Breaking Gridlock in DC

For John, BLUF:  E J Dionne thinks gridlock is about partisan politics and ignores the possibility it might be about economic ideas in conflict, and thus the best path out of the Recession.

Yesterday's [Lowell] Sun had an OpEd by Columnist E J Dionne.  The title was "Can This Election Break the Partisan Party Gridlock?  You can find it here, at least for a while.♠  Mr Dionne talks about the problem in DC being about politics and elections and ignores the fact that we have a hugh recession and the two parties are presenting two opposing ways of solving the problem.  On the one hand, you have the Keyensians, pushing a plan that cuts taxes and increases Federal outlays to spur the economy.  On the other hand you have something that might be called the Chicago School (or reference F A Hayek)♥, which believes that recessions are about bad investments, which must be purged to clear up the system.  These two views are not compatible.

Showing that he doesn't understand, Mr Dionne concludes:

If Obama wants to do more than survive, he thus has to fight a bigger and broader campaign that targets not only Romney but also a GOP congressional apparatus that has moved the party far to the right.  Paradoxically, Republicans who want to bring their party to a more sensible place share an interest with Democrats in the president doing just this.  It will take real toughness to produce more peaceable politics.

This misses the point that we have irreconcilable differences and to cut a deal in the middle is to give us the worst of both possible worlds.  Why doesn't Mr Dionne grapple with the real issue?  It could be that he doesn't understand it, but I suspect he just thinks Republicans and the Chicago School are stupid (putting him in the Paul Krugman School—as opposed to the less caustic Keynesian, Professor Brad DeLong).

Sometimes there are no easy answers.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Here is the version in The Washington Post.

♥  That is Chicago as in the University, not Chicago as in Municiple Politics.