It's a bit of a slog for a blog, but insightful regarding the Democratic congressional dysfunction and liberal notions about things like the youth vote.
I should note, too, that Blumenthal is also the Hillary campaign operative who daily sends out to the press anti-Obama items, many unsubstantiated stuff from right-wing sources. He is unapologetic about it, but many former fans find it reprehensible.
Nevertheless, he's got a valuable take on things.
B
ush, Cheney, et al. sought to create an unaccountable and unfettered executive. In order to do that they kept the Congress under their heel (when Republican) and at bay (when Democratic), as well as exploiting and intimidating a craven and status-driven national press corps. Following the dictum that people are policy, Bush & Co. used the power of presidential appointment to fill the administration with more than loyal Republicans. Bush built a regime, not just an administration. For example, the appointments of Federalist Society lawyers from the commanding heights of the Department of Justice to counsel offices of every department and agency was intended to install cadres of a new ideological clerisy. Professional standards have been construed as mere instrumentalities of conscious “liberal’ ideology, a counterpoint and obstacle to power. Cherry-picking information to support a priori political conclusions has pervaded government methodology from intelligence on weapons of mass destruction to climate change.Once again, a new government would have to have extensive understanding of the federal apparatus in order to reconstruct it. The Congress cannot do the job, even if it conducted the most far-reaching investigative hearings and maintained diligent oversight. Only a president can truly fix the executive branch. The Bush model of a president who casts himself as a big picture man, while dependent on advisers for working the actual machinery, inevitably leads to a president who would soon find himself in control of neither.
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