A fascinating and important book by Thomas E. Mann (Brookings Institute), Norman J.

Ornstein
(AEI). They detail the current political dysfunction in the U.S. and analyze both its cause and
potential steps for a cure. They firmly believe that a healthy two-party political system that
supports a variety of views and encourages real and vigorous debate is the best formula for the
American-style of government. But they argue that we’ve moved in the last 30 years to an
extreme form of political discourse that’s wholly unhealthy and could be a threat to the long term
viability of The Republic. I thought the first half of the book where they outline the nature of the
problems was better than the second half where they propose solutions, but it was pretty
compelling throughout. While both Mann and Ornstein are well known for their nonpartisan
analysis, they come down pretty hard on the GOP in “It’s Even Worse Than It Looks.” The
following paragraph from the introduction largely sums up the premise of the book:

“[H]owever awkward it may be for the traditional press and nonpartisan analysts to
acknowledge, one of the two major parties, the Republican Party, has become an insurgent
outlier—ideologically extreme; contemptuous of the inherited social and economic regime;
scornful of compromise; unpersuaded by conventional understanding of facts, evidence, and
science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition. When one party moves this
far from the center of American politics, it is extremely difficult to enact policies responsive to
the country’s most pressing challenges.”

Regardless of your political leanings, I’d recommend this book as part of any reading into the
current political state of America.

Congressional scholars Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein are no strangers to D.C. politics.
The two of them have been in Washington for more than 40 years — and they're renowned for
their carefully nonpartisan positions.

But now, they say, Congress is more dysfunctional than it has been since the Civil War, and they
aren't hesitating to point a finger at who they think is to blame.

"One of the two major parties, the Republican Party, has become an insurgent outlier —
ideologically extreme; contemptuous of the inherited social and economic policy regime;
scornful of compromise; unpersuaded by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and
science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition," they write in their new
book, It's Even Worse Than It Looks.

Mann, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, and Ornstein, a resident scholar at the
American Enterprise Institute, join Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep to talk about the book,
which comes out this week.

Mann and Ornstein posit that democracy in America is being endangered by extreme politics.
From the first day of the Obama administration, Ornstein says, our constitutional system hasn't
been allowed to work.
"When we did get action, half the political process viewed it as illegitimate, tried to undermine
its implementation and moved to repeal it," Ornstein says.

The authors make no secret of whom they blame for most of the dysfunction in Congress — the
Republican Party. And Ornstein says some of his colleagues at AEI, which is known as a
conservative-leaning think tank, "are going to be quite uncomfortable" with his position.

"We didn't come to this conclusion lightly," he says. He points out that he and Mann have been
highly critical of both parties in previous works. For example, they called the Democrats
"arrogant, condescending [and] complacent" after Democrats had been in the majority for 40
consecutive years up to 1994.

You know, maybe we are better than we were in the period leading up to the Civil War, but that
left us with a virtual fracture in our society.

Norm Ornstein

"But for Republicans currently inside Congress, you have a new set of litmus tests and a new
outlook that leads them in directions where you can't say that there is such a thing as climate
change, you take positions on things like immigration that are simply off the rails, and if you
compromise, you are basically defiling what the party stands for," Ornstein says.

"We're not exactly neutral or balanced, are we?" says Mann. But a central message of their book,
he says, is that norms of nonpartisanship in the media and elsewhere sometimes do "a disservice
to the reality."

"It disarms the electorate in a democracy when you really need an ideological outlier to be reined
in by an active, informed public," Mann says.

Mann and Ornstein recognize that many people will likely be skeptical of the argument that
things in Congress today are so much worse than they used to be.

Last year, Ornstein wrote a piece for Foreign Policy magazine about the 112th Congress titled
"Worst. Congress. Ever." He says a lot of people wrote to him and said, "Oh, come on, what
about the period right before the Civil War?"

"And I said, 'I'll grant you that. Do you really want to be compared to the period right before the
Civil War?' You know, maybe we are better than we were in the period leading up to the Civil
War, but that left us with a virtual fracture in our society. We don't want to see that happen,"
Ornstein says.

Some might argue, however, that a politics of extremes is necessary at times. Solutions are not
necessarily to be found in the middle — sometimes we may have to go to the edges to solve our
problems.

"I think that's a reasonable argument," Mann says. "I don't believe in a golden mean; I don't
believe you find policy wisdom between two polar points. I don't dismiss that possibility, but I
look at the platform that's so ideologically based, that's so dismissive of facts, of evidence, of
science, and it's frankly hard to take seriously."
Ornstein adds: "We're not against conservatives. Some of our heroes are very, very strong
conservatives here. We're not against strong liberals, either. ... The problem is not one that is
resolved by just turning it over to one side to do simplistic solutions that are based on more
wishful thinking than reality. It's finding that hard reality."

E. Mann and Norman Ornstein offered an historical overview of the growth of partisanship and
the decline of regular order in Congress, concluding that Republicans in their fanatical zeal to
recapture Washington were primarily responsible for breaking the Branch. Now comes an
update for the Obama Era and a renewed criticism of the problems of partisanship,
reemphasizing that Republican's are more to blame that Democrats.

It's Even Worse Than it Looks: How the American Constitutional System Collided With
the New Politics of Extremism Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein, Basic Books, 2012

Introduction

When the Conrad-Gregg proposal to deal with the federal debt crisis was introduced Republican
leaders were for it. But then cosponsors Mitch McConnell and John McCain turned against it.
Why? Because President Obama was for it. “Never before have cosponsors of a major bill
conspired to kill their own idea.” Thus do authors Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein introduce
us to the desperate situation in D.C.

The authors identify two sources of dysfunction:

1) The parties are now so polarized and “vehemently adversarial” as to resemble parliamentary
parties. In a parliamentary system there are stridently adversarial voices but the majority is not
inhibited from enacting its agenda. But in a constitutional system such as ours, with its
separation of powers, the majority is limited. This implies that effective government rests on
negotiation and compromise. But parliamentary-style polarization has meant that majority power
is now limited in a manner exceeding that envsioned by our founders thanks to uncompromising
partisans willing to play politics. There is a serious mismatch between our constitutional form
and its present parliamentary-style content.

2) The Republican party is “an insurgent outlier—ideologically extreme, contemptuous of the

inherited and social and economic policy regime; scornful of compromise,unpersuaded by
conventional understanding of facts, evidence, and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of
its political opposition.”

Our problem is polarization but not just any polarization—asymmertric polarization.

Republicans are more partisan than Democrats.

Part I The Problem

Chapter 1 The New Politics of Hostage Taking

The Republicans treated the 2011 debt limit crisis as a chance to hold Democrats hostage. No tax
increases or no new debt limit. In the past these episodes of brinksmanship never seriously
threatened default. Now for the first time in our history major political figures were openly
calling for default. Republicans were more concerned with political victory than in preserving
the full faith and credit of the United States.

An important policy note is that amidst the brinksmanship the Gephardt rule (see this wiki) was
no longer operative. In the past both Democrats & Republicans often invoked this rule which
stipulated automatic increase in the debt limit with the passage of a budget resolution. In 1995
the newly ascendant House Republicans waived the Gephardt rule. And though they weren’t
fully prepared to breach the debt limit they did manage to cause partial government shutdowns.
But in 2011 they didn’t merely waive it, they repealed it.

The emergence of the Republican “Young Guns” including most notably Eric Cantor, Paul
Ryan, and Kevin McCarthy explains this new partisan intenstity. Importantly, these young guns
had risen through the ranks of the establishment, rather than bursting on the scene as upstarts,
making it more difficult for Speaker Boehner to resist or dismiss them and thus less able to
negotiate with the President and Democratic leaders in a spirit of compromise.

For the authors the entire debt limit episode– culminating in the Standard & Poor downgrade of
the US credit rating– crystallized the crisis of current politics. The Republicans’ take no
prisoners approach rode roughshow over meaningful debate, problem solving, respect for
adversaries. When Majority leader Mitch McConnell spoke out on the need for avoiding default
it was because the Republican brand might be tarnished, not that our economic well-being was
being put at risked. Tribalism and party loyalty prevailed over responsible governing.

Chapter 2 The Seeds of Dysfunction

The authors spy the rise of parliamentary-style polarization in the 1978 House mid-term
campaign. That year the National Conservative political committee (NCPAC) emerged as a
major force. They produced many negative ads notably accusing Sen Dick Clark of Iowa of
being a baby killer. All this was significant as a precedent for what has become common on both
sides, “a nationalized highly ideological independent expenditure campaign.”

But the truly significant event of 1978 was the election of Newt Gingrinch to Congress.
Democrats had controlled the House for 24 yrs. Gingrich came determined to change that. The
core of his strategy emerged from his reflections on the fact that people tend to love their
representative while loathing Congress. Thus he adopted a strategy of vilifying Congress itself
hoping to negate the incumbunt advantage in elections by associating those incumbunts with a
corrupt institution. He publically attacked Democrats and discouraged Republicans from
cooperating whether in committee or on the floor.

He also discouraged his fellow Republicans from moving to DC, advising them to spend as little
time possible in the capitol, thereby burning one of the traditional bridges to bipartisanship.
Mark Sanford and others under Newt’s influence slept in their offices.

Newt’s strategy of attacking adversaries and delegitimizing Congress undermined public trust.
Colleagues became enemies. Confrontation and obstruction became the new norm. He
nationalized congressional races thereby helping establish the permanent campaign–meaning
electoral politics trumps policy-making. Eventually many of Newt’s allies would make their way
to the Senate, infecting this historically restrained branch with tactics of confrontation and
obstruction.

It wasn’t all one-sided. Democrats took Newt’s tactics to a new level with the Bork nomination
in 1987. Still Gingrich is the man who set the tone.

But there are deeper roots than Newt and Co. He and his adveraries were operating in a polarized
landscape. This growing polarization has become the biggest problem in our politics. Today the
degree of ideological overlap between the parties is nil. The most conservative Democrats are
more liberal than the most liberal Republicans. The public is also similarly polarized.

Pundits like to attribute the divide to gerrymandering but that’s too simple an explanation
according to Mann and Ornstein. One must consider the weakening Democratic stronghold in
the south alongside the rise of the counterculture and the conservative backlash. The culture
wars. And not to be overlooked were the many demographic shifts–notably older northern
Republicans moving south or the exodus of Republicans from the west as Asians and Hispanics
moved in, transforming the nature of the electorate. All this occurred in tandem with a national
tendency to ideological sorting.

Increasing polarization meant that by the 90s both parties began to shift resources from their safe
districts to the few remaining competetive ones thus involving everyone in the larger effort to
claim majority status. Regular order—the rules and norms that had characterized Congress for so
long—took a backseat to political maneuvering. Debates and amendments were constrained, the
conference committees that had occurred behind closed doors became almost extinct. The rise in
partisanship meant that it became better to tout an issue than a bill. Party-line voting even spilled
over onto issues devoid of ideological content.

And then the authors emphasize that the polarization has been asymmetrical. Our media like to
appear fair and typically present both sides as equally guilty of partisanship. But reality is quite
different. The Republicans have purged their moderates and shifted sharply to the right.
Geoffrey Kabaservice has documented this transition in his book Rule and Ruin.

Propelled by Grover Norquist, the Republican’s categorical pledge not to increase taxes is
perhaps the best indicator of its ideological bent. Democrats have become the centrist protectors
of status quo government. Today more than 70% of the Republican electorate identify as
conservative or very conservative while only 40% of rank and file democrats call themselves
liberal or very liberal.

Then we must consider the explosion of media–internet, blogs, cable tv. All this has fragmented
audiences and radically altered media business models. In the past network news thought of
itself as a public trust. We have lost the experience of a common set of facts and information.

The FOX business model—“combative, partisan, sharp-edged”—has proven the most successful.
MSNBC is a tamer FOX for the left. CNN places a hardline liberal opposite a hardline
conservative thus reinforcing the view that our sole dialogue is a polarized one.

Amidst all this the email has enabled a new and improved version of the urban legend,
expanding the capacity to spread false information.
Lastly the authors mention the problem of money in politics. Robert Kaiser in his book So
Damn Much money has ably exposed the corrupt lobbying phenomenon. And the authors “have
heard the same story over and over: a lobbyist meets with a lawmaker to advocate for a client,
and before he gets back to the office, the lawmaker calls asking for money.”

Yet all do not operate in the flamboyant manner of an Abramoff. Newt Gingrich’s groups made
$150 million advising businesses and organizations. Gingrich denies lobbying but then the
authors wonder what those clients were buying if not influence.

The 1990s saw the rise of soft money (see this wikipedia entry) and almost unrestricted sources
of campaign money. The intensity of outside influence grew thanks to a loophole in the
regulations that allowed for so-called “issue ads.”

The Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (McCain-Feingold Act) regulated soft money until the
supreme court began overturning prior decisions including most importantly the Citizens United
case. Now we are in a veritable Wild West. And it’s now possible to evade disclosure laws.
Karl Rove’s American Crossroads GPS claims status as a 501(c)4 (nonprofit social welfare
organization) but its real purpose is to elect Republicans. Rove created the group so donors
might be spared a Rove association. Evasion of disclosure laws is primarily a Republican issue.

Then the D.C. court of appeals issued the SpeechNow v. Federal Election Commission decision
which offered new ways to overcome campaign contribution limits. Enter Super PACs. So the
money is out of control. Candidates spend more time raising money than thinking about policy.

Chapter 3 Beyond The Debt Ceiling Fiasco

Parliamentary-style partisanship and hostage taking have greatly increased since Obama.
Republicans are less cooperative than ever. In an unprecendented move Eric Cantor demanded
cuts from other programs before he would consent to funding relief for Hurricane Irene and other
disasters even as citizens were suffering. Then on the issue of subsidies to small airports John
Mica proved so intransigent that thousands of workers suffered furloughs and 24,000
construction workers lost their jobs. The episode cost $300 million in lost airfare taxes.

In the Senate hyperpartisanship has meant that holds and filibusters have become political
weapons they were never designed to be. H.R. 3548 which sought to extend unemployment
benefits passed 98-0 but it didn’t fly through the senate in a day or two as one would expect. It
took a month because Republicans launched two filibusters during the course of its adoption.

Judicial and Executive appointments instead of taking a few weeks can take half a year. Many of
Obama’s various department appointees were held up for months. On Memorial Day 2002 Bush
had 13 nominations pending. On Memorial Day 2010 Obama had 108.

The behavoir goes beyond partisan rivalry intent on scoring political points. Republicans are
now effecting a new nullification. They are “blocking nominations even while acknowledging
the competence and integrity of the nominees, to prevent the legitimate implementation of laws
on the books.“
There was Donald Berwick, Peter Diamond, and Elizabeth Warren. No matter how qualified the
nominee the Republicans obstructed simply to prevent the law they oppose from being carried
out.
In America, more than in any other Democracy, policy-making is hampered by our separation of
powers, our system of checks & balances. This is why the parliamentary style polarization is so
pernicious and destructive. The majority can’t get anything done.

The Democrats are not blameless but they are more centrist and open to bargaining and
compromise. The Republicans are so extreme that effective governance is difficult. A
Republican return to the mainstream would eliminate much of our dysfunction.

Part II What To Do About It

Chapter 4 Bromides to Avoid

There are those who belive that the American system will correct itself. David R. Mayhew
presents this view in his books “Divided We Govern” (2005) and “Partisan Balance: Why
Political Parties Don’t Kill the Constitutional System” Mayhew challenges the notion that there
are major differences between the parties or that the majority is prevented from getting anything
done. Filibusters aren’t so bad in his reckoning. Things work out.

But Mann and Ornstein maintain that the first few years of the Obama administration have been
game-changing. Mayhew’s critique would now have to reckon with asymetric polarization, the
demise of regular order, a dramatic decline in legislative productivity, plummeting approval
ratings of congress and trust in government; and “The hostage taking of the full faith and credit
of the United States” along with an unprecedented downgrade of our securities; we’re in a dire
economic situation.

Some see our salvation in third parties. But those who believe that most Americans are centrist
and or contemptuous of the the two parties are deluded. In reality 90% of voters identify with
either of the parties. So-called independents are closet partisans [see Keith, The Myth of the
Independent Voter].

Contrary to Thomas Friedman or Matt Miller, there is no real evidence to support the notion that
a centrist could attract a serious following. Besides there are by now too many institutional
barriers to third-party viability and any such candidate is merely likely to play spoiler and siphon
support from centrist Democrats to the boon of radical Republicans. And to a lesser extent vice
versa.

A constitutional amendment to balance the budget is unlikely to help much either. Left open is
the question of agreement on the concrete steps to make this a reality. There is no such hope on
the horizon. PAYGO was a workable solution but the Republicans instituted CUTGO in 2011.

Term limits do not seem seem to be the answer. The evidence thus far is damning. In States
where limits have been enacted they have increased the erosion, inefficiency and
unresponsiveness of lawmakers causing them to concentrate on how to use their limited time as
springboard to future opportunities. Thus focused on the short-term, long-term problems are
more readily bequeathed to the the next wave of short-term successors. They are generally less
beholden to their constituents. (See Kousser: Term limits and the Dismantling of State
Legislative Professionalism (2005), Carey et al, Term Limits in State Legislatures (2000), and
Kurtz et al, eds., Institutional Change in American Politics: The Case of Term Limits;
Legislating Without Experience (2007).

Lastly, the authors do not consider the full public funding of elections to be a promising reform.
The Supreme Court has returned campaign funding to a state of nature. Lawrence Lessig and
others make compelling arguments that reduction in private funding would weaken special
interests. But ideological polarization means ideas trump interests. Public funding does nothing
for our parliamentary mismatch. Getting rid of filibusters would be more helpul than getting rid
of private funding. With the rise of independent spending groups that fund-raise on behalf of
their preferred candidate, it would be virtually impossible to control the flow of private money
anyway. Until we get a new FEC and Supreme Court, or until Congress starts seriously
regulating money spent in federal elections, the best hope seems to lie in finding ways to
encourage small donor fund-rasing.[Lessig is in agreement here]

5 Fixing the Party System

The parties have become internally homogenous. That they are roughly equal in strength raises
the intensity of the conflict. Ideological purity gets support from new media and new activist
groups. Extreme partisanship and a permanent campaign have become the rule. The asymmetric
nature of the polarization amplifies the perniciousness of partisanship.

The authors’ first recommendation is to expand the vote. We might begin by moderninzing our
outdated registration system. In most Democracies the burden of registration is on the state but
in the U.S. it is on the voter. This could be remedied with automatic electronic registration.
Additionally government could work with private entities to improve voter lists to monitor
eligibility. Governement should also work to make voting more convenient—people should
have more voting options. We should institute election day registration (EDR) at the national
level.

Efforts to restrict voting must be defeated. Republicans have been interested in restricting voting
for partisan purposes. Congress should pass a new voting rights act that would include enabling
IDs to be obtained for free. Congress might also establash a separate federal ballot to avoid
confusion on state tickets.

And there’s no reason why we should vote on Tuesday. A 24hr voting period from noon
Saturday to noon Sunday makes better sense. We should also make attendance at the polls
mandatory. The Australian model would be ideal though the authors evince little hope that we
will adopt a similar one. Even so such a system would moderate partisanship by increasing the
need to appeal to the center; at least such has been the case in Australia.

Redistricting reform is another way to alleviate hyperpartisanship. However Mann and Ornstein
are not convinced that an end to gerrymandering would significantly reduce polarization. Just
look at the Senate, which is not subject to districting. But reform might at least contain the
infection. [see Thomas E. Mann “Polarizing the House of Representatives: How Much Does
Gerrymandering Matter?” in Red and Blue Nation? Volume 1, eds. Nivola & Brady, 2006].
Possible reforms include establishing an independent redistricting commission, judicial
intervention using the Voting Rights Act, and finding ways to introduce transparency and get
citizens more involved.
Open primaries are another way to repair our polarized party system. Specifically top-two vote
getter (TTVG) primaries might ameliorate hyperpartisanship.

Relatedly, we could find alternatives to our winner-take-all system which leads to large areas
dominated by one party (see Duverger’s Law). Such alternatives might include instant runoff
voting (IRV) or even proportional representation (PR), especially suited for us is the single
transferrable vote (STV) with multi-member districts.

On a cautionary note PR can wind up favoring extremist parties “because they can get a foothold
and seats in the legislature and force unnatural conditions in which extreme groups hold the
balance of power.” The authors note that in Israel the minority interest ultrareligious parties
have been able to hold the majority hostage.

Funding Campaigns. The authors strongly support laws that mandate disclosure. They support
the DISCLOSE Act which was shot down by Senate Republicans including strong supporters of
reform such as John McCain and Olympia Snowe in yet another display of asymmetric
polarization. Also necessary is the reinforcement of laws keeping independent group funding
from the candidates they support.

The FCC should require that political ads on radio and tv operate under full real-time discloure
laws. The SEC should demand all public corporations reveal political contributions. Leadership
PACS should be abolished, lobbysists should not be allowed to contribute to any campaign.
The authors favor a system supporting matching funds for small donors at a ration of 4 or 5:1.
This would encourage more participation with the citizenry and less fishing for the big donors.
[see the Authors, et al, “Reform in an age of Networked Campaigns”]

Chapter 6 Reforming U.S. Political Institutions.

We have to think big because our problems are big. The authors want reforms that would
correct the mismatch between our constitutional system and our parliamenteray style
polarization. Eliminating House midterm elections would reduce dividedness. The Senate could
move to every 4 yrs or 8yrs. The authors acknowledge that there are no easy solutions here.

Shifting power from Congress to the Executive would also help. Restoring majority rule in the
Senate is crucial.

Then we might limit the actions in the Senate that are eligible for filibuster. Further reform
should entail allowing only one filibuster per debate; the minority party should be required to
take the floor rather than the burden being on the majority in providing quorum; delays external
to the filibuster should be eliminated; rules should require a vote on nominations along with
time limits for holds.
[See Binder, “What Senators Need to Know About Filibuster Reform”]

Chapter 7 Navigating the Current System

We need to change the political culture. We can start with a restoration of public shame. “People
like Colin Powell, Robert Gates, Bill Clinton, Tom Brokaw, George Schultz, and Oprah
Winfrey, ideally through some collective effort, should have the goal of recreating in society
some sense of shame for distortions, lies, and other efforts to coarsen the culture and discourse.”
Google, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft should get together and find ways to reduce the
falsehoods spread over the web.

We need to re-create a public square ideally with a new source of funding, with a public media
model along the lines of The PBS News hour, Charlie Rose, and Diane Rehm.

We can create a shadow congress in which former legislators across the spectrum convene and
engage in robust civil debat (Congress rarely engages in meaningful debate, this could be one
way of compensating for this shortcoming).

The ideologically exteme Republicans must be reigned in. Democrats are not without fault but
they stay within bounds. There is some hope for change from within the Republican party in
resposne from criticism from conservative comentators like Ramesh Ponnuru and Steven
Hayward who have chastisted Republicans for their ideological rigidity.

The power of the citzenry should be harnassed. In our present climate a “throw the bums out”
mentality will likely only reinforce hyperpartisanship. We are not a dircect democracy but a
Republic and we need leaders and representatives who can shape the debate responsibly, setting
the tone for the voter.

Obama wanted to be postpartisan but he ran into a Parliamentary Republican Party intent on
obstruction. The best Presidential strategy in such a situation would be to not give in to the
opposition and thereby expose their extremism, the President should continually shine a light on
their obstruction. There is then hope that the public will turn on Republicans in the next election
in a manner more informed than a 'throwing the bums out' approach.

Traditional media must stop pretending that the partisanship is equal. The public must be
properly educated on the meaning and reality of asymmetric polarization. Politician’s lies or
distortions about facts should be emphazised in news stories not buried in back pages. Reporters
should reveal when a minority party kills a bill by filibuster and not treat a 60 vote hurdle as
customary. It is of utmost importance that traditional media clarify the differences in the party
platforms.

Voters must punish extremism and seek to restore & maintain norms. They must also question
the use of filibusters, and beware of centrist candidates as they are most likely to merely play
spoiler.

The authors conclude with a nod to a Westminster-style parliamentary system. It enables the
majority to put its program in place and when the next election cycle arrives voters have a clear
idea of the majority party's successes and failures. Accountability is clearer and cleaner than in
our present mismatched politics.

Still the authors see hope in the patriotism of Americans, their belief in freedom, their flexibility
in responding to crises. And there are signs of hope in the country at large, such as the ability of
many of our metropolitan areas to form public-private partnerships to solve problems. Social
movements like the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street, despite some unsettling elements, reveal
an honest desire to get America back on track.

The primary recommendation for this book, in my opinion, lies in the authorship, the
collaboration of two authors from apparently opposite sides of the politic spectrum. Like most
current political books, it is likely that this one will be read through the lens of the political bias
of each reader, Democrats celebrating its conclusions and Republics condemning them. At the
very least, it deserves a careful and thoughtful reading, inviting each reader to think about the
issues raised and to respond constructively to them. There seems to be no question that this
country is at a difficult and confusing crossroads, a moment in history when we can choose to
proceed in one of a number of directions. By doing nothing different we are de facto making a
choice, and we need at least to know and acknowledge what choice we are making.

In summary, the authors have presented a cogent and convincing argument for the difficulties we
face. If their suggestions, and there are many, often seem unlikely to be implemented in the face
of daunting obstacles and the resistance of those benefiting from the current state of affairs, they
at least deserve thoughtful discussion and action where possible. The book ends with this short
paragraph: “We end where we began: it is even worse than it looks. But we are confident that if
the worst has not yet hit, better times, and a return to a better political system, do indeed lie
ahead.” I am unconvinced that their book justifies their optimism.