Those are not combat fatigues.
Dana Milbank,
wanker extraordinaire:
I’m often asked if there’s anything that could clean up the mess [in DC] [...]
My usual answer is a shrug and an admission that there’s no silver bullet. There are many possibilities—campaign spending limits, term limits, nonpartisan primaries, nonpartisan redistricting, a third party—but most aren’t politically or legally feasible, might not make much of a difference or, as with Harry Reid’s rewriting of Senate rules, have the potential to make things even worse.
If only people weren't partisan! The problem with these ideas isn't that they aren't politically or legally feasible, it's that they're stupid. Election results are having less and less relation to spending—Democrats were heavily outspent in 2012, Republicans were heavily outspent in the Colorado recalls. Term limits just empower unelected consultants. Non-partisan primaries cut down on voter choice, and if the idea is that it would eliminate ideological candidates, California's Rep. Darrel Issa makes a mockery of that. And nonpartisan redistricting, while actually a good idea, has nothing to do with the ideological bent of resulting candidates. Issa and Iowa Rep. Steve King can attest to that.
And anyone who thinks that getting rid of the filibuster will make things worse in DC is an outright buffoon. Or someone who hates the idea of functional government. Amazing that people can argue, with a straight face, that preventing a tiny minority from obstructing the will of a Democratically elected majority will make a chamber work more smoothly. In reality, it removes chamber accountability, as the minority can gum up the works while crying to voters about a "do-nothing Senate". So yeah, kind of hard to cram more stupid into a single paragraph.
Read below the fold for more on Milbank.
But Milbank doesn't stop there:
But one change, over time, could reverse the problems that have built up over the past few decades: We should mandate military service for all Americans, men and women alike, when they turn 18 [...]
There is no better explanation for what has gone wrong in Washington in recent years than the tabulation done every two years of how many members of Congress served in the military [...]
Correlation doesn't equal causation, there's that counterexample named "Allen West" to contend with.
The argument that military service would eliminate rank partisanship is so devoid of merit it virtually hurts to read. Personally, I wouldn't mind mandatory national service. My military stint helped build who I am today. But if Milbank thinks military service would moderate people's partisan tendencies, then how would he explain ... me? But better yet, how would he explain this:
Rep. Todd Akin
Sen. Lindsey Graham
Rep. Louie Gohmert
Sen. James Inhoffe
Rep. Darrell Issa
Rep. Peter King
Rep. Ron Paul
Rep. Allen West
Rep. Joe Wilson
Some of Congress's most obnoxious right-wing ideologues ... happened to have served! Boy, that military service sure taught Joe Wilson not to scream "YOU LIE!" at the president during a joint session of Congress! Issa is a single-man wrecking ball to the notion of good governance, more interested in witch hunts than in putting his country first. And West ... 'nuff said.
That list doesn't even include reliable conservative ideologues like Sens. Thad Cochran, Jeff Sessions, Pat Roberts and Roger Wicker. And pain-in-the-ass John McCain, of course.
And I'm sure Republicans could bust out a list of Democrats they consider obnoxiously partisan who also happened to serve, like Sens. Teddy Kennedy, John Kerry, and Tom Harkin, and Reps. John Conyers, Pete DeFazio, Charles Rangel, and Bobby Rush.
But finally, if military service is so necessary to build character and appreciation for country, why didn't Milbank himself enroll? Ah yes, a Yale graduate who was a member of the Skull and Bones secret society doesn't need to partake in such plebeian tasks. It's easier to demand sacrifice and service from others than to willingly engage in it yourself.
But don't worry, I won't call for Milbank to get drafted into the armed forces. I could make an idiotic argument like, "It's no coincidence that Milbank is a hack, and he didn't serve his nation in uniform!" But I know all about that "causation doesn't equal correlation" thing. I guess they don't teach that at Yale.
In reality, no amount of military service would cure Milbank of his hackishness. Because military service, no matter what Milbank might think, is not a cure for someone's personal failings.