Just a remark here to mention I have been going back into this little tome, Why Americans Hate Politics.
He purports to be a rather well informed political theorist and historian.
One little detail I would point out about his reporting on the vital center issue Ch 5, p. 117:
"From the end of WW II until the 1960s, there really was broad agreement within the country..."
'Fundamental' as it is, he doesn't think hard enough to criticize it against both parties when it comes to its fundamental tenets:
"a free market economy... to underwrite a globalist foreign policy, a modest welfare state, and steadily increasing standards of living...."
The really idealistic naive parts,
which it does not even occur to Dionne to tackle,
even though they are fundamental to both parties he criticizes,
were the free market economy as connected with a globalist foreign policy, together with the unrealistic goal of a perpetually rising standard of living.
It has been precisely these shared fundamentals which have been so catastrophic for America as a commonwealth.
No comments:
Post a Comment