still attract the dumb and the naive. Fortunately, not very many of them now, down to 4% in one recent poll. And at least being in the race keeps him off the Sunday morning talk shows as a supposedly smart pundit.

Ralph