Debt Deal

The headlines are all saying a deal's been worked out; and of course, "the lefties" are up in arms because they see it as Obama caving to the demands of the Tea Partiers, while the wingnuts on the radical right say they hate it because it requires compromise and lacks the kind of purity they say God sent their guys to Washington to establish.

So I don't wanna be too centrist about all this, but when everybody makes a big show of being upset with something happening in DC, you can be certain of a couple of things:
1) Some very important constituencies are making loud noises about losing some of their clout.
2) Somehow, the really good politicians manage to stay in power through all this "upheaval and change".

Cutting to the chase, while not meaning to oversimplify: First, remind yourself that contributors are the ones who get a politician elected - voters are the people who go to the polls and confirm the results that the contributors have paid for in advance.

Second, that means we're talking about politicians representing their Contributors, while the Contributors represent various Voting Factions.  We've been more and more accepting of the notion that "government should look and act like a business" - well, we've largely achieved exactly that.  We've evolved a system that's installed a layer of Middle Mgmt (ie: Lobbying Firms, PACs, Think Tanks, etc), and those middle managers have taken on some very important tasks that used to be the responsibilities of the elected officials.  eg: We have Lobbyists who are hiring people to investigate, draft and negotiate legislation.  We have Representatives who are then acting like a Sales team as they try to convince the voters that this piece of legislation is a good thing.

There are many more wrinkles and convolutions of course, and I don't think I have a direct line to the truth here, but I think it's safe to say we're nowhere near the kind of democracy we were told about in school.

If I accept the premise that "government should look and act like a business", am I not also expected to draw the inference that "government should look and act less like a democracy"?

Taken together, I think this debt debate and the the fact there are Repub advantages in Governorships and Statehouse Majorities and on down to County Boards and City Councils means that Repubs believe they're on the verge of something pretty big.

I find it hard to disagree.  I think we could be one or two election cycles away from taking the final plunge.  They'll keep telling us this is what democracy is, and we'll keep trying harder and harder to believe we haven't completely fucked up the greatest thing ever - blue pills for everybody.  In a binary world, your only choices are conformity and death.

Hoping against hope that I'm wrong.